US Politics: Butter Not Guns

[Week]

4 minutes ago, The Great Unwashed said:

I think it's germane to the discussion if the implication going forward is that dissatisfaction with Harris as a pick will automatically be correlated with race. 

I think more directed at toxic twitterati/VERY ONLINE on the Left. 

[Guest]

2 minutes ago, Week said:

I think more directed at toxic twitterati/VERY ONLINE on the Left. 

I'm not going to dispute that some of that is at play, but the comment itself paints a broad brush about white lefties.

[Week]

6 minutes ago, The Great Unwashed said:

I'm not going to dispute that some of that is at play, but the comment itself paints a broad brush about white lefties.

From the quote: "Maybe not you, white progressive who has determined that there is only one true way to solve our problems, but to A LOT of people."

That is a specific description of white lefty. If you take offense, then the shoe fits. You are not required to identify yourself as such. I would call myself a white lefty* and do not take offense.

*Or at least moving far more in that direction than 5 years ago.

[Lollygag]

There are some on the far left who are beginning to strongly resemble the evangelicals of the far right, hence "One True Way". I'm guessing this choice of words is deliberate and low-key calling out this evangelicalism.

[Guest]

5 minutes ago, Week said:

From the quote: "Maybe not you, white progressive who has determined that there is only one true way to solve our problems, but to A LOT of people."

That is a specific description of white lefty. If you take offense, then the shoe fits. You are not required to identify yourself as such. I would call myself a white lefty* and do not take offense.

*Or at least moving far more in that direction than 5 years ago.

I'm not looking to fight; just saying that taking the one sentence ignores the rest of the tweet, which is much more indiscriminate as to whom it is in reference.

I would assume that you wouldn't take offense to the tweet because you're someone who is pleased with Harris as VP. The sub-text about anyone who is not pleased with Harris is VP is much more muddied.

[Week]

3 minutes ago, The Great Unwashed said:

I'm not looking to fight; just saying that taking the one sentence ignores the rest of the tweet, which is much more indiscriminate as to whom it is in reference.

I would assume that you wouldn't take offense to the tweet because you're someone who is pleased with Harris as VP. The sub-text surrounding anyone who is not pleased with Harris is VP is much more muddied.

Pleased with Harris as VP? Yes -- generally -- though I probably would have preferred Susan Rice of those mentioned 'in the running' for VP. It's a bit Sophie's Choice considering that I would rather have had Warren, Castro, Booker, Harris, or Bernie at the top of the ticket.

[Guest]

1 minute ago, Week said:

Pleased with Harris as VP? Yes -- generally -- though I probably would have preferred Susan Rice of those mentioned 'in the running' for VP. It's a bit Sophie's Choice considering that I would rather have had Warren, Castro, Booker, Harris, or Bernie at the top of the ticket.

That's my only point; you're generally pleased about it, so you know the tweet isn't in reference to you.

I'm generally not pleased about it, so it's a lot more difficult to tell if I'm supposed to be a target or not.

[TheMightyKC]

1 hour ago, Ormond said:

All Christians are catholic with a small "c". Over 99% of Catholic churches would be Roman Catholic, though there are a few tiny groups called Old Catholics, Polish National Catholics, etc.

I must say though that I am nearly as speechless as Fragile Bird that there is anyone in the USA with enough education to be making posts on this board who knows so little about Roman Catholicism. Were you home schooled? Where is your town located, anyway? 

We live outside of Los Angeles in Agoura Hills, which isn't too far from where I grew up.  I have heard plenty about Catholicism I was just never clear on the distinction between Roman Catholic and Catholic.  I've certainly never seen RC as an abbreviation for Catholic, I don't think it was too foolish of me to assume Fragile Bird meant "KC" instead of "RC".

I'll ask my other church leaders more about this, it is slightly embarrassing to admit I know so little about a fellow branch of Christianity.

[DMC]

What were the alternatives for women of color?  Bass?  No, for many reasons.  Maybe she could've gotten over all the op research that got dumped on her lately, but she's still incredibly untested to be elevated to a national ticket.  Same with Abrams, or Cummings, or Lance Bottoms.  Susan Rice has dealt with national politics, sure, but she's never even ran a campaign.  You really want her as the heir presumptive in 2024?  Harris was the obvious choice.

[Week]

2 minutes ago, The Great Unwashed said:

That's my only point; you're generally pleased about it, so you know the tweet isn't in reference to you.

I'm generally not pleased about it, so it's a lot more difficult to tell if I'm supposed to be a target or not.

You are framing the tweet as to whether you are a target or not. The point of the tweet is to pause and reflect. Reflect that there are broad swathes of people outside of our bubble who are inspired by this choice. That is something to celebrate even if you disagree with her as a choice and some of her politics.

Quote

Harris is INSPIRING to a lot of people. [snip] A LOT of people. So, you know, something to think about, people who maybe aren't hooked into HBCU Twitter.

