Do we really want to be accused of being racist for the next four years? I don’t.
It seems that every time Barack Obama is criticized, the media or someone associated with Barack Obama screams racism. If it’s a reach they just claim that the offenders are speaking “in code.” I guess I wasn’t sent my “white guy decoder ring” for this election because these accusations of racism seem pretty weak to me. But more importantly, I don’t think it raises the level of discourse and I don’t think it’s good for the country in the long run.
– Bill Clinton was accused of racism for comparing Obama to a “fairy tale.”
– Sarah Palin was accused of racism because she said Obama was “palling around with terrorists.” She was referring to Bill Ayers who is a terrorist (and a white one) but the Associated Press said most people think of terrorists as dark skinned so Palin’s a racist.
– John McCain has been accused of racism for pointing to Obama and saying “that one” during the debate.
– James Carville subtly hinted at massive riots if Obama loses going into the election ahead in the opinion polls.
– Harry Reid said to a radio talk show host: “[Franklin] Raines, who you’re talking about, worked for Fannie Mae, was there for a while. The only connection that people could bring up about Raines and Barack Obama is that they both are African-American, other than that there is nothing.”
– PBS journalist Ray Suarez said the “pseudo controversies” about Obama’s background being raised by Palin and McCain are symbols for a “racial calculus” hard at work in U.S. politics. (Racial calculus? Is that the new Math?)
I think that politically it helps Obama in the short term because it makes his political opponents have to think twice about everything they say. And it gives all of McCain’s statements a ‘speech by committee’ feel to them – as if they’ve been scrubbed clean by lawyers. John McCain is like an athlete thinking about his shot.
I fear the media will see metaphorical wolves everywhere the closer McCain gets in the polls. In fact, expect race to be the center of media attention the last week of the campaign. But soon, America will just stop listening. It’s like in all political discourse, the comparisons to Hitler abound. Every Republican has been compared with Hitler at some point. But soon, all the metaphors make us forget how to know the real Hitlers when we see them. And if these outlandish accusations of racism continue without merit, people will stop listening altogether. And we won’t recognize the real thing.
October 10, 2008 at 3:07 pm
I already stopped listening a long time ago, somewhere around the first O.J. trial. The words “racist/racism/racial” etc., have been rendered almost completely meaningless by those who carelessly make the accusations those words imply; they’ve lost all sense of what a true racist is. When someone does make the accusation, I immediately think that person is racist him/herself or that they have no capacity for real thought about the given argument. It’s become a tool for many who just want to stifle and silence someone else who disagrees with them. If someone ever accused me of being a “racist” I would say, “Funny, I was thinking that YOU’RE the racist,” and see how they react. There’s also this default (and dangerous) attitude out there that assumes that people of certain races CAN’T be racists.
October 10, 2008 at 5:50 pm
It is calculated.
Cry racism, and sooner or later nobody wants to deal with it any more, and it permits one to get away with any amount of race-mongering.
Cry voter fraud, and sooner or later the media and public get too weary to notice when one is actually committing it oneself.
The irony is, the attempts get so outlandish that nobody can quite believe it… One can be fairly open about palling around with openly-avowed enemies to the country, while simultaneously accusing critics of being the real enemies for daring to ask about the connections. One can be a demagogue and sit in a racist church for 20 or so years while claiming that “The Man” is just hating by talking about it. One can attempt to game an election, and trying to do anything about it means dealing with “ZOMG Their stealing teh election!!1!” Well, no… quite the reverse. It’s so brazen that people ought to (and have, and will again) go to jail, but pressing those charges just before the actual election looks like a politically-motivated ploy, rather than an honest effort to ensure a fair ballot.
This is common strategy among radicals – cast doubt on the social norms, economic systems, and civic processes; cause problems in order to exploit the natural tendency of the majority to have something done to help fix the problems; enact “solutions” that move things closer to shifting power away from the common people to a concentrated few.
October 11, 2008 at 12:48 am
exactly…again, i pray that common sense will prevail…however, I’m afraid that this election is going to somehow be seen as redemption for all of the oppressed years.
October 11, 2008 at 3:36 pm
I agree that most of these comments were not in fact racist – but I did find it tasteless for Palin to claim Obama was “paling around with” a terrorist. Those of us who are familiar with how a board works in the business community realize that two people belonging to a board does not make them great buddies. Also – many individuals hold fund raisers for politicians and it doesn’t make them best buds.
So while I do agree here that the cry of racism is far too frequent – I think scaring your voters into thinking Obama is dangerous is just wrong. I don’t believe John McCain, Sarah Palin, or any of the republicans think he is a danger. I think they realize that some of the American public do think so, so are having their fun with it.
October 12, 2008 at 3:13 am
Anon 10:36,
If you were on a board with Timothy McVeigh, wouldn’t you at least say something about how incredibly inappropraite it was for him to be there? And would you let him help launch your political career? Positively review a book he wrote? Bill Ayers is the same kind of man as Timothy McVeigh–just with a lower body count and better luck. I think McCain and Palin are right to bring this up–it is significan to the kind of man Obama is.
–Elizabeth B.