Interesting to see that for some, hatred of socialism/communism is still their overriding motivator. As a socialist, I’ll have to keep that in mind.

Yeah, it’s kinda sad that to this date, these people keep spouting “communism” as if it were the ultimate insult. They don’t look as if they’ve read the Communist Manifesto themselves, either.

A spectre is haunting America…  No, wait, that’s just white dudes in sheets.

I’d rather be communist socialist than a secessionist.

I suppose there could be videos of Obama supporters saying stupid, uneducated, and hateful things too. I just can’t find any. I searched at YouTube for “people at obama rally” and the first page of hits all looked lovely and hopeful. Same search for “people at mccain rally”: 10 of the first 20 hits are of people at McCain events saying Obama’s an Arab, socialist, Muslim, or terrorist.

This makes perfect sense, of course. Obama isn’t running on a platform of fear and hate.

Seriously, I’m missing the part of the Marxist analysis that relates to electing a moderate liberal who wishes to keep a mixed economy.

At least on liberal blogs I have a good idea that when people reference books they actually know what they are talking about.

I also caught the word “raghead” from one of them… nice.

These people are vile and frustratingly, willfully dumb. I can’t believe they’re raising the spectre of the “red menace” of communism. That’s so 1950s. It makes them look crazy, paranoid and completely out of step with the modern world. Even if I liked John McCain (never!) I’d be hard pressed to vote for him if it meant I had something in common with that crazy mob and would be associated with them in some way after the election. I knew when Bush took office 8 years ago he was going to validate all the crazy creepy crawlies out there and encourage them to come out from under rocks. It’s not that I didn’t think they existed before, I just think they weren’t as outspoken since they hadn’t had a major political leader validate their brand of crazy yet.

Someone needs to explain socialism to those idiots.

Someone needs to explain socialism to those idiots.

I wonder if they still support the Bush administration, since they just did after all socialize the financial industry.

These look like the kinda folks who come reeling out of rustic taverns and spew on the streets early in the morning in some parts of denver (yes, I once lived there).  The RNC probably rounded them up to attend the McCain rally because no self-respecting rethug (an oxymoron, I know) would go.

Pam, is your assertion that there is no “Obama mob of hate”?  Honestly. 

As to the proponents of communism; it is a great idea in theory, though in practice it has been a dismal failure pretty much everywhere.

Socialism is a slightly different animal and works in some European countries, though there are major cracks of late due to significant immigration into those countries.  Socialism works if all citizens are of like mind and most are working, for example Sweden of a generation ago.

I wonder if they still support the Bush administration, since they just did after all socialize the financial industry.

Yeah, funny how that never comes up at these events.

My one real hope in this is that the media wakes up to the fact that there really are racists out there.  One of the problems with the “real America” theme is that it is one that has been reinforced constantly by the media.  In all sorts of news stories which focus on the “heartland,” and over and over again in advertising.  I know that advertising has to sell on visuals and associations, thus the beautiful farms and idealized America, but this is the ugliness that it ends up breeding.  I remember watching Ben Stein doing a commentary on CBS Sunday Morning show (usually a sane production) about how much he enjoyed his summers on a lake in Idaho, how it was the “real America.”  The video was all beautiful blonde children running, playing, splashing in the water.  He even said that there were “no gangs” there.  Of course, my reaction was, you just don’t know what the rural version of a gang looks like, and how do you think they would react to having Jewish folk at “their” lake.

I think this needs to be a wake-up call for dumping the “real” America meme.  There are more Haitian immigrants living in Massachusetts alone than there are farmers making a living at it in the whole country. 

And the Republicans get these images thrown back at them for the next generation.  This is how they won office.  And the media covered it up for them.

<blockquote>Socialism is a slightly different animal and works in some European countries, though there are major cracks of late due to significant immigration into those countries. </blockquoye>

Actually, due to the lack of population growth in the last 20 years, inmigration has been a great boost for the european socialdemocracies, since they’ve been paying for our retirement pensions and social security. Here in Spain, I remember hearing about the end of the welfare states in the beginning of the ‘90s, and how that fear disappeared after the foreigners started to come and helped pick up the population growth rate.

