Color Conscious, or JC Watts is right
By BlackRepub Posted in african americans | black republicans | Culture | outreach — Comments (32) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »
A bit of obvious disclosure, that I am an African-American Republican. I became a Republican during the 2004 campaign season, right as I had just turned 19 so my first ever Presidential vote was for George W. Bush, or as my friends and I like to call him, G Dubs. I believe that the Republican Party is the natural home for African Americans, because of our stances on school choice, lower taxes, economic policies such as an opposition to raising the minimum wage and illegal immigration, and of course the social issues of crime, gay marriage and abortion. RNC Chair Ken Mehlman was the person who really confirmed my decision to remain a registered Republican rather than stay and independent who leaned Republican. I believed him when he said the GOP will not be complete until more African-Americans come back home. 2006, hailed as the year of the Black Republican was obviously a disappointment resultswise, but I felt was something to build upon because the GOP had finally broken through with a large crop of candidates on the national stage, something I have long advocated was necessary to counter the unelected race pimps in the Democratic Party.
Now I will admit, that I'm young, and haven't been around politics or the GOP for very long, but I must say I am gravely disappointed with how the GOP has conducted itself in terms of African-Americans this cycle. I am not arguing for affirmative action candidates, but the two facts that there are no high profile Black candidates running under the banner of the GOP is disgraceful and should be unacceptable to the Party. The common argument is why fight for a constituency that considers white Republicans racist and Black Republicans Uncle Toms is a foolish one considering that Michael Steele was able to get 40 percent of the Black vote and Ken Blackwell was able to get 35 percent. If the Republican Party could get 25 percent of the African American vote, we would win a majority of our races. If the GOP could get 35 to 40 percent, it would make up for the Hispanics that are being bamboozled by the La Raza pimps on the immigration issue. I was disappointed, as my RedState mentor Gamecock was, to see that none of the first tier candidates went to the African American summit. And yes, Tavis Smiley is a liberal, but if they can stand up to Chris Matthews they can stand up to Smiley, and it comes down to the reason why Rudy went to a socially conservative conference: you win simply by showing up. If the top tier ha d simply shown up to debate, they would have been able to go into the Black community and say I care about your issues, and I have a plan to address them.
You see, younger African-Americans are not the Civil Rights generation are not beholden to the poverty pimps as our grandparents and our parents were. We know the truth, that while racism certainly exists, it is by no means the all encompassing factor that it was to blocking opportunities for African-Americans. In fact where racism exists, it is often the Republicans that should be calling out the Democratic Party for is unabashed racism (ie Steele and Oreo Cookies, Cosby on Clarence Thomas, Robert Byrd, resident Senate Imperial Wizard.) yet we are afraid to because we have ceded the ground on race. I for one am tired of seeing my party cede ground on every major issue. The thing that got my vote was seeing George Bush stand in front of the Urban League and tell Black America and say, I'm here to ask for your vote. The only man I can see doing that right now, is Mike Huckabee, who I consequently am supporting. I believe Huck is the only one who will lay out a plan for the African-American community much like George Bush did with talking about Pell Grants, NCLB, minority home ownership, and abortion and gay marriage. In a time where we are pushing to win an election, every vote is going to count, and we don't need to expand our ideology with Rudy, we need to expand the tent and bring conservative voters into the fold. I'm willing to meet the GOP halfway this year, but we must as a Party do better; otherwise we can expect that reliable 12 percent of African American Republican voters to dwindle even further.
I made a similar point in discussing how the GOP would like to be able to ignore SoCons in the same way as they do the Black Community.
I got jumped for it and was told that I was wrong, that the GOP falls all over itself to bring in Black voters, then I was accused of race baiting because I used the word "token" as in token, or minimal, support and recognition of the Black Community by the GOP.
specifically a 'plan' for...
