by I suppose it had to happen sooner than later.
The attacks against Obama’s skin color have been hitting him hard and heavy over the last week due to his spectacular rise in Iowa. We expect Karl Rove to bang on Obama.
I didn’t think the Clintons and their friends would step so low so fast.
The cutting down of Obama by Rove and the Clintons with coded Hate Speech
— is both overt and suggestive — but the end effect remains the same:
Color his skin with darker emotion and falsities that pretend to live
as truths.
On December 16, 2007 Bill Clinton — a Southern boy — brought up the stereotype of Blacks as lazy gamblers:
Former President Bill Clinton made an unusually direct attack Friday night on Senator Barack Obama,
one of his wife’s leading rivals for the Democratic presidential
nomination, suggesting that voters who would support someone with Mr.
Obama’s experience were willing to “roll the dice” on the presidency.
On December 20, 2007, Bob Kerrey condemned Obama’s “Muslim” schooling even though Senator Kerrey knew Obama did not attend a madrassa.
Former Nebraska Sen. Bob Kerrey has apologized to Barack
Obama for any unintentional insult he committed by raising the
Democratic presidential candidate’s Muslim heritage while endorsing
rival candidate Hillary Rodham Clinton….
“It’s probably not something that appeals to him, but I like the fact
that his name is Barack Hussein Obama, and that his father was a Muslim
and that his paternal grandmother is a Muslim,” said Kerrey, a former
governor and the current president of the New School in New York City.“There’s a billion people on the planet that are Muslims, and I think
that experience is a big deal.”
Kerrey’s mention of Obama’s middle name and his Muslim roots raised
eyebrows because they are also used as part of a smear campaign on the
Internet that falsely suggests Obama is a Muslim who wants to bring
jihad to the United States.
Hillary joined the racist fracas on January 7, 2008 with this cut against Obama:
Clinton rejoined the running argument over hope and “false
hope” in an interview in Dover this afternoon, reminding Fox’s Major
Garrett that while Martin Luther King Jr. spoke on behalf of civil
rights, President Lyndon Johnson was the one who got the legislation
passed.Hillary was asked about Obama’s rejoinder
that there’s something vaguely un-American about dismissing hopes as
false, and that it doesn’t jibe with the careers of figures like like
John F. Kennedy and King.
“Dr. King’s dream began to be realized when President Johnson passed
the Civil Rights Act,” Clinton said. “It took a president to get it
done.”
On January 10, 2008, Karl Rove weighed in with his racist invective, starting with the stereotypes that Blacks are their bodies and not their minds:
His trash talking was an unattractive carryover from his days playing pickup basketball at Harvard, and capped a mediocre night.
Next, Rove went after the old Racist bait that Blacks are shifty and unmotivated:
He is often lazy, given to misstatements and exaggerations
and, when he doesn’t know the answer, too ready to try to bluff his way
through.
Then Rove calls up the stereotype that Blacks are duplicitous and want something for nothing and they’ll lie to get their way:
For someone who talks about a new, positive style of
politics and pledges to be true to his word, Mr. Obama too often
practices the old style of politics, saying one thing and doing another.
Rove finishes his Obama flaying by making a purposefully “pale”
comparison to another failed wannabe democrat while against stabbing at
Obama’s weak intellect and faintly damming his “articulateness:”
When it comes to making the case against Mrs. Clinton, Mr.
Obama comes across as a vitamin-starved Adlai Stevenson. His rhetoric,
while eloquent and moving at times, has been too often light as air.
We must now wonder why Karl Rove is disparaging Obama and crediting Clinton.
There’s no such thing as a coincidence
— so there is only one reason Rove bangs the drum against Obama and
rings bells for Hillary: He’s terrified of an Obama nomination because
Rove knows Obama will win and that’s why he has been pro-Hillary for
over a year because he knows she’s beatable.
When republicans love the
democrat nominee, democrats have a problem.
When the number one enemy of the democrat party picks Hillary as the
“inevitable nominee” — we must begin to realize for that reason alone
we must reject Hillary and choose Obama in order to break the hate
speech cycle of the republican party and their ongoing want to divide
us instead of uniting us.
In a January 12, 2008 New York Times editorial, Bob Herbert — a Black Man in Big Media —
provided this chilling analysis:
I could also sense how hard the Clinton camp was working to
undermine Senator Obama’s main theme, that a campaign based on hope and
healing could unify, rather than further polarize, the country.
So there was the former president chastising the press for the way it
was covering the Obama campaign and saying of Mr. Obama’s effort: “The
whole thing is the biggest fairy tale I’ve ever seen.”And there was Mrs. Clinton telling the country we don’t need “false
hopes,” and taking cheap shots at, of all people, the Rev. Dr. Martin
Luther King Jr.
We’d already seen Clinton surrogates trying to implant the false idea
that Mr. Obama might be a Muslim, and perhaps a drug dealer to boot. It
struck me that the prediction of so many commentators that Senator
Obama was about to run away with the nomination, and bury the Clintons
in the process, was the real fairy tale.
