Obama's mentor Rev. Goofball preaches Black Power, not Multi-Racial Power. I understand that Obama affiliated himself with Goof's Black Power in order to appear authentically black to his southside Chicago constituency, but let's not pretend that most of his afr-amer supporters view him as multi-racial. For those who think like the good Reverend, there's only Black and non-Black. "Multi-racial" in their view belongs in the latter category.

At some point-- maybe not today, or tomorrow, or next week, but soon and for good, our party is going to have to wean itself off of the identity politics teat that is the single greatest threat to our taking the WH this year and successfully leading the nation afterward.

Marty, This is you're fourth blog today. Is that a record? You seem very excited. Too much coffee perhaps? Or was it all the attention you got last week?

I only bring this up because in this short piece I count at least three, possibly four, typos. Professor: Correct Thyself!

Mr. Peretz, these subjects (Obama, Hillary, Reverend this, Bitchy that, etc., etc.) are all very well... But aren't the Republicans finding a way to stay in power (substantively speaking) after loosing an election? Have you paid attention to the proposal of Paulson on the Federal Reserve and it's incredibly increased powers of market regulation?

The Republicans loosing but keeping an "independent" agency applying their ideologically based economic theories independently of elections?

You should pay attention to this or at least warn Dionne, Jr. ...

Tep... right you are about weaning oneself from identity politics..

But about Pastor Goofball... there was a very interesting testimonial by a White church member of TUCC who belonged because his Black wife did.  She apparently broke off their engagement years ago because she felt that as an upcoming Black leader she couldn't marry a White guy.  Pastor Goofball heard about it, called her in, persuaded her that such racism was wrong and married them a few months later.  Interesting as so often reality is other than it seems.

By the way, if you have any curiosity  (to me that is increasingly the operative word) do go to Youtube... type in Wright and Fox Lies and you'll get longer clips of the more outrageous sermons... one about 9 minutes, the other 6.  Let us know what you think...It really is an object lesson in how effectively sound bites do manipulate and that al that can save us from it is not scepticism necessarily, but simply CURIOSITY

Unlike Israel Marty? A land of one religion.

Anna - I myself don't take the Black Power stuff seriously, and I'd bet that, as your example of Wright's kindness suggests, he doesn't either.

It's basically another variety of American Preacher-Huckster Performance Art, of a piece with Swaggart's fulminations, Jim and Tammy's mascara-stained happy tears. Same shtick, different demons, same ol' cash on the barrelhead. "Spiritual mentor" -- giggle.

If Obama had any class he would have at least avoided dragging the woman who helped raise him into this gaudy, vain and fraudulent spectacle.

Oh, Anna, you didn't ask but having been through these discussions about 1,000 times in my not-so-short life, I'll cut to the chase and say that rather than hearing still more race-based blather I'd prefer we finally start living King's admonition to judge on not skin color but the content of people's character.

Seen in that light, Wright has vastly more in common with Falwell than he has with you or Falwell had with me. *<(:o)

Peace,

t

ok, on thread (about multi-racial families), my wife is Chinese, I am Irish-German and our children are growing up as mixed race and multi-lingual. My older son had blond hair (now brown) and when he was younger my wife was always confused as being the nanny. Neither of our children truly take after either of us. As they grow older it should be interesting to see how they classify themselves and are classified by others. One of the greatest benefits of mixed races is that the Children often outstrip the parents in attractiveness. And additionally, the incidence of negative recessive genes getting passed down are far less common among mixed race children. sickle cell anemia for example.

personally, I agree with Bulworth, we should screw ourselves grey.

There is no more multi racial country than Israel with Jews from Europe, Ethiopia, Arabs lands, India and even China.

Only a typical ignorant a hole would think otherwise.

Ireland, there is a lily white country. Bigoted too; they get three Africans living there illegally and they think they are a multi-culti heaven.

jackson, about Ireland, way untrue. I work with a woman from Dublin married to a man from Tanzania. There are a lot more true black Irish now than you are aware of. just check the data. no need to knock Ireland because you are pissed off at one Mick. (I can say mick because I am one, so says I)

blackton said: "jackson, about Ireland, way untrue. I work with a woman from Dublin married to a man from Tanzania."

I know there are some B lack Africans in Ireland, blackton. But come on, Irish culture isn't exactly multicultural.

How many Blacks Irishmen or women are part of the literary canon. How many Black African composers?

Let's get real here.

Now, I am not attacking Ireland for not being multicultural. I don't expect her to be a multicultural society any more than I expect Iceland or Japan to be so.

My point was that the ignorant (stupid really) bigot is in no position to attack Israel a country that is a hundred times more multiracial and multicultural than his own.

tep:  "At some point-- maybe not today, or tomorrow, or next week, but soon and for good, our party is going to have to wean itself off of the identity politics teat that is the single greatest threat to our taking the WH this year and successfully leading the nation afterward."

Yes, indeed, but Obama is not the man to do it.

This is a pity since his only strong suit was that he could rise above racial divisions and so far his campaign has done nothing but play the race card and accusing other of doing so.

Wait till they confron McCain you will see the same tactics used against him.

They have already started with their "angry white male" crap on this site.

blackton, I was trying to locate an article about anti-African sentiment in Ireland that I read a while ago but couldn't locate it. However, I did come up with this and am posting it for whatever it's worth. People should do their own research on the issue, if they are interested:

" Black children left out of Irish schools"

http:////news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070903/ap_on_re_eu/ireland_black_students

Headline: Black children left out of Irish schools

"DUBLIN, Ireland - Almost all the children who could not find elementary school places in a Dublin suburb this year were black, the government said Monday, highlighting Ireland's problems integrating its increasingly diverse population. The children will attend a new, all-black school, a prospect that educators called disheartening. About 90 children could not find school places in the north Dublin suburb of Balbriggan , a town of more than 10,000 people with two elementary schools. Local educators called a meeting over the weekend for parents struggling to find places and said they were shocked to see only black children."

NEWSFLASH: we are all mixed, don't believe it, go get yourself a comprehensive DNA test and prepare to be shocked.  Beyond the field of anthropology the concept of race is a social construct, that is the reality.

I was watching Henry Louis Gates most recent show African American Lives 2 and it was interesting to see all these well-known African-American figures he had tested, including himself, many if not most of whom finding out that some percentage, perhaps 50% or more of their genetic makeup could be described as most typically Caucasoid.

We're all mixed folks, that means every other human being is your brother or sister, all you have to do is go back far enough, so start acting accordingly.

AaronBBrown thanks for stating the obvious and I didn't need to watch Gate's DNA parade to figure it out. A basic course in biology will teach you that.

Still, this is nor what we are talking about here. What is meant by "race" unfortunately is not DNA but skin color.  The fact that more and more Americans see themselves as neither Black or White is a good thing. However, this doesn't prove that Obama should get the nomination or be elected President.

Irish music with a 'fro

www.youtube.com/watch

Great clip Mac.

Jack, you'll notice I pointed out that Israel is a land of one religion. I didn't mention anything about race or ethnicity. Some people claim Jews as an ethnic group don't they? Regardless, I'll leave that debate to the Zionist scholars on this site.

If Marty is going to wax lyrical about the benefits of a "many people of

different races, ethnicities, tribes and RELIGIONS in the population.", then it's valid to point out that Israel is a land of one religion.

