October 14, 2012

Shameful, lowly race-baiting... but who's doing it?

So somebody got a picture of the back of a man — no face, no name — in a T-shirt that says — on the back — "Put the White Back in the White House." BuzzFeed posts the photo with the information that it's a "Getty Images" photo. So we don't even get the name of the photographer. We're told "The Getty Images photo was taken at a Romney/Ryan campaign event in Lancaster, Ohio on Friday." We can't see much of the context. Who's around this guy?

Why put this picture up? Well, obviously, it gets hits for BuzzFeed, which doesn't need any more motivation than that. It does need the utter lack of ethics and decency it takes to throw something this unfair into the public debate. The BuzzFeed staffer who did this post is Andrew Kaczynski, whom we've seen before. (He was behind "Paul Ryan Gets Testy and Walks Out of Interview.") Presumably, he's doing his job of attracting links, and I'm exacerbating the dynamic by linking. But I'm doing this because I have recently criticized Romney supporters for injecting race into presidential politics.

I said it was a mistake for Rush Limbaugh and others to play that Obamaphone lady over and over. Even with no mention of race, I thought the recording was used — with deniability — to stir up racial feelings. My post — "Just How Racist Is the 'Obama Phone' Video?" — got very strong pushback from commenters. People did not want to acknowledge that race had been injected at all. I participated in the comments at first. For example:
Look, those of you who don't see the racial problem are already probably going to vote for Romney. For Romney to win, he has to influence people in the middle who are sensitive to this kind of racial ugliness. You may say my sensitivity is set to[o] high, but I'm saying that I believe the people with my level of sensitivity are much more likely to determine the outcome of the election.
But my commenters fought on, passionately, which showed, I think, how deeply they — like me —  object to racial material. The objection took different forms. I was saying don't use powerful material when it will feel racial to some people, and they were resisting seeing it as racial. Within our disagreement, there was an intense agreement: We object to racial material.

Back to that T-shirt. Who should be condemned here? There's that bald-headed, no name guy. I assume he is a Romney opponent. The reasons for that assumption are oozingly obvious. (Here, Robert Stacy McCain spells them out for you.) He deserves condemnation, whether he's for or against Romney. The photographer deserves condemnation if he has thrown this crap into the public space without giving us a name, a shot of the man's face, or even a broader shot of the people around him. We are deprived of the context we need to think about whether other people at the rally saw it, approved, laughed, shunned him, confronted him.

But Buzzfeed and all the Romney opponents who chose to link to Buzzfeed should be ashamed. They lowered themselves. They saw an opportunity go racial and they took it. Here's Caroline Bankoff at New York Magazine:
This photo of the not-so-subtle look, taken at Friday's campaign rally in Lancaster, Ohio, doesn't really require further description. 
It sure as hell does require further description! Who was that bald man? How long was that shirt-back displayed? Is this a false-flag effort to smear Romney? And why don't you care? Just go ahead and stir up racial fears and ugliness, Caroline Bankoff. Shame on you and everyone else who slavered at the opportunity to serve up this racial obscenity.

314 comments:

1 – 200 of 314   Newer›   Newest»
Ipso Fatso said...

This will be picked up by the MSM, the Rachel Maddow's, Andrea Mitchell's and Chris Matthew's of the world, amoung others, to smear Romney and his supporters. It will be accepted as truth and they will not ask the questions that you Ann, just asked. That is what they are in the business of doing, that is, doing everything they can to re-elect their guy.

Scott said...

An agent provocateur passed off by BuzzFeed as a Romney supporter. Both are complicit in the smear.

Anonymous said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Carnifex said...

False flag events are bread and butter to dirty politics. I read G. Gordon's book and how he talked about wanting to hire a bunch of hippies to storm into a CREEP office(wonderful acronym that) to wreck it, and to micturate on the carpets, much like in the "big Lebowski"

There's a reason these things happen. They work, and the perps are rarely caught.

The shooting in Denver is also being bandied about as a false flag operation. Denver is notable because the last time something like this happened there they did catch the perp, and he was a D working to get Zero elected.

AS an aside, I saw several twitter postings by supposed black people claiming that they were "gonna riot" if Romney wins. Just based on past behavior, I can believe that one.

Also Romney is gonna' ban tampons, and bring back slavery.(also on twitter)

cubanbob said...

Children whine and adults accept responsibility. That is all one needs to know about democrats.

furious_a said...

It's ugly, and only going to get uglier as OFA&Co. get more desperate.

Michael said...

It is the same sad story. Pick one of a crowd of thousands and smear the whole by association. It is a tactic routinely used against normal Americans and rarely against the shrill and ugly, increasingly unhinged and violent left.

Matt Sablan said...

I normally don't get involved in conspiracy theories, but I have to admit, this makes no sense at all. Real racists don't advertise themselves as racists in ways like that; they think their thoughts are normal and acceptable, so they don't go out of their way to make ridiculous statements like that because, as far as their concerned, they're not saying anything controversial. I don't wear "Chocolate tastes good" shirts or "Coffee helps me wake up," it's the same thing for racists. It is a baseline truth for them.

virgil xenophon said...

Why, pray tell, is the display of such a sentiment any more racist that, say, public pronouncements by Samuel L. Jackson that he is voting for Obama purely, solely "because he is black?" Yet the latter is socially acceptable (e.g.,where are the calls to boycott Jackson films) whereas the former is acclaimed as verboten?

Discuss, ANN..

I'm Full of Soup said...

This tactic works. It worked successfully against the tea party. The MSM conventional wisdom is still that the tea party is a bunch of old white racists.

BonHagar said...

Gonna go with fake, October Surprise, an effort by dems to stave off the losses.

Matt Sablan said...

"This tactic works. It worked successfully against the tea party. The MSM conventional wisdom is still that the tea party is a bunch of old white racists."

-- I remember the "racist" old white Tea Partier who had a gun at an event who, it turned out, was actually a young to middle-aged black male, once someone found the non-cropped picture.

SomeoneHasToSayIt said...

Nice history rewrite try Ann, but you got your ass handed to you on the "Just How Racist Is the 'Obama Phone' Video?" post. And rightly so.

pm317 said...

Yeah, who was this man and why was he there? Until we hear that explanation straight from him unfiltered, this bit of news is worth nothing, nada, zilch. Even when we hear an explanation from him, it still does not amount to a hill of beans because it is one person and absolutely has no reflection on Romney (especially when Obama gets 95% percent support from unquestioning Blacks).

At least with the other video of obamaphones, we knew why the woman was there and what she was saying.

Matt Sablan said...

"(especially when Obama gets 95% percent support from unquestioning Blacks)."

-- I'm hesitant to say that's racial. Isn't that about the % that Democrats normally get across the board (maybe marginally higher?) Any -D gets that high of a vote, for reasons that are probably not racial.

Sammy said...

It's obvious it's a plant... everyone else is wearing a jacket... While this guy in a t shirt, he probabely wore a jacket , took it off sat in the area where the cameras are ... The Romney Ryan logo on the back is suspious , then the massive stupid sentiment...


But who cares, if he is plant , like like the unions did with the Tea Party..... You have famous Obama supporters calling Mitt Romney , a white nigg-- .

SomeoneHasToSayIt said...

