Posted on 06/30/2014 4:38:08 AM PDT by Kaslin
Incumbent Republican Senator Thad Cochran’s successful game plan, which drove his run-off victory over Tea Party challenger Chris McDaniel for Mississippi’s Republican Senate nomination, was unconventional.
But most incredible was the success of this game plan – to reach out to liberal black churches and get Democrat black voters to turn out and vote for Cochran – despite being executed in broad daylight.
Soon after Cochran lost to McDaniel in the primary, necessitating a run-off because McDaniel fell short of getting 50 percent of the vote, papers reported the intent of Cochran’s team to turn out black Democrats to overcome the thin margin by which Cochran lost.
McDaniel knew exactly what to expect. The Cochran campaign told him. Yet he remained a spectator through it all. His counter strategy was no counter strategy and just continue what he was already doing. Appealing just to Mississippi’s conservative white electorate.
Sitting in the White House today is the most left-wing president in the nation’s history, elected twice without winning the white vote. I have written about the demographic changes taking place in the country and the need for Republicans to talk about limited government and traditional values to non-white Americans.
If this is true about the nation as a whole, it certainly is true in a state like Mississippi whose black population, at 40 percent of the state, is the largest in the nation. Half this black population is poor.
Cochran’s forces dumped money into liberal black churches, communicating that he is their champion because of the government pork he’ll continue to bring into the state.
But a news flash for McDaniel, which he should know, having served as a state senator, is that not all blacks are liberals. In Mississippi’s huge black population are many conservative black pastors who want freedom for their flocks. They know that black poverty is not about government money.
A few of these conservative black pastors in Mississippi are part of the national pastor network of my organization, CURE.
Former NFL star Brett Favre made an ad for Cochran in which he talked about Cochran getting “…critical funding for our schools.”
But in the latest Quality Counts report from the publication Education Week, Mississippi is rated 51st in the nation, among 50 states and Washington, DC, in K-12 student achievement.
The report continues, as reported in Mississippi Business Journal, that “Mississippi ranked among the lowest 10 states in providing young people a chance for success in life, financing schools and improving teaching.”
If the success of Mississippi’s schools was about “critical” funding from the federal government, why are they the worst in the nation?
The main victims of Mississippi’s dismal schools are black children.
In a Pew Research survey of last October, 25 percent of blacks expressed favorability toward the Tea Party, just 6 points less than whites.
But the McDaniel campaign seemed clueless that there were potential allies in Mississippi’s huge black population to counter Cochran’s liberal assault.
It is pathetic that some commentators are actually writing that Cochran’s government plantation appeal to blacks shows how Republicans can reach this community.
In a scene early in the Oscar-winning film Patton, General Patton, who was sent to take command of the demoralized American troops in North Africa in the early days of World War II, is shown looking through field glasses, watching a tank battle which would become America’s first victory in North Africa. He studied the tactics of his adversary German commander Field Marshall Erwin Rommel. As he watched, Patton bellowed out “ Rommel, you magnificent b------, I read your book!”
Thad Cochran laid it out for McDaniel – he gave him his book - but McDaniel chose not to read it.
There are plenty of black conservatives who understand that big government politicians – Democrats or Republicans – hurt their communities. They just need Republican candidates to recognize they exist.
‘So maybe one or two of them was a closet Republican’
should be:
‘So maybe one or two of them were a closet Republican’
Don’t dump all blacks in one pile. There are many conservative blacks who have escaped the plantation and are staying out of it.
You need to reread Cochran’s ‘outreach’ to blacks. None of the points you mentioned made his list. That is my point. You can waste all kinds of time & money with your approach, but Cochran has the winning formula down cold. Go back & review his ‘black outreach’. It’s the best $ can buy.
You’re basing your presumption on the notion that the Black vote is monolithic. Star cited evidence that up to 25% of Blacks have a good opinion of the Tea Party.
That’s an opportunity. We ARENT talking about going after the Blacks who voted for Cochrane. We’re talking about going after the Blacks who might have voted for McDaniels, but didn’t vote at all because they weren’t asked.
I’m basing my observation on the FACT that blacks aren’t stupid. We can all name black conservatives. We love & lionize them, & rightly so. But this I guarantee. They were not so box-of-rocks stupid that they needed someone to explain the score. The knew Dems were the party of homosexual-worship, infanticide & anti-Christianity. They knew Republicans were more conservative. (The line is getting blurrier all the time.) It just happens that one day they decided they’d had enough moonbattery & made the shift.
Your argument is that blacks who vote Dem are morons. They have no idea they are voting the party of far left excesses. They would be shocked, SHOCKED, to discover the GOP is less liberal. So they need a kindly person to come to the door, speak at a low grade level, & spell out the differences in very basic terms.
Believe me, black people are far sharper than you imagine. They do indeed know the difference. & they vote Dem for the reasons Cochran spelled out only too well & too accurately.
I wish black American conservatives would do something their white counterparts also fail to do and hold off on shoot from the hip commentary on some of these racial issues. Usually basing their comments on MSM information. That means get the facts before pulling the trigger and even talking to both sides before snapping the safety off.