"I believe Huck is the only one who will lay out a plan for the African-American community much like George Bush did with talking about Pell Grants, NCLB, minority home ownership, and abortion and gay marriage. "
" in the end, it's not the years in your life that count. It's the life in your years."
Abe Lincoln
Is that W laid out a solid foundation of how to my grounds in the African-American community. The problem is that often, the GOP has tried to reach out by pretending to be Democrat-lite. George Bush offered an alternative, which was accountability for poor performing schools and pouring money into scholarships rather than affirmative action. Also George Bush had based his program off of his great educational initiatives in Texas, where the top ten percent of all public schools could be enrolled in UTexas. Under Bush, as we all know the Black middle class was able to soar with the benefit of the tax cuts, which benefitted African American small business owners, allowing Blacks to move forward economically and not give all of teir profits back to the government. And unfortunately, the perception that the Bush administration was not receptive to Katrina wiped out all of the progress W had made with the Black community, but doing all Bush had done with respect to the Black community as well as having Blacks in his inner circle helped him increase his support 5 percent from 2000 to 2004. I see Huckabee as the most likely to include African-Americans in his inner circle (personal bias:I trust Southerners more to do the right thign on race matters) because he has specifically addressed issues of school choice and cultural attitudes in the Black community. It's not that I think our other candidates don't care, but I know that Huckabee does care, so I'd rather not take a wait and see approach.
Chuck Norris does not vote for president of the United States. He gives the voting machine a swift roundhouse kick and Mike Huckabee wins.
BlackRepub,
Help me out here. I'm a mid-40s white guy who strongly believes the GOP needs to do more to bring in the Black vote. I believe that not because we need to win elections, but because there are millions of Black Americans who are in a world of hurt.
The electoral victories that will come by earning their vote will be swell...as long as the GOP doesn't earn that vote by becoming Democrats.
How do we campaign on GOP/Conservative issues to the Black American Community?
Specifically, how do we talk, what do we propose?
How do we make it resonate and more importantly, make it work?
We campaign by taking the issues that have always resonated with the Black community, and we hammer them home hard, and we aggressively beat the Democratic Party over the head with them. This is a two headed attack that we need to use in order to win. We would first have to continue the policy that we had in 2006 which was running a good number of African-American candidates. African-Americans are going to see the music when they continue to see that they are being forced to vote for the white guy over the Republican, and will tire of hearing that the Republican, isn't really Black. We saw the first inclination of that with Steele, which was really a great start and something we should build on instead of discarding. We ram home that we are the party of school choice, something that resonates with poor Blacks and Blacks in general. We don't only push the social issues, because while Blacks are with us there, we need to push the economic issues harder with the majority of people, and push abortion/gay marriage in the Black Church. We need to speak to Black businesses about tax cuts, home ownership,and that fact that our policies make it easier to own businesses. We must show the Black community that they have been abandoned by the Democratic Party and show that our platform makes sense. We are the Party of education, low taxes, and saving the family. We need to be aggressive about race, and we need to be able to counter the demagogues. But I think we can do it, and I think it was proven in Maryland. We just need to continue what we have been doing in the past and not abandon in under th mantle of electability in a bad year. Also we need to put Black R's in some easy safe conservative seats in the Senae and House, so that every African American Republican isn't clawing their eyes out every time they run in politics. Representation matters, and I believe we will be a better party for it.
Chuck Norris does not vote for president of the United States. He gives the voting machine a swift roundhouse kick and Mike Huckabee wins.
"Also we need to put Black R's in some easy safe conservative seats in the Senae and House, so that every African American Republican isn't clawing their eyes out every time they run in politics."
This is much easier said than done. The safest, most conservative seats in the House and Senate have disproportionately large white populations, and this is even more true for the voters in Republican primaries in these seats. There's always a long list of hopefuls for these positions just biding time until the incumbent retires. It's generally not a good idea for the national party to pick sides in primary battles. Fair or not, I think it is a fact that people tend to vote for candidates that look like themselves. Thus, there are not only numerically more potential white candidates for these seats (by virtue of the candidates being drawn from the Republican population in the district), but white candidates probably have an electoral edge, all other factors being equal. I'm just not sure how your suggestion is to be accomplished.
