Even though "he could have checked white, checked both black and white, or checked the last category on the form, 'some other race,' which he would then have been asked to identify in writing." In the last census, in 2000, 6.8 million Americans opted to present themselves as bi- or multi-racial. Presumably, a lot more people will do that in 2010. Why didn't Obama?
The census form, we should see, extracts an opinion about race from us. And what do we think of the opinion of the President who, some of us thought, would move us into a new era of race?
My first thought was that he disrespected his mother and maternal grandparents, who contributed so much more to his upbringing than his father ever did. My second thought was that his experiences in society, including his rise into vast political power, had so much to do with being perceived as black (and not white). My third thought was that he wants to preserve his designation as The First Black President. He's into himself as a historical figure, and First Mixed Race President doesn't have the same cachet — and there'd be all those pesky arguments about whether he was the first. Out on the internet, I'm seeing claims that various former Presidents — Thomas Jefferson, Andrew Jackson, Abraham Lincoln, Warren Harding, Calvin Coolidge — had a mixed racial ancestry. I can see not wanting to get bogged down in that.
April 3, 2010
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192 comments:
Yesterday, I posted some quotes from his book. Read them, and then you'll understand.
Of course that's "second black president".
fixed.
He is identified as "white" on his birth certificate, so this balances that.
Trey - wv = native lol
"Obama passes the biracial option . . . "
This is a decision he made quite a while ago--certainly before Harvard, probably well before.
Seems to me that Obama would have needed to decide to buck the tide at a young age to classify himself other than black.
The society classifies him--and people like him--as black. We did so by statute in many state, to provide a disincentive to racial interbreeding. We do so more or less instinctively now.
Plus Obama quickly learned how to take advantage of being black.
I was truly offended by that question on the census form. There are certainly valid reasons for gathering information on race, but to break down into 5 possible categories the "hispanic or latino" possibility, or into 11 possible categories the "Asian or Pacific Islander" group just struck me as too much.
So I entered "post racial American."
F
Polarizing!
Claiming to be unifier, maybe Obama feels that America should finally enter an era where race is disregarded as an issue just as he disregarded it on the form. He could be modeling behavior he wants to see in America.
He was simply confused because the census form does not have a separate block to check that says: "[_} You are The One"
"bipass" not "bypass"?
I did not check any boxes. I wrote in American Born.
You should just delete this blog post.
One of the sad things about Obama's exploitative treatment of race is that his choice will encourage other biracial individuals to choose a single racial identity, thus hardening identity politics. But, after all, identity politics is what really got him elected in the first place. Ask Bill Clinton.
""bipass" not "bypass"?"
LOL.
Maybe our Prez was singing to himself and forgot the rest of the words:
The ink is black, the page is white
Together we learn to read and write
A child is black...
Shocking that a 20-year member of Rev Wright's race-baiting church would self-identify as black, eh?
The idea that Obama would move us into a new era of race relations was always absurd on its face. It's well past time to stop clinging to that illusion.
We haven't gotten a census form because the US Post Office because the Government sent them to our street addresses and we have no mail delivery to the street unless you put up a mail box at the street. 90% of the people in this rural area have PO Boxes.
So the Post Office returned all the census forms.
Now, we get to see if anyone will actually show up to ask census questions. Probably not since we are not at home during the day. Working ya know.
Nevertheless....I plan to put Tauren as my race in the other category. Or, maybe, Undead. That would be a good choice.
I also am offended. Only one choice for White and multiple choice for everything else? How about Welsh/Basque/Irish/German which is what I really am.
I identified as "American". Sure, not really a race, but neither is black or white. As for Obama, I think your second reason is the right one--first black president is central to his legacy. Why pointlessly risk screwing that up?
Select "Other".
Write in "Human".
This just proves that Obama and liberals are obsessed with race.
first of all, nearly all black americans have not-to-distant white ancestry. that is actually part of being black american from a purely racial perspective. and this has nothing to do with who raises you.
more importantly, when Obama was asked about this in particular -- he said 'African-American' because his dad is African, and his mother is American.
are people w/ Irish or German mother and an american born father 'disrespecting' their mother when they write 'white' and not German-American ?
i havent clicked on that 'he's into himself as a historical figure' link, but hope very much that you are not there referencing shelby steele as an authority on what it means to be black because that guy is not taken seriously by anyone except the white people who are not really interested in knowing anything about black people -- rather he's only for the white people for whom he confirms what they already think.
I haven't gotten a census form yet. Should I have?
I selected other for myself, my wife and kids and then wrote in American by each. It's a legit answer and one you can be proud of.
At least we don't have this, kind of thinking, anymore.
But, you know, as soon as we get over color and culturally defined race designations, our national health database will start doing DNA analyses of racial markers.
gosh ann, what a disappointment.
you do take shelby steele seriously.
It was a political choice. That's why we even know about it.
Indeed, the "race" choices on the census were about nationality more than race. Japanese, Korean, Chinese vs. White. No Italian, Greek, Irish.
Made no sense, and I can't figure out why they did it that way, or how that data will be used.
I was completly unaware german was a race. The things I learn here. So I put american on mine.
As Blago said you don't sell the victimhood status for nothing. And truth about race is a poor construct from days of Africans owned as slaves by every race and tribe that could make a living off of them, much like Thai girls and boys in todays world trade in sex slaves. Politics is winner take all, and for now we do have elections that are counted honestly, almost.
for all of you people who chose not to check 'white' and instead opted 'human' or 'other', why did you do this ?
and anyone w/ a parent of european descent who didnt write [name of country]-American ? why not ?
Don't be a biracist
American culture still follows the one-drop rule. Obama's daughters may someday not choose black on a census form but we haven't made that much progress as of today.
German-Danish-English-Scottish-Alsace Lorraine-maybe somewhere in there some Mediterranean-Virginian-Okie-Floridian-Texan-Houstonian fair-to-olive tho' tan in the summer-complexioned American?
We should all be Racy-Americans.
Race is in the eye of the beholder.
I noticed that there was no category for Arab or even any Middle Eastern origin, yet India and Pakistan were listed as different "races." There were options for all Pacific Islands and Asian countries but no options for if you were, say, Somalian, which is a significant immigrant population in some areas.
What Bill Harshaw said.
Duh.
Roman isn't even on the form this year.
The Zero is the whitest white guy in the country and, yes, I include the Bush and WF Buckley families. He uses black the way the Kennedys use Catholic and Irish.
danielle said...
...
are people w/ Irish or German mother and an american born father 'disrespecting' their mother when they write 'white' and not German-American ?
One is ethnic, the other racial. Almost all people who are German-descended, which is their ethnic background, are white, which is their race. Unless you are telling us you're one of those closet Aryans who insist the Krauts are the Master Race.
BTW Most people of German descent in this country think of themselves as Americans, not German-American. I thought this was another of the National Socialists' mind games, trying to break the American people into petty, bickering camps, but apparently danielle actually believes it.
MayBee said...
It was a political choice. That's why we even know about it.
Indeed, the "race" choices on the census were about nationality more than race. Japanese, Korean, Chinese vs. White
Agree on the politics, but Japanese, Koreans, and Chinese do think of themselves as different racially. That was part of the reason for the way Japan treated conquered Asians in WWII.
Actually, the list should have simply said Asian, since those from the Orient are usually classed that way, but I have a feeling we're going to find out we have a whole new range of oppressed minorities after the Census is "analyzed".
Note, of course, the races are not listed as Caucasian, Negro, and Mongol.
It's quite obvious that Omama is a race baiter and a bigot. What'd you expect?
"My first thought was that he disrespected his mother and maternal grandparents, who contributed so much more to his upbringing than his father ever did."
That was my first thought too. The second thought is of course, in keeping with his opportunistic tendencies, he wants to fully exploit how he looks, the superficial rather than the substance of his existence(surprise! surprise!). How nice it would have been if he paid homage to both his lineage, the white and the black to truly become a post-racial president. Of course his crass calculation if he did that is that he may not get the 95+% support from the black people he has exploited all along.
Calvin Coolidge claimed to have some Native American ancestry, though apparently there's no actual proof of that; what is proven, however, is that Charles Curtis, who was vice-president to Herbert Hoover, was one-quarter Kaw. (That's a Native American tribe.) Is that multiracial enough for this age, or do only African Americans and Hispanics -- who aren't even a different "race", they are European plus black and/or whatever Indian tribes they encountered in their part of the world, and Spaniards are European) count these days?
