Conservatives suppress minority voters

Montana Superintendent ‘Baffled’ by Indian, Queer & Black Voters

By Adrian JawortA Montana republican Yellowstone County assessor, treasurer, and superintendent of schools already under fire for sending plagiarized letters to the editor of a local newspaper added more fuel to the flame when it was reported he sent an e-mail from his government account using disparaging language against minorities.

The letter, written to his sister after the 2012 elections, was produced to the local Billings Gazette by county attorney Scott Twito after a public information request was made to search Max Lenington’s government e-mails. The requests were made after a pair of Lenington’s plagiarized letters-one which was titled, “Why I hate Barack and Michelle Obama”–were published by the Billings Gazette. Although entire sentences are written nearly verbatim to columnist Mychael Massie’s piece called, “Why I dislike the Obama’s,” Lenington denies any plagiarism violations.

In Lenington’s e-mail he sent to his sister using his government account, he wrote, “It still baffles me how (Obama) got elected. It must mean there are more lesbians, queers, Indians, Mexicans and [n***ers] than the rest of us!”

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, American Indian and Alaska Natives comprise 6.5 percent of the Montana population that includes seven Indian reservations. Montana Indians are currently in a lawsuit against the state aiming to give them satellite voting offices in rural Montana where some of the most heavily populated centers of the reservations still have to travel over 120 miles to vote.Comment:  Blaming minorities for electing Obama is what's behind all the conservative efforts to suppress voters:

Tea Party, GOP Groups, Target Minorities for Voter Suppression Schemes

How Conservatives Are Conspiring to Disenfranchise Millions of Americans

Another foolhardy GOP bid to suppress voter turnout

Defending the Freedom to Vote

You don't have to take the word of liberal pundits and organizations about voter suppression. Conservatives freely admit they're trying to keep Democrats from voting:

GOP Official Resigns After Saying Purpose Of Voter ID Is To Suppress Votes Of Democrats, ‘Lazy Blacks’

Republicans Admit Voter-ID Laws Are Aimed at Democratic Voters

Pennsylvania Republican admits voter suppression is all about electing Mitt Romney

Ohio GOP Admits Early Voting Cutbacks Are Racially Motivated

Florida Republicans Admit Voter Suppression Was The Goal Of New Election Laws

Max Lenington is typical of conservatives across America. As this posting proves, many if not most of them are racists.

For more on conservative racism and voter suppression, see Republicans Alienated "Nontraditional" Voters and Republican Says Black Voters = Fraud.

Charlie Hill on politics

Charlie Hill: 'The Indian Spirit is America'

By Jason Morgan EdwardsHill is no fan of politicians, in general. "I don't support none of those SOBs," he says. "I don't believe politicians have any kind of answers. They never did. They never will. They're just 3rd and 4th generation Europeans that have no answers for Native people." Hill believes that the real instigators of change in the world "have been the artists, the writers, the poets, the musicians because they're the ones people always censor. They're the ones people lock up. Those are the ones who make you think." He goes on to say, "There's always controversy when they put new artistic products out. They take off the straitjacket." As an example, Hill brings up the late-80s gangsta-rap group NWA: As he sees it, they were shining the spotlight on the conditions and problems that exist in the inner-city, not unlike Richard Pryor when he came onto the scene. "People were terrified of him, until later they caught up, and started imitating him," Hill recalls. "He was about freedom of expression, and what you say in your story."

Despite his disdain for politicians, Hill voted for Barack Obama--the only Presidential candidate he has ever voted for. "He's a tribesman, and a person of color," Hill says. "And, I just thought, this one time, I'll vote." Hill is confident that America will never have another white President. "Once you go black, you never go back," he quips. The nation is in the process of rejecting the old-boy network. "That kind of thinking is on the way out, like the 8-track tape," Hill says. "Guys like Romney and Bush and Bush II and all those guys--Dan Quayle, Sarah Pale-face--all of them. They're obsolete and they're out of touch." Hill believes that "overall, the Indians have the key to everything. I always say we have the answers to fix this country because we have the owner's manual--and that's not just a joke."

"It gets right down to us," Hill explains. "If people don't know Native people, they don't know America. If Americans don't know anything about us, they don't know anything about themselves. When Americans don't know Indian people, they must look at their own world, their own science, their arts, their medicine in the same myopic way. It's right in their faces, and it's like, they don't get it." Hill is quick to point out that he does not believe that white people are evil, but collectively, and generically, when it comes to Indians, "Americans are stuck on stupid. It's not a skin color, it's an attitude. And, the only way they're going to get right with everything is to get right with Indians. The way it should be done--with honor and respect."
Comment:  For more on Charlie Hill, see NIGA 2012 (Day 1) and IIIRM Festival Honors Charlie Hill.

Woman Warriors on CBS

Native American Women Warriors Receive Mainstream National Coverage on CBS

By Vincent SchillingThe Native American Women Warriors, an all Native American women’s color guard, consisting of female veterans from all branches of service, have received national and mainstream media coverage on their participation in the 2013 Inaugural festivities.

Over the past week, CBS and other news organizations have followed the NAWW group as they have made their way to Washington D.C. to participate specifically in the American Indian Society Inaugural Ball and Powwow and the Inauguration Parade of re-elected President Barack Obama.

The story will air at 6 p.m. EST on the CBS Evening News and will be the last story of the evening highlighted their week’s activities.

According to CBS correspondent Byron Pitts, “We were looking for a story to do about a group participating in the inaugural parade and the Native American women warriors seemed to be a perfect fit. It is a story that probably most Americans didn't know. I think one of my lines in the story was, 'all of them have different stories of struggle that led to great success.'"How NAWW got started:

Native American Women Warriors Celebrate Inauguration While Raising Awareness for Native Female Veterans

By Vincent SchillingWhile jingle dresses generally have a bright mixture of colors and are adorned with jingle bells, those worn by BigMan and the other two female vets proudly displayed large emblems of their branch of service on their backs. When an elder, Camille Clairmont, noticed how their red, white and blue jingle dresses were decorated—with the women’s designation of unit and rank, as well as U.S. flags and Iraqi Freedom patches—she asked Mitchelene why they were not with the other color guards.

When BigMan explained that they were not official color guards, Clairmont told them “the dresses speak for themselves.” Meaning, they looked as if they belonged in the color-guard procession.

BigMan agreed, and the three women decided they would join the other color guards. The male color guards told them to go at the end of the line, behind all of the male veteran color guards. BigMan was at first discouraged but then realized their position in the rear of the line was not a dishonor, but rather, a special position, since they’d be the last color guards seen.

As the color guards entered the arena, the emcee announced, “History has been made today—in all my years as an emcee, there has never been an all-female Native American color guard, and so I have the privilege in announcing our first.” And through such accidents is history made.

After marching at the Denver powwow, BigMan decided to officially serve as an all-women Native color guard. She founded The Native American Women Warriors, a non-profit organization that seeks to address the needs of today’s modern military women. Her Women Warriors are also the first all Native American female color guard. They now regularly serve as a color guard at powwows, and travel all over the country for events honoring Native veterans.Comment:  For more on the subject, see First Female Native Color Guard.

Minority voters understand economics

The facts put the lie to racist and sexist Republicans like Mitt Romney and Bill O'Reilly. Indians and other minorities vote Democratic because they aren't blinded by their prejudices. They understand how the economy works and can see that Democrats are better fiscal managers.

Data show minorities--and whites--fare better under Democratic presidents

By Zoltan Hajnal and Jeremy D. HorowitzSpeaking to donors after the election, Mitt Romney attributed his loss to President Obama to the administration's strategy of "giving a lot of stuff" to blacks and Latinos, citing in particular "free healthcare" and "amnesty for the children of illegals."

But data show a more plausible explanation: black, Latino and Asian-American voters, who overwhelmingly voted for Obama, were simply evaluating the long-term record of each party.

The data we analyzed show unequivocally that minorities fare better under Democratic administrations than under Republican ones. Census data tracking annual changes in income, poverty and unemployment over five decades tell a striking story. Under Democratic presidents, the incomes of black families grew by an average of $895 a year, but only by $142 a year under Republicans. Across 26 years of Democratic leadership, unemployment among blacks declined by 7.9 percent; under 28 years of Republican presidencies, the rate increased by a net of 13.7 percent.

The black poverty rate fell by 23.6 percent under Democratic presidents and rose by 3 percent under Republicans.

The results for Latinos and Asians, though based on fewer years of data, show the same pattern. For example, Latino incomes grew an average of $627 a year under Democrats and fell by $197 a year under Republicans. More important, these gains do not come at the expense of whites. On average, white incomes have similarly grown, and white joblessness and poverty have likewise declined, under Democratic administrations. These numbers show that economic condition need not be a zero-sum game pitting races and ethnicities against one another.Comment:  For more on the subject, see Republicans Alienated "Nontraditional" Voters and Letters to Romney on "Stuff."

