"Black Americans And The '08 Party Of Lincoln"

The Republican National Convention showcased a Native American color guard, a black preacher and video footage of civil rights pioneer Rosa Parks, all part of its effort to present the GOP as a picture of diversity. What it hasn't offered is many minorities speaking from the podium in prime time, or sitting among the delegates.

The convention has a decidedly homogenous look to it, coming hard on the heels of a Democratic gathering where minorities were prominent on the podium and in the crowds, and the spotlight focused squarely on Barack Obama's historic racial breakthrough.

Not that Republicans have been deliberately denying broad exposure to prominent party members from minority groups — there just aren't that many.

The party had hoped to showcase Louisiana's Republican Gov. Bobby Jindal, the country's first elected Indian-American governor. But he stayed home to help coordinate the state's response to Hurricane Gustav. The Republicans have no black governors or members of Congress to put on stage.

It's a problem for the party that goes deeper than the challenge of coming up with a diverse speaker's lineup.

"It is what it is," said Michael Steele, Maryland's former lieutenant governor and the first black elected to statewide office there. "You can't sugarcoat this stuff."

Steele, who chairs GOPAC, which recruits and trains Republican candidates nationwide, got 10 minutes on the podium in prime time Wednesday night.

Texas Railroad Commissioner Michael Williams, who is black, also spoke, and later had the opportunity to place McCain's name before the delegates in nomination. He alluded to the historic significance of Obama's breakthrough as the first black presidential nominee for a major party, a nomination he accepted at the Democratic convention in Denver.

"But I am here with you in St. Paul, rather than being in Denver last week, because I believe values and ideas take precedence over the politics of demography and identity," Williams said. "And because I know John is ready to lead."

It is a message the Republicans hope will be embraced more broadly among black Americans, so many of them captivated by Obama's path-breaking course.

The predominance of white faces on the podium in St. Paul was reflected in the faces staring back from the audience in St. Paul. About 13 percent of GOP delegates identify themselves as belonging to a minority group, according to convention organizers, who provided no further details on the ethnic breakdown.

Minority representation is down from 2004, when about 17 percent of delegates and alternates were minorities.

Joseph Wood, a black delegate from Arkansas and treasurer of the state Republican Party, said there are more important things to consider than how many minorities are standing on the podium.

"Would we like to see more now at the senior level at the conventions?" he asked. "That would be great, but we already know that they're in prominent positions in the Cabinet under George Bush and his dad and Ronald Reagan. I'm not sure we're missing anything at this meeting just because there's not a whole platform onstage of minorities."

Nearby, fellow Arkansan Robert E. Smith Jr., another black delegate, labeled it "a short-term problem."

"You just haven't dug deep enough. Because at the grass-roots level there are those who can articulate" a strong message to minorities, he said.

Steele, the GOPAC chairman, said McCain has demonstrated his ability to connect with blacks and other minorities in his appearances before groups such as the NAACP and the Urban League, although he doesn't always get credit for it amid all the focus on Obama's history-making candidacy.

"God forbid you say a Republican has juice with black people," Steele said. "I think he has more juice than people give him credit for. People will probably laugh at that, but let them keep on laughing. I think they'll be surprised at how well he'll connect."

      Many Americans, both black and white, have forgotten that the Republican party, the "party of Lincoln" were the original abolitionists that passed the thirteenth, fourteenth and fifteenth Amendments that gave black Americans citizenship and the right to vote. Americans forget that it was a Republican party controlled Congress and Supreme Court that passed President Lyndon B. Johnson's Civil Rights Act. Americans forget that Dr. Martin Luther King was a life time Republican. Many Americans may have missed GOP candidate, Senator John McCain, speaking in Memphis, in the rain before a somewhat hostile crowd, on Dr. Martin Luther King's birthday, apologizing for his voting against the national holiday for Dr. King, reaching out to black voters in a year with the first black American Presidential candidate. John McCain may be a "warmonger" but he is no racist.

      The supreme issue for me, in this election, is the return to the small, non-interventionist and civil liberties protecting government called for in the American Constitution. Both Democratic candidate Barack Obama and GOP candidate John McCain are for "Big Government" and deficit spending on wars in Afghanistan, Pakistan, Iran and possibly in Eastern Europe. The imperialistic neoconservatives have already co-opted the Republican Party and they stand ready to do the same to the Democratic party should Barack Obama win the election. Both candidates support the Bush Administration's so-called "War On Terror", which is just the cover for the war profiteering military-industrial complex, as I see it. My values and issues prohibit me from voting for either the charismatic Obama or the gutsy McCain. My values and issues compel me to vote for Bob Barr and the Libertarian Party. This year I refuse to vote "for the lesser of two evils" but man, is Governor Sarah Palin hot!

tags: republican party  republican convention  john mccain  barach obama  politics  president  us  takebackamerica  bob barr  

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