This whole race thing is stupid, and it only lives on because the livelihoods of so many bureaucrats and academics depends on the racial spoils system. I reject it all, and I put "unknown/adopted" on my census form because I am adopted and I never bothered to look up my blood relatives.
BTW Most people of German descent in this country think of themselves as Americans, not German-American. I thought this was another of the National Socialists' mind games, trying to break the American people into petty, bickering camps, but apparently danielle actually believes it.
And that's because they have no distinctly "German-American" cultural following of which to speak. They have largely been assimilated into a blander, definition-less understanding of "white". Things might have been different around the time of the founding, and even during the build-up to WWII. But those days are long gone.
Irish and Italian-Americans, Greeks, etc., esp. on the East Coast, not so much.
The issue is that "race" has now been subsumed by what we now think of as culture (with obvious exceptions when it comes to coloration, as Harshaw reminds everyone). Which is all just as well, seeing as how they are both man-made constructions.
But what I want to know is, how can conservatives keep appealing to the supposed sanctity of this culture versus that one if they don't even have a clue as to what culture is?
I guess right wingers need to find SOMETHING to perpetuate their artificial outrage and continue playing the race card card. Pathetic and desperate.
What if you're Jewish? Isn't that considered a racial/ cultural tribe sometimes (meant in a positive way), and didn't the Diaspora, well multiple ones, mess up that whole country and culture of origin signifier?
Don't know the current anthropology, but aren't we all African-descended?
It's not a question about DNA, but of beliefs.
Identifying as black over biracial is of a piece with Obama's philosophical mentors, including the black supremacist and anti-Semitic Leonard Jeffries, professor in the department of black studies at City College in Harlem.
1) The modern nations of Africa notwithstanding, Jeffries' sees whites as oppressive and violent “ice people,” in contrast to peaceful and mutually supportive black “sun people.”
2) Obama first became a member of Rev. Jeremiah Wright's church when Wright turned toward African-centered thinking in the late 80s and early 90s. Trinity United featured speakers like Jacob Carruthers, a follower and defender of Jeffries, who wrote that that the true birthplace of world civilization was ancient Egypt, which then spread to the rest of Africa. This civilization, he argued, was far superior to the oppressive Roman and Greek-based values of Western civilization.
3) Obama and Bill Ayers helped the Chicago Annenberg Challenge fund groups like the South Shore African Village Collaborative (SSAVC), part of the Afrocentric education fad of the 1990s. SSAVC schools had “African-Centered” curricula built around “rites of passage” ceremonies based on African puberty rites.
Obama is black in these respects.
Pogo is not just being silly with his thesis on "The Phenomenon of Obama as a Big and Evil, Subversive Social Force", but completely full of sh*te.
(Sorry to be so blunt and crude with you this morning, Pogo, but it must be said).
The fact of the matter is that someone who looks as dark as Obama will be thought of as black.
In other words, what Bill Harshaw said. Again.
What is so hard to understand about the meaning of appearances on a blog often devoted to photography and, particularly, to analyzing images of people's clothing, gestures and bodies?
Yes, this is clearly a political move to shore up the black vote in 2012.
Fucking lunatics.
""The fact of the matter is that someone who looks as dark as Obama will be thought of as black."
Ritmo, bitterly clinging to race and Marxism.
"This is a decision he made quite a while ago ... "
Sorry ... but a person cannot decide which race they are. Parents decide that when they conceive.
Barack Obama is not black, and saying it again and again won't make it thus.
Declaring that he is black on a census form is a measdemeanor crime punishable by a $500 fine.
Barack Obama is a mulatto. He is bi-racial. His mother was white. He just happened to have a black father by accident of fate.
He is not the nation's first black president. There's never been a black president, and if Obama's performance is a guide, I doubt there ever will be one.
He gives black politicians a bad name and he should stop parading around the country like he is one of them.
He isn't.
My first thought was, I don't care what box the President chose.
I'm still not coming up with a reason to care. If that were in my top-ten reasons to be unhappy about President Obama, that would a happy outcome.
"a political move to shore up the black vote"
The left's vote is cut from the same cloth.
Again:
Another pointless race post.
It's like being stuck in an endless "stuff white people like" piece.
edutcher, what confuses me is how the section on race seems to confuse ethnicity and race. So we have white, black, various asian nations, etc. Why does the section on ethnicity only deal with hispanics? Why aren't caucasians able to differentiate by ethnicity? Because they don't clamor for special treatment based on ethnicity? It's all very irksome to me.
Ritmo Brasileiro spewed this bit of racism: "The fact of the matter is that someone who looks as dark as Obama will be thought of as black."
Only by fucking racists such as yourself Ritmo. People like you see everyone in terms only of their color. You are precisely the type of person Dr. King warned us about.
Dr. King had a dream that one day, Barack Obama would be judged by his complete lack of any economic capabilities and not by his skin color.
You're a racist pig, and you should stop posting your racist comments on this blog. You're not welcome here, your comments are not welcome here, and you and the other racists who have infested this comment section sent here by the Democrat Party to scatter your excrement can kindly get the fuck out.
You're not wanted here, and your racists comments have no place here.
New Hussein Ham,
Who made you the "who is and isn't welcome here" police? The fact of the matter is that you and Althouse are so concerned with the Presidents race that anytime anything having to do with race can possibly be spoken about in a negative fashion regarding President Obama, you racist tea-baggers do it.
There is no chance that you are not racist, and until Althouse says disagreeing with her is not allowed on her blog-space, I am just as much justified in saying YOUR racist comments are not welcome here.
The funny thing is, you are the "race" that you claim to be. Race is "self-reported."
Ann Althouse may very well be claiming to be "black" as her racial category at the University. Whom am I (or the University's personnel office) to judge what's in her family background?
She then gets counted in affirmative action reports, EEO reporting and the like as "black," helping quotas, distributing federal and state dollars.
The whole business of race reporting and tracking is a scam built on a house of cards.
The truth is the most obvious defense against idiocy such as "New Hussien Ham's" and any other evil.
Poll a cross-section of Americans. Do they identify him as "black" or as "white"?
Sorry to let reality to get in the way of your "dream", shithead! But if racial categories persist in American culture, that is hardly my fault for pointing them out. I'm not a conservative who believes that my pretending things away makes them actually, you know, go away!
But keeping spewing your ignorant vomit on me and blaming me as a "racist" for pointing out the reality of how perceptions work!!!
And, "not welcome on this blog"??? By someone who never had anything to remonstrate Cedarford over???
You are the dumbest of all the shits ever taken!!!
HaHAHAHahah!!!
Headlines should read, "Obama encourages people to make false statements on census forms."
He is not the nation's first black president. There's never been a black president, and if Obama's performance is a guide, I doubt there ever will be one.
Not sure if the contradiction therein could be more obvious if a dozen flashing police lights were attached to it.
---
But then, Ham's all about dishing out the crapple.
"Poll a cross-section of Americans. Do they identify him as "black" or as "white"?"
Don't try to escape your racist words, Ritmo.
You're trying to judge the man on the color of his skin. You're trying to make him something that he isn't. You're trying to convince America that Barack Obama is a black failure so people won't vote against black people in the future.
Barack Obama isn't black. To be black would require his parents to have been black. They weren't.
A cross-section of Americans would tell you they don't like Barack Obama whether or not he's black or white. His race is relevant only to racists such as yourself.
Socialism isn't black. It's not white. It's red.
Americans hate socialism and they're not like you. Only you see a black man in the white house.
They say that height is the determining factor as to who will be elected of the two top choices. Next time, let's try to get a midget in.
Smallest president was James Madison, I think. He was only five feet fall, and weighed about 100 pounds.
We can do better than that. Yes we can!
Apropos of bi-racialism, I had never heard this story from Tiger Woods -
I became aware of my racial identity on my first day of school, on my first day of kindergarten. A group of sixth-graders tied me to a tree, spray-painted [the n-word] on me, and threw rocks at me. That was my first day of school.
Anyone believe this?
"People like you see everyone in terms only of their color."
Far be it from me to point out the perceptual shortcomings of someone as judicious in his observations as "New "Hussein" Ham" (whose broadbrush statement made by his over-the-top avatar, BTW, is extremely offensive to Muslims), but I'm not aware of this. Furthermore, I'm interested in understanding the perceptual shortcomings of someone who doesn't understand the meaning of the term "only". By his lowly reasoning, I must have a similar opinion of Barack Obama, Alan Keyes, Idi Amin, and Sammy Davis Jr. And that slipshod mouth-foaming of his suggests that I must detest them all.
