Appeasement: Obama Accommodates Racist Conspiracy Theorists

Then you just exaggerated? Because it's 51% who believe he was born overseas and 21% who don't know. That's a bit different. Don't pull a John Kyl. Just stick to the real facts.

~String

 

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It's not like the real facts aren't discouraging enough.

 

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Indeed, so making stuff up is pretty crappy.

 

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Mod Note: In fact and upon further digging, Buffalo has been warned enough about this sort of thing. The warnings have gone up and down. I'll settle for two weeks. [see: my earlier post]

 

The birther response to Obama's long form birth certificate:

http://themoderatevoice.com/107938/...ssue-msnbcs-lawrence-odonnell-ends-interview/

and the beat goes on.

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No I didn't. Fiftyone percent believe Obama was not born in The United States, that is a majority. And there are another 21 percent who claim to be unsure about his birth...despite all of the evidence to the contrary. In any case, this is not the fringe you originally claimed. It is most of the Republican Party. This is main stream Republicanism if you judge what is mainstream by the number of heads subscribing to the notion.

 

Okay. I won't sit here defending the Republican party.

And, perhaps, it's no longer a "fringe" thing. I can back away from that. But, I firmly believe that it's still a minority of the country and an unworthy portion of accommodating.

~String

 

I think the reason President Obama took the extraordinary action of requesting a waiver from the State of Hawaii and obtaining a copy of his long form birth certificate was to knock yet another hole in the Birther lies. But as we all know, it won't stop the believers. They will come up with some other equally bizzare lie.

The number of folks subscribing to this lie has grown since Trump took on the Birther cause. A number of Republican states have introduced bills requiring a long form birth certificate to be listed on the presidential ballot. What I find particularily amusing is that some of those states don't issue long form versions (e.g. Kansas). I mean this whole thing is crazy! It is insane. It is sad. If we fall for this kind of crap, then we deserve what we will get.

 

And that's the point, Joe!

He handed these lunatics a "win" and he gained--LITERALLY--not one micron of ground. Nothing. Nothing at all was gained, other then his own condolence for sticking it to them. And maybe that was worth it, but now he's been lowered into acknowledging them at their level. It's utterly ridiculous.

If this were to tame the fringe members of our government or give him some wiggle room in dealing with his opponents, then--as we say in Retail--it would be value added. As it is, it's not. It achieves none of those things. It won't even silence the fucking birthers. You saw that wack-job in the video you posted!

~String

 

Obama Accommodates Racist Conspiracy Theorists

In spite of all his talk of flaming and goading and whatnot in another thread, Tiassa, our resident expert in race sensitivity and political correctness has decided to name this thread Appeasement: Obama Accommodates Racist Conspiracy Theorists

See, only Tiassa is able to officiate on the definition of racism.

Which is why anyone whoever questioned Obama's credentials is a defacto racist.

Hence the title of this thread.

And the question of goading and flaming and whatnot is a non-issue. It only pertains to others.

The title of this thread isn't an attempt to goad. Is it?

 

No. It's the truth.

Tiassa and I aren't exactly in the same ball-park when it comes to political philosophies, so it's not every day you get us agreeing on these sort of things, But I totally agree with the title. I've yet to meet a truther who didn't reek of racism, ethnocentrism and Christian smugness. Pick one. They're all just as disgusting.

Failing that, remember, this is a POLITICS thread. Things aren't always pretty.

~String

 

No one would be questioning the eligibility of a white man. While some birthers may not be racist, the source of the birther question definitely is.

 

I wonder how many black birthers there are.

 

Reactions

Reactions: Confusion, Disappointment, Accusation

As the sun peaks the sky on the West Coast a day after President Obama changed the world by lowering the bar for admittance to the American political discourse to include racists and the psychiatrically incompetent, people are still blinking dazedly in the light, wandering about with blank looks on their faces, trying to figure out just what the hell happened.

Except for the lack of blood and bodies, twisted metal and broken glass, sirens and panicked screaming, you might think you are looking at the aftermath of some disaster—a terrorist strike, or natural cataclysm.

Those who consider themselves regular people insofar as they don't attend the snivelling, snooping politics of desperation, and thus have no opinion about Birthers, just want things to go back to normal.

Obama's supporters want their pyrrhic victory back.

And the Tea Party presses forward like an army celebrating its triumph.

Or perhaps that is a bit melodramatic?

Anyway:

Shortly after President Barack Obama declared himself an American-born citizen with papers to prove it, Baratunde Thurston declared himself a disgusted black man.

