July 22, 2004

THEY MAY NOT LIKE HIM, BUT YOU BET THEY RESPECT HIM:

Bush and Blacks: The message—both in words and action—is clear, consistent, and stirring. (Charles Upton Sahm, 21 July 2004, City Journal)

“We’ve got a president that’s prepared to take us back to the days of Jim Crow segregation and dominance,” says NAACP president Kweisi Mfume. Republicans’ “idea of equal rights is the American flag and Confederate swastika flying side by side,” says NAACP chairman Julian Bond. And the leaders of this supposedly nonpartisan organization are surprised President Bush declined to attend their convention last week?

Instead, tomorrow the president will address the National Urban League, a black organization whose mainstream leadership is focused on ideas for improving life in inner cities rather than on politics and racial demagoguery. The president will have a lot to talk about. Issues number one and two on his domestic agenda have been education reform and his faith-based initiative, both specifically targeted to help inner city minority residents, and both implemented by two accomplished African-American cabinet members, education secretary Rod Paige and HUD secretary Alphonso Jackson.


President Bush telling the NAACP to stick it reminds us of a story we told when Joe Lieberman groveled before the Mau-Mau crowd:
There was a book in the '70's--The Wanting of Levine (Michael Halberstam--David's brother)--about the first Jewish presidential candidate. In the book, Levine proves himself worthy of the respect of a black civil rights group by refusing to eat the plate of feces, disguised as a steak, they serve him at dinner. He's told that most of those who come begging for an endorsement go right ahead and eat, complimenting every bite.

President Bush, to his credit, pushed the plate away. You've got to think Senator Kerry would ask for seconds and John Edwards for the recipe.

Posted by Orrin Judd at July 22, 2004 4:12 PM
Comments

Someone else has read and loved The Wanting Of Levine! I'm not alone!

Posted by: Francis W. Porretto at July 22, 2004 4:41 PM

Me too. Good book, although I suspect it would seem dated today. If I remember correctly, the theory was that blacks would achieve the middle class only after the federal government started hiring them to fill a national police force, more or less designed to be a dumbed down FBI for blacks.

Posted by: David Cohen at July 22, 2004 5:39 PM

And Kerry and Edwards would pay them back by offering up a similar meal to blacks if elected, and they would react the same way.

Posted by: MarkD at July 22, 2004 8:23 PM
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