ok, I am a registered Democrat (was before Obama came along) and I am an Obama supporter. I am really taken aback by the RNC, not so much by the aggressive rhetoric (which is typical in these types of "pep rallys" for both parties), but moreso because of the lack of diversity in the Republican crowd.

Though my ideals aren't in line with the Republican Party, I have to believe there is a larger group of minorities or a different demographic that supports the Republicans as ardently as the 50+ white group that DOMINATED the crowds last night.

With that said, as carefully crafted as these speeches and conventions are (even those hand-made signs supporting Palin were handed out to participants), why is there not a more conscious effort to appeal to those who aren't old/white? It would seem that those minority voters would play a huge part in deciding who the next president will be.

Maybe this has already been posted, but if I was a female from another country, lets say India, I would feel like I had nothing in common with any of those people there.

9/4/2008 3:21:25 PM

Quote :

"why is there not a more conscious effort to appeal to those who aren't old/white?"

Because the oligarchs that fund the Republican party are all old/white?

9/4/2008 3:23:44 PM

Aren't Mexican Americans and Latinos in line with republicans? From what I seen many of them support McCain, or maybe its because Obama is running in the other party.

9/4/2008 3:24:59 PM

hey hey hey

there was at least one black guy there last night.

they showed him about 74 times ok

9/4/2008 3:25:00 PM

no there were respectable black ppl there


it's probably the fact that the massive tax increase when make above 30k a year is off the charts.

capital gains tax!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!11111111111111 i vote with my wallet!!!!!!!!!!!

9/4/2008 3:30:31 PM

Quote :

"why is there not a more conscious effort to appeal to those who aren't old/white?"

Easier than Bristol Palin on Prom Night - because they don't like people who aren't like them!

conservative

afraid of change

9/4/2008 3:31:24 PM

afraid of change. yeh.

when's the last time the liberals have changed?

still babykillers and proud of it? yep
still supporting the gays more than veterans? yup
still trying to tax the prosperous? yep
still no energy policy? yup
still spewing the same shit as last election? yep

-liberalism- the new conservatism.

9/4/2008 3:47:04 PM

Dude, they had a black country singer in a cowboy hat. They're diverse as hell.

9/4/2008 3:49:39 PM

Quote :

"still supporting the gays more than veterans? yup"

Last time I checked, John McCain isn't doing much to support either.

9/4/2008 4:10:32 PM

this thread has AIDS

9/4/2008 4:13:28 PM

your posts are so terrible, I think they have given me cancer.

9/4/2008 4:16:33 PM

Quote :

"Aren't Mexican Americans and Latinos in line with republicans?"

Hispanics tend to vote Democratic, though not as overwhelmingly so as is the case with blacks. The important exception to this has usually been Cuban-Americans, who are solidly Republican because they view that party as being more hard-line anti-Castro. But there's been a lot of talk about how even that is starting to change, and several reliably Republican counties in Florida are up in the air for the first time in recent memory.

I think a big reason Republicans haven't reached out is that they can't figure out how to reach out without being laughed at. They could try to appeal to the strong sense of religion in the black community, though it would probably be ineffectual because black religious leaders are Democrats almost to a man. They could promote lower taxes and more services for the poor, but then they'd be in a position of having to out-democrat that democrats.

I think it's more an issue of economics than race. People with less money vote Democrat because they have more to gain by doing so. Ditto for people with more money voting Republicans. Yes, even wealthier blacks still tend to vote Democratic. Part of that's momentum, part of that is to avoid being seen as a traitor, and part of that is out of the racism element. As we start getting into a larger population of second- and third-generation middle class minorities, I think you'll start seeing a modest growth in the number of them that are Republican.

9/4/2008 4:28:23 PM

I can't for the life of me see why a black person wouldn't want to be a Republican, with all the non-racism and all

http://thehill.com/leading-the-news/westmoreland-calls-obama-uppity-2008-09-04.html

Quote :

"Westmoreland calls Obama ‘uppity' By Mike Soraghan Posted: 09/04/08 03:07 PM [ET] Georgia Republican Rep. Lynn Westmoreland used the racially-tinged term "uppity" to describe Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama Thursday. Westmoreland was discussing vice presidential nominee Sarah Palin's speech with reporters outside the House chamber and was asked to compare her with Michelle Obama. "Just from what little I’ve seen of her and Mr. Obama, Sen. Obama, they're a member of an elitist-class individual that thinks that they're uppity," Westmoreland said. Asked to clarify that he used the word “uppity,” Westmoreland said, “Uppity, yeah.” Other Democrats have charged that the Republican campaign to paint the Illinois senator as an “elitist” is racially charged, and accused them of using code words for “uppity” without using the word itself."

