It’s the sentiment of one voter in West Virginia. And I know I’m in many ways the stereotypical coastal elitist here, but I don’t 
think I’m crazy to think that a party absolves itself of morality by pandering to that kind of thing, always afraid of taking a step forward because it might offend some whose thinking is backwards (ie “That Martin King is kind of radical, shouldn’t we just bide our time rather than upsetting the apple cart? People in the deep south aren’t ready for big change just yet”).
I don’t believe in supporting candidates far outside of the mainstream of thought but at the same time that road goes both ways. I don’t believe in not supporting a candidate because of the opinion of a voting bloc outside of the realm of common sense.
Of course, at the same time, this shows the world of difference between Virginia and West Virginia.
“Obama just doesn’t sound right for an American president.”
What, and George Bush is Oliver Wendell freakin’ Holmes?
Please tell me they’re talking about raccoons here.
Well, Sam Vetter is just going to have to get used to Obama’s strange name.
I don’t think that the majority of Americans think this way. These sort of crazy comments undoubtedly make for good news stories and it’s unfortunate that the media decides to cover bigots and then tries to pass these people off as average Americans.
Despite the hurdles that Obama will face in the coming months, I truly believe that he will be our next president. He will be a wonderful, inspiring and refreshing leader for America. He is our one great hope for getting this country back on track. The random bigot will eventually get over his strange name and his skin color when they finally see Obama the man.
Peace.
Obama ‘08
Oliver
It drives me crazy how many Democratic Party Apologists hold the views of white Americans AGAINST Obama.
I am certain Talk Left will denounce such views as this “Obama doesn’t sound American”. Oh wait, no Talk Left won’t, they will denounce Obama for having the arrogance to keep his own name.
I live in Atlanta, which is probably one of the more forward thinking Southern cities, but I still hear this garbage. If someone has a hangup about a name, they probably won’t vote for that person and in my view should stay home. Maybe the rest of the country is not so virolently anti-black, but down here that “just sounds funny”
I’ve heard this from a coworker here in Minneapolis. Then again, Hannity has openly said this very opinion on his show. It’s a way to attack Obama’s blackness without doing it directly, since you’d never imagine a white guy named “Barack Obama.”
As for names, sixty years ago you would never have said a name like “Kennedy” or “Reagan” was presidential. Too Mick.
Well the funny thing to me is using a name as a barometer for this. My full name is Lloyd Oliver Willis Jr. This guy would probably not have a problem voting for me if all he saw was that name on a ballot. That is, in my opinion, the name of some sort of stuffy British Lord. And yet here I am.
P.S. Just to further my point, I’d like to share with you a story about one of my many run-ins with the media.
One day I was waiting for a friend outside of the Time Warner building in Manhattan. There was a reporter and a film crew there and they were asking people about the art piece that depicts Obama as Jesus.
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/17927102/
They asked 20 or so people what they thought about this “controversy” and very few people cared. Finally they interviewed one woman who passionately stated that this would NEVER be allowed if it were Allah and that there is a double-standard that makes it acceptable to trash Christianity. Finally the station got the comment they were waiting for. Just as they were packing up, I approached the reporter and film crew and asked them what THEY thought about the Chocolate Jesus and the Obama Jesus and, of course, they couldn’t give a shit about it.
The media tries to create controversy because it makes for good news and higher ratings. I’m not saying bigotry and racism doesn’t exist in America (I’m now referring to comment that Obama has a strange and un-presidential name) but what I am saying is that the media reports these views disproportionately. When the media gives bigots airtime, it only helps to validate the bigots fucked up views. Other bigots watch the news and say to themselves “Yeah! See, that IS a valid point. That’s what I think.”
Sure these bigoted comments are upsetting, but I do not believe that the average American is an uneducated bigot. Obama will prevail and be our next president despite the bigoted fears of a few. We just need to focus on sanity and reason.
“Of course, at the same time, this shows the world of difference between Virginia and West Virginia.”
Which as any Civil War buff knows is so cruelly ironic.
These are the same numbnuts who voted for Bush over Kerry, so who gives a crap about them? We weren’t going to get their votes anyway, and we won’t need them.
Exactly. Why worry about this voting bloc when they’ll break for McCain anyway?
Vanessa is correct. You bat it around for a while, and somebody is going to either say the name is funny, or repeat one of those web rumors. So what? Here’s the key: few of those folks were EVER going to vote for a Democrat.
The other key is Obama’s repeated showing that the more people see him, the more likely he is to be accepted. The more people hear him talk, the more likely he is to be accepted. WV will almost certainly go for Clinton, but don’t expect a landslide in the fall. Many ‘regular white folks’ or whatever the loons are calling them remember the Clinton era as a time of a good economy, with a president who spoke well and (but for the unfortunate Lewinsky thing) appeared to at least pay a bit of attention to their lives. Thus, a vote for HRC in the primary. That doesn’t translate to a vote for Bush term 3.
On a somewhat related front, I think the name is a stone cold asset. Easy to say, easy to remember. Distinct, but not too long.
“On a somewhat related front, I think the name is a stone cold asset. Easy to say, easy to remember. Distinct, but not too long.”
And babies can say it. Which is VERY amusing.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hmwvu20MvGY&feature=related
The question to answer is this: Do we give the racist minority in the Democratic Party veto power over the nominee?
But… But… Jerome Armstrong assures us that racism has absolutely nothing to do with why Clinton is so far ahead in WV. He has even gone so far as to suggest that we think that because we are ‘unable to deal with defeat’, and has taken to banning people and deleting their comments just for suggesting it.
Jerome Armstrong wouldn’t lie, would he??
Just keep repeating it until it doesn’t sound stragne anymore.
President Obama. President Obama. President Obama. President Obama. President Obama. President Obama. President Obama. President Obama.
There, that wasn’t so bad.
Vanessa: These sort of crazy comments undoubtedly make for good news stories…
The media tries to create controversy because it makes for good news and higher ratings.
I agree completely with the point you are making, but let’s at least not refer to these as “good” news stories. They have nothing to do with “good” journalism and using the word to describe them gives them a legitimacy they do not deserve.
Call them what they are. They make, at best, popular news stories or, most accurately, sellable news stories
The fault line in the electorate in November is isn’t going to be black-white, or male-female, rich-poor, or coastal-fly over.
It’s going to be cool-not cool.
Are we ready to Embrace the Cool?
Oh, Hells yeah.
That doesn’t translate to a vote for Bush term 3.
I’m gonna go out on a limb here: Bush will not be elected to a third term.
56 some odd guns and he worried that “Obama” does not sound right. Some of my fellow countrymen are embarrassing.
I’m gonna go out on a limb here: Bush will not be elected to a third term.
Yeah, but his SURROGATE is, jackass. A man who has pledged to continue the same ruinous policies of the last seven years.
Please go somewhere and buy a frickin’ CLUE.
Sean D. Martin,
You’re right, these stories aren’t “good” in the sense that they aren’t intelligent or thought-provoking. I suppose what I meant is that controversy leads to higher ratings (I don’t know if this is actually true, but I believe the networks believe this) and in the minds of some journalists, this is a good thing.
Vanessa
According to Talk Left, and even their Obama “Supporter” (derisive laughter break….),
“Hillary will win West Virginia. Period.”
How do they know? I don’t know, but it certainly IS definitive.
The greatly Ironic Thing about Talk Left and MYDD today is that they have taken time out from demanding that Obama supporters, Blogs that lean towards Obama, and of course Obama himself start kissing Hillary supporters asses to DENOUNCE Obama’s loser voters for the thumping Obama will take in WV. A Hillary State.
People in WV oppose abortion, any legal status for homosexual couples, and 70% own guns and (according to CNN) are “Values Voters”.
And they will vote for Hillary Clinton because she shares their antiabortion, NRA, anti-Gay stands?
“Hillary will win West Virginia. Period.” Obama supporter BTD at Talk Left.
Who knew? (Talk Left and Taylor Marsh, that “working class Scotch Irish gun loving decades ago Beauty Queen, and MyDD, but who else knew?
“Barack Obama” has to be the most euphonious name for a president since “Franklin Roosevelt” and “Abraham Lincoln.” I for once can’t wait to start saying “President Obama.” Sounds like the future to me.
Sing along with the chorus, y’all: Oh-bah-mah! Oh-bah-mah! Oh-bah-mah!
I for one have grown tired of the least successful, most-government dependent, genetically inferior Americans getting a disproportionate share of attention from politicians and money spent on them. I refer of course to West Virginia and its unwelcome history of flag-pole shaped family trees, severe welfare mentality, Robert Byrd and interstates connecting towns with no stoplights.
Now these comments of mine are not nice and not charitable, but they are no different from the racist comments of our West Virginia friends who would condemn Obama for his race, his alleged intention to put more black Americans in positions of government responsibility (i.e. to lord it over the hillbilly honkey, shudder), and his name.
For the record, I don’t want President Billy Bob either, so maybe I am no better than the inbreds in the WV hollows. There are a lot of nice people with roots in West Virginia; the more ambitious of them are called Pittsburghers and Baltimoreans now. West Virginia doesn’t want an “Obama” as President because that would show just how backwater the state is – a black man can become President, but it’s still a backwater in the hills. Again, if this is unkind, I really don’t care. I am tired of having politics run down to the lowest inbred common denominator, which is exactly what Hillary is doing on her repeated Archie Bunker campaign. If West Virginia doesn’t like it, good. Let them cry all over their Dolly Parton album collection. Hope it hurts the poor, armed Klansmen and their cousin wives.
I don’t see how he could have a problem with Obama’s name. After all, in the fall he will vote for a man whose name sounds an awful lot like a curse of God. McCain – Mark of Cain. You be the judge.
News flash: whichever candidate you support will end up getting the votes of a lot of seriously stupid people.
I’m not worried about the statement from this voter in terms of the elements of anti-Obama sentiment it represents, rather, this sentiment offends me because American has allowed this sort of stupidity to fester in its midst.
The archetype of the people I grew up with was, like Obama, as he put it, “a skinny kid with a funny name who believes that America has a place for him, too.” It’s a shame that some people are so insulated from what America is all about that they don’t understand that someone with a name like Obama *does* sound right for an American president. So does Kennedy or Patel or Chang, for that matter.
The fault line in the electorate in November is isn’t going to be black-white, or male-female, rich-poor, or coastal-fly over.
It’s going to be cool-not cool.
Are we ready to Embrace the Cool?
If we’re voting for student body president, then sure. Hell yes.
But for the President of the United States, many people expect more than just “the coolest guy in the race”.
Doesn’t sound right? Bah!
I wonder how many people who say that would have no problem with Bobby Jindal on the GOP ticket?
>> But for the President of the United States, many people expect more than just “the coolest guy in the race”. <<
Yeah – because “the guy you’d rather have a beer with” has worked out so well.
Yeah – because “the guy you’d rather have a beer with” has worked out so well.
I wasn’t aware that the “have a beer with this person” question was a “fault line in the electorate” in the 2000 or 2004 elections.
Doesn’t sound right?
Heck, we already had presidents named Washington and Jefferson. What’s the big deal with “Obama”?
Hey, that’s my picture. Awesome!
I’m voting for Bob Barr, if he wins the Libertarian nomination. Or John McCain otherwise.