Perhaps more can be done to appoint blacks inside Republican state and federal administrations. Or, to give more national party support whenever there is a viable black Republican candidate for office somewhere.
was from a very white district. And Steele (MD), Blackwell (OH), Swann (PA), and Cain (GA) were running in majority white districts (i.e. state-wide). Cain didn't win the nomination, but if he had he would be in the Senate today. Too bad he didn't wait it out in NE and run for the open seat that's there now. A black Senator from NE, that'd be awesome.
But there should be some effort to cultivate a "bench" of younger black conservatives to run in Republican districts. I know of several up-and-coming black conservatives in OK who I hope will eventually run for seats in that state (all of which are white majority districts). Hopefully other states have a similar dynamic going on, especially in the South.
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The original suggestion was to get Blacks into "easy safe conservative seats." I would not consider state-wide elections in Ohio, Pennsylvania, and Maryland to be easy, safe seats. I don't think those candidates lost because they were black--they just had too uphill a battle in those races in 2006. Of course, Cain exemplifies my point that Blacks may have a difficult time winning Republican primaries in safe conservative areas. I'll give you Watts as a candidate in a strongly conservative district, but was he the beneficiary in the primary of any party assistance or was he just such a good candidate? I don't necessarily disagree with blackrepub's suggestion of getting some Blacks Republicans elected by having them run in strongly Republican districts, but I'm just not sure how it is to be done and how feasible it is. Maybe there are great black republican candidates like Watts out there who reside in strong Republican areas and can be recruited to run and supported by the party. I really don't know.
Indeed, J.C. Watts received extraordinary assistance from the Oklahoma GOP during his first campaign for the 4th District House seat. I know, because I managed the campaign for the first and only Republican candidate who had entered that race prior to the announcement that longtime incumbent Rep. Dave McCurdy (D) would not seek re-election to that office.
After that announcement, "everyone and his dog" -- including Watts -- entered the race, Democrat and Republican alike.
Watts, of course, had the highest name recognition due to his status as a former Oklahoma Sooners quarterback and as the first African-American to win statewide office as a member of the Oklahoma Corporation Commission.
During his tenure on that three-member body which regulates utilities, the oil industry, etc., he was involved in many scandals which, without party support, would have sunk anyone without the backing of some powerful people in the state.
During the campaign, we uncovered information that would have sunk his chances in that race (and his future political hopes for that matter), but we chose to inform him of its existence so that he could "clean it up" before his Democrat opponent could find it. After all, despite his shortcomings, his Democrat opponent in the race would have been far worse for the people of southwest Oklahoma.
What was the "dirt" we found on Watts? Sorry, but I'm taking that to the grave.
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Nope, you just sewed FUD (Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt) into the conversation. If your story is true, it would have been better to not mention it at all. If it's not true, you just accomplished a backhanded smear at the man without having to defend it.
"Yep, I found some pretty bad dirt, but I'll never tell you what it is so I can protect him." is a great defense against all inquiries.
Socialism doesn't work. It looks nice on paper, but it's been tried and it's failed miserably every time (usually accompanied by widespread death and suffering).
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As one of the editors here most focused on black voter outreach, I have been saddened by the lack of showing up.
Who has given a major speech from an HBCU? It is young black voters who have become less Democratic over the past 15-20 years. Targeting younger communities makes sense. As blackrepub points out, he became an R at the age of 19. That's the age many young people start choosing a political affiliation.
Rs should be reaching out to those communities and HBCUs are the obvious place to start.
Rs should also be frequently the Urban League. They are not a right-of-center group, but they are focused on real research and an effort to understand urban problems. They fill the role that the NAACP filled before it became a partisan and shrill organization.
