Dean makes racial-political history

[opstachuck]

from the Black Commentator -

"Howard Dean’s December 7 speech is the most important statement on race in American politics by a mainstream white politician in nearly 40 years. Nothing remotely comparable has been said by anyone who might become or who has been President of the United States since Lyndon Johnson’s June 4, 1965 affirmative action address to the graduating class at Howard University..."

http://www.blackcommentator.com/68/68_cover_dean.html

[DrFunkenstein]

1. Dean is an "apologist for the American Manifest Destiny?"

My faovrite quote from the speech:

"It's time we had a new politics in America – a politics that refuses to pander to our lowest prejudices."

Let's take a look at a piece by a Nation correspondent following the Dean revolution.

Then there was the Imageering 101 political staging, a subject of much snickering in the press pool. At most every stop Dean had a statistically accurate multicultural microcosm await his arrival on stage, usually against a background of a giant American flag. Milwaukee, the second stop on the tour, was the most painful: seventeen supporters of various races (in proper proportions: three blacks, two Hispanics, etc.), frozen and seemingly afraid to move or make a face against the backdrop of a mammoth Old Glory. Watching them wait for Dean gave me shivers; they looked like sausages nailed to a giant red, white and blue crucifix.

It was not lost on some of us, for instance, that his wooden campaign slogan, "Take America Back," was also used by two other former Trippi candidates: Gephardt in 1988 and Jerry Brown in 1992. Much of Dean's public presentation, in fact, is a rehash of other Democratic campaigns. He makes a joke about Bush being "all hat and no cattle," which was a laugh line in Gephardt's campaign speech earlier this year. And his closer line, "You have the power! You have the power! You have the power!" (delivered in the style of Jesse Jackson's "Keep Hope Alive!" bit) was a Gore line in 2000.

The funny thing about this was that when I pointed out these behaviors to Dean supporters, they rarely failed to admit to being turned off by them. At best they were indifferent, distantly aware that these gags were being staged for some other mystical personage "out there" who would be convinced by them.

"Does that do anything for you, you know, seeing an ethnically mixed bunch of people standing in front of a big flag?" I asked 18-year-old Megan Colvin in Milwaukee.

She shrugged. "Well, no," she said. "But I think he's trying to say something about diversity."

"But," I said, "he's trying to say it to you, isn't he?"

"I guess," she said.

http://www.thenation.com/doc.mhtml?i=20031006&c=5&s=taibbi

[LuminousX]

3. Is it working or not?

[DrFunkenstein]

4. Works For Me!

I'm convinced that he would never pander to the African-American community with photo ops in Southern Baptist churches or have white supporters holding the (oops) wrong signs up.

[SahaleArm]

9. LOL *nm*

[drfemoe]

10. why can't someone who is not

AA hold a support sign for African-Americans?

I don't get that one. Is that bad manners?

I'm on the same side as Dean's African-American supporters,
so why would I be prevented from carrying that sign?

I am open to understanding your POV.

[polpilot]

20. I'm convinced these posts are good for you. I can feel you healing.

'04 was hard on Kerry supporters and long time Dean backers should try to understand your disappointment on his problematic campaign.

Dean '04...

[drfemoe]

21. what '04 was hard on Kerry supporters?

[helleborient]

14. Nothing more recent than Oct. 6th - 2 months ago - to smear

Howard Dean with?

You're responding to a current article with old news...good try.

[caledesi]

2. I totally agree with this. HD has no problem with "in your face"

discussion about race. I really appreciate that. Yes, Kucinich has talked about race as well, but we do know that the media has put the "lid" on him. Those b*stards.

HD is probably going to the be nominee, but in no way do I want the rest of the candidates to stop speaking out. * must be called on for his reckless, inane, divisive politics. So "bring 'em on."

I am being honest here. I think Dean will be the nominee, but I hope with all my heart that great people like Kucinich get a really high position within the administration.

Also, Randi Rhodes (you know her, liberal talk show host) said Kucinich would make a great talk-show host. I agree. Maybe that is his new career.

We are going to take over the presidency, the House and the Senate. I feel it.

[DrFunkenstein]

5. Charlie Rangel On Gore Announcement In Harlem

Charlie Rangel: Gore, Dean are Harlem Hypocrites

When Al Gore said during his endorsement of Howard Dean on Tuesday that it was "good to be back in Harlem," Congressman Charlie Rangel and his staff wondered what the ex-VP meant by "back."

"Of all the congressional districts we have in the country, I would think mine is one that Gore is least familiar with," Rep. Rangel complained to Newsday.

