Yee-haw...I can almost hear the music from "Deliverance" in the background.

I'm white, from New Jersey and recently visited Hilton Head, SC. What I heard about Obama mostly started with the letter "N". Even from schoolteachers.

I live in an area that is populated with white people who proudly proclaim their red-necked, conservative status. I am, in fact, related to one. She told me recently that she doesn't like to admit that other people are smarter than her. She actually finds smart people threatening. If you look around, you may find some of that at the root of Obama's problem. Republican candidates dumb themselves down so that the average voter can see themselves in their reflection. Everyone wants to feel like they could be president, and admitting that you need a really smart person for the job means admitting that you might not be able to do it.

The comments and excuses here are just despicable. And I thought I'd seen everything the left could offer in hate towards Hillary and women during the primary.It's official: Salon is the left's answer to the Free Republic and the KKK.

They're not "yokels" and "hicks" and "idiots" and "racist uneducated trash". They're regular hard working people devastated by the economy who told you loud and clear they trusted Hillary to fix it. They're only sin is in not accepting on blind faith that an empty suit with eyebrow raising affiliations would somehow be able to fix things havng no record or experience to prove it. Which to me proves they at least are in posession of some of the critical thinking Obama's radical pondscum supporters aren't.

In fact over half the party told you they thought Obama wasn't a good idea - including all the big electoral states from New Jersey to California and all the battleground states: Michigan, Florida, Pennsylvania, Ohio and so forth- that McCain has surpassed Obama in or is neck and neck with.

You're a hateful lousy bunch and it will be a pleasure to watch your candidate be resoundingly rejected as he should be.

In my opinion, race is the issue in my "small" town. In fact, I do not have an Obama-Biden bumper sticker or yard sign since I do not want my car or house vandalized. It is even more profound that my kids tend to be almost silent on our support for Obama-Biden (at school, church etc). Albeit, with things looking like 50-50, we shall see the results of our "American" values "test". Either way, if Obama-Biden wins, they will be governing 50% of bitter people. So, we have lost anyhow. Suffice to say, evolution will correct all of this in the long haul.

@Dissent

"That's why I'm pursuing citizenship in the EU."

I admire a leftist who takes the initiative to fix the problem he/she perceives. Instead of spending your life among people who poke fun at your PBS tote bag, go forth and live in that perfect world you've always dreamed of.

.. because they know the true feelings of many rural (and suburban and urban) whites. The death knell of the Democratic Party - despite Clinton's two victories, neither overwhelming - was Jesse Jackson's success in '84 and '88. When Sam Donaldson proclaimed an end to "white male dominated" politics, it jump started something in the Republicans. Over time they have led voters to believe that a vote for the Democrats is a vote for the party of Jesse. It wasn't overt (?), but subliminal enough to work. The other tact, which began as a defensive shield for the "comfortably dumb" Dubya, was to make Americans suspicious of intelligence. Bush vs. Gore was Regis vs. Trebek. Don't trust the guy that's smarter than you! I watched this years Republican Convention and thought that with all this anti-elitism talk, they must be glad William F. Buckley is dead.

Thus to many, Barack is the embodiment of all they've grown to hate and/or mistrust. And some of you guys are right: few things stir up resentment more than an intelligent Black man. Consider the narrative: learn to read and face punishment or death (why?), to every type of hurdle possible to enter the University of your choice (why?). So to many White Americans who have been taught that Blacks are too lazy and not as smart as they are, it's almost like finding out there is no God.

Racism is not a characteristic you can glean from the electorate by asking them about it - they will deny it, and they will go out of their way, at times, to seem the opposite of what they are. This is why, in the late primaries, Obama pre-election poll numbers were higher than his actual vote. The question Hoyle should've asked, and endeavored to answer, is whether or not the incredible tension of racism (which results in, for instance, a disproportionate death row population, an unequal educational system, and the lack of true proportional representation in the House and Senate) has subsided sufficiently to allow an Africa-American to become president. And the way he should've attempted to answer that is to look at the indices - the results - of racism in society - because bigotry never shows itself in anything except results.

It is a question that is worth asking - and worth answering and solving. And it is a question that many Democrats should've asked, and answered, last January.

Shut the fuck up, you fucking asshole. Fuck you and your eight years of that treasonous piece of shit and his lackey McCain. You are a blackhearted little pig with no soul. We have had enough of you mouthbreathing racist ignorant motherfuckers. Maybe its high time for a Second Civil War.

"He may not be a Muslim, but he sure ain't no Christian."

"It's called the WHITE House for a reason." (followed by a huge guffaw)

"His name could be John Smith, I will never vote for a n*gger"

I'm sure more "pearls of wisdom" followed, but at that point I left the room.

If I had be a journalist, they would have cleaned it up a bit, but this is how they really feel.

And yes, these hateful people vote.