The problem is that this "larger group of people" haven't condemned the actions of the fringe, or worked to drown them out. they are content to let the fringe drive the protests/discussions/talking points. and that is something for which they ought to bear culpability.

It's like the quote on my facebook profile says:

“Man's inhumanity to man is not only perpetrated by the vitriolic actions of those who are bad. It is also perpetrated by the vitiating inaction of those who are good."

I thought this was a win for the Obama administration.
(assuming they actually got the intended target)

WTG US TROOPS!!!

I guess they got intel on the guy, as to where he was headed in a convoy. One copter strafed his vehicle, the other swung around and the troops grabbed the dead bodies. Sounds like really good work from our guys.

Someone call security... there's a black woman speaking at a Tea Party! How on earth was she allowed up there?

Good for him.

And I agree. The Democrat mainstream failed to reel in the crazies during the Bush administration and the GOP mainstream failed to reel in the crazies during the current administration. I would note that I don't believe that it's their responsibility to keep everyone in check. I figure it's my responsibility as a citizen to realize that the fringe isn't terribly bright, but I know that personal responsibility in this country is a fading trait.

My point is that the fringe doesn't represent the mainstream that continues to have concerns, even though some would paint the fringe AS the mainstream. I choose to ignore the nuts and focus on the policies. Rainmaker said he's only talking about the fringe now. He wasn't earlier, but I'll take him at his word that he has changed his previous stance.

Crazies can't be reeled in. That's why they are crazy.

:+1:

There's also the whole "why the heck is the media giving them a voice again?" issue. Remember, freedome of the press is there to protect the Republic, not help drive it into the ground...

I thought the liberal media doesn't give conservatives a voice? :)

Non, no, no...you need to go and link to pictures sourced from liberal blogs. That way we can be certain this is legitimate.

Well, of course they do when it anecdotally benefits their viewpoint. Just like Fox News has no problem running unflattering coverage of anti-war protesters with signs comparing Bush to Hitler.

Linking all Obama dissenters to the racist protesters is akin to linking all Evangelical Christians to Fred Phelps.

However, like Phelps, shocking, disgusting race rhetoric is more sticky and more likely to end up on random forums than well thought out rational rhetoric. (ie bikini Palin and the gun) It's hard to dismiss the "crazy few" when their message is seen by millions

This may be hard to believe, but its possible that most of the anti-Obama movement isn't racist and that there's a portion of it that is racist. As Ta-Nehisi Coates said at The Atlantic, "It's not the message, but it's a message."It's a hell of a lot more than a few signs. It's Glen Beck saying Obama has a hatred of white people. It's Stormfront rallying members to attend Tea Parties. It's a number of state level GOP leaders caught sending out offensive emails and pictures. It's selling products at the Texas GOP convention with pictures of Obama as Aunt Jemima and Uncle Ben. It's damn near the entire birther movement. If you can't see any racist element it's because you don't want to see it.

All it would take is for Boehner or Cantor or Steele or even Limbaugh to say, "We have no place for racists and they aren't welcome here," but they haven't said that. Instead they've decided it's politically advantageous to turn a blind eye to the racism that's all around them. If you don't want to be tarred as racists, stop hanging out with racists.

That's completely different. Most, if not all of the anti-war movement was linking Bush to Hitler.

Maybe they're waiting until they run for president. That seems to be the time to rid yourself of relationships with racists.

Well played, Cam.

deleted because I misread Cam.

This is just plain stupid. Any of those people would tell you exactly that if they were asked. Racism is all around us because there are stupid people in this country and those stupid people don't fall along party lines.

Funny then that no one here can say that. It's all about how few they are in number or how it's the same everywhere. Why is it so hard to say that the racist element of the anti-Obama movement is a disgrace?

That's all it would take to what - end racism? That's pretty optimistic. Are you sure that none of them have ever said that racism is bad?

Obviously, there's huge racist elements in this country. I guess I don't quite get what the obessesion is with this element. What's the point? That there's racists in the U.S? We knew that. The only other purpose for harping on this stuff, IMO, is to try to invalidate the entire opposititon. And yes, I understand that nobody's saying that everyone who opposes Obama is a racist. But it's more subtle than that. A huge chunk, perhaps the majority of this thread, involves attacks on these super-conservatives. Even though NOBODY in the thread has taken their side. Why is that? It seems pretty obvious to me.