The leading black Democrat was no kinder to Gore's Vermont sidekick, telling the New York Post, "From what I gather, Howard Dean brought all of his black supporters with him to the announcement. I counted one black guy."

The fact that the two lily white Democrats were trying to capitalize on their tenuous ties to the African-American community also irked Rangel's aides.

Deriding Gore's antics, Rangel's chief of staff Jim Capel complained, "This sucker didn't come into Harlem to campaign" when he ran for president in 2000. "And he's coming here to endorse?"

Gov. Dean's pandering rubbed Capel the wrong way as well, saying his choice of the Harlem venue "sort of seems odd in that neither Gore nor Dean has a close association with this community."

http://www.newsmax.com/archives/ic/2003/12/10/190626.shtml

[RUMMYisFROSTED]

6. Just flaunting your NewsMax familiarity these days, aren't ya?

When in Rome...

[drfemoe]

11. Did you read the other story

December 9, 2003
Breakfast at the National
Black Theatre's
Institute of Action Art
8:00 a.m until 9:00 a.m.
2031 5th Avenue (at 125th Street)

and realize that Dean already had an event planned at that location for weeks?

The timing was due to Gore's schedule, and he met Dean where Dean was going to be. Gore came in from China (or somewhere, I don't have the new article right in front of me) on MONDAY night and was leaving for Europe the next day.

They had been talking to each other for some time. Gore read the foreign policy speech Dean had sent him, and called him from (his international location) FRIDAY night. Dean didn't tell his wife or Trippi. Trippi found out about it when it 'leaked' MONDAY.

From my POV, I am not going to take Rangel's word that there was *one* African American person there. It says he watched it on tv. I've looked at all the pictures I can find of the event, and they are mostly stage shots. Did the version CR see pan the audience, so he could count? I can't tell from the pictures what the audience looked like.

Since he is endorsing and campaigning for Clark, and given the nature of 'politics', it is not surprising that Rangel would try to cast a negative pall on Gore's endorsement and claim that Dean has "tenuous ties to the African-American community".

I'm not going to judge by how many minorities show up to events or supposedly back a certain candidate.
If Charlie Rangel and Wesley Clark want to make it about that issue, they are absolutely free to do so.

[RevolutionStartsNow]

7. Meanwhile....

This was an incredible, beautifully written speech.

It deserves to be read, and can be read in full at the end of the article linked above. The article is very interesting, too.

[maxr4clark]

8. a good speech

This was a good speech. I don't agree with the article that it was historically important or very different from the speeches that many democrats give on Republican racial politics. Also, the point about Gore made in the article wasn't supported with anything but Gore's presence on a stage next to Dean. As speeches go, it was a speech Dean can be proud of.

I disagree with Dean on the fundamentals of the race issues in America. Dean says we are born equal; the truth is we are not born equal in this country. An African-American child is much more likely to be born into poverty than a Caucasian child. Johnson's affirmative action program was intended to correct the historical economic imbalance between Caucasians and African Americans, which was caused by the enslavement of Africans by Americans.

Affirmative Action is now being recast by Caucasian and conservative African American politicians alike as "equal treatment for everyone", and that is not enough to correct the historical economic imbalance. Until that historical imbalance is gone, African Americans need to have more support for education and more incentives and opportunity for high-paying jobs. That is what affirmative action is about: removing the historical stigma associated with skin color. Lyndon Johnson's speech was historic precisely because it was followed up with a fully-funded program to begin to repair the harm done by our Caucasian ancestors.

The only American institution that I know of that has made even a moderately successful attempt to correct the historical stigma against African Americans is the military. While that is admirable, it is painful to me that the best Caucasians can do to make amends for the enslavement of Africans is to make it easier for them to die for their country. IF we have learned any lessons in the military about how to provide more opportunity to African Americans than to Caucasians, it is time to put that knowlede to work to give more African Americans opportunities to flourish in American society, American politics, and the American economy.

I'd like to see more money spent in the United States each year correcting the racial bias against African Americans than on correcting the German holocaust of the Jews by propping up Israel. African Americans are far less militant and far more valuable to America as citizens than Israel is as an ally. Perhaps Europe should begin to repay its debt to the Jews, rather than America. I'd like to see a serious effort to improve our recognition and treatment of Native Americans. I think one of Bill Clinton's biggest failings as a President was that he did not take the opportunities he was presented to begin to make amends to Native Americans.

When the Democratic Party puts money and manpower behind the campaign of an African American, I will think of the Democratic party as advocates on behalf of African Americans. When the Democratic party submits and aggressively supports legislation to begin the process of making amends to Native Americans, the Democratic party can say it advocates equal rights for all Americans. Simply doing less harm than the Republicans is simply not enough.

[Very Good Dem]

12. Duplicate

[Very Good Dem]

13. Yes, it was a good speech, but ...

hardly "the most important statement on race in American politics by a mainstream white politician in nearly 40 years." Anyone who would make such a claim is either lying outright or is woefully clueless.

Of course, consider the source - blackcommentator.com is hardly a representative or credible authority on race issues in America. First, it is an obscure internet site that, as far as I can tell, most people have never seen or even heard of (funny, a Google search pulls up mostly hits to the Dean website, where the site is obviously getting a lot of play). I know of not a single black person who reads this outlet. At least, not until a couple of months ago when it started getting a lot more attention as a result of white Republicans continually cite it as a source. For example, it recently provided Republicans a massive amount of ammunition by running a racially offensive political cartoon attacking Janice Rogers Brown - a horrible Bush judicial nominee.

The cartoon was unnecessarily nasty and played to the worst racial stereotypes and, as such, helped to divert attention away from Brown's record (which, in and of itself, is more than enough to demonstrate she is unqualified to be a federal judge) to questions of her race, which made it all the more difficult to block her nomination. Republicans couldn't get enough of it, even blowing up the cartoon to gargantuan proportions and propping it up in the hearing room and on the floor of the Senate as a visual aid for their harangue against Democrats who, according to them, were attacking poor Justice Brown because she's a black woman. And the response in the civil rights community was universal - "what in the hell is blackcommentator.com?!"

While those who are unfamiliar with speeches on race in our political history might swoon over Howard Dean's comments, those of us who have been paying attention and actually deal with the issue know that his speech, while good, was hardly groundbreaking or even particularly noteworthy.

This is, frankly, one of the problems that I have with Dean's supporters. Rather than just showing the good your candidate is doing, you try to convince us that he somehow has invented the race dialogue in America, that he is some kind of maverick on the cutting edge of the issue. He isn't. And the belief that he is doing or saying anything new only highlights how out-of-touch the Dean campaign is with the racial issue since no one who is even remotely familiar with race and politics would believe that Dean is a racial prophet.

For those of you who believe that Dean is doing or saying anything that no white politician has done or said in the last 40 years, I urge you to do a little research before you make this claim again. There is ample material out there, but you can start with such speeches as Bill Bradley's 1991 speech on race and civil rights, John Kerry's speech on race, civil rights and judicial nominations given earlier this year, and just about any speech on race or civil rights given by Jack Kemp, Bill Clinton and Bobby Kennedy. If you take off your "Howard Dean is the second coming" blinders long enough to actually research the topic, you will find that, while Dean's perspective and comments are commendable, he is hardly the first or only white politician talking about this issue with eloquence and insight.

[helleborient]

15. But the only other current candidate you mention as being

particularly eloquent about race issues is John Kerry who is doing poorly in his campaign.

So isn't it important that Howard Dean is leading AND speaking eloquently about race?

[mbali]

17. Kerry was but one example

this was not a comprehensive list. I could also have cited you to numerous other speeches by current Democratic candidates, including several of John Edwards' speeches.

Moreover, the post to which I responded did not claim that Dean was the only white candidate currently running for president and who is ahead in the polls who is speaking eloquently on this issue. It put forth a quote alleging that Dean's speech is "the most important statement on race in American politics by a mainstream white politician in nearly 40 years" and that "othing remotely comparable has been said by anyone who might become or who has been President of the United States" since 1965. A ridiculous statement, to say the least.

I have no problem at all with anyone claiming that Dean is speaking eloquently about race. But for someone to claim that Dean is doing something that no one has done in 40 years or even that none of his opponents are doing now is simply too much to stomach. Anyone who truly believes this is so far out of touch with what is going on in politics and civil rights that they cannot be taken seriously on this issue.

[opstachuck]

16. very good response

i was surprised by this article because the claim seemed to be somewhat ridiculous. you seem to know what you're taking about
yet at the same time you condescend to Dean supporters at the end and that's not going to win anyone over, if that's even what you're trying to do. i don't know anyone who would respond positively to being stereotyped as a blind follower - in fact, i would suggest it would only increase their fervor. despite that bit at the end, a very good response.

a Dean supporter

[mbali]

18. I should have said

"some Dean supporters," rather than lumping them all together.

Sorry.

[drfemoe]

19. lift

:kick: