New Huffington Post Column

Splendid as always, Bob. I would argue that every tag the right hurls at Obama—socialist, communist, Marxist, fascist, Muslim, whatever—is a manifestation of “the other,” and thus has racial coding embedded in it. No thinking person could understand the ideologies or the dogma with which the president has been associated, review his actions in the context of that knowledge, and conclude that he actually subscribes to any of them.Then again, his accusers are conservatives, so there ya go.

I’m scared and I haven’t even read it yet! Boy oh boy, I’d certainly better vote for Democrats only!! That’s sure to solve all these problems that only Republicans (and conservadems of course) cause.

Dear Allen….go away.

Grrr…. I hate the new comment system at Huffpost!!

Wasn’t last summer the summer of Republican race-baiting?And the summer before that too?Oh wait, race-baiting is all they have.Their policy is garbage and their track-record is garbage. Race-baiting is probably their best shot.

Nicole – Yes, it very pretty bad. I don’t comment there very much because atleast 50 or 60% of my posts are deleted by moderators for seemingly no reason.Their moderation policy is utterly incoherent.You can post something with correct spelling, grammar, and well-crafted logic and have it deleted, while someone else posts “blah blah this is what happen when u put libruls in charge!” and it gets a pass.

Good column. As a second-generation, melanin-deficient Californian, I oscillate between amusement and irritation at the insane over-reaction by whites to the fact that we are going to become the plurality race in a couple of decades. Good lord, pale people, that’s the case now in California (43% white) and the whites are still running the joint! Calm down.I will take issue with one thing, though: calling Andrew Breitbart an attention whore is an insult to whores. (Yes, I’m recycling my jokes.)@Red Pill: Agreed.

Bob, you did a great job highlighting the, “you know what that means,” component to right wing politics of division.That’s a really important nuanced aspect of the propaganda.It’s like when Sarah Palin rolls her eyes when she realizes she’s being confronted by a teacher. She’s a teacher, “you know what that means…”This is all eerily similar to what that 1947 War Department, “Don’t Be A Sucker,” warned about.I hear, “we don’t want Liberals, Muslims, Blacks, Mexican babies, Earth science, or The Reefer– in our America!”"This seat is taken!”"Can’t sit here.”"Women can stay and will be tolerated as long as they know their place like the Founders intended!”A divided populace serves as the get-away car for Dominionist billionaires and millionaires and subjugation to multi-national econ-terrorists.It’s a full-time job keeping up with the relentless bombardment of bigotry, fear, and divisible rhetoric.If the media did a better job of highlighting our similarities and like-minded struggles and successes, all this noise would sound a lot worse by comparison. But bigotry, fear, and divisible rhetoric has been encouraged to become “the norm,” desensitizing acknowledgement of our common dreams and bonds.It should be the other way around. More unifying examples and consistent newsworthy deference should be the real normal, and divisible rhetoric confined to the exception.

Agree, Ashby. I used to comment at HP daily. Then they started with the stupid badge system, the user-mods, and I stopped commenting for the most part.A month or so ago, they instituted a new comment system which is even worse. The mod is now a fucking machine. the system is provided by a company [Adaptive Semantics Inc.] which was bought out by HP. Its system completely SUCKS.

The two-person startup tech company provides a semantic analysis engine (aka JuLiA) used by the Huffington Post to moderate the thousands of comments published on the blog every day.

http://awesomedc.com/2010/06/18/wow-100000-daily-comment-on-huffington-post/Anyhoo, I rarely even read there anymore because i become infuriated, want to post, and I hate to post on their system.Two of my comments on Bob’s post were deleted. What a waste of freaking time.

LOL @ Alopecia.

I visit HuffPo daily.But I’ll read only 3-4 posts a week that may address my interests or ire, and I usually read some of the comments.I stopped commenting when I Googled my HuffPo screen name and comments I had made on HuffPo popped up.I am more than the sum of my comments on HuffPo!Don’t think for a minute that I don’t appreciate those who do comment and challenge misconceptions and spin.

“I am more than the sum of my comments on HuffPo!”True, that.

I also hate the infuriating, frequently misleading or downright false, headlines on Huffpo.

hahahahaThey use an algorithm to moderate posts? No wonder there is seemingly no ryhme or reason to which posts are deleted and which are allowed.I was unaware of that, thankyou for informing me.

Great column, Bob.

@Ashby ->>>They use an algorithm to moderate posts? No wonder there is seemingly no ryhme or reason to which posts are deleted and which are allowed.I typically moderate my own comments for the first several hours after I publish something, and I generally approve everything — even the crazy wingnut trolls.The rest of the comments are moderated by Huff Post staffers.

Bob, is that on the blogs only, or the entire site?

Good comments MR. Brink. Good film “Don’t Be a Sucker” as well.I’m kind of surprised the Republicans just don’t push the “economy issue” instead of pushing the Race/Minority/Fear agenda.