What makes you think people aren't "used" to this? Racism is racism. I was brought up, my whole life, NOT TO BE RACIST!! My whole entire family since I was a child has spoken up AGAINST RACISM exhibited by BLACK PEOPLE. I invited my WHITE BEST FRIEND to my home many times as a teenager. I NEVER GOT INVITED TO HER HOUSE because her parents were RACIST. They did not try to hide it.


I don't see this or understand what you are saying here. This has not been MY EXPERIENCE of BLACK PEOPLE. I was speaking to you regarding my ACTUAL EXPERIENCE with the KKK. I actually went to a David Dukes Rally while in college. I've actually chosen to have discussions with acknowledged racists to try to understand them better...there's no understanding, BTW...

This has not been my experience where I live. Race is discussed in newscasts all the time. Everyday, actually.

I don't like this ANALOGY because David Duke is not a minister.

I THINK it's DIFFERENT with YOUR MINISTER.

I was serious about disagreeing with my minister's POLITICAL VIEWS while valuing how he feeds me SPIRITUALLY.

I would always HATE those kinds of sermons.

I didn't want to know the REAL HIM...

Maybe this a JUSTIFICATION...

BUT, I REALLY don't consider OBAMA to be a RACIST or else I personally would not be a SUPPORTER...

well, it is the experience here and in many other large cities. Considering that Philadelphia has one of the largest black populations in the country, I would say it is a very fair representation.

Los Angeles deals with similar issues.

Heck, we had a high up city employee caught skipping work but being on the book...while she screwed her boss..put up a KKK note during City Council hearings (she put it up to the news crew that reported her crimes). She made a big stink about race.

So, how has it been handled....her BLACK boss said to the news crew..."don't you ever disrespect a black woman like that again."

Mimi, that stuff is typical in much of America.

Like I said earlier, I'm LEARNING.

Enjoyed this discussion.

me too.

I hope you get a chance to visit the blackgenocide.org site.

it is very informative.

Mimi I don't believe that for one second.

Many of the African-American people I work with are all about Obama and the only thing they can say is that it's so historic. Can't mention an issue - other than race.

MEDC, with all of Obama's "talk" about the HUGE importance of education, with all his "talk" about wanting MORE money for education as one of the "fundamental" planks of HIS proposed administration as President, WHY don't we ever hear anyone talk about the Chicago schools where Barack is "home boy?"

I really wonder how many people know what actually happens in Chicago and how much of a "reformer" Obama has been while he WAS directly in a position to "do something about it?"

Whether or not Obama may or may not be a "racist" is irrelevant to me. He is NO "reformer," he IS a "party-line" guy and he IS NOT interested in real reform.

The debate last night made that very clear. He IS for increased taxation, he IS for "income redistribution, he IS a master of oratory and "saying" things he thinks people want to hear, but he IS from a RECORD standpoint NEVER going to actually do anything that brings real reform to Washington.

He is FOR the "Reproductive Freedom Act" and has said he would sign it into law immediately if he had the chance. THAT legislation would make it impossible to STOP ANY abortions. THAT is consistant with his RECORD on abortion. He is against ANY legislation that would "limit" abortions in any way. He TALKS like he would support limits, but that's all it is....TALK. His record and his support for the "Act" SHOW clearly that he is lying through his teeth when he says he would support ANY limits on ANY abortion.

What he is doing has been to try to "talk" like he is a "centrist," but he IS 100% the most LEFT liberal in the US Senate and he has always been FAR LEFT.

He also DID NOT, in the debate and in a direct challenge to him by McCain, repudiate the outragious, racist comments of Congressman Lewis. What he DID do was to try to "excuse" Lewis' statement.

I work with health insurance all the day, and Obama's "plan" for healthcare "reform" WILL destroy the insurance industry, and with it, much of the Medical industry. He stated that it costs an average of $12,0000 per year for health insurance. McCain stated that according to his figures, it costs an average of about $5,800 per year, and he wants to give a tax credit of $5,000 per year FOR health insurance. I know what it costs for health insurance and I can tell you that McCain has the right "numbers."