Whiteness defines others as outsiders

A good posting on what the Republican Tea Party really stands for:

Whiteness in the Age of Obama

By Jedediah PurdyRecall the numbers: 59 percent of white voters supported Romney. More dramatically, 88 percent of his votes came from whites. One simple but plausible analysis suggested that Obama won a majority of white votes only in New England, New York, and Hawaii. His national share of the white vote fell by several points after four years in which Republicans, especially the Tea Party, worked relentlessly to be the party of whiteness.

As I've noted before (and so have lots of others), this was the barely-concealed meaning of Tea Party claims that Obama was not American, not constitutionally the president, somehow deeply alien. These ideas are so unmoored from reality that they have to be approached as symptoms, not positions. Race was also much of the meaning of tying Obama to food stamps, and of (barely less public) assertions that health care reform was a giveaway from white taxpayers to black dependents.

Those notorious maps showing the overlap between Romney states and the old Confederacy take on a grim extra plausibility when you consider that Obama seems to have taken less than 20 percent of the white vote in the core states of the Deep South--Mississippi, Louisiana, Alabama, Georgia, and South Carolina. I'm reminded of the friend in West Virginia who told me, back in 1988, that one reason to support Jesse Jackson in the Democratic primary was that he could pick out his solitary vote when the local newspaper printed the results.

But consider: whiteness, like any other racial category, is a made-up thing. It is a matter of what people do, not what they are. (Social construction is the clunky academic name for this.) Like other made-up things, it changes. Obama's share of the youth vote in swing states like Virginia, Florida, and Ohio was so high that clearly, somewhere around age 30, a majority of white people started supporting the president. Romney's success with old people isn't just a matter of the fact that America used to be much more white. It's that white people used to be much more white--in the Mitt Romney sense of white. Whiteness, too, is changing. What might it become?

There's plenty of reason to hope it might just go away. From the beginning, whiteness has been a power play, a way of defining oneself as obviously, implicitly superior: entitled to deference, closer to the heart of the nation, a real American. Much more than the national identities it consolidated--English, Irish, German--it was always defined by a palpable contrast, especially with African-American slaves and victims of segregation. As the boundaries of whiteness shifted to absorb Irish, Italians and those formerly black families that made the tragic crossing from "passing" to "being" white, it always took its meaning from what it was not, always depended on someone else's being underneath or outside.Comment:  Again, this is what all the talk about birth certificates, Muslims, Kenyans, food stamps, moochers, the 47%, "gifts," voter fraud, "traditional values," etc. was about. Namely, defining anyone who voted Democratic as a traitor to the white Euro-Christian privileged class. As Purdy put it:[W]hiteness has been a power play, a way of defining oneself as obviously, implicitly superior: entitled to deference, closer to the heart of the nation, a real American.For more on white privilege, see White "Norm" Is Planned and Enforced and White = Sick, Brown = Deviant.

Republicans alienated "nontraditional" voters

‘Romney is Wall Street’s worst bet since the bet on subprime’

By Ezra KleinChrystia Freeland is editor of Thomson Reuters Digital and author of “The Plutocrats: The Rise of the New Global Super Rich and the Fall of Everyone Else.” We spoke Tuesday about how the plutocrats she reported on for the book were handling Mitt Romney’s loss. A lightly edited transcript of our conversation follows.

Ezra Klein: You’ve written about the revolt of the very rich against President Obama, and all the money they spent and time they dedicated to defeating him. So what’s the mood in those circles now that they’ve lost?

Chrystia Freeland: There’s a great joke on Wall Street which is that the bet on Romney is Wall Street’s worst bet since the bet on subprime. But I found the hostility towards Obama astonishing. I found the commitment to getting him out astonishing. I found the absolute confidence that it would work astonishing. On that Tuesday, the big Romney backers I was talking to were sure he was going to win. They were all flying into Logan Airport for the victory party. There’s this stunned feeling of how could we be so wrong, and a feeling of alienation.

The Romney comments to his donors, for which he was roundly pounced on by Republican politicians, I think they accurately reflected the view of a lot of these money guys. It’s the continuation of this 47 percent idea. They believe that Obama has been shoring up the entitlement society, and if you give enough entitlements to enough people, they’ll vote for you.

EK: Here’s my question about those comments. Romney was promising the very rich either a huge tax cut or, if you believe he would’ve paid for every dime and dollar of his cut, protection from any tax increases. He was promising financiers that he would roll back Dodd-Frank and Sarbanex-Oxley. He was promising current seniors that he wouldn’t touch their benefit. How are these not “gifts”?

CF: Let me be clear that I’m not defending any of them. But I think the way it works—and I think Romney’s comments were very telling in this regard — there are two differences in the mind of this class. First, they’re absolutely convinced that they’re not asking for special privileges for themselves. They’re convinced that it just so happens that their self-interest coincides perfectly with the collective interest. That’s where you get this idea of the “job creators.” The view is that to seek a low tax environment or less regulation, that’s not special pleading for yourself, it’s not transactional politics. It’s that this set of rules is the most conducive to economic growth for everybody. It will grow the pie. Now, it also happens to be an incredibly convenient way of thinking. If you’ve developed an ideology that what’s good for you personally also happens to be good for everyone else, that’s quite wonderful because there’s no moral tension.

EK: You and I spoke shortly before the election for a piece I was doing on Romney’s history as a manager. These folks, too, are purportedly very data focused, very good at assimilating new information. So I find it genuinely scary that neither Romney nor his super-rich backers had any idea he was going to lose. All the polls, all the models, all the betting markets said he was likely to lose. How did a group of people who, in their jobs, have to be willing to read and respond to disappointing data convince themselves to ignore every piece of data we had?

CF: That’s the single most astonishing thing. By his own definition, Romney’s single strongest qualification to become president was analytically based, managerial excellence. And if the election campaign were the test of that, and even if you were ideologically his fan, you should think it right that he lost. Now, how could it happen? My first thought was it was also the case that all the smartest guys in the room managed to lose a lot of money in 2008 and managed to convince themselves of a set of very mistaken beliefs about where the markets where going to go. It was a lot of the same people on the wrong side of both bets.

But I find it truly mystifying. I don’t claim to have particularly unique insight. I think it could be a combination of things. One is a generic belief that in order to run for president you have to think you’re going to win. You can’t do it otherwise. A second thing, and this is not so much about the rich guys as about the Republican Party in America, I think Republicans have felt since the time of Ronald Reagan that they are the party that represents the true America, and that the Democrats might sometimes win, but it’s kind of an aberration. And when it comes to the super-rich guy dimension, and I imagine this has happened to Obama as well, when you’re a rich and powerful guy, it can make it hard to see reality, especially when you’re paying your campaign staff great salaries, as Romney was.Reaping the Whirlwind Pt.2

By Josh MarshallTPM Reader JR on reaping the whirlwind …

Josh’s blog posts recently from TPM readers JT, JB, and KE struck a nerve with me, especially the one from KE on being Asian-American and taking it personally when Republicans and conservatives attacked Obama. I am Indian-American, born and raised in Iowa (my childhood in Ames and Marshalltown and college years back to Ames) to immigrant parents. Obama’s heritage and identity as a racial minority is a big deal to me, no question, and was an attraction to me in 2007…he is the only Presidential candidate ever to get my money in a contested nomination fight, before he was the presumed nominee.

There is no question the Obama Presidency has exposed a lot of racism and xenophobia and religious bigotry among Republicans and conservatives, disturbingly more than I would’ve guessed. PPP was mocked early on in 2011 for their polls testing whether GOP primary voters in various states believed Obama was born in the U.S., whether he was a citizen, whether he was a Muslim…even whether he was the anti-Christ! At first I was dismissive of the some of the results because I’m well-aware that people are willing to give ridiculous answers to ridiculous questions. But then after one GOP Presidential primary debate, Frank Luntz on Fox News had a majority of Iowa GOP focus group members raise their hands in earnest when he asked, in earnest, whether they believed Obama was a Muslim.

And as time went on, it became clear in other polling that PPP early on was on to more than just snarky telephone survey replies, there really is a disturbingly large percentage of Republicans who are openly hostile to Obama specifically because of his race, his national origin, and his partial religious ancestry. That GOP electeds from Boehner to McConnell to all the GOP Presidential candidates were unwilling to call out any of it just reinforced the point, since it established they were afraid because these people were a very large part of the GOP base. You don’t worry about calling out your own party’s cranks in public if they’re marginal figures whose votes you don’t need and don’t think you’ll lose because they have no other options…Republican candidates and electeds know that they can lose primaries for openly challenging racial and other bigoted hostility toward Obama.