The discussion plays out the same way every time.

-Conservative said/did this.
-"Ya, but that's just the fringe, and there's a liberal fringe too."
-"Ya, the but the conservative fringe is more mainstream!"

Lost in the whole discussion, every time, is the fact that nobody is taking the fringe's side. So the entire dicusssion tends to be about the size of the conservative fringe. That's a great thing for a liberal to focus on, because they can't really lose. The focus in on this fringe, and the only discussion point is how many of them there are.

Nobody's saying that there isn't racism, or that racism isn't bad. People question what relevance that has to non-racist critisisms of the president, and what the strategy is in making it the central issue in Obama's administration.

I think the racist element of our country is a disgrace. I don't limit it to just those who populate the anti-Obama movement.

The racist element of the anti-Obama movement is a disgrace.

I believe racism is a bad thing.

But I don't think its racist to critcize a black president, and nobody here's making racist comments - so what's your point?

It looks like Obama decided to ask the Supreme Court to block the release of the prisoner abuse photos.

In a Shift, White House Takes Prisoner-Photo Case to the Supremes - Law Blog - WSJ

He sounds more and more like Bush on security issues every day (except there isn't the same backlash - except from the always-consistent ACLU)

"releasing these photos would inflame anti-American opinion and allow our enemies to paint U.S. troops with a broad, damning and inaccurate brush, thereby endangering them in theaters of war.”

really? you think it's because people want to paint all of the opposition with that brush?? :lol:

ummm no.

it's because it's REPREHENSIBLE and BIGOTED. And in cases like that it's important to call out the racist bullshit for what it is so that it loses it's power and ability to subtley influence and infect others - particularly in younger generations.

if those on the "right" or those in the "opposition" on this board would just say "yes we agree there's an element of the opposition to obama that is racist and it's morally reprehensible and we reject it out-of-hand" then it would be a non-issue in this thread.

the fact that the majority of people in the "opposition" instead choose to defend these people is what makes it a constant theme in this thread (and indeed in society as a whole if you take FOFC as a microcosm of society).

by defending it, or refusing to acknowledge that it exists and that it's racist, you are implicitly empowering it.

not saying that one or two politicians or national media figures could make a difference, but if they all stood up together and said "hey this is wrong...it has no place in our party" it might do a hell of a lot of good as far as restoring some moral-rightousness to the GOP

of course i stopped reading before MBBF posted this.

kudos to him.

nobody's trying to paint the entire opposition to obama as racist, we're just saying that to a large degree the racists have hijacked the message and it's important that they are called out for what they are.

if someone isn't a racist then they shouldn't take statements made about the "fringe" as if they were directed at them

I could have missed something, but I haven't seen a single post defending racism in this thread.

nobody here is. but the impression is that those that are making those racist statements are being "defended" or "laughed off as no big deal."

if everybody (on both sides of the aisle) would just point it out and agree it's a disgrace instead of trying to justify it or downplay it, it could be moved past and we could have actual substantive policy discussions again.

It's not painting the entire opposition, but it is an attempt to invalidate that opposition more subtly.

See the multiple: "these are the same people that think X" posts.

I've said that racisim is wrong as have many others in this thread. Are we seriously arguing whether racism is wrong here???? You can call someone out for playing the race card when it's not warranted while still noting that there are idiots around us.

Nobody's trying to justify it or downplay how bad it is either. I just question the motivation behind making in the central issue of this thread when nobody here is disagreeing.

I could start a thread about how bad murder is, but that would be pointless. But if the murderers all happened to be of one particular group, it wouldn't be hard to figure out why I was bringing it up.

Well, not to nitpick here, but let's be a little more precise. Just like the "past 8 years" statement that is thrown around (and we all do it), $13trillion is not what Obama started with. He started with $10trillion...the remaining $3 trillion has been accumulated over the past 9 months (not all his fault necessarily...but this is how it works for everybody).


So...becoming more aware of this country's financial mortality should be put on hold because our President is black? What does this even mean?

