Posted on 05/13/2014 11:01:39 AM PDT by Drango
It's a fact of American life that a good share of the electorate is , and even of President Obama. What's less certain are the reasons why.
For some Democrats, the explanation is simple: race. In recent weeks, West Virginia Sen. , Mississippi Rep. and former Florida Gov. have all said racism is the driving force behind Republican resistance to the president.
Republicans, unsurprisingly, say their disdain for Obama is based not on the color of his skin, but on the content of his policies.
"If any white Democrat had pushed through a billion-dollar stimulus plan and a takeover of the health care industry, he would have been equally detested by conservatives and Republicans," says Whit Ayres, a GOP pollster and consultant.
There's no question we're living in a time of divisive politics, when roughly half the country is likely to hate the president, no matter whom he or she might be.
But race has been a factor in American politics since the very beginning. It's certainly part of the mix in terms of responses to Obama.
His status as the nation's first African-American president exacerbates the concerns of those who feel the country is changing rapidly in ways that are not always comfortable.
"It's more than just about race," says Christopher Parker, a political scientist at the University of Washington. "He represents the changing demographic nature of America, the browning of America."
Race Is Not The Whole Story
Obama has had to put up with no white president has endured, including a protester waving a outside the White House gates last fall and a South Carolina congressman, Republican Joe Wilson, yelling at him during a 2009 address to Congress.
But modern presidents have all triggered strong negative reactions. John F. Kennedy met with rhetoric from the John Birch Society that in some ways Tea Party responses to Obama. Militia movements expanded and grew during the presidencies of Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton, while George W. Bush's presidency inspired on the left and a fantasizing about his assassination.
"Bill Clinton was vilified and hated more, with more passion," says David Carney, a Republican consultant. "It was much more personal and negative than anything about Obama."
That's debatable, but Clinton was impeached and Obama has not been. Robert Smith, a San Francisco State University political scientist who wrote a book about Obama, Kennedy and the politics of ethnicity, agrees that the primary source of animus toward Obama is ideology, rather than race.
"If the first black president would have been a conservative, then these conservatives would not express this racial animus," Smith says.
But Race Is Definitely A Factor
It's possible that no Republican would have voted for the Affordable Care Act if it had been promoted by a President Joe Biden or John Edwards. (Hillary Clinton raises a different set of issues, as we'll be reminded over the next couple of years.)
But the fact that it was a president of color who pushed the law through has added fuel to the fire, argues Smith, the San Francisco State professor.
"There's a perception that Obama's major achievement is a transfer from middle-income white people to low-income minorities," he says.
Obama's tenure has been marked by consistently disappointing economic news. At times of such anxiety, demographically similar groups of white reactionaries always gain renewed prominence, says Parker, co-author of Change They Can't Believe In: The Tea Party and Reactionary Politics in America.
At the present moment, Obama's own race and the much-discussed rise of previously marginalized groups including Hispanics and gays serves to heighten that recurring reaction.
"That makes these people nervous," Parker says. "They feel that they're losing this America that they've known."
All That Obama Represents
Obama is not just an African-American, but a man whose father was African and gave him the Muslim middle name of Hussein. His mother was white but on the countercultural left.
Obama himself is the first urban president the country has seen for decades, a cosmopolitan figure who spent part of his childhood abroad.
He's a product of the Ivy League who did himself no favors in 2008 by those who differ culturally from him as "bitter" and clinging to their "guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations."
"He just doesn't relate well to flyover country," says Carney, the Republican consultant. "His eliteness, his disdain for things that are more traditional America is more the reason why he's disconnected to this large portion of the country than his race."
All of this — his ideology, his background, his manner and the unforgettable fact of his race — bleed together, making him a figure held in a type of disdain that's notable even in an era of heavily polarized politics.
"Obama's race and his Ivy League background and the sense of his elitism, all of those come together to make his case the worst we've seen," Smith says.
Nope. Race isn’t it. Replace this loser with a Constitutionalist of ANY color and they’ll be loved.
Race Alone Doesn’t Explain Hatred Of Obama, But It’s Part Of The Mix (NPR)
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I’ll go against the grain here and AGREE with this premise. But only to the extent that Obama, Holder, and the White Hut Regime has made race a key part of their agenda.
Has Obama set back race relations? Is he directly responsible (along with the presstitures) for kicking up anti-black sentiments?
Absolutely.
What do you think of this headline? Race doesn’t explain hatred of Bush, but it’s part of this mix? Or this one: Race doesn’t explain hatred of Reagan but it’s part of the mix. Or this one: Race doesn’t explain the hatred of Palin, but it’s part of the mix. Or this, Race doesn’t explain the hatred of Clarence Thomas, but it’s part of the mix.
I would despise him no matter his sex or it’s race.
While many people will tap dance around this issue. Why wouldn't we be nervous about giving up the most successful nation and civilization the world has ever known to a bunch of invaders and white haters? You can take your one way race rhetoric and cram it up your ass.
“There’s a perception that Obama’s major achievement is a transfer from middle-income white people to low-income minorities,” he says.
No. Wrong.
That transfer of wealth was started by white guys and before bozo was born.
bozo has presided over the attack on the middle class (you know, the people who sign the checks).
Well, just try to ignore them, it is your life and none of their damn business.
They think they know best how to run all of our lives but I guarantee you they can't run their own.
“What do you think of this headline? Race doesn’t explain hatred of Bush, but it’s part of this mix? Or this one: Race doesn’t explain hatred of Reagan but it’s part of the mix. Or this one: Race doesn’t explain the hatred of Palin, but it’s part of the mix. Or this, Race doesn’t explain the hatred of Clarence Thomas, but it’s part of the mix.”
It depends on which side of the fence you’re on. I can picture headlines like that in certain publications and websites.
This can’t be as poorly written as it appears. It’s illiterate. Maybe a mixup in copying?
It is not his blackness I despise, it is his commie white blood.
The daily dose of “racist” accusations from the left. (Yawn)
In other words, he hates us. So, we hate him back.
Okay, I’ll play. According to this retarded logic EVERY SINGLE BLACK PERSON that voted AGAINST GW Bush is a racist.
Live with it libtards!
Ping to latest NPR delusional filth.
bump
Ping to latest NPR delusional filth.
It is a mistake to treat this as normal political discourse, and the action of NPR in cutting off criticism is proof. It is that sad simulacrum of political discourse to which the Left has been reduced: repeated, unanswerable accusations levied without evidence or any attempt to listen to a reasoned reply. Evidence to the contrary is dismissed out of hand under the formula, "You're only saying that because ___". Continuing such discussions is an exercise in futility.
I dare say the American People's problem with Obama has little to do with race (though I suspect patriotic Americans don't appreciate Obama's frequent but none too subtle stoking of racial animosity as with Trayvon, plus his selection of the highly racist AG Eric "The Red" Holder) and has mostly to do with Obama's dishonesty, fraud, and commie agenda.
These same people would vote on a heartbeat for a ticket that contained two black conservatives, and probably with more enthusiasm than the RINO slime that the GOP has put at the top of the most recent tickets.
Its hard to imagine how anyone could be as deranged as these people and still hold down a job.
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