From ThinkProgress:
A booth at this weekend’s Texas Republican convention sold buttons asking, “If Obama Is President…Will We Still Call It The White House?”
These people know where some of their support will come from. I’m just surprised they let their slip show.
UPDATE (by David): The actual button, via TPM, of which the Texas Republican party has predictably denied any knowledge:
Please share widely!
doesn’t surprise anyone. the whisper spin begins now.
The GOP as the party of Lincoln was a casualty of the Southern Strategy.
Someone has to go over to RMG post this and demand they condemn the Texas GOP! We shouldn’t be the only ones who have to hold regularly scheduled condemnations.
The Southern Strategy, that moved conservative Southerners into the Republican party, has an equal and opposite effect that is in its final stages.
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p>The liberal wing of the Republican party, and many libertarian-leaning Republicans, were mostly northeastern. They remained with the GOP during the early days of the Southern Strategy, but the big-government and heavy on moral dictates of the new GOP has pushed the Northeastern GOP into significant decline. QUICK: How many GOP congressmen from the six New England states? With the departure of Lincoln Chafee, how long before the four remaining GOP senators are history?
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p>Shays, CT. That’s it, and he might be on the way out in 08.
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p>Dec ’08: 3 GOP + Lieberman
Dec ’10: 2 GOP + Lieberman
Dec ’12: 2 GOP
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p>and that’s as far as it will go. Both Snowe and Collins have done a fine job staying fairly moderate. Sure they caucus with the GOP, but they cross the aisle often enough on health care and environmental issues that they’ll hold serve in Maine until they retire methinks.
She’s a faux moderate – she shadows Snowe, but often doesn’t vote the same way on key issues. If Obama has good coattails in Maine, we may see her ousted…
Tom Allen has concentrated some energy on Collins not investigating the contractor abuse in Iraq. That issue could have enormous traction:
Make no mistake. Maine voters still have fond memories of Senator Margaret Chase Smith. So this race is still uphill. It’d be great if we could win it.
I have a warm spot in my heart for Margaret Chase Smith too, despite the fact that she was a Republican. Not only was she an alum of my college, a member of my sorority, and one of the few women in Congress when I was growing up, but she stood up to Joe McCarthy pretty early on, which was an incredibly brave thing to do at the time. She should have been a Democrat.
Declaration of Conscience
I mean like the material quoted. Collins’ indifference to contractor abuse in Iraq lies beneath the standard set by Senator Smith.
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p>By the way, don’t you delight in accusing us progressives of whining. Do I not detect some whining here? Tut-tut. Very unbecoming. Quite.
Her lead over Tom Allen continues to erode:
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p>Source: Rasmussen Reports
Thanks for this.
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p>You’re link to ThinkProgress has a blank href attribute, so it links to this page itself. Here’s the correct link.
Because Tony Snow assured us that racism was so pase. Those zany republicans – so into retro!
and was hoping someone got around to the 80+% of blacks voting for Obama.
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p>Can you imagine if Hillary got 10% of the male vote like she got 10% of the black vote? Oh gosh, it would hit the fan so hard.
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p>There’s a boatload of people who are voting for Obama solely because he is black. This is inherently racist. Sorry to burst the bubble. Until you guys decide to get outraged over that as you are over this button, you are in no position to be disgusted with the people who won’t vote for him because he’s black.
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p>80% of whites voting for McCain would be racist.
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p>80% of blacks voting for Obama is okay.
Schaller in Whistling Past Dixie does site data that indicate that “racial perspectives” make Southern whites more likely to vote Republican. This is in contrast people voting Republican in other parts of the country.
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p>But that’s based on data.
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p>What are you doing here? Are you complaining that there’s some kind of racism going on? If so, you’re hinting not proving.
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p>Or are you complaining that we aren’t outraged on the proper JTS-approved schedule?
90% of the black vote went to Obama. CNN reported this throughout the primary, so it’s data. But this is NOT racist? You really need to pull your head out from up your politically correct ass.
is not proof. Not even when accompanied by profanity.
CNN has been reporting it all along. Not my assertion. Just reporting the facts. I haven’t heard you dispute them yet. Sorry for the “profanity.”
Your facts don’t prove racism.
90% is suspicious in a Democrat primary where one of the candidates was previously very popular among black voters. I return to my original point, that it’s wrong to be a racist, no matter what color you are.
Smoking in elevators is bad, too.
Why is that suspicious? Issues important to Blacks have rarely been taken seriously in this country. If I was Black Democrat, given the choice between two Democrats, I’d throw my vote to the candidate I think would best listen to me, who would know what I go through. In this case, between Obama and Clinton, that happens to be Obama.
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p>This is not an either-or proposition because white interests are generally served by default, and, I would argue, are very intertwined with Black issues (for example, urban policy affects the Blacks who live in cities and the whites who work there); also, the race of the president isn’t going to reverse that (given that most of the government is not Black).
