> let there be no reason now for any
> American to fail

It's a prayer.

Like "and crown thy good with brotherhood" and "patriot's dream that sees, across the years, thine alabaster cities gleam undimmed by human tears"

-- these are, as they say, forward-looking statements, not guarantees of performance.

"Wouldn't it be nice if we were grownups ..."

I sure didn't get the sense from McCain's speech that he was claiming racism had gone away, just that the country could be proud that we'd come far enough to elect a black guy. That seems right to me. Fifty years ago, there were plenty of places where he wouldn't even have been allowed to vote, or to buy a house, or to send his kids to the local public school, or to enroll in a university. That's an amazing amount of social change, IMO. It's something to be proud of about our country, in a decade that hasn't offered a hell of a lot for us to be proud of.

None of this means that racism is gone, or that the performance gap in education will now magically vanish, or that blacks will suddenly stop ending up in prison so often, or that any number of other bad things will stop happening. But it seems like some very strong evidence that racism has massively declined, that the world has truly changed for the better.

I’m already seeing comments in various blogs about how the Obama victory means liberals “don’t get to play the race card anymore” (whatever the hell that means).

"Playing the race card" means using race as a political weapon by demonizing another race (Willie Horton and the infamous "black hands" ad being classic examples.)

Conservatives, as part of their general war on political language that doesn't favor them, have been working for years to define "playing the race card" as any acknowledgment by a politician that race exists, and we don't live in a perfect post-racial society. Hence the idiotic complaints about "liberals playing the race card." (Which is not to say that liberals can't, just that most of the attempts by conservatives to put actions in this category are fundamentally dishonest.)

Um, what's the big deal? Nader said this throughout this campaign:

http://tinyurl.com/6rjjaz

"Nader was asked if Obama is any different than Democrats he has criticized in the past, considering Obama's pledge to reject campaign contributions from registered lobbyists.

"There's only one thing different about Barack Obama when it comes to being a Democratic presidential candidate. He's half African-American," Nader said. "Whether that will make any difference, I don't know. I haven't heard him have a strong crackdown on economic exploitation in the ghettos. Payday loans, predatory lending, asbestos, lead. What's keeping him from doing that? Is it because he wants to talk white? He doesn't want to appear like Jesse Jackson? We'll see all that play out in the next few months and if he gets elected afterwards."

The Obama campaign had only a brief response, calling the remarks disappointing.

Asked to clarify whether he thought Obama does try to "talk white," Nader said: "Of course.

"I mean, first of all, the number one thing that a black American politician aspiring to the presidency should be is to candidly describe the plight of the poor, especially in the inner cities and the rural areas, and have a very detailed platform about how the poor is going to be defended by the law, is going to be protected by the law, and is going to be liberated by the law," Nader said. "Haven't heard a thing."

"We are obviously disappointed with these very backward-looking remarks," Obama campaign spokeswoman Shannon Gilson said."

He was ready to use race then, and he won't stop now, if he can peel off liberals who are uncomfortable with someone who isn't as, um, liberal, as Nader.

Yet another reason to dislike Ralph Nader. As if I needed one.

It occurred to me while watching McCain deliver his concession address that: a) he had a new speechwriter, b) he was speaking in stark contrast to the innuendo and dog-whistle-filled rhetoric of his campaign speeches, and c) probably all the better to distance himself from any unpleasantness engendered by his prior remarks, and the fueling of racial and vague hate/fear of "otherness" they inspired.

And his audience was having none of it.

I worry still about the long-term consequences of McCain's campaign. I wonder at just how easy it was for a nominally respectable gentleman from a mainstream political party to surface deep-seated resentments and stir up demons in want of exorcising.

And Nader? Complete tool. Unsafe on Any Channel.

"Classy," like "mandate," ceased to mean much long ago.

I think you're reading too much into McCain's speech. Saying we're "a world away" from where we were doesn't imply all racism has gone away. I myself feel like we're "a world away" from where we were during the Civil Rights era. That doesn't mean we're rid of evil and hate, far from it.

As for Nader, he just doesn't seem to know that "Uncle Tom" is a racial slur. He seems to think it's just an expression meaning "someone who is beholden." That's not despicable of him, it's just ignorant, and a further indication of how marginal he has become.

Not that it matters at this point, but it looks like the Nader vote in Missouri is running larger than the gap between Obama & McCain and McCain is ahead. So in principle, Nader may have cost Obama one state.

I went to a segregated high school, and the University of SC was integrated about the same time as that school. We have come a long, long way. We're not there yet. Both of these have to be acknowledged.

I lost interest in Nader a long time ago. Which is a shame, because every now and again he says something sensible; this is not one of those times.

It is, still, a baby step in the right direction that a(n indeterminate but undoubtedly significant) number of (presumably but not necessarily exclusively) white voters voted for a black man because he's competent rather than voting against a competent man because he's black.

Baby steps.

I think anyone who suggests that racism is no longer alive and kicking because a black man has been elected president should observe the way that women are now invariably paid fairly for their work in the UK*, a generation after our first female Prime Minister.

*To save you checking: nope. It's going *backwards*.

The word that came to mind about McCain's concession was "gracious," and I've heard a lot of other people who had that impression. Perhaps we're grading on a curve, but maybe we can afford to be generous on that point anyway.

It was a relief to not see the angry, whiny, blinky McCain that we've been seeing so much of recently. Was he relieved too? Or did they change his meds?

Palin's outfit was a real change of mood from her campaign togs. Reminded me of Victorian widow's weeds.

I liked McCain's concession speech just fine: for me, it evoked the McCain that I liked from 2000, who wasn't willing to buy into the more invidious Republican tactics of the day.

But it wasn't enough to make me like him again. When you let your surrogates call your opponent a socialist terrorist-loving troop-hating middle-class-taxing danger to America in October, and in November you turn around and admit that your opponent is actually a decent guy whom nobody need fear, I am not going to like your November self more simply because I agree with it. Tuesday's McCain didn't make me say "McCain's back" so much as it made me wonder whether the McCain I liked was ever more than the Good-Cop side of the man.

I'm so ashamed that I once, long ago, voted for that man.

True, Katherine, but those Bob Barr votes have a MUCH higher probability, in a two-person race, to have gone to McCain than the Nader votes do of having gone to Obama. (See Indiana.)

