Racism

This has been a primary rife with what I call The Opression Olympics.

"Bitch Is The New Black" squealed Tina Fey on SNL and this black feminist didn't find it at all funny. Actually, I thought the squeal had a tinge to white supremacy in it.

So now we have Marie Cocco at the Washington Post saying this :

Most of all, I will not miss the silence.

I will not miss the deafening, depressing silence of Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean or other leading Democrats, who to my knowledge (with the exception of Sen. Barbara Mikulski of Maryland) haven't publicly uttered a word of outrage at the unrelenting, sex-based hate that has been hurled at a former first lady and two-term senator from New York. Among those holding their tongues are hundreds of Democrats for whom Clinton has campaigned and raised millions of dollars. Don Imus endured more public ire from the political class when he insulted the Rutgers University women's basketball team.

Would the silence prevail if Obama's likeness were put on a tap-dancing doll that was sold at airports? Would the media figures who dole out precious face time to these politicians be such pals if they'd compared Obama with a character in a blaxploitation film? And how would crude references to Obama's sex organs play?

Get used to it Democrats. Whether we run a woman or a black this year, the nastiness from right wing idiots will get pretty bad. Look to what the Republicans did in the Tennessee Senate race in 2006 and you'll get some idea what we are in for.

Georgia is leading the way. Seems a bar owner in Cobb Co. Georgia who thinks he's so clever made up T-shirts with a picture of Curious George (registered trademark of Houghton Mifflin Harcourt) eating a banana with the caption "Obama '08." When confronted by some uppity civil rights groups the bar owner insisted he wasn't racist. From a Daily Kos article because the original newspaper article keeps crashing Firefox:

The T-shirts are being peddled by Marietta bar owner Mike Norman at his Mulligan's Bar and Grill in Cobb County. They show a picture of Curious Georgie peeling a banana, with the words "Obama '08" underneath.

...

Norman acknowledged the imagery's Jim Crow roots but said he sees nothing wrong with depicting a prominent African-American as a monkey.

"We're not living in the (19)40's," he said. "Look at him . . . the hairline, the ears -- he looks just like Curious George."

H/T To Duke over at Migra Matters.

Image Credit : BarackObama.com at Flickr

Michael has the whole text over at The Daily Gotham. The speech is flawless but this quote resonates with me as also a fellow "biracial American" :

I am the son of a black man from Kenya and a white woman from Kansas. I was raised with the help of a white grandfather who survived a Depression to serve in Patton’s Army during World War II and a white grandmother who worked on a bomber assembly line at Fort Leavenworth while he was overseas. I’ve gone to some of the best schools in America and lived in one of the world’s poorest nations. I am married to a black American who carries within her the blood of slaves and slaveowners – an inheritance we pass on to our two precious daughters. I have brothers, sisters, nieces, nephews, uncles and cousins, of every race and every hue, scattered across three continents, and for as long as I live, I will never forget that in no other country on Earth is my story even possible.

It’s a story that hasn’t made me the most conventional candidate. But it is a story that has seared into my genetic makeup the idea that this nation is more than the sum of its parts – that out of many, we are truly one.

Here's the awesome rant by Keith Olbermann on the matter of Clinton having yet another surrogate race-baiting for the upcoming elections in Pennsylvania :

I went over to Booman Tribune to see how they were dealing with the show and I'm there in several threads. Martin himself asked me why I believe that Ferraro's comments do enter David Duke territory because to him the words sounds stupid, not racist.

Well ...

I think the most salient aspect that ties Ferraro's words to Duke's is her claim that she was a victim of anti-white racism :

"Any time anybody does anything that in any way pulls this campaign down and says let's address reality and the problems we're facing in this world, you're accused of being racist, so you have to shut up.

"Racism works in two different directions. I really think they're attacking me because I'm white.

[ Excerpt from, Special Comment : Wednesday 12 March 2008 ]

[ ... ] Senator Clinton:

This is not a campaign strategy.

This is a suicide pact.

This week alone, your so-called strategists have declared that Senator Obama has not yet crossed the "commander-in-chief threshold"…

But -- he might be your choice to be Vice President, even though a quarter of the previous sixteen Vice Presidents have become commander-in-chief during the greatest kind of crisis this nation can face: a mid-term succession.

But you'd only pick him if he crosses that threshold by the time of the convention.

But if he does cross that threshold by the time of the convention, he will only have done so sufficiently enough to become Vice President, not President.

Senator, if the serpentine logic of your so-called advisors were not bad enough...

Now, thanks to Geraldine Ferraro, and your campaign's initial refusal to break with her, and your new relationship with her -- now more disturbing still with her claim that she can now "speak for herself" about her vision of Senator Obama as some kind of embodiment of a quota...