This history lesson, from Charlie Martin at PJ Media, seems especially timely:

"It was Nathan Bedford Forrest, a Democrat, who founded the Ku Klux Klan.
Woodrow Wilson segregated Federal Buildings and jobs after 50 years of integration under largely Republican administrations.
It was the Democrat Party in the South that instituted Jim Crow Laws.
It was the Democrat Party in the South that instituted “separate but equal”.
It was the Democrat Party in the South that supported the Ku Klux Klan.
It was George Wallace and the Democrat Party in the South that said “Segregation Forever”.
It was Orval Faubus and the Democrat Party that wanted the Arkansas National Guard to enforce segregation, and Dwight Eisenhower, a Republican President, that sent the 101st Airborne to integrate the schools.
It was Bull Connor, a member of the Democrat National Committee, who turned the hoses on the marchers in Birmingham, and it was the Republicans who made up the majority that passed the 1964 Civil Rights Act, over the filibuster of such Democrat paragons as William Fulbright and Al Gore Sr. — and Grand Kleagle Byrd.
(And no, the Dixiecrats didn’t join the Republican Party – most of them remained Democrats.)
It was the Democrats who kept Grand Kleagle Byrd in the party.
It was Democrats who called General Colin Powell a “house nigger”.
It was Democrats who called Condi Rice — who grew up with and knew the little girls in Birmingham who were blown up, by Democrats — an “Aunt Jemima” and ran cartoons of her with fat lips doing Hattie McDaniel riffs.
It was Democrats, or at least Obama supporters, who called Stacy Dash a hundred different racist names for daring to leave the Democrat plantaion.

It’s the Democrats who hold annual dinners honoring Andrew Jackson, who owned slaves and who orchestrated the Removal, the Trail of Tears, the near genocide of several of the Indian Nations.

So when the Democrats stop having Andrew Jackson dinners, and take Wilson’s name off the bridge in DC, and start taking Grand Kleagle Byrd’s name off of the hundred things named after him, then we can talk about one asshole in the back row of a Romney rally."

Oso Negro said...

Umm...not so fast with the epistemic closure, please. What if we don't see the cell phone lady as racial material but as an actual person? In Madison, Wisconsin, in the daily life of a law professor, I must question whether there is routine contact with citizens such as cell phone lady. In my town, Galveston, Texas, you meet them very frequently indeed at city council meetings, school meetings, at the grocery store, and so on. I would posit that the reality of cell phone lady was difficult for our hostess to accept. Not so for some of us in the commentariat. Declaring that we all object to racial material neatly squares the circle of a visceral reaction to the perception of "racial material" with love of loyal readers. If I write off the cell phone lady as "racial material" I am writing off too many citizens of my town.

somefeller said...

Remember everyone, if someone says or does something racist and appears to be a right-winger, he is obviously a moby! Because conservatives would never say or do such things. Keep that in mind and everything falls into place.

Shantastik said...

To maintain credibility, Althouse needs to make the same veiled threat. unless Obama himself comes out against it, then it's time to call all dems racist and vote Roms

Tim said...

The thing about racial politics is, we'll always have it until we decide to give it up.

We can start by judging people by the content of their character, not the color of their skin.

Fernandinande said...

Some guy, no doubt a silly Dem, is wearing a shirt. Big deal.

This is real racism:

"Obama launches African-American education initiative"

somefeller said...

And one more thing, if Robert Stacy McCain says something, it must be true. Especially on matters relating to race.

Matt Sablan said...

"Remember everyone, if someone says or does something racist and appears to be a right-winger, he is obviously a moby! Because conservatives would never say or do such things. Keep that in mind and everything falls into place."

-- Skepticism is a healthy trait; when something seems too good to be true, it often is.

Anonymous said...

I also think those Romney opponents who are so excited about this should explain why "ONCE YOU VOTE BLACK YOU NEVER GO BACK" buttons at the Democratic National convention are okay. Those weren't a false flag.

http://news.yahoo.com/photos/convention-goer-stands-convention-floor-first-day-democratic-photo-230750114.html

edutcher said...

I do believe Insta pointed out yesterday that you start to see this sort of thing when the Lefties get desperate.

And they are very desperate.

Which is highlighted by some phony folksy doing his best Conservative baiting.

Tim said...

Shantastik said...

"To maintain credibility, Althouse needs to make the same veiled threat. unless Obama himself comes out against it, then it's time to call all dems racist and vote Roms"

Maybe so.

Or, she recognizes her complaint was so overwrought (esp. in light of Obama's lie about waiving the Stafford Act) that, instead of apologizing for becoming emotionally unmoored by the episode, found another way to even the calls.

TML said...

Check out @ToddKincannon on the Twitters. He's got all the links, including this one

http://fotoforensics.com/analysis.php?id=0d00c0af9c4ba03ca250f45477e328c04e20b947.72077

To support a strong case for fakery.

Dr Weevil said...

Do we even know that this was taken at a Romney-Ryan rally? I see parts of five other people in the picture, none of whom seems to be wearing any R-R regalia, and all of whom are just standing there like lumps. Not very rally-like, is it? They don't appear to be standing in line for anything, either - too spread out.

So, is the whole thing posed? Did someone pay an ugly, bald, and very white guy to wear the shirt, and promise him and the rest that none of them would be recognizable in the picture, so there was no danger of national notoriety? No danger that anyone would recognize a face and say "Hey, I know that guy! I didn't know he was a racist a--hole!" or "Hey, I know that guy and he's a union guy and a fanatical Democrat! What's he doing wearing a racist R-R shirt? . . . . Ooooooh! I get it! Just another dirty trick!"

Wince said...

But I'm doing this because I have recently criticized Romney supporters for injecting race into presidential politics. I said it was a mistake for Rush Limbaugh and others to play that Obamaphone lady over and over.

Except Obama-phone lady was in a group of paid representatives sent by the Obama camp to a Romney event, and she was the one pulling racial string with her comments about the phones and who they were supposed to benefit along racial lines.

Being stooges of the Obama campaign sent to Romney events may be what Obama-phone lady and Bald-racist-white guy have in common.

In answer to your question, "'Shameful, lowly race-baiting... but who's doing it?'"

KCFleming said...

Obama has accomplished more than David Duke had ever hoped to achieve:

Barack Obama's presidency 'has not helped cause of black people in US'

".....recent books and surveys have shown that black American progress has often either halted or declined.

From increasing segregation in the workplace, to hundreds of thousands of young black men in prison, to stuttering levels of black voting and a black middle class sent into reverse by the recession...

About half of the 2.3 million people in US prisons are black.

When prisoners are included, the employment rate for young black men who have dropped out of school sinks from an already low 42% to 26%.

....eventually one in three of all black male adults will spend some time in prison if current trends continue.

In the 1930s, blacks were three times more likely to be incarcerated than whites, but the figure now is seven times more likely.

The Pew Charitable Trust showed that 68% of middle-class Americans are predicted to see their economic status decline in the next generation. The National Urban League civil rights group also showed that from 2005 to 2009 the average black household's wealth fell by more than half. Nor has economic decline stopped. From 2009 to 2012, median annual household income for blacks fell by 11.1%, compared with a drop of 5.2% for whites and 4.1% for Hispanics. The current black unemployment rate of 14% is roughly double that of the white jobless. However, it is not just recent economic turmoil that has dampened black progress in America.

Racial segregation between white and black men is increasing in one in six industries.

....it is white men who have gained access to managerial jobs since the 1960s.

"The United States is no longer on the path to equal employment opportunity," it says.
"

edutcher said...

PS Another recycle of the "Tea Partiers" with racist signs who turn out to be Lefties with racist signs.

purplepenquin said...

I assume he is a Romney opponent.

Of course you do. It seems that a lot of folks who comment on this blog refuse to beleive that anyone could truly be a racist SOB, and thus anyone who acts as such is merely a moby acting under a false flag....


....yet anything ugly/threatening that was said to you during the recall protests was absolutely the work of "the Unions" 'cause you find it impossible that Walker would actually follow through on his plan to put some "plants" into the crowd to cause problems.


*rolls eyes*


Rusty said...

