If this discussion were taking place in a private club  they could have restricted my membership because I was not the right kind of person. In a social media group they were stuck with me; and I was privy to a discussion that I could never have been privy to otherwise -- unless I were the proverbial  fly on the wall.

They wanted to have a sanitized debate about sound fiscal policy, family values, and low taxes to stimulate a robust economy, but often when they mentioned one of the Republican candidates I would chime in with a symptom of racism, or one of the other social diseases, in that candidate's appeal to voters.

America is supposed to be post-racial. Talking about racism in a public discussion, especially with these polite men, is almost as taboo as talking about gonorrhea of genital herpes. But every time one of them made a personal attack on the President, code-worded or not, I responded by pointing out the hidden or subliminal bigotry in the attack.

We were captive in this social media prison.  After a while we may have developed a mild case of mutual Stockholm Syndrome, with each of us developing relationship to our captors.

With no anger I defined subliminal bigotry for them: "racial animosity below the threshold of conscious perception, hidden so deeply that there is no overt awareness of it, yet it influences deeply held beliefs and judgments."

I had to admit that I enjoyed the banter just as I described it in A Foolproof Plan for Republicans to Win the Presidency in 2012: Part One (It might be a good idea to click on the link and read that post; but I think you can get the drift from reading only this one.)

Several times I thought of Eugene D. Genovese's statement in Roll, Jordan, Roll: The World the Slaves Made: ". . . slavery bound two peoples together in bitter antagonism while creating an organic relationship so complex and ambivalent that neither could express the simplest human feelings without reference to the other."

Now 150 years after slavery there was still bitter antagonism but also a lot of mutually beneficial understanding. In private messaging some of the men agreed with me, and lamented that their party's candidates did indeed have political histories and present appeals to voters filled with  racism, greed, and evangelical hatred.

With one of them I discussed why I thought that Obama himself is actually a conservative.  I sent him a link to Spiritually Liberal, Socially Conservative  He read it and cited ways in which he thought I was wrong; or I had not made a distinction between personal conservatism and political conservatism. It seemed to be a mutually beneficial exchange. We both had something to think about.

In private messaging another wrote that I  was idealistic and naïve and that Obama was just "a clever politician masking his intent.  To me he seems bent on moving America towards a 'European-style socialist economy.' This man sent me material  to read against which I argued that there was a difference between socialism and communalism.  I sent him a link to "Twoness" and the American Dream

The argument there was that Obama seems at peace balancing "two warring ideals" (communalism and individualism ) in one truly bi-racial, truly bi-partisan body. So must the nation. He sent me more material that tugged against my idealism; but he partially accepted that Obama's cleverness just might be the only way the Obama could check individualism run amok.

I got several of the men who communicated with me privately to read the first chapter of the online edition of W.E.B. Dubois 1903 masterwork The Souls of Black Folk. By studying Dubois over the years, I had come to fully embrace his concept of "Twoness."  I got a message back from one of the men who read Dubois for the first time.

"Read first chapter of Soul of Black Folks on the train on the way home from work. I'm one of the few whites on the subway through Brooklyn and the LIRR train I take to Jamaica so I couldn't help but think it's great atmosphere for reading this book. I see all the people around me in a new light."

I had the most rewarding exchange with a  man who showed  a lot of  courage in the public discussion filled as it was with so many free-market zealots who were unwilling to even examine what "free market" means Capitalism, capitalism, capitalism, they wrote in the same unassailable way that evangelicals write about the name of Jesus. 

The man's courage was in saying that "planned economies work fine. Just because the Russians mucked it up means nothing. China is doing better than the US and has been for a while." I wrote him privately:

"I've been mulling over what you said. My questions are: In your opinion can we ever get  right-wing Republicans to even consider a planned economy without shouting down the suggestion as communistic. And can anyone suggest that America could learn anything from China without the person making the suggestion being tarred and feathered and run out of town?"

I was learning so much in the discussion that I decided not to let anyone off the hook. I decided I would make them wait even longer before I gave them the foolproof plan for a Republican victory in 2012, and I was more than ever convinced it was foolproof.

Click Link below to read more

Final Part of a Foolproof Plan for Republican Victory

George Davis is creator of the series of world-sourced, interactive books, Barack Obama, America and the World. This series contains the background reporting, drawn from sources across the nation and around the world, that give deeper meaning to the ideas in this post.