cross-posted to jack and jill politics
One week ago, I wrote one of the most depressing posts of my blogging career. Having seen what I wrote, a friend told me, "you can't post that. It's so... depressing." Taking her advice, I revised the post and published something slightly less forlorn under the title "How Does Obama Do It?" Yes, what I posted last Wednesday was the cheery version :)
In that post I basically expressed my campaign and Hillary fatigue. I'd been giving 110 percent for several months, burning the candle at both ends and from the middle, and my body gave out. I was mightily sick, having contracted the notorious Hillary virus and had no shortage of anger at feeling like I've been making the same set of arguments for weeks: Obama is the nominee; Hillary is a kamikaze candidate; Obama is the nominee; Hillary is insane; Obama is the nominee; OMG the right wing was right about The Clintons, etc. etc. etc.
My plan was to take a break from writing about the campaign while I restored some balance to my physical and mental lives. I wasn't sure how much time I would need: a week, a month, more?
After about a week during which I increased my intelligence by a factor of two by watching no cable news, ate well, slept better, conversed with friends (thanks for the weekend, Boston.) and tried pretty effectively to avoid the noise of the blow by blow campaign machinery, I am back.
I read every single comment on that post, and I owe every member of this community a heartfelt thank you. You all lifted me up beyond my wildest expectations and contributed to the healing process.
In August of 2006, Jill invited me to be a part of this then-new blog that would contribute thoughtfully, humorously and bitingly to the political conversation from a black perspective. We have grown beyond any of my own expectations thanks to new writers dnA and rikyrah, an exploding community of commenters (and lurkers!), the incredibly inspirational Afrosphere movement and the timing of events well beyond our control. We have something special here at Jack & Jill Politics, and I feel extraordinarily proud and privileged to be a part of it. Thank you.
As I thought about how I'd return to battle -- have no doubt, this is battle -- I decided I would lay out some principles of operation for myself. These don't necessarily extend to the other writers here, but are my own rough guidelines made public now to help keep me straight while I have a moment to reflect.
Here's what, on the best day, I hope we accomplish:
Provide thoughtful, honest and hopefully original commentary on the racial themes emerging in this presidential campaign and broader political environment.
I can never underestimate the value of explaining that which I think is obvious. It's become clear that conversations of race in this country are woefully handicapped by a colossal gap in the lived experiences of various Americans. I can't tell you how many times non-whites write expressing their gratitude for seeing things from a black perspective. There is literally a lag of several months before most white bloggers and the press realize some of the things we and fellow black bloggers have been throwing down. Many of you describe JJP as a beacon of light, and I hope we remain that.
Stay grounded.
I've said it before, and I'll say it again: the best thing a political blogger can do is unplug from the media noise machine and incessant polling and get out in the street. While my canvassing for Obama in VA, TX and PA was to help him, I got much more out of it than he did. I am reminded of the diversity of the country and the depth of its challenges and the small, basic needs of its people every time I head out.
Prevent Hillary Clinton from stealing the nomination or destroying the nominee.
I struggled over the past few days with what to do with my feelings toward Senator Clinton. She has fallen so low in my esteem that I considered not ever uttering her name much less writing about her. She's practically dead to me. But my silence would not really help my cause. I will continue to attack her ideas and her tactics when I feel they do harm to the people and causes I hold dear. The greatest revelation to me has been watching my own understanding of The Clintons evolve. It's been ugly, but it's been necessary, and I'm glad that I see the truth of their ugliness, late though I am.
Address the distractions thoughtfully without becoming or amplifying them.
One thing I worry about is getting caught up in a media narrative or agenda that is not of my choosing nor in the interest of what I believe to be best for this country. These questions that dominate the news like "Why can't Obama close the deal?" rest on the most false of premises. As with Hillary, ignoring them is an option, but I think the better response is to address these noisemakers as the distractions they are and flip the script as best as possible, highlighting the absurdity of it all.
