Case in point: Washington Post “media critic” Howard Kurtz’s article today about FOX News Channel’s “reporters’” growing discomfort with the shenanigans of FNC darling Glenn Beck, he of the mighty chalkboard of insanity, his ludicrous fits of crying, his manic desire to be a political player, the fearmongering, paranoia and Stalin-Mao-Hitler-Marxist-Communist-Racist-Obama-hating cavalcade of madness. The meme that Beck is merely an entertainer and that FOX personalities are worried that the new star on the block could damage its relationship with the White House and the channel’s reputation are laughable at best. After all, Beck organized the infamous “9/12″ rallies, a non-news event enthusiastically covered by FOX, complete with inflated crowd estimates. Beck, in displays of false modesty, claims to be a mere rodeo clown. Nonsense. He’s a liar, an ignoramus and a dangerous Father Coughlinesque demagogue who has done enormous damage to political discourse and the profession of journalism. (Beck would probably decry Coughlin’s loyalties but the technique remains the same).

Beck apologized recently for wasting his audience’s time following a hilariously absurd and demented interview with disgraced tickling enthusiast and former Congressman Eric Massa. But not to worry, he’s back to whatever passes for normal now.

FOX’s “news” operation didn’t show restraint or a desire for fact-checking while helping pump damaging, and false stories about the Clintons into the media churn, with the Vince Foster conspiracy theory still holding a strong showing behind the JFK assassination.

And it’s not as if Beck makes money for the network. He’s a loss leader (here’s a partial list of companies that have pulled their ads, despite Beck’s strong ratings). There are rumblings that Rupert Murdoch’s children are fed up with the drama surrounding FOX News’s foolishness, but you can bet that as long as daddy Rupert is in charge and Roger Ailes continues to draw breath nothing will change.

The Kurtz article follows an absurd piece in the Washington Post by former New York Times Executive Editor Howell Raines. With wide-eyed wonder, he ponders the vexing question of why reputable media organizations don’t call FOX out as a propaganda mill. This from a man who if he had a sense of shame would have the decency to keep quiet about media ethics, considering that reporter Bush/Cheney stenographer Judy Miller’s wildly incorrect WMD/Chalabi articles started being published in the NYT on his watch. The New York Times, which sets the agenda for all other publications in the United States, was thereby complicit in pushing falsehoods that led to an unjust and unnecessary war, costing thousands of American lives and ruining the U.S.’s reputation around the world. Good work, Howell.

But to answer your question, Howell: Cowardice. The American media are sheep. You’re welcome.

American reporters love to express their wonder at the Pakistani media’s love of conspiracy theories and wrinkle their brows over what a terrible impact the dissemination of false and sensationalistic information could have on the U.S.-Pak relationship. Look in the mirror, people.

– Cross Post from: The Pakistan Update

For some folks at MSNBC? Seems like it, given this recent departure. Craig Crawford, an MSNBC mainstay, has quit the network, even leaving before his contract was out. Wait until you read why that is in this article, MSNBC Political Analyst Craig Crawford Has Left the Network – In A Very Public Way. (Photo by Terry Ballard)

It confirms what many of us have been saying for a while:

Writing on his blog at CQPolitics.com, Crawford says he has found the network “unrewarding for me,” – and expands on his reason for leaving in a comment to Mediaite.

Crawford last appeared on MSNBC on February 5, as a guest on Countdown with Keith Olbermann, where he regularly appeared (according to TV Eyes). The blog post came exactly one month after that appearance. Crawford wrote:

Three months short of my current contract I sent the following to the boss, Phil Griffin: “Phil, Just wanted to give you the heads up that my situation with MSNBC has become so unrewarding for me that I’ve decided to move on. — Craig”

But he really expanded on the reasoning in the comments:

i simply could not any longer endure being a cartoon player for lefty games, just gotta move on to higher ground even if there’s no oxygen

i have never and never will forgive Chris for calling me a racist after the West Virginia primary (the last time I will ever go on air with him). Probably should have resigned then and there, but better late than never.

“Cartoon character for lefty games”?? Holy smokes! Tell us how you really feel, Craig:

We asked Crawford what he was referring to regarding Chris Matthews, and to expand on why he left the network. He responded by email:

I haven’t felt like a good fit for MSNBC since the presidential campaign, and the hard turn toward point-of-view programming. No particular event brought this on, just my desire to try other outlets and have more fun. As far as Chris is concerned, on Morning Joe after the West Virginia primary he accused me of always defending Clinton and what he claimed to be her racially motivated campaigning. That’s the problem. Trying to be fair became seen as bias in the new thinking over there. But I do wish my many pals at MSNBC nothing but good things.

This appears to be that incident from Morning Joe.

Dang, Craig, maybe you could have spoken up a bit more back then, giving it back to Tingly Leg that Hillary ISN’T racist, and for Tingles to claim she is, and calling you a racist, too, was nothing short of reprehensible and slanderous? Just asking. So, tell us more:

The decision by a Countdown regular to leave MSNBC because of his the way he perceives the network is a notable one. Although Crawford isn’t purely left-wing, he is a commentator that represents the left perspective. His exit, and his reasoning, show some level of discontent among those who may be politically on the same team at MSNBC.

Crawford says on his blog he will be on Fox & Friends as a guest on Monday, although FNC says he won’t be. He also writes in the comments that he is a “free agent.”

> Update: Crawford took down the F&F booking info shortly after publication.

Some interesting comments at both Craig’s blog, and at Mediaite about Craig’s decision. Many people support him, but a number of MSNBO viewers attack him for going to “Fox and Friends.” Now there’s a surprise.

It is mighty interesting that Crawford has departed the network before his contract was up, and especially the reasons why. I reckon it is better late than never. Oh, no, wait – because he colluded in MSNBC becoming MSNBO, participated in Hillary-bashing even if it was in staying silent in the face of blatant falsehoods about her from other commentators. And he did participate in their “lefty games.” Now, we are stuck with Obama wrecking our country. But, hey – if things keep going this way, there will be fewer “journalists” willing to make Obama’s presidency a success, like Good Ol’ Chris Matthews. I guess that’s something.

Welcome to the Kool Aide Free zone, also free of Hopium smoke. Glad you made it out, Craig.

A party called the Compton Cookout “was held off-campus near the University of California San Diego, and the firestorm it has created has been massive: Protest marches, teach-ins, protesters who walked out of the teach-ins and campus investigations have ensued. The administration for its part immediately placed blame on perpetrators they believed to be responsible – a so-called white fraternity, Pi Kappa Alpha”.

Despite the denials by Pi Kappa Alpha, the media continues to blame the fraternity and students for organizing the event.

MSNBC ran with the story, but it has since been scrubbed…. Why?


Perhaps they found out something, like the truth, but preferred to scrub the entire thing, instead of changing their narrative? Don’t believe me, check out their latest story:

KKK-style hood found on UC San Diego campus
Cops investigating third incident targeting black students at college

The incident was the third targeting black students at UC San Diego in as many weeks. The other incidents were a “Compton Cookout” party that mocked Black History Month and a noose in a library.

University officials also said a student admitted she and two other people were responsible for hanging the noose. A statement did not identify the students or their race or include a motive.

In a news conference Friday, Chancellor Marye Anne Fox said the student has been suspended but declined to discuss her motive or other students involved.

