WaPo: The GOP is no party for blacks, Latinos, and gays

[DrScholl]

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1964 was the civil war?

Given that it was the Republicans who pushed for the Civil Rights Act and put it into law, this is just hyperbole from the party of slavery. 

Here we go again. This is why Republicans lose, they don't get it. This isn't the past and today's Republicans don't get credit for what happened back then. You're not going to win by running around ranting that Democrats are the party of slavery and pretending that your party has no structural problems.

And for the record, zero southern Republicans voted for the civil rights act and as for the northern ones, they had a bigger number of no votes among them than northern Democrats did. Not so perfect when you look at it like that.

[DrScholl]

Let's also not forget that the Republican Party reacted to losing the re-election by saying black people and other minorities only voted for Obama so they could get free stuff.

Then there were those conservatives on social media that made racial slurs and threats, some of which got them in trouble with authorities. That doesn't sound like a happy, tolerant, colorblind party to me.

[DrScholl]

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Then why does FDR get credit for what he did?

His policies still fit somewhat with what Democrats stand for now. Besides, no one is denying how the parties were in the past, it's about the present. Republicans have race issues that are separate from things that happened over 100 years ago.

[DrScholl]

Can't have it both ways. The Republican party is opposed to slavery. I can quote Woodrow Wilson, telling black men that they were dumb for voting for him.

Slavery is not a modern issue and back then, the Democrats pretty much were the conservative party. The parties right now are the exact opposite of what they were all those years ago. If you have to go back a hundred years to prove that your party doesn't have race issues, then you have a problem.

[DrScholl]

Again, the parties are not the 'exact opposite'. They are the same parties they've always been. The Democrats were the party of slavery - and they still don't believe in racial equality. They don't believe that black people are equal to everyone else. They believe in racial quotas - they believe in making it easier for black people because they don't believe that black people are equally capable.

Why did the Republicans appoint Clarence Thomas - if they have a race problem? The only ones who think the Republicans have a race problem are Democrats, and why would you trust the democrats? They don't understand what racial equality actually is.

History can't be rewritten and it is indisputable that both parties are completely different from many years past. Going on about quotas and how Democrats think black people are incapable won't get Republicans anywhere. Most of the Republican caucus in the House is white, while Democrats have a diverse caucus. That doesn't sound like inequality to me.

[DrScholl]

Then Democrats should support neutral redistricting. You and I both know - that they have attempted to carve out enclaves.

Not that this is a thread about redistricting, but Republicans controlled most of the redistricting last year, they drew mostly white districts because those are the only ones they can win, let's not pretend otherwise. Democrats would benefit if districts were not drawn like that.

[DrScholl]

Right, that's because they aren't drawn to preserve minorities to create a 'congressional black district'. That's what some people used to call segregation back in the day. How does that convey an attitude of racial integration and harmony?

You're not getting it. Most of these minority districts were drawn by Republicans to preserve their own seats. Republicans don't even object to those seats because it benefits them.

[DrScholl]

So you're saying that Democrats are willing to hurt minorities?

You're clearly out of arguments. I didn't say anything of the sort.

[DrScholl]

Ate my reply. If the Democrats were sincerely the defenders of the downtrodden, wouldn't they seek to maximize their representation?

You're arguing that they deliberately adopt a strategy that minimizes their representation. Why?

I don't really think packing minorities all into one district is necessarily fair. My point was that Republicans benefit more from packing minorities and don't draw those districts out of "fairness".

[DrScholl]

Lee Atwater never said that.  A liberal professor claimed he said that in 1981, but he made that claim in the early 2000s.  If he really said that, then why didn't this professor use it against him then when it could have destroyed his political career?  Even the (very nasty) New York Times obituary written after Lee Atwater's death never mentioned this quote.  And if he did say it, then he was talking about how racial politics in general had become frowned upon.  Pat Buchanan, arguably the architect of the "Southern strategy", said that it was an attempt to convince moderate, pro-civil rights Southerners to vote Republican as a protest against the segregationist policies f many Democrats.  Read it for yourself:
 http://www.wnd.com/2002/12/16477/

It's on tape.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X_8E3ENrKrQ

[DrScholl]

OK, here's the link, for real:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZT7pASof8Lc

That doesn't disprove the fact that Atwater was on tape, saying the exact quote that you stated that he never made.

[DrScholl]

Count me down as member of the party of Dr. Martin Luther King, Fredrick Douglass, and Booker T. Washington, not that of Jim Crow, secession, and the South.

All of those people would have been Democrats in the modern era. On the other hand, under today's right-wing logic, getting rid of Jim Crow would be viewed big government and socialism, you know since socialism is a word for everything bad in the world. Your argument doesn't work.