Bill Clinton was just inducted in the Arkansas Black Hall of Fame – the first Caucasian to be so honored. Author Toni Morrison called him, “The first Black President.” There seems to be little doubt that Clinton is unusually popular with African Amercans. The question is: Why?
Clinton’s record doesn’t match Lyndon Johnson’s momentous commitment and efforts to get civil rights legislation. John Kennedy took outstanding action after the murder of 3 civil rights workers in Mississippi. Harry Truman integrated the military IIRC. Clinton didn’t even match George W. Bush for having African Americans in top-level policy-making positions.
This cite says “Clinton…was honored for his efforts on behalf of the black community both nationally and internationally.” I do recall his effort to help Haiti, which ultimately was unsuccessful. Other than that, I can’t think of other Clinton “efforts on behalf or the black community.”
Shodan,
Anyone can come in and make racist comments (on any OP actually), even with the intention of trolling. So all bets are off!
As to the OP, I think it’s about empathy. In ways not merely overt, he felt at home talking to and mingling with African-Americans, and they as a group, may be, felt that he “understood”.
IN a way IMHO (or even GQ) makes sense, because I ama genuinely looking for an answer. However, I put the OP into GD because:
The response may be fact-based. E.g.
– Clinton accomplished x, y and z, or
– Clinton achieved popularity by promotional activities a, b, and c, or even
– Clinton isn’t as popular as he appears because p. q, and r.
The OP includes some hot-button items that are apt to become a debate.
I suppose the real appeal is Hillary’s legal defense of the Black Panthers.
Oh, wait, that never happened.
Speaking seriously for a moment, if Colin Powell were to run in 2008 (I’m sure there are hundreds of people in and around DC who drool at such an idea) we might see a shift, but the Democrats have historically been favoured by minority voters and a Democrat President who has personal charm (as Clinton did) can score highly, while a candidate without major charm (as Mondale and Dukakis were) could be creamed.
I suspect Bryan’s answer is far closer to the truth than DDG’s.
If your standard for “surrounding himself with African-Americans” is “he nominated a bunch of people to some middling-importance Cabinet positions and some of his best friends are black and he claps in time,” you’re digging pretty hard. Note the hsyerically funny wording of DDG’s link:
That’s just hilarious; “Well, sure, he passed a conservative bill, but he felt really bad about it.”
Or this one:
That’s absurd; the first President to EVER talk about race relations? What, Lyndon B. Johnson never said anything about race relations? Eisenhower didn’t? Kennedy? Oh, but it says “initiate a national dialogue.” Gosh, thanks. LBJ actually DID something. WJC “initiated a dialogue.” How can you be fooled by such transparent nonsense? It literally sounds like something from a Dilbert cartoon; “We’ll initiate a dialogue on race relations to provide stakeholders with a straw dog analysis blah blah blah.”
In truth, Clinton is simply an excellent politician. He is probably the most skilled American politician in modern times - I don’t think Reagan had anything on him. He was, and is, extremely good at making people like him, even without giving them a substantive REASON to support him.
Ron Brown, God rest his soul, was plenty important. I’m not saying these people weren’t important - but this hardly proves Bill Clinton did well by the 40,000,000 black Americans he was supposedly such a great thing for. Appointing Ron Brown to his cabinet is great and all, but it doesn’t strike me as being a tremendous blow for race relations.
For that matter, I don’t consider Bush’s appointments of Powell and Rice to critical positions to be huge race relations coups, either.
To my mind the key is the difference between symbolic actions and substantive actions. Symbolic actions are important, but are dwarfed in importance by substantive actions, action that have a direct and considerable impact on people. Appointing Ron Brown or Colin Powell to cabinet is a symbolic action with respect to race (obviously those men were primarily hired for those jobs for other, practical reasons.) Clinton’s supposed accomplishments, as listed in DDG’s link, are wholly symbolic. He appointed some people with dark skin to some Cabinet posts and he “started a dialogue.” The former is only symbolic with respect to race relations and the latter is meaningless mumbo-jumbo. Symbolic acts are important to be sure, but what REALLY matters are SUBSTANTIVE acts. With respect to race relations, Clinton’s resume is very short on substantive acts. So is Bush’s, of course. I am a fan of neither man, but IMHO their failings are very different, and in Clinton’s case his primary failing was that he talks the talk but doesn’t walk the walk.
Black unemployment was at its lowest level ever under Clinton.
Black income was at its highest level ever under Clinton. That’s why. Life was good for black people under Clinton.
And symbolic actions are generally what win elections. We’re talking about election to a Hall of Fame, which is about as symbolic an honor as there is.
You can argue that Clinton’s accomplishments with regard to race relations aren’t important, but it doesn’t necessarily mean he isn’t loved for them.
I know, Dumbguy. And doesn’t that answer the OP? After all, we’re just trying to explain his popularity.
Clinton is popular among African-Americans because he’s such a good politician. Symbolic actions are the hallmark of a good politician - not necessarily a good President. It’s not because he actually did a good job. You can ascribe much of Bush’s popularity to the same phenomenon, though his symbolic actions and constituencies are quite different.
Clinton was popular (among many groups) in large part due to his ability to use symbolic acts to prop up his popularity, plus the fact that he was just a darned good actor; the whole “frowny face” routine seemed to impress a lot of people.
Black unemployment was at its lowest level ever under Clinton. Black income was at its highest level ever under Clinton. That’s why. Life was good for black people under Clinton.
Rates of violent crime went down throughout most of the Clinton administration, with some of the sharpest drops being for rates of gang-related violence in inner-city areas. Since Clinton fought for the Brady Bill and for use of federal funds to hire 100,000 new police officers, many Blacks believed that he was actually concerned about crime in urban areas, a topic that often seemed to be ignored by Washington politicians.
