Can you be Black and enjoy a Tea Party?
And tell me that this quote is wrong. Clarence Page: “President Barack Obama’s election has inspired a record number of African-American candidates to run for Congress this year. What’s surprising is that they’re running as Republicans.”
Regards — Cliff
Hat tip to Instapundit
14 comments:
Ok, Cliff, I will tell you.
First of all, 95% of those identified as "black" have been studied to have voted for Obama according to the fine print in that ridiculous canard of a story/argument itself. "Record number" is thus a bogus characterization, and especially disingenuous in light of studies showing the actual demographics of the Tea Party phenomenon, which are predominantly white.
Yes, Cliff, I will tell you that Clarence Page's quote is wrong. Why didn't you do even the least amount of corroborating research to consider the actual number of Democrat candidates of color compared to Republican candidates of color, instead of quoting a piece of nonsense as if it carried any relevant truth at all? I can tell you that the Frederick Douglass Foundation has solicited a list of all black non-Democrat (i.e. Republican and Independent) candidates for national office, and it contains exactly 38 names. (By comparison, there are 39 SITTING Representatives in Congress who are identified as being of color who belong to the Democrat party).
Yep, 38 individuals have now become a national phenomenon and populist groundswell. At least if you are as gullible and misguided as Clarence Page and some of his readers would seem to be.
Oh come on!! The posit isn't/wasn't that there was a record number of black Reps IN Congress. It was that THIS year, there is a record number of Rep blacks that have been movitvated to RUN.
And don't even start to elevate the blacks who are IN Congress to some sort of Democrat elite status. They are elite alright, but not in a positive way. We have folks like Maxine Waters who proclaimed during the Watts riots that the civil disobedience was a valid and acceptable means of protest by people who are unheard. Of course, today she denigrates the tea party folks for the same thing that she cheered for in Watts. And then we have the outright criminality of others. We even have an AG who "forgot" to pay his taxes, but he'll throw YOUR butt in jail if you don't come completely clean and on time.
It is getting a bit tedious to be continously assaulted with logic that holds that if the Dems do it its fine, but if the Reps do it, it is somehow reprehensible and immoral. Now we have a black POTUS and so suddenly, black has become truly beautiful under almost any and all circumstances, and God forbit anyone who counters that ideology.
The ridiculous canard is the endless, Momma-gonna-be-good-to you BS that is the day in and out Democrat mantra.
We're all fed up with political parties, we all are.
Being half-Greek, the enthusiasm of having 'one of our people' is something well is understandable from the days of Dukakis and Tsongas.
I do happen to vote Republican here in Massachusetts, but I probably would quite bothered by Republican candidates in other parts of the country and vote Democrat, like Texas where they celebrate the death penalty.
I hate guns, a hunting rifle OK. And while I understand the importance of the 2nd amendment, seriously no one needs an arsenal.
rewrite
Oh what I'm trying to say... a party's platform should be one of cohesive platform of public policy for the entire nation rather then catering to specific groups, as a big tent. It tends to create an oil & vinegar effect. I hate being seen as a 'voter bloc', where I'm being marketed specific issues. I should be happy that get my one thing, and not see the big picture.
I try to be cautious and aware because I know I'm a one/two issue person, so I can always fail to see the bigger platform.
We're not necessary Republican, just the Democrats have pushed the envelope.
Such as using federal stimulus money to help open a Planned Parenthood in the small city of Fitchburg. Yes, that is where our state allocated the money. Oh of course they don't actually perform abortions, but why else does anyone go to Planned Parenthood. No one woman goes there for their annual pap smear or if they want to keep the baby, especially since mandated health insurance we have REAL doctors through Mass Health.
More one being fed up from fitchburg.
http://spectator.org/blog/2010/01/29/obama-stimulus-vs-massachusett
The Suffolk University poll in Massachusetts, which like the PPP poll, was pretty much on target in the final result, singled out two white working class towns, Gardner and Fitchburg, as bellwethers. Obama won Gardner, where Democrats hold a three-to-one registrations edge, by 59 to 31 percent in 2008. Brown won it by 56 to 42 percent. Obama won Fitchburg, with a similar Democratic edge, by 60 to 38 percent in 2008. Brown won it by 59 to 40 percent.
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Renee, you go girl!!! I am in your corner!!!!
I asked and Kad Barma told me.
And, Kad is correct in that I did not fact check Mr Page. I was in a rush and as I have been reading his columns, off and on for over 20 years, and find him a solid Democratic Party voice, I figured he was on to something.
As for Blacks running as Republicans, this is like the line "it isn't how the bear dances, but that the bear dances."
Once upon a time Negro voters were reliable Republicans, but that all changed and the Democratic Party took them under their wing, once the Republicans helped get them voting rights. But, credit where credit is due, President L B Johnson was the one who moved the Democrats in Congress into the yes column.
But, frankly, LBJ and Bobby Kennedy have been gone a long time and it would be good for Blacks and the nation if they started to vote in a more diverse way. I would like to encourage that kind of diversity.
Regards — Cliff
I think that reporters repeatedly going back to the racial well for column fodder does everyone in this country a disservice. (The president was born to a white woman--that makes him just like all the rest of 'em--just leave it at that).
The bigger question is why people are motivated to find racial excuses for the Tea Party phenomenon. My suggestion is that their overwhelming conservative bias is in such dire need of offsetting credibility, that people will grasp at any straws they can imagine before they will admit to themselves and to the world that they're Republicans in sheep's clothing.
At the very least, Ralph Nader makes no excuse for his extreme liberalism, while he serves to undermine the electoral interests of those with whom he is closest aligned. The Tea Partiers will cause the same electoral effect in the other direction, (i.e. the loss of conservative candidates in close elections), yet they can't even be that honest with themselves, let alone the media.