I thought the recording was used — with deniability — to stir up racial feelings.

So stupid is a race now?
Should have seen that coming.

You know what I thought when I saw that video?
Now there's a gal who likes her Kesslers and PallMalls.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

This is the kind of false flag low ball crap that inspires bad faith groupthinkers (at blogs where somefeller resides) to spring into action. Look! -racists!

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

Who is this guy? What's his name?
He must have a name.

pm317 said...

Race neutral voters pick Romney or Obama based on your idea who is better. Race driven guys vote for Obama and we will see who wins in November.

SomeoneHasToSayIt said...

Democrats frequently become desperate when Republicans fail to live up to Democrats race-baiting strawmen characterizations.

Thus we get Tawana Brawley, folks burning crosses in their own yards, profs hanging nooses on there own doors, Congressmen hearing non-existent cries of 'nigger' as they walk across malls.

The list goes on and on.

And the reasons are always the same.

1. Republicans are not racists
2. Democrats are.
3. Republicans have fair-play standards
4. Democrats do not.

Doesn't exactly take Sherlock.

Charles said...

As @ToddKincannon pointed out, the guy wasn't even at the Romney event. He was outside of the event and there's no evidence that he ever got in (or even attempted to get in.)

sakredkow said...

An agent provocateur passed off by BuzzFeed as a Romney supporter. Both are complicit in the smear.

The paranoia of the right-wing is no longer a trope - it borders on the clinical.

furious_a said...

This tactic works. It worked successfully against the tea party.

It did? Really?

dbp said...

The difference between the left and the right: When an obvious plant is placed in a Republican setting (assuming this was even at a Romney event) it proves to the left exactly what they already knew. On the other hand, when someone at a Democratic event is wearing a Che' t-shirt--no big deal, totally acceptable.

Automatic_Wing said...

And one more thing, if Robert Stacy McCain says something, it must be true. Especially on matters relating to race.

Nice passive-aggressive ad hom, but why don't you engage with the substance of what McCain wrote? It seems extremely "convenient" for Ronmey's opponents that this guy put a Romney sticker on the back of his racist t-shirt and positioned himself right where the press photographers and only the press photographers could see the back of his shirt.

You're a smart, Ivy-educated lawyer, does it not occur to you to ask cui bono?

garage mahal said...

I don't know.... doesn't the skinhead give it away that this guy is a Republican?

Carnifex said...

@Pogo

As I said in an earlier posting about race, an inordinate number of the black middle class is there because of Governmental hiring practices. When the governments, whether city, county, state, or federal, have to start trimming the dead wood, the least effective workers will be the first to be let go.

It sounds racist but it is just the truth. While there are plenty of successful black people in America, the middle class black owes its allegiance to Affirmative Action. And when our great race baiting leaders like Rev. Jesse, and Rev. Al, notice the inordinate amount of blacks being laid off by governments, what will be their response? It will be reasonable, I'm sure (/sarc).

The beatings will continue until morale is improved!

Roger J. said...

I know--the guy is a painter who wants to get the contract to repaint the white house. No? That seems to me to as plausible as those who took this as racist given the dearth of information.

In the absence of any information as to the man's name, address, etc, some folks (is "folks", BTW, racist?) appear to have jumped to conclusions with very little supporting information. Alas--its the way of American politics.

I have no doubt that "racism" exists in American society, and probably always will--but there seems to me to far less racism than 40 years ago. I can only offer anecdotal evidence: Quite common to see a lot of interracial dating here in Memphis and Missippi. And as long as an increasingly less number of the population are racists, it becomes more difficult to apply the term to any perceived slight.

KCFleming said...

Garage exemplifies the racist thuggery of the Democratic Party.

Roger J. said...

Garage: I know as many upper middle class liberals who have adopted the shaved head look--its a fashion statement more than a political statement. Now why any guy would want to shave his head every day escapes me, but it seems to be the modern alpha male statement about tonsorial grooming.

I'm Full of Soup said...

Matthew & Sabian:

Unfortunately, most polls find Americans view the Tea Party negatively. I blame the MSM for that - it consistently portrayed the Tea Party as old and white and out of touch.

I think the Teap Party ideas are what we desperately need BTW.

dbp said...

Totally Republican

Matt Sablan said...

"I don't know.... doesn't the skinhead give it away that this guy is a Republican?"

-- Or just genetically bald. Or a cancer survivor. Or shaving his head for a Halloween costume.

I'm Full of Soup said...

I meant to address that last comment to Matthew and to Furious.

bagoh20 said...

I'm sorry, but there is no way to deal with this stuff but to ignore it. This post and the Obamaphone one just fanned the tiny ember back to flame. Even in this tiny community here it created racial division that was not there before. Racism is a construct. The cure at this point is to let it fade away. Stop reconstructing it. You're doing it to scratch your own itch, and feed giving in to your own need to pick the scab, and prove your virtue. Let it heal. Yes, scabs are ugly. Control your emotions, and don't give into selfish needs.

madAsHell said...

but who's doing it?

You show me who keeps playing the race card, and I'll show you a race baiter.

furious_a said...

phx: The paranoia of the right-wing is no longer a trope - it borders on the clinical.

Sure it does...

'08 race worker held in damage to Colorado Democratic HQ
Posted: 08/26/2009 01:00:00 AM MDT

One of two people suspected of shattering 11 windows Tuesday morning at the state Democratic Party headquarters has an arrest record and a history of helping a Democratic political candidate, public records show.

somefeller said...

Garage: I know as many upper middle class liberals who have adopted the shaved head look--its a fashion statement more than a political statement. Now why any guy would want to shave his head every day escapes me, but it seems to be the modern alpha male statement about tonsorial grooming.

I rock the shaved head look and have for a decade or so. You don't have to shave every day, just every 5 days or so unless you want no stubble ever. The main thing you really need to do is exercise frequently or you'll look like Uncle Fester.

sakredkow said...

And this is the party of "rational" people - the Democrats are the emotional ones.

furious_a said...

Unfortunately, most polls show...

...yes, and "studies show" and "some say", oh, those 2010 mid-terms.

Seeing Red said...

If I were at a Romney event, at minimum, I'd be standing close to this guy to hide the shirt or put a sign up.

Or point out what a moby he is and have people notice.

Carnifex said...

PHX said--"The paranoia of the right-wing is no longer a trope - it borders on the clinical.."

Really? that's the best you can do?

When the people you disagree with list event after event where a false flag event has occurred and it had been exposed as a false flag event, and the best you can come up with is "You're just paranoid"?

I at least gave an example of the republicans planning one, you didn't even go that far. Just went all ad hominem. I guess that's like going "full retard" ala Tropic Thunder.

Here's another paranoid event...Buzzfeed breathlessly reported that Romney's campaign had driven past a house in Virginia that was flying a confederate flag!

OMG!!11! Don't you see it?!11! Romney HAS to be a racist for this to occur. Surely no one in their right mind would drive past a random house displaying something so racist!11!

In other words jackwagon...


SQUIRREL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Michael said...

Garage. "I don't know.... doesn't the skinhead give it away that this guy is a Republican?"

Dude, I know you live in hicksville but that is no excuse. The skin head look long ago migrated to the left.

Roger J. said...

Somefeller--appreciate the comment--glad you dont have to run a razor over your scalp every day. Me? I bought a wahl clipper 10 years ago and just cut my hair very short. see a barber every month to trim up the spots I missed. When you dont have much hair, its the easy way to go.

Askance said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
virgil xenophon said...

