Group items tagged

What Gertrude Stein said about her hometown Oakland could also be said of Sarah Palin. "There is no there, there." Sarah Palin is simply without substance.

She even tried to humanize her image, saying that despite her views against same sex marriage she didn't judge people and had a diverse group of friends. However, when moderator Gwen Ifill asked Palin if she was in agreement with Senator Biden, who'd said he was against all forms of discrimination against same sex couples but did not support gay marriage, Palin would only repeat what Biden said about gay marriage. Perhaps because she realized that her key supporters -- the evangelical right wing -- might already be choking on their fried chicken wings because of her attempt to say something pleasant about a group of people they consider an abomination.

In one of the most incendiary columns ever written, "Race And The Presidential Election," Bill O'Reilly sets the race-bait bar to record-breaking...depths. Short of saying that Barack Obama wants to sleep with your pearly-white daughter, O'Reilly uses just about every button meant to alarm his white fans to the fact that Barack Obama is BLACK and that just his running for, let alone becoming, president, could set off race-laced fireworks.

"Obama's second dilemma is convincing skeptical white voters that he and his wife are sympathetic to their concerns. Let's be honest--few white Americans would tolerate a Reverend Wright for five minutes, much less 20 years."

Richard Rorty's socialist parents, Walter Rauschenbusch's daughter Winifred and her husband James Rorty, moved from churchly circles into the cosmopolitan company of the old New York Intellectuals and at least for a season loved Trotsky more than Jesus. Their son Richard was born in 1931 into a family circle of leftist politics and very progressive social hopes. Frequent guests in the Rorty home included John Dewey, Sidney Hook, Lionel Trilling, the Italian anarchist Carlo Tresca and John Frank (Trotsky's secretary who lived with the Rortys under an assumed name). Richard Rorty confesses that as a boy of 12 he knew the point of being human was to give one's life to fight against social injustice. He also knew the temptations and terrors of radical politics. He knew that Stalin had ordered the assassinations of Trotsky, Tresca, Frank and scores of other anti-totalitarian leftist leaders and intellectuals.

Walter Rauschenbusch was declared the father of the Social Gospel.

The rhetoric, once again, masks racism through comparative oppressions - the prevailing misrepresentation of how the black vote, and also the Hispanic vote, supported anti-gay policies on the day that black history would be irrevocably altered.

Gay is the New Black

Offense #1: It presumes that, because we made significant racial progress through the election of Obama, somehow racism has been conquered while homophobia has not been. Obviously, racism hasn't been conquered, or that slogan would have never emerged in the first place.Offense #2: Such a slogan is designed to pit two marginal groups against each other, conveniently ignoring the fact that certain fundamental religious organizations whose congregations are overwhelmingly white were instrumental in enacting Proposition 8 in the first place.

“Republican candidates who have established their own personal brand

The joint fund-raising committees have been utilized far more heavily this presidential election than in the past. Mr. Obama’s campaign has leaned on wealthy benefactors to contribute up to $33,100 at a time to complement his army of small donors over the Internet as he bypassed public financing for the general election. More than 600 donors contributed $25,000 or more to him in September alone, roughly three times the number who did the same for Senator John McCain.

Compared with Mr. Obama, Mr. McCain drew a slightly larger percentage of his big-donor money from the financial industry, about a fifth of his total. The next biggest amount in large checks for Mr. McCain came from real estate and then donors who identified themselves as retired. With his emphasis on offshore drilling, Mr. McCain has also enjoyed heavy support from generous benefactors in the oil and gas industry, a group Mr. Obama drew relatively little from.

Donations to these joint fund-raising committees have surged this election cycle, taking in nearly $300 million this year through September — with Mr. McCain collecting slightly more than Mr. Obama — compared with $69 million in 2004. Campaign finance watchdogs call it a worrisome trend, saying the heavy emphasis on such arrangements brings candidates one step further into the embrace of major donors.

I understand how ambition can warp judgment. But your recent personal attacks on Barack Obama are so beyond the pale for presidential politics that you now face a fateful choice by the Wednesday debate -- will you pull back from the abyss of sleazy slander or risk losing not only the election but also your reputation and honor?

First, it's wrong and you shouldn't engage in such self-immolating behavior. Second, it's backfiring -- since polls show the gap widening since voters care a lot more about their jobs and 401(k)'s than Bill Ayres. Third, while a loss is a loss, for down-ticket Republicans, an Obama win by 10 points rather than by 4 points can be the difference between 56 and 60 seats in the Senate, between 245 House seats and 260 House seats.