HispanicVista Columnists
It Is Official - Republicans Are Nitwits
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By Steven J. Ybarra, JD/HispanicVista.com - March 27, 2006
- Notas por La Casa Politica
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I was a guest on the Hannity “radio rant” not long ago. Before I came on the air, Hannity made his favorite quip to his audience, “How stupid do they think we are?” My father used to say if a man asks that question, well, that is pretty much the answer.
I have been watching the situation for a while and been busy working here in California on several campaigns and so have not written anything for a long time. A friend of mine recently asked why I had been so silent recently. I replied, “…because the Republicans are nitwits and there is simply no cure for stupid.”
Why, you may ask, have I reached the conclusion that Republicans are nitwits?
Let us start with the non-federal issues.
In California, the Secretary of State has certified the Diebold machines for the June 2006 elections. Now I am not going to get into the argument about whether they work or not, or whether Halliburton benefits out of this. The reason why he is a nitwit has to do with the fact that tens of thousands of good people who work every election cycle will have to deal with equipment that is going to fail.
Stupid is defined in Webster’s as ignoring known facts. It is a fact that new electronic equipment fails. Ask yourself, how many times you have had to reboot your computer this month. Do you remember the dreaded blue screen of death?
The machines will fail as they did in Florida, Nevada, and Ohio. Californians will get off work, go to vote, see lines around the corner, and decide to go home instead.
Fortunately, for some candidates almost 40% of all Californians vote by mail. (Look for candidates to win who focus on mail ballot voters and who also have Latinos on their top campaign staff not just as window dressing outreach workers.)
Here is why California Secretary of State McPherson is a nitwit. The registrars of 21 counties wanted to hold the June primary totally by mail in their counties. However, they, like many folks, were scared of the consequences. Despite the pleas of the locals, a Democratic bill in the legislature that would have temporarily fixed this issue died for the lack of any Republican support. (Republican members of the California Legislature represented most of the affected counties - so much for local control of local problems.)
When the machines die, and they will, the Democratic Secretary of State Candidate Debra Bowen will have a great campaign issue.
Now on to the national issues.
Let us take on the easy one - Afghanistan. This month a guy who became a Christian is going to get his head cut off for it because the Bush administration allowed the Constitution of Afghanistan to be run according to Islamic law! I wrote about that last year and none of you so called Christ believers said squat.
Well, guess what? When you write your constitution according to religious law it becomes a theocracy rather than a democracy! Bush wanted this government so bad he did not want to force any Bill of Rights on them. Republicans are nitwits. Moreover, if the Afghanis want to cut somebody’s head off, let them execute the opium growers who violate Islamic law by growing poppies that get shipped to Harlem and East Los Angeles!
On to Iraq and the many issues around body armor, disarming the locals, lack of training, cost of the war in soldiers and material, lies about weapons of mass destruction, the list just goes on and on. OK I expect the government to lie to me. As Thoreau said, it is in their self-interest to do so. However, do not make me the bad guy because I believed your lies and now that the truth is clear say you are liars. If I make a decision based upon a lie, it is not an informed decision.
Moreover, why do folks buy into the myth that everybody thought they had the weapons? When Bush’s own people did not believe the lies and tried to say so, Bush made them change their reports. He stole the public trust and nothing he says deserves our faith. The Republicans are nitwits if they think that after a while America will not get it.
So here is the question of the day, will the Democrats get it?
I was on the phone with UPS last week to ship a package, heard the Spanish surname of the employee, and said, “Buenos Dias.” The worker did not reply. I said, “Wow, can’t you speak Spanish?” And the worker replied, “Nope, not allowed to. The company will not allow me to say anything - even to reply to you in Spanish, even if I have to put you on hold while I get you to the translation unit.”
Wait a minute! I thought we fixed that problem here in California like eons ago! UPS still does not get it. Folks like to be civil and courteous and Latinos are the first in line for that. Just like the Republicans who do not get that the continuous attacks on the Mexican citizens who come here to work and are called terrorists drive Latinos away from the Republican Party. UPS has just made it clear that Latinos should ship FedEx.
The Republicans who continue the attack on Latinos are going to help Democrats win elections! That is if the Democrats get it. Where was the Democratic National Committee in the demonstrations on March 25, 2006 where one million brown folks said that immigration “reform act” was offensive. I know that some of the folks that demonstrated were voters.
I know that Howard Dean has a 50-state strategy but that dog does not hunt – for goodness sake, even the West Wing on TV knows it does not work. It is about the base. You got to win the base. Until Democrats stop fearing Latino voters in all fifty states and work to get them the right to vote at home permanently (i.e., by mail with permanent absentee voter status) we will continue to lose Texas, Nevada, Colorado, Ohio and Florida. Until the Democrats care to come up with a real budget and a plan for the Latino vote, which is greater than the cost of their dinner parties, our voters will not have a reason or the training on how to vote.
Fortunately, I know that the California Democratic Party gets it, which is why I will give the Democratic National Committee (DNC) meeting in New Orleans a miss, until there is a published budget and a plan for Latinos by the DNC - it has very little to do with the reality of winning the Latino vote.
©Steven J. Ybarra JD is a retired civil rights attorney who operates a consultant company in California. He is a member of the Democratic National Committee and a long time political activist. Contact Steven at: sjybarra@aol.com. This article is copyright by Steven J. Ybarra JD, originally published in http://www.hispanicvista.com/ but permission is granted for reprint in print, email, blog, or web media if this entire credit paragraph is attached.