The Democrats and Racism

The 2008 primary campaign season may be best noted for exposing the hypocrisy of Democrats and race. Ever since the days of Jimmy Carter and Walter Mondale we have had to listen to the noblesse oblige attitudes of Democrat leaders as they sniff with disdain and lecture us about race and bigotry. They engaged in revisionist history when it comes to addressing the checkered past of our nation’s treatment of blacks. John Kennedy is treated as the hero of the civil rights movement by the Kennedys’ post mortem public relations machine when, in fact, President Kennedy’s primary contribution to race relations was to authorize spying on Martin Luther King, Jr. The Democrats claim ownership of the Civil Rights Act when, in fact, despite a Democrat majority in both the House and Senate, it only passed because of the support and leadership of Republicans in both houses. During the Carter and Clinton presidencies, they rewarded the monolithic support of black voters with a couple of lower level cabinet positions.

Like most of the liberal elite, the Democrat leadership likes to preach more than to practice racial tolerance. And nowhere is this hypocrisy more evident than in the great liberal bastion of Massachusetts — home of the Kennedys and the Kerrys. The Democrats of Massachusetts have always felt free to look down their noses at the rest of the nation about race — it easy when all you elect is rich, white men. And so when Massachusetts Democrats were confronted with the possibility of a black man as their nominee, how did they react? Exit polls in Massachusetts on Super Tuesday indicated that Hillary Clinton won with the support of overwhelming numbers in what the mainstream media euphemistically described as “blue collar” Democrat neighborhoods. What they failed to reveal is that these are predominantly white neighborhoods that are so adamantly racist that most blacks would fear for the lives were they found after dark amid the Southies.

The irony of this is that pre-election polls showed Barak Obama with a significant lead among Democrats. One can only assume that many of those stout hearted Democrats lied to the press for fear of having to admit their racist tendencies. But in the privacy and anonymity of the polling booth they were free to exercise their private bigotry.

The following week, exit polls in Louisiana revealed a similar pattern among Democrats. An Associated Press article revealed that eighty percent of white Democrat voters who said race matters voted for Hillary Clinton. Seventy percent of all white Democrats voted for Clinton.

And on Tuesday, Gov. Ed Rendell (D-PA), a prominent Hillary Clinton supporter in addressing the upcoming Pennsylvania primary, noted that “there are some whites who are probably not ready to vote for an African-American candidate.”

And don’t think that this latent racism is confined to working class Democrats. As noted previously, despite overwhelming support from the African-American community, the Democrats have reserved leadership roles to those who are white — usually white AND rich. Even Bill Clinton, revered by some misguided sycophants as America’s first Black President, has shown his racial intolerance. Oh sure, Clinton attended services at the black churches, played saxophone with black jazz players, cried with black mothers and participated in ceremonies honoring Dr. Martin Luther King. Sure, he played to a cast of race hustlers like Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton and in doing so solidified the perception of them as Black Leaders — knowing full well they presented little threat to the Clintons’ dominance of the Democrats.

But as the liberal elites so often remind us, it is the actions under stress that demonstrate one’s real thoughts about race. And the Clintons, in the wake of Hillary’s repeated defeats have shown what they really think of black ambition in general and Barak Obama in particular. First they dismissed Obama’s candidacy as a “fairy tale” — the idea that a black man should aspire to be president. And then, the ultimate slap, they demeaned Obama’s victory in Georgia by dismissing it as the same as Jesse Jackson — as if all blacks were the same. The Clintons and their supporters continue to suggest that a black man cannot win the presidency and, in doing so, make the man’s color more important than his character.

One of the most pernicious forms of racism is to take the support of the black community for granted and dismiss its aspirations as improbable.

The Democrats would be well served to heed my father’s advice: Before you criticize others, clean your own house first.