An exclusive land, even to the piont of defining citizenship. When you have differen't roads for Arabs and Jews in the occu...disputed territories and you can't become a FULL citizen with FULL rights unnless you are a Jew, then that's worth mentioning.

Maybe we should pass into law something similar. An exclusive Roman Catholic country, for Roman Catholic's only.

I wonder how that would go down?

Many have said how wonderful it will be when we finally get over racial tagging.  My two step-daughters are bi-racial (my wife's first husband was Nigerian) and I've been their step-father from 8 years of age to now 20.  What I can say from first hand experience is that there is a real and identifiable perception difference in this area based on age.  The 20 years old and below people today from diverse environments have next to no racial 'tagging' issues at all.  The older the person, the more need to identify by ethnicity.  Young adults don't even think about mixed race relationships, they just think about individuals for who they are.  Since I was 18 when Selma occurred, I look at this as why the whole civil rights thing happened, but many my age can't seem to face this reality.

On another point - I notice there's the old South way of identifying a person's race floating around.  One drop of African blood makes a person African-American.  I'm Irish-Dutch-Austrian-something else-and possibly a little tiny bit Native American.  So am I Native American?  Obama's talk on race and having a national discussion is really needed, far more than many of us realize.

My next door neighbours dog is black Jack and her cat is Jewish, keeps wailing at the wall all night, keeping the whole estate up. So, I'm not sure what you're getting at.

The cat actually took over the dog's kennel. Meowed something about ancesteral feline's once living there. The dog has to do the best he can in the rain at the back of the garden. He's hoping the owners will intervene so he can get in from the cold. But my neighbours seem to prefer the cat. I can't but feel sorry for the dog. We've had a falling out over it. My neighbours are accusing me of being a rabid anti-Feline, I think they're a bit unhinged to be honest.

Poor dog.

You're allowed call me a Mick Blackton. Us Mick's gotta stick together, begorah.

Did you know that "Mick" used to have the same connotation as the 'N' word does today?  During the Civil War there were race riots in NYC, mostly by Irish immigrants, protesting emancipation - the Irish were on the bottom of the pile and were deathly afraid freed blacks would take all their menial jobs.  I'm fairly certain this is where the classic Irish-American bias against African-Americans originated as it's not present in Ireland itself.

I can sympathize about being labeled a rabid anti-Feline - I get that a lot, especially from Felix supporters.

:) Walt.

True, but you also know that a lot of American musical heritage is the result of Africans and Irish having a bit of craic? Tap dancing (a gig doing a jig etc), Jazz, even a lot of folk music, and the MIck's are the blacks of Europe. My bothers keeper.

As a matter of fact, I'm claiming Bone, Blackton and Teplukhin in TNRland for the Republic. Not a bad green team that - solid at the back with good penetration going forward.

The Nazi Neil Mackenzie and comes to the aid of the antisemtic Ignoble Popushit.

Figures!

Content of our character. Not color of our skin.

Wright and other race-mongers be damned.

"Murder sparks Irish racism fears"

news.bbc.co.uk/.../1813880.stm

"Diary on Irish Racism"

flag.blackened.net/.../diary97to2000.html

"Irish Anti-Semitism

THERE is no question that the Irish/Irish Americans and Ireland are anti-Israel/anti-Semitic (in general and more so than most.) I do believe it is due to the “Jews killed Christ” mentality.

Here is a posting on The Irish Times site that I would like to see reprinted in the Irish Voice. At least the “Jew killed Christ” Catholic (Irish Catholic) mentality should be explored.

“I often ponder why Ireland is so much on the forefront of the anti-Israel coalition. And then I think back to my childhood days growing up in Terenure, Dublin, in the early 1950s, and I recall being told by the kids in the street that “I killed God,” when I was still too young to understand what they meant.

“Those were the days when an Irish Jew couldn’t get a summer job in the post office, because there were ‘no temporary positions,’ only to find that there was a job for the next guy in line, a Catholic.

Ireland was one of the last European countries to establish diplomatic relations with Israel. This was explained to me once by a Catholic friend, Seamus (or Shimmy, as I called him), who told me that his priest had explained that Israel shouldn’t exist because God had ‘punished the Jews and taken away their country.’

“With our shoeless legs dangling in the Dodder river (after fishing for pinkeens with a jar and a bottleneck), Shimmy once said to me, ‘I’m worried about you. When I die I’m going to go to heaven, but what will happen to you?’ This is what Shimmy had been taught at home, and I was by then 14, and already knew what anti-Semitism was.

“The problem with Ireland is that anti-Semitism and other forms of racism are too deeply ingrained in the Irish culture. That is why the Dublin street marches against Israel are a bit more extreme than elsewhere in Europe, the slogans are a bit more vile, and the marchers a bit more radical in their anti-Israel chants.

“Ireland has quite a bit of soul cleansing to do before its criticism of Israel gains any legitimacy. It should first turn a critical eye on itself. A land of saints and scholars it is not.

“Ehad Haam, an Irish Israeli.”

Patrick McVeigh

Floral Park, New York"

www.irishabroad.com/.../Letters-090806.asp

People who live in glass houses shouldn't throw stones!

anti-Feline Jack, anti-Feline.

jack - Ireland today is definitely mutlicultural-- many thousands of Poles and muslim Africans have immigrated during the last 10+ years. Goes hand in hand with being rich - wealthier than the English and nearly everyone on the continent  8-)

WaltB - ironic, isn't it, that race-mongers on both sides of this absurd divide would consider your step-daughters part of the "Other".

The best way to get beyond race is to get beyond race. Our national dialogues should address national issues, not tribal ones

Jack, come on. One man's recollections of reactionary, priest ridden 50's Ireland?

That's a bit weak.

I mean we were anti everything back then. Our lone striker is right, the country is radically changed.

We've taken a huge Slav immigration wave on the chin. Dublin is like Warsaw now and they're great people. My mother went into the church in town to light a candle and she was amazed to see the church full of Polish and East Europeans all queing to see the Priest, to tell him their problems. She said it reminded her of the Ireland she grew up in.

Anyway, there are a lot of street portests from the militant left against Yankee imperialism and Israel and on and on, but that's a function of our history more than anything else. And if you define an anti-Israel stance as anyone who voices opposition against the occupation, then you'd have to say the rest of the world is anti-Israeli. Hardly a function of some latent Irish racisim.

Why do you hate canines Jack?

Ignoble Popidrek has has the sense of humor of the progromchik.

teplukhin2you said: "jack - Ireland today is definitely mutlicultural-- many thousands of Poles and muslim Africans have immigrated during the last 10+ years"

I know but that doesn't make multicultural. There is a lot of bigotry and antisemitism in Ireland today. Africans and other non Europeans are not always welcome there.

Needless to say I am no supporter of the organization that posted the followin, tep.  It is more the kind of group that ignoble would belong to. However, the facts are indisputable:

"Government scapegoating of immigrants encourages racist thugs"

struggle.ws/.../racism.html

This is why Ignobles scapegoating of Israel is so pathetic. This creepy pogromchik  needs to put his own house in order, first.

Well, taking into account the numbers of immigrants, the number of incidents are small. It's also worth noting the mention of Loyalist thugs in that report, which occured in the United Kingdom Jack. There is a border you see.

There are incidents, we're far from perfect. Two Polish lads got screwdrivers to the head a couple of weeks ago. The President attended the funeral in solidarity, as did most politicians.