President Bush stopped addressing the NAACP and instead attended the Urban League each year. The new candidates should similarly give a talk or have a debate with the Urban League.
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This is a Republican primary. The goal of these candidates right now is to persuade Republicans to support them.
To expect these guys to venture into Democratic strongholds to campaign I think is unfair.
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for the sheer reason that we put no effort to win them. The biggest example I see is Maryland in 2006. A deep blue state, yet because Steele is able to capture 40 percent of the Black vote, he narrowly loses, and had he beenr unning in a year that was not so anti-GOP, he would have won the Senate. We have a chance to expand our base without compromising any of our principles, and I think that we have abandoned the Bush/Rove/Melhman outreach that was making inroads in the Black community, and I think that a huge mistake in the long run for the Republican Party, because we should be looking to expand among a naturally conservative constituency.
Chuck Norris does not vote for president of the United States. He gives the voting machine a swift roundhouse kick and Mike Huckabee wins.
I can see reaching out to all Americans in the general, but this is the primary season. What does it accomplish to talk to people who can't even vote for you yet, because they're not Republicans?
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You can't just show up 3 months before the election, and suddenly think that tyour agenda is going to have rsonance. I think that's why Evangelical Christians have done the best in bringing African-Americans into the conservative fold. Praying and having church events with white and Black eveangelicals is certainly going to affect the political landscape. I think that addressing the Urban League as well as addressing the African-American community on issues on off years and primary season gives an impression that you are genuine with promoting an agenda that is going to benefit the African-American community and not just there to win votes on election day.
Chuck Norris does not vote for president of the United States. He gives the voting machine a swift roundhouse kick and Mike Huckabee wins.
And I think your point about multi-racial evangelical communities is an under-appreciated development in the political realm. In OK (the state where Bush got 28% of the admitted small black vote), this is a development I've watched for a while. The homeschooling community and the mega-churches are now quite multi-racial. One can speak to many minorities without going to a "minority" event. And blacks have seen that white Rs are not racists. I'm sure there is some effect the other direction with white church-goers being more sympathetic to some of the concerns of the black community.
But the important thing is that there is something greater than race or politics that unites them. I see a future PhD thesis in the making.
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would definitely lean toward voting for someone who is reaching out to the black community.
I do think the IA and NH lock on early primary season affects the calculus. But SC has a lot of black voters. Giving a speech at a SC HBCU (instead or in addition to Bob Jones) could win over some volunteers and excite some otherwise untapped resources in that primary state.
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That candidate who does so isn't just speaking to the group he is addressing. He's speaking to all the primary voters out there who see and hear what he says and does.
absentee
Not only would people outside the university listen because of the Presidential candidates, but you could get free publicity because it is out of the ordinary. I hope campaign staff from each candidate are reading this.
BR, I was planning on writing a diary on the JC Watts thing also, but last night was Bones and House, my only TV night of the week, so.... didn't do it yet.
I'm very glad you chimed in. I love JC Watts -- I'm a native Texan who did alot of time in OK, and graduated from OklaState, and I had to de-program my I Hate OU gene in order to embrace Congressman Watts. But hey, I learned to overcome my prejudice.
I'd like to address 3 areas (so far) in which I disagree with him - and/or you on this.
But I'm saving it up for a diary tonight. Stay tuned!
It's war -- so when can we start shooting back at the enemy Democrats?
I can't contribute on the weekends until the end of February-I consider football to be more important than politics and running a close second to church :)
Chuck Norris does not vote for president of the United States. He gives the voting machine a swift roundhouse kick and Mike Huckabee wins.
is because all the Cowboy games originally scheduled for noon kick-offs keep getting bumped up to 3:15.
Allowing church, big Sunday lunch, short nap, then the Boys.
It's war -- so when can we start shooting back at the enemy Democrats?
