Posted on 06/16/2004 9:50:14 AM PDT by JulieRNR21
WASHINGTON - With the presidential election only a few months away, it is time for President Bush to unleash his secret weapon - his relationship with black and Hispanic voters.
The president is already winning a third of the popular vote among Hispanics, according to a Zogby International poll taken this spring. With advertisements and outreach focused on reforms to allow easier immigration for workers, the president has a good chance to add to his numbers among Hispanics.
But in a close race, the key to re-election rests on the president's ability to increase his percentage of the black vote. Here, he has the chance to make tremendous gains - if only because he now has practically no support among black voters. A May Washington Post/ABC News poll showed the likely Democratic nominee, Senator John Kerry, with a 79 percent to 6 percent lead over Mr. Bush among black voters. If the president gets only 6 percent of the black vote this year he will have achieved the near impossible task of getting a lower percentage of black votes than he did in 2000, when he won 8 percent.
But the president has the opportunity to flip the script. With a direct appeal, President Bush could win at least 20 percent of the black vote - and the White House.
How can he attract those votes?
Continued here:
http://www.nytimes.com/2004/06/16/opinion/16WILL.html?ex=1088386784&ei=1&en=4b70924f6edba46f
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
We can post full NYTimes articles can't we?
oh please this guy probably just wants Bush to spend money on a lost cause
I'm pretty sure that any blacks who want to vote for Republicans will be welcome in the Republican party.
Juan Williams is a two-faced poormouth, whose credibility is supect depending what microphone is under his nose.
Oh Man, JUAN WILLIAMS, reaching out towards Bush???????
That is not good news for Frenchie.
By doing exactly what he's been doing for 3 plus years. Lead.
Compelling and thoughtful article. I'm sure Juan will get a lot of grief back in the NPR newsroom for writing it.
Juan put out the blueprint, time for George to follow it.
Great article from a surprising source. He is absolutely right. Bush should really give an all out effort to reach blacks and hispanics. So many of them are conservatives who oddly vote Democrat. They just need a counter to the false info they get from the left about Republicans. GO BUSH!
Read the details. He is right on the money. It would not be wasted money at all. There is no better time to reach out to church-going, conservative minded blacks and hispanics. We have the voucher issue, the gay marriage issue, the Bush-appointed-a-ton-of-blacks issue... These people are reachable. We just haven't tried, so the false info from the left has stood uncontested.
FYI......PING
Juan is selling short the intelligence of black voters. Most of my black friends are middle class and most of them like Bush and fear Kerry.
I personally can't stand this crap about every segment of the public needing to be reached out to. Seniors, Blacks, Latinos, Soccer Moms, Christians, Convenience Store Clerks, and on and on.
America lost it's soul when Americans decided they wanted to be called something else.
I'm Irish and Cherokee and I want to be called an American and if a man does what's right for America, he gets my vote. Currently that man is George W. Bush.
I don't think he is reaching out to Bush. He is a Kerry guy. But this is an honest and straightforward column just the same. Whatever his intentions, this is good advice.
Juan Williams actually trying to advise President Bush constructively? Wow.
Re#10 Laura Ingraham had NR author Delroy Murdock of Project21 on this a.m. Same message. Says if W and the GOP go to the black communities, they will find a responsive audience...
"Read the details"
no worries i have read them - i just think it is futile that is all
like most of the guys i go to the gym with - all more or less share my values but think Rs are the worse than Hitler.
If there is no D next to the name then they wont vote for them. I think it is a similar situation with the black community. I wish Bush Could make inroads but i really dont see that happening
of course i could be mistaken
He makes a good case...
Juan spends every Sunday morning passionately bashing Bush and giving dem talking points...I am somewhat puzzled.
Just checked the list. Looks like it is okay to post all of NYT. Here's the rest of the article:
How can he attract those votes?
First, the field is open.
Compared with previous Democratic campaigns, Mr. Kerry's
has done a poor job of reaching out to black voters. As
Donna Brazile, Al Gore's campaign manager in 2000, said
recently, "Don't expect me to go out and say John Kerry is
a great man and a visionary if you're not running ads on
African-American or Hispanic cable networks. Fair is fair.