“This person admitted her involvement in what we consider to be an abhorrent act,” Fox said.

UC and campus authorities did not indicate whether the students would be charged with a hate crime. Under state law, hanging a noose to terrorize is punishable by up to a year in jail.

The school has been in turmoil over an off-campus “Compton Cookout” party organized by some students that urged people to dress as ghetto stereotypes and promised there would be chicken, watermelon and malt liquor.

No mention, in either case, of the race/minority status of those really responsible. In fact, they blame students for organizing the Compton Cookout. I think we all should be suspicious of the alledged white hood found, too:

A university statement said the hood was found about 11 p.m. Monday. The object appeared to be a white pillowcase that had been crudely fashioned into a hood with a hand-drawn symbol. A rose had also been inserted into the statue’s fingers.

This is how the Compton Cookout and noose story are being reported elsewhere in the MSM:

Fraternity Mocks Black History Month With “Compton Cookout”

Officials at UC San Diego are condemning a ghetto-themed party organized by fraternity students to mock Black History Month.

A Facebook posting advertising Monday’s ‘Compton Cookout’ invited people to a condominium complex off-campus.

The invitation urged all participants to wear chains, rapper-style urban clothing by makers such as FUBU and speak very loudly.

Schwarzenegger condemns ‘intolerable acts of racism’ at UC San Diego, other campuses

A series of racial and religion controversies involving UC campuses — including the “Compton Cookout” party and a noose found at UC San Diego — has been met with concern by Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.

“I am deeply troubled by the horrific incidents that recently took place on various campuses of the University of California system,” the governor said in a statement. “The acts of racism and intolerance that we have witnessed are completely unacceptable and I join with the University of California President, Chancellors and student leaders in condemning these terrible incidents.”

From the CSM:

“I strongly condemn the acts of hate and bias that have occurred over the past days,” said Chancellor Marye Anne Fox in a Web-based video. “We are feeling real pain, and we will take real action.”

“It is very disturbing that this kind of racial intolerance rears its ugly head, especially in the age of Obama,” says Najee Ali, executive director of Project Islamic H.O.P.E. in Los Angeles. “It shows we haven’t come as far as we think in promoting tolerance and unity among ethnic groups.”

NAACP urges UCSD to punish creators of ‘Compton Cookout’ party

The NAACP Friday condemned an off-campus party held by members of a UC San Diego fraternity mocking Black History Month and urged the university to punish those involved.

“This event was intended and did expose the true feeling of a group of people, who either are racist, who acted out their beliefs, or people who say they are not racist, but engaged in acts that were racist,” said Leon Jenkins, president of the Los Angeles NAACP.

Monday’s party, allegedly organized by some members of the Pi Kappa Alpha fraternity, was themed “Compton Cookout” and urged attendees to dress and act in a manner perpetuating racist stereotypes.

The fraternity has denied that it sanctioned the event. University officials initially indicated that because the party was held off campus, there may not be grounds to punish those involved under the student code of conduct.

Now here is some information you won’t find in the MSM, or on the liberal blogs. The truth.

Meet Jiggaboo Jones, the African American organizer of the fifth annual event:

And as for the student who left the noose in the library? Another tidbit you won’t find in the MSM is the identity of the minority student who came forward and admitted to accidentally leaving the noose in the library.

The UC San Diego student reportedly responsible for hanging a noose last week in a campus library issued a public, but anonymous, apology Monday and said she had no racist motivation.

The noose’s discovery set off protests at a school that is already tense from recent racially charged episodes and triggered condemnations from UC leaders and Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger.

In a letter published Monday on the front page of the UC San Diego student newspaper, the Guardian, the student wrote that the incident was “a mindless act and stupid mistake” and was not meant to recall the lynching of blacks.

“As a minority student who sympathizes with the students that have been affected by the recent issues on campus, I am distraught to know that I have unintentionally added to their pain,” the student wrote. She was suspended Friday and remains under investigation for a possible hate crime.

Sloppy journalism, or just a deeper desire to blame the frat boys and continue the racism meme we are inundated with daily?

I think Left Coast Rebel summed it up quite well:

And there you have it. A media-created, trumped up, liberal orgy of racist white UCSD students (that aren’t) is an injustice that has to be dealt with and the 1st Amendment must be cast aside (at least for those that are ‘not of color).

Additional thought – if these college kids are so racially insensitive, steeped in racism and guilty of perpetuating racial stereotypes, why did they have to be told, by Mr. Jones, in explicit detail, how to dress in Compton style?

This is the Facebook page where the invite was posted – the photo is Jiggaboo Jones.

Read the invitation as it appeared on Facebook here.

Reid Apologizes For ‘Negro dialect’ Comment; Reid apologized Saturday for remarks he made about then-candidate Barack Obama.

Washington (CNN) – Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid apologized Saturday following reports he had privately described then-candidate Barack Obama during the presidential campaign as a black candidate who could be successful thanks in part to his “light-skinned” appearance and speaking patterns “with no Negro dialect, unless he wanted to have one.”

Journalists Mark Halperin and John Heilemann reported the remarks in their new book “Game Change,” which was purchased by CNN Saturday at a Washington-area bookstore. The book is slated for official release next Tuesday.

“He (Reid) was wowed by Obama’s oratorical gifts and believed that the country was ready to embrace a black presidential candidate, especially one such as Obama – a ‘light-skinned’ African American ‘with no Negro dialect, unless he wanted to have one,’ as he said privately. Reid was convinced, in fact, that Obama’s race would help him more than hurt him in a bid for the Democratic nomination,” they write.

“I deeply regret using such a poor choice of words,” Reid said in a statement to CNN.

Holy Crappydoo. Are you kidding me?? One thing with which I can agree, this was certainly a “poor choice of words.” That is putting it mildly. You know there are more words to come to explain this away:

(Update 4:00 pm: Reid spokesman Jim Manley tells CNN that the senator also called President Obama Saturday afternoon to apologize for his remark. In a statement released by the White House, the president accepted Reid’s apology: “Harry Reid called me today and apologized for an unfortunate comment reported today. I accepted Harry’s apology without question because I’ve known him for years, I’ve seen the passionate leadership he’s shown on issues of social justice and I know what’s in his heart. As far as I am concerned, the book is closed.”)

In his Saturday statement, Reid said he apologized “for offending any and all Americans, especially African Americans for my improper comments.

“I was a proud and enthusiastic supporter of Barack Obama during the campaign and have worked as hard as I can to advance President Obama’s legislative agenda.”

Reid also pointed to his efforts to integrate the Las Vegas strip and the gaming industry, among other legislation favored by African-American voters: “I have worked hard to advance issues important to the African American community.”

The Nevada Democrat – who waited to formally endorsed Obama until after the conclusion of the tough presidential primary battle in 2008 – is facing an uphill re-election fight this year in his home state. (CNN Political Producer Rebecca Sinderbrand contributed to this report.)

By all means, check out the Comments at this piece, too. The people there are playing a game of Twister to try and claim why these comments were not the LEAST bit racist, and only Republicans would see it that way. Riigggghhhttt. And speaking of:

Update: Republicans called on Democratic lawmakers and candidates Saturday to condemn Reid’s original remarks. “For those who hope to one day live in a color-blind nation it appears Harry Reid is more than a few steps behind them,” National Republican Senatorial Committee communication director Brian Walsh said in a statement.