While (Nader - Barr) (ca. 6,400) is larger than (McCain - Obama) (ca. 5,900), I wouldn't give odds that Obama wins a two-person race there. You probably have to assume that fewer than 25/640 (ca. 4%) of the Nader voters would have gone for McCain.

That's a Leap of Faith that Steve Martin and Indiana Jones together wouldn't try, even with pre-Snake River Evel K. helping.

It doesn't look to me like McCain said racism was completely gone, but rather that the current situation is "a world away" from one in which a black man couldn't even be invited to dinner at the White House. I agree with him; the situations are a world apart.

That opening of McCain's speech made me twitch, too, but I thought the rest was classy because he basically concluded with "He will be the President now, my President as well, and I will work with him, and I want you to work with him instead of against him, too."

Actually, I just searched for the bit I liked best:

"...And I pledge to [Obama] tonight to do all in my power to help him lead us through the many challenges we face.

"I urge all Americans ... I urge all Americans who supported me to join me in not just congratulating him, but offering our next president our good will and earnest effort to find ways to come together to find the necessary compromises to bridge our differences and help restore our prosperity, defend our security in a dangerous world, and leave our children and grandchildren a stronger, better country than we inherited."

His supporters and the boos, however, put me in search of a word that is the antithesis of "classy." I still cannot come up with one that fits my irritation enough.

carol,

Palin's outfit was a real change of mood from her campaign togs. Reminded me of Victorian widow's weeds.

now, i've read the text of the concession speech, & i don't really feel like watching it. but i felt such nice schadenfreude hearing people say how upset & shocked palin looked.

i'm reproaching myself for this, but, um, are there any good pictures of that?

Ken #15: Perhaps so. I guess I have a hard time imagining why -- at this juncture -- anyone would vote for Nader except as a mistake or in the same spirit as voting for Mickey Mouse.

One of the commentators noted that it's seemed for some time that McCain was aware this election was full of issues bigger than he could encompass, that Obama is the right man at the right time--and although he couldn't admit that aloud, his concession speech hints in that direction.

It puts his campaign actions in a different light--someone had mentioned that his first debate with Obama looked like basic fear: that McCain looked like a man who knew he'd lost, and was trying not to flub his lines too badly on his way out.

Palin, however, seems to have convinced herself that they really were going to win. She surrounded herself with supporters, avoided (or was kept away from) all contact with questions that would indicate doubts, and rode the wave of excitement at her own rallies, while ignoring that Obama's rallies were just as emotional... and larger.

McCain started off by claiming that blacks, and *only* blacks elected our new President. Eeew, talk about racist dog whistles. He did eventually backpedal almost enough to satisfy me.

Voters whose ancestors were here 10,000 years ago voted for Senator Obama, as well as voters who just got their citizenship. We all did it. Together. In the next four years, we may not always agree... but we can cooperate and compromise and look for the best solution. We may not find it, but we can keep trying... it's not like we're short on problems.

elfwreck @ 20 - Palin thought that God was going to give her the Presidency. It could be you're not familiar with the rabid evangelical mindset, but trust me on this; even at the last, she utterly believed that she had been called to Washington to lead in Jesus Christ's name. (Or that God was giving her a pony in the form of the Presidency -- there's not much distinction between them.)

At this point, she has to be having a crisis of faith. She'll unfortunately get over it, but look at her trajectory. She's called to get into politics, runs for mayor of Wasilla, wins. Runs for Governor of Alaska, wins. Asked to be running mate of presidential candidate ... loses?

She can't have been prepared for that. It's always come so easy. The $150,000 of clothing was just icing on the cake -- God always rewards the faithful with material goods in this world. It's how you know you're on the right track.

Now she has to wonder: was God's purpose for her simply to serve as a negative example for somebody else? (She'll never think of that on her own. Perhaps we should organize a letter-writing campaign.)

Torrilin @ 21: +1.

Good thing I didn't have any respect for Ralph Nader left to lose. Some day, the folks who voted for that souless, sanctimonious, self-promoting, hypocritical *racist* gasbag in 2000 will have the decency to be embarrassed about it. Jesus Christ on a pogo stick.

Ulrika: I didn't get to vote in 2000--hadn't been registered before, moved to a new city for college, and then my life exploded in a dramatic and messy way and I forgot about the election entirely until the very day--but I was seriously going to vote for Nader then. I am indeed embarrassed by my younger self and have since repented and learned better.

I still think it's far less about skin color and heritage than it's about this nation repudiating arrogant, corrupt, criminal insanity.

Yes it's partly about color, and it certainly helped persuade a number of people to vote who might not have voted. But we all voted for this guy because we believed he was a far better candidate than his opponent.

We voted for him because we wanted a stop to the agenda that ever more degraded the republican party into a criminal syndicate and abjured rationality and facts in favor of dominionist irrationality. It's particularly about repudiating the last 8 years, and its agenda to destroy any effective government, while remaining permenantly in power. Iraq and Katrina both were terrible dramas that showed the nation what that means, in horrific detail.

This election was about getting good government back, government that is run with intelligence and reason, not gut irrationality, a government that recognizes we're a part of the larger world.

Love, C.

Renatus-

If you were just starting college in 2000 you were awfully young to have any idea about who Ralph Nader was beyond how he presented himself. Lots of people who were old enough to know better bought that load of crap he peddled despite having been around long enough to have noticed that he didn't have a track record accomplishing anything beyond torpedoing the American automotive industry's early venture into compact, fuel-efficient, German-style cars.

I'm with albatross@#2 on that comment. Yes, a graceful concession speech doesn't completely make up for his bad behavior during the campaign. Even so, making a full and prompt concession (especially, not getting into tha "they stole the election" thing) keeps me from tossing him in the same mental trashcan as the ShrubCo mob.

Barely. I'll certainly be keeping a sharp eye on his behavior for the remainder of his term.

On the gripping hand, Nader, lost my goodwill, and my interest, years ago.

Ulrika: Gaaah, that's true. I was a silly fuzzyheaded idealist at 21 (waited to go to college), which was part of why my life exploded... anyway. I'm still embarrassed, but less so than if I'd been the age I am now or older, because yeah. What you said.

miriam beetle @18, this is the best picture I could find quickly.