And all this is very personal to me. When I was a small child in Ames, Iowa, in my immigrant family, neighborhood teenagers assaulted our home regularly, pelting fruit and whatever else at our house. Several times my dad had the police come and lecture this group of kids. It was all about race, and these kids’ parents did nothing. So when Mitt Romney in a Michigan stump speech snarks that no one asked him for his birth certificate, and his GOP allies defend the racism as “just a joke,” when so many GOP federal and state electeds endorse or tacitly condone questioning of Obama’s citizenry and engage in other dog whistle racism, these are always personal attacks equally on me…if Obama is not an American and does not legitimately belong, then they’re saying the same about me.

I imagine I’m not alone, that people of color across the board see what I see, and the election results confirm this. It’s striking to me, and IMO underreported, that Obama clearly lost great amounts of white support in Florida and indeed his 37% in the exit poll with Florida whites has always been disastrous…and yet he wins the state with an absolute majority. It’s striking to me that the national exit poll has not only people of color increasing to 28% of the total, but also that it has both Hispanics and Asians giving over 70% to Obama. These things tell me that people of color across the board see what I see, an appalling racism and xenophobia in the Republican Party that is enraging.(Paragraph breaks added to make this more readable.)

Republicans just don’t get it

Hours after Stuart Stevens insults most Americans, Tom Davis credits Obama's victory to the "underclass"

By Joan WalshOn Wednesday I finished my piece on Mitt Romney strategist Stuart Stevens boasting that President Obama “only” won the votes of Americans who earn less than $50,000–that’s most people, by the way–and rushed to MSNBC’s “Hardball” to discuss the GOP’s diversity problems with supposedly moderate former Congressman Tom Davis of Virginia.

It was a calm, respectful conversation, until Davis volunteered that Romney lost because of Obama’s voter turnout operation–specifically, his ability to turnout “underclass minorities” and “particularly those who orient toward the city” who were “pulled out of the apartments.” Since we had been talking about the GOP’s problems with women and people of color, I respectfully offered Davis some “free advice”–that it might be time to retire the term “underclass.” It got worse.

Davis mumbled about the term not being “politically correct,” and when I referenced Stevens’s slur against people who make less than $50,000 a year, many of whom are actually middle class, Davis jumped in: “That’s not where the voter turnout came, if you know your voter stats, it was really people who were making even less than that, pulled out of the apartments…groups that traditionally haven’t voted.” (Yes, I caught the condescending “if you know your voter stats.”)

Davis’s “underclass minorities” remark has gotten a lot of attention–Salon flagged it and posted the video here–but I want to spend a moment on his concern about “groups that traditionally haven’t voted.” To be fair, Davis wasn’t accusing Democrats of voter fraud, the way other Republicans have. But he still seemed unsettled by the fact that the president turned out people who “traditionally haven’t voted”–who were “pulled out of the apartments” even! Yes, there are all sorts of hoary racial stereotypes jumbled up in those words, and class stereotypes as well.

Republicans don’t know what to do when “groups that traditionally haven’t voted” turn up at the polls. Because they know they lose. And this is an ancient struggle, predating this country’s founding but embedded in its DNA. We sometimes forget: There once were property requirements to vote in many states. It wasn’t until 1830, more than 50 years after our nation’s founding, that white men had universal suffrage (of course it took a lot longer for black men and longer still for women.) Even after that, we fought a long voting rights struggle against poll taxes and literacy tests and other ways to keep African Americans from voting in the South.

Because Republicans and the powers that be know one thing: If every eligible voter actually voted, we would live in a very different, much more just and more fair world. A world with less economic suffering and much more opportunity. Even allowing for the fact that some working class people don’t vote their own economic interests, whether because of culture or religion or race: If we made sure that lower-income people voted in the same proportion that upper income people do, the GOP would be on an even faster path to extinction than it is currently.

That’s what accounts for the new GOP push for restrictive voting laws. Republicans are no longer talking as much about “fraud,” which has been proven to be virtually non-existent; they’re owning up to the fact that the new laws are intended to suppress the turnout of minorities and poor people who came out to vote in record numbers in 2008 and then again in 2012. Those folks who were “pulled out of the apartments” by the Obama campaign.It Gets Worse for Mitt Romney as He is Named the Least Influential Person of 2012

By Jason EasleyRomney’s lasting legacy isn’t that he was at the helm when the Republican Party finally crashed and burned on a national scale. This honestly wasn’t Romney’s fault. It doesn’t matter who the Republicans might have nominated, they would have lost in 2012. (Having a party platform that alienates women, African-Americans, Latinos, and young voters tends to have that sort of impact on the electoral bottom line.)

Mitt Romney’s lasting legacy is that he confirmed to the rest of America what it had long suspected. Those old, rich, conservative white guys who are looking to buy elections view the rest of the country with contempt. When these men say they want their country back, they really mean that they think they are entitled to run the show. Women belong in the kitchen. Young people should stop being lazy and get a job. African Americans are invisible, and Latinos are criminals who should be prosecuted and/or (self) deported.

Naming Mitt Romney the least influential person of 2012 isn’t kicking a man when he is down. It is telling the truth about a presidential nominee who had done so little, yet felt entitled to so much.Comment:  For more on the subject, see:

O'Reilly confirms he's a racist
Letters to Romney on "stuff"
Republican says black voters = fraud
Romney:  Obama gave "gifts" to win
White men lose to demographic change

White "norm" is planned and enforced

A lesson from South Africa that applies to most white people in America:

What living in South Africa taught me about racism in America

By Kameron HurleySo of course I couldn’t really see segregation, and how it worked, because I was so neatly cut off from people who were different from me. I lived in a place of invisible race, full of white folks. The people I saw everyday were mostly white. At work, at school, at the mall--I just figured this was how it was. Of course race didn’t matter and we were all the same, I told myself, but it’s a lot easier to say that when all the people you see every day look the same way you do, and are the same people making the laws, and setting down the unwritten rules. And deciding where the white and non-white people live.

Because I was a white person growing up in white suburbia, it didn’t really dawn on me how stiffly our country was still segregated until I spent a year and a half living in South Africa. In the US, about 28% of our country is non-white now. In South Africa, over 80% of the country is non-white.

That meant that the way the world was segregated, even post-Apartheid, was glaringly more obvious to me. Most of the world was non-white where I lived, in Durban. It was only when you’d walk into isolated upperclass neighborhoods, or down certain streets, that you saw these little congregations of white people sitting behind their ten-foot barbed-wire topped fences. But even then, everybody had a housekeeper, and a gardener, and a handyman, and those people--in nearly all cases--were not white. So when you walked into a white enclave, it felt exactly like a white enclave should feel: not “normal.” It was abnormal to be in a neighborhood primarily filled with white folks.

I remember the first time I walked into a store in downtown Durban and realized I was the only white person there, just a couple weeks after arriving. It was a startling moment of dissonance. I felt like I’d done something wrong, like maybe I wasn’t supposed to be there. I realized I was 22 years old, and had never in my life been the sole white person… well, anywhere. And the knowledge of that, the striking realization that, in fact, the world I grew up in was a false one, that I had grown up under the false pretense that being white was somehow the norm, and that I had somehow picked up this strange illogical notion that the rest of the world was of course mostly-white too, was absolutely shocking to me. We expect that we’re smarter than that. That knowing something intellectually--of course the world is diverse and varied and wonderful and I had “known” that since I was a child--does not translate into real knowledge of that world until you experience it, was… really depressing, actually. Because I realized how many other white people in America had grown up just like me, in these false white rural and suburban ghettos where they had absolutely no idea of the actual composition of America.And how this applies to everything from the 2012 election to science fiction:I was reminded of this experience during a very laughable post-election moment when I was viewing this video from a Republican poll watcher in Aurora, Colorado. He was deeply concerned about the fact that the “racial mix” at the polling station he was at skewed far darker than “the mix of people at the mall.” (!!) This, he said, was evidence of some kind of Democratic conspiracy to get more non-white people to this particular polling station.

What he failed to realize is that “these people” had been in Aurora all along--they simply didn’t move in the same spaces he did. The only time he saw them was now, on election day, when they all had to come to the same place to vote. If he hadn’t been a poll watcher, he likely would never have noticed them. Because that’s privilege. Because that’s having the ability to live in spaces that have been built to exclude others, and give you a false sense of the world.

After living in Durban, I moved to Chicago, and experienced that eerie train ride from the north side of Chicago to the south side, where the composition of people on the train changes so dramatically that it looks… planned. Because it was. Planned and enforced. Just as it had been in my great-grandfather’s neighborhood in Portland, OR.

When I read a lot of golden age SF, I think about these guys who grew up in planned neighborhoods like my great-grandfather’s, where people who were “different” from the false middle-class white “norm” were excluded. I think of television shows that still give us this narrow view of what “normal” is--so very white, so very male, with strict standards on body sizes and face shapes.

If this is the world you’re fed every day, why wouldn’t you replicate it? Of course, the future is white and male and middle class. Of course the galactic empire is white and male and middle class. It is constructed that way. Just like our cities.Comment:  All this comes under the heading of white privilege: the social constructs that let white people think they're the norm, even though the world is predominantly brown.