Whether some people should have been more aware during the Bush years or not...they are NOW. So what is Obama doing to explain these NECESSARY deficit spending levels? Not enough to ease the concerns of enough people in this country...unless again, you believe it is only racists and tea baggers who are concerned/not sold on his economic policy.



Why does race even enter into this conversation? Because some liberal blog you visited is showing images that are offensive and you hate racism? Great...me too! Can you find a legitimate media outlet that has shown those same images...and can show enough of them to indicate more than a blip...or do those pics only happen to fall into the hands of liberal bloggers?



Agreed completely. And if any of those signs are legitimate and not photoshopped to suit a liberal bloggers' agenda to rile up outrage against the outrage...then I condemn those people and the people standing around them. But forgive my skepticism as racist conservatives aren't the only people with agendas involving deceit and misinformation.

I'll do it, but only if I have my title here changed to Captain Obvious.

Whatever the number is, the point is the same. No one cared about the first $10 trillion.

That's not true at all. I'm not sold on his economic policy and believe it's going down the wrong track in some ways. I'm not racist or a tea bagger.

My point is that none of these people would be storming Washington if George Bush was given a 3rd term. To go from not giving a shit about spending to magically becoming enlightened on inauguration day is a tad suspect.

Many of the posters I saw on TV, including the Obama African Witch Doctor one which seemed to be all over the place, came across as racist. Birth certificate crap, dressing him up as Bin Laden, or other Muslim stuff. These were shown on CNN and Fox News. I saw tons of Nazi signs all over the place as well.

So these photos and people giving interviews were all photoshopped or fabricated? Interesting.

Agreed completely. And if any of those signs are legitimate and not photoshopped to suit a liberal bloggers' agenda to rile up outrage against the outrage...then I condemn those people and the people standing around them. But forgive my skepticism as racist conservatives aren't the only people with agendas involving deceit and misinformation.[/quote]

I mean the headline on arguably the most trafficked conservative news site today in big bold letters was:

WHITE STUDENT BEATEN ON SCHOOL BUS; CROWD CHEERS

With all the news going on around the world, a school bus fight gets the biggest nod. Not trying to stir up some racial tensions, eh?

No one is calling anyone in this thread a racist. I never even said the movement against Obama was racist. I simply stated that the tea parties had racial overtones to me.

[/quote]

I'm fairly certain one group or another would have stormed D.C. if Bush had been given a 3rd term... and I'm willing to go out on a limb and say that there'd be some conservatives among 'em.

In fact, I'm fairly certain that even if McCain had won the election and done the same things Obama has done, you would have seen similar protests against spending.

Isn't that what you're doing in this thread?

If you're saying, "well Fox News does to", I definitely agree, though the reason there is more simple: race stories = web traffic.

You really think the same people would be protesting McCain that are protesting Obama right now? That we'd have the same types of signs and same types of flags flying around?

There's plenty of "crazy" to go around for the party out of power. Just check out the 40+ pages of google images comparing Bush and Hitler (many from anti-war rallies):
Bush hitler - Google Images

Definitely not (maybe a couple), but that was CamEdwards' post you quoted, I don't know how my name got in there.

No, but a large number of conservatives would be protesting his policies. "Republicans first" wouldn't, but those people are largely dwindling in total number.

Back to the main subject, this whole "your fringe is worse than my fringe" defense of policies is pointless. As much as I disliked some of Bush's policies down the stretch, he atleast tried to sway people with arguments for them on things like tax cuts, privatizing social security, no child left behind, Iraq war. He said "tax cuts will stimulate the economy because of X"... "Privatizing social security will solve the impending crisis in cost because of Y" ... "No child left behind will improve public education because of Z"... "We need to go to war with Iraq because of A". He didn't say "Look, a bunch of lefty nuts are comparing me to Hitler. So, don't question my policies on taxes or the war."

You could atleast argue a point and get in a discussion. This is simply impossible to with the current administration. If you say "Hey, I'm worried about the cost of this health care program given the math doesn't add up, all prior deficit estimates have been way too low already and I don't see the benefit for the cost. Plus, I'm worried about my current employer dropping coverage down the line and waits for services."

The response isn't "I get those concerns, but here's how we can ensure the cost doesn't go up and you don't lose coverage by your employer ...".

You get "Hey, you're just one of those racist guys who yells at tea parties. Come back when you have a clue". Throw in the fact that non-democrats don't have any house of congress or the White House and that's a quick way to build a ton of negative sentiment from a large group of people.

And the response earlier was "America: Love it or Leave it" or some comment slighting someone's patriotism.

I don't say this to try to give validation to how it works today, but in my 15 years of following politics, this seems to be how its always worked.

The problem was that the dissension against the Iraq war and the Bush tax policy was not completely marginalized by the media. Administration are always going to try and marginalize dissent, but usually the media doesn't allow that to go unchallenged. The reason Bush had to make his case was that main organizations like the New York Times, Newsweek, CBS evening news, CNN, MSNBC, Washington Post and others ran stories on how the criticism was legitimate and even building on comments made people at rally's in op-eds. Now, outside of the WSJ and Fox, no one gives any credence in the media to the concerns by the dissenters.

My biggest fear right now is that we have a democrat-run house, democrat-run senate, democrat-run White House and major media outlets that do little to question their policies. These organizations did a very good job of making Bush and republicans defend their policies on a number of issues. Now, it almost seems like they spend more time trying to debunk the protests than actually investigate/question the administration's claims.

All this does is drive more people to Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Fox News, Ann Coulter, Glen Beck and even more vocal fringe because there's simply no other place to go if want a critical view of Obama's policies. I fully expect that Fox News, Limbaugh and others will be extremely popular (and more powerful) by the end of Obama's term because no one else was willing to question the administration. This will lead to more people with "fringe" views (in the eyes of the left) simply because the only way to get investigative reporting on Obama and the democrats in congress were to visit those outlets.

that's just bullshit and not true.

if you want to have a legitmate policy debate and a logical discussion, that's one thing.

if however you want to walk around holding up "obama=monkey" signs while exclaiming that you have issues with the rising deficit, you're going to be called out as a racist.

you can't then turn around and try to play the innocent about the sign you were holding up. if you want respectful treatment then don't disrespect others.

that's a good point

That wasn't really my quote, but I think you responded to the right one.

Well, while I've seen plenty of "We don't want Obama's socialism" and "I didn't vote for this Obamanation" types of signs in the mainstream media (and I'm lumping Fox News and MSNBC in this)...I have not seen the overtly racist images like you posted, which the liberal blogs seem to have a plentiful source of, on any of the mainstream media's coverage.

So, yes...I am skeptical of where these images originated from and why only liberal blogs seem to have them.

Is LGF a liberal blog? If it has, things have changed quickly.

Little Green Footballs - Tea Party Leader Backs Racist Doc

Can you link to a legitimate news source for this image/coverage?

I'm not trying to put you on the spot, I'm seriously not seeing these anywhere but on left-wing blogs.

The Washington Post covered the 9/12 March on the front page but covered the much larger Iraq War protest in the Metro section. Every single news org ran with the 9/12 protests as their top story. Did they cover the racism, yes, but that's because there was a lot of racism.

As to their arguments, what's the substance behind the protesters? Sure people here, including you, have offered good arguments against, and there are a number of conservatives that have also offered fair critiques, but the people in DC and at town halls haven't had much constructive to say. It's all death panels, euthanasia for veterans and Maoism/Stalinism/Fascism. If you want the substantive arguments to be heard you need to stop putting the crazy arguments out front. As long as Senators and Representatives are parroting the crazy arguments, that's what's going to get air time. Was there a single substantive speech on healthcare policy at the 9/12 rally?

There are a number of principled conservatives just as appalled by these tactics as I am, David Frum, Bruce Bartlett, Rod Dreher, etc., bu those voices are not only not featured, they're cast aside as being heretical to the movement. Who in the GOP as the guts and authority to have a Buckley style John Birch Society moment?

This isn't a conspiracy to silence legitimate criticism either on this board or nationally. As much as I'm politically opposed to a lot of conservative ideas, I'd love a sane opposition to keep the Dems in check. I think a strong opposition is vital to a functioning government. This current incarnation of the GOP, however, is anything but sane. They've embraced a culture of anything goes and have very little substance that they want to add to the debate. As long as the racism and crazy is tolerated by the people that run the GOP, the story is going to be at least partially about the racists and the crazies.

Charles Johnson is one of the conservatives that has practically been disowned because he spoke out against racism directed at Muslims. He's still very much opposed to Obama, but he's also determined to call out the racism that he sees as delegitimizing conservative arguments.

Dr. David McKalip, surgeon who forwarded Obama e-mail, resigns from leadership post - St. Petersburg Times

Wasn't really that hard to find. I'm not sure what your point is.

Did I say they'd have the same signs? Did I say they'd have the same flags? I said that there would still be some conservatives protesting in the streets about McCain's policies if McCain had won and had enacted the same policies Obama has followed.

And yes, I do believe what I wrote. It's not like McCain was really popular with the Tea Party crowd, and we know that there were plenty of eligible voters who stayed home in 2008 because they didn't like either candidate.

It would actually be a really interesting experiment to ask Tea Party attendees how they feel about John McCain, Sarah Palin, Michael Steele, John Boehner, Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Glenn Beck, and whoever else you want to throw out there. I'm guessing that of the bunch I named, McCain would easily have the lowest approval rating among Tea Party attendees.

The big difference, though, is that the establishment wouldn't be supporting them. You wouldn't see congressional leaders talking about death panels ad groups like FreedomWorks wouldn't be bankrolling and promoting any protests. That's my problem, not that there are crazies, but that the establishment is tolerating and/or promoting them.

Of course you don't. You linked me to an article about a guy forwarding racist emails who happens to be against Obama's health care plan.

I'm sorry, I thought you were looking for coverage of the Obama image in a legitimate news source.

edit: Ah, just reread it, and you were.

I think I'm in the same boat as he is. It's always more embarrassing to me when the people I agree with (well, more) act like complete assholes. I expect the Democrats to act that way.

So, I guess I have to take my "obama=monkey" sign off my front lawn to get into a real debate - damn!

This is such a scarecrow argument that's it is becoming silly. You can find millions of well-written, non-racist criticisms on the health care policy and engage in a debate if you wish (including this thread here). Or, you can continue to paint the anti-health care/Obama policy dissent as largely a bunch of crazy racists and avoid any legitimate discussion. It's a shame so many are choosing the latter.

My point is that we shouldn't be relying on people at rally's with signs to begin critical discussions on Obama's policies. It took the town hall debacle just for the country to begin discussing the pros and cons of Obama's health care idea. Prior to that, you couldn't find one critical view of this policy unless you watched Fox News or read the WSJ.

OK, how can normal independent/conservatives "not tolerate" it. Everyone in this thread on the conservative side has said racism has no part. You just cited 4-5 conservatives in various media circles that have come out against it. Is that unless Rush Limbaugh comes out and slams every person with a sign, conservatives are tolerating that? What about those of us who don't listen to Limbaugh?

It seems like there's a much higher burden on conservatives to "control their crazy's" than there ever was on democrats/liberals. It seems like many in this thread feel that until every conservative on the planet (including the ghost of Reagan) disavows every potentially racist sign, their side is supporting it. It's an unattainable goal and one of many scarecrows setup to avoid any meaningful debate on issues like health care and tax policy.

I don't consider myself part of the republican establishment, I don't listen to Hannity/Limbaugh/Colter/Beck, I don't blindly vote republican (voted mostly democrats locally) and I don't like a lot of Obama's policies on health care and tax policy. Am I not allowed to have a voice because some who agree with me use crazy tactics? There are a lot of much more independent people than me who have similar concerns and the frustration over not being able to enter into a real discussion with being labeled crazy is something that will impact future elections.

The Obama image was the only image not sourced from a liberal blog (it was an image sharing site). I was speaking to the tea party protesters and why more legitimate media aren't covering/exposing this if there are truly that many overtly racist images to be found in these gatherings.

See, I don't doubt there are questionable, inappropriate, and perhaps even racist attendees (i.e. the "Whatchyou talkin bout Willius" sign which I cant recall the source of ATM)...but those images with overtly racist shirts, signs, and propaganda is way beyond what I have seen on any (reasonably) legitimate reporting news channel or website. And with no better information that I can find...I am suspect of the "pouring fake gas on the invisible fire" potential.

