You're definitely out pacing your evidence here.

If you could demonstrate hispanic or asian presidential candidate wouldn't have the same draw among their ethnic communities you'd have a point.

Otherwise you're stuck in a black-white false dichotomy which hobbles the comparison because political behavior is different among historically oppressed communities.

Bill Richardson

Hispanics and the 2008 Election:

CHILLICOTHE, Ohio -- As nearly 100 local residents gathered at the courthouse here to commemorate the birthday of Martin Luther King Jr., a navy blue pickup truck displayed a grim reminder that racism is no relic.

"A real white person would not march for MLK," said a sign on the tailgate of the truck, parked beside the courthouse, provocatively in view of those who marched to the historic First Baptist Church.

A man sat behind the steering wheel, next to a Confederate flag on the seat, offering no apologies and lamenting that the day had come when a black man, Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois, had a real chance of becoming president of the United States.

The man said he would never vote for a black candidate, no matter how qualified, purely on the basis of race. Referring to most of the marchers, he said, "Look at all that white trash." link




What IS it about Barack Obama that disturbs you so? What is so evil about this man that so provokes you to write these foolish, illogical, mindless and ridiculous statements.

I'm not going to waste my time linking to articles (again) where Black commentators called Obama's racial authenticity into question. You're not going to read it anyway, so why bother? You only believe whatever fits your preconceived and negative stereotypes. It isn't as if your closed mind would accept anything coming from a Black man.

"African-Americans are the most racist voters in our country."

Where do you come up with this absolute drivel?

It's not as if African-Americans haven't been voting for White politicians ever since they got the right to vote. The same White politicians who have promised to look out for and protect the interests of Blacks only to lie through their teeth and throw them overboard as soon as it was politically expedient.

Blacks have been hoping against hope and throwing their votes on White Republicans first and White Democrats later, but that fine, because that was the way things were supposed to be. As long as darkies voted the right way--the White way--everything was just fine. But then something went wrong. We got it in our nappy little heads that maybe---just maybe---every so often we might want to vote for someone who looked like us, came from the same neighborhood as us and thought about looking out for our interests instead of depending on the good will and charity of White politicians who might brush a few crumbs off their table when they thought we were "ready" to handle it.

The hysterically funny and tragic thing is Negroes/Coloreds/Blacks/African-Americans have been giving their political support and surrendering their power, autonomy and independence to White politicians for so long, people like you, barnaby 2341 believe it comes standard equipped along with the blue eyes and pink skin.

How dare Blacks actually want to back a Black man for President! And over a White woman no less! Where do they think they are? In South Africa voting for Nelson Mandela?

Apparently, there's no such thing as Whites voting for White candidates only because they are White. Blacks "go tribal" and vote out of misplaced racial loyalty. Whites are only "voting to protect their interests" and only then after much scrutiny and critique.

To argue with someone like you, barnaby2341, of long-established and easily proven deep-seated reluctance, revulsion and downright refusal some Whites have to even consider voting for a African-American no matter how qualified they might be or how much they might mirror their own interests is an exercise in futility. I might as well try to explain the The Big Bang Theory to a remedial reading class. Certainly, anyone with your twisted belief system will never accept the suggestion that even an incredibly successful Black candidate Barack Obama could fall victim to The Bradley Effect.

Whites vote to protect their interests all the time based upon a candidate having White skin. But since Whites rarely think of themselves in racial terms as benefits them enjoying the majority status in America, they never stop to question this. It's the status quo. Race only comes into play when Blacks do the exact same thing. Only then does it become voting based exclusively on skin color.

You might want to cut some holes into that pillow case on your head and get off your hypocritical and sanctimonious high horse. African-Americans could vote only for Black candidates for the next 100 years and never get close to the head start White voters have on choosing based on race.

You want to be angry about Black voters supporting a Black candidate in overwhelming numbers, barnaby2341. You want to blame somebody? Look in the mirror. Blacks learned how to play choice based on color from the masters of the game colorstruck choosing and you White bigots were excellent teachers.

