What brought this on? (Been muzzle-deep in writing, planet coulda
gone up in a fireball of alien laser attack, wouldn't have noticed)

     As for Tea Party, racism, Obama., etc, from a Canadian PoV there
seems to be a far stronger flavour of 'coded' virulence from the Far Right
over the past few years.

     And sometimes not very well coded either. Whomping lot of bald-faced
misinformation/agit-prop/lies are being pumped out in a steady stream
about Obama (birth certificate, muslim or not, eats white babies for
breakfast or not, etc.).

     Ideological differences do not account for it. If it looks like a duck,
quacks like duck, and has a KKK hood in the closet like a duck, it's
probably a racist duck. We can rule out liberal aardvark, anyway.

     Leastwise racism's almost certainly a strong motivator for, and a strong
attack point for, many in the leadership of the Tea Party movement. Check
out the T-shirts at TP rallies. Hatred of the Democrat's budgetary policies
did not draw those crowds, I fear. Demonizing Obama, OTOH...

     Crappy strategy. Alienates the mainstream who know racism when they
see it, devalues the TP's genuine political message, further brands
the movement as lunatic fringe. Makes for big rallies, though.

     Yeah, and look who we elected to power a while back. Canadian pot
calling the 'Murrican kettle black here (sic). :- )

FB.

Fred... I don't know where you get it. I really don't. However, since you asked me where *I* got it, I can just as well show you:

Morgan Freeman inserting his foot:
http://newsbusters.org/blogs/noel-s.....#ixzz1YnWDliVr

And of course, the slam dunk from the, ahem, BLACK Republican Nominee Herman Cain:
http://www.newsbusters.org/blogs/no.....a-party-racist

Far right coded virulence? Find some. Here's some from the far left:
http://www.politico.com/news/storie.....811/62396.html
http://www.politico.com/news/storie.....911/62979.html

Here's some more. Death threats over a bake sale designed to protest racist collegiate entrance practices?
http://www.cnn.com/2011/09/25/us/ca.....ale/index.html
When was the last time you saw right wingers sending DEATH THREATS over a BAKE SALE?

And the riots we've had that are pretty much entirely black and hispanic?
http://townhall.com/columnists/thom.....ion/page/full/
Wisconsin:
http://wisconserve.com/2011/08/05/r.....und-milwaukee/

If you think the left is content to slander/threaten on the basis of race, oh no. Here's more:
If you're a member of the Tea Party, apparently you're a Nazi
http://www.woai.com/news/local/stor.....spx?p=Comments

More:
http://news.yahoo.com/obama-tells-b.....015928905.html
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/storie.....09-25-17-28-31

I could go on for DAYS Fred. Can you provide even half as much demonstrating ANY sort of racism or glaring bigotry on the part of the right?

'Lo Ceb:

     Oh dear. I'm out of practice. That should have been a light tap
on a nerve followed by a brush at the funnybone. Instead, looks
I landed a hammerblow. Sorry.

     But I can answer about sources. Sort of.

     I'm on 26.4K bps dial-up. So I'm not getting news off the Net.
Time and pico-bandwidth prevent all but work-related surfing.
YouTube is right off. I'd check out your links but it'd take me an
hour (at minimum).

     I don't read newspapers. Costs $$$, and can't get 'em delivered
out to my rural home. Magazines, equal negative, save for Scientific
American (a font of political commentary). My Mother's three-month
old Maclean's that she sometimes drops on me doesn't count. But
a stack of 'em burns well.

     Being rural I don't have cable (if I did I'd have high-speed
Internet, pleeease God?). I do have a TV, of course, but I stopped
watching at least 5-8 years ago; only about six channels over the air.
Most of them are now digital, including PBS, dammit.

     What's left? Oh yes, radio. That's on 24/7. Half the time I'm tuned
to one of several rock stations (no news there). Sometimes I'm on the
CBC (not very much, or very good, news there). More often I'm on NPR
(a little better news, and a ton of classical).

     Lastly, I'll sometimes pick up the BBC on the CBC/NPR late night
programs at 1:00AM in the morning and going to dawn. Rebroadcasts
from radio from all around the world. News from Africa is often
interesting. News from Australia is often a hoot. But that's rare;
gotta sleep sometime.

     Oh, lastly lastly, I'm able to pick up CBC TV on the far end of the
FM dial. So I often listen to the National, the CBC's nightly hour-long
news show.

     So added up, exactly how much do I know about US politics?

     And out of all the hours of 'news' I've listened to, how much of it
has harped on, trumpeted about, foamed at, the deeply embedded
brands of racism that are buried in the 'Murrican psyche? (black, white,
brown, red, yellow; quite the rainbow, y' know?)

     First question: I know waaaay the hell more than at least 90% of
Americans. Does that sound arrogant? Perhaps it is. But I am nearly
50 years old, and highly literate, and well-educated. Also, we
Canadians tend to watch you Yanks like hawks (or beavers with
telescopes?). To the point where most Canadians know more about
US politics than our own, I think, which ain't a good sign.

