Posted on 06/17/2013 4:01:35 AM PDT by Kaslin
Anyone who doubts that the Republican Party can attract black voters needs only look south to Louisiana.
At a conference held in Baton Rouge at the end of May, called @Large and aimed to attract black conservatives, black Democrat Elbert Guillary, a member of the state legislature, announced that he was switching party and becoming a Republican.
Less than two weeks later, just up the road in Central City, Louisiana, black Democrat city councilman Ralph Washington – who attended this same @Large conference, made the same announcement – he’s becoming a Republican.
It’s really not such a mystery. The mystery is why this is not happening more often.
I’m asked all the time why, when it is so clear that blacks are damaged by the left wing political agenda, black voters so uniformly and consistently support candidates – Democrats – who advance this agenda.
My answer is that Republicans need to start acting more like the businesspeople they claim to be.
Any businessman convinced that his product is the best doesn't blame customers for not buying it. He doubles down on his efforts to understand these potential customers better and how to sell to them.
There needs to be more appreciation of the differences in the black population.
A Gallup poll done in 2011 showed that whereas 39 percent of whites say they are “very religious,” 53 percent of blacks do. A large percentage of “very religious” blacks are conservative and very different from blacks on the left who identify with the NAACP.
The @Large conference, where I was a speaker, was hosted by pastor C.L. Bryant, who tells his own story about leaving the left-wing black establishment in his new film “Runaway Slave.”
Bryant was president of the NAACP chapter in Garland, Texas, but his relationship with the NAACP soured when he refused to speak at a Planned Parenthood pro-abortion event.
His eyes began to open and see that his traditional Christian values – protecting the unborn and promoting the traditional family, individual freedom, and dignity – were out of whack with the political agenda blacks were automatically signing onto.
Elbert Guillary is now the first black Republican in the Louisiana state legislature since reconstruction.
Listen to him to understand why a conservative black leaves the Democratic Party.
He called the Democrats “the party of disappointment” and expressed disillusionment with Democratic policies on abortion, gun control, education, and immigration.
Democrats “have moved away from the traditional values of most Americans,” he said. “Their policies have encouraged high teen birth rates, high high school drop-out rates, high incarceration rates, and very high unemployment rates.”
Or listen to now-Republican councilman Washington:
“…the value system I was raised up with, it really doesn’t side with the Democrats...Some of the things I see happening today, with the entitlement programs, we have to change. We can’t continue doing the things we are doing and survive.”
Everyone understands that black American history is unique and complicated.
But wallowing in the past is never an answer to anyone’s personal challenges.
The challenge is clarifying right from wrong and acting accordingly moving forward.
It has always seemed pretty clear to me that traditional values and personal freedom and responsibility must be the agenda moving forward for every American of every background.
Black Americans, like every American, need less taxes taken out of their paychecks, need to be able to choose where to send their children to school, need to be able to pick freely a health care plan that suits their needs, and need to save for retirement instead of paying payroll taxes.
You can’t sum it up any better than what Elbert Guillary and Ralph Washington have said. There are many, many Guillarys and Washingtons out there in black America. We need more efforts like the @Large conference to reach them
In other words, they woke up and smelled the coffee!
Yeah, but stupidly, the GOPe still disdains the very values we need to ‘preach’.
Power drunk ijits.
Give it time and I will be proven right.
Congrats to them, but I hope they know about the civil war currently underway within the party itself. The establishment is just as bad as the rats.
Time for the conservatives to take back the GOP.
If all these 53% are so conservative, why did they continue to vote for the dimocarts and the carmel guy in DC?
I really fear that we will eventually end up like the UK, with a three party system. Liberals will rule forever then.
More and more I see very smart and courageous black leaders emerging to carry forth the principles put in place by our Founding Fathers, supported by a belief in God. They know that socialism and communism only bring poverty and suffering to a nation and what they desire is the freedom to pursue the American dream, so that their families can enjoy the peace and prosperity that God intended.
Don’t forget, according to MSNBC’s Chris Hayes, George Wallace was a Republican.
I hate to sound cynical but a whole lot of these line crossers haven’t “seen the light”, they just know they’ll never be in the majority as a Democrat in a deep southern state. It has a lot more to do with committee assignments than morality and they bring their liberal views with them.
Bloomberg proved that the GOP has no standards for admission.
A Russian economist predicted the break up of this country. He said, basically that it would split into three parts. The Southeast, Southwest, and Central states all the way to Canada would become one. The west and east coasts would then be on their own.
Unless that happens soon, it won’t matter how many democrats change over to Republicans, especially in Louisiana. They have Landrieu and she’ll vote the party line no matter what. And pretty soon, like the rest of the country, republicans and conservatives will be a dying breed.
Race trumps everything!
The late Republican Governor Dave Treen of LA was a big Landrieu supporter in 2008.
Time for Conservatives to form their own Party while the Republicans commit suicide.
yep, look at all the turncoat rino’s. hmmm. It’s too late. rino’s are in line with the liar in chief and the destruction of America mode.
These are two exceptional individuals. We can be sure if they run again they will be soundly repudiated by their own past voters.
The GOP needs to enthusiastically reject Chinese manufacturing, and bring jobs back to America.
Now.
The GOP stepped closer to being the second party of disappointment last November. We need new members that will make a difference. I hope these folks will help shine a light into the dark corners of the system.
Possibly they will promote a presidential candidate that will actually have a chance to win.
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