You equate acts of violence, often fueled by drink and drugs with institutional racism, which is incorrect. While Israel actually has laws that prohibit non-Jews from becoming full citizens. That sentenece alone should give you pause for thought Jack. I won't hold my breath.

   "While Israel actually has laws that prohibit non-Jews from becoming full citizens."

Ignobale pogromchik speaks and lies.

Israel has more than a million non Jewish citizens which is many times more than Ireland has.

The porgrmochick doesn't like to be told the truth about his precious bigoted Ireland.

When it comes to Ireland the bigot makes excuses:

"Well, taking into account the numbers of immigrants, the number of incidents are small."

"Small?"

From the link above:

"In July of this year the government managed to convince 79% of the people who voted to pass a referendum which restricted the rights of some children born in this country to Irish citizenship. We helped campaign against the citizenship referendum on the grounds that to deny someone citizenship based on the fact that their parents were immigrants was racist and unjust. We also feared that that, if passed, the referendum would encourage racists and bring about a climate where they were likely to be more active."

You are a hypocrite as well as a bigot.

Go peddle you Jew hatred on an Irish website where it belongs.

:) Up to my nads in work Jack, but you're lightening the load.

First of all.

A tried and tested technique in TNR is to attack the source. I find it quite amazing that you are quoting an anarchist publication Jack as evidence of some absolute truth. Now, I'm partial to a bit of anarchism myself but I wouldn't rely on it to prove a point.  

The link between an entirely sensible referendum 7 years ago to isolated (isolated means there is no common group or party involved in each attack) individual acts of violence is spurious, at best.

As for my own lies - there a million non-Jews in Israel but as you know the majority of them are Arabs who fell on the right side of the line during the creation of Israel.

More importantly, there are laws that specify an Israeli citizen as EXCLUSIVELY Jewish.

Woof, woof.

This lying  Ignoble shithead never learns.

He said:

"While Israel actually has laws that prohibit non-Jews from becoming full citizens."

If there is such a law there couldn't be a more than a million non-Jewish citizens of Israel. There are also non Jews at all levels of Israeli government including the Supreme Court and the army.

Now the  asshole says that:

“there a million non-Jews in Israel but as you know the majority of them are Arabs who fell on the right side of the line during the creation of Israel.”

There are also hundred of thousand of non Jewish (from a halachic point of view) residents from the former Soviet Union who have also become citizens.

In nay case, it doesn't matter how they became citizens.   Besides citizenship and entry into Israel are two different things.

Citizenship can be acquired either through:

residence

Citizenship by residence was intended for non-Jewish denizens of the British Mandate of Palestine (Arabs, Druze, Bedouins, etc) who where considered to be associated with Palestine during the period immediately prior to the 1948 Arab-Israeli War. Such denizens who were still within the territorial confines of Israel after the war were granted full Israeli citizenship. In order to determine who was eligible for citizenship under this provision, the state of Israel conducted a population registration in 1952 and again in the 1980s. Those found to meet the requirements obtained Israel citizenship.  

Or by

By birth

A child born to an Israeli citizen (including children born outside of Israel as first generation out of Israel) is considered an Israeli citizen[1]. Children born outside of Israel are eligible for Israeli citizenship if and only if one of the child's parents was an Israeli citizen through birth in Israel. In other words, the principle of jus sanguinis is limited to only one generation born abroad. Despite this limitation, the descendants of an Israeli national abroad can obtain Israeli citizenship through other methods, such as the Law of Return, if they are eligible.

Hence if an Israeli male is married to a non Jew abroad his non-Jewish children are eligible for citizenship.

By naturalization

Adults may acquire Israeli citizenship through naturalization. To be eligible for naturalization, a person must have resided in Israel for three years out of the previous five years. In addition, the applicant must have a right to reside in Israel on a permanent basis. All naturalization requests are, however, at the discretion of the Minister of the Interior.

The issue is a lot more complicated than a besotted bigot like you could understand.

Now since you are not interested in the truth, go stick you sick bigoted head in the toiler were it belongs.  

Jack, where I live the first roses are blooming (Cecile Brunner, old-growth vine, light pink), children smile, boys surf, hearts are light and April's off to a fine start.

Have a nice Apr 1.

"Jack, where I live the first roses are blooming.."

April fools’ day joke, right?

Primavera here too, crocuses are blooming…. Are we on the weather or the nature channel, now?

Teplukhin's right Jack. It's a fine day here as well. If I misrepresented Israeli law, then I apologize.

But I stand by the general intent of an exclusively Jewish state.

Anyway, my other laptop is now off after a savage day and I'm building up to the EU quarter finals. We take on that famously communistic (is there such a word as communistic?) club Roma tonight. So, I know you'll want us to teach those commies a lesson tonght Jack.

Get in there yea good thing! Get stuck in there!

Sorry to interfere dear John.

But being so worried with the criteria of citizenship in Israel (and I'm not saying that it isn't a legitimate worry, to be carefully addressed within the particular circumstances at hand), aren't you the one that violently rejects Turkey's admission in the EU (and Turkey's admission in the EU would not, by far, create problems of demographic balance: it would only be a very clear sign -- and a very good sign, from my perspective -- that the EU polity is by no means an ethnocentric polity or anything of the sort...)

Is it "do what I say but not what I do"? And isn't this sort of hipocrisy a permanent feature of some enlightened speech of the "gauche caviar" in Europe (which prevents it to be taken seriously in anywhere serious)?

Not to say that we aren't before very complex problems. But I simply cannot accept this permanent exam of Israel as a way to atone one's bad conscience about the solution of one's own problems. Perhaps the admission of Turkey in the EU would be a very fine example to be followed by many...

jacksondyer is featured in an article in the current New England Journal of Medicine about a newly discovered condition named Tourette's Dementia. The principal symptoms are general insanity and a potty mouth.  jacksondyer is the only known sufferer of this condition for which there is no treatment.

Typical asshole response:

"If I misrepresented Israeli law, then I apologize."

You always "misrepresent" Israel and do so knowingly. This is because you are a compulsive Jew hater.  

"But I stand by the general intent of an exclusively Jewish state."

Who cares what you think.

Israel is a proud Jewish State and even so there is more freedom there than in any Arab or Muslim State. Irish history doesn't offer us a model of tolerance even when it wasn't under British control.

If there is "more freedom [in Israel] than in any Arab or Muslim State" why do some many Israelis choose to live in the Occupied Palestinian Territories?

Chill. Fly a kite. Follow the happiness formula of the good doctor Martin Seligman of U-Penn: news.bbc.co.uk/.../4903464.stm

"Three exercises proved to be placebos and three worked well, producing lasting reductions in depression and lasting increases in happiness:

"The three that worked were "three blessings" - writing down three things that went well today and why; "the gratitude visit" - writing a gratitude testimonial and delivering it personally; and "using your signature strength in a new way" - taking the signature strength test and using your highest strength in a new way."

ditto for you, eNdee mack.

teplukhin2you -

Your advice to me is misdirected.

My entire contribution to this thread, before jacksondyer spewed his potty-mouthed dementia in my direction, was a YouTube of Thin Lizzy doing Whiskey in the Jar.

The villain of this thread, as with every thread on The Spine, is jacksondyer.

Ask an African football, or africian american football player what kind of abuse they hear from european crowds. (I'm talking soccer here now). Read about how UEFA, the euro body controlling this has to regularly fine clubs for the racist chants of their supporters. Stuff that stopped here in the US a long time ago, except to my shock, in Pittsburgh in the early 90s...a very racist place...

ask us player DeMarcus Beasley what he has heard playing in Scotland...

