The GAP Bubba

First came the GAP ® then Baby GAP ® and now Bubba GAP. I can see it now – rows and rows of “sweatshop free” flannel shirts, hunting vests and trucker caps. Instead of ad campaigns featuring wafer thin models, celebs or musicians, we turn to Larry the Cable guy being hoisted aloft by adoring NASCAR fans.

I have been left at the station. Standing beside me are reason, logic, and the outward appearance of fairness. Apparently it is okay to refer to large segments of the American population as simply “Bubba.” We get the reference and apply it accurately when contemplating the editorial point being made.

This is so wrong-headed on so many levels that it pains me to slow down my brain enough to document this scenario accurately.

We begin with the catalyst - Newsweek’s lament of Barrack Obama’s “Bubba Gap” on their most recent cover. We all know this means he is perceived as too aloof for the common man. Too “out of touch” with the gun owning, church attending, working class fella. They no doubt are thinking “white guy” as well, but they don’t say this out loud so as not to offend all of the Black Americans named Bubba.

And what of those among us actually named “Bubba?” This is a great nickname and a term of endearment around where I live and work. I would think to lump the over-arching life view of the “Bubba” in Dothan Alabama with another residing in Mankato Minnesota would be a stretch. It would also be stereotyping. The big media painfully refer (to this day) to Bill Clinton as “Bubba” and this seems to fit fine. Does Obama have a “Bill Clinton” gap? Does this sum up Newsweek’s editorial view? I think not. The two are political peas in a pod.

Obama’s slip up (allowing his real views to be recorded, not in actually expressing his true feelings to the proper dinner crowd in San Fran) with the “bitter American” comments brought us all closer to the inner thoughts of a Freshman Senator who would be President. No sooner than the audio hit the internet did the editors of the major news outlets begin the spin.

(Remember the fawning over his Kennedy-esque race speech? Obama himself recanted (without even reading my essay on the subject) a month later in his press conference denouncing the un-denouncible. Recall the CNN reporters saying Rev. Wright hit “a home run” in the National Press Club diatribe? Which forever eliminated the defense of Wright’s rhetoric as being simply “out of context sound bytes”?)

The reason liberals in particular love Obama is the emergence of a new elite. One in which their views of an imperial and arrogant America are spoken as gospel by their new messiah. Liberals yearn for elites who have the grace and know how to help us “Bubbas” along and make the tough decisions regarding the role of Government and the direction of the Nation. In place of free minds and free markets the Democrats champion expert testimony and cocktail party intellectual banter.

I will continue to espouse my belief that Black Republicans are the key to the future of this country, as they “get it” and are in a position to positively influence young minds in the areas of individual liberty and capitalism as the best method to prosperity in the world. They want school choice, tough sentences for criminals, and the Government to stay out of the way they run their businesses.

This is why the Obamarama is so disheartening. When a Black REP comes down the pike he or she is demeaned by the very liberals who scream for equality and equal representation for all. Or worse, they are painted with the sell out or “Uncle Tom” (thanks Spike Lee) brush. I was still in college during the shameless Clarence Thomas hearings but even then (in my more liberal leaning days) I saw them for the “modern day lynching” that they were. People think it funny that Lt. Gov. Michael Steele has to dodge Oreo cookies hurled his way at debates. Hilarious! I get it - black on the outside and white on the inside. Yes, yes… brilliant!

I truly wish there were a viable Black American REP candidate that would in fact unite the country and bring about REAL change. It is true that some white people will never vote for a black candidate. It is true that some black people will not vote for a white candidate. When will this change? Never. Man is imperfect and there will always be prejudice in the world. Let this not cloud our ability to view the candidate for WHAT THEY STAND FOR and not WHO THEY ARE.

The 2008 Presidential Race perfectly illustrates the difference between Conservatism (an ideology) and Liberalism (an identity). For me (and a majority of Americans, some of whom are named Bubba) the WHAT will always trump the WHO.