Constance #26: That's my take, too. Obama could not possibly win on the basis of being black. He could and did win on the basis of honestly seeming to be the right guy for the job, and running against a guy who, in several independent ways, seemed the wrong guy for the job.

I was in Grant Park last night watching the speeches with the rest of Chicago. I was floored that there was minimal booing when McCain appeared on the screen, quite a lot when he mentioned Palin, but otherwise the audience was quiet and respectful. Most people seemed to agree that if that version McCain had been running, we'd still be waiting for the results instead of watching him concede. I found bits of the speech abrasive, but it didn't seem like anybody in my immediate proximity felt the same way.

As for Nader, well, give the man his due. He's doing an excellent job of remaining a solid punchline election year after election year.

I've pretty much been watching BET, because they did a whole day of recapping his candidacy, nomination and winning, speeches and all. I'm full of warm fuzzy feelings of happiness.

I know he can't solve all the problems at once, but he's not a smirking Bush butt-head who wants to give all the bananas to his buddies and leave the rest of us out.

McCain's speech? Feh.

Palin? I didn't listen last night. But today I was flipping channels on commercials and CNN or Faux had her on. It sounded like she still felt anointed, She extended an offer to help Obama with energy policy or foreign affairs or some other such crap. It sounded like she expected that she was owed some position or other in government because of her self-perceived 'goodness.'

I don't think McCain meant to imply that racism is entirely dead. But all too often, in our zeal to point out that racism is not dead, we minimize the progress that *has* been made, which, in truth, is massive. The danger is that by minimizing the progress, we can start to feel like it is a hopeless task, which can inhibit progress as much as a false sense of completion.

As far as Nader goes....why are we still talking about him? Let's please just let the idiot fade into a well deserved obscurity.

#21 - Torrilin - Thank you!!! I was beginning to think I was the only one who thought that way.

From a comment of mine last night: I know it's debatable, but when he leads his concession speech by basically saying that it was the black vote that won this election, I have a problem with that. Barack has an amazing following right across racial lines. To me that was the first salvo in a future campaign to reach out to that old Republican fiction, the "Silent Majority." It also laid out the groundwork for assigning blame for his own loss, and trying to save face. But he does this by trying to drive a racial wedge. To me that is more than a little contemptible.

For me, McCain's whole speech was ruined by that beginning. While later parts were more polished, and had more of the grace we expect from a veteran politician, it didn't overcome that start. Good bye, McSame, see ya!

Racism is often used as an excuse for everything from low pay to lack of esteem to crime and just about everything else that happens in America. The real issue for me is one of wealth and poverty, not race-and Obama seems rich enough to be President.

@22: I'm familiar with rabid evangelicalism and the "God appointed me for this job!!!" mindset. It's just... fascinating to watch it in a major political race; I'm used to seeing it push for legal changes or pet projects.

It'll be interesting to watch Palin in the next couple of months. Oh, wait. I don't need to watch Palin. It'll be interesting to watch Saturday Night Live for the next couple of months.

I suspect Tina Fey will be grateful to not have to play Palin for a few years.

Today FOX has been surprisingly decent. It's as if for one day they don't have to play wingnut to keep their jobs.

Was I the only one who was bothered by the end of McCain's speech?

And I call on all Americans, as I have often in this campaign, to not despair of our present difficulties but to believe always in the promise and greatness of America, because nothing is inevitable here.

Americans never quit. We never surrender. (Cheers, applause.) We never hide from history, we make history. (Cheers, applause.)

Given the booing earlier in his speech, it felt to me like a call for his supporters to... I don't know what. "Make trouble." I felt like it was a bit of a retraction of his earlier talk about working with Obama. Without the booing, it might have made sense, but with it... I think if I were McCain giving that speech, I'd have extemporized a different ending after hearing the booing.

Maybe my tinfoil hat is just on too tight after the past eight years.

I was polite to a coworker today who said she had voted for Nader, because she is so unhappy with the concept of a two-party system that she wanted to vote for someone neither a Democrat nor a Republican. I settled for saying that I had things against Nader that had nothing to do with his running for President, and that if I had been feeling similarly I would have voted for McKinney. (Had she asked what I had about Nader, I would have explained about him and Cylert, but she didn't, just noted that more people in her district chose McKinney (Green) than Nader.)

I sure hope the first hairdo on the panel who spoke was right. I'm hoping we won't see much of RFN after this. Did anyone else think it looked like the left side of his face was paralyzed? His right eye was expressive and the lid moved occasionally, but his left eye was fixed and lifeless.

Scorpio 39: Today FOX has been surprisingly decent. It's as if for one day they don't have to play wingnut to keep their jobs.

Hmm, I haven't watched Faux News any more than I could avoid for years, so you may be right. That's a perspective I hadn't thought of on the video here. I interpreted it as them preparing to use RFN as the standin for "liberals" going forward...as in "Remember, it was a liberal who called Barack Obama an Uncle Tom!" I don't have the stomach to watch Barf O Rile Me to find out if I'm right, though.

Kevin 40: Maybe my tinfoil hat is just on too tight after the past eight years.

OMG, I just realized that in two and a half months, this t-shirt will be obsolete! I'd better get maximum wears out of it now!

Kevin @40:

Yes, I was totally bothered by that ending. After a subdued speech all the way through, McCain had the only moment where he really seemed invested in what he was saying as he tells his supporters that "Americans" (all Americans? or, as it seemed to me, Palin's real Americans?) never quit, never surrender. Sounded like he may have lost, but he wasn't done.

Vicki @ 41, Ulrika @ 27:
What's so bad about Ralph Nader? (Besides the video at the top, of course) I just read the wikipedia article, but it didn't mention anything and I don't know anywhere else to look. Everything else I've read about him is generally laudatory, so I'm curious. (I'm also 19, so forgive my ignorance)

I use this word only for very special people.

Ralph Nader is an absolutely arrogant, irrelevant, egotistical cunt.

Ian @44: Here's a thread about his getting Cylert banned. That's just one item, but it's one that particularly burns around here.

I'm sure others will be offering further links shortly!

Jon Sobel #7:

As for Nader, he just doesn't seem to know that "Uncle Tom" is a racial slur.

