…than this?
Only if he were to hang a noose on the baclk of the Vice-Presidential turducken.
Race
Tories Are Racist – It’s Hardly News. What’s the Dutch Excuse?
Bear the following article (h/t Feministe) in mind as you listen to this afternoon’s David Cameron setpiece conference speech on tonight’s news, extolling the electoral virtues of the all new, firm-jawed, righteous, green, antiracist, compassionate Tories .
Tory aide suspended over racist photos on Facebook
Haroon Siddique and agencies
Monday October 1, 2007
Guardian UnlimitedA Tory aide was suspended today for allegedly posting images on the internet of a fellow researcher with her face blacked up accompanied by a racist insult.
The damaging revelations came as the Conservatives try to use their annual conference in Blackpool to close the gap on Labour in the opinion polls, ahead of a possible snap election.
Emma Claire Pentreath, a constituency officer for the Hammersmith and Fulham MP, Greg Hands, was shown having her face painted black with a burned cork, on the social networking site Facebook, the London Evening Standard reported.
Philip Clarke, a parliamentary aide to the former attorney general Lord Lyell, was responsible for posting the photographs, according to the website, and the 24-year-old has now been suspended by the Conservatives.
The Standard reported that the photographs, which have since been removed, were accompanied by a caption which read: “Emma’s career in politics lies in tatters after she follows Ann Winterton’s lead and dresses as a ‘Nigger Minstrel’.”
Congleton MP Mrs Winterton was sacked as shadow cabinet spokeswoman for agriculture after making a racist joke at a rugby club dinner in 2002.
Another picture reportedly showed a grimacing Ms Pentreath with a caption reading: “The piece de resistance! Teeth shining, nostrils flared and eyes glowing. Truly terrifying.”
‘New Conservatives’ my ass: they’re the same old racists they always were. And could
their excuse for such antedeluvian, bigoted and nasty behaviour get any lamer?
Mr Clarke, 24 said the postings were “not intended to be racist”, but added: “I behaved very stupidly and I bitterly regret it.”
A Tory spokesman said; “Racism is completely unacceptable and has no place in the Conservative party.”
In March, photographs emerged of Barnet Conservative councillor Brian Gordon, blacked up at a fancy dress party to look like Nelson Mandela.
Opposition parties accused him of racism but a spokesman for Mr Mandela said that there was no “ill intent”.
Labour’s Dawn Butler, a black MP, said the caption accompanying the latest photos showed that the Conservatives “had not changed one bit”.
“It appears that Tory staffers think it is funny to call one another ‘Nigger Minstrels’,” she said.
“The message needs to get through to this Tory party that this is unacceptable and that the excuse of absent-minded racism is no excuse at all.”
“Blacking up” is often viewed as racist because of its connections to the minstrel shows of the 19th and 20th centuries, which promoted the mocking stereotype of a grinning, happy-go-lucky, infantilised black rascal.
That last is a message that the Dutch nation also needs to take on board. Already the blacked up, minstrelesque Zwarte Pieten are appearing in Amsterdam, though it’s weeks yet to Sinterklaas.
Any foreigner who claims that this tradition might be a tad insensitive get jumped on – “But its’ cultural!” The Dutch cry resenrfully. “You’re just trying to interfere with our traditions and anyway we don’t mean to be racist!”
Sure they don’t. Funny how both they and the Tories manage it anyway.
“You Know How To Whistle, Don’t You?”
There is nothing so low that these fuckers won’t stoop to it. When are the Democrats going to get that through their thick skulls?
Don’t Miss That Meme
As you can see in our feature story over on the right, [here] the White House’s new line is that Barack Obama may be too “intellectually lazy” to run a serious presidential campaign let alone be President of the United States.
But don’t think this allusion to generations of stereotypes about black men was just some stray comment.
The RNC just shot off an email building on the slur. With the headline “Razzle Dazzle”, the email continues the theme that Obama is just another black fancy-pants with a slick smile and nice turn of phrase but either without the candle-power or stick-to-it-iveness to actually get things done.
“Chicago Star Obama Continues His All Show, No Substance Campaign With Event On Broadway,” the email begins.
What to expect next out of the RNC? Obama would be a better singer and tap dancer than president?
Why stop there? Why don’t the RNC just run up ol’ Dixie over Congress and hook a couple of nooses to the bumper of the presidential limo?
