Posted on 03/17/2002 6:00:26 AM PST by Love America or move to ......
Hispanics nationwide have a stake in the Texas governor's race. Laredo businessman and millionaire Tony Sanchez won the Democratic primary by about a 2 to 1 margin. If Sanchez unseats Republican Gov. Rick Perry in November, he will become the first Hispanic governor of Texas. Texas, following California, also would become the second state in which Hispanic voters put an end to Republican dominance.
In California, Hispanic voters were something of a sleeping giant. That all changed with the administration of Pete Wilson, the Republican governor who stupidly decided to exploit the state's xenophobes and bash immigrants. Wilson blamed immigrants - legal and illegal - for just about everything from lousy schools and health care to the failure to achieve world peace.
Faced with such abuse, the sleeping giant woke up. Voter registration drives became a favorite pastime in Hispanic neighborhoods. In 1998, Gray Davis became the first Democratic governor of California in 16 years.
He trounced his Republican opponent Dan Lungren, drawing 58 percent of the vote; Lungren got 38 percent. Davis captured just about every voter block except for white men, Republicans and Protestants. He carried Hispanics by a great margin.The Texas primary race, similarly, drew a heavy Hispanic vote in the southern part of the state. Observers said more Hispanics were moved to vote. While the major Democratic candidates both were Hispanic, Sanchez said his opponent, Dan Morales, was embarrassed to be Hispanic.
Sanchez reportedly spent about $18 million to defeat Morales. This is a record for a Texas primary, and it reflects an odd element to the general election. Sanchez is new to politics and wealthy. The family fortune is said to be $600 million. He reportedly threw as much as $13 million of his own money into his campaign kitty.
Hispanics are the fastest growing minority in the country. And as they increase, so too does their political influence. This is the most important political trend since Richard Nixon launched his successful southern strategy in which he urged conservative southern Democrats to switch to the Republican Party. It's a trend that could affect Illinois, New Jersey and some southern states where there is growing Hispanic influence.
The future of hispanic politics in this country is with Democrats like LA city atty Rocky Delgadillo (who won in the same election), who wants to get hispanics off food stamps and into jobs, and Republicans like Henry Bonilla.
Meanwhile, the latest gallup poll has 45 percent of hispanics saying they might vote for whatever Republican is running in their Congressional district this year (usually each party gets in the low 30's when asked who they will vote for.) That's a miraculous number, when you consider that so many come from districts where there are no credible GOP candidates.
The cultural issues, like homosexuality and abortion, will be critical to bringing hispanics along. Hopefully, Republicans will stop being so afraid to pick up the cultural issues. That, more than immigration politics, is losing hispanics for the GOP.
You sound just like the Meathead.
Same here in Houston. The people arguing with you over this don't know squat because they are not here, lol. They seem to love illegals so much, why don't they invite them to Virginia, etc. to live? LOL
ROFLOL, that is precisely what you are doing! Fitz has more understanding of this issue than you and the other illegal-lovers on this thread combined.
Insults should be irrelevant. What kind of person changes their entire belief system around simply because the feel insulted?
It's like, "oh well, I used to be against the re-distribution of wealth and all sorts of Marxist PC social engenieering that was intent on destroying America, but you know what? I feel I was "insulted", so now I'm for all those things.
Please!
Umm...
Bailing out?
On the contrary. A welfare state will only survive an ethnically homogenous society. Take a look at the Scandinavian countries, for example. They have traditionally had very homogenous societies with massive social spending. However, as the number of immigrants has grown so has the opposition to wealth redistribution. The bottom line is these kind of social contracts are only possible if there's a very real sense of communality in the society.
In the US the political right, especially the Republican party, has been playing with the ethnic card against the welfare state for well over 30 years. It has worked quite well, also.
Look, do you want to know what it will take to win the Chicano vote? 1. Permit unlimited and unrestricted immigration. 2. Welfare for life. 3. Turn over as many states to Mexican rule as they wish.
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