What Cain Says About Race

Douthat meditates on the subject:

We should remember this moment, because it’s a perfect encapsulation of how race’s role in American politics has changed over the last 75 years. We are nowhere near the post-racial moment that Barack Obama’s election was supposed to usher in; instead, we seem more obsessed with race than ever, and more attuned to identity politics in all its permutations. But Herman Cain’s candidacy has confirmed what the experience of the Obama era has already suggested: In national politics, race matters, but ideology matters much, much more.

Earlier thoughts here.