Taking another bite at the apple, I ask why oh why is "identity politics" only "shameful, lowly race-baiting" and/or a "racial obscenity" when done by whites and not blacks? Is it not the fact that it is the left in general and blacks in particular that are driving our national politics in this direction? And is it also not a fact that the sentiments you deplore, Ann, in the "white in the White House" T-Shirt, while regrettable, (IF, in fact done by a real conservative) are noone but the natural push-back against odious race-based politics promulgated by the left in the first place? And why no moral outrage by you over the Convention buttons jrc007 alludes to, above? Funny, I must have missed that post..

Guess, what, Ann. I am sick unto death of the one-way street--the constant, overriding mantra of moral outrage and guilt-tripping about race and conservatives that people like you--the self described liberal "decents" of this world--attempt to lay on white conservatives by demanding that they constantly, unendingly, justify their very existence by forever repeating their "non-racist" bona fides?. Quit blacktopping the right, Ann, you doth protest overly much..

This Homey don't play that game..

Michael said...

Garage. "I don't know.... doesn't the skinhead give it away that this guy is a Republican?"

Dude, I know you live in hicksville but that is no excuse. The skin head look long ago migrated to the left.

Tank said...

Matthew Sablan said...

"(especially when Obama gets 95% percent support from unquestioning Blacks)."

-- I'm hesitant to say that's racial. Isn't that about the % that Democrats normally get across the board (maybe marginally higher?) Any -D gets that high of a vote, for reasons that are probably not racial.


The problem with this is that, once it became clear the Zero could actually get the nomination, 95% of blacks voted for him, against Hillary, who, in addition to having virtually the same political positions as Zero, was a woman, and should have been getting the "woman vote."

So, it's true Dems always get most black votes, but even between Dems, blacks vote black, if the choice is between a black and a white [of course, this is ok for them, affirmative action voting].

Ipso Fatso said...

"I don't know.... doesn't the skinhead give it away that this guy is Garage Mahal?"

FTFY

somefeller said...

I tried the Wahl clipper. Too messy (stubble everywhere) and some spots were always uneven. A Mach 3 razor every 4 or 5 days is the way to go. I recommend giving it a try.

Roger J. said...

Somefeller--at my age stubble isnt a problem :) My few hairs are usually, if I am lucky, cut to about an eighth of an inch. I will, however, give your suggestion a try. Thanks

sakredkow said...

PHX said--"The paranoia of the right-wing is no longer a trope - it borders on the clinical.."

Really? that's the best you can do?

When the people you disagree with list event after event where a false flag event has occurred and it had been exposed as a false flag event, and the best you can come up with is "You're just paranoid"?

I at least gave an example of the republicans planning one, you didn't even go that far. Just went all ad hominem. I guess that's like going "full retard" ala Tropic Thunder.

Here's another paranoid event...Buzzfeed breathlessly reported that Romney's campaign had driven past a house in Virginia that was flying a confederate flag!

OMG!!11! Don't you see it?!11! Romney HAS to be a racist for this to occur. Surely no one in their right mind would drive past a random house displaying something so racist!11!

In other words jackwagon...


SQUIRREL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!


Another shining beacon of all that right-wing "rationality" and reason.

My post was simple. You guys who are immediately going into "It's a false flag operation!" mode are showing real paranoia.

Note that I didn't say anything about Romney. Although I will say that I am sorry for the moderates in your party. Concerned troll that I am.

Bob Ellison said...

TML, thanks for the links to Todd MacKinnon's stuff. I tried to understand the foto evidence he posted, but didn't quite get it. Anyway, as you noted, Todd evidently thinks the case is made. But there's another picture of the guy wearing that shirt at another rally-- this one in Ohio. He gets around!

Unknown said...

It is simply a series of canards to dismiss racially flagrant symbolism as 1.) I don't want to talk about it so we won't and 2.) to even assume as the first point of rebuttal that the t-shirt fools are "plants" by the democrats to discredit Romney.

It is what it is. Low lifes inhabit both ends of the political spectrum and the farther each candidate pushes his position the more of these flakes show up.

This isn't just a GOP problem. It is an American problem that needs debate and discussion rather than a head in the sand.

Unknown said...

Michael said...
"The skin head look long ago migrated to the left."

As well as intelligence? What a stupid observation. leftist skinheads?????? are you f..g crazy?


sakredkow said...

Geez Lynn. Get a grip of your emotions, will ya? See how women can't think at all?

Diogenes of Sinope said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
pm317 said...

Matthew Sablan said...

"(especially when Obama gets 95% percent support from unquestioning Blacks)."

-- I'm hesitant to say that's racial
---------------------------

What Tank said. And to add, Obama and his minions painted Clintons and everyone who voted for Hillary as racist in Primary 2008. Dems on Dems, 95+% Blacks on 5-% Blacks who supported Hillary. I am comfortable giving some of that to group pride but 95%?!

Diogenes of Sinope said...

In the end the race baiters always win. There is no good way to defend against a false public charge of racism. They win because the majority of people inclined to believe that Republicans are racists are operating on an emotion, visceral level and not subject rational debate. Their reaction is immediate and emotional.

And with each false charge the race baiters slowly and surely build their case on the concept of the preponderance of the evidence principle.

sakredkow said...

Their reaction is immediate and emotional.

Heh. None of that from the righties here.

Roger J. said...

Lynn--take a deep breath and unclutch your pearls--I think we were talking about male tonsorial styles and not political statements. At least I was. Others? I can not speak for them.

somefeller said...

Roger: for your first razor shave, shave with the clippers first, wash and dry your scalp, then shave with razor and shaving cream. Your scalp will get used to the blade, but the first time it is sensitive. And use aftershave just like on your face, same principle.

Michael said...

Lynn. I think you should get out more.

Roger J. said...

Somefeller--thanks again--I will report back. Since I have little to do except chase kids and dogs off my lawn, I should have time to give this a shot.

Michael said...

Lynn. You should also observe the use of the word " look" in the statement that horrified you.

caplight45 said...

Have you no shame?

Soitently not! Nyuk nyuk nyuk.

garage mahal said...

@Ipso
I have a thick, wavy, and even unruly head of hair. I have them thin it out with those thinning shears every other time I get it cut. A nice problem to have to be sure, and i really do feel for men that don't have anything to work with.

AndyN said...

Ann Althouse: Romney supporters doing anything that can be construed as racist by independent voters like me will drive us to vote for Obama.

Shrieking Leftard: ZOMG!!! There's a Romney supporter wearing a racist shirt!!!!!!

Ann Althouse: It's shameful of you to use race baiting to try to sway voters.

They do it because they believe it will work. Their belief that it will work has been reinforced by people like you explicitly telling them that some forms of it will work.

Roger J. said...

Garage: as you age, I think you will find that less hair is a good thing. Unless, of course, like slo joe you want to hang on to it via hair plugs :) (sorry--it was a high hanging curve ball)

sakredkow said...

Shrieking Leftard: ZOMG!!! There's a Romney supporter wearing a racist shirt!!!!!

Rational Republican: ZOMG!!! It's a false-flag plant!!!!!

somefeller said...

Roger - you won't go back. I've had a few instances when I let my hair grow back for more of a standard bald guy look. They never lasted.

Anonymous said...

Reminds me of Obama telling Black pastors lies about Katrina's Stafford Act funding to whip up false racism charges.

It has to be a plant, that's the Democrat play book and they are desperate at this point.

I would hope that people in the middle, even if they believe it was a Romny supporter would see it is one guy, not Romny/Ryan.

Diogenes of Sinope said...

Andy N, the race baiters use race as a weapon because they have seen that it works well. They care nothing of truth or justice, ethics or morality, they only care about power.

Unknown said...

haha Roger J.

My husband took to shaving his head...and I gotta tell ya' that the visual is intoxicating...

go for the look. unless you are a Conehead of course.

edutcher said...

phx said...