BlackRepub,
I recommended your diary and wholeheartedly agree with your points. I haven't posted on Redstate in awhile but I do want to let everyone know that there are several efforts going on at the grassroots level to network together young black Republicans, refine and roll-out a Republican urban agenda, create a database of young black Republicans (age 16-35) that can network with each other and help with GOTV in urban areas, and ultimately through internships and other candidate training be prepped for running for office.
There's a lot going on. The problem is that whenever Af-Am Republicans make progress, someone in Republican leadership does something stupid that just elongates the standard 5 minutes I have to spend explaining away the biases against the Republican party before I can get to discussing policy. Not showing up for the Tavis Smiley debate was either the apex of stupidity, naivete, or both. Those who showed up and laid out conservative solutions to problems that currently have disproportionate impact on the Af-Am community will be very formidable in the general election if they pass the primary (read: Huckabee). As for the top four, it wouldn't surprise me if they have trouble winning Bush's 10%.
There is nothing lonelier than being a black Republican in Boston, Massachusetts
Please do use RS or at least keep us up to date with respect to those efforts. I know it might be difficult since many of the GOP-leaning young black voters are GOP-leaning because they don't want to be first-and-foremost "black" but would rather be seen as an individual.
Nevertheless, for the truly committed partisans this type of networking seems to be a very good development. Best of luck.
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I'll try to answer my own question but if anyone already has a link, please let me know.
Huckabee's participation in the Tavis Smiley hosted debate is one reason he is getting this second look by the media and by many of us.
BlackRepub, I'm going to recommend as I think you have touched on some issues that truly vex some of us. I may not agree with everything here but the tone and ideas expressed are very laudable.
As a conservative who happens to be black, I think not showing up at the Tavis Smiley debate was a mistake, but not the end of the world. The RNC can go after black voters without compromising at all, using core conservative principles of individualism to reach out. With that said, its not a matter of showing up at NAACP events to reach out to the 'black community', but rather finding the natural conservatives among the group that would fit in perfectly.
A perfect example is my Aunt and her husband. They both live in OK, run a church, and were probably the first Republicans in my family I knew. They fit right in with social conservatives on pro life issues and my aunt has been an entrepreneur for most of her adult life.
The keyword here is microtargeting. Finding that black small businessman, the black military man/woman, black evangelicals, pentocostals, etc would be the same exact thing the RNC does to white voters. You've got your Nascar dads, security moms, white evangelicals, white small businessmen/women..the Rovian strategy applied to blacks, no more no less. White voters surely are not a monolith because they aren't treated like a monolith.
I think to really sell conservatism, it has to be sold to the right buyers. And sure, show up for those debates with people claiming to speak for all 40 million of us, but realize that showing up is only to play defense to avoid the "they don't care about blacks" smear. The key is to do some demographically intense targeting until the point where you don't have to show up at old hat groups like the NAACP. The paradigm shift can happen, but won't unless Republicans stop treating blacks as if our skin color, and not what we do as men and women in our daily lives, is what is most important.
I'm an Okie and I know more black Rs from there than from anywhere else (I haven't been living there since 1999).
Exit polls showed Bush at 28% in the Oklahoma black vote (albeit with a large margin of error). Nevertheless, it was his best showing in any black community. I don't know how much JC Watts helped with making it okay to be black and vote R, but it did matter some.
Also OK seems to have a lot more biracial evangelical churches which probably has some effect. Finally, because there are no "black districts" in OK, there isn't a gerrymandering of all the black voters into one far left district. That may also have led to more outreach.
Whatever the reason, I'm proud to be from a state where black outreach has happened and been successful. Hopefully, that trend continues. I know several young black professionals who are thinking about a future in politics. I'll be supporting them for sure.
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I tried to make a similar point in a posting a few weeks ago, but not being an African-American, I'm afraid my opinion doesn't carry much weight on this topic. We can definitely do better in addressing the concerns of the black community...and I think we can do it without sacrificing our conservative ideals.
...when they see me they'll say, "There goes Loren Wallace,
the greatest thing to ever climb into a race car."