"This" would be the nation's first black president standing in the White House, blue power suit and all, going on TV to debunk, in more detail than before, the persistent, he-ain't-really-an-American rumors fanned anew by Donald Trump, the developer and might-be presidential candidate.

Many African-Americans responded to Wednesday's scene with a large sigh. The rumors and the controversy had a particular, troubling resonance for them: They've seen, heard, lived, the legitimacy of black people being called into question so many times before that, they said, they weren't shocked to see it happen to Obama over something as simple as a birth certificate.

But they were sad about it, too, seeing what they felt was a high-level manifestation of the idea that when a black person accomplishes something great there must be something wrong ....

.... "Black people are taught, 'Your bar is higher. You have to answer harder questions. And you're never really, satisfactorily accepted,'" Thurston said in an interview. "That's a good motivator as a kid, it makes you run fast. But at some point, it's exhausting to carry such historical baggage in your daily life."

(Ross)​

It's a hard argument to avoid. Conservatives, long advocates of states' rights, tacitly argued while pursuing this issue that the states themselves aren't good enough, that the states aren't credible. For that half of Republicans that believe Obama is foreign-born, and the extra twenty that just weren't sure—for that nearly twelve percent of the House Republican Caucus in the 111th Congress—the states simply aren't good enough.

And I don't see why a black person would be any less prone to wondering about that. After all, the thought has occured to me, and I don't have the visceral, vital investment in the question: Really? A black man is elected president, and suddenly conservatives flip on states' rights?

I mean, we already know that conservatives disdain the Fourteenth Amendment, having heard the agonized whimpering about "anchor babies", but there is another aspect, as well. What about Hawaii, a state, or Barack Obama, a person, means the Fourteenth should be set aside? Under the Equal Protection clause, what is good enough for everyone else is good enough for the president, unless, of course, the president is black and has a funny-sounding name. Then the president, sworn to protect and preserve the constution, ought to throw out the Fourteenth Amendment and say, "Yes, this is a person for whom the equal regard of the law is inappropriate. Thus, the state's credibility is not in effect for him."

And, yes, I can imagine that, if I was black, the disbelief would be that much more raw. It's really this important to people. The conservatives aren't racist, but damn it all to hell, they're going to make the black man go above and beyond.

And there would seem to be a reason. It's not that Obama is too black. It's that he's not black enough. At least, so says Princeton University professor Melissa Harris-Perry:

Many on the left say that birtherism is just racism, but there's more than simple racial animus behind it. I suspect that part of the problem is that Obama is indeed not black enough; specifically, the president is not sufficiently Negro—the historical variation of blackness that is uniquely and indisputably American.

The American slave system disrupted the ability of enslaved Africans to retain or pass along their ethnic identities. Igbo, Ashanti, Akan, Yoruba and Hausa became interchangeable units for sale. While slaves nurtured fragments of cultural, religious and familial traditions, much of the specificity of their African experience was surrendered to an imagined and indistinct notion of "Africa." Moreover, the law did not initially recognize slaves or their US-born children as American. So enslaved Africans were women and men literally without a country, defined solely in terms of their labor value. Their descendants eventually achieved citizenship, but to be an American black, a Negro, is to be a rejected child who nonetheless clings to her abusive father because she knows no other parent. To be a black American descended from slaves is to lack, if not a birth certificate, then at least a known genealogy—to have only a vague sense of where one comes from, of who one's ancestors were and of where one belongs.

In this sense, Obama is not very black. He is not a Negro. As a black man, President Obama's confident and clear knowledge of his lineage is precisely the thing that makes his American identity dubious. Unlike most black people, he has easy access to both his American and his African selves.​

I think it's a fascinating theory, but Harris-Perry overlooks that this is the Tea Party; these are Birthers. The nuance of the tale she tells, of the condition she suggests, is far too minute, and is lost like a raindrop amid thirty-foot swells.

Indeed, we might find some insight to the president's personal struggle over the issue of how to deal with the biblical-scale flood of racism he's endured in recent years. But for a self-identifying group of people, such as the Tea Party, who are so confused about history and bitter in their opposition that they will denounce the president as Hitler while accusing his political allies of being Jews, there is the possibility that Harris-Perry's subtlety ranges into the realm of elitism.

Of course we can imagine the Birthers as such simplistic fools that they're confused—and thus frightened, and therefore angry—at the sight of a black President of the United States who isn't a stereotypical nigger. President Barack Obama owes them that, at least. A little Ike Turner, or Eazy-E, or Kanye West, maybe. Then the Birthers and their racist, conservative friends could justify their hatred. But he's not, so they can't, and that's all the more reason to be angry at him.