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p>Show me a wealthy Black Republican that is voting for Obama, and he’s potentially doing so for racial reasons, though I think it’s possible for a Republican to be concerned for other Blacks who are not wealthy or Republican. Show me a poor Black Democrat who would vote for a Thomas Sowell, … well, I doubt that any Black Democrat could vote for him.
There’s a hypothesis that voters vote their self-interest. We folks on the liberal side seem to believe this strongly. (What’s the Matter with Kansas? brings that home.) However, rational choice theory coupled with research by political scientists has confounded this hypothesis. It’s not true. The data point the other way and they point strongly.(See for example, Caplan, The Myth of the Rational Voter.)
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p>Apparently, voters strive to vote for what’s best for the country. How they perceive that varies.
… are not without controversy.
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p>Check out “What’s the Matter with What’s the Matter with Kansas?“
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p>By Larry Bartels
and thank you for the lynk, Mr Lynne.
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p>My point however was that the question posed by Franks’ book, “Why are these people voting against their interests?” presumes that people normally vote for their interests.
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p>Trouble is: the research shows the opposite. People rarely make a calculation of self-interest and vote accordingly. There are a few exceptions (smokers, for example) but they are quite anomalous.
… to vote against their interests is a dark art, partially exposed by Jacob Hacker and Paul Pierson in Off Center: The Republican Revolution and the Erosion of American Democracy. Alterman called it required reading for anyone running for office.
We are supposed to be electing a president who is going to serve the interests of the U.S.A., not just a specific group. I really don’t understand what black voters think Obama is going to do specifically for them. Personally I felt that Hillary would have been a better president, which would have benefited all Americans (including blacks). Up until now, the Clintons have enjoyed popularity among blacks. For some reason, that changed during this election. Suspicious indeed.
Oh gosh, now why might that have happened?
Bill’s comment was wrong, not in the sense of being racist and immoral, but in the simple sense of being incorrect.
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p>Obama, at the time, did seem like an unlikely, upstart candidate, likely to appeal most to a particular interest group. Which is unsurprising, because he ran an insurgent campaign.
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p>The statement was incorrect because Obama later demonstrated an ability to reach beyond interest group politics, to his credit.
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p>What is more surprising to me is that this statement is generally accepted as ipso facto evidence of racism, which strikes me as tacit acknowledgement that Jesse Jackson is, and was, a divisive charlatan mostly interested in Jesse Jackson.
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p>What is stranger to me is that Onama and his campiagn continue to allow this perception to linger, since, at this point, it does the most harm to one Barack Obama.
…to insinuate that Bill Clinton is racist is just wrong. Disregard an entire career and presidency as a champion of civil rights because you don’t agree with his political analysis. That just makes me sick. It is so fashionable this year to throw the race card around.
Show me the racial breakdown of who voted for McCain this primary season. What percentage of his votes came from White people?
I meant to reply to this comment, but the new comment appears below here.
That is one of the funniest comments I’ve seen on BMG in quite some time. Thanks for the chuckles, Joe!
Give him a break: he’s just passing on talking points. I’ve heard it for about a week to 10 days from my friends who spout such things.
So says a Gallup Poll.
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p>So I’ll grant JoeTS his conclusion that 90% of an historically oppressed minority voting for its first viable presidential candidate in the nation’s 230 year history is racist if he grants me that the Republican party being 93% White means that the Republican party is a racist party.
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p>Big tent my foot. Big tent full of White people.
You think it’s ok for the “oppressed minority” to be racist while it’s definitely not ok for the Republicans (read: whites) to be racist. Racism is bad–end of story. Stop trying to justify it.
I was pointing out how silly it is to conclude that Black people voting for Obama means they are racist. It’s simple, if 90% of Black people voting for Obama is racist, then 93% of Republicans being white indicates that Republicans are racist. If 90% of Black people voting for Obama is not racist, then 93% of Republicans being white is not racist. No difference.
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p>What, pray tell, is the proper percentage of Black people who are allowed to vote for Obama in order to be not racist? Should it be 50/50? Considering that 90% of Black people voted for Democrats in 2006, are we going to hear cries of racism when 90% of African Americans don’t vote for McCain in November?
Yes. One of the cornerstones of the Republican campaign against Obama is to remind people how black black black black black black black black he is.
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p>BTW, Rush’s denial that he started the whitey rumor is one of the unintentionally funniest things I’ve read in awhile.
I guess I would have expected a split similar to that of the general population’s vote. So yes, about 50/50. As for the 2006 vote, the blacks historically vote democrat, hence the 90%. Hillary and Obama had virtually the same position on everything. Why the lopsided results then? 90% of the white vote did not go to Hillary, did it? You can try and spin this as much as you want, but racism = racism, no matter what the color. Two wrongs don’t make a right, do they?
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p>By the way, what percentage of Republicans should be white?
93% sounds about right to me.
… could make the case that 90% blacks voting for Obama is self defense in light of 93% of whites for McCain. Also wonder what the breakdown is by class/income and if the same could be said there.
I’m sorry, has the general election taken place while I’ve been asleep at the switch?
