For Clarification
I love the guy - I voted for him and hope he'll do what he promises, but I just don't consider Barack Obama to be "Black." Same goes for folks like Halle Berry, Mariah Carey, or Tiger Woods. I just see them as mixed. I think Barack at least may feel the same way since he's always dodging ethnicity questions. I understand way back when in slavery times and/or when blacks were still embroiled in civil rights battles that that's how people were classified back then. The weird thing to me is that if you were to ask any of them why, most would give that exact reason - that Whitey used to automatically consider anyone with ANY black blood as "Black." It's my belief that this is an incredibly antiquated line of thought and that kind of thinking holds them back. I mean - it's 2008. Black men aren't [officially] arrested for just looking at white women anymore. Mixed babies of black women aren't automatically written off as bastards anymore. So let's get rid of this old-school "Massa sez" way of thinking.
Not that I'm denying that they don't have it in them. I just don't think it's right to embrace only one part of their heritage and [essentially] denounce the other. Unless that other parent was a total a-hole to them or something. That'd make me want to forget that part of my family. But I like what Tiger did - he publicly embraces all parts of himself.