Is there anyone with so much as a second grade education who believes that Obama would be where he is today if he were white? Lots of people are voting for him, and supporting him, because he's black. But worst of all is the racism of the Left, who demand LESS of him; less accountability, less clarity on what he really intends to do, less of a track record, less guilt by association, less accountability by his wife, because they so desperately want a minority, and not the best candidate (Barack "I want change, you want change, we should change for the sake of change.") That's the essence of racism. Most of my liberal friends (I've only lived in New York and San Francisco) admit to expecting less of minorities, but offering more leeway and opportunity to members of those groups because otherwise, what? They can't compete without the lower standards and quotas? That's racism.

Good point.

Well put. Throwing around the R-word to push points across will cost the Democrats independant voters in November. It will frustrate a huge portion of the electorate -- left-leaning social libertarians like myself -- who hate this kind of stupid invective but like the idea of another Republican in office only slightly less.

I bought Richard Thompson Ford's "The Race Card" after reading the selected passages in Slate. It's well worth the price. It can be difficult to appear reasonable when discussing race in anything but the established point headings of the ordained talkers but Ford is refreshingly clear. Hearing from someone else who recognizes the absurdity in our attitudes toward race in America is like coming up for air.

Cheers to Geraldine Ferraro for not apologizing.

Exactly. If you want to be taken seriously as a minority candidate (for anything, not just the presidency) is stop crying 'racist!' whenever anyone criticizes you. And people should not give lower expectations to someone just because they are a minority as reverse-racism either. This is the only way eventually race will truely be a nonissue instead of the current "oh it's an issue, but no one can speak about it, because we want to make sure no one thinks us racist" junk we wade through.

Just think how different presidential races would be if all the candidates names, faces, and voices were hidden.

Let's play stupid hypothetical. Let's say there was a highly charismatic, well spoken, articulate politician that's positive message appealed to numerous individuals. Let's also say this individual had very little federal government experience. If this individual was white, would he do as well.

Well, considering I just explained Abraham Lincoln, Ronald Reagan, Bill Clinton, John F. Kennedy, and many others, than I will definitively say, "yes" to your question.

Obama has received over 13.3 million votes. Sure, some have voted for him solely because he is black. However, a great many more have voted for him because they think he is the better candidate. Other black presidential contenders have come before him and did not fare as well. Obviously, it has to do with a lot more than race.

We could as well as the following questions:

Would Hillary be where she is if she were male?

Would John McCain be where he is if he wasn't white? Male? The child of a career navy officer?

I submit to you that these questions are all entirely meaningless. Obama wouldn't be Obama if he wasn't black. Hillary wouldn't be Hillary if she was a man. And John McCain would be someone else if any of those things changed.

So, I am not entirely sure what your point is. I do think though the comparison of JFK to Obama is probably valid (both young, idealistic, well spoken, able to put a vision out to Americans, etc). Note the fact that both were young meant that neither one had a huge number of accomplishments in life.

I guess in my mind, the *only* legitimate question is how good a job of leading the country we think they would do. If you want to attack Obama, Hillary, McCain, etc pick that topic. Try to leave everything else out. Otherwise, like Ferraro, you just look STUPID.

This is actually one of the huge issues with Hillary's campaign, which has sought to play the sexism card often.

BTW, in the primaries I plan on voting for Obama. I haven't made up my mind for the general election yet though.

"Let's say there was a highly charismatic, well spoken, articulate politician that's positive message appealed to numerous individuals."

And if you are refering to Obama, then you are mostly lying, because his speeches are pulled off of bad sermons, other speakers, and the only way he won his senate seat was because the Republican Incumbant died.

Obama succeeded Peter Fitzgerald, who is still very much alive. He retired.

Obama won the Democratic Primary and Jack Ryan won the Republican primary. Jack Ryan, though, dropped out of the race due to a scandal.

The Illinois Republican party eventually drafted Allen Keyes to run against Obama. Obama won the general election 70% to 27%.

San's reputation should precede him (at least from those of us on Faith-based). He is almost better to ignore ;-)