Lois & Clark Forums Forums General Discussion Fun with Polls Poll: Which US presidential candidate do you like best?

First of all, I was responding to your post as much as I was to the whole media barrage about it. I could go into details about it, but there's no indication that you really want me to tackle this question, nor do I think it would do us any good.

When I wrote that I was not basing my reading on anything but the modes that people use to talk about race (at the level of discourse), particularly here in the US (which this election exhibits far and wide). I see some of that language in your post, certainly, and that's what I'm responding to as it echoes some of the language in a lot of the articles I've read.

Your interpretation of what I'm getting at, seems rather reductive ("suggesting racism in questioning Obama's choices"), which leads me to conclude that more than disagreeing, we're not understanding each other.

At these moments, it's good to stop.

alcyone

You've made a very serious allegation here, Alcyone. I would call this worse than a flame, in fact. What you've implied about me is pretty awful and hurtful.

c.

What, specifically, do you think is being alleged, Carol?

She's said that she doesn't feel she's being properly understood. It's a claim that's perhaps supported by the fact that I don't, myself, entirely understand what she means by "the modes that people use to talk about race."

It's better to make sure that we understand what she did mean before making accusations against her.

Or, as she said, perhaps it's better to drop it and move on. As you may have seen, I've had recent experience in another thread where fundamentally different interpretations of the same words led to cascading misunderstandings. Accusations (apparantly) being read by both parties where none were (apparantly) intended... It gets messy. And once you take offense, there can be a tendency to continue to get into that mindset... to read things that way even when the author meant no such thing.

Alcyone, if you could clarify your statement, that would be great. Give it another try, and we'll see where it gets us.

Otherwise... maybe it's better just to leave it be. Give people the benefit of the doubt. Chalk it up to a misunderstanding and move on.

Guilty as charged. And it's totally my fault, which is why its best to duck out.

Honestly, the problem with getting into these discussions is the defensiveness with which these issues are tackled. Ideas are reduced to "is X racist or not?"

To clarify, I was talking about certain assumptions that are reflected in language especially in what is taken as 'natural' (that's what I mean by discourse) specifically the colorblindness myth. This is not the same as personal criticism, but since not everyone sees that distinction (critique of ideas/personal criticism), it's simply better to put a lid on it now.

Believe me, I'm not implying or suggesting that anyone is a racist.

*sigh*
alcyone

But you did, Alcyone. As well, the second last paragraph in your post above again makes that implication.

c.

No. She said something which wasn't clear and which could be read that way, but then, when asked, specifically stated that she hadn't intended it as such. There's a difference, Carol. The statement was poorly phrased, but it doesn't mean the intent was there.

It was a mistake. It happens. A few posts back, I made a mistake in not quoting the text I was replying to. And then you made a mistake by not seeing the text I was replying to and assuming that I was making false and hyperbolic accusations. And then Alcyone made a mistake using vague wording which could be interpreted to imply things she didn't mean. We're only human. Mistakes and misunderstandings happen.

I'm sorry you were offended, but if she said she didn't mean it that way, I think we should accept that and move on.

posting very quickly and flippantly 'cause it's past my bedtime; I hope to come up with something more serious tomorrow sometime...

Oh, come *on*, Paul. That is *so* 1980s.

What sort of context would make "G-d damn America" into a positive thing? Or the bit about "Israel" being a dirty word? And as you may know, most of the sermon clips that are in the media came from a DVD of the best of Reverend Wright. If that's the best, I'm ... morbidly curious about what they'd consider the worst

Alcyone, I agree with you completely that he's got the right to say stuff like that, and people have the right to support him. But stuff that doesn't get much noticed on a lower level hits a higher amount of scrutiny when it gets up near a higher level of publicity. It's worthy of being looked at, is my main point.

Thought experiement: If John McCain had claimed Jerry Falwell as his close advisor and friend, and had associated with him for 20 years, and had tithed at least $20,000 to Jerry's ministries... you think the media would give McCain a pass on that whole "9/11 was God's punishment for gays" thing? Or might that, too, be worthy of being looked at? I'm just sayin'.

PJ

lol, sorry. I guess I'm a little out of touch. I've got CDs and/or MP3s of Springsteen, Madonna, U2, and Blondie, and I do miss actual music being on MTV...

(Though, really, I was always more into VH1...)

Bitterness and bad feelings seem to have crept into this thread, which was perhaps inevitable. But it is sad, all the same.

Let me comment, just a tiny bit, on a few things that Reverend Wright said. He said, as far as I can remember, that the United States killed more people in Hiroshima and Nagasaki than Al Qeada or Osama bin Laden or whoever it was killed Americans on 9/11. And, well, that's true. You can argue that circumstances were very different (they were), or that one attack was a reasonable and measured response to a war situation that was already in progress while the other was an unprovoked attack, and... well. Maybe that's a fair comparison of these respective attacks, but maybe it isn't. Anyway, as long as you are comparing two actual events that actually happened in real life, you are at least discussing reality. History. Also, when you base your discussion on actual events, there is at least a chance that you may take each other seriously.

So... uh.... how serious is it going to be if you, you know, start cursing each other?

Please! I did not say that any of you were cursing any of the others. This was a hypothetical question. I just mean... if anyone, hypothetically, starts saying "damn you", or "you're stupid", or, say, "you are a racist", how likely is it that this person will help himself, herself or anyone else to understand the real world or the actual situation better? How much clarity or respect will such statements bring to a discussion?

But, yes, Reverend Wright said something like that. Yes, he did say, "Damn you, America", or something like that. How smart was that? How much understanding and respect can he ask for if he says something like that? Ugh. If he wanted to compare the United States and its morals with those of other countries, how well-considered was it to bring down a general curse on the United States as a whole?

But... that's one of those things that people so easily do, isn't it? It's easy to lose one's temper and accuse others when things go wrong. Instead of being reasonable you are just angry.

But did you know that Jesus did that kind of thing himself? Pretty much? This is what we can read in Matthew 21:18-20:

In a parallel passage in Mark, we learn that it is not the season for figs, when Jesus curses the poor tree for not bearing fruit (Mark 11:12):

And then there is this in Mark 11:20:

This happened when things were building to a climax in the gospels, when Jesus had come to Jerusalem and tensions had started building. Whether or not Jesus believed that he was indeed going to be crucified, or if he thought, maybe, that God might grant him some sort of worldly victory over the Pharisees and the High Prists and the Romans in Jerusalem, we can't blame Jesus for being tense and short-tempered himself. And then he takes it out on a poor fig tree, which didn't bear fruit because it was not the season for figs! And Jesus cursed it and killed it!

I have always thought that this is Jesus' weirdest and most cruel miracle. But at the same time, I have always liked this little passage, because it is such a wonderful tribute to the sheer flawed humanity of Jesus. He was like the rest of us, occasionally scared and impatient, and in need of taking his frustrations out on somebody else.

Anyway. Reverend Wright is, yes, a Reverend. It is his job to read the Bible, which contains so many curses and damnations and inflammatory statements. So Reverend Wright spoke like the Bible and called down damnation on his country. And I seem to remember that Jesus cursed Jerusalem... and all in all, I think that this is another good reason to keep church and state well separated.

Yesterday I read somewhere that the bitterness between Obama and Clinton and the brouhaha surrounding Obama because of Reverend Wright is really hurting the Democratic party. So maybe the next President will be John McCain. Bomb, bomb, bomb Iran. Yes, maybe bombing Iran is better than being friends with a Reverend who says "damn America". But then again, maybe it is not.

Ann

The fact that some think America should repent for racism because if not it will be damned?

1. For a community who has seen racism be pardoned and sactioned for most of their lives, I would assume hearing that God is in fact taking that into account and not letting it slide would be uplifting. "Someone will right my wrongs," is how I would have phrased it, but I'm not a fiery Reverend.

2. I believe Roger and Paul pointed to the complexities of the Israel/Palestine issue, which addresses why "Israel" might be a dirty word to some and who would find their views validated by that statement.

But again the confrontational phrasing IS problematic and I can see why it would offend some. I agree it has no place in the race, aka to the larger American public 100%. Because of that, it's good that Wright was dismissed from the campaign. But these issues are, to me, issues of phrasing--I don't think they matter unless they are brought to the door of the mass public, where they alienate the majority. And well, here you have it.

Phrasing issues aside, I'm not so sure that these statements have _no_ valid views behind them and are simply about racism (against whites) and hate. And by extension that anyone that believes these should be guilty of racism and hate.

Which is why questioning *Obama's* views due to this seems a bit much, because honestly there's a lot of crap people close to us say and that does not make them racist or hateful. And most importantly whatever horridly phrased remarks they say do not make _us_ racist or hateful.

Again, I take as much issue with the phrasing of Wright's statements as I take issue with Ferraro's phrasing of her own take on the presidential race (adding that Wright's hellfire oratory is something not exactly unheard of in many churches so there's the context for hyperbole). And if Ferraro had been that close to Clinton and said that afirmative action quip, honestly, I would feel that the panic was equally unwarranted. *Hillary's* credibility and judgement really wouldn't be an issue unless she didn't recognize the damage of these statements and didn't act quickly.

Definitely, and the public deserves Obama's take on this. The public deserves that these statements be denounced and that the Rev be asked to get away from the campaign. However, hysteria over Obama's "separatist politics" is a bit much.

