This election cycle saw candidates get off to an early start in campaigning. I decided that I would (mostly) ignore the debates and campaigning until later in the year simply because I didn’t want to devote the next year and a half of my life to obsessing about presidential politics. When the coverage descends into the absurd, though, how can you ignore it?

Truly, absurd is the only way to describe this:

Senator Clinton, are you black enough?

The question usually aimed at her darker opponent from Chicago triggered a burst of laughter from Hillary Rodham Clinton. She recovered from the barb and proceeded by not answering it.

This campaign moment occurred Thursday before the Las Vegas convention crowd of the National Association of Black Journalists. CNN White House correspondent Suzanne Malveaux pinned back the former First Lady to explain how she could “sustain black support “ while running against an African-American. Ironically, thanks to Sen. Barack Obama’s mixed white and Kenyan parentage and campaign mischief, it is he who usually gets to field the “black enough” question.

“Are you black enough” is offensive when it’s aimed at Obama; it’s downright silly when it’s sent Clinton’s way. Suzanne Malveaux should feel ashamed for asking a question that lowers the level of debate even further--and, it’s to Clinton’s credit that she sidestepped the idiocy.

A fair pair of questions would be, “Why should black Americans vote for you? What will you do to address issues of concern to the majority of blacks who worry about educational opportunities, jobs, and unfairly enforced drug laws?” Blacks in America aren’t one solid voting block beholden to those issues, of course, but ignoring the fact that those issues are of serious concern to many wouldn’t indicate a very serious mind.

Concern with those issues doesn’t mean that a candidate is “black enough” for the job, though, it means that he or she has given serious thought to the problems. I’m never going to ask if a candidate is white, blue-eyed, or male enough for the job; I am going to continue to ask if they act like adults on the issues that are most important to me. The person that I believe has addressed those issues (national security, entitlement reform, tax policy, for instance) the best will be the person that I vote for regardless of their skin tone, hair color, religious affiliation, party affiliation, or shoe size.

The question isn’t: “Are you black enough?” The question is: “Are you good enough?”

Update: Say Anything Blog has a similar response. As does this cat.