My Obamalogue on Race

In light of Sarah Palin’s … let’s say awkwardly titled post from this morning, I thought today was a good day to post my Obamalogue from last night.

For the record — I think what happened in Benghazi was a tragedy, and an avoidable one, and there has clearly been some deliberate obfuscation regarding it. No matter what color the President is. But Sarah Palin’s none-too-subtle racism is a stain on her party and she needs to be disavowed before she lowers the level of debate any further in this country. Shuck and Jive? Are you fucking kidding me? He isn’t Bojangles Robinson, he is your fucking president. And don’t tell me that Jay Carney used the term in a briefing — he was talking about himself, and its a false equivalency, and you know it.

At any rate. If you’re not done hearing the politics of a Q-level sitcom hack, here’s my piece:

Let me make something very clear before I start – hating Obama does not automatically make you a racist, and its silly and reductive to say so. There are intractable voters who will never vote for a Democrat, who will never vote for someone with an ironclad record on womens reproductive rights, or for the first American president to vocally support gay marriage. They call themselves values voters – which is silly because everyone who votes is a values voter – but these people would not vote for anyone with Obama’s record, regardless of the color of his skin.

Having said that -there are those who might have something else behind their criticism of our 43rd president, and in the tradition of noted Republican comedian Jeff Foxworthy, I have devised a sort of litmus test that might help you decide if your concerns about Obama are legitimate, or based on something else–

If your big problem with Michelle Obama is that she seems arrogant, and YOU’VE NEVER SAID THAT ABOUT A FIRST LADY BEFORE, NOT EVEN LAURA BUSH, you might be a racist.

If you’re enraged at the number of vacation days that Obama has taken but were strangely quiet while Bush broke a Presidential Vacation record – a record that had previously been held by Republican Herbert Hoover, the president who presided over the stock market crash of 1929 – you might be a racist.

If you were fine with the Patriot Act and with the warrantless so-called ‘sneak and peek’ searches that were made legal therein, but you think that health care for children is a massive violation of your constitutional rights, you might be a racist.

If you’ve never used the word ‘thug’ to describe a sitting American president until this one, you might be a racist.

Obama has provided Israel with the largest amount of military aid in US History, and has hit Iran with the most crushing sanctions ever inflicted on the country. If you still think Obama is worse for Israel than a guy who baptizes dead jews so they can live forever in the Mormon celestial kingdom, you might be a racist.

If you’ve ever even remotely even in jest, even when you were drunk and high and trying bath salts for the first time so much as suggested that Obama is not as smart as George W. Bush, you might be a racist.

Under Obama, 78 million dollars have been provided for tuition assistance to those who served our country in an all-volunteer army. During his convention speech, Romney neglected to mention our soldiers. If you’re a veteran and you’re voting for Romney, you might be a racist.

If you stood by and nodded approvingly when George W. Bush dressed up like a pilot and declared Mission Accomplished SEVEN YEARS before we actually left Iraq on another presidents watch., yet you’re losing your shit over the President singing a couple bars of an Al Green song at a benefit, you might be a racist.

And lastly if you ever said “I’m not racist. Besides he’s only half black,” guess what? You’re fucking racist.

Election day is November 6th. Double check that you know where your polling place is, and just to be safe, bring some photo ID with you. Thank you and God Bless America.