Obama wants to "nationalize" healthcare for a huge chunk of Americans and "let" the others keep their employer based health insurance plan. Do you know what's "wrong" with that idea?

Employer based group health insurance is what is referred to as "guaranteed issue" insurance. In other words, no employee can be turned down for health insurance based upon any health condition. THAT results in higher costs BECAUSE there will be healthy folks AND "not so healthy" folks in the same plan, and the insurance rates MUST be higher for everyone in the plan in order to "income redistribute" the cost for the people with health conditions that can DRAIN the insurance "pool."

Think of it this way. Let's "assume" that Obama is right and it cost's $12,000 per year for insurance. Now lets assume that the "small business" that Barack like to toss around has 100 employees (not all that "small" as most have far less) in their insurance program. The insurance company will collect $1,200,000 per year to insurance the healthcare costs of all 100 people.

IF everyone is "healthy," that would be a "nice" profit, even after paying all the insurance company expenses and salaries, etc. But if some of the people (and statistically they will) have or already experience health "problems," they will "use up" that "pool of money" very quickly. Each "group" is individual for that group and is NOT part of a larger group.

So let's assume that 10 people have some health issues beyond "just checkups." If 10 people have "simple surgery" during the year, at a very modest cost of about $30,000 per stay, that will "chew up" $300,000, leaving $900,000 "left" in the pool (not accounting for salaries and buisness expenses of the insurance company). Now let's also assume that only 2 people have cancer and spend an average of $500,000 each for surgery, radiation, chemotherapy, medications, etc. That's a $1,000,000 and now the insurance company is "in the hole" by $100,000 (and that's STILL not accounting for their employee's salaries and their expenses).

And that's if ONLY 12% of the employee pool actually uses healthcare. That ONLY if Obama's $12,000 per year figure is correct, which it isn't. McCain's number of $5,800 per year is much closer to the actual premium cost.

So what's an insurance company to do? They can DROP the coverage for that group, they can INCREASE the premiums to keep the plan "solvent." There is NO other "option" because healthcare is NOT "free."

What is the employer to do? He can "shop around" for another insurance company, but his rates will still be based on his "group's" experience of using healthcare. He can drop all "company provided" insurance and let his employees "fend for themselves" and ELIMINATE a huge expense line from the company's budget. He can lower the "employer contribution" part and increase the "employee contribution" part...which IS what most companies have chosen to do. MOST companies have already shifted the ENTIRE cost of a company guaranteed coverage health plan for FAMILY members of the employee TO the employee, because the cost to the company to "foot the bill" for non-employees is just too high.

I have "practical experience" with that sort of thing as a former employer of some 30 people. I "banded together" with several other small employers and we had a "pool" of about 200 employees. TWO people from one of the other companies had surgery the first year of the plan, and the insurance company DOUBLED our rates for everyone for the next year. "Take it or leave it" is the only option an employer has.

Now Obama want you, and me, and mimi, and everyone to "foot the bill" for insurance for "most people." GUESS who "most people" are in that equation? They are the people who USE healthcare.

The government already HAS such programs in place, and they are called Medicare and Medicaid. Neither one of them "pays" the true cost of healthcare. They MANDATE to the providers (doctors, hospitals, etc.) what they will pay, what they WILL NOT cover or pay for, and the provider CANNOT bill the patient for anything over what they "allow."

MANY doctors are considering pulling out of the Medicare system. Why? They aren't paid enough to justify the expenses they have to carry to be ABLE to stay in business. With some 70 MILLION people expected to be in the Medicare system by around 2028, ALL subject by law to the draconian limitations of the "government payor source," is it ANY stretch of the imagination to think that Obama's plan to "nationalize healthcare" will HURT, if not DESTROY the healthcare system? Doctors, Hospitals, Staff, DO NOT "work for free." They do NOT "volunteer" their services anymore than any other worker or business does IF THEY EXPECT TO STAY in business to be able to offer healthcare services to anyone.

