np - So What, Miles Davis
Anyway, so. This morning, in the oddly advert-low Chicago Tribune | GOP to be watched closely on race:For all of Bush's appeals to minorities in the 2000 campaign and during his first two years of office, he has little to show for it. Though the president enjoys high approval ratings overall, his marks from African-Americans tell another story. A poll published by The Wall Street Journal last week found 62 percent of blacks said they disapproved of Bush's performance as president, compared with 65 percent of Americans overall who approve.
Since the Democrats' embrace of civil rights legislation in the 1960s, African-Americans have become the most reliable component of the Democratic coalition. In many ways, those gains were more than offset by whites aligning with Republicans, especially in the South. And despite many efforts at outreach, no Republican presidential candidate has made serious inroads in the African-American vote.
Race, more than even abortion or guns, divides American politics like no other issue, with Democrats consistently backing issues that favor African-Americans and Republicans consistently opposing them. Since 1964, Bill Clinton is the only Democratic presidential candidate to capture a majority of the white vote (46 percent to 45 percent over Bob Dole in 1996).
Bush, who often talks about how his compassionate conservatism is a more inclusive philosophy, won only 9 percent of the African-American vote. But Lott's flameout over such a volatile issue shapes a different kind of problem for the president, namely that suburban white women might now have misgivings about him and the GOP.
Registration is required at the Trib, if you wanted to see the rest of that articke, or this one, GOP sees Frist as wound healer:
Kim Gandy, president of the National Organization for Women, said: "Few senators have a worse voting record on civil rights than Trent Lott--but Bill Frist is one of them. Frist has voted against sex education, international family planning, emergency contraception [the morning-after pill], affirmative action, hate crimes legislation and the Employment Non-Discrimination Act."
Anyojne surprised -- or denying -- that the GOP has a few problems appealing to wimmenandminorities (as usual, non-black people of color are ignored in this commentary/article) probably hasn't been paying attention the last few decades.
Comments
The comment about ignoring non-black/non-white ethnic/racial groups really resonates for me. I'm so used to discussions of race, especially where politics are concerned, being white-black-brown that I notice when Hispanic issues aren't mentioned.
I hear a lot of bad things about Texas, particularly about race, from non-Texans, and much of it is deserved. But Houston is really a multiethnic city: not just black-white + Hispanics, but with a wide variety of Asians, Middle Easterners, etc. (It's a fantastic food town too, for obvious reasons.) It's not perfect--Houston has a lot of problems involving race, ethnicity, and SES--but it's better than living somewhere where I might never see a person of another race in person.
And it does make for a different kind of discussion about race and politics.
Posted by: Ginger | December 22, 2002 12:04 PM
Ginger, if my brain was working, I'd have remembered to mention seeing Charlie Chan's Revenge linked up at WampumBlog a few days back. Or I would have added angry asian man to my list of links ages ago.
Since it's still not working, I'm not sure mentioning them in the same breath with zero context is such a great idea either. . .
So, um, how are rents in Houston?
Posted by: Aaron | December 22, 2002 1:10 PM
Rents are cheap, because Houston is go-go libertarian and has no zoning at all. (Everything is voluntary civic associations, which causes a different set of problems.)
The economy still sucks and there are still plenty of rednecks, though.
My view on Texas: "My country, right or wrong. When right, to be kept right. When wrong, to be put right." Funny how most people who quote the first bit often forget the crucial part at the end.
[goes off to check links out]
Posted by: Ginger | December 23, 2002 10:25 AM