Prometheus 6

Yeah, that's kinda blatant

Ta-Nehisi Coates has a blog. Since January.

Virtually every pundit who's spent the last week commenting on Rev. Wright has taken the position that Wright's views are likely not Barack Obama's. And yet many of them still believe that it is--and evidently should be--a tremendous hurdle for him to the presidency. This, to me, is the equivalent of standing in the middle of the street while a tractor trailer is barreling down on you, and getting pissed because the people telling you to get out the way happen to be yelling.

This country is in more trouble than it even knows. The Iraq War is bad enough. The rise of competitive powers like China and India will complicate things. Meanwhile our gluttonous dependency on foreign oil has seemingly only deepened. This isn't simply a problem of getting to work or polluting the enviornment--our food supply is virtually hostage to a steady supply of petroleum. And speaking of our food supply, we are facing a generation, so obese and sickened by a McDonald's lifestyle, that they actually may live shorter lives than their parents. I won't bring up the general state of the economy, or the state of education.

White people aren't being spared any of these problems. If Barack Obama looses because he is an inferior candidate, so be it. But if looses because we live in a world where Ann Coulter can call a presidential candidate a fag, and still hit the networks whenever a book comes, but Jeremiah Wright is branded the Anti-Christ, than white people will have denied themselves a potential avenue out of this mess, on the basis of soundbites and YouTube clips.

This country has never understood why Mississippi is the poorest state in the country. It's because racism is a suicide bomb--if you are the sort of fool to believes in the inhumanity of black people, it's quite likely you believe in a lot of other hooey also. Racism is self-destructive in that it correlates directly with ignorance and stupidity. Anti-racism is self preservation. Closing the chasm between black and white, healing America's original sin isn't a favor to black people--it's in the country's interest. LBJ didn't do us any favors in the 1960s, he saved America's collective ass by keeping it from looking like South Africa.

If Obama is derailed by Wright, I greatly fear for this country's future. Not in some hazy two centuries from now future, but in the next two decades, future. It will be a triumph of cynicism and mean we ultimately really are what big media says we are--passive consumers, unthinking receptacles, zombies mindlessly waiting on the end.

Hillary's historic ambition: to be the first woman to lose the Presidency. It's the only explanation.

Well, I just returned from my ward meeting tonight in University City, Philadelphia, and two Clinton staffers made an appearance. When one spoke on behalf of Hillary Clinton, he specifically listed Jeremiah Wright as an example of why Obama would be less electable in the general election. The context of his argument was that the Wright story demonstrated that Obama had not gone through the rigors of a presidential election before [P6: And when has SHE ever run for President before?], and it was possible that more damaging stories like that would come out as the campaign progressed. Aka, the Wright story is demonstrative of how Obama is less electable.

Subtle...

"I've already seen this guy four times today," Chicago-area ad salesman Blake Gordon said. "Every time, it's the same exact spiel. 'I need change.' 'I want change.' Why's he so eager for all this change? What's he going to do with it, anyway?"...

Those who encountered the black man Tuesday said he engaged in erratic behavior, including pointing at random people in the crowd and desperately saying he needs their help, going up to complete strangers and hugging them, and angrily claiming that he is not looking for just a little bit of change, but rather a great deal of change, and that he wants it "right now."

"I'll be honest, when that black guy said he would 'stop at nothing' to get change, it kind of scared me," local mechanic Phil Nighbert said. "Just leave me alone."

And I REALLY think it's time for Hillary's speech addressing the sexism she sees and what she intends to do about it.

Hillary Clinton spent the night in the White House on the day her husband had oral sex with Monica Lewinsky, and may have actually been in the White House when it happened, according to records of her schedule released today by the National Archives.

At least Reagan had the decency to get elected before going senile...

In Israel yesterday, NBC’s Lauren Appelbaum reports, Lieberman once again intervened when McCain made an incorrect reference about the Jewish holiday Purim -- by calling the holiday "their version of Halloween here."
 
McCain made the incorrect statement during a press conference with Defense Minister Ehud Barak after touring the Israeli city of Sderot to view buildings damaged by Hamas rocket fire. McCain was discussing the numerous rock attacks on the city. "Nine hundred rocket attacks in less than three months, an average of one every one to two hours. Obviously this puts an enormous and hard to understand strain on the people here, especially the children. As they celebrate their version of Halloween here, they are somewhere close to a 15-second warning, which is the amount of time they have from the time the rocket is launched to get to safety. That's not a way for people to live obviously."