The latest example is the chickenhead relay of people saying "Obama's relationship with Wright proves he can't be trusted to negotiate with foreign leaders." Uh huh, so what do Clinton and McCain's judgment to launch foolishly into an unnecessary, illegal, immoral and provocative war say about their judgment. If his pastor judgment is so offensive, how offensive is Hillary's choice to allow the continued use of cluster bombs in civilian areas? Please.
Remember that, for the most part, the media organizations manipulating this election do not have the people's best interest at heart.
I wouldn't be much of a blogger if I didn't bitch about "mainstream media" on the regular, but there is substance to the critique. We've all watched as the real story got subjugated by Miley Cirus or Britney or William Ayers. The ABC debate was a more obvious flash point for many, but we've been living in a vast wasteland of journalism for quite some time. This is not new, but it is getting worse. As I scream at my television (why does Dan Abrams exist?), it's worth remembering that the institution responsible for mediating our political discourse is woefully under qualified for and structurally unable to rise to the task.
This is the same media that thinks when the stock market goes up, the economy is doing better. This is the same media that is closing down foreign bureaus at a time when nations are more interconnected than they have ever been. This is the same media that pushed this country, yes pushed us headlong into a war without batting an eye. They helped murder people. The institutions are corrupted and their incentives are for their own market expansion and survival, not a healthy democratic society. When they get it right, accolades are due, but when they get it wrong, well I cannot be surprised. I can just call them on it and try to provide an alternative.
Raise critical issues
As a part of not getting caught up in bullshit narratives, I want to be a part of highlighting legitimate issues. This country is long overdue for a discussion of a realistic energy policy (hint: a summer gas tax reprieve is stupid). We are long overdue for an honest accounting for the mounting chronic disease whose origin is no mystery. We don't need crazy ass drugs. We need to restructure our lives so we don't sit on our asses all day shoving poison into our faces because Monsanto and Cargill benefit. We are long overdue for a discussion about our rather insane drug and imprisonment policies.
I'm not foolish enough to think myself an expert or possessing of enough time to write meaningfully on all of these and more issues, but the world of ideas is vast, and we live in the world of embedded media and hyperlinks. The knowledge is out there, and I'd like to be a part of bringing it to you. You can look forward to fewer links that feed the beast of CNN and more to alternative media and fellow bloggers holding it down for journalistic integrity.
Take action.
You should stay tuned for some of the upgrades we have planned here at JJP, but suffice it to say that "blogging" or "writing" is the tip of the iceberg. The Clinton Attacks Obama Wiki scratches the surface of the type of activism we can be a part of. Yall saw the impact bloggers could have in a case like Jena. That's what's up. Even if we're just bitchin about what some network did, we should try to accompany those words with a call to action. Whether fundraising, calling advertisers, organizing meetups and protests (Denver!) or building tools of collective knowledge, we don't just have to sit here and complain about what's wrong with the world. We can use these tools to help create the world we want to see. Sound familiar?
There's more to say, but that's enough for now. Thank you all again for being an incredible community. Every time I come here, it feels like coming home. We'll be doing a more formal request for your ideas on the future of JJP, but feel free to comment here or write us any time.
Fired up! And once again, ready to go.
Viewing entries in
Election 2008
cross-posted to jack and jill politics
Thanks to Craig Hickman for the link. I'm just clipping the closer. My emphasis added in bold.
