Trash Talk: Anti-Obama Lore and Race in the Twenty-First Century

265 Pages·2022·4.797 MB·English

by  Patricia A. Turner

Trash Talk

Trash Talk
Anti- ObAmA LOre And rAce
in the twenty- First century
Patricia A. Turner
university OF cALiFOrniA Press
University of California Press
Oakland, California
© 2022 by Patricia Turner
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Turner, Patricia A. (Patricia Ann), 1955- author.
Title: Trash talk : anti-Obama lore and race in the twenty-first century /
Patricia A. Turner.
Description: Oakland, California : University of California Press,
[2022] | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: lccn 2022006310 (print) | lccn 2022006311 (ebook) |
isbn 9780520389236 (cloth) | isbn 9780520389243 (paperback) |
isbn 9780520389250 (epub)
Subjects: LCSH: Obama, Barack. | Rumor in mass media. | Fake news—
United States. | Racism—Political aspects—United States—History—
21st century. | Racism against Black people—United States—History—
21st century.
Classification: lcc p96.r862 u6 2022 (print) | lcc p96.r862 (ebook) |
ddc 302.2/4—dc23/eng/20220412
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022006310
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2022006311
Manufactured in the United States of America
31 30 29 28 27 26 25 24 23 22
10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1
To the best of women friends,
Peggy Canale, Victoria Frisch, Rhonda Gomes,
and Carolyn Whitehurst
And to the indefatigable crew at Snopes

Contents
Introduction 1
1. Flagged Down 27
2. Articles of Faith 54
3. Born to Run 77
4. Michelle Matters 103
5. Pandemic Levels 129
6. Obama Legends in the Age of Trump 163
Epilogue 195
Acknowledgments 207
Notes 209
Bibliography 227
Index 245

Introduction
The election of Donald J. Trump as the forty-fi fth president of the United
States came as a surprise. It stunned professional pollsters who deployed
complicated algorithms to measure voter sentiment. It vexed savvy politi-
cians who thought they understood their districts and all of the voting
patterns relevant to the election. Seasoned journalists who followed the
major and minor candidates even prior to the state primaries were non-
plussed by the headlines they had to draft in the days after the ballots were
tallied on November 8, 2016. Millions of women who wore pantsuits to
the voting booth or mailed their absentee ballots were flabbergasted and
horrified by Hillary Clinton’s loss. Indeed, many Republicans and Trump
devotees acknowledged they had prepared themselves for a Clinton win.
Some in his inner circle claimed that even Trump himself was caught off-
guard by his victory—though he never publicly admitted to any self-d oubt.
Most of these groups later sheepishly acknowledged there were indeed
numerous signs that, had they been recognized, would have lessened the
shock of the election’s outcome. For instance, the domestic political envi-
ronment signaled a renewed willingness on the part of those aligned with
right-w ing causes to proudly proclaim their conservative beliefs. The ever-
growing size of Donald Trump’s rallies, had they been measured, might
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