This Sunday's sermon, brothers and sisters, concerns the obstinate nature of faith when confronted by fact. We draw our text from the book Misquoting Jesus, by Bart Ehrman, the famed New Testament expert at Chapel Hill, North Carolina.
Ehrman once was a fundamentalist Christian. In his student days, he wrote a paper addressing a famous problem in the Gospel of Mark. In Chapter 2, verses 25-26, Jesus refers to an incident recounted in the Old Testament -- specifically, to 1 Samuel 21:1. But Jesus gets the passage wrong. He uses the name "Abiathar" when he should have said "Ahimelech."
You're probably thinking: No biggee. But for a fundamentalist, the contradiction is very threatening.
Most fundamentalists will not budge from the doctrine of Biblical inerrancy, not even in the smallest of details. In their view, any admission that the Bible could be wrong in a single verse is tantamount to saying that the whole book is untrustworthy.
Young Ehrman wrote a paper devoted to Mark/1 Samuel contradiction. He did much scholarly research. He did a close parsing of the original Greek of the Gospel passage. He formulated an abstruse and convoluted argument which, he thought, would finally resolve the issue. And he felt certain that his professor would be very pleased.
The prof sent back the paper with one line scribbled at the very end:
"Maybe Mark just made a mistake."
Ehrman says that those words "went right through me." After allowing himself to admit that the Bible could be wrong in this one passage, all the other contradictions and problems became apparent.
Undoubtedly, Ehrman had previously run into people who told him that "The things that you're liable to read in the Bible ain't necessarily so." Even at that stage in his academic career, he must have read works by Biblical specialists who did not presume inerrancy.
But those other voices did not impact his thinking. The psychological tipping point came only after he saw those six words scribbled in red ink -- Maybe Mark just made a mistake. The simplest answer, he now understood, was the one most likely to be true -- and all of his hyper-critical scrutiny of the text was simply an attempt to escape that truth.
There are many forms of religious fundamentalism.
And sometimes a blogger, not a professor, wields the hammer that cracks the concrete coating of unreason.
Anti-Clintonism is an American religion.
Both the right and the left adhere to this form of fundamentalism. Even those who claim to be free of its taint are not. Like Hazel Motes in the Flannery O'Connor story, we can never truly escape from a socially-condoned form of zealotry. A Democrat may denounce Ken Starr in 1998 yet write "Remember Vince Foster!" in a Kos diary ten years later.
I'm not immune. I felt an unreasoning antipathy toward Bill Clinton for the first six years of his presidency, and I still don't care for Hillary. But why did I, do I, feel that way?
Throughout most of the 1990s, I did not try to counter the myths told about Bill Clinton, because I didn't want my progressive friends to think me naive.
In truth, they were naive. And I was cowardly.
Freeing oneself from any form of fundamentalism is never easy. That's why young Bart Ehrman constructed that elaborate, abstruse argument to resolve the contradiction between Mark and 1 Samuel.
And that's why many progressives, including many of my readers, have constructed elaborate, abstruse arguments to justify the Great Myth of 2008.
This smear first seeped into the progressive meme-stream before the first primary. At that time, the majority of blacks, Hispanics and working class Democrats favored Hillary. Obama appealed to the young and to affluent liberals.
Hillary was comfortably ahead in the national polls. The press derided her for running an ultra-safe campaign. She was quoted as saying, a bit nervously, "I can't make any mistakes."
Yet the Myth asks us to believe that, under those circumstances, the Clintons embarked on a terribly risky strategy. Supposedly, they decided to use racist "code words" in order to appeal to those voters who had felt drawn to Obama. According to The Myth, Hillary Clinton came under the impression that racism would fetch those New Yorker readers and Eminem listeners.
Funny thing: None of the Republican candidates ever resorted to racist or sexist code words when vying desperately for conservative votes -- even though it became clear early on that the Democratic nominee would likely be a black man or a woman. McCain did not use such a risky tactic when appealing to reactionary whites in Alabama or Tennesee.
Yet we are to believe that Hillary took that risk when making her pitch to the brie-and-chablis crowd in California.
Progressives continue to make elaborate, abstruse arguments designed to convince us that Hillary sacrificed her base in order to get her claws into this hallucinated voting bloc of young, affluent liberal bigots.
Progressive bloggers make elaborate, abstruse arguments designed to convince you that Bill Clinton's post-South Carolina reference to Jesse Jackson's 1988 victory was somehow an appeal to racism. Actually, it was a reminder that South Carolina has been known to vote against the national frontrunner. (Bill also praised Obama very highly on that occasion. Progs never tell you that part.)
