Lazy Saturday Reads: Political Incorrectness For Me, But Not For Thee
Posted: September 10, 2016 Filed under: morning reads, Republican politics, U.S. Politics | Tags: "hatred, basket of deplorables, Donald Trump, Hillary Clinton, homophobia, Racism, xenophobia 64 CommentsGood Afternoon!!
Well, Hillary’s gone and done it now. And her base is fired up! Last night at the LGBT for Hillary gala in NYC, she told the truth about Trump supporters last night, and the Trump campaign and the white male media are reaching for their smelling salts and swooning onto their fainting couches. Outrage!
Trump supporters have spent months yelling “lock her up” and “hang the bitch” whenever Trump mentions her name in his rallies. When he mentions President Obama, they scream “he’s a Muslim.” But when Hillary talks about their ugly bigotry, they’re suddenly innocent victims and “hard working Americans.”
Trump rally in Mobile, Alabama
Guess what? There are millions of hard working Americans who are not white bigots. The simple truth is that anyone who supports Trump at this point is aligning him or herself with racism and xenophobia. That is Trump’s entire platform. He doesn’t have any realistic plans to bring jobs to working people, and he plans to lower taxes on the rich so much that there will be zero federal money to do anything about jobs, infrastructure and the other fake items in his talking points.
Abby Philip of the Washington Post last night: Clinton: Half of Trump’s supporters fit in ‘basket of deplorables.’
Hillary Clinton said Friday that “half” of Donald Trump’s supporters could be grouped in “the basket of deplorables” at a fundraising event in New York City.
“You know, to just be grossly generalistic, you could put half of Trump’s supporters into what I call the ‘basket of deplorables’. Right?” Clinton said to applause and laughter from the crowd of supporters at an LGBT for Hillary fundraiser where Barbra Streisand performed. “The racist, sexist, homophobic, xenophobic, Islamaphobic — you name it.”
Man at Trump rally
“And unfortunately there are people like that. And he has lifted them up,” she added.
Clinton then noted, as she has several times in the past, that Trump has “given voice” to white supremacist and anti-Semitic voices on the Internet. This, in combination with being in contact with some of the best Law Firm SEO Expert in the world, means one thing: data driven seo services are going to take over the internet.
“He tweets and retweets their offensive hateful mean-spirited rhetoric,” Clinton said. “Now, some of those folks — they are irredeemable, but thankfully they are not America.”
Of course that’s not all she said.
“That other basket of people are people who feel that the government has let them down, the economy has let them down, nobody cares about them, nobody worries about what happens to their lives and their futures, and they’re just desperate for change,” Clinton said. “It doesn’t really even matter where it comes from. They don’t buy everything he says, but he seems to hold out some hope that their lives will be different.
“They won’t wake up and see their jobs disappear, lose a kid to heroin, feel like they’re in a dead end,” Clinton said. “Those are people we have to understand and empathize with as well.”
Oh my God! How dare Hillary call out the racists and white supremacists who not only flock to his rallies, but also inhabit the highest levels of his campaign? Although the media didn’t cover it very well, she gave an entire speech on this topic last month. Some excerpts:
From the start, Donald Trump has built his campaign on prejudice and paranoia.
He is taking hate groups mainstream and helping a radical fringe take over the Republican Party.
His disregard for the values that make our country great is profoundly dangerous.
In just this past week, under the guise of “outreach” to African Americans, Trump has stood up in front of largely white audiences and described black communities in such insulting and ignorant terms:
“Poverty. Rejection. Horrible education. No housing. No homes. No ownership. Crime at levels nobody has seen.” Right now,” he said, “you walk down the street and get shot.” [….]
A man with a long history of racial discrimination, who traffics in dark conspiracy theories drawn from the pages of supermarket tabloids and the far, dark reaches of the internet, should never run our government or command our military.
Hillary Clinton at last night’s LGBT for Hillary gala.
Ask yourself, if he doesn’t respect all Americans, how can he serve all Americans?
Now, I know some people still want to give Trump the benefit of the doubt.
They hope that he will eventually reinvent himself – that there’s a kinder, gentler, more responsible Donald Trump waiting in the wings somewhere.