For more on the subject, see White = Sick, Brown = Deviant and White Privilege Will End Soon.

Below:  White "god" Kirok teaches savage brown-skins about science and technology.

US more divided than ever?

Author Gyasi Ross talks with someone named Dennis at an airport:

Divisiveness, Drunken Pilots And Kim Kardashian: A Pigeon-toed Indian Pontificates About The 2012 Elections

By Gyasi RossDennis retorted. “You know what I see? What was your name again? Thank you. Gyasi, I see divisiveness. I see a country divided and this is probably the most divided this country has ever been.”

He continued, “If Obama had shown more of a willingness to be conciliatory, maybe it wouldn’t be like this. I’m not saying that the Republicans have been perfect, but the country was never divided like this under a Republican president. Bush, Bush, Reagan, you name him—it wasn’t like this.”

I tried to emulate Dennis. He set an amazing example of how to listen, even when you thought the other person was full of fecal matter. I held my tongue—channel Dennis—as he concluded.

“If this nation continues with this divisiveness, this country is going toward a really destructive path. Obama should be the person to bring us together, yet he’s tearing us apart.”

Now mind you: I’m not an Obama apologist: I think that he’s a very good president that can be great. At this moment in time, he’s far from great and, although he has been exemplary in his understanding of Tribal issues, has made some decisions that I wonder what the heck he’s thinking. I’m also not a Democrat apologist: they have many of the same flaws, in the big picture, as the Republican Party. At this point, Dennis was so nice that I didn’t necessarily want to offend him or be brisk with him. Still, facts are facts, and the notion that Obama is the cause of the divisiveness in the nation is not something that I was prepared to silently let ride.

I thought about it—how can I be diplomatic, yet honest, to this handsome, yet ridiculously dishonest, man?

“Dennis, thank you for sharing your thoughts. I think you’re completely off—I respect your opinion, but not your history. Let me explain. I think I can honestly say that my reading of history shows that the nation has always been divided. The only thing is that rich, white dudes like yourself didn’t have to care about us poor people’s side of the divide before. Dennis…seriously? Never been this divided? Unless there was a huge hoax, like the reports that we landed on the moon, this country had a civil war with hundreds of thousands of Americans killed. That’s pretty divided, I’d say. I also think that the country was fairly divided when your people massacred thousands of Natives at any particular massacre site. I could name a few. Believe it or not, us Natives—as much as we seem to like white stuff—didn’t agree with those massacres of women and children. I also suspect that black folks did not agree with slavery or Japanese people with internment camps. But maybe the country’s citizens weren’t divided because Natives and blacks weren’t citizens yet.”

“But seriously, that doesn’t seem divided to you? Yet now, because a few white rednecks want to secede because babies are getting treated by a doctor and a black man told that doctor to treat those babies, the country is the most divided it’s ever been? I can’t really see that one, Dennis.”Comment:  Yeah, I think the Civil War--when the country was literally divided in two--was more divisive than the current split. And I suspect we could find more moments in US history when the country was just as divided.

For instance, the first few years of the Republic, when the western territories threatened to secede. Or the 1990s, when Clinton barely survived impeachment and Gore barely beat Bush in the popular vote.

Considering the Tea Party arose about five minutes after the scary black man entered the White House, Dennis's complaints are silly. Who was marching in the streets comparing Obama to a dictator or a terrorist before he'd actually done anything? The same people who wanted to secede after Obama won reelection. Carping conservative crybabies, that's who.

So when white men complain about "change," "divisiveness," or the loss of "traditional values," we know what they're really talking about. Their privileged status is eroding and they don't like it. They want to hold all the wealth and power, not share it.

For more on the subject, see White Men Lose to Demographic Change and America's "Bootstrap Theocracy."

O'Reilly confirms he's a racist

Bill O'Reilly confirms the racism latent in his previous remarks on Obama's reelection:

O’Reilly: Black Voters Don’t Believe In ‘Self Reliance’ Or ‘American Exceptionalism’

By Annie-Rose StrasserSince the night of the election, Bill O’Reilly has been looking for a scapegoat on whom he can blame Mitt Romney’s loss. He seems to have found one in African American, Latino, and female voters.

Before all the votes were even cast on November 6, O’Reilly came out with the theory that “The white establishment is now the minority,” and that women, black, and Latino voters are “non-traditional” voters who “feel that they are entitled to things and which candidate, between the two, is going to give them things?”

On his show last night, O’Reilly responded to comedian Jon Stewart’s criticism that mourning “traditional voters” is latent racism. But in his rebuttal, O’Reilly explained that the mass turnout of voters of color signaled an end to “traditional American voters.” The new voters, he argued, don’t understand “traditional American values”:If you look at the exit polling, you’ll see that a coalition of voters put the President back into the oval office. That coalition was non-tradition, which means it veered away from things like traditional marriage, robust capitalism, and self reliance. Instead, each constituency that voted for the President—whether it be single women, Hispanic Americans, African Americans, whatever—had very specific reasons for doing so. [...]

Traditional American voters generally want a smaller government in Washington, more local control, some oversight on abortion, and believe in American exceptionalism.O’Reilly isn’t new to making racially charged comments. Just days before the election, he speculated that Sec. of State Colin Powell cut Obama “a little more slack” in his endorsement of him because they are both black. He’s also claimed that Democrats have made black people “dependent” on the government.Comment:  You don't have to think much to realize how stupid O'Reilly's claims are. For instance, Republican presidents have consistently increased the size of the federal government. Poor people are much more self-reliant than the rest of us--surviving without the safety net of wealth and privilege.

O'Reilly is basically saying white voters are smarter than brown voters. But you don't have to know how or why he thinks minority voters are different. Simply claiming they're different--from the white norm, that is--is discrimination by race, hence racism.

O'Reilly joins Romney, Limbaugh, Palin, and other Republican leaders in claiming white voters are "traditional" or "real" Americans and minorities aren't. Either they believe this swill, which is scary, or they're saying it to pander to their racist constituents. Either way, their claims are racist and they're racists for uttering them.

For more on the subject, see Letters to Romney on "Stuff" and Romney:  Obama Gave "Gifts" to Win.

Letters to Romney on "stuff"

Dear Mr. Romney

By PolitiSisFollowNovember 15, 2012

Mitt Romney
PO Box 149756
Boston, MA 02114-9756

Dear Mr. Romney,

As a registered Libertarian during the primaries for the 2008 elections, I very seriously considered you a viable candidate as President of the United States. Had you won your party’s nomination then, I would have had a very difficult decision. At the time, I felt that you were an astute businessman who would be able to maintain an even temper and would be a good negotiator–skills I feel are important both in foreign policy and while working “across the aisle” with Congress.

In all honesty, by the time the primaries for the 2012 elections were over, there was zero chance that you would get my vote. Even if it were not for the fact that President Obama has done an outstanding job as President (displaying exactly the two qualities I noted above as important to me), your poor performance and far-hard-right position was disappointing to say the least.

But the elections were over, and I would have been happy to move forward except that you had to show your lack of character yet again while speaking to your donors on Wednesday. Mr. Romney, I am not young, nor black nor Hispanic, nor poor; but you have made me angry enough to write my first ever letter of this type. How dare you insult me by claiming that President Obama bought our votes via the Affordable Care Act?

More importantly, your obnoxious excuse illustrates exactly why you lost this election. The Affordable Care Act is not “buying votes”–it is a critically necessary step towards bringing the United States up to par with every other first world country and most second/third world countries. The United States spends more per person yet has worse outcomes in nearly every category because we still operate on the failed “for profit” health insurance system. I won’t get into the moral implications of that with you Mr. Romney, but I will note that the Affordable Care Act is a small step towards allowing people like me–not young, not Hispanic, not black, not poor–to make sure our sons and daughters have health coverage until their careers are launched.

Mr. Romney, my daughter is Type 1 diabetic. Let me emphasize–she is Type 1–the kind that is not lifestyle related. She didn’t choose to be an insulin-dependent diabetic, nor is there a single thing she (or I) could have done to prevent her being diabetic. Insulin-dependency is a life or death situation, Mr. Romney. There is no pulling one’s self up by the bootstraps–my daughter either gets her insulin to stay alive, or she dies. When she turned 19, she was dropped from the health insurance policy she was on because she was no longer a minor; but because of her pre-existing condition we could not find a replacement policy… at any price. It came too late to help my daughter, but one of the most important provisions in the Affordable Care Act allows parents like me–not young, not black, not Hispanic, not poor–to keep our adult children on our health insurance policies until they are 26 years old. This is not “buying” our votes, Mr. Romney. This is good public policy! And the health care situation in the United States is a "big issue for the whole country," one of the biggest!I’m Black and I Want More “Stuff” and “Things”: An Open Letter to Bill O’Reilly

By Jesse HagopianDear Mr. Bill O’Reilly,

On election night, as it became increasingly clear that Mitt Romney was going to lose the election to Barack Obama, I watched Fox News host Megyn Kelly ask you, “How do you think we got to this point?”