It is easy to view the Birthers in this context. Which, perhaps, is why the right wing defends its racists by blaming President Obama, as RNC Chair Reince Priebus did. Of course, he's not the first. One of our conservative neighbors explained to me, a while back:

"Race is absolutely not the motivation for opposition to Obama, but it is used by some as a tool in the fight against him ....

.... As I said, race is not the motivating factor, it's policy. But some (such as the cartoonist you featured earlier) will use any weapon at hand to stop Obama. Not because he's black, but because they believe he's going to destroy what they believe is unique about America."​

Did you catch that? It's Obama's fault for moving these good and decent people to racism.

Quite clearly, then, Harris-Perry's consideration of Obama's blackness occurs at the wrong valence. A little less of the nuance of Negro, and perhaps a bit more of the need for a Nigger.

Just remember: To the Birthers and their allies and patrons, this is all Obama's fault. If only he had been a Republican, then they never would have wondered.
____________________

Notes:

Ross, Sonya. "Some blacks see racism in 'birther' questions". Associated Prss. April 28, 2011. MSNBC.MSN.com. April 28, 2011. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/42802371

Harris-Perry, Melissa. "For Birthers, Obama's Not Black Enough". Sister Citizen. April 27, 2011. TheNation.com. April 28, 2011. http://www.thenation.com/article/160233/birthers-obamas-not-black-enough

 

Does Buffalo ever do anything else BUT post half truths and give a false impressions??

 

Yes, we already assumed that the man was vetted and elected. Certainly it borders on clinical neurosis. Do the insane recognize the moisture on their chin as foaming drool? At this rate, by 2012, the far right wing of the Republican party will need "rubber-rooming".:crazy:

 

Mod Hat — Just a note

Mod Hat — Just a note

I think it should be mentioned, for the sake of the people who try to spike thread tags with some sort of half-witted message directed at one person, that your sum effect is to reduce staff sympathy toward whatever personal issues you might report, or otherwise communicate, to us.

Really, there is a difference between my black ink and my Mod Hat. No, I don't like the guy. But that doesn't mean you get to piss all over decency in order to take a swing at him.

Sorry, but that's the way it has to be. The champions of decency must themselves be decent.

If you can't figure that out, there's nothing I can do to help you.

 

It's not just Republicans, a poll released a few days before Obama finally decided to release his birth certificate showed only 38% of Americans were sure that Obama was born in the US:

Only 38% of Americans believe Obama was definitely born in the USA

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1380630/Only-38-​

Again, the majority of the country was, at least, not sure about Obama's birth. And you might also note that this whole thing was started during the Democratic primary by a supporter of Clinton:

Investigating the roots of the Obama birthplace conspiracy theory, John Avlon—author of Wingnuts: How the Lunatic Fringe Is Hijacking America, available now from Beast Books—uncovers the first Birther and finds she's a Hillary Clinton supporter also implicated in Dan Rather's exit from CBS.

Investigations for my new book, Wingnuts, revealed that the Birther conspiracy theory was first concocted by renegade members of the original Obama haters, Party Unity My Ass, known more commonly by their acronym, the PUMAs. They were a splinter group of hard-core Hillary Clinton supporters who did not want to give up the ghost after the bitter 50-state Bataan Death March to the 2008 Democratic nomination.

In the early summer of '08, message boards on sites like PUMAParty.com began lighting up with the ultimate reversal-of-fortune fantasy—that their party's nomination could be overturned on constitutional grounds. "Obama May Be Illegal to Be Elected President!" read one representative e-mail: "This came from a USNA [U.S. Naval Academy] alumnus. It'll be interesting to see how the media handle this...WRITE TO YOUR LOCAL newspaper editors etc. Keep this out there everyday possible. Also write to the DNC too!"​

http://www.thedailybeast.com/blogs-and-stories/2010-02-08/the-secret-history-of-the-birthers/#​

Furthermore, the recent rise in the legitimacy of the whole birther hoopla which prompted Obama to finally address it is primarily due to Donald Trump who was until recently a registered Democrat and (I believe) supported both Gore and Kerry. The same is true of his chief political advisor.

So don't lay this nonsense solely at the door of Republicans. Sure, they played a big part in in. But the story got its start from the Democrats and the whole thing was brought to a head by the "former" Democrat, Donald Trump.

 

exactly in doing this he is in some way saying that these people needed to be taken seriously and that their concerns and complaints were valid.