Because after all, it’s hard to believe anyone – let alone a nominee for president – could really believe all the things he says.
But the hard truth is, there’s no other Donald Trump. This is it.
Maya Angelou, a great American whom I admire very much, she once said: “When someone shows you who they are, believe them the first time.”
Were any of the white reporters who are so outraged today paying attention to that speech? Right now Hillary is the only person who can save this country from being taken over by a racist populist demagogue who publicly expresses admiration for strongman leaders like Vladimir Putin and Kim Jong Un.
We’ll see what happens with this, but I hope Hillary doesn’t back down. In fact the percentage of “deplorables” in Trump’s audiences is probably greater than 50 percent.
Here are a couple of article from June about the Trump “coalition.”
Vox: The easiest way to guess if someone supports Trump? Ask if Obama is a Muslim.
You can ask just one simple question to find out whether someone likes Donald Trump more than Hillary Clinton: Is Barack Obama a Muslim? If they are white and the answer is yes, 89 percent of the time that person will have a higher opinion of Trump than Clinton.
That’s more accurate than asking people if it’s harder to move up the income ladder than it was for their parents (54 percent), whether they oppose trade deals (66 percent), or if they think the economy is worse now than last year (81 percent). It’s even more accurate than asking them if they are Republican (87 percent).
Those results come from the 2016 American National Election Study (ANES) pilot survey. My analysis indicates that economic status and attitudes do little to explain support for Donald Trump.
These results might be rather surprising since most political commentators have sought to root Trump’s appeal in the economic anxieties of working-class whites. As George Packer recently wrote in the New Yorker:
The base of the [Republican] Party, the middle-aged white working class, has suffered at least as much as any demographic group because of globalization, low-wage immigrant labor, and free trade. Trump sensed the rage that flared from this pain and made it the fuel of his campaign.
Other analysts, however, have found that support for Trump is rooted in animosity and resentment toward various minority groups, especially African Americans, immigrants, and Muslims.
Read more at the link.
The Atlantic: Donald Trump’s Coalition of Restoration.
[A] survey by the non-partisan Public Religion Research Institute, and the center-left Brookings Institution, measures Americans’ attitudes about a broad range of issues relating to immigration and demographic change. Consistently, the poll found that Trump supporters view the changes with greater—often much greater—alarm than not only Democrats or independents, but also Republicans who did not support Trump during the GOP primaries. In all, the survey shows that Trump was lifted by a coalition that largely believes the America it has known is under siege—and that unprecedented measures are required to reverse the threat.
According to figures provided to me by PRRI, Trump supporters (including both Republicans and GOP-leaning independents who backed him during the primary) are more likely than Democrats, independents or other Republicans to say that they worry about being a victim of terrorism or violent crime; that they are bothered when they hear immigrants talking in a language other than English; that discrimination against whites is as great a problem as discrimination against minorities; and that American and Islamic values are inherently at odds. Fully 80 percent of Trump voters say that immigrants are more burden than benefit to America; just 27 percent of Democrats, 41 percent of independents, and 53 percent of other Republicans agree.
Often the contrast between Trump supporters and all other adults widened further when the poll measured those who hold these positions most vehemently. Fully 44 percent of Trump supporters, for instance, said they “completely agree” it bothers them when they hear immigrants speaking a language other than English; less than half as many independents, Democrats, or non-Trump-supporting Republicans agreed. Likewise, while about two-fifths of Trump Republicans “completely” agreed that “because things have gotten so far off track in this country, we need a leader who is willing to break some rules,” less than one-fifth of Democrats, independents, and other Republicans concurred.
That instinct helps explain the broad support in Trump’s coalition for his edgiest proposals; indeed, the poll makes clear that Trump triumphed not in spite of his most polarizing ideas, but largely because of them. Roughly four-fifths of Trump supporters say they back his plans to build a wall with Mexico, to temporarily ban all Muslims from entering the country, and to bar Syrian refugees. In each case, between 43 and 47 percent of Trump supporters back those ideas strongly.
TERRE HAUTE, IN – MAY 01: Guests wait in line before Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump addresses a rally at the Indiana Theater on May 1, 2016 in Terre Haute, Indiana.