All they have left to appeal to now is the base of the base of the base (and I use ‘base’ in its basest sense) – the rich white trash, the social inadequates, the creationists, the hardcore eliminationists, the milporn lovin’ chickenhawks and the staring-eyed John Birchers. They infest big money political donor groups like the Veterans of Foreign Wars and National Rifle Association and they’re just salivating for the day when all their Turner Diaries-fed fantasies of themselves as an oppressed minority striking back against liberals come true, and they get to play armageddon for real.
The dogwhistle’s blowing and the flying monkey minions hear it loud and clear. There’s to be 15 more months of this, supposedly; I dread to think how much lower the Republican party is going to go. What if a candidate is assassinated as a result of these naked appeals to bigotry?
I can’t decide whether that is in fact what the GOP and White House want or whether it’s just that they’ve become so powerdrunk and so arrogant that they think they can control a rabble once they’ve roused it. Either way, presiidential politics are taking an even scarier turn. Whatever you think of his politics, Barack Obama is a very, very brave man.
“How I Met Your Mother”
Thanks to Racialicious, now we know where all those pudgy, glistening-faced young Republicans that infest Washington like naked mole-rats get their hard-faced trophy wives from.
What does an ambitious young Harvard man want in a woman? Here’s a Craig’s List ad from one of America’s “best and brightest”:
[Click image for bigger Flickr version]
No Black, Asian, overweight or unattractive women for Harvard party
by Carmen Van Kerckhove
What woman could resist such a charming invitation? (Thanks Christopher!)More commentary on this CraigsList ad here, here and here. And if you never read Wendi Muse’s classic post analyzing the racism of CraigsList personal ads, what are you waiting for?
Far be it from me to condemn dating classifieds, but if you ask me, (you didn’t, but I’m telling you anyway – isn’t the internet grand?) any self-respecting woman who’s ambitious and greedy enough to respond to such an overtly racist, classist and sexist ad as that deserves all the connubial bliss that’s coming to her.
UPDATE: It occurs to me that this guy’s a wannabe who’s just too cheap to spring for a paid escort.
I wonder, could this advertiser be one of these eligible bachelors?
Let A Million Squirty Fowers Blossom
I’m at the hospital again today so just time for a quick post to thank Digby for cheering me up no end with this story.
The scene: a neofascist hate rally in Knoxville, Tennessee. The cast, a hardscrabble of hillbilly Hitlers and a troop of…. what, clones? Really?
Oh, clowns.
White Flour!
by digby
Via Perlstein, here’s a hilarious story about a Klan rally. For real.
Saturday May 26th the VNN Vanguard Nazi/KKK group attempted to host a hate rally to try to take advantage of the brutal murder of a white couple for media and recruitment purposes.
Unfortunately for them the 100th ARA (Anti Racist Action) clown block came and handed them their asses by making them appear like the asses they were.
Alex Linder the founder of VNN and the lead organizer of the rally kicked off events by rushing the clowns in a fit of rage, and was promptly arrested by 4 Knoxville police officers who dropped him to the ground when he resisted and dragged him off past the red shiny shoes of the clowns.
“White Power!” the Nazi’s shouted, “White Flour?” the clowns yelled back running in circles throwing flour in the air and raising separate letters which spelt “White Flour”.
“White Power!” the Nazi’s angrily shouted once more, “White flowers?” the clowns cheers and threw white flowers in the air and danced about merrily.
“White Power!” the Nazi’s tried once again in a doomed and somewhat funny attempt to clarify their message, “ohhhhhh!” the clowns yelled “Tight Shower!” and held a solar shower in the air and all tried to crowd under to get clean as per the Klan’s directions.
At this point several of the Nazi’s and Klan members began clutching their hearts as if they were about to have a heart attack. Their beady eyes bulged, and the veins in their tiny narrow foreheads beat in rage. One last time they screamed “White Power!”
The clown women thought they finally understood what the Klan was trying to say. “Ohhhhh…” the women clowns said. “Now we understand…”, “WIFE POWER!” they lifted the letters up in the air, grabbed the nearest male clowns and lifted them in their arms and ran about merrily chanting “WIFE POWER! WIFE POWER! WIFE POWER!”
This is the funniest thing I’ve read in years. It’s perfect, sublime.
And if this part is true, then it makes my year: