In Their Words: Hating Barack Obama
The election of Barack Obama as the first black American president left white supremacists and hate groups in an uproar. Many were apocalyptic. Others were melodramatic. A few saw a silver lining.
The election of Barack Obama as the first black American president left white supremacists and hate groups in an uproar. Many were apocalyptic. Others were melodramatic. A few saw a silver lining. At least one — Ray Larsen's Church of the National Knights of the Ku Klux Klan — called on followers to fly "yankee flags" upside down and wear black armbands on Jan. 20, Inauguration Day. A few samples:
"I believe tonight is a night of tragedy and sadness for our people… . [T]he country is not recognizable any more."
— Former Klan leader David Duke
"Someone will kill him! And I will celebrate!"
—Neo-Nazi activist Hal Turner
"I consider this to be the darkest day in American history since the end of the Civil War. They might as well have put Bin Laden in the White House."
—Comment posted in an online forum of the Traditional Christian Knights of the Ku Klux Klan
"An Obama presidency … will only intensify racial polarization and stimulate greater white racial consciousness and self-assertiveness. More of the sleepers will waken."
—Greg Johnson writing in The Occidental Quarterly, a far-right race journal
"[T]he next four years could prove to be the biggest bonanza ever for open borders advocates."
—Federation for American Immigration Reform, a nativist hate group
"It could mean an awakening of our spirit and blood. Every time the television shows an image of Obama, it will be a reminder that our people have lost power in this country."
—Thom Robb, national director of the Knights of the Ku Klux Klan
