Will the GOP ever appeal to Minorities?

[Verily]

extinct?

In other countries there can be partially integrated minorities for millennia that are still massacred in bloodbaths when times are tonight. 

I think he's saying that whites will no longer be the majority. Which might be true, but it's beginning to look more likely that it will not be true. Extrapolating to 2050 is really dumb. In any case, whites would still be the plurality unless something extremely radical happens.

Anyway, I put the likely lifespan of the Republican Party as not lasting past c. 2150. This isn't an observation on its ideology, past or future, just on probability of party collapse in a FPTP system (or even the possibility that FPTP will be abolished). Same holds for the Democrats, of course. So "ever" has a relatively limited span of time. In that sense, it's certainly possible for the Republicans to win one minority group before disappearing, although winning the minority vote overall would be much more difficult and less likely.

[justfollowingtheelections]

I don't see the Republican Party changing anytime soon. They certainly need a new message if they even hope to exist as a political party. And yes, Mike Huckabee did sum it up very well when he said "We can't just be the party of old, angry white men." And it's not just racial minorities that the GOP needs to focus on if they hope to appeal to minorities in the future.

Does anyone else not find it a little sad how in the South, Republicans are for white people and Democrats are for black people? This needs to change for both sides because it's degrading. As for Latinos, if the GOP expects to win them back, they need to stop the xenophobic and anti-immigration talk. We obviously need comprehensive immigration reform, I think we can all agree on that, but deportation and building a wall across the U.S.-Mexican border is not the answer and probably doesn't bode well for the Latino community. Don't forget, though, that Republicans do well among Cuban Americans in South Florida. Asian Americans are similar to Latinos, socially conservative and fiscally liberal, but I don't know why they vote so strongly for Democrats over Republicans. Maybe because a lot of them live in San Francisco?

It appears as though the gender gap is back as well. Exit polls showed Obama winning 56% of the female vote to 43% for McCain and just narrowly winning men 49-48%. Men, however, are a minority in this country now, so I guess that's one minority group that the GOP can rely upon! however, if they expect to attract more women to the party, they need to change their message on women's rights, pay equity, gender discrimination, and just blatant sexism.

AGE is another factor that needs to be addressed. There seems to be a growing generational gap between the parties as well. Democrats are getting the youth vote, and Republicans are getting the elderly vote. Why is this? Well, it was solidified by Obama's appeal to young voters but John Kerry also won the youth (18-29) vote as well. As someone who fits into this category, let me offer my analysis on why Democrats get the youth vote. Young America is typically more socially liberal than mainstream America. A large percentage of young adults are pro-choice and more tolerant of homosexuality and diversity in general than our older counterparts (I saw a poll taken in 2005 somewhere that showed that 56% of young adults 18-29 support gay marriage now). At the same time, young voters share the concerns of many other Americans: health care, environment, and education is obviously a big factor with so many more younger Americans going to college nowadays. If the GOP expects to attract the youth vote, my advice would be for them to ditch the hate and bigotry that is spewed from the religious right wing of the party (i.e. "If you kill babies you're going to hell" and "God hates fags" doesn't really resonate well with young people). Oh, and ditch the campus preachers too like Brother Jed who go to college campuses and tell them that fraternity boys are "rapists" and sorority girls are "whores" and black people are "animals" how all colleges propagate the "left-wing liberal agenda." Yeah these messages are not going to make want young America vote Republican anytime soon. Democrats, however, still get a substantial proportion of the elderly vote because of populist issues like Medicare/Medicaid and Social Security.

Speaking of religion (which shouldn't even be a part of politics), the Republicans just need to ditch the religious right wing of their party because they are a shrinking minority. The exit polls showed that McCain only won Protestants. Obama won Catholics, Jews, and all other religious and non-religious groups. Obviously the GOP needs to appeal to more than just WASPs if they expect to be a congregation with open arms

I would mention sexual orientation but that's a waste of time seeing as how we all know that the LGBT community is never going to vote Republican until they drop their homophobia and intolerance. Although, it is worth mentioning, that McCain got 27% of the LGBT vote in 2008 compared to George W. Bush's 25% in 2004. Maybe McCain's vote against the discriminatory Federal Marriage Amendment twice and calling Jerry Falwell an agent of intolerance is the direction the GOP needs to go if they want to get their share of the gay vote.

These are just my explanations. Right now, Republicans is the party of the majorities and Democrats is the party of the minorities, and until Republicans change their message, I don't see them ever attracting minorities.

