Nor did his incoherent response about not applying the death penalty if someone raped and killed his wife.
As someone who was around in 1988, paying attention to the election, and saw the commercial, I'd like to tell those of you who have only heard about it, that it never occurred to me that Willie Horton was black when I first watched the ad. He was just a small figure in a revolving door. I needed racist Democrats to tell me WIllie Horton was black.
And Dukakis didn't lose the election because of the Willie Horton commercial. Dukakis lost because many perceived him to be a schmuck and he was not the one most likely to continue the Reagan prosperity.
ML/NJ
The “Willie Horton ad” is always the excuse for Dukakis’loss but let us not forget how it came about...from Wikipedia:
“The first person to mention the Massachusetts furlough program in the 1988 presidential campaign was Al Gore. During a debate at the Felt Forum sponsored by the New York Daily News, Gore took issue with the furlough program. He did not, however, mention Horton by name. He asked it in the form of a rhetorical question, asking Dukakis whether or not he would extend Massachusetts-style furloughs to the federal level.”
And the fact that Horton was black doesn’t make any difference. The fact is, he was a vicious criminal who was idiotically released on furlough, and he escaped and committed another heinous crime. The Dukakis forces knew they had no defense on this issue, so they played the race card. “Horton’s black, so you’re a racist for using this as an issue”.
The Willie Horton ad was a perfectly legitimate ad. Just as concern about illegal immigration is a perfectly legitimate concern.
Nor did his incoherent response about not applying the death penalty if someone raped and killed his wife.
The left has been so gleeful in their attempt to smear Republicans as racists all trying to whip up fear of a ‘Willie Horton’ while applying selective amnesia to the fact that it was Gore who brought up the issue, that Michael Moore even ran the add in “Bowling for Columbine”. Of course it was a splice job of the Gore add, the Bush add (they picked up Gore’s issue), with a incorrect caption added by Moore (originally saying Horton committed murder while out on furlough, since corrected on the DVD to say he committed assault), and showing a picture of Horton which I do not believe was done in either add (any FReeper input on the specifics of the adds clearly showing Horton was a black man?).
As someone who was around in 1988, paying attention to the election, and saw the commercial, I'd like to tell those of you who have only heard about it, that it never occurred to me that Willie Horton was black when I first watched the ad. He was just a small figure in a revolving door. I needed racist Democrats to tell me WIllie Horton was black. And Dukakis didn't lose the election because of the Willie Horton commercial. Dukakis lost because many perceived him to be a schmuck and he was not the one most likely to continue the Reagan prosperity.
What you neglected to mention is that it was Al Gore who first used the Willie Horton issue against Dukakis...not the Republicans.