Would You All Get It Through Your Heads that Talking Race Hurts Obama???

[kurtboss]

It marginalizes him.

Unless you have some Maccaca moment from McCain, it actually hurts Obama when this is brought up.

And if there is a Maccaca type moment, my guess is there won't need to be any real debate or discussion.

[BlooInBloo]

1. (beats the elephant back behind the curtain.)

[endarkenment]

2. I have heard a rumor that Obama is black.

Do you know anything about this?


Seriously, you need to wise up. It is called dog-whistling. They know exactly what they are doing. They will come as close as they can to outright saying 'don't vote for the n*', and whenever anyone objects to their racist crap, they will feign shock and indignantly declare 'you are playing the race card'. Fuck them. McCaint has allowed his campaign to go right in the gutter and there is no way that the Obama campaign should or will allow that to go unchallenged.

[elehhhhna]

4. AND he has two black children. With a black woman! OH NOES!!1!!11111111

[kurtboss]

15. Racists Know He's Black....

McCain just wants us talking about it.

You don't convert racists.

[babylonsister]

3. You can choose to ignore it, but that doesn't mean a thing. As Gene

Robinson wrote...

http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/20080804_mccains_race_baiting_scoundrels/

This battle over Obama’s image as a black man is arguably the central front of the presidential campaign right now. Once-sharp lines between the candidates on issues such as withdrawing U.S. troops from Iraq or allowing new offshore oil drilling are becoming blurred. The Democratic Party’s structural advantages going into the election are formidable. It’s hard to imagine how McCain could possibly win unless he generates doubt in voters’ minds about Obama.

[kurtboss]

7. Yes McCain Wants to Talk Race...Get the Picture?

He wants to win. What he wants generally is goof for him and not Obama.

[endarkenment]

9. "What he wants generally is goof for him and not Obama. "

I couldn't agree more with what you wrote. Not what you meant, but what you wrote.

[kurtboss]

12. Yes He is a Goof

But he knows talking race only helps him, not Obama

[scheming daemons]

5. Wait..... he's black?

[tekisui]

6. Nah. It actually scare the shit out of mcSurge.

When asked how Obama played the race card, he drew a blank, and then lied that Obama retracted his comments.

McSurge thought it would hurt Obama, then got a rude awakening. I doubt the old fart will mention it again.

[tekisui]

8. I contend that racists do not have a voting majority in this country.

[kurtboss]

13. Bingo....And, They already know he's black

So the race business is just a distraction.

[MadMaddie]

14. I second that

Americans have been conditioned by the Media and the Republicans to think that the racist are majority.

Clarification...update

[mloutre]

20. What? You mean Americans *aren't* a majority?

Damn. This is what I get for cancelling my Boston Globe subscription last month. I mean, who knew?



:0)

[MadMaddie]

26. ha..ha..good catch...I fixed it

[JackORoses]

10. so tell Bill to shut up about it already

[MadMaddie]

11. Sooooo Obama and his supporters should do like Kerry

just ignore the slander, innuendo's and it will all go away?

That worked out real well for Kerry!

When McCain puts out commercials claiming he and only he is a true and patriotic American, (which implies that Obama is not because of various reasons like race and where he grew up and where he was born) the Democratic party is obligated to refute and expose the bullshit.

Why the fuck is everyone so afraid of talking about race. Race is rooted in the very fabric of this country....it's time to grow up and admit it.


<snip> it actually hurts Obama when this is brought up. <snip>
So every time Obama's black face is put on the television screen it hurts him?

It is not Obama playing the race card it is the Republicans...and it is backfiring on them.

[kurtboss]

22. When It's Race Yes

Unless it's damn obvious it's a loser.

Again, are you going to convert racists to vote for Obama or hoping they don't notice he's black? I mean what is the point.


The only advantage is if the majority non-bigots were to get disgusted with McCain over something.

And yes really dense, white people will not stand bigotry....but it has to be stupidly obvious.

[MadMaddie]

27. So your answer is to let McCain and his surrogates use

Race as a swiftboat tactic and not call them on the lies?

That just reflects weakness....yes it is damned if you do damned if you don't...but it also shows McCain that everytime he opens his trap trying to pull some bullshit he is going to get called on it....

Trust me if Obama were to all of a sudden stop defending himself against the racist attacks then the story would be Obama not proud of his Black American heritage.


McCains campaing is going to ensure this is not a color blind political race.

This is not Obama playing the race card, he has every right as an American to refute the bullshit lies. You have to keep in mind it is also the way that Obama's campaign is responding to the attacks. The responses are measured, not shrill and they always, always are based in facts.

[XemaSab]

16. I'm hoping that the more we talk about it the more the American people are over it

I mean, the 50th time you say "Look, a black man!" people aren't going to look, because they just don't care.

[kurtboss]

19. First Reasonable Argument I've Heard In Favor of It

But I don't see any indication people aren't hooked on racism talk. The country is a like a bunch of junkies.

[Major Hogwash]

32. Gawd, I would hope so.

It gets old hearing about it after awhile.