You responded by saying,

Because it’s a changing country. The demographics are changing. It’s not a traditional America anymore and there are 50 percent of the voting public who want stuff, they want things. And who is going to give them things? President Obama. The white establishment is now the minority. And the voters—many of them—feel that this economic system is stacked against them and they want stuff. You’re going to see a tremendous Hispanic vote for President Obama, overwhelming Black vote for President Obama and women will probably break President Obama’s way. People feel that they are entitled to things. And which candidate between the two is going to give them things?

It is my hope that a great artist takes brush to canvas to capture the contours of your furrowed brow when you uttered the words, “It’s not a traditional America anymore.” It was a look of depraved beauty that made my heart sing. Watching you, Mr. O’Reilly, before a national audience, realize that all of your racist lies and hatred could not change the fact that people of color exist and will not be bowed by your insane denunciations, was an inspiration to me and millions of others.

Yet, on one account, O’Reilly, you are utterly correct: Black people definitely do want “stuff” and “things” as you so eloquently put it. And I am one of them. To very loosely paraphrase the rap crooner of the West Coast, Warren G: I want it all, money, fast public transportation, fully funded public schools, Medicare for all, Social Security, an end to all wars, and every damn thang.

While you are right that Black people do want “stuff” and “things,” your paranoid fears (refracted through the racially outdated retina you use to view the president) that we will receive a cornucopia of benefits from President Obama is merely another thing about the election you incorrectly predicted.Comment:  For more on the subject, see Republican Says Black Voters = Fraud, Romney:  Obama Gave "Gifts" to Win, and White Men Lose to Demographic Change.

Republican says black voters = fraud

Maine GOP Head Suspects Voter Fraud Because ‘Dozens, Dozens Of Black People’ Voted

By Annie-Rose StrasserThe head of the Republican Party in Maine thinks there might have been voter fraud in his state because “nobody in town knows anyone who’s black,” but black voters came in to vote on election day.

GOP state chairman Charlie Webster aims to find those who committed the alleged fraud fraud by sending thank you cards to voters, and seeing if they are returned to sender.

In an interview with an NBC affiliate, Webster said he was astounded by the “dozens, dozens of black people” who voted, and thought it was odd because he personally doesn’t know anyone who knows a black person in town:In some parts of rural Maine, there were dozens, dozens of black people who came in and voted on Election Day. Everybody has a right to vote, but nobody in town knows anyone who’s black. How did that happen? I don’t know. We’re going to find out….

I’m not politically correct and maybe I shouldn’t have said these voters were black, but anyone who suggests I have a bias toward any race or group, frankly, that’s sleazy.Webster isn’t alone in using race to explain away Republicans’ losses this election season. Vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan claimed that Obama won because of the “urban vote.” His running mate, former presidential nominee Mitt Romney, also said yesterday that Obama won re-election because of the “gifts” he gave black people, Latinos, and women.

On top of that, Webster’s methodology is, to say the least, flawed. Not knowing any black people isn’t evidence that they don’t exist, and having a piece of mail bounce back is not proof that voters intentionally lied about their address. Indeed, even though Maine has one of the smallest black populations in the country (just 1.3 percent of the state is black), it’s much more likely to find a black Mainer than an instance of voter fraud in the US. Voter fraud is less common than being struck by lightning, of which there’s just a 0.000001 percent chance.Comment:  Short version of the Republican "voter fraud" fiction: If any brown-skinned person votes, it's probably fraudulent.

An example may help explain the problem. My hometown includes a mosque and a Baha'i temple. I've passed them many times, but I haven't seen huge numbers of congregants.

If 20 people dressed in robes or whatever showed up at my polling place, I wouldn't assume they were strangers brought in to commit fraud. I'd assume they lived in a neighborhood I wasn't familiar with. I'd assume that I was the problem, not them.

That's the difference between a typical liberal like me and a typical conservative like Webster. He sees diversity as a scary assault on traditional "norms." I see it as the way things are. He's biased to think people of color are somehow "wrong." I'm not.

For more on the subject, see Romney:  Obama Gave "Gifts" to Win and White Men Lose to Demographic Change.

Romney: Obama gave "gifts" to win

Romney doubles down on his 47% comments. He really believes half the country, especially Indians and other minorities, are moochers who want government "gifts."

Beware of Dems bearing gifts

Romney, Ryan, O'Reilly and other GOP hypocrites are lying about the role of politics in American life

By Joan WalshBy now everyone knows about Romney’s explanation of why he lost on a conference call to donors. Here’s a snippet:With regards to the young people, for instance, a forgiveness of college loan interest, was a big gift. Free contraceptives were very big with young college-aged women. And then, finally, Obamacare also made a difference for them, because as you know, anybody now 26 years of age and younger was now going to be part of their parents’ plan, and that was a big gift to young people. They turned out in large numbers, a larger share in this election even than in 2008…

You can imagine for somebody making $25,000 or $30,000 or $35,000 a year, being told you’re now going to get free health care, particularly if you don’t have it, getting free health care worth, what, $10,000 per family, in perpetuity, I mean, this is huge. Likewise with Hispanic voters, free health care was a big plus. But in addition with regards to Hispanic voters, the amnesty for children of illegals, the so-called Dream Act kids, was a huge plus for that voting group.Yes, he called them “illegals.”

Romney and his friends are being intentionally deceptive about the role of politics in people’s lives. We come together to do what we cannot do alone. Throughout American history, that has involved a widening realm of protection and insurance for poor, working- and middle-class Americans—until the GOP convinced a majority of people (particularly whites) that it was all going to minorities, and they began voting Republican.

How can it be wrong to give the “gift” of guaranteed healthcare, if the American people so choose? And we did so choose by reelecting President Obama. Is it really some kind of skeezy gift to change immigration policy? Or reduce student loan debt? Or share the costs of contraception, as well as childbirth, which have traditionally fallen on women but which benefit everybody?

And how can it not likewise be a “gift” to cater to the wealthy for generations, slashing their tax rates as well as larding our tax code with special breaks that only accrue to the top 1 or 2 percent? Those are the gifts the Republicans have been giving to the rich, especially since the Reagan era.From the 47% to ‘gifts’: Mitt Romney’s ugly vision of politics

By Ezra KleinDuring the campaign, Mitt Romney repeatedly promised seniors that he’d restore President Obama’s $716 billion in Medicare cuts. He promised them that, unlike Obama, he wouldn’t permit a single change to Medicare or Social Security for 10 years. He promised them, in other words, political immunity. While the rest of the country was trying to pay down the deficit and prioritize spending, they’d be safe.

He also promised the rich that they’d see a lower overall tax rate, and while he did say he would try to pay for some of those tax cuts by closing loopholes and deductions, he also said he expected faster growth would pay for those cuts—which means he really was promising tax cuts to the rich at a time when he said deficit reduction should be a top priority. Oh, and let’s not forget his oft-stated intention to roll back the Dodd-Frank financial reforms and replace them with…something.

Keep all that in mind when you hear Romney blaming his loss on “the gifts” that Obama reportedly handed out to “the African-American community, the Hispanic community and young people.” Romney was free with the gifts, too, and his promises to seniors and to the rich carried a far higher price tag than any policies Obama promised minorities or the young.

But to Romney, and perhaps to the donors he was speaking to, those policies didn’t count as “gifts.” They were…something else. Good ideas, maybe. Or the fulfillment of past promises. Or perhaps it wasn’t the policies that were different, but the people they were being promised to.

The last time Romney’s comments to his donors leaked, he was telling them about the 47 percent of Americans who don’t pay taxes, refuse to take responsibility for their lives, and will support Obama come hell or high water. These new comments are continuous with those: Romney really does appear to believe that there’s a significant portion of the electorate that’s basically comprised of moochers.

That’s Romney’s political cosmology: The Democrats bribe the moochers with health care and green cards. The Republicans try to free the makers through tax cuts and deregulation. Politics isn’t a conflict between two reasonable perspectives on how to best encourage growth and high-living standards. It’s a kind of reverse-Marxist clash between those who produce and those who take, and the easiest way to tell one from the other is to see who they vote for.

When Romney thinks he’s behind closed doors and he’s just telling other people like him how politics really works, the picture he paints is so ugly as to be bordering on dystopic. It’s not just about class, but about worth, and legitimacy. His voters are worth something to the economy—they’re producers—and they respond to legitimate appeals about how to best manage the country. The Democrats’ voters are drags on the economy—moochers—and they respond to crass pay-offs.

Romney doesn’t voice these opinions in public. He knows better. But so did the voters. That’s what you see in the overwhelming rejection Romney suffered among African-Americans, Hispanics, Asians, and young voters. They sensed that Romney fundamentally didn’t respect them and their role in the economy, and they were right.