If you were to seek Obama as a Vice President, it would be, to Ms. Ferraro, some kind of social engineering gesture, some kind of racial make-good.

Do you not see, Senator?

To Senator Clinton's supporters, to her admirers, to her friends for whom she is first choice, and her friends for whom she is second choice, she is still letting herself be perceived as standing next to, and standing by, racial divisiveness and blindness…

This is getting ridiculous.

I guess that to create a diversion from the Spitzer debacle, and to give racists in Pennsylvania a reason to get out the vote, Geraldine Ferraro "steps down" from her role as a member of Hillary Clinton's finance committee.

And just as other racist liberals, she raised the "intentions flag" : That their intentions are misunderstood, that their intentions are not what people say they are.

It gets better.

She goes down "in protest", arguing that she was being deprived of her First Amendment Rights and that they are attacking her to hurt Hillary :

Dear Hillary –

I am stepping down from your finance committee so I can speak for myself and you can continue to speak for yourself about what is at stake in this campaign.

The Obama campaign is attacking me to hurt you. I won't let that happen.

Thank you for everything you have done and continue to do to make this a better world for my children and grandchildren.

Republicans routinely insult Blacks, Native Americans and Muslims, and even Jews. It is no wonder hate crimes are up during Bush's time in office.

The latest example of Republican anti-Black and anti-Muslim hate speech comes from a Congressman from Iowa. From an email I got from American Family Voices:

While the Democratic Party has yet to decide who the nominee of the party will be, the radical wing of the Republican Party is just beginning their opening salvo against Sen. Barack Obama.

We need your help today to stop these racist and bigoted attacks.

Congressman Steve King (R-IA) is known for his outrageous and disgusting comments. In the past he's been quoted as comparing immigrants to livestock, calling undocumented workers a "slow-moving terrorist attack", claiming that immigrants have murdered more Americans than the combined death toll in Iraq and Afghanistan since 2002, comparing the abuses at Abu Ghraib to mere "hazing" and waging a war against "secularists" who want to "eradicate Christ from Christmas." Suffice it to say, this man is off his rocker.

Image Credit : Steve Garfield at Flickr.com

Some say Hillary Clinton found her voice and it's republican (h/t Oliver Willis).

Well, now we know why Hillary Clinton has gone into Karl Rove territory with her "he's not fit to lead" attacks against Obama : She wants to be on the top of the ticket.

This from CBSTV :

NEW YORK (CBS) ― Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton hinted at the possibility of a Democratic "dream ticket" with Sen. Barack Obama.

Speaking on "The Early Show" on CBS, Clinton said "that may be where this is headed, but of course we have to decide who is on the top of the ticket."

Clinton said the race between her and Obama remains "incredibly close," with just "smidgens of difference" between them in both the popular vote and number of delegates.

Unbelievable. She will do what it takes to be in the Oval Office, no matter the consequences.

If this is dirty politics at its worse, I don't know what is. And what's worse, the DNC is all behind the effort.

She won the popular vote by a sliver (4%).

Some people think that Rush Limbaugh's call to Republicans to go vote for Clinton may have something to do with it.

Early exit polling shows 10 percent of the voters in Ohio's Democratic Primary identified themselves as Republican, along with 22 percent who said they were independents. It was the same story in Texas: 10 percent of the voters in the Democratic primary identified themselves as Republican, along with 25 percent who said they were independents.

Funny, because I was being smacked around a week ago when I suggested that Republicans voting for Obama is a good thing. If they did vote for Clinton though, to throw off the race, we'll have hell to pay in November if she is the nominee.

Just as in Ohio, last minute voters went heavily to Clinton.

Just as in Ohio, gender wasn't an issue.

Race on the other hand ...

So Texas and Ohio were almost identical in outcome --although Clinton's winning margin was bigger in Ohio.

Yes, he does say that it looks like it was crucial in Clinton's win. He take the MSNBC exit polls and looks at the question "In deciding your vote for president today, was the race of the candidate". This is what he finds :

I'm not even going to go there describing the intentions behind the votes, but Matt should have included the data right above that question because it was asked twice but with 2 difference sets of answer choices :

Yet there are more exit poll numbers that just popped right out at me from the web page. For one, the numbers of minorities is minuscule.

On the issue of privilege vs. fear, b-serious knocks it out of the park over at Jack and Jill Politics. Here's a taste of a very long yet lucid post :

“Shame on you Barack Obama”?!?!?! Who the hell is she to talk to him like he’s some 4 year old? This ain’t pre-school and her condescending attitude is getting real tired, real fast.

