The Larry Doby of presidential politics

I'm not asking you who's on second

CNN wonders why no one really seems to care how black Herman Cain is:

...why isn't Cain's ethnicity as much a part of his story as it was with Obama?

For one, many conservatives decry the focus on a candidate's race as an obsession for liberals...

There's a second reason that some conservatives, particularly tea partiers, largely ignore Cain's race: it drives a stake through claims that the movement harbors racists...

There's a third reason: the novelty has worn off. Everyone knows now that a black guy can be just as poor a president as a white one, so who cares whether the next guy up to be president is black or white?  America has now been there and done that. No one is going to give it a second thought when a Bobby Jindal or a Nikki Haley or a Ben Nighthorse Campbell gets close to the presidency. No one except the press, for whom the 'first x' can always make a story seem more interesting than it really is. I mean, freaking Pakistan has had a female head of government. That we haven't is not really a story, it's just a fact.

When Obama was first elected, I asked How long until he can just be the president? I didn't know the answer then, but today I know it is 'less than three years.' If someone you know still consistently refers to Obama as 'the first black president,' you know that person is either a racist or a liberal*, and you probably ask yourself on occasion why you still talk to this person. To everyone else you know Obama is just the president.  And if the first black president** is no big deal, why would the second matter at all?

UPDATE: Racism is everywhere, man:

[PMSNBC Host Ed] Schultz's example? He quoted [Sen. Jim] Demint saying that "If we are able to stop Obama on this [health care law], it will be his Waterloo***. It will break him." For clarity, Schultz repeated the offending line, "It will break him."

Dr. James Peterson, director of Africana studies at Lehigh University, explained that "break" is a racist verb, "a term that was used to destroy, mentally and physically, slaves." Accordingly, the Demint line demonstrated "how dark some of these racial discourses can be in presidential politics."

Did you catch it? Everyone knows that "dark" is a euphemism for "black."  Darkies. Africa as "the dark continent." Washington D.C. itself  as "Dark Country." I can't believe that in this day and age, we still have to put up with such blatant racism on television.

* no exclusive disjunction intended.
** Besides, Obama is the third black president anyway.
*** freaking racist Napoleon