Pin sold at the Texas GOP Convention

Senator Barack Obama has a tough fight ahead of him.

In addition to running against Senator McCain, he also has to run against what I like to call the Invisible Candidate. The Invisible Candidate appears to be non-partisan, and we’ve seen the effects of it in comments like Geraldine Ferraro’s (“If Obama was a white man, he would not be in this position”), during the West Virginia and Kentucky primaries, and on the lips of the Fox “Osama-oops-Obama” anchors week after week.

But the level of conscious racism that prompted a vendor to sell buttons at the Texas State GOP convention reading “If Obama is President….will we still call it the White House?” shows that supporters of the Republican Party are more than willing to play on people’s prejudices, and that Democrats cannot afford to be complacent about the general election.

The invisible candidate has shown its face, even if just for a moment.

Though the primary season was a tough one for everyone involved, we should keep in mind that the battle is not behind him. Obama is not likely to sail through the general election and glide into the White House on the crest of a wave built on Hope.

No, I don’t believe that everyone who opposes Obama is racist. That would be backwards thinking. There are certainly policy differences between Obama and McCain, and I sincerely hope this will matter in November.

However, I do believe that some of the low minds with an interest in seeing another Republican administration are willing to bring the undercurrents of fear and prejudice to the surface, just as Cheney did in 2004 by implying that a vote for Democrats was a vote for terrorism.

Many folks will say that McCain is running against an Invisible Candidate as well – ageism and the fear that he’s senile or at risk of becoming senile. To that, I’d suggest that people look at the ages of previous Presidents. Americans don’t seem to have a big problem voting for old, white guys. And I’d submit that an old, white guy running against a guy who has the double whammy of being African-American and in possession of a funny, foreign sounding name probably doesn’t have too much to worry about in terms of the comparison of biases.

But let’s turn our attention back to the Texas State GOP Convention for a moment. No, the button is not official party gear. But the fact that a vendor thought that a State Convention of Republicans was likely to be a great market for selling racist sentiment ought to give us all pause.

Even if McCain hasn’t given an indication that he will stoop so low in his endeavor to become President, there are probably many, many people and groups willing to employ this strategy for a variety of reasons - from personal prejudice to fear mongering.

Regardless of whom one supports for President – and I think it’s not a huge surprise to anyone that I’m an Obama supporter – it would be best for all of us to insist that the Invisible Candidate step forward and make itself known. Buttongate (I know, I’m rolling my eyes, too) might even be a blessing in disguise: the only way to combat racism directly is to discuss it. Social ills must be acknowledged before they can be addressed, even if it makes us uncomfortable. It’s easy to pretend that racism doesn’t exist when it disguises itself, but in the privacy of the voting booth it will reveal itself. Let’s get it out in the open before that happens. It’s the only way to take final steps to heal our racial divide and move on to the substantive ways to make our society better.

On a strategic level, it’s important for Obama supporters to know that this type of tactic exists and will be used. The other side has tipped its hand. This should sound alarm bells in the parts of our brains that might have grown lazy with the confidence of an Obama victory. This is an especially important lesson for those of us who live in liberal communities and colleges; it’s easy to assume that, because everyone around you seems to agree with you, everyone everywhere must agree with you. This is – and I can not say it emphatically enough – not the case. The best way to ensure an Obama victory is to assume that he is the underdog who needs every single vote to win, and that there are people working tirelessly to make sure he doesn’t get them. Complacency is a tacit vote for the Invisible Candidate.