9/4/2008 4:30:01 PM

How is the word 'uppity' racist?

9/4/2008 4:34:32 PM

It means black folk shouldn't be anything more than dumb sharecroppers and all the real decisions should be made by the whites.

God, have so many people missed out on 20th Century American history?

9/4/2008 4:36:58 PM

"Uppity" was a poor choice, but I'm not sure it shows Westmoreland to be a racist. He could just be an idiot -- based on the syntax of his quote, that's what I'm leaning towards.

I don't see how the elitism thing is racist, though. Republicans have been using that brush to paint Democrats for a while. John Kerry got positively slathered with it. While I've heard the actual word "elitist" more this time around, the concept has been used plenty before on regular white people.

9/4/2008 4:37:09 PM

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OQ_v3T0HVXY

9/4/2008 4:38:53 PM

Quote :

"Online Etymology Dictionary - Cite This Source - Share This uppity 1880, from up; originally used by blacks of other blacks felt to be too self-assertive (first recorded use is in "Uncle Remus"). The parallel British variant uppish (1678) originally meant "lavish;" the sense of "conceited, arrogant" being first recorded 1734."

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/uppity

The more you know.

Without more overt behavior/comments from Westmoreland, I'd have to agree with Grumpy.

9/4/2008 4:45:46 PM

Westmoreland was one of 33 members of the House to vote against renewing the Equal Rights Act of 1965

9/4/2008 4:53:00 PM

His stated reason for opposing renewal of the Voting Rights Act isn't something I'd consider overtly racist.

9/4/2008 5:07:21 PM

Quote :

"With that said, as carefully crafted as these speeches and conventions are (even those hand-made signs supporting Palin were handed out to participants), why is there not a more conscious effort to appeal to those who aren't old/white?"

It works both ways. Maybe if the Dems weren't so obsessed with pleasing minorities, they'd have won the white vote more than twice in the last fourteen presidential elections.

9/4/2008 6:06:59 PM

wow, and another old school TWW racist comes out from under his rock.

9/4/2008 6:13:40 PM

All the diversity is outside of the arena on a bridge. More people outside than in.

[Edited on September 4, 2008 at 6:18 PM. Reason : e]

9/4/2008 6:17:56 PM

Well I'm assuming no diversity = no blacks, because there are plenty of Hispanics and Asians in the Republican party.


And I think it says alot more about black people than it does about the Republican Party.

9/4/2008 6:19:38 PM

Quote :

" because there are plenty of Hispanics and Asians in the Republican party"

"plenty" ha!

There are for more in the democratic side of things.

9/4/2008 9:53:23 PM

Being asian, I don't know many asian conservatives. I account it to two main reasons:

1) Most asians hold very secular moral values or are very apathetic about social policies. Therefore, most asians can't relate to the social policies of the republican party. Abortion? Who cares, says the asian, they do it all the time in China. Same sex marriage? Why bother, says the asian, we used to just stone 'em in Pakistan.

2) The asian community is very family oriented. And in the eyes of the asian person, the democratic party houses those values more practically. Most policies/laws passed by democrats will undoubtedly help large families. These laws just generally appeal to the asian community. Asians would love universal healthcare. Healthcare for the whole family, yay! (seriously, my mom doesn't have healthcare, nor does my wife's whole family, they just don't see it as a necessity. Take some herbs and you'll be fine. But, if healthcare was handed to them on a silver plater, they'd be all over it). They would love more open borders or easier immigration. Send over grandma and uncle Chong!

You get my point. If you're asian, you can relate to me. Just my opinion and experience being around my own "people".

[Edited on September 4, 2008 at 10:25 PM. Reason : meh]

9/4/2008 10:12:16 PM

Diversity? I believe it's an old old wooden ship used back in the Civil War days......

9/5/2008 12:22:33 AM

^^ Those are things any foreign-born American is going to know.

I have an Irish friend who doesn't get the Republican's xenophobia, and according to him that's how most foreigners view the Bush-era republican policies.

9/5/2008 12:27:57 AM

Quote :

" I think it's more an issue of economics than race. People with less money vote Democrat because they have more to gain by doing so..."

I don't think this is a matter of economic calculation because, after all, asians still skew dem and they are excellent at math.

Which party a minority group supports is mostly influenced by history.

Whether people like to admit it or not, segregation and jim crow are recent history. Most americans and most republicans alive today were alive during that time. The democrats paid the price for doing the right thing, and the republicans took the spoils and gave up the moral high ground. Non-black minorities can't simply ignore this recent history because it would be like seeing all your neighbors get robbed then not doing anything to protect yourself.

Republicans need to prove that when pushed to extremes, they won't say "fuck you" to minorities and immigrants as they did to blacks a handful of generation ago. This is why by default, minorities will look to the dems (even though nowadays, dems are anti-immigrant just as much as repubs).

However, for all of the different minority groups, the most important thing is how the white rulers in either party has treated them specifically, apart from others. Special regard builds more trust than general policies that may incidentally help a certain minority.

In republican land, this means sustained and significant involvement in minority communities that shows special regard. Dems have no problem throwing support at minorities because it pays off immediately in votes. To break in to minority communities, republicans have to do more than the democrats to show that they specifically care about a minority group as a whole, and they have to be willing to wait for years for trust to build and payoffs to materialize.


[Edited on September 5, 2008 at 12:55 AM. Reason : .]

9/5/2008 12:51:05 AM

^ nevermind the fact that the Democrats are the ones that originally instituted the Jim Crow laws...

But, remember, folks, diversity means having a quota of people from each group! Gotta have the token black, asian, woman, indian, muslim, etc...

9/5/2008 12:19:44 PM

yes, let's pull out shit from 130 years ago to taint the Democratic Party of today. Seriously, the only thing the Republicans have to hang their hat on, in terms of race, is Lincoln freeing the slaves.

Have y'all done anything in the past 140+ years in terms of that? Didn't think so.

9/5/2008 12:25:09 PM

Quote :

"the only thing the Republicans have to hang their hat on, in terms of race, is Lincoln freeing the slaves."

i think abolishing slavery was kind of important

but i'll say again, give credit to the sly Democrats for somehow convincing minorities that they are the natural party for them...even though they're basically saying "you obviously can't provide for yourself because you're too incompetent, here vote Democrat and we'll provide for you"

9/5/2008 12:30:16 PM

^ More like... republicans tend to fuck shit up... let me vote for the people who tend to NOT fuck shit up.

9/5/2008 12:46:10 PM

thats deep

9/5/2008 12:50:36 PM

as cheap as asians are, i never get why so many of them are democrats.

taxes are about the only big issue for me.

i don't want to pay them.

9/5/2008 12:50:54 PM

Quote :

"yes, let's pull out shit from 130 years ago to taint the Democratic Party of today. Seriously, the only thing the Republicans have to hang their hat on, in terms of race, is Lincoln freeing the slaves. Have y'all done anything in the past 140+ years in terms of that? Didn't think so."

I'm not a Republican, but 80% of Republicans voted for the 1964 Civil Rights Act. 61% of Democrats did.

9/5/2008 12:51:58 PM

let's be fair, smackr. The Democrats caused the problem of Jim Crow laws. And they should be given credit for finally fixing it? Would you give credit to George W. Bush if he solved climate change? Would you give credit to George W. Bush if he solved the problem in Iraq? Would you give credit to George W. Bush if he announced that the gitmo detainees had Constitutional rights? No. You wouldn't.

The issue of time is irrelevant. If you won't give credit to one party for fixing something they broke, then you should not give credit to another for doing the same.

Quote :

"More like... republicans tend to fuck shit up... let me vote for the people who tend to NOT fuck shit up."

Riiiiiiight. Democrats gave us SS, which has fucked up people's retirements today, because they expected that SS would handle it. Democrats fucked up healthcare by regulating and suing it to death. Democrats fucked over the auto-industry by allowing unions to ass-rape the companies. Democrats fuck over education by taking national control over it and denying local parents the right to run it for their own children. And Democrats fucked over blacks by instituting Jim-Crow laws and perpetuating the myth that blacks need hand-outs in order to make it in life. But it's the republicans that fuck shit up...

9/5/2008 12:54:37 PM

Quote :

"Democrats fucked over Democrats"

ahahaha

9/5/2008 1:13:30 PM

meh, when good speaking devices go bad

9/5/2008 1:14:22 PM

Quote :

"let's be fair, smackr. The Democrats caused the problem of Jim Crow laws. And they should be given credit for finally fixing it?"

The major flaw with your logical fallacy is that you are trying to make an on going entity, the Democratic Party be the same as a single individual. the Democrats who voted to implement Jim Crow Laws are not the same people voted to over turn them. Humphrey's 1948 speech at the Democratic Convention drove the racist forces from the party. To some how blame the current political party for the errors of individuals long dead is a false premise from the get go. just like Repbulicans of today taking credit for freeing the slaves.