Granted kozal. That's been an unfortunate aspect of European soccer for a while. Much less so in the UK these days. The worst of it is in Spain and Italy. The Italian Ultra's are split between the fascits and communists and are thugs.

But look, don't dis the greatest field game ever invented by man over a few retards.

Louis - Non to Turkey!

That Neil Nazi Mckenzie should complain about some one else's language is beyond ludicrous. But then the independent Jew hater is beyond ludicrous himself as his risible post shows:

“If there is "more freedom [in Israel] than in any Arab or Muslim State" why do some many Israelis choose to live in the Occupied Palestinian Territories?”

The question, Jew hater, is: if Israel is such a hateful place why do more than a million Muslims live there? In fact when some villages were going to be turned over to the PA as part of a peace deal, the Arab villagers complained.

Now go back to your Islamic sermon, jihadist wanna-be.

"ask us player DeMarcus Beasley what he has heard playing in Scotland..."

and not just in Scotland, in Ireland too as well as on the continent.

"The worst of it is in Spain and Italy. The Italian Ultra's are split between the fascits and communists and are thugs."

It's always worse elsewhere to some people. The hypocrite can never point to himself and his own country.

Eve Garrard has a compelling portrait of Israel haters as "stalkers:"

The context is the rpeated attempt by Jew haters to boycott Israel. It also applies to posters who keep repeating the same libel comments about the Jewish State even after they have been shown to be wrong:

“Stalkers will often denigrate their victims [see the repeated and lip-licking comparison of Israelis with Nazis] which reduces the victims to objects [see the false claim that the boycott is of universities not of individuals; see also the lightminded dismissal of academic freedom]. This allows stalkers to feel angry at victims [see claims about the sinister power of the 'Zionist lobby' which allegedly silences its adversaries; see also the charge that Israelis are colonialists and settlers, with no mention made of just what many of these people were fleeing from when they came to Israel] without experiencing empathy [see the total silence about the war crimes and crimes against humanity committed against Israelis, and the genocidal threats made by Israel's enemies], or they may feel that they are entitled to behave as they please toward the victims [see the claim that criticism of Israel can't be anti-Semitic; see also the kind of discrimination against individual Israeli academics and students shown by Andrew Wilkie and Mona Baker]. Viewing victims as "lesser," "weak" or otherwise seriously flawed [see the charge that Jewish nationalism is illegitimate, and that Zionism is racist] can support delusions that the victims need.. to be rescued [see Jacqueline Rose's purported psychoanalysis of Israel], or punished [see the boycott movement passim], by the stalkers. Stalkers may slander or defame the character of their victims [see claims that Israel is an 'apartheid state', and suggestions that it attempts to commit genocide against Palestinians] which may isolate the victims [see the stated aim of the boycott movement] and give the stalkers more control or a feeling of power.”

From normblog

jacksondyer - STALKER. Eve Gerrard writes that "Stalkers will often denigrate their victims."

On this comment thread alone jacksondyer has written:

-- Only a typical ignorant a hole would think otherwise

-- My point was that the ignorant (stupid really) bigot

-- Ignobale pogromchik speaks and lies.

-- You are a hypocrite as well as a bigot.

-- The issue is a lot more complicated than a besotted bigot like you could understand.

-- Now since you are not interested in the truth, go stick you sick bigoted head in the toiler were it belongs.  

-- This lying  Ignoble shithead never learns.

-- Go peddle you Jew hatred on an Irish website where it belongs.

-- Typical asshole response:

-- This is because you are a compulsive Jew hater.  

-- That Neil Nazi Mckenzie should complain about some one else's language is beyond ludicrous. But then the independent Jew hater is beyond ludicrous himself as his risible post shows:

-- The question, Jew hater, is

-- Now go back to your Islamic sermon, jihadist wanna-be.

And so The Spine is stalked by its resident Tourette's dementia victim - jacksondyer. Hate has rotted his brain.

Eve Gerrard on Normblog - a meeting of the minds of two intellectual frauds.

Both Eve Gerrard and Norman Geras hide their support for the Israeli subjugation of the Palestinian people under a thin veneer of cultured intellectual writing. Furthermore, Geras is one of the main architects of the execrable Euston Manifesto - another attempt to provide a cultured intellectual foundation for the wanton killings of hundreds of thousands of Iraqi civilians. Gerrard and Geras are no more than apologists for brutality - I don't know how either of them sleep at night.

1.    

Solidarity in the Conversation of Humankind: The Ungroundable Liberalism of Richard Rorty by Norman Geras (Paperback - Aug 1995)

Buy new: $16.00    14 Used & new from $7.50

Usually ships in 6 to 8 weeks

Eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping.

Books: See all 334 items

2.    

The Contract of Mutual Indifference: Political Philosophy After the Holocaust by Norman Geras (Paperback - Aug 1999)

Buy new: $18.00 $14.04    30 Used & new from $0.08

In Stock

Eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping.

(2)  

Books: See all 334 items

3.    

Literature of Revolution Essays on Marxism by Norman Geras (Paperback - 1986)

4 Used & new from $14.90

Books: See all 334 items

4.    

Discourses of Extremity: Radical Ethics and Post-Marxist Extravagance by Norman Geras (Paperback - May 1990)

Buy new: $19.00    9 Used & new from $11.68

The stalker and fraud Neil Nazi Mckenzie is back again.

Imagine this hateful asshole calling someone like Norman Geras and Eve Gerrard a fraud.

Here are some titles of books NOrman geras has written:

1.    

Solidarity in the Conversation of Humankind: The Ungroundable Liberalism of Richard Rorty by Norman Geras (Paperback - Aug 1995)

Buy new: $16.00    14 Used & new from $7.50

Usually ships in 6 to 8 weeks

Eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping.

Books: See all 334 items

2.    

The Contract of Mutual Indifference: Political Philosophy After the Holocaust by Norman Geras (Paperback - Aug 1999)

Buy new: $18.00 $14.04    30 Used & new from $0.08

In Stock

Eligible for FREE Super Saver Shipping.

(2)  

Books: See all 334 items

3.    

Literature of Revolution Essays on Marxism by Norman Geras (Paperback - 1986)

4 Used & new from $14.90

Books: See all 334 items

4.    

Discourses of Extremity: Radical Ethics and Post-Marxist Extravagance by Norman Geras (Paperback - May 1990)

Buy new: $19.00    9 Used & new from $11.68

Now what the fuck has Neil McNazi produced?

Oh yes, he is an independent scholar and independent scholars don't have to produce anything of worth. With Neil McNazi its Jew hatred 24/7. The asshole can't even compose a post without bringing in 10 links and quoting 20 bloggers.

YOU ARE A MISERABLE PATHETIC SLOB AND IF IT WEREN'T FOR THIS WEBSITE THERE WOULD BE NO ONE FOR YOU TO TALK TO.

Now go fuck yourself since no one would want to get close enough to you it would have to be a solo performance if you have nay balls left.

Blackton  said:

ok, on thread (about multi-racial families), my wife is Chinese, I am Irish-German and our children are growing up as mixed race and multi-lingual. My older son had blond hair (now brown) and when he was younger my wife was always confused as being the nanny. Neither of our children truly take after either of us. As they grow older it should be interesting to see how they classify themselves and are classified by others. One of the greatest benefits of mixed races is that the Children often outstrip the parents in attractiveness. And additionally, the incidence of negative recessive genes getting passed down are far less common among mixed race children. sickle cell anemia for example.

personally, I agree with Bulworth, we should screw ourselves grey.

