They do such truly classy things during an election campaign. Things like, for example, this:
The latest newsletter by an Inland Republican women’s group depicts Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama surrounded by a watermelon, ribs and a bucket of fried chicken, prompting outrage in political circles.
The October newsletter by the Chaffey Community Republican Women, Federated says if Obama is elected his image will appear on food stamps — instead of dollar bills like other presidents. The statement is followed by an illustration of “Obama Bucks” — a phony $10 bill featuring Obama’s face on a donkey’s body, labeled “United States Food Stamps.”
Here’s the image in question:
Really, I don’t see what all the fuss is about. How anyone could think this was racist is beyond me. Doesn’t everyone love watermelon, fried chicken and barbecue? And gosh darn, don’t a lot of people use food stamps these days? It’s not like these are really racist stereotypes of black people. Is it? Surely something as innocuous as this didn’t offend anyone. Did it?
Sheila Raines, an African-American member of the club, was the first person to complain to Fedele about the newsletter. Raines, of San Bernardino, said she has worked hard to try to convince other minorities to join the Republican Party and now she feels betrayed.
“This is what keeps African-Americans from joining the Republican Party,” she said. “I’m really hurt. I cried for 45 minutes.”
A real shame that Democrats are smearing poor John McCain, Sarah Palin and their supporters as the haters this election season. Because everyone knows Republicans don’t hate anyone. Anyone white and Republican, that is. After all, the rest of us are either just a bunch of angry terrorist loving liberals, or angry, dangerous black militants or illegal aliens from the planet South of the Border here to steal our social security benefits, and as we all know such people are unpatriotic traitors and vermin who are fair game for Real Americans. Why the whole lot of us probably ought to be taken out and shot. We should feel fortunate they let us stay in this country at all. For now.
So, as you see, Republicans are the kindest, bravest, warmest, most wonderful human beings on Earth. So just leave them alone, you American Hating Obamamaniacs! Haven’t they suffered enough?
“Al The Plumber” needs some national attention instead of that ditto-head “Joe.”
Ya also gotta wonder what it is that Sheila Raines has had her head up all this time. I’m getting pretty sick of sappy suckers that just don’t want to wake up.
It is from the Inland Empire in latte-sipping, Volvo-driving, left-winging California.
If you want to know where the Yes votes on Prop 8 are coming from, look no further than this “Reagan Republican”.
And it is by now means left wing. Very Republican, lots of social conservatives and Mormons and right wing retirees. My Congresswoman was Mary Bono, to give you an idea.
It’s really a shame, because Republican policies have done nothing for the Inland Empire. The freeways have become more and more congested, no rail lines connecting the cities despite open land to build them on, housing prices took a massive hit these past two years, and the whole place is turning into Sprawlmart thanks to Prop. 13. Some of the ugliest suburbs in America are in the Inland Empire.
Most of the “hideous suburbs” are now ghost towns of foreclosed cookie-cutter homes. Maybe Riverside County/City planners will rethink their abuses of natural spaces and waste of water and refuse to let developers pave over every square mile.
HAHAHAHAHA who am I kidding? Just 3 miles east of the Foreclosed Estates, more houses are going up.
Could there be a clearer illustration of racism?
And people wonder why so many of us are amazed that any African American could ever belong to the Republican Party.
And this part….well, it speaks for itself.
“It was just food to me??????” WTF!!!!
Fried chicken….ribs….watermelon.
Nope. Nothing significant there.
Purely coincidental. My bad.
You know, I do have to say – I know those are racist tropes, but I really don’t know why. I like all of those things (well, except for Kool-Aid, which I’ve never heard of as a racist thing before, actually). I don’t know the history of how those things became associated with racist stereotypes of black folks – though they all seem like things I associate with the South to one degree or another so if I had to guess, I would guess that it was northern racists who created the association.
OTOH – using the word “buck” in association with a black guy. Yeah – that one I know the history of and … yeesh.
My last girlfriend was African-American, and so I spent plenty of time with her, her family, her friends. Not every black person drinks Kool-Aid, but a lot of them enjoyed fruit-flavored drinks like grape soda and Kool-Aid, as opposed to my white friends who mostly stuck to Pepsi, Coke, 7up.
Also, who doesn’t like BBQ or fried chicken? Her dad cooked great BBQ, and KFC was when you didn’t feel like cooking but wanted something greasy. El Pollo Loco (grilled chicken) was actually a bit more popular than KFC — healthier too.
Her family never ate watermelon that I saw. Maybe that’s a southern thing.
But whatever the truth is, the fact is that these things are used in stereotypical racist ways to demean and marginalize black folks. It goes back over 100 years, a way to make them cartoonish. There isn’t really any white analogue for it, since we are the dominant culture, but it’s definitely hurtful.
Putting Obama on a food stamp is just outrageous. He goes to Harvard Law, could be the first black president, and yet he’s nothing more than a welfare king. Ridiculous.
In the early 20th century there were “humorous” postcards which were produced in quite large numbers. They were commonly known as “coon cards”. They are now considered collectibles. These cards were often used in much the same way postcards are used today. Though many of them were used in advertising and were very often drawn as caricatures. A favorite theme was the stupid, foolish and lazy black man, often found eating a watermelon he had just stolen. Because, of course, that was what black people do, right?