Progressive bloggers make elaborate, abstruse arguments designed to convince you that Bill Clinton's "Fairy Tale" remark was racist. Oddly, those progs never embed the video which captured Bill's actual words. I did.
Progressive bloggers make elaborate, abstruse arguments designed to convince you that Billy Shaheen characterized Obama as a drug dealer. He did no such thing.
Progressive bloggers made elaborate, abstruse arguments designed to convince you that Clinton, in one of her recent commercials, had "darkened" video of Barack Obama -- even though anyone with the requisite technical knowledge understands that lossy video codecs usually darken online videos.
Progressives may offer abstruse, elaborate arguments designed to convince you that Geraldine Ferraro's silly words were somehow more vile than Jesse Jackson Jr.'s unapologetic -- and indefensible -- appeal to racism: "Do you want to be the one to prevent a black man from winning the White House?"
I have no doubt that Josh Marshall can make an elaborate, abstruse argument justifying his obsession with the McCain/Hagee connection, even as he pretends that the Obama/Wright connection is no big deal. No double standard there. Right, Josh?
Yes, we've heard many elaborate, abstruse arguments.
And I'm the professor who scribbles a message in red ink at the end of that composition.
Maybe you'll ignore the message now. Maybe you'll allow yourself to think the unthinkable thought at a later time. Maybe you never will. The simple truth remains the simple truth, and Anti-Clintonism stands revealed as a matter of faith, not fact.
Maybe Mark just made a mistake.
And maybe Barack Obama is a lying bastard.
23 comments:
Joe,
I've read your blog for some years now. I read it first. I am like many other of your readers who say that neither of the Democratic candidates are top of the line. But in the past months I have watched and read of Hillary's attacks on Obama (and on the Democratic Party, should Obama win the nomination), placing him as presidential material at number 3, behind her and McCAIN!? I am sorry, but I do not want a republican in the White House in 2009. This type of campaign rhetoric has pissed me off, far more than the issue of racism in the Democratic camps. I will find it very hard to vote for Clinton if she wins the nomination, and I've voted Democratic since 1960!
Maybe Hillary's staff just made a mistake.
First, the McCain thing has nothing to do with the Hillary-the-racist Myth propounded by Camp Obama and the progblogs. If you feel that party loyalty justifies ignoring that Myth, then I understand. Until quite recently, I felt the same way.
The McCain business is not connected to that myth, which is why I have not addressed it. I'll do so later.
"Maybe Barack Obama is a lying bastard." Well, maybe, but in your post you don't quote one thing that Obama said. Presumably you are ascribing to Obama things said by Jesse Jackson, Jr. or even "progressive bloggers."
I don't think Clinton darkened Obama's photo, nor do I hold her responsible for everything every supporter of hers has said. Why do you hold Obama to that standard?
When the Church Fathers were composing their Latin Vulgate, they needed a Latin term for the Greek NT neologism 'Agapé' (Love/God's Love), so they coined 'caritas', from the adjective 'carus' (meaning something like 'dear', 'esteemed'). English 'charity' (from the French word 'charite') derives from 'caritas'. The Gothic word for 'adulterer' and the Latvian word for 'lecherous' derived from the same Indo-European form as Latin 'carus'. Also the English word 'whore'.
H, that was delightful. It had nothing to do with anything I wrote, of course.
Of course. "The simple truth remains the simple truth, and Anti-Clintonism stands revealed as a matter of faith, not fact." Faith, Hope, and Charity: Camus said "From the mass of human evils swarming in Pandora's box, the Greeks brought out hope at the very last, as the most terrible of all. I don't know any symbol more moving. For hope, contrary to popular belief, is tantamount to resignation. And to live is not to be resigned."
You mean faith like Xtian faith, i.e., belief? The French words for belief and for the cross are like the same. English 'cross' came into the language as 'crois' for a while, which in French also means '(I/you) believe'. And you know the English transliteration for God's OT name is I AM THAT I AM, right, and the French for 'I am' is je suis, and the French je suis also means 'I follow'?
I don't think Clinton has played the race card to any great extent. She has been patronizing however."I have a lifetime of service, and Mr. McCain has a lifetime of service and Mr. Obama has a speech he gave in 2003." Then there was the business of the person in clear second place (down by more than 100 delegates, 500,000 votes and 14 states won to 28) offering the front runner the VP slot. And the whole 3 am phone call ad was right from the Rove-Bush politics of fear textbook. And Clinton - as first lady or Senator - never even got a 3 am phone call other than "your husband is banging an intern."
