by Dr. Boyce Watkins, Syracuse University
Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid had to backpedal and apologize very quickly for a private conversation he had with Barack Obama during Obama's presidential campaign. In the discussion, Reid stated that Obama could be a successful candidate because he is "light skinned" and that he speaks with "no Negro dialect, unless he wanted to have one."
Two journalists, Mark Halperin and John Heilemann, made this assertion in a book to be released next Tuesday.
"He [Reid] was wowed by Obama's oratorical gifts and believed that the country was ready to embrace a black presidential candidate, especially one such as Obama - a 'light-skinned' African American 'with no Negro dialect, unless he wanted to have one,' as he said privately. Reid was convinced, in fact, that Obama's race would help him more than hurt him in a bid for the Democratic nomination," they write.
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