Younger Cuban Americans are more Democratic than their parents and grandparents.  As for Asian-Americans, the answer is pretty simple.
The first reason is because they live in big cities.
The second is the same reason why all minorities vote for the Democrats: because the GOP is seen as the White Party.

[Lunar]

extinct?

In other countries there can be partially integrated minorities for millennia that are still massacred in bloodbaths when times are tonight. 

I think he's saying that whites will no longer be the majority.

Since when in world history does that ever prevent persecution and extreme negative stereotypes towards minorities [even-more-minorities?] ?  Hell, sometimes plurality demographics can be the most aggressive in their biases, say, Malaysia as a random example.

edit: Nevermind, Malays now occupy a slight <50.5% majority.  I'm sure they'll no longer get preferential admissions into public universities and other forms of affirmative action now.

[TeePee4Prez]

They'll have to in order to survive.  And they can.  Most older blacks I know are very religious to the point of suffocation.  I'm curious as to why the GOP has never been able to capitalize on that.

[○∙◄☻¥tπ[╪AV┼cVê└]

They appeal to a minority of the population.

[Lunar]

They'll have to in order to survive.  And they can.  Most older blacks I know are very religious to the point of suffocation.  I'm curious as to why the GOP has never been able to capitalize on that.

Some GOP strategists have been curious about that too [not the talented ones, at least for not long].  Same with Hispanics.

Alas, the same approach one uses to appeal to white evangelical Protestants might not work for others.  I don't know if blacks view two hundred white Southern and/or suburban politicians engaging in so-called political "bible-thumping" as that appealing.

[Lunar]

Maybe minorities are just too stupid to understand the important issues, and recently I don't think they understand how important it is to find out whether Barack Obama is pro-America, a terrorist, a Muslim, or what!

[justfollowingtheelections]

I think with Obama's election , the Democrats have won the black vote for at least one more generation.

[Lunar]

I think with Obama's election , the Democrats have won the black vote for at least one more generation.

MAYBE YOU FORGOT ABOUT THIS

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GWTh9_A6t8w&eurl

"Some slum love out to my buddy. Gov. Bobby Jindal is doing a friggin'
awesome job in his state." [The questioner asked him about "slum love"
to be fair]

"We need to uptick our image with everyone, including one-armed
midgets."
[The question asked him about one-armed midgets, though, to be fair]

 "And the American people don't have that kind of bling-bling in their
pockets."

"But, it's real and we've got to get in the real."

"I know what's up. I know what time it is."
(Inspiration: "Timebomb," 1987, Public Enemy. (Flava Flav: "Yo, we gotta
let 'em know what time it is!")

"There you go, playa."

"We want to convey that the modern-day GOP looks like the conservative
party that stands on principles. But we want to apply them to
urban-surburban hip-hop settings."

"We missed the mark in the past, which is why we are in the crapper
now,"

"People who said I can't make the trains run on time never gave a
reason.
I say to them, 'Stuff it.'"

Steele described the new multi-platform PR offensive as "avant-garde, technically. It will come to [the] table with things that will surprise everyone - off the hook." Asked whether that meant cutting-edge tactics, Steele demurred. "I don't do 'cutting-edge,'" he said. "That's what Democrats are doing. We're going beyond cutting-edge."

"I'm always open for everything, baby."   ... to Neil Cavuto,

"That's the nature of this job, baby."

[justfollowingtheelections]

It's because of things like this that the Republicans have no chance of winning the minority vote any time soon (especially the black vote).

[Lunar]

It's because of things like this that the Republicans have no chance of winning the minority vote any time soon (especially the black vote).

those are all from after Obama was elected, so something was going wrong before that.

[sorry for the format, it was easiest for me to copy that from an email]

[justfollowingtheelections]

It's because of things like this that the Republicans have no chance of winning the minority vote any time soon (especially the black vote).

those are all from after Obama was elected, so something was going wrong before that.

[sorry for the format, it was easiest for me to copy that from an email]

Of course there was but my point is that they haven't learned anything and instead of trying to appeal to minorities by listening to their problems, they elect black guys like Steele as if black people are so dumb they cannot see the motives behind such an action.
it's insulting and patronizing and that's exactly why they will remain an irrelevant party.

[pbrower2a]

As America becomes less rural and less white, the GOP must adapt or die. Urban life requires more infrastructure and more public services whose cost per citizen isn't getting cheaper. Suburbia used to be full of people more concerned with taxes than with public services and thus GOP-leaning... but in much of America that is now past.

Add to that, the GOP has left a bad taste for its hypocritical stand of selective contempt for government; it has shown itself willing to use the treasury to enrich special interests while attacking government aid to those who don't make huge campaign contributions. Add to that the collapse of the housing bubble (Hispanics and Asians probably got hit harder than whites), "majority of a majority" politics of Karl Rove that ensured that many would get nothing out of government while paying taxes, an unpopular war, and economic decline for all but the top 5% of income-earners -- and the GOP must re-invent itself to survive.  The GOP can no longer rely upon the Religious Right to bring "reliable" voters to the voting booths.

The only growing constituency of the GOP seems to be poor white people who may have gone GOP on "cultural" grounds, and if this group recognizes what it has in common with poor non-whites (especially blacks), then the GOP is in deep trouble.

The GOP created a regional  polarization as a consequence of Karl Rove's "majority of a majority"  politics, and that manifested itself eighteen states (ME, VT, MA, RI, CT, NY, PA, NJ, MD, DE, MI, WI, IL, MN, WA, OR, CA, HI) and the District of Columbia in which the GOP nominee for President has not won since 1988 -- and in none of those states did John McCain get close to winning the states.  Those states and DC comprised 248 electoral votes in 2008, or 93% of those needed to win the Presidency; note well that the GOP has been losing House and Senate seats in that region rather steadily.  Although none of these states is a reliable area for population growth for the next couple of decades and this group of states will be losing electoral votes (to about 240), much of the rest of America has begun to have the same demographic trends likely to manifest themselves in voting.

If the GOP had 'only' lost New Hampshire, Iowa, and New Mexico, states that Dubya won only once -- barely -- in addition to the so-called Blue Firewall, then the GOP would have still won the Presidency in 2008. If it had 'only' lost such swing states as Ohio, Florida, Colorado, and Nevada, then winning back the Presidency might be an imaginable feat in 2012 through get-out-the-vote efforts and negative campaigning. But it gets worse: the GOP lost one State that hadn't voted for the Republican nominee since 1976 (North Carolina) and two (Virginia, Indiana) that hadn't voted for the Democratic nominee since 1964.

It stands to get worse for the GOP; the states that voted for Obama have begun to get the demographics that the Blue Firewall has. Most Presidential elections for an open seat show some flux -- but in 2008 almost all the flux was toward the Democratic Party.     

[??????????]

My command of the English language is just fine. Point out the problems if you want to teacher. And again you are assuming I have a great dislike of Hispanics, which of course if you actually knew my stances you'd know is completely ignorant.

No, I don't assume that

You're a liar then. No shock really, just calling you what you are.

[Psychic Octopus]

Actually, I heard that before the economy went haywire, that Hispanics *might* swing for McCain. Who knows, though.

[War on Want]

extinct?

In other countries there can be partially integrated minorities for millennia that are still massacred in bloodbaths when times are tonight. 

I am an optimist on ideas on minorities and immigration for obvious reasons but I think that if you look at America's history we are unlike any other country when it comes to immigration. Our immigrants have been absored at extremely fast rates and have been fully integrated at extremely fast rates. Will this likely change in the future? I doubt it, Latinos are assimilating at very fast rates and I have confidence that as more and more of them become middle class that opinions of them will begin to go up. This will translate towards more interacial marriages and more of them in mostly white communities.

My point isn't that Whites won't be a majority in the future, it is that the predjuidices towards minorities will be mostly gone. This is harder with Blacks for pretty obvious reasons and I think the one area of the country that will remain much like it is today is the South. 

[Vepres]

I think it is possible for Republicans to win hispanics and make inroads with blacks. McCain may have bested Bush's percentage of the the hispanic vote were it not for the housing crisis and the financial meltdown in September. If GOP candidates drop the anti-immigrant rhetoric, focus on reforming the immigration system without amnesty, they could make significant inroads amongst hispanics. Also, keep in mind that third generation and further hispanics, if not already having some white in them, begin to vote much like whites do.

I'll explain the blacks later, but I have to go.

[??????????]

I think it is possible for Republicans to win hispanics and make inroads with blacks. McCain may have bested Bush's percentage of the the hispanic vote were it not for the housing crisis and the financial meltdown in September. If GOP candidates drop the anti-immigrant rhetoric, focus on reforming the immigration system without amnesty, they could make significant inroads amongst hispanics. Also, keep in mind that third generation and further hispanics, if not already having some white in them, begin to vote much like whites do.