 

[DanteGabriel]

2 minutes ago, TheMightyKC said:

We live outside of Los Angeles in Agoura Hills, which isn't too far from where I grew up.  I have heard plenty about Catholicism I was just never clear on the distinction between Roman Catholic and Catholic.  I've certainly never seen RC as an abbreviation for Catholic, I don't think it was too foolish of me to assume Fragile Bird meant "KC" instead of "RC".

I'll ask my other church leaders more about this, it is slightly embarrassing to admit I know so little about a fellow branch of Christianity.

This kinda reminds me of a long-ago freshman dorm conversation with the girls living across from me. We talked about religion, I as a lapsed Catholic and one of the girls was very deeply Catholic (she's a judge in Texas now). I confessed that I found the actual transubstantiation of the host to Christ's literal flesh to be pretty tough to (almost literally) swallow. She looked at me like I was an alien and yelled, "Jesus, Dante, you've been a Protestant this whole time!"

[Maithanet]

Imo if Biden wanted someone other than Harris, the next best choices were senator Duckworth and gov Grisham.  But I don't know exactly whether either of them would be better than Harris, they are just plausible - I could see the potential benefits at least.  Someone like Bass really raised questions about why you wouldn't just pick Harris.

[DMC]

Yeah I woulda been fine with Duckworth, but I think Harris' better.  Particularly to takeover in 4 years.  Also, if you're fine with Duckworth, I don't see not being fine with Harris in terms of lefty credentials.  Not like there's any discernible difference between the two in ideology.  Grisham..I dunno.  He needed someone exciting.  Not sure she excites many, even Hispanics.

[Fez]

2 minutes ago, DMC said:

What were the alternatives for women of color?  Bass?  No, for many reasons.  Maybe she could've gotten over all the op research that got dumped on her lately, but she's still incredibly untested to be elevated to a national ticket.  Same with Abrams, or Cummings, or Lance Bottoms.  Susan Rice has dealt with national politics, sure, but she's never even ran a campaign.  You really want her as the heir presumptive in 2024?  Harris was the obvious choice.

Yeah. The only other options were Michelle Obama, who wouldn't do it in a million years, or Tammy Duckworth, who would've been fine but I think the campaign specifically wanted an African American woman.

If you ever wanted another clear indication of the history of systematic racism and also sexism that has existed in this country, there it is. There simply isn't much of a bench of women of color with the experience and standing to be a VP nominee because so few have had the opportunities to obtain them.

There's only been two female African American senators in US history, zero governors (unless you count the DC Mayor), and four cabinet secretaries (one of whom was Condi Rice).

[Mr. Chatywin et al.]

9 minutes ago, DanteGabriel said:

This kinda reminds me of a long-ago freshman dorm conversation with the girls living across from me. We talked about religion, I as a lapsed Catholic and one of the girls was very deeply Catholic (she's a judge in Texas now). I confessed that I found the actual transubstantiation of the host to Christ's literal flesh to be pretty tough to (almost literally) swallow. She looked at me like I was an alien and yelled, "Jesus, Dante, you've been a Protestant this whole time!"

Since we're talking religion, it's worth noting the irony that the ultra conservative religious right claims to worship a far left liberal hipster, who was a brown skinned Jew that kicked it with immigrants and said rich people don't go to heaven.

Sigh.

[Kalbear]

40 minutes ago, The Great Unwashed said:

I'm not going to dispute that some of that is at play, but the comment itself paints a broad brush about white lefties.

The shoe fits until it doesn't. 

[TheMightyKC]

2 minutes ago, Tywin et al. said:

Since we're talking religion, it's worth noting the irony that the ultra conservative religious right claims to worship a far left liberal hipster, who was a brown skinned Jew that kicked it with immigrants and said rich people don't go to heaven.

Sigh.

Excuse the joke, but that's more of a Sophomore conversation, hahahahahaha!  I think that point has been made many times, Ser Obvious!  

(Sorry, but I Just Couldn't Resist)

[Centrist Simon Steele]

1 hour ago, JEORDHl said:

Oh, I'm sure she was too progressive an AG for certain Californians. But the people that bought into all this 'cop' bs didn't bring facts. 

Woman. Black. Progressive on crime [check out the programs she instituted as AG] a lot of different biases working against her there.  

 

 

Here is a NYT article by Lara Bazelon (her and her sister Emily are both well-respected) about exactly why this is incorrect. It's not about her race, it's about what she did to people of color.

It's not that people "didn't bring facts" (so Ben Shapiro sounding), but that the facts are troubling. She is very similar to Klobuchar in this way. I don't care if people like her, she's been chosen, but to denigrate those critical of her as being duped or as other posters suggest being racist, is just a simple way to dismiss valid criticisms of her that will come up again.

[maarsen]

3 hours ago, Fragile Bird said:

You leave me speechless. Really.

I can remember being a lad and seeing RC cola and thinking Catholics get their own cola? 

[Zorral]

I expected it would be her for some reason since Biden is the one who got the primaries -- maybe?  (We'still counting, or something, here.)

As I'd have preferred Warren or Castro for the Pick, I'd have preferred them for VP too.

But at least he chose somebody who can get on fire and show that fire to the voters.