As the South Carolina primary campaign built to a climax, Sen. Barack Obama addressed a largely African-American audience in Sumter:
Obama used the friendly setting to urge voters not to be fooled by what he said were untruths coming from Hillary Clinton’s campaign. “They’re trying to bamboozle you. It’s the same old okey-doke,” he said, using a slang phrase for a con. “Y’all know about okey-doke, right? It’s the same old stuff.”
Obama also raised emails that have been circulating falsely calling him a Muslim. “I’ve been a member of the same church for almost 20 years, praying to Jesus, with my Bible,” he said. “Don’t let people turn you around.”
It is an interesting juxtapositioning:
I see Obama using the language of Malcolm X in his speeches in South Carolina. Before a largely African-American audience, Obama used the terms “bamboozled”, “hood-winked”, and “okie-doke.” These terms were made famous by Macolm X on the stump in his days with the Nation of Islam. Obama is attempting to conjure that connection with the South Carolina audience to clue them in to the Clintons’ tactics. I guarantee he won’t use that lingo in front of whiter audiences because it won’t resonate the same way. In this particular example, I watched as a handful of individuals in the background, and two in particular, laughed and rolled their eyes as he invoked the words of Malcolm. They knew the deal.
Actually, Obama can borrow from Malcolm X in front of whiter audiences knowing it will sail overhead (unless there are Spike Lee fans listening), just as he borrowed “Yes, we can” as a slogan from the illegal immigration activists and Cesar Chavez without whiter audiences recognizing it.
Nevertheless, it is passing strange that a candidate who belongs to an “Afrocentric†church that bestows awards on Louis Farrakhan would borrow from Malcolm X — who was a spokesman for the Nation of Islam — right before complaining about e-mails claiming he is Muslim.
Okie-doke? Wasn’t that Buckwheat?
Technically, Islam should condemn, attack, and hate Senator Obama for having been a Muslim in his youth and leaving the faith. Have you ever, anywhere, at any time seen any condemnation of him? From any Muslim?
I also notice that Al Qaeda in Iraq hasn’t condemned Obama yet. I think that Obama is secretly Al Qaeda’s preferred candidate.
o,americans,why don’t ya try to know ISLAM, the truest of all things on earth?
The religion of peace, right noni?
I’ve been hearing the terms, “bamboozledâ€Â, “hood-winkedâ€Â, and “okie-doke for nearly 50 years now.
Apparently I never knew it, but my white southern father is secretly a member of Nation of Islam. Who knew?
My point is, these are just terms used in the southern parlance of language, I wouldn’t read too much into them to be honest.
Yes, it’s common Southern talk, and common among old black people almost anywhere, because they almost all talk some kind of Southern talk.
But that’s exactly what’s fucked up about it. Obama’s aping blackness in the same kind of crude and out-of-touch way we rightly mock Hillary for doing.
This isnt’ a “Nation of Islam dog-whistle,” it’s a white uppper-class twit painting it on thick and not getting called on it.
I thought “yes we can” was borrowed from Bob the Builder.
For the record, I am not claiming that Malcolm X created any of those terms. However, a glance at Obama’s early years reveals no evidence that Obama ever lived in the South, or was particularly immersed in African-American culture, either. I would suggest that Obama picked this up during his stint as a community activist and that the most likely source was Malcom X or Spike Lee.
Synova writes:
Obama is picking up the youth vote, isn’t he?
This is for psycho
If obama should be called on what he said in a speech at an African American South Carolina place of worship so should Mrs. Clinton’s appearence at an African American church in Atlanta, Georgia when she took on the dialect of Black Folks while pandering for African American support last year.
Ms. Clinton’s problem at this time is that she thought she would receive a cake walk to the Whitehouse. Oh what a rude awakening. I was one of many who stood in a line wrapped around the building to make sure that she didn’t on Super Tuesday. I am a woman, a senior and African American.
2-16-2008
I think I have read every speech Malcolm X ever made , and reach the conclusion that Malcolm X
did not associate “okie-doke” with hoodwink,
or bamboozle.
HH
if he was muslim so what the american gov. did more harm to the world then any muslim we should be afraid of christians if anyone
while you are so busy trying to discredit Obama for every move he makes, why don’t you clean up your own disgusting closet. this country has allowed klansman like jessie helms, strom thurman, and a whole lot more to stink up the senate until they died and went to hell. so why don’t you spend some time explaining that, or all the money george bush and dick cheney have robbed this country blind of, since you do have time to research the past. now HOODWINK that!