Senator Obama is a grown a*s man. He’s just as accomplished as she is, yet she wants to go around the country and call him some naive rookie??? She dismisses his supporters and ignores the impact that he has had.

It’s never good enough. He can win 11 straight states by an average of 33%, but it’s still NEVER GOOD ENOUGH! He can expand the Democratic party by bringing in Independents, cross-over Republicans and first-time voters, but it’s NEVER GOOD ENOUGH! He can draw crowds of 20,000 but it’s NEVER GOOD ENOUGH! He can win more states (24 to 11), have a commanding lead in Pledged delegates, have a strong lead in the popular vote . . . but it’s still NEVER GOOD ENOUGH!

No. We still have to hear the media talk about a Clinton comeback, even when the MATH says it’s highly unlikely.

She needs to stop making excuses. She needs to recognize that (beleive it or not) this brotha is just doing a better job at reaching the voters than she is. Plain and simple.

Her stunts are going to backfire on her. It has nothing to do with being a man or woman. Democratic primary voters don’t like negative politics . . . it’s as simple as that.

You know, I’d love to see the press give Obama as much room to be a stereotypical black man as they give Clinton to be a stereotypical woman. I’d love to see Obama get the opportunity to go straight up gangsta and show his a*s! But we all know that would never happen. The second he shows ANY aggression whatsoever, is the moment people see him as the “angry black man.”

This goes to show that there are differences in how the media treats race and gender. I’m not saying that they’re better or worse, just different. I’m just gonna say it. This country has an instinct to protect white women. It can be a burden at times (i.e., Cult of True Womanhood) but it's still there. Hillary gets her feelings hurt and voters rush to her aide. She throws a fit and we make excuses because, after all, we can’t forget those double standards, right?

Yet, at the same time, we have an instinct to FEAR black men.

Tell me, what would happen if Obama went on a tirade against Hillary, like she’s done over the weekend??? What would happen if he (gasp) raised his voice to this white woman? What would happen if he spent all of his time talking about the “white man,” the way Hillary talks about the “boys club?”

Rick Lazio, a white man, found out when he “invaded her personal space.” If he took the fall, you can imagine what would happen to Obama’s black a*s the second he steps out of line.

Go read the whole thing, NOW.

Totally ganked from Nezua's blog

New York Newsday published an interesting article about Hillary Clinton this past weekend. In An early look at how Clinton deals with crisis Glenn Thrush points to what seems to be the Senator "formative" experience as a defense lawyer or, as she likes to describe herself, a fighter.

In her 2003 autobiography "Living History," Clinton writes that she initially balked at the assignment, but eventually secured a lenient plea deal for Taylor after a New York-based forensics expert she hired "cast doubt on the evidentiary value of semen and blood samples collected by the sheriff's office."

However, that account leaves out a significant aspect of her defense strategy - attempting to impugn the credibility of the victim, according to a Newsday examination of court and investigative files and interviews with witnesses, law enforcement officials and the victim.

Rodham, records show, questioned the sixth grader's honesty and claimed she had made false accusations in the past. She implied that the girl often fantasized and sought out "older men" like Taylor, according to a July 1975 affidavit signed "Hillary D. Rodham" in compact cursive.

Yes. Hillary Clinton's first experience as a defense attorney was to represent a 41 year-old man who was accused of raping a 12-year old girl with the aid of her 15 year-old boyfriend. The way she went about winning a reduced sentence for her client was to question not only the reliability of the victim's testimony. Nope. The article suggests she may have even fabricated allegations against the 12 year-old victim (that she wanted to have sex with older men) in order to do shatter the victim's credibility.

This article is important for one reason. After a whole weekend in which the Senator went on a tirade questioning the credibility of Barack Obama it is clear now that the Senator is hell bent in doing exactly what the did 30 years ago to the 12 year-old rape victim : To destroy the credibility of Obama at all cost, especially before tonight's debate.

The New York Times claims is part of a 5 point strategy that has been laid out to kill Obama's momentum :

1. This past weekend she went on an angry yet media seeking "Shame on you" tirade against Obama for flyers that appeared in Ohio highlighting her support for NAFTA and the economic flaws of her health care plan.

2. She then proceeded to mock and ridicule Obama's theme of "Change" as something that would only appeal to delusional people.

3. She incredibly goes on to compare Obama with Bush.

4. Then there was the infamous non-denial from the campaign about their involvement with a photograph of Barack Obama in traditional Somali garb used to fan the fires of his crypto-islamism.

5. All this to 'hammer in' that Hillary is the most experience, most reliable, most electable.

Wow. Just wow.

Certainly there is much talk today about ‘what Michelle Obama’ said, and really meant. Many kinds of talk and opinion… various people have been discussing or debating or just flatly carrying on about what Michelle Obama meant or didn’t mean, and weighing in on her character, brainpower, heart, or lack of such, etc. (Her husband, later said she meant her words more narrowly with regard to the political process wherein people stood up for change.)

My thoughts however, keep returning to another matter entirely. I’m not new to scabrous words. This man’s outburst at Starbucks is not the first, but merely the elevendy-millionth time as a woman from a minority group myself, I’ve heard such or been felled by such words personally.

BUT, especially since being flash-shot by this man at Starbucks bellowing about “a nigger only gonna be president over my dead and burning body,” ….I rode the Time Machine back over the many decades I’ve be blessed to live thus far, and I see, with immediacy, how far we’ve come in this nation… meaning, that yes, any of us minority persons can be objected to publicly nowadays, and called names out loud, in print, in front of and behind backs….

but NOT immediately and with full looking away by all authorities and cronies, be dragged to the dark of the woods and dealt an ‘inch of one’s life’ beating, or death with finality, there…

This comes via Media Matters:

During the February 19 edition of his nationally syndicated radio show, Bill O'Reilly took a call from a listener who said of Michelle Obama, "I just wanted to say that I think Michelle Obama is an angry woman -- is speaking, I think, with her real voice for the first time." O'Reilly and his callers were discussing Obama's recent comments, which included her assertion that "[f]or the first time in my adult lifetime, I'm really proud of my country." When O'Reilly asked the caller, whom he identified as "Maryanne," "You're basing that on what?" she replied: "Well your representative asked me not to talk about this, but I have a friend who had knowledge of her and said to me months ago, 'This is a very angry,' her word was 'militant woman.' " O'Reilly then responded, "What I want you to do then, Maryanne ... I want you to stay on the line. ... Because it's not fair to Michelle Obama for you ... because we don't know who you are, and we don't know who your friend is, but we want to know. We want to know, OK. But it's not fair at this point for you to say, 'My friend said X and Y,' because we just don't know. But if you would give us your information, we would like to talk to your friend. And then whatever your friend tells us, we'll track it down. We'll do it in a fair and balanced and methodical way." He later added, "If indeed Michelle Obama is angry about something, if she has a history, we would like to know that, and then we can put it into some kind of context so that we can be fair to everybody."

Oh yes, there is more ...

This is one of the most powerful speeches I have ever seen given (I was able to catch the whole speech in bits and pieces as people were reporting about it through YouTube) and it is even more powerful once read.

Why? Rudd enacts with this as law an acknowledgment that white privilege is founded on government policies that sought to make Aborigine Australians extinct.

Here's the quote :

The uncomfortable truth for us all is that the parliaments of the nation, individually and collectively, enacted statutes and delegated authority under those statutes that made the forced removal of children on racial grounds fully lawful.

There is a further reason for an apology as well: it is that reconciliation is in fact an expression of a core value of our nation - and that value is a fair go for all.

There is a deep and abiding belief in the Australian community that, for the stolen generations, there was no fair go at all.

There is a pretty basic Aussie belief that says that it is time to put right this most outrageous of wrongs.

It is for these reasons, quite apart from concerns of fundamental human decency, that the governments and parliaments of this nation must make this apology - because, put simply, the laws that our parliaments enacted made the stolen generations possible.

We, the parliaments of the nation, are ultimately responsible, not those who gave effect to our laws. And the problem lay with the laws themselves.

As has been said of settler societies elsewhere, we are the bearers of many blessings from our ancestors; therefore we must also be the bearer of their burdens as well.

Therefore, for our nation, the course of action is clear: that is, to deal now with what has become one of the darkest chapters in Australia's history.

In doing so, we are doing more than contending with the facts, the evidence and the often rancorous public debate.

In doing so, we are also wrestling with our own soul.

Full text after the jump

Australia Says Sorry to Stolen Generation

Apology Speech by Kevin Rudd 13th February 2008 to the Stolen Generation.

Part 1. A little History
Part 2. Personal Interviews
Part 3. Footage from Australian supporters
Part 4. Apology Speech by Kevin Rudd

The Stolen Generation is a term used to describe the Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children, who were removed from their families by Australian government agencies and church missions, under various state acts of parliament, denying the rights of parents and making all Aboriginal children wards of the state, between approximately 1869 and 1969. The policy typically involved the removal of children into internment camps, orphanages and other institutions.

I have been moved to tears by the incredible gesture of Australia's Parliament under their new Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd.

