McCain and the Race Card – The Corporate Media’s Role

Posted by AzBlueMeanie:

In my last post, I discussed how Republicans since Lee Atwater and Ronald Reagan have fore-sworn the overt form of racism which lasted well into the 1970s in favor of a more subtle form of racism which speaks in coded language.  (This has its roots in the "Southern Strategy" first adopted by Barry Goldwater in 1964, and later adopted as the official political strategy of the GOP by Richard Nixon in 1968.)

Today I will address the corporate media’s role in defending the status quo of privileged WASP elitists who believe that they are endowed with a god-given birthright to lord over us, the ignorant unwashed masses of humanity – that would be you and me by the way.

From the beginning of the primary season, the McCain campaign, the White House, the RNC and their surrogates have been steadily feeding talking points into the corporate media, talking points that in reality are racially charged code words. (Sadly, the Hillary Clinton campaign engaged in this also).

I was going to name names in the corporate media, but my research indicates that every network anchor, political reporter, talking head pundit and conservative commentator in television, radio and newsprint have repeated these racially charged code words ad nauseam for many months now, giving them the imprimatur of legitimacy as a topic for discussion while astutely avoiding any discussion of the underlying racism in using such coded language. This has begun to change only in recent days.

What I am referring to is the constant repetition that Barack Obama is presumptuous, arrogant, cocky, overly confident, too self-assured, etc.  The Daily Show demonstrates this point in this clip:

These are all words which conservatives applied to George W. Bush as positive leadership traits in 2000.  But these words carry a double-entendre meaning when applied to an African-American man.  They are racially charged code words that have come to be understood for "uppity Nigger."  "Mind your place, boy!"

As Bob Herbert noted with respect to McCain’s recent swiftboat ads, they are "designed to exploit the hostility, anxiety and resentment of the many white Americans who are still freakishly hung up on the idea of black men rising above their station and becoming sexually involved with white women."  Op-Ed Columnist – Running While Black – Op-Ed – NYTimes.com

"The racial fantasy factor in this presidential campaign is out of control. It was at work in that New Yorker cover that caused such a stir. (Mr. Obama in Muslim garb with the American flag burning in the fireplace.) It’s driving the idea that Barack Obama is somehow presumptuous, too arrogant, too big for his britches — a man who obviously does not know his place.

Mr. Obama has to endure these grotesque insults with a smile and heroic levels of equanimity. The reason he has to do this — the sole reason — is that he is black."

And it is the sole reason that he is an African-American that Barack Obama cannot respond to these malicious racist attacks because the flip-side to these GOP attacks, should he call them out on their racism, is to portray him as the stereotypical "black victim."  It’s always a win-win situation. The GOP will fabricate the impression that Obama is demanding special treatment and privileges because he is black.  There was already an element of this in McCain’s whining about Obama being a media darling and receiving "special treatment" from the media.  This from the man who, more than any politician in living memory, has enjoyed the protective cocoon of "The John McCain Protection Society" from the media, "his base."

This new line of attack was rolled out on Sunday.  Cracker attacker Sen. Lindsey Graham, in the warm embrace of Fox News Sunday, while discussing Obama’s innocuous comment about not looking like the presidents on our currency stated that "there’s no doubt in my mind that what Senator Obama is trying to suggest — that he’s a victim of something."  Yeah, you would be lying, cracker.

As Eugene Robinson explains Eugene Robinson – Who’s Raising Race? – washingtonpost.com:

The key words are "victim" and "racist" — which Obama did not say. Graham puts them in Obama’s mouth because of their power to alienate.

With the first loaded word, Graham is trying to tie Obama to a stereotype: the Great African American Victim. He’s playing to the annoyance some whites feel at being reminded of racial sins committed long before they were born or even long before their families came to this country.

As Graham well knows, Obama has taken great pains to sanitize his campaign of even the faintest whiff of victimhood. Obama understands that in order to be elected president, he has to come off as the least-aggrieved black man in America.

Most of his supporters understand this, too. They know that he can’t react with anger when his love of country is questioned over a flag pin. They see that he can’t be seen to take offense when his self-confidence — a quality shared by every U.S. senator I’ve ever met — is portrayed as arrogance, as if he had somehow reached beyond his station by thinking he is worthy of being elected president.

Robinson continues, "The second of the bombshell words that Obama didn’t say — but that Graham would like you to think that he said — is an even bigger canard. He called me a racist has become a popular and convenient refuge of scoundrels."

Former Sen. Tom Daschle, also a guest on Fox News Sunday, accurately reminded Graham that Obama "has never said that he believes that John McCain is a racist." Graham wouldn’t acknowledge his point.  This is because the McCain campaign is running a fact-free campaign. 

Rather, McCain has approved a "fear and smear" campaign of lies, distortions and racially coded language.  And the corporate media is his willing and complicit partner in this crime against the American people and our democracy. 

If Dante were to write The Inferno today, he would include a lengthy chapter about the special ring of hell reserved for the media whores in the corporate media.  It is little comfort to imagine this vision of hell as their eternal damnation.  Our democracy demands justice now.