I was not aware that I thought that way.
But then again, we're listening to someone with a bomb on his head.
You're trying to judge the man on the color of his skin. You're trying to make him something that he isn't. You're trying to convince America that Barack Obama is a black failure so people won't vote against black people in the future.
Barack Obama isn't black. To be black would require his parents to have been black. They weren't.
A cross-section of Americans would tell you they don't like Barack Obama whether or not he's black or white. His race is relevant only to racists such as yourself.
Socialism isn't black. It's not white. It's red.
Americans hate socialism and they're not like you. Only you see a black man in the white house.
You, sir, are an unhinged lunatic. And even if mind-reading were possible, I highly doubt that your sorry and reptilian excuse for a brain would be capable of it.
Do you want your straightjacket in white, black or red?
What an absolute lunatic!!!
"I was not aware that I thought that way."
Your inability to detect your own racism knows no bounds. Are you so used to spewing racism that you just can't see it?
It is only you declaring that "Barack Obama is black" when he would in fact have had to have had two black parents to be black.
Why can't you just limit your commentary to Barack Obama's obvious shortcomings as both a man and a politician, instead of spewing your hatred all over this blog just so Tbogg and his friends at FireDogLake can make fun of Ann?
Nobody wants you here. You're only hear to make offensive racists statements ... such as "Obama is black."
He isn't, and you need to quit yelling "black" in this crowded theatre.
Quit calling him the "black president" when he's clearly just "the bad president." Judge him by his shitty performance in office, not his skin color.
20 million people are out of work or having to work part-time because they can't find a full-time job ... that's Obama's legacy. Not his skin color.
His mulato pigment is irrelevant to the millions and millions and millions of people out of work who he is raising taxes on.
You're trying to convince America that Barack Obama is a black failure so people won't vote against black people in the future.
By definition, lunacy knows no bounds.
Point out one instance where I've identified Barack Obama as a "failure", let alone a "black failure", whatever that means.
But the sort of boundary defined by the results of this exercise would be impossible for someone like "Ham" to do it. And yet, I challenge him to partake of reality with a simple exercise that doesn't "prejudge" the conclusion before arriving there based on simple, straightforward, easily agreed upon premises and facts.
Go ahead. Do it.
You can't.
You dumb, rambling, unhinged nut.
Ritmo Brasileiro said...
BTW Most people of German descent in this country think of themselves as Americans, not German-American. I thought this was another of the National Socialists' mind games, trying to break the American people into petty, bickering camps, but apparently danielle actually believes it.
And that's because they have no distinctly "German-American" cultural following of which to speak. They have largely been assimilated into a blander, definition-less understanding of "white". Things might have been different around the time of the founding, and even during the build-up to WWII. But those days are long gone.
Irish and Italian-Americans, Greeks, etc., esp. on the East Coast, not so much.
Nonsense. I grew up in an Irish family (my mother's) on a street populated by Irish and Italian (mostly Sicilian) Catholics on Philadelphia's Main Line in a blue collar neighborhood. Not once did I ever hear a description of the inhabitants as anything but American. By that time, the use of hyphenates was considered old-fashioned, a relic of the turn of the century. As I said before, there are those, like the Kennedys, who use their ethnicity like a flag, but most of the Irish, Italians, and others have assimilated. The revival of hyphenates is something the Left encouraged in the 70s and later to try to separate as much of the people from each other as possible.
Sorry to let reality to get in the way of your "dream", shithead! But if racial categories persist in American culture, that is hardly my fault for pointing them out. I'm not a conservative who believes that my pretending things away makes them actually, you know, go away!
Racial categories exist because white, black, brown, red, or yellow skin color and the ethnographic features which accompany them are the only instantly recognizable characteristic of any human being. You can't tell religion or, to varying degrees, ethnicity by sight. Some people, such as yourself, still want to attach meaning to that, but most of this country has moved on. I think that's why the Left is so frantic these days. They are, to paraphrase a line from Christopher Dodd, on the wrong side of history.
Not once did I ever hear a description of the inhabitants as anything but American.
You are confusing nationality with ethnicity.
Some people, such as yourself, still want to attach meaning to that, but most of this country has moved on.
Bullshit. Blame me for the fact that integration came so late to America. Once mixed black-white couples and their children are more numerous than couples that are either/or, then you can accuse me of persisting in a fantasy that history has left behind. Not before.
Invective is a kind of rhetorical spackle that leftists use to hide the cracks in weak arguments.
And that's because they have no distinctly "German-American" cultural following of which to speak.
Unless you open your eyes. Visit an area with a strong German heritage, such as Cincinnati, and you'll see signs everywhere. Much of the German culture has become the American culture and in that sense is hard to distinguish, especially to the small minded.
Plus, the Germans wanted to assimilated into society and didn't have huge numbers resisting assimilation. My great-grandparents met on the boat coming over from Germany, my grandmother was the first person in her family born in the U.S. She went to a German speaking grade school in Ohio. There's plenty of German culture around, it's just not that different from mainstream American culture because much of mainstream American culture is based on it. Remember that next time you go to OktoberFest.
The last few years I've gotten to know an older gentleman from Germany. The similarities between him and my father, his mother,etc surprised me. The culture is strong. Of course, small minded people love belittling entire groups of people based on race, ethnicity, religion, etc.
"Point out one instance where I've identified Barack Obama as a "failure", let alone a "black failure", whatever that means."
You're claiming Barack Obama is "black" are you not? Your sheet is showing.
He's clearly a failure, so you're trying to convince people that the reason he is such a failure as president is that he's the "nation's first black president."
When as a matter of fact (not opinion, but fact) Barack Obama is not black.
Why would you do that except that you wish to blame the failure on black people?
Black people had nothing whatsoever to do with Barack Obama's complete failure as a President. The millions and millions and millions of unemployed are not unemployed because of black people. They had nothing to do with it. Why are you trying to link black people to Barack Obama's failures? It's not their fault.
You should just judge Obama by his failures as a man and as a poor politician ... instead of trying to make it seem like he's "black."
He's not black.
And black people resent being inaccurately grouped with such a fucking loser President.
Maybe if everyone checked the black box we could shut up about it. But then the camera toting workers would arrive.
Invective is a kind of rhetorical spackle that leftists use to hide the cracks in weak arguments.
I wasn't aware that New "Ham" Hussein was a leftist, Broccoli Guy. In fact, his invective avatar seems to suggest he isn't.
Once mixed black-white couples and their children are more numerous than couples that are either/or, then you can accuse me of persisting in a fantasy that history has left behind.
Paradoxical, you state a fantasy to claim your not persisting in a fantasy. The ratio of interracial marriages, etc is not necessarily a measure of racism or the lack of it. BTW - my daughter's boyfriend is half Filipino, half white and his mother's really short, how should he be counted in the census?
He's clearly a failure, so you're trying to convince people that the reason he is such a failure as president is that he's the "nation's first black president."
Again. Point out one instance where I've stated that I believe Obama is a "failure". You cannot substitute your blind assertions for my own beliefs.
Perhaps you do not know or even grasp the difference between "facts" and personal beliefs, so this could be exceedingly difficult for you. But your own attempt at reasoning (from which you now retreat) requires that you do so.
And black people resent being inaccurately grouped with such a fucking loser President.
Evidence?
Although you are, quite clearly and literally, a lunatic, I'm sure everybody would be a bit happier if you found a way to achieve some sort of solid ground to stand on for what you say.
"Blame me for the fact that integration came so late to America."
Look dude, Spaniards began integrating America the moment they set foot here - as far back is 1560.
Wikipedia: "... African slaves were brought to Spanish Florida as early as the 1560s. Most slaves were African and were held by Europeans, although some Native Americans and free blacks also held slaves; there was a small number of white slaves as well."
I'm sure it just explodes your head to realize that yes, black people had slaves too. That "slavery" isn't a "black" issue. Or a "white" issue. Black people held slaves - and still do in large portions of the Earth.
Not sure what your point is, except maybe that brown people enslaved black people.
Again, why would you make racist comments against the Spanish?
America has always been integrated.
"Evidence?"
Evidence? All those black people at the Tea Parties aren't evidence?
Oh, wait ... I forgot ... you only see a black man in the White House ... where one does not exist ... but you can't see all the black people rallying at the Tea Party protests.
You tie yourself in knots with your logical inconsistencies and I have to say, it's fun batting you around like a cat bats a mouse around.