----

The question isn't who your children resemble, but who your grandchildren say they are. Bulworth's post-racial formula only works if succeeding generations continue to marry out of the in-group.  

I'm guessing Obama's daughters would call themselves "black" (rounding up from 0.75 to 1.0). I don't see generational intermarriage happening with blacks or latinos (though I have no scientific data to back this up). With and between Asians, one sees more of this phenomenon - especially a blurring of Japanese, Philipinno and Chinese Americans into a melted pot of Amer-Asians.

jacksondyer, as the author of 3,579 posts on The New Republic, is in no position to suggest to someone else that "if it weren't for this website there would be no one for you to talk to."  He has made over one third of all the posts on a thread and, as is so often the case, spewed excreta from his potty mouth across each and every one of the posts.

3579 posts, jacksondyer. Stop being a parasite on Martin Peretz and get your own blog. Then you will discover that no one is interested in either your Toureette's syndrome or your demented ramblings. Good luck.

jacksondyer complains about people who "can't even compose a post without bringing in 10 links and quoting 20 bloggers."

Speaking for myself, I like the collaborative nature of the web and link to commentators I believe to be of interest to an intelligent reader of the TNR blogs. Unlike some, like Martin Peretz and jacksondyer, I do not scour the internet seeking an isolated malicious comment that I then maliciously attribute to an entire civilization. Instead, I link to commentators who write in the intellectual neigborhood of The New Republic - indeed, many of the writers I link to have written and even worked for The New Republic.

But, sometimes, I link to pertinent items like the most famous black Irish musician performing Whiskey in the Jar: www.youtube.com/watch

ndmackenzie writes:   "Both Eve Gerrard and Norman Geras hide their support for the Israeli subjugation of the Palestinian people under a thin veneer of cultured intellectual writing. Furthermore, Geras is one of the main architects of the execrable Euston Manifesto - another attempt to provide a cultured intellectual foundation for the wanton killings of hundreds of thousands of Iraqi civilians. Gerrard and Geras are no more than apologists for brutality - I don't know how either of them sleep at night."

As it happens, I signed the Euston Manifesto myself, although I haven't been involved in discussions for 18 months or so, so I'm wondering which part of the document is the most objectionable to you -- the brief preamble A, the 15-clause section B which details the principles of the EM (including a two-state solution for the Israel-Palestine conflict that protects the rights and dignity of both peoples), or C, the brief explanatory conclusion.

But perhaps you mean with "execrable" not so much the Manifesto but rather the signers, nd?

In any event, as I regard myself as most definitely not providing a "cultured intellectual foundation for the wanton killings of hundreds on thousands of Iraqi civilians," and indeed opposed the war and oppose it to this day, I take issue with your characterization.  To the best of my knowledge, the original EM signers and the many many people who have signed it since run the gamut of opinion on the invasion, and are almost to a man/woman individuals who would describe themselves as being on the Left.

On the other hand, if you haven't read it -- why not take the time?  It might help.

The asshole Neil McNazi Mckenzie can't couldn't think his way out of a wind tunnel.

He is again counting my posts. This is another sign that he has got nothing to say.

The putz comes here to post on one topic only: JEWS! He is obsessed with Jews. Either that or he is being paid by some Arab or Muslim group. Not even he, as screwy as he is would spend so much time posting here on JEWS 24/7 if he weren't paid for it.

In fact, nd, so we're clear w/o any ambiguity on where we both stand, I'll paste in the short note I added to my signature back then:

"Because the EM has broken through the frozen ice of current "progressive" rhetoric that apparently sees no difference between the socialist struggle for a more humane and equal world and Islamic fundamentalist ambitions to turn back or devastate secular modernity. Because the EM has confronted the destructive extremes of a legitimate tradition of self-critique that the Left has always practiced. But that critique has become a pathology, a deeply irrational hatred for the West -- ironically, the part of the world from which the modern socialist tradition emerged. Because we need a Left for the 21st century."

The Euston Manifesto was widely recognized at the time of its publication as an attempt to justify the war in Iraq on "liberal" grounds by a group of individuals, who like the neo-cons before them, had abandoned the left. The document contained many outrageous slanders of the left and in reality was nothing more than thin intellectual veneer on a pro-war agenda.

Among the slanders:

-- A. Preamble) Indeed, the reconfiguration of progressive opinion that we aim for involves drawing a line between the forces of the Left that remain true to its authentic values, and currents that have lately shown themselves rather too flexible about these values. It involves making common cause with genuine democrats, whether socialist or not.

The warmongering manifestants clearly believed themselves to be true to the authentic values of the Left while those who opposed the war because of a concern about its likely consequences were inauthentic voices of the Left.

-- B.2) We decline to make excuses for, to indulgently "understand", reactionary regimes and movements for which democracy is a hated enemy -- regimes that oppress their own peoples and movements that aspire to do so. We draw a firm line between ourselves and those left-liberal voices today quick to offer an apologetic explanation for such political forces.

This is a vicious and vile slander. The manifestants imply that those who opposed the war in Iraq were indulging "understanding" reactionary regimes.  They did indeed draw a firm line - and on their side it was in favor of starting a war that would lead to the deaths of hundreds of thousands of Iraqi civilians. War, while sometimes it is the only answer, is frequently the wrong answer.

-- B.3) We reject the double standards with which much self-proclaimed progressive opinion now operates, finding lesser (though all too real) violations of human rights which are closer to home, or are the responsibility of certain disfavoured governments, more deplorable than other violations that are flagrantly worse. We reject, also, the cultural relativist view according to which these basic human rights are not appropriate for certain nations or peoples.

Another vicious and vile slander couched, however, in the langauge often used to justify the Israeli subjugation of the Palestinian people. So much for "human rights for all."

-- B.6) We reject without qualification the anti-Americanism now infecting so much left-liberal (and some conservative) thinking.

Yet another vicious and vile slander. The Euston manifestants were well aware that the European left is able to differentiate between the policies of a nation and the people who live in it. They, of course, had no qualms whatsoever about the anti-Europeanism that was institutionalized in the United States at the time. Anyone still for "Freedom fries?"

-- B.8) The recent resurgence of another, very old form of racism, anti-Semitism, is not yet properly acknowledged in left and liberal circles. Some exploit the legitimate grievances of the Palestinian people under occupation by Israel, and conceal prejudice against the Jewish people behind the formula of "anti-Zionism". We oppose this type of racism too, as should go without saying.

Ah, yes, lets rehearse the old Likudnik slander that criticism of Israel is anti-Semitic. The idea that some exploit the "legitimate grievances of the Palestinian people" is particularly offensive

-- B.11) Drawing the lesson of the disastrous history of left apologetics over the crimes of Stalinism and Maoism, as well as more recent exercises in the same vein (some of the reaction to the crimes of 9/11, the excuse-making for suicide-terrorism, the disgraceful alliances lately set up inside the "anti-war" movement with illiberal theocrats), we reject the notion that there are no opponents on the Left.  ... Conversely, we pay attention to liberal and conservative voices and ideas if they contribute to strengthening democratic norms and practices and to the battle for human progress.

More vile and vicious slanders culled from the wider fantasies of rightis talk radio. Oh, how kind, the Euston manifestants now go on to say they pay attention to the liberal voices they have just damned over ten paragraphs.

