Jim Webb Equates Trump's Racist Remarks With Liberal Rhetoric On 'Southern White Culture'

[tenderfoot]

2016 Democratic presidential candidate and former Virginia Sen. Jim Webb ran to Fox "news" this Sunday to trash liberals and conflate the push to remove the Confederate flag from government property with Trump's racist remarks about Mexicans. If Webb wants to assure he never gets above that two percent mark where he's polling right now, keep this up.

Jim Webb Stands Up For 'Southern White Cultures':

Democratic presidential candidate Jim Webb on Sunday suggested that recent efforts to remove Confederate symbols from public places were as "divisive" as Donald Trump's disparaging comments about Mexican immigrants.

Without prompting from "Fox News Sunday" host Bret Baier, who had been asking questions about national security, Webb asked if he could please talk about Trump, the billionaire GOP candidate who has called Mexican immigrants rapists and criminals. Webb criticized Trump before pivoting.

"This kind of divisive, inflammatory rhetoric by people who want to be commander-in-chief is not helpful, and we have seen from the liberal side as well this kind of rhetoric as it goes to Southern white cultures," the former Virginia senator said, apparently referring to recent debates over the Confederate flag.

"We need to be inclusive and recognize that we have problems and that we can come together to solve them," Webb said. "But don't be throwing these bombs to our cultural groups." [...]

Webb has seemed eager to distinguish himself as the only Democratic candidate with a really nuanced take on the flag, in an apparent effort to win over white working-class voters who increasingly vote Republican. On Sunday, Baier asked Webb whether he thought efforts to remove Confederate symbols from public places were racial healing or political grandstanding. In response, Webb again compared the Confederate debate to Trump trashing Mexican immigrants.

more: http://crooksandliars.com/2015/07/jim-webb-equates-trumps-racist-remarks

[4139]

1. First Iowa, then NH and the South Carolina...

[Erich Bloodaxe BSN]

2. And that's why he's polling in single digits. nt

[arcane1]

3. Remind me again why HIS campaign isn't considered a "long-shot"?

[zazen]

4. please Jim Webb run as a _Republican_!

Jeez. He's still far less extreme than any of the current contenders, so worst case scenario we end up with him. Better scenario is that he pulls some of the loons from the far right more toward the middle in their thinking. The closeness of these folks to the brink frightens me given the economic and environmental mess we're in. They're too easy to lead into fascism under the right leader.

[truebluegreen]

5. Sounds like a (Democratic) Constituency of One. nt

[treestar]

6. At least he admits that the culture is "white"

[Vinca]

7. What on earth is Webb's motive for running?

Is he looking for large speaking fees at Klan conventions?

[lonestarnot]

9. More likely than not.

[Comrade Grumpy]

11. That's some ridiculous shit, and exactly the kind of thing Webb is talking about.

I understand most of DU is ready to write off white male voters and write off the South. Webb isn't.

He's also good on foreign policy, Wall Street, and criminal justice reform. But I don't expect him to get any serious traction.

[brush]

13. We can write him off too

And all white male voters are not clamoring to keep flying the confederate flag.

[lonestarnot]

16. Tee Hee. Wrote him off before he got started. :)

[geek tragedy]

8. That's some awesome white dude populism. nt

[TwilightGardener]

10. If Jim Webb can pull in more poor/working class white males who don't feel the Dem party speaks

for them, I'm OK with that. It's a very fine line to walk, however, without veering into racial division.

[Quixote1818]

12. I only got through half of that. The Democratic Party is simply moving back to where

it was when FDR was president and away from Reagan and Wall Street where it has been the past 25 years.

I don't know what Webb is up to but he is clearly not trying to win the Democratic nomination.

[Johonny]

14. Confederate flag removal hasn't been all that divisive or else TV channels

state legislators, and other organizations wouldn't have been so quick to latch on to it. Meanwhile just about no one not hiding Klan membership is embracing Trumps depiction of Americans of Mexican descent. So besides that Webb has a great point... he should sweep up the Klan vote not going to Trump. Does he even make Iowa at this pace?

[Uncle Joe]

17. My guess is the Republicans were gunning that there would be "overreach" from

Democrats, websites and liberals in general.

This has been the case with much divisive and simple minded rhetoric.

It went from removing the Confederate Flag on state grounds in South Carolina proposed by Republicans, to removing Confederate Flags from Arlington, to digging up the deceased Confederates from Arlington, digging up Nathan Bedford Forest buried in a public park, removing the Confederate Flag which has flown along other nation's flags in Florida, to outlawing the Confederate Flag, calling anyone with a Confederate Flag a racist, member of the Klan, ignorant, only having two teeth to chew their food with, firing people that fly the Confederate Flag because just flying it oppresses minorities, all the way to should the South be reoccupied? And more

http://www.democraticunderground.com/10026966867

"Liberal Radio Host Thom Hartmann: 'Should We Reoccupy the South with Union Forces'?"

I imagine Russia prefers us to be weak and divided as well, so they play along our cultural and social fault lines, expanding them in whatever way they can, keep the division roughly 50/50 to prevent real substantive progress from being made, lest we as a nation become even stronger internally and externally.

All of this divisive regional rhetoric creates a backlash extending the Republican hold on much of the South while turning some moderates against voting Democratic, it plays right into the less than 1%'s hands and perhaps Webb recognizes this?

Not only were the Republicans gunning for overreach, the flag issue; et al all but wiped out the issues of intelligent gun control and actual hate groups from corporate media coverage after the good people in the Charleston church were murdered.

[alarimer]

15. GFY, Jim Webb.

What an asshole.