An agent provocateur passed off by BuzzFeed as a Romney supporter. Both are complicit in the smear.

The paranoia of the right-wing is no longer a trope - it borders on the clinical.


Riiiight.

Now let's think back and try to recall the percentage of these "racist" incidents that turned out to be false flags.

Just about all, haven't they?

Roger J. said...

Lynn--its good to know that conservatives and liberals (and I assume you are a liberal) can agree on the important stuff.

Anonymous said...

That looks like a commercial print job. The first 10 pages of Google hits failed to turn up a seller for this particular shirt, but I did find a related item on this right-wing hate site.

alan markus said...

The Million Muppet March will be held on November 3rd.

Seems racist to mock the Million Man March in that manner. Or is it not racist, just a million puppets marching for Obama? We need a poll to sort that out!

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

Nice history rewrite try Ann, but you got your ass handed to you on the "Just How Racist Is the 'Obama Phone' Video?" post. And rightly so.

I disagree..

I think she captured on this post what happened in the Obamaphone radio play just right.

jungatheart said...

"Shameful, lowly race-baiting...but who's doing it?"

Althouse

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

The thing about racial politics is, we'll always have it until we decide to give it up.
We can start by judging people by the content of their character, not the color of their skin.


Stacy Dash is trying it... that woman is my hero.

ricpic said...

Althouse really thinks that her hypersensitivity, not to overt racism, to the merest hint of what she perceives to be borderline racism, that that is at the heart of the thinking of a sea of moderates as to how they will cast their vote. Whatever.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

Paul Z finds the seed.

The meme. It's a leftwing Palin hate site, with the left's signature racist Alinsky tactics all over it.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

Thats not fair deb.

If Althouse skips it it looks like we are hiding.. in some conspiracy of silence in the face of ugliness.

The best thing to do imo is what Althouse is doing. Condemn it.. and by helping to put the spotlight on it help bring to light whatever or whoever did this.

The media are going to do what they are known to do.. help Obama at any price.. we got to push back twice as hard by saying and demonstrating with our free speech that this is not what we conservatives.. Romney supporters stand for.

Dr Weevil said...

Lynn Meadows thinks there are no leftist skinheads. Apparently she's somehow missed the huge number of professional athletes who shave their heads. Many of them are black. Are we to assume that they're all Republicans because they shave their heads? Was jazzman Eddie 'Cleanhead' Vinson a Republican? Maybe, but the odds are against it. Is Michael Jordan? I don't think so, though I may be wrong in that case (can't be bothered to check). But I'm pretty sure a lot of the white athletes, and most of the black ones, who shave their heads are not right-wingers.

Of course, there's more than one reason for a man to shave his head. Here are five I can think of right off the top of my shiny bald head:

1. For younger men, especially in Hollywood (Bruce Willis), the NBA, and Wall Street, it seems to be an alpha-male dominance thing.

2. As a corollary to the preceding, some jobs are easier to do if a shaved skull helps inspire respect in one's subordinates. That's certainly true of high-school teaching: students are quicker to obey the instructions of a scary skinhead than a kindly-looking guy with a full head of hair, especially if the latter is gray (see also point 4 below).

3. For older bald or balding men (like me), it's more often a matter of being too cheap to pay barbers and wanting to save a whole lot of money by shaving our own heads. It's always annoyed me that barbers don't give any discount for a head with very little hair on it to start with. It only takes them half as long to clip one. (The first man I ever met who shaved his head was a naval officer, a friend of my father, in 1967. He was so bald that he could only grow a little patch of hair above each ear: there was nothing at all on top or in the back. Barbers wouldn't give him a discount - he asked them -, so every morning while shaving he'd just use a little more shaving cream than other men and keep going upwards from the chin to the jaw to the sideburns to the sides of his head and finish the job himself. He had to wear thick wooly hats in cool weather, but hats are cheap.) I also like not having to listen to a barber who won't shut the Hell up while he cuts my hair. Finally, I also save money on shampoo: soap and water work fine on a bare skull. Are right-wingers more likely to be cheap? Maybe, but there are plenty of cheap lefties, at least when it comes to spending their own money.

4. A side-effect of shaving one's head is that no one can tell the color of the hair that isn't there. I look a lot younger with no hair than with gray hair on the sides, and will continue to do so until my eyebrows turn gray. (I've always suspected that Michael Jordan started shaving his head not only to look cool but to cover the fact that he was getting bald. Not that I know for sure that he was getting bald, but I believe his father was bald, so it seems likely.) I could suggest that wanting to look younger than you are is more a left-wing than a right-wing thing, but that would be rude. It's certainly not purely right-wing.

5. In a few cases, people will shave their heads in solidarity with a friend who has lost all of his or her hair in chemotherapy. That's really sweet, and not at all right- or left-wing.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

PHX - Ann asks: "But who's doing it?"

ZOMG!

Clues. Got an answer for that one, PHX?

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

I'm going with false flag until shown otherwise.

garage mahal said...

@Roger
I had to get a flat-top from losing a bet once. It did look quite ridiculous and I was mercilessly mocked by my friends until it grew back. It just isn't me and I really am glad I do have hair.

AllenS said...

Good work, April. Take that libs.

Chip Ahoy said...

phx said...
Their reaction is immediate and emotional.

Heh. None of that from the righties here.


This is pure bullshit and you know better. You utterly refuse to address the obvious facts and keep returning to this nonsense. You're stuck. Presently stuck on mean and stupid.

Aaaaaaaaaand you are doing exactly what this bullshit is intended to produce. It's recognized immediately for exactly what it is, it's not tolerated, it's why, it's exactly why the Democrats are failing, that and being incompetent -- its innate racism is rejected. And fast.

Fr Martin Fox said...

Somefeller:

Who is the fellow in the white White house t-shirt voting for? Do you know? I have no idea. The outlet publishing the photo doesn't tell us anything about him.

I don't know if he's a moby, but it's a classic tactic, and there is a remedy: the reporter asks the individual's name, and publishes his face.

Then, if he is a plant, it can be exposed.

Let me ask you, do you think it might be a good idea for the media to help provide that sort of transparency?

Because, after all, there is another possible tactic (which is wrong, but may happen): the Romney folks could do the same. (And I predict, at that point, the reporters will wake up and do their job.)

I recall when I lived in DC, a friend of mine and I decided to go to a rally the unions were sponsoring on housing. Just as Mr. McCain said on his blog, the place was well seasoned with a variety of socialist and even communist folks.

If one fascist or racist shows up at a right-wing event, the media says it defines what that group stands for; why doesn't that same go for folks advocating communism? This was during the Cold War.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

Thank you AllenS, but I can't take credit. Paul Zrimsek @ 10:44 nailed it.

The link is pretty damning. Notice all the blind faith /bad faith leftists have scattered.

What say you, democrats?

Care to condemn ugly racism on YOUR side?

I suspect the deceptive left is fine with ugly False Flag operations. Just so long as such operations help their cause.

Unknown said...

Dr Weevil said...
Lynn Meadows thinks there are no leftist skinheads. Apparently she's somehow missed the huge number of professional athletes who shave their heads."

Honeybunch, my husband is both black and an x-professional athlete and if you think that is what is meant by the term "skin-head" then you only suitable for the GOP camp of ignorance unless Fix News scoops you up first.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

Its been my experience that people who go to GOP rallies are for the most part politically astute people.

It would not surprise me if this photo was not taken at a Romney rally as claimed.. it could be a staged photo.

Lets Remember what we are dealing with here.

In classic Chicago style politics, a dispatched group of Obama camp supporters tried to crash Paul Ryan’s speech during a campaign stop in Iowa yesterday.

