The Race and Racism

During this Presidential race many Americans thought that we had put racism and sexism behind us. I don’t know about the sexism, but today it became apparent that the racism is still rampant.

This morning’s newspaper printed an article headlined “Supremacists spread anti-Obama fliers.” Apparently a white supremacist group headquartered in northwest New Jersey had dropped off fliers in driveways in Roxbury suggesting that voters should not elect Senator Obama because he is black.

This week a family member told me that an acquaintance of his was shocked that he might vote for a black man.

Now before any of us pat ourselves on the back, assuring ourselves that we are above all that, too cosmopolitan and diverse, take a look at the posts on a local Hillsborough forum. Look for the ones that refer to Senator Obama as “Hussein.” While that may in fact be the senator’s middle name, the posters do not use any other candidates’ middle names. Look for the ones that call him Barack bin Obama. Look for the ones that refer to the Muslim religion.

There are those who may argue that these aren’t racist comments, but in our hearts we all know better. Especially those making the comments.

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"The parallel between antifeminism and race prejudice is striking. The same underlying motives appear to be at work, namely fear, jealousy, feelings of insecurity, fear of economic competition, guilt feelings, and the like." - Ashley Montagu (1905 - 1999), American anthropoligist, social biologist.

NOW It's Fall

After my rant about retailers pushing the season by putting out Halloween candy in August, I was going to post that I was now willing to see Trick or Treat stuff...

Unfortunately I was in a store today and saw a pile of boxes of fake Christmas trees. Kind of ruined the whole thing.

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Happy First Day of Autumn.

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"Gather ye rosebuds while ye may,
Old Time is still a-flying:
And this same flower that smiles today
To-morrow will be dying. " - poet Robert Herrick (1648)

Palin Because...

While American's wonder why McCain chose Sarah Palin as his running mate, the answer seems obvious: Comedy writers needed fresh material.

This is how it came about.

With presidential campaigns being so expensive, the comedy writers all pooled their money and came up with the highest bid - uh, I mean contribution - to McCain's election fund. Since they won, they got to pick the vice-presidential candidate.

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Okay, so do you have a better explanation?

Palin: Because....

When presidential candidate McCain announced that his running mate would be Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, there was a collective ”Who?” heard across 49 of the 50 United States.

Then everyone asked “why?”- including the citizens of Alaska. I’m not even sure McCain could answer the question in depth.

But then I heard one of the night show hosts talking about President Bush’s reaction to Russia’s invasion of Georgia. According to this comedian, upon hearing about the invasion, Bush sent warplanes to Atlanta. [I’m pretty sure the comedian was joking.]

Then it occurred to me why McCain chose Palin: he thought that it would be an election coup if he could develop an alliance with a foreign country with oil reserves.

Right?