Well, this is your unsupported assertion, anyway. I know you are old enough to remember Clinton, and how much conservatives disliked him and his attempt to change our healthcare system. Now we don't like Obama's attempts to do the same, and you think it's more reasonable to play the race card than to just figure that the half of the country than didn't want these changes under Clinton still doesn't want them? It's unreasonable and uncharitable towards your fellow citizens.

To get to your position, one would have to conclude that the people who didn't want this kind of health policy under Clinton are now somehow okay with it, but hate Obama because he's black. Please, step back a little from the political divide that we're experiencing in this country and give your fellow Americans a break.

Furthermore, you can almost disprove your assertion mathematically. Obama captured over half the popular vote, which would imply that more than half the country doesn't have a problem with his race (in fact, I'd guess only a very small fraction does). Now his approval rating is below 50%, his disapproval is above 50%, and opposition to Democratic health care reform is over 50%. Clearly, some Obama voters are no longer pleased with him, and don't want this bill. You have to account for that change somehow, and it can't be that we've got millions of hardcore racists in America who just woke up and realized that he's black.

And regarding any jackhole racists who show up to tea party rallies: There are jackhole liberals, too. They're all over the Daily Kos. They don't define either party.

Even more vile was the protest sign saying a gun might be necessary to stop the health care bill.

Here is the sign in all its violent glory.

If you don't think a good part of the tea party vitriol is about race, either you haven't been paying attention or don't know how to identify when race is a factor. Sorry, you can't tell me someone who has no steeping in the history of racism and how it works suddenly has his thumb on the pulse of social intricacies involving the thing and can identify when racism is present more than someone who has lived as the target of it or someone who has had a formal education on it.

It's like listening to Helen Keller give a critique on Mickey Mantle's batting swing. Sure you listen out of politeness but at some point you have to remind Keller that she's deaf and blind, has never batted against a pitcher, has never watched or heard a baseball game, and for those reasons her perception amounts to horsesh*t and should be taken as seriously as Mantle telling her how to get along in life while being deaf and blind.

Ahhhh so racism is an imperfection...like a hangnail or a 3rd nipple or a club foot...

I'm sorry. If you have racist tendencies, you're not a decent person. You're a scumbag. Being racist is a choice. Like being a Republican or a Scientologist. It's not genetic like being blond or having a high hairline.

Those statistics are questionable. Americans support the current health care reform bill, depending on the polls. They also like Obama about as much as they did Reagan in his second year in office. The only thing that the polls are clear on is America's distaste for the Republican and Democrat parties. And it's the most clear on their distaste specifically for Republicans.

Second, voting for Obama is not like asking Jesus for forgiveness. It does not automatically make a person "not a racist." I'm reminded of the FiveThirtyEight story back in October 2008:

I've been saying that Obama's race is a strong (possibly the strongest) thread uniting Tea Partiers for close to a year now, so this type of story isn't super surprising for me. However, it is to the point where denying the racism in the Tea Party movement is right about on par to denying evolution or global warming.

Yeah, the "true color" (note the singular) of the Tea Party is white.

It's like an economic Stockholm Syndrome. Maybe these working-class morons think that suddenly they'll become high-wage earners, and so must hedge against that eventuality that'll happen any day now (not aware of the economic forces keeping them right where they are).

Conversely,

conservative + "n-word" = racist motherf*cker

O wow, a threat that equates Republicans and Tea Partiers to racists, this is pretty unique.

I really don't think a democrat would need to put forth any form of policy, liberal or no, to engender this type of reaction any more. A saddening number of my relatives are people like this. Even a thought of anyone being elected to a governmental office who isn't specifically a conservative protestant republican is enough to get them spitting bile and propaganda.

I had a similar thought while reading through a big puff piece on Obama and the bill in today's NY Times. They're treating it like he's gotten a national healthcare system through the pipeline instead of what amounts to a long-term cementing of private insurance's primary role in healthcare finance. This is not a bill that's hostile to industry players.

I don't think anyone spent tens of millions of government dollars trying to prove made-up accusations about Bush, but they did that for Clinton. Much of the criticism of Bush - the propaganda in the run-up to the war and after it, to the tune of $200 million a year is just one example - was factual. It's hard to compare grass roots name-calling to organized propaganda campaigns falsely accusing Clinton of embezzlement and murder, and Kerry of cowardice.

Put another way, the Democrats have no contributed nearly as much to the tactics of modern political propaganda as the Republicans.

I said the bulk of the anger is based on race. The leaders of these Tea Parties are racist, because they are purposely taking advantage of race to build bigger rallies. The rallies have swelled in size because they are filled with bigots. I am old enough to remember Bill and Hillary's healthcare reform losing. And what we see today is different. It's not healthcare that is driving the anger filled rallies. It's the black socialist muslim. Clinton healthcare failed because of the issues. The issues are no longer even being talked about today.

The problem is, what the clinton were trying to avoid is what is happening today in healthcare. Its getting worse, and there are far more people that would support Obama's plan now than there were in in the 90's. But that has been muddled by the racial divide.

What I'm saying is that the Tea Party leadership, if wanted to be taken serious, needs to emphatically admonish the behavior of a lot of their members. It's all wink-wink, nudge-nudge right now. And this is unacceptable.

But they are afraid that if they get rid of that continent, they will no longer have a base to fight Obama with. And if that is what they need, then their ideas lack merit.

I'm not saying that being against the bill makes you or anyone else a racist. I'm saying that there are much fewer of you that are against it if race is taken out of the equation.

I think that there is a pretty big distinction between Republicans and Tea Partiers. It is possible to be a reasonable Republican or Democrat. I have yet to meet a reasonable Tea Partier.

Well, we agree on this, at least. All unacceptable behavior should be denounced, period. And I have no idea whether the leaders (such as they are - it's a disorganized movement, as I understand it) of the Tea Party movement have done so. Possibly some have.

I've always wanted to hear terrorism and the targeting of civilians denounced far more widely by leaders in the muslim community, as well.

Without the kinds of admonishments you're calling for, it's often hard to figure out how widely held some disgusting views are within groups that one doesn't belong to.

I still agree...I could even write it for the Tea Party spokesperson:

"Regarding reports that some in attendance at our rallies have used racist terms and other epithets, we condemn this behavior entirely. It is beneath contempt, and it has no place in our movement. Frankly, I wish any people who want to engage in hate-filled speech rather than a civil, peaceful political demonstration would crawl back into their holes. "

Converse of 'if p then q' is defined as 'if not q then not p'.
Converse of a converse is the original statement.
Now don't use this term anymore, it gives me a headache.

That's not really the equivalent, at all. First, it infers that muslim leaders have not denounced terrorism, which is not true. Second, leaders of any church should not have to answer for the actions by extremists that are not members of their church.

But the Tea Party is a political movement that may become an actual political party. When their rallies are continually filled with bigotry, they have far more responsibility to address it if they want to be taken seriously.

It's a pretty ugly comparison, and one I don't think you wanted to make.