PUBLIC NUISANCES
R . E m m e t t T y r r e l l , J r . P u b l I c n u I s a n c e s violence even today. It is especially mystifying to see Clinton play the race card. I do not credit him with many virtues,...
...Any disagreement on domestic issues he was apt to present as part of a Republican “Southern strategy” to win Southern white votes...
...That is no longer the case...
...The enormous expense of media advertising and getoutthe-vote drives was unnecessary, as most of the participants were volunteers, loyal party members, or public-spirited citizens prevailed upon by neighbors to get involved as Democrats or Republicans...
...Moreover, they reduced the need for the vast fundraising operations that are our contemporary re formers’ nightmare...
...Moving over to the Republican race, none of the waged by the late segregationist George Wallace...
...Yet with a growing sense of tolerance and a growing economy offering jobs and other opportunities, we have reason to believe that racial harmony is replacing the racial strife of the past...
...Jimmy did not play the role of the bigot while in the White House, not exactly...
...Of course, when the fur ceases to fly over these racial charges, I think it will be clear that Hillary is not nearly the bigot Wallace was, but neither is she as nice a person...
...Then once the national convention was convened, they had to present themselves to each state delegation...
...and Nixon—a very classy affair compared to today’s infantile confrontations...
...From north to south, race riots have broken out in this country for generations...
...Nowhere on his record is there any evidence that he ever sought to benefit from bigotry against blacks...
...This is the repellent absurdity to which identity politics has sunk...
...Kennedy was in a pretty good position to win the nomination, but he had to present himself to state delegations nonetheless...
...In fact, every candidate still in the Republican race has been accused of flip- floppery, occasionally using multiple feet...
...Now, after his repeated acts of treachery in South Carolina, we see Bill actively turning whites and blacks in his own party against each other...
...Yet they do it within their own party, dividing Democrats along racial and even ethnic lines...
...Southern politicians, more than any other politicians in this country, should be aware of the racial antagonisms of the past and the potential for racial 7 8 T H e a M e R I c a n s P e c T a T o R M a R c H 2 0 0 8 R . e M M e T T T y R R e l l , j R . demagoguery in South Carolina: they are actually worse than I have been saying...
...This was not a costly blitz through a primary state, accompanied by expensive and misleading media barrages and transient opportunities to embarrass his rivals...
...He was forever presuming himself to be the champion of black people and Republicans to be anti-black...
...Yet Wallace was rarely accused of lying...
...If our reformers really want to end the nightmare of $100 million primary campaigns and the trashiness of this primary season, they will bring us back to the good old days of national political conventions that really matter...
...We fought a bloody civil war over it...
...The divide between the races will continue to narrow...
...Rather, as the historian Betty Glad demonstrated in her fine biography of him, Jimmy Carter: In Search of the Great White House, Jimmy played the racial politics at the beginning of his political career in Georgia while seeking the governorship...
...It was a serious meeting among Democrats who were deeply involved in governing their states...
...Reading Arthur Schlesinger’s Journals, I came across the now-deceased historian’s observations of JFK at the 1960 Democratic national convention...
...Increasingly the Clinton camWith the leadinG Candidates for the Democandidates has yet to charge another with racial bigotry...
...He was frequently given to transforming policy disagreements into a matter of white voters repressing black voters, that is to say Republicans repressing blacks...
...After watching him huff and puff up the issue of race in a way that Americans have not seen since the presi- In the aCrid aftermath of the South Carolina primary I think it is safe to say that Toni Morrison, the dential campaigns of the late George Wallace, the former Boy President, rather than being our first black president, is our second redneck president...
...I say Clinton is our second redneck president because first came Jimmy Carter...
...Actually, they were as democratic as today’s caucuses and primaries...
...He particularly disrelished visiting the segregationist Southerners, but he did so...
...Hillary is caught lying every few days, and the lies are not even as clever as those of her mendacious husband, the sex maniac...
