Dialog between GR and DPBrewster

[Genuine Realist]

[quote id=”119083022″]I don’t think the Republicans strategy to try and limit Obama to one term was anything but political. Nothing wrong with that in and of itself. As you correctly note, that is what opposition parties do. But don’t kid yourself, a not insubstantial amount of the rhetoric sure was racist or race based. [/quote]

The hell it was. Obama swept into office with a huge plurality, and I think it was pretty apparent that he was an African-American man. He didn’t lost his cachet because the fact of his race became suddenly apparent. He lost it when he adopted the Democratic Establishment health plan lock, stock, and barrel. That, and embracing the financial establishment. He lost it when he embraced Democratic factional identity politics lock, stock, and barrel.

Back in 2016, during the debates, I was struck by the diversity of the REPuBLICAN panel. Two Hispanic social conservatives (Rubio and Cruz), an Indian Catholic convert (Jindal), an African-American physician (Carson), am Establishment guy with a Mexican wife, himself a Catholic convert (Jeb Bush), a conventional midwest governor (Kasich), and the ultimate maverick Trump. And the Democrats, with a tired old 60’s socialist (Sanders) and a that’s-not-funny feminist (HRC), the most conventional of stereotypes, is bragging on ITS diversity?? Come on. Look at the world as it is.

Carson ran first in polls for some time. Condoleeza Rice, Black, female, and possibly gay, could have any place she wanted in the Party.

Obama ran into obstacles because of his politics. If he had actually taken the problems of globalization seriously, he would have remained at 60% plus approval, which is as good as it gets. His apologists run to racial explanations because they don’t want to face the fact that, despite all his charm, he was wedded to technocratic and media elites. He didn’t give a damn about large patches of the American public. Nor did Hillary. And they paid for it.

I wouldn't give you two cents for all your fancy rules if, behind them, they didn't have a little bit of plain, ordinary, everyday kindness - yeah, and a little looking out for the other fella, too.

[Legend]

Well put, GR. I do think that a portion of the opposition to Obama was of the racist sort, but far less than those who just didn’t like his politics or that he was easy to belittle as a made for TV POTUS.

The more we learn about the Obama admin, the more normal it looks, and that isn’t a compliment.

____________________________________________________________
Sic transit gloria mundi (so shut up and get back to work)

[Genuine Realist]

dpbrewster said… (original post)

I call BS. You are correct as to the WHY, and I don’t disagree. But there was a good deal of actual racist dialogue, as opposed to merely oppositional, from the right. Quite frankly, speaking of the world as it is, I find it amusing that you ignore it or blithely sweep it away. And Trump continues to use such dialogue to his advantage. There is a very ugly undercurrent still at play in US society. And we ignore it at our peril.

Call what you like, The fact is that Barack Obama went from being an obscure Illinois senator in 2002 to becoming President in six (!) years, beating the ordained candidate of the hero of the Democratic Party and winning one of the most decisive elections in recent US history. In his entire career, he never lost an election or even suffered a career disappointment. Some victim of racism.

Also, since 2010, the rejection of Democratic attitudes and values has been one of the most striking phenomena in US political history. The Republicans now hold majorities in both Houses, control the Presidency, the Supreme Court, and 2/3rds of the governorships. That wave of rejection obviously has nothing to do with Obama’s race. In fact, he was the only winner in the pack, in 2012, against a relatively strong Republican candidate. If he suffered from bigotry, you’d expect him to fail worse than the other Democratic candidates, with all that baggage and race besides. But he didn’t. He outpaced them.

He lost popularity in 2009-10 for a simple reason. Having run on a platform of ‘hope and change’, he proved once in office to be one of the great establishment Presidents of our time – first embracing the financial establishment, then the Democratic establishment, in lending his popularity to the enactment of a medical coverage overall that was NOT one of the issues of 2008, and in a template that had been decisively rejected for decades. Worse, the sausage making was done in public. The Right exploded, and he was stuck with the Tea Party. That was a principled opposition, not racial. He didn’t deliver ‘hope and change’ – he didn’t even try.

I’m sure race mattered to a fraction of the voters, but the number of African-American voters who went his way out of racial loyalty had to be many times that. (I don’t blame them for that – I vividly remember the way Catholics supported Kennedy in 1960.) There is also that fraction of other voters who voted for him on a Mafic Negro basis – I know more than one. Race to the extent it mattered helped Barack Obama far more than it hurt.

The reactionary obsession with race and gender is killing the Democratic Party, as well as its snarky attitude toward American power. The one great issue of our time is the wealth divide. Rather than recognize that persons on the wrong side of it, whatever their race, have far more in common than not, they persist with their seating chart. Trump is both the best and worst thing that has happened to them. He is so obnoxious that they might pick up protest votes. But rather than acknowledge how much has gone wrong with the Party message, they obssess on Trump and double down on snark. Believing that race had any significant role in opposition to Obama is a symptom of that.

I wouldn't give you two cents for all your fancy rules if, behind them, they didn't have a little bit of plain, ordinary, everyday kindness - yeah, and a little looking out for the other fella, too.

[johnnyo53]

Well, DP, there’s plenty of institutionalized racism and bigotry coming out of the left and the demtards too,  and Holder and Obama deserve a lot of credit for stirring that pot and then running from their own words.  Nobody’s ignoring it, but the left doesn’t know WTF an HONEST discussion looks like, because they so invested in their “I have a need, therefore I have a right, and society owes me, and somebody else should be responsible for picking up the tab for me”.

“I remember that one fateful day when Coach took me aside. I knew what was coming. "You don't have to tell me," I said. "I'm off the team, aren't I?" "Well," said Coach, "you never were really ON the team. You made that uniform you're wearing out of rags and towels, and your helmet is a toy space helmet. You show up at practice and then either steal the ball and make us chase you to get it back, or you try to tackle people at inappropriate times." It was all true what he was saying. And yet, I

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