Abstract

On November 4, 2008, during his concession speech to President-Elect Barack Obama, Senator John McCain transformed Obama's victory into his theodicy by claiming that the election "proved" that the country had progressed from its days organizing social life around racial exclusion. McCain's speech exemplifies a paradox of "American" progress: black bodies ascending to social heights previously prevented through a particularly pernicious brand of white American antiblack racism, upon whose backs U.S. global financial and military dominance was built, become evidence for justifying American exceptionalism. One tragic irony of American history is that since at least emancipation, "black...