Introduction : is America a nation of cowards or has Attorney General Eric Holder lost his mind? -- The teaching moment that never was : Henry Louis Gates, Barack Obama, and the post-racial dilemma -- "I know what's in his heart" : enlightened exceptionalism and the problem with using Barack Obama as the racial litmus test for Black progress and achievement -- The audacity of Reverend Wright : speaking truth to power in the twenty-first century -- Setting the record straight : why Barack Obama and America cannot afford to ignore a Black agenda -- Pull yourself up by your bootstraps : Barack Obama, the Black poor, and the problems of racial common sense thinking.