Obama is flat out incompetant to BE President and flat out dangerous to the "health and welfare" of our country. Couple him with Reid and Pelosi, and the rest of the "tax and spend" Congress, and the recipe is for disaster.

And that doesn't even touch on his other "proposals" such as energy independence and the defense of our country.

Black, White, Purple, any color you want to wrap him in, he is flat out dangerous and inexperienced. His judgment of who his "advisors" and "supporters" are is KNOWN by those he has CHOSEN to fill those roles. His judgment, admittedly in my humble opinion, STINKS and is "liberal/socialist" at best.

But go back and look at the Chicago school system and the Chicago Teachers Union if you REALLY want to see Obama's judment and his sort of "reform."

One would imagine that things like this will be commonplace in the new Obamination.

http://worldnetdaily.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=72966

John Street...former Mayor of Philadelphia....Obama supporter

Imagine a white person making a remark like this.


John Street again...this speaks for itself.

http://www.myfoxphilly.com/myfox/pa...-US&layoutCode=TSTY&pageId=3.1.1

what do you think would have been the response if the players and "insult" had been switched???

This is the type of stuff I am talking about that whites have tolerated for many, many years.

BTW, she is still employed....not even reprimanded.

We will either be a society that shuns ALL racism or ALL of it is acceptable. There is no middle ground.

Another shining beacon of light for the wonderful world of liberalism.



I wonder why they don't just change their name to what they really "Planned Abortionhood"?

Billion dollar industry should "say it all."

"Follow the money, stupid." And I wonder how much money this "not for profit" pays in taxes? We already know they spend a lot in "donations."

OK, Big K. Sorry you don't believe THE TRUTH. You are welcome to have YOUR OPINION.

I definitely WOULD NOT vote for a black REPUBLICAN. There are those, you know? How about Clarence Thomas?

I am a DEMOCRAT and a LIBERAL which SEEMS (I may be wrong on this) to be a "different"..almost unacceptable and intolerable... point of view of many on this forum..which I have come to learn. I didn't know that this forum was filled with conservatives.

I have never been in close association with those that did not share my political views and I am learning alot about the thinking of those of you who do not.

Mimi, I understand where both you and BK are coming from.

We live in a country that saw the likes of Marion Barry elected three times. Do you think that would have happened based on his merits...or was it due to his running a place with a 60% black population.

Also, I would NEVER vote for Jesse Jackson or any CORRUPT POLITICIAN regardless of COLOR. MOST of the black people that I know WOULD NOT.

I agree with you. BUT, one would need to be blind to see that it happens all the time in the US. John Street was a criminal before...and during his stint as mayor. He was elected solely because of his skin color in a place whose demographics allowed that.

Sadly, I do NOT think your experience is reflective of the majority of this country.

Medc:

You may not mean to be saying this but TO ME, the implication is that black people are ignorant and/or lack integrity.

For an informed voting public who really need to KNOW what is behind the campaign rhetoric and what Obama really thinks rather than what he says to get elected, especially about his core issue of education:



Barack Obama is a good writer, and he knows how to tell a good story.

In The Audacity of Hope, he relates his 2005 visit to Thornton Township High School, in a predominantly black suburb south of Chicago, to conduct a "youth town hall meeting."

The students must have been excited to have this opportunity - a chance to question their state's newly elected and highly popular United States senator. To prepare for Obama's visit, they were surveyed about the quality of their education, with the idea that they could present their concerns.

Obama writes:

At the meeting they talked about violence in the neighborhoods and a shortage of computers in their classrooms. But their number one issue was this: Because the school district couldn't afford to keep teachers for a full school day, Thornton let out every day at 1:30 in the afternoon. With the abbreviated schedule, there was no time for students to take science lab or foreign language classes.
How come we're getting shortchanged? they asked me. Seems like nobody even expects to got to college, they said.
They wanted more school.


While reading about his visit to Thornton, I wondered whether maybe Obama missed the tension that must have gripped that room as those students, mostly black and disproportionately poor, pleaded with him for more school. I wondered in a particular how the teachers who stood in attendance felt as it all transpired. For they knew something of which Obama was probably unaware: the average teacher in Thornton Township District was earning $83,000 that year, short days notwithstanding (the figure does not include the administrators, who make more).

That was just the average. Some of the teachers in attendance that day were probably making more than $100,000 - over one-quarter of Thornton Township District's teachers did in 2005.

Did the teachers worry that Obama might realize the real cause of the short day? With teachers that expensive, how could any such school district "afford to kept teachers for a full school day?"

The elementary school day in Chicago proper is even shorter, at five hours and forty-five minutes. Until 2003, it was only five and a half hours long. This in not for lack of funds: Chicago public schools already spend $10,550 per pupil - 20 percent above the national average - and they have the shortest school day of any major city in Illinois.

The Chicago Teachers Union (CTU), an early endorser of Barack Obama for president, has vigorously resisted attempts to increase instruction time. In 2007, CTU demonstrated its might by taking on Mayor Daley, thwarting his attempts to force full days upon teachers. Their new contract contained no extra hours, but significant pay raises for the next four years. Deborah Lynch, the previous CTU president, had agreed in 2003 to a fifteen-minute increase in the school day in exchange for a seven-day reduction in the school year and large annual raises. This minor concession - a net five hours of extra teaching per year - was used against her in the next teacher's union election, which she narrowly lost.

For teaching less than six hours a day, nine months out of the year, even the lowliest twenty-two-year-old teacher in Chicago straight out of college will earn $43,702 this year, plus $3,059 in employer pension contributions - modest, but more than the city's median income. If he spends his summers on the beach (without taking any graduate classes) and stays four years, he will be making $57,333 in 2012, with a $3,992 pension contribution. He has a secure job and a guaranteed raise every year, regardless of economic conditions. He finishes the school day when other people are headed back to the office after lunch. If he makes his summers more productive, he can move into a higher salary "track" by going to school over the summer. The salaries of the most educated, skilled, and experienced teachers in Chicago will almost certainly be about $100,000 by the time he gets there.

For the money they spend, the Chicago public schools provide very little in the way of results at the high school level. The four-year graduation rate, depending on how you measure it, is as low as 54 percent. According to one recent study, only 6 percent of entering freshmen in Chicago public schools will obtain college degrees by age 25. Only 31 percent of Chicago high school juniors meet or exceed state standards on the Prairie State Achievement Examination.

Education is one of Senator Obama's favorite issues. His writing demonstrates a genuine appreciation for the fact that he could never have gotten as far as he has without the top-quality education he received - an elite private school in Honolulu and undergraduate and law degrees from two of America's most prestigious academic institutions. And in his book and his speeches, he acknowledges that there are serous problems with American education.

In his Senate stump speech in 2004, Obama brought up education constantly:

When I see my five-year old and my two-year old, it makes me weep because I see children who are just as smart and just a beautiful as they are, who just don't get a shot…It's unacceptable in a country s wealthy as our ours that children every bit as special as my own children are not getting a decent shot at life.