There should be a further question on the census: Does filling in the box on race trigger a moment of hesitation or an existential identity crisis?....Obama would have been open to second guessing whatever box he chose. Most of us don't have to negotiate our racial identity--just having to do that is a disadvantage. I don't knock him for trying to make it work. His campaign was buy racial.
The racial checkboxes on the census form have little to do with race. They have everything to do with political power.
All of the distinct non-white races on the form have some kind of ongoing client relationship with the bureaucracy.The government apparently needs to know the relative importance of these groups when it comes to doling out money or political mojo.
If you're not white, and there isn't a checkbox by your race, then you don't matter.
Paradoxical, you state a fantasy to claim your not persisting in a fantasy. The ratio of interracial marriages, etc is not necessarily a measure of racism or the lack of it. BTW - my daughter's boyfriend is half Filipino, half white and his mother's really short, how should he be counted in the census?
Should I claim your conclusion, based on your misreading of my remark, as similarly paradoxical? I said nothing of Filipinos. It might shock you to consider that not every group in America has had the same road to toe, but there you have it. So once Filipinos have experienced a centuries-long struggle against slavery, Jim Crow, segregation, and every lingering social or perceptual effect of that legacy, then let's consider the history and experience of Filipinos in America as equivalent to that of blacks, such that the experience of one can be substituted for the other. How does that sound?
BTW, I could care less about the census and am much more interested in exposing the massive ignorance (and the self-righteous indignation it breeds) on display in the remarks of the more unhinged commenters here.
"In fact, his invective avatar seems to suggest he isn't."
That you cannot even identify my "invective avatar" says far more about you than you realize, you fucking facist moron.
Oh, the sad torture of listening to "Ham" Hussein as if he were actually capable of trafficking in facts. Inexplicably, he seems to believe that he is:
"America has always been integrated."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-miscegenation_laws#Origins_in_the_Colonial_Era
Ah, Tedio, we see you haven't finished masturbating yet.
"you fucking facist moron."
Looks like the creative spelling movement is catching on. Or, should I say "contagious"?
Which little bit of misappropriated history do wish to apply as an epithet against me next? Oh, let me guess!!! "Stalinist"?
"So once Filipinos have experienced a centuries-long struggle against slavery ... "
Filipinos have been slaves. That you don't know this says a lot. Black people are still suffering slavery, Ritmo. You seem to think it ended. That says a lot about your experience and stupidity.
Instead of whinging about civil rights issues of 50 years ago, why not cry out against the current slavery of black people that is occurring still today?
Wikipedia: "According to a broad definition of slavery used by Kevin Bales of Free the Slaves (FTS), an advocacy group linked with Anti-Slavery International, there were 27 million people in slavery in 1999, spread all over the world."
People of all races and creeds have, at one time or another, suffered under slavery - or practiced it - and other inhumane conditions. Slavery is a human condition ... not a black issue. Black people hold slaves - even white slaves.
White people have been enslaved for centuries at a time (you do agree with that statement, do you not?)
Slavery has nothing whatsoever to do with skin color - but you see everything through you racist prism, so I don't expect you to even understand why people are trying to get you to just admit that Barack Obama isn't black.
It's simple. Just say it out loud.
"Barack Obama is not black."
How is it masturbating, Broccoli, when I'm merely returning "Ham's" sloppy volleys of ejaculate and flinging them back into his face?
Filipinos have been slaves.
In America? I'm not aware of that. I thought we were talking about America, no? You know, America! That country you claim to care so much about that you are willing to lie and distort every known historical fact regarding its past and present?
Don't tell me it's not America you're concerned about, "Ham". The Teabaggers wouldn't know how to react. And BTW, what is your stance on all those immigrants (legality of status notwithstanding)? Just curious.
There is no need to state the obvious.
"Looks like the creative spelling movement is catching on. Or, should I say "contagious"?"
I'm not trying to call you a fascist. If I wanted to call you a fascist, I would write that.
You are one, but that's not my point.
You are a facist.
You see everyone by the color of their face.
You're a skinist. A melanist. A skin jobber.
You see everything through the prism of one's race.
It's not enough that Barack Obama is a "failure" you have to make him a "black failure."
Can't he just be a failure? Why do you have to drag the black race into it ... are you trying to say he's a failure because black people are inferior? Is that what you're doing?
For centuries, black people have fought against the perception that they are the cause of our nation's problems. They don't need to be inexplicably linked to Barack Obama's failure as a president.
They are black. Each had a black mother and a black father. Don't deny their history. Don't rob the black people of their black heritage by lumping them in with Barack Obama.
He is not one of them and they are not the cause of his failures.
It is racism to try to link Barack Obama and his many failures to "black people."
Even if you are incapable of seeing it.
There is no need to state the obvious.
If by this, you mean that "Ham's" belches are too masturbatory to bother refuting, then I humbly accept your encouragement to dismiss him through shunning.
He is obviously an unhinged lunatic whose grievances may be as much psychological as they could be said to be social, political or historical. Just wish some of you would have the balls to come right out and say it. It makes it easier for guys like me who would prefer to have an easier time learning how to distinguish where some conservatives differ from, er, others.
We've settled the question of whether Barack Obama can admit to his white heritage. He can't. He denies it and with it thousands of years of white history.
I think the far more interesting question is whether Barack Obama is bisexual.
"It makes it easier for guys like me who would prefer to have an easier time learning how to distinguish where some conservatives differ from, er, others."
You're all about "distinguishing" people, aren't you Ritmo?
Why do you need to paint lines around people, Ritmo? You were raised by racist parents, I can tell. Even if you won't admit it. It's in your history. It's so obvious.
Everything you say is about dividing people into groups. You want to "distinguish" one person from the other person. To set some outside the group. To create "insiders."
You can't just see us as people.
You're the sickest kind of racist there is ... the kind where it is so ingrained you can't even see it in yourself.
"Poll a cross-section of Americans. Do they identify him as "black" or as "white"?"
The majority answered "failure", and they don't think his race helps at all, whatever it is.
All facts aside, I think a majority would say "biracial", since that's the truth?
My first thought was that he disrespected his mother and maternal grandparents, who contributed so much more to his upbringing than his father ever did.
Wow Ann, that's even low for you. I know a number of bi-racial people with all kind of races of parents and to think that "claiming" a race is disrespectful is just nasty, judgmental tripe. I'm guessing that people who call themselves Jews with one Caucasian parent are being disrespectful to their parent or vice-versa. Race and ethnicity are complicated issues in America, though unfortunately not to you and your enlightened masses here. I'm glad that you bring such wisdom and insight to an issue that I'm guessing that you
"gosh ann, what a disappointment.
you do take shelby steele seriously."
Yea, Ann, How can you listen to a Black who's off the liberal plantation? He can't possibly have anything to offer. Damned Uncle Tom.
Against my better judgment and Scott's good advice, I will answer (for hopefully the last time), and say that the category of "black" is subjectively defined. And not by me. So my own perceptions on this are moot. If my perceptions had even mattered to you in the first place, you would have discerned (or even listened to) them by now.
Regarding Obama's non-African heritage, this has not been ignored by him or dismissed, as you'd discover if you'd bother to read anything he's had to say about it.
Onward to your speculation of Obama's supposed bisexuality, Ham.
"Black people are still suffering slavery"
Only if they hang around white folks - which I ain't:
Laterz.
"It is racism to try to link Barack Obama and his many failures to "black people.""
Ham, that is very well put.
There are dozens of African Americans who would be qualified to be President; people who have demonstrated their depth of leadership and vision in many different venues.
Barry O. isn't one of them. To the extent that Affirmative Action has become a cultural value of this country, America has elected an Affirmative Action president.
Obama's failures ought to be his own alone, However, his Affirmative Action status will cause Black people to bear them, since this benefits those who make a living off of servicing the Affirmative Action cultural value -- the race baiters and poverty pimps who would be out of a job if people were judged not by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.
"Wow Ann, that's even low for you. I know a number of bi-racial people with all kind of races of parents and to think that "claiming" a race is disrespectful is just nasty, judgmental tripe."
God, you racists can't even see the elephant in the room, can you?
Answer this question: What would be your gut reaction if Barack Obama had claimed on his census form that he was "white"?
What if he then proposed passage of a White History Month?
You'd all be claiming that he was "abandoning" black people. That he was denying their shared history. You'd be claiming Barack Obama was a race "traitor."
No amount of denying it will matter. We can all see you for the racists that you are.
You're a bunch of sick, sick people.
All facts aside, I think a majority would say "biracial", since that's the truth?
