Posted on 10/09/2002 1:57:31 AM PDT by kattracks
I know he will come around. (Maybe I should have him contact you!) He is not a man who wants a handout from the government, just a fair shake, like we all do.
Thanks for your wonderful posts.
TC
It's tough being a conservative, black, gay male in the People's Democratic Republic of Seattle. Sometimes I feel as if I'm just banging my head against a wall.
True enough, Mike, but look at it this way; you're an advertising executive's dream come true!
Be Seeing You,
Chris
I know this question wasn't directed at me, but let me take a stab at an honest answer.
I've been what can be popularly be discribed as a conservative (making choices and decisions from that perspective or mind-set) for 25 years. But I didn't know what being genuinely conservative really was until I went to college. And after that, I didn't know who other, genuine, thinking conservatives were until I was ready to leave college. I entered college in 1987 and didn't graduate until 1993. During that time I worked and studied every semester I could. If I had learned everything that was being taught to me in college, I would have graduated as a thoroughly indoctrinated, liberal (popularly-described, not classically described) with a liberal arts degree. Not conservative at all.
During school and after I left, I had to find my own work and make my own connections. I've made some good decisions in that regard, and some not-so-good. Nothing illegal or morally dishonorable. Just not optimal. Right now, my income is very modest. And my skills are not in business, management, or in fields like computer science or engineering. I'm a graphic designer and the field, as a profession, is full of left-leaning peers. (At least in my corner of the country.)
To answer your question:
The short of the long is that if being conservative (my emphasis) is about making money, I couldn't help you if I wanted to. (Not much, anyway-- I AM fiscally responsible and live within my means.)
But if by being conservative you mean adhering to a set of core values that will assist one in leading an honorable and happy life, I'm happy to share any knowledge I have with anyone and I'm not ashamed to say that I'll probably be learning for the rest of my life. But I'll say this: if there was a life-course on How to Be A Conservative, no one told me about it, either. I had to learn the hard way. Free Republic is the first and only place I'm aware of where conservatives (and Classical Liberals and libertarians, for that matter) of like and unalike minds can meet, discuss, argue, and grow. We all have something to teach and learn from one another here.
I should add that people who describe themselves as conservatives will not always agree on what it means to be a conservative. I would say a more accurate (but not wholly accurate) term to describe my philosophical beliefs would be "libertarian." That's enough to raise howls from some people right there, but if someone says, "Oh, you're a conservative," it's not a term I will flinch from because that's what I hear most often from people when I talk to them about the issues of the day.
I don't know if that answers your question to your satisfaction or not, but that's the answer I'd give to anyone.
I think this is ABSOLUTELY true, and I'm wondering why no one else has commented on it. The local Cincinnati radio guy here is very straightforward about the racial issues the city faces. He gets a few black callers (who say they are black, anyway)who agree with him. There is one black lady who is vicious. I wonder what the mainstream black population thinks of him?
And then there is the racist card. How much courage does it take for a white person, publically called a racist, to stand tall and say, "Don't call me names, respond to what I've said." Too much courage from what I've seen. It just doesn't happen.
I'll be at my local republican campaign office on Friday. I'm going to ask if Davis or his supporters who are going door to door have been in Covington. Maybe I can start a discussion.
Give that man a cigar! That's the kind of honest and forthright answer that I've been looking for. I know there's not a correspondance course for this. But at the same time, new conservatives - black or white or purple for that matter - shouldn't have to listen to patronizing idiots who feel that their brand of conservatism is the only one either.
Some people on FR at least appear to resent my presence. They appear to resent any attempt to encourage other blacks to leave the liberal plantation. Those are the ones who need to reexamine what it is to be conservative.
Here we disagree through a diplomatic lense. "Appear to resent" your presence? If it looks, acts, smells, walks, and quacks like a duck, why call it a quail?
I've said it before. Conservative blacks fight a continuous, simultaneous two-front war. From the left flank, the marxist Frankensteins make our lives miserable because they just can't get right. The right flank contains those who don't want us in the conservative camp. So what do I say to these things?
Lock and load!
After the 2000 primary, I gave to conservative allies a plan to strenghten our cause. My tactics were not adopted. I went along with the alternate tactics and we accomplished my tactical goal of removing 4 key players who were the obstacle to any growth or reaching out to anyone .
....Gov George Ryan,
....State House Minorty Leader Lee Daniels,
....State Party Chair Larry Williamson and
....Crook County Chair Manny Hoffman.
We knocked them out, plus some, but not all, of their sychophants. This created a vacuum in the Party which we have been able to partially fill with our man as State Chair and a pretty good woman as Crook County Chair. The vacuum as House minority leader is the next big battle.
"Republicans" Gov George Ryan and Lee Daniels actively destroyed the party. Larry and Manny did nothing to build the party. They were the leaders of the country club/ establishment dominant wing of the party. They flourished on kickbacks from contracts and no-show patronage jobs to fellow members of the club. Women on the outside thought they were anti-woman. Blacks thought they were anti-Black. Pro-lifers thought they were anti-prolife. etc. In reality, they were just anti-everyone not already in the club.