Republicans are now trying to claim that this is Hillary Clinton’s “47 percent moment.” Bullshit! From Daniel Politi at Slate: Why It’s Ridiculous To Call Clinton’s “Basket of Deplorables” Her “47 Percent” Moment.
Hillary Clinton has straight out called Donald Trump a racist who is “offering a dog whistle” to the most extremist, hateful portions of American society. But now Republicans are acting very shocked that Clinton would say that around half of Trump’s supporters could be classified under the broad heading “basket of deplorables,” meaning racists, sexists, homophobes or xenophobes. In other words people who would never vote for Clinton.
The Democratic presidential candidate’s use of the word “half,” immediately made Republicans associate it with Mitt Romney’s infamous “47 percent” line from the campaign that was secretly recorded. Except, you know, this event was covered by the press and her statement—read in context—was actually a call to arms for her supporters not to automatically dismiss someone as irredeemable just because he or she happens to support someone like Trump.
As is evident from the remarks, what Clinton was saying is that not all Trump supporters are racists, xenophobes or homophobes, a common thinking in particularly liberal circles. So “if you know anybody who’s even thinking about voting for Trump, stage an intervention,” Clinton said before adding that getting people to stop supporting the Republican candidate “may be one conversion therapy I endorse.” [….]
[In 2012] Romney talked down and dismissed the importance of poor people while Clinton talked down to and dismissed racists, xenophobes, and homophobes. A slight difference. Plus, Romney was talking about people who may have actually chosen to support him whereas Clinton was referring to people who in no way would vote for her. So the risk of alienation really isn’t that great to begin with, although of course it could make the most fervent Trump supporters more fervent.
Please don’t back down, Hillary! You are right, and the media will disparage you no matter what you say or do. Thank you for standing up for Americans who don’t want our country to be led by a disgusting racist, white supremacist, and wannabe dictator.
What else is happening? Please post your thoughts and links in the comment thread and have a wonderful weekend!
peej
Carissa
bostonboomer
dakinikat
ecocatwoman
grayslady
mablue2
JJ Lopez aka Minkoff Minx
NW Luna
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Mona (aka Wonk the Vote)
Sky Dancing 
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After a great career in sales and marketing, I know that repetition is the foundation to getting it done. Every time we hear someone say the name ‘Trump’ we are hearing a ‘mini commercial for him – for good or bad – it embeds the name in people’s psyche.
People don’t always listen to the full message and when folks are interviewed in stores, asked why they bought certain products they’ll tell you, I’ve heard about it before – they really don’t remember the story behind it. And there are many Repugs out there who know he’s ‘their’ candidate, have never heard him speak – but know that he defeated all those other Repugs to get the nomination – so he must be good – right?
I almost left the luncheon I was at on Thursday when a woman (I thought is educated, and well read) started spouting all those obvious lies we’ve heard about Hill and was quite adamant about how they were true – when I asked where she’d heard those things she mentioned one of the sensationalist ‘rags.’
We can’t take anything for granted, we need to be patient and educate as politely and focused as we can. I recently have turned three dyed in the wool Rs around by sharing some of the information I’ve gotten here and other research I’ve done. It’s ‘only’ three, but I’m not done yet and if each of us took it on as a personal ‘project’ we’ll see the numbers mount.
We cannot afford that DT becomes POTUS, we can’t give him the slightest edge,
Joanelle said:
“We can’t take anything for granted, we need to be patient and educate as politely and focused as we can. I recently have turned three dyed in the wool Rs around by sharing some of the information I’ve gotten here and other research I’ve done. It’s ‘only’ three, but I’m not done yet and if each of us took it on as a personal ‘project’ we’ll see the numbers mount.”
I agree wholeheartedly and applaud you for your efforts. I’ve been trying to educate people I know and new people I meet about the true Hillary. I’m polite and take their concerns seriously. I don’t put them down. Maybe I don’t reach many people but every voter counts! Each of us making this a personal “project” is a great idea.
Yes! I do this. Although with the last one I kinda lost it when the man said he was a progressive. I responded proudly “I’m a liberal.” I think he was shocked that I actually used the L-word.
Well, if you want to get into the liberal vs. progressive label discussion rather than build bridges with people who probably agree with you on most issues, you can go that route. I would let it pass but that is just me.
