The Politics Thread

[ReddFoxx]

A new Washington Post poll has Obama up 4 in Virginia. If that holds and it certainly could hold up with a only a week to go, Romney's chances of reaching 270 are infinitesimal.

[Vee]

There's nothing official on Romney and Ohio. It's just scuttlebutt right now, though I could swear I had seen a few reputable articles regarding backchannel talk in the past couple days. Let me see what I can find.

The media is trying to pretend Romney still has a shot in Ohio, because without that shot that's the end of the horse race. He really doesn't. As per Nate Silver (who the right wing is now smearing as "an effeminate castrati"):

Edited October 28, 2012 by Vee

[marceline]

It all comes back to the fact that for all the talk of a liberal media, the truth is that the media is owned by corporations who want Romney to win.

I feel like Nate Silver needs to go into hiding after the election.

Edited October 28, 2012 by marceline

[Vee]

The thing is, the Romney momentum myth was dispelled in the last week or so - it was all a bluff. The numbers did not back it up. They've started coming to terms with that, but they continue to pretend he is competitive in Ohio when he's really not very competitive. Except without Ohio there is no game.

Sandy or no Sandy, they'll have to face up to that sometime late next week in order to avoid looking like fools on the 6th. I think Nate Silver and most other reliable predictions had Obama at 290-295 EV.

[Wales2004]

So back to John Sununu for a minute....can someone explain to me the point of getting riled up over what he said?

It seems to me that the focus should have remained on Colin Powell's statement instead of acknowledging that John Sununu was trying to distract and then giving him the distraction he wanted.

The focus on racism should be on physical and other tangible damaging acts. Not on this type of nonsense that gives people "racism" fatigue and allows serious acts to go unnoticed.

This cycle of having "experts" come out and say the same things over and over again, push their latest book, and claim we need a national dialogue on race is pretty useless. How did that work after the outrage over Don Imus and Dr. Laura?

They should start that dialogue with the definition of race because I for one, would love to know how come black people are the only race that unite over race and not nationality, etc. How come black people are the only race which apparently has a speech pattern, dances, sings, is ath-a-letic, eats fried chicken, watermelon, looks like monkeys, apes, shares the same pea brain? Did I leave anything out? I would love to hear the answer to that.

I would also love to hear the "experts" offer a resolution to the problem as I have yet to hear a single one of them say anything beyond stop racial profiling.

[DRW50]

Comments like Sununu's aren't just isolated. They all go together as part of a deliberate attempt to push a racist view on the public. And it tends to work.

http://www.dallasnews.com/news/politics/national-politics/20121027-ap-poll-majority-of-americans-harbor-prejudice-against-blacks.ece

[marceline]

Exactly. It's just the modern version of the Southern Strategy. "Black people are bad. They'll always stick together. You don't want them in power."

What's amazing is that the same people who claim Powell only endorsed Obama because of race will then turn around and berate black voters for not supporting Herman Cain, Allen West or Artur Davis. All these people care about is hating on black voters who look out for their own interests.

[Wales2004]

I don't believe the polling regarding the increase. It would make more sense to me if they polled the same group of people and noted a change in their attitudes.

I understand the political strategy of using race but everyone else makes it so much easier by constantly being shocked over things that are said. Look how much time is taken up with minutiae.

At the end of the day, who did John Sununu really harm? The ignorant people that are more likely to be swayed by whatever he says were of that mind in the first place. How many rational logical people actually heard him and said "oh that must be true?"

There's entirely too much whining going on. I've even heard people whining about someone calling them "black." Why? Because someone white called them black which means it has to be racism.

Is it hard to see why even the most patient reasonable person can get tired of hearing these complaints over and over again and eventually get tired of it and just start tuning it out so that legitimate complaints aren't taken seriously?

[Wales2004]

I don't think those people give two flying figs about black voters. They just riling people up and watching them all run around like they've lost their minds because stirring up confusion makes them feel victorious.

So far they've done an excellent job at setting the confusion in motion.

[DRW50]

John Sununu's comment is not in isolation. People have been saying this type of comment about Obama for five years now. Day after day after day of the media giving a megaphone to people who say:

- Obama only gets support because he's black

along with

- Obama wasn't born in the US

- Obama needs to go back to Africa

- Obama hates America and plots to destroy it

- Obama is lying to the public about his evil past

- Obama is a secret "race hustler" who is only in office to ruin the white man.

