Not Blood But Spirit

Hilzoy flips out on Kathleen Parker's widely-circulated op-ed on "full-bloodedness" -- "an old coin," we're told, "that's gaining currency in the new American realm." Parker writes, inter alia:

Politics may no longer be so much about race and gender as about heritage, core values and made-in-America. Just as we once had and still have a cultural divide in this country, we now have a patriot divide. [...]

It's about blood equity, heritage and commitment to hard-won American values. And roots. [...]

Although I have not an inkling of what blood equity is, I'm all in favor of tradition, virtues, and memory. But those things have little, or perhaps nothing, to do with 'full-bloodedness" -- certainly not during an election season in which the real point of contrast between McCain and Obama is actually full-spiritedness. And no way is Obama the "smart, contradictory person...more in tune with our times" because his father was Kenyan. I'd say he's that way because of a complex combination of his traditions, virtues, and memories. Just like McCain, who's considerably less smart and contradictory and tuneless than Obama but who, for just those reasons, attracts and reflects a quintessentially American spirit.

If Obama had McCain's spirit, as Hilzoy recognizes, this blood talk would be even more absurd and pointless than already it is, and Obama lacks McCain's spirit for reasons tangentially connected, at best, to his half-whiteness. On what planet are Obama's catlike cool and easy confidence the phenotypical hallmarks of biracial genes? Parker's whole concept is the political-journalism equivalent of telling an assailant that Elvis has just rounded the corner and fleeing while the dupe (hopefully) stops to look. You want to go after Obama's spirit? Knock yourself out. The issue isn't even so much that blood talk is and must forever be verboten -- it's that 'fullbloodedness' is a false description of the actual contrast in character between Obama and McCain (even if you flip the account I've given here, making Obama the spirited pep boy and McCain the doddering fogie).