Friday, January 30, 2009

Us Too-ism.

So Michael Steele is the first African-American head of the RNC.   Call me cynical and myopic but this is the kind of move that just doesn't feel real.    Its isn't that Steele is not qualified but its hard to imagine him being elected to the post if there had been no Obama.  In much the same way Palin owes at least some of her juice to Hillary's primary success. 

It speaks to a kind of simplistic political calculus  that values the symbolic over the substantive and simply seems unable to grasp why  the Democratic primary and Obama's candidacy captured  so many imaginations.  Conservatives dismiss these as nothing more than identity politics and in doing so reveal a profound misunderstanding of legitimate issues of gender and race.  Which is how they find themselves essentially saying "hey we got a black guy too"

I don't know who the first out gay national politician will be.  But I'll bet the second one is a Republican.

3 comments:

  1. Gonna disagree with you a bit. There is a fight going on in the GOP. Guys like Tom DeLay (of Sugarland TX) are finally getting kicked out of the GOP. Tom DeLay is the reason that there are not more minorities and gays in the GOP. When he was in the House of Reps, it was between him and JC Watts (Oklahoma - Black and played safety for OU) to be elected Majority Whip. DeLay played some very dirty politics. JC Watts walked away from the GOP.

    Mr Steele represents the future that the GOP is going to have to go to and can get there smoothly if a couple facts are kept in mind:
    - Minorities, especially Black-Americans are Conservative even though they have voted Democrat in the past

    - Minorities hate being patted on the head and thrown crumbs. Both Dems and Repubs have been guilty of this

    I'm optimistic. I'm in the minority

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  2. Steele may or may not be the future of the party but it took 6 ballots and a fairly close final vote of 91-77 to confirm him as party head none of which would have happened in my opinion if new President were white.

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  3. For the record Watts was a quarterback not safety. Another one of those awesome wishbone college QBs in the Big 8 that had major college success but weren't taken seriously by the NFL at all.

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