“Unfortunately, this is just the latest in a long history of embarrassing and controversial remarks by the senior Senator from Nevada. He always shares exactly what’s on his mind with little regard to perception or consequences, and it’s one of the reasons he is the most vulnerable incumbent Senator in either party facing re-election.

“Nevada deserves better from its leaders and this November, voters in the Silver State will have an opportunity to elect a new Senator who will put their views and values first and foremost. In the meantime, we hope Reid’s fellow Democrats in the Senate and on the campaign trail will stand up and rightly condemn these racially insensitive remarks by their elected leader.”

As indicated above, Harry Reid is already facing a hard row to hoe to win back his position. His poll numbers were already tanking in Nevada BEFORE this little Newsflash came out. Sure will be interesting to see how this plays out for him in the next few months…

I might add, how lovely of Obama to be so magnanimous and excuse these comments from Reid, asserting that what is in Reid’s heart was not reflected in Reid’s words. Uh, yeah. Sure. It’s a shame that assertion was not extended to those of us who never not even spoke words like this, but never had them in our hearts, either, yet when did not support Obama, were being painted with that broad brushstroke of racism.

Or that this dismissal of such a charge was not extended to the Clintons, who also never said anything remotely like Reid’s comments, but who were labeled as racists by Obama for simply stating facts. That’s some crystal ball Obama has to be able to tell the difference between what is in one’s heart and what actually comes out of one’s mouth.

As for Reid, he does not need a crystal ball to see into his future. His constituents are going to let him know soon enough what his future holds. These kinds of statements from him might just make the message that much clearer.

So, what do you think? Racist comments, or much ado about nothing?

UPDATE: Now it is coming out that Bill Clinton allegedly said that “a few years ago, he would be getting us coffee” speaking about Obama to Ted Kennedy when trying to get Kennedy’s support. Now, IF Bill Clinton said this, I take that to mean Obama would have been a staffer given his lack of experience, not anything more nefarious than that. In light of Reid’s comments, however, I have no doubt that is how people are construing it.

One person made a negative comment about Bill Clinton at the above referenced article, to which someone else made this very good reply:

Bulls***! Clinton has a long history of being pro civil rights. This is another smear the Clintons hit job by the Obama or Kennedy sychophants. Everyone knows Kennedy had a meltdown after Hillary credited Johnson rather than JFK (and rightly so) in the passing of the Civil Rights Act when discussing MLK jr. The following day Ted and Caroline endorsed Obama. People need to do their history on both the Clintons and the Kennedys. The Clintons have always been on the side of AA’s in the struggle for equal rights. Where were the Kennedys? Before Bobby convinced JFK to support civil rights in his campaign platform JFK did’nt give a rat’s *** about black people. How conveniently people forget or whitewash JFK voting AGAINST civil rights in 1957 when he was the Senator for Massachussetts …a mere 3 years before running for POTUS! Or even Bobby ordering the FBI to wiretap MLK. Or Papa Joe Kennedy’s pro Nazi sympathies?! The Kennedys are the biggest hypocrites ever especially that boozer Ted who could’nt tolerate the idea that there might be two Clintons making it to the White House and only one Kennedy. Oh no, That family has long believed that the Democratic Party was actually their personal fiefdom and damn if the Clintons were going to be the new royalty! This is a whopper of a LIE and even the most rabid Clinton hater can smell the stench of this caca! Posted By: True Democrat

Someone else commented that Kennedy couldn’t stand the thought of a woman president, which would not surprise me at ALL. That seems far more likely to me.

In any event, I wanted to include this since I had made mention of the charges of racism against the Clintons above.

But then, my fellow NQ writer/friend, LisaB, alerted me to a story I missed in my own home town paper while I was out of town, which she found at Michell Malkin’s site. Now, you may recall that I have no love lost for this man who repeatedly stabbed the Clintons in the back before our primary last year, painting them as racists for stating actual facts (like that it takes a president to sign a bill into law – one would THINK a US Representative would be aware of that, but apparently, Rep. Clyburn does not know that). So, I was not at all surprised that he claimed in a recent Post and Courier article that Michelle Obama won’t come to SC because we’re all a bunch of racists and too hostile. Oh, how I wish I was making this up:

U.S. House Majority Whip Jim Clyburn said Friday that a conversation with White House staff left him with the sense that a hostile environment in South Carolina is keeping the first lady from visiting.

The high-ranking South Carolina Democrat said he has received more than 100 invitations for Michelle Obama. But this summer when he brought one of those requests to her staff on behalf of his alma mater, South Carolina State University, Clyburn said her security was an issue.

The conversation came after former Richland County GOP activist Rusty DePass suggested on Facebook in June that an escaped zoo gorilla was not harmful because it was probably one of Mrs. Obama’s ancestors. DePass’ comment was coupled with a remark in July from U.S. Sen. Jim DeMint, a Republican. DeMint said that beating the president’s health care plan would be a ‘Waterloo’ moment for Obama.

Congressman Joe Wilson’s ‘You lie!’ outburst during Obama’s joint address on health care reform last month didn’t help either, Clyburn said.

‘A lot of it has to do with the fact that the climate in South Carolina just is not good, and that’s a shame,’ Clyburn said at a roundtable discussion at his Columbia office.

‘I do believe it is keeping her away from this state,’ he said.

The congressman said the first lady’s family connections in South Carolina and her fond childhood memories from Georgetown County left many excited at the possibility that the Obamas would vacation on the coast here. Her security must be guaranteed before that could happen, Clyburn said.

DePass said Clyburn’s comments were off base.

‘The idea that people in South Carolina are hostile to the Obamas is poppycock,’ he said. ‘That’s utterly ridiculous.’

I concur. Just more race baiting from Rep. Clyburn. Oh, I am so proud that he speaks for me – NOT. But there’s more:

DePass apologized before the South Carolina Conference of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People for his Facebook comment, and reiterated that apology

Friday. He also said that his history with the Republican Party included reaching out to minority voters and trying to remove the Confederate battle flag from the Statehouse dome.

Wilson’s office also said Clyburn was wrong.

‘Congressman Wilson respectfully disagrees with Congressman Clyburn’s assumption,’ Wilson spokesman Ryan Murphy said in a statement. ‘He believes the people of South Carolina would welcome the president and the first lady should they decide to visit our great state.’

Neither the first lady’s press office nor the Secret Service provided comment for this story. DeMint’s office also did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

Pat Caddell of Hanahan, an expert on public opinion polls and a Democratic strategist, said South Carolina surely has racists among its residents, but racism isn’t the prevailing sentiment. ‘The Democratic Party will blow itself up if it keeps assigning things as racist,’ Caddell said. (Reach Yvonne Wenger at 803-926-7855 or ywenger@postandcourier.com.)

Sigh. I have to tell you, I am pretty damn sick and tired of being called a racist because I live in South Carolina for starters, but for any, ANY, questioning of President Obama’s policies (or lack thereof). For Rep. Clyburn to claim that the First Lady isn’t coming here, even though she has FAMILY here, because it’s “hostile” just makes me, well, “hostile!”

I had to read some of the comments at the end of the article to see what some of my fellow Palmetto State residents had to say. Three in particular caught my attention. The first is obviously in response to another comment:

treasured wrote:

regulardude…Please give us a break!