...The evil of Jim Crow followed after that war, featuring widespread injustices against blacks and violence between the races...
...Why two Southern politicians would play the racial politics—each in his different way—is mystifying...
...Today national conventions are a thing of the past because mid-20th century reformers accused them of being undemocratic...
...but even they fall short, owing to the environment in which they must operate, an environment shaped by a prima donna electorate and a press that encourages soap opera...
...Though I have called him a sociopath, I thought that when it came to the issue of race he might be more scrupulous...
...And none has been caught raising campaign funds through a Chop Suey Connection...
...Moreover, he wants to encourage ill-will between Latinos and blacks within his party...
...It is a dangerous game...
...R . E m m e t t T y r r e l l , J r . P u b l I c n u I s a n c e s violence even today...
...Both are the consequence of idiotic state caucuses or state primaries, inflated into circuses by enormous sums of money, and all lacking in party discipline...
...Most of the delegates at national conventions were chosen democratically at their state conventions, where party platforms were pounded out and presidential nominees chosen...
...It is especially mystifying to see Clinton play the race card...
...It was adult politics...
...I cannot think of one of Governor Wallace’s household pets disappearing under mysterious circumstances...
...I long to see candidates in silly hats rather than in silly situations...
...At this stage Senator John McCain and Senator Barack Obama come closest to displaying dignity...
...paign puts me in mind of presidential campaigns the Democratic Party...
...In the time of competitive national political conventions, presidential candidates still had to campaign throughout the nation but at far less expense...
...conventional Wisdom WASHINGTON cratic nomination charging each other with racial bigotry, I think it is safe to observe that 2008 will not be a progressive year in Senator Hillary Rodham Clinton even has Wallace’s surly style...
...I do not credit him with many virtues, but the one virtue I thought he had was racial tolerance...
...But perhaps you will understand my astonishment after the Clintons’ He let Me down WASHINGTON novelist, was dealing in fiction when she pronounced Bill Clinton our first black president...
...After the heroism and idealism of the civil rights movement the country has steadily moved toward racial tolerance and an improvement of the material condition of all minorities...
...Yet, we have repeatedly heard the ugly charge of flip-floppery flung about wantonly, and it is not a reference to casual footwear but to casual dissembling on issues...
...They, in turn, got a sense of him...
...Reformers inveighed against the spectacle of floor demonstrations, with delegates wearing silly hats and parading up the aisles, but such high jinks were harmless, far less expensive than today’s vast media buys, and turned up presidential nominees far more impressive than today’s poseurs...
...What is more, seasoned politicians were influential every step of the way, right up to the convention...
...He already had a sense of what they were like but now had an opportunity to review his estimates of them...
...That is not to say that as president he did not use race divisively...
...Thankfully, racial tolerance is probably too far along for the Clintons to screw it up...
...It is time to return to nominating presidential candidates in national political conventions, the same kind of conventions that gave us Roosevelts and Eisenhower and the 1960 race between Kennedy M a R c H 2 0 0 8 T H e a M e R I c a n s P e c T a T o R 7 9...
...Something is missing, and, as I see it, that something is dignity...
...To be sure, as president he treated race the way President Carter did, interpreting policy differences between him and his Republican opponents as inspired by the Republicans’ presumed racism...
...Thus far the 2008 campaign in both parties is very unsatisfactory...
...None has done oppositional research on an opponent’s kindergarten records...
...Admittedly there remain instances of unspeakable cruelty, hate crimes committed by brutes on both sides...
...Now comes the Clinton quest for the Democratic nomination and what journalists politely call “the race card” is being played...
...He is making these invidious efforts purely to bring his family back to power...
...Race is the cruel burden this country has borne since its inception...
...Now after the Clintons’ treacherous campaign against Senator Barack Obama, we see that some Democrats will practice a Southern strategy too...
Vol. 41 • March 2008 • No. 2
