Rangel-Obama 08!

Damon W. Root | November 4, 2008

Embattled rent control crook and English Only-tax evader Rep. Charlie Rangel (D-N.Y.) is playing host to a massive election night party outside the Adam Clayton Powell State Office Building on 125th Street tonight in Harlem. I'd try estimating the size of the turnout, but it was really too damned crowded to tell. The main focus was the jumbo TV erected at the side of the plaza, but there was also a stage where Rangel and other bigwigs piped up periodically to address the crowd.

To call the mood celebratory would be a serious understatement. This is a crowd steeped in the historical importance of the moment, quite conscious that they're gathered in America's most famous black neighborhood to watch the election of America's first black president. That's something every classical liberal should appreciate. When it comes to state-sanctioned violence and oppression—including restrictions on such fundamentals as the right to own property and the right to keep and bear arms—African Americans have suffered the very worst that government has to offer. That's not to say that the coming Obama adminstration is going to be very good for individual liberty, but his election represents a victory for classical liberalism nonetheless.

Here are some of the photos I shot. 

You can't quite tell, but Charlie Rangel was wearing one damn fine bowtie.

This following image, or versions of it, were everywhere, even on the podium above. Just who's running for president, anyway? Isn't the dude on the left getting top billing?

Here's the free market in action, even in Obama's America!

Here's one of the capitalists selling the above pins.

No comment.

On a final, unsettling note, here's overlord Chris Matthews, overseeing all from the jumbotron.

Comments

Where\'s Godwin when you need |11.4.08 @ 10:16PM|#

his election represents a victory for classical liberalism nonetheless

|11.4.08 @ 10:19PM|#

Are you sure this party is not being assembled to watch Ambassador Keyes' results from California come in?

SIV|11.4.08 @ 10:20PM|#

Fuckin' Frogs!

Joel Leggett|11.4.08 @ 10:22PM|#

Obama's"election represents a victory for classical liberalism nonetheless." The man is a socialist that publicly extols the virtues of wealth redistribution. Do you even know what a classical liberal is?!?!?!?!???? Was this statement actually made here at reason magazine?????

Welcome to the new Orwellian America where even so-called-Libertarians see the election of a socialist as a victory for classical liberalism.

|11.4.08 @ 10:25PM|#

So, for the next 8 years, any time Obama does anything I don't like, I am supposed append to my criticism, "...but it is still great that he's black!"

Barack Obama|11.4.08 @ 10:27PM|#

I would like to thank George W. Bush for his support these past eight years. I would not be here without you.

Ironic|11.4.08 @ 10:30PM|#

"When it comes to state-sanctioned violence and oppression-including restrictions on such fundamentals as the right to own property and the right to keep and bear arms-African Americans have suffered the very worst that government has to offer."

And now it is an African-American who threatens those very things on the rest of us.

|11.4.08 @ 10:31PM|#

Good for them. Let them be happy. I am really happy for black people and the fact that a black person can be elected President. They should be happy. Regardless of what kind of a disaster Obama is going to be as President, it is still good that a black person can be elected President.

Now, the people who fit the 'stuff white people like' description can go fuck themselves. But black people, I am really happy to see them celbrate.

Ironic|11.4.08 @ 10:32PM|#

"When it comes to state-sanctioned violence and oppression-including restrictions on such fundamentals as the right to own property and the right to keep and bear arms-African Americans have suffered the very worst that government has to offer."

I would also like to point out that [insert preferred term for the decedents of people who lived in the America's before 1492] have had it even worse than African-Americans in this regard.

|11.4.08 @ 10:35PM|#

I forget. Are we Oceania or Eurasia?

Ironic|11.4.08 @ 10:37PM|#

Anthony, we along with Airstrip One (UK), are Oceania.

Ironic|11.4.08 @ 10:40PM|#

So, I welcome any suggestions on where I should move to. I am not sure I want to be here for much longer.

|11.4.08 @ 10:40PM|#

"but his election represents a victory for classical liberalism nonetheless."