Wise advice, Beata. He’d said some things earlier which led me to think he was going to be a lost cause. Normally I talk about the living wage jobs, good schools, clean water, and those things which ideally we should all want. I hadn’t intended the I’m a liberal to shut things done. I then said that Colin Powell used a private e-mail server, and the man said “Actually that’s not really true.” And then he walked away from me.
Well, Luna, at least you tried and you may never know what lasting impression your conversation had on him. Perhaps he will vote for Hillary after all.
I usually ask people about themselves. Who are they thinking about voting for and why? What issues are important to them? If I know where they are coming from, I can tailor “my pitch” for Hillary in a way that I think will appeal to them. If they bring up something negative about Hillary ( like her emails ), I ask them to tell me why that bothers so much and if they think something about Trump ( like his ties to Russia or the way he attracts so much violence around him ) might in fact be more dangerous. Nudge them in Hillary’s direction but in a way that allows them to think for themselves: “Who would be a better President?”
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NBC News: Kerry: Deal With Russia Could Be ‘Turning Point’ in Syria War.
http://www.nbcnews.com/news/world/john-kerry-says-deal-reached-russia-reduce-violence-syria-n645941
The media was allowed by the Hillary campaign into this fundraiser. This was not Romney telling his big donors something that he wouldn’t have said beyond that room. Hillary was completely aware that there were media people there. She said this deliberately. This was not something that just got out. Too bad some of the people reporting on this do nto know, or do not care about, the actual facts.
Also, the entire statement shows her sympathy for some Americans who have been left behind, and are so frustrated and angry that they will vote for anything different. That was the real point of the statement. She will actually try to help those people. Trump never will, that is beyond obvious. I do not know why it is so difficult for the media to report thirty seconds of a Hillary speech, rather than fifteen seconds, when the context is so crucial to her meaning.
Good points, William.
In my area, the only 24-hour news channel included in our major cable company’s “basic plan” is Fox News. A lot of the people in today’s economy can’t afford expensive cable TV plans or access to the Internet through a computer or other source. There are still people who don’t have computers! So they get all their news via Fox News. I don’t call them “stupid”; I call them “uninformed”. They believe the lies told by Fox News because that is all they hear. If Fox News doesn’t report on Hillary’s full statement, they will never learn about it.
All the more reason for Hillary to buy air time for a town hall or another type of forum to present herself directly to voters as you have suggested before. It’s an excellent idea. I think she should air it on the major networks ( ABC, CBS, NBC ) so people who don’t have even basic cable can view it. That may seem a bit old-fashioned but it is a way for her to reach the largest audience.
Yes, it’s the only way Hillary can talk to people unfiltered by the media. They can’t take it off, they can’t relegate her to a box at the bottom of the screen, as with her rallies. People can listen and make up their minds. Otherwise, everything she says is essentially mischaracterized or taken out of context. And what she said never requited an apology. Even if she overstated it, it’s not by much. Meanwhile, Trump lies about everything, and never apologizes for anything; and gets away with it all. And of course the media gleefully characterizes what she said today as an apology, even if it really wasn’t. So you lose either way; might as well buy the time and let the people decide what she means. And no matter what happens in the election, it is clear that 90% of the media is worse than worthless, they are an actual menace to democracy.
The “basket of deplorable” part of Clinton’s comments is what is getting the big media play (because that’s what Trump tweeted about and sadly most of the media take their cues from him), but really the more important thing was the rest of the quote bb mentioned:
Trump’s “deplorables” support, and his leveraging of it, are horrifying. But there are many, many surrogates and others who are pointing that out. That group is simply not reachable. It’s the “let down” basket that is still reachable. It’s true that many in the U.S. have NOT recovered from the economy’s crash in ’08, and no politician has done anything for them (aside from Republicans and Tea Partiers trying to distract them from economic security to social issues).
I don’t understand why the Let Down basket doesn’t see that Clinton is the only candidate who will address their concerns and that Trump will never do anything for them. But I do wish Clinton and her surrogates would make her plans for everyone’s economic security a larger part of her messaging, and that the d*mn media would cover that aspect of her campaign instead of playing their silly word games.