Stick to cackling over the murder of police officers. A perceptive political and sociological commentator, you aren't.

He is as far left as it gets – having the distinction of even being to the left of Teddy K!

The answer is NO.

Once upon a time, I respected Andrew Sullivan. His analysis recently has been sub-par.

I have noticed that Obama has tried to add some self reliance words to his speeches. He seems to recoil from the label of "liberal".

But look at what he is proposing:

-Stipends for college. The old "student loan" system is railed as as unfair. What, I have to pay this back? The student loan system is a good way that the government helps the person pay, it doesn't pay for him. Time to junk it for a bigger government entitlement.
-Helping people with mortgage payments. To me, this will just be a give away and potentially (ok, I will project this will happen) people will take bigger loans than they can afford since Uncle Sam is footing part of the bill.
-Government health care. Need I say this is big government liberalism at its worst?

The GOP estimates that Obama has proposed $874 billion in new spending. Even if their figures are off, that's a lot of jack.

None of that is people helping themselves. Most of that is people helping themselves to the money of others. Don't give me some rote argument about "Republicans want people to starve". That is garbage political rhetoric. Wealth transfer simply does not work. These programs don't have a conservative bone in their metaphoric body.

I'm not saying I disagree, but that's pretty fricken hypocritical. Collectively, the republicans have outspent and bloated government the government size far more than any democrat. Suddenly, republicans have found their principles. Unfortunately, it's not principles they found - it's obstructionism.

Maybe you'd feel better if Obama just printed more money so everyone gets $300 to spend or sent another couple hundred billion to Iraq? Would that make you like Obama more in terms of his fiscal policies?

You will not be able to find any post on this or any other board in which I have given unequivocal support to this war. In fact, during the ramp-up before the initial invasion (and I was not on this board then), I told many friends that I thought this would be a long boondoggle and I was concerned about precedents set by attacking Iraq without a clear Act of War on their part.

I disagreed with the war-on-the-cheap program, opting instead for the Powell Doctrine of overwhelming force. Indeed, I told one on my prep school friends that if we go in, I want to go in like an elephant into a field of grass. We lost the northern front because of the Turks and attacked anyway, and we went in light--both mistakes.

What you have read me say here is that once the war started, as an American nationalist, I wanted to see it finished in a way that was beneficial to us. I do not believe in turning and running, even if we got into a war for the wrong reasons. I never want to see our national power compromised. We should be feared and respected globally. Unfortunately, the general populace here wants to be liked, which isn't a realistic option for a global power. For this reason alone, I think we would never be a good imperial power. Sometimes our leaders don't remember this.

But, I sure do not believe in redistribution of income. I do not believe in paying people to reproduce, as we do now. I do not believe in creating incentives to remain poor and needy. I have no problem helping those how are truly unable to help themselves--the handicapped, for example--and I want to help those who are trying to help themselves. But, I would design a system that in exchange for temporary support requires a change in behavior, in culture, and in ambition. A nation with underpeforming assets is a losing nation in this global econoumy, and we have many people here who simply are not peforming to their potential, and we subsidize it. We built the Empire State Building in one year in 1933; could we do that today? I doubt it, and so do the world's businesses, as they run from here to find labor that is reliable, cheap and effective.

The Democrats have long been the party of the pandering handout, despite Bill Clinton's adoption of the Republican platform on welfare reform, which I am sure has helped and for which I give him credit. And, his Secy of the Treasury was brilliant.

So, your criticism is cute but incorrect. I have many gripes with the Republican party--they are not the party of smaller govt they (until recently) claimed to be (Nixon created the EPA--ouch); and they are not the party of limited govt. Also, this administration has mismanaged this war (Frankly, if McCain had been president and assuming we still went into Iraq, at least he would have gone in heavy and hard and we could have dictated terms and we likely would have made it to the overseer mode by now). In fact, I don't think I would call either party "Conservative" in the way I use the term.

