Letters to the Editor
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lumi
We've heard your talking points about a million times before, they're like bad tee vee reruns, and they just don't score.
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Dear Joan Walsh ...
I don't know if you'll read this. You seem to ignore most of my other comments addressed to you (not that I blame you). But I was skimming through these comments and I noticed that you wrote early on (page 10, or so) to say this:
Joan Walsh: "Nice letter, chicadow. As I've said before, Obama deserves better supporters. And yes, dataguyx, the Klinton Kult Krap is beneath you. Thanks to those who read the post and tried to understand."
I went back and read the chicadow post. It was garbage, drawing on Irish-Catholic stereotypes and basically not offering anything other than insults. I don't recall having seen chicadow post before.
But I am a little sorry to see you lump chicadow into all Obama supporters. ("Obama deserves better supporters.") Do you really think that his comments are representative of Obama supporters? I find people like that to be the exception and not the rule. Many of the Obama supporters on here maintain somewhat reasonable and non-insulting tones in what they write. I try to be one of them.
The other thing that strikes me about your comment is that it makes me wonder if you are not paying attention to the comments from Clinton supporters? For example, read through the posts from Cythera45 (whose litany of abusive and violent insults I once turned into a jam-packed song) and tell me that Obama supporters are any worse than Clinton supporters. Is it possible that you have a bias that causes you to notice the negativity of one side more than the other?
Another thing I want to say is this: You've written at length about what Obama said. What do you think of his follow-up? More importantly, what do you think of how Hillary Clinton is jumping on this to make it seem like Obama said something much worse than he actually said? The Hillary Clinton campaign is spreading around buttons that say "I'm not bitter." They're going whole-hog on this -- creating a controversy and rallying cry out of next to nothing. What do you think of that? Do you consider it fair game, in the same manner that you said Clinton's use of out-of-context comments by Obama about the Reagan era were also "fair"?
I will say this about Obama: He has attempted to carefully walk a thin line between (1) a positive message based on getting beyond old political divisions, and (2) being able to fight back and with as much sharp-toothed vigor as his opponents. And yet, when Obama does attack, can you recall a single time when Obama tried to score rhetorical points based on something that was out-of-context and that people listening were likely to misunderstand? I submit that Obama has not made this a practice of his campaign, while Hillary Clinton does it whenever it is expedient. This is why I prefer Obama -- he wants to win, but he wants to win the right way.
What do you think?
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Argh
I am feeling very bold.
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Ed Rendell: PA is not ready to vote for a Black Man for President.
Ed Rendell also stated that the middle of his state was like Alabama.
Where is your article Joan on Ed Rendell calling the voters of his state racists or rednecks.
Where was the outrage from Pennsylvanians. Never seen it or heard it.
Obama is telling people that they vote against there own interest by voting on things they consider close to them.
When in reality those things really don't effect there everyday life.
Why they tell you they want to take away your guns, stop abortions, teach kids that women were created from a man's rib, stop the Gay's from marrying, and that the Mexicans are coming everything in your life is getting worse.
You continue to make choices on these issues that won't feed one mouth you have to feed.
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Studs Terkel - Race (sorry, long, but I think relevant)
So I was going to stay out of this, because 500+ posts just seems a little silly to me. But, I can't hold my tongue. I was reading Studs Terkel's book, "Race," this weekend, and I found an interesting, and I think relevant, passage. It's an interview with an ex-Klansman (a Klan leader actually) named C.P. Ellis. He talks about two things: 1) why he became a Klansman, and 2) how community and labor organizing changed his mind on all of it. In Mr. Ellis' own words:
"I worked seven days a week, open and close, and finally had a heart-attack. Just about two months before the last payment of that loan. My wife had done the best she could to keep it runnin'. Tryin' to come out of that hole, I just couldn't do it."
"I really began to get bitter. I didn't know who to blame. I tried to find somebody. I began to blame it on black people. I had to hate somebody. Hatin' America is hard to do because you can't see it to hate it. You gotta have somethin' to look at to hate it. The natural person for me to hate would be black people, because my father before me was a member of the Klan."
This man changed though. First he began to realize that he, and other Klan members were being used by local politicians to do their racist dirty work. Those politicians were also pandering to the Klan for votes - all very secretly though. He realized that he was being used when he noticed those same politicians didn't want to be seen with him in public.
No longer content to be a pawn, Mr. Ellis got involved in his community. He started by working toward local school reforms. This forced the man to work with blacks in the community - people he hated. That hatred started to go away, slow at first, but then with increasing momentum. He went on to become a labor organizer, putting his Klan-learned leadership skills toward something positive. His revelation was that wedge issues were wasting his life. Involvement in public service changed him, and, seeing him changed helped many others change, both black and white.
This is what Barack is talking about. There is no lie or condescension to it. How do we change? We refuse to be used. We refuse to allow wedge issues to define us. We abandon bitterness for hope. And we take action, from the bottom up.
My only wish is that Barack would actually finish the sentence. People are bitter, and politicians exploit that bitterness. The exploitation of bitterness is where the true condescension lies.
Now call me an Obamabot, and dismiss what you know to be the truth.