… feels under attack, they tend to rally and circle the wagons. I just openly wonder if he voting percentage is evidence of such a rally and if such a rally is evidence that blacks feel under attack. Given the class breakdown of races, the lack of class mobility, and the GOP policies that seem largely to have contributed to that situation, one could understand how such a demographic might feel pushed against from all sides.
Until the polling is done, we should accept that we don’t really know.
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p>By the way, Clinton had the majority of the Black vote — at least according to polls — early in the primary season.
I was questioning the percentages in the Democrat primary. Why exactly were blacks under attack then?
It’s 93% of the Republican Party being white. Vastly different statistic…
… but you get the general gist behind the question.
…I just hate to think of that many people voting for McSame!!
Here. If you have evidence that would dispute it, bring it forth and we can discuss it.
And the transcript was an interview with the editor-in-chief of Gallup Polls. Is the implication that Gallup is making this stuff up? Also, what evidence is there to make me believe that there has been a radical shift since Bush has taken office and that 93% statistic is no longer accurate?
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p>But if you want it straight from the horse’s mouth, here is the Gallup press release, which was found via “a google”.
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p>Again, do you have data that shows the 93% number as inaccurate? Or is the best you’ve got just dismissing it as outdated info from 2000? If you’ve got more accurate or more up to date info, or a reason to believe there’s been a paradigm shift in Republican demographics in the last 8 years, let’s see it.
You haven’t. Ball is in your court.
And that wasn’t enough, I found a second citation with expanded numbers.
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p>But you still pretend as if that the 93% number is untrue. All I’m saying is if you can’t dismiss something just because it’s inconvenient to the faux Republican outrage over 90% of Black people voting for Obama and makes the GOP live up to the stereotype of being a White-only party; you need a good reason and some evidence. Otherwise, there is no reason not to believe the GOP is 93% White.
I can’t fit citations into titles.
Think about it and get back to us when there’s been 42 consecutive black Presidents, will you?
Is it a numbers game after all? What exactly is the “correct” number of white, black, hispanic, gay, Italian, Greek, bisexual, transgendered, Polish, handicapped, stupid, etc., etc., etc., presidents? But, after, all, once we achieve these goals, you won’t have anything to whine about, will you? This is insane.
absolutely nothing, but Obama’s race since you landed here. What’s up with that? With all of the compelling issues plaguing this nation and the world, you are driven to comment upon nothing except Barack Obama’s race. Why is that?
I am not commenting about Obama’s race. I couldn’t care less about his race–or anyone else’s for that matter. My complaint is about everyone else’s focus on race. It played a big part in the Democrat primary, and it was talked about constantly. That’s my point. Why can’t we just get over this? I realize that there were many heinous things that happened in previous centuries. No matter how you look at that, it was awful. How human beings could have done that to other human beings is just beyond my comprehension. But it happened, and no matter how much we talk about it or, worse, try to correct it, it’s never going to “unhappen.” Let’s all agree that it was awful and that we will all do everything in our power to make sure it doesn’t happen again. End of story. Time to move on. If we choose not to, and instead decide to try to make things right, then it amounts to retaliation–against the people who didn’t perpetrate the crime no less.
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p>But we can’t. We keep getting dragged back into it. Obama himself (to his credit) says we need an honest dialogue about race to heal the wounds. But you know what? There cannot be a dialogue because a dialogue requires two sides, and one side is not free to comment openly and honestly because they are afraid of being labeled racist (as I have been). And once you are labeled racist, that’s what you are, even if you are not. It’s professional and political death and it’s the fear of being so labeled that causes people to withdraw from the dialogue. Stupid decisions get made and cause further resentment, and so the cycle begins again.
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p>So you see, I am not focused on race. I am focused on everyone else’s focus on race. I don’t want to talk about it or hear about it any more. I hope Obama becomes president and I hope he’s a great president and I hope he can do something about the monumental mess that the current idiot has made. Then I will say Obama was a great president, not the first black president.
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p>You are correct that there are a lot of other issues requiring our attention. I agree, let’s focus on those and end the nonstop race talk.
I’m sure the volumes of black people voting for Obama in Montana, Wisconsin and the Dakotas really pushed Hillary over the edge. It’s not racist for a group of people who have never, in a million years, had a nominee to vote for that candidate. If there had never, ever been a Catholic President and suddenly there was someone running who spoke to the issues you cared about… you wouldn’t vote for that person? That’s not an ism, racism or otherwise. It’s just basic, human nature. Now, if anyone decided they could never, ever vote for someone just because they’re black, or Catholic, or whatever… that’s a different thing.
66% of Americans are non-Hispanic whites. 93% of the Republican party is White. I looked for racial demographics of McCain voters myself and could not find an answer; it seems no one is really asking this question. Why do people want to focus on the fact that so many Black people are voting for Obama but nobody wants to address that McCain’s voters and Republicans in general are disproportionally White?
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p>You say, Joe, that “80% of whites voting for McCain would be racist”. What if that is indeed the number for the 2008 primaries? What if it is higher? Do you think that 80%-90% of McCain voters being White is racist?