Serious question about racism and xenophobia, and Obama.

[cliffordu]

(This post assumes that Obama gets nominated. Please stay with me for a moment...)

I think DU is, at it's best, a fine compilation of diverging views within the sphere of current Democratic principles.

At it's worst, it's kind of like group therapy among 10,000 close friends. After the room is set on fire. But I digress...

I know that most of the people here are neither racist or xenophobic, and that we all know that this is not the case nationwide.

My question is this: How will the Democratic Underground, and the Democratic party as a whole combat the -relentless- racism and xenophobia that is now loading up in the media......It will be a 24/7 fact of life in the General Election. And it WILL be relentless, every hideous lie and racist meme spun out through the web until they become urban legend and cannot be effectively squelched.

Is there a way to effectively preempt this onslaught? A clearing house, perhaps, that can send 100,000 emails to Bill Mahar when an asshat like Rep. Jackson, or whoever that Georgia state representative was, who got away with two of the three big lies so far about Obama - the flag pin and the hand over the heart. Mahar looked stunned about the hand over the heart...like he didn't know the truth. He should have known that night, about 100,000 times....

As far as I know there is no organized effort to at least let people who are SUPPOSED to be our allies know, let alone the subnormal freaks on the radio dial...and THEIR ADVERTISERS.

I think it might be time to start the process of getting organized on this level. I lived in Nashville and in Texas for a couple years, and although there are many fine people in these places and all across this nation, to say this is going to be an uphill battle, I think, isn't really doing the problem justice.

Overconfidence really fucked us up in 2000. I don't think we can afford another Republican.

[Swamp Rat]

1. First, we have to clean out the dittohead trolls in our own basement.

[cliffordu]

5. Where did you get the photo of my brother?

[Swamp Rat]

7. That cloned creature was spawned from Rash Limpball's warped DNA

[Johnny__Motown]

2. I think an Obama v McCain GE will be about "Middle America" I don't think that

Middle America is a bunch of racists or xenophobes.


If the far right start that crap and see people run screaming from them then the problem may take care of itself.

[quinnox]

3. no question there will be whites

who won't vote for Obama because of race. Its a sad reality but nonetheless all too real. If Hillary had won, there would be many males that wouldn't vote for her. So both of them have an extra obstacle in place to beat McCain, it will be tough, edge to McCain. I have been saying for awhile that McCain has a 60% chance to win.

[Ichingcarpenter]

4. Vote Clinton the best Republican President ever

the Government needs to fear the people.

[LibDemAlways]

6. I think for every overt attack on Obama, assuming he's the

nominee, there will be many more references to race that won't mention him at all, but that will appeal to people's prejudices and lose him votes.

20/20 last Friday was a perfect example - a story that was supposed to be about how people react when they witness a crime. The show hired three white teens to trash a car in the parking lot of a public park in the middle of the day. Hidden cameras caught many people just walking on by. Only one man called the police. Meantime, two people called the police while this was happening to report that two black men were sitting in a car parked in the same lot. Just sitting there, or, actually, sleeping there. That was enough to spur two different people to call the cops. Later the white teens were replaced by three black teens who trashed the same car. The lines to the police station lit up immediately as 10 people called the cops within a few minutes. One woman said she didn't like to see this happening in her "backyard." The announcer solemnly stated that white people apparently fear black males.

I'm sure we'll be getting a lot more of this as the months wear on. Race baiting that isn't specifically about Obama but that serves as a reminder to whites that blacks are somehow scary.
How effectively he can counter this type of crap remains to be seen.