Putting the "ass" in "canvassing"

As a general rule, I prefer "grumpiness and cynicism" to "hope and ideological motivation."
But the idea of Barack Obama as president makes my Eurosnobbish heart warm over. So, finding myself in South Florida a few precious weeks before the election, I decide to talk to strangers and get heatstroke--for the cause.

I show up to the Obama-Biden headquarters located in the Bermuda Star of David of south Florida: the intersection of Delray Beach and Boca; a half mile from the Kings' Point complex, and East of the everglades.

I'm greeted by a 20-something at the door, cute in a sort of annoyingly motivated sort of way. "WHAT AN ADAWRABLE BOY!" an 80-something volunteer would exclaim later. (I was waiting to hear "I'm gawing to intraduce him ta my granddawtah!" but alas...)

I say I'm willing to canvas, and he shuffles me over to a table with an attractive middle aged woman. I ask where she's from, she says Boston. Originally? Lebanon. I'm immediately excited; start talking about my aborted year in Beirut, etc. Then it occurs to me...

...They're sending a blonde and a Lebanese woman out to canvas in Boca Raton. Boca. Raton.
The 'more pro-Israel-than-Israelis' heartland. The Hilary-or-die democrats. The target of the Great Schlep!

Nevertheless, we pile into my car with Obama buttons and our mail-in ballots, and get assigned to a neighborhood picked at random.

Knocking on the first door, we speak with a nice, young black guy about mail-in voting. We chat, he fills out a mail-in ballot request form.

As we're leaving, my canvassing partner declares in a loud voice:

"WHY THEY SEND US TO BLACK NEIGHBORHOOD, BLACKS ALREADY LIKE OBAMA."

I mumble something about pushing early voting and we keep going. We knock on a couple more doors, everyone is really nice and receptive, and I'm feeling pretty warm and fuzzy about America, racial harmony, and the future of the world as a whole. THEN Faiza offers another piece of wisdom:

"BLACK PEOPLE WHY THEY ALWAYS SO ANGRY?"

"What's that?"

"FOR EXAMPLE THAT BLACK MAN HE LOOK SO angry LOOK AT WAY HE ANSWERED THE DOOR..[continues rambling]..."

"(Silence)....uhhh..."

REALLY, Obama volunteer?! Although tempted to point out the obvious--that we were volunteering for a man who happens to be black, and in fact the old white man is the 'angry' one, I was shocked into silence. I'm willing to accept that I didn't understand the nuance of what she was trying to say, but I think I got the gist of it.

Clearly, her feet are in the right place, but I don't quite buy the "I'm voting for Obama, so I can be as racist as I like." It's worse than the "Some of my best friends are...(black/gay/et al.)" rhetort, which has never held any water, and is even sadder on the eve of this election.

Sad, strange, or just plain depressing, the experience is noteworthy because the first place I have heard pretty openly racist remarks firsthand was....with a volunteer for Obama.

Oh, America.

UPDATE! Well, hello, Gawker, way to reiterate the scary/fascinating phenomenon of Racists for Obama