Mitt Romney's misperception of President Obama's 'gifts'

Mitt Romney stirred up controversy Wednesday by claiming President Obama won by effectively buying voters with policy.

By James RaineyRomney couldn’t be expected to acknowledge that he offered up “gifts” of his own: extended tax breaks for the wealthiest Americans, a shredding of the regulations that would keep big investors from running amok, unfettered access for big energy companies to America’s wildlands.

One of the most striking, and persistent, results of public opinion polls throughout 2012 was how the public felt about the two men running for the Oval Office. At the bottom, a majority of Americans felt President Obama understood people like them.

They trusted putting the country in his hands for four more years, not simply because he gave them gifts, but because they thought he had their overall best interests at heart. They felt the investment whiz who made millions flipping companies didn’t understand the struggles of people like them. The voters assessed, not single issues or transactions that could be tabulated on a balance sheet, but an entire relationship they would have with whomever they put in the Oval Office.

Romney’s best self—the one that gave tirelessly and deeply to his fellow parishioners in the Mormon church and who worked with opponents to make progress in Massachusetts—made an appearance now and then. But that Mitt Romney didn't seem, often enough, like the one who was running for president.

So in what may be one of his final words on campaign 2012, the candidate explained how he understood the price of everything. And ended up looking like he knew the value of very little.Comment:  To reiterate the obvious, here's why most people voted for Obama:The voters assessed, not single issues or transactions that could be tabulated on a balance sheet, but an entire relationship they would have with whomever they put in the Oval Office.As a typical Obama voter, I can confirm this. I don't personally benefit from immigration reform, student loans, free contraceptives, gay marriage, and so forth. Other than getting a small rebate from my insurance company, I don't benefit much from Obamacare. I voted for Obama because these things are good for the country, not for me personally.

That Romney thinks this shows how stupid and out of touch with reality he was. His palpable disdain for half the country basically disqualified him from being president. Smart voters understood that, which is why they sent him packing.

What's especially funny is to hear Jindal, Gingrich, and other Republicans denounce Romney for his comments. Where were they when he said the same things in the infamous 47% tape? At the time, most of them said Romney was basically right and merely phrased his remarks poorly. Now that they're stuck with the biggest loser in recent history, the hypocrites are changing their tune.

That they criticize these "moocher" claims only when the election's over and nothing's at stake shows just how hypocritical they are. I'm guessing most of them still believe the Republicans' "moocher"-hating dogma. We know Gingrich, who labeled Obama the "food-stamp president," does.

Republican Party = racist

The pundits above are too polite to note the corollary to Romney's remarks, but I'm not. Many conservatives equate the "moochers" who want "gifts" with minorities. Romney's claims are basically racist. If he isn't a racist himself--a dubious claim--he played upon the racism embedded in the Republican Party.

Even when he lost, he still told his conservative backers what they wanted to hear. White, middle- and upper-class Euro-Christians are the real Americans. Poor brown people are lazy, good-for-nothing bums. They're un-American because they won't work and sacrifice like white people to get ahead.

Of course, this is what whites have been saying about blacks and Indians since the beginning. It's entrenched in America's founding mythology. Euro-Christians created America for the "chosen people"--i.e., hard-working, God-fearing folks like themselves. Everyone else is a leech and a parasite trying to sponge off the whites' self-proclaimed greatness.

It's no wonder we heard so much about Obama's birth certificate and religion. These beliefs are consonant with the conservative worldview. And that worldview is fundamentally racist.

For more on the subject, see GOP America = Strives vs. Parasites and Romney:  47% Are Moochers.

White man explains why Republicans lost

Letter to a future Republican strategist regarding white people

By Eric GarlandMay I explain why not, purely for your education, such that you might be interested in winning an election on the national level at some point in the future? It bears pointing out that I should be your Low Hanging Fruit, the easy vote to get as opposed to, say, African-Americans, Latinos, or Asians--and you’re not even speaking well to me. The reasons why ought to concern you deeply.

As a Card-Carrying White Male I love expressing my opinion irrespective of whether people care to hear it, so let’s get started.

Science--One of the reasons my family is affluent is that my wife and I have a collective fifteen years of university education between us. I have a Masters degree in Science and Technology Policy, and my wife is a physician who holds degrees in medicine as well as cell and molecular biology. We are really quite unimpressed with Congressional representatives such as Todd Akin and Paul Broun who actually serve on the House science committee and who believe, respectively, that rape does not cause pregnancy and that evolution and astrophysics are lies straight from Satan’s butt cheeks.

Climate--Within just the past 18 months the following events have come to our attention: a record-breaking drought that sent temperatures over 100 degrees for weeks, killing half the corn in the Midwest and half the TREES on our suburban property--AND--a hurricane that drowned not New Orleans or Tampa or North Carolina but my native state of VERMONT.

Healthcare--My wife and I are quite familiar with America’s healthcare system due to our professions, and having lived abroad extensively, also very aware of comparable systems. Your party’s insistence on declaring the private U.S. healthcare system “the best in the world” fails nearly every factual measure available to any curious mind.

War--Nations do have to go to war sometimes, but that Iraq thing was pretty bad, to put it mildly. Somebody should have been, I dunno--FIRED for bad performance.

Deficits and debt--Whenever the GOP is out of power, it immediately appeals to the imagination of voters who remember the Lyndon Baines Johnson (!) administration and claim that the Republican alternative is the party of “cutting spending” and “reducing the deficit.” The only problem with your claim is that Republican governments throughout my entire 38 year life (Reagan, Bush 41, Bush 43) have failed to cut spending and deficit and debt EVEN ONCE.

Gay marriage--As the child of Baby Boomers who got divorced (as was the fashion!) in the '80s and '90s, and for whom 50% of my friends had their homes broken by divorce in the critical years before age 18, I sure am unsympathetic to your caterwauling bullshit that “gays will destroy the sanctity of marriage.”His conclusion:[I]f it weren’t bad enough that your policy positions are a complete clusterfuck for the reasons I lay out in great detail, you manage to follow up the whole exercise with insulting me, my wife, and my friends of every stripe who didn’t vote for your political party--all of whom are hard-working, taxpaying, job creating, law abiding, great AMERICANS of EVERY COLOR AND CREED.

From this white, Mayflower-descended strategic analyst, allow me to offer you the three strategic options you have before you:

1. You drastically moderate your platform to harmonize with the policy positions I present above

2. You disband the party and reorganize it to reflect current realities

3. You kick and scream and stamp your feet and call me and my friends names--and submit to several decades of one party rule

While I do not want a one-party system, I also don’t particularly care which of these options you choose. If you look carefully at the numbers on Tuesday, nobody else cares, either.Comment:  For more on the presidential campaign, see Upside-Down Flag Sparks Outrage and White Men Lose to Demographic Change.

Upside-down flag sparks outrage

McDonald's Flies American Flag Upside Down At Half-Staff In Follansbee, West Virginia (PHOTO)

By Ryan GrenobleFor the most part, today's reactions to last night's presidential reaction have been a predictable mix of partisan lunacy and more measured calls for national unity.

But it seems a McDonald's restaurant in Follansbee, West Virginia, is particularly distressed. The fast food eatery was spotted flying the American flag upside down this morning at half-staff--typically a signal that the flag-bearer is in jeopardy and in dire need of assistance.

An upside-down flag can also be interpreted as a protest. Many saw the flag as an objection to Tuesday night's presidential election results.

According to News9, an employee at the restaurant indicated the flag's position had been set by the owner.

A person representing themselves as the owner of that McDonald's later contacted News9 and told the station that the flag's position and appearance was the result of a mistake.

Comment:  It's hard to believe that the flag turned upside-down through an error and nobody noticed. It seems more likely that the manager wanted to send a message but lied about it when he was caught.

Here's an example of the outrage the upside-down flag generated--an excerpt from an open letter:

Re-posting from a Proud American:You didn't lose because you "weren't conservative enough" or because the country has become full of lazy "takers" who don't want to earn a living or just want America to "turn in to Europe."

You didn't lose because of Hurricane Sandy or because Chris Christie hugged the President on TV--they were both doing their jobs.

You didn't lose because of a liberal media, liberal college campuses, liberal polls that were "weighted to Democrats" (mostly because they were accurate), or because of "election fraud"... actually, that probably benefited you this time.

No. You lost because your policies, tone, conspiracies, rigid inflexibility and irrational rhetoric helped align enough moderates, swing voters, and minority groups whom otherwise could be persuaded by Republicans, to align with Democrats and a beatable incumbent.

It's not that you didn't get your message out, it's that we all actually heard it and threw up a little in our mouths.

There isn't a mandate for Democrats in this election. Liberalism wasn't rewarded in this election. However, calm pragmatism, compassion, working together, compromise and sincerity were rewarded. People may not have agreed with President Obama, but more felt he was sincere and that he understood their daily problems, fears, and dreams. If you don't trust what the polls say, take a look at who is sworn in on January 20th. I thought you'd at least believe in Math when it came to counting to 270.

Sincerity is the only thing in politics you can't fake. You can't teach it. No matter how shiny a candidate's bio is, how smooth he is, or how perfect the gray hairs rest on his temples--any average Joe on the street can spot a bullshitter.

Mitt is a generous and good man, but he didn't know who he was or "needed" to be at any given time in that campaign. That's largely his fault for lacking core convictions or personal toughness (Ronald Reagan and George W. Bush possessed both traits--that's why they won).

But you, the right wing base of the party, who drove so many of us moderate republicans out the door years ago, were the main catalyst. Your inability to reason, compromise, or let new facts and evidence challenge your predetermined outcomes led millions of moderates to no longer be able to stand on stage with you.

Frankly, you're embarrassing--more so than a crazy family member at dinner, or having your mom drop you off at a high school dance.

You say stupid shit and look stupid saying it.

You pass amendments to ban flag burning and then hang it upside down and post it on Facebook when you lose.

You preach limited government in the economy when Democrats are in charge and then look the other way when you're in charge.

You want a government small enough to stay out of corporations and banks but big enough for bedrooms and hospital respirators (see Schiavo, Terri).

There's a hatred inside of you that burns in a way that scares normal people.And the conclusion:Please. I welcome a challenge to what I've said. If you think because I voted for President Obama that I'm a socialist or that I don't want a better America, I'm happy to take time from running a business I've co-founded and time from money I'm trying to raise for Big Brothers Big Sisters of America to pause and give you a fresh one. At no charge.

But I do ask this: be a real Patriot. Look at that flag you've hung upside down. Look at what you've done to it and what that means. Thousands of our bravest men and women, braver than me, just lost limbs and in many cases their lives so that Iraqis and Afghanis could vote however they see fit. I did that on Tuesday and so did you. That's what that flag stands for--equal access to a process, not a guarantee for any of our desired outcomes.

A country that defeated Hitler, Mussolini, and bin Laden won't crumble because the guy you wanted to be President got beat.

You lost. Now learn from it.

Sincerely,

A Proud AmericanComment:  For more on the presidential campaign, see White Men Lose to Demographic Change and Obama Wins Again!

White men lose to demographic change

Whites-only GOP meets its demographic destiny

The creaking noise you hear? It's the sound of conservative white men trying to fight off change--and failing

By Rich BenjaminI have traveled this country extensively, before and during the election campaign, speaking to whites about their political values, most recently in various swing suburbs in Ohio the weekend before the vote. The vast majority of straight white men I encountered were reasonable, thoughtful voters. And here’s an irony: Much of the GOP—think Romney, Mourdock, Akin—cling to a political narrative according to which white male voters are “conservative” and “minority” voters are “liberal,” and where white male voters are self-sufficient and everyone else is dependent. It’s exactly this form of white-on-white racial profiling, a fear of the future, that produced the election’s outrageous comments about unions, the poor, rape, women, minorities and the like.

Why did conservative straight white men self-destruct so spectacularly this election? Perhaps because, in trying to secure the votes of other white men, they failed to notice that these white men have mothers, daughters, gay relatives and/or friends who are racial minorities; and that other white men are suffering economically; and that straight white men can also embody the country’s dramatic change? The cheap, divisive, nativistic, racialized ways that conservative leaders divvy up the electorate has now come to spook them. It’s a vicious loop: What this political narrative does is to fuel a further sense of embattlement and decline among disenfranchised straight white men.And:Like whiteness itself, once stable, reliable institutions are perceived to be “broken”: the nuclear family, the classroom, the “border,” the economy and the very nature of work. Little wonder all the venom flew as conservative straight white male candidates flailed while facing a dramatically changing country and electorate.

And now the Republicans should realize it is their own party that is broken. The politics of alienation is not an agenda. If such politics cannot win during such a tenuous economic backdrop, it’s unlikely to ever again.And:This election unfolded against this backdrop, what I call “The White People Deadline”: 2042. As this cultural “time bomb” ticks, fear mounts over a perceived loss of whites’ raw power—demographic, social, economic and political. So the debates raged on, including over women’s reproductive rights. Often racially coded, these contraceptive and abortion political clashes are a proxy debate for whites’ demographic viability. The political parties scrambled to consolidate their appeal to white voters even as they scramble to compensate for the decline of white voters. A new white upper class and a declining white lower class are diverging so vastly in core values and behaviors, writes Charles Murray in “Coming Apart: The State of White America, 1960-2010,” that they “barely recognize their underlying American kinship.” Murray’s much-discussed tract essentially yokes a decline of social values and of “whiteness” to an entire demographic’s “failure” to cope with a challenging future.

Coming apart? That doesn’t just describe the widening gulf between the prospects of rich and poor whites. It describes the firewall straight white conservatives are trying to erect against the future. The hapless candidates railed away against their sense of decline, marching to defeat at the polls.

“The white establishment is the minority. People want things.” What things does O’Reilly, the rickety sage of straight white men, mean? Clean energy? Immigration reform? Reproductive rights? Forward-thinking healthcare? Marriage equality?

The lesson for conservatives isn’t to fight harder against the change. It is to surf it. The GOP not only failed to diversify its base; it needs to rethink its assumptions about straight white men in the first place.America: Love it or be left behind

Obama can only do so much: Angry older whites have to decide if they want to secede from our multiracial future

By Joan WalshRepublicans will not go gently into that bad night, and thus we are hearing a range of reality-denying reactions, some of them flat out crazy. We’ve seen Rove’s deranged explanation for his party’s shellacking by what John Judis and Ruy Teixiera identified a decade ago as “the emerging Democratic majority:” Obama suppressed the white vote, Rove insists, primarily by running a negative campaign against Romney (John Kerry would like a word with you, Boss Rove). Let’s walk through a few others:

Obama’s emerging Democratic majority consists of slackers and moochers who just want things.

“People feel that they are entitled to things and which candidate, between the two, is going to give them things?” Bill O’Reilly said during his Tuesday self-pity party. “The white establishment is now the minority….The demographics are changing. It’s not a traditional America anymore.” A majority of Americans, O’Reilly opined, “want stuff. And who is going to give them things? President Obama. He knows it, and he ran on it.”

The self-satirizing Ann Coulter declared “It’s over. There’s no hope if takers outnumber makers,” reprising the failed VP nominee Paul Ryan’s Ayn Randian depiction of the American divide. Rush Limbaugh declared, “I went to bed last night thinking we’re outnumbered. I went to bed last night thinking we’ve lost the country. I don’t know how else you look at this…Conservatism, in my humble opinion, did not lose last night. It’s just very difficult to beat Santa Claus,” continuing the theme of the Obama coalition going to the polls for handouts.

That “the white establishment” built the modern social welfare state (albeit mostly for white people) is lost on O’Reilly, Coulter, Limbaugh and their ilk. That whites make up the vast majority of “takers” is likewise lost on them. But not on uber conservatives like Charles Murray, or the National Review’s dyspeptic hater Mark Steyn. “The fact is a lot of pasty, Caucasian, non-immigrant Americans have also shifted,’ and are very comfortable with Big Government, entitlements, micro-regulation, Obamacare and all the rest—and not much concerned with how or if it’s paid for,” Steyn wrote Wednesday.

No doubt a lot of the “pasty” folks Steyn talked about voted for Mitt Romney, since the red states are the new welfare queens, sucking more from Big Government than they provide in taxes. Don’t expect white GOP voters to process that contradiction in the early stages of grief, however.

The emerging Democratic majority can’t provide Obama a mandate without more white voters.

It’s not only GOP hacks who are saying stupid things about the white vote. Two days before the election Politico’s Mike Allen and Jim VandeHai declared that Obama’s problem with whites might make it hard for him to be the president of all America. “It’s possible,” the pair intoned darkly, that Obama “will get a lower percentage of white voters than George W. Bush got of Hispanic voters in 2000″ (he didn’t). Then they lowered the boom:

“A broad mandate this is not.”

Really? Let’s review. Obama won 93 percent of African Americans, 71 percent of Latinos and an astonishing 75 percent of Asian Americans, a group that used to split between parties. He won a majority of Catholics, Jews and Muslims as well as the religiously non-affiliated (he only lost white Protestants.) He won women and young people. The only group he lost was white people, and particularly older white people and extremely particularly older white men.

Does Obama have really have a problem attracting broad support? Or would the problem belong to the stubborn minority bloc that won’t vote for him, no matter what he does? Do the math, lads.

Racism behind the vote

If you think this voting trend--white men for conservatives, everyone else for liberals, is some sort of demographic fluke, think again. It's fueled by the bigotry of white men who fear women, minorities, and gays for roughly the same reason. Namely, a loss of power, control, and manhood--which are basically the same thing to the men in charge.

Here's a smidgen of the voluminous evidence on conservative racism:

Obama and the Death of White Power

David Leonard looks at how the President's re-election is invigorating a new wave of bigotry

By David LeonardThe re-election of Barack Obama to the office of President of the United States prompted a wide range of hateful reactions. From tearful Romney supporters to enraged bigots, the prospects of an African American leading the nation for another four years sent many within White America into panic mode or what I like to call “WDD:” White Delusional Disorder.

Teenagers took to twitter to hurl racial slurs without concern for the blowback; college students at Ole Miss and Hampden-Sydney (among others) took to the streets to voice their anger. In displays of violence usually reserved for sports celebrations, or disgust over an early bar closing, White males made their prejudices clear, hurling racial epithets and rocks with little fear of consequence. As editor Jamilah Lemieux said of those on twitter “the fact that there are so many people willing to publicly express these views…is troubling.”

Predictably, much of the chatter has focused on individual reactions, imagining racism in terms of emotion, anger, and frustration. The media’s shock and awe is not surprising given its failure to shine a spotlight on the resurgent White nationalism since 2008 and persistent racial inequality in the United States. Worse yet, the media has consistently portrayed racism as extreme in nature--the extremely young, the extremely bigoted, the extremely Southern, the extremely uneducated, and the extremely low-class. But most of us know that it is more common than any newspaper may have you believe.

The anxieties, anger, and outrage weren’t so much about backlash against liberal values, but what Obama’s victory revealed about the nation. There was a clear, alarming message about demographic shifts and waning White male control. According to Keisha Bentley-Edwards, “The anger wasn't only about President Obama and his re-election. It was overall frustration at the emerging power of diverse people in this country.”Clueless Racist Tweeters Reveal the Degraded State of Right-Wing Discourse

By David NeiwertAs Karoli and Blue Texan have been observing today, the fever swamps of the American Right are, predictably, coming completely unhinged over the re-election of President Obama. This is especially true the farther you move from right-wing pundits out to the conservative base--where the hatred of Obama is bubbling up a fresh heaping helping of steaming racism.

See, for instance, the gallery of racist tweets put together by Jezebel this week. Go ahead, spend a little time there. Then come on back, get a shower, and let's talk about it.

The leading states from which these tweets emanate are Alabama, Mississippi, Georgia, North Dakota, and Utah. Now there's a big surprise.

What's shocking and disturbing about these tweets is just how many people out there reflexively and thoughtlessly indulge in outright and outrageous racism--and then express surprise that they're accused of being racists!

Indeed, the pervasiveness of this response indicates just how degraded Americans' understanding of racism has become--mainly because, whenever it raises its head now, the right-wing media shouts down and belittles anyone who calls it out. So now there are millions of people out there who think that there's nothing particularly racist about using racist slurs.Like other conservatives, Bill O'Reilly wasn't just describing a demographic trend. He was admitting what I and others have been saying for years.

Namely, that "traditional" America means white men. That losing to Obama means white men are losing to women, minorities, and gays. That scares the bigots who think they're superior and deserve to rule. They hate Obama for robbing them of their "birthright."



For more on conservative racism, see Majority of Americans Are Racist and Conservative Admits Welfare-Bashing Is Racial.

Obama wins again!

My tweets and retweets on Election Night 2012:

It's a given that Romney will lie in his concession speech. He'll say he supports the president and wishes him well.

News flash: If the election is too close to call, the Supreme Court's conservative five are ready to invent a reason to give it to Romney.

Sherman Alexie: "Obama will win easily. Media is just trying to create reality show drama."

Someone needs to reinterview the Bronco Bamma girl and tell her our long national nightmare is finally over.

Ezra Klein: "Right now, all the data we're getting in tracks state polling over the last week. if that holds, it's bad news for Romney."

Obama ahead 51-49% in Florida with almost 2 million votes counted. If he takes Florida, it's all over, folks. #ICTMNVote

Third-party candidates getting 1-2% of the vote, with Johnson in the lead. Could make a difference in some states. #ICTMNVote

Obama takes Pennsylvania. Gonna be over soon. If he takes OH, VA, FL, and CO, can we call it a landslide? Or at least a mandate? #ICTMNVote

Elizabeth Warren wins in MA. Will she be the only Native in the Senate, or what? Will she answer ICTMN's questions now? #ICTMNVote

Based on all the trends, I'm calling it for Obama. It's all over but the vote counting. Four more years of hope, change, and the status quo!

Matt Yglesias: "If your candidate says something insane and repugnant about rape, the electorate has a way of shutting the whole thing down."

Ezra Klein: "Early to draw political lessons, but if you're a GOP candidate and you've got a theory about rape and abortion, maybe keep it to yourself?"

Tim Wise: "And THIS is what community organizers do, conservatives…they own your pathetic asses. Welcome to the future. Suck it up or leave the country"

My deep thought on the 2012 presidential election. pic.twitter.com/QHpsN2UX



Put away your coat hangers, women. You won't need 'em for another four years. #RepublicanWaronWomen #ObamaWins

Another deep thought on the Republican attitude toward women and women's issues. http://qkme.me/3ro80u via @quickmeme



Indian Country Today: "NBC News projects Obama re-elected. Ohio is his. #ICTMNVote"

Tim Wise: "Good news? Romney got crushed & the right has 2 question their certitude about God's will. Bad news? At least 4 more books from Ann Coulter"

Joan Walsh: "The Obama mandate: His re-election is a victory for using government in tangible ways to improve people's lives http://www.salon.com/2012/11/07/the_obama_mandate/"

Bill Maher: "Tea Party has now cost the Republicans 5 senate seats. My next donation is going to them."

Glenn Greenwald: "The GOP has been crushed in 3 out of last 4 elections. #BushCheneyLegacy"

Thank you, George W. Bush. Your wars, disasters, and recessions didn't just give Obama four years in office. They gave him eight years.

Obama should appoint Romney his jobs czar. That would throw Republicans into a tizzy!

Thank you for reelecting President Obama, women and minorities.

To Mitt Romney and his family members: Get a job, you lazy bums!

Unlimited spending, voter suppression, rigged machines...none of that can overcome people power. The 99% decide who's president, not the 1%.

For more on the presidential campaign, see Green Party's VP Candidate Is Chippewa and Ryan:  Obama Threatens Western Values.

Green Party's VP candidate is Chippewa

Green Party VP Candidate Talks American Indian Roots & Real Action for the Future

By Rob CapricciosoGreen Party vice-presidential candidate Cheri Honkala says her Chippewa heritage is a part of her biography that few people this year have asked her about during her run for the White House—even though it has influenced almost every aspect of her life’s work and many facets of her personal life, too.

From fighting for environmental justice to struggling with extreme poverty to coping with an early childhood rife with domestic violence to having a brother who committed suicide, Honkala says her story mirrors that of many American Indians today.

It’s a reality that few mainstream politicians share, and she believes it is important for Native people to support candidates who understand them from personal experience.

“The Democrats and Republicans have thrown indigenous people down the stairs time and again,” Honkala says. “It’s only when we say ‘no, this is enough, I am leaving this abusive relationship’ that we can truly be free.”

But can a third party, itself struggling for widespread recognition, really be a beacon of light for Indian country?

Honkala says yes, and shared her strong thoughts on the two-party system, compromised values, and tribal involvement in politics in a pre-election interview with Indian Country Today Media Network.And:How does this ‘warrior’ philosophy influence your politics?

It’s time we go back to our roots where we live communally and collectively. We need to focus on the real priorities in life. We need to stand up for what is right. That is what the Green Party platform is all about.

Are there many Native Americans in the Green Party?

I think that Winona LaDuke [who is Anishinaabe and who ran as a Green Party vice-presidential candidate with Ralph Nader in 1996 and 2000] really paved the way. She brought in a lot of Natives to the party. Other folks, including myself, have worked hard to connect with tribal communities. I hope to see in the years to come an even bigger increase because neither the Democrats nor the Republicans have similar values to most indigenous people. The Greens value the Earth and the climate. They value taking care of each other. They value culture and sovereignty.

It is a matter of mass education [to get more people involved], which is quite difficult in this era of corporate funding of American elections. The Democrats in particular have worked hard to keep away Third Party ideas, especially among tribes. They have paid lip service to issues that many tribal citizens care about, like climate change, but they haven’t taken strong action on it.Comment:  Writer Cappricioso told me Honkala had nothing but good words for LaDuke, while LaDuke hadn't commented on Honkala. I'm guessing LaDuke doesn't want to talk about her Green run for vice president since she endorsed Obama.

For more on Winona LaDuke, see Winona LaDuke Changed Our World and Warrant Issued for LaDuke.

Below:  "Jill Stein and Cheri Honkala sit outside the debate in Hempstead, Long Island."