It doesn't come as a complete surprise, but this article from Yahoo! News about racial attitudes is a shameful comment about our so-called post-racial attitudes. Turns out they aren't very post-anything.
Antebellum would be more accurate.
From the article:
In all, 51 percent of Americans now express explicit anti-black
attitudes, compared with 48 percent in a similar 2008 survey. When
measured by an implicit racial attitudes
test, the number of Americans with anti-black sentiments jumped to 56
percent, up from 49 percent during the last presidential election. In
both tests, the share of Americans expressing pro-black attitudes fell.
And there's more. This week, Colin Powell officially endorsed Barack Obama for president with eloquence and reason. That, evidently, was not enough for former Bush Chief of Staff, New Hampshire Governor and present Romney staffer John Sununu. His take was that Powell endorsed Obama because he's black. So is Powell. In the small mind of a zealot, that makes sense. Not only is this offensive from a racial point-of-view, it is meant to reduce Colin Powell, a great military leader and public servant who actually enunciated a military doctrine that all presidents should honor, to someone who can't think for himself and must endorse Obama for emotional reasons. He's questioning Powell's intelligence. Bad move.
The strategy of dividing the country by race has been a Republican staple since Richard Nixon used the Southern Strategy in his 1968 and 1972 campaigns. Ronald Reagan endorsed state's rights very early in his 1980 campaign, and Sununu's boss George H.W. Bush famously made Willie Horton the face of black males in 1988. Racism was muted, for the most part, in the election of 2008 (many Democrats feared a Bradley Effect where people say they'll vote for a black candidate in a poll, but don't vote for them in the actual election) as the economy and a near-Depression pushed it to the background. But racism is alive and well in 2012.
Fortunately, I believe, this might be the last national election where the Republican Party's coalition of older southern and western white voters influences its policy choices. The country is changing demographically and the GOP had better nurture the few African-Americans in its ranks for 2014 and 2016 if it wants to remain competitive. I also expect Latinos like Marco Rubio to be the face of the party at the expense of Paul Ryan. Even young people might find a GOP message more reassuring if it wasn't so anti-black, brown and gay.
Despite these attitudes, it does look like the United States is about to reelect its first African-American president, and that means something. Obama doesn't betray a great deal of passion in his non-campaign face, but he desperately wants to win this election for symbolic and political reasons. A one-term presidency would embolden the racists to say that the US tried an African-American president and he failed. Two terms allows Obama to be an even more powerful symbol and leader, as he will now be president when the economy recovers, and the health care, Dodd-Frank and tax reform laws take hold.
In short, he will leave a legacy worthy of a great president.
For more, go to www.facebook.com/WhereDemocracyLives and on Twitter @rigrundfest
Saturday, October 27, 2012
Tuesday, October 23, 2012
Polling Report: October 23, 2012
The debates are done, the swing states remain swingy, and the money is flowing. Must be the last two weeks of the campaign. And true to the divided nature of the country, there are two narratives for the final push.
The first says that Mitt Romney has the momentum because of his first debate performance and the new perception, pushed very hard by his campaign, that Romney is really a moderate, not the scary conservative that Obama said he was in the summer. In many ways, Mitt has won his argument because, depending upon the poll, he has become more likable and he's improved his standing with women. Romney's national poll numbers are up and he's made inroads into states that were solidly behind the president, such as Florida and North Carolina.
The second says that President Obama took it on the chin in the first debate, but came roaring back in the last two and, though he's lost the big lead he had at the end of September, still leads in the states he needs to be reelected. Is this the controlling story? Or is there another, less-widely reported subplot?
The media seems consumed with momentum and polling figures, and you can get your fill at fivethirtyeight, Pollster, RCP, Red State, or TalkingPointsMemo and they will tell you the same story: Obama has the lead, by varying degrees, but it's going to be a very close election. In fact, we could be looking at a 2000 scenario, where Obama wins the electoral vote but loses the popular vote. That's the system we have. Go figure.
At the two-week mark, Obama has the inside track on the election. Whatever movement towards Romney was evident after the first debate has slowed, the president's ground game is resulting in leads in Ohio (though shrinking) and Iowa where early voting has been taking place. If Obama can win those two states and Nevada, where he has never been behind, then he'll win the election. Romney has all-but taken up residence in Ohio for a late personal and advertising push, so it's not conclusive that Obama will shut the door until election day.
All of this is giving partisans on both sides the jitters and short finger nails. I don't see an October surprise, but I guess that's why they call it, well, a surprise. The real surprise would be one of the candidates pulling away at the last minute. With the country so divided though, I would suggest that you buy sustenance for what will surely be a long night on November 6-7.
For more, go to www.facebook.com/WhereDemocracyLives and on Twitter @rigrundfest
The first says that Mitt Romney has the momentum because of his first debate performance and the new perception, pushed very hard by his campaign, that Romney is really a moderate, not the scary conservative that Obama said he was in the summer. In many ways, Mitt has won his argument because, depending upon the poll, he has become more likable and he's improved his standing with women. Romney's national poll numbers are up and he's made inroads into states that were solidly behind the president, such as Florida and North Carolina.
The second says that President Obama took it on the chin in the first debate, but came roaring back in the last two and, though he's lost the big lead he had at the end of September, still leads in the states he needs to be reelected. Is this the controlling story? Or is there another, less-widely reported subplot?
The media seems consumed with momentum and polling figures, and you can get your fill at fivethirtyeight, Pollster, RCP, Red State, or TalkingPointsMemo and they will tell you the same story: Obama has the lead, by varying degrees, but it's going to be a very close election. In fact, we could be looking at a 2000 scenario, where Obama wins the electoral vote but loses the popular vote. That's the system we have. Go figure.
