I am ASHAMED of my black brothers. ASHAMED.

It is boolshit like this that jacks up the stereotype that we're all just stupid:

Say what, brotherman? "I don't think a woman should be the head of no country because it's too much power for a woman. It's not about race."?! No, it's not about race, it's about abhorrent and disgusting sexism, the same kind of sexism that paints us black men in the eyes of every Jerry Springer fan as violent baby daddies who beat on and leave their women. And this guy disgusts me too, but for lesser reasons: "And to see a black man running for president, I never thought I'd live long enough to see it." Well bro, apparently Obama's messaianic message of lights shinin' down on us and telling us to vote for Barack Obama made you forget all about Jesse Jackson.

I'll mix it up and throw the white girl under the bus too, just as she has Senator Clinton:


"People have less trouble being outwardly sexist than they do outwardly racist, so I'm going to reinforce the outward sexism and not even get off my lazy ass to do anything about it!"

These screencaps come from this article on the BBC News. Read the comments; most foreigners are definitely split, but leaning more towards someone with experience; they question (rightfully so) Obama's green. The Americans leaving comments are just as split as they are here back at home, with the fanatical Obama people singing his praises/dissing Clinton.

And does anyone else see the total irony of this:

At the Maryland church, parishioner Michael Gaddy said Clinton made a good speech, but nevertheless he supports Obama.

"It's not a dilemma for me," Gaddy said. "I think Obama's the better man for the job. If for some reason he doesn't get the nomination, I think we'd all be behind Hillary."

If you'd be behind Hillary then, then why not now?

Because he black, that's why.

I picked up the Newsweek issue with McCain on the cover and inside is a good article about how American voters vote called When It's Head Versus Heart, the Heart Wins:

Which candidate a voter identifies with is one of the most important gut-level heuristics, since it is tantamount to deciding that someone is enough like you to "understand the concerns of people like you," as pollsters put it. "If you feel a candidate is like you racially or by gender, you're more likely to believe that that candidate will support what you support," says Norris. But with a white woman and a black man vying for the Democratic nomination, where does that leave black women? Whom they most identify with depends on which aspect of their own identity dominates their self-image. For instance, in a study of whether black women believed O. J. Simpson guilty or not of the 1994 murder of his ex-wife and her friend, those whose identity as a woman trumped their sense of themselves as black were significantly more likely to believe Simpson guilty. But black women whose self-image was dominated by their race tended to believe him innocent.

Which aspect of identity takes precedence can change week by week and even hour by hour, depending which aspect of yourself you're reminded of. That, too, explains some of the volatility in this year's primaries...Clinton's emotional moment in New Hampshire brought gender to the fore, but the injection of race into the South Carolina primary made that aspect of identity more salient, and black women voted overwhelmingly for Obama.

For real. That's the real stuff, there, the real change and "transcendence" of this voting choice: The ability to recognize the strength in your gender over the strength of your ethnicity and over Obama's ethnicity. Women who choose Clinton are helping to annihilate that last glass ceiling in the American political power structure; men who choose Clinton are helping to achieve that too, and are also evolving beyond their fears of putting a woman in charge of things. To quote from some blogs on HillaryClinton.com:

As an Afro-American woman, it is even harder since people just assume that you are voting for Obama...DON'T GET IT TWISTED! I'm voting for REAL experience, not just pipe dreams that may or may not happen. Yes, he does inspire younger people to vote and that's great, but do they REALLY listen to all of the messages. I truly doubt it. All flash and no substance. (AlexVA)

And man I feel bad for this kid...and again ashamed of my supposedly "educated" black brothers:

Men feel a general feeling of emascualtion; youth feel the peer pressure of their friends that want them to join the increasingly cult-like Obama "movement" and women are afraid that people will assume they support Hillary "just" because she's a woman. I can testify to this using first hand experience. On election day, on the UC Berkeley campus, I faced a lot of fire for wearing a Hillary shirt in the form of emasculating insults (being called Hillary twice during a "learn your classmate's name" ice-breaker), general resentment (being jeered and booed at) and outright harassment (two Black guys were in my face trying to force me to validate my position. In case you were wondering, I didn't back down).

What this all adds up to is a situation where people are afraid to voice their support for Hillary, even to anonymous pollsters over the phone. Even though any legitimate pollster will make every effort to keep the call professional, in the back of their heads, people always wonder what that person actually thinks of them. (Joseph Bui)

I get the same bool from the people (some family members, but mostly coworkers) around me, but I don't care. I remember what the Clintons have done for the black community. I remember Toni Morrison's comment (see my first post here) and feeling slightly offended by it until I read about Bill Clinton and who he was/what his family did for poor black folk in the South. I know that Bill is now just trying to help his wife, and his "gaffe" in South Carolina isn't what Obama's campaign or the media made it out to be.

That's the context of the "fairytale" comment. Can you really sit there with a straight face and tell me that that was racist? To quote Bill, give me a break. We loved and defended Bill once we got to know him and now we abandon him and his wife just as quickly and spitefully as Ted Kennedy did because someone with the same color skin we got might have a chance at getting elected (and qualifications don't seem to matter, so long as what he say makes you feel ALL GLORY HALLELUJAH!). It's wrong, and I'm sorry that the truth offends, but y'all a bunch of disloyal ingrates, and I would hate to be your white friend for 16+ years only to see an other brotha (or sista) come along and successfully dis me to get you to dis me. "We'll vote for Clinton if Obama doesn't get it." = "Oh, but I can still be your friend when my new black friend ain't around." Right.

Salon: Do black people feel stronger about him than, say, Colin Powell or Jesse Jackson?

DeWayne Wickham: You're measuring on different scales. African-Americans are very proud of Colin Powell, proud of his accomplishments, proud of the fact that he, unlike many other black Republicans, did not renounce affirmative action but rejoices and celebrates affirmative action and how it's benefited his life and the lives of others. But they don't see him as someone who is on the right political track. Bill Clinton is someone who is cut out of the Democratic mold. Since 1936, a majority of African-Americans have voted for Democratic presidential candidates in increasing numbers. We believe that our political fate rests most comfortably in the hands of Democrats. Yes, we also hold Clinton in higher esteem than we do Jesse Jackson, which is kind of fascinating.

Until some green kid named Obama came along, opened his mouth and watched people faint at the rainbows, unicorns and the Second Coming of Jesus spilling out of his mouth in 2004 (and again now, in 2008). It is just so boolshit!

At least there is some hope for our race:

You go, girl. You tell the man where it is.