Nader's been in public life and in politics for decades; I can't imagine him not knowing that it's a slur. He's not just saying Obama's beholden to corporations--he's also saying that this is a betrayal of the poor, starting with African Americans. I think he knew what he was saying. If he didn't, he should have asked Smith why he was pressing him to retract it...given how shocked Smith was, that should have tipped him off that he'd made a faux pas. Instead, he just seemed pleased with himself.

We'll see how he spins it in the press tomorrow, I guess.

Jon Sobel @7, Seth @16, it's not the "world away" part I object to, it's the end of that paragraph: "let there be no reason now for any American to fail to cherish their citizenship".

I read that as a clear reference to Rev Wright's "God Damn America" speech, and Michelle Obama's comment back in February that "for the first time in my adult life I am proud of my country".

And this is all tangled up in a long, convoluted discourse about race and political privilege, and who's allowed to criticize the country and how without being accused of being unpatriotic or radical or whatever.

Chang @45, please don't use that word for any kind of people at all when you're commenting on this blog.

Ian, #44: Well, for starters, here's a question for you to consider: why don't we ever hear about anything Nader is doing between Presidential races? There's a lot of Green work he could be doing; he's also got (or had -- after this, I think it's past tense) some influence with other people who could make a difference.

For that matter, after his first failed Presidential run, he could have regrouped and run for a lower office to build a platform on. But he doesn't do anything like that, because that would be work. He just wants to have things handed to him on a silver platter.

Re Palin, Time Magazine's special edition on "How He Did It 2008" includes the tidbit that she wanted to speak at McCain's concession, but her request was denied. I really do wonder what she would have said, because I can think of at least 3 separate ways she could have gone, none of them particularly helpful to the Republicans!

Oh, and if Nader honestly doesn't realize that "Uncle Tom" is a racial slur, that speaks very ill of his education... especially since he's from my generation.

Avram, #48: I think you're dead on target. I think that was the opening salvo for a meme of, "Why are you still complaining? We elected one of your kind President!" whenever a black person calls shenanigans on racism in society.

The other person the "let there be no reason now" line reminds me of is Ward Connerly. The anti-affirmative-action backlash is all about the majority getting to decide that racism is over and they don't have to do anything about it any more and if the still disadvantaged and discriminated against minority has a problem with that, it's reverse racism.

I thought it was a gracious speech in general, but McCain could have left out his musings on race and it would have been even more gracious. McCain didn't lose because of his skin color. He lost because he was not as good a leader.

I didn't watch McCain's speech, but I'm glad he gave it, if you know what I mean!

See McCain revise the image he's trying to project, again?

Hmm.
Mitt Romney was much more moderate than e.g. Dr Silber of Boston University--was it Romney or someone else who Silber lost to? Anyway, for quite a while it was socially liberal Republican versus social rightwing Democrat in gubernatorial races in Massachusetts. His last year and a half allegedly being Governor, however, Romney was mostly running around putting himself forward as someone interested in running for President, and turned into a caricature of the fellow who'd originally run for Governor of Massachusetts, backpedalling and disavowing all social views he had run on as Governor, as regards religious tolerance and reproduction, rights for homosexuals, etc. His spinmeisters were claiming he had fooled the citizens of Massachusetts regarding his views....

Anyway, McCain isn't an honest politician, he keeps putting himself up for sale to different sets of bidders/women, and to my cynical view he's doing it again....

REALLY tacky comment: he would have been an excellent candidate for "the black syph" if he hadn't gotten that extended stay in the Hanoi Hilton from an airplane incident, instead....

Descartes @ 36:

FWIW, Obama earned the vast majority of his money as royalties on a book written in part to get normal people excited about participating in politics. I think this makes him a poor target for class warfare.

I'm really disgusted right now. I think you're calling Nader a racist mostly because he's telling you what you don't want to hear: that Obama may wind up being a diverse face on the same old oppression.

I think your attitude here lends support to the progressive idea that moderate liberals want the status quo, only with less guilt, so they advocate superficial changes that hide the oppression.

The "Uncle Tom" expression has been used to descibe lots of different individuals from traditionally marginalized groups getting into power and then forgetting where they came from. Reading a racist subtext into it is just as nasty and dishonest as the conservatives reading something anti-feminist into the "lipstick on a pig" figure of speech.

I wish you guys would stop blaming your party's failures on the few have to guts to call for deeper change.

Yeah, what does the term "Uncle Tom" have to do with race, anyway? You people* are so sensitive!

* ahem.

#56
You're missing the entire historical background of 'Uncle Tom'. It goes back, IIRC, to Uncle Tom's Cabin, an abolitionist novel from the mid-19th century (see: Harriet Beecher Stowe). The racism was there from the beginning; the non-racist uses (such as they are - always insulting) are much more recent.

@ Jen Roth, 57

If that was directed at me, I didn't say the term had nothing to do with race. Perhaps you'd like to rephrase?

Since two people in a row misunderstood me, perhaps I was unclear and should be the one to elaborate.

I'm well aware of the term's history. Of course it's racial. And it points to something that often really does happen: historically-screwed people often work their way up by stepping on those below them. Obama doing that looks like a legitimate danger to me, and saying so by reference to a literary example of it doesn't have to imply anything negative about Black people.

I had a friend the other day who got called racist when he told a Democrat he was voting Green. The Democrat's logic was that the only reason not to vote for Obama was not wanting to see a Black man succeed.

It looks to me like moderate Democrats, especially in this election, have read something unenlightened into the words of anyone who says something inconvenient. It's a subtle kind of ad hominem and so it's unfair. Why won't you guys look at the idea instead of speculating about the hidden intentions of the personality that made it?

Mortimer, first read the thread. Then comment on it. (If you want to respond that you did read the thread- not really, there's at least one post to wich you obviously didn't pay attention, or you wouldn't say what you're saying about the motives of people here.)

The "Uncle Tom" expression has been used to descibe lots of different individuals from traditionally marginalized groups getting into power and then forgetting where they came from.

Examples? I can't remember ever seeing it being used against non-blacks.

Why won't you guys look at the idea instead of speculating about the hidden intentions of the personality that made it?

If you had paid attention to every post in this thread, you wouldn't ask that.

