Racist America comes out of the woodwork to attack Barack Obama

Shakespeare’s Sister has an ongoing multi-part “Obama Racism Watch” documenting incidents of racism in the media directed at Senator Obama (similar to their multi-part series “Hillary Clinton Sexism Watch” that is at 106 entries and shows no signs of stopping.)

I won’t go into every incident because they cover it much better than I, but I wanted to note some of the stuff that has happened just in the last few days, because it is just beyond my understanding, and I have to say something about it because it’s so – shocking.

Fox News’ “Terrorist Fist Jab”
Apparently, after introducing her husband to the crowd, Michelle and Barack did a “fist bump” as seen below. Now if you know anyone under 25, they’ve done this — it’s a thing that young people do – an alternative to high-fiving, or shaking hands, specifically done by people when they are awesome. I think I’ve probably done it, although I probably shouldn’t. It’s not a black or white thing, it’s just another way the youths of America are expressing themselves because they are cool.

But Fox News host E.D. Hill had this to say about it: “A fist bump? A pound? A terrorist fist jab? The gesture everyone seems to interpret differently.”

Michelle Barack Fist Bump
Michelle Barack Fist Bump

I think the only people interpreting this as a “Terrorist Fist Jab” is Fox News. Now it’s not hugely surprising to me that people at Fox would not recognize how awesome people greet one another, because no one at Fox is actually awesome. But how did the word “terrorist” get inserted in there? Really, anything you don’t recognize done by people who aren’t the same color as you is now terrorism? How old are these old farts anyway? And when do we get to shuffle them off to the retirement home?

The “Obama as Curious George” T-Shirts
Kelly Newcom of Ash Flat, AR made these T-shirts of Barack Obama as Curious George. But he specifically claims that the are “not racist” ignoring the years and years of shameful history where people used monkeys as derogatory images depicting African Americans.

Racist Anti-Obama Shirt
Racist Anti-Obama Shirt

The reason the image in the above shirts has a bag over his head is because just recently Marietta, Georgia bar owner Mike Norman got in major copyright infringement trouble for selling this shirt in his bar:

Racist Anti-Obama Shirt
Racist Anti-Obama Shirt

What’s bothersome to me is the huge number of blog posts out there with the titles of “is this a racist image?” as though there’s really some possibility that it isn’t.

FoxNews declares Senator Obama’s wife is his “Baby Mama”
Fox News does it again with this caption they showed yesterday under a picture of Michelle Obama:

Racist Fox News Caption
Racist Fox News Caption

For those of you who may not be familiar with the term “Baby Mama” it means a woman who is the mother of your children, but with whom you are not in a relationship. It is a term used somewhat in the African American community, but not widely, and it’s denounced by some African Americans.

But Michelle Obama is MARRIED to Barack and is his wife, not his “baby mama.” Fox using the term seem to be trying to imply that Senator Obama and his wife aren’t married to each other.

On the other hand — Now McCain’s first wife, the one he dumped after she was paralyzed in a car accident and had to learn to walk againshe is McCain’s Baby Mama. As is the first wife of any middle-aged white guy at Fox News.

The Obama Sock Monkey
Apparently, someone actually thinks that this Obama Sock Monkey is a viable product for sale and not a unbelievably racist image. Feel free to contact them and tell them they’re douchebags. I can’t even imagine how someone could create this, let alone mass produce it.

Racist Anti-Obama Doll
Racist Anti-Obama Doll

Racism aimed at Senator Obama’s Young Daughters
Even Senator Obama’s young daughters are under attack. Michelle Obama Watch notes that an “artist’ named Yazmany Arboleda in New York produced an “Exhibition” titled “The Assassination of Barack Obama” that was investigated by the New York Police and the Secret Service.

Among the images in this exhibition are a giant picture of Senator Obama’s daughters, Sasha and Malia Obama, under the title “Nappy Headed Hos.”

Racist Insults to Children
Racist Insults to Children

I don’t even know how to conclude this post, really. I know that racism is, unfortunately, still alive and breathing in the United States, but it still feels like a kick in the stomach to see things like expressed like this so publicly. As if these people actually expect the people around them to nod their head in agreement instead of wanting to kick the crap out of them.

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“All Televisions Tuned to Fox News”

No wonder the Vice President is so out of touch with reality — check out his “tour rider” from the Smoking Gun — the list of demands he has of hotels when he travels.
Item #6 – “All Televisions Tuned to Fox News”
Wouldn’t want to accidentally hear what real people have to say about the state of the world or anything. Pencilled in, though — requests for USA Today and the New York Times. Interesting.

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I was forced to watch Faux News

Turns out the only 24-hour “news” channel at Stephanie’s house on basic cable is Fox. (She hardly watches TV, so she doesn’t have a full package). No wonder so many lower-income people who can only afford basic cable have such a skewed idea of what’s going on in the world.

While we were watching the “sunshine and roses, the president is Hercules” version of what’s happening in New Orleans last night, apparently they locked people in the Convention Center and wouldn’t let them leave. Reporters are pleading for help and crying on camera.

Meanwhile, Bill O’Reilly’s talking point last night was “the government is not responsible for protecting you. You should not rely on the government to take care of you. Learn to fend for yourself.”

Really, Bill? So what’s the point of government, then?

They keep blaming the mayor, the governor, the “people who refused to leave.”

All of that is irrelevant — the point is that we had a disaster in a major city the completely wiped out the city, and thousands of people died, not because of the disaster itself, which they survived, but of thirst, heat stroke, violence, lack of electricity. They died of the AFTERMATH.

In the event of a terrorist attack, this is exactly what would happen, and there would be no way for them to shift the blame onto the victims of the tragedy. That’s a crime for which the president ought to lose his job. Bush is a living example of the Peter Principle in action.

Yesterday I was listening to some co-workers discuss New Orleans, and one of them was making jokes about how stupid the people of NOLA are and how they deserved to have it happen. He was trashing people who are donating to the relief effort, saying that we shouldn’t reward the people for living in a city below sea level and refusing to leave.

And it occurred to me that if something like this happens here in Indiana, that jackass guy is the one who would end up getting me killed. That’s handy information to file away for future reference.

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Top Ten Conservative Idiots (#113)

Courtesy Democratic Underground. In which Bill O’Reilly threatens to shoot Al Franken because Franken is smarter than he is and made him look bad at a book expo. Aw, poor Bill. Also, the Catholic church accuses gay people of hate crimes for kissing. Gee, that’s so similar to Matt Shepard being beaten to death and tied to a fence post.

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Fox News Faux Pas

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If you needed more evidence that Fox News isn’t exactly “news” and is more right-wing hysterical polemic: Fox news mistakes a parody site for a right-wing news site, has founder of parody site on show to comment on “real” news.
Parody site founder deliberately doesn’t tell Fox he’s a humorist so that he can savor the irony of making them look dumb: “In a shocking, somewhat frightening example of the glaring research vacuum that plagues television news” and “All anyone at the network would have had to do is actually have read the first paragraph of the piece to discover that it was 100-percent crap.”

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