Gan
09-20-2008, 08:20 AM
By INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY | Posted Thursday, September 18, 2008 4:20 PM PT
Election '08: The supporters of the first post-racial candidate keep bringing it up. Racism is the new refuge of scoundrels. The real issue is not the color of Obama's skin, but the thickness of it.
For a time, Barack Obama was riding "the chance to make history" train, garnering huge support on that issue alone. Then came the GOP nomination of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, an outlet for disgruntled Hillary Clinton supporters and hockey moms, plus a different way to make history.
Once "hope" and "change" had to be defined as more than a podium sign, and Obama had to speak on occasion without a teleprompter, avoiding the joint town hall meetings he promised John McCain, it became apparent that it was not change for the better Obama was offering.
He offered trillions in new taxes and surrender to our enemies abroad. He was a classic liberal, the No. 1 liberal in the U.S. Senate, and that's a losing argument.
Why do Democrats think McCain has caught up? Speaking in Iowa City, Iowa, on Tuesday, Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius, another woman Obama did not choose, provided an answer.
"Have any of you noticed that Barack Obama is part African-American?" she asked in response to a question about why the election is so close. "That may be a factor. All the code language, all that doesn't show up in the polls."
Liberals, not being able to understand why The One we've been waiting for could possibly lose, needed a comforting excuse, and racism provided it.
For example, David Paterson, the Democratic governor of New York, recently accused Republicans of using "community organizer" not as a criticism of Obama's tissue-thin resume, but as a racial put-down.
But if anyone has repeatedly injected race into this campaign, it is Obama.
Meeting with donors in San Francisco on April 6, he famously told them of "small towns in Pennsylvania" and the Midwest beset by job losses in a changing economy. He told of how "they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment" to vent their frustrations.
It is Obama who said racism was the reason he could lose.
"Nobody thinks that Bush and McCain have a real answer to the challenges we face," he said in Springfield, Mo., on July 30.
"So what they're going to try to do is make you scared of me. You know, 'he's not patriotic enough, he's got a funny name, he doesn't look like all those other presidents on those dollar bills.'" Who are "they"?
CNN's Jack Cafferty says: "Race is arguably the biggest issue on this election, and it's one that nobody is talking about." Nobody on the Republican side anyway. Cafferty opines: "The differences between Barack Obama and John McCain couldn't be more well-defined. . . . Yet the polls remain close. Doesn't make sense . . . unless it's race."
It doesn't make sense to Time's Michael Grunwald, either. In a piece titled "For Obama, Race Remains Elephant In The Room," he said McCain's "Celebrity" ad linking Obama to Britney Spears and Paris Hilton "had a whiff of lock-up-your-women alarmism about the sexual power of black men."
Speaking of small towns in Pennsylvania, Grunwald tells of a visit to a Manheim Central High School football practice. The coach said his team works hard, plays with discipline and comes through in the end. "A lot like John McCain," said the coach.
Grunwald writes: "If you're familiar with the code words of the sports world, you've probably guessed that Manheim's players had something else in common with McCain: They were white."
So what if Obama loses? Philadelphia Daily News columnist Fatimah Ali wrote in her column of Sept. 2: "If McCain wins, look for a full-fledged race and class war, fueled by a deflated and depressed country, soaring crime, homelessness — and hopelessness!"
Maybe Team Obama will provide us with a glossary of code words.
Its candidate's very nomination and rise to fame and fortune belie his charges of racism. Martin Luther King once dreamed of a day when people would be judged by the content of their character and not the color of their skin. Sadly for Barack Obama, that day has arrived.
http://ibdeditorials.com/IBDArticles.aspx?id=306630254921767
Election '08: The supporters of the first post-racial candidate keep bringing it up. Racism is the new refuge of scoundrels. The real issue is not the color of Obama's skin, but the thickness of it.
For a time, Barack Obama was riding "the chance to make history" train, garnering huge support on that issue alone. Then came the GOP nomination of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, an outlet for disgruntled Hillary Clinton supporters and hockey moms, plus a different way to make history.
Once "hope" and "change" had to be defined as more than a podium sign, and Obama had to speak on occasion without a teleprompter, avoiding the joint town hall meetings he promised John McCain, it became apparent that it was not change for the better Obama was offering.
He offered trillions in new taxes and surrender to our enemies abroad. He was a classic liberal, the No. 1 liberal in the U.S. Senate, and that's a losing argument.
Why do Democrats think McCain has caught up? Speaking in Iowa City, Iowa, on Tuesday, Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius, another woman Obama did not choose, provided an answer.
"Have any of you noticed that Barack Obama is part African-American?" she asked in response to a question about why the election is so close. "That may be a factor. All the code language, all that doesn't show up in the polls."
Liberals, not being able to understand why The One we've been waiting for could possibly lose, needed a comforting excuse, and racism provided it.
For example, David Paterson, the Democratic governor of New York, recently accused Republicans of using "community organizer" not as a criticism of Obama's tissue-thin resume, but as a racial put-down.
But if anyone has repeatedly injected race into this campaign, it is Obama.
Meeting with donors in San Francisco on April 6, he famously told them of "small towns in Pennsylvania" and the Midwest beset by job losses in a changing economy. He told of how "they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment" to vent their frustrations.
It is Obama who said racism was the reason he could lose.
"Nobody thinks that Bush and McCain have a real answer to the challenges we face," he said in Springfield, Mo., on July 30.
"So what they're going to try to do is make you scared of me. You know, 'he's not patriotic enough, he's got a funny name, he doesn't look like all those other presidents on those dollar bills.'" Who are "they"?
CNN's Jack Cafferty says: "Race is arguably the biggest issue on this election, and it's one that nobody is talking about." Nobody on the Republican side anyway. Cafferty opines: "The differences between Barack Obama and John McCain couldn't be more well-defined. . . . Yet the polls remain close. Doesn't make sense . . . unless it's race."
It doesn't make sense to Time's Michael Grunwald, either. In a piece titled "For Obama, Race Remains Elephant In The Room," he said McCain's "Celebrity" ad linking Obama to Britney Spears and Paris Hilton "had a whiff of lock-up-your-women alarmism about the sexual power of black men."
Speaking of small towns in Pennsylvania, Grunwald tells of a visit to a Manheim Central High School football practice. The coach said his team works hard, plays with discipline and comes through in the end. "A lot like John McCain," said the coach.
Grunwald writes: "If you're familiar with the code words of the sports world, you've probably guessed that Manheim's players had something else in common with McCain: They were white."
So what if Obama loses? Philadelphia Daily News columnist Fatimah Ali wrote in her column of Sept. 2: "If McCain wins, look for a full-fledged race and class war, fueled by a deflated and depressed country, soaring crime, homelessness — and hopelessness!"
Maybe Team Obama will provide us with a glossary of code words.
Its candidate's very nomination and rise to fame and fortune belie his charges of racism. Martin Luther King once dreamed of a day when people would be judged by the content of their character and not the color of their skin. Sadly for Barack Obama, that day has arrived.
http://ibdeditorials.com/IBDArticles.aspx?id=306630254921767