One of the things I admire most about Clinton is that when she says it’s okay if you’re not for me, I’m still for you, she really means it.
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Hillary is spot on! And I’m glad that she’s not only calling out Trump and his racist, sexist, xenophobic, homophobic campaign, but also those same problems in his supporters.
At Trump rallies they scream “kill the bitch” and holler “muslim, muslim” when Obama is mentioned. His campaign is one of hatred and bigotry and she has an obligation to call it out.
Last night at a rally, Donald Trump said that if the occupants of Iranian military vessels made inappropriate hand signs (meaning shooting birds) at our military vessels, he would “blow them out of the water”. No coverage of that at all and I heard that with my own ears.
Somehow calling half of Trump supporters “deplorable” which is the truth, isn’t as newsworthy as saying you’d commit an ACT OF WAR because someone shot the bird at a U.S. Naval vessel. The man is crazy.
That speech last night was horrible! What about when he said Hillary could come into the room and shoot someone and she wouldn’t be prosecuted.
There’s that double standard. Hillary tells the truth and it’s “Oh no”. Trump lies, deceives, refuses to acknowledge lies even after they’re revealed, asks Russia to hack Hillary, Has a racist campaign manager, a campaign manager that is on the payroll of dictators, retweets the KKK and White Nationalists and it’s like “well, you know he’s only a businessman”.
It doesn’t matter what his occupation is. No one should be making these racist, sexist, incendiary statements.
For those of us with weakening eyes:
Hillary Clinton
2 hrs
Last night, I was “grossly generalistic,” and that’s never a good idea. I regret saying “half”—that was wrong. But let’s be clear, what’s really “deplorable” is that Donald Trump hired a major advocate for the so-called “alt-right” movement to run his campaign and that David Duke and other white supremacists see him as a champion of their values. It’s deplorable that Trump has built his campaign largely on prejudice and paranoia and given a national platform to hateful views and voices, including by retweeting fringe bigots with a few dozen followers and spreading their message to 11 million people. It’s deplorable that he’s attacked a federal judge for his “Mexican heritage,” bullied a Gold Star family because of their Muslim faith, and promoted the lie that our first black President is not a true American. So I won’t stop calling out bigotry and racist rhetoric in this campaign. I also meant what I said last night about empathy, and the very real challenges we face as a country where so many people have been left out and left behind. As I said, many of Trump’s supporters are hard-working Americans who just don’t feel like the economy or our political system are working for them. I’m determined to bring our country together and make our economy work for everyone, not just those at the top. Because we really are “stronger together.”
Empathy is so lacking in this country. I do believe that people are starving for someone who really cares about them. We need to let people know that caring is what Hillary’s life work has been about.
I also believe that behind many people’s anger is fear, especially fear of the future and what it may hold for them and their loved ones. It is legitimate to feel fear. The world is a dangerous place. Trump has been able to tap into that fear by stirring it up. Hillary needs to calm it down.
The type of people who fall for Trump are the type most driven by fear and anger over other emotions. I hope they can be open to listen to Hillary.
http://www.salon.com/2014/07/29/secrets_of_the_right_wing_brain_new_study_proves_it_conservatives_see_a_different_hostile_world/
That is an interesting article, Luna.
When I said it is legitimate to feel fear, I wasn’t referring to some abstract bogeyman or idea. I was talking about people who have been left behind in our society. People who worry everyday about how to get food, pay rent, see a doctor. I know that fear well. My mother used to say “We live hand-to-mouth” because we did. We were scared about the future all the time. We never knew what lay in store for us. If it was something bad, we knew we didn’t have financial resources to help us. No house or land to sell. No savings. No car. Nothing. A lot of people are like us. They live in places like Indiana and West Virginia. Places nobody visits unless they have family there. Places people leave if they have the money to do so. The ones left behind are an easy mark for a con artist like Trump who can blame their real problems on immigrants or some other group. He whips their fear into anger. If Hillary shows that she understands the fear many people feel ( which I believe she is doing ), it will be a tremendous help to her campaign. It will also be a tremendous help to people who are suffering.
