I need help understanding

[TNNurse]

I live in very red East TN. I live in the country. More people fly Confederate flags here since it became "popular". Interestingly this area was split between the north and south during the war....sometimes in a family.

Today I followed a car containing two white women (I do not think any black people live anywhere around us) and their car had a Ben Carson sticker on it. I think he is bizarre and ignorant. What is the appeal to rural white people that this man has? My husband thinks it is all about abortion and he could be right.

I think he is a scary person and he appears sort of sedated. I am a retired RN and worked with surgeons for 37 years. Some of them were interesting, well read and well educated people and some of them has the people skills of an alligator. He may know a lot about brain surgery but he is certainly not very smart about a lot of other things....really important things.

[Erich Bloodaxe BSN]

1. I think they think he'll be the Republican 'Obama'.

They think Obama won simply by being black, and so they assume Carson will do the same, and that he'll peel off Dems and Indies to vote for him based solely on that. He's got the 'right' politics, and he hasn't said word one about making any kinds of changes to actual racist policies or institutions of daily life, so they're willing to put him in office and maintain the status quo of real racism in the country while proclaiming themselves 'not racists' because they voted for a black guy.

[immoderate]

2. They really don't see themselves as racist. They are "selective."

Ben Carson is 'one of the good ones.'

--imm

[Mnpaul]

6. They needed a new "good one"

Bill Cosby went south on them.

[procon]

3. He's a very non-threatening black man

so he's acceptable to whites. Remember how Herman Cain was on top of the polls even though he was definitely the mayor of Crazytown? He was funny, he bad mouthed Obama on cue, he said all the right buzzwords thst allowed white voters to believe -- at least for a little while -- that they really aren't racist to the bone.

Like Cain, Carson plays the same role, and white folks can can pretend that they would actually vote for him because they know his stage act will be temporary. He will never get past the old bulls who rule the Republican Convention, and no whiter place exists on this earth.

[A Little Weird]

4. He's soft-spoken

If you don't actually pay attention to what he says, he sounds kind and humble. It makes a nice contrast to the bombastic Trump.

[pnwmom]

5. He's a soft-spoken, seemingly intelligent black man who makes the racists

feel better about themselves by agreeing with them.

He says things like "Obamacare is worse than slavery" -- confirming exactly what they want to hear.

[TNNurse]

7. I agree except for the part about

"seemingly intelligent". I do not care he graduated from med school and had a career as a surgeon. He makes ignorant statements, does not seem to have much knowledge of government and I think he is scary.

I do not think the soft spoken part is calming or attractive. I think he sounds drugged.

[pnwmom]

8. I used the word "seemingly" on purpose. I think people credit him with more general

knowledge and intelligence than he deserves, simply because of his MD.

In truth, I think he's a black Ronald Reagan, with a scalpel. And Ronald Reagan was elected by a landslide.

[jwirr]

9. Could it be that they think they can get the black vote this

way? They may realize they are not going to have an easy time getting elected so they are going to get the black vote?