-- B.12) Political honesty and straightforwardness are a primary obligation for us.

I think the previous 11 paragraphs disprove this assertion.

-- B.13)  Respect for others does not entail remaining silent about their beliefs where these are judged to be wanting.

But didn't they just say that legitimate criticism of Israel was anti-Semitic?

-- B.14) Open source

whiskey, tango, foxtrot

-- B.15) For we embrace also the values of free enquiry, open dialogue and creative doubt, of care in judgement and a sense of the intractabilities of the world. We stand against all claims to a total - unquestionable or unquestioning -truth.

Item A in the evidence against this is Norm Geras's blog.

C. We are also united in the view that, since the day on which this occurred, the proper concern of genuine liberals and members of the Left should have been the battle to put in place in Iraq a democratic political order and to rebuild the country's infrastructure, to create after decades of the most brutal oppression a life for Iraqis which those living in democratic countries take for granted - rather than picking through the rubble of the arguments over intervention.

Ah, yes, we shouldn't bother trying to find out how we managed to initiate what is probably the biggest foreign policy disaster in the history of this nation - and hold accountable those responsible for this disaster.

-- C) This tendency has reached the point that officials speaking for Amnesty International, an organization which commands enormous, worldwide respect because of its invaluable work over several decades, can now make grotesque public comparison of Guantanamo with the Gulag, can assert that the legislative measures taken by the US and other liberal democracies in the War on Terror constitute a greater attack on human rights principles and values than anything we have seen in the last 50 years, and be defended for doing so by certain left and liberal voices.

A particularly vile and vicious slander against an organization which has done so much for human rights throughout the world for the last forty years.

The Euston Manifesto is an utterly disingenuous document. Whatever the claims of the manifestants it was nothing more than a despicable attempt to provide moral cover and self-apology for former liberals who realised the war had turned into a disaster.  The method they chose for their moralizing - the vile slandering of people who made the correct moral judgment - remains disgraceful.

Regardless, the Euston Manifesto is now an irrlevant document. Although as I pointed out earlier in this comment its worthlessness was clear even on the day it was published. I have no wish to further discuss it.

I have no doubt whatsoever that you don't wish to discuss it, if that's the extent of your argument.  However, I notice that you devote a lot of words and space to something that is for you apparently, and simultaneously, unimportant.  About three times the length of my original comment, at a guess.

So, as it seems I'm now guaranteed (assuming you stick to your promise) not to suffer any active debate here, let me say this to counter the ludicrous distortions you just posted:  you ignore the fact that the Euston Manifesto took up the problem of left-wing support for, and solidarity with, groups and ideologies that only wish harm to the very values and objectives for which the Left has stood over a couple of centuries.  You ignore the fact that -- as noted above -- the originators and the signers run the spectrum from pro-war to anti-war and you also ignore (which kind of astonishes me) the energetic debate that the EM's publication stimulated across Europe and in the U.S.

And I note for future reference the smug and self-regarding tone of your comment.  As was said once in a different context and language, you may not wish to discuss the Manifesto, but it sure is able to discuss the likes of you!

Trying to talk to brain dead MacKenzie? How ironic.

Ma plus profonde sympathie, irony.

We'll see what happens.  There are people who "don't wish to discuss" stuff, and then suddenly they want to discuss it.

Man is that it? Only 65 ill informed, antagonistic, f*ck you Jew hater posts? That's not a Spine thread.

This place is going to the dogs.

Get it? The dogs?

"This place is going to the dogs. "

Perfect kennel for Ignorble and McNazi.

A bit off-topic (and a bit on-), y'all:

I came by a copy of Richard Rodriguez' *Brown* and am thinking of inserting it into my commuter-train reading queue.

Have any of you read it? Thumbs up or down? Grains of salt advised?

Thanks in advance!

I love you Jack. Let's go for a walk. Go on, go on, let's go for a walk. Throw the ball Jack, throw it. You smell funny. Let's play the game. Go on throw the ball.  

I read Richard Rodriguez' earlier book, Hunger of Memory: The Education of Richard Rodriguez by Richard Rodriguez, but not that one Bill.

His earlier book was ok but it didn't leave wanting to read more of him.

if you like that kind of memoir, let me suggest:

" Lost in Translation" by Eva Hoffman

Ignoble Jew hater has got way too much time here. Time to shut the bigot up.

I love it. The Spine's alpha louse, jacksondyer, looks out on his domain and says someone else "has got way too much time here." The facts, as usual, indicate otherwise.

jaskcondyer - 23 posts

Ignorant populist - 14 posts

If anyone needs to shut it on The Spine and get a life it is jacksondyer.

Thanks, jackson--I'll take the Hoffman book for a ride on BART.

"Drawing the lesson of the disastrous history of left apologetics over the crimes of Stalinism and Maoism, as well as more recent exercises in the same vein (some of the reaction to the crimes of 9/11, the excuse-making for suicide-terrorism, the disgraceful alliances lately set up inside the "anti-war" movement with illiberal theocrats), we reject the notion that there are no opponents on the Left.  We reject, similarly, the idea that there can be no opening to ideas and individuals to our right. Leftists who make common cause with, or excuses for, anti-democratic forces should be criticized in clear and forthright terms.  Conversely, we pay attention to liberal and conservative voices and ideas if they contribute to strengthening democratic norms and practices and to the battle for human progress."

I think that segment makes a lot of sense, as a general approach.  What about you?

nazimackenzie and crazypopulist (who is off his meds, again)  are two peas in a pod.

 Is there anything more touching than mental invalids trying to validate each other?

A small and inferior attempt to regain the thread .  . . . dkrieger, I agree but don't believe we'll be grey.  I think it was Time that had a cover many years ago of a typical U.S. citizen of 2xxx, and they were a light brown polyglot (they morphed about a dozen races together).  I think that's what will happen.  The young adults I've seen who've been raised in a diverse environment (I'm old and am authorized to repeat myself!) including schools, have no barriers or qualms about cross-racial relationships.  Those who've been in single race environments still have problems, but these are the minority (both exclusionary private schools and ghetto schools are equal in this).  Perhaps I'm expecting too much from too little, but I really believe there'll be a major change in this country over the next decade or so.  

Ironyroad -

I believe it is useful to discuss how the left should view the World and that is a topic that is actively discussed both in this magazine and elsewhere. Indeed, Peter Beinart the former editor of The New Republic even wrote a book on the topic. This is particularly important in the United States where, as the war in Iraq has shown, the consequences of a false worldview can be catastrophic.

I have no particular interest in discussing the Euston Manifesto because it was a product of a certain time and as you point out its publication led to an "energetic debate ... across Europe and the US" at the time.  The general tone of the Euston Manifesto is sufficiently insulting to the vast majority of the left - for whose benefit the manifesto was written - that it is not a particularly good point for starting a genuine dialogue on how the left should view the World. Indeed, the section you quote demonstrates in microcosm the problems of the Euston Manifesto:

- Drawing the lesson of the disastrous history of left apologetics over the crimes of Stalinism and Maoism, as well as more recent exercises in the same vein (some of the reaction to the crimes of 9/11, the excuse-making for suicide-terrorism, the disgraceful alliances lately set up inside the "anti-war" movement with illiberal theocrats), we reject the notion that there are no opponents on the Left.  We reject, similarly, the idea that there can be no opening to ideas and individuals to our right. Leftists who make common cause with, or excuses for, anti-democratic forces should be criticized in clear and forthright terms.  Conversely, we pay attention to liberal and conservative voices and ideas if they contribute to strengthening democratic norms and practices and to the battle for human progress.

The final sentence of the paragraph is unobjectionable although it is clumsily written and somewhat limited in focus.  The problem is that it is the last sentence in the paragraph following two sentences criticizing the left and one sentence praising the right. Indeed I may be mistaken but I don’t think the right was ever criticized in the Euston Manifesto. The authors of the manifesto were so interested in smearing and slandering the left that they put the core message of the section at the end. This section should have comprised one sentence and that sentence should have been a better written version of the final sentence. I would then agree unreservedly with the assertion that we should listen to thoughtful voices in whatever part of the political spectrum they occur.

As I implied in my earlier comment the authors of the Euston manifesto spent too much time criticizing straw men on the left.  The opening sentence in this section contains several particularly vile smears. It alludes to the "disastrous history of left apologetics" over several ideas as if these are universal ideas of the left which they clearly are not. The authors of the Euston Manifesto knew perfectly well that these ideas were held by trivially small numbers on the left yet they chose to hold the entire left responsible for them. Later in the same sentence the Euston Manifesto mentions the "disgraceful alliances lately set up inside the 'anti-war' movement with illiberal theocrats)." Putting the words anti-war in scare quotes is obscene and is offensive to the millions of people round the world who genuinely and honestly thought this war was a mistake - and were proved right by events. Furthermore, the anti-war movement was enormous and as with any movement that large is going to attract people with diverse interests. But again the authors did not quantify they scale of the problem they had with the anti-war movement they found it more convenient to smear the entire movement because of actions of some adherents. The authors of the Euston Manifesto wrote all this apparently ignorant of how it would distract from the message they wished to propagate that the left needs to develop a morally and intellectually coherent view of how it regards the world. I find it hard, however, to take instruction from authors whose own moral and intellectual capabilities are so wanting.

So yes, ironyroad, we should listen to reasonable voices from any part of the political spectrum. And we should continue to discuss what should be an appropriate world view for those on the left. But the Euston Manifesto comes from an earlier time and serves us less well now than it did then. It has too many failures to be a good starting point for discussion and that is why I am not interested in discussing it.

You all do seem to have spun out into some kind of crazed frothing at the mouth... what the heck is all this name calling about?  Being persuasive?  Or even a conversation?  What's Israel or Iereland and whether or not either is racist or how much have to do with anything we were discussing, other than somebody's pet peeves?

Tep... I don't disagree about your comparison of Wright with Falwell necessarily... but I guess I do find the media sound bite frenzy on the issue yet another swiftboating... why are we hearing nothing about the crazed supporters of McCain who purport to be men of the cloth?  Why are we hearing nothing about HRC's religion of the Elite Powerful?

Besides, I guess I feel awfully skeptical about any attempt to manipulate our political reactions with repeated sound bites.  Sure it works... but what a substitute for thinking through whether Obama should or should not be supported.

But one final observation... there is some difference between White racist rhetoric and Black racist rhetoric or Black Liberation rhetoric.  Racism from the majority usually has an awful lot more bite.  Wright's kind of rhetoric seems to function more as a letting of steam mechanism.  I don't think it necessarily means s I am applying a double standard by trying to understand context... Context always matters ... having lived on the South Side a long time and having gone to Black churches in many a political campaign...I can assure you what one hears in Black churches does have a different ring... and maybe if some whites didn't have such bad consciences they wouldn't be so SHOCKED!  SHOCKED! that there is occasional anger in the Black community which to their ear sounds over the top... Motes and beams in the eye, say I.

Woof!

Go on go on go on throw the ball. Go on. Come on throw it Jack, throw the ball go on throw it.

Annabella,

I am assuming that you are new to The Grudge Report. Let me enlighten you: About once every few months, our two storied combatants go at it, 'ammer and tongs. Sometims sleepy gets in his licks, sometimes others. But the jackson v mackenzie cage fight get replayed, almost verbatim, about every 2 to 3 months....

thejauntyboulevardier -

I seem to remember you have been on the end of some tongue-lashing from jacksondyer yourself from time to time.  I hope you also noticed that following my first posting on this thread - a You Tube of Thin Lizzy performing Whiskey in the Jar and how offensive could that be - jacksondyer responded by calling me a Nazi.

go placidly amid the noise and haste of life and... rip each others' heads off

Anna - I agree, the black power foaming at the mouth stuff doesn't shock me, or bother me much, to be honest. My sole point on this controversy is that Obama is BS'ing everyone when he tells all the world that his poor granny, the woman who helped raise him, is a) a racist and b) on a par with nutty conspiracy theorists who use their public perch to spread theories that the government is deliberately infecting black people with AIDS.

That was cheap, and ugly, and puts the lie to what has to this point been Obama's main, and really, his only, claim to prominence: his supposedly superior ability to unite the nation as a new kind of pol who's above politics. He's not a uniter. He's definitely a politician.

I think that he will have a real problem escaping what I see as the next GOP line of attack this fall, the rap that he's 1) a BS artist, and 2) disdainful of ordinary older white folks who lack advanced degrees.  

Check out the fascinating interview with Karl Rove today in GQ (!). Speaking of which, why the hell isn't TNR scooping interviews and stories like this? Why do I have to go to a third-rate popinjay/lads' magazine to find cutting-edge, on-the-horizon interviews like this?

"But one final observation... there is some difference between White racist rhetoric and Black racist rhetoric or Black Liberation rhetoric.  Racism from the majority usually has an awful lot more bite."

They feed each other, Anabella. Black racism which seems to be protected by certain people on the left is today the more dangerous because it is rarely opposed and because it is often used by the extreme right to justify its own racism.

Gee Neil Nazi mackenzie objects to being called a Nazi after he equated Israel with nazi Germany and called Israelis "Zionazis."

"

He also keeps justifying Islamic Jew hatred and talks about a Jewish lobby in terms that invoke the forged book "Elder of Zion."

This is why he doesn't want to discuss the Euston manifesto. The latter document opposes the antisemitism Neil Mackenzie believes in.

The masochistic Irish Setter is back barking his head off. Didn't have enough punishment yet.

Any way this thread is toast. Time to move on.

Tep... don't you think the rap about Obama slamming his poor old Granny has been overdone?  I sure didn't read it as equating... I saw it as saying... hey many of us have our racial hangups in this society.  I wonder if she is still alive and I'll bet you anything she wouldn't say she felt that her grandson had dissed her by making that statement...

Jackson... I agree that the bashing of Israel by the Left and the likes of Wright  is offensive and frankly stupid...But it is a touch more complex... not that it justifies it ... just maybe explains and casts light...

There is an awful lot of resentment among some of Wright's generation and even education (by the way ihis education is a fairly impressive one) about Jews for 2 major reasons.  First and foremost, the resentment is based on Jews being the "successful" minority in the US of A...(Nerfore the Asians came along with far greater contempt for Blacks)  and Blacks as politically sophisticated as Wright really is and of his generation feel they have been a "screen" for what otherwise would have been a greater anti-antisemitism in America...Jews were in a sense the "protected"  minority because Blacks were there to be put down instead.  And of course there is the history of the civil rights movement which is oddly paradoxical.  Jews were among the greatest supporters among whites of the civil rights movement (witness the 2 Jewish boys killed with the Black boy in Mississippi when was in 1965? or later?... but also Jews were seen as  condescending in the movement... and the 2 minorities then drifted apart.. Obama alluded to that and his desire to be a bridge.  He could hardly address the first point.  It is too complex and would elude most hearers on first exposure anyway.