It was the most forthright repudiation of an out-of-control supporter that we can remember. We would like to say that it will finally take the racial charge out of this campaign. We’re not that naïve. It is an injustice, a legacy of the racist threads of this nation’s history, but prominent African-Americans are regularly called upon to explain or repudiate what other black Americans have to say, while white public figures are rarely, if ever, handed that burden. Senator John McCain has continued to embrace a prominent white supporter, Pastor John Hagee, whose bigotry matches that of Mr. Wright. Mr. McCain has not tried hard enough to stop a race-baiting commercial — complete with video of Mr. Wright — that is being run against Mr. Obama in North Carolina. If Mr. Obama is the Democratic presidential nominee, we fear that there will be many more such commercials. And Mr. Obama will have to repudiate Mr. Wright’s outbursts many more times. This country needs a healthy and open discussion of race. Mr. Obama’s repudiation of Mr. Wright is part of that. His opponents also have a responsibility — to repudiate the race-baiting and make sure it stops.Wow NY Times. Go head. All they were missing was to call out the Clinton campaign for its race-baiting. To those who have written in saying "but McCain repudiated Hagee immediately" or that the situation is somehow incredibly different. I say "false." 1. McCain's campaign actively sought the endorsement of John Hagee. That is an entirely different thing. It's not like Hagee was just out there in the mood to endorse. When you seek someone's endorsement, you are saying you're completely cool with that person. 2. While it is true that McCain "distanced" himself from some of Hagee's statements on Feb 29 he didn't fully "repudiate" them for several more weeks. 3. Some have commented here that Obama's "pastor judgment" indicates he cannot be trusted with running the country. Fine. Now listen to what McCain's campaign said to explain the Hagee endorsement
A McCain adviser acknowledged on Monday that the campaign had failed to look into Mr. Hagee’s background adequately and said that as a result the campaign’s procedures for vetting endorsers had improved.Oh my stars! What on Earth would happen if we let McCain be president and he failed to look into the background of people offered national security clearance? We'd all be killed, that's what would happen. Brown terrorists would walk across the Mexican border and kill our babies dead, all of them. Clearly John McCain doesn't have the judgment to lead. We don't need a president who learns how to vet people "on the job." 4. It's not just a Hagee situation for McCain. Remember Jerry Falwell? Jerry Falwell was "an agent of intolerance" according to the John McCain of 2000, but come election 2008, Mr. McCain saw fit to speak at the commencement of Falwell's Liberty University. I know that's what I do with agents of intolerance. Why just the other day, I gave a speech at a luncheon for the Chattel Slavery Restoration Society Of Norfolk. What can I say? Their French onion dip was to die for. Jerry Falwell also blamed America for 9/11, but his argument was much weaker than Wright's. He didn't even go so far as to blame American foreign policy, preferring instead to blame lesbians, gays, feminists, abortionists and the ACLU. What a damned idiot, rest his soul. The point being, John McCain and every other Republican seeking national office has made a quadrennial ritual out of kissing the ring finger and asshole of vile, ignorant, hate-filled, so-called Men Of God, who use their pulpits to enrich themselves and launch baseless attacks on large groups of Americans. Don't pretend Mr. Straight Talk somehow exercised magically superior judgment. His hands and the hands of his entire party are filthy with explicit appeals to the very worst of human nature, and you don't have to dig through years and years of DVDs to find the perfect soundbite. These boys do it out in the open. That's how little they think of us. That's how much we're being played.
cross-posted to jack and jill politics
See for yourself:
That's gotta hurt. I don't envy Senator Obama right now, and seeing him distinguish between Wright on Moyers and Wright at the National Press Club helped me see the difference as well. So have the commenters here. I truly believe the press and the Right would harass Obama on this issue to no end regardless of what Wright said, but I can see how he made it a little easier. Moving on. So, this is the part in the show where all Catholic politicians are asked why they haven't left a church that sanctioned mass child rape right? Or is it the part in the show when Hillary Clinton is dragged before the cameras to explain her association with The Family? My bad, it must be the part of the show where John Hagee gets death threats and McCain is harassed for weeks on end about his choice of a spiritual advisor who is promoting war against Iran because he thinks it will accelerate the Second Coming. Or not. What a farce.
cross-posted to jack and jill politics and Daily Kos
There are superdelegates and supervoters. I am one of the latter, having sacrificed money, time, creativity and my health to volunteer for this campaign. The fact is Obama is still winning and is still the likely nominee, but I don't feel so hot right now.
Much of that has to do with the fact that I'm very sick with a horrible cough, fever and sore throat. I must have come into contact with a Hillary supporter in PA and gotten cooties from her negative campaigning and vile Deathmarch to Denver. She is poison, and I fear I've been temporarily infected.
Some of it also has to do with frustration over her destructive tactics and the refusal or inability of the party and its voters to see it for what it is. Perhaps I lack patience, but it's clear to me that Hillary Clinton is trying to destroy Barack Obama, and she does not care what the impact of that is. I've written before about how her attacks have certainly served the valuable goal of testing and toughening him up.
I think we crossed the threshold of the value of this strategy a few weeks ago, and I was worried that she would help destroy his appeal among independents and moderate Republicans by running a Republican campaign against him.
Now, I'm more worried that not only has she sabotaged him among those voters but is working to do so among the very Democrats who he and we will need in November. On Brian Lehrer this morning, I listened to an Obama supporter say she would reluctantly vote for Clinton in the general if she manages to snatch this nomination. She wouldn't be happy, but she would do it.
Then I listened, dumbfounded, as a Hillary supporter said she would not vote at all or would vote McCain. Excuse me, but what on Earth did Obama do to these people? Are they so offended by his positive message and talk of hope and massive restraint in the face of withering GOP attacks from a member of his own party? Does the fact that he has not stooped to her level cause that much rage? Really? What would these people say if he actually did attack her?
Really, if this is how people react to calm, cool, collected Obama, I actually fear what an outburst from him would result in.
Today, I am angry, but it is not the inspirational anger of being "fired up!" and "ready to go!" No, this is the short-term, despondent anger of "do whatever you want" because this country probably doesn't deserve Obama and clearly doesn't know what to do with him.
Hillary Clinton ran fear-mongering ads with Osama bin Laden. No democrat has ever done that. She said we would "obliterate" Iran if they attacked Israel with a nuke. John McCain happily sings "Bomb, bomb Iran," and I struggle to see the difference between them. What's the point of electing a Democrat who talks and walks like a Republican?
Haven't we already seen what happens when Democrats act like Republicans, especially over issues of "security?" We get an illegal war and warantless wiretapping. Why would Republicans vote for Hillary when McCain is the real deal?
I'm also bothered by Clinton's message that "Obama can't close the deal" with rural, white, gun-toting voters. That was proven true yesterday when she won 62 percent of households where a gun owner resides. So in the primary, at least in PA, these are her voters. Her message that Obama can't win them, however, has a major silent assumption: that come November, she will do nothing to help win them to the democratic nominee!
She's claiming these voters and plans to keep them, for what?
The point of all of this is that I'm tired of blogging about Hillary Clinton and her deathmarch campaign. I'm tired of pulling clips of her back-stabbin, Kamikaze tactics. I'm tired of Obama showing insane amounts of restraint (because he's better than her) and being rewarded with more of the same bullshit, being told he can't close the deal because he won't show an ad implying he won't let bin Laden walk into the country and kill little white babies silently in the night.
Hillary has to threaten Iran because she lacks the imagination and talent to envision another future. She has to stir up fears among gun-owners and religious people, because despite her priceless surname and early advantages, she's been reduced to Politicking 101: scare the shit out of the voter.
So I'm taking a break from my intense blogging of this campaign. Everything that I could say has already been said. All the arguments are on the table. Hillary is willing to do anything, not just to win the nomination, but to destroy the nominee.
My continuing down this path only hurts me and my health right now, and I simply cannot watch any more cable news. That's like turning to leeches and "bleeding" when society is in need of serious medical attention.
Besides, there are other things going on in the world that deserve my and our attention, so I'll try to shift my focus to energy and food and other issues of interest to black folks and Americans that does not have to do with this silly, silly Democratic primary.
My final thought is this:
Having these feelings has also shown me just how strong both Barack and Michelle Obama are. They are full of more fight, more hope and more faith than I can muster right now, and I say more power to them. For those of you feeling down right now, take heart that our candidate has and continues to weather so much more.
cross-posted to jack & jill politics
This is my second weekend in Philly for Obama. Sorry my blogging has been so low, but I'm in the street most of the day and need to get some sleep at night. Below is a slideshow of my Flickr photos and notes on what I've done and seen/heard so far. Apologies in advance for the rough nature of the notes. Also, the first few photos are from my canvassing trip to philly two weeks ago. This weekend's trip starts with a black and white of a baby.
The rally.
I arrived from NYC Friday evening at 5pm and went to the record-breaking rally. Because of all my insane volunteering, I was given a blue ticket, which put me in the section closest to the stage. I'll upload a photo slideshow in a later post. Standing for three or four ours isn't the most fun thing in the world, but I kept myself occupied meeting other volunteers and snapping shots with the camera. Observations:
- Security was serious, airport style, get rid of your water bottle intense
- The music at this Obama rally was horrible. They had lots of time with just the playlist and, for the life of me, I didn't get why there was so much damn country! They could have played the Yes We Can joint or the Obama Reggaeton hit. I just created this Barack The Vote muxtape available for your campaigning pleasure. At one point the crowd actually started chanting, "NO MORE MUSIC" and booed when the next song came on
- There were so many people
- I ran into a fellow New Yorker whom I met volunteering for Obama in Dallas. Dallas! And yet we found each other. Nice
- The crowd was energetic and a bit rowdy. From the video many of you may have seen Obama taking more breaks to deal with the crowd reaction. He was like, "let me finish." We were so hyped. At one point he said something like, "No matter which democrat you support..." and was immediately cut off with cries of "You!!" and "Obama!!" These people were not having any Hillary talk
- Being in the front and hanging after with volunteers, I completely missed the impromptu multi-thousand strong march down Market Street.
cross-posted to jack & jill politics
"Senator Obama, a guy who you sat next to you on a plane for several hours was recently heard saying that America wears combat boots. We've brought him here tonight. Will you kill him with your bare hands, or do you not love America?"
That about sums up the so-called "debate" which was much more freak show than anything resembling a deliberative discussion. Constitutional Hall should be declared a national disaster zone.
I may write something more substantive later, but what happened on television last night was a disgrace and a great disservice to the American people and the people of Pennsylvania. I watched from a bar in Philly not far from the debate site and had a mind to walk over there and pull the plug on the entire operation. Utter and complete nonsense it was.
To add insult to injury, here's the headline from ABC News' own coverage:
Clinton, Obama Find 'Brotherly Love' at Philly Debate
Dems Last Chance to Settle Scores Before Pennsylvania Primary
Half of the debate. Half was entirely about bullshit the country has already processed and was more than ready to move beyond. I could barely contain myself, and I got even more frustrated when my fellow debate watchers weren't ready to storm the place with me. Thanks for keeping me sane JJP.
Here's something from The Onion (YouTube) we can all appreciate:
Poll: Bullshit Is Most Important Issue For 2008 Voters
So what can we do? I'm quite tired and have to get up early, but would love to hear your ideas and leads. Is it even worth calling, writing and tying up the lines at ABC? Pressing for non-renewal of their FCC license? Harassing advertisers? Increase coordinated efforts for media reform?
Of course I'm bothered by the lack of balance and hate that they slammed Obama as hard as they did, but I'm most deeply offended by the lack of substance!
I have a feeling a boycott won't work in a case like this. Folks are likely to move on. I guess I expect very little response from ABC or any MSM outlet. We have to keep doing us, building up our grassroots media and activism and accountability.
Share your ideas in the comments, and let's see what folks respond to. Also, what are other blogs and organizations doing?
Update @ 10:23 am
The NY Times debate tool is very useful in times like these. This was a 90 minute debate. Iraq came up at minute 41. Minute 7 is where they started into Obama over bittergate. That's 34 minutes of bullshit to start the debate off. Of that time, 5 minutes were spent on Hillary's credibility, the remainder on Obama.
So 29 minutes on Obama
& 5 minutes on Clinton
6-to-1 pile on measured in the most important terms to television: time.
Now as for what we can do...
Some steam-blowing-off activities:
- George Stephanopoulos got his Weather Underground question from Sean Hannity. Here's the audio to prove it.
- Get at ABC News via web form
- Jam their phones with complaints. 212-456-7777 when you call, if you ask for News, then press 2 then 199 you can leave a message for "Other News"
cross-posted to Jack & Jill Politics
Barack Obama is rubber. Hillary Clinton is glue. Everything she says about him bounces back and sticks to her. Everything.
