The Great Black Hype

When Obama got elected the first time, people everywhere not only celebrated the fact that a black man had achieved the presidency, but also that he was a man whose personal and professional qualities gave them hope that things would be different, especially after the dark ages of the Bush era. Here was a man who was a professor of constitutional law, a man of conscience, who had worked with the poor of Chicago.

And yet, this is the same man who has just said that the domestic spying program is " a modest encroachment on privacy." Really? Says who? Had he known about it when it started in 2007 under Bush, would he have had the same opinion, or would he have called it something else much stronger?

Clearly, Obama has disappointed those who thought that he had a different take on things. Guantánamo, drones, the IRS and now this. The Great Black Hope has turned into the The Great Black Hype.

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