A bit of a rough weekend here, and unfortunately Jill is out of town.
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Melissa Harris-Perry on why (some) White liberals are turning on Obama.
An interesting retrospective by the participants in the notorious "Stanford Prison Experiment."
After a Palestinian stone-thrower apparently caused a car accident which killed a Jewish settler and his infant child, settler militants are vowing revenge, with one extremist Rabbi proclaiming "There are no innocents in war."
Convicts told: Go to church or go to jail. It's not an Establishment Clause violation, the police chief argues, because you've got a choice!
The Marine Times cover on the repeal of DADT is, indeed, fantastic.
I thought the Herman Cain fad had passed, but apparently nobody thought to tell Florida.
This is from a few days back, but the new Union of Jewish Students (UK) campaign for a two state solution respecting the rights and dignity of Israelis and Palestinians alike looks very cool. I'm dubious that it will have any impact on campus radicals, but hopefully it can make a dent on the middle.
US gives high-powered military equipment to Mid-East ally fighting terrorist organization which seeks an independent homeland for a stateless, oppressed people.
Looks like Congressional Republicans have been reading my Comment.
I respect MHP a lot, but her article in the Nation was just terrible. "White liberals ate shit from Clinton, so if they don't do the same for Obama they are likely racist." That's especially poor analysis given that a huge number of Obama's '08 supporters, particularly the one's who he is going to have trouble re-mobilizing next year, were voting for the first time. Also, the fact that we have a terrible unemployment rate now, which was not the case with Clinton.
ReplyDeleteHere's a pretty comprehensive take-down of her argument: http://www.salon.com/news/david_sirota/2011/09/26/white_liberals_obama
ReplyDeleteAlso here's another one: http://www.salon.com/news/opinion/joan_walsh/politics/2011/09/25/white_liberals_obama/index.html
ReplyDeleteBasically, I think everyone who pays attention to politics can agree that MPH is dead wrong here. If she wants to use her academic and public reputation to shill for an unpopular incumbent politician, that's her call, but she's coming off pretty poorly for it.
MHP fires back.
ReplyDeleteMeh.
ReplyDeleteThat doesn't really address any of the points made by the two articles I linked, which actually get into the empirical opinion research. It's just an amalgam of talking points from anti-racist blogs which, while not wrong or inappropriate to call attention to, don't really do the work MPH needs to do if she wants her position to be taken seriously.
I mean, both of the articles I linked actually make evidenced cases that Obama's policy positions and the weakness of the economy are hurting his support among white liberals, and her rejoinder is the boiler-plate "the burden of proof shouldn't always be on us," "you can have black friends and be racist," etc. How exactly is that a relevant response to the points Walsh and Sirota are making?