WHEN African-Americans go to the polls next week, they are likely to support Barack Obama at a level approaching the 95 percent share of the black vote he received in 2008. As well they should, given the symbolic exceptionalism of his presidency and the modern Republican Party\u2019s utter disregard for economic justice, civil rights and the social safety net.<\/p>\n
But for those who had seen in President Obama\u2019s election the culmination of four centuries of black hopes and aspirations and the realization of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.\u2019s vision of a \u201cbeloved community,\u201d the last four years must be reckoned a disappointment. Whether it ends in 2013 or 2017, the Obama presidency has already marked the decline, rather than the pinnacle, of a political vision centered on challenging racial inequality. The tragedy is that black elites \u2014 from intellectuals and civil rights leaders to politicians and clergy members \u2014 have acquiesced to this decline, seeing it as the necessary price for the pride and satisfaction of having a black family in the White House.<\/p>\n