In addition to filling the vacuum, our hope was that other players and wnnabes would wake up and open up the party. Our moderate Republican state treasurer has responded with intelligence. Speaker of the House Denny Haster doesn't seem to have a clue. He seems to think that all he needs is more money to buy new sychophants.
Going back to 1960, Black State Rep (and my mentor) Bill Robinson, put together a coalition around Ogilvie based on good government and independence of the corruption in both parties. Blacks, and everyone, worked together on the basis of a common interest in fighting corruption. The Ogilvie Republican good government image was the only thing that kept Republicans winning in Illinois. Gov George Ryan destroyed that image.
So like the Chicago sports teams, Republicans are now in a rebuilding year. I am optimistic we can succeed in 2004. But 2002 looks pretty grim.
The current Republican candidate for governor, Jim Ryan has the curse of the name. He claims to be pro-life but defends his record of trying to put an innocent man to death (Rolando Cruz). He claims to be pro-death penalty but his record on Cruz destroys his death penalty position. The Hispanic press and TV has been anti-Jim Ryan (for good reason) since Cruz became a debacle in the 80's. To the Hispanics Jim Ryan is our Buchanan-Dornan-Wilson-Tancredo. The Blacks look at Cruz and think "If Jim Ryan would do that to a Hispanic, just think what he would do to a Black. No wonder none of us want to live in Jim Ryan's DuPage bastion of Republicanism."
rdb3: I've said it before. Conservative blacks fight a continuous, simultaneous two-front war. From the left flank, the marxist Frankensteins make our lives miserable because they just can't get right. The right flank contains those who don't want us in the conservative camp. So what do I say to these things?
This was an interesting thread. mhking, I would be honored if you would include me on your Black conservative ping list.
FWIW, I'm not black, but I've noticed the same disdain you allude to from two distinct types in Republican/faux Conservative circles. First there are the Jim Jeffords/Judge Smails from Caddyshack country club types. These quintessential RINOs reflexively belong to the Republican party, the Harvard Yacht Club and the Episcopal Church because that is what's expected of persons of their alleged high status. I'm usually too busy laughing at them to feel slighted by their disdain.
The second type are the intellectual offspring, legitimate or otherwise, of the Jim Crow wing of the Democratic Party. They are the ones who reflexively cheered Bull Conner, Orville Faubus and James Earl Ray.
Disclaimer: the above is not meant to denigrate Southerners or suggest that bigotry is indigeneous to a specific part of the country. Having lived a year in Birmingham, Alabama, I learned first-hand about Southern hospitality and encountered far less prejudice there than I saw growing up in New York City. Bigotry is a set of attitudes and beliefs, not a matter of accents or zip codes.
Unfortunately there are a fair number of this type of "conservative" on this forum, no doubt because they think the term is short-hand for their racist ignorant beliefs. You can spot this type by their belligerent boasts that America's greatness resulted from the color of the Founders' skin rather than the content of their character. They are wrong and profoundly so. First, America was a melting-pot even in the 1700s, not the ethnically homogenous Anglo-Saxon society of their imagination. More important, what made America great was not the ethnicity of its Founders, but the greatness of their ideals.
These bigots pretending to be conservatives hate minorities and immigrants (at least the dark-skinned ones) because they think they will dilute the racial/ethnic purity to which they erroneously attribute America's greatness. Alexis deToqueville said: "America is great because she is good. When she ceases to be good, she will cease to be great." These people think America was great because she was white and when she ceases to be white, she will cease to be great.
One of my favorite Ronald Reagan sayings explains the fundamental difference between America and other countries. Reagan said: "You can go to France, but you cannot become a Frenchman. You can go to Germany, but you cannot become a German. But you can come to America and become an American." The corollary to Reagan's insight is that people like Dinesh D'Souza and so many other honest, hard working immigrants from every corner of the globe are more American than any native-born bigot whose ancestors fought in the Civil War. These fake-conservatives are Americans by accident of birth only, just like the French and the Germans. They will never become Americans, at least not in the larger sense Ronald Reagan meant.
Conservative bigots belong in the party of slavery and Jim Crow, not the party of Lincoln and Reagan. Perhaps this explains their disaffection and disloyalty. I'm sure they'd feel right at home with the other freaks and losers on the Commie/racist/anti-Semitic Left.
Republicans need to do the right thing even if it costs us votes in the short-run. Nixon's "Southern strategy" was wrong even though it helped him win the 1968 election. The Republican party is still paying the price of that sleazy cynical vote-grubbing strategy today. Bob Dole was a weak candidate and he ran a pi$$-poor Presidential campaign. But one thing he did right was show the bigots in our ranks the location of the exit sign. At least the guy who thinks we made a mistake fighting Hitler in WW II and writes that America is no longer worth fighting or dying for (what's left of Osama bin Laden in the Tora Bora cave would agree him I'm sure) had the courtesy to leave on his own. The ones who didn't take the hint need to be escorted -- on a rail.
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