Mindel wrote:
knoxsouthy wrote:
Black Democrat Congressman;
Quote:
In a statement issued Saturday, Lewis said McCain and running mate Sarah Palin were "sowing the seeds of hatred and division, and there is no need for this hostility in our political discourse." He noted that Wallace also ran for president.
"George Wallace never threw a bomb. He never fired a gun, but he created the climate and the conditions that encouraged vicious attacks against innocent Americans who were simply trying to exercise their constitutional rights," said Lewis, who is black. "Because of this atmosphere of hate, four little girls were killed on Sunday morning when a church was bombed in Birmingham, Alabama."
Like I said any attack on Obama is viewed as racist in nature. And then reported as such.
Good lord, you're obtuse.
Given that even Obama has denounced the statements, I'm not sure what you're arguing here...
What's strange is that McCain is criticized for attacking Obama, and then criticized more for *not* attacking Obama. Oddly, by the same people and at the same time. Perhaps one might just conclude that most of you really aren't non-biased enough to make a valid judgment about this?
Not that I'm any less biased, but at least to give some perspective, here's how I see it. Conservatives are pretty pissed off right now. They're seeing information about Obama flying out there that is not being reported much in the news at all. Sure. Some of that stuff is bogus, but there is enough real and accurate information that seriously questions the integrity and judgment of Obama that many conservatives feel is just plain not getting out to the people as a whole. Meanwhile, every minor detail about Palin or McCain gets front page treatment and massive coverage.
In that context, many conservative feel that Obama is effectively stealing this election. We see poll numbers that indicate that so much of the public has bought into what we consider to be blatant lies and fearmongering. A hint of implied racism if you don't vote for Obama, references to McCain being just like Bush, and outright false statements about the facts of the current economic crisis are all just placed out there for public consumption without any analysis or question, which certainly helps the public believe it must be true. When the media reports an allegation by the Obama camp and does nothing to fact check or follow up on it, this amounts to an endorsement of the statement. Meanwhile, everything said by the McCain camp is either ignored or presented in a negative context, complete with countering statements.
It's sickening to watch and a whole bunch of people are pretty pissed off about it. That's what you're seeing at these rallies. That's why they're upset that McCain hasn't taken the kid gloves off. In their view Obama is just telling boldfaced lies to the public and McCain is being too much of a gentleman to call him to the curb for them. Meanwhile, Obama seems to have no problems bashing McCain on everything, no matter how much of a stretch. Heck. Even when he tried to pull his people back as well, he got just as much boos, but most of the clips of that segment cut out the booing, while most of a similar event with McCain left the boos in (and focused on them in fact). So suddenly the story is McCain upsetting his base with one statement at one rally, but Obama actually did the exact same thing and got the exact same response from his followers.
The lopsided nature of the coverage is bad and just seems to get worse the closer we get to the election. So yeah. Lots of people are pissed. They feel that the only way this information is going to get out there is if McCain stands up and makes the accusations. But that's going to mean he's going to have to get off the fence. Not sure if he can do that though...
In a broader sense, I suspect that McCain is trying to play "good cop" here. There's nothing inherently wrong with that IMO, and it may just work in this situation. He only need to make statements that feed into those being made by his surrogates to get the message across, and that's pretty much what he's doing. Again though, it's hard to say if that's the right approach either. We're looking at a very volatile race. I would not sit there too smug if I were an Obama supporter though. His support really is based on a whole lot of people assuming that the stuff being leveled at him just can't possibly be true.
I also suspect that the "Bradley effect" has less to do with white undecided voters saying they'll vote for a black man, but then not doing so on election day as it does with people of all colors (probably more among black folks though) being over represented in polling data. At the end of the day, if the polls say one thing (or appear to say one thing) and the election results say something else, the problem isn't with the election results, but with the polling. I've posted about this before. Liberals in general tend to place great stock in polling numbers (hence, why Joph manages to post them into just about every thread). Conservatives don't really place much weight in them. As a result, Liberals tend to create the very polling trends they want to see and use to convince themselves (and others) that their "side" is winning. It's a conflict between perception and reality. If you care a whole lot about how something appears, you'll take steps to make it appear the way you want. It's the same with polling. Liberals are more likely to participate in polling than Conservatives. By a good margin.
I only somewhat jokingly commented to a friend of mine when the subject of the recent polling trends came up that after the VP debate finished and Palin not only stood her ground but did very very well, every Conservative in the country breathed a sigh of relief and went back to their normal lives, while every Liberal in the country lept into action to make sure that everyone knew how horrible Palin was, and how evil McCain was, and to make sure that everyone knew (presumably through polling) that the McCain/Palin ticket was doomed no matter what happened in that debate.
I really do think that Liberals react to a sense that their candidate may not be doing as well against his opponent by redoubling their efforts to make it appear as though he's not. Could be wishful thinking of course, but it sure seems to match the trend(s) we've been seeing. It seems like whenever McCain's camp hits a strong note, or makes a good attack, or scores solid points, the polls suddenly jump up for Obama. I think you guys are only lying to yourselves though, but we'll see...
