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Posted on 11/11/2004 5:16:51 AM PST by truthandlife
So much for polls that had President Bush getting twice as many black votes as he did in 2000. In 2000 he got 8 percent of the black vote. This time, he got only 11 percent. Eighty-eight percent of the black vote went to John Kerry.
What's interesting is that no other racial group in America has a vote-skew anything like that. Latinos voted 53 percent for Mr. Kerry and 44 percent for Mr. Bush. Asians were 56 percent for Mr. Kerry and 44 percent for Mr. Bush.
Blacks get insulted when people say we all think alike. But then why don't we take our individuality to the voting booth?
For one thing, a great many black people associate the Republican Party with racism. This means that voting Democratic is often less about making a personal choice than voting on the basis of a group concern.
This is understandable. But it's also obsolete. It's time for the black community to start spreading its vote across the two main parties.
The Democrats have no reason to address our concerns in any real way, because we're a slam-dunk.
And that leaves black America powerless. Help comes only when someone decides to try something out of the goodness of their hearts, and then there is always the question of follow-through.
This is why groups with pull make the parties court their vote.
Not that all of us should start voting Republican -- that would just leave us with the same problem. We just need to reconsider the idea that voting Republican is automatically disloyal.
For the record, President Bush did not get my vote. I voted for John Kerry because that's what my personal take on issues and priorities led me to do. But a lot more than 11 percent of us might find that Republicans have important things to offer us as well. Faith-based initiatives come to mind, as does education reform.
About racism: Our progress will have more to do with a party's policies than how some of its members might feel about their kids marrying ours. In 1912, W.E.B. Du Bois endorsed Woodrow Wilson over Theodore Roosevelt. Mr. Wilson was a bigot, as was President Roosevelt. But Du Bois was interested in whose policies would allow blacks to make the best of the worst in the real world.
The civil rights revolution was four decades ago. Even President Clinton's Dialogue on Race is a fading memory. Soon Latinos will outnumber blacks. We're in a war in Iraq. The days when helping blacks was front and center on the government's agenda are gone. We have to start playing ball the old-fashioned way.
I know some think racism is the defining experience of being black, and that this means that our voting must reflect that. But must it, if this leaves us with no purchase upon national resources for our betterment? Must it, when Latinos are no strangers to racism, and yet they split their votes?
In that light, we have to ask: Does our voting pattern really represent the diversity among us in experiences, aspirations, values? Do we really want to give in to allowing racism to define us?
Because today, if we do -- if we vote as victims rather than as individuals -- we only perpetuate our victimhood. We become the Democrats' mascots, instead of a force to be grappled with.
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But where are those numbers coming from? Aren't they from the exit polls? The exit polls also showed Kerry won the election. I'd wait until the precinct by precinct analysis is done. Exit polls are skewed --- they tend to be done in certain neighborhoods and too few numbers. I've never seen exit pollers outside the precinct here.
The "hispanic community" is ALREADY reaping the benefits of their massive swing to Republican votes (40-50%) in the form of the new Attorney General. The blacks continue to be slaves on the democrat party plantation, not fundamentally different from their status as democrat party slaves in 1840. Pathetic.
Just goes to show 'brainwashing' is difficult to overcome.
"I voted for John Kerry because that's what my personal take on issues and priorities led me to do."
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lol I'd like to hear what those issues and priorities were.
Blacks in general will not figure it out. They are "victims" and intend to stay that way. Even this "enlightened" author voted for Kerry, so why is he in a position to give advice to others? Forget about them. They are a shrinking minority, thanks to prison and abortion. Republicans should concentrate on Latinos who have much more going for them and are the minority block of the future.
Your fundamental point is correct. Black represent about 20% of the total vote, and its by large a christian conservative vote, which is antithetical to the democratic party. What Dubya and Reps leadres need to do is to sell their conservative ideas to black leadership and win them over.
"We hold these truths to be self evident, that all groups are created equal..."
Wait a minute - That's not quite right, is it??
Oh - That's right!!! All MEN are created equal!!!
Groupthink is a disservice to every individual in the group. Until each group starts to promote individual thought and self-made decisions, the group serves only to enslave its members.
This applies equally to ethnic and political groups, IMHO.
What's even more interesting is that 2 of those groups, JEWS and MUSLIMS, voted for the same guy in the same numbers.
Why would any clear thinking jew vote just like a muslim??
Where do you get that statistic from?
AT the most they are 12%.
Where i am from black people have it figured out. They vote democrat because it is too there benifit. They are content sitting on the front porch of there pink house and hoping uncle sam will feed them and as long as they keep having babies in my state of mississippi the gov will indeed keep feeding them. It is sad but true and you may say this is a racist statment and well may be but it is the truth from my eyes in the south.
Yeah your right between 10-12 percent. But understaes its important. future republican wont win Michigan with out the black vote... or othre battleground states.
"Republicans should concentrate on Latinos who have much more going for them and are the minority block of the future."
Republicans are concentrating more on Latinos. Why as we type Republicans are advocating ignoring the rule of law by granting amnesty to criminals who have illegally infiltrated our country. So you are correct, except on one issue. With the help of Republicans, Whites are fast becoming the minority block of the future.
Conservaties should not sell their conservative ideas to black leadership when the black leadership is the problem. Rather, Republicans should be on the march creating a new, dynamic cadre of black leaders.
Let it be known that Mr. McWhorter is for gay marriage and partial birth abortion.
No, blacks need to vote as individuals and not as a racial block.
Blacks represent about 20% of the total vote<< Where do you get that statistic from? AT the most they are 12%.
You are correct. According to Voter News Service (VNS), the principal exit polling organization, black voters cast 10 percent of all ballots, or (based on assumptions about the final vote numbers) approximately 10.5 million votes. In 1996, according to VNS, black voters also cast 10 percent of all ballots, or approximately 9.5 million votes. The increase from 1996 to 2000 was about one million additional black votes. The Hispanic share of the overall votes cast, according to the same exit polls, rose from five percent to seven percent.
In 1996, black and Hispanic votes, combined, made up 24.4 percent of Clinton’s total. In 2000, 28.5 percent of Gore’s vote was cast by black and Hispanic voters.
Esentially, blacks and hispanics make up about 30% of the Dem vote. Blacks as the most loyal (or brainwashed) group have little to show for their slavish devotion to one party. The Democrat Party is run by white liberals who keep minorities out of leadership roles and major party influence. Tokens such as Jackson and Sharpton are used to keep the black masses in line. They (Jackson, Sharpton, et. al.) receive payoffs to keep them on board. They should be the targets of Belafonte's charges rather than Powell and Rice.
"But then why don't we take our individuality to the voting booth?"
Wish I had the answer.
Some of our black brother's and sisters are mind numbed robots. Blacks also have the prototypical case of the Helsinki syndrome.
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