Foxes Know That Hens Don’t Like Them
If a fox and a pig were running for president of the United States, who could blame the fox for not wasting his time courting the hen vote? Sure, some hens, 10 percent or so, would vote for the fox. But the overwhelming majority of hens would vote for his opponent.
It isn’t that pigs are crazy about hens or vice versa, but it’s well known that foxes only care for hens when they’re hungry.
With that said, I’d like someone to unpack all of this indignation I’m reading about in the wake of last night’s Republican debate at Morgan State University. Much is being made about the decision by the Republican front-runners: Rudy Guiliani, John McCain, Mitt Romney and Fred Thompson, to skip the debate at the historically black institution in Baltimore.
Even some B- and C-list Republicans jumped on the Seeking To Be Offended Express. “I’m embarrassed for our party, and I’m embarrassed for those who did not come,” said Mike Huckabee, the former governor of Arkansas. “Because there’s long been a divide in this country. And it doesn’t get better when we don’t show up.”
Ah, so the divide would have gotten better had the main candidates shown up. Dude …
I wish that Huckabee, Sen. Sam Brownback (R-Kansas), Rep. Duncan Hines (R-California) or even Alan Keyes (R-Universal Clown Coon) had told the audience of blacks and Hispanics, “Truth be told, none of us really like coloreds or illega … um, Hispanics, but we know we have no chance at winning our party’s nomination, so we had nothing to lose by coming here tonight and talking to you people.” But that would have been too much like telling the truth.
Though you wouldn’t know it now, blacks have been aligned with the Republican party historically. The Democratic party, Southern Democrats in particular, supported slavery for “practical” reasons during much of the 19th century. The man who abolished legal slavery, President Lincoln, was a Republican. It’s no surprise, then, that when blacks were given the right to vote, many of them supported Republican candidates. (To this day, old-guard blacks tend to be Republican.)
It wasn’t until President Truman’s Fair Deal during the 1940s that blacks began to shift to the left in large numbers. Seventy years later, the overwhelming majority of blacks vote Democratic. Doing so has gotten our community practically nowhere, but that’s another discussion entirely.
Tavis Smiley, the moderator of last night’s debate, said at the beginning: “Some of the campaigns who declined our invitations to join us tonight have suggested publicly that this audience would be hostile and unreceptive. Since we are live on PBS right now, I can’t tell you what I really think of these kinds of comments.”
Well, I’m not live on PBS right now, so I can. I think those campaigns were right. And I think Smiley, Tom Joyner (who was also at last night’s debate) and the rest of the black people who have their lips twisted up know it.
When Republican candidates show up at black churches during election time, black folks sit around talkin’ about how, ‘They only come around when they want our vote.’ Now that A-list Republicans, including President Bush, are keeping it thorough and not even going through the motions, they’re wrong for that, too?