U.S. Senate
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(D) J. Hickenlooper*
(R) Somebody
80%
20%
Governor
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(D) Michael Bennet
(D) Phil Weiser
60%↑
50%↓
Att. General
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(D) M. Dougherty
(D) Jena Griswold
60%↑
40%↑
Sec. of State
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(D) A. Gonzalez
(D) J. Danielson
(R) Sheri Davis
50%
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30%
State Treasurer
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(D) Brianna Titone
(D) Jeff Bridges
(R) Kevin Grantham
40%
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30%
CO-01 (Denver)
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(D) Diana DeGette*
(R) Somebody
90%
2%
CO-02 (Boulder-ish)
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(D) Joe Neguse*
(R) Somebody
90%
2%
CO-03 (West & Southern CO)
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(R) Jeff Hurd*
(D) Somebody
80%
40%
CO-04 (Northeast-ish Colorado)
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(R) Lauren Boebert*
(D) Somebody
90%
10%
CO-05 (Colorado Springs)
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(R) Jeff Crank*
(D) Somebody
80%
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CO-06 (Aurora)
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(D) Jason Crow*
(R) Somebody
90%
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CO-07 (Jefferson County)
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(D) B. Pettersen*
(R) Somebody
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10%
CO-08 (Northern Colo.)
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(R) Gabe Evans*
(D) Manny Rutinel
(D) Yadira Caraveo
45%↓
40%↑
30%
State Senate Majority
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DEMOCRATS
REPUBLICANS
80%
20%
State House Majority
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DEMOCRATS
REPUBLICANS
95%
5%
February 28, 2009 10:48 PM UTC
50 Comments
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Hey, I’m 55, I’ve served in the Army, I have “black*” blood relatives.
I know that chicken jokes and watermelon jokes are offensive. I know that.
I just don’t understand why.
Jokes about chitterlings or double-wide trailers have condescension built in, based on bigotry against the poor. They are cheaper substitutes for what the middle Class enjoys.
But I eat as much chicken as most folks, and would eat a lot more watermelon if only I bothered to buy it. Koreans relish it.
What’s the inherent offense ?
Does it represent some special icon in black culture ?
* – “Black” is in quotes when referring to my mixed race relatives because that is a label imposed by others.
They see themselves as mixed-race. They love their black family and their Caucasian family and embrace both. My children can be Caucasian if that’s how they choose to self-identify. Many people tell them that they’re Asian. Well, who gets to decide ? They do. Not me, and not you.
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Barron, I grew up in the deep south in the ’50’s. This slur makes me, a WASP, cringe. I hesitate to explain the offense, but here is it in a nutshell:
The full article can be found here:
http://www.poynter.org/column….
Hopefully one day, it will lose its power to hurt others. But we’re not quite there yet.
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I grew up a Navy brat,
and then served on active duty.
I think of it as the opposite of segregation, where integration was no longer being forced in the military,
it was just an accepted part of the institutional culture.
Living on an Air Force base in England in 1968, it would never have occurred to me to think less of a classmate for having dark skin. My Dad’s favorite subordinate was a Black Air Force Captain, who went on to earn LTG rank.
Later that same year I moved to Colorado Springs, and there were “race wars” at Mitchell High School.
At the time, I didn’t get it.
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I hope one day that we all can be color blind as you are. It really is a blessing.
Prejudice, of any kind, impairs our judgement. Knowledge, accompanied by understanding, sets us free.
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I’m as bigoted as the next guy.
Not quite sure how I misled you into thinking that.
I know enough to be embarrassed by it, and to try to overcome and compensate for my racial bigotry, but its still there. It has erupted, under extreme stress, in behavior that I wish I could either make amends for or forget.
Its a part of me.
Some of you here might have a very different opinion of me if you had seen me at my worst.
…….
I was just trying to explain why I didn’t understand that particular insult.
The military environment doesn’t prevent one from developing prejudices; it just helps teach people how sensible and useful they are in dealing with specific individuals. Not at all.
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I make no claim of being colorblind either. But your post above, viewed from the perspective of a fourth generation Georgian, sounded pretty colorblind to me. It is something to aspire to.
But I appreciate your honesty.
A good oil, medium sized, hanging in what was my sister’s bedroom.
Like memories of segregation or the holocaust, I don’t think we should – pardon the word choice – whitewash our ugly past.
My hesitation was due to the fear of perpetuating the (apparently fading) stereotype. But as you rightly suggest, remembering the horrors of segregation and the holocaust are necessary so that future generations realize that this cannot be excused, tolerated or ignored.
Perhaps the excesses in the past two weeks of blatant bigotry will awaken a sleeping giant.
Steve Harvey’s essays have been very enlightening and should serve as a guide for all of us to respond to all such occurances.
The way you nailed the troll “Kevin Jones” was priceless. Thanks for policing the neighborhood 😉
Two more points.
My best friend, a black man, won’t eat watermelon because of the stereotyping. A shame.
I just finished reading Joseph Conrad’s famous The Nigger of the Narcissus. Written about 100 years ago it was interesting to see that the 21st century “n-word” was never used as perjorative. It was a simple statement of identification because of color of skin.
I beleive, and have stated here, that the values assigned to words are the result of the culture, not some inherent, inseperable reaction as a result of those values. While the word nigger has a long history of being associated with strong prejucide and hate, there is also a long history of it being an adjective without value assigned.
I just hope Obama is never offered watermelon at a picnic. The racists would never let that one go. Maybe my friend is right.
as does sinister (left). Thus the innocuous root of yet another prejudice. I learned that last week when I caught a terrific movie on cable – Denzel Washington’s “The Great Debaters”. It was very moving.
derivative of the Latin “niger” for “black.” With the use of definition of a skin color or race, it moved from adjective to noun.
many hispanics living in the United States have adapted by using the word “moreno,” which means “dark complected,” instead of “negro,” which means “black,” to refer to African Americans. Before I had seen anyone else doing it, I had suggested it to me wife: Saying “negro” (pronounced “nay-gro”) in public in obvious reference to an African American is just too inviting of misinterpretation.
Wonder how that came about.
Thanks for that observation.
Found the wiki page for Moreno. Very fascinating — it’s equivalent to referring to someone as a brunette. And it is a popular surname.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/M…
Moreno is a pretty common last name. A lot more common that “Guero.” 🙂
I seemed to have read only the header the first time around, a week or so ago.
In Mexico, “Moreno” means considerably darker than “brunette” (it would start to apply to a somewhat dark-skinned mestiza, and continue to apply to ever darker complexions from there), though when I was studying Spanish in the U.S., one textbook did seem to indicate that it could apply merely to brunettes. I’ve never seen it used to refer to a brunette, but I could imagine it in Hispanic countries with a high proportion of European blood (particularly, of course, Spain itself).
Anyway, just an FYI.
is the point. You and everyone else, including the supposedly innocent mayor. So,whatever the reason or lack thereof for the stereotype in the first place, clearly this was meant as a racial stereotype based insulting joke: No more Easter Egg roll because the darkies in the White House will use the lawn for a watermelon patch. If not that, what?
When are these idiots going to figure out that all their cute little e-mails will be made public? The mayor is certainly not clueless in the way he pretends to be. He’s just plain dumb as a post.
As for who gets to decide, it’s never that simple. Plenty of European Jews whose parents had converted to Christianity found out the answer to that question during WWII. If it ever gets to be that simple it certainly won’t be because of the current crop of Republican bozo e-mailers.
There can’t be anyone in the country that doesn’t know this is an insult to blacks. To send it to a black businesswoman suggests a disconnect with reality that is frankly mind-boggling when connected with an elected official.
It would be nice to get past where this sort of thing doesn’t matter, but you’re right that it’s not simple. And sadly it won’t be in our lifetimes.
much as harrydoby pointed out above.
From a cultural studies web site:
Images of smiling black people with watermelons appeared in advertisements or as trinkets, and became the fodder of blackface minstrel shows.
But it wasn’t from mouse clicks.
Help me out here, Barron.
You’re defending this with the so-called “ignorance” defense?
You’re going to have to do better than that.
In fact, if you are defending this at all, no matter what the defense, you are as wrong as wrong can be.
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I got the message on the 6th post below.
I don’t mean to defend the watermelon cartoon, if that’s what you’re asking.
Most everyone knows, including me, that is hurtful and offensive. I just didn’t understand why it was so hurtful.
I got my explanation.
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That’s clear.
“free” federal bailout watermelon?
I was counting on it for the big family picnic in June.
Are you actually following in the footsteps of the Los Alamitos mayor? Are you making yet another Obama watermelon joke?
Kind of surprised the winner wasn’t Joe(not) the Plumber(not). Yeah, watermelon joke e-mails, enraging Hispanics and their great line-up of preliminary 2012 candidate picks are making me shiver in my Dem boots. Oooh, just look at the crossover appeal. Wait…there isn’t any.
http://www.politico.com/news/s…
Motto: “This is the best we’ve got. Really.”
What a crappy field. It really shows how the wing-nuts control the party when Ron Paul gets 13% and Charlie Crist and Tim Pawlenty don’t even get on the radar.
What a joke.
The fact that he’s been giving statements indicating that he’s considering running shows how low the Republican Party has fallen.
If Romney WANTS the nomination in four years. If Obama remains popular, there will be many Rs who probably will rather wait until 2016. That’s assuming Obama remains popular, but for arguments’ sake…
I think Mitch McConnell had it right when he said the meeting was the Republican Party’s equivalent of college “spring break”. A lot of irresponsible behavior goes on there.
it all will be all over the media at the speed of light. If this is the face they want to present, fine with me. First there was Sarah Palin, then Jindal’s speech, now this. They’re going to put some SNL writers out of a job since the straight transcripts don’t require any exaggeration to get laughs.
I can see how this works for Rush. He gets the same listening audience regardless. Can see how it works for members of congress in conservative districts who only care about hanging on to the perks of a congressional seat But how does it work for the rest of GOP? The ones who would actually like to return their party to power some day?
say that they are dissatisfied with their possible 2012 presidential candidates, that should tell everyone what they believe their prospects are in keeping the R Party from total collapse. And when 52 percent of the CPAC voters are college students, it shows the world what kind of leadership their party has.
And speaking of continuing incompetent leadership, I wonder if Wadhams could tell us what happened to CPAC’s 2006 presidential straw poll winner, George Allen.
If turning the white house lawn into a watermelon patch isn’t supposed to be a racial stereotype, what is the point of the joke supposed to be? What is the watermelon patch the punch line of?
that mayor knew. He would not have even thought it interesting if he did not get the bigotry.
that seems to go beyond “mere” racism. He sent this email to a black local businesswoman! Sure, she was on some email list of his, but he had to know that she was on the email list. I’m really not quite sure what to make of it. Even if, incredibly, he somehow thought that it was innocent fun that wouldn’t offend an African American, that degree of stupidity deserves to be rewarded with removal from office in any case.
Where do these people come from?!
such a surreal place…