@ Raphael, 61-62

I assume you're referring the comments which suggest that maybe Nader wasn't aware of the problems with the term. If you're thinking of something else in the thread, please point it out.

Saying that Nader is ignorant instead of racist is still talking about what the personality might think instead of examining the issue. And the two ideas are not completely separate: racism is often attributed to ignorance. It's still subtext-hunting to the exclusion of examining the explicit message.

I'll google for some examples of "Uncle Tom" in reference to other minorities and post that separately because it'll take some time.

Xopher, #42, all my anti-Bush buttons will have to go into the inactive political button box.

Mortimer, first, I'm calling Nader on a racist remark he made. You, and he, both know the history of the term "Uncle Tom". You, and he, both know what it means. If he wants to be taken seriously, he can talk like a person who wants to be taken seriously. It doesn't actually take all that much thought or effort to avoid calling a black man an "Uncle Tom".

I have doubts myself about the upcoming Obama administration. I'm waiting a few weeks to write about them, so as not to harsh the afterglow of the election. When I do write about them, you can be damned sure I'm not going to call him an "Uncle Tom".

As for Nader himself, it's been years since I had any respect for the man, even if I happen to agree with him about one or two things. He's clearly more interested in his own enrichment and aggrandizement than in actually furthering the causes he claims to serve.

Mortimer @60: Using "Uncle Tom" wasn't a literary reference per se. The name began as one, clearly, but it has taken on a life of its own outside Harriet Beecher Stowe's work, and a much less pleasant life at that.

A little like saying "But his choice, basically, is whether he’s going to be Uncle Sam for the people of this country, or Judas in the pay of the giant corporations" and claiming no disrespect was intended -- it was a literary reference. (Or, speaking of a Jewish person -- Lieberman, say -- to compare em to Shylock. Substitute names and marginalized groups ad nauseum.) However apt it may be, it's still rather offensive to allude to age-old stereotypes, and, in this case, to apparently consider Obama living up to that stereotype as a possible outcome of his presidency.

It is almost certain that Obama will disappoint many of his supporters in the coming years, for many reasons. Obama said so himself in his acceptance speech last night. (There's a reason I have this bumper sticker up on my wall.) But to phrase that sentiment the way Nader did was tactless at best -- not a hanging offense, but it does nothing to improve my opinion of the man.

Mortimer @63: Saying that Nader is ignorant instead of racist is still talking about what the personality might think instead of examining the issue.

The racial aspects of Nader's remark are the issue. You know how I know it's the issue? Because I'm the one who wrote the post that started this thread. That means I get to decide what my post is about. Not you, and not Ralph Nader.

Nader's comment doesn't strike me as being racist in any simple or traditional way, though it was strange as hell

I first heard "Uncle Tom" decades ago as a term of disdain among blacks for other blacks, and it always seemed to carry more emotion than, say, "Oreo cookie"--it indicated a kind of collaborator or apologist. The only time I would hear whites use it would be when reporting on the opinions of blacks about each other--it wasn't a judgment that an outsider got to make. I can imagine (barely) an angry, suspicious, radical black posing the underlying question that Nader did, and maybe even invoking the Tom insult, but it's amazingly arrogant and tactless of Nader to frame it that way. It's very far into "we get to say it but you don't" territory. (Though I have not heard the term used in earnest by anyone for a very long time.)

I had a friend the other day who got called racist when he told a Democrat he was voting Green.

Your friend was called racist for voting for a black woman?

Later in the interview, Nader said that Obama could choose between being a good president or being a toady for corporate interests. If he had said that the first time instead of using a racially charged insult, nobody would be calling him on using a racially charged insult. He chose the ugly but more attention-grabbing approach. That was his choice, not the choice of people on this thread.

Ian @ #44, besides the Cylert ban, the other principal reason Nader is persona non grata for many Democrats is his remark in 2000 that there wasn't a dime's bit of difference between Democrats and Republicans, justifying his run for the Presidency that year. Consequently, he siphoned a lot of votes away from Al Gore in that election, particularly in Florida.

Hence, there's the sense that had he not run what was essentially a vanity campaign (vanity because he's done nothing to establish the Green party since that failed attempt, contra what someone serious about his party would have done), Al Gore would have won in 2000 and the country would have been spared the criminal behavior of GWB and his cronies for the past eight years.

Here are some examples of "Uncle Tom" that do not reference race, but other kinds of oppression.

Here's a feminist blog calling Sarah Palin an "Uncle Tom":

http://girlinshortshorts.blogspot.com/2008/09/sarah-palin-as-female-uncle-tom.html

Here's a blog that describes Dick Cheney's lesbian daughter as an "Uncle Tom":

http://girlinshortshorts.blogspot.com/2008/09/sarah-palin-as-female-uncle-tom.html

And here's one that refers to "Uncle Tom Log Cabin Republicans":

http://girlinshortshorts.blogspot.com/2008/09/sarah-palin-as-female-uncle-tom.html

In looking for these, I did run across plenty of very-inflammatory uses of the term. It's certainly not polite and the very fact that we're discussing it so much, and ignoring his point, suggests that Nader could have chosen his words better. But racist or ignorant? That's debatable, and it's a great way to change the subject when someone's trying to quickly indicate the thorny paths that circle complicity and assimilation.

And, on a more personal note, speaking as someone who's left of the Democratic party (who has never voted for Nader,) I usually am either hated or ignored. So I rarely have much to gain by being polite.

I see similar things happen with other marginal voices: they say it nicely, no one hears. They get frustrated and say it rudely. People talk about how rude they are and ignore what they're saying. Nader seems to try hard to stay out of that dynamic. Maybe he's finally being radicalized.

Kevin, I have that bumper sticker on my car. It expresses my opinion pretty well.
I expect to be disappointed by politicians. But I don't expect Obama to shock me or horrify me or make me ashamed of either him or my country - and Bush and Cheney have done all of those.

[posted from 71.141.107.33]

A lot of people who voted for Nader are already embarrassed about it. I, for example, am embarrassed that I voted for Nader in '96. I had good reason to be disappointed in Clinton, yes, but voting for a destructive little twerp like Nader was the wrong way to express that disappointment.