Liberal commentator Mark Halperin admitted the hecklers, who even tried to storm the stage, appeared to be “on duty” Democrats who were dispatched to disrupt the event
.

If its easy to conscript more than a few people to do the sort of thing I just linked to... how easy could it be to conscript one... to pay one... to find a volunteer... to put on that shirt.

Bob said...

I have found ONE place to get a tee shirt with this racist sentiment, and that is a left-wing anti-Palin Zazzle shop:

http://www.zazzle.com/antipalin/gifts?cg=196681417743621968

AllenS said...

And good work to you too, Paul. Sorry that I didn't see your link the first time through. Fuck off, libs.

Unknown said...

Here is a fucking clue - Those of us that don't care about race are sick about how all those old racist fuckers obsess about race all the fucking time.

I've had it with the baby boomers and the new young fuckers they have infected with the lowest form of collectivism, ie racism.

Move on! Grow up! Just because you see the world through race tinted glasses doesn't mean the rest of us do.

Example Obamaphone video:
I saw a person acting like a fool.

Ann saw a black person acting like a fool.

Huh, and I'm somehow the racist.

Suck my balls.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

somefeller - What is your opinion of this?

Unknown said...

Oh and yes, I do think this was probably a false flag event.

Damn, this crap makes me so angry.

I hate having to deal with race obsessed idiots all the time.

Dr Weevil said...

What kind of moron calls someone "Honeybunch" when she's verbally abusing him? The same kind who thinks that "skinhead" in the context of this thread means something other than "man with a shaved head". We are of course talking about a man of whom we know nothing except that he has a shaved (or very close-cropped) head and is wearing a racist T-shirt.

I am of course well aware that a very small subset of men with shaved heads are "skinheads" in a narrower sense. Is there any reason to think that the man in the picture is one of them? Is he wearing steel-toed boots? Not possible to say. Does he have a criminal record? If we knew his name, or could see his face, it might be possible to find out. Is he a member of a gang? If so, he doesn't seem to have brought them with him. Is he young? Definitely not. Do skinheads in the narrow sense vote Republican? I seriously doubt it. Do they have anything to do with the subject of this thread? No.

Renee said...

When I think of racists, I guess the white supremacy type, that they wouldn't like Mormons or Catholics as well.

Considering Obama is half white, and assuming his mother's ancestry is protestant, he is more 'white' then a Mormon or a Catholic.

I saw it on "I have Cheezeburger", I didn't see it as funny. But I again I'm voting for Romney, from Massachusetts, where no one thought he was a bad governor.

Anonymous said...

I'd still guess it's not an Obama supporter posing as a Romney supporter, but a sincere Obama supporter who thinks he's making a clever, ironic sally. (Think "an even more witless somefeller"-- and shudder.)

bagoh20 said...

It's 20 freaking 12! Could we get something a little more new, interesting, and compelling like maybe pictures of kittens with funny captions. And, no, I don't care what color their fur is.

Unknown said...

Dr Weevil said...
What kind of moron calls someone "Honeybunch" when she's verbally abusing him?"

'cause honeybunch, i was raised in the deep south and when we learned how properly to diss someone we used that term. my momma taught me that and it has endured to great effect.

MaggotAtBroad&Wall said...

Rush played the audio of the woman and not once did he ever mention race. Althouse did. Rush played it because he was trying to create the impression that the woman is a typical Obama supporter who supports him because he will give more "free" stuff (e.g., a phone) to people already on the government dole. The woman even mentioned social security, medicare, and disability in the interview. So neither she nor Rush ever mentioned race at all. You bizarrely wanted to see a racial angle that wasn't there. Rush played it because the woman is a symptom of the entitlement society, which Rush strongly opposes.

The man wearing the shirt with the offensive slogan is clearly, overtly racial. You can draw no other conclusion. But because we only see a picture we do not get the benefit of questioning his motives. Unlike the Obamaphone woman, who appeared eager to explain why she supports Obama - and not once did she mention or even imply her reasons are rooted in race.

I do agree that anybody who linked to the photo of the guy wearing the shirt is just as guilty as the photographer and the shirt wearer. They all wanted to spread the exact same message that some people who support Romney are doing so on racial grounds. Finally, even the clown at BuzzFeed says the Romney campaign called the shirt "reprehensible". I'm not sure the Obama campaign was ever asked to comment on the Obamaphone video. Probably because the video was as absurd as reflecting Obama's views as the shirt is absurd in reflecting Romney or his supporters views.

Comparing the two events in racial terms is weak.

Unknown said...

ul Zrimsek said...
I'd still guess it's not an Obama supporter posing as a Romney supporter, but a sincere Obama supporter who thinks he's making a clever, ironic sally."

or, to be more probable, it is a typical right wing bone head supporting his best candidate chance for racial inequality.

Seeing Red said...

It it really an obscenity or becoming a caricature?

Polling the youngsters, they want AA to end.

Renee said...

A year or two ago, during a Boston Tea Party, these had a few people with racists signs. Again this is Boston, the northeast. Actual members of the Tea Party, took pictures and posted online, what was being done to their ralliess.

Again who took this picture? Can Snopes find out? Any other eye witnesses, was the person taking the photograph 'in on it'?

Dr Weevil said...

Poor stupid Lynn Meadows thinks calling me "Honeybunch", while utterly ignoring my argument, somehow makes me look bad? Well, bless her ignorant little heart.

AllenS said...

Maggot, scroll up to the links provided by Paul and April.

Seeing Red said...

Doesn't "my dear friend" or whatever Joe said work just as well, or is it a cultural thing?

YoungHegelian said...

There seems to be a standing assumption on the Left that a racist could not & would not support Obama.

That assumption is wrong. Here, from Esquire, in their own words, straight from the horse's ass, is why various racists supported Obama in 2008.

It really would behoove the Left to kick notions of "False Consciousness" to the curb and actually listen to what their opponents are saying.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

Comparing the two events in racial terms is weak.

I dont think Althouse is comparing them as much as anticipating some push back concomitant to Obamaphone.

I dont think she holds them both up as originating from the same mint.

LilyBart said...


Hey, wasn't electing Barack Obama supposed to bring racial healing to the country?

Did you notice we are more divided than ever?

Seeing Red said...

--This isn't just a GOP problem. It is an American problem that needs debate and discussion rather than a head in the sand.--

This isn't unique to America.

Do parts of Europe still throw bananas at the soccer players?

furious_a said...

Fr. Fox:
Who is the fellow in the white White house t-shirt voting for? Do you know? I have no idea.


...but I have an idea where his tee-shirt came from.

"Lynn Meadows" appears to be a cornpone "Lindsey Meadows" who's kicked her smoking habit.

Seeing Red said...

Was it in Spain? I can't remember.

Chip S. said...

Whether this one guy is a Dem or a Rep makes no difference to me. I'm already pretty sure that not very many Klan members are voting for Obama.

Tough shit.

I know what my reasons are for supporting Romney over Obama, and they are completely unaffected by finding out who this bozo is. I know they call these things political "parties," but I'm not picking a group of friends on Nov. 6. I'm helping pick a new and better president than the guy we've got.

Pretty simple, really.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

Althouse knows her commenters.

By know.. I dont mean the biblical sense ;)

Seeing Red said...

Wasn't Lindsey of Jewish background who lost family in the Holocaust?

This Lynn is from the deep south?

Am I getting confused?

FleetUSA said...

At plenty of Tea Party meetings I saw infiltrators trying to bait Tea Party members to see B0 as a Nazi. They shunned the infiltrators. So this sounds like same crap.

Anonymous said...

Relax, I'm sure the guy's identity will be revealed in the days to come, then we can call each other racists for real, 'kay?

