Racism is like bad breath. You never notice you have it yourself. But other people know you’ve got it.
[QUOTE=adaher;
And BTW, if Democrats are so much better on race than Republicans, why are there more minorities holding statewide offices in the Republican Party? Why do Democrats relegate 99% of their minority politicians to representing majority-minority House districts?[/QUOTE]
What you say is true.
But to me, the more intriging question would be; why do minorities (among other groups) stay loyal to one particular party that has relegated them to little more than mere pawns over the last half century?
IMO, it has more to do with culture than the ‘D’ or the ‘R.’
We’re throwing around generalizations in this thread because we have to. There is no other way to simplify a discussion of national, state, and local politics into a paragraph without doing so. Generalizations are majorities and trends, not absolutes. Politics is not mathematics; finding a single exemption does not invalidate the proposition. There will always be exceptions. All politics is local, and all that.
Parties are not monoliths and neither are voters. They are complex and need to be flexible to contain half the population, a remarkably diverse grouping. People do not vote issues, and they do not vote values; they vote perceived self-interests and those can contain a basket from column A and column B and from all the side dishes. Perceived self-interest is not the same as rational self-interest, assuming that such a thing can exist. Some black voters can vote Republican because they see advantages to doing so, and that is not self-hatred. The absurdity of the charge is best seen by looking at working class whites. If they vote for a party that puts the wealthy investment class consistently over their issues, that seems rationally self-hating and any number of commentators have reported on this. They vote Republican in numbers far greater than minority groups vote Republican, yet they are not charged by Republicans as being self-hating.
Therefore the way to attract more minority voters to the Republican ticket is to appeal to them in ways that are to their perceived self-interests. Demonizing them is not a solution. That type of politics coalesced around Obama, who since the 2008 primaries has been seen as the Other, a non-American in values, skin color, place of birth, and upbringing. Republican politics has exploited this notion of the Other, often successfully, since the Southern Strategy of Nixon, made explicit into a rallying cry by Reagan. Blacks are the Other, Hispanics are the Other, Asians are the Other, Muslims are the Other, Gays are the Other, even Women, Atheists, Foreigners, Union members, Intellectuals, Scientists, whatever group can be collectivized as not Us. How do we know the Republican Party is racist? Because the minorities they demonize say so. Although it is fascinating from the outside watch as Republicans insist that each group is distinct and different and what gets said about one should not be applied toward any other, the recipients of the Other designation understand that at any moment the tag could be applied to them. You cannot eliminate the black population from your good graces and expect to win over a majority of Hispanics. Or any of the rest of the groups that have been ousted from what Americans look like. Any action toward one is an action toward all. It’s obviously in their perceived self-interest to think that way.
Interestingly, young voters seem to overwhelmingly share this attitude. A diverse population tends toward liberal attitudes, because proximity leads to shared interests, familiarity, and acceptance. Monocultures are the most conservative. Local politics tends to be conservative because it can be broken down into a series of monocultures. State elections - governors and senators - tend to be more liberal because urban areas, not including many suburbs, are denser, more populous, and more diverse. National elections have trended to increasing liberality for the same reasons. This is not absolute - again, local issues matter greatly - but it is the trend.
Balance is not a stable condition. There is no reason to expect any subset of the population or the population as a whole to split 50/50 on anything. In addition, the population changes constantly. People move incessantly; they change attitudes along with their jobs, the size of their families, and the economic conditions; older voters die off to be replaced by new, young voters; immigrants are random factors. Whenever a state is split equally, it should be expected that it will tip in one direction or the other in another decade. This is exacerbated by the political parties, which also change to try in stay in tune with the population. If the Democrats change with the times - gay rights, marijuana use, immigration - but the Republicans do not, then an inevitable trend toward the Democratic party will emerge. Trends are not short-term predictors - local factors will determine the 2014 election - but they are good long-term predictors. “Tailoring your message and policies to specific interest groups” is not shortsighted; it is literally the definition of politics. It is done 100% of the time by Republicans today. They are just tailoring their messages and policies to a shrinking segment of the voting population.