But, the Repubs do cut taxes, and if I can have nothing else from either party, that is at least something tangible I can put in the plus column. I get not even that from the Democrats....

BecomingHuman

I figured someone would bring up Richardson, though barnaby himself already pointed out the problem with that.

Think it through and consider...

Shirley Chisholm, Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton, Carol Mosley-Braun

did these candidates get the traction in the black community Obama did?

Viability. Find a comparable candidate of another minority.

I agree that whole "blacks are the most racist voters[/b] is drivel....

but I suspect it's drivel a lot of people believe so I figured it could use some perspective.

Edited to Add:
It occurred to me I haven't weighed in on the central topic.

There comes a time when ideology must take a backseat to practicality.

A conservative may well vote for Obama if he finds the alternative so distasteful he needs to be part of avoiding it.

McCain presidency?

Your call.

I've run through the previous posts of this topic, and cannot find a place where barnaby mentioned Bill Richardson, or Hispanic racial politics, for that matter.

So why doesn't Richardson count?

Clearly, he's a Hispanic candidate who hasn't had a draw among his ethnic community.

barnaby gave a very good reason why initially Obama trailed Clinton among black voters.

They didn't think he could win. Same goes for Richardson and all of the black candidates I listed.

Richardson is not comparable to Obama. He's more a Mosely-Braun.

Then shouldn't Hilary be winning, by the same numbers, amongst whites?

I didn't foresee this taking that long so I think I'll start a thread. sometime tonight.

The short answer is no.

Fair enough. I think, on the whole, Hispanic and Asians are less racially inclined voters than African Americans. That sentiment comes from the rather wide tilts in black votes, compared to the relatively modest, and perhaps insignificant, tilts in Latino and Asian votes. In the 2004 election, for instance, Kerry beat Bush amongst Hispanics and Asians by 9 and 12 percentage points, respectively. Compare that with the whooping 77 point advantage from the African American community!

I don't think being Hispanic, or Asian, has the same ethnic draw that being Black does in this country.

I surely wouldn't vote for Obama unless his opponent was to his left, and that's not likely to happen in this lifetime. Weakening the military, bailing out of Iraq, spending untold billions to cure 'global poverty', and giving away the store to illegal aliens are just a few of the reasons he'll never get my vote. And he is a bit too close to the Muslim world for my taste. The fact that he's garnering unprecedented and undeserved support just because he's black seals the deal for me.

I will not throw away my vote on a fringe candidate, it is too valuable to me. I may not be happy with John McCain but he's the least liberal in a very poor field.

Then you should be very happy you have a cranky old White man available for your vote. There is no lack of conservatives grumbling, griping and groaning that here you are nine months away from Election Day and your choices have dwindled down to John McCain or nothing. All you have to hang your hopes upon is a 71-year-old "maverick" with a short fuse and a commitment to carrying on the failed policies of a failed president.

John McCain will garner unhappy and undeserved support from Republicans and conservatives who can't stand him only because they have nowhere else to go. The overriding reason is as much as they dislike him, he is the only White man standing who can save the nation from it's first female or Black president.

That's a helluva thing to build a candidacy upon.

If it weren't for McCain's position on Iraq, I'd probably vote for him. As far as republicans go, he's been closer to the center, maintains conservative principles, and clearly knows how to reach across the aisle to get things done. Contrary to your view, he's probably the best candidate republicans could put up right now if they want to undo the damage created by Bush. Why do you think much of the republican party hates him? Right or wrong, he is not a lemming.

Much like many conservatives, I believe the war on terrorism is the defining issue of our time and our national security is paramount to almost any other issue. However, pretending the war in Iraq has anything to do with the war on terror and allowing our resources to be sucked dry because of catastrophic policies is about as retarded of an idea I've ever heard. So, my vote for the oppostion party has nothing to do with McCain's age or temperament - it's just I have a household policy of not voting for retards.

Actually, no. He is the least liberal candidate still standing. Race and gender have nothing to do with it.

I don't form my opinions of politicians based on their race, sex, or religion. It is a shame that others do.