The only reason to vote for McCain is that for historians we would actually witness a Presidential Funeral of a sitting President. And that would the first since JFK in 1963.

And let's face it McCain is no where near the physical shape of Reagan when he took office. Pay attention to McCain's running mate: if he wins that will be the 45th President.

"Hang that darky from a tree" doesn't hurt him, it helps him. That's the kind of naked hate that can push even racially conflicted people into doing the right thing. That's the beauty of Obama: he is actually CHANGING MINDS, not just sorting out the prejudices into the usual little boxes.

And this is why it gets a little tiresome to read yet another rant which complains about this and that media figure's dumb statement about Hillary, and then implies that Obama doesn't face notable hurdles by comparison. The fact that Chris Matthews isn't out there explicitly calling Obama an ape doesn't mean that he's facing fair treatment.

I think that super over the top racism can backfire and actually help him too. My grandparents have only just now started paying attention to who the guy with the funny-sounding name is. Grandpa Lloyd says things like "I don't know if we're ready for a black president yet" in the same breath he calls George Bush a war criminal. Grandma Lois says "Elsie at church got an email that he won't say the Pledge of Allegiance, you think that's true?" and then says "his wife reminds me of a black Jackie Kennedy--so pretty and glamorous!" They have their own prejudices, and they are conservative with a small "c" (yup, Reagan Democrats) but when they hear outright racist attacks on Obama it helps push them into his camp. For all their flaws, they don't want to be seen as racist and they both have a fundamental American sense of fair play. The Rev. Wright thing, for instance, didn't even phase them really when I prodded them on it. In fact, my grandma said "Please, we don't make every Catholic politician respond and comment everytime the Pope mouths off!"

Nobody cares what those America-hating 19 percent racist deadenders think.

They are last century.

This is THIS century.

Buh-bye!

Chicago use to be a racist shithole, just as bad as Boston.

jesus, bigots, he's a christian, half white, raised by white people, his DEAD black dad is kenyan, the most british of african countries, not a big angry scary american west-africa descended black, he's an ivy-league lawyer, and he's a centrist democrat!

please, try & design a more acceptable black presidential candidate - he's BARELY BLACK. black americans will be fucking pissed at him & calling him a sellout bougie oreo by the end of 2 terms.

The difference, of course, is that having reservations about electing an old man to the presidency is rational; making the decision based on skin color is not. It's not prejudiced to ask if a 72-year-old man who refuses to release his health records and has shown increasing signs of mental confusion is fit to lead the free world.

On the other hand, this will be the last Presidential election in which race will be even this much of an issue.

My Democratic parents are West Virginians in their 70s, raised me not to associate with "colored" people (a term they used almost into the 1990s) and both of them are working for the local Obama campaign headquarters. They won't vote for Hillary because they don't like that she's a liar.

Yes, some people are so stupid as to vote against their best interests because of race -- and some people aren't.

That good ol' boy McCain's finger does not need to be on the button.

Harold Washington still won, and now the central library is named after him. Take that racists!

All but three of the Chicago area wards voted for Obama in the primary when he ran for Senator in '04.

For what it is worth, Obama's "top political advisor" David Axelrod worked on Harold Washington's campaign for mayor.

I went to Pittsburgh with 14 other Seattleites to campaign for Barack Obama. Several of our canvassers (black and white), received the same treatment. I was not subject to such blatant racism at someone's front door, but I did receive special criticism from a man whose house we drove by. I did not know what to make of it, but my white partner said he was talking to me like a white person trying to put me in my place. I did not think much of it until we passed by again and I made a correction. It was as if the man thought I was talking back to him. The look on his face said it all. Long story short, I am a person of color, a gay man and many folks have a hard time pinning my inherited looks. Many folks did not know what to make of me and I never knew who would be at the other side of the door. It was culture shock on both ends.

I see people cringing when they shall hear "I, Barack Hussein Obama, do solemnly swear".

In 1921 "I, Warren Gamaliel Harding, do solemnly swear..." didn't raise an eyebrow. Gamaliel was a respected rabbi and Jewish scholar. Did Harding ever have to defend himself against his parents' choice of his middle name?

One cannot underestimate the unintelligence of the American voter, some of whom postulate that because of Obama's middle name he must be some sort of jihad plant, à la the excellent Costner movie "No Way Out".

And most mysterious of all, why does no one in the media or in our acquaintance label Obama "half-white"?

Born and raised in Pgh here and have lived all over the nation. Without a doubt western Pa is the most racist place I've ever lived. (Georgia was the most homophobic). It wouldn't suprise me to learn that Obama has not campaigned extensively in WV out of concern about some yokel shooting at him.

Those aren't racists, they're Clinton's "hard-working white Americans!"

It does appear to be this election's most used euphemism huh? I was watching MSNBC this morning and it was so obviously used to refer to racists. They're not kidding anyone with that shit.

I don't know anyone under 40 who actually blindly answer their land line. Then again, older, crazier people tend to be more consistent voters.

An interest election it will be.

I don't want interesting. I want a fifty state blowout. I want to see McCain lose his train of thought in a debate and wander off behind the curtain. I want Huckabee to be his VP and get arrested in a men's toilet. I want Bob Barr to siphon off 12% of the vote in the kook states. I want to hear wailing and gnashing of teeth; I want the Republicans to disappear into the desert for forty years.

"John McCain says he's a defender of democracy. But the folks running his campaign have been playing for the other team.

Two of John McCain's senior campaign staff were forced to resign this week after revelations that their lobbying firm was paid hundreds of thousands of dollars to represent Burma's brutal military dictatorship.1

And it gets worse—turns out this goes all the way to the top. Charlie Black, McCain's campaign chairman, ran a lobbying firm that represented brutal dictators like Ferdinand Marcos in the Philippines and Mobutu Sese Seko in Zaire—along with terrorist rebel Jonas Savimbi in Angola. Together, these men have been responsible for massive human suffering.2

And for good measure, Charlie Black has represented war profiteer Blackwater Worldwide and Iraqi fraudster Ahmed Chalabi.3"
1. "A Lobbying Firm and Its McCain Ties," MSNBC, May 12, 2008
http://www.moveon.org/r?r=3654&id=12653-653296-eNQlqY&t=5