From Huffington Post:
In January 1995, as the Clintons were licking their wounds from the 1994 congressional elections, a debate emerged at a retreat at Camp David. Should the administration make overtures to working class white southerners who had all but forsaken the Democratic Party? The then-first lady took a less than inclusive approach. "Screw 'em," she told her husband. "You don't owe them a thing, Bill. They're doing nothing for you; you don't have to do anything for them." ...those who were at the event say the 1995 episode fits into her larger political viewpoint. As Harry Boyte, the director of the University of Minnesota's Center for Democracy and Citizenship who was at the retreat, told The Huffington Post: "[Hillary Clinton] sees herself as the champion of the oppressed, but there is always a kind of good guy versus bad guy mentality. The comment before that was that 'the Reagan Democrats are our enemies and they weren't on our side,' and she was agreeing with that comment. She said we should write them off: screw them."There you have it. Screw them. Screw those people with values. Screw those hunters. Screw those church-goers. Screw those people whose hypothetical offense I am exploiting for short-term political gain. It doesn't matter why they might be frustrated. She doesn't try to explain it. She writes them off. That's just cold. She's so full of excrement, this one. The article continues, explaining that after her comments, Bill Clinton stepped in to explain (I've highlighted a few sections for later focus):
I know how you feel. I understand Hillary's sense of outrage. It makes me mad too. Sure, we lost our base in the South; our boys voted for Gingrich. But let me tell you something. I know these boys. I grew up with them. Hardworking, poor, white boys, who feel left out, feel that our reforms always come at their expense. Think about it, every progressive advance our country has made since the Civil War has been on their backs. They're the ones asked to pay the price of progress. Now, we are the party of progress, but let me tell you, until we find a way to include these boys in our programs, until we stop making them pay the whole price of liberty for others, we are never going to unite our party, never really going to have change that sticks.The HuffPo author seems to think that the above "is remarkably similar to what Obama was trying to convey in his now controversial remarks about small town America." He's wrong. I bolded a few sections above which caused me to pause. Bill goes far beyond anything Obama was trying to say. Bill says that "our reforms" came at "their expense" and amazingly claims that they've paid the whole price of liberty for others. What a paternalistic nincompoop. I'm sure poor Southern white men have suffered the neglect of a corporate-driven system that overlooks them. All poor people have. I'm sure it was painful for many white supremacists in this group to watch women and blacks start working and voting. But to somehow claim that this group paid the whole price of "liberty for others" is stunning. How magnificently twisted of you Mr. Clinton. Here I am thinking that the liberation of any is the liberation of all, that a society which begins to value the least of us can finally truly value each of us. Here I am thinking that the "liberty of others" might have been fought for and paid for in blood by those very "others" through marching and lynchings and state-sponsored terrorism, but apparently it was all due to hardworking, poor, white boys. This sounds similar to Hillary's "it took a president to get it done" comment which sparked so much ugliness in this campaign back in January. It's never the oppressed working hard, fighting and dying for their freedom. It's always somebody else. Thanks for the clarification, Bill. Now kindly, take your opportunistic, back-stabbing, kamikaze wife and your patriarchal, historically revisionist ass, and shut the fuck up.
cross-posted to jack & jill politics
We received this email from Amanda yesterday. Check it out, and get someplace where you can crank up your speakers, your woofer and your tweeters!