Very little is certain in politics. I can be certain of only one thing. If the Republicans keep their current messages and policies - and they show every sign of adamantly doing so - they will be the minority party for a generation.
Apparently one in three Latinos, Asians, and Jews, don’t see it. And one out of ten African Americans.
We’re also defining racism down here. Real racists know they are racists and are proud of being racists. Nowadays we call someone racist if they make a statement out of ignorance without malice, or favor a policy that has a disparate impact on this or that group. Unless that person is a Democrat, in which case they are assumed to be working for the common good. Or, in Robert Byrd’s case, he gets a dispensation for being an extreme homophobe because he fought hard to protect Social Security.
I don’t think it’s bad intentions on the part of Democrats. I think both parties are just following their instincts on race. Republicans believe that we should be color blind and that it doesn’t matter if a white guy represents black voters or a black guy represents white voters. Democrats believe it’s an insult and non-representative to have a person of one race represent a district where voters are of another race.
Just look at what the DNC allows to happen to Steve Cohen every election. If you want to see what real racism looks like, get a load of some of the rhetoric coming out of those Democratic primaries.
Not really, cherry picking is more likely to get you what you want to mislead others. There is a very good reason **adaher **only choose the state wide offices.
And remember, the subject here is indeed focused on the Republican congresscritters.
That’s quite an assumption given that the Democratic winning streak is er, one election. 2010 showed that when Democrats misgovern things can snap back awfully fast. Let’s see how 2014 goes. If Democrats win solidly in 2014, then I’ll be impressed. And you can be sure Republicans will be as well. 2012 spooked the GOP. A 2014 loss would demoralize them.
That’s because Democrats only win now in majority-minority districts. They have not been electing minorities in white majority districts. They don’t even give them a chance. In a white district, the DNC can be relied upon to almost always put their support behind the white candidate.
And you really think that helps your point? I’m really afraid you are not even aware of what you type. This is actually evidence that outreach to the minority groups at large is not being done by the republicans, they only count on the few minorities that are conservative, but your condescension oozes forth by not realizing that many minorities do not approve of the those conservative minorities, just as they do not approve the conservatives at large.
And yeah, the point stands, the big picture (or at least the “family photo”) of the congress of today shows that the minorities have enough numbers to make a difference where it counts in congress, Republicans can only show minorities with almost no voice from the groups that they are suppose to represent.
Culture, huh? :dubious:
Guys, this is why people think Republicans are racists. Because they are.
And that statement makes you a racist, because it assumes that millions of minority voters are too stupid to know they are hated.
See how fun this game is?
What’s racist about that? Of course there are millions of stupid minorities. There are even more stupid majorities. Stupidity is found in all races and ethnic groups, in the same proportion.
Not sure that calling congress people pawns was supposed to be laudable, in other words, I think you are not even following the conversation.
Oh, and the numbers and conversations with many minorities in Arizona shows me that they do know adaher.
The numbers say they don’t. Arizona has a LOT of Latino voters, yet has all Republicans elected statewide. You need to reeducate some people, apparently. I hear your side has camps for that.
Dude, are you seriously for real???
And Romney was the first runner-up and Obama came in next to last.
If two out of three, or nine out of ten, people see something it probably DOES exist.
Since what I actually said was that 2014 was unpredictable for reasons of local politics and can’t be used as a guide to the future, you either didn’t read my post or more likely are deliberately misrepresenting it.
2012 was completely predictable. That it spooked Republicans says only what your posts continue to say: they have completely lost touch with reality. Given that you better hope with all your fingers and toes crossed that they lose in 2014. Any positive feedback on their current path will be disastrous for two generations.
Generation
You assume that two out of three see the other party as racist, rather than merely wrong or not in their interests to vote for.
One thing we know for sure, a third of Latinos, and recently nearly half of Latinos, didn’t see the Republicans as racist. Otherwise they wouldn’t have vote for GWB.
As others pointed out, your ignorance knows no bounds about the Hispanic numbers in Arizona and your last jab is just reaching for the Godwin.
And that is because he was a very a Republican that supported immigration reform and sincerely reached for minorities, but that was then, the point is the now. Now that is very rare nowadays.