FBI Wages War on Black Folks: Southern Strategy Rises Again

[McCamy Taylor]

We were warned. Pat Buchanan told us that it was coming months ago when he was on Countdown. He was being interviewed by Keith Olberman and he said that if Republican's were smart they would mobilze their base by making them scared of Democrats, especially Black Democrats, like Charlie Rangel who would head a Congressional Committee if the Dems took over the House. This is, of course, Nixon's old Southern Strategy which Buchanan helped perfect for Nixon back in the early 1970's and which Papa Bush used to such advantage in his own presidential campaign in 1988 with the imfamous Willie Horton ad and his War Against Black People aka the War on Drugs (ironically, a war which may have been fueled by cocaine supplied by "freedom fighters" from central America who were dealing drugs on the side but whom the administration protected because of their anti-communist politics). Bill Clinton brokered a peace between the United States and its African-american citizens, and in the first few years of the W. administration that peace seemed likely to hold. Bush Jr. was more interested in scapegoating muslims. African-americans were embraced under the umbrella of Christian Americans who might possibly be sold school vouchers and family values.

However, Katrina and sagging poll numbers changed all that. Now, the GOP needs something to revitalize the base--and to make people stop hating the Bush administration for their mishandling of the ongoing economic disaster of the Gulf Coast reconstruction. So, the War on Black Folks, aka the Southern Strategy has been resurrected.

I first posted this when Buchanan first made his pronouncement sometime back in May. At the time, I was mostly going on a hunch and a little bit of evidence---the McKinney case which had been thrust into the national media spotlight for no particularly good reason except that someone wanted it there, the Barry Bonds case which did not even seem worthy of being national news, the Duke Lacross rape case, the so called election hearings in Ohio in 2005 in which Bill Frist's attorney presented evidence that the NAACP had given away crack in exhange for votes (evidence which was later refuted but only after the Ohio legislature passed draconian legislation), the new Voter ID-Poll Tax in Georgia that unfairly burdens minority voters.

Since then, I have seen the evidence accumulate that there has been an ongoing conspiracy to target African-americans in this country. Why, when everyone has known about Jack Abramoff for years (the president even fired a prosecutor who was going to indict him), did the FBI choose to spend its resources setting up a sting operarion to go after