A year ago it seemed Republicans had absolutely no chance at the presidency in 2008. Well, well. For quite some time things have been looking up. We should be really really depressed right now but we’re not. Out of nowhere we have a Republican Obama, but one with substance and credibility. He could counterbalance McCain’s age issues nicely as the vice-presidential nominee.
It’s Bobby Jindal, Governor of Louisianna. He was on Jay Leno’s show last night, apparently. I don’t have a TV, but noticed this clip on Youtube.
Hey, a nonwhite Republican with good diction! It must be the “Republican Obama”!
God forbid somebody actually put some thought into pigeonholing. Hell, even Rush had the decency to compare him to a white guy. (He calls him “the next Ronald Reagan”)
If the race thing didn’t factor into your thread title then I apologise.
Anyway, nice as it is to see an electable Indian-American (being one too), I can’t stand the guy. He’s against abortion (including in cases of rape and incest), any form of gay rights other than the most piddly lip service about “tolerance”, and pretty much everything else a social conservative could possibly hope for.
He’s a panderer, pure and simple. According to his bio, he started using the name “Bobby” at the age of four (very common among Indian-Americans, particularly in business, to adopt a “Western” name just in case whoever you’re on the phone with is a racist, you see), and converted to Catholicism in high school. I’d bet dollars to donuts he adopted both just as soon as he thought he might like to run for office someday.
[Pulls on Mod socks] I’m moving this to GD, which is a better fit for this topic.[/barefoot]
I was trying to think of a way to say this myself. That’ll do nicely. I don’t mean to speculate about Mark Ryle’s intent, but I’ve heard this suggestion before. While Jindal has a real resume, the only reason he’s being compared particularly to Obama is that they’re both minorities. It’s silly and disrespectful, and also the kind of Affirmative Action thing that the GOP likes to criticize the Democrats for.
You may know more about the guy than I do, but I think speculating about his motives - particularly in adopting a Western name - is on par with what the Clintons tried to do with Obama’s kindergarten essay.
I think that makes him an outstanding candidate. He’s a prodigy! As early as age four, he was able to discern the relatively complex issue of wanting to run for office and realizing that his name would be a handicap. Let’s see another candidate with that sort of political instinct in Pre-K!
Your point is well taken. I see the likeness more in the ‘excitement factor’ of fresh, young, dynamic candidates, both with minimal political experience.
Those darn tricky Indians! I guess I’ll have to watch my Christian Indian friends more closely since they must be planning some sort of a sneaky political move in their future. :rolleyes:
Did your friends convert, or were they raised as Christians?
Roll your eyes all you want. You don’t see it as even a little too convenient that the one prominent Indian-American in public office converted to Catholicism?
Either that, or he’s a prodigy because at the age of four he was able to grasp the relatively complex issue of changing his name. How many four-year-olds do you know that change their names to something other than Batman?
Because they liked the Brady Bunch? If you mean because he wanted to appeal to voters, it’s because he would be artificially Westernizing his background to appeal to the baser instincts of some voters. I find that insulting.
You don’t really have to welcome them, since they were both born here.
It’s Barack, btw.
I’m pretty sure “Caucasoid” is no longer a generally accepted genetic grouping. In any case, voters rarely have a background in anthropology or genetics; if you ask the average American whether Indian people are white or not I’m pretty sure the answer would be “no”.
From a layman’s standpoint, Caucasian = white, end of story. I gather that it meant something a little broader originally that might’ve included Persians and other Aryans, and if I’m right some Indians are descended from the latter group. But that’s academic. On a census form and in society, Bobby Jindal is Asian and he’d never pass as a white guy. If he was chosen as McCain’s VP and McCain kicked the bucket, people would say Jindal was the first minority and first Asian U.S. President. Nobody would say “oh, another white guy.”
It sure is interesting. I have immigration records for Domenico, Pasquale, Francesca, and Lazzaro coming through Ellis Island some years back, but I don’t recall these folks in my family. I recall an Uncle Dominic, Uncle Pat, Aunt Frances and my grandfather Louis though.
Funny how this works.
Given how many people before us in our own families have done this, it seems silly to criticize our Chinese and Indian neighbors when they engage in the same practice.
As for the religion thing, we can’t know why Jindal converted, but the evidence is that this conversion was sincere and well-considered. Jindal has even written an article for a Catholic journal of opinion. Casual Catholics don’t go so far as this.
I think you could find lots of things to disagree with Bobby Jindal on if you’re inclined to disagree with him. But the matter of his name and religion don’t seem to be issues that will get much traction.
That’s a very good point, and one that I hadn’t considered. However, we’re not necessarily talking about the same thing. Some of those who came through Ellis Island were renamed involuntarily by barely literate or lazy officials. Others adopted watered down versions of their names because the originals were hard to pronounce. Any number Anglicized their names because of a prevailing trend of bigotry toward non-Northwest European immigrants.
Mr. Jindal hasn’t had to deal with any of that, with the exception of a very weak form of the latter, perhaps.
Also, Chinese, as far as I can tell, don’t pick Western names themselves; their parents do it. At least, everyone I’ve met who was from Hong Kong was named that way. I have much less of an issue with that.
