A Mitt Romney supporter has decided to express his disdain for President Obama with blatant racism. Morgan Hill, California resident Blake la Beck placed an empty chair atop his front yard fence, then added two watermelons and a noose, with a sign fashioned to look like a teleprompter, reading, “Go Back To Kenya you idiot” nearby, to show his hatred of President Obama and his support for Mitt Romney. There’s a pro-Romney sign just feet away.
Susan Shirley, also of Morgan Hill, was so upset, she took the above photo and posted it to Facebook with this comment:
Sorry to bum you out on a Sunday, but blatant racism thrives in my beautiful town of Morgan Hill, Ca. Driving down a road between Morgan Hill and San Martin, we spotted some Romney signs, then a chair. Amusing. Then we noticed the watermelons on the chair. Disgusting. Finally we noticed the noose hanging over the side of the chair. Horrifying. Freedom of speech? Absolutely. Freedom for people to share this picture with everyone they know to point out the ominous side of the conservative party-PLEASE.
Writing of the racist exhibit, Greg Mitchell at The Nation says “this is not to say that most Romney backers are out and out racists. But it would be nice if the media, belatedly, explored the remaining strength of Birtherism—and what it reveals. Mitchell has a few more thoughts:
Despite the blatant racism on display at various Birther and Tea Party rallies—at protests embraced by many in the GOP and Fox News—we have often been told that the numbers of such adherents is very, very low. Or even, that racism is dead in America since, as Will Cain of The Blaze told Bill Maher last Friday with a straight face, the US elected a black president.
On the other hand, how do you explain that Birtherism was never a “fringe†faction within the GOP? In fact, all manner of polls have shown that actually at least half of Republicans embrace or once embraced the meme that Obama was not born in America. The latest poll I saw still pegged that “fringe†at an unhealthy 40 percent of all Republicans.
One of the great mainstream media fails of the past two years, right up to the GOP convention, was ignoring Birtherism as a near-majority view in the modern GOP—and refusing to probe what that means.
The Huffington Post adds:
California’s KTVU reports that the display was first brought to their attention by a community resident who posted an image of the arrangement to Facebook. The station has since interviewed property owner Blake la Beck, who declined to comment, but claimed the display speaks for itself.
The controversial spectacle resembles similar ones put up last month. In both Texasand Virginia, homeowners “lynched” empty chairs in their front yards alongside anti-Obama messages, drawing criticism and calls of racism from their communities.
Racist rhetoric has also emerged this election season in more direct attacks on the Obama campaign. Last week, a vandal spray-painted the words “Muslim Lier”(intended to be “Liar”) on a large banner outside a campaign office in Des Moines, Iowa.