Can I use that?

EcoDude|11.4.08 @ 10:41PM|#

Over at DailyKos, they're celebrating the coming Progressive Utopia...

...until reality creeps in.

The Obama camp is already backpedaling, saying things like "It's not the first 100 days, but the first 1,000 days"

Ironic|11.4.08 @ 10:43PM|#

So, how many hours before Bush attacks Iran?

|11.4.08 @ 10:45PM|#

I say Obama should go to war with Eurasia, then.

Orange Line Special|11.4.08 @ 10:51PM|#

What an idiotic post. But, then again, that's what I always say.

Meanwhile:

Top Obama adviser Prof. Charles Ogletree says 21st-century white America, as a general rule, remains racist towards Blacks, Latinos, and Asians, and racism is likely to persist for decades -- Barack Obama is an exception only because "he happens to be biracial," so that his election will not be proof that whites have moved beyond racism.

Also, when the f does my group get our own president?

P.S. Can someone tell me when corporate pluralism became a classical liberal tenet?

db|11.4.08 @ 10:53PM|#

"but his election represents a victory for classical liberalism nonetheless."

Can I use that?


For toilet paper? Yeah, sure.

Cigar Bill|11.4.08 @ 10:55PM|#

This is a crowd steeped in the historical importance of the moment, quite conscious that they're gathered in America's most famous black neighborhood to watch the election of America's first black president.


But...but...but I thought I was the first "black president."

|11.4.08 @ 10:58PM|#

Classical what? I don't think that phrase means what you think it means.

|11.4.08 @ 11:04PM|#

How does the election of a hero-worshipped politician do anything to ratify classical liberalism? It may be a validation of democracy, in some way, but not of classical liberalism.

Classical liberalism is about individual liberty, not about "leaders" (and thus being led).

|11.4.08 @ 11:14PM|#

Tom: Because it means that people can overcome what ultimately were socialist restriction on my (i.e. Black folks) freedom. Say what you will about the man, but being Black in America means overcoming a whole lot of fundamentally socialist crap holding us down. Now if we can see what was really holding us down as a people...

Jack|11.4.08 @ 11:54PM|#

Yes,

Whites stop slavery, we're racist.
Muslims still practice slavery, they are enlightened.

Saudi Arabia, Iran, Iraq, Afganistan, Japan, China, India...those are all really great places to be black.

Oh, and lets not forget Africa, where no matter what your color, it sucks tremendously to be black, or any other color. Or any democrat/black run city in the US, where the crime rate is out of control.

Scott66|11.5.08 @ 12:11AM|#

"a victory for classical liberalism nonetheless."

That is some tortured rationalizing. At least that other idiot here at Reason admitted he was for Obama simply because he is black, why don't you do that as well?

|11.5.08 @ 12:25AM|#

Soooo, now, "If it's bad for America, is it STILL good for Democrats?" Oh my, how things will change! Change YOU CAN BELIEVE IN! Bend over Obama. From now on, it's YOUR screw-ups that will be make you into toast. You'll be blamed for drought, storms, market plunges....you name it. And that gas price better not get back to 4-bucks! Let us all practice now: "I Blame Obama." Has a nice ring to it! Let's see how YOU like it, buddy boy.

MAX HATS|11.5.08 @ 2:54AM|#

IT'S OVER.

SOCIALISM IS HERE.


BY WHICH I MEAN A PROGRESSIVE TAXATION SCHEME OF SIMILAR SCOPE TO THAT WHICH EXISTED UNDER REAGAN.


[wailing, gnashing of teeth, begins manically typing out newsletter on stage right via manual typewriter]

MAX HATS|11.5.08 @ 2:58AM|#

OUR LONG RUN OF GLORIOUS FREEDOM IS COMING TO A CLOSE. EVERYTHING IS DIFFERENT NOW. THE LEVEL OF INCOME TAX PAID BY A TAX BRACKET FAR ABOVE MY OWN CHANGES EVERYTHING. FREEDOM IS ON THE LINE. IT IS LIKE BRAVEHEART. WITHOUT CHENEY IN OFFICE, WHO WILL STAND UP FOR THE CONSTITUTION?

|11.5.08 @ 3:25AM|#

Come on., calm down. There's no point in being angry. Just chill out and let Obama take care of you.

Winthorpe|11.5.08 @ 5:50AM|#

Shouldn't it say France for Le Pen?

The frogs can shampoo my fucking nuts.

|11.5.08 @ 6:43AM|#

I for one welcome our new overlords

|11.5.08 @ 9:00AM|#

No need for Bush to attack anything - he can let that mess wait for the Messiah to settle. Bambi will walk over there and talk to the mullahs and all will be calm, including the seas. He is just that good.

|11.5.08 @ 9:43AM|#

There's something very symetrical about crook of the day Rangel celebrating at a monument to crook of the past Adam Clayton Powell.

|11.5.08 @ 9:52AM|#

SWEET! Now someone else will pay my mortgage and gas bills..

Better stock up on high-capacity mags though, I bet another Brady Bill is coming...

|11.5.08 @ 10:31AM|#

a massive election night party outside the Adam Clayton Powell State Office Building on 125th Street tonight in Harlem

If Rangel never did anything else good, we should still be thanking him for finally putting an end to Adam Clayton Powell's tenure in Congress by beating him in the 1970 Democratic party primary.

|11.5.08 @ 10:32AM|#

In the spirit of the historic election, I plan to honor America by saluting President Obama with the same salute he gave to Sen McCain. Every day, every time I hear his name or hear him speak. Congratulations, Barack.

|11.5.08 @ 11:14AM|#

When it comes to state-sanctioned violence and oppression-including restrictions on such fundamentals as the right to own property and the right to keep and bear arms-African Americans have suffered the very worst that government has to offer. That's not to say that the coming Obama adminstration is going to be very good for individual liberty, but his election represents a victory for classical liberalism nonetheless.

This may be the dumbest thing I've read on Reason this year. Obama is not going to improve black's property rights or gun rights; if anything, he is going to preside over the further erosion of those rights, for blacks and everyone else.

Classical liberalism, aside from its limited government premises (soundly rejected by this election) stands for equal treatment before the law. That battle was won for blacks a generation ago. Dragging everyone down is not a victory in any way for the black community or classical liberalism.

|11.5.08 @ 11:16AM|#

You'll be blamed for drought, storms, market plunges....you name it.

Not a chance. The coastal media bet the farm on electing him; they're going to do everything they can to keep his teflon coating nice and shiny.

economist|11.5.08 @ 10:54PM|#

"his election represents a victory for classical liberalism nonetheless"
Excuse me while I take my Haldol. I must have been hallucinating.

economist|11.5.08 @ 10:57PM|#

R C Dean,
As joe said, we might as well resign ourselves to eight years of hopey-changey politics. His exact words, were, "lay back and enjoy it". While it seems to be a subconscious association of an Obama presidency with rape, I figure resigning ourselves to it is all we can really do at this point.

economist|11.5.08 @ 11:00PM|#

I'm glad to know that the staff of reason (apart from Jacob Sullum, who must have missed the memo) has taken the initiative in sucking up to the president-elect. While some might say that cautious optimism is generally the best way to begin an administration, I tend to believe that we should regard most elected officials (and every president) with the suspicion and mild disdain that they deserve.

economist|11.5.08 @ 11:06PM|#

Whoopee, people make money selling Obama-themed merchandise. Capitalism's going to be okay, you guys! Ignore that socialist behind the curtain...

Charlie Rangel|11.5.08 @ 11:27PM|#

Of course my name come first. It's all about ME! Who cares about the president-elect of the United States.