And I understand that many African-Americans distrust my political party.

[LynneSin]

Every once in awhile Bush does actually get it right

http://www.signonsandiego.com/news/nation/20060720-0912-bush-naacp.html

Bush to NAACP: 'I understand that racism still lingers'

WASHINGTON – President Bush acknowledged persistent racism in America and lamented the Republican Party's bumpy relations with black voters as he addressed the NAACP's annual convention Thursday for the first time in his presidency.

“I understand that racism still lingers in America,” Bush told the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People. “It's a lot easier to change a law than to change a human heart. And I understand that many African-Americans distrust my political party.”

That line generated boisterous applause and cheers from the thousands in the audience, which generally gave the president a polite, reserved reception.

+++++++++++++++++++++++

Perhaps they were applauding boisterously because that was the first time they agreed with George Bush on something

[EST]

1. That's the way I read it.

[Mythsaje]

2. Truthy...

Real truth would be if he said..."And I understand that African Americans have a REASON to distrust my political party."

[Selatius]

3. I want to see Jeb Bush and Katherine Harris talk to the NAACP

I want to see them try to explain the purging of Black voters from the rolls in Florida in 2000.

[LynneSin]

5. I want to see Kenneth Blackwell

That man betrayed his own people to get ahead which makes him a thousand times worse that either of those two combined

[MichiganVote]

4. Few white people * isn't too popular with either nowadays

[Mind_your_head]

6. The group applauded b/c for ONCE he spoke the truth.....

"“It's a lot easier to change a law than to change a human heart. And I understand that many African-Americans distrust my political party.”"

His actions prove/show that he doesn't understand one d*mn thang......

[enki23]

7. er... there's no "perhaps" about ut.

.

[Cleita]

8. Considering that the hard RW of the GOP baits

their base's racism and other xenophobias to get their votes he should be concerned about the distrust of what is usually their targets.

[jobycom]

9. Yep. Then the arrogant bastard follows with this self-serving gem

“For too long, my party wrote off the African-American vote, and many African-Americans wrote off the Republican Party.”

See, he's gotta lecture "those people" that it's their fault, too, that they are equally guilty.

Oddly, I don't really think Bush is a pure racist, in the way David Duke or Ronald Reagan were. I think he is generally open-minded on race, on a personal level. But he doesn't really understand the big picture, and he is way too eager to use race as a political tool. Yes, I can say the second part of that about many, maybe most, white Democrats in power, too. But even so, the Dems try to make things better. Bush has no interest in making things better, he has no plans to stop repressing the black vote whenever he can, he has no apologies to offer for what he himself or his father or his party in the last two decades have done to make racism worse in America. He can apologize for non-specific sins, and he can name specifics like slavery (very perceptive of him to acknowledge that slavery was bad, wasn't it?), but he can't apologize for what he's done specifically, or what he's allowed to be done in his name. Where's the "I'm sorry for repressing your right to vote in 2000 and 2004. I'm sorry for allowing hundreds to die in New Orleans because I was mad at the governor. I'm sorry for breaking all my promises to help New Orleans rebuild. I'm sorry that hundreds of thousands of homes sit ruined in New Orleans in a region of America that looks like a Third or Fourth World Nation and I have no interest in rebuilding them, or even protecting the property rights of those who own them. I'm sorry that my tax cuts and wage decline has created a new form of slavery in America that strikes all poor, but strikes blacks disproportionately. I'm sorry that our justice system imprisons large percentages of black males for crimes that white males commit equally but are rarely imprisoned for (and the Democrats won't bring that one up, either). I'm sorry that in Texas I refused to stay the executions of black men who may have been innocent, but had no trouble sparing the life of a white man who raped and viciously murdered over a hundred women. I'm sorry that I bomb non-white nations over issues I wouldn't dream of bombing white nations over. I'm sorry I've been as neglectful of equal rights and civil rights and human rights for all people as anyone I condemned here tonight. I'm sorry I spoke at Bob Jones University and that I honored Reagan, the racist who kicked his campaign off in Philadelphia, MS to show respect to the civil rights murderers from that town. I could go on, but we'd be here until tomorrow night if I mentioned all the things I've done wrong involving race relations in America."

That might have gotten him some genuine applause, rather than a round of applause meant to chastise him.

[tinfoil tiaras]

10. No Shit

The Republican Party was and is still the white-flight party (of the South and elsewhere). Why is the South almost all Republican? Because Democrats in the 1960s started supporting civil rights legislation and they figured that the "Dixecrats" couldn't go anywhere, so they decided to go with the Republicans who were opposing the civil rights legislation. The poor whites don't wanna vote Democratic because then they'd be voting with the black people which some of them don't wanna do, even though they're voting against their own self interests by voting Repuke....

:mad:

[rucky]

11. I'm shocked he admitted this. n/t

[Mind_your_head]

12. He didn't know what he was saying....he doesn't know one thing about

"the human heart"....he doesn't have one anymore.

Tragic for him, but at some point, the rest of us have to say "ENOUGH"!!!!!