THE AUDACITY OF BOB JOHNSON

A former student of mine asked me after Barack Obama served Hillary (I'm Bill's wife remember?) Clinton a can of whip ass in the Iowa caucus: "If you were his adviser, what's the first thing you would advise him to do?"

"Double his security," I responded.

"Really?"

"Yep, those Clintons can be dangerous! "

So the Clinton campaign unleashes its attacks with mud and tears and anything else they think can shake Obama's rope-a-dope campaigning. Mr. Bill calls Obama's campaign a "fairy tale," first denying he said it, then saying he didn't mean it that way.

Friday he was on Black radio more than Beyonce. He grinned, he joked and spoke in a humble manner, trying to slap five with Black America over the airwaves. He tried to shuck it off by reminding -- in often unsubtle ways -- how much the Clintons have done for Black folks.

Many Blacks have a love affair with the Clintons. But then, after years of Ronald Reagan and George Bush the first, a very low water mark was set. Anyone who didn't endorse a return to slavery was considered a savior, a great white hope if you will. President Clinton attended all the Black conventions, went on Arsenio Hall's show, played the sax and was seen publicly eating ribs. Not to mention his trips to Mickey-D's, arguably America's first Black national food chain in the same way that Clinton was our first Black president.

At first they tip-toed lightly over race with subtle nods and winks. They brought in the New York Lt. Governor David Patterson all the way to Iowa to stand silently behind her on the podium during rallies. Why invite a Black politician unknown outside the state to this party? Because Patterson, once one of the most powerful members of the NY State Senate, left his position for an essentially ceremonial one: Lt. to Gov. Eliot Spitzer. Why? The deal was put to him that "when Hillary wins the presidency, I'll name you as U.S. Senator," Spitzer allegedly said.

Yeah, right.

But now, after the Clintons have tasted their first defeat since impeachment, they release the attack.

First the unsubtle statement by Mrs. Bill that even though Martin Luther King did his thing, "it was a President who signed the civil rights bill into law!" thus minimizing King's achievements and sacrifice.

I'm pretty sure not even Pres. Lyndon Johnson (the president she refers to) would have agreed with that one.

And even before they started feeling Obama hot on their trail, a Hillary pit bull campaign staffer wondered aloud on nationwide TV if Obama maybe used to deal drugs.

And now the Black attack dogs show their teeth. "Go git 'em boys!"

So up steps Bob Johnson to say: "Bill and Hillary Clinton have been deeply and emotionally involved in Black issues since Obama was doing something in his neighborhood -- and I won't say what he was doing, but he said it in (his) book..." A clear reference to Obama admitting in his book previous use of marijuana and cocaine. Johnson later backed off saying he was referring to Obama's labor organizing work. Huh?

So Black billionaire Bob Johnson, who made his fortune with BET which specializes in racist, stereotypical, misogynist, violent videos, has the audacity of take the moral high ground against Obama. Bob Johnson who has never taken a public political stance in his life -- not against police brutality, not against sub-standard education and health care -- and certainly not against the Black-on-Black crime that are as much a part of BET videos as ham hocks are to greens.

Now, amazingly, he wipes his hand off in the same water that the Clinton's use and gives validity to the myth that the Clintons were civil rights trail brazers.

Columnist, writer, Mike Barnicle said today on MSNBC, that when playing the race card, "the Clintons are not just playing with fire -- they are playing with plutonium. Race is America's third rail..."

He is dead on target.

The only thing as disturbing as the "Black attacks" on Obama's character being orchestrated from the Clinton campaign, is how many Blacks are still drinking the Kool-Aid. Sometimes all white politicians have to do (and they know this well) to win Black support is manipulate a handful of Black "leaders" and to show up at Black churches and sing spirituals along with the congregation.

To those Blacks who believe, as Bob "BET" Johnson does, that the Clintons have done much to forward the progress of Black people in America, I ask: Write three things they have done in the space below: