The pig line was a brilliant use of "reverse code words"

[Hokie]

It dawned on me tonight that Obama intentionally used the "pig line" to show how code word racism works. It is brilliant. Palin has been using the code words "community organizer" for "uppity n----" in every speech. Obama just showed them how the game is played. That is why the McCain crowd is howling like stuck pigs. They just got stuck with a big one. Obama can say he never was talking about Palin when he knew exactly how this would be taken. I hope he uses this line again and again.

[flamingdem]

1. I agree. Obama can deliver this and more, he's warming up! nt

[AzNick]

2. Reminds me of the bully who kept coming at me until I sent him to the hospital.

Of course I was the bad one in the mind of the teachers, but nobody ever bullied me.

For those who wonder, I threw a ping pong pad at his face.

[Xipe Totec]

14. Sometimes you just have to do it.

I stabbed a bully in 6th grade with a #2 pencil.

He had to go to the hospital to get it removed from his stomach.

The only thing that saved me from being expelled was that the kid was half a foot taller and two years older than me.

I never did get bullied again.

[knixphan]

17. damn right you didn't!

[napi21]

3. I know nothing about code words, but IMO, Sarah opened the door to

"animals" when she said she was a "Pitbull with lipstick"! Well, dear girl, if you feel comfortable being a bulldog, you damn better feel comfortable being a pig!

[madmom]

9. Pitbulls don't need to be pampered!

[progdonkey]

4. eh, I think you're reading too much into that...

I didn't see any racial intent behind the community organizer lines. I saw it as just an attempt to belittle his record against Palin's being a mayor, knowing that a Republican crowd--to whom "public service" means "the public serves us"--would have no clue what a community organizer actually does.

And the pig line is a very, very common idiomatic expression that's been used for years by others (including McCain about Hillary) and by Obama himself.

It's all just a little throwaway line that Republicans have latched on to because they're just that desperate--in the same articles, they've been saying that Obama also insulted McCain by calling him a fish! (He said, "You can wrap an old fish in a piece of paper called 'change.' It's still going to stink." The idea of wrapping a fish in a piece of paper is apparently something that Obama came up with on his own.)

It's just pure desperation; trying to give it some deeper meaning actually helps the Republicans, because it legitimizes it as a valid topic of conversation. There's just no there there.

[Hokie]

6. Believe me, "community organizer" was the chosen code word

That is why it was such a big hit in Palin's speech. Who is the most famous "community organizer" of our time? Why MLK of course. They hated him for the same reasons.

[backscatter712]

7. I definitely heard that dog whistle.

Trust me. Their definition for "community organizer" is "n****r activist making ghetto n****rs all uppity."

The rethugs are absolute scum.

[Hokie]

8. I am white and I could figure out what Palin meant

I think it is obvious when they use the words "community organizer" in a negative sense exactly what they mean.

[backscatter712]

13. The problem with dog-whistling is that people are getting wise to it.

Once you figure out the tricks, it's pretty obvious.

[progdonkey]

12. I guess I should be glad that I don't hear that particular whistle...

Like when there was that quote running around by Palin saying "so Sambo beat the bitch!" I had to look "sambo" up in the dictionary, and when I told the quote to my sister, she also said, "Sambo?"

[FatDave]

18. Interesting.

Just out of curiosity, how old are you? I'm 38, and I can remember the book from which that term derives being around in my childhood. They had it in the waiting room of my doctor's office. They also had ashtrays.

[dmr]

20. I had to explain it to my teenage son & his friends. In a way,

maybe it's a good sign they didn't know what it meant. She is a disgrace if she spoke those words - most especially in public.

How I wish we could all treat each other with dignity.

[FatDave]

21. Oh, it's definitely a good sign.

I'm glad that shit's dying out. I'm amazed it was still acceptable as recently as the mid 70's.

[dmr]

23. Ever watch 'All In The Family'?

It was the 70s and it was true to form. At least it was in the area of Michigan I was raised in. I hate bigotry. With a purple passion, I hate it, and will not stand for it. I would have taken Palin to task if she spoke those words within my earshot. 'Course she'd probably have me 'disappeared' out in the wilderness somewhere. < sigh >

[FatDave]

26. I did.

I think Meathead might have been an early role model for me. :D

[progdonkey]

22. 26, almost 27...

But I also grew up in Indonesia as a Foreign Service brat, so on a lot of "hidden America" sort of things, I'm pretty clueless. For instance, the first time I heard the word "nigger" was in Civil War documentaries and the movie "Glory" (my dad went through a big Civil War history phase in the late 80s :P), so I honestly thought it was just a slang word for blacks (rude, but not "run and hide" bad) and didn't learn until a bit later just how bad it was. Plus, there weren't that many black Americans there (I think I met a total of 10 the entire time I was there--from first grade until I graduated high school!), and since I was always hanging out with the kids of other American diplomats as well as those of foreign diplomats, I didn't really hear a lot of ethnic slurs, let alone hear them directed at people.

[CarbonDate]

25. I'm 30, and I had to look it up.

Not that I didn't get the gist... I just didn't readily understand the reference.

[FatDave]

27. I remember there being an effort to clean that kind of stuff up when I was still pretty young.

Like under 10. I don't remember anything official about it (though there may have been, I was a lot more interested in Star Wars than the evening news) but I remember grownups talking about it in somewhat hushed tones.

I hope there's people preserving the racist crap of our past. I'm pretty sure there are. I don't mind it being tucked away out of the mainstream, but I'd like to be able to once in awhile say "don't forget, there was a time when this shit was acceptable."

[Retrograde]

15. just like she uses "San Francisco" in her speeches

and we know what kind of people live there!

[backscatter712]

19. Bingo!

Their dog whistles must not be working - WE CAN HEAR THEM!!!

[Pachamama]

29. Yep, San Francisco is the code word for "Gays" and those awful "Liberals"

:eyes:

[janet118]

33. If the paper fits . . . n/t

[Neshanic]

5. It was. I love it.

[Ashy Larry]

10. I don't think so.

I've heard that line many times before from many different people. It's an old saying. I think Obama was just making the point that the republicans are putting a piece of shit in jewelry box and calling it a diamond. Obama is more concerned about McCain co-opting the 'change' message than the use of racial codes. People who respond to that stuff would never vote for him anyway.

[Hokie]

11. That too. Thus the brilliance of this..

Two meanings. Attack John McCain directly and throw the use of code words right back in HER face.

[Citizen Kang]

16. Chicago Politics

You don't just succeed in Chicago Politics without getting a little dirty. Obama knows what he is doing.

[Raine]

24. "BRILLIANT" is the word for it ...

I hadn't thought about it but that is genius, now they can get a taste of their own medicine. :thumbsup: :evilgrin:

[lamp_shade]

28. Somebody on some news show last night said "Obama should

have given it more thought before making that statement. I'm pretty sure he did... yea... pretty sure.

[wicket]

30. "howling like stuck pigs"

LOVE IT!!!! :rofl: :rofl: :rofl:

[Hokie]

31. See how this playing?

McCain whining like a stuck pig and the media is playing his own pig remark. I hope Obama keeps using this line.

[Honeycombe8]

35. Obama loses every time the news mentions Palin. He will not be using that line again. nt

[annabanana]

32. nope... It's a very old established expression that was ONLY

ever used to mean trying to dress up something (ANYTHING - a policy, a plan, anything) deficient so it could pass muster long enough to get in the door.

[Honeycombe8]

34. I think he just used a common-man expression, and one that McCain used before, to describe what he

said it described.

I don't think Obama had any ulterior motive. I think it was as simple as it seems, and the McCain camp is jumping on it so as to keep Palin's name in the headlines. That's all.

Why do I think this? I saw Obama's person on Morning Joe discussing this lipstick pig comment. She was pretty ticked that this subject was being discussed at all. It's NOT what the Obama campaign wants to be talking about.

ANY time the news is about Palin, for whatever reason, the Obama campaign loses that day.

[TexasObserver]

36. Agreed. Here's another to consider.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=132x7011531

Anything that is suggestive of "speaking in tongues" will draw attention to that aspect of the governor's life.

[Zombie2]

37. Of course!

"GET UP... GO GET EM!" ~ Joe Biden 09/08/2008