I'll explain the blacks later, but I have to go.

95% of GOPers aren't anti-immigrant in the first place. They are anti-illegal immigration which is leaps and bounds different from anti-immigrant.

[pbrower2a]

I think it is possible for Republicans to win hispanics and make inroads with blacks. McCain may have bested Bush's percentage of the the hispanic vote were it not for the housing crisis and the financial meltdown in September. If GOP candidates drop the anti-immigrant rhetoric, focus on reforming the immigration system without amnesty, they could make significant inroads amongst hispanics. Also, keep in mind that third generation and further hispanics, if not already having some white in them, begin to vote much like whites do.

I'll explain the blacks later, but I have to go.

The subprime lending/real estate meltdown likely delivered Hispanics to the Democratic Party. Look at Nevada: about everyone thought that it would be close... until the real estate meltdown hit young homeowners in Greater Las Vegas. Young Mexican-Americans, who buy housing at lower incomes than any other ethnic group and make huge sacrifices (second jobs, reduced personal spending) to do so, got hit hardest as a group. Nevada ended up voting like Michigan (blowout Obama win) instead of like Indiana (which was going to be close).

In Florida the Hispanics are more diverse -- and I don't have as much familiarity with Cuban-Americans or Puerto Ricans (I have lived in Texas and California and not Florida)... but the real estate meltdown hit Florida too. There was a real estate boom in Florida, and contrary to myth it is not all Yankees taking their retirements there. Like Nevada, Florida has a large entertainment industry, but in theme parks instead of casinos. Hispanics got many of the steady but low-paying jobs in the tourist trade and were able to get housing. Cubans may have been hit less, having been in Florida longer and being more assimilated economically, but Central Americans and Puerto Ricans got hit harder as newer residents of Florida. 

In one of the ultimate ironies, a practice that Dubya promoted -- getting as many people into mortgaged housing as possible irrespective of underwriting and lending practices -- may have had unintended consequences. It was intended to make more conservatives -- people owning their own houses and having to pay taxes on them would be more anti-tax and hence pro-Republican -- but when people started losing those houses, those voters went Democratic. Dubya might have gotten some votes that he might not otherwise have gotten in 2004, but McCain paid the price.

   

[Sbane]

I think it is possible for Republicans to win hispanics and make inroads with blacks. McCain may have bested Bush's percentage of the the hispanic vote were it not for the housing crisis and the financial meltdown in September. If GOP candidates drop the anti-immigrant rhetoric, focus on reforming the immigration system without amnesty, they could make significant inroads amongst hispanics. Also, keep in mind that third generation and further hispanics, if not already having some white in them, begin to vote much like whites do.

I'll explain the blacks later, but I have to go.

I think the anti-immigrant rhetoric coming from the republican party in 2005 changed the minds of many latinos. They liked Bush when he offered comprehensive immigration reform but we all know how that turned out and who's fault it was. They don't necessarily support illegal immigration, but they surely don't want them to be deported if they are law abiding residents. Add to that the prominence of republicans like Tancredo and it might be easy to perceive that republicans are hostile to immigrants. Latinos definitely like Mccain, as evidenced by how well he did with them in Arizona, but their perception of republicans and the economic meltdown caused them to swing in huge numbers to the dems. Even without the meltdown, I doubt Mccain could have done as well as Bush.

95% of GOPers aren't anti-immigrant in the first place. They are anti-illegal immigration which is leaps and bounds different from anti-immigrant.

[Vepres]

I think it is possible for Republicans to win hispanics and make inroads with blacks. McCain may have bested Bush's percentage of the the hispanic vote were it not for the housing crisis and the financial meltdown in September. If GOP candidates drop the anti-immigrant rhetoric, focus on reforming the immigration system without amnesty, they could make significant inroads amongst hispanics. Also, keep in mind that third generation and further hispanics, if not already having some white in them, begin to vote much like whites do.

I'll explain the blacks later, but I have to go.

I think the anti-immigrant rhetoric coming from the republican party in 2005 changed the minds of many latinos. They liked Bush when he offered comprehensive immigration reform but we all know how that turned out and who's fault it was. They don't necessarily support illegal immigration, but they surely don't want them to be deported if they are law abiding residents. Add to that the prominence of republicans like Tancredo and it might be easy to perceive that republicans are hostile to immigrants. Latinos definitely like Mccain, as evidenced by how well he did with them in Arizona, but their perception of republicans and the economic meltdown caused them to swing in huge numbers to the dems. Even without the meltdown, I doubt Mccain could have done as well as Bush.

