Obama : from the new JFK to the new Malcolm X in four weeks

Barack Obama may have started his campaign being billed as the new John Kennedy and as America's first post-racial candidate for president, but in recent weeks it it has has been the words Muslim, Hussein, Somali, Farrakhan, black separatist, white oppressor, radical, racially charged and firebrand that have come to dominate media coverage of the Illinois senator. In a country with such racial baggage as the United States, where 22% of people who voted for Hillary Clinton in the recent Ohio primary admitted that race had been an important factor in their decision, this represents a worrying development for Mr Obama.

Support for Obama has fallen significantly in the Gallup and Rasmussen Democratic nomination tracking polls since videos of incendiary and racially charged sermons by his "spiritual advisor", the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, began to be aired on US television on Thursday night. Friday's figures (based on surveying conducted mostly before Thursday night) saw Obama lead Clinton by 6% (according to Gallup) and 8% (according to Rasmussen). Mondays figures now see him trailing by 2% (Gallup) and leading by 2% (Rasmussen) . These figures do little to dispel the suspicion that Obama could risk scaring away white voters if the current tone of his media coverage continues.

The seeds of Obama's current malaise were sown four weeks ago, when his wife Michelle claimed at a rally in Milwaukee that she was proud of her country for the first time in her adult life, comments that provoked widespread criticism and debate in the media. Within days political website The Politico had published Mrs Obama's university thesis, written while studying at Princeton in 1985, and which discussed the marginalisation blacks faced in society in general and within the university of Princeton in particular. Contained in the thesis was the following statement :

"It is possible that Black individuals either chose to or felt pressure to come together with other Blacks on campus because of the belief that Blacks must join in solidarity to combat a White oppressor."

This comment attracted much media attention and was widely misrepresented (most notably by Sean Hannity of Fox News ) as suggesting Mrs Obama herself held these views.

The following week saw Obama's Muslim spectre again rear its head. On Monday February 24th Mr Obama received an embarrassing endorsement from the radical and anti-Semitic black separatist leader of the Nation of Islam, Louis Farrakhan. The next day Matt Drudge, founder of breaking news website The Drudge Report, claimed a member of the Clinton campaign had sent him a photo (above right) of Obama dressed as a Somali tribal elder (taken during a Senate trip to Africa in 2006 ) and quoted a Clinton staff member as saying "wouldn’t we be seeing this on the cover of every magazine if it were HRC (Hillary Rodham Clinton)?". Whilst Mrs Clinton denied knowledge of the photo, her campaign manager Maggie Williams refused to rule out the possibility that the photo had been sent from a member of the campaign staff. Obama's campaign manager Davidf Plouffe responded by accusing the Clinton campaign of "shameful, offensive fear-mongering ".

That day also saw the Tennessee Republican Party release the following press statement, accompanied by the Drudge photo which it claimed showed Obama in "Muslim" dress :

"The Tennessee Republican Party today joins a growing chorus of Americans concerned about the future of the nation of Israel, the only stable democracy in the Middle East, if Sen. Barack Hussein Obama is elected president of the United States."

The following "correction" was later posted on its website :

"This release originally referenced a photo of Sen. Obama and incorrectly termed it to be “”Muslim” garb. It is, in fact, Somali tribal garb, hence, we have deleted the photo. Also, in order to diffuse attempts by Democrats and the Left to divert attention from the main point of this release - that Sen. Obama has surrounded himself with advisers and received endorsements from people who are anti-Semitic and anti-Israel - we have deleted the use of Barack Obama’s middle name."

The next day (Wednesday) saw conservative radio show host Bill Cunningham insisting on referring to the Illinois Senator exclusively as "Barack Hussein Obama" while he gave a warm up speech for Republican presidential candidate John McCain in Cincinnati. Senator McCain later repudiated Mr Cunningham's comments and apologised to Mr Obama, claiming he had no foreknowledge of the speech Mr Cunningham would make. That evening's news cycle was dominated by the controversy, and brought further unwelcome attention to Mr Obama's middle name, a common (though not necessarily Muslim) name in the Arab world.

Far worse was to come however when US television news began late last week to broadcast videos of controversial and racially charged sermons given by Obama's pastor and spiritual advisor, the Rev Jeremiah Wright. In the videos, Rev Wright can be seen saying "Barack knows what it means to be a black man living in a country and a culture controlled by rich white people", and claims "the government lied about inventing the HIV virus as a means of genocide against people of color" and "the government lied about pearl harbor, they knew the Japanese were going to attack."

In other sermons Wright discusses "white America, US of KKK A", and says "God damn America....for killing innocent people, God damn America for treating us citizens as less than human". Wright also talks of black criminals engaged in black-on-black shootings : "Black men turning on black men, that is fighting the wrong enemy, you both are the primary targets of an oppressive society that sees both of you as a dangerous threat."

Some excerpts from Rev Wright's sermons broadcast on Fox News

For Obama , a candidate who has campaigned largely on a ticket of unity and inclusivity, and whose celebrated speech at the 2004 Democratic convention included the famous line "there's not a black America and white America and Latino America and Asian America; there's the United States of America", the playing of these videos on national television must make for excruciatingly embarrassing viewing.

Of course, there is no evidence that Obama is a Muslim or that he shares the controversial views held by Mr Farrakhan or Mr Wright. On the contrary, Obama has repeatedly pointed out in public that he is a Christian. He has denounced Mr Farrakhan's anti-Semitism and insisted that he would be a "stalwart" in defending Israel. He has likened Reverend Wright to "an old uncle who says things I don't always agree with", even going on to say "I vehemently disagree and strongly condemn the statements (made by Wright) that have been the subject of this controversy."

However as Mark Twain said, a lie can travel halfway round the world while the truth is still putting on its shoes, and in today's soundbite driven world, Obama's campaign staff will fear that simply hearing Obama's name mentioned frequently in the same sentence as words like black separatist, racially charged, Farrakhan, radical, Muslim and anti-Semitic will be enough to establish a certain guilt by association in the minds of some white voters, even if only on a subliminal level.

Americans may be prepared to elect a black JFK, but they most certainly are not ready to elect a new Malcolm X. Obama's chances of winning the Democratic nomination and the Presidency of the United States may now depend on his ability to reassure voters that he is the former and not the latter. Tomorrow Obama will give a major speech in Philadelphia in which he will speak about "not just Reverend Wright, but the larger issue of race in this campaign". It could be the most important speech of his career.