Blogging Blue

The more time I’ve had to process Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich’s appointment of Roland Burris to fill president-elect Barack Obama’s now vacant U.S. Senate seat, I’ve come to the realization this appointment was specifically engineered to call the bluff of Democrats in the U.S. Senate and force their hand in regards to whether or not they’d seat someone named by Gov. Blagojevich. What’s really disappointing is the concerted effort that was started yesterday by Congressman Bobby Rush to inject race into this appointment. During the press conference announcing Burris’ appointment to fill the vacant U.S. Senate seat, Congressman Rush stated any refusal to set Roland Burris by Senate Democrats would be the equivalent of a lynching, and on the Today Show earlier today, Roland Burris himself asked if a refusal to seat him by Senate Democrats is racism. Here’s a little snippet of Roland Burris injecting race into the discussion:

Given the public statements by Congressman Bobby Rush yesterday, as well as Roland Burris’ own statements today, it’s become obvious this entire situation was carefully orchestrated in an attempt to shame the U.S. Senate into seating Gov. Blagojevich’s pick, but it’s an absolutely despicable move, and it’s sad to see Roland Burris sell his soul simply so he can be a United States Senator.

Last week Wednesday, Democratic Rep. John Murtha said his home base of western Pennsylvania is racist and that racism could reduce Barack Obama’s victory margin in the state by 4 percentage points. I think it was a stupid thing for Rep. Murtha to say about his own constituents for a variety of reasons, but apparently Sen. John McCain agrees with Rep. Murtha.

H/T to The Brawler.

Earlier today, Jay Weber, local right-wing squawker, posted a list over at Right View Wisconsin of Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama’s associations and gaffes that Weber feels have been overlooked by the mainstream media. Curiously enough, Weber didn’t a post a similar list for Republican presidential nominee John McCain, so I’ve done Jay Weber’s work for him.

Jay, if you happen to read this, feel free to post it over at RVW. I’ve even used your same style, so your readers won’t even know you didn’t write it!

While prepping for work this morning, I started to make a list of the types of things that would have knocked any other candidate for office out of the running. I included associations of Senator John McCain’s, as well as gaffes and mistakes he’s made.

I had to stop after 25 minutes because I just had to move on to actually going to work, but I could have continued on much longer. Folks, it’s amazing how many passes Sen. McCain has received. I know it’s an overused charge by talk show hosts, but any other candidate really would have been disqualified immediately, or mocked until their candidacy was a joke, if they had even a single one of these associations or mistakes.

I didn’t want this post to be gargantuan, so I give just the essentials. But these are all easily researched.

Associations:

Anthony T. Bouscaren. Sen. McCain served on the board of the U.S. Council for World Freedom (USCWF) with Bouscaren, who’s a known white supremacist. What other politician wouldn’t even have to answer questions about his association with a known white supremacist?

Related to the USCWF: The USCWF was founded in Phoenix, Arizona in November 1981 as an offshoot of the World Anti-Communist League. The group was, from the onset, saddled with the disreputable reputation of its parent group. The WACL had ties to ultra-right figures and Latin American death squads. Roger Pearson, the chairman of the WACL, was expelled from the group in 1980 under allegations that he was a member of a neo-Nazi organization.

Rev. John Hagee. During the Republican presidential primaries, Sen. McCain said he was “proud” to receive the endorsement of Rev. Hagee, who’s noted for his strong anti-Catholicism.

Pastor Rod Parsely: Noted for his belief that Islam should be destroyed, Sen. McCain called Parsley a “spiritual guide” before ultimately rejecting Parsley’s endorsement.

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In 1998, convicted felon G. Gordon Liddy’s home was the site of a McCain fundraiser. Liddy, who served time in prison for his role in the Watergate scandal, also referred to McCain as an “old friend” when McCain appeared on Liddy’s radio show in 2007. Interestingly enough, Liddy has a rather “curious” fascination with Adolph Hitler:

When he listened to Hitler on the radio, it “made me feel a strength inside I had never known before,” he explains. “Hitler’s sheer animal confidence and power of will [entranced me]. He sent an electric current through my body.”

Sen. McCain’s running mate (and her hubby) have ties to the Alaska Independence Party, which has a stated goal of seceding from the United States.

Sen. Mccain’s got close ties to Freddie Mac through campaign manager Rick Davis, who until August was being paid $15,000 a month by Freddie Mac until last month through the firm owned by Davis. It’s being said Davis & Manafort, the firm owned by Rick Davis, had been kept on the payroll of Freddie Mac because of Rick Davis’s close ties to Sen. McCain, who by 2006 was widely expected to run again for the White House.

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Gaffes: Some call Sen. Joe Biden a walking gaffe machine. Sen. McCain’s actually much worse.

In 2000, Sen. McCain is quoted as saying, “if all you run is negative attack ads, you don’t have much of a vision for the future…or, you’re not ready to articulate it.”