And right now Sweden is demanding more inmigration, by the way. Sure the newcomers could rely on the welfare and leech the system, but they don’t because working is much more profitable. (also, you need to stay at least 2 years in Sweden before you’re made elligible for any help).

aw, I didn’t check the html tag. :(

“Is your assertion that there is no “Obama mob of hate”?  Honestly. “

Post up some video links or them, bunky. Otherwise, shut up.

I don’t even know what an “Obama mob of hate” would look like. Shouting McSame? Yelling that he’s old?  What on earth could someone say about McCain that would be on the same level as calling him a terrorist and acting like a monkey?

Why hasn’t the Communist Party of America released a statement calling Obama “Not liberal enough!” yet?

“Is your assertion that there is no “Obama mob of hate”?  Honestly. “

Post up some video links or them, bunky. Otherwise, shut up.

You’re much politer than me, Factcheck. I was about to say “Pics or GTFO.”

Cyd, I keep hearing people claiming there’s some equivalent scary Obama mob out there (probably comprised mostly of scaaary black people, natch), but the most anyone making those claims has been able to produce of evidence is a video of some Obama supporters….booing. Now, I admit that being booed gives me the vapors for simply days, but somehow I’m just not able to make the leap to believe that that’s somehow equivalent of what’s coming out of the McCain side lately.

I completely agree with you, Phoebe.  “Socialism!” has been spewed at prominent, politically active POCs since the civil rights era.

Why hasn’t the Communist Party of America released a statement calling Obama “Not liberal enough!” yet?

Actually, the CPUSA is quite pro-Obama. The CPUSA is surprisingly moderate, nuanced, and measured in political opinions, I find. Just some further evidence that communists are not any more prone to “extremism” than capitalists, or advocates of mixed economies.

>>At least on liberal blogs I have a good idea that when people reference books they actually know what they are talking about.

“And they won’t have to burn the books
When no one reads them anyway”
- Tragedy, “The point of no return”

As to the proponents of communism; it is a great idea in theory, though in practice it has been a dismal failure pretty much everywhere.

As opposed to pure capitalism, which has been a smashing success.

Interesting that the people who bothered to come up and spew something at the camera were all white and over 50, or nearly all (and mostly male).

Poor dears. Their life-sustaining illusion, their final comfort and solace, maintained ever so precariously for the last 40 years, is shattering—i.e., that however much an ignorant, belligerent, powerless yokel you are, however intimidated you are by people of education, however confused you become by the speed and complexity of urban life, you can be goddamn sure of one thing, you have it over the black man. Yes, they’re reaching back to the McCarthyist language of their childhoods as a mask for their infantile bawling—and it comes off less as threatening than pathetic.

God almighty, I wish that stupidity and ignorance were jailable offenses.

Although I feel America has come a long way on racial issues since 1964, video clip after video clip like these shows how ridiculously far we still have to go as a country.

However, if these people in the video feel so passionately against Obama, does that mean if he’s elected they’ll move to Canada or France?

mike:

I don’t even know what an “Obama mob of hate” would look like. Shouting McSame? Yelling that he’s old?  What on earth could someone say about McCain that would be on the same level as calling him a terrorist and acting like a monkey?

I really do think that, to these people, it’s on the same level that we’ve said anything at all about McCain. Any criticism, no matter how accurate or reality-based, is in their minds precisely identical to lynching Obama in effigy.

Wapsie has it right: this is the demographic of ignorance, anachronism, resentment and unexamined privilege. Fat lot of good that privilege ever did them, anyway; these people are just as fucked as the rest of us.

I wonder if they still support the Bush administration, since they just did after all socialize the financial industry.

Not the whole financial industry, just the losses they incur.  Profits have to remain privatized.

