“Meanness” an Attribute for GOP

I heard this morning that what Conservatives most want is someone who is “mean,” someone who can beat the president in this fall’s general elections.

That’s why issues about Newt Gingrich‘s marriages and his alleged desire for an open marriage, just wasn’t an issue in the South Carolina primary. There is a “national conversation” that is in place, one ABC reporter said, and in order for Mitt Romney to regain a bit of the ground he has lost, he has got to tie into that conversation.

Included in the conversation is anger amongst the GOP. The successful GOP candidate must connect to that anger, and run a campaign that addresses the “politics of resentment.” It seems, according to some, that a large part of the GOP base is angry at the “elite media,” the economy, of course, and the fact that Barack Obama is in the White House.

When Newt Gingrich did his “Contract with America” some years ago, the issue of anger was addressed; specifically it was the anger of white men. Is that the same crock pot that Newt has identified and is adding ingredients to – this pot of stew, brimming with elements of white anger?

This election cycle is a bit scary to me; for the party of “faith and values” to be willing to abandon that platform just so they can elect someone they think can get the president out of the White House makes me wonder about the validity of their claim to be so above it all. The recent YouTube video of the young man giving a spoken word about how he hates religion but loves Jesus, then, seems so appropriate. This young man sees the disconnect between what religious people say and do, and it bothers him.

It bothers me, too.

It seems that if the faith and values people are just looking for someone to go on the attack, and be “mean” enough to get President Barack Obama out of office, then something is askew. If the Evangelical, pro-life base is willing to remain silent on what appear to be obvious moral breaches on the part of Newt Gingrich, just because they think he can beat President Obama, then something is wrong.

When it no longer becomes important that a presidential hopeful at least appear to be concerned for all of God’s children, when it becomes OK for a man who’s marital and extramarital indiscretions are not important (when in the past, such indiscretions were enough to knock any candidate out of the ball park), then we Americans need to stop and pause.

We are in a very dangerous place.

I suspect that the next few weeks leading up to the Republican convention are going to be painful, because the campaigns will be so nasty and so “mean,” that the real issues will be lost. Politicians are good at manipulating the emotions of Americans, and Newt Gingrich is one of the best.

If it is true that what GOP voters are looking for most is someone who is “mean,” it’s likely they won’t be disappointed.

But at the end of the day, what in the world will it mean for our country?

A candid observation…

Such Thing as Racially Coded Language?

I got into a rather lively debate with a (former) Twitter follower of mine.

She had seen the title of my post entitled “Newt Gingrich Owes African-Americans an Apology” and had taken issue. Her response to the tweet announcing the blog post was “no he doesn’t.” She said I was playing “the race card” and that “it doesn’t work.”

Later in the evening, she and I started an exchange. I said that Newt had played the race card by referring to President Obama as “the food stamp president.” Though statistics show that more whites than blacks receive food stamps, what many “hear” when they hear “food stamps” is “black people are getting food stamps” because they are lazy and do not want to work. It’s an underlying thought in this country, and, I argued, Newt knows that very well.

I said that Newt was playing to his base. I also, erroneously, said that he had earlier said that “poor black children” don’t have a work ethic,” and my friend quickly corrected me and said he had only said “poor children.” She was right and I admitted it as such.

But she was angry. She said I was racist and that I was calling HER racist for saying that Newt Gingrich was playing to his base. And she said that people like me are the ones who keep the races divided. She “unfollowed” me.

She is not the only one who would agree with me, and clearly, not every African-American would agree with me. Just this morning, CNN’s Soledad O’Brien and Roland Martin were talking about this very same thing with former GOP presidential hopeful Herman Cain, who vehemently rejects the idea that there is such a thing as racially coded language.

But that’s all right. Back to my little encounter with my Twitter friend, I was sorry that she “unfollowed” me because I enjoyed tweeting with her. She and I obviously have different ways of seeing things, but that’s good; one learns from talking with people who are different.

But what bothers me is that she really thinks that there is no such thing as racially coded language. She accused me of “race baiting,” and if bringing up that Newt was playing the race card to appeal to his mostly white, South Carolina audience, then that’s what I was doing.

