Media Pushes Risky Obama

Juan Williams, a pundit biased against Obama, was just on NPR talking about how many white people are uncomfortable with Obama's color. Newsflash: a risky poll out today. So many of the stories for the past couple of weeks have focused on Obama's riskiness. He's a risky guy, that Obama guy. Risky, Risky, Risky. 

John McCain's strategy, laser targeted at old white men, same as Hillary's strategy, to make Obama the Other, is working in that the media can't stop talking about why Obama is risky -- he's skinny, he's uppity, he's arrogant, he's a celebrity, he's young. He's black. Black. Black. Black.

I know that the republicans are playing on the fears of the folks who live in the Appalachian regions and they may know they're being played. They just need a good excuse not to vote for the black man. Too skinny, they'll take it. Too much schooling. Yes, you can't have a smart man in the White House. 

But I don't think Obama is going to get their vote no matter what he does. He could give them all $1,000 and they'd turn up their noses. 

I'm not sure Obama's going to need that vote and I think their numbers are over estimated. I also think there are plenty of old white people who WILL vote for Obama (and there are old white people who aren't racist who will vote for McCain and that's respectable).

But this year is the year the youth voter will tip the election in Obama's favor. Not many in the press are talking about this because in the past, the youth talked a big game but never made it to the polls. This time is different because they are actively involved in the campaign. They are invested. 

Frankly, I'm tired of writing about the old white people who won't vote for Obama because he's black, so I think I'll stop. 

More than anything, it's getting BORING. It also deflects the light away from McCain, who is lamer than lame, even by republican standards, and getting a free ride. 

This story wraps it all up:

RCP: Some of my Chicago friends who support Sen. Barack Obama already are speaking as if his victory is a done deal. I hate to burst their bubbles, but a nagging question still haunts Obama euphoria: Why isn't he further ahead in the polls?

After all, they gush, his superbly managed campaign of "hope" and "change" seems to be humming along, as strong as the euro against the dollar. The popularity of his rival Sen. John McCain's Republican brand is as weak as a subprime mortgage.

A CBS poll today shows some interesting results:

Working class whites (white voters with incomes less than $50K and without
a college degree) are now backing Obama – a reversal from last month.
George W. Bush won this group in both 2004 and 2000.

However, when income and education are isolated the results are a bit
different. Whites with incomes under $50K (regardless of education) back
Obama, while whites without a college degree (regardless of income) give
the edge to McCain.

Bob Herbert on Morning Joe

Herbert talks about his most excellent story about how the republicans are appealing to the "white working class," also known as the voters who wouldn't vote for a black man.
He also wrote about Obama's unforgivable offenses. Shame on Obama for being presidential.

We're coming to the end of the George W. Bush era. We have an opportunity and we should be focusing on issues, Herbert says.

McCain and the Republican Race Baiters

Bob Herbert takes McCain to task. McCain should be ripped apart for exploiting race, trying to appeal to the "white working class" by painting Obama as scary.

People who are racist shouldn't be coddled. They should be shunned. Unfortunately, we still have a strong undercurrent of racism in this country and exploiting it, strangely enough, has politically advanced McCain, or so says the media. I guess we'll see how politically advanced he is in November.

Paul Krugman put it like this a year ago:

I thought I was quite clear: the leadership doesn’t care about race, but uses it to win elections; it’s the base that cares.

So not only are racists despicable people, they are being used as pawns, so that makes them stupid, too.

McCain no longer garners any respect here. McCain officially is a low-minded panderer. A Grumpy one, too. The lower he goes, the more Obama supporters get in gear.

NYT: Gee, I wonder why, if you have a black man running for high public office — say, Barack Obama or Harold Ford — the opposition feels compelled to run low-life political ads featuring tacky, sexually provocative white women who have no connection whatsoever to the black male candidates.

Spare me any more drivel about the high-mindedness of John McCain. You knew something was up back in March when, in his first ad of the general campaign, Mr. McCain had himself touted as “the American president Americans have been waiting for.”

There was nothing subtle about that attempt to position Senator Obama as the Other, a candidate who might technically be American but who remained in some sense foreign, not sufficiently patriotic and certainly not one of us — the “us” being the genuine red-white-and-blue Americans who the ad was aimed at.

Since then, Senator McCain has only upped the ante, smearing Mr. Obama every which way from sundown. On Wednesday, The Washington Post ran an extraordinary front-page article that began: