The "Overeducated" and Barack Obama

So who are you going to hold up as a marvelous example of presidency? He has a certain authority in the real world, Carters opinion is noted to be of importance in Europe. Criticise his opinions on a rational basis or you might just be judged partisan. I might ask whose opinion would you accept?

Someone who was not thrown out of office, just to begin with. How the hell does Jimmy know whether the criticisms of Obama are racist or not? We need surveys, if we can get them.

Answer my question , your replies are not reasoned.

What question was that. And just saying my replies are not reasoned does not make them so. What about them is not reasoned. You seem to think that merely saying something makes it so. It doesn't. You have to support what you say with an argument. That's logic.

Your argument against Carters article was that he failed to be reelected, so his views where not valid. How is that a reasoned response? Look who inherited his position another president whose brain went walkabout for half his term. Demeaning a man by his inability to be reelected is not reasoned or reasonable, is it. Comment on his article not the man.

Really? I haven't heard any racist remarks... admittedly I can be oblivious. I saw the PBS news tonight and their commentators seemed very slightly hopeful that when the Republicans get up off the floor from their recent set-backs, some bipartisanship might be possible.

Really? I haven't heard any racist remarks... admittedly I can be oblivious. I saw the PBS news tonight and their commentators seemed very slightly hopeful that when the Republicans get up off the floor from their recent set-backs, some bipartisanship might be possible.

I am sure you think that is true. But what is needed is evidence.

Now, there's an authority! He ought to know about failed presidencies.

He was tossed out of office just as soon as possible.

How the hell does Jimmy know whether the criticisms of Obama are racist or not? We need surveys, if we can get them.

That is not my argument. My argument is that Carter has no more idea whether the opposition to Obama is racist than anyone else does. How would he know? Did he take a survey of the population? No. It is just one person's opinion. A different thing I said about Carter is that he ought to know about Obama the way one failed and terrible president should know about another failed and terrible president. Birds of a feather. That is entirely different from what I said about Carter being an authority about racism. He isn't because he does not have any more information than you do.

Reagan inherited the mess Carter left, and he was a highly successful president. So what is Obama's excuse?

I didn't say racist remarks on television, though there have been many comments that seem to be thinly veiled racism.

There are people who do not like Obama because of his race. I've met these people. They have stood in my store ranting and raving for half an hour about why (insert racial slur) have ruined this country, and that Obama's Presidency is the end of our good republic.

I wish this were not the case. On election night I saw a young man charge into a crowded apartment complex parking lot, wielding a shotgun, yelling about "damn (racial slur)".



I don't need a survey when I'm talking about people I have encountered. People who unabashedly lambaste Obama on the basis of his race.

If you really do not believe that there exists a significant portion of the American public that dislikes Obama at least in part due to their racial prejudice, then you must not have the slightest idea of American history. [/COLOR]



Your opinion of Carter's policies has absolutely nothing to do with his understanding of race in America. Even if we accept that Carter's policies were failures, it does not follow that he has no understanding of race in America.

You ought to know about that much logic.



You mean he was defeated in a Presidential election by one of America's most popular modern Presidents.



Because he keeps his eyes open and gives a damn.

And if we can't get surveys? Then what? Deny that many Americans are racist?

Carter has exactly the kind of evidence you have, namely anecdotal evidence. "I know a fella in Georgia who does not like Obama because Obama is black". But that is not evidence that opposition (say) in Congress, or in the Supreme Court, is racist.

In fact, the only decent evidence we have that there is little racist opposition to Obama is the fact (not story, but fact) that Obama won the election by a good plurality.

What evidence have you, aside from a few stories about your limited experience, that the opposition to Obama's policies is racist?

And yes, if we don't have evidence, then we should not believe (or assert) what we do not have evidence for. What do you think?

Who said anything about Congress or the Supreme Court?



As if my experiences are not factual? As if they were hallucinations?



I'm not arguing that the opposition to Obama's policies is somehow purely race related. I'm arguing that there are a great many people in the US who oppose Obama's Presidency due to racial bias.

And my non-fictional accounts are evidence of this. When compounded with the non-fictional experiences of many other people across this country, to deny that there racism is a significant source of anti-Obama sentiment in this nation is not simply naive, but absurd.



If there is no reason to believe, do not believe.

However, there is ample reason.

What opposition are you and Jimmy talking about, then?

did not say your personal experiences are hallucinations. I said they were only anecdotal evidence. It is irrational to make generalizations on insufficient evidence, and anecdotal evidence is insufficient evidence.

Obama was elected by a solid plurality, and, again, your have no good evidence for general racial bias against Obama.

Again, I did not say your accounts were fictional. I said they were insufficient evidence for your generalization. You really ought to make that distinction.

It is not my place to speak for President Carter.

I am talking about a segment of the American population. You see, Ken, racism is something that pervades all elements of American society. It is not existent just here, or only there, but a little bit exists just about everywhere.



To make generalizations, yes. But I'm not making one.



That I have met many people for whom race compels their dislike of Obama, that racism pervades American society. Not that everyone is racist, mind you, but that some people most certainly are. I doubt you are to deny that there are racist people in this country.



You really ought to pay attention to the argument people make, rather than the argument against which you wish to rail.

Prejudice and Obama's Opposition | Psychology Today What you ask for has already been done....It shows that prejudice does influence many opinions.

... Its propaganda from the right, its bitter and twisted attitude will by any means destroy the best you have produced in a hundred years. Its not, the over educated, its the intelligent , that recognise that you have a man capable of making history but is hog tied by Conservative backward politics. Its just not this damned red that thinks it, I have heard british conservatives express the same opinion. Wake up America face your future.

Your generalization was that racism pervades all areas of American society.

In particular, it fuels opposition to Obama. Now. what did you say your evidence for that was?

But from the experience that you happen to have had, it is fallacious to generalize to most or all.

The claim that racism pervades essentially all areas of American society is not a generalization. It is an assumption thought reasonable by every scholar who investigates race. That racism is real, and that many different sorts of people are racist.

Or do you honestly disbelieve that there are racist people, and that racist people have a variety of backgrounds?



Saying that, as a matter of fact, not generalization, that some of the opposition to Obama is fueled by racism is supported by the fact that I happen to have met people who openly admit their racist dislike of Obama.



Which is exactly what I have not done. To reiterate:

"You really ought to pay attention to the argument people make, rather than the argument against which you wish to rail."

You are confusing generalization with interpolation. Granted, it's a tricky difference, but I think you can figure it out.

Or do you really think it's absurd to believe that there are people other than those I have met who also dislike Obama, at least in part, due to his race?