Southern Strategy Pt. 2

I haven't really written much this week, in part because most of what I've been following connects to the Sotomayor hearings, which are so devoid of actual content that I have nothing interesting to say.

However, I do have a little response to the punditry, because Pat Buchanan has written an online article so dumb, I am actually impressed. I'm going to take apart the crazy piece-by-piece.

Pundits here gets hoots of appreciation for doing to a white Christian woman what would constitute a hate crime if done to a "wise Latina woman." But, as no Republican who followed the script of the mainstream media ever won a national election, why should the party pay them mind?

You keep on using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means. -Inigo Montoya.

In 2008, Hispanics, according to the latest figures, were 7.4 percent of the total vote. White folks were 74 percent, 10 times as large.
Adding just 1 percent to the white vote is thus the same as adding 10 percent to the candidate's Hispanic vote.

Awesome. Great, so we'll put more money into appealing to "white folks". that seems like a reasonable investment--but darned if there aren't lots of different kinds of white folks just like there are lots of different kinds of Hispanics. How do we appeal to these folks, Pat?

Why did McCain fail to win the white conservative Democrats Hillary Clinton swept in the primaries? He never addressed or cared about their issues.

These are the folks whose jobs have been outsourced to China and Asia, who pay the price of affirmative action when their sons and daughters are pushed aside to make room for the Sonia Sotomayors. These are the folks who want the borders secured and the illegals sent back.

Okay, given that Sonia Sotomayor is being sandwiched between foreign nationals and illegal immigrants here, I'm going to quickly note that Judge Sotomayor is from Puerto Rico, an American territory. But I'll shake off any concerns about framing and just assume Pat Buchanan honestly thinks Republicans should be fighting on these legitimate issues where blue-collar white folk have a certain opinion by a 3-to-1 margin.

Had McCain been willing to drape Jeremiah Wright around the neck of Barack Obama, as Lee Atwater draped Willie Horton around the neck of Michael Dukakis, the mainstream media might have howled.

And McCain might be president.

And here's where the train of logic goes flying off the tracks for me. Because Jeremiah Wright doesn't represent any of those issues that supposedly matter to white Americans uniquely. No, Buchanan is simply saying "Playing the race card is a viable tactic". This would be true even if he just mentioned Jeremiah Wright, but by drawing a connection to Willie Horton--unrelated except for the color of his skin--the implication is obvious.

From a logical perspective, Buchanan is wrong. Actively alienating a large ethnic group in today's politics is not a trade that automatically wins you more of the other ethnic groups at any percentage level. (Southern Strategy*3 =/= White Folks Strategy) But from a moral perspective, this is actively despicable. Buchanan is lobbying for Republicans to actively stoke racial division, as though such campaign tactics had no impact on the real world and how interracial relations take place day to day.

The brazenness is incredible. This man needs to stop being treated as a respectable public figure, and despite his ability to make Republicans look very silly, MSNBC needs to get him off television. Of course, giving people like Buchanan a voice constantly so they can create controversy is the Original Sin of the Media, controversy bias.

(As an aside, Buchanan reminds me of Nate Silver's "Operation Gringo" a while back which suggested something similar in pushing an "anti-immigrant, anti-NAFTA" platform to gain ground in the Midwest and South, since under an electoral vote system Hispanic vote fluctuation wasn't that dangerous to Republicans. However, not only is he treating this as a "What if the Republican Party did this" hypothetical as opposed to actually advocating it, but he is much more realistic about "whites" not being monolithic.)

On the other side of the coin is this quick blurb from Chris Good at The Atlantic. Actual elected Republicans who answer to Hispanic voters--in this case, John Cornyn--are taking care to moderate their tone and make sure not to alienate Hispanic voters during these confirmation hearings. Good--but the next step is that the national party needs to behave itself as well. Just as Southern Democrats are sometimes distrusted by social conservatives because of the national party they support, Cornyn's show of respect will be for naught if all of his friends who he supports don't play nice as well.