For those who choose to smoke tobacco/marijuana, drink to excess, inject drugs, have sex without protection, eat greasy cheeseburgers or any other potentially self-destructive behavior, the question is: did race cause them to act this way? Or, is it a question of class? Is it a combo of both? Is it neither?

Questioning whether blacks are directly responsible for the plight or plights that befall them is simplistic, at best and clueless, at worst. In fact, probably many factors are in play...education to racism to culture...to "explain" why poverty is, perhaps, so ingrained or endemic to them as a people.

Many blacks who have been raised in abysmal conditions or have endured blatant racism have, nevertheless, thrived and triumphed; unfortunately, others have not. Why?

It benefits no one to excuse bad behavior as either culturally and/or ethnically-based. Neither does it benefit anyone to dismiss others who suffer as unredeemable. It does benefit society as a whole to attempt to help change "bad behavior" into non-destructive behavior.

In the end, it seems to me that we are all responsible for our own fates, where conscious choices are made. I don't think that one single race, though, is either more or less responsible for their own fates, because of that race.

When they're running for office, candidates left, right and middle promise to "do the people's business" if elected; upon election, these SAME droids immediately and completely forget all their campaign promises. What's a voter to do?

That total disconnect between campaign promises made and campaign promises acted upon simply reinforces that feeling of loathing many of us have for politicians.

Short of removing an official from office for malfeasance or an illegal act, wouldn't it be nice to be able to remove one or two of them for "failing to carry through with a campaign promise"? We have a legal remedy when a seller or manufacturer cheats us or fails to make good on a warranty; why not have some similar solution for elected officials?

Of course, a good old-fashioned tar-and-feathering would be a satisfactory solution, as well.

If ever there was a "test" to qualify candidates to be able to run for high office, a grade-school grasp of the realities of the Middle-Eastern dilemma would be it. Mike Huckabee gets a D-minus...and, I'm being generous.

This is what happens when a BornAgain preacher, steeped in Rapture/SecondComing/Armageddon-ist philosophy that favors Israel's demise so Jesus may come again, is taken seriously as a candidate for the Presidency.

The knuckle-dragging, mouth-breathing crowd must be so proud.

Many, many thanks for your contribution with "Mike, This Is God Speaking"; your humor is razor-sharp.

Thanks for giving me, and Salon's other readers, a much-needed laugh out-loud.

AnaHadWolves

Walter, Walter, Walter...>>tsk<<

Sometimes, a candidate looks like a dingbat, doofus or dimwit because...Taa Daa!...said candidate is, indeed, a dingbat, doofus or dimwit! Hard to compete with that!

Whether its Fred Thompson looking like an old, rumpled couch-cover...Mitt Romney looking like an unctious, aluminum-siding salesman...Rudy Giuliani lisping his way through a "thpeech"...John McCain aging like the "Picture of Dorian Gray" right before our eyes...Mike Huckabee self-flagelating like an Opus Dei adherent on crack...or, Tom Tancredo vigorously holding his right arm down from making a Third Reichian salute...these guys have more warts than a 500-pound warthog.

I always enjoy watching campaign commercials for a candidate and then comparing that idealized persona to the actual candidate on the stump; the differences are hilarious.

Its kinda like seeing Superman in his torn and stained boxer-shorts.

"I'm shocked", the young man said as he recoiled in horror. "I'm shocked that the Bush Administration, which presented itself as a compassionate conservative one, is actually more interested in corporate profits than compassion. That means that Mr. Bush...lied!"

"All that Bush demonstrates are ostentatious shows of faux-Christianity, a lack of empathy for those struggling to make it through each single day and a dearth of charity for anyone other than his corporate-class buddies.", he mused, adding, "I wonder what he thinks his legacy will be because of his avarice and hubris?"

The wiser friend of the author, putting an arm around the shoulder of the political neophyte, leaned and whispered in his ear, "We get the kind of President we pay for...and, we have paid a mightily high price for this one."

The younger man, crestfallen, turned to the friend and asked, plaintively, "So, what do we do when another candidate comes along and promises to be a compassionate conservative and wants our vote?"

The author's friend became silent for a moment, composed himself, and turned to him, saying, "We get a shovel and a shotgun; the shovel for the plethora of bullshit spread by the conservatives." "And, the shotgun?", his naive friend inquired.

"That's in case they think we'll buy into their bullshit for the third election in a row", he said.

They both laughed as they donned their coats and headed out to the hardware store for large shovels and a couple of nice Benelli 12-gauge semi-auto shotguns and a case of triple-ought buckshot.

"...So that's how it happens...I always wondered how normal Americans became republicans.-- Wabanatta_3..."

Uh, "normal Americans" don't become Republicans; abnormal Americans who have undergone frontal lobotomies become Republicans.

Big diff...

Huckabee is just one more Southern-Fried God-Huckster who demonstrates an abysmal lack of candor: he wants a theocracy in this country...as long as the theocrats who are in-charge are BornAgains!

Those who claim to have spoken to God, or worse, to have been spoken TO by God, are the scariest; Mike Huckabee should scare anyone who believes in a true separation of Church and State.