I think it is important to discuss poverty issues. It tends to make people uncomfortable but so be it. It’s much easier to talk about racism, sexism, xenophobia, homophobia and any number of other social problems. But there is still a stigma around poverty. My mother used to say people think poverty is catching. “Poverty cooties” she would call it. It drives people away.
Poverty issues are tremendously important. It is not as easy to get ahead now as it was for my parents. They could live comfortable on one middle-class income. The house they bought in Seattle cost about 2 x my father’s annual wages. The house I’m living in now costs about 10 times a middle-class annual income. It used to be possible to work one’s way through college. Now that’s hard even with junior/community college tuition. My friends and co-workers who have reasonably good jobs but don’t already own a house are priced out of the housing market here. And rents are ridiculous.
Hillary talks about making the economy work for everyone, not just the rich. And about living-wage jobs, and tuition-free technical/community colleges, and debt-free 4-yr state colleges. She talks about how we need more love and compassion in the world and in politics. Just some of the reasons I support her. Why can’t the Trump people listen and hear what she says?
“Half” is wrong because it’s a hell of a lot more than that, if they are willing to put up with the behavior shown in the Times video.
He also has Binders full of Bigots on his campaign staff.
LOL!
My coughing woke me up last night (this is becoming a nightly event) and I went online to find the Trumpsters swooning and clutching their pearls over being called deplorable. Hah! What a riot! The lovers of straight talk and haters of political correctness are offended at such a scurrilous charge! I got into a back and forth with one of them on twitter until, you guessed it, he wound up calling me (and Hillary) a c#%nt. It just doesn’t work trying to come off as offended at being called deplorable when you turn around and call the people you are whining about c#%nts. Trump now predicts her poll numbers will drop as a result. As if!!
On the “C” word. How dare you, a lowly woman, speak your mind. If you do you are a “C”! Well fuck them!!!!! This lowly woman will speak her mind whenever I damn well please. And you speak your mind whenever you damn well please.
Last night we stopped to get gas at Kroger Fuel Depot. It was packed because it was Friday night. Three to four vehicles in line at every pump. We pulled up behind a man in a big SUV. After he filled up his gas guzzler, he walked away from his vehicle and got in line to buy something at the outdoor pay station. The line at the pay station was at least 10 people long. We waited for 10 minutes, with vehicles behind us, while he stood in line, probably to buy a pack of cigarettes or a lottery ticket. Finally I got out, walked to the pay station and said “why did you leave your vehicle at the pump after filling up when there are other vehicles behind you?” he said “I needed to buy something”. I said “You should have parked your vehicle and walked over”, he said “I’ll do that next time”, I said, “no, you’ll do that this time or I’ll get the manager to move your fucking vehicle”. He left the line and moved his vehicle. I’m an old woman and sick and tired of being run over by inconsiderate, ignorant people. I won’t take that kind of shit. I’m sure Hillary feels the same.
Good for you, Mouse, but I’m sure that you’re aware that, today, he’s just as likely to pull out a gun and shoot you dead, old woman or not.
You know Sue, I’ll take my chances. 🙂 My wife of 32 years was like “honey, honey, where are you going?”, I said “going to tell the man to move”, she said “be careful”. I’m too old to be careful, there’s much more enjoyment in taking life head on.
Because you are awesome! Good for you mouse!
“Because you are awesome! Good for you mouse!”
My wife didn’t think I was so awesome, she was a bit upset. But I’ve always been feisty and a fighter and I don’t see age changing that. Unless or until I get where I can’t get out of the car :-). That may be a game changer.
Good for you, Mouse! (And I understand your wife’s reaction.) These people do this sort of bully behavior because they’ve been able to get away with it. If early on they’d been set right they might not be continuing this crap.
Hey Luna……What irritated me most was that after he filled up his big SUV he turned toward our vehicle, looked me right in the eyes and walked away leaving his car, with the door open, to get in line for something to eat, drink, smoke or a lottery ticket. Just rude and inconsiderate.
People are always trying to run me over. Being disabled makes me an easy target. I would like to be able to say it’s always some redneck with a Trump sticker on his truck but it’s not. Unfortunately, the last one was an African-American woman with a Hillary sticker.
!! That makes me furious. In my medical practice I work with a lot of people who for one reason or another have disabilities and use adaptive equipment. Hey, tomorrow any one of us could get hit by a car and end up with a TBI, or spinal cord injury, or could come down with some neurodegenerative disorder. It’s not a character flaw! It’s not contagious!
My own mother commented about a person with ALS in a W/C at a social event and said he shouldn’t have come if he was “that way.” I loved my mother, but she accepted the dominant paradigm brainwashing in many ways. “He wants to be here, Mom. Does his condition make you feel uncomfortable? We’re all mortal.” And later when she became physically limited with her own ambulation she self-restricted herself from activities which would have given her — and her friends and relatives — enjoyment and comfort. Sad.
Luckily, I have good friends who are very supportive. But among strangers out in public, I am often treated poorly. It still shocks me. And at social events where people don’t know me well, it can be rather awkward. I don’t like being “the disabled person”, I want to be seen as a human being just like everyone else.
I used to work with severely developmentally disabled children before I became disabled myself. Disability has never been something I considered a character flaw. I loved the children I worked with. Being around them was a blessing and taught me so much. When my mother became disabled with severe rheumatoid arthritis, she was in a wheelchair for nearly 20 years. During that time, I also became disabled.
I think my mother’s attitude ( she remained charming and social all those years in spite of her pain ) and the earlier examples of the children I worked with has helped me to accept my disability. I just wish other people could as well.
And my boyfriend has helped me more than I can ever say. He is the most wonderful person I have ever known. He tells me I am beautiful every day.
Beata, you are beautiful. A compassionate heart radiates beauty. A mind full of hatred, no matter how pretty the face or body, gives the lie to any pleasant impression of the person’s shape.
I love working with the patients I have, and being useful. To be of use — do good for people — is what I have to do, and I take joy in doing so. Sometimes people tell me “Oh, I couldn’t do that — it must be so hard to work with people with disability.” I get very indignant and set them straight — it is rewarding work. And I treat my patients as people, regardless of what shape or ability they have at the moment. That’s how I’d like to be treated. One’s inherent self-worth does not depend on skin color or bank balance or whether you get around in a W/C or on your own two feet or with an exo-skeleton. It’s the heart and mind which count.
One of my patients told me a really funny story (I’ll change some details for anonymity). She was having problems getting reasonable accommodation at her workplace, though the organization was subject to the requirements of the ADA. She helpfully suggested her boss use her wheelchair to go around the building, in and out of some offices, the restroom, and to and from the cafeteria. We-ell, boss-person got stuck badly in the restroom and in fact rammed the chair so hard trying to turn it around and get out that she was trapped in the stall and couldn’t get the door open enough to get out. This was before people carried cell phones everywhere, so boss-person had to wait until someone else came to the restroom and could rescue her. Perhaps I shouldn’t have roared with laughter at this story, but it was poetic justice that the person who had resisted complying with ADA regs because “it wasn’t necessary” got a taste of exactly why the buildings needed to be modified for accessibility.
Good piece from Josh Marshall telling her not to back down…
http://talkingpointsmemo.com/edblog/this-is-critical-hillary-can-t-back-down
They just can’t stop themselves from lying. Eric Trump tweeted out a fake photo of Trump’s yuuuuuge turnout at his Pensacola rally. Mark Cuban caught it and called him out.
http://theconcourse.deadspin.com/eric-trump-tweets-out-fake-photo-of-rally-1786475295
Read a piece the other day where Ivanka Trump’s bio said she graduated Summa Cum Laude, when it was exposed that there was an exaggeration on her bio, she changed bio to say she graduated Cum Laude. Just like Melania’s bio had her a college graduate but when asked to produce proof, they took her bio down. Donald says he graduated at the TOP of his class at Wharton School of Business, but no one has ever been able to verify that.
There’s something seriously wrong with people who lie when it’s not even necessary. What, would “Cum Laude” have looked bad? Why puff something up that doesn’t need puffing? I think that’s what they refer to when they call someone a pathological liar.
She inherited the characteristic, poor woman.
I guess it’s not good enough to be good, they believe they must be the best, even if they have to lie about it.