Was Obama’s negative remarks about the US to other countries patriotic?You get respect when respect is earned.

Just because he is the President does not mean that we have to agree with him and like you, we can voice our opinions and our concerns.

There have been many concerns about this President and they have not just been from SC.You are just reading articles from a SC paper.What is the difference in your remarks accusing us of not respecting the President and you obviously not respecting your own state that you insist on living in?Must be something you like about it.

I have grown children and I have a young child. As it stands right now, they and their children will have to pay back for many years all the money that Obama has dished out in his so called stimulus plans.

Now, if you want to sing his praises, well and good, but don’t call the rest of us unpatriotic if we don’t agree with what he is doing.That is our right as Americans.

And this one:

caberchucker wrote:
Yeah, that makes sense that she’s “scared” of the hostility in SC. Oh wait, didn’t the Obamas and Oprah have to move their rally to USC’s stadium while campaigning, so they could accomidate all the people? Nevermind, I guess that never actually happened.

Uh yeah, evidently not.

And finally, this one, which I think really hits at the core of this charge by Rep. Clyburn:

wonderdog wrote:
Clyburn is embarrassed because he got snubbed by the Obamas, so he made up this nonsense to make it appear that it’s somebody’s fault. If he can get enough people to buy into that BS, maybe he can convince himself, too.

Now that the Obamas have no more use to them after he played his role as patsy during the campaign, why should they deign to do anything that might help him in some way? But yes, so much easier – for Rep. Clyburn, that is – to blame it on the very people who sent him to D.C. Nice, really nice. Can’t wait to see what he calls us next!

Apologies all for my prolonged absence – getting married, changing jobs, moving apartments and turning 30 years old are to blame (and, just in case you were wondering, they were awesome, good, not so good and great, respectively).

And while I’m at it, forgive me also for flogging a dead horse with the above.

But, hey, if it’s acceptable for the Obama administration and all those affiliated with it to whine incessantly about racism (of the overt, covert, latent, imaginary and genetically-ingrained varieties), then who am I to stop the party?

So please follow the fool-proof chart and discover, much to your own amazement, the racism that you didn’t even realize resided within you.

You dirty, little racist-oppressor-colonialist, you.

But it still looks a little complex to me. Isn’t there a simpler way of displaying this information? What was it again?

Oh, yeah: white = racist.

Anyone disagree (white racists aside)?

PS – Click here to enlargify the image. Hmm, is that even a word? Magnify… enlargify… magnify… nah, enlargify’s way better.

Funk & Wagnall’s Dictionary Definition of racism: A belief in or advocacy of the superiority or inferiority of a particular group on the basis of supposed racial differences.

Not so much anymore…

Real racism exists. And it’s bad news. It devalues who we are as thinking beings. It exposes innocents to hate and oppression. It disrespects, as Martin Luther King observed, the option to assess people as individuals and on the basis of their character.

Not too long ago, to call someone a “RACIST” was a condemnation reserved for those who displayed their ignorance and intolerance against an entire people.

But the term has been watered down so thin that it has almost lost its meaning.

Currently you can be called (and may have been already) a racist IF:

You were a Hillary Clinton supporter. (That’s when most of us got first stung with the label.)

And most notably, you disagree with anything President Obama proposes or endorses.

Obama’s supporters and campaign started expanding the use of the R word by suggesting that criticisms of him on the basis of his Chicago associates, his razor-thin resume, and the blanks in his record were mere smoke screens to hide seething racism. That many of us could have genuine concerns about an individual candidate that transcended race was summarily dismissed.

Damage has been done. But the victims are no longer those who endured that dreaded label slung wide to politically intimidate us. The attempted manipulation was soon seen for what it was. And with that discernment, the term “racist” became neutralized.

But there are victims. Those who endure true racism are now deprived of a once powerful term to describe what it is. And words matter. If there is no word to clearly describe something, it essentially doesn’t exist.

But here’s the problem for me. I had really liked President Carter. I had a lot of respect for him, in fact. I was young and naive when he was in office, but certainly the work he had done AFTER leaving the White House was commendable. For instance, the work he and his entire family did for Habitat for Humanity has helped numerous people, including in my home town. I have experienced firsthand seeing the joy and pride the new homeowner as she looked at her house, and talked about what it meant to her. And the group of university students with whom I was working, all female, becoming more empowered, more sure of themselves, because they were helping to build someone a HOUSE, and the sense of pride and accomplishment that gave them.

The work Carter has done in Africa, helping to eradicate a horrible disease of worms that infiltrate too many areas there, doing horrible damage to the people they infest. Or his work in monitoring elections. Heck, even his recent decision to leave his church of many years because they will not ordain women.

My partner and I have visited the Carter Presidential Library in Atlanta, GA, a beautiful place in a calming and serene environment. I walked through that buildung filled with a sense of awe, seeing what he gave up, and subsequently his wife, when he left his commission as a Naval officer behind to go back to Georgia and help out the family. As I saw photographs marking historic moments, actual papers from events I had read about, or seen on tv. I was in awe as I saw his actual Nobel Peace Prize. And with pride, we have supported the Carter Peace Center for years now with monthly contributions…

(Photo by rachydachy)

But, things have been changed now. It began with some of his statements about Israel. Then President Carter inserted himself into the Primary Campaign, making some unkind remarks about my hero, “>Hillary Clinton. And now this. Being called a racist because I oppose the way by which Obama became President, but even more, because I oppose his policies. When someone calls me a racist, I gotta say (as we do down here in the South, “Them’s fightin’ words.” And so, I have written this letter to send to the Carter Center when my next payment is due:

Dear Carter Center,

Sincerely,
The Rev. Amy

What a sad day, for me personally, but also for this nation, when a former president makes such a grievous, and unfounded, charge against over half of the population. Because we have the audacity to judge the president by his CHARACTER, rather than the color of his skin, as Martin Luther King, Jr., charged us to do, we are called a heinous name. How sad, and how infuriating.

President Carter, as respectfully as I can muster after being called a racist, I would suggest it is time for you to go into retirement, and leave off sharing your political opinions. You are not doing yourself or your legacy any good, to be sure. Even more, you are not doing this nation any good. Rather, you are fanning flames that divide us, not unite us, all to provide cover for a man who, had he been properly vetted in the first place, and had the DNC followed its own rules, would never have gotten this far. Speaking for me only, I am judging Obama on the merits, not the color of his skin. I suggest you do likewise.

Or this: Is Sarah Palin a poster girl for racism?

Or this: Town Meeting Protestors ‘Taking a Page Right Out of a Nazi Playbook?

Or this:

Maybe this was over the line? Sarah Palin getting divorced.

Or any one of the images I added above? Why the fuss over one anonymous poster?

Racist? I don’t think so…

By now you’ve heard about the arrest of Henry Gates. But did you hear that Obama, while admitting he didn’t know the facts, said the Police acted “stupidly”. How the hell does he know? He doesn’t even know the facts! Heck, he doesn’t even have the story right. Check out all the stories on memorandum.

Wow, another race card. And Obama said, “I think it’s fair to say any of us would be pretty angry.” Why would ANYONE be angry if someone saw two men trying to bust down a door and called the police? I would be glad neighbors were looking out for my home. WHY why why would that make anyone angry? The police come and you show your ID. End of story.