Ken Starr and the whitewater and monica stuff was all an attempted political hit job with no evidence of real wrong doing. I do credit Clinton with doing a fairly good job of running the country, as far as the general economy and keeping us out of any major wars. My complaints with Clinton deal more with NAFTA, WTO, and his attack on Constitutional rights, like the Anti Terrorism And Effective Death Penalty Act, or the murder of the Brach Davidians, or the use of the DEA and Justice to arrest state legal medical marijuana sellers and users, which led to the death of Peter McWilliams.
In the days of..
In Mark 2:26, reference is made to an occurrence in "the days of Abiathar the high priest." But from 1 Sam. 22, we learn that this event took place when Ahimelech, the father of Abiathar, was high priest. The apparent discrepancy is satisfactorily explained by interpreting the words in Mark as referring to the lifetime of Abiathar, and not to his term of office. It is not implied in Mark that he was actually high priest at the time referred to. Others, however, think that the loaves belonged to Abiathar, who was at that time (Lev. 24:9) a priest, and that he either himself gave them to David, or persuaded his father to give them.
not sure where you get Obama is a lying bastard out of all this
For what it's worth these comments from former Clinton consultant Dick Morris are relevant to this ongoing discussion:
Hillary Sends Ferraro After Obama
...
The blunt fact is that Geraldine Ferraro would not make a statement like this one without at least the tacit knowledge and acquiescence of the Clintons and their campaign. Ferraro is an old pro and would know enough not to shoot off her mouth without making it part of a carefully conceived strategy to discredit Obama based on race.
As such, her comments need to be seen as a piece with the attacks on Obama's minister and his endorsement by Farrakhan. With Hillary now almost totally dependent on older voters, the race card may be the only way to produce the kinds of margins she needs in the future primaries to offset Obama's large and widening lead among elected delegates.
http://newsmax.com/morris/hillary_ferraro/2008/03/17/80946.html
The devil made me do it.
"And maybe Barack Obama is a lying bastard.
Why? Because he said "I did NOT have sexual relations with that woman....?"
Nice to see you at least use the qualifier "maybe." Of course, if you bothered yourself to dig up actual proof for your assertions, you could dispense with such qualifiers.
In my comments to you here, I've tried very hard to be respectful and even-handed. In return, you've accused me of being a "Kos KoolAid drinker," an unreasoning Hillary-hater and hectored with a condescending tone. [Maybe it's the residual bile from dealing with "trannies" or something, but the response is disproportionate to any offense given in my posts.]
Since I don't visit Kos, I don't even know just what kind of cultists I'm now accused of consorting with, nor do I "hate" Hillary, but that doesn't seem to matter to you. It is far easier for you to simply lump dissenters in with whatever group of misfits and mental deviants you think are unworthy of reasoned reply. It's not a winning strategy, Joseph.
If the only rejoinders you can offer to respectfully worded dissenting comments is high dudgeon, it's a tacit admission you have nothing to further your cause but invective. Which is a shame, because you were once a much bigger person than that.
As I've repeatedly stated from the outset of my comments here, I was for Edwards, just like you, and I no longer have a horse in this race. [As a Canadian, I cannot vote, and my only contribution is to offer an outsider's opinion.] Obama wouldn't have even been my second choice, primarily because too much of his background is a blank slate to me. However, we're now down to being forced to choose between the two Dem candidates who remain standing.
You've made your choice, Joseph, and have been honest enough to state clearly that you were not attracted to Hillary so much as you were repulsed in her direction by the actions of Obama supporters. Fair enough.
Your blind spot seems to arise when you cannot understand that others, like you, have likewise been repulsed, only in their case it was toward Obama by the actions of Hillary and her supporters.
That doesn't make their decision correct, any more than yours is, but it is a fact worth noting. The blogosphere is replete with such comments: "You know, I was undecided about who to vote for, until I watched Hillary's campaign work so hard to diminish, demean, degrade Obama's achievements," etc., etc. You seem to think that this antipathy toward Hillary is unwarranted, and somehow the result of a grand conspiracy against the Clintons.
Voters have noticed, and been repulsed by, Hillary's imperious condescension. It has been clear since Super Tuesday that her campaign had no "second act," because they didn't realize one would be necessary. She was supposed to have had it locked up by then. That's the aura of entitlement you may have heard or read about.
If you check your timelines, you'll see that Iowa and Super Tuesday transpired well before any race-based bullshit had arisen. Consequently, you cannot posit that her own failure to connect with the voters she needs is the result of some Obama campaign to incite racial division.
It doesn't seem to stop you from trying however. And, like the candidate you now support, that effort doesn't seem to include offering any proof for assertions, only conclusions reached through your own deductions.
