Hey Jamie! Election love from DK

AN OPEN LETTER TO THE PORTLAND MERCURY

In last week's issue, Eli Sanders devotes a full page to insinuating that Hillary Clinton's supporters are racist ("Among the (White) People.") Now, I am no Clinton apologist. I have my own qualms about Hill and Billy, but they have more to do with some of their business connections, and specifically (having just seen the Alex Jones documentary "Endgame") the fact that they are both known to have attended the Bilderberg conferences. (Don't know what Bilderberg is? Not surprising, since the U.S. media is unable or unwilling to cover it.) However, I feel that accusing the Clintons of currying favor with racists is going too far, although I've heard similar sentiments from equally credible sources, such as Seth Meyers on SNL's "Weekend Update." On the other hand, it has been pointed out that Bill had the black vote in a big way during his time in office, and African-American voters turned their backs on him and Hillary as soon as Barack entered the picture. Or to put it another way, if Hillary's supporters are racist, does that mean Barack's are sexist? Perhaps you could do an article pointing out how an unfortunate side effect of an election featuring (for the first time) a woman AND a black man as leading contenders for the U.S. presidency has resulted in accusations of racism and sexism on BOTH sides of the Clinton/Obama divide, rather than pointing the finger exclusively at Hillary?

OR, better yet, an article on the difference in treatment the two candidates have received from the media! When Bill says that his wife has been the subject of "the most biased, one-sided media coverage in the history of American politics," he has a point. Obama is regularly described with glowing strings of praise such as "handsome," "charismatic" and "dreamy" - even comparisons to Jesus in your own pages! - while Clinton is derided as basically a power-crazed, unlikable harpy who should just give up already and step aside. I'm not crazy about Hillary, but if I was her, I wouldn't quit until the game was over either, and the pressure for her to do so is just one example of the bias the media has shown towards her since day one. Making fun of Hillary is easy, and kind of funny, but there's something disturbing underneath the humor: it reveals a little too much about who we value - and who we gleefully de-value - in our culture.

Yrs etc.

Tony LeTigre