But it seems a bit naive to really believe that there is no such thing as racially coded language. It has always been done. President Reagan, the GOP iconic hero, did it when he used the phrase “welfare queen.” I am quite sure that the image that most people had, black and white, was that of a black woman with too many kids who refused to work but who kept having children so she could get more money from the government.

It is a despicable image, and an inaccurate one. Yes, there are people of all races who abuse the system, and yes, it is true that if one keeps getting hand-outs, he or she might be less inclined to look for work, but that doesn’t apply to everyone or even to the vast number of people who are on public assistance.

Rick Santorum, at least, was forthright in his comments which were not all that complimentary toward black people. He said, outright, that he didn’t want to make black people’s lives better by giving them somebody else’s money. I want to give them the opportunity to go out and make their own money…” (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/03/rick-santorum-entitlements-black-people_n_1181212.html)

It was a straight up statement; you didn’t have to guess about what he meant. He later tried to back out of it and said he didn’t say “black” people, but he did. He was standing on the long-held stated and believed myth, again, that “black people” are lazy, that “black people” are the ones who are using and abusing the welfare system. It was insulting, but the language was not racially coded.

Gingrich, on the other hand, did use coded language when he said that President Obama is the “food stamp president.” He was more honest when he said that the “African American community should demand pay checks and not food stamps.” It is still insulting; it is still a statement that upholds and supports a myth that black people are the ones driving the growth of “big government,” and that is just not true. You can read what Gingrich said at (http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/01/05/newt-gingrich-paychecks-food-stamps_n_1188193.html).

I will probably never re-connect with my former Twitter friend – she won’t have it – but I cannot let this discussion slip into nothingness. She called me a racist for saying that Newt was and is playing the race card and for sticking to my guns. That’s rather like one who has been beaten being blamed for the beating. African-Americans, and many whites, have “been in the storm too long” not to recognize when they are being targeted for someone else’s gain.

Newt Gingrich is a master politician and a very smart man. Trust and believe that he knew what he was doing when he said President Obama is the “food stamp president” to that roomful of white people in South Carolina. If saying that makes me a racist, then so be it. The truth is the truth.

A candid observation…

No Time to Go Backwards

By now, everyone knows that seven states have passed laws that compromise the ability of some people to vote; the feeling is that the laws unfairly impact minority voters.

Seven states, including Florida, Georgia, Tennessee, West Virginia, Ohio, Wisconsin and Maine, have passed laws that prevent early voting, and at least 15 states have passed laws that require voters to have a photo ID. States requiring photo identification include Texas, South Carolina, Kansas, Floria, Wisconsin, Rhode Island,Mississippi and Kansas.(The states with new voter ID laws include Kansas, Rhode Island, Tennessee and Wisconsin.)

Civil rights organizations are concerned that these new laws, which have been adopted in so-called “battleground” states, will unfairly impact minority voters. It is estimated that about 5 million voters will be negatively impacted by the new laws. A study by the Brennan Center for Justice at New York University, states that about 18 percent of seniors and 35 percent of African Americans do not have the proper photo identification.

This, after so much blood was shed by black and white people, during the 60s, to give African Americans the right to vote.

In October of 2011, a 96-year-old Tennessee woman, having learned of the new photo ID requirement of her state, was denied a photo ID because, in spite of having an envelope full of documents which affirmed her identification, including her birth certificate, she didn’t have her marriage license.

That was a problem, said the clerk, because the name on her birth certificate and on her old voter registration card was different from the name she currently has.

That sounds like something from the days of poll taxes, where clerks denied African Americans the right to vote for all sorts of contrived and dastardly reasons.

GOP presidential candidates, including Texas Gov. Rick Perry and former House Speaker Newt Gingrich say the new laws are necessary to prevent voter fraud.

That is GOP-speak for “we-didn’t-like-the-huge-voter-turn-out-in-2008-that-helped-put-Barack-Obama-in-the-White-House.

The United States Justice Department is looking into these laws, but the slowness of “the system” is a tad worrisome. It is January, sure, but before we know it, we will have gotten through what is sure to be a lurid election campaign season and November will be upon us.

I am sure there are nice, compact “directions” on what people should do in order to make sure they have the correct identification come November, but folks who make laws know how people work. They know that a great number of people will either remain uninformed about the new laws, or will wait until it’s too late to get the needed photo identification, and then, come voting day, tear-tear…they will not be able to vote.