As for why you don't hear about Nader's work on building the Green Party between elections... I'd say the most likely explanation for why he has no interest in helping the Green Party is that he's not a Green. This time he didn't even bother to pretend. There was a Green Party candidate, and it wasn't Nader. He was running on his own vanity ticket. I'm glad that the events of this election made him inconsequential.

And, on a more personal note, speaking as someone who's left of the Democratic party (who has never voted for Nader,) I usually am either hated or ignored.

Lots of people here are left of the Democratc Party. It's unfortunate that you chose to pigeonhole them as moderate, self-deceiving Dems who just can't handle Nader's truth-telling.

I assume you're referring the comments which suggest that maybe Nader wasn't aware of the problems with the term.

No.

If you're thinking of something else in the thread, please point it out.

Post 46.

Maybe he's finally being radicalized.

Radicalized against whom? The various major corporations in whose stocks he's invested his personal savings? The wealthy business people who finance his campaigns?

What Austern said.

I vote Green for all sorts of local offices - our Green candidate for state Representative took 30% of the vote yesterday, three times what the Republican in that race took. In '96 and in 2000 I voted all Green & Red, no major party candidates in any races that offered other left choices. I was registered Green until the 2004 primaries.

Nader gutted the Green Party by pushing up into Presidential politics instead of focusing on local parties. Then he turned around and pulled the knife out the other side by splitting off into his own party the first time the Greens didn't tow his line, instead of putting his considerable resources into growing the party at a sustainable level in the areas where it's doing well.

Look at the electoral map and see all the places where the Greens were growing in 2000 - Iowa City, Iowa. Kirksville, Missouri. Cambridge. Minneapolis. Seattle. How are they doing there, now? I saw in the county Kirksville's in, "other" got 1% of the vote. There are a lot of reasons for that, but Nader is one of them.

Since 2004, he's repeatedly acted like a clueless, sexist, whiny, self-important jerk. This is just another example of that.

Nader is a yudz. But this thread is reminding me of a story that shows that lots of folks can be vague on the origins and current meaning of "Uncle Tom". I am NOT defending Nader, who should know better, I just want to tell my story:

Scene 1: In San Francisco one day, a black bus driver was doing his job and trying to keep an unruly passenger (also black) from failing to pay for passage. The driver finally kicked the passenger off the bus and as the passenger left he yelled to the driver "You are an uncle tom! You are worse than an uncle tom, you're Clarence Thomas!"

Scene 2: Professor with lots of experience in Asia but new to the Midwest is teaching Constitutional Law in a small midwest college, explaining about the different supreme court justices, recounts the SF bus story to show how some people view Clarence Thomas. Gets met with a sea of blank stares from the room of midwest white college students. Professor asks students if they know what the term Uncle Tom means. One student raises a hand shyly and says it is someone who helps lovers escape. (Professor then explained origins and evolution of term "Uncle Tom" to blinking students)

Scene 3: Professor tells me Scene Two. I immediately ask Professor "So, the student only knew about Uncle Tom's Cabin from The King and I?" Professor: "How did you know? And what did she mean? I've read Leonowens' biography of being a Governess at the Siamese Court and I don't know what that student was talking about."

Me: "I grew up in that corner of the Midwest. If you don't understand musicals from the 1950's you won't get the culture." I then proceed to explain to the completely unbelieving professor the traditional Thai costumed scene in The King and I that is based on Uncle Tom's Cabin.

For the uninitiated, the Uncle Tom Cabin play within the movie from Ytube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7ByIPzAvmsk&feature=related
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HawdubD4hqE

And, on a more personal note, speaking as someone who's left of the Democratic party (who has never voted for Nader,) I usually am either hated or ignored. So I rarely have much to gain by being polite.

Mortimer, there's a lot to be gained here by being polite, or at least by avoiding the cliches-of-aggression that usually get featured on troll bingo cards. Not saying you're a troll, because you're carrying on a conversation now, and trolls don't -- but your intro could have gone into troll land pretty quickly. And unless a troll turns out to be a pinata, they're not much fun. And even a good pinata is trumped by excellent conversation, which is definitely available hereabouts. (At least, in my opinion.) Also poetry, inspired lunacy, and a whole lot of fun.

Me, I am currently doing stuff within the Democratic-Farmer-Labor Party in my state (and I keep wondering why the rest of the country doesn't get the Farmer-Labor part in there too, but never mind that), but I'm lefter than the average bear there, as far as I can tell. However, it's getting some stuff done at the moment. We'll see how it goes.

And, not to put too fine a point on it, Nader can bite me. (I used to take Cylert. Now I take prescription amphetamines, to the detriment of my blood pressure and my risk of heart attack, et cetera. Ahem.)

Anyhow, McCain's opening bugged me for exactly the reasons it bugged Torrilin and Edward Oleander. So did his implication that racism's over -- which is very much how it sounded to me -- and so on. But I do give him some points for some of the good stuff he said. I just wish he would have shut those booers down once and for all. But then, he cultivated them for long enough. I suppose their shock at his about-face was understandable.

*sigh*

Mortimer @ #71:

I think the problem here is similar to an issue discussed rather thoroughly on Making Light a few months ago, which is the existence of loaded terms which may seem benign to outsiders but which carry toxic baggage. "Uncle Tom" is one of those terms. Ralph Nader is some kind of career... something, possibly a politician, but at any rate a big part of his job is to use words. It's his responsibility to avoid those loaded terms in public speech, and in this case he failed.

I would also like to point out that it really doesn't matter whether other people have tried to generalize the term "Uncle Tom" -- the reactions of people in this thread make it clear that "Uncle Tom" has not lost its sting, not by a long shot. The practice of reclaiming is a tricky one. Best not to get into it unless you are deeply immersed in the culture, and in this case, well, Ralph Nader is white.

I don't have much more to say. I have my beefs with Nader as well. I don't assume every single person here is a moderate Democrat. And I am probably wrong about which left-leaning party my friend voted for.

But criticism of the Dems, especially from the left, too-often gets met with talk about how the speaker is secretly bigoted in some way.

Discussions about proper terminology are ongoing, and language is rich in meaning. Anyone reasonably competent in lit crit can find an oppressive subtext in almost any long-enough text.

And, once again, when you're on the margins your options are often to be a jerk or be invisible.

