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Sunday, Nov 8, 2009
As domini so aptly noted, there are few things racists are more threatened by than a black man in a suit. (I know this from hard experience--and the experiences of at least two white-collar/executive members of my family who do on-the-road consulting work.) When a person's entire belief system and self-esteem is built on someone being "lower" than you, there is nothing that burns you more than those lower people "getting ahead" of you. These folks _have_ to believe there is something wrong with someone non-white who is equal or has more than them. Admitting that a black person may be smarter or more talented than them--no way in hell are they ever, ever going to admit that.
>As to my own thoughts, I think the reason rural and small town working people liked George Bush is that they believed that, despite two Ivy League degrees, his education didn't *take*. They knew his education didn't really take because "Jesus Christ changed his heart" -- or something like that.<
But even then, they cut him slack because he was white-like-them. If he had been black, they would have thought he was running a con like those "Sharpton" urban-preacher types. :P
"Part of the reason that they don't like Barack Obama is that they believe his education *took*. Barack Obama talks like an elegant and intellectual man. He is everything that they find threatening."
Because he's black. End of story.
...-post-WWII history and lynching stats has proved that even when black folks serve their country and are military/patriotic, even when they live up to the small-town ideal, racists still hate them. That is why racism is so hard to fight and insidious--the goalposts for how "white" black people are supposed to be are set insanely high, and even when black people meet those, they 1) are given another goalpost to jump, which are often totally different from the last goalpost 2) get grief for being "uppity" or "thinkin' they'rn better than us white folks."
"I've reached the point where I honestly don't care. I moved to a big city to get away from people like that, and have been very successful."
There’s something to this…
Most of the people I know who’ve left small towns and the ‘burbs to seek education and opportunities in cities are doing pretty well compared with those who stayed behind. Typically, we have reasonably good jobs with adequate (or better) salaries and healthcare. Our houses, for the most part, aren’t being foreclosed in large numbers. We get around by public transit or bike or foot and don’t need to worry about whether putting gas in the SUV to drive to Wal-Mart is cutting into the food budget. And god knows it’s not our sons and brothers and boyfriends being used as cannon fodder in the latest war. Hell, if McCain wins, some of us might even get a tax cut.
So why are we the only ones worrying?
Why do Americans have to have a President like themselves. In Europe, not that our system is perfect, we seem to vote for someone we think is more intelligent than ourselves. You have
already had Bush the puppet with a low i.q. who has already caused chaos in this world with his cowboy mentality, do you really want a moose-hunting bear shooting veep who is only a heart beat away from being president, to be in charge of this world. Good grief no-way!
Please America vote for Obama........he is your present day Abraham Lincoln, and perhaps saviour. Let intelligence rule O.K.
"It is obvious that rural, working-class whites are more comfortable with the conservative small-town Palin, to whom they can relate"
There you have it in a nut shell...the definition of the real "American Tragedy." This woman, just as George Bush, represents that vast swamp out there that is going to suck us all under. The quicksand or slush pit that will "disappear" what is left of the shredded Constitution. Who in his right mind could "identify" with this right-wing whacho extremist - who? Real Americans, that's who.
If McCain and this woman get into the WH it won't be long before he is hiding behind her skirts and all the rabid neocons will EDUCATE their new protege while swilling their martinis and laughing at all those naive red-necks who took the bait again...hook-line-and-sinker. All they had to do was pull in the line..they go for it every time, and while they swallow the bait those in power will finish picking their pockets.
"What is to be done?" as Lenin said about 90 years ago.
Diktatorship of the proletariat is the answer brothers and sisters. Just ask Bernadette Dohrn and Billy Ayers.
It would be like this: In Joysey, for instance, none of da selfish suburban people in Rumson would get a vote, only the appropriate civil servants and underdawgs in places like Asbury, Camden and Newak would be allowed to vote
Voting is a privilege, not a right. Didn't Lincoln or Washington say that?
To the posters that insist it's racist that 90% of blacks are voting for Obama because he's black are wrong. It's because they are Dems.
I daresay they'd vote for Hillary-D against Alan Keyes-R in the same proportions.
It's clear from the polls that Obama DOES have a serious problem. Bill Maher's article quoted in one of the letters and Dan Hoyle in this article reinforce this belief.
To deny that and continue to tread the same down the same, tired old route could well lead to defeat.
True, in a contrary view, Klytus in one message here felt that in his small, mostly-white Louisania town, "the folks around here think that Obama is alright". Hopefully that will turn out to be the case in most of small-town USA - but remember that GW Bush managed first to steal the election from Al Gore in 2000 and then in 2004 he actually did win it from Kerry! It would evidently be foolish to underestimate the utter stupidity of the US citizen (that decided those two elections)!
It seems clear - from the polls, from this article, from many of the other responses to this article - that a whole lot more needs to be done by Obama to convince small-town America that Obama+Biden would be a better presidential team for them personally than would be McCain+Palin. It's evidently a huge and difficult job: you have to pander to their own overweening sense that they (small-town USA) are the centre of the universe; that they are wise and wonderful and the salt of the earth; that they have a right to continue living in the same wasteful, sloppy way that they have been doing for the past so many decades - and still to get in some progressive thinking into the leadership of the world's sole superpower! Tough job, indeed...
To my mind (as an outsider), the following issues are significant:
1) GW Bush and Gang have led the USA to disaster worldwide - in every sense in every way. GW Bush and Gang are War Criminals, plain and simple - much of the world outside the USA is convinced of this. Also, for US citizens, compute the real costs of GW Bush over the past 8 years!!! (I don't believe this has yet been done effectively and accurately, Joe Stiglitz notwithstanding. And those figures are NOT yet properly in the minds of small-town USA)...
2) McCaim+Palin are almost certainly more of the same as GW Bush and Gang. The USA is toast for sure if this Gang retains power. Small-town USA will be toast, too.
3) In many ways, Palin could well turn out to be just what Obama has been looking for. Palin is, to my mind, the pivot on which this election will turn. Palin IS practically of of McCain+Palin.
Check out those disgusting pictures of Palin proudly gutting moose; Palin proudly shooting wolves down from the air; Palin getting a 17-year old to bear a child; Palin misusing her gubernatorial powers to bully her brother-in law; Palin this and Palin that - there is plenty of ammunition available: get all of that properly into the minds of small-town USA. It's not such a heroic picture at all!
3a) Obama should not be seen to do any of that himself!
4) Thus far, this much is clear: Obama+Biden do NOT have it quite right.
(Meanwhile, those wolf ads are getting ready from Bush-Cheney-McCain-Palin-Rove! And, consider this: GW Bush is getting ready for an war-excursion into Pakistan).
GSC
Much of the initial coverage about Fort Hood turned out to be wrong. Is there anything wrong with that?
The accountability imposed by another country for the CIA's kidnapping and torture reveals much about our own.
Fox News' morning show plays to type, talking about whether Muslims in the Army should face "special debriefings"
The survivor and author is upset about comparisons some on the right are making to genocide
219 Democrats and one Republican join in favor of the legislation, which passed by a narrow margin
Salon headlines in your mailbox
