by P. G. Abeles
Okono had borrowed punch lines, phrases, and ideas without attribution, time after time; including his first national speech. Virtually his entire economic plan was lifted wholesale from McCracken’s. The scope of the plagiarism was compelling to anyone who’d witnessed the epic self-immolation of a presidential candidate years before, who’d been savaged by the media after he strayed from originality on a single, regrettable occasion. Equally illuminating should have been the media response this time—which essentially amounted to a collective yawn. “So what’s the big deal?” they said. McCracken supporters marveled. Okono seemed to have some Antaean ability to emerge unscathed, a Teflon candidate.
Equally tepid was the media’s response to investigations (again largely done in the blogosphere) that a significant number of events and descriptions in Okono’s “autobiography” were demonstrably untrue. The media had largely cheered when one of the afternoon talk show queens exposed a best-selling writer who had fictionalized aspects of the story he promoted as his “memoir.” But there was no censure of Okono’s fabrications, perhaps because there was no reporting of it. Claire McCracken’s every statement was scrutinized ad nauseum for its strict adherence to the facts. When she strayed, she was branded a “congenital liar” with a “complicated relationship to the truth.” Okono’s far more extensive literary enhancements and fabrications remained like the man: masked, concealed.
As weeks passed, it became increasingly clear that the McCracken campaign wouldn’t touch the story of The Minister. Mostly they were afraid. They were still doing a delicate soft-shoe to hold on to the African American super delegates who had pledged (or almost pledged—fingers crossed!!) their support. McCracken needed the “supers” far more than the supers needed McCracken. A McCracken win had always been predicated on the support of African Americans. At this point, they held the whip hand, and they knew it.
But, in fairness, many of McCracken’s white supporters represented even more of a problem. The liberal elite of the Democratic Party had made it clear that they were not going to countenance attacks on Okono—no matter how justified. Some of her closest advisors—African American themselves—urged the McCracken campaign to make The Minister and his church an issue. The campaign wouldn’t do it, they were too afraid of the backlash.
When Okono became a serious contender, and it became clear he would make a serious dent in their primacy with African Americans, the McCracken campaign should have made some cold calculations as to what a winning coalition could look like if it didn’t include the black vote. They didn’t do it. They didn’t do it for the same reason they spent $30 million in Iowa, a state they always knew they were almost guaranteed to lose: they couldn’t cut their losses.
Finally, someone got tired of pussyfooting around and ordered the tapes of The Minister’s sermons from the church website. $19.95 bought candidate Okono a whole heap of trouble. Viewing the tapes provided the immutable evidence that for 20 years, Congressman Okono had worshipped in what most people would consider a racist church. He’d been married, and his children had been baptized, by what many would conclude was a racist minister. The ties between The Minister and Okono were close and long-standing. The title of Okono’s second autobiography was taken from the title of one of The Minister’s sermons.
The Okono campaign went into frenzied spin control, but they knew how bad it was. Realistically, it was unrecoverable. First, The Minister was a “crazy uncle” who was retiring anyway—Okono downplayed the extent to which The Minister had been his mentor since he listened to his sermons on tape at Harvard. As it appeared to snowball, Okono had no political choice but to repudiate him entirely. To do so, the Okono illusionists positioned Okono in front of a phalanx of American flags, lined up like soldiers behind their general. If the flags had been animate, one suspects they wouldn’t have stayed. Because Okono—who had had every opportunity in his privileged life—spoke not about the good of America, but of the bad, and he admitted maybe he wasn’t so post-racial after all. Never had bald political necessity been garbed in so much convenient self-righteousness. Predictably, the media loved him for it.
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Menlo Park, California
APPELBAUM LOVED SILICON VALLEY. His wife teased him that it was the proximity to all that cash, and he admitted that between the money from the tech companies and the venture capital firms, it was close to a Democratic fundraiser’s paradise. The weather was nice, too—if a little banal. Today he had appointments with the money guys. It bored him, but there was no way around it. He’d meet them, sometimes arrange a photo-op with O. and the guy’s wife and kids. Talk to them a little about strategy—how the race was
going so far—next objectives—maybe do a little damage control on The Minister thing—shit like that. Then he’d turn them back over to Kim Matheson and she’d get the dollar commitment.
He looked at the list of appointments in front of him. He’d met this guy before. Paul Johannsen. One of the titans of Sand Hill Road. Harvard Business School. Right out of school, started a venture capital firm with a couple of classmates and invested in some dot-coms. Thing exploded. Appelbaum didn’t know if the guy was lucky or smart—he supposed when you were making that kind of money, it didn’t matter. Johannsen was completely idealistic, a real boy scout—he’d told Appelbaum at their first meeting that he wanted to use his money to do good in the world. What a yutz. Appelbaum smirked at the memory.
A friend had introduced Johannsen to Okono at a fundraiser he’d lined up for his HBS buddies—and they were all sold. Liberty! (yay!) Justice for all! (yay!) Clean Air! (yay!) Clean water (yay!) And here’s this fresh, young, handsome black guy—untainted by the same old “politics as usual” as represented by the McCrackens (this was an easier sell, since none of them were from Chicago and knew about Okono’s questionable
tactics in his own races). And he went to Harvard! And he was about their age! And he had young children! Why, really, he was just like them (okay, maybe not so nebbishy)! Only black! Awesome.
If they’d sort of sold out their idealistic principles by just making money hand over fist, (but not really, not in their hearts) Okono had been out working in the “hoods” (wow. They felt more authentic just getting the jargon down. Should they throw in a “brother?” Just kind of casually? Could that work? Too much?). They were enthralled. They left with certifiable man-crushes and went out to proselytize. He was black; “they was bad.” Appelbaum got a headache thinking about all the liberal shemendricks in New York and California suddenly channeling their “inner” black power.
The narrative was set. McCracken was hard, not likeable. Jesus, even her husband was afraid of her—a real ball-buster and, really, who needs that? Too much like the humorless women in business school: too pushy, too eager, too mean. The subtle subtext, that they would never admit, was that they didn’t want a woman president any more than they would welcome a woman employer. It would be weird…and kind of threatening. What they said out loud was that they were happy to support a woman—just not this woman. Of course, it was almost impossible to conceive of a female candidate on the national scene with more policy credentials than McCracken, but no matter… they loved this guy, Okono!
Now of course, Appelbaum knew, none of these guys would buy a stock without investigating the company. And they certainly wouldn’t recommend it to a potential investor without due diligence—but they gleefully passed around misinformation about Okono. Worried that he has no legislative track record? Why, here’s a list thoughtfully pulled together by a ‘reporter’ for the Daily Kos that profiles 900 (Yup. You heard that right, Bub. Nine. Zero. Zero.) pieces of legislation Okono passed in the Congress. More than McCracken!
Now, Appelbaum wondered, would these guys pass around numbers they hadn’t checked, about a company they wanted people to invest in? Earnings of 3,000%? More earnings than any other company!!? Some crazy shit like that? No. No. That would be illegal. But these guys, these fat cats of finance—who theoretic
ally lived and died by the quality of their research of potential investments—they sold Okono as carelessly as boiler room pitchmen sell a hot stock. And they knew nothing about him.
So one might think the numbers might be close? Maybe not 900 exactly (nine hundred was a lot!), but 850? That wouldn’t be too bad, would it? Appelbaum smiled to himself. Well, what if it were... 2? How bad would that be? Would these guys still be good with that? Appelbaum wondered, chuckling.
Of course, McCracken had a few bills herself, so the Okono supporters were quick to make the point that Okono’s work represented real legislative accomplishments—real substantive stuff. So what were they? Did they know? Because Appelbaum did. The two pieces of legislation Okono had passed in Congress were to name a post office and to honor an African country.
Appelbaum thought about P.T. Barnum and the wire-haired Harvard psychology professor advising the campaign. It was true that they were separated by more than a hundred years, yet they both understood…well…sales. It was all right-brain psychology. All emotion. All delirium. Appelbaum chuckled. Okono was the South Sea Bubble and tulipmania all over again.
But Appelbaum cautioned himself. He ought not to be so sanguine. He must remember to be careful. In this case, the truth would be… inconvenient. If some of these…discrepancies…between the facts and the version the Okono campaign was promoting were pointed out to the money mandarins, it might cramp their ardor a bit. It was lucky, then, that it was rarely pointed out to them, because all the deferential liberals who were nabobs of capital wanted to believe in Okono. And believe they did. At least for now, thought Appelbaum. How they achieved it, Appelbaum was less sure. After all, truth be told, Okono had missed 46% of the votes in this, his first session in Congress. Honestly, how could the guy pass 900 pieces of legislation when he wasn’t even there? Jesus! Appelbaum thought, his mouth in a crooked smile. If Okono had actually passed 900 pieces of legislation, he might have had to consider voting for him himself.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Washington, DC
THE THREATS WERE MAKING HER STAFFERS NERVOUS. At first, they were from constituents—or people who claimed to be constituents. But the bullying and hate that Congress-woman Miriam Carter was attracting as an African American—who refused to switch her support from McCracken to Okono—had become frightening.
Some—both black and white—called her a traitor to her race, an Uncle Tom, an ingrate. Others would no longer speak to her at all. To them, she was apostate. Her only answer, she told them, was the testimony of her life. Their anger pained her deeply, but it seemed to her misplaced. Like many of the African American leaders, she had pledged her support to McCracken long before Okono had even officially declared he was going to run. McCracken had a record of working on issues that were important to the African American constituency. Okono didn’t have a record of working on much of anything except getting elected. As to veiled threats or implied insults, Miriam Carter had long since developed a tough skin. And she had never been easily swayed—particularly when she believed her decision was a matter of principle.
Dozens of other prominent African Americans had folded under the pressure. Other members of the Congressional Black Caucus had spoken out about the death threats they were receiving: prominent leaders, lions of civil rights. Their complaints received scant attention from the media. Some were sincerely torn about not supporting the first viable African American candidate for national office. Others had no such scruples. To their minds, Okono wasn’t ready. Worse, as long-time advocates of civil rights, many of them saw him more as an interloper than a fellow traveler.
But in the end, it didn’t matter—the Okono supporters’ back door machinations and efforts to intimidate would ultimately triumph with almost all of them in the end, because it wasn’t about race, it was about money. The threat of the almost unlimited war chest the Okono campaign could offer a future opponent to defeat them in their next contest was, they knew, not idle. No one had ever seen the kind of money the Okono campaign was able to command—according to FEC filings, the Okono campaign was spending a staggering $293,000 an hour.
So what difference did it make if what the African American patriarchs said about Okono in private was different than the fulsome support they offered in public? In fairness, a few didn’t care about Okono’s money machine. They were nearer the end of their lives than the beginning—and they were looking to their legacies—hopeful to be remembered wisely and well. They became increasingly fearful that the Okono movement was sweeping beyond them, past them. If they didn’t climb aboard the bandwagon now, they feared their own accomplishments would be consigned to the sidelines forever: irrelevant, un-memorialized, un-remembered.
But there was more to it than that for the African American matriarchs. This contest—that pitted the constituencies of a white woman against a black man—was nothing new, only the venue was different. The presidential campaign actually represented the apotheosis or “perfect storm” of a grudge match that had brewing since female abolitionists (of both races) had fought for civil rights, but were themselves denied the franchise until fifty years after it was granted to African American males. For more than a century, civil rights for African Americans males butted up against civil rights for women, and mostly, the African American males prevailed.
Even in 1964, after the Civil Rights Act outlawed discrimination, discrimination against women (particularly in employment) was greeted with a wink and a nod. Contrary to the law, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission expressly condoned “help wanted ads” that differentiated by sex. Educated, professional women (black and white) who wanted to rent an apartment or apply for a credit card were forced to find a willing male to co-sign their applications.
And then there was the civil rights struggle itself. There was an increasing historical awareness that African American women had been thrown on the front lines—as intentional victims, not leaders. Women like Rosa Parks, Autherine Lucy, Elizabeth Eckford were all heroes, but they were silent heroes. In the rallies called to protest their ill-treatment, the mighty male ministers spoke to the crowds on their behalf. The women were not allowed to speak.
So, too, the organizers—women like JoAnn Robinson, and Daisy Bates, Fannie Lou Hamer and Ella Baker—who led the voter registration drives, organized the boycotts—their work and words went largely unrewarded, unrecorded. They did the organizing, a man took the credit. Many of them believed they had had the worst of it: insulted, beaten, and imprisoned by white supremacists, then ignored and disregarded by the black men whose purposes they’d served.
But if Miriam Carter suffered privately from divided loyalties or ancient feuds, she never said so. As she traveled the country with McCracken, Miriam Carter told the crowds in public the same thing she told her staffers in private…that she had been behind Claire McCracken from the beginning for the only reason that mattered. She thought she would make the best president. Actually, she thought she would make a great president, one for the history books. She’d known her a lot of years. She’d seen her buffeted and tempered by all the exigencies and humiliations of modern political life and, in her opinion, it hadn’t just made her a better politician, it had made her a better person.
Miriam was fond of telling people that if her life had taught her anything, it was the relevance of Martin Luther King, Jr’s exhortation to judge people not by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character. At one point, McCracken had spoken to her about it directly. Claire had told her she appreciated everything Miriam had done, but she understood the kind of pressure Miriam was under—and for her own good, she should leave the campaign. Carter wouldn’t do it. “This isn’t about race,” she said, “it’s about experience and personal history. I gave you my word that I would fight for you to the end, and that’s exactly what I’m going to do.”
Chapter Twenty-Nine
April 2008
Rockville, Maryland
WITH THE PENNSYLVANIA PRIMARY only weeks
away, McCracken’s campaign had started to regain some of its momentum. With nothing to lose, Claire McCracken broke out of the chrysalis created by her staff and put it all on the line. She started connecting with people directly in a way that felt less constrained, more authentic. The popular infatuation with Okono was dimming slightly, as the strange reality dawned on many Democrats that they really knew very little about this man who was running for president. To some of them, that didn’t seem quite right somehow.
One of the most persistent criticisms of Okono was his lack of foreign policy expertise. As a congressman only nine months into his first term when he started running for president, he simply hadn’t had the time on the national stage to develop personal relationships with world leaders.
So it should have made some in the press wonder, why Okono and his omnificent and savvy team of media handlers—as adept as Rumpulstiltskin at spinning gold from chaff—didn’t emphasize the one foreign leader with whom Okono did have a close relationship—Obongo Malinga of Nigeria. Malinga! The name sounded more like a Parker Brothers board game you might play on a rainy afternoon at the beach than a corrupt would-be African potentate. But from the McCracken supporters’ point of view, Malinga was McCracken’s get-out-of-jail-free card.
In August 2006, Okono had made a trip to Nigeria as a delegation of one. No doubt this was viewed as what it was—a victory lap. African American politicians were accorded great respect in Africa. But while there, at rallies and events, Okono appeared constantly at the side of the opposition party candidate—Obongo Malinga; who was running for president. This, in and of itself, might qualify as a violation of the Logan Act (which prevents American politicians from taking a foreign policy position contrary to the U.S. government). But standing alongside Malinga, Okono criticized the Nigerian government and its current president for corruption—a fair, if undiplomatic, criticism. However, the censure seemed oddly misplaced. Nigeria’s government had a better record than most, and Malinga was widely reported to have his own corruption issues, having inexplicably accumulated a billion dollar fortune during a two-year term as oil minister. The rumors were prolific that Malinga had been set up in the oil business by Gaddafi.