I think that often people who get bogged down in these kinds of debates are making easy, superficial changes (i.e. ones in language,) while ignoring deeper, structural problems that require risk and sacrifice in order to fix.

And the responses to me have been about everything except that.

Mortimer, if you're serious, please stick around. Seriously.

(And if you're hair-trigger about language stuff because you've been thwacked by lit-crit stuff at a college or university, you have my sympathies... and my assurance that this ain't that.)

Mortimer, if you think there's no criticism of Democrats to be found here, you haven't looked very hard. Since this looks to be your first appearance here, that's understandable.

My impression is that a lot of commenters here (including myself) would be happier if the Dems reverted to the liberalism of Humphrey, McGovern, Wellstone, and even the non-warmaking part of LBJ. But we're realists enough to know that's not gonna happen anytime soon, so we focus on trying to nudge the Dems we have in directions we want to see them go.

Margins are elastic.

Laertes@14: I don't think you (or I) need to be ashamed for voting for McCain long ago. He was a different person then - at least, in his public face.

(The recent Rolling Stone article made a good case that he's been the same paragon of entitlement all along - but I didn't have access to that information then, and neither did most of us.) Similarly to those who voted for Nader long ago. All you can do is to make your best judgement based on the information you have at the time.

And, once again, when you're on the margins your options are often to be a jerk or be invisible.

Maybe. But it's important to be a jerk in useful ways. Nader failed miserably on that score.

Discussions about proper terminology are ongoing, and language is rich in meaning. Anyone reasonably competent in lit crit can find an oppressive subtext in almost any long-enough text.

What Nader said wasn't subtext. Words have meaning.

Jen, #69: Not just that, but when pressed, he said he was "not sorry at all" to have used the racist terminology.

Although to be honest, as jolted as I was about that, what really pissed me off was that he then went on to repeat a number of Republican talking-point-lies about Obama, such as the canard that his tax plan was going to hurt poor people. Which makes me wonder if he used the term "Uncle Tom" deliberately to distract the interviewer from calling him on any of his factual misrepresentations...

Mortimer, #81: I think you're missing an important point which is much more consciously part of the culture here than it is in many other places*: Language matters.

One of the reasons the Republicans have been so successful over the past couple of generations is that they've put a lot of effort into framing the language of the discourse. The language people use to discuss an issue shapes the ways that they think about it on a level that often isn't consciously noticed. How, for example, did "liberal" come to be a pejorative in the first place? When and how did a person using a high-school-level vocabulary become suspicious as an "elitist"?

Yes, we're sensitive to language and its use (and misuse) around here; that's because we've seen what it can do. Talking about the language isn't avoiding the problem, it's going to the root of the problem -- and changing the way people address an issue often makes it easier to implement the real changes you're talking about.

* Very likely because a lot of the folks who hang out here are writers, editors, and readers.

Speaking from a trans-oceanic point-of-view, the book Uncle Tom's Cabin just isn't part of the culture. I get the idea of somebody being some sort of toady for his oppressors, but the label just doesn't have any specific sting for me.

On the other hand, I knew people who had worked for the British colonial governments in Africa, and I've read more Kipling than most of the people who froth at the mouth at a mention of The White Man's Burden. I've very mixed feelings about the Bonsil family, but the idea of African countries having an administration which wasn't overwhelmed by tribalism wasn't an evil idea. And look at the wailing about colonial oppression--Kipling wasn't wrong about the thanks you get.

These things are complicated. And you can say them in dumb ways. Most of all, America seems hobbled by a long history of racism.

Nader sounds like another one of the idiots. And, sorry to say, we have them in Britain too. You don't have to be a fascist to be stupid.

Chang @ 45: "I use this word only for very special people."

Only using a sexist insult on people you really, really hate doesn't really make it better or less sexist. Quite the opposite, actually.

Mortimer @ 71: "Here are some examples of "Uncle Tom" that do not reference race, but other kinds of oppression."

That's not very exculpatory, truth be told. You're right that using the expression "Uncle Tom" when you're talking about something other than race isn't racist, but that's only because you aren't talking about race. Removed from context, it lacks the same sting. If you're using it to talk about a black man however, then, well, it's racist. Compare your argument with this one: speaking about "fifth columns" is a lot less serious accusation when you're talking about, say, the lack of enthusiasm for your high school's sports teams than when you're talking about actual war.

Chang@45

I use this word only for very special people.

Ralph Nader is an absolutely arrogant, irrelevant, egotistical cunt.

I don't, speaking as a philologist and a woman, see cunt as any more acceptable than Uncle Tom.

Think about it; Nader is using a term that is so offensive that the first association, the only association it has, is racist. Only someone perceived as black can be an Uncle Tom. Possession of a cunt means, among other things, that one is female--and it's reserved for "special people," as if it's the worst thing you can call Nader.

Dave@87: I'm a purebred Australian who has never read Harriet Beecher Stove and yet I know what it means to call someone an Uncle Tom. Ralph Nader must have known, and even if he didn't, he could have made a quick retraction and reiterated his point using a different phrase.

Or, to put Lisa@89's point more bluntly: You know how there's the joke about how you'd call someone an ass but that's an insult to donkeys? Calling Nader a cunt is like that except that it's an insult to women, and not at all in a joking way.

Besides which, that particular usage of "cunt" is a metonymy of using a rude name for a woman's genitals to refer to the whole woman. As such, it's a reinforcing of sexist thought patterns by its very existence, and thus using it is doubly an insult to women.

The fact that Nader is perhaps worthy of extreme insult doesn't excuse the collateral damage.

Mortimer: One other thing I didn't think to mention above -- a strong insistence that "it's not about the language, it's about X" is a fairly common obfuscation by troll-types who are trying to duck out of being called on abusive language. Obviously this does not apply to you (the context is completely different), but I know that I, at least, am a lot more sensitized than I used to be to that particular argument after 15 years in online circles! And I doubt I'm the only one; you may be catching a certain amount of cumulative affect.

zeynep @17:
His supporters and the boos, however, put me in search of a word that is the antithesis of "classy." I still cannot come up with one that fits my irritation enough.

boorish?

#83 now that--"Margins are elastic."--would make a great bumper sticker.