Without a "second act," Hillary has been reduced to the "kitchen sink" strategy, which is to contrive whatever sensational little daily tidbit they can to keep Obama off balance. Meanwhile, Hillary oozes condescension toward somebody who is consistently beating her, as though her own lacklustre performance thus far is in no way related to her extravagant failure to lock this thing up.
Condescension alone isn't working for Hillary, Joseph, any more than it'll work for you. If Hillary's campaign is to succeed, she needs to focus on the issues and not have as her sole platform a relentless attack against her opponent. She needs to realize this, Joseph. And so do you.
Otherwise, her campaign will continue to flounder, and your efforts on her behalf will not alter a single thing.
Feel free to interpret my comments as being motivated by some king of dislike for you or for Hillary, but they are not. If I disliked you, I wouldn't bother to comment at all. But I DO like you, and have read things here that - even when I disagreed with your 'take' - were informative and entertaining.
Nor do I hate Hillary. But if you're going to be of any value to her campaign, tell her she needs to do better. No amount of positing grand conspiracies will make her a more worthwhile candidate. If she wants to win, she needs to become the candidate she claims to be, not the candidate she's been thus far.
You know Joe, I really do agree with you about the fact that there was a grand conspiracy to discredit Bill Clinton and by extension Hillary Clinton back in the 90's. I even thought that Monica was unknowingly used to trap Bill and that whole episode was laughable and a waste of time, specially in light of Iran-Contra. Bill Clinton has what JFK had and what MLK had...charisma or an ability to connect to people and that was deemed very dangerous by the right. I didn't agree with all of Bill Clinton's policy positions but all in all I was happy with him (now days Democrats idealize Clinton days the same way that Republicans idealize Reagan days).
Back then I could not understand the "Hate Hillary" crowd. Just because she was not the be seen and not heard wife or didn't bake cookies ....etc. didn't merit that kind of hate.
However, we are not talking about the 90's here, we are talking about 2008 and we are not talking about Bill but Hillary.
So let's talk about this election. Like you I voted for Obama in the primaries and until I walked in the polling place, I had not made up my mind. Edwards was my choice and he was out. So what made me vote for Obama?
- I don't think Hillary is a racist and none of the "race card" allegations affected me in any way (which is why yesterday I kept mentioning that I was merely offering hypothetical arguments)
-The fact of the matter is that Hillary is probably smarter than Bill and deffinatlly more disciplined than Bill but she does not have what Bill had ...charisma.... that ability to connect to people and Obama has it.
-I did not like her vote on the Iraq war(and I never believed that she was fooled by Bush)but I also understood why she would not apologize for it as the MSM was zeroing on. What pissed me off was her vote on the Iranian Revolutionary Guard. I felt that was due to AIPAC pressure and that does sway my vote for President.
-The red phone ad pissed me off along with "McCain and I are qualified". That just left a bad taste in my mouth even though it probably helped her win Ohio.
-She sounds petty sometimes like when she complained about why she gets to answer the questions first in the debates and when she brought up the Rezko thing in the debate(after being accused of all those untrue allegations back in the 90's herself). She hardly ever acknowledged or congratulated Obama on his wins like she is a sour loser.
- But the number one reason I voted for Obama has to do with a core ideology they differ on. Hillary believes that leaders are instrumental in changing policies. That people need to be persuaded to pick the good leader and then go home till the next time around. In all her stump speeches she kept saying pick me and I will be ready and I will give you affordable health care and I will get us out of Iraq..etc. The comment about MLK and LBJ was not in my mind about racism but about this ideology that she holds (Political Leaders matter more that Movement leaders). In contrast, Obama has been talking about a movement. He started by being an organizer. he always says that we not only need to pick a Democrat as president, but we need to increase the number of DEMS in Congress and local offices. He implies that "HE" can not do or undo anything without popular support from people as well as members of his own party. He has inspired young people and Black people and others to join and participate. We have seen a three or four fold increase in number of voters this election and he does deserve some credit for it. When I walked in the polling place on election day, I saw a Obama volunteer outside, directing traffic, pointing people in the right direction, answering questions. I saw Obama signs everywhere. Inside, there were a ton of people waiting to vote (this is Texas and it is a primary, last real election I voted in there were 3 people in the room).
In short, I voted for Obama, because I agree with him that it takes a movement and participation from voters to change things. He put his money where his mouth is. He got people involved and he benefited from it.
Maybe sometimes you have to analyze something by breaking it down to the tiniest micro level, before you can properly bring the bigger picture into focus. Or rather, first you'd have to have the requisite analytical capability and desire to understand something, in order to arrive at an understanding at all. I used to be pretty interested in theology, and if nothing else, it changed the way I parse information and cross-reference it; both on the micro and macro levels, breaking things down and putting them back together. Your analogy of the fundamentalist mentality of Progressives and this theologian got me thinking.
First, this theologian was probably too intelligent and thoughtful to remain a fundamentalist forever--as opposed to progressives and fundie Xtians, whose respective dark, confused worldviews compel me to run the other way when I see them coming. They aren't affected by reason because they can't afford to be, their thinking is sloppy because it has to be, careful analysis would destroy the foundations of their worldviews, and this is unacceptable; therefore the conflicting data has to be excluded somehow. I think there is a single defining psychological disposition that's at the core of both ideologies, or any ideology for that matter: don't know what to call it, but has to do with the lengths they have to go to in order to hide from information that counters the core aspects of their worldviews, including the way they see themselves.
Theologian Terri Murray fired an intellectual broadside at American right-wing Xtianity in this piece (linked at the first item on this page):
http://www.yuricareport.com/
--though it was probably aimed way over their heads. In the process, she made the case for something that really, REALLY brings into focus a potentially fatal flaw in the New Testament as a whole: "The West has no single, coherent basis for ‘Christian’ ethics because the New Testament contains two conflicting ethical systems." The ethical systems of Jesus and Paul are incompatible. Whoa. I instantly recognized that this was true, and I had simply never looked at it this way. Paul presents serious theological and commom-sense problems, and I thought he was a control freak, and probably a pain in the ass to be around. But by extrapolating indentifiable, contrasting ethical systems from the words and actions of these two individuals, she nailed it.
Paul, of course, would have a simple answer for this problem: "I do not permit a woman to teach a man." Perfect example of a fundamentalist strategy, you just eliminate as many voices from the discourse as possible, by simply excluding them from the worthy.
Anyway, this got me thinking about extending the analogy in terms of ethics: what would happen if you analyzed the Democratic party in a similar fashion, would you come up with conflicting ethical systems, or would you come up with ANY ethical systems? Maybe this is pointless, but for me, it's an interesting and novel way of looking at segments of society or individuals, deducing their core ethical values by means of analyzing their behavior over time. Probably needn't point out that this is a better method of discerning a person's real applied ethics than by asking them. What sort of picture might emerge? The question is too big for me, it seems the picture would be pretty messy. Probably a better way of deducing the subconscious impulses buffeting behavior about, than trying to impute an ethical system, where there may not be one. Well, OK, this whole construct just got too confusing. Still, just for fun, if you could construct an ethical system from the actions of an individual or group over time, what would it look like? Whatever else could be said, at least Jesus and Paul HAD coherent, discernable ethical systems. With fundies, progressives, and the Democratic Party in general, it would be way messier.
bogart,
Give it a try. I would be interested in that discussion. It would certainly be much more intellectual than discussing "mud-throwing' tactics.
"The apparent discrepancy is satisfactorily explained by interpreting the words in Mark as referring to the lifetime of Abiathar, and not to his term of office. It is not implied in Mark..."
Gotta love fundies. They can do this crap all day long.
As the SubGeniuses say: "We'll teach you how to pull the wool over your OWN eyes!"
not sure where you get Obama is a lying bastard out of all this
Haven't been reading my last five or so posts, have you? That'sfine. But...if ou didn't come here to read my stuff, why did you come here at all?
(PS. Here's my favorite. Reconcile John and the Synoptics on the question of the day of the Last Supper. I've heard all the rationalizations, and I'm curious as to which one you favor.)
My informants tell me that Dick Morris isn't reliable. For $500 he'll tell you secret stuff; for $1000 he'll tell you he wasn't telling the truth for $500.
Geraldine Ferraro, like Hillary, understands that if you only talk about 'racism' and 'sexism', you're only talking about symptoms and manifestations when it's long past the time since we should have been talking honestly about race and culture and misogyny, gynephobia, poverty, and violent crime. But Geraldine got dunked and drowned like the innocent women of Salem. The fucken corporate media loved it in 1984 when VPOTUS Poppy Bush said he kicked her ass, and now they get to do it themselves.
When 2007 began it was clear to everyone that the Democrats would win the White House. That is, CHANGE was the default future. Hillary was happy to be considered first and foremost to 'lead' the CHANGE.
John Edwards made his campaign be about Hillary's corporate backers and lobbyist connections. What could Hillary do about that? Nothing much.
Barry co-opted both the fact of CHANGE and Edwards's finger-pointing, making 'change' apply to the stereotypes and caricatures of well-experienced politicians.
On the merits alone, whatever criteria you choose, no one is more qualified than Hillary to be POTUS. No one is so much as half as qualified as she is.
Last June 28 I was getting a haircut at a new barbershop in town. I asked the barber if he'd be watching "the debate tonight", he said "Sure". I couldn't get a shampoo because the shop didn't have sinks - the shop didn't have insurance coverage or the state certification for such services.
The shop is next to a grocery market that sells a lot of organic food and all that vitamin and essential oil stuff. The staff all have one or another kind of mark on their bodies: home-made tattoos, suicide scars, stab wounds. I get the impression they hire social outcasts. Every conceivable 'ethnic' group and age group shop there, and the prices are the highest in the city.
If you think someone else needs a memory refresher, recommend this article from blackamericaweb.com:
http://www.blackamericaweb.com/site.aspx/bawnews/stateof/debate628
"For what it's worth these comments from former Clinton consultant Dick Morris are relevant to this ongoing discussion:"
Gary -- DICK MORRIS?
See what you fucking Obamabots have come to! I could not imagine Kossacks quoting Dick Morris approvingly even two years ago. At that time, everyone understood what a liar he is.
Remember the aftermath of 9/11 and Morris published "recollections" to this effect: "Bill Clinton could talk forever about income redistribution but naver mentioned national security..."?
That's not an exact quote; I'm going on memory. But if you will look it up, you'll see that I got damned close.
And Morris' memory was ridiculous. Inane. Everyone on the left understood it as such.
"The blunt fact is that Geraldine Ferraro would not make a statement like this one without at least the tacit knowledge and acquiescence of the Clintons and their campaign."
Are you out of your mind? In the midst of everything that has happened, after the Obama campaign had made enormous headway with their smear campaign, you really think that the Hillary campaign would court controversy?
Do you have any evidence for that absurd claim? No, you do not. Obamafolk never present evidence; they prefer to refer on slimey arguments of the "Well, everyone KNOWS..." variety.
Here's a real quote from Hillary: "I know I can't make any mistakes." Look that up; I know I have that one word for word, or nearly so. At the time, everyone derided her sentiment, because it cemented the impression that she was overly careful. But at the same time, everyone understood why she said it.
The fact is, Ferraro has shot off her mouth in stupid ways before, well before this election. (God, I never liked that woman.)
The fact is, in 2008 no candidate of any stripe, of any party, in any contest, could ever hope to have anything to gain by appealing to racism.
The last time anyone tried a trick like that was (arguably) 1988 -- twenty years ago -- and there were those who argued even then that the Willie Horton ads hurt Poppy more than they helped.
And ENOUGH with this this chronology horseshit. Cut the crap. The Obama forces have been racist-baiting Hillary since December, at least.
So what are you saying...? That the accusation was false THEN but is accurate NOW?
Isn't that a little like saying "All flying saucer sightings previous to 1998 were hallucinations, but after that, they were real"?
C'mon. Listen to yourself. That line of argumentation is ridiculous, and you know it.
Let's talk about that Ferraro quote in more detail. As you know, I previously have scoffed at the assertion that being black somehow made it easier to run for president in this country.
But now I'm beginning to wonder, based on the numbers.
Six percent of the electorate say that they would never vote for a black man. Yeah, I gotta admit: Starting out with a six percent deficit is a huge problem.
But now I've seen articles saying that Barack Obama has sewn up the African American vote based on, quote, "the politics of racial identification."
12.8% of the country is black, according to the last census, and more than three-quarters of them are going for Obama. So that figure more than matches the six percent deficit.
Especially when you consider that those six-percenter bigots probably would never vote Democratic anyways.
Of course, we then get to the intangibles: Outside the six percent who admit that they would not vote for a black person, how many SECRETLY have a problem doing so that they won't admit to pollsters, or even to themselves?
I wish we had numbers which could answer that quesion. Everyone wishes we had data. But we don't.
Which means we are stuck in a guessing game.
So was Ferraro's statement incorrect? It depends on how you answer that guessing game.
In my view -- my guess, if you will -- black pols have a harder time making an appeal, even when speaking to whites who would vote for a black candidate.
So yeah, I think Ferraro got it wrong.
But I don't have the data to prove it, and neither do you.
To throw in my two cents on what JFK guy said, here's this article from the nytimes that talks about the differences between the campaigns.
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/16/weekinreview/16bai.html?_
I am pushed further and further from the Clinton campaign because of their campaign model.
They seem to change their attack based on what scores well in polling on that given day.