Probably. Although it's hard to see how this matters given how rabid some people even become at the prospect of a detached discussion of how people are viewed.
I take unambiguous exception to an idea I suspect may be at play -- that a detached discussion on the way people's perceptions have been prone to manipulation will suck all the humanity out of the topic.
Why do people of mixed race usually call themselves Black? Don't they know the hatred and discrimination that will be aimed at them in America? Maybe they do, and that's why they avoid calling themselves white.
Tedio, is that your tongue I feel up my ass?
"Only if they hang around white folks - which I ain't: Laterz."
Emcee ... if you're serious about ensuring that black people aren't slaves, then you'd realize that many of them still are. You would educate yourself.
No, black people aren't slaves in America, where we solved that problem with the Civil War in the 1800s ... but today in Africa they are. In Africa, black people are routinely both slaves, and slaveholders.
Slavery still exists. You're just deliberately blinding yourself to it.
You're accidentally not a slave at this moment. Becuase as a result of luck, you were born in the United States at this point in our history, instead of being born in Africa where slavery still exists.
That is a happenstance of birth. But many black people still are still slaves. To suggest, as Ritmo does, that black people aren't still slaves is to deny their suffering.
Tedio, is that your tongue I feel up my ass?
No, it's your French tickler. And you should know the difference by now, even if just visually in the case of my tongue. My tongue has many less protrusions on it. Heh.
@bagoh20: It's a political thing. When you belong, you get bennies.
As I repeat in every race thread: We are all African, 100%, get over it.
"Free your mind and your ass will follow." --George Clinton
I once heard Lisa Lampanelli make a joke about how she wasn't saying that Andy Dick was gay, but that he has been known to guess the flavor of a popsicle just by sitting on it.
That's pretty damn funny.
My, er, company last night got a huge kick out of it as well. And that was after all the commotion in the parking garage.
As Trooper would say...
"Just sayn'."
"Although it's hard to see how this matters given how rabid some people even become at the prospect of a detached discussion of how people are viewed."
It only matters to racists ... like you, who wish to keep discussing whether or not Barack Obama is black ... as he illegitimately claims to be.
Barack Obama is not black. He's white. He has a white mother ... so he's white. (This makes as much sense as claiming he is black because he had a black father.)
It is an insult to black people to call him black. To lump his failures onto them so everyone associates his failures with black people.
Black people have a heritage that Barack Obama is denying when he claims to be black. When it is so clearly evident to anyone who is not a racist that Barack Obama had a white mother.
Barack Obama is trying to glom on to Black Heritage and claim it for himself when he does not deserve to be associated with their successes.
Racists are trying to create a "black failed President." Instead of the more generic "Democrat failed President."
We should scoff and pity him if Barack Obama tried to claim he was a War Hero when he isn't.
And yet, some people like yourself fail to scoff when Barack Obama claims to be black when he isn't. And your continued refusal to admit that he is not black is so obvious for everyone to see that it marks you as a confirmed racist.
You will never, ever admit that Barack Obama is falsely claiming to be black.
He's white. Because his mother was white.
(Which makes just as much sense as saying he's black because his father was black.)
As a white man, I have no cause to scoff when Dear President wants to claim he is one race or another. That's a dispute within a family of which I am not a member.
At the same time, I hope that Black people are coming to the realization that Affirmative Action constitutes enslavement within the boundaries of lowered expectations. It only serves to perpetuate racism, not eliminate it.
wv:unfli
Which is true:
He's Black?
He's White?
He's Biracial?
OK then we're done here.
It looks like Obama is gonna get a visit from a Census worker, maybe even a fine.
Black people do not agree he is black.
Black people know Barack Obama had a white mom. So, he's not black.
Only racist people claim Barack Obama is black. They want to link his failed presidency to "black people" so that when a real black person runs, people will associate that black person to this failed presidency and not vote for the real black person.
Barack Obama's mother was white. His failed Presidency is no different than Jimmy Carter's failed presidency and is not the fault of black people.
And people like Ritmo should be ashamed of trying to link this guy to black people.
He's not black.
He's white.
Ok, Ham. He's white.
BTW, which "race" are you, so that I can attribute to every member thereof the failure that you are?
Would you like to swing on a star
carry moonbeams home in a jar
and be better off than you are
or would you rather be a mule
A mule is an animal with long funny ears
he kicks up at anything he hears
His back is brawny but his brain is weak
he's just plain stupid with a stubborn streak
and by the way if you hate to go to school
You may grow up to be a mule
Oh would you like to swing on a star
carry moonbeams home in a jar
and be better off than you are
or would you rather be a pig
A pig is an animal with dirt on his face
his shoes are a terrible disgrace
He has no manners when he eats his food
He's fat and lazy and extremely rude
But if you don't care a feather or a fig
you may grow up to be a pig
Oh would you like to swing on a star
carry moonbeams home in a jar
and be better off than you are
or would you rather be a fish
A fish won't do anything but swim in a brook
he can't write his name or read a book
to fool the people is his only thought
and though he's slippery he still gets caught
but if then that sort of life is what you wish
you may grow up to be a fish
(music)
a new kind of jumped up slippery fish
And all the monkeys aren't in the zoo
everyday you see quite a few
so you see it's all up to you,
you could be better than you are
you could be swinging on a star
--Bing Crosby
"BTW, which "race" are you, so that I can attribute to every member thereof the failure that you are?"
I'm green ... with blue eyes ... same as you.
"Ok, Ham. He's white."
He's certainly not black, and to say that he is black is an affront to actual black people.
They don't want to be associated with this sort of loser because then racists like yourself will make claims that he's only a loser because he's "black."
He's not black.
He has a white mother. Black people have black mothers.
I don't expect Obama's presidency to be a failure, despite the poor performance so, far for two reasons:
1) Although he was incredibly unprepared for the job, and always will be ideologically, he will learn and move to the center, or at least fake it well enough to get back a lot of independents and his polls will improve.
2) The economy will rebound eventually, and it will with the vigor of a pendulum swung hard in the other direction. This always happens in this country no matter who is in power and what the policies are. The damage to the country is long term and he will not get the blame until after his successor takes the brunt of it. Don't think this very thing has not been discussed at length with his people.
He's certainly not black, and to say that he is black is an affront to actual black people.
You're an idiot. You know, a much easier conclusion in that your conceptual framework is wrong and race is a social construction. It always evolves and depends on concepts other than biology. It isn't a valid biological concept. Phenotypical characteristics that we can roughly group, sure. But that's not really what people mean when they talk about race.
It only matters to racists ... like you
And yet, you seem to have a lot invested in it.
I only discuss it because what concerns racists (or people who are not actively or even unwittingly racist but are yet "unblinded" to race) may concern me, as someone opposed to them or interested in how people who are not blind may actually perceive the world.
Your irritation over this just shows your discomfort with free speech and freedom of inquiry. You also seem to believe that conceptions of the world can be made up on an ad hoc basis and without any semblance of internalized attitudes, but that's a more complex problem than your inability to read and accept the harmlessness of a discussion of things that the participants to that discussion neither endorse nor subscribe to.
What The Counterfactualist said.
It's really not too hard to grasp, I would think.
The rebound of the economy is the greatest obstacle to the reform I hope the Tea Party movement effects. It will weaken their message. Obama and the Dems are counting on this. The rebound of the economy is beyond the control of the government, at least in any intended effect kind of way. It will happen when it wants to and that will make all the difference.
This is kind of like an addict having his enabler show up just in time to fund another binge. A short term reprieve that only prevents the inevitable cure that is needed.
"Phenotypical characteristics that we can roughly group, sure. But that's not really what people mean when they talk about race."
Oh, well then if you can be black just by force of will, then Barack Obama isn't the First Black President.
Bill Clinton was.
So, he'd be the second Black Failed President.
It's the whole 60s construct of race, institutionalized and still being argued as if it was valid despite DNA research saying we have it rather skewed up.
Added in that is that two Jewish lawyers who were working on how to set up the EEO to track "racial progress after Civil Rights legislation" created 3 artificial races or distinct groups.
1. Native Americans, now defined as those of Asian ancestry who become Native Americans by magically living North of the Mexican border. And "clarified matters" by saying it is to tribes north of the Border to designate who is Native or not.
Full-blooded Mayans, of course, are not native Americans but Hispanics.
2. Filipinos and Japanese and Indonesians are not Pacific Islanders, but "Asians" by the thinking of the two EEO lawyers that concocted the Pacific Islander group. Unless you are a Maori or a Melanesian in Indonesia...then you qualify. Or an Athabaskan on an island, vs. the Alaska mainland.