I've become an avid reader of JJ politics in the last few months, mostly because of my support of Barack Obama. One of the things I've found striking about this whole race and Barack's candidacy is how deeply invested and passionate black people around the world have become in this. I'm not even American (I'm from Barbados) but I have been following the race intensely, as has nearly everyone else here in the Caribbean. In fact, I just came across this song yesterday from one of Jamaica's biggest dancehall stars, Mavado. It's actually a remix of a huge hit he has right now. Truth be told, most of Mavado's music is gangsterish posturing but it just goes to show how deep Obama's impact is. I also decided to included the youtube video of the Mighty Sparrow's 'Barack the Magnificent'. Now, the Mighty Sparrow is from Trinidad and regarded as the greatest calypso singer alive - he's quite at the other end of the spectrum from Mavado - he's 73, sings a completely different style of Caribbean music, lives quite at the other end of the Caribbean in the other main cultural power of the West Indies. I found it pretty amazing because you can't get two more different Caribbean artists than Mavado and Sparrow- they are also about two generations apart- Sparrow could literally be Mavado's grandfather. Not only that, music is social commentary in the Caribbean- especially calypso. When we sing about you - 'yuh reach'. And when we're singing about someone who's not even West Indian - yuh really reach. Obama really is crossing boundaries. We want this as much as you do. Bless up, AmandaHere's Mavado's We Need Barack
And here's Mighty Sparrow's Barack The Magnificent
Thanks for sharing these Amanda. All I can say is I really want some roti and a peanut shake right now!cross-posted to jack and jill politics
It's a simple question. All these old, white millionaires on TV are saying Obama made a big mistake. That he chose poor words. That he offended small-town Pennsylvania.
How do they know?
They all live in Los Angeles and Manhattan. They eat sushi and drink mad lattes. They read the NY Times. None of these commentators owns a gun. I bet most don't go to church. I bet most don't know financial hardship because their town wasn't decimated by the end of the industrial era in this country.
It's all bullshit. Almost everything you see on TV is just bullshit. These idiots have big ass microphones and cameras and soapboxes. They are in the top percentile of wage-earners.
Yet somehow they know the hearts and minds of a rural voter?
It's a complete farce.
They waited all of 30 seconds to say his comments were wrong, but they didn't ask any of these allegedly-0ffended voters. They just made it up. They pulled political analysis right out of their buttholes. And yet, their uninformed opinions dominate the news and dominate the discussion.
Just look how much time we've spent on this topic, and we're supposed to be new media. Granted, I think we serve a useful purpose in these distraction-debates when we call bullshit. When we counter with information. When we don't simply amplify or get baited (like Hillary) into a meaningless conversation. However, it's not easy.
So do I have special insight? Not much, but I have family that's lived in rural PA and post-industrial Michigan. I also think I use my brain more than these TV people. And I still live in the real world.
The dangerous part is that if PA voters were not offended before, they might be now because they don't hear the context of Obama's statement (a reaction to a question about what they might face as volunteers going to PA). They only hear "elite" and "out of touch" and "condescending." Thus Obama gets defined beyond his control. If it could happen to Max Cleland, of course it can happen to a half-black dude who grew up in Hawaii and Indonesia and graduated from Columbia and Harvard.
It's so frightening and certainly not isolated to this candidate or this event.
So, can anyone point to actual -- and I know this is crazy -- evidence that rural or post-industrial small town voters would be offended by Obama's comments? If not, then just realize we're all being bamboozled and distracted.
Meanwhile, there are food riots in the developing world due.
In the last year, the price of wheat has tripled, corn doubled, and rice almost doubled. As prices soared, food riots have broken out in about 20 poor countries including Yemen, Haiti, Egypt, Pakistan, Indonesia, Ivory Coast, and Mexico. In response some countries, such as India, Pakistan Egypt and Vietnam, are banning the export of grains and imposing food price controls. Are rising food prices the result of the economic dynamism of China and India, in which newly prosperous consumers are demanding more food—especially more meat? Perennial doomsters such as the Earth Policy Institute's Lester Brown predicted more than a decade ago that China's growing food demand would destabilize global markets and signal a permanent increase in grain prices. But that thesis has so far not been borne out by the facts. China is a net grain exporter. India is also largely self-sufficient in grains. At some time in the future, these countries may become net grain importers, but they are not now and so cannot be blamed to for today's higher food prices. If surging demand is not the problem, what is? In three words: stupid energy policies.I'll be writing more about energy and food policy later.
cross-posted to jack and jill politics
Within days, someone has set up this website, and it's reached the front page of Digg. Talk about rapid response. Not from a campaign, but from a citizen.
That's incredible.