Yes, We've Lost Donors Because We've Protested a Rash of Clinton Surrogates Who Have Racialized the Nomination Contest (and They Aren't Doing it Accidentally), Like Major Clinton Supporter NY AG Andrew Cuomo Who Used the Expression that a Candidate Can't "Just Shuck and Jive." Like Clinton Backer Gov. Ed Rendell of Pennsylvania Who Told a Pittsburgh Paper that Race Matters in Presidential Vote in PA and Having a Black Opponent for Gov. Added Several Percentage Points to His Own Victory (As In Hillary Clinton Will Win More Votes in PA Than Obama Because He's Black and She's White -- Wink, Wink, and Nod). "It was callous and insensitive," said J. Whyatt Mondesire, president of the Philadelphia chapter of the NAACP. "We want him to apologize to all people, white and black." More to Come.The accusation of a coordinated Clintonian conspiracy is inane: "Okay, Andy, here are your lines. And Governor Rendell, here's what we want YOU to say..." Come off it, Buzzflash. Even the most paranoid anti-Clintonians at Free Republic have never posited such an unlikely scenario.
The "offense" taken here is entirely manufactured. In an internal memo, the Obama camp confessed to a strategy of ersatz outrage. It was, in fact, the Obama supporters (Jesse Jackson Jr. and others) who inserted race into the contest. To quote my earlier piece:
Hillary made an innocuous and perfectly accurate statement: "Dr. King’s dream began to be realized when Lyndon Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act of 1964." Obama's flacks have tried to misrepresent these words as some sort of attack on King and on Obama personally.
Obama's tactics have been pure Rove:
1. Obama had surrogates do the dirty work, while he stayed aloof. (Think Bush-v-McCain in 2000.)
2. He attacked his opponent's strength. The Clintons have always been popular in the black community. A large percentage of the voters in South Carolina are black; Obama needs black Clinton voters to switch over to him.
3. He put his opponent on defense by forcing her to be ultra-self-conscious about every syllable. It's getting so that a candidate cannot say "Hi!" without fear that someone will find some reason to be insulted by that word.
Obama must learn that white people really don't dig it when their innocent words are twisted.Cuomo's "shuck and jive" remark did not apply to Obama; see the Rolling Stone report here and the Marty Peretz apology here. Will Buzzflash show the same class that Peretz did? I doubt it.
I could have said what Hillary said. If she's a racist, then so am I. And if Obama (or his flacks) want to accuse me of being a bigot -- well, screw him. He's the candidate; I'm the voter. He needs me; I don't need him.
While Cuomo did not use that phrase in reference to Obama, I will. Like it or not, "shuck and jive" has seen wide informal usage as a synonym for "bullshitting" -- I've often heard it used in that fashion when the accused bullshitters were white. I distinctly recall my civics teacher saying "Don't give me the shuck and jive" when I came up with a lame excuse for an absence. And Obama (for whom I voted) always struck me as a bit of a bullshit artist: Much rhetoric, few details; great image, little experience. Certainly, Obama's claim that he can unite right and left is bullshit, since the right wants no such comity.
More than that.
Rolling Stone offers what it considers a more precise definition of the term shuck and jive: "the artful oratorical prowess of black people to dissemble before white power." The entire point of this post is to accuse some black Obama supporters of resorting to that very tactic, as when Jesse Jackson Jr. faked outrage over the (quite accurate) LBJ comment and over Bill Clinton's non-racist "fairy tale" remark. Remember Cheney's bogus indignation over John Kerry's reference to Mary Cheney's lesbianism? Liberals scoffed. So why should the Obamabots be allowed to work a similar trick?
More than that.
A TPM writer -- I forget which one -- recently made an interesting point. Not long ago, some hecklers at a Clinton speech chanted "Iron my shirts!" She quickly laughed off the insult, and so did everyone in the media. But suppose a group of Obama hecklers chanted "Shine my shoes"? The entire country would have (properly) gone into a week-long paroxysm of self-criticism. One can sell dolls of Hillary Clinton dressed as a Dominatrix, but god help anyone who sold dolls depicting Barack Obama dressed as a slave or a minstrel.
The TPM writer's point was not to justify racist insult, but to show that sexist insult receives more lenient treatment. While Obama himself has always behaved in a dignified fashion toward Hillary Clinton, Buzzflash has made the candidates responsible not just for their own words but for every word said by supporters. Very well, then: If one were to place every sentence uttered by every Obama supporter under the magnifying glass, could one find a phrase or two that might be construed (perhaps with some squinting of the eyes and some stretching of definitions) as degrading to women?
Perhaps I should make the experiment.