3. HIspanic is the wildest and most fun one the lawyers in the 60s dreamed up. A black and white man with ancestors in Panama with an English name is HIspanic, but a man with similar DNA from Belize next door is Black. A white guy born to a family named Hernadez is white if born in Spain, Hispanic if born in Peru, and Asian if born on the wrong Pacific Island, like the Philippines.
The whole construct is ridiculous and 50 years out of date. It has no scientific legitimacy.
It should be tossed off the census and replaced with more useful data. Like asking people if they had been unemployed or underemployed in the last 10 years, for how long. Or what their total debt is as a percentage of income. What foreign languages they speak. If they are happy with the public school system their kids attend.
The race stuff and race advantages implicit in the important the Census places on it needs to be trashed.
A friend of mine has decided that being "Hispanic" would advantage him and his kids considerably. He is part Portugese and has spent thousands to lawyers promising to help him convert his ethnicity.
I didn't know memes could cause things into being just by force of will. I didn't know that memes were interchangeable with widely held understandings. I didn't know Bill Clinton was thought of as literally black rather than just figuratively black - or at least was proposed to be as much by an author.
We are dealing with someone who lacks the capacity to understand that ideas are often merely symbolic representations, folks.
"The rebound of the economy is beyond the control of the government ..."
It is not beyond the control of the government to prevent.
And Barack Obama's policies are preventing the economy from rebounding.
Will there be growth of some kind? In an economy this large, there is always inherent growth.
But his policies will stunt that growth. They're already admitting unemployment isn't going to get any better on their watch and that the deficit will skyrocket on their watch, burdening our children with their high salaries on borrowed Chinese money.
A rat can't change his tail. I don't think the Tea Party is too worried about any rebound in the economy accruing to Barack Obama's benefit. Obama will cite it as a reason to confiscate more wealth.
He's done with.
But first, we're going to dismantle his political party ... and then when he hasn't anyone left to hide behind, we're going to toss him and his only newly-proud wife back into the street from which they emanated.
"We are dealing with someone who lacks the capacity to understand that ideas are often merely symbolic representations, folks."
No. I agree with you that calling Barack Obama "black" is nothing but symbolism in exactly the same way that calling Bill Clinton the first black president was only symbolic.
Neither one of them are black. But I predict they will share the same fate - disgrace.
Oh, so the guy who blames racial categories on "Jewish lawyers" says the concept of race is outdated by - you guessed it - biological standards.
I guess that says something.
BTW, I'm not aware of anyone here except Ham who believes that biological standards are what define race.
"new hussein ham" - Oh, well then if you can be black just by force of will, then Barack Obama isn't the First Black President.
Bill Clinton was.
=======================
Few think of Bill Clinton as a failed President in the same way they see Carter, Bush II, and perhaps Obama as heading for..
Heck, these days, LBJ and Nixon look pretty good by comparison to the weak crew that came after them.
Even Reagan may come down a notch or two because the ruinous impact of some of his economic ideology taking 20 years to manifest as net negatives(1)Free trade - lost jobs all to be replaced with Newer and Better Ones!,, (2)Supply side economics to fuel Gov't growth,(3)Deregulate the Heroes of Wall Street, (4) Trickledown economics.
Reagan will never be regarded as a Failed President, but might be put in the FDR, LBJ, Nixon category of "strong Presidents that did a lot of good things, did a lot of bad things".
Far be it from me to point out
How great is the debt that the elevated register owes to cliches.
"I agree with you that calling Barack Obama "black" is nothing but symbolism in exactly the same way that calling Bill Clinton the first black president was only symbolic."
So, Barack Obama's self-definition, and the definition he shares with the majority of Americans who do not reject that, has nothing to do with his combination of ancestry and complexion? Those things had nothing to do with the way (one way, not the only way) that he identifies?
Fascinating.
"Few think of Bill Clinton as a failed President in the same way they see Carter, Bush II ..."
The House of Representatives (the people's house) impeached Bill Clinton - only the second President to be impeached in the history of our country.
That is the very definition of a failed Presidency.
Carter was fired after one term - failure.
Bush was re-elected and not impeached. Success!
But I'm sure someone will be along momentarily to claim that if your parents are black, you can be white.
"So, Barack Obama's self-definition ..."
Yes, if Barack Obama claimed he was Chinese, you would scoff.
If a person who has two white parents claimed to be black and tried to enter a college on that basis, they'd be indicted for fraud.
"How great is the debt that the elevated register owes to cliches."
No greater than the debt of rhetorical respect he owes to the deluded and frustrated incompetent who argues with him.
How you "self-identify" has no bearing on what you really are.
George Washington was not black, no matter how he might have self-identified.
You're belittling the proud history of black people by claiming that anyone can self-identify as black.
That's racist and won't be tolerated here.
Personally, I checked "other" and wrote in "American".
Why does Barack Obama need to be black.
That is the real question.
What inside him forces him, compels him, to steal from real black people their heritage?
"Yes, if Barack Obama claimed he was Chinese, you would scoff."
Barack Obama lacks both any Chinese ancestry and any Chinese following that would accept this claim.
You're belittling the proud history of black people by claiming that anyone can self-identify as black.
Hey, every single one of us ultimately traces our lineage back to Africa. Just because your ancestors lived in Europe and America for 995 of the last 1000 generations doesn't mean you should overlook your African heritage. :)
"Barack Obama lacks both any Chinese ancestry ..."
Evidence?
"Hey, every single one of us ultimately traces our lineage back to Africa."
If we were to accept this statement on its face, then Barack Obama wouldn't be the First Black President.
He's just another plain old failed Democrat socialist - one in a long line of them. Nothing special about him.
That's the real issue.
Not his color.
Not his white mom.
Dr. King would be judging Obama on the number of unemployed and concluding he's a failure not becuase he's black ... but because of his policies.
For Ritmo ... he must be black at all costs.
Have you read his book? It's all about finding his lost father and gaining credibility as black (i.e. someone with a father.)
Anyone who was in college during Obama's era - which I'll loosely term the Affirmative Action era - and got out and about at all - should not be surprised. I'm not. And I'm not even one of the ones who cares about this kind of thing.
And yeah. Of *course* it shows disrespect to his white family. But he's got a black wife and black daughters now. White family all gone.
(White people sometimes - Lord. Yes. People resent you. Even if you're perfectly nice. K? )
More "Obama" News:
Signaling Jobs Recovery, Payrolls Surged in March
Starting to reverse the loss of eight million jobs, American employers took on 162,000 more workers in March.
TMink said..."He is identified as "white" on his birth certificate, so this balances that."
That's a lie.
His mother is identified as Caucasian, his father as African.
There is NO identification of President Obama's race.
Peter V. Bella said..."I did not check any boxes. I wrote in American Born."
You missed the deluded booze hound box?
I did not like the etnic question in the census form very much. It's too close the 'nationality' clause in the Soviet documents. You know, that so unimportant matter in the "great union of free peoples" that the communist paradise was. I find the preoccupation with race/ethnic origins propagated by "progressives" absolutely distasteful, but not surprising, since these are the same people who are forever the best friends of the opressed, that have been selected and approved by the KGB. And for this inmportant task they had to divide people rather than unite them.
How wonderful the healing Obama has done for race.
And look! The waters no longer rise.
Nora said..."I did not like the etnic question in the census form very much. It's too close the 'nationality' clause in the Soviet documents."
Get real:
The 2010 Census isn’t designed to capture data on a person’s ancestry. That is captured on the American Community Survey (ACS), which is part of the official census but conducted throughout the decade on a rolling sample of about 2.5 percent of the population every year.
In Census 2000 and earlier decades what is now the ACS was commonly called “the long form” of the census; the 2010 Census is the first to use a short form only. ACS data on ethnic groups can be found on the Census Bureau Web site.
The race and Hispanic origin questions on the 2010 Census are required to manage federal programs.
The questions follow the categories required by the federal Office of Management and Budget (OMB) for federal statistics.
Pogo said..."How wonderful the healing Obama has done for race. And look! The waters no longer rise."
Ahhh, and yet another tea bagging fool rears his ugly, bigoted head.
Hold you head back and open your mouth Pogo...I have a surprise for you...
bagoh20 said..."The rebound of the economy is beyond the control of the government, at least in any intended effect kind of way. It will happen when it wants to and that will make all the difference."
Good lord...did you even attend high school?
You actually believe the economy's ebb and flow just "happen(s) when it wants to??"