The Justice Department has locked horns with South Carolina over their new law. Some Republicans say that its “intrusion” into South Carolina’s business is just another example of “big government,” and is proof of why President Obama, dubbed by some as “the most liberal president in United States history” needs to be out of the White House.

But, no. I would have to disagree. In its history, the United States government has been either slow or absent in matters pertaining to protecting or ensuring the rights of African Americans far too often. A government that said nothing about what’s going on to compromise the right to vote for African Americans and others would be a government that would not be worthy of respect.

This is not the time to go backwards.

A candid observation…

Wasteful Spending the Mark of American Political Campaigns

Some things just do not make any sense to me.

Like, politicians spending millions of dollars, basically to try to destroy each other, and win an office, while people are hungry, homeless, and sick. It makes no sense for GOP candidates or for President Barack Obama, who reports say will probably spend a billion dollars in his re-election bid, while American people are suffering.

Has America lost her way and her moral compass? How can any individual and any country condone such blatant wasteful spending when not only our nation but countries all over the world are in severe economic distress?

Not only is there wasteful spending going on, the issues that have Americans at bay are basically being ignored. In the recent GOP debates, there was not a lot of substantive conversation or talking about the issues which are breaking America’s back. Instead, there was petty argument and attacks on each other. This, while 46 percent of the nation is living in poverty?What’s wrong with this picture when a candidate would rather rail about same-sex marriage than how to fix an economy where the rich are getting richer on the backs of the poor?

Can a nation sustain itself, being like this?

One of the things I am learning about President Franklin Delano Roosevelt is that he never lost his touch with “the people.” He insisted on making those around him and those who made laws think about “the common man.” He insisted upon people having what he called “The Four Freedoms:” freedom of speech and expression, freedom to worship God in whatever way one wanted, freedom from want, which meant to him, the right of the common man to make a living wage, and freedom from fear. He wanted these freedoms not only for Americans, but for people all over the world.

Why does it feel like present day politicians are not even close to wanting those freedoms for Americans – or for anyone else?

The middle class of America is about gone, yet the likes of Mitt Romney and the other GOP candidates have said virtually nothing about that. Newt Gingrich and Romney are both being backed up financially by extraordinarily wealthy super PACs…and it’s a sure thing that the “stealthy wealthy” will continue to throw bucks in the campaign buckets of candidates so that their economic positions can be maintained and grown.

What about the masses? Does the common person in America matter to anyone at all?

GOP candidates and Republicans in general lift up the name of Ronald Reagan as though he were the blood brother of Jesus, yet his “trickle down economic” policy never worked; what “trickled down” to the masses wasn’t enough to ensure they had quality lives. And now, with technology changing the way everything is done, the resources for the masses are even less. It used to be that a high school graduate could get at least a decent manufacturing job, but the wealthy – folks who own manufacturing businesses – are outsourcing jobs overseas, leaving their own American brothers and sisters to languish.

No problem, some would say. Just stay in school. Get an education! That’s good except that everyone cannot afford to go to college and some kids are just not college material. For those who do go to college, they are strapped by student loan debt that is so exorbitant it’s frightening.

The wealthy of this country do not seem to care. They are helping to develop the middle class of developing countries,and undermining America’s own. What is wrong with this picture?

If one has money, one can do about anything; in contrast, if one does not have money, one is enslaved to poverty and debt for his or her lifetime. Some of the GOP candidates have suggested, and some have stated outright, that those who are poor are poor because they want to be; they have not tried; they are lazy.

Not true. There are scores of Americans who are working their fingers to the bone and still cannot make ends meet. As for the unemployed, there are many who have given into the depression that comes when one is rejected over and over again, and those who are lucky enough to finally find a job also find out that potential employers second-guess hiring them when they realize the applicant has been out of work for so long.

This is America, where life is supposed to be easier than it is in other, “lesser” countries.

That may have been the case a while ago, but sadly, the reality and the legacy of America is changing …and nobody seems to care.

A candid observation…

Paul, Santorum Need Come to Jesus Meeting

I keep thinking that somebody ought to tell Mr. Paul and Mr. Santorum that racism is…not presidential.

