|
In
Florida, a record black vote turnout in Democratic precincts
in 2000 nearly tipped the election to Al Gore. In 2004
it was exactly the reverse. A tepid black Democratic
turnout, combined with the 13 percent of the black votes
Bush received, which was double what he got in 2000,
helped him win Florida outright and avoid a repeat of
the election debacle of 2000. Republican gains among
blacks were even more dramatic in Ohio. Bush garnered
nearly 20 percent of the black vote there. To put that
in perspective, if Bush had gotten the same proportion
of the black vote in the state in 2004 as he did in
2000, his margin of victory over Democratic presidential
contender John Kerry would have narrowed from 118,000
votes to 25,000 votes. Given the large number of provisional
ballots filed in Ohio, the Democrats almost certainly
would have challenged the election certification. It
would have been Florida 2000 all over again.
GOP gains among black voters are no accident and are
not due to happenstance. In August 2000, embattled GOP
strategist Karl Rove told Washington Post national political
writer Tom Edsall that the Republicans must reject "the
use of such issues as affirmative action, and 'welfare
queens' that past GOP candidates had employed in a calculated
bid to polarize the electorate and put together a predominantly
white majority." Mehlman repeated a variation on the
line at the NAACP convention when he tendered his and
the GOP's mea culpa for snubbing blacks in past years.
Bush and Mehlman aim to bury the sorry episode in Republican
history when it blatantly pandered to racists and states
righters, ultra conservative kooks and loonies, and
hopelessly alienated black voters. Their strategy is
to resurrect the part of its past in which Republicans
championed black rights. The difference this time is
that Republicans have radically redefined the fight
for black rights. It's not for affirmative action, and
more entitlement and welfare programs. It's pro-business,
and homeownership, pro-Social Security privatization,
and pro traditional family values. That appeals to young,
upwardly mobile blacks.
The rare times that Republicans have made any real effort
to attract blacks, put money into a black Republican
candidate's campaign and delivered on their promise
to pump more resources into health care, education,
minority business, and education programs, they've dented
the Democrat's lock on the black vote and even managed
to win a few key state offices, most notably in Maryland
and Ohio. In 2006, a slew of high profile blacks will
bid for Senate and governor seats in Pennsylvania and
Ohio, two perennial crucial battleground states.
The spectacular emergence of the black evangelicals
as a potent political force also has been a boon to
the GOP, and a nightmare for Democrats. If Republicans
play their anti-gay marriage, and anti-abortion cards
right, and Bush delivers on his African AIDS funding
initiative, they'll get even more black evangelical
votes in the 2006 elections.
The fear and loathing many blacks still have of Bush's
policies for now guarantee the Democrats a winning hand
in the hard fought game for black voters. But Republicans
think they can do something that was unthinkable a scant
four years, and that's break the Democrat's stranglehold
on the black vote. Bush and Mehlman may be on to something.
Earl
Ofari Hutchinson is columnist for BlackNews.com,
a leading political analyst and social issues commentator.
He is also the author of The Crisis in Black and Black
(Middle Passage Press).
PRESS CONTACT: Earl Ofari Hutchinson, 323-296-6331,
hutchinsonreport@aol.com |
|
|
Email
This Article To A Friend