If that's the case, why are the Republicans screaming about how they could do a better job of spurring it along? And why does the GOP constantly yap about how Ronnie "The Saint" Reagan saved the economy by cutting taxes?
He wasn't part of the "government?"
Duh.
Ritno - was to point out the biracial dichotomy, white or Filipino? Similar to Obama's predicament and race has nothing to do with history, just genetics.
Congrats on not taking the bait on his short mother though. She happens to be the Caucasian parent.
The perpetual focus on race divides people needlessly. As the U.S. Census ads say, the census is the base for all sorts of programs and allocation of funds. Why do they need to know race except to disperse funds and programs based on race, which is discrimination.
Danielle: "are people w/ Irish or German mother and an american born father 'disrespecting' their mother when they write 'white' and not German-American ?"
If your census form allow you to check "German" for race you sure got a different one than I did.
Obama apparently always considered himself black from an early age. In "Dreams From My Father" Obama expresses an astonishing amount of hostility toward whites. If a white candidate for president had said similar things about blacks it's inconceivable he could have gotten his party's nomination.
I have read that 60% of American Blacks have Native American (Indian) ancestry.
Personally, I think of him as the first Whack president.
Uh, you know, White+Black = Whack...
Ok, how about the very first Blite President?
Either seems appropriate.
More "Obama" News:
Underemployment rises in March under to 20.3%. The Bureau of Labor Statitisics reports that a total of almost 25 million Americans are now either unable to find a job, or are forced to work part time becuase they cannot find a full-time job to support their families.
Many are simply ignored by Barack Obama - not even counted as unemployed because they're so discouraged by the job picture that they've stopped for now even top look for work.
The Federal Reserve reports that there are approximately 6 job seekers for every available job.
60% of the more than 20,000 people interviewed by Gallup said they're "not hopeful" for the future.
In other news, Barack Obama awarded million-dollar raises for AIG executives - so the rich keep getting richer on his watch while the poor keep getting unemployed. One executive got a 41% raise, the ohter got a 56% raise.
My second thought was that his experiences in society, including his rise into vast political power, had so much to do with being perceived as black (and not white).
Haha, if other peoples' perceptions were the most important determinant of racial identity, I would totally be identifying as Hispanic. At least, I assume it's Spanish that people are using when they speak to me. I don't speak the language myself, beyond simple greetings.
Anyhow, I don't think there's anything troubling about his identifying as Black, not as biracial. Nor is it surprising -- he's spent his entire adult life trying to assimilate into the Black Chicagoan community, so it's unsurprising that his self-image, today, is "Black" not "multi-racial." "Black," in the US, is, after all, a mixed category in itself, given that in the past, people who were half-Black and half-White consistently ended up categorised as "Black."
Speaking for myself, I'd have to say that my racial identity is pretty contextual. If you put me with a bunch of 100% Korean Korean-Americans, I turn into a White. On the other hand, in a mixed group, I'm Korean. In general, in the US, I'm Korean, and I self-identify as Asian-American. On the other hand, in Korea (or Japan or wherever), to the extent race (as opposed to nationality) is a factor, I'm a White. Of course, that's largely irrelevant given the key distinction which is that one is a Foreigner.
In general, for mixed Asian-White Americans, I think that because Asian identities, as Korean, Chinese, Vietnamese, Hmong, whatever, are strong identity groups, with defined boundaries, and exist independent of and apart from American society -- because they are not just catch-all social definitions, left over from the days of segregation, for a kind of person who is not-White under the one-drop standard -- it's hard for biracial Asian-Whites to choose Asian or White as their racial identity.
Anyhow, I filled out my census form honestly. And I appreciated that rather than Asian-White, I could actually specify Korean-White.
Still no "Cablinasian sex addict" box on the Census.
Why the hate?
Duscany - "In "Dreams From My Father" Obama expresses an astonishing amount of hostility toward whites. If a white candidate for president had said similar things about blacks it's inconceivable he could have gotten his party's nomination."
Well, I would assume blacks have a slightly different take on how they've been treated by white people, versus a white person's treatment via a black.
That civil rights movement wasn't based on the plight of the white man.
Creeeeeaam tangerine and Mont elimar;
A ginger sling with a pineapple tart;
A coffee dessert--yes you know it's good news;
But you'll have to have them all pulled out after the Savoy Truffle.
Witness the conservative implosion at the thought of an acceptance of others while maintaining a scoffing posture toward diversity.
New "Hussein" Ham - "And Barack Obama's policies are preventing the economy from rebounding."
Anybody who thinks the current recession could be turned around in amatter of 14 months needs to take a busines course, and read some history.
The recession began in December of 2007...and Obama wasn't President.
And...considering the DOW is up from 6,500 to 10,800 that's certainly a pretty good start.
As for unemployment:
Unemployment was at 8.5% when Bush left office.
It stands at 9.7 now.
Not exactly a massive jump, considering the worldwide economic crisis little Georgie left behind.
If the economy is flat by the end of next year President Obama will be in trouble.
If it is improving, the GOP is fucked.
All this emphasis on the color of a person's skin to determine what 'race' they are is a distraction.
There are many people in this world who are much darker than Obama and many 'blacks' in the US who would be classified as Caucasoid. The Dravidian speaking groups from Southern India for example. The Ainu of Japan are also classified as Caucasian. Race has to to with the characteristics of the body, skull, and other skeletal details.
Looking from the outside in on Obama, I would (anthropologically) classify him as a Caucasoid type. Australian aborigines are also classified as a subset of Caucasians and I'm pretty sure that they are darker than Obama.
The whole thing is stupid and meant to divide us, one from the other.
The only reason we have these differences in peoples appearance is due to hundreds of thousands of years of population isolation and evolutionary selection for certain characteristics that are environmentally advantageous.
Given the global economy, ability of people to travel and the lowering of cultural barriers to intermarrying......I expect that in a few generations (20 or 30) there will be very little variation in people. Skin color or morphology. I see this as a good thing.
Nice try but it's not anthropology (or any science) that's making use of the concept of "race". Anthropology was the discipline that recognized race as a social, not biological construct.
So, it's nice to know that you masses have taken to declaring your lack of use for it. That still doesn't erase history, though, and it doesn't erase a group identity that grew out of that history, either.
My first thought was that he disrespected his mother and maternal grandparents, who contributed so much more to his upbringing than his father ever did.
Yesterday when some journalist tweeted that Obama had done that, I retweeted it and added, "Throw the women who raised u under the bus!"
So what is people's problem with Shelby Steele? They both have black fathers and white mothers, but Steele grew up in a black neighborhood, Obama in a white one. IMO Steele totally nailed Obama's "bargaining" personality and his insecurity with his own blackness in this interview; it's sort of a General Relativity Theory of Obama:
http://www.hoover.org/multimedia/uk/34693979.html
DBQ -
"
There are many people in this world who are much darker than Obama and many 'blacks' in the US who would be classified as Caucasoid. The Dravidian speaking groups from Southern India for example. The Ainu of Japan are also classified as Caucasian. Race has to to with the characteristics of the body, skull, and other skeletal details.
Looking from the outside in on Obama, I would (anthropologically) classify him as a Caucasoid type. Australian aborigines are also classified as a subset of Caucasians"
1. The Global genomic project is binning people along fairly close lines to the classic 3 races. But the DNA shows surprises. Australian aborigines are a proto-race, before the White and Mongoloid races differentiated from the root "out of Africa" stock that iself was quite different than Subsaharan blacks. The aborigines are not Caucasion at all.
Nor are Ainu.
The Haploid markers are interesting stuff. Whites evidently were in the New World in numbers before the Vikings and Columbus. The Yamoto Race of Japan is actually 3 distinct genetic groups that arrived at different times, blended, and developed some unique genetic attributes over time.
Hobbit People of Forensia appear to be miniaturized proto-Malay stock.
Evidence exists Homo Erectus was still alive 50-60,000 years ago when modern man met them and gradually wiped them out, much as the case of Neanderthals, and would have been the fate of Aborigines if we hadn't developed higher morals in more recent centuries.
While subsaharan blacks have the highest genetic diversity as the older, never left Africa stock (that didn't suffer severe bottlenecks), the most interesting and diverse place for Human DNA is now believed to be Southern INdia.
Anthropology was the discipline that recognized race as a social, not biological construct.
Bull pucky.
Physical anthropology is a subset of Anthro and originally (and artificially I must say) classified races. Paleoanthropology has both elements of physical and cultural artifacts.