The minute both Levin and Ingraham reported those robo calls and the subsequent print racial sleaze attack on the “Tea Party”. They should have gotten on the horn and find out what the hell is going on. I think both Levin and Ingraham would have answered their calls for one, and if they talked to both sides of the issue it may have focused the issue back to the socialists.
They to the best of my knowledge didn’t. If one major black condemed it might have a difference.
You aren’t listening to what I’m saying. Let’s try this again.
The Blacks who voted for Cochrane did so because of appeals based on Liberalism. Government spending, race, etc.
What Star is saying is that there were other Blacks, representing an untapped source of votes for McDaniels, that would have responded based on Conservative appeals and voted for him, if only he’d made those appeals.
‘You aren’t listening to what I’m saying.’
That cuts both ways. I’m saying that blacks who want to vote conservative already know how to do it. They are not so childishly simple that they need an adult to hold their hand. Look around you. There are plenty of prominent black conservatives. I covered this point already. I.e.: they knew which party was more conservative & gravitated to it.
The idea that there is a large pot of conservative black votes out there that just have no idea which party is moonbat liberal & which party is more conservative is insulting. Blacks are not that stupid.
Finally some sanity. That is of course the point she is making. And it’s not like McDaniel would have had to have won the entire black vote. Just swaying a few thousand would have worked.
Getting pretty tired of all the whiny histrionics around this place.
Thank you. Your post hits the nail on the head!
“”The idea that there is a large pot of conservative black votes out there that just have no idea which party is moonbat liberal & which party is more conservative is insulting. Blacks are not that stupid.””
There was an overwhelming amount of news about the McDaniel/Cochran runoff. The Black Conservatives knew full well who the real Conservative candidate is and who the faux RINO liberal candidate is.
I agree with you. If the Conservative Blacks really want to elect candidates with limited government platforms, they knew which candidate represented those values.
If the Conservative Blacks could not vote in the McDaniel/Cochran runoff because they had already voted in the Democrat primary, then they really aren’t conservative.
And it’s not like McDaniel would have had to have won the entire black vote.
*************
And he wouldn’t have. But you have to act like you know and represent all constituents
not just the party faithful. Candidates tend to talk to and stay in the party base
rather than stepping out into other arenas. I believe McDaniel went totally silent
for about four days after the election. Four wasted days out of a 21 day runoff.
Thanks. & btw, I love your tagline.
You said that well. & the way you phrased it brings another point to mind. It is liberals who treat blacks like ignorant children. They have a very racist view of blacks, in that they act like unless you tell a black American what to do, he/she cannot figure it out. They are mere droids, to be programmed/manipulated at will.
Conservatives are not supposed to operate on this level. We should respect the fact that blacks, too, have brains. They have the ability to decide. The idea that they cannot opt to vote conservative unless someone leads them by the hand is demeaning.
And one more thing. This idea that a black can be a conservative by persuasion yet will vote moonbat-left *unless* ‘invited’ to do otherwise is also a canard. By that standard, I should still be voting Moonbat. I.e.: I would have reasoned thus, ‘I am becoming more conservative while Dems are becoming aggressively unhinged-liberal. But I cannot vote conservative/Republican unless someone ‘invites’ me, so I am doomed to keep on pulling the lever/punching the chad/touching the screen for Dems’.
Excuse me. Adults make decisions on their own. I saw the time had come to renounce the Dems & did so. The idea that a black person, by virtue of being black, cannot do likewise is false. There are many black conservatives. They made the decision based on principle. Others are quite capable of doing likewise.
You’re ignoring the cases where people are undecided or leaning but need a nudge. Plus there are young or inexperienced voters who might have conservative instincts but truly aren’t sure who to vote for. It makes no sense not to make an effort to get these people’s votes.
This election had nothing to do with reaching out to black voters. It had everything to do with Democrats being encouraged and in some instances paid to throw a Republican primary runoff election. It had everything to do with treachery perpetrated by establishment Republicans against the Republicans of Mississippi who, by the way, voted for McDaniel 8 points higher than Cochran. Total betrayal. Win at ANY cost.
Your comment was race-free, & I like that. Certainly an appeal should be made to leaners of all races, as well as to young voters. But the appeal should be on the basis of conservatism itself. People of every race can be sold on conservatism if it is presented with sufficient strength & power. None of the GOPe do so, & if one did, it would be pure hypocrisy. They don’t govern like conservatives. Some of the TEA party candidates do present conservatism with eloquence. That is ‘outreach’ at its finest.
Now let me ask you something. I was still a moonbat when Reagan was campaigning, so I have no particular knowledge of his approach. But perhaps you do. Did he pander to blacks specifically, or did he just sell conservatism so persuasively that Dems [some Dems; not me] crossed over & voted GOP? No speculation, please. I am looking for an historically accurate reply. Thank you in advance.
I mean making a special effort to persuade black voters.
Mine, too. Was she asleep during this race? Why didn’t she reach out to the McDaniel campaign with this advice?
And yet here we have an article by a prominant Black Conservative saying that more Conservative outreach to Black Conservatives is necessary.
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