I saw a headline yesterday that said "Wright flap hurts Obama." What Wright says can only hurt Obama if it becomes a "flap." Have you seen the headline "Hagee (or Paisley or Fawell) flap hurts McCain"? Of course not, because there is no "flap" because no one is talking about it. The Chicago Tribune gave a great deal of space today to the "Wright flap." No mention of McCain. Even the left/liberal/progressive bloggers have stopped talking about it for the most part. So, all that is left in the media discussion is the "Wright flap." And it will continue that way all through the fall unless the media is forced to address the imbalance.

If Obama wins it will be because of the economy, the war, and people being sick of Republicans. Wright is a problem because he makes it easy for bigots like this to attack all black people, Obama included: he's the handle of the powerful lever of racial stereotypes, and Obama, and the election along with him, is on the other side of that lever. As a black man it amazes me how white people just don't get this sort of thing, how amazed and outraged they are by attitudes I see every day, attitudes that are so ingrained in people they don't know they have them themselves, would recoil in horror -- and anger -- if I pointed them out. To his credit Obama understands this as well, and has run his campaign, indeed, his life, in such a way to minimize this effect, but "minimize" does not equate to "disappear." Wright is just the beginning.

Don't be fooled into thinking that this applies only to African-Americans. The sense of threatened tribalism is at the root of movement conservatism, and always has been.

This is why it was so easy to sell most of white America on the Iraq war. Polls showed that 2/3s thought that Saddam had something to do with 9/11, or at least close ties to AlQ.

You could confront one of these people with the facts, but you would get push-back that when you parsed to down, almost always boiled down to this: "well one sand-nigger is pretty much the same as another sand-nigger, so why not start with that one?"

Take almost any one of their "thoughtful" screeds about Islam and do a global search/replace from "Islam" to "niggers" and the text becomes instantly recognizable. This racist energy had for a long time been at least partly directed towards "the Communists" but now that it isn't it is pretty much clear that Islam is now the designated nigger.

I'm getting sick and tired of all the veiled racism among media figures. Finally we have the id describing what underlies it all.

in a way, I'm wondering who wrote that. guess I could have written it, I'm an old guy that lives in a poor neighborhood, see all that stuff everday. then again, I could wonder if Chris Rock wrote it(ever see his video, "Black People Vs Niggaz"?), or maybe some of my black neighbors who are trying to move up to the middle classes and very tired of carrying the black baggage.

yes, there needs to be some (long overdue) dialogue.

Every day I see young black males wearing tee shirts down to their knees -- and jeans belted just above their knees. I'm an old guy. I want to smack them. All of them.

What the hell is it about the damn pants? People wear pants. They wear them all sorts of different ways. What the hell is the problem?

The next time Instapundit is on a talk show, I look forward to breathless dissection of his "blogger problem."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QOdlnzkeoyQ

The excerpt from this that is shown on TV by Faux and friends is misleading.

Not that that should come as a surprise.

~

...why certain white people want all black Americans to answer for the misdeeds of some black Americans. No one has ever asked me to account for Jeffrey Dahmer or Susan Smith or Timothy McVeigh. I was not asked to personally condemn Enron. I'm not even asked to explain stuff like this guy's post. I even get a pass on THAT.

Personal responsibility is all good and well as a principle, but I guess when you're looking to justify your racism, you have to put it aside. Just gets in the way otherwise.

Even a member of the John Birch Society at one point. While not a blatant racist, he subscribed to what I'd call the "Republican Code", meaning while he wouldn't say it explicitly, it was clearly the subtext.

However, even so, the "n-word" was a huge deal and absolutely forbidden. Forbidden to the point that in regards to said "punk", I literally don't know what a "nigger" (I hate to even type it) would be. Seriously - I have no vision of what constitutes one, other than the idea of an innocent black person (usually man) being labeled it out of hate. To me it doesn't describe anyone, except the speaker. It describes "hate" and "evil" to me, but to the one saying it, not the one it is being said to.

Obama's comments about his grandmother resonated with me because of my dad, but, like her, I think my dad despite his conditioned racism was a good man at heart. He would have never written or supported that evil rant you passed on.

Most particularly, even if he was a racist at some level, he didn't want to be, which is very unlike the man who wrote that ugly post you quoted.

What nazdagg said.

Many African-Americans would agree with the sentiments that Glenn Greenwald points to as racist. As did the mostly black crowd that cheered Chris Rock on.

The first step in having a conversation is to be honest, and let others be honest too. Let a white person say what Chris Rock said. The sense of relief will be tremendous.

Glenn:

I read your post and followed the link. Here's the comment I left there:

OK. Here's a comment from one of your "office liberals." I think this post is spot on. I also don't like the use of the "N" word. But, in this context, that's tough.

In fact, I think this is exactly the kind of conversation that Obama is telling us to have. Read his speech. He tells us why blacks are angry. But he also tells us why whites are angry. He says both sides have legitimate beefs. And it's the fault of both sides. And there's only two ways to deal with it: ignore it (and it will fester and won't go away), or get it out in the open (where it can get closer to fixed).

I don't know if Obama is toast. I hope not. But many commentators listened to Obama's speech and thought they heard, for the first time in many, many years, a politician talking to us like adults. Deal with this issue, dammit, he is saying. Both white and black, deal with it. Get it out in the open; express your frustration and then, horrors upon horrors, really listen to the other side.

So, I think the bigger issue is whether this country can do this. Can we carry on an adult conversation about this? Whites are sick of hearing about it - because they've never been given the social permission to respond (as you have). It will take a quantum shift. Whites and blacks will have to listen to each other without playing the race card and asking for each other's firing or scalp.

Or, do we give up, retreat to our corners?

I wouldn't be too quick to say this can't be done. Maybe it can't. But I hope it can. Otherwise, maybe we really aren't a nation of adults. And maybe, at least on this issue, Obama is just way too good for us.

This is not a partisan thing for me. I think that McCain would like to tell the country the same thing - if he dared. But this is one of those "third rail" kind of issues. Maybe Obama has touched it and is toast. Maybe it was stupid to think that this country is made up of adults (of both races). Maybe. We'll see.