CT Blue

Indiana is not a very enlightened state, but it leads the nation in one respect: robocalls are illegal. If you want to spread slime, you have to hire real people to do it. The only trouble is that real people, even the poorly paid folks who really need the money they make in what must be a horrible line of work, have consciences, and there’s only so far you can push them:

Some three dozen workers at a telemarketing call center in Indiana walked off the job rather than read an incendiary McCain campaign script attacking Barack Obama, according to two workers at the center and one of their parents.

Nina Williams, a stay-at-home mom in Lake County, Indiana, tells us that her daughter recently called her from her job at the center, upset that she had been asked to read a script attacking Obama for being “dangerously weak on crime,” “coddling criminals,” and for voting against “protecting children from danger.”

Williams’ daughter told her that up to 40 of her co-workers had refused to read the script, and had left the call center after supervisors told them that they would have to either read the call or leave, Williams says. The call center is called Americall, and it’s located in Hobart, IN.

…

“We were asked to read something saying [Obama and Democrats] were against protecting children from danger,” this worker said. “I wouldn’t do it. A lot of people left. They thought it was disgusting.”

This worker, too, confirmed sacrificing pay to walk out, saying her supervisor told her: “If you don’t wanna phone it you can just go home for the day.”

…

Representatives at Americall in Indiana, and at the company’s corporate headquarters in Naperville, Illinois, didn’t return calls for comment.

Obama should give these people an all expense paid trip to the Inaugural ball.

Frankly, I’m getting tired of reading about the election campaign. It’s actually beginning to look like opinions have hardened. Unless modern day polling techniques have gone off the rails, or the Republicans manage to steal it again, Barack Obama will be the next president. All we have to do is endure another week or so of ever more desperate and vile campaign tactics from McCain. Those tactics are becoming ever harder to take, as it becomes increasingly clear that the net effect will most likely be not a McCain victory, but a hardening of attitudes among the morons who populate the Neanderthal wing of the Republican party. At this point I just can’t get excited about discussing the latest McCain atrocity, like the disturbed young McCain campaign worker who tried to ignite racial tensions in order to get her man elected. I just want it over.

So it’s helpful to pause a bit, even now, to consider what’s happening. Our country has been so near destroyed by the Bush regime that it’s difficult for us to remember that our country has strengths that even Bush couldn’t destroy. Indeed, there are social trends that proceed apace, despite the best efforts of the Republicans to retard them. Keith Richburg, a black reporter for the Washington Post, recently penned a column for the Guardian, and he makes some interesting observations. He is stationed in Europe, and points out that an Obama could not happen there:

..[I]t’s difficult, if not impossible, to imagine a Barack Obama emerging in Europe soon.

One reason is that Europeans for the most part do not talk about race and race relations as openly as we do. In America, we wallow in it. We self-analyse and form committees, workshops and seminars to talk about it. There are countless organisations and associations dedicated to racial issues. Bookshops stack shelves talking about our racial history and problems. We take measurements of pretty much everything, from black student school test scores to minority living standards.

…

A year ago, no one here would have predicted that a black candidate would become the nominee of a major party and have a more than realistic chance of winning the White House on 4 November. And it’s a testament to Obama’s considerable skill that he has largely managed to make his race an afterthought. America is on the verge of something historic and it almost seems anticlimactic.

But black Americans are still pinching themselves, still not quite able to believe what has been achieved. And all Americans should pause from the heated political rhetoric and reflect on the sense of accomplishment, win or lose, that his candidacy represents – an affirmation of that American ideal.

It is worth remembering that, for every voter that refuses to vote for Obama because of his race, there are many for whom it truly is an afterthought, or, for that matter, a small bonus. I’m certainly not voting for Obama because of his race, but I’m glad our highly qualified candidate happens to be black. That’s one more landmark reached in our 400 year old struggle against racism. I never thought it would happen in my lifetime, and now it looks like it will. Thats something to think about and savor as we endure the foulness of the final days.