As for the the breakdown in voting for or against the civil rights act, it wasn't a partisan divide at the time. It was a sectionalist divide. More southern democrats voted for the civil rights act than southern republicans. the Republicans who voted for the civil rights act were northern republicans, those who voted against it were southern and western. Same for the Democrats, except for at least some southern democrats voted for the civil rights act, unlike their republican counter parts.

9/5/2008 1:42:13 PM

You sir are a liar.

9/5/2008 1:51:00 PM

so, as long as I let enough time pass, I can fuck something up and then fix it, right? come on, smackr. It's bullshit and you know it. You can't take credit for fixing something that you originally caused. No matter how much time has passed... If McCain pulled all troops out of Iraq, would you give the Republican party credit?

9/5/2008 1:51:48 PM

I'm going to comment on the Asians and Asian conservatives thing as well. First off, I'm going to say that lumping together the various Asian communities into one big grouping is not effective because each major community has very distinct characteristics that make them politically unique.

I'll use my own ethnic group as an example: the Korean-American community actually has a very large and influential conservative, Republican leaning faction. Korean churches have a tremendous amount of influence within the Korean immigrant community, one could say they are the most powerful social institution within the Korean community, and many of their members are strong social conservatives, particularly those who grew up in the 60s and 70s and emigrated in the 70s and early 80s, when Korea as a whole was a very socially conservative and rabidly anti-communist society. From there, you've got a surprisingly large group of second generation, socially conservative and well educated evangelical Christians. This is not the entire Korean community by any stretch of the imagination, but it is a very large, visible, and influential block.

Until recently, there was also a very large faction of small business owning Koreans from all ethnicities who were Republican leaning because of their pro-business stand. However, the combination of a rather crazy foreign policy and a hard tack right on social issues of the last eight years has alienated them somewhat.

Immigration is a mixed bag for the Korean community: on the one hand, they are all for greater immigration and exploit Mexican illegals like every other business. However, there is some frustration with illegals in the sense of why should they get special treatment and amnesty when my family had to go through the bureaucratic grinder to get here?

There are a lot of issues where even Korean-American conservatives can be courted, issues like the economy and health care, but if becomes a race primarily built around social issues, they'll probably go Republican. Things are shifting of course as the older generations grey out and as society shifts back in Korea, but as it stands right now, no one can deny that there is a large Republican leaning, conservative faction within the Korean-American community.

9/5/2008 3:08:55 PM

Quote :

"so, as long as I let enough time pass, I can fuck something up and then fix it, right"

there you go again, thinking continuing institutions are singular people.

Quote :

"You sir are a liar."

you sir, are ignorant.

[Edited on September 5, 2008 at 3:24 PM. Reason : .]

9/5/2008 3:23:19 PM

there you go again, ignoring the royal singular... when it was blatantly obvious that was what I was using. I even thought about that verbage there, but I figured you weren't obtuse enough not to get it. Guess I was wrong.

9/5/2008 3:24:37 PM

I don't even think your realize what you are arguing anymore. Every synapse in your brain has completely misfired all at the same time leaving you bumbling idiot.

9/5/2008 3:27:18 PM

I think it's because the party has changed quite a bit. Now they are trying to appeal to the wacky christians and the gun people. If you are a "live and let live" type of person, they are not going to appeal to you. And that doesn't bother them.

A good example of that is here with Sarah Palin...it's pretty obvious why she was picked and who she is going to appeal to...

9/5/2008 3:41:42 PM

The argument about which party freed the slaves and which party voted which way in 1964 is ridiculous and you know it. A better question to prove the point of the matter would be, if we had that same vote TODAY, which party would overwhelmingly support it, and which would probably have a few people vote against it? You say both parties would have voted for it 100%? How about just 10 years ago? Strom Thurmon?

9/5/2008 4:11:04 PM

Quote :

"If you are a "live and let live" type of person, they are not going to appeal to you."

I'm definitely a live and let live type of person...so much so that I'll live regardless and don't even feel the need to vote for either of these chuckleheads...but whether or not McCain/Palin appeals to me, please explain how someone like Obama/Biden in favor of more government regulation and more government involvement in day to day life is going to appeal to someone who is "live and let live"?

9/5/2008 4:13:00 PM

^^^^ nice ad hominem. I'll accept that as a tacit admission of defeat.

^^^ I am one of those "live and let live" people. And I will agree that the current repubs do not appeal to me.

^^ What a crazy hypothetical. I don't think anyone in politics today would vote against it. I hope that is what you are trying to say...

[Edited on September 5, 2008 at 4:14 PM. Reason : ]

9/5/2008 4:13:46 PM