Seeing Red said...

Can call?

Have been called for 4 years.

wyo sis said...

How about, for the next month, we make a pact not to believe anything about either candidate that is politicized?
We believe only that which can be verified, and not just by a supposedly neutral journalist.
I know, what's the fun in that?

bagoh20 said...

FYI, The daredevil dude who is jumping from 120,000 ft. is ascending via balloon. He's currently at 80,000 ft and rising at about 17mph. You can watch it live, including from inside his capsule at:

http://www.space.com/17956-red-bull-stratos-skydive-live-video.html

rcommal said...

This one seems awfully obvious to me and certainly got the needle on my bullshit meter going. I agree with those who say the absence of context is highly suspicious in this case. I want to know where the picture of the guy's face is--especially if he refused to give his name or an interview (a likely scenario, if this guy's for real, btw) to the reporter--if indeed an actual reporter was involved. I can tell you that when I was reporting events, I would have insisted on talking to this guy and if he refused, I would have doubly-insisted that the photographer get a picture of this guy's face.

I don't, as it happens, have a problem believing that there are racists out there. I can even imagine racists dumb enough or arrogant enough to wear this sort of shirt. But this **stinks to high heaven** and **screams set-up** to me, and I'm not one who tends to just jump to conclusions like that.

This is very irresponsible, and it is outrageous. I'm with Althouse on this one.

edutcher said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Anonymous said...

Baggy, what a twist on hang gliding!

AllenS said...

Inga, you need to relax, and scroll up to the links provided by Paul and April.

edutcher said...

What AprilApple linked.

And Insta links to confirmation the shirt came from an anti-Palin site.

Ann needs to update the post.

I don't expect the trolls to offer any admission that they were wrong.

Again.

But this should be a warning to a lot of other people.

Anonymous said...

Whatever happened to that young woman who said her face was cut up by some Obama supporter back in 2008, I wonder?

YoungHegelian said...

@Fleet,

.... Tea Party members to see B0 as a Nazi.

The guys with the Obama = Hitler signs are LaRouchites, and they show up at every large demonstration of the Right or the Left with some sort of provocative sign so that they can attract attention, and, maybe, just maybe, peel off some new members.

The LaRouche movement really is sui generis in the American political scene, but, when they run candidates for office they always run 1) with the most anodyne sounding Anglo-Saxon names (e.g. Sally Smith never Consuela Rodriguez) & 2) always as Democrats.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

Somefeller, If your lizard king doesn't already own one, you should purchase a few of these lovely items for him. He'll love them! The perfect gift for the deceptive race-obsessed left.

Anonymous said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Anonymous said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
Lem the artificially intelligent said...

One thing is for sure... the truth will come out... and once it does... I'm confident it will not hurt my candidate and if it doesn't hurt the party that originated it... it might make them pause when they think of trying it the next time.

Thats why is important, imo, to air this out, even if we have to hold our noses, because if we dont they are just going to keep trying it over and over... until their wish to make GOP synonyms with this kind of shit.

Lets not be afraid of getting our uniforms duty... (thats baseball lingo for those of you thinking of taking it somewhere else)

bagoh20 said...

"Baggy, what a twist on hang gliding!"

He's just gonna fall. We FLYYYYYY!

The onboard camera shows the outside of the capsule, and you can see that the steps have non-skid, so he doesn't slip and fall. That would be tragic. I'm sure it's government mandated.

I recently built handrails for our flying club, that the city required, so that the pilots that just jumped off a 3,500 mountain don't accidentally fall off the 3ft platform where they drink beer.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

This shadowy character - Andrew Kaczynski - obviously doesn't care about his credibility.

Buzzfeed - LOL.

Anonymous said...

Hi Allen, I am relaxin' slept late and I am now having ( or drinking, slurping, sipping) coffee with Irish cream and a pumpkin chocolate chunk scone, yummm..

Anonymous said...

I agree with phx. Heaven knows, the pure hearted liberals, who are so much kinder and better than those terrible conservatives, would never, ever stoop to false flag operations. 'Cause phx is a huge believer in civility. Stop being so paranoid, Rethuglicians! Well, except there's this:

"One of two people suspected of shattering 11 windows Tuesday morning at the state Democratic Party headquarters has an arrest record and a history of helping a Democratic political candidate, public records show.

Police said that about 2:20 a.m., 24-year-old Maurice Schwenkler, now in custody, and an at-large accomplice took a hammer to the picture windows displaying posters touting President Barack Obama and his health care reform efforts.

Early Tuesday, Democratic Party chairwoman Pat Waak said the damage to her building in Denver's art district was a consequence of "an effort on the other side to stir up hate." She tempered her statement after Schwenkler's political history was revealed."

http://www.denverpost.com/commented/ci_13203950

rcommal said...

**Sigh**

Do I have to say setups to make the other side look bad or to demonize candidates in unfair, inflammatory ways are disgraceful no matter who does it?

OK, consider it said.

Anonymous said...

Haha, I would need handrails. But seriously Baggy how long can you glide/ fly before you eventually fall? Or do you fall gently and land on your feet?

AllenS said...

Unrelax, Inga, and scroll up to the links provided by Paul and April.

sakredkow said...

If this was a false flag attempt and I'm wrong, then I am wrong. Mea culpa. I would never hesitate to eat crow when I had it coming.

The ONE thing I co-signed on in this thread was as follows:

"It is what it is. Low lifes inhabit both ends of the political spectrum and the farther each candidate pushes his position the more of these flakes show up.

This isn't just a GOP problem. It is an American problem that needs debate and discussion rather than a head in the sand."

bagoh20 said...

Inga, On a good day, as long as the sun's up. We are sun powered. The record is about 500 miles overland.

bagoh20 said...

Yes, we land on our feet mostly.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

Edutcher got the lowdown @ 12:01.

rcommal said...

God, Zazzle is making me want to puke up the coffee I just drank. Or had, or whatever.

Disgusting.

Anonymous said...

Relax Allen, I saw the links. Now I could go all conspiratorial here and say that he's a Romney supporter, pretending to be a Obama supporter. o_O

Fr Martin Fox said...

Furious_a:

Well, the websites I've seen, linked here, don't show a shirt that looks like that picture.

But, having a shirt made up isn't that hard.

rcommal said...

Yep. And someone knows who made that T-shirt and who sold it (if not bought it).

rhhardin said...

It's false flag but not race baiting.

It's the opposite, counting on whites not being racists and therefore wanting to disassociate themselves from the tea party.

There's no benefit in stirring up blacks.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

This shadowy character - Andrew Kaczynski - obviously doesn't care about his credibility.

Thats why we need to, at the risk of not averting our eyes, call out this shit so that next time the aiders and abettors (like this Buzzfeed fellow) will do their work with do care and vet this stuff out b4 putting it out.

edutcher said...

phx, you're an honest man.

rcommal said...

Plenty of do-it-yourself custom T-shirt sellers on the Internet.

Anonymous said...

"Do I have to say setups to make the other side look bad or to demonize candidates in unfair, inflammatory ways are disgraceful no matter who does it? "

Agreed.

The irritating thing is that when idiots like Maurice Schwenkler vandalize the Obama campaign HQ in Denver, it is, according to Dems, only the action of one deranged fool and does not reflect on Dems as a whole. When an idiot shows up at a Tea Party rally in an objectionable T-shirt or falsely claims to have been attacked by Obama supporters, somehow those people are held to be indicative of how ALL conservatives "really" think and behave.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

This isn't just a GOP problem. It is an American problem that needs debate and discussion rather than a head in the sand."

I might not disagree, were it not for the fact that if we were to continue on the Obama course, pounding sand would be all thats left.