Eleven years ago a study was published under the title Bringing Them Home | "Report of the National Inquiry into the Separation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Children from Their Families". The study was the height of a coalition of Aboriginal groups and human rights organizations who had fought for years to force the Australian government to blow the lid off the years of its genocidal policy against Aboriginal Australians.

ANOTHER BLOG POST exclusive to MTV, as it is part of my Street Team 08 duties! This one delves more into one of my favorite paradigms, Symbol and Essence.

Words that came to me while thinking on our many forms of warring with the Other.

Crossposted at The Unapologetic Mexican, Jesus' General, and OpEdNews.

This came out of the mouth of one of Hillary Clinton's surrogates, the governor of Pennsylvania :

Gov. Ed "Don't Call Me 'Fast Eddie' " Rendell met with the editorial board of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette last week to talk about his latest budget. But before turning the meeting over to his number-crunchers, our voluble governor weighed in on the primary fight between Hillary Rodham Clinton and Barack Obama and what the Illinois senator could expect from the good people of Pennsylvania at the polls:

"You've got conservative whites here, and I think there are some whites who are probably not ready to vote for an African-American candidate," he said bluntly. Our eyes only met briefly, perhaps because the governor wanted to spare the only black guy in the room from feeling self-conscious for backing an obvious loser. "I believe, looking at the returns in my election, that had Lynn Swann [2006 Republican gubernatorial candidate] been the identical candidate that he was --well-spoken [note: Mr. Rendell did not call the brother "articulate"], charismatic, good-looking -- but white instead of black, instead of winning by 22 points, I would have won by 17 or so."

I know I have a habit of sometimes zoning out in these meetings, but it sounded to me like Mr. Rendell had unilaterally declared Pennsylvania to be Alabama circa 1963.

On a mailing list I am part of, people made this point about the Clinton campaign : if it is not mysogyny, then it must be the latinos who'd never vote for a black man or, as in Rendell's Hillaryland, white people who would never vote for a black man.

Now, here's some questions I have :

As if we don't already know, today is Trent Lott Appreciation Day. While this is a great step forward for mankind, Lott, featured above rocking his signature hip hop dance move, deserves so much more than one day of Appreciation. Because Lott is so much more than a mere mortal and senator. Did you know he was also

1. a misunderstood STD: Of course Lott is an STD (Strom Thurmond-defending); and outspoken segregationist. But Trent is no racist, and is as opposed to racism and Strom Thurmond was opposed to miscegenation. He is actually color blind. Lamenting the Sunni/Shiite hoopla, Lott said: "It's hard for Americans, all of us, including me, to understand what's wrong with these people. Why do they hate each other? Why do Sunnis kill Shiites? How do they tell the difference? They all look the same to me." See! Like Steven Colbert, Lott doesn't even see color, or ethnicity!
2. a salt of the earth working man One of the many exploited workers in Washington D.C., and part of the great Capitol Hill to K street migration, Lott recently left politics in search of a better life and a living wage as a lobbyist. Luckily, and purely coincidentally, by stepping down before the end of the year, Lott avoided a law, that was about to come into effect, requiring that senators wait two years after retiring before they start lobbying their former colleagues.
3. a martyr: as if the abject poverty faced by senators weren't enough, Trent's economic woes were only worsened by Hurricane Katrina. Nobody felt Trent's pain more than the President himself, seen here either trying to hold back tears or looking at a pretty molding on the ceiling, who said:
   
   

All the Clintonistas of the blogosphere, as embodied by the likes of Talk Left and their cheerleaders, have their panties in a bunch because Michelle Obama dared to hesitate about supporting Hillary Clinton, if she were to be the nominee.

I want to make this clear right now :

Either reject the Clintons now or end up extending the Bush legacy with 4 years of Billary in the White House.

With Obama? Insiders would fight tooth and nail to maintain the status quo, but it would be harder to justify with a Presidency predicated on Change. Especially given what's he's built is not a campaign but a movement.

So to those who continue deluding yourselves saying any Democrat is better than any Republican, you would be wise to head over to Booman Tribune.

Martin Longman, Booman himself, has been the wild man in the desert, screaming the truth behind the "Hillary is as good as Barack" ruse. For him, it's simple : It's about integrity. It's about fighting the myopia that plagues liberals "with a stagering lack of sophistication". It'a about taking a stand and walking away from cowardice.

i’m a free woman. and being free means you get to think for yourself, and you get to decide for yourself what to do. so i say i am not a traitor. no, i’m not a traitor. i’m just following my own truth, and that truth has led me to barack obama.

[...]

don't play me small. i am not voting for barack obama because he's black. i am voting for barack obama because he's brilliant.

OH SNAP!

When it comes to smackdowns, Oprah is the queen.