95% of GOPers aren't anti-immigrant in the first place. They are anti-illegal immigration which is leaps and bounds different from anti-immigrant.

That's true, but the few that are *cough*Tancredo*cough* scare them away. Trust me, I have a realistic view of the Republican party. As I'm a resident of a somewhat Hispanic state, I must say that, in terms of politics, Hispanics are very conservative/libertarian (later generations aren't as socially conservative). It's the tone the GOP strikes, which frankly sounds hostile at times. If more Republicans could sound like Giuliani, McCain, or others on the immigration issue (though obviously not other issues), then the Republicans could make significant gains among Hispanics. Remember, Bush won 45% of the Latino vote in 2004, which he would've lost the election without (CO, NV, and NM, would've swung Democratic, giving Kerry the presidency).

[Ogre Mage]

Given the Right's reaction to Sonia Sotomayor, not for a very long time, perhaps never.  Since we have had to listen to their cascading shi*stream about how she is racist, hot tempered, lazy, an angry woman, a member of the Latino KKK and an affirmative action flunkie.

I am a minority and I would rather shoot myself in the foot than join the GOP.

[Vepres]

Given the Right's reaction to Sonia Sotomayor, not for a very long time, perhaps never.  Since we have had to listen to their cascading shi*stream about how she is racist, hot tempered, lazy, an angry woman, a member of the Latino KKK and an affirmative action flunkie.

I am a minority and I would rather shoot myself in the foot than join the GOP.

Of course they're spinning this to appeal to their base, just as Democrats do when a Christian conservative is nominated.

It's sad that minorities such as your self hate the GOP (though I can sympathize it at times) because the Democrats take you for granted, therefore they don't help minorities (seriously, what have they done for minorities since the civil rights act that actually worked?). Likewise, the GOP doesn't help minorities because they don't see the point if they can't win them.

Republicans outside of the south typically are very reasonable when it comes to minorities and immigration (except Tancredo), but they don't control the party at this time. Look at McCain, Giuliani, Schwarzenegger, Huntsman Jr., Collins, and Snowe, among others. You wouldn't call these people anti-minority/immigrant would you?

I think Republicans simply need to show empathy towards minorities, even if their policies don't change much. They could ask poor southern blacks what the Democrats have done for them, for instance. Then they could explain how (in their opinion) their pro-growth policies will bring jobs to their areas, and how tax cuts give them immediate financial benefit.

I think there will be a major change in the GOP in the next year and half or so. You see, they're fielding moderates for congressional races, and if they're successful, the party could look very different in 2011 than it does now.

Ogre Mage, if I were  you, I would look at candidates as individuals, and not by party. You should encourage others in your community to do the same. It will ultimately benefit you and your community (because races will be more competitive, therefore incumbents will be forced to help their communities if they want to win reelection).

Edit: I also just saw a video where Michael Steele, the chairman of the RNC, told Republicans to stop slamming Sotomayor here. He urged them to, and I'm paraphrasing here, stop the empty, knee-jerk attacks, and focus on the issues.

[tmthforu94]

Since Hispanics are supposed to be the Majority within the next 40 years, Republicans will, since whites will obviously be a minority.

[Mint]

It depends. From 2000 to 2004 we did extraordinarily well with Hispanics, it was really only after Katrina, the drop off in support for Iraq, etc. that we saw those gains eroded. As hispanics assimilate more and the Republicans regain credibility with Americans as a whole, I suspect that as a group we'll be pretty much 50/50.

Now how to appeal to other minorities? Blacks are obviously out of the question, although we could slice off some of them if we took a more centrist or liberal line on affirmative action and economic issues in general. Same for a lot of the more recent generation hispanics. If we want to win over asians, that shouldn't be that hard. Looking at the data up until recently, they tended to vote for us up until 1992. The reasons for that are essentially the same as whites: Republicans alienated them with their focus on white evangelicals and lost credibility on the economy and other issues through their at times comical mismanagement.

Since Hispanics are supposed to be the Majority within the next 40 years, Republicans will, since whites will obviously be a minority.

We're not a 'race' set aside from whites. There's a lot of white hispanics like myself that come from the andean regions of Latin America. There's also black hispanics but the media tends to act like they're just 'mixed.' Bottom line, not everyone is mestizo.