Both gentlemen fared well in the Iowa caucuses, and both seem to have a hunger for the nation’s highest office.

But Mr. Paul and Mr. Santorum, can we talk?

Just a couple of days ago, Rick Santorum said that he “didn’t want to make black people’s lives better by giving them other people’s money.” He was speaking to a group of white people, and I guess…well, I guess he was comfortable and he knew what they’d want to hear.

In the name of God, some white folks just think black folks ought to just …shape up, right?

He later on said that he didn’t recall making the statement, but that’s only after he said, in an earlier statement, that he had probably been thinking about what he saw in the movie “Waiting for Superman,” which focuses on black kids trying to get into charter schools…

Santorum said to Sean Hannity on the latter’s television program that, well, he doesn’t make racial distinctions, and, by golly, he has some black friends! Yep, sure does. Michael Steele and J.C. Watts, both black, are his friends.

Never mind that neither of those gentlemen seem to relate to the real plight of many African Americans.

And then there’s Mr. Paul, who, back in the day, had newsletters written under his name. Now, he says he didn’t read any of “that stuff,” but the fact is that “that stuff” appeared in these newsletters and he did not disavow any of it.

What didn’t he disavow, you ask? Well, for one, his statement, “If you’ve ever been robbed by a teen-aged male, you know how fleet-footed they can be.” (italics mine) In that same newsletter, published in 1992, he said that “we can safely assume that 95 percent of the black males (in Washington D.C.) are semi-criminal or entirely criminal.” He was the only member of Congress that opposed giving a Medal of Honor to Rosa Parks and opposed to the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Mr. Paul said he is not a racist; in a 2008 CNN interview, he said that he’s the one who protects blacks in the inner city. He says that the statements show the tendency of the media to take things out of context.

That’s fair. The media does have a tendency to take things out of context.

He said in the 2008 interview that he repudiates all of the statements in the newsletters, and that is good. He said he has never read the stuff written under his name.

He said that the real issue is the drug laws that so unfairly impact black people, and he’s right on that.

But it’s the little things, the little tongue-in-cheek things that are said that help keep racial tensions alive, and keep marginalized people feeling, well, marginalized. It is a myth that most of the people on welfare are African American; though proportionately, the poverty rate for African Americans is higher than that for whites, statistics show that more white than black people are on welfare.

One of these presidential politicians ought to say that, don’t you think?

I know it is the job of a politician to get elected, and politicians will say anything to get elected. Ironically, I think of the words of the Apostle Paul, who said in 1 Cor. 9: “Though I am free, and belong to no man, I make myself a slave to everyone, to win as many as possible.” (9:19) Later he says, “Do you not know that in a race all the runners run but only one gets the prize? Run in such a way to get the prize.” (9:24) I chuckled as I read that entire passage of scripture and wondered if Paul, in addition to fiercely loving Jesus the Christ was not also a politician?

It seems to me, though, that a good politician ought to have the adjectives “honest” and “sensitive” somewhere in his or her resume. Mr. Santorum and Mr. Paul need to “fess up” to saying, or allowing to be said in their names, some pretty racist stuff. It happens. This is America, and it is no secret that many to most white people have grown up with disparaging views and opinions about black people. How great it would be to hear a white politician just “own up” and admit they’d said some things that reflected how they grew up and were taught?

When we admit our goofs, we can begin to fix them.

And fixing their apparently racist ways of looking at black people is a must, in my view, for anyone who is striving to get to the White House. The American government has not been a friend to black (or brown) people, or to women or other oppressed groups. The American government turned its head to the injustices suffered by black people and would not, did not, protect its black citizens.

The country has suffered as a result of that.

Mr. Paul and Mr. Santorum would do themselves and their campaigns a favor if they would just have a “come to Jesus” meeting with Jesus, and ask Jesus to change their thoughts and beliefs when it comes to black people, black life and black culture.

Because the country is not a lily-white place, gentlemen, and the country cannot be as great as it has the potential for, if all of its people are not treated having been created equal.

A candid observation.

RuneScape Wiki: The Ancient Curses are a set of prayers obtained as a reward after completing The Temple at Senntisten. →