election, go over to Slate Magazine and check out what has been posted there on sites like Ballot Box, Today's Papers and Politics regarding Sen. Obama's color.

What people say about racism when asked directly and what they think are two different things.

You're concerened with ad hominen remarks after referring to specific people in the article as backwards dimwits? Do you just not get that your attitude is what people hate about liberals? You can write off anyone you please, because you're about to be written off in this election.

Have you at least contributed money to Obama? If only that comes out of our dialogue, I'll consider my work done here.

He spoke to random people. This is not exactly a statistically significant sample.

So am I in the land of simply illogical? Because yes, I do believe that there are small town racists out there. They also don't like women. Yelling that Obama shouldn't have been voted for because racists exist isn't exactly a good argument to make as a woman. That cuts both ways. Sexism exists, too. Does that mean we never let a woman run again?

That post was beneath you. I can not believe you meant it that way. Because if you are trying to argue that the "Muslim" people are not racist...someone has body snatched you. Sane people who did not want to vote for Obama said "healthcare" or "education policy" or "military policy" and articulated why. The true idiots say "empty suit", "lacking experience" or "Muslim" and can't articulate what that stuff means. They just repeat it like a parrot, and shut up or shift topics when people press them on why.

I know good people who present logical reasons not to vote for Obama. "He's a Muslim" is not one of them. Nor is "empty suit". Those are people parroting bullshit from the TV, because they know they won't vote for a black man and they aren't going to bother to look further.

If your point is that we shouldn't have a black nominee because some people are racist, then we shouldn't have a female nominee because some unknown number of regularly Republican voters are sexist. Anything else is a double standard. And they we know 35% of Clinton's voters said that they were going to vote for Mccain in the election.

The question is how to turn the hearts of people who are listening. There are more people in the suburbs and exburbs than the areas that this man is talking about. There are potentials out there who are listening, who are economically bleeding.

At some point people need to love their children more than they fear a black man. Why the rich guy yells fear and they yell "outsider", the rich guy steals their money and sends their kid off to get killed in war. Oh, and the rich lady (because hockey is damn expensive) want to nuke Russia (because the only way we get war with Russia right now is nukes- we have no soldiers in reserve for a NATO attack).

To paraphrase Sting, I hope these people love their children too.

I am refering to your "land of illogical and land of idiots" post. We cross posted. The newer post is better.

Most people here consider themselves exponentially smarter than the average bumpkin. But even the average bumpkin knows not to insult the people whose votes you desperately need.

The Thursday night interview with Sarah Palin included a brief discussion of the Republics of Georgia. She made the point that Georgia should be in NATO. That way, the next time Russia crosses the border, we will join the fight. I was stunned, but then I realized that for people Palin's age or less, fear of nuclear war belongs with fear of monsters under the bed. Being from Alaska, she should know that a wounded bear is among the most dangerous animals on Earth. If that wounded bear has nuclear teeth, civilization itself is at risk.

I'm 42. I saw duck and cover videos, I got everything about the communists being bad, and we had the "The Day After" holocaust movie to boot. It's not her age. She's simply incompetent and/or batshit crazy. There is no way we are going to war with Russia over Georgia, because Russia has nukes and would use them. She might believe in "survivable nuclear war" but competent people do not. She is INCOMPETENT and she proved it last night. We do NOT HAVE ENOUGH SOLDIERS TO PUT THEM ON THE GROUND AND WE DO NOT HAVE BASES CLOSE ENOUGH OR BIG ENOUGH TO STAGE FROM. The fact that she said that should disqualify her from this whole thing.

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Loved your post, and it's a damn good question that bears repeating:

Why doesn't anyone ever complain that McCain & co "just don't get" well-educated, cosmopolitan, urban voters?

I had an interesting exchange with another Salon poster, pseudonymouslawyer over the weekend who made an excellent point which also bears repeating:

Agreed on McCain as economic simpleton. I wish someone would ask him, for example, how he can have anything remotely resembling an understanding of the challenges facing the American economy (and in particular the challenges facing small business) given that he doesn't know how to use a computer or the internet, by his own admission. How can he possibly have a grasp of the way shit works and what the problems are if he hasn't even had the rudimentary experience of, say, buying a book on Amazon? Yet it is entirely possible that we will wind up with a man without the experience of rowing a dinghy at the helm of the ship of state, as it were. It boggles the mind. I have a hard time imagining Gramm getting confirmed as anything in a hypothetical McCain cabinet given his massive fuck-up ("a nation of whiners") on the campaign and where UBS is at at the moment. Of course, we wound up with plenty of doozeys with Bush 43 (Aschroft and Gonzales leap to mind), so I guess I won't be shocked if Secretary Gramm happens.

Today, the Obama campaign has an ad running addressing McCain's lack of knowledge about the internet and how he "doesn't get it".

It isn't all about guns, gays, and god.