Letters to the Editor
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Re: Agents from the right
The only logical conclusion is that you are another agent provacateur from the right...or just incredibly dumb.
Me. surely you jest. Actually the "agents from the right" that worked so hard to ensure you nominated your weakest candidate are beginning to gloat about it. You'll hear more.
I feel sorry for you. But a lot sorrier for my kids and grandkids, so please don't expect my sympathy as you fast realize how foolish you were.
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Shawn the Neokkkon
...the new Nostradamus. Can you also tell me who will win the next 50 World Series and Superbowls? I saw Back to the Future II too and I could use the $$$.
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Hey, ShawnWM. I have never taken you seriously. But I am fascinated by your insanity.
Here's a comment for you. ShawnWM: you are an insane racist piece of human garbage.
Please discuss.
best,
Oliver
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Shawn are you going to ante up and write us all a check or at least a thank-you card
if Obama is elected in November AND makes this country better, more peaceful and prosperous nation?
I know that this, in your universe, is an impossibility. Like dogs flying. Like UFO's being sighted in Switzerland. Like Saint Patrick's day falling on a Sunday in December. But what if?
Will you say you're sorry at least for so much moaning and groaning? The funny thing is that you don't say whether you are going to vote for McCain or this Dukakis-Obama fellow. Even Bill Kristol points out that Dukakis probably would have won if Reagan had had a 30% approval rating. (Or if Reagan had started a new war with the U.S.S.R. instead of officiating at the end of the Cold War with the U.S.S.R....)
The real question is, my friend, are you going to vote for McCain or Obama in the general, presuming, as the numbers seem to imply, that Obama is the Democratic nominee?
And here's another kicker: did you send any money to the Clinton campaign since you have been so anxious for her to win?
Just curious. I held out sending any campaign contributions, hoping to spend it in the general rather than watching two Democrats go nuclear on one another. However, after watching what I felt like was media saturation again with a pastor that I didn't care to hear one more moment about, and Clinton offering to obliterate Iran, I sent $25 to Obama and I'm glad I did. And lucky that I could since financially I've been worse off than I am at the moment. Thank-you refund check.
So...how much do have you invested in this thing? Other than pain and moaning I mean?
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What a great sentence: meter and music!
Renegade Iconoclast
Spare us the dumb tooting tin horn of your divisive bombast.
-- manos99
Yes, it was satire, but very well done, and it can be tough to tell these days...
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doloresflower
"Obama didn't start getting 90% support until after South Carolina. Look at the numbers in relation to some of the Clintons actions as ask why they actually have seemed to impact the percentages by at least ten percent (he did not have 90% AA support in South Carolina)...a critical number...if Hillary Clinton could have kept this ten percent instead of giving it away."
no, he got 80, with a native South Carolinan in the mix, hardly an argument against the idea that many were voting race. And SC was of course very early in the process. As I mentioned, Obama's own people say they saw the shift from black voters to Obama begin happening pre-SC. His increase from 80 to 90 percent had less to do with Hillary than with the fact that SC solidified the idea that he was a viable candidate (also goes to my point that blacks are voting "intelligently" as you like to say--they aren't voting for Obama just cuz he's black)
" I notice that you don't say anything about precisely same number (90%) block support for Bill Clinton"
Actually I did. I said you were comparing apples and pineapples. Blacks vote nearly 90 percent for all dem candidates. And "support" is different. To determine if one is voting based on race, you need candidates of different races and, to control for policy variables, share similar politics (i.e. a primary race). You don't have that in your example.
"I don't see why, theoretically, black people can't vote together without it being race based"
again, you contradict your own arguments here. They can't vote together as a race, but can vote together due to a perceived racial dissing? Secondly, you again oversimplify my point. There are many times they can vote together without it being race based. Voting for Obama over McCain, two candidates who are nearly diametrically opposed on almost all policy would have nothing to do with race. voting for Obama over Keyes would obviously have nothing to do with race. And "together" is a euphemism that completely distorts/ignores the reality that it isn't simply "together" like a simple majority or 70 percent or even 80 percent--it's millions voting in 90 percent lockstep--not the same thing. I also have to say, not that you've made this case, but I find it ironic that Obama people who bristle at the idea that blacks are voting for a black are also making the case for Richardson as a VP cuz he'll "bring hispanics". I get it--only those Hispanics are so unsophisticated as to vote based one race/ethnicity.
"African American support for Kerry and Al Gore were in the 80% plus range"
a) they did not win 90 percent consistently. The last dem to do that in a primary was, yes, Jesse Jackson. So your argument is that in the last 40 years, the fact that the only two candidates to take 90 percent of the black vote are black is pure coincidence?
b) kerry and Gore won 80 plus percent a few times (key). They did not win anywhere close to 80 percent overall. For instance, Kerry got a third of the black vote in SC and OK, didn't even get a plurality in Tenn, Arizona, Conn, and 60 or under in Cal, Missouri, Wisc, NY, Virginia, Fl, OH. In other words, 80 percent for him in a primary was an aberration. when did h Obama get only a third? half? 70 percent?) And Gore was hardly matched against an equal caliber candidate. Yes, he pulled 80 plus percent of the vote at times, but when he's defeating Bradley 75-25 overall--hardly the same comparison as Obama and Hillary. Bradley was clearly done very early so why waste a vote on him?
"I'm no mathmatician"
perhaps that's the problem? Or a historian? Not to be flippant, but your numbers fail you as examples since they don't hold up to historical fact and you tend to conflate numbers that shouldn't be or make comparisons that aren't equivalents.
"you don't think that her actions (or say Ferraro's or Bob Kerrey's or Bill's or her comments about MLK and LBJ or her speech about Obama not passing a threshold for commander in chief or Bill later saying that Obama played the race card on him...) played ANY part at all in this election? Not even a ten percent role?"
No, because all of those happened after he was already getting 80 plus percent. Do I think they played some role? Of course. Just like lots of other factors do (though I'll have to note once more that this argument that those mattered means you're saying blacks are voting based on race and as a group) Ten percent? No, not even close. And again, even if that were true, since Obama is the first person to consistently, in fact, I believe every time post SC (that's correct?) to get 80 plus percent of the black vote while still matched up against a candidate is evidence enough that race has something to deal with it. I find the whole tortured attempt to obscure this simple and neutral (as in no negative association) reality to be more harmful to any adult discussion of race, same as the trumped up allegations of racism against Hillary for her MLK statement or Ferraro for hers (if she were racist you'd also have to call her misogynist for the same statement since she also said she wouldn't have been in her position were she not female) And how does her characterization of him as not passing the threshold get lumped in with all the race examples--now that is a racist comment?
If we can't face reality then we're not going to get very far in conversation.
But if you seriously think Obama would be the first person to garner repeated 80-90 percent votes (closer to 90 in almost all) among blacks in every primary were he in fact white we're not going to get very far anyway as it just isn't a serious statement.