     Getting some poli-sci courses under my belt hasn't hurt. Plus
a couple of years of journalism training. Meaning I listen to the
news with a much more critical ear, knowing in advance that
all news contains 'spin' and agenda. Facts, and the facts not
said, come a distant third.

     Upshot: when or if I comment on US politics I am hardly
guaranteed to be absolutely correct. Who is these days? But
that comment will be coming from place of strong, in-depth
knowledge (that's taken a long time to acquire). It will be
informed by a wide variety of sources and voices (literally),
and trust me, eclectic is a good thing here.

     And I'd like to think it won't suffer from any (or much)
ideological taint or cant, insofar as I like to think I'm an
equal-opportunity political critic and smart enough to make
that claim stick. I'll run a rhetorical truck through anybody's
argument, left, right, center, I don't care, bwahahahaa!!

     Ahem. :- )

     I'll make a comment right here. Over the past 5-8 years,
US politics has undergone a steady and profound polarization.
The stresses that have produced this, and the future problems
facing America, are for another screed. 'If you're not with us you're
against us' has infected both the right and the left, and in a way
that has gutted the center.

     In fact, it is becoming nearly impossible to hold a centrist,
moderate position on *anything* without taking deadly attack
from either side. Logical: the centrists/moderates are really
as much the enemy as those unspeakable bastards at the
other end of the spectrum.

     Since when did people who differ from you politically
become the enemy? As in, The Enemy. And exactly how long
will American democracy survive if this goes on?

     Ceb, the astonishing, Pope-verified, miracle would be if
racism *hadn't* been elisted in the political war that's
underway in your country. It's in heaviest use on the Far Right,
but quite correct, the Left is sticking the knife in too. Poor
blade that doesn't cut both ways. Splendid scare message:
better vote for us or all those racist Tea Partyers will have
us back to lynching in no time flat.

     Do I guess that it was something along those lines [from
Freeman] that got your goat? Can't blame you.

     The problem is, racism is one of the oldest set of buttons on
the American political 'dashboard.' They're easy to push. The
political strategists and the money behind the Tea Party knows this.

     They are all highly seasoned and skilled, politically speaking,
and they know that motivating a grass-roots movement cannot be
done just by printing a pretty pamphlet. It takes propaganda, lots
of it, and of a particular activist flavour that hasn't really been seen
in American politics for a long time. And certainly not from the
Right. It's working, too.

     It defies reason and realpolitik to assert that these virtuous,
moral, ethically pure and high-minded people would *not*
use one of the more effective weapons in their arsenal (ie.,
racism). No, no, we're in a fight for the country's future, we're
in a life-or-death battle for political power, we're up against
unspeakable bastards who won't hesitate to do anything
to stop us. No, we're not going to use racism here; somebody
feed that strategy paper into a shredder, please.

     Okay, I'm laying it on a little thick, and to be fair it's a
perfect fit for the people who lead on the left as well. But I
haven't seen or heard of anybody on the left creating anything
like that poster [of Obama looking like the Joker]. Then the
T-shirts. How they were used, and more things like it, cannot be
read benignly.

     Or can it? As a grass-roots movement, it is not at all
unthinkable that a racist thread has emerged without any
leadership cadre actively promoting it. These are American
citizens we're talking about here, not sheep. And they're mostly
white American citizens, and by definition they're not grazing
on the liberal side of the paddock. Given who's President,
reason tells us that racism will be expressed, in some form.

     Either way, it's hard to argue that the Tea Party is a totally
colour-blind, non-racist movement. How much is involved, and
whether or not it's been deliberately fostered, now this is where
I'd love to offer you some links.

     Can't. All I can give you is a synthesis arising from what I've
heard over the past few years, in bits and pieces and in fragmented
form, about what's going on in US politics.

     - Such as evidence that the 'grass roots' Tea Party is being funded
by billionaires for whom ultra-far right is next-door to Communist (the
Koch brothers, and others). (NPR Marketplace)

     - Such as evidence about how right-wing US political organizers
are influencing Canadian conservative politics, and how they work (CBC
politics show called The House).

     - Such as a BBC piece (I think?) that looked at how the Tea Party
got started, with mention of demographics (so white they can't
even dance).

     - Such as an NPR talk show (Diane Reems) that did a number of
shows on the Tea Party and pitted callers and left and right
commentators against each other.

     - Such as a piece from Australia about attempts to organize
something like the Tea Party there, with mention of the racism
in the US version.

     You'll pardon me for not getting dates and times. These are
the ones that I remember. There might have been more. But this
does answer that second question. Hardly anybody's mentioned
racism and the Tea Party in the same breath. Certainly not NPR;
can you imagine the shell fire on their position if they did?

     None of this will be convincing to you, I fear. I'll grant it could
look like I'm inventing this out of thin [radio] air.

     Find me a price for one of those T-shirts, will you? Could be
very valuable someday.


FB.

Fred, I have always valued your mind, and your ability to spin a yarn.

I have a deep-seated respect for the time you've put in and the history you've got behind you.

(ready for the but?)

