I just saw the thread title as a chyron under a piece about the incident at McCain rally yesterday when a bunch of red-faced louts took turns urging McCain to up the sleaze attacks on Barack Obama.
One of them was this dickhead (youtube), who got a roar of approval from the hate-filled, violent lynch mob which is now becoming the standard Palin/McCain audience.
I guess that the dude in question is some kind of right wing radio host in Milwaukee.
Anyway, my reason for starting the thread is to marvel at and mock the fact that Fox somehow feels it’s relevant to point out that the guy is black. Why on earth do they feel that is significant? They remind me of my late, racist grandmother from Lousiana who would speak approvingly of the N_____s who knew their place, and seemed to think it made some kind of devastating point of she could find a black person who would criticize Jesse Jackson.
Obviously, Fox thinks we’re supposed to think it’s powerfully significant that black person would be a McCain supporter or bash Obama. What other conceivable reason is there to explicitly call attention to the dude’s skin color when nothing he said had anything to do with race? This kind of thing is revealing about Fox and the right wing in general, I think. No matter what they say, they’re race obsessed. It’s all they can see, even when it has nothing to do with anything.
McCain has boxed himself in – he can either track this shit onto the debate floor, repelling everybody but his hardcore base and giving Obama an opportunity to clean it up once and for all, or he can dodge the subject and look like a total wimp in front of everybody, including (or perhaps especially) his hardcore base.
It’s not just Fox that does this. The New York Times ran a similar story yesterday and I think I saw CNN do it too. It’s one of the most annoying parts of this year’s election coverage for me. The news seems to really struggle with the idea that people don’t act as monolithic blocs - people have their own opinions even if they happen to be minorities with the same skin color as one of the candidates. I’m not sure if it’s more insulting to the minorities in question, because it REEKS of tokenism, or to the viewer/reader. :rolleyes:
It seems every poll, every rally, every aspect of this campaign is broken down by race. Percentage of blacks 18-34 planning on voting for Obama vs. McCain, etc. I read the Washington Post every day and it seems every day we get pie charts of racial breakdowns. They ran a story last month about how many Asians were at a McCain rally in Fairfax. And of course we get treated to the discussion of how many black faces one could find at the Republican convention.
I don’t think you can hardly blame Fox for pointing out race in one of its stories. It’s everywhere in this campaign.
I guess that’s why Republicans want explicit discrimination on the basis of race in all enrollment and hiring decisions. Oh wait, that’s the Democrats.
The race issue has completely saturated this election.
What pisses me off the most, personally, is that when I disclose that I’m against Obama, there’s always at least one idiot in the whatever group that claims it’s because I’m a racist.
If there were a black candidate for an office that fit my political views better than his or her opponet, they’d get my vote. I’m not voting for Obama because I disagree with his policies and proposals. Period. I’m proud that this country has finally produced a viable presidential candidate who happens to be a minority, but I oppose this individual because of his stance on the issues.
Can I volunteer to be the white guy that tells Obama to ramp it up on McCain?
Look at all the women, like Ann Coulter, who have no appreciation for the fact that 50 years ago there is no way they could have made a living at the the job they have chosen.
I’m sure you can dig back into Nazi Germany and find some Jews that admired Hitler.
I find it interesting that the liberals are the ones who are throwing around offensive racial terms here. Have you considered that bringing up those terms might be offensive or hurtful to people?
And yet somehow merely describing someone as “African American” is WORSE than invoking The N Word and “darkies”?
The level of passion you are displaying in this election is truly remarkable. I envy you.
Look, I understand that over 90% of eligible blacks in America favour Obama. On its own, this is quite understandable. On the otherhand I can’t recall of any political free election where a candidate has such a high percentage of the vote generally or from a significant segment of the population.
I can understand a passionate African American speaking out against Obama would be music to the ears of Republicans, if only because the African-American rejection of their candidate diminishes their view of themselves as inclusive of minorities. I’m only speaking of the good Republicans of course.