I fell in love with Mayor Pete at the same time many did—watching his CNN town hall some months ago. Since that time Liz Warren has ascended to my favorite status, but Buttigieg remained my second choice, and I favored him to share the ticket with Warren. But this latest controversy obviously hits him in the soft spot politically—and I can’t for the life of me overlook this deficit in his political portfolio.
I have a few complaints about the Obama presidency—his cozy status with Wall Street, his moderation and concurrent avoidance of conflict. But my number one beef with Obama was his refusal to make a national issue of cop-on-black crime. To me it was a betrayal of his base. Can you imagine a Republican POTUS standing by the wayside if police around the country were systematically killing Christians???? No, of course not. But especially in his lame duck term, IMO Obama should have sicced his AG, Eric Holder, to form a federal commission to study the issue and mandate action to address this heinous reality. It still sticks in my craw that they didn’t.
Fade to Mayor Pete Buttigieg, who evidently has been thinking for some time about running for POTUS in the Democratic primary. As mayor, he has little opportunity to make a political statement about a national agenda item—but #BlackLivesMatter is certainly the most obvious issue that’s sitting in his lap, and he of course MUST realize that minority issues are going to be his greatest weakness in the primary. He fired an A-A police chief early in his mayoral career, and describes it as a teaching moment—but what the hell did he learn? Mayor Pete Buttigieg, seemingly the master of speaking off-the-cuff in an articulate and empathic manner on all issues great and small, appears in front of an angry group of black citizens, all of whom probably know the mayor better than we do— and he’s clumsily reading off a sheet of paper in his hand to no avail, and evidently lost for words on a national issue that’s of tremendous importance to privileged old white me, to say nothing of the African-American citizens of our country. It appears as if he hasn’t given a moment’s thought to this issue during the entirety of his time there.
I’m not impressed or hopeful. He does not appear here to be ready for prime time. And this is happening in reference to an issue that he has had every opportunity to master as Mayor of South Bend.
Here’s another article from CNN that provides more history on this issue. It’s not at all reassuring.