As a U.S. senator and as a state legislator, Barack Obama has had an opportunity to do something concrete about these children who are not being given "a decent shot" by the system. And he highlighted the problem of shortened school days in his own book. But in real life, this issue hits too close to home for him. He cannot criticize CTU for depriving Chicago schoolchildren of a full day and a full year of school. The union is his ally, his endorser, his donor, his supporter. He is committed to the union, not necessarily to the issue of education. Obama's description of his relationship with CTU and other unions is revealing:

I own these unions. When their leaders call, I do my best to call them back right away. I don't consider this corrupting in any way; I don't mind feeling obligated…toward teachers in some of the toughest schools in the country, many of whom have to dip into their own pockets at the beginning of every school year to buy crayons and books for their students…


That certainly sounds better than saying that he "does not mind feeling obligated" toward Chicago unions who demand short work days and short work years. The CTU awarded Obama for his loyalty in October 2007 by endorsing him for president, providing a counterweight on the same day that its parent union, the American Federation of Teachers, endorsed Hillary Clinton.

Obama has acquired an undeserved reputation for reform in education because he offers mild rhetoric about a merit-pay program for teachers. But the takes all the teeth out of the idea by promising his allies that the measure of "merit" will not be determined by student achievement - "arbitrary tests" - but by some yet undiscovered measure to be chosen by the teacher's unions. Obama's merit pay also comes only in exchange for six-figure teacher salaries.

In addition, Obama has not supported even obvious reforms, such as those pertaining to classroom discipline, a huge problem in urban schools. The state legislature rarely becomes involved in such an issue, but when it did in 2001, Obama twice voted "no" on a bill that let school districts require unruly students to complete suspensions before they could be shunted to new school districts.

Many Americans watched Obama's March 18 Philadelphia speech on race and focused in on his refusal to disown his eccentric pastor. But his former state Senate colleague Republican Steve Rauschenberger winced when he heard Obama describe how politicians have failed inner-city schools - "we still haven't fixed them" - which especially harms black children, who make up 47 percent of Chicago's school poplulation.

"What set me off personally," says Rauschenberger, "was to see him tell us that we've failed urban school kids. Sure we have, but it wasn't without his help. He was a defender of the status quo in the city of Chicago for eight years. And as a national rock star, he could be turning his guns back at the education system in Chicago. He doesn't."


Before he became a politician, Obama had not been so deeply committed to placating teacher's unions and avoiding fundamentally reform issues. He noticed in the 1980's and later lamented in his 1995 book, that no one had the guts to be frank with educators about the poor product they were providing in public schools on Chicago's South Side. The church pastors, Obama wrote in Dreams from My Father, were hesitant to address education reform because of

…the uncomfortable fact that every one of our churches was filled with teachers, principals, and district superintendents. Few of these educators sent their own children to public schools; they knew too much for that. But they would defend the status quo with the same skill and vigor as their white counterparts of two decades before…Efforts at reform - decentralization, say, or cutbacks in the bureaucracy - were part of a white effort to wrest back control…As for the students, well, they were impossible.


Somewhere along the line, as he entered politics and aligned himself squarely with the CTU, Obama seems to have lost track of this lesson. Today, when he discusses education reform, he tinkers around the edges. He talks about some important educational questions - funding, teacher training techniques, etc. - but not fundamental questions, such as what to do with failing teachers and administrators, a serious merit-pay system with truly objective standards, and whether Chicago teachers should work full days and full years for the fair wage they receive. As David Brooks put it:

[W]hen you look at the actual proposals Obama offers, he doesn't really address the core issues…He proposes dozens of programs to build on top of the current system, but it's not clear that he would challenge it. He's all carrot, no stick. He's politically astute - giving everybody the impression he's on their side - but substantively vague. Change just isn't that easy.


On the issue of education, as with his endorsements of Machine politicians, Obama saves up his political capital for advancement - he doesn't squander it by fighting messy battles for reform that might put him at odds with his political allies. For Obama, reform is something to discuss during election campaigns, not to be implemented or followed, especially when it could cause him to forfeit a political advantage. This does not separate him from most politicians in either party. It means that he is like all of the others.


(The Case Against Barack Obama, David Freddoso, pp79-85)

I think it speaks to the COMPLEXITY of racial issues in this country. Could it be that a group of people is in such LONGING for REPRESENTATION that they would COMPROMISE their values?