Bracing For One Last Attempt At Racial Inflammation (And No Ebola Travel Ban)

The NY Times sets the stage for the final Democratic push towards election day:

Black Vote Seen as Last Hope for Democrats to Hold Senate

WASHINGTON — The confidential memo from a former pollster forPresident Obama contained a blunt warning for Democrats. Written this month with an eye toward Election Day, it predicted “crushing Democratic losses across the country” if the party did not do more to get black voters to the polls.

“African-American surge voters came out in force in 2008 and 2012, but they are not well positioned to do so again in 2014,” Cornell Belcher, the pollster, wrote in the memo, dated Oct. 1. “In fact, over half aren’t even sure when the midterm elections are taking place.”

Well, I'm not sure when the midterm elections are taking place either, but my quick guess is the first Tuesday in November. However, not having checked a calendar, can we have elections on Nov 1, or is the rule (taking its cue from holidays like Easter) that elections are to be on the first Tuesday after the first Monday? Or is it Labor Day that falls on the first Monday following the first Sunday? Score me as one more low-information voter.

But enough about me! Clearly the Democrats need a Trayvon Martin and they need him, well, just about now. Michael Ferguson looked like a a great choice to fill that role but his story seems to be unraveling a bit, although media attempt to cocoon their readers continue. Hope sprang back to life last week when a white police officer shot teen-aged Vonderrit Myers, and MSNBC is keeping hope alive despite clear evidence that Myers was a gun-thug who fired at the officer first.

Finally, anyone imagining that Obama will be imposing a Ebola-related travel ban on West Africa two weeks before an election where the Democrats are desperate for black votes and pushing a message about racist Republicans clearly lacks a private pollster. As with so many other things, Obama will have more flexibility after the election.

HELP FROM MY FRIENDS, OR, BING IT ON: My buddy advises me that Election Day this year is Nov 4, the first Tuesday after the first Monday. Hmm - no elections on the day after Halloweeen, i.e., All Hallows Day. Yet we pretend to have a separation of Church and State...

Comments

[Comanche Voter]

Ah yes, once again our not so beloved President proves to be a prevaricating political putz.

[Another Bob]

The dem rabblerousers have done their best to keep hope alive in Ferguson, stretching that response beyond any reason. The last chance is withholding the grand jury result until after the election. Was surprised to see the Times of all people preparing the ground for the lancing of that boil.

Whatever DOJ unit is scouring local police reports must be burning the midnight oil...

[Extraneus]

From the previous thread, a valiant attempt to use Ebola to get blacks to the polls...

CNN columnist: Slow aid for Ebola because… racism

There’s evidence lighter skinned people have trouble “feeling” the pain of those with darker skin. Researchers at the University of Milano-Bicocca, in Italy, tested this in by showing a group of Caucasian people video clips of people of various races being pricked with a needle. They monitored the viewers to see how their bodies responded to the sight of another person being hurt. The white viewers reacted more strongly — or showed more physical empathy — when white people were hurt than Africans.

In another study, “researchers found that white participants, black participants, and nurses and nursing students assumed that blacks felt less pain than whites,” Slate writes.

Except for a handful of health workers, nearly all of Ebola’s 4,400 casualties have been black Africans — and these simmering biases are deeply troubling.

[AliceH]

That would be Michael Brown, not "Michael Ferguson".

/copyreader

[Tarantella @ the Red Masque Ball.]

Put another nickel in
Play that race tune once again.

[Beasts of England]

O rare Michael Ferguson!

[Beasts of England]

No one is more upset with this administration's response to Ebola than Obola. According to the NYT he's seething! Seething, I tell ya!

Hope that doesn't carry over to his golf game this afternoon. You should never play golf while seething. Ever.

[Sue]

Simmering biases? Good grief. What freaking color or the healthcare workers in these countries? The ones I've seen or predominantly white and predominantly Christian.

[Beasts of England]

Juan Williams calls networks Chicken Littles for their Ebola 'hysteria'. And that's why I don't watch politics on the tv.

::changes channel::

[Sue]

Oh carp. I know when to use are or or. I really do.

[henry]

Well, the Milwaukee mayor and police chief are trying with Dante Hamilton -- shot 17 times after scuffling with a police officer in the park next to city hall in May. Homeless, off his meds, reacted badly to a pat down and started clubbing the cop with the cop's baton. Our favorite Milwaukee DA is sitting on 3 investigations (local, state police, & FBI) which must clear the cop, so the police chief fired the cop for violating procedure. Even the protestors call that a pile or crap -- and are on the "no justice, no peace" conga line.

Calling this "one last attempt" is wishful thinking.

[Janet]

Simmering biases? Good grief. What freaking color or the healthcare workers in these countries? The ones I've seen or predominantly white and predominantly Christian.

Excellent point, Sue. I wonder what CNN opinion writer John D. Sutter has done?

[Miss Marple]

Bringing this over from the last thread, it is my comment about that terrible CNN article:

I am still SEETHING over that CNN article accusing us all of racism because we have been slow to help the Ebola countries.

I seem to emember a huge concert on TV called "We Are the World" put on to raise money for a famine in Africa. I also seem to remember the US military going into Somalia to help because of ANOTHER famine, due to the Civil War. In both cases, the response was due to TV coverage on CNN and then other networks.

Until the doctor and nurse from Samaritan's purse were brought back here for treatment, thee was hardly any coverage on television about this Ebola outbreak. The only reason I knew much about it was because I was reading African news as I had been worried about my husband, and none of what I read was in AMERICAN news sources.

Why is it that the NBC camera crew was only over there in late September? Where were they in March?

Maybe Americans would have been pressuring the US government to do something earlier if they had KNOWN about it!! Maybe CNN could have given it more attention if they hadn't been covering Ferguson, Missouri 24/7!!!

Daggone it, I am sick of the constant accusations of racism. I would be very happy to take all of the funding for the DOJ Civil Rights Division, EPA, Energy and Education and send it straight to Liberia, where I think it might do some actual good.

[Jeff Dobbs]

“In fact, over half aren’t even sure when the midterm elections are taking place.”

There is no such thing as "election day". You can absentee vote for weeks before "election day" for no reason whatsoever other than you're too lazy to drag your butt to the polls. Or if voting in person - and making time out of one specific day as set aside in the Constitution is too inconvenient, you can early vote for days and sometimes weeks before as well.

With their advantage (here), I will not be surprised when Dems propose that a citizen's vote is so important to the republic, that every vote will be assumed to be straight party ticket by party registration, unless the voter makes it to the polls and indicates otherwise by actually casting a ballot.

[Fred Beloit]

All hail Seether.

[Pagar]

If you were not capable of getting a photo ID by the time you became old enough to vote, how capable could you be of finding out when the voting that you don't have an ID to vote in would take place?

[Sue]

How many times has the media made up Obama's anger over any given issue? Someone here used to chronicle the many times Obama showed anger, ire, frustration, etc. when there was absolutely no evidence he did.

[Miss Marple]

I am sorry I missed this last night. I might see if I can catch a rerun. Vidoes are at link, where Judge Jeanine interviewed Sean Kaufman and Dr. Bob Arnott. We discovered that

1. The CDC would not even discuss that their protocols were inadequate.

2. Who and the US government (that would be that racists Barack Obama) IGNORED the warnings from Doctors Without Borders about the extent of the outbreak, SEVEN months ago.

As I said in my previous rant, CNN didn't cover this much because Obama wasn't interested. I rest my case on who is the racist over Ebola.

http://nicedeb.wordpress.com/2014/10/19/cdc-blew-off-ebola-experts-advice-on-protocols-video/

[peter]

nicely played, Fred Beloit at 10:02

[AliceH]

FRED @10:02 - Perfect! I am stealing that. Too funny ;)

[MaryD]

Please add my applause to the 10:02 Fred! Hilarious!

[RickB]

I'm sure everyone here understands the Democrat urge to whip blacks in order to improve results but this Politico piece strongly suggests that whipping 12% of the population to higher production will not offset the damage done by Democrats within a segment comprising 51% of the population.

The Democrats are taking the lash to women as well as blacks but there is no evidence of results having improved as a result. In fact, to over generalize from a single data point, Rasmussen is showing that the nutty Nutmeggers in the Deep Blue Hell of Connecticut are actually rejecting Danny the Drunk in favor of Foley. When Rasmussen last polled Connecticut on August 19th, Malloy was at 45 and up by 7, today he's at 43 and down by 7. He's buried up to his neck at the mean tide line and the flood tide is still coming in.

[Miss Marple]

For anyone with a relative with autism, this is a really interesting article:

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/19/fashion/how-apples-siri-became-one-autistic-boys-bff.html?hp&action=click&pgtype=Homepage&version=HpSumSmallMediaHigh&module=second-column-region&region=top-news&WT.nav=top-news&_r=0

[Iggy]

--In another study, “researchers found that white participants, black participants, and nurses and nursing students assumed that blacks felt less pain than whites,” Slate writes.--

Just another case of helpless blacks being turned into self loathing racists by the white patriarchy I guess.
Heaven knows they can't possibly be autonomous, self actuated beings with their own functioning crania, rather than hapless, oblivious children in need of a white, governmental, matriarchal nanny to care for them.

[glasater]

I'm pretty confident that black Americans don't want to get ebola just as much as white/caucasian do.

And with Zero granting amnesty to hispanics and further importing south of the border kids isn't making them feel any better about their future.

[Neo]

‘This is a gift-wrapped issue for the GOP,” NYTimes reporter Jonathan Martin told CNN’s John King Sunday morning.

“The fact is this is one more example they can cite to point out that President Obama has not run a competent federal government,” he said. “It’s a pretty visceral issue.”

“The second issue is this larger question of a world coming undone. And the backdrop of events to which this election is playing out, whether it’s beheadings. Whether it’s Ebola. The events taking place with Vladimir Putin,” said the NYT reporter. “For Republicans, they simply have the point in saying “Competence and Chaos?” and that’s a pretty compelling message in a year that’s structurally good for them anyways.”

[narciso]

he doesn't actually bother to inform himself

http://hotair.com/headlines/archives/2014/10/19/the-ebola-scare-and-the-myth-of-sinister-yet-competent-government/

what is sad, is how they vote like Lemmings or Eloi, they hang on the every word of fools like Zaphod or Sharpton, a far cry from Douglas, King
or Dubois, who didn't treat them like children,

[Marlene]

I think I'm caught up. DoT,best wishes to your nephew. A friend of ours had an illness earlier this year with the same symptoms as your nephew. He is a healthy 60-something guy and the doctors were mystified. He slept 20 hours a day for two weeks and slowly regained strength. He was healthy enough to go on a planned Alaska cruise this summer. Very scary.

Well,we are on the cusp of autumn/winter here.The leaves have dropped and today it is cold and gray.

[Carol Herman]

Ferguson is not in the news! The report is out that the cop was mauled by the "gentle giant" ... and there were two shots in the car. As Mike Brown reached for the patrolman's gun.

It's no longer a news worthy story.

Though I did see a great comment:

PANTS UP - DON'T LOOT