At a recent rally in Pennsylvania, Sen. McCain inadvertently addressed the crowd as “My fellow prisoners.”

At a campaign event in Pittsburgh back in July, Sen. McCain said when he was first interrogated after being taken prisoner in Vietnam, he named the starters on the defensive line of the Pittsburgh Steelers as his squadron-mates, despite writing in his book Faith of My Fathers that when pressed for more useful information, he gave the names of the Green Bay Packers’ offensive line, and said they were members of his squadron.

Sen. McCain has cited on numerous occasions… including a TV commercial (that is no longer online)… one particularly egregious example of “wasteful government spending” involving the study of grizzly bear DNA: “Three million to study the DNA of bears in Montana. Unbelievable. I don’t know if it was a paternity issue or criminal,” he joked, “but it was a waste of money.” The only problem? Sen. McCain voted for the study he was so fond of attacking as wasteful.

Back in 2005, McCain is quoted as saying, “I’m going to be honest: I know a lot less about economics than I do about military and foreign policy issues. I still need to be educated.”

At a campaign event in New Hampshire, Sen. McCain joked about attacking Iran, singing, “Bomb bomb bomb, bomb bomb Iran.”

During a town hall in Scranton, PA in September, Sen. McCain declared that “there’s only one ethnic joke that can be told in American politics and that’s Irish jokes.” McCain then preceded to tell a joke about drunk Irish twins. Politico’s Ben Smith reported that Seamus Boyle, the president of the Ancient Order of Hibernian’s (an Irish-Catholic organization), said the joke “was really an insult to a whole nationality to be stereotyped as drunks.”

On September 24th, Senator McCain announced that he would be flying back to Washington “immediately” to concentrate on the current financial crisis on Wall Street. Though scheduled to appear on CBS’s “The Late Show with David Letterman” later that day, the McCain campaign called host David Letterman to cancel at the last minute, informing him that the Senator was “getting on a plane immediately to race back to Washington.” Stuck without a guest, the visibly annoyed Letterman chided McCain throughout his monologue, saying that McCain could simply of sent Governor Palin in his place, and questioned the “real” reason for Senator McCain’s sudden attention to his duties in Washington.

Flash forward 15 minutes later when someone informs Letterman that… not only was McCain NOT currently rushing back to Washington, but was in fact 5 blocks away (from 52nd street to 57th street) preparing for an interview with CBS Evening News anchor Katie Couric.

In an interview in 1998, Sen. McCain asked, “Look, is this guy, Laden, really the bad guy that’s depicted?”

On September 18. 2008 Sen. McCain said that if he were president, he would fire SEC Chairman Chris Cox for his “betrayal of trust” leading up to this week’s financial market crisis. The only problem? The president can’t fire the SEC Chairman.

During a rally in Jacksonville, FL on September 15th, Sen. McCain adamantly reasserted that, despite the failure of yet another major financial institution, Lehman Brothers, precipitating a 500+ point plunge in the DOW, that “the fundamentals of our economy are strong.”

And this is where I had to stop…

A couple of days ago, I blogged about Greg Howard, the teacher in Florida who asked his students what “change” stood for in relation to the Obama campaign and proceeded to write out the acronym “come help a n****r get elected.”

That same day, Kevin Fischer over at Right View Wisconsin posted an entry blasting teachers for engaging in pro-Obama activities on school time. I posted a link to the story of Greg Howard to make the point that teachers on both sides of the political spectrum are engaging in questionable behavior, with the following comment:

What’s even more disgusting is teachers who engage in politics in their classrooms and use the “N” word in the process

After my comment, readers of RVW were quick to defend the use of the “N” word as being perfectly acceptable (emphasis mine):

I’d say equally disgusting since we don’t know what the pro-BO teachers are calling McCain-Palin.

Why can’t you say nigger? My black friends and co-workers do. Young black men don’t seem to give 2 shits about it.

Not to be outdone, “Steve T.” of RVW posted a series of links to news stories dealing with the use of the “N” word. Now I’m not sure if Steve posted the links in an attempt to justify white folks using the “N” word to describe African-Americans, but if he did, he wasn’t successful, because many of the stories Steve linked to make it clear that the use of the “N” word is just not acceptable.

Now I don’t know whether some of the folks over at RVW are actually racist or not; I’d prefer to believe they just don’t understand the issue as well as they’d like to think.

First came comparisons of Democratic presidential nominee Barack Obama to a monkey, then came racist buttons. Now, courtesy of two Republicans from Tennessee, we have the latest installment of Republican racism, Obama Waffles.

Now sure, I get the joke that Barack Obama has waffled on some issues - as if Sen. John McCain doesn’t have his share of flip-flops - but that’s not my issue. Making a joke is one thing, but does the joke need to involve racial caricatures?