[blondeatlast]

17. When Pat Buchanan stops talking about it, MAYBE I will. As long as Pat's scoring points among whites

of privilege who are dying to use the *n* or *u* words and just waiting for Pat to open the gates, it's a MAJOR issue--because the RW is making it one.

[kurtboss]

18. So Your Premise is That Buchanan will Convince People to Become Racists?

I mean think this shit through.

If they're not going to vote for him, they won't.

As others have said, that doesn't make up much of this population...and, thankfully, they're basically GOP votes to begin with, so he doesn't lose anything.

[mloutre]

21. No, he'll just convince some people that it's okay to admit it.

I mean, it's always worked for him...

[kurtboss]

24. So Pat Is Going Make People Realize They're Bigots and Vote Against Obama?

Again, not to be a dick, but I just don't think that's how this works.


If you're a racist you aren't voting for him. Pat Buchanan won't matter.

[mloutre]

29. repeating my previous point -- what Buchanan et al are doing is providing cover to closet bigots

...so they don't feel so sheepish about admitting their closet bigotry in public.

[Raineyb]

31. Anyone who claims not to be a bigot but won't vote for a black man is still a bigot

What exactly would you have us do? Pretend the man isn't black? Race is going to be brought up. That can't be helped because the Republicans are pigs. Not mentioning it at all makes it sound like something that has to be overcome and it is not.

Regards

[blondeatlast]

23. No--Pat's trying to make it okay for them to publicly use race as an excuse.

He's been carved up by Eugene Robinson and Rachel Maddow over it but the "moderators" never call him on it at all.

He's outright said (On Hardball, last week) that race should be PROMOTED as an issue and used in ads.

But go ahead, ignore it if it makes you feel better about yourself.

[kurtboss]

25. Yes, As it Hurts Obama to Talk about It

He and the GOP want to talk about it.

They want to play we're the victims of affirmative action. We can't talk because of Political Correctness.

Then they get the non-bigots all dismissive as they don't like being called racists or thought to support a racist candidate.

America does not want to deal with race, only to bitch and point fingers.

[mloutre]

30. Oh, I see. Never mind. Replying to this poster is a clear-cut case of NTTTAPTS Syndrome.

Like my Tennessee grandma always told us:

"Never try to teach a pig to sing.

It wastes your time, and it annoys the pig."

You clearly are a one-note johnny, sir, and I'll not waste any more time giving you room to prove how tone-deaf you are.

[blondeatlast]

34. Well, he can't any longer; the tombstone gets in the way... nt

[northernlights]

28. not necessarily

Ignoring the race baiting lets them remind some people of their biggest fears about Obama.

Discussing race only hurts Obama if McCain succeeds in making people think Obama is playing the race card, or if it changes the dialog for the rest of the race. But the race doesn't really get going until Sept. so there's time to get this out of the way. In the meantime it's a very risky tactic because it can boomerang.

And I think it did boomerang last Sunday, at the moment that Gergen said straight out that everybody raised in the south *knows* that "arrogant" is code for "uppity." The stunned looks on the rest of the pundit faces, George Wills incoherent sputtering, said it all.

As long as they get called on their attempts to race-bait under the radar, then it boomerangs. Now they have to be very careful about what they say and how they say it. Just call them on *every* code word, *every* euphanism.

Honesty and openness leaves them sputtering and speechless because there is no good, effective response. It turns the tables on them. It forces them to defend or deny their own very immoral behavior. And then they become a lot less likely to continue the discussion because it's not going the way they wanted or expected.

They *hate* to be confronted with straight talk because then they lose. Every time. In fact, it forces them to defend the statement, and raises doubts in everybody's minds abouth *their* racism.

When Liebermouse (sorry to mice everywhere!) and McCan't called Obama a handsome, well spoken, young man, my *first* response was to wonder if that wasn't a code for "boy." And I sent my thoughts off to the author of one of the articles.

It's not unlike when some jerkoff starts spouting about "killing unborn babies" and I tell them to get their noses out of my uterus. It changes the discussion from women's need to be protected from their own potential immorality into the absolute immorality of some stranger controlling what goes on in someone else's uterus. It turns it into a discussion of who the hell owns my body anyway, me or some white wasp in Washington along with some southern born again baptist.

[rucky]

33. You don't have to tapdance around it.

If race comes up, you talk about race. If it doesn't, it's not an issue.

[CitizenPatriot]

35. it doesn't hurt him

he's black. so what? it hurts the people who have something to hide.

they're racist and we're not afraid to call them out on it. I have more faith in the majority of Americans to be appalled by the inherent racism of the McCain campaign than I do fear that they will hold Obama's race against him. the people who are racist tend to be die-hard right fundy extremists. they're not our problem -- they are irrelevant (so long as you don't live near them or let them take over your government and influence law -- ooops).

Studies have been done on how to handle this stuff- by experts- and someone on DU wrote about it on the Journal Page. The recommendations from the experts were not to run and play deaf -- call it out. It's not our shame to hide. And Obama never makes it the issue. He addressed the intent of their attack, removes the power from it, and then gets down to the business of running a country. Next problem.