Yesterday — January 13, 2008 — on Meet the Press,
Senator Clinton laughed and guffawed her way through an hour interview
with host Tim Russert where she entirely denied any attempt by her
campaign to call Obama’s skin and cultural background into question —
and she twisted the moments of her denials by actually suggesting it
was Obama’s own campaign that was falsely accusing her for being a
Racist:
Against the tide of Hillary’s spurious new charges, Obama himself fought back and said this:
This is fascinating to me. I mean, I think what we saw
this morning is why the American people are tired of Washington
politicians and the games they play. But Senator Clinton made an
unfortunate remark, an ill-advised remark, about King and Lyndon
Johnson. I didn’t make the statement.I haven’t remarked on it and she,
I think, offended some folks who felt that somehow diminished King’s
role in bringing about the Civil Rights Act. She is free to explain
that, but the notion that somehow this is our doing is ludicrous. I
have to point out that instead of telling the American people about her
positive vision for America, Senator Clinton spent an hour talking
about me and my record in a way that was flat out wrong.
In today’s New York times, the Race-baiting issue intensified against Senator Obama:
And publicly, the campaigns spent much of the day
shadow-boxing on an issue that advisers to both of them described as
volatile. The issue broke through when Robert L. Johnson, the founder
of Black Entertainment Television, who appeared at a rally with Mrs.
Clinton in Columbia, S.C., seemed to allude to Mr. Obama’s use of
cocaine as a young man.“To me, as an African-American, I am frankly insulted that the Obama
campaign would imply that we are so stupid that we would think Hillary
and Bill Clinton,
who have been deeply and emotionally involved in black issues since
Barack Obama was doing something in the neighborhood — and I won’t say
what he was doing, but he said it in the book — when they have been
involved,” Mr. Johnson said.
What’s next?
Watch soon for the Clinton supporters, especially if South Carolina does not go well for her, to paint Obama as — “the uppity house Nigger that disrespected the proper White Lady”
— now they won’t use that blunt a phrasing, they’ll couch it in more
acceptable racially coded hate speech, but the intention and effect
will be the same: Hillary was disrespected by the boy.
Much of what you posted is subtle yet chilling. One point however needs to be made:
Isn’t racist in the least. Hillary is just so dictatorial and convinced of the “truth” of top-down hierarchal power that she cannot conceive of beneficial change not originating from the Power Structure. In her eyes a citizen is powerless while the government is powerful.
Still freaking scary though!
jonolan —
That’s a fine point to make, but people in my neighborhood are upset because they read that quote as Hillary slamming MLKjr. because he was not able enough to finish the movement he started and it took a White Man in a power position to get it done — they consider Racist her POV and phrasing.
That will be problematically for Hillary but doesn’t speak to the truth of the statement’s intent or basis.
Is it possible, or probably even, that the people in your neighborhood are predetermined to find any statement – aside from absolute praise – about MLK by a White as racist? Is it similarly possible that people in your neighborhood have been “anticipating” a racial attack and are over-primed to find one?
That’s a fascinating question, jonolan. I understand what Hillary meant — she was speaking about process and not skin color — but when you’re running against a Black Man for president and your skin is White and his is Black and you claim LBJ got it done while MLK,jr. did not… I think you set yourself up to be vilified in the minority community to claim to have served because you are wrongfully claiming the mantle of the White Savior.
Hillary’s extended claim on Sunday that she’s vested in the civil rights movement and that she has served the Black community well over the last 35 years make her statement even more head-shaking — not only because she should know better… but because you know she knows better… so you then have to wonder why she’s invoking certain memes and shared dreams that do not really historically belong to her unless she’s playing it for political gain.
I always thought the “Bill Clinton as the first Black president” label was a terribly dangerous naming to coddle and I wish both Clintons had rejected it instead of embracing it.
I can see possible reasons for Hillary’s statement:
1) She’s so entrenched in the Top Down approach to ruling a people that she never considered the statement in any other light. This would be shortsighted and frankly stupid, but stranger things have happened.
2) She wants the Race issue brought out. If so, the question becomes why does she want it to be about race?
jonolan —
Great points!
1. I don’t think the Clintons do anything that isn’t pre-planned, pre-determined and thought out from every angle. She knew precisely what she was saying and what she was inferring and for her to play innocent now — especially after the fake crying scene — is just the height of silliness.
2. If the race is about Race, she wins. She wins by the color of her skin and Obama is left to fight off all the boogeymen of history and the lingering, ingrained prejudices that still have resonance today. She can get away with invoking questions about his skin; but he cannot get away with raising questions about her gender. It’s a fascinating political disconnect.
Just a quick comment as I am otherwise occupied …..
It didn’t take long for their “true colours” to show.
Now all we need is for people to virally spread that this is racist.
David,
It may be worse than just “If the race is about Race, she wins. “ Hillary has the Black “Old Guard” activists in her court. If they fail to speak out against her – so far they have failed to do so – they portray the picture that Obama doesn’t have support from the “Black Leadership.”
