"Liberal" concern trolls: Earl Ofari Hutchinson

If Earl Ofari Hutchinson is any measure, Bob "the Daily Howler" Somerby may be able to keep up the liberal concern-troll act for quite a while. In Beck Speaks for the White Majority Huffington Post 08/29/2010, Hutchinson promotes the FOX News position that Real Americans hate Obama. His pitch is pretty transpartent:

Despite the PT Barnum, con man hype, Beck speaks to the majority's unvarnished hostility to liberal Democrats, big government, the elites, Wall Street, abortion, gay rights, taxes, and obtrusive government, and most of all President Obama's policies, and him. Beck and Palin have masterfully stoked white disaffection with Obama. A July Washington Post/ABC News poll found that a bare 40 percent of whites approve of the job he's doing. This was the lowest rating among this crucial voter demographic since the start of his presidency.

There was more bad news. In rapid succession, forty-three percent of white voters strongly disapprove of the job Obama is doing, while less than 20 percent strongly approved. More than half of college-educated whites disapproved of the job he is doing, and, among white college-educated women, Obama's approval numbers dipped below 50 percent for the first time in his presidency.

The disaffection with Obama was not just from white Republicans, or even white independents. That was expected. It came from white Democrats. The racial split among Democrats was evident in the Democratic primaries. Democratic presidential foe Hilary Clinton consistently and in some states handily beat out Obama among white Democrats. The split did not evaporate with Obama's win. Conservative congressional Democrats get elected largely with white votes in conservative leaning districts and they have been the least enthusiastic about Obama's policies. [my emphasis]

What a mush of partial information and bad analysis! Here he conflates disaffection with Obama among white Democrats with support for Glenn Beck, which is just silly. The Democratic base voters most disaffected with Obama right now include many liberal Democrats who don't think Obama and the national Party are doing enough to counter the hate propaganda from clowns like Beck.

Do the majority of whites harbor "unvarnished hostility to liberal Democrats, big government, the elites, Wall Street, abortion, gay rights, taxes, and obtrusive government"? No. Are a majority of US whites Mormon fundamentalists like Beck? No. Is there a white majority who shares Beck's John Birch Society-like conspiracy theory of history? No.

But the toxic combination of bad economic conditions with the failure of the Democrats to establish a clear narrative to challenge the Republican attacks on Big Gubment are giving the Republicans who do assert such hostility a chance they don't deserve in this year's elections. But understanding that reality isn't helped by such a big exaggeration of Beck's popularity.

Tags: 2010 elections, radical right

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