Longtime local activist Paul Cobb insists black power in Oakland hasn't been diminished by these trends, but redefined. Black voters are choosing not to support black candidates who go to every cocktail party but don't visit the neighborhoods. Clearly, despite its futuristic rhetoric, Brown's campaign is also a look backward, to a time when white liberals and black insurgents believed they could remake urban America. Brown talks of asking former Black Panthers to work for him, and expects to win the Latino vote with support from the United Farmworkers. That's unlikely, says de la Fuente.
Black voters are very mature, but some black leaders are still using race to divide.
I don't have a Latino agenda. I have an Oakland agenda. Brown and his black allies take the carping in stride. For the time being, Oakland's politics are still mostly played on a black and white checkerboard, and Brown is the player to beat. Joan Walsh writes about race and urban affairs.