Full Description
As the first African American president, Barack Obama faced unique challenges and obstacles when addressing issues of race. While rhetorical attacks on the basis of race directed at Obama were not unexpected, many of the most consistent racially-motivated criticisms of Obama were associated with his religious identity. The Jeremiah Wright controversy gave way to the birther and 'secret Muslim' conspiracy theories, while anxieties about Obama's identity proved particularly potent as modes of political attack in the context of the war on terror. This book examines the ways in which those attacks often originated in the rhetoric of the Christian Right and the ways in which these theories circulated amongst the Christian Right. Perry argues that the intersections of race and religion in American politics produced rhetoric that often caricatured Obama as un-American, anti-Christian, and an enemy of the state. By exploring the arguments used to cultivate these characterizations and tracing the roots of conspiracies that worked to delegitimize Obama's religious identity through racial claims and stereotypes, a clearer picture emerges of what is at stake when people can no longer separate religious convictions from political arguments.
Contents
Introduction: The GOP and the Christian Right
Chapter 1: George W. Bush, the War on Terror, Certitude and Aporias: We're Ready to Believe You
Chapter 2: Imprecating Whiteness and Losing Black Religious Freedom: The Damned Road from Jeremiah Wright to Rick Warren in the Obama Campaign
Chapter 3: Amalekites and Birthrights: The Birther Conspiracy, Dominion Theology, and Othering Barack Obama
Chapter 4: The Holy Wars and the Crusade against Obama: Muslim Conspiracy Theories and the War on Terror
Conclusion: The 4 Horsemen and a turn to the Eschatological