I understand. It's probably how a lot of conservatives felt when there was no liberal outcry over Moveon.org's "General Betray-us" ad, Kos's "screw 'em" comment about the deaths of civilian contractors in Iraq, Rep. Pete Stark's comments a few years ago about sending kids to Iraq to get blown up "for the President's amusement", etc. etc.

Look, it's not difficult to play "count the crazies" these days, nor is it particularly productive. You can't get rid of the crazies in the Democratic Party, we can't get rid of the crazies in the Republican Party, in large part because the politicians on both sides see their crazies as part of the base or a potential voter.

Arles: How about not repeating the Death panels lie? How about not defending a guy that yelled during a joint speech? How about correcting people at their own town halls that compared Obama to Hitler/Stalin/Mao? How about asking the RNC to stop giving money to an organization that promotes th birther conspiracy? How about not whispering to constituents that you agree with the birther conspriracy? How about not claiming that healthcare reform will lead to euthanizing veterans?

All of these are things elected officials could do on their own. When Republicans have taken it on themselves to distance themselves from the crazies and racists I've been pretty consistently praising them. It's not that I expect them to disavow every thing said on every blog, but I don't think it's too much to ask them to not repeat the crazy and not hang out with racists.

I can't find anything but negative comments from elected Dem elected officials about Kos's comment or the Betray-us ad. I didn't find any comments on Stark's quote. Again, this isn' count the crazies as I'm willing to stipulate there are at least equal number of crazy Dem supporters. The problem is that the establishment is encouraging and supporting the crazies.

Then I'd suggest we all start complaining about it in a more bi-partisan manner, because neither side is going to disarm itself of its crazies unilaterally.

At this point it seems you are taking the "when conservatives can prove to me they no longer beat their wives, I'll talk to them" approach. There's plenty of seedy money going into the DNC and organizations that compared Bush to Hitler that have never been disavowed by the left. Heck, Democratic senators called US military soldiers terrorists and compared their tactics to the SS. These guys are still in office (a la Dick Durbin).

If you want to discuss actual policies, I'll be on board. But if this thread is now going to be a "my side likes our crazy's less than your side so your argument is moot" discussion, there's no point in continuing. It's obvious you want some kind of morale high ground for the left in regards to fringe support and I just don't see a difference between the two sides on this front.

I figure they can completely blow off the whole resistance to the health care plan as a bunch of racist crazies but two things pop to my mind...

1) Why don't the Democrats with an unbreakable super majority just pass this great plan? If all that opposes it are racists and crazies what's stopping them?

2) What will be the excuse when they get their asses handed to them in 2010? Racism? I will still be voting Libertarian but I can't say it would bother me to have a President and Congress of differing parties rendering much of DC useless. (And hence good for the American people)


Continue on with the marginalizing... (I think Bush and his cronies were successful for a while with this until people realized how shitty their policies were. It just seems like a lot of us figured out how shitty Obama's are much quicker)

And Glenn Beck certainly doesn't speak for me. I saw him on tv saying that he won't take credit for the tea party movement gaining strength but believes it must be divine intervention. Yeah, that's it. I think I will always side with Democrats when it comes to the whole God/politics thing. Too bad people don't seem to understand the magnitude of a trillion because their social policies have always outshined the crap the Republicans throw out there.

Hmm ... I'd figure it'd go Hannity, Beck, Limbaugh, Palin, Boehner,with Steele & McCain battling for last.

Darned if I'm willing to sift through the ongoing rubble in the thread to see if this has already been posted or not but I noticed an interesting tidbit in a story on the Joe Wilson witch hunt today. I note it here (as well Barney Frank almost having a stopped-clock-twice-a-day moment in the voting) since I believe it was this thread in which there was excitement concerning all the donations that were pouring him to help whatever Dem will get his ass handed to him by Wilson in the next election.

[i]The Wilson dispute, by capturing the attention of Republican and Democratic loyalists, has been a financial bonanza for both Wilson and his expected challenger in next year's election, Rob Miller. Each has raised some $1.5 million in contributions since the speech last week.[/quote]

I figure they can completely blow off the whole resistance to the health care plan as a bunch of racist crazies but two things pop to my mind...