Sgt. James Crowley was doing his job, responding to a 911 call of a possible B&E and was attacked, called a racist, and now is being told he acted “stupidly” by the President of the United States. By a President who doesn’t even have his facts straight. Witnesses support Crowley.

View this video here.

A woman who was walking past, on her way to work – who lives five miles away - saw the two men breaking in to a home. She called 911 and reported two black men with backpacks trying to force entry into a home. People kept asking why this neighbor didn’t recognize Gates, as if the fault is hers that she didn’t recognize him.

One comment I read, “How much will anyone bet that the so-called “neighbour” is a white person who doesn’t much like this Black guy living in his/her neighbourhood.” Wow, another race card. A woman, 40-year-old Lucia Whalen of Malden, was passing a house on her way to work, saw two men trying to break down the front door and called 911. Now she is racist? She wasn’t a neighbor. She worked nearby and she did see two black men trying to force open a door.

Sgt. James Crowley arrived on the scene and saw Gates inside the front door. The witness was on the sidewalk and was waving and pointing at the home telling the officer the men were in the home.

Crowley approached the front door and asked Gates to step outside. According to the police report, and Gates himself, Gates refused and demanded to know who he was (a fully dressed police officer?) Crowley says he was responding to a call about a possible B&E and Gates responds, “Why, because I’m a black man in America?”

Gates continued to berate the officer, and refused to step outside, nor would he provide ID. He called the officer racist. He threw out “do you know who I am” and “you haven’t heard the last of me”. Gates also picked up the phone, called someone, and demanded to speak to “The Chief” then asked what the Chief’s name is.

Read the entire police report here, and the second report by Carlos Figueroa. (The Boston Globe has scrubbed the police report from their site)

This is the statement issued through Gates’ lawyer.

Gates refused to exit the home, he did not show his ID until he had made a phone call, yelled repeatedly at the officer, and accused him of racism. There were several witnesses, and his story was corroborated in a second police report.

The police officer knew that there were two men, per the 911 call. Crowley was following protocol by asking Gates to step outside. He also asked Gates if there was anyone in the house and Gates told him it was none of his business.

Gates opened up the door at some point, and Crowley entered the house, and Gates then walked into his kitchen where he retrieved his Harvard ID. He continued to insult Crowley and call him a racist.

Gates has now admitted to saying, “Are you not giving me your name and badge number because I’m a black man in America?”

It seems to me he is now creating stories to explain the phrases he was heard yelling, as quoted in the police report. I have listened to witnesses, see photos, and read numerous articles, including his statements, and the police depts.

Can people honestly believe that when the officer asked for Gates to step outside, and for his ID, had Gates obliged and explained the situation he would have been arrested? Seriously? There is no chance that Gates was pissed off at his door being jammed, pissed that the cops showed up, and acted irrational, which led to the arrest?

It’s just automatically racism on the part of the officer? Sounds to me like it is elitism *you don’t know who you’re dealing with!* From everything I have read Gates had major attitude, and pulled the elitism and racism cards. The police have a job to do, and I can’t imagine it does anyone any good to scream at them while trying to do it.

There has been an increase in daytime robberies in Gate’s neighborhood, he should have been thankful they were protecting his home. Not indignant because he was asked for ID.

A 55-year-old neighbor said he witnessed the entire episode – from the squeal of police brakes in the initial response to Gates’ uproar. “The police did their job. He should be thanking them, but they shouldn’t have arrested the guy,” the neighbor added.

Gates brought race into the situation by accusing Crowley of being racist, and by blaming the situation on being a black man in America. Sgt. Crowley was responding to a 911 call. Race had nothing to do with his showing up on Gates’ porch.

Isn’t Gates being the racist by assuming because Crowley is white he is racist?

Gates was not arrested for being in his home. He was arrested for disorderly conduct and refusing to comply with an officer. He wasn’t arrested because he is black, but he sure acted like an ass because the officer was white, and that’s what got him thrown in the slammer.

Bill Carter, the man who snapped a photograph of Gates being led away in handcuffs, said police officers were calm and that Gates was “slightly out of control” and “agitated” when he was arrested.

“The officers around kind of calmed him down,” Carter said. “I heard him yelling — Mr. Gates yelling. I didn’t hear anything that he was saying so I couldn’t say that he was belligerent.”

There was an article on Daily Beast, and the author wrote:

“…tells you that even if a black man is a brilliant, famous, rich, classy, Harvard professor who’s 58 years old, walking with a cane because of hip-replacement surgery, and ensconced in his own Cambridge home during the day, he can still be arrested. That’s because Malcolm X’s 40-year-old quote is still true: “What do you call a black man with a Ph.D.? A nigger.”

Wow, really…? It should tell you that anyone who disobeys police orders/attacks police/breaks the law can be arrested. It shouldn’t matter how rich, affluent or classy someone is. I never argue with police orders, ever.

The Police Dept. dropped the charges, but stands behind the officer, saying he obeyed proper procedure. A statement was released, “All parties agree that this is a just resolution to an unfortunate set of circumstances.”

That wasn’t good enough for Gates, though. He is now demanding an apology and denying he yelled at the officer. Despite what the witnesses say…

Gates said that when he walked outside it was like a cop convention there were so many police outside. Crowley didn’t call for backup until Gates was refusing to comply with his orders, and refusing to show his ID. The way Gates tells it, they were already there. Gee…lawsuit?

Gates said he was arrested because a white cop couldn’t tolerate having an intellectual black man stand up to him.

Gates made it about race and refused to comply with the request of a police officer. Why was Gates “standing up to him”, as he stated he was?

Why was he so pissed a policeman was asking for ID because of a call about a potential break in? Why was he so pissed that the policeman was responding to a potential B&E call that he would demand his name and ID? What had Crowley done that made Gates demand that information?

He couldn’t reply “Hello officer, yes I am the owner, I have been out of town, and my door was stuck. Here is my ID, and Harvard ID. Thank you for responding so quickly and keeping an eye on our neighborhood.”

(BTW, the door was stuck because Gates thinks that someone tried to break in while he was in China.)

“Because of the capricious whim of one disturbed person . . . I am now a black man with a prison record,” Gates said. “You can look at my mug shot on the Internet.”

Because of the actions of Gates, Crowley, “…a highly respected veteran supervisor with a distinguished record in the Cambridge Police Department,’’ is having to defend himself against charges of racism by Gates, and charges of stupidity by Obama.

“His actions at the scene of this matter were consistent with his training, with the informed policies and practices of the Department, and with applicable legal standards.’’ said the Cambridge Police Superior Officers Association.

Michael Graham from Boston Herald wrote:

Colorblind test failed … by Gates with his racial profiling of the white cop.

The Gates who greeted Crowley was a racist. And I know, because the professor said so himself.

By his own admission, Gates didn’t just blame the incident on the fact that he is “a black man.” He also added the accusatory question, “Are you doing this because you’re a white police officer?”

According to an eyewitness quoted in the Herald yesterday, when police asked him for ID, Gates started yelling, “I’m a Harvard professor . . . You believe white women over black men.”

From the Boston Herald, we learn that Crowley comes from a family of police officers:

Verina Crowley said James is the third of her four sons, all in law enforcement. Two brothers, Jack and Joseph, also work for the Cambridge police. The fourth, Daniel, is a Middlesex County deputy sheriff.