Oh, that is rich! LOL – plagiarism on so many levels – LMAO
I heard about this in the a.m., and was thrilled to see her calling out the alt-white Donnie followers. I worked during the day, and just caught a headline saying Ms. Clinton now “regrets” her statement. NOOOOO! Don’t back down! This needs to be the start of a serious offensive against the Cheetoh Hair and his Little Hand Brigade. Some are saying “insult Trump, not his followers,” which kind of makes me think of “hate the sin, love the sinner,” a phrase I despise. Donnie is nothing without his followers, a big zero, a bad joke. It is the followers who have elevated him (and I count the people who pretend to be members of our mythical free press in that category), and it is they who have to be held accountable. Let them whine and throw their temper tantrums. They just look more ridiculous, like the weak, ineffectual, unloved, sniveling, cowardly crybabies that they are.
“which kind of makes me think of “hate the sin, love the sinner,” a phrase I despise”
I’m a lesbian so that phrase hits me particularly hard since it was invented by religious right Christians to marginalize the LGBT community. The truth is they hated me and my wife and all LGBT people because we dared to love each other and our love didn’t fit their mold of what a “couple” should be or what “lovers” should look like. So we talked back and kept talking back until we finally won the argument. If you back down they win. If you confront the bigotry they lose. Hillary must confront the bigotry.
My reaction too. First thing I see this afternoon: “Hillary apologizes…” Well, no, not exactly, but nobody reads as far as the “I won’t back down” part.
She apologized for saying “half” of them are deplorable. It’s probably less she said. But now it’s a so-called “apology.” Grrrrr.
Meanwhile, CheetoHair and his little hairlets can call her any kind of garbage they want and talk about assassinating her, and that’s A-OK.
SCREEEEEEEEEEEEAM
You don’t mind if I yell along with you, do you quixote?
I didn’t think so.
Screaming shared lightens the load
(I have a dream of a day when nobody needs to scream….)
http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2016/09/basket-of-deplorables/499493/?utm_source=feed
From Coates … Great with stats
Since I heard about it I kept praying. Please God don’t let her take it back ,apologize for it or water it down. But as always it happened. Why Hillary why.
In fairness to her, she said she regrets saying “half”. It’s not as bad as walking the whole thing back but I think she was hoping it would put an end to the testeria on the part of the media. It didn’t, but the rest of us knew nothing would satisfy them.
The media is shaking with excitement at the opportunity to have another angry dialogue about race and prejudice. There is certainly room for such discussions, but it has taken up the entire campaign. I don’t think more than 20% of the so-called undecided voters have the slightest idea what the programs proposed by Hillary, or the vague policy nonsense formulated by Trump, might be. The very frustrating thing is that if this campaign ever got down to policy disagreements, Hillay would win handily, because she is on the right side of all of these, and even the majority view on most. But the media simply will not let a policy issue be discussed. This comment of Hillary’s shouldn’t really even be news, not with the election almost 50 days away, and the future of the country and planet at stake. But I remember about a month before the 2004 election, the media spent several days discussing Theresa Heinz Kerry’s mistake about whether Laura Bush had been in the workforce; and then another week or so going over John Kerry’s innocuous remark at a devate that Mary Cheney, a gay activist, was gay. And that got us the financial meltdown of 2008. Wake up, electorate!!
Bill Clinton has always said, “The other side doesn’t want to talk about issues because if the talk is about issues, we win. So they have to talk about things like character and likability.” The msm is just being complicit.
Donald is getting blasted in his Twitter feed. The revenge of the Hillary supporters is on.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CsB1TS_WAAAShwK.jpg:large
Let’s see when Trump apologies for saying “most” Americans are fewking idiots. And let’s see the MSM chastise him for saying it in the first place.
Joy Reid did not let Trump surrogates off the hook this morning on the Bondi case: http://www.msnbc.com/am-joy/watch/the-bondi-and-trump-donation-saga-continues-762239555747
https://www.change.org/p/msnbc-sign-to-have-joy-reid-co-moderate-3rd-presidential-debate-with-chris-wallace-fact-check
Joy is fabulous
Who was it who first said “Political Correctness is PC for Plain Courtesy”? I can’t remember. I use that line when somebody lets slip a glimpse of their bigotry and complains about fairness.