Fr Martin Fox said...

OK, aside from the political angle...

Who knows people like this? Anyone?

I have known people who, I think would say that they don't want a black man as president; same with some who wouldn't want a Mormon or a Muslim or an atheist.

But the folks I'm thinking of know they will get in trouble for saying such things, so they are careful who they say it to.

What sort of people wear that shirt? I know they exist. Does anyone know such people?

Dr Weevil said...

Here's an angle that I don't think has been covered adequately above:

The fact that there's only one picture is itself suspicious. When Zombie goes to a leftie rally in San Francisco or Berkeley, he (she?) comes back with dozens of pictures. For every really offensive picture, there's another similar one nearly as offensive in just the same way. The very abundance of evidence tells you that they can't all have been posed or photoshopped.

This even applies to second-hand evidence from far-away places. When a Pakistani demonstrator waves an Osama sign with a muppet on it, or catches himself on fire while burning an American flag, we all wonder whether the almost-too-good-to-be-true picture was photoshopped, but in both of those cases (as I recall) there were multiple pictures from different angles available on the web. Here we have one single picture, and that is itself highly suspicious.

bagoh20 said...

Fr. Fox, Religious beliefs are, I think, a valid reason to reject someone. Not blindly, but it matters, while race does not.

bagoh20 said...

The record for a manned balloon ascent has just been broken. He's now at 116,000ft.

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

The record for a manned balloon ascent has just been broken. He's now at 116,000ft.

You mean he surpassed the hot air of air force one?

Mighty feat indeed.

Fr Martin Fox said...

Bagoh20:

Well, I would say that a citizen is free to cast his vote for any reason whatsoever; the reasons themselves will likely range from more to less reasonable.

If someone votes against a candidate on religious reasons, it may be reasonable, or it may not.

bagoh20 said...

The decision has been made. He will jump. He's at 123,000ft. He's getting ready to go right now. Live on video!

bagoh20 said...

Holy shit. I got wood.

Ned said...

There is ZERO difference between you and buzzfeed when it comes to race baiting...see if you can figure that out...

Lem the artificially intelligent said...

Good call Weevil.

Anonymous said...

I think you get two people who do this type of thing.

1. An actual white supremist and one with low intelligence. They exist but in small numbers
2. A political troll looking to manufacture a racial issue as a form of marketing for vote and keeping the base inline. There are probably 100 more these types of people out there than the white supremist.

Romney doesn't support either type in any way, shape, or form.

Synova said...

I don't think it's impossible that the guy was exactly what he presented himself as. Nevertheless, I did notice how new the shirt was, how white and crispy the letters were.

One of the buzzfeed comments was more or less, sure, there are racists on the left, too, but they know better than to wear a shirt like that... as if that made them better people. But what does it take to *believe* that Republicans don't know better than to wear a shirt like that?

My understanding of how the world works, though, is that people who would wear a shirt like that *honestly* will simply do so. If you believe those things you also believe in your moral rightness. This is my problem with all the "code" and "dog whistle" bull shit. People who really and truly do think that other races are inferior simply say so. No mystery. Just like Cedarford simply says what he believes about the Jewish Conspiracy.

So sure, whatever, this guy may have been an actual white supremacist in his brand new special event T-shirt, believing that in their hearts everyone else agrees with him and will secretly like the shirt.

Which means he thinks the same way as the buzzfeed commenters, that in their hearts everyone else there agrees with him and secretly likes the shirt. And they feel all vindicated at the Republicans finally openly saying what they always knew was absolutely true.

And does it matter if the guy was a "false flag" or a "plant"? Does anyone who's prejudices were confirmed care?

There is a word for believing bad things about a whole group of people because of who they are and not because of what they've done.

It's called being a bigot.

Anonymous said...

According the League of Women voters precursors to voting fraud in any way shape or form never happen. So this was an actual white supremist. case closed. No need to investigate further.

Dante said...

The sub-culture has been stubbornly resistant to Baby Boomer efforts to bring them into the mainstream. See Pogo's list above.

Therefore, one should:

a) Continue on the same path, because it's right, elect a race baiting black president, implement AA version 2, adopt Multi-culturalism and PCism

b) Consider the above approaches are inherently racist, and reject them in favor of race neutral methods, such as merit and demerit based approaches.

Dr Weevil said...

If we had more pictures, or (even better) a film, would we see the other people around this guy noticing his shirt and telling him "Get the Hell away from me, you racist creep! Romney and Ryan don't need any support from the likes of you!" or something like that? Just wondering why we don't have any context at all. Well, not really wondering: I think we all know why there's no context.

Caroline said...

What sort of people wear that shirt? I know they exist. Does anyone know such people?

I know personally two racists- one is a 74 yr. old Irish-American male Democrat from NYC; the other is a 70 yr. old Puerto Rican Republican female from Brooklyn. (Ironically they married each other.)

I doubt either would wear such a shirt. Even though they are old and racist, they are aware that racism is unacceptable today. Kids and grandkids remind them constantly when they slip up.

Dr Weevil said...

"Ironically, they married each other"? No. Conveniently for everyone else. As my mother always said when two weird or unpleasant people married each other, "Why ruin two marriages?"

Unknown said...

Dr Weevil said...
Poor stupid Lynn Meadows thinks calling me "Honeybunch", while utterly ignoring my argument.."


sweetiepie, i didn't notice an argument made by you....sorry.

Joe Biden, America's Putin said...

Fr Martin Fox-
It's about the sentiment. Where did that ugly phrase originate? The zazzle site gives us a huge clue.

Seeing Red said...

Felix did not break the freefall record.

Unknown said...

I've got a theory.

Romeny is so upside down with the black vote that he hired some stooge with a racist t-shirt and tried to blame the democrats for planting this stooge to draw attention to his party's (GOP's) racist underpinnings and to deflect his hiring this stooge, has a bunch of clods posting on a blog that it is a strawdog and really a democratic operative.

just sayin'.

Caroline said...

As my mother always said when two weird or unpleasant people married each other, "Why ruin two marriages?"

Hey- are you calling my mother and step-father weird? They can, indeed, at times be unpleasant. ;)

yashu said...

"The paranoia of the right-wing is no longer a trope - it borders on the clinical."

Riiiight.

Now let's think back and try to recall the percentage of these "racist" incidents that turned out to be false flags.

Just about all, haven't they?


Exactly. There is plenty of documented evidence of this kind of thing being done by Democrats in recent years. Much of it exactly at this point of the 2008 campaign. Links have been provided to attest this. And there are further reasons given in this particular case of this particular guy/ photograph that corroborate the "false flag" hypothesis.

But you mock right-wingers here as irrational and paranoid for (1) making that probable inference and (2) objecting to this kind of thing. Disappointing from you, phx.

Though your last comment is better. But yeah, it sure would be easier to "prove" it's a false flag if the media "journalists" (or journolists) circulating this photo had taken the trouble to, oh I don't know, get the guy's name. Or find out more about the circumstances and context in which he supposedly appears.

I always call out mobys here when I think I see them. Sometimes I say, I'm not sure if it's a moby, but in any case it's a troll. This guy is probably a moby (I'm 95% sure), but in any case he's a troll. And in any case, it's disgusting for the journolists to propagate this meme.

As was noted here, Buzzfeed is the same outfit that reported "Romney van passes house with Confederate flag."

Buzzfeed is much more worthy of your mockery than "paranoid" right-wingers here.

Carnifex said...

PHX=Shiloh.

Just likes shouting squirrel as loud and often as they can. Going on the ignore as an asswipe list.

Alex said...
This comment has been removed by the author.
«Oldest ‹Older   1 – 200 of 314   Newer› Newest»