Myself, I am waiting for the first political movement to seriously champion civil liberties as well as fiscal conservatism. The Republicans mouth the words, but they have proven themselves to be, rather, champions of abusive Federal power, (Dubya's executive orders and "Patriot" Act are the greatest offenses against our Constitution since the Confederacy, which took over from Adams' Alien and Sedition Act for the title at the time), and budget-busting spending. (The Democrats at least don't make a pretense about their fiscal idiocy).
Until then, Ron Paul for President.
Kad
Yes, columnists going to the race well is not a happy thing. But, given that Clarence Page is Black, I thought his remarks about Black candidates in Republican primary contests was interesting and sort of counter to the normal flow of things.
I fully agree with your comment about President Obama being born to a caucasian mother. Note and like all the others, so let us move on.
As for racial excuses for the Tea Party movement, I think those inside weren't looking for any until the outside media suggested there were some and then those on the inside were looking for evidence that they were not, in fact, a race based movement.
A year ago, at the Demonstration downtown Lowell I was not thinking of race at all. I was interested in the diverse issues, some of which I agreed with and some I thought were fluff. Race never came up.
Do you thing Representative Ron Paul, MD, is going to run in 2012?
Regards — Cliff
I think the crackpots waiving the Obama placards with Hitler moustaches on them are likely the ones responsible for confusing the Tea Party phenomenon with racial politics. I never felt the Tea Parties were about race--my impression of their perversion from the original goals of civil liberties and constrained government spending is that it has been all about major party politics, and opposing all things Democrat.
I do think Ron Paul will run again, if only to have the national stage as he does every four years to remind all of us that our present economic policies, conceived and initiated by a Republican, and continued and expanded by a Democrat, are suicidal for this country. Perhaps this time, (one can only hope), more people will be inclined to listen.
The civil liberties question is more thorny. Until someone correctly rationalizes and sells the criminal (as opposed to "terrorist") nature of the threat, and allows us to move past fearmongering as national policy, we're going to be losing more than winning for the foreseeable future. And that's the most terrifying aspect of all.
My ire evolves from the extremism that has characterized both mainstream political parties, and threatens to institutionalize the tea party movement and thus give a platform for even more extremism.
I am fed up with the deplorable state of the American political system and the opportunities that the process has provided a few self-serving people. I am NOT fed up with American government however and that, for me, is the rub. I am of the opinion that we need to move the center of government more toward the state and local level and that will, I believe, moderate much of the opportunity for extremism to include the tiresome and pointless hyperbole about race. Race is one of those things that is an issue only to those for whom it is an issue, especially when discussions of race almost universally, in America, focus only on ONE race.....over, and over, and over. I personally want to scream out the window...."Get over it." Over time, it becomes much more a self fulfilling prophesy than a perverse offense by others.
And, as far as BHO and his band of idiots goes, RACE has absolutely nothing to do with the record thus far. Incompetence, super-narcissism, profound lack of meaningful experience, and a complete disregard for consideration of differing viewpoints....those are defining characteristics of this Administration.
We need to drain the swamp that DC has become and replace the fetid mess with fresh faces and ideas.
Renee -- I was really interested in those policy points...it's funny b/c I agree with both (I am 100% completely opposed to the death penalty in all cases, and I'm sort of center-left on gun control) and we both volunteer for the same (Republican) candidate.
Remind me to tell you about the forum in Shirley...I really felt like I was the most left-wing person in the room when the immigration issue came up. I'm not saying I have the answers -- I don't -- but I think we need to be a lot smarter about how to handle the issue of the millions of undocumented immigrants here than some totally impractical *solution* that doesn't address the roots of the issue either.
That's without even getting into issues like equal rights for gays, decriminalization of marijuana, being reluctantly pro-choice or any of the other ways I'd fail a conservative litmus test.
Anyway, your comment really gave me pause because I feel like I identify with the Republicans in Massachusetts when we're talking about spending issues or foreign policy. I also get along with many of them on a personal level b/c frankly I think that pound-for-pound they're more down-to-earth than the D's (trust me, Trey Stone and Matt Parker are all over this...and I'm sure we could trade funny stories about reactions from Ds versus Rs to our petition requests in front of supermarkets). I haven't changed my registration from Unenrolled yet but have thought a lot about it, despite being all over the map on policies (I think I'm inspired mainly by Bill Weld).
If I lived in California, New York, or New Jersey, where Democrat-controlled legislatures are destroying those states (no exaggeration) I'd be having a lot of these same issues...but in many other states (Wyoming? Alabama?) I could just as easy wind up on the other side of the aisle, so to speak.
"Such as using federal stimulus money to help open a Planned Parenthood in the small city of Fitchburg. Yes, that is where our state allocated the money. Oh of course they don't actually perform abortions, but why else does anyone go to Planned Parenthood. No one woman goes there for their annual pap smear or if they want to keep the baby, especially since mandated health insurance we have REAL doctors through Mass Health"
"Rhea Gordon, who teaches the abstinence-only workshops, said she works with the Lowell Mission Church, a subcontractor of Healthy Futures that receives $156,000 to mount five one-hour workshops per year at each middle school. She said the program's motto, "The choices you make now will affect you later," can be applied to decisions about joining gangs, using alcohol and drugs, and becoming sexually active."
Where is the seperation of church and state? Planned parenthood is also a place that serves teens with birth control needs and questions to avoid some of those abortions. Many urban areas such as Lowell receive abstinence only sex ed from a church and need to receive additional information elsewhere. In this day and age we use a group that condemns condoms. We need to fund groups that will offer comprehensive sex ed because our students get nothing in the schools.
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