I mentioned the whole Republican issue before as another angle to why this generated such controversy (my take being that this is more shocking on the Dem side). I don't think anyone is surprised when a Republican candidate has some preacher with inflammatory rhetoric behind him. In fact, I'm shocked at McCain's secularism And actually, I'm cynical enough not to care that he welcome support from John Hagee. I can't stress enough how much I really don't care. Maybe that makes me an irresponsible voter, but there are only so many hours in a day.

I pointed to Bush as an example before, since he ran on religiously inflected moral values and got elected and got religious advisors playing a part in government. Is it possible that all his religious advisors are people who've never said remarks as offensive as those Wright has said? Against Muslims, gays, what have you? If I wanted to, I could probably dig something up. But is it THAT important to focus on who said what, really?

What I've mantained all along is that it's an issue of phrasing that has been blown out of proportion. And in fact it was ultimately dealt with in a pretty good way.

alcyone

Alcyone still has not acknowledged that in none of my posts did I dispute Wright's right to believe or say what he wants.

Nor has she, in any of her posts that replied to mine, indicated that she is aware that what my my argument was:
that a person who runs for the Presidency of the United States on a platform of inclusiveness is vulnerable when an important person on his campaign team does not reflect that same inclusiveness.

Regardless of what Paul has written, (and Paul you are so good to to try to mend these fences but, sadly, you can not speak for Alcyone), the wording of Alcyone's post remains contradictory with respect to her implication about what I wrote.

c.

This post *is* about Wright.

Ann, Wright goes a bit further than what you have indicated. His views are easily found on the Web.

Most of what he says is what you would expect from a Christian pastor. As well, he's done a lot to instill community pride in his parish. Also some interesting glimpses into the workings of ward politics (which are, howver, totally irrelevant to this discussion).

But it's the inflammatory hate speech that sometimes veers into his sermons that's at issue here.

Obama himself now disavows those extremist views that Wright has promulgated.

c.

Well, I can read her posts, the latest of which on the subject is pretty clear to me. And, since I took the time to contact her privately for clarification of her statements, I can go by that, too. I may not be a moderator of this forum, but I am part of the team, and I take things like this seriously.

And you still have not acknowledged that you falsely accused me of making wild and insulting accusations against you. Or, more to the point, that you falsely accused her of calling you a racist. Those are, as you say, very serious allegations.

But I understand that those accusations were based on a misunderstanding. It happens. Sometimes we don't understand each other properly. We read things into each other's words that weren't intended. When that happens, the best thing to do is to accept that mistakes were made and move on.

Nor have you indicated in any of your posts that you understand what she was actually saying. It's not necessary to do so.

She's said that she was misunderstood. She's said, point blank, that she didn't call you or anyone else a racist. She's also said that it was her fault for using unclear language and that, given that she's not making herself properly understood, she feels that the best thing she can do is acknowledge her mistake and move on.

I've been in this position myself, and I know from experience that at times like this further attempts at clarification are only likely to prolong the misunderstanding and brew more bad feelings.

Mistakes were made. Mistakes were acknowledged. There were misunderstandings and misinterpretations.

Once again, the best thing to do is accept that and move on.

Back to the topic at hand...

Obama himself already responded to this one, as I posted on the previous page:

Paul, I sent you a PM thanking you and expressing my appreciation - I thought that was acknoweledging what you had said. You sent a nice note in reply and so I thought that was that. (well not quite because I wanted to reply to your reference to "interesting times" ) btw, I never did accuse you of "wild accusations".

Honestly, I'm not sure what you're referring to here. I did respond to Alcyone's arguments, disgreeing with some of them, but agreeing with others. If you read back through my posts, I think you'll see that.

I did not falsely accuse her of calling me a rascist. Alcyone has not contacted me privately nor has she posted anything further here to clarify. Her last reference to her allegation was contradictory.

You'll note above that I did mention that Ann would find a lot of positive things about Wright on the web. It's true, though, that if you limit yourself to one source (on any subject) you might wind up with just YouTube. But I think Ann wouldn't be that lazy.

c.

Yes, you sent me a nice PM thanking me for my apology. It was not necessary but it was appreciated. However, you have yet to actually admit that you made a mistake, too. It's one thing to accept an apology, another to make one of your own. But yes, I was perfectly happy to say that was that. We had a misunderstanding, it was cleared up, we moved on.

That's the way to do it, and that's why I brought it up. Pressing the issue only makes it worse. Which is why I'm not going to rehash the details here. I'm only pointing to it as an example, and to remind you that there are two sides to every issue.

You said:

I was responding to that, saying that I don't see why it's necessary for her to do so.

Again, I was pointing to a similar situation in which you were on the other side. You responded to Alcyone, but she pointed out that you hadn't understood her properly. You haven't acknowledged that you understand what she actually meant. But there's no reason to do so. As I keep saying, the best thing to do when something like this happens is to acknowledge that there was a misunderstanding (which, technically, you also have yet to do) and let that be the end of it.

But I see you've edited your post while I was writing mine:

In fact, you did accuse her of calling you a racist. And, in fact, she has specifically stated that you misinterpreted her words, and that she did not call you a racist. You read her as saying something she didn't mean. You made a mistake. It happens. But that mistake led you to accuse her of something which she did not actually do.

If you want to demand a further apology from her, then it's only fair to ask that you apologize for your part.

But again... Pressing the issue isn't going to get us anywhere good. The best thing to do is acknowledge the mistakes and move on.

Which is exactly what Alcyone has said she wants to do. Which is why she's not posting further about it. She said she made a mistake. She accepted responsibility for it. She specifically said that she did not intend the implications that you read in her (admittedly poorly phrased) words. And then she withdrew from the subject. I don't see that anything further is necessary, and, as I've said, it's my repeated experience that dragging it out further, even with the best of intentions, will only make things worse.

Now, I think we've prolonged this quite enough, letting this thread get mired in mistakes and bad feelings. If you'd like to continue this discussion, we can do it privately.

For what it's worth, a bit of personal advice... This isn't the first time you've taken offense where none was intended. I think you'll find that if you give people the benefit of the doubt rather than assuming the worst possible interpretation of their words, life will be much better for you and everyone else. And when someone tells you that you misinterpreted them and the offensive implication was not in any way intended, I find it's best to take them at their word and move on.

Paul, this is from back in the thread:

I don't think what I concluded was wrong based on what was there, but I did see that once you'd explained, Paul, that you had not meant that I was buying in to smears or questioning O's patriotism. So, yes, the wording matters quite a lot. You then said that you hadn't meant to insult me with your comment. I'm not sure how I made a mistake in pointing out that I was insulted in the first place, though. (It's happened every once in a while on these boards that people have pointed out that they have felt insulted by what someone has written. usually it was a consequence of misunderstanding) But I would appreciate a private note explaining this because I've missed something.
Anyway , then our private exchange followed.

with respect to Alcyone's accusation:
Alcyone wrote:
to which I replied:
Alcyone then posted this:
Which I found contradictory. this was Alcyone's last post directed at me.

Right now I'm not sure what to make of Alcyone's comments, given what you have written. What she, herself, has posted here with respect to my comments remains contradictory, however.

With respect to your personal advice :
In fact, that is what I had thought I had done with you personally, Paul But since Alcyone has yet to tell me that, I can't follow the rest of your advice. I will , howver, should she do so.

A bit of personal advice from me too - please be careful with how you characterise statements when you dismiss people's views that disagree with yours.

You are very right to mention the importance of how we phrase things. And it is always right to acknowledge mistakes and to apologise to those affected by our mistakes.

I'm sorry, but I had to reply - had your last post not hammered me so, I would not have done so. I plead self-defense

this is my last post. I promise

c.

I've responded in private, as agreed.

We now take you back to your regularly scheduled socio-political/religious debate.

Me, personally. I think all of them are a sad example of what America can produce as leaders. Clinton is a flaming liberal, I wouldn't vote for her if you had a gun to my head. Obama isn't much better, the only upside that I can think of is that he doesn't have the political experience to do as much damage if he does manage to get into office. Typically, I vote republican. however, Mcain has a long glorious history of throwing other republicans under the bus in the name of "bipartisanship" which as far as Mcain goes is anything but. He doesn't just reach across the eisle, he moves over and sits down. As far as I'm concerned, we're pretty much doomed no matter who we pick, unless Mcain picks a decent VP and then has a heart attack. Just the same, I'd rather not hang the next four years of mysery on the republicans...

I think I'll write in a vote for David Copperfield

Airlik said:

That's interesting in light of the current new subject for the talking heads. So the talking heads are all a-buzz from the how Clinton published her schedule. Critics say that it doesn't illustrate "experience," but I heard several people argue that it's what is NOT in the schedule that matters (I admit I'm not sure what this means, perhaps the fact that maybe meeting with White House staff doesn't make it in the schedule?).

Given that--what I'd like to know is how you people watching the election stand on the experience issue (I know Roger echoed the opposite of Airlik, if I'm recalling correctly--that Obama's lack of experience was a big negative). There are those that say it matters and those that say that nothing can prepare you for the Presidency. And there are those that say that the less experience the better, because of the current state of Washington.

What do you think? Has your opinion changed through time?

alcyone