12 comments:
Joe, how about a statement from an Obama supporter that goes after all of us:
Presenting "thereisnospoon"
"You boomers (I have to assume you're a boomer, or at least an older "X"er) are all the same. Lots of self-righteousness, lots of selfishness, not a lot of brains. Lots of trashing all the sexual rules and doing lots of drugs when your hormones were raging, lots of "me decade" selfishness when you were finding yourselves during the 70's, lots of racism and tax cuts when you finally settled down in the 80s, lots of "what's good for the Dow is good for America" and moaning about your own kids' sexuality and those awful video games (shudder!) during the frivolous Roaring 90s, and lots of getting back at those nasty terrorists during the midlife crisis years under Bush II, together with consolidating your housing and 401(K) profits you "earned". Now you'll be demanding your cheap prescription drugs and pensions from a boomer candidate who will do everything to deliver them, while panicking about the value of the houses whose equity you leveraged to the hilt. Color me singularly unimpressed."
YES!! a friend of mine - and of this blog - was making this point to me just the other day!
the bias against women is so unbelievably hardwired, we don't even notice the parallels with racism.
but, there they are.
and my friend and i went on to note that the abortion 'issue' is the xenophobics' last 'acceptable' stand. (i would posit that the gay rights issue also figures in here, as it and women's rights both address the most intimate of identities: sexuality. the one is an issue of choice, the other not, which parallels the religion/race issues, as well.)
my friend and i also agreed that, whereas right to choose activists take a position that will not in any way interfere with the right to lifers' decisions about their own bodies, the right to lifers' position robs the rest of us of that freedom and right to choose what happens to our bodies.
i pointed out that the difference hangs on how we address the embryo; whereas right to lifers see it as a viable life, most of the rest of us - however unconsciously - see it as, well, my friend used the term parasite, and i can't argue.
that may seem cold, but it's true. the embryo is not in the least viable as anything and does not exist except as it requires a host. er, hostess.
moreover, we do not issue death certificates, names, social security numbers, count them in the census, or any of the standard paperwork that accompanies a life, a 'real' life.
then she made this powerful point:
nor do we, when an individual is faced with the fact that he or she might provide the perfect match for a life-saving kidney or liver or lung or heart, ...nor do we require by law that this perfectly matching individual undergo the procedure to sacrifice their bodily organ, in order for another to live.
in this case, it is voluntary to ensure that another life is saved, but in an abortion, the right to lifers would have women subjected to that forced sacrifice, a forced pregnancy. which, if you think about it on this level, is no different than a forced abortion.
apologies for steering the issue in this direction, and i don't in any way need for the discussion to go here.
but it was such a powerful point in the overall debate about women's rights, and joe has dutifully directed our attention to this disturbing manifestation of the American monster in our midst.
how casually we accept our treatment of and opinions about women. we both objectify them - render them objects - and subjectify them, rendering them our 'subjects' like royalty treats their servants.
woman as nigger.
in all of these ways we reject women as equals, which makes a very powerful statement about our culture, and our selves.
and as per joe's further astute comments to my post below on racism, wouldn't it be great if we so thoroughly mongrelized the human race that we could no longer be racist?
then we'd be truly forced to face the misogynist/homophobe within us.
Or how about this statement from one of the thousands of phony Democrats at Daily Kos:
Presenting "davefromqueens"
"As of today I vow never to vote for Bill or Hillary Clinton ever again for any position for elected office, be it dogcatcher, Senator from New York in 2012, or President of the United States. If my abstention, combined with the abstention of others, turns out to be the difference between President Hillary Clinton or President BushMcCain, then so be it. The only people who will be to blame for this fiasco will be those who are still supporting the dishonest tactics of the Clintons. You will also be held responsible for all harm that a BushMcCain presidency would inflict on the American people."
If Troll Dave is a Democrat, I am Elvis.
Troll Dave then goes on to list 26 reasons why he will never, ever vote for a Clinton for anything, and of course, it's full of bullshit and right wing talking points:
1. "I" "I" "I" in virtually every Hillary speech ad nauseum.
2. Mark Penn. (The incompetent jackass who couldn't get 50% against Bob Dole and took the surest thing {Tony Blair's 3rd term} and turned it into a close race.
3. Terri McCauliffe and the establishment machine.
4. "turn up the heat."
5. Smearing Obama with a kindergarten essay
6. The Rezko hypocrisy.
7. The drug use smears.
8. The attempt to freeze out Iowa students.
9. The anti-choice smear of Obama in New Hampshire.
10. The cooked books and $5 million dollar loan.
11. Playing the race card in South Carolina and elsewhere.
12. Bill Clinton's fairy tale remark.
13. Attempts to prevent service workers from caucusing in Nevada.
14. The cactus tears in NH. (She attacked Obama dried eyed next sentence.)
15. The mischaracterications of present votes in the Illinois state legislature.
16. Her failure to apologize for her politically calculating vote on Iraq.
17. Her equally politically calculating vote on Kyl-Lieberman.
18. The vicious attempts to play the misogyny card when 99% of Obama voters don't have a sexist bone in their bodies.
19. HRC's Michigan shenanigans.
20. HRC's Florida shenanigans.
21. Bill Clinton's caucus v. primary comments.
22. The cheesy Wisconsin attack ad while she's in Texas.
23. Lanny Davis (yep the Lieberman jackass) echoing the Clintons elitist attitude about upper middle class voters "not counting."
24. Hillary Clinton saying that Patti Solis' decision to step down was Patti's decision when Hillary knows Patti was fired.
25. Mark Penn's significant states comment telling people in 22 states to go F off.
26. Hillary attacking Obama this week saying she gives solutions while he gives speeches. (During a speech of course.)
So what is going on here? Right wingers play-acting as progressives, Libertarians hell bent on crashing the gates of the Democratic Party (led by Kos, himself), the MSM continually playing both sexist cards and reverse-racism cards against Clinton...
When you think of all the power and money and dirty tricks being employed against Hillary Clinton, and the fact that she is still standing somehow while all these forces try to topple her like a Saddam statue, and then you begin to wonder why...why is this going on, just wtf is going on, you realize that this is nothing short of a coup against the Democratic Party, one which will result in a massive crash and burn as "The One" goes down to defeat come November.
hm. the first comment went up while i was writing mine.
WTF??
this kid - and there is no way this child has moved very far out of his/her teens, if at all - was very clearly NOT around during those times he so smugly defines (as if HIS sense of history is anything close to reality; sounds like rove to me!).
someone needs to remind this neophyte that obama is no spring chicken. tho he appeals to the youth, he is himself 46 years old, and only a decade younger than myself and most babyboomers.
so the point of that rant is pretty well trashed there, too. history as mean and ignorant sound bites, and youth-inspiring candidate as almost 50 year old teen. quite the grounded and solid world view, that.
i hate to use the term 'slackers', as it makes me feel so bad for the young who don't slack, because i happen to know and actually hang out with so many who actually relate to my generation, and respect all that we actually accomplished, despite all the drugs and disillusionment. in contrast, i was so PROUD to be referred to as a hippie!
this poor dupe would do well to go out and 'find' him/herself, whatever it takes. harboring such sadly misguided (tho pithy) reductions of a whole generation to nasty barbs does no one the kind of service his candidate would offer this country.
ALL of this country, including this poor slob. like one of us.
not to be trite, but hey, get a life.
thanks for sharing this, john; gives us a heads up on one angle of attitude we might expect, tho i suspect it's a very very small sliver of an angle. i mean, really; except for the fact this person claims to support obama, i'd swear this was written by a rightwingnut repug!! (the ghost of rove again....)
and please, feel free to share this back at him/her.
chuckle; hit the return key too quick.
that was me up there above this, ranting back at the young ranter.
dr. elseWHERE
Joseph, you are right on in this post! I do not know what your readership is, but I hope it is high...and I've removed Buzzflash from my favorites list.
I won't be missing the Buzzflash link; good call, Joseph.
Dr elsewhere, if you thought that one was amazing, please check out this next one - I call these "entities" The Great Pretenders, and there's more I'm looking into right now.
But please check out that link to my coverage of Kids for Change/Kid for Edwards - and especially what this "kid" supposedly wrote all by himself.
SluggoJD
Nice try, tranny.
You know how I instantly knew that you were pushing a CD movie? YOU WERE ANONYMOUS.
Always, you fuckers are anonymous. How brave of you!
Why do you come here?
At any rate, I noted about a dozen long-exposed lies and howlers in the You Tube trailer alone.
Just go away, tranny. You have plenty of other places to romp and play. WHY DO YOU COME HERE?
Andrew Cuomo: Cuomo, Bill Clinton’s former Housing Secretary and a prominent Democrat political player in New York, was tape recorded using racially inflamatory rhetoric to build opposition to a potential Democrat primary opponent while speaking to a Democrat group. Cuomo stated that voting for his rival for the New York Democrat gubernatorial nomination Carl McCall, who is black, would create a “racial contract” between Black and Hispanic Democrats “and that can’t happen.” Upon initial reports, Cuomo denied the statement but later a tape recording surfaced. Cuomo later dropped out of the race for governor.
Joe, you suffer from not knowing when to close your mouth. So Bussflash made a stupid mistake. Fair enough. However, when you venture into the realm of comparing a doll where Hillary Clinton is dressed as a Dominatrix to that of Barak Obama dressed as a slave or in minstrel, it shows the typical "baby boomer" resentment which is a testament to how some of you will just never get it. Nice try though.
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