(h/t Black Snob)

Veteran Journalist Amy Alexander examines her time at the NAACP and describes the 100+year old organization as gradually becoming a vehicle for the NAACP President to massage their ego.

At very detailed length, Alexander describes her time as the “voice” of Jealous, writing his editorials, crafting his talking points and attempting to get him media ready. The key word is “attempting.” Many people have remarked that Jealous’ jump to erroneous conclusions on Sherrod smelled to high heaven of someone who’s not media savvy (or even regular savvy). Alexander paints an even more damning portrait — of a man in love with himself and in love with the limelight, but incapable of meeting the needs of the 101 year old, historic civil rights organization.

Amy Alexander

Rachel Maddow shows an excellent piece about the consistency of Fox News use of the “Southern Strategy” in an attempt to scare white voters by depicting blacks (and in particular POTUS Barack Obama’s administration) as somehow being “out to get them.”

At the Daily Dish, Andrew Sullivan catches some classic institutionalized racism.
Pathetic display by John Derbyshire

Derbyshire’s thoughts here…

“At some level, I’ll agree, this is not our business. North of five million people have been slaughtered in the Congo this past twelve years, and nobody much (no, not me—how about you?) has lost a wink of sleep over it … [But] the Congo is nothing to me. Israel is something to me. It’s an outpost of my civilization, organized on principles I agree with, inhabited by people I could live at ease with. They defend themselves, their borders, their interests, with the kind of vigor and thick-skinned determination I’d like to see my nation display. (If only!) I admire them and wish them well.

There’s an affinity. In some tenuous sense, they are me, and I am them. The Gazans? I’ll care about them right after I start caring about the Congo.”

Emphasis by Sullivan.

If what Derbyshire says is an accurate observation of how foreign policy should be determined by countries, isn’t obvious what will happen to as the demographic power shift occurs in this century?

Brasil is an emerging as a huge economic powerhouse with a population of 200MM and over 50% of that population people of color (who recently sided with Turkey on a few key UN votes).

Turkey already a NATO powerhouse and teetering on the edge of the Middle East and European …

More interestingly, what happens as the demographics change sharply in the United States?

General McChrystal is relieved of command it’s fascinating…

Here is the amazing Rolling Stone article about the “Runaway General”

So, I’m basically live blogging the relief of command by General McChrystal.

I don’t think that any General, (non-founder) CEO or worker should ever be so central to a company or service that they can not be replaced.

It seems like an awful lot of mission “rah rah.” Nothing major.

One of the many surprises from Tuesday’s Primary night was an unheard of black candidate winning the South Carolina Democratic nomination for Senator.

Theroot.com has begun to unwrap what many would call the strange case of Alvin Greene:

Alvin Greene, a 32-year-old, unfunded, unemployed veteran who is black and lives with his mother in Manning, S.C., ran away with the Democratic nomination for the Senate in the Palmetto State last night. In the November general election, he will face first-term GOP incumbent Sen. Jim DeMint, who many expect to seek the GOP presidential nomination in 2012.

TheRoot.com Alvin Greene

Alvin Greene himself was able to put his win into historical perspective:

Greene, who is completely unknown to Democratic officials in South Carolina or anywhere, put his win in dramatic historical perspective: ”I want to thank all my supporters for making history in South Carolina,” he told the Greenville News. ”It’s been over 100 years since a black has won the nomination of a major party to the U.S. Senate from this state.”

However, I think this says a lot about Greene’s unlikely candidacy’s ability to succeed and the lack of Democratic machinery in South Carolina.

Politico has a piece which should put to rest the idea that black voters imply vote for black candidates or democrats for that matter in a sort of blind fashion (as characterized by republicans — who amazingly never seem to worry about demographic groups like conservative christians or religious sects).

I guess it came as a belated shock that in order to win a Democratic Party Primary it helps to support Democratic policies!

Davis won only two of the 11 counties in Alabama where African-American voters are a majority and lost some counties in the rural Black Belt by huge, double-digit margins. In Lowndes County, where 70 percent of the population is black, Sparks, who is white, won by 29 points. In Perry County, with a 67 percent black population, his victory margin was 44 percent.

Sparks even bested Davis by 16 points in Davis’s home base of Jefferson County, where Birmingham is located, and Davis won just two of the 12 counties he’s represented since 2002.

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0610/38042.html

Well, low and behold African-American voters have again shown a significant margin of disapproval toward black candidates that hew to centrist positions when more liberal alternatives are available.

Salon sums it up best

Davis voted against healthcare reform in the House back in March, calculating that a “yes” vote would kill him with the Alabama general election audience of 2010. This may well have been accurate, but he forgot that he also faced a Democratic primary — and Democratic voters were none too happy to see him siding with the GOP and against Barack Obama (even if the White House was privately understanding of Davis’ vote). His years of tacking to the middle made it impossible for him to get the benefit of the doubt. Leading civil rights groups ended up backing Sparks, who is white, over Davis. When the returns came in on Tuesday night, it wasn’t even close.

In a way, it’s a fitting end. Davis built himself up at the expense of his party. Then his party got even.

Glenn Beck reaches a new low by attacking 11 year old Malia Obama — to make matters worse for Beck, this is after he had a little on air tea pity party with Sarah Palin. during the little discussion Palin complained about the “mainstream media,” which employs both herself and Mr. Beck and say that “families were off limits.”

Yet, it’s clear Beck like Limbaugh before him, are willing to attack Democrats families no matter how young, whenever convienent.

Hear Beck’s idiocy here.