On 'Barack The Magic Negro'

The Washington Post has a nice summary of 'Barack The Magic Negro', which Republican National Committee chair candidate Chip Saltsman distributed to potential supporters on a Christmas CD:

The song, written by conservative satirist Paul Shanklin and aired repeatedly on Rush Limbaugh's radio show last year, is sung in the imagined voice of the Rev. Al Sharpton to the tune of the old Peter, Paul and Mary song "Puff the Magic Dragon." It was inspired by a March 2007 column in the Los Angeles Times by David Ehrenstein, an African American writer who sought to place Mr. Obama's candidacy in the larger context of what he called "the magic Negro," an idealized figure who assuages liberal guilt and fulfills white Americans' desire for "a noble, healing Negro." Mr. Shanklin took the column and ran: "Barack the Magic Negro lives in D.C./The L.A. Times, they called him that/'Cause he's not authentic like me./Yeah, the guy from the L.A. paper/Said he makes guilty whites feel good/They'll vote for him, and not for me/Cause he's not from the 'hood."

While this AFP piece suggests that 'Barack The Magic Negro' "has triggered a nasty battle for the soul of the struggling [Republican] party," Posts Washington and Huffington both reach the same sad conclusion- Saltsman's actions may actually have helped his candidacy.

A Special Christmas Gift: Palin in 2020

I hasten to add that the gift does not come from Enduring America but from America's foremost columnist of sense and sensibility, Ms Anne Coulter:

Sarah Palin wins HUMAN EVENTS’ prestigious “Conservative of the Year” Award for 2008 for her genius at annoying all the right people. The last woman to get liberals this hot under the collar would have been … let's see now … oh, yeah: Me!

Exalting "our beauteous Sarah", our beauteous Ann spends 2000+ words saying nothing about Palin on the economy, international affairs, social issues, or even the latest Jolie-Aniston confrontation. Instead, Palin's qualifications come via the iniquities of the "left-wing" press: "discombobulated and angry", filled with "anti-religious hysteria", and "decid[ing] that a woman with children could not handle the stress of higher office".

OK, it's Ann Coulter, who could only exist as a "Legal Affairs Correspondent" or any other kind of Correspondent in the mythical polarised US of common-sense Americans fending off the evil liberals ruining the country. Still, it's quite amusing to see how Ann blurts one moment, "Who cares if Palin was qualified to be President?", and then in the next explains how Beauteous Sarah will assume that office.

She will do so by "becoming older and wiser", "being a good governor, tending to her children so none of them turn out like Ron Reagan Jr., and reading everything Phyllis Schlafly, Thomas Sowell, [and] Ronald Reagan have ever written:

Democrats may have a fleet of women politicians, but they don’t have a deep bench of attractive ones.

Thanks, Ann, for the Greatest Gift of All. Reading this supposed formula for Republican success, I'll sleep a little sounder tonight thinking that the GOP implosion 0f 2008 --- with all its humourous fallout --- may be with us for just a while longer.

Maybe even until 2020.

A Farewell Song for George Bush: "What You Doin' Standin' Around?"

This man on his own could fill a Top Ten list of good-bye music for our 43rd President, but the pertinence of this song's message makes it our 4th nomination:

[youtube]http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=XR80U_DQwFE[/youtube]

See all the Farewell Song contest entrants

Why We Love Conservapedia: Converting Liberals Through Death

Our favourite on-line encyclopedia continues to give us joy with its detailed examination of "Why Do Non-Conservatives Exist?"

The Conservapedia team has now added the scientific study "What Triggers Reconsideration of Liberal Beliefs?" Not quite sure of the methodology, apart from "making up a lot of numbers", but apparently 15% find the conservative light with the "loss of a loved one that resulted from accepting or promoting liberal values, as in losing a loved one to crime caused by pornography, drug addiction, gambling, etc."



Those dramatic findings in full:

• 25%: raising or teaching children, and realizing how destructive liberal values are to many of them


• 20%: a religious conversion followed by taking the Bible to heart


• 15%: a loss of a loved one that resulted from accepting or promoting liberal values, as in losing a loved one to crime caused by pornography, drug addiction, gambling, etc.


• 10%: a new friendship with someone who is conservative, and realizing how much good flows from the conservative values^[1]


• 10%: simply by maturing and seeing liberalism's impact around them, and realizing what they were taught as youth was wrong


• 10%: a desire to learn the truth, and a dislike for those who mislead


• 5%: using conservative values to overcome an addiction, and then realizing the benefits of conservative values in many other ways


• 5%: taking a truthful course in economics, or learning it in the workforce^[2]

Sports Story of the Year: Keeping the Gays Out of the Olympics

Growing up in Alabama, I have been a long-time fan of the Mississippi-based American Family Association, which keeps America pure in politics and culture.

One of the AFA's valuable missions is to ensure that homosexuals do not take over the term "gay", sucking all the happiness out of the word. In pursuit of this mission, they brought in an AutoReplace computer to make the necessary changes.

Thus, when top American sprinter Tyson Gay qualified for the 100 metres at the Beijing Olympics, the AFA ensured he was entered under the correct name:





And this was far from the only instance of AFA's moral revision of dangerous surnames. In fact, throughout the run-up to the Olympics, you might say the organisation had a bit of a fixation with Tyson Homosexual:



Unfortunately for political humourists, the AFA has censored its own computer, restoring Tyson Gay and names like professional basketball player Rudy Gay to their legal names.

Still unclear, however, how my Mississippi protectors would handle the dangerous combination of sexual deviance and alcohol consumption in a story about the late professional golfer Gay Brewer.