Just how significant is Obama’s victory to people around the world? In our first translation from Brazil, another melting pot nation where no Black man has ever served as head of state, Lucas Mendez of BBC Brazil writes:
“Barack Obama has done it. The Democratic Party nomination is his. If we bow before clergy and nobility, it’s no shame to get on one’s knees to hear from a man who has changed history. … Imagine what those southerners who believed in the superiority of the White race would think now, seeing a Black man so close to the presidency. … We are on our knees. Even those who, like me, doubt his chances of being elected in November, have to believe in a better world thanks to Barack Obama.”
By Lucas Mendez
Translated By Brandi Miller
June 4, 2008
Brazil – O Globo – Original Article (Portuguese)
Barack Obama has done it. The Democratic Party nomination is his. If we bow before clergy and nobility, it’s no shame to get on one’s knees to hear from a man who has changed history.
He’s still not president, but just imagine how it was for a Black man in the southern United States in 1961, when Barack Obama was born.
In Black schools there were no Whites, nor were they in the bars, at restaurants or hotels. Nor were they permitted in public restrooms. Blacks didn’t have White friends, or vice versa.
Or imagine a White man only seeing Blacks across counters, in factories, or in kitchens scrubbing the floor.
In 1968, myself and three other journalists were refused service by a restaurant owner in Alabama because there was an Ethiopian among us. When we called the police, four cars came to “escort us” us to the state border so we wouldn’t be attacked.
On Tuesday, with words alone, a slender black man named Barack Obama who emerged from a poor neighborhood in Chicago became the Democratic Party candidate for the Presidency of the United States. He could be the boss, the commander-in-chief, the leader of the greatest empire on the planet.
Imagine what those southerners who believed in the superiority of the White race would think now, seeing a Black man so close to the presidency. And many of those that believed this actually voted for him.
READ ON AT WORLDMEETS.US, along with continuing translated foreign press coverage of America’s historic 2008 election campaign.
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