Like this:
And this:
This is the legacy the Republicans are following with their actions.
The Ugliest yet – McCain’s Robocalls in Multiple states
TPM
I guess we can look forward to a wave of major profiles of this by all the mainstream media, calling it our for what it is, right?
what about some decent Republicans…are there any left?
Most of them have jumped ship.
Seriously – how decent can you be if you’re sticking with this crowd? Even the “moderates” like Voinivich or Snowe are tainted by the fact that they aren’t out there denouncing the disgusting crap their party pulls to win elections.
“Fedele said she got the illustration in a number of chain e-mails and decided to reprint it for her members in the Trumpeter newsletter because she was offended that Obama would draw attention to his own race. She declined to say who sent her the e-mails with the illustration.”
And she didn’t see it was racist BUT she did it because Obama drew attention to his own race?
Just remember that this is what passes as fun humor in Republican emails these days. And she tries to blame Obama for her sick actions? There is a lot to be said about Republicans passing the buck on personal responsibility.
For the life of me I don’t understand why ants would join an aardvark club…
LMAO
This sort of thinking is as basic to them as is breathing… and who thinks about breathing?
My uncle is/was a Republican land developer in the Chicago area. (I’m using the vague tense because I’d read on the Internet that he died, but there was no word from family. If you’ve read Hillerman’s “The Shape Shifter”, you’ll understand my doubts and disassociation.) Allan Hamilton was Treasurer of the RNC in the 1980s, or thereabouts. He was a major donor and insider. They sited O’Hare near his properties and made him very, very rich. Not wise, not tolerant, not human, but rich. The later transparency laws drove him and many other wealthy men underground. They eschew all publicity. Fear?
The old-timers still are donors, but it isn’t as massive or as direct. They make their influence felt in other ways. Providing hideaway retreats, for example, where the accumulated wisdom of their years of service can be brought into play. In absolute privacy. The perfect “undisclosed location”.
For example… when Cheney shot that lawyer in the face? It happened in Texas, but could easily have happened in Montana on one of my uncle’s 5 ranches. (I’m pretty sure he was the one who gave Cheney the $3000 fly-fishing rod, because those are custom-made in Dillon, MT… just up the road from Twin Bridges.)
That ranch has a lot of elk and there is plentiful deer (a lovely rolling property with brisk streams and good cover). It is a real working ranch with cattle and horses. My uncle would take a group of cronies… politicians and developers and business associates… out hunting. No big deal, except this: You know that thing with Troopergate and hunting on somebody else’s tag? It is a common scam up in Montana, and I bet Alaska is no different.
The old ladies like their bragging rights. There is a lottery for tags, and a limit. I think you can get a deer tag each year, but elk or moose or such have a delay before you can apply again. Grandma hadn’t fished since Grandpa died, and certainly hadn’t hunted in decades, but she applied for those tags religiously. She was handicapped. If you are handicapped, you can shoot from the vehicle! For someone like Cheney or Hastert or Gingrich or any other fat old coot, having such a tag in the truck was great. The men could could drive over the ranch until they saw something instead of walking all day.
Grandma gave her tag (always for a cow because the meat is tastier, and she wasn’t interested in trophy racks) to my Uncle. He rounded up tags for his buddies so they could go out and shoot things. She got meat for the freezer and bragging rights. The day the tags came in the mail, the ladies would all call each other bragging about which tags “they” got. When the hunters came back, they could brag again about how much meat was in their freezer. Total scam. But if everybody else cheated by applying in multiple names of relatives, they all had to cheat. Did Wooten’s wife EVER shoot anything? Maybe, maybe not… but with both people applying for tags, you double your odds of having free meat in the freezer. Lotteries work that way. The State doesn’t care unless too many animals of the wrong type are harvested. Or somebody decides to make it part of a political vendetta.
The main ranchhouse for the owners and their guests (you were wondering when I’d get to the point?) is a beautiful brick Victorian that was rebuilt and remodeled and redecorated. There are large watercolors by a western artist on the first floor. The one nearest the stairs, where you must pass by several times/day, is memorable in its bigotry. It shows a corral, and the cowboys inside are roping and branding… hard messy work. Outside the fence is a black cowboy, sitting on his butt, eating watermelon. WHERE do you get watermelon on a ranch in Montana??? The title of this delicious exercise? “Hiring him was like losing three good men”.
I regret that I don’t remember the artist, and there is no record of this piece online. There are probably other details besides the watermelon, but that seared itself. My aunt, a gracious well-bred Texan, approved every piece of artwork on those walls. I drove down with Grandma for a family reunion, ages ago. Nobody else was bothered by the image or the sentiments. Nobody. I bit my tongue for a week. However, year in and year out pasty white politicians and businessmen would pass by that image and accept it as part of the milieu.
How could they think that one man wasn’t the equal of another… but was no better than the LOSS of three good men simply because of his skin color? What is the opposite of good… bad? or evil?
And was the watermelon really necessary?
And this was art, to be purchased and hung with pride of place?
BTW, I am an artist, disabled and broke,… but I wouldn’t create such a hateful piece for ANY amount of money.
Stay classy, Republicans.
This election certainly does seem to have shown the nature of the Gop message-so to speak; and what a class act they are! They make my hair stand on end.