1) Why don't the Democrats with an unbreakable super majority just pass this great plan? If all that opposes it are racists and crazies what's stopping them?

2) What will be the excuse when they get their asses handed to them in 2010? Racism? I will still be voting Libertarian but I can't say it would bother me to have a President and Congress of differing parties rendering much of DC useless. (And hence good for the American people)


Continue on with the marginalizing... (I think Bush and his cronies were successful for a while with this until people realized how shitty their policies were. It just seems like a lot of us figured out how shitty Obama's are much quicker)

I was going to say there'd be no chance of him being kicked out, but his margins of victory have declined in each of the past three elections (65-33, 63-37, 54-46) so I'll change there's almost no chance of him losing next time. Unfortunately.

Heck I wouldn't be surprised if he goes on to win by more without a presidential election taking place.

SteveBollea translated:

yeah... let's try that from a different source. :)

That doesn't scan, Cam.. they disable hotlinking.

That's a strange translation. What makes Steve a creepy gif?

Yep, no racism whatsoever. ere's Limbaugh today:

You must have him on ignore or just don't read his posts ;)

That will be definitely convincing to the zero posters who have claimed there's no such thing as racism.

Well darn. Let's see if it works this time.

I'm guessing you're going for this?

The problem with this is that George Bush was pretty liberal in his policies. Sure he was moronic with his foreign policy and he had some wacky conservative views that set back science a decade, but for the most part he was moderate and even liberal when it came to economic policy.

With that said, the people who are against Obama and his policies voted massively in favor of Bush in 2000 and 2004, as well as for McCain in 2008. There were no tea parties over the past 8 years for Bush. And the people who have been polled to be most against Obama supported McCain in massive numbers.

So you can claim that these people would be protesting anyone, but actions don't back it up. No tea parties when Medicare was massively expanded or spending skyrocketed. Votes weren't lost in 2004 during all this. The areas most against his economic policies voted for people with essentially the same policies. At some point your hypotheticals need to be backed up by some statistics.

I don't watch cable news 24/7 but CNN did cover it Yesterday in a rather long segment. They showed a lot of images of racist signs, confederate flags, etc. They spoke to people who were talking about birth certificates and how he's a Muslim. They had one of the leaders of the tea party on who refers to Obama as an Indonesian Muslim and welfare thug.

I'm sure Fox News would not cover the story due to their vested interest, and I don't really watch MSNBC because it's not in HD.

You can run a search through Google news for with tea party and racism in it and come across thousands of articles. I don't think it's been headline news as I still think issues with race are difficult to bring up in this country.

And as I said from the beginning, this isn't a knock on opposition or trying to generalize them. I'm against most of his spending policies with the exception of the health care plan (which I'm against the revised version now). But I honestly don't see how you can't find the veiled racism at these events when looking through the images and videos that are out there. I guess you'd rather close your eyes and claim they are all photoshopped.

Wonder if Limbaugh will apologize now that it's turned out that it was just bullies telling kids where they could sit, and that there was no racism involved.

Wait.. who am I kidding, of course not.

(honestly, do we expect anything from Limbaugh/Hannity et all? I had to admit my surprise that at least Malkin publicly corrected her mistake when she found out that the estimates for the 9/12 protests was 70K, not 2 million as she was told via Twitter that ABC News had announced when nothing of the sort had happened)

Honestly, both sides need to drop the racism mud throwing contest. Are there some who will attack every move that Obama makes because of the color of his skin? Yes. They're getting tons of press right now. But are there also some who will defend Obama on every move he makes due to the color of his skin? Yes.

It made it's way around on just about every major conservative site today. But it has nothing to do with stirring up racial tensions. I mean a fight on a school bus is just big news these days in our country.

I don't just buy it to the level you apparently have been convinced to because every google search I try leads me to left-wing blogs. I spent about 5 minutes yesterday trying to find more reputable sources and could not...it shouldnt take any longer than that.

I guess the issue I see with this even being brought up is...what is the purpose of liberals making this a topic? Is it to attribute his sliding approval numbers on racists "converting" the middle to their beliefs? I just dont' understand this argument at all.