Verina Crowley said her sons were raised mostly in the Fresh Pond neighborhood where she still lives, attended racially diverse Cambridge public schools, and graduated from Cambridge Rindge and Latin High School, where she worked for 26 years.

“He is not a racist,’’ she said in the hallway of her home. And Gates “is not the first black person he ever met in his life.’’

“…it was not the first time he had a memorable encounter in the line of duty with a prominent black man. Nearly 16 years ago, as a Brandeis University police officer, Crowley desperately tried to save the life of Reggie Lewis after the Boston Celtics star collapsed while practicing in the school gym.

“It bothers him terribly that he couldn’t save him,’’ Crowley’s 74-year-old mother, Verina Crowley, said yesterday, speaking of her son and the famous basketball player.

This isn’t the first time Crowley has been accused of racism though:

Yesterday, as President Obama condemned the Cambridge Police Department during a prime-time White House news conference and Crowley steadfastly refused to issue the apology that Gates has sought, a fuller picture began to emerge of the 42-year-old sergeant who arrested the Harvard scholar last week on a charge of disorderly conduct on the porch of Gates’s Cambridge house.

Crowley was a certified emergency medical technician when he performed cardiopulmonary resuscitation on Lewis, to no avail, after the player’s heart stopped on July 27, 1993. In a Globe interview later that day, Crowley said he rushed to the university’s Shapiro Gymnasium, confirmed that Lewis had no pulse, and frantically tried to revive him.

“I just kept on going,’’ he said. “I just kept thinking, ‘Don’t let him die – just don’t die.’ ’’

The Cambridge cop prominent Harvard University professor Henry Louis Gates Jr. claims is a racist gave a dying Reggie Lewis mouth-to-mouth resuscitation in a desperate bid to save the Celtics superstar’s life 16 years ago Monday.

“I wasn’t working on Reggie Lewis the basketball star. I wasn’t working on a black man. I was working on another human being,” Sgt. James Crowley, in an exclusive interview with the Herald, said of the forward’s fatal heart attack July 27, 1993, at age 27 during an off-season practice at Brandeis University, where Crowley was a campus police officer.

It’s a date Crowley still can recite by rote – and he still recalls the pain he suffered when people back then questioned whether he had done enough to save the black athlete.

“Some people were saying ‘There’s the guy who killed Reggie Lewis’ afterward. I was broken-hearted. I cried for many nights,” he said.

Now, 16 years later, he is accused of racism by Gates, one of the foremost scholars on race in America.

And accused of stupidity by the President of the United States. Just for trying to do his job.

Perhaps Gates shouldn’t have been arrested for his rude behavior and his abusive tone and disorderly conduct – at this point I don’t know how disorderly he was. But Crowley shouldn’t have been abused and called a racist for doing his job. Gates created the situation, he elevated the situation, and he was in the wrong. People are arrested all the time for disobeying police orders. You just don’t do it. I don’t care who you are.

Gates is obviously a very learned man, very intelligent, and a very genteel man. He has lived almost 60 years, is very, very successful, and has never had any problems with the law before. He has won numerous awards, and recognitions, and lives in a very nice community in Harvard. But that does not give him the right to accuse someone of being racist, just for doing their job. Especially when he admits to throwing around the race card. That also doesn’t mean they aren’t capable of acting irrational. (Remember Grannie getting tasered in the above video?)

I think Gates needs to man up and admit he was out of line, and I think both he and Obama owe Sgt. James Crowley an apology. I can’t believe Obama would take a dirty shot at our Police Officers like that, especially not knowing the facts. Officers that put their lives on the line every day to protect and serve.

Crowley replied on how he felt about Obama’s comments:

A white police sergeant who arrested renowned black scholar Henry Louis Gates Jr. says he’s disappointed President Barack Obama said police acted “stupidly” without knowing all the facts.

In an interview on WEEI on Thursday morning, Crowley said it was “disappointing that he waded into what should be a local issue.”

And btw, when Obama said that if he were trying to break into the White house he’d “be shot” mean that he thinks the Secret Service and DC police are racist? I kind of think anyone trying to break into “his house” would be arrested or shot.

Given last November’s election result, qualifications obviously have little relevance any more.

And why not? What do qualifications, y’know, those certificates of education, achievement and intelligence, actually tell us about someone that we cannot infer from that person’s smile, charisma and, dare I say it, skin color?

Quite a bit, now you mention it.

How can anyone deny that meritocratic systems work best? If it just so happens that every single lawyer at a given firm is white (or black or anything else), middle-aged and male, but are also all better qualified than anyone else, then I’ve no problem with it.

Ditto politics, business, teaching and everything else. No other consideration, social engineering included, should trump the ability to do the job.

In fact, why don’t we try an experiment with the next set of elections? What would be the result if voters were not given names, photographs or any other personal information about candidates, only their concrete record of achievements?

No doubt that, too, would somehow be construed as racist.

So that this post isn’t entirely theoretical, the US Supreme Court last week heard arguments in the case of Ricci v DeStefano, brought by a group of 20 firefighters (19 white and one Hispanic) against the city of New Haven, CT.

118 firefighters took exams in 2003 for promotion to the ranks of lieutenant and captain.

When the results for the 15 vacancies came in, 14 of the top-scoring applicants were white and one was Hispanic. No African-Americans (out of 27 who sat the tests) scored highly enough.

Uh-oh. Big problem.

The solution?

Clearly the most reasonable response, therefore, was to deny promotions to everyone. Which the city of New Haven promptly did.

But here’s the thing: when the most qualified people are denied positions that they’ve earned, we all suffer.

I’m weeping inside that this even needs to be stated.

Here is how the AAPOR defines the Bradley effect on page 53 of the report:

the tendency for respondents to report a preference for a black candidate (Obama) but vote instead for a white opponent.

And here is what their extensive and rigorous report found (pages 53-54):

Several compelling pieces of evidence suggest that the New Hampshire estimation errors were probably not caused by the “Bradley effect” – or the tendency for respondents to report a preference for a black candidate (Obama) but vote instead for a white opponent. A meta-analysis by Hopkins (2008) indicates that while the Bradley effect did undermine some state-level polls in previous decades, there is no evidence for such an effect in recent years. In the 2008 general election, the very accurate final poll estimates of Barack Obama’s fairly decisive victory over John McCain dispelled suspicion that the Bradley effect was at play during the final weeks of the fall contest. There is also a conspicuous lack of evidence for a Bradley effect in the primary contests outside of New Hampshire. Of the 81 polls conducted during the final 30 days of the Iowa, South Carolina, California, and Wisconsin contests, the vast majority (86%) over-estimated Clinton’s relative vote share, while just 14% over-estimated Obama’s relative vote share. This finding is based on the signed direction of A for each survey.26 Furthermore, as reported in Table 3, poll estimates of Obama’s vote share in New Hampshire were quite accurate – it was only Clinton’s share that was consistently underestimated.

Here is Table 3 (page 14):

In poll after poll Hillary Cinton’s support was undersampled while Obama’s support was correctly sampled. It was not that her supporters lied to pollsters; they were simply not contacted.

Pollster.com offers this summary of the report:

• Given the compressed caucus and primary calendar, polls conducted before the New Hampshire primary may have ended too early to capture late shifts in the electorate’s preferences there.
• Most commercial polling firms conducted interviews on the first or second call, but respondents who required more effort to contact were more likely to support Senator Clinton. Instead of continuing to call their initial samples to reach these hard‐to‐contact people, pollsters typically added new households to the sample, skewing the results toward the opinions of those who were easy to reach on the phone, and who more typically supported Senator Obama.
• Non‐response patterns, identified by comparing characteristics of the pre‐election samples with the exit poll samples, suggest that some groups who supported Senator Clinton–such as union members and those with less education–were under‐ represented in pre‐election polls, possibly because they were more difficult to reach.
• Variations in likely voter models could explain some of the estimation problems in individual polls. Application of the Gallup likely larger error than was present in the unadjusted data. The influx of first-time voters may have had adverse effects on likely voter models.

Hillary’s base of women, blue collar workers, union members, single mothers and the elderly were simply too difficult to contact, while young Obama supporters were always available by telephone. It was not racism or the Bradley Effect that enabled Hillary to win New Hampshire; it was that the pollsters never spoke to her base.

But the media and the Obama campaign had to accuse New Hampshire Democratic Primary voters of racism in order to minimize Hillary’s victory and racialize the race before the South Carolina primary, where the majority of Democratic voters are African-American.

Here is Mickey Kaus of Slate on January 9, 2008:

1. Bradley Effect: It seemed like a nice wonky little point when Polipundit speculated on the Reverse Bradley Effect–the idea that Iowa’s public caucuses led Dem voters to demonstrate their lack of prejudice by caucusing for Obama. Now this is the CW of the hour. Polipundit wrote:

I suspect that Obama may have scored better than he would have in a secret-ballot election, and benefited from a Reverse Bradley Effect.

New Hampshire, of course, is a secret ballot election. Voters might have told pollsters one thing but done another in private.** New Hampshirites I ran into Tuesday night mentioned that the state was very late ratifying the MLK Holiday.

Here is Andrew Kohut in the New York Times on January 10, 2008:

To my mind all these factors deserve further study. But another possible explanation cannot be ignored — the longstanding pattern of pre-election polls overstating support for black candidates among white voters, particularly white voters who are poor.…

Poorer, less well-educated white people refuse surveys more often than affluent, better-educated whites. Polls generally adjust their samples for this tendency. But here’s the problem: these whites who do not respond to surveys tend to have more unfavorable views of blacks than respondents who do the interviews….

In New Hampshire, the ballots are still warm, so it’s hard to pinpoint the exact cause for the primary poll flop. But given the dearth of obvious explanations, serious consideration has to be given to the difficulties that race and class present to survey methodology.

Here is David Kuo of the Huffington Post as votes were counted during the New Hampshire Primary:

Tonight, despite all the talk of how little race matters in this campaign, it is clear that race is still a big deal in bi-racial campaigns. And it has showed up for the first time, in a measurable way, in the 2008 presidential race.

It means that every poll — from exit polls to tracking polls — are absolutely suspect from here on out.

Here are excerpts from MSNBC on the night of the New Hampshire Primary:

ROBINSON: Well, I‘ll tell you what some people will suspect. Here you have polls, you know, the day before the primary showing Obama way ahead. And he finishes, you know, 15 points lower than that. A lot of people will suspect a “Bradley effect.”

You know, Tom Bradley…

SCARBOROUGH: Oh, Tom Bradley. You‘re…

(CROSSTALK)

ROBINSON: Not the Bill Bradley effect. We were talking about Bill Bradley‘s endorsement being, you know, not necessarily the greatest thing. I‘m talking about Tom Bradley, the mayor—African-American mayor of Los Angeles years ago, ran for governor of California. Polls showed him on election eve that he was going to cruise to victory and he lost. And Doug Wilder of—the first…

SCARBOROUGH: Wait, wait, wait, but are you really saying right now that the people of New Hampshire may have—I won‘t say, be racist, but are you saying that they did not want to go in that booth and vote for a black man? …

BRIAN WILLIAMS, NBC ANCHOR: I was just going to say, I‘ve been listening to the panel. Number one, the “Bradley effect,” whether people are going to decide it was in effect in this case is very real and talked about among people in the political business. Let‘s not forget the Gantt race in North Carolina few years ago.…

CHUCK TODD, NBC NEWS POLITICAL DIRECTOR: Well, look, you can only go back—you know, and I go back in recent history and you try to find races where you had these gigantic poll shifts, where the final pre-election polls differed so dramatically from the actual result.

And the one thing they all have in common is something that Eugene Robinson brought up earlier, and that is race.

It was Tom Bradley in California governor‘s race in 1982. The polls had him ahead—ahead by a fairly healthy margin over George Deukmejian. He ended up losing.

And Virginia governor, 1989, Doug Wilder had a double digit lead going into the final—in the final weekend. He won by a very narrow 1 point margin.

Harvey Gant, the 1990 Senate race with Jesse Helms—one of the most divisive races, frankly, that this country had on race. That was, again, pre-election polls had Gant ahead, Helms wins.

So you can‘t help but look at that—and particularly you‘ve got to wonder what this sends—the message that this could send to African-American Democrats, who may look at this and say, well, of course, that‘s what happened. You know, a lot of times when I‘ve noticed this and when you talk to African-American Democrats, they sat here and they‘ll see this race stuff a lot quicker than us in white America. And I think that this is—it‘s at least, you‘ve got to explore it. You‘ve got to look at it. History has taught us this—recent history—when it‘s come to dealing with African-American candidates.

Here is Carol Costello, Andrew Kohut and Professor Charles Ogletree on CNN’s Situation Room on January 11, 2008:

I’m Wolf Blitzer.

You’re in THE SITUATION ROOM.

Is the U.S. ready for an African-American president?

Senator Barack Obama’s strong showing so far in this campaign has many saying absolutely, yes. Others, though, say it’s too soon to tell.

Carol Costello has been looking into this story for us — you’ve been talking to a lot of people supposedly knowledgeable on this very sensitive subject.

What are they telling you?

COSTELLO: Well, it is a sensitive subject, isn’t it?

You know, most I talked with today say it is too soon to tell.

Obama seems to have transcended race, but can he in the long run?

Already, critics say Obama’s opponents are trying to create this subtle narrative of racial division. They deny it, but it illustrates how hard it is in this country to take race out of the equation.

(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)

COSTELLO (voice-over): The Iowa caucus created all kinds of excitement surrounding Barack Obama. His win in a predominantly white state and a strong showing in another seemingly proves it — Obama can transcend race. It’s something Obama has always believed could happen.

SEN. BARACK OBAMA (D), PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: If I have your support, if I have your energy and involvement and commitment and ideas, then I am here to tell you yes, we can in ‘08.

COSTELLO: Maybe. But there are those who feel while Iowa and New Hampshire prove Obama can certainly get white votes, it doesn’t mean he can continue the trend — that Obama’s second place finish in New Hampshire, despite polls that had him coming in first, illustrates the undercurrent about race that exists in this country.

Andrew Kohut, in charge of Pew Research, has a theory. He says many of those inclined to vote for Hillary Clinton in New Hampshire were poor, uneducated whites who don’t participate in polls and who often don’t vote for blacks.

ANDREW KOHUT, PRES., PEW RESEARCH CTR.: At least race should be considered because we know that the kinds of people drawn to Mrs. Clinton are always the kinds of people who turn down surveys at pretty high rates. We don’t know much about whether the people who we don’t get are like the people that we do get.

COSTELLO: Polls about race are notoriously difficult to analyze. Take this ABC/Washington Post poll conducted before the Iowa caucus. A whopping 88 percent of Americans said race would not matter in choosing a president. But pollsters say you have to take this result with a grain of salt. Few people are willing to tell a pollster they’re racist. It reflects the Bradley effect, after Tom Bradley, a black man who ran for governor in California in 1982. Most polls showed him leading but he lost to a white male candidate.

PROF. CHARLES OGLETREE, HARVARD LAW SCHOOL: Ask Tom Bradley when he ran for governor in California. Black man, thought he could win, he didn’t. Ask Harvey Gant in North Carolina. Ask Harold Ford, Jr.

COSTELLO: Look at the stats. There is one black governor in the United States. They are nine women governors. They are 16 senators who are women. And one black man, Barack Obama.

Still, Barack Obama got plenty of votes in New Hampshire and in Iowa, which are both 95 percent white.

You could say that trumps the poll, but there are many more people yet to vote and racial under currents that are so hard to predict.

(END VIDEOTAPE)

And here is the Obama campaign as discussed in an article by Ryan Lizza in the January 21, 2008, edition of the New Yorker:

Did Obama experience a similar fate in New Hampshire? The evidence is murky, but his campaign believes the question is important enough to warrant study. When I asked a senior Obama adviser whether the Bradley effect was a possible explanation for the gap between the final poll numbers, which showed Obama leading by an average of eight points, and the ultimate outcome, he replied, “Definitely.” He added, “If so, then the question is: what’s different between Iowa and New Hampshire? It could be that the socially acceptable thing in front of your neighbor at a caucus could be different than what you do in a secret ballot. Obviously, that’s something we’re going to be trying to figure out as we go forward, primarily through polling. I know people are working on ways of asking questions about getting at people’s attitudes about race. We’re working on this.”

In other words, the Obama campaign cited the Bradley Effect in order to explain a loss, and the sycophantic media repeated the notion again and again and again. Apparently they received the memo from David Axelrod as votes were counted in New Hampshire. Too bad real analysis reveals that the Bradley Effect had no impact on the New Hampshire Primary.

Will CNN apologize? Will MSNBC apologize? Will the New York Times apologize? Will Slate apologize? And is it not a coincidence that after the Obama campaign decided race was the reason he lost the NH primary that the Clintons were accused of racism by the Obama campaign during the South Carolina primary? All of it was debunked in the report released today by the AAPOR. Will Obama and Axelrod apologize to Hillary and Bill Clinton?

I doubt anyone will apologize, for no one in the Obama administration or in the Obamamedia cares about facts. But at least all of us know that those of us who voted for Hillary during the New Hampshire primary and during the other primaries are not racist. Will they apologize to us?

A world where we co-exist in perfect harmony. Where African Americans feel proud. Where charges of racism no longer exist. Where people put down their differences, and view the world differently. Where people pledged to live better, and respect each other and be better people.

So, how’s that been working out?

“Good Morning America” reporter David Wright said, “Ever since the inauguration, America has seemed to bask in a post-racial glow. But not so fast. Yesterday, the New York Post published a cartoon likening President Obama to a violent monkey shot by police.”

Hmmm, is that true? Is the New York post cartoon destroying this post racial glow?

If you asked me, I’d say things have not been going too well all month. And it is particularly disappointing, considering it is Black History Month.

Someone even threw a race card at Black History Month, because Black History Month is in February, the shortest month.

“…take this Black History Month, which, frankly, I think a lot of people roll their eyes and say, oh, the shortest month of the year actually gets to be the month devoted to black people… “ ~Soledad O’Brien

“As for ‘cutting through bull,’ Brown should have corrected O’Brien when she repeated the old radical line that somehow Black History Month is the shortest month on the calendar due to some racial slight, which completely mangles the facts. It began as “Negro History Week” and was founded by African-American historian Carter Woodson in mid-February to honor Abraham Lincoln and Frederick Douglass, whose birthdays are on the 12th and the 14th respectively.”

Apparently there are plenty of race cards still in the deck. The latest one dealt by Clyburn, implying those who oppose the stimulus package are racist.

“Clyburn also had some strong comments for Gov. Mark Sanford on why he thinks he opposed the stimulus.

The governor of Louisiana expressed opposition. Has the highest African-American population in the country. Governor of Mississippi expressed opposition. The governor of Texas, and the governor of South Carolina. These four governor’s represent states that are in the black belt. I was insulted by that,” Clyburn said. “All of this was a slap in the face of African-Americans. It had nothing to do with Governor Sanford.”

The first African American Attorney General, Eric Holder, appointed by the first African American President, called Americans a nation of cowards when it comes to race.

And one of Time’s Top 25 Best Blog picks, and Obama supporter, The Huffington Post, tried to stir up even more racial anger, by posting a video that was edited to make it seem like John Gibson was comparing Eric Holder to an escaped monkey. The blogosphere went ballistic, calling Fox racist, until they realized it was a fake.

Al Sharpton is calling for hundreds of people to be thrown out of work because he doesn’t understand who wrote the stimulus bill.

“The cartoon in today’s New York Post is troubling at best, given the racist attacks throughout history that have made African-Americans synonymous with monkeys. One has to question whether the cartoonist is making a less than casual inference to this form of racism when, in the cartoon, the police say after shooting a chimpanzee, “now they will have to find someone else to write the stimulus bill.” ~Sharpton

(Sharpton is the one calling Obama a monkey, not the cartoonist. The cartoonist was calling Pelosi a monkey.)

The only African American in the US Senate is being asked to resign, because it was revealed he did, in fact, try to pay to play.

“A group of black ministers who supported U.S. Sen. Roland Burris as he fought to get his job now plan to ask for his resignation following revelations that he tried to raise money for the disgraced governor who appointed him, one of the ministers told The Associated Press on Thursday.

Many of the city’s influential black pastors supported Burris because of his scandal-free reputation — even though he was appointed by then-Gov. Rod Blagojevich three weeks after the governor was arrested for allegedly trying to sell the Senate seat.”

And one can assume these High School kids and their parents seem to have lost that hope and change fuzzy warm glowing sensation, after watching this disturbing riot that broke out at a high school basketball game.

And who can forget how the month started out with an ugly attack on pop star Rihanna, by her boyfriend Chris Brown, who was initially defended by some of his friends. I think Chris Brown lost his warm and fuzzy glow.

“Words cannot begin to express how sorry and saddened I am over what transpired.” (does that sound familiar?)

TMZ.com has a photo of Rhianna, taken by the police, after the beating. The poor thing! I think she is so adorable, and this is just awful. She better press charges.

Even Ashton Kutcher, who pledged to “be a servant to Obama, and all mankind, because together we can, together we are, and togther we will be the change.” lost the glowin’ feeling.

Here he is, railing against his “f*cking dick weed neighbor” because he hired construction workers to work on his house, who started (legally) at 7am. (even though the guy tolerated the TEN years it took for Ashton to build his house.)

So, David Wright was right and wrong. People seem to have lost that post election glow, but it wasn’t the New York Post cartoon that did it.

Well, the people in this video are still basking in that post election glow. They have decided to use the word President in replace of the *N* word. But, according to one guy, white people can’t use the word President, anymore. Ever.

(is this for real?)