Weren’t we supposed to be ‘past’ this?

The great success of Sen. Barack Obama’s presidential campaign has proven that America is finally getting past the barriers of race and the injustice of racial discrimination. Or so say respected journalists like Peggy Noonan, among others.

On the other hand, Obama’s campaign is the source of charges and accusations of racism when just about anyone criticizes the senator, or even raises his African-American heritage as a benefit, as Geraldine Ferraro just found out. But unlike others who back down quickly, Ferraro is not intimated or willing to let her words be turned into a campaign tactic.

Former vice presidential candidate and Hillary Clinton supporter Geraldine Ferraro fought back against charges of racism Wednesday, defending comments she made earlier this week that Barack Obama “would not be in this position” if he were white.

Speaking with FOX News on Wednesday, Ferraro said her comments are being misconstrued, and that she was only saying that race in Obama’s case, and gender in her own case, can be a reason why a candidate gets chosen over another candidate.

Ferraro has always been scrappy, and now she’s on the receiving end of a picked fight. Fine by her.

She also accused the Obama campaign of continually playing the race card to its advantage.

“Every time this comes up, every time there is something to — some opportunity to play the race card — and this is being done by David Axelrod, who knows better, he’s his (Obama’s) campaign manager — every time they have an opportunity to do it, they do it. They did it against Bill Clinton, and it worked. They shut him up. They did it against (Pennsylvania Gov.) Ed Rendell, it didn’t work. And now they’re doing it against me.”

“I’m sorry. I said nothing negative. I care about the black vote in this country. I am absolutely thrilled by the historic campaign, and I really don’t think this is right that they should attack me,” Ferraro said.

Obama’s people should have known better.

“For his campaign to take that and spin it and attack Hillary and me as being racist, I tell you, it is just appalling,” said Ferraro, who is on Clinton’s finance committee.

“My comments have been taken so out of context and have been spun by the Obama campaign as racist that it’s doing precisely what they don’t want done — it’s going to the Democratic Party and dividing us even more,”…

To be continued, evidently.