The initial classification of race was a physical Anthropology discipline. It was a long time ago that the 'races' were classified.
Races were NEVER EVER classified by social, cultural aspects or artifacts. NEVER.
The sociological or cultural aspect of anthropology is a separate discipline.
Don't argue with me. I was an Anthropology major in college (eons ago) with a concentration in Mesoamerican Studies and a minor in ceramics. I thought I was going to be an archaeologist in Central America. LOL. The best laid plans of 20 year olds.
The aborigines are not Caucasion at all.
Nor are Ainu
True. This is why they are called "Caucasoid". Proto races that are not one or the other, but more Caucasoid in morphology than Negroid.
The Haploid markers are interesting stuff. Whites evidently were in the New World in numbers before the Vikings and Columbus
Yes. There is strong evidence that Kennewick Man (approx 9k ago) was a proto Caucasoid type as opposed to the Asian/Mongoloid type (a later wave of immigration) that many American Indians stem from.
Historical evidence of modern European's (circa AD 100 to 500) contribution to North American is intriguing. Earlier than that...we don't have physical evidence but the haploid markings are very very interesting.
It seems Ritmo is on to something.
It is now clear that our human "races" are primarily cultural creations, not biological realities. The commonly held belief in the existence of human biological races is based on the false assumption that anatomical traits, such as skin color and specific facial characteristics, cluster together in single distinct groups of people. They do not. There are no clearly distinct "black", "white", or other races. Source
If races don't really exist, why would anyone support continuing to make distinctions between people based on race? Wouldn't they a more "reality based" world?
Anybody who thinks the current recession could be turned around in amatter of 14 months needs to take a busines course, and read some history.
Which is an amusing thing to say, considering how many members of the Obama administration claim they've turned the recession around. :)
the census is only measuring the number of people who *choose* to state that they *identify* with a particular race or ethnicity, in however they define it.. with a few categories listed for people so that they don't have to sort through 300M hand written notes to collect data.
its not meant to be scientific/biological .... its sociological it would seem, eh ?
i've long thought that the term 'African-American' refers more completely to either immigrants from Africa (and their kids) ... the term black is used by people of African descent from all over the world and in all parts of the world.
negro is a more antiquated, and sort of esteemed, way of saying black american ...
anyhow. if black-american was separated from black and was also separated from african-american, then maybe the people here who are bitter that Barack didnt check mixed race would be happier.
actually, probably not. you'd still find something to dislike our president about.
Races were NEVER EVER classified by social, cultural aspects or artifacts. NEVER.
I assume you mean "by anthropologists", since people have been using the word "race" to refer to social and cultural groups for centuries. E.g., "the French race", "the Jewish race" and so on.
DBQ is venting another one of her rage-fueled, psychopathological hatred of humanity fit. As it turns out, she's wrong.
Races were always a social construct, as DADvocate and Revenant point out. (And yes, whether their relative, social uselessness makes their use in government or other exercises pointless as well, is another question).
The fact of the matter is that the sciences merely accepted this socially accepted phenomenon as a biological truism and didn't think to challenge it. However, such thinking probably changed some time after your friends, the Nazis, took the notions of biological hierarchy or innate superiority versus inferiority implied by race, to their logical conclusions and used them to justify the commission of mass extermination on a scale never before witnessed, thanks to a combination of the industrial means that were available to them and German efficiency.
I first learned that races were a social construct from Conrad Kottak when I took an intro course taught by him at the University of Michigan back in 1993. That was the state of the field back then, which I assume was more recently than "eons ago", as taught by the man who authored a well regarded text on it.
Of course, science being a provisional form of knowledge, molecular biology could turn this back around and find some kind of biological justification for the utility of race as a classification scheme, once again, for what were always social constructs. But I wouldn't trust Bunny's ideas on that since she obviously has trouble understanding both the chronology of the advances made by a field she majored in as well as whether it was actually challenging popular opinion or merely following it.
"You actually believe the economy's ebb and flow just "happen(s) when it wants to??"
I absolutely do. Fools who have though otherwise have done every possible evil in the process of proving me right for nearly 100 years. And it continues stronger than ever with no success to date.
If government was able to control the economy by enacting policy that did so effectively, why would it do anything else? Nothing would assure continued power, control and wealth so efffectievly for those who did so. By now we would all agree what this policy was and it would be clung to like a baby bottle.
"actually, probably not. you'd still find something to dislike our president about."
You're getting warmer.
I looked up Jefferson on Wiki. His mother was a Randolph, as was his son-in-law, her cousin. I'd read somewhere the Randolphs were descended from Pocahontas, which Wiki mentions in the s-i-l's page, but not on Jefferson's.
"Jeffries' sees whites as oppressive and violent 'ice people,' in contrast to peaceful and mutually supportive black 'sun people.'"
He should have visited Central Africa a century and a half ago, when the Zande were consuming (sometimes literally) all the smaller tribes around them.
He's a great role model for African American's in general, and African American kids in particular. Pleased to hear this is what he decided to do.
Thanks, Fudd, for bringing da Joooos into it. Never would have guessed. Gettin' a nice JO over your Tiger Beats tonight, or are the pages too stuck together now?
"Homo Erectus"
C-fudd's favorite species!
"Even Reagan may come down a notch or two because the ruinous impact of some of his economic ideology taking 20 years to manifest as net negatives(1)Free trade - lost jobs all to be replaced with Newer and Better Ones!,, (2)Supply side economics to fuel Gov't growth,(3)Deregulate the Heroes of Wall Street, (4) Trickledown economics."
Wow, sounds like a regular Bolshevik. You sure your mama didn't have a Hebe in the woodpile, Fudd?
He's a great role model for African American's in general, and African American kids in particular. Pleased to hear this is what he decided to do.
"African-American" -- a term used primarily by white people who are walking on eggshells around black people. It's okay, you can just say "black". Relax.
Maybe we'd have to get to Althouse's 5th or 6th thought before she realized that the one-drop rule still applies in the USA.
At least he didn't say "Cablinasian."
Most "black" Americans are of mixed race (as are many "white" Americans). And even the races that mixed were mixed before they mixed. The whole concept is pretty arbitrary.
But of course for a long time there was a "one-drop rule" about African ancestry, enforced by white society. And of course the Black Power movement in particular decided to seize on that and affirm it but reverse its valence, making it a matter of pride rather than shame. Then it became hip to be anything but "white." American Indian tribes had a lot of white-looking people knocking on their doors claiming a great-great-grandparent.
Obama is the child of that era. The younger people are, the likelier they are to be genuinely, comfortably, casually post-racial.
DBQ -- "The best laid plans of 20 year olds" usually go agley by getting best laid.
Ritmo is 100% on target. Without a doubt, the notion of "social construction" will prove to be the most profund concept in the history of ideas.
Thanks to the work of thinkers like Conrad Kottak the educated among us now know the what we in the West call "knowledge" is the product of social construction. Reason, logic, science (and even the so-called "law of gravity") are all products of social construction.
Why even Ritmo's existence is a social construct. If those who control and shape social constructs should deem him to not exist, he would cease existing right then and there.
Reality is no longer complicated; it's all really quite simple.
Forms required by the State of California:
What is your ethnicity? Please check ONE
___ Hispanic or Latino
___ Not Hispanic or Latino
No other options.
Answer: American. Human.
What is your Race:
___ American Indian or Alaskan Native
___ Chinese
___ Japanese
___ Korean
___ Vietnamese
___ Asian Indian
___ Laotian
___ Cambodian
___ Hmong
___ Other Asian
___ Hawaiian
___ Guatamalan
___ Samoan
___ Tahitian
___ Other Pacific Islander
___ Filipino/Filipino American (I guess they get the American designation)
___ African American or Black
___ White
WHITE.
No breakdown for WHITE. No ___ Russian, NO ___ English, NO ___ Scottish, NO ___ Irish. NO ___ Norwegian, NO ___ German, NO ___ Israeli. NO ___ French, NO ___ Australian, NO ___ Canadian, NO ___ Swedish, NO ___ Danish, NO ___ Greenlander, NO ___ Italian, NO ___ Dutch..... no. Just WHITE. Not even "Caucasian" anymore. Fair's fair. If you are going to break it down, do it for everyone.
Most everyone I know is a mix, sometimes of 5 or six of any of these categories.
What are you? And what is your answer? No matter what it is - it should be AMERICAN. HUMAN RACE.
there is a brilliant answer to all of you here who self-righteously think its not perfectly acceptable for Obama to check black/AA/Negro on the census.
please read the post.
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