Of course, all indications are that this is precisely the kind of black leader that will have any real influence in American life as we move on. Booker is to be commended for knowing it and acting accordingly. However, there isn’t much drama in being that kind of black leader, however you pronounce your B’s. On that, another problem of Booker’s begins with B – Barack.

There was a time when the sheer fact of Obama’s blackness had more than a few harboring expectations beyond logic. “Yes, we can!” he intoned, and everybody went crazy — but more because of the skin color of who said it than anything else. Obama sounded like a preacher, and thus a prophet. He was going to get us beyond the partisan divide because, well, he’s wise, or … been through the fire … or, well, okay, black.

We’re past that, and being a pretty color will never again get a black politician walking in Obama’s footsteps that kind of adulatory reception. Never mind that we’ve also seen that black politicians come in flavors as un-Obaman as Herman Cain and Allen West. No, from here on out black politicians will be vetted more on the content of their character than the color of their skin, ironically enough.