If you voted for him because you thought he was black - not because he was playing games, but because you were wrong - and were upset because you wanted to vote for a white guy, then that’s probably true. In real life Wilson engaged in some serious dishonesty, mispreresenting himself and excluding some pertinent information. Perhaps you could review the thread?
Frankly I would never trust what the candidate says about themselves. If anything, go by endorsements. It was trivially easy for me to look up who had endorsed each little local candidate, and Dave Wilson didn’t get a single endorsement from anyone, not even a right wing publication or caucus. Except of course his Iowan cousin.
Don’t hate the player; hate the game.
As noted earlier, if this doesn’t prove that a large contingent of Black people vote based on race and nothing else, I don’t know what will.
In a weird way, some good things are happening in this thread: Republicans are admitting they approve of tricking voters, they’re admitting they have no idea how to prove their stereotypes of black voters. They used to keep that stuff in private, but as a party they’ve forgotten how to use their inside voices. Once this is all out in the open the healing can begin. elucidator, get ready to lead us in a kumbaya.
It doesn’t, for the myriad of reasons above- chiefly, that his opponent was black. And considering that the vast majority of black voters in all of American history have voted for white candidates, I don’t see how anything could prove that “a large contingent of Black people vote based on race and nothing else”.
We all know that as Houston Community College Board District 2 goes, so goes the country.
Okay. Let’s see…
1.) He didn’t trick anyone. The guy never said he was Black (in fact, he didn’t disclose his race at all) and he did point out that he was talking about his cousin. If you, as a voter, don’t know who the candidates you’re voting for are, then perhaps the fault lies with you?
2.) This also goes to Indy, but where’s the stereotype? The article flatly points out that people thought they were voting for a Black guy, not a White one. In fact, if you type “Dave Wilson” into Google, you get all sorts of headlines which read “Man wins local election by implying he’s Black” or something similar. Now if Dave Wilson only won the local election by implying he’s Black, then the implication of that rationale is that he would have lost had he disclosed he were White. If he would have lost due to him being White, then that’s a clear case of identity politics and voting based on skin color. Does anyone here think that he would have won if everyone knew he was White? I don’t, and I highly doubt even you would make that claim.
The fact that the “other guy” was Black has absolutely no bearing on anything. It was because the voters thought both candidates were Black that Dave Wilson won, as then it came down to personal positions. But if his race was widely known? Forget about it. He would have lost solely due to him being White.
Yes, he did. He said that a bunch of people endorsed him who didn’t actually endorse him.
And what’s more important, the stories about the event, or the event itself?
Cool, you’re back, I was starting to miss you.
Anyway, I’m not sure what this case proves. Would a significant amount of the electorate who voted for this guy have voted against him if they knew he was white? Maybe. Probably. So?
Makes me wonder. Has anyone checked with Ron in Iowa to verify he actually did endorse his cousin Dave?
If you vote based on assumptions instead of facts about whom/what you are voting for, you deserve whatever outcome you get.
This should read “if someone goes out of their way to mislead you.”
I’m sorry, I fail to see how putting photos of people on your campaign materials that match the demographics of the population who’s vote you are trying to get = “going out of their way to mislead you”. If he was plastering the face of some black guy on his flyers with the intention of misleading people to think that was a photo of the actual candidate, then yes that would be intentionally misleading.
It’s discussed at length in this thread and in every article about the story.
Sorry, removing photos of yourself from campaign materials, and pointedly mentioning the endorsement of your cousin who lives 1,000 miles and just happens to have the same name as a prominent local politician, THAT is intentionally misleading.
To clarify. His intent was to obfuscate his background. He intended to make it difficult for voters to link his current campaign to his prior campaign. He also intended to make it appear that he had a valuable local endorsement, when he did not.
Pretending to be black was a side effect of his main intention, to be an unknown candidate with a strong endorsement from a respected local politician.
As an aside, I’m not sure what the anti-gay thing is about. Correct me if I’m wrong, but I’m not aware of the African American community being staunchly pro-gay. In fact, I always thought that, as a group, they were less likely to support a pro-gay agenda than the majority.
He’s described in reports as an anti-gay activist and seems to have a personal problem with the mayor of Houston (she’s a lesbian). I am not sure anyone but the far right would be on board with this. Among African-Americans support for gay marriage lags behind support among white people, but that support has grown a lot in recent years- and Wilson seems to be in the “gays are disgusting and sinful” camp, which is that much more retrograde.
Speaking of side effects of obscuring his identity, Wilson’s mayoral campaign site says he actually sued to stop Houston Community College from buying some land. If he made that public in this year’s campaign, I’m not aware of it. Does anyone think that might’ve been a pertinent issue?
Look, I’m not denying that the guy was slick. He seems to be quite the asshole too. But several facts remain:
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There is no rule that you have to have a photo of yourself on your campaign materials.
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Endorsements from another political office/politician almost always include the title, especially when dealing with common names and it might not be immediately obvious who’s doing the endorsement. For example, “Endorsed by UAW Local #32, Endorsed by The Cleveland Plain Dealer, Endorsed by Congressman Joe Blow, Endorsed by Former Governor Jack Handy”.
Yes, saying “Endorsed by Joe Bloe” (your cousin) because he has the same name as the local political hero is underhanded and slick, but you are free to print the endorsement of whomever you want. It isn’t fraud. If the voters assume that it’s referring to “Congressman Joe Bloe, the local political hero”, that fault still remains with the voter, regardless of how slick of a tactic it is.
So yes, Dave Wilson ran a slick campaign with some smoke and mirrors to get the votes of a population that he rightly concluded casts their votes on assumptions and impressions. But nothing he did was outright wrong, fraud or not commonly practiced in election campaigns. The voters didn’t ask “Who the hell is this guy?” or “Which Ron Wilson are they talking about?”. The incumbent apparently made no attempt to shed any light on his opponent either.
Go ahead and find another campaign where someone did this. I’ll wait.
Is your claim that every local election, the candidates have a website featuring their portrait on them, so that voters can check to see what race said candidate are?
Wilson’s opponent sure did. Not so people could check his race, of course, but that’s in keeping with much of the other nonsense that’s been posted here.