I was trying to figure out if any of those folks had read the manifesto themselves.

I think logic needs to be added to school courses at an earlier age. Calling somebody a name is not an argument, nor does it make it true.

A co-worker said that she had “moral reasons” to vote for McCain. I assume this is code talk for religious fundamentalism. I was struck dumb, but I should have said, “I’d rather not talk politics at work.”

However, if these people in the video feel so passionately against Obama, does that mean if he’s elected they’ll move to Canada or France?

Hey, lay off Canada, they’re nice folk up there.  Also, I don’t want any of those assholes coming thru my state to get to Canada.

Send ‘em to fucking Mexico, where they can work off all that hate in the broiling sun.

McCain supporter: “his wife made him say that” (that he was Christian)

way to go - hatred of race and of women in the same sentence - we have a loser here….

A co-worker said that she had “moral reasons” to vote for McCain. I assume this is code talk for religious fundamentalism.

“Moral reasons” usually equates to “ZOMGZ BORSHUN”.

Or it could be that her minister told her to vote that way.

I thought of something interesting this morning.  If McSame wins, I can call my brother’s immigration lawyer and start talking with my various contacts in more progressive English speaking countries about help getting jobs and crossing borders.  Even Americans who lack my education level could find jobs in Canada or Australia if they are willing to work in certain areas of other countries where labor is needed, and take advantage of the benefits of citizenship.

If Obama wins, these people have NOWHERE TO GO!  Nowhere.  There isn’t a country that does what they want to make the US into that isn’t an Islamic theocracy or full of dark people who wouldn’t be too keen on their arrival.  Even Brazil has healthcare, and Mexico wouldn’t want them around because they would hold it back on the considerable progress they have made.

“Lookit—the important thing is, God may not be on my side, but Satan is on your side. “

So, let me see if I follow: we have all the power of Satan backing us up and you have….nothing. You may commence wetting your pants in abject terror now.

Cyd: the concern-trolling didn’t work, the fake whatabouttery isn’t working. Do you have a third act?

I’ve been trying to think what Fox News and their ilk would call it if brown muslim people were burning, hanging, or otherwise inflicting symbolic violence on an effigy of W. Bush or John McCain. 

Starts with a—lemme see—starts with a T, I think.

Tuh, tuh, tuh—I swear it’s on the tip of my tongue, but I just can’t get it.  Somebody help me out?

I don’t even know what an “Obama mob of hate” would look like. Shouting McSame? Yelling that he’s old?  What on earth could someone say about McCain that would be on the same level as calling him a terrorist and acting like a monkey?
Mike on 10/25 at 10:19 AM

I can think of lots of mean, hateful things to say about McCain, Palin, and their partisans. The thing is, they are true. And while I feel just as passionately as this mob that the election of the wrong side would be a a disaster, those feelings have in fact been borne out, sadly, by the actual policies and actions of their predecessors.

But going out and just screaming hatred accomplishes nothing. The reason I despise these so-called conservatives is that we can do better, and it is this positive message that fuels the Obama campaign.

Whereas modern American “conservatives” would be quite embarrassed to see a demonstration that their patty, mean, narrow-minded approach to things is not the only, or best, way to get things done, and are desperate to prevent that from happening. Hence their frustration and anger, underlain by fear they would be proven wrong and hence culpable.

The worst thing they can say about Obama, or Democrats in general, that is actually true, after all, is that quite often they do they same things their favored reactionary candidates do.

I don’t even know what an “Obama mob of hate” would look like.

Mike

The reason you don’t is that, as of yet, there hasn’t been one. I don’t really think there will be, either.

As Mark pointed out, conservatives who have wished to become scared of Obama can only point to his charisma, and the tendency of some people to call him “the One”, “the Messiah” etc. And this just makes them look ridiculous, since most of them spent the last eight years expressing an even more extreme adoration for George W. Bush, not to mention expressing hatred of anyone outside of their party and ideology.