WashPost Columnist: Obama Is Lincoln, Romney Is Andrew Johnson

Liberal journalists are gearing up the narrative than a win for Mitt Romney is a win for white racism. In Saturday’s Washington Post, black columnist Colbert King audaciously framed Obama as Abe Lincoln and Mitt Romney as his impeached Tennessee successor, Andrew Johnson.

“What would be the consequences for race of a Mitt Romney victory? A Romney takeover of the White House might well rival Andrew Johnson’s ascendancy to the presidency after Abraham Lincoln’s assassination in 1865.” King lamely offered the protest that “I am not asserting that in the unlikely event President Obama loses, the result could be chalked up to his being black.”

He’s only insisting that a victory for Romney is anti-black, just as a victory for Barry Goldwater in 1964 would have been a victory for segregationists. Federalism equals racism:

A Romney win would be worrisome, however, because of his strong embrace of states rights and his deep mistrust of the federal government — sentiments Andrew Johnson shared.

And we know what that Johnson did once in office.

His sympathy for Confederacy holdouts, and his distaste for Washington, led him to retreat from Reconstruction and avert his gaze as Southern states enacted Jim Crow laws, many of which lasted until the 1964 Civil Rights Act.

There is nothing in Romney’s record to suggest that he would be any stronger than Andrew Johnson in resisting the blandishments of his most extreme supporters, especially regarding federal enforcement.

Johnson stood by as Southern states enacted “black codes,” which restricted rights of freed blacks and prevented blacks from voting.

Romney stood by last year as Republican-controlled state legislatures passed voter-identification laws, making it harder for people of color, senior citizens and people with disabilities to exercise their fundamental right to vote.

So once again, asking voters for a driver’s license is painted as the same thing as “Colored” water fountains and restrooms.

King somehow thinks it’s historically fitting to compare Obama and Lincoln:

In some quarters, the hatred of Lincoln bordered on fanaticism; similar sentiments are in evidence against Obama.

It was Lincoln’s declaration that, after the war, the nation would have “a new birth of freedom” that led to him taking a bullet on Good Friday, April 14, 1865.

Obama’s exhortation in 2004, “There is not a liberal America and a conservative America — there is the United States of America. There is not a black America and a white America and Latino America and Asian America — there’s the United States of America,” goes down no better with some folks.

Obama didn’t run for president on that uniter’s line in 2008, and he certainly hasn’t governed as a uniter.  It's even more laughable that Obama is comparable to a president who promised "a new birth of freedom," instead of a new birth of Europe-Xeroxing socialism.