Michele Bachmann Is Passing For White

All the blogosphere is atwitter (get it?) about Michele Bachmann signing a document called "The Marriage Vow" which declares that a black child born during slavery was more likely to be raised by both parents than a black child born after the election of our nation's first black president.

That Michele Bachmann would show any concern whatsoever about black children being raised by both their parents in marriage when her own parents divorced confirms for me what I suspected all along: Michele Bachmann is passing for white.

Yeah, I said it. I think Michele Bachmann is black. Why else would she even care about black children and their chances of being raised by both their parents?

Long before I found out about her "Marriage Vow" and her deeply held concern for black children, I always suspected she wasn't straight-up white.

"Look at her," I told my husband, Black Man Not Blogging (BMNB), when I first saw Michele Bachmann on TV, "she's got that tawny cast . . . that deep beige skin tone that, back in the day, would have been hailed proudly as that of an 'octoroon.'"

My husband, who has relatives who span the skin color spectrum from lighter than Michele Bachmann to deep chocolate, stared hard at her image on the screen and said, "Well, you might be on to something there. She's got the same skin color as Mary Landrieu, and Landrieu looks mixed, too." Looks to me that Michele Bachman and California Attorney General Kamala Harris are about the same skin color. I'm just sayin' . . .

Could it be spray tanner? Nah. Not orange enough, like John Boehner, although it would be perfectly acceptable for her to use spray tanner given that she represents Minnesota.

Could we be on the verge of having our -- dare I say it? -- first African American female president?

Ms. Bachmann, I urge to you reconnect with your African American roots and embrace your real people. Nothing else explains your concern for black children. It's not too late for you to learn how to fry catfish, make a better-than-average potato salad, and do the Electric Slide. You can even put the flat iron away and embrace your hair's true texture. Rock that 'fro and go.

And while you're at it, tell Mary Landrieu and President Jimmy Carter they can stop passing for white, too.