Thanks for popping in, Nicola! Yes, it’s now already all over the news and the Hillary defenders now claiming, “SHE can’t be a Racist! She’s just a truth-teller! There’s no skin color involved!” Such a mess — a tarpit… if you will…
jonolan —
If Obama wants to win — he should be perfectly comfortable with Hillary being burdened with the old guard Black activists. Having those headaches on her side makes him look more universal and more approachable and “newer” for the non-minority votes to come to him if he isn’t branded as the “typical Black” candidate.
Obama should attack the old guard — toss it right back in their face — then he plays to a larger, colorless, more universal, ideal.
David,
Given the sad fact that those “Old Guard” Black activists are heavily involved with the Democratic National Committee and the Dems have 852 superdelegates (21% of the total) that are not pledged to vote as the states’ population decides, I’m not sure how wise it would be for Obama to discount those old men. 🙁
jonolan —
It might not be wise to confront the Old Black Guard for the democrat nomination, jonolan — but it would help Obama immensely in the general election. If he can hack away at HRH in the next few primaries and become the “new voice” of the left, then he’s set to craft a whole new majority based on independents and disaffected blue-collar republicans and he can leave the old, hard, left-wing guard alone to fend for themselves and dare them to ignore and betray the first Black President of the United States.
My response to HC’s supporters is IF that isn’t racist what is?
Nicola!
Her supporters claim it is IMPOSSIBLE for her to be Racist because of her history so it must be something else… like people LOOKING for Racist things in her speech.
I find it quite the opposite. The LBJ quote — in standalone text — is not Racist. However, when that phrase is uttered from Hillary’s mouth, the phrase becomes Racist — in situ and in context — because of the mind of mouth that is speaking the words.
Tough crowd for Hillary today:
http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/01/14/clinton-receives-tepid-reception-at-mlk-event/
I’m actually torn. While I absolutely loath and despise Hillary, I’m not pleased with people misinterpreting what was said. That misinterpretation may well set us all up for greater sorrow later.
You can reach the right result from erroneous data, but moving on from that singular result can be dangerous because of the underlying false premise.
Here’s a Black woman’s take on what Hillary said, jonolan:
She argues the case better than I have here.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2008/01/11/AR2008011103281.html?hpid=opinionsbox1
Now Hillary knows she’s in trouble when Newt Gingerich is writing her love letters:
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0108/7851.html
When Rupert Murdoch, Newt, Rove and Fox News all love Hillary — true democrats should curl from her in revulsion. They love her because she’s so hated and so beatable.
When your enemy champions your champion — defeat soon follows.
I’ll let you in on a little secret – Mr. Murdoch doesn’t care about politics beyond corporate taxation, FCC regulation and anti-trust legislation. He’s in it for the long haul money, everything else is just a smoke screen. LOL!
This whole Hilary / Obama thing is entirely revolting. I so want Obama to take control so that we have a chance of a good president. 🙂
Hi David,
Either Hilary Clinton is too callous or too smart – chance of being the latter is more I think.
“Everything is fair” in war?
Well, the voters will decide what to infer from this.
A never ending argument means both the parties are wrong, it’s even more dangerous when it is one sided.
Gordon —
Someone said on the news yesterday the only way the Obama/Clinton rift can be healed so the democrats can win is if they run together on the same ticket.
I don’t think Obama would have her as a second even though she’d take the job. If he did take her, it would mean he accepted her Race Hate.
On the flip side, Hillary would absolutely take Obama as her second — she would have to have him to win — but I don’t think he’d want to take second to her, but if he refuses, the democrats lose the election in a Racial split from which they will not recover. There will be a lot of pressure on him to take the second slot with her, though, and he might do it for the goodness of the republic.
He can win at the top of the ticket without her — the reverse is no longer true for her.
The war feels one sided to me, Katha. It’s Hillary’s gang banging on Obama. His side is on the defense and not in attack mode. This sort of cruelty is awful so early in the season, but perhaps the democrats will wear it out so when the republicans start in on Obama the voting public will already be tired of all the Race Hate.
jonolan —
I agree about Murdoch. He follows the money. When he “met” with Hillary that was made clear. That’s unfortunate because it makes him an opportunist and not a believer in his own b.s. spewed daily from his media spigots.
David,
The US – at least the voting part of it – was split along racial lines in the Civil War / War of Northern Aggression. it was split along State vs. Federal lines. The Race / Slavery issue was just the straw hat broke the camel’s back. This is more like the 1960s as opposed to the 1860s.
That should have been “wasn’t split along racial lines.” Sorry.
I think “state’s rights” was the “fairytale” gloss over the real issue of slavery, jonolan, during the Civil War.
We’re going to talk about the Civil War here this week — so sharpen your blades and pull on yer boots!
Ok, I’ll do that. hehe.
Mwa-ha!
True david, I agree.
I hope everybody understands the meaninglessness of it – someday.
It will be interesting to watch, Katha!