This isn't some Tea Party heckler, this comes from people who command national media attention, and adoration. Michelle Bachmann. Donald Trump. John Sununu. Ann Coulter. The families of prominent politicians like Romney and Tommy Thompson.

There's a basic derision and dehumanization which overtakes almost all the coverage of Obama, whereas any support for Obama is usually just dismissed as being based on race, or being part of a fading cult.

There's often this idea that people who object to these comments are too "PC", too "shrill," need to get over it, make things worse. But these comments, when all lumped together, for years on end, become part of the public consciousness. It's an adult version of the ugly slurs that often line the school hallways, one that, if anyone ever complained, all they got in return was, "If you bring it up you'll just make it worse."

Edited October 28, 2012 by CarlD2

[DRW50]

Of course they care about black voters. If they didn't they wouldn't have spent so many years disenfranchising them in every way possible.

[Ann_SS]

You got that right. Those SOBs do not just care about black voters, they are DAMN obsessed with them (and Latino voters). It is their obsession that made the Republicans spend ALL that time and money going all the way to the Supreme Court to reduce early voting hours or create the voter fraud myth to restrict voter id or put up voter intimidation billboards in minority neighborhoods or send white poll watchers in to minority neighborhoods to intimidate voters. The comments by Sununu and his ilk are ways to sow fear of the "violent angry black person" taking over the country. One thing this election has made clear and that is that the Republicans and some other whites remain in shock and disbelief that a black man was elected President and that it will happen again. This is exactly the reason for all these comments along with the "liberal guilt" accusations that have been flung around.

Edited October 28, 2012 by Ann_SS

[marceline]

I disagree. These remarks come from the "angry white men" that the GOP tries to cultivate. These are the people who look at the very near future and see themselves becoming the minority which makes them utterly and completely hysterical. Sununu plays the "all blacks stick together" card because it taps into the fear of these white men that they will be treated the same way they have treated racial minorities, women and LGBT people. Sununu deriding Colin Powell was the same as the way Bryan Fischer campaigned for Mitt Romney to fire his gay staffer (whose name escapes me at the moment). It's the same message: don't let the blanks get power because if they do they will discriminate against you. It's an epic form of projection.

[Wales2004]

Do I have any reason to believe that the people to whom this lot appeals would want to support Barack Obama? They're echoing the beliefs or thoughts of their constituents/supporters.

The coverage I've seen of Barack Obama lacks a middle ground. It's to both extremes. He's the worst ever and all the things you pointed out. Or he's the man who can do no wrong except when certain people like Chris Matthews are mad that he doesn't react the way he wants, or the disillusioned who don't think he's lived up to their expectations. Black people who criticize him are usually labeled as race traitors.

People can keep complaining if that's what they want to do. I personally don't see the repetitive cycle as progressive but I don't want to keep people from their complaints. I knew from day one that Barack Obama would encounter racism so while I might sometimes shake my head, I'm not going to get stuck on it.

They're trying to disenfranchise voters for their own benefit which is wrong. The rest of the narrative is that the laws are aimed at the poor and the poor are apparently all black. I don't like the fact that they wanted these voter i.d. laws implemented during the middle of a presidential election cycle. I think it should be effective across the board January 1. 2013.

I see immigrants come here and get driver's licenses (legitimately) and identification cards so if the hardship was a story of the elderly not getting their i.d. it would make more of an impact. At some point it becomes easier for other people to look at black Americans as being weak and pathetic because groups of people including immigrants from the African continent, come in and seemingly hit the ground running.

[DRW50]

I think there is a mix of cynical efforts to stop any Democratic-leaning voters, and genuine racism. There have long been two camps in the GOP - the Rove and Lee Atwater types who harness hatred for gain, and the true believers, who loathe and detest all the "others". I'd say the latter have now taken over more and more, and you are getting more and more people who are skilled manipulators as well as probably not faking their prejudices and bigotries (Jim DeMint, Rick Santorum).

There's also an effort out there which focuses on stopping college kids from being able to vote - a New Hampshire legislator early this year essentially said he was pushing to stop college kids from voting because they were too young and too stupid to know they shouldn't vote for Democrats.