Racists (likely) didn't vote for Obama...Obama won the election by a landslide...part of that landslide is breaking off due to objections to his policy and direction...now because some racists (may or may not) have a presence in Tea Party assemblies, the entire health car debate and fiscal policy is about race?

If the point is to bring up that there are racists in this country...well, great, there are also child molesters, murderers, financial cheats, and tax cheats. They all suck in my mind and I bet they all had some presence at the Tea Party assemblies as well.

And were part of the Obama electorate as well.

First of all, I went to Belleville West High School and it is/was one of the more racist areas you will find (going both ways). Belleville is right next to East St. Louis, one of the poorer black communities in the nation.

Outside of the local police officer backtrack after his race comment (which he was pressured to do by the city to not incite anything), what makes you think racism wasn't involved? I've talk with family and friends from back there and everyone close to the situation feels there was a high race component to the crime. Now, I was witnessed a ton of white to black racism in that city growing up (and a similar amount of reverse black to white racism) and it doesn't seem like a lot has changed.

It seems to me that dismissing race as a factor in this crime without knowing all the facts is just as silly as Limbaugh attributing the entire action only to race. Race was a factor, now whether it was 25% or 75% of the reason is only known to the kids who took the action.

Yeah, I'd agree with that wholeheartedly. That's a really rough area that has a strong racial divide. Race wasn't the only component, but it is a factor. You don't know that area if you think race had nothing to do with the situation.

and voted for McCain as well.

really, that's a pretty stupid statement.

???

Someone speculates that there are various scoundrels among the Tea Party crowd & I point out that the scoundrels also exist in the ranks of the ranks of the Obamites as well and you see a problem with that (beyond my stating the obvious)?

It's sad that instead of having a productive debate on bullying some people want to make this all about race.

was just trying to say that there are scumbags all over, and they have all sorts of political affiliations.

perhaps a slight reading-comprehension fail as i hadn't finished my first coffee yet (generally useless before that). i was focused more on the first part of what you were responding to and missed the part where it was talking about that being the components of tea parties.

how about we have a productive discussion about actual alternatives to the proposed healthcare bills?

Republican Health Care Reform | The Next Right

And I'll add one that's been out there for a while, but no one wants to touch: End the tax break for employer-provided health care plans. Use the savings to give people tax-credits/vouchers/whatever to purchase their own plans. Mandate that plans cannot discriminate on price or availability.

It is stupid that we insist on linking health-care and employment. Get rid of the employer as middle-man.

dola: I apologize to the board that I made that post and did not call Republicans racist or Democrats communists. Bad form for this thread, I know.

I posted the three main alternatives several pages back. It didn't elicit a single response. I don't think people are interested in productive discussion on policies. See the past few pages where people where arguing whether racism is wrong while no one disagreed with them.

Ok, I want to avoid the actual birther argument but look at a related issue. This has been asked around the office but no one seems to know what the answer is.

Let's say it was conclusively discovered that Obama was not born in the US (again, I don't believe that nor do I want to argue that here). What would happen? People seem to have three thoughts:

1. Biden becomes president.
2. McCain becomes president b/c he was the top vote getter for a valid candidate (under this scenario).
3. Entire presidential election is tossed out, and we vote again.

Sorry if this has been covered before, but this thread has gotten too long to read through.

4. Obama's mother is still a US citizen, so Obama is still a citizen.

People are born outside the US every day and still have citizenship due to their parent's citizenship. That's the insanity of the whole birther movement.

But, if it was somehow proven that Obama couldn't be the President the only remedy would be to bump Biden up.

Nobody cared about the SCOTUS ruling on Gitmo photos, and Obama's flip-flop there.

The racism thing is an easier fight to "win" (even though nobody's opposing them), that's why the liberals gravitate towards issues like that. It gives them the feeling of moral superiority that the Democrat party sells. It's like crack cocaine for them. Only with membership of the Democratic party can you feel "compassionate" without actually having to do a damn thing.

Yeah, but don't you have to be a born-on-US-soil citizen to be president? Again, I'm not arguing that point, more curious what would happen if at this point we found out he wasn't eligible.

You've been on quite a roll lately making sure nothing in this thread is trivial, keeping people from making mountains out of molehills, and policing the copying and pasting thoughts from other sources.

Kudos.