Jane

Hi,

I delurked for the first time (I think) on the Smulp thread, but was illmannered enough not to note that. So, hello everybody.

I'm Australian and I recognize the negatives of Uncle Tom, though I haven't read the book. What I am unsure of is Uncle Sam - I know it as a nickname for the USA, but I usually only hear it as negative, I thought Nader was trying to use it as positive contrast - is that correct?

As for cunt, maybe we are less sensitized to it here in the Antipodes, I tend to use it as an endearment. Although not to all people. Only in special, very loved, cases if you will.

Tyg, #95: If you've mostly heard "Uncle Sam" as a negative, that probably reflects more on the U.S.'s recent behavior than on the term. Usually Uncle Sam is an affectionate national personification, like the old "John Bull" figure in England. He's the guy on the famous "I want YOU" recruiting poster and he's used in American political cartoons to this day.

linkmeister @ 83... if the Dems reverted to the liberalism of Humphrey

"You realize you will never get out of here. Every entrance is guarded."
"Aaah, don't try that line on me, Jack. This is Broadway, not Berlin!"
"It's a great pity, Mr. Donahue, that you and I should oppose each other. We have so much in common."
"Yeah? How's that?"
"You are a man of action. You take what you want, and so do we. You have no respect for democracy - neither do we. It's clear we should be allies."
"It's clear you are screwy. I've been a registered Democrat ever since I could vote. I may not be Model Citizen Number One, but I pay my taxes, wait for traffic lights, and buy 24 tickets to the Policeman's Ball."

(Bogart to Nazi Veidt in 1941's All through the Night)

#95: I don't think it's unusual for an expletive to be highly offensive in one culture and less so in another. The C-word and the N-word are nuclear devices in American English. As such, I don't ever use them except possibly in quotation. I suppose it's interesting that to say "the C-word" or "the N-word" isn't offensive, but to say either actual word is. However, this takes me into a realm I'm slightly deaf to, social interactions. I'll shut up about that now.

As for McCain, I'm afraid I took it as Avram had. I think it's because McCain was missing that crucial second component where he's supposed to talk about how much distance we have yet to cover. Without it, it sounds very much like "Yay, racism is a thing of the past." To me, anyway.

I fervently hope that the day will come when we don't have to talk about how far we have left to go because we will have gotten there. However, John McCain isn't the guy who gets to make that call. No, not even for himself. His job is to express his ideas in a way such that people will understand them the way he wants them to. He's then dependent on how people hear things.

This, BTW, is why Nader earns a Total Fail. It's like when Lynn Westmoreland called Obama "uppity." Very much an "Oh no he didn't" moment. (Ok, one might argue that Westmoreland wanted the racial connotation. I'm trying to be generous.)

Alison at 11 said:

I think anyone who suggests that racism is no longer alive and kicking because a black man has been elected president should observe the way that women are now invariably paid fairly for their work in the UK*, a generation after our first female Prime Minister.
*To save you checking: nope. It's going *backwards*.

Well, maybe if Thatcher didn't put the boot into the unions, the workers and the very idea of society, then society might have continued to become a fairer place.

I probably have a whole rant about this and how good the weakening of collective action and the privatisation and deregulation of everything has been for Britain, but equally probably you don't want to hear it.

Let's just say I doubt very much that among Obama's first actions will be to start attacking Civil Rights groups.

Then again I have very little idea what Obama's first actions might be. I hope very much that most of them will be to mend the damage of the previous regime.

I've been on the road, and so couldn't respond earlier, but it seems to me that the core of Nader's comment is not simply racist in the traditional sense as something else. It is that, being an Arab-American,Nader feels that he can speak on behalf of black people and that black people will see the brother within. Now I have a moderately hard time seeing that, and I suspect that most other people do.

Mortimer, #71: And, on a more personal note, speaking as someone who's left of the Democratic party (who has never voted for Nader,) I usually am either hated or ignored. So I rarely have much to gain by being polite.

Sometimes people are hated and ignored because they've decided they don't have much to gain by choosing their words carefully.

Not that invective is bad. In the right place it can wake people up, or give courage, or just help blow off steam. Hunter Thompson, for instance, could be brilliantly scathing on Nixon:

If the right people had been in charge of Nixon's funeral, his casket would have been launched into one of those open-sewage canals that empty into the ocean just south of Los Angeles. He was a swine of a man and a jabbering dupe of a president. Nixon was so crooked that he needed servants to help him screw his pants on every morning.

But you'll notice that, in that passage, Thompson did not choose terms carrying a history of offensive baggage like "Uncle Tom," and did not choose terms that incidentally clawed masses of innocent bystanders like (as seen elsewhere on this thread) "cunt." They would have distracted from the point. They would have hidden the point.

When I see Nader use "Uncle Tom," I don't see a guy trying to communicate an idea in any forceful way. I see an attention-seeker who gets off on shocking people. Why, then, should I waste time looking at Nader's "ideas?" As far as I can tell from his language, the whole "corporate crusader" schtick is just an alibi.

I haven't read Stowe's book, but my recollection is that the negative connotations of "Uncle Tom" come not so much from the book itself, but from the numerous plays (both authorized and unauthorized) that were based on the book, and which make Uncle Tom a much less respectable caricature.

Someone who's read the books and plays may be able to say more about this. I have a list of online works of various sorts featuring Uncle Tom, and would be glad to add to this if anyone wants to suggest other online books.

Holly P.@80: The practice of reclaiming is a tricky one.

IMO it kind of works on the educated, sympathetic sectors of the target audience and just serves to convince everyone else that the original taboo's been lifted, hey whoopee, we can all say "N*" (or whatever) again. ISTR someone here pointing out that Chris Rock had stopped doing his (very funny) "N*s and Black People" routine for that reason.

Any substantial successes anyone can point me to? Wouldn't want to be heaping scorn on a valid and constructive linguistic process.

Fragano @ 100... Nader feels that he can speak on behalf of black people and that black people will see the brother within.

'The Brother Within' reminds me of Keenan Wynn's character in Coppola's musical Finian's Rainbow.

Holly P. @#80: the existence of loaded terms which may seem benign to outsiders but which carry toxic baggage.

The ultimate irony being that "Ralph Nader" is himself in danger of becoming such a term.... ;-)