But....

My news is current, I'm in Smaug's (racism's) chamber, so to speak, and the goblet is in my hand (I'm white) which means the dragon's ire is roused at me. I analyze intel FOR A LIVING, and I work for the government. This is my field and I play ball very well. I also make a lot of money, so I actually have a stake in the company beyond a monthly welfare check and foodstamp run to the local municipal office. I pay IN, so I pay attention. I have a stake in this and my facts are straight.

In my lifetime (31) racism has been relegated in reality to two realms. The backwoods, and leftist political screeds. While there have been notable instances of race-related crime (The dragging death of James Byrd in Texas comes to mind, perpetrated by three white men all of whom had multiple priors on their criminal records, one of whom has already been executed with one more to go, the third having been convicted of a lesser crime, all done by a white judge and sanctioned by a series of white governors.)

In USEFUL terms however, racism is the clarion call of the idea man who is out of ideas and needs a weapon to stir up the mob. Just like the unions in this country have long passed on any utility they may once have had and the feminist crowds have nothing real left to complain about and thus grow increasingly shrill over increasingly petty details, racism is one of those beasts that only hangs around because people keep calling its name. My boss is a black woman and HER boss is a black man. The two army warrant officers running my section are both black, and one is female. The idea that people of color or people lacking the penis can't get anywhere in this world is an idea reserved to losers, fools, ivory tower academics, and politicians who need votes from the first three groups.

The Tea Party is a sub-section of the republican party that started, and is centered around, FISCAL responsibility and policy, the very name is garnered from a famous rebellion against unjust taxation. How do you get race out of that? Look at the benefits rolls that are financially unsustainable. Who has the largest percentage of their respective populace on those rolls? Do the math. If you paid attention to the riots in England just recently you will probably have noted the absolutely anti-intellectual bias displayed by the rioters. This anti-intellectual bias is being aped in England, and has its source in "urban" culture here. The difference is our police carry and USE their firearms... but it's getting worse anyway. Since you haven't got the internet oomph to read the articles I referenced, just trust me in that I'm well sourced. The people on the dole have no interest in getting off it, and the only thing that motivates them is the threat of that dole getting cut by the people actually paying for it, or rather, racking up debts for the sake of it.

You aren't racist because you want to kill a program that isn't helping and can't be paid for just because a greater percentage of some other race than white is on the dole. You're CALLED racist because ostensibly, your REAL goal, you crafty underhanded sneaky bastard you, is to hurt black people, not cut a program that doesn't work. Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar, Fred.

As a student of history you should know that Nazi's weren't on the right. They were on the left. The whole Nazi SOCIALIST party thing kinda gives that away. The greatest perpetrators of mass murder in the name of social order or any other 'ism' were just about all on the left; Hitler, Mao, Stalin, Robespierre... and then there are the lesser perpetrators Castro and his right hand of the revolution Che Guevara, Hugo Chavez, the list goes on and on and on. The great bamboozle of our time may very well be the repeated use of the epithet Nazi as applied by the Left to the Right... which is I'm pretty sure in the dictionary under "BackAsswards."

Likewise the people showing the wounds and grievances of the various 'isms' are in fact the people with the knives doing the cultural damage. The Tea Party just wants to spend its money as it sees fit and doesn't think the government can handle it, and who can blame them? The President's "new" job plan introduces fiscal sanity by turning a 10 trillion dollar debt into a 17 trillion dollar debt within ten years.

Took us two hundred plus years to rack up what we got, and he wants to just about double that in under 1/20th of the time. That's his idea of fiscal responsibility. That's his plan for creating new jobs and stabilizing the flagging economy: enslave our children at infinitum to the chinese or whoever else happens to want to buy into the failing system next.

People don't want Obama out because they're racist. They want him out (and I say this again) because his policies have failed and they suck and he won't quit pushing them down our collective throats. He could be white, or brown... or BLUE. People would think the same thing of him... well that's not true. If he weren't black, he wouldn't get so much support from the BLACK Congressional Caucus (you want explicit racism? There it is. No other race seems to feel the need to have a color caucus in US government. Asians in Congress? Nope, just regular Congressmen, ditto Hispanics... and for that matter whites.) and wouldn't garner so much of the black vote.

So much for judging men by the content of their character rather than the color of their skin, eh? How ironic that the people judged by their flesh tone these days are all the same, but their roles are reversed. Blacks can do no wrong (unless they're republican) and whites can never oppose blacks or anyone else for that matter, because it's automatically deemed to be about race and this accusation trumps whatever logic may be behind their contention. There may be poetic justice in this, but certainly no REAL justice.

I very much doubt that you have to deal much with people of other races way up there in Canada and I suspect that the vast bulk of your knowledge on the subject is academic. Mine is based on current events and having spent my life bearding the dragon in its lair. Was there racism? Sure. Is there racism? Yes. So what's the difference? The difference is the dirty little secret of democratic politics: Racists aren't powerful anymore. They don't influence votes save in opposition. The only power racism has in politics is as a smear. Functionally... it doesn't exist.