It's very disconcerting to me because it seems a power grab built of the desperation of having to continue the campaign long after they expected to win.
This paints a picture (regardless of the truth) that the platform isn't what matters, the winning is what matters. Let me expand on that.
While the message for the day may refer specifically to her superiority in one context or another over her opponent, the sound-byte style talking points betray any real meaning I would take away from that.
Take for example the mailers in Ohio. What did I get out of that? I know for instance that the mailers attributed a quote to Hillary that was a lie, I know the mailers drew an unfair link between pictures of closed plants and Hillary's stance on NAFTA. I'm not defending that mailer. However, her press conference with her huffy "Shame on you Barack Obama" just made me cringe.
She reminds me of W. running in 2004. His outbursts in the debates "I need more time!" (to fix Social Security) synch in my head with her outbursts in the debates "now hold on, this is really important"(Healthcare), like somehow I missed her saying the same thing (with the same outburst) in the last debate.
It smacks of someone who doesn't have any real interest in the platform they are running on, they are willing to whine and point fingers when they don't get what they want, and what they seem to want above anything else is just to win.
This is underscored by the worrying signs that she believes that she is entitled (re: aura of entitlement) to some secrecy by privilege.
Another candidate who gets on the "We know what is best for you" bandwagon is just not going to do it for me.
The withholding of tax documents and earmarks exudes the same sense of superiority and entitlement that I dislike so much in the current administration. It's not that I'm calling her a Republican, I'm just turned off by the lack of openness, and after the current administration, can you blame me?
I don't feel comforted at all by what experience an establishment candidate would take into a phone call at 3:00 AM.
I just don't get that impression from Barack Obama.
Granted his campaign is run by an ad man, and they are pushing the vision for all it's worth. But the general actions of him and his staff (with some glaring exceptions), and their general reaction to the attacks against them paint a totally different picture.
I get the impression that his platform is well reasoned and thought out, that he stands for his platform and that his platform is the way it is because that is what he thinks is the most likely way to start moving in that direction.
He is for more of an open government than Hillary, and so far he has a fair record of acting that way.
He has released his tax documents, he has released more information about his dealings with Rezko than the press knew. He has worked for open government in his Senate career.
National Security and Executive Privilege should be thrown out as blanket excuses and we'd be better off for it.
It also seems that Hillary's campaign is missing the loop-closing function. They take their talking point for the day, push that talking point, and when it's thrown back in their face the following day, they are already on to Mark Penn's next talking point.
Why can't I hear from her campaign how her plan for healthcare doesn't garner wages from people too poor to afford the healthcare she is making mandatory?
I recall her campaign saying that Obama was lying about that, but I've never seen it explained how that isn't true.
On the other hand, Obama makes it a point to address issues that arise around him and turn that into a positive simply by openly addressing it.
Releasing his video about Wright, talking to the Chicago Tribune about Rezko?
Directly addressing something that is negative about his campaign is appealing to me.
Hillary doesn't seem to do it very well or very often and again that reminds me of the current administration.
Perhaps I'm unfairly laying too much baggage from the current administration at her feet, but the similarities are just enough to make me leery, and if I have another option, I'll take it.
Right now, the way I see it. Obama is that option.
I was leery of him from the beginning because he seemed like an empty suit too timid to say anything for fear that it would cause a scandal.
Now that I've heard a chance to hear him and Hillary say plenty of things, I'm just not as turned off by him as I am by her.
One way or the other, I'm going to vote for someone. I'm voting for the candidate that sickens me the least.
Please note that I'm talking here about my feelings and my perceptions. This is only where I'm coming from, not the entire picture.
People are turning away from Hillary because she is one of the Pandering Elite.
These Pandering Elites chose not to vote against the Iraq war. And these same Elites are bankrupting the country and will not prosecute Bush for his crimes. THAT IS WHY PEOPLE HAVE TURNED ON HER. She doesn't talk about correcting anything. She simply panders to whatever the Elite of America, UK, Mexico, Israel and Saudi Arabia want from her.
She's not going to fix the border issue. She's not going to do anything about the environment. She's not going to try to get us out of Iraq. She won't fix health care. She won't get to the bottom of 9/11. She's only going to do what it takes to get her in the White House. Then when she gets there she will simply put a bandaid on everything and pretend like she did something.
I'm not Obama will be much better. But at least he isn't Hillary.
Frankly a lot of us are just tired of bullshit. Tired of gatekeepers, tired of coveryups... and just want to keep rolling these fucks over until we get some measure of change back into the system.
CapnDudeGuy
Maybe Cannon just made a mistake? I've been following this since you decided to switch from Obama to Hillary, and though I agree with much of what you're saying, I have to wonder if your vehemence about it all comes from having really believed that Obama was the real thing. I voted for him in the primary but mostly because I don't want to go through another 4 years of hearing Clinton drama. In fact, your vehemence now reminds me of my anger at Bill for screwing up his presidency. How I wanted to believe he was the real thing! Wait, that's not when it happened - it was after he let us down on health insurance and gays in the military. Then Monica. Yup, the Clintons are political machines. A vote for Barack seemed smart. Also, he's different enough from McCain that he could win against him, unlike Hillary. So, of course, you don't have to acknowledge it publicly of course, but isn't it possible that this time around you were a true believer for awhile? And you made a mistake? That you forgot that they both want to win no matter what it takes.
Having read your posts for the past couple of days I have noticed several things.
I admit I am coming from a place of ignorance of the whole behind close doors election thing. So I do find it hard to believe that EVERY comment made by an Obama supporter has come from hillary hate or Obama camp directions.
I doubt Hillary is playing the race card, the same people who won't vote for a black man are definetely not going to vote for a women. Hell they wouldn't even vote democrat.
What I see is your contempt for his supporters playing this political game. And it sounds to me like there are plenty of trolls out there from the right wing camp pumping up the progs full of BS and vitriol.
And it has you pissed off, which is good, since that is a good motivator, however I think that the chosen style of communication with these people is ineffective. Since the true supporters/ not the trolls can't see the bigger picture. They need help in breaking up with a campaign that is getting dirty on both sides. it's all in the social style and communication they use. Apparently people have a lot emotionally vested in their respective candidates, and as such feel personally attacked when joseph points out the BS being perpetrated by the Obama Camp. What I see is obama staying out of the fray while his troup do the dirty work, so I can't say he may be a lying bastard. But maybe he isn't the champion of a new kind of politics.
The race card is being way blown out of proportion. i like the phrase "A lie told a thousand times is still a lie" . unfortunately the people who are spreading the lies may actually believe it. It all sickens me.
Edwards for president
"Wait, that's not when it happened - it was after he let us down on health insurance and gays in the military. Then Monica..."
He let you down on "gays in the military"? How?
He lost most of his political capital fighting a battle that simply could not be won. And then the left got angry at him because Clinton did not expend ALL of his capital on an issue that could not be won!
Health insurance? My god, were you even AWAKE in the 1990s? He fought damned hard for it. He lost.
Lefties like you seem to think that presidents are supernatural beings. Nope.
Laws are passed by CONGRESS. Congressfolk need votes from the citizenry, and the citizenry can be swayed by propaganda. The right wing's propaganda machine was better funded and more effective. The right set up an astonishingly effective network decrying the Clintons as socialists. And that ended universal health insurance.
Did you vote for a chief executive, or did you vote for a Messiah?
Gee, maybe we should argue that Clinton let us down on the issue of world hunger. Why didn't he multiply the loaves and the fishes in order to feed the multitudes?
"And then Monica..."
In the end, lefties have nothing better than to repeat right-wing talking points.
"He [Obama] is for more of an open government than Hillary..."
By what standards?
Let's look at the Bill Clinton administration, under the presumption that he might provide a few pointers as to what Hillary would be like.
Clinton passed Executive Order 12891, which created the Advisory Committee on Human Radiation Experiments. As a result, his Energy department released some AMAZING documents on the government's radiation and nuclear experiments.
Those documents were all online. I recall that site well. I could not believe what I was seeing -- unredacted! Stuff that I had been dying to look at previously.
And we are not talking about a small amount -- we are talking about TONS of material, on truly covert stuff that researchers had long wanted to learn more about.
The origin and development of EMP weaponry. The use of unmanned aircraft to spread toxic radiation. Things like that...
Reagan didn't declassify that material. Carter didn't. Bush I didn't.
Bush II RE-classified that stuff, including documents that I had downloaded. That site no longer exists!
And what about FOIA? Freedom of Information enthusiasts never had it so good as in the Clinton years. The headlines for the wikipedia entry on FOIA tell the story...
"6. Reagan's Executive Order limiting the FOIA
7. Expansion of the FOIA during the Clinton Administration
8. The Electronic Freedom of Information Act Amendments of 1996
9. Bush's Executive Order limiting the FOIA"
How DARE you accuse Clinton of not being for open government?
Everyone should notice that you did not cite specifics. You simply leveled a baseless charge, like a good Kossack.
What a lying piece of crap you are!
Joe,
You are on "HINES SIGHT"!
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