You also have 2 fairly different modalities, styles of worship, rhetoric, for all that Black churches and congregants by and large read the Bible with great devotion.

Oddly enough Southerns, Black and White, have far more culturally in common than do Blacks and Jews, unless the Jew happens to have been raisded in the South, but there aren't that many of those.

So a long lecture which may be neither here nor there, but it does serve to explain some things.  Of course, Jews have been particularly sensitive, both because historical hate speech has so often led to hate actions (and worse for them)... but also they are furious about the double standard that the Left applies to Israel... they hear that and some refuse to be comforted by Obama's disclaimers.  They simply don't believe him because of Wright.  Complex.  All very complex... and of course people hang on so tenaciously to their world views.  They provide the comfort of the known.

But I do believe much of this changing because American demographics are changing so markedly.  And the young so want to believe in the possibility of a truly Progressive politics and Obama, whatever else you may or may not say about him, does promise that.  They do not see him as bullshitting and I assure you that people who know him and have known him for years do not either.

Is he perhaps a Bambi?  Is the world simply too dangerous and too chaotic for such visionaries in positions of power?  Perhaps.  Maybe the win at all costs, take no prisoners, my way or the highway, which has always been HRC's hallmark may be the one that is necessary.  BUT she is not gonna get the nomination.  You can take that to the bank...So I suggest that we try to at least understand where Obama is coming from as we try to decide whether to vote for him or McCain come November.

Iggy, in what way is Israel "a land of one religion?"  It's a secular state so no official state religion. It is a Jewish state in that it is constitutionally a nation of and for the Jewish people. But it has citizens practicing many religions, and as jackson points out correctly, many nationalities and ethnicities - a great many. I don't get your meaning.

jaunty:

"Sometims sleepy gets in his licks, sometimes others. But the jackson v mackenzie cage fight get replayed, almost verbatim, about every 2 to 3 months...."

Is Iggy a member of this club, too, in your opinion? He certainly seems to be at brickbats with dyer, in this thread anyway.

BTW, I think I asked you at one time what keeps you coming back. Forgot what you said, if you said anything, I can't remember. Marty drives me crazy often, but as is said you know where he stands, no additives or transfats.

Of course he equated them, Anna! That was the crux of his speech!

OTOH, OTOH. White folks, I grant you Wright; now consider Madeline Dunham. So there! "There goes a black one, who doesn't like a white one, who doesn't like the black one, and scooby-dooby-doooo-by...."

Obama is too clever, and too slick, not to have known what he was doing, which was to vault an obscure family member into world-wide notoriety in order to preserve the association with Wright that was the original (and, we now see, enduring) source of his all-important _credibility as an AUTHENTIC BLACK POLITICIAN_ in the eyes of his southside and national afr-amer audience.

Sacrifice a Pawn (Mrs. Dunham/Grandmother) in order to save his Bishop. In this gambit one can admire Obama's chessmanship, but not his integrity or character as a man. That's a red flag, I think. Don't think for a second that the GOP's operatives will not be all over this character flaw in the fall.

tom,

ah my friend, what motivates any of us to return to anything?  Amusement...ennui...titillation...

you notice, mon cheri, that, unlike mack and iggy, I have made herculean efforts to avoid getting into knife fights here at the Grudge Report. It takes two to spit at each other and obviously, the jackson v mack rematches give both, on some very weird level, a degree of satisfaction and pleasure.

but like driving by a car wreck with strewn mangled bodies throw about, I have to admit that I am inclined to look....

and I rarely go after the Grudgemeister these days. More often than not, when i do post, I agree with the old dude...

hey tep, I lost your email. Can you send it to me? I have something to pass on to you...thanks.

ndmackenzie writes:  "But the Euston Manifesto comes from an earlier time and serves us less well now than it did then. It has too many failures to be a good starting point for discussion and that is why I am not interested in discussing it."

This at the end of six long paragraphs!  Ok, I realize that a certain amount of rhetorical squirming around can be necessary in order not to look like one is evading a debate while trying to delegitimize its originators -- done it myself -- but there's a real curiosity value to your habit of discussing the EM in considerable detail and vehemently denying any wish to so discuss.

In any case, I have to say that I disagree, also vehemently.  Not only is the Manifesto not a weird and badly thought out historical oddity that even misrepresents its own position, but the enthusiastic translation of the EM into several languages by volunteers within a very short time is at least prima facie evidence that it touched a deep need among a wide range of people in many countries who were driven to despair at the embrace of theological oppression, social and gender authoritarianism, and crudely essentialist world-views by people who claim to belong to the Left -- a particular shock because that is the tradition that has justly claimed the progressive dynamics of the Enlightenment to be its own.

With respect to Iraq, the UK offers a particularly good example:  over the past 5 years the British forces in Basra and southern Iraq have stood by as a relatively secular social order was captured after the invasion by Shi'a radicals and the region transformed into terror-ridden theocratic sub-state modeled after Iran during the 80s.  The British Left had a couple of potential responses to this:

a) OK, we're absolutely against the war, BUT as long as the UK is there we take responsibility for that and demand that progressive and democratic elements be supported in that part of Iraq and some basic civil rights protected as long as we're there.

b) We're absolutely against the war, that's all that matters, we don't care about anything else -- don't confuse us!

Unhappily, b) was the chosen option, and there are many similar choices in recent times made by the so-called Left in other parts of the world.

The EM did not invent straw men, I'm afraid.  Despite its many flaws (and there are many) it placed front and center a painfully important question that has been avoided and deflected for at least a generation.  A failed politics of unquestioning solidarity based on the West being the permanent bad guy brings us to this item:  can the Left, which gave to the world a language to speak the struggle for social progress, intelligence, equality, and human freedom, survive the beginning of the 21st century in which it appears to want to melt into the embrace of forces of reaction, stupidity, hierarchy, and oppression?

It just about survived the Stalinist nightmare.  This may kill it off.

"It just about survived the Stalinist nightmare.  This may kill it off."

You make many good points which will be lost on the person you are addressing.

The most important item on the EM is the need to support liberla democratic  forces and voices within Muslim  societies.  Especially, gays and women who are oppressed.

The sad fact is that many in the so called "left" here are ready to sacrifice these people on the altar of their weird antisemitism and obsession with Israel.

Yes this will kill, whatever is left of the left, not that they care since many of them are kind of leftists who would feel very comfortable in a Fascist as well as Leninist, or even Jihadist cell. As long as the group is antisemitic and as long as they hate Israel they are for it.

"Jackson... I agree that the bashing of Israel by the Left and the likes of Wright  is offensive and frankly stupid...But it is a touch more complex... not that it justifies it ... just maybe explains and casts light..."

There are too many explanations already, Annabella. We need to take a firm stand against Wrightian rhetoric and those who would excuse it.

Gimme a hundred.. who's gottahundred.. goingonce,goingtwice

t_thibaud@yahoo.com

My best to your family, K. Hope all's well

Woof!

...The Ignorant Populist said:

Woof!...

Woof?

See above thread Basman for woof explanation.

...See above thread Basman for woof explanation...

Started to read it then thought life is too short.

Meow!

:) Great way to hit the ton Basman.