At the two-week mark, Obama has the inside track on the election. Whatever movement towards Romney was evident after the first debate has slowed, the president's ground game is resulting in leads in Ohio (though shrinking) and Iowa where early voting has been taking place. If Obama can win those two states and Nevada, where he has never been behind, then he'll win the election. Romney has all-but taken up residence in Ohio for a late personal and advertising push, so it's not conclusive that Obama will shut the door until election day.
All of this is giving partisans on both sides the jitters and short finger nails. I don't see an October surprise, but I guess that's why they call it, well, a surprise. The real surprise would be one of the candidates pulling away at the last minute. With the country so divided though, I would suggest that you buy sustenance for what will surely be a long night on November 6-7.
For more, go to www.facebook.com/WhereDemocracyLives and on Twitter @rigrundfest
Sunday, October 21, 2012
Foreign Affairs
Remember when foreign affairs wasn't supposed to be a major part of the presidential campaign? It was supposed to be about jobs, jobs and jobs, but now that the world has intruded on our parochial election, the third debate will play a major role in the last two weeks of this contest.
This does not bode well for Mitt Romney, and it plays into one of Obama's strengths.
Romney's first problem is with Libya. He's been wrong about what actually happened since the attack on September 11, and made an error of both fact and tact in last week's debate. And now that internal documents show that the president was right about the Benghazi attacks, Mitt will need to find another avenue to question Obama's leadership.
He won't find that with Iran, due to the latest reports that show the Iranians interested in having face-to-face discussions with the United States about their nuclear program. Romney has been critical about the way that Obama has been handling the Iran issue, but reaching out for talks, even if they take place after the election, shows that the economic sanctions are having a devastating effect on the Iranian economy. On the campaign trail, Romney has been talking about military strikes on Iran as a way of protecting Israel. Now, however, even Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu agrees that sanctions are an effective policy.
Romney has also boxed himself in on Afghanistan. According to this story in the LA Times, his policy is much like the President's.
In the 16 months that he has been running for president, the thrust of Mitt Romney's policy toward Afghanistan has been this: He would hew to President Obama's timeline to withdraw U.S. troops by the end of 2014, but he would part ways with the president by giving greater deference to the judgment of military commanders.
Beyond that, Romney has revealed little about what his guiding principles would be for committing U.S. troops in conflicts around the world or what elements have shaped his thinking about Afghanistan — subjects likely to be broached in Monday's foreign policy debate.
Excuse me for being naive, but don't we need a sense of Romney's worldview? Would he keep troops in Iraq and Afghanistan if he already was president? And how much deference would he give to the military commanders? I thought that our Constitution guaranteed civilian control of the military. Ultimately, the president is the Commander-In-Chief. President Obama has made those tough decisions. It looks like Mitt is ready to...defer.
But the above policy represents a shift from previous Romney statements on Afghanistan, so it's difficult to tell exactly where he stands.
Obama's foreign policy has been pragmatic, and at times he has angered the left by keeping some of the Bush security laws and not closing Guantanamo Bay. But the killing of Osama bin Laden and treaties with Russia on weapons and Colombia, Panama and South Korea on trade prove that he is a president who has his eyes on the future and a keen sense of how the United States will succeed in a truly global environment. He needs to hammer these points home and expose Mitt Romney as the foreign policy rookie that he is.
For more, go to www.facebook.com/WhereDemocracyLives and on Twitter @rigrundfest
This does not bode well for Mitt Romney, and it plays into one of Obama's strengths.
Romney's first problem is with Libya. He's been wrong about what actually happened since the attack on September 11, and made an error of both fact and tact in last week's debate. And now that internal documents show that the president was right about the Benghazi attacks, Mitt will need to find another avenue to question Obama's leadership.
He won't find that with Iran, due to the latest reports that show the Iranians interested in having face-to-face discussions with the United States about their nuclear program. Romney has been critical about the way that Obama has been handling the Iran issue, but reaching out for talks, even if they take place after the election, shows that the economic sanctions are having a devastating effect on the Iranian economy. On the campaign trail, Romney has been talking about military strikes on Iran as a way of protecting Israel. Now, however, even Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu agrees that sanctions are an effective policy.
Romney has also boxed himself in on Afghanistan. According to this story in the LA Times, his policy is much like the President's.
In the 16 months that he has been running for president, the thrust of Mitt Romney's policy toward Afghanistan has been this: He would hew to President Obama's timeline to withdraw U.S. troops by the end of 2014, but he would part ways with the president by giving greater deference to the judgment of military commanders.
Beyond that, Romney has revealed little about what his guiding principles would be for committing U.S. troops in conflicts around the world or what elements have shaped his thinking about Afghanistan — subjects likely to be broached in Monday's foreign policy debate.
Excuse me for being naive, but don't we need a sense of Romney's worldview? Would he keep troops in Iraq and Afghanistan if he already was president? And how much deference would he give to the military commanders? I thought that our Constitution guaranteed civilian control of the military. Ultimately, the president is the Commander-In-Chief. President Obama has made those tough decisions. It looks like Mitt is ready to...defer.
But the above policy represents a shift from previous Romney statements on Afghanistan, so it's difficult to tell exactly where he stands.
Obama's foreign policy has been pragmatic, and at times he has angered the left by keeping some of the Bush security laws and not closing Guantanamo Bay. But the killing of Osama bin Laden and treaties with Russia on weapons and Colombia, Panama and South Korea on trade prove that he is a president who has his eyes on the future and a keen sense of how the United States will succeed in a truly global environment. He needs to hammer these points home and expose Mitt Romney as the foreign policy rookie that he is.
For more, go to www.facebook.com/WhereDemocracyLives and on Twitter @rigrundfest
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)