Maya Angelou: Vote for Obama on the Content of His Skin

@ Word,

So is it likewise suspect when an Evangelical white person celebrates the victory of a Michelle Bachman? If you’re point is there is no place in politics for identifying personally with a candidate beyond political positions, let’s at least acknowledge black people don’t have a monopoly on that. As for your dismissal of racism against Obama, I suggest you speak to an Obama volunteer, the ones who went door to door, before you dismiss it wholesale.

I should remind you that you are the one who drew a clear distinction between Democrats and Republicans in regards to who is wholly responsible for “holding this country back now from moving beyond race”. Do I take it then that you agree with the Republican-made charge that General Powell can only be voting for Obama because they are both black? How does that fit into this?

http://m.theatlanticwire.com/politics/2012/10/john-sununu-plays-race-card/58387/

It was Sununu’s last question of the night. Just before sending Sununu off, Morgan asked him if he thinks card-carrying Republican Colin Powell should leave the Republican party after he endorsed Obama for the second time in a row. “Frankly, when you take a look at Colin Powell, you have to look at whether that’s an endorsement based on issues or he’s got a slightly different reason for endorsing President Obama,” he said.

When Morgan asked what he was referring to, Sununu didn’t hold anything back. “Well, I think when you have somebody of your own race that you’re proud of being President of the United States, I applaud Colin for standing with him.”

For the record: Colin Powell cited Romney’s “fluid foreign policy;” Obama’s views on health care reform and the auto bailout; and said he was more comfortable with Obama on immigration, education and climate change.

The filthy murderer known as B arack Husein O bama is only able to destroy this country because of black racists like this one, and white ones like the media marxists. They deserve their inevitable fate, much as the young communists of Europe – being tortured and exterminated in the gulags they built themselves.

@Liberal1 (Objectivity):

But not everyone shares the same prejudices—and I use the term in a non-racial sense (just a clarification before someone begins to harp on the “liberals are always bring up racism” thing).

No, some people have different prejudices. Like the prejudice that most recently came to light, about those who do not agree with Obama must think that way due to their own inherent racism.

I don’t agree with Obama. Hell, I don’t even like him very much, at all, and, if given my preference, Obama would stay far, far away from politics for the rest of his life. But even so, I take great offense when I hear from some on the left that my viewpoints on Obama are driven by racism.

There is overt racism, subtle racism, even unintended racism so who really gives a rats ass?
Be your own self and do what you” honestly” feel is the right thing to do driven by pure convictions.
Do not be swayed by bigots on either side of an issue.

@Randy:

I disliked the coward John Kerry just as much. Does that make me racist? It is the personal values of the person who is running for the office that I am concerned with.

Good point. If I had to pick politicians on the left that I dislike most, I’m not sure Obama would make the top 10. Chuckie Shumer has been number 1 for me, for a long time. I can’t stand him. John Kerry ranks pretty high, Pelosi, DWS, Dirty Harry, the list goes on.
I actually like Dick Durbin; I don’t agree with him most of the time, but I find him to be a likable person. I’ve met John Lewis and he’s a real nice guy, but he’s not the same guy that speaks on the floor of the House.

@Liberal1 (Objectivity):

before someone begins to harp on the “liberals are always bring up racism” thing).

And your point? as always, bringing up racism…

Some more interesting news on the subject of our society when racism is merely a liberal construct:

WASHINGTON (AP) — Racial attitudes have not improved in the four years since the United States elected its first black president, an Associated Press poll finds, as a slight majority of Americans now express prejudice toward blacks whether they recognize those feelings or not.

Those views could cost President Barack Obama votes as he tries for re-election, the survey found, though the effects are mitigated by some people’s more favorable views of blacks.

Racial prejudice has increased slightly since 2008 whether those feelings were measured using questions that explicitly asked respondents about racist attitudes, or through an experimental test that measured implicit views toward race without asking questions about that topic directly.

In all, 51 percent of Americans now express explicit anti-black attitudes, compared with 48 percent in a similar 2008 survey. When measured by an implicit racial attitudes test, the number of Americans with anti-black sentiments jumped to 56 percent, up from 49 percent during the last presidential election. In both tests, the share of Americans expressing pro-black attitudes fell.

“As much as we’d hope the impact of race would decline over time … it appears the impact of anti-black sentiment on voting is about the same as it was four years ago,” said Jon Krosnick, a Stanford University professor who worked with AP to develop the survey.

Most Americans expressed anti-Hispanic sentiments, too. In an AP survey done in 2011, 52 percent of non-Hispanic whites expressed anti-Hispanic attitudes. That figure rose to 57 percent in the implicit test. The survey on Hispanics had no past data for comparison.

The AP surveys were conducted with researchers from Stanford University, the University of Michigan and NORC at the University of Chicago.

Experts on race said they were not surprised by the findings.

“We have this false idea that there is uniformity in progress and that things change in one big step. That is not the way history has worked,” said Jelani Cobb, professor of history and director of the Institute for African-American Studies at the University of Connecticut. “When we’ve seen progress, we’ve also seen backlash.”

Obama has tread cautiously on the subject of race, but many African-Americans have talked openly about perceived antagonism toward them since Obama took office. As evidence, they point to events involving police brutality or cite bumper stickers, cartoons and protest posters that mock the president as a lion or a monkey, or lynch him in effigy.

“Part of it is growing polarization within American society,” said Fredrick Harris, director of the Institute for Research in African-American Studies at Columbia University. “The last Democrat in the White House said we had to have a national discussion about race. There’s been total silence around issues of race with this president. But, as you see, whether there is silence, or an elevation of the discussion of race, you still have polarization. It will take more generations, I suspect, before we eliminate these deep feelings.”

Overall, the survey found that by virtue of racial prejudice, Obama could lose 5 percentage points off his share of the popular vote in his Nov. 6 contest against Republican challenger Mitt Romney. But Obama also stands to benefit from a 3 percentage point gain due to pro-black sentiment, researchers said. Overall, that means an estimated net loss of 2 percentage points due to anti-black attitudes.

The poll finds that racial prejudice is not limited to one group of partisans. Although Republicans were more likely than Democrats to express racial prejudice in the questions measuring explicit racism (79 percent among Republicans compared with 32 percent among Democrats), the implicit test found little difference between the two parties. That test showed a majority of both Democrats and Republicans held anti-black feelings (55 percent of Democrats and 64 percent of Republicans), as did about half of political independents (49 percent).

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_AP_POLL_RACIAL_ATTITUDES?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2012-10-27-11-47-18

@ Red,

Tom, when a person goes on the Ed Schultz show to bash republicans, he is not a republican. He may be a ‘former’ Republican, but that’s what it is.

There it is. The death of the right to hold ones’ own opinion in the Republican party articulated once again. You would almost think he said rape wasn’t a gift from God, so swift was his exile . Toss him overboard. There are plenty of other men of his pedegree to fill the ranks.

Good luck with your party. I’m sure young people, independent minded women, immigrants and non-whites are just dying to sign up for a party whose entire purpose is to prop up a dynasty of wealthy white Evangelical Christian men and let then tell us all how to live while they conveniently grow richer.

@Tom: Tom, I notice you didn’t disagree wth this:

You will note that there is an NAACP and there is not a NAAWP, there is a ‘black caucus’ and not a ‘white caucus’ and there is an ” Institute for Research in African-American Studies at Columbia University”

Wonder why.

@ Red 68

Why would I disagree with your facile observation? You apparently have very little understanding of American history, or as I commented earlier, you find it annoying that others do.

@ Word,

I cannot peer into Powell’s heart to tell whether or not racial identity had any bearing on his decision. And if it did, he may not care to admit it to himself, let alone to others, publicly.

There was a time, I think you will admit, no one knew for sure whether Colin Powell was a Democrat or Republican. When he publicly became a Republican, he was a moderate, when such a thing existed as an option. He articulated reasons for his support for Obama, none of which are far-left; and many of his specific, articulated reasons for not supporting Romney fall well into Powell’s specific, expert areas of expertise, lending them weight. From a color-blind perspective, this isn’t a shocking endorsement. So are we now saying Powell is a racist if he doesn’t support Romney, someone his politics don’t align with, because he is black and so is Obama?

Similar to Maya Angelou. She entered the popular consciousness reading a poem at Bill Clinton’s inauguration. Her endorsement of Obama is hardly shocking. So is she a liberal who supports most Democratic candidates, or a black women supporting Obama because he’s black? Your post doesn’t entertain both possibilities. You didn’t mention her connection to Clinton. It’s possible someone could read your post and assume she’s apolitical, making the race reason, your reason, all the more likely. You say racism is almost extinct in America, if liberals didn’t bring it up. Except it does exist when two distinguished public black people, neither considered particularly conservative – one a known liberal – endorse a Democratic Presidential candidate.

Note: edits above were make concurrent with Words response. I stand by both version and assume all responsibility for any confusion.

@Redteam: My son played on club basketball teams from 6th grade until he graduated from High school. At one time, he was the only white kid on the team. After he went to college, he started an intramural basket ball team. He tried to recruit some of the black kids that he had played with for 6 years. They told him that if they played on his team, they would be ostracized from the schools black community. My son finally determined who was racist!

This is a good comment on this subject! http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2012/10/how_would_we_know_we_were_racist_if_the_left_wasnt_there_to_help_us.html

@Richard Wheeler: Just out of curiosity, do you call yourself a European American or an American?

@another vet:

Just out of curiosity, do you call yourself a European American or an American?

Another vet, there seems to be 3 classes of Americans. Americans, Native Americans, African Americans. I’m gonna stick with just plain old American

Another Vet In celebration of Notre Dame’s resounding victory over Oklahoma, today I’m an Irish American.lol
Call them Blacks if YOU prefer.

WORDSMITH
knowing your profile on what you stand for,
anyone accusing you of RACIST IS AN IDIOT,
the one who spit for the sake of covering his ignorance,
you always took the side of the one who you knew was not able to defend himself
because he was not here, you always got some juicy answers because you where protecting other minority,
even sometimes we felt you where one of them,
so just to say that TOM has pick on the wrong one,
and is showing how much more he has to learn before coming here and spitting on CONSERVATIVES
who are the ones protecting all the minority,
and the proof is of how many are coming to join the REPUBLICAN PARTY, they come proud and ready to take on the RACIST DEMOCRATS HYPOCRITES PRETENDING TO BE FOR ALL THE PEOPLE,
oh ya, don’t never take the CONSERVATIVES SILENCE AND TOLERANCE FOR GRANTED.
AS MAYA IS CONCERNED,
she is poetry gifted, but it stop there, I enjoyed her poetry but not her politic views, it would have work if she would have chosen another ability instead of skin color,
too bad she could not find anything to upscale
better than race color, like ALLEN WEST HERO,
HERMAN CAIN ABILITIES TO PROSPER, AND SO MANY MORE

Richard Wheeler
that is expected of you as far a THE GIFT OF TOM,
allow me to differ on your mindset,
TOM put his both feet in his mouth every time he come
and try to prove the CONSERVATIVES COMMENTS WRONG,
BUT it’s your narrow view,