Stu Rothenberg managed to write an entire column on the GOP's problems getting black voters to vote for the GOP... without mentioning Hurricane Katrina, LBJ and civil rights, GOP efforts to prevent blacks from voting, and Nixon's Southern Strategy.
Really.
Rothenberg begins by saying he gets why the GOP presidential candidates skipped a recent CBC-sponsored debate. He says the CBC is a Dem institution, and likens it to the Dems who skipped a debate that was to air on Fox News. So far, I'm trying to keep an open mind, but then there's this:
The CBC is essentially a Democratic group — when he was in the House, Oklahoma Republican J.C. Watts refused to join it because of its agenda. Given that, it isn’t surprising that less than a week before Roston’s column appeared on the Internet, the CBC issued a news release announcing that the group was "outraged" by the confirmation of Leslie Southwick to the 5th Circuit Court, a nomination supported unanimously by Republican Senators.
Nowhere does Rothenberg mention that Southwick has a disturbing record on civil rights. Wow... a judicial nominee who has a troublesome civil rights record, and the CBC opposes him. I'm shocked, shocked, I tell you!
Rothenberg goes on to note that GOPers have set up institutions and outreach efforts to black voters. He continues:
It’s difficult to "create" a corresponding conservative leadership in the black community when most African-Americans share the general outlook of existing leaders. And that too is a problem for GOP strategists: The existing black leadership both reflects grass-roots opinion and reinforces existing preferences and assumptions by continually pounding on Republican policies and political personalities.
On certain social issues, black voters (and Hispanics, for that matter) are more conservative than their white, liberal allies. But that really doesn’t matter, since they don’t vote on those issues.
Though it admittedly is a generalization and there are exceptions, the GOP’s fundamental problem is that African-Americans think of the government as a protector and benefactor, while most Republicans (and all conservatives) see government as a problem. As long as that is the case, and specifically as long as affirmative action is an issue, Republican opportunities in the black community are extremely limited.
I'm not going to say that affirmative action isn't a factor, and I do think that views of the role of government are also a factor.
But no mention of the civil rights movement and the party affiliation of LBJ?
No mention of the utter disaster that was the Republican-run government's response to Hurricane Katrina?
No mention of Nixon's Southern Strategy and the racist appeals that Republicans have historically used against Democrats? (Willie Horton, 'welfare queens', etc.)
I just don't get how anyone could write a column on the Republican Party and why it garners so few votes from blacks, and not at all explore the fact that Republicans often come across as people who don't want to associate with blacks. There's no seeming empathy for people in general, let alone an entire race that has been smeared so that the GOP can win some elections. A political party that uses black people as its political "whipping boy" for decades and won't honestly addressed what it did, can't expect to win many more black votes.