Then again, I think it’s safe to say Obama Waffles will appeal to the “Bubba vote” described by former Republican Congressman Dick Armey:

“The Bubba vote is there, and it’s very real, and it is everywhere,” Armey told USA TODAY and Gannett News Service. “There’s an awful lot of people in America, bless their heart, who simply are not emotionally prepared to vote for a black man.

Given this latest example of racism, I think it’s safe to say Republican presidential nominee John McCain has the “Bubba vote” solidly locked up.

H/T to James Rowen and Whallah!

Here’s a little something I found as I was surfing the Cheddarsphere today. In a post over at his blog, The Way I See It!, Cudahy blogger Randy Hollenbeck posted a few of his favorite pictures of Barack Obama:

Now call me crazy - and you wouldn’t be the first to do so - but the pictures above strike me as being more than a little racist, and not even in a subtle, *wink wink, nod nod* kind of way. Now I’m sure some will say, “Zach, don’t you think you’re making a mountain out of a molehill?” and I’ll say I don’t think I am. While I know these kinds of prejudiced and racially insensitive aren’t representative of how all conservatives feel, they sure don’t do much to dispel the idea that there’s a large group of conservative folks who can’t bear the thought of an African-American serving as President.

I emailed Randy Hollenbeck to get his thoughts on why he’d post pictures with such racial overtones, and his response was to ask what was racist.

Leave it to Patrick McIlheran to come to the defense of an almost indefensible position. Earlier today, Paddy Mac blogged about a recent controversy that’s come to light in Georgia, where a bar owner thought his idea to make t-shirts comparing Barack Obama to Curious George would be good for a few laughs. First Paddy Mac starts off his blog by saying:

Jerks: If the bar owner either didn’t know that it’s widely regarded as an insult to call someone a monkey, that it’s considered still more insulting to say it of a black person, or that Obama is black and so you really should avoid the monkey imagery, he’s an idiot.

Or he’s just being provocative.

So according to Paddy Mac, the bar owner’s just a jerk or an idiot, or perhaps he’s just being provocative. It couldn’t be the bar owner’s really just a racist showing his racist stripes. After all, we’re talking about a bar owner in Georgia, so it’s not as if this guy’s oblivious to the fact that comparing an African-American person - and in this case an African-American who just happens to be running for President of the United States - to a monkey might be just a tad bit racist.

McIlheran goes on to attempt to rationalize the t-shirts as a little “tit for tat,” pointing out that President Bush himself has been the target of unflattering comparisons to a chimpanzee:

Then again, this would be more obvious if we weren’t just wrapping up eight years in which comparisons of national leaders to chimpanzees were just ordinary political dialog from many of the same people all enthused over Obama. What goes around…

What seems lost on Paddy Mac is the fact that all comparisons of Bush to a chimp have to do with the fact that Bush doesn’t seem to be much smarter than the average trained chimpanzee, while conversely having nothing to do with Bush’s race or ethnicity.

H/T to Dan Cody over at Left on the Lake

First of all, a tip of the hat to Michael Mathias at Pundit Nation for this story.

The race for Milwaukee County Executive between State Senator Lena Taylor and incumbent Scott Walker promises to be one of the most hotly contested races in Wisconsin in 2008, so it shouldn’t come as any surprise that both candidates are going to pull out all the stops in order to win the race. However, what is surprising is just how low Scott Walker’s most vocal supporters are willing to sink in order to see him re-elected. In an editorial written for GM Today, WISN radio host Mark Belling, one of Walker’s most vocal and reliable media surrogates pulls out all the stops and asserts that Lena Taylor is a gang member. Commenting on a bill that would raise the age at which some juvenile offenders could be charged as an adult, Belling noted:

t’s not surprising that the bill is sponsored by some Milwaukee County Democrats like Sen. Lena Taylor, as they are chronically soft on crime and sympathetic to their increasingly influential gang bosses.

As Michael Mathias noted, Belling’s choice of words is curious, given that Lena Taylor is the only lawmaker among those cited by name whom Belling chooses to associate with gang bosses, and she also happens to be the only lawmaker of those cited by name who is African American. Anyone who has paid attention to Belling’s bellicose squawking throughout the years knows he’s not afraid of a little race-baiting from time to time, but his assertion that Lena Taylor is somehow beholden to “gang bosses” is vile, despicable and simply uncalled for, and I’ll be curious to see how Scott Walker responds to Belling’s comments.

I know the right-wing squawk brigade here in Milwaukee makes their living on saying and writing things that most normal folks find to be objectionable - lest we forget Jessica McBride’s attempted comedy bit bringing up the murder of 4-year-old Jasmine Owens in a fake interview with Journal Sentinel columnist Eugene Kane or Mark Belling’s comments referring to hispanics as “wetbacks,” resulting in his suspension. It’ll be interesting to see Senator Taylor’s response to Belling’s comments, because I’m sure she’ll have something to say about being thrown in with gang members.