So send my dad a postcard, send my sisters a bumper
sticker." The Kerry campaign has also been notable for its
lack of blacks and Hispanics among the candidate's top
advisers. And Mr. Kerry has rarely been identified with
issues that compel black voters - notably affirmative
action.
Second, it's increasingly clear that blacks are no longer
willing to vote as a bloc, automatically lining up with the
Democrats. This is particularly true of younger black
voters. A 2002 poll by the Joint Center for Political and
Economic Studies, a research group based in Washington,
found a shift in the political identification of black
voters. For example, 34 percent of 18- to 25-year-old black
voters identified themselves as independents. Overall, 24
percent of black Americans of all ages see themselves as
independents - a four percentage point increase since the
2000 election. And now 10 percent of blacks call themselves
Republican, a six percentage point rise since 2000.
Young black Americans seem ready for a forthright
conversation about race and politics. While many older
blacks responded with anger to Bill Cosby's recent call for
poor black people to take more responsibility for their
problems, the young people I encountered were uniformly
supportive of Mr. Cosby's words.
It's worth noting that for this group, the president has an
issue with considerable appeal: school vouchers. Despite
strong opposition from civil rights leaders (and
Democrats), 66 percent of blacks and 67 percent of
Hispanics favor vouchers, according to a recent Newsweek
poll. That is higher than the 54 percent of whites who say
they want to see vouchers used to give students access to
better schools.
Third, Mr. Bush has a network to make a pitch to black
voters - the black church. Despite some bumps along the
way, black churches remain generally enthusiastic about the
president's faith-based initiative. The president has used
his appearances before faith-based groups as a way to
communicate with black Americans. It was no surprise that
Mr. Bush used a speech to ministers to condemn Senator
Trent Lott for expressing kind words about Strom Thurmond's
segregationist past.
And then there is the president's top selling point with
black voters - his track record of appointing minorities to
top positions. There are three black cabinet secretaries in
the Bush administration: Alphonso Jackson, secretary of the
Department of Housing and Urban Development; Rod Paige,
secretary of education; and Colin Powell, the secretary of
state.
What's more, the administration official most closely
identified with the president is a black woman, Condoleezza
Rice, the national security adviser. By giving Ms. Rice and
Mr. Powell so much clout, President Bush is miles ahead of
any other president, Democrat or Republican, in his
treatment of black people. More important, the president,
by appointing people of genuine talent and ability, has
created a climate where tokenism is rarely part of the
debate. After all, Mr. Powell consistently has a higher
approval rating for his job performance than any other
administration official.
This is the record that President Bush can draw on to win a
larger share of the black vote. But he has to want to do
it. In private conversations, administration officials make
the case that they want the black vote. But it is also
clear that they are not planning to work hard to get it -
in part because they are still angry over the black
response to their efforts in 2000.
Interestingly, the anger predates the post-election
sparring in Florida. It has its roots in an ad, run
nationally by the N.A.A.C.P., that implied that Mr. Bush,
as governor of Texas, did not want to punish the white men
who attacked and killed James Byrd Jr., a black man, in
Jasper, Tex., in 1998.
The ad distorted a complex situation. As governor, Mr. Bush
took the conventional conservative position that hate
crimes legislation could lead to a dangerous increase in
prosecutorial power. Mr. Bush argued that there were
adequate criminal penalties to punish Mr. Byrd's
assailants. No matter: the N.A.A.C.P. broadcast its ad. Mr.
Bush, who won 30 percent of the black vote and 47 percent
of the Hispanic vote in his 1998 gubernatorial campaign,
was introduced to minorities as a man willing to stand with
white lynch mobs.
If President Bush wants to return to the White House, he
needs black Americans to vote for him; in swing states in
the South and Midwest, they could make all the difference.
To do that, though, the president needs to begin reaching
out to black Americans. Fortunately, he has a lot to say.
You make a good point, but in this case we must address how groups perceive themselves and go from there. Blacks have been getting a lot of wrong information from the left for too long. If we were able to set that straight, we could cause a huge shift in the electorate. We should be getting the conservative black and hispanic vote. It is outrageous that the left has them too scared to vote GOP. We have to put forth the effort because the left has been lying for years now. We must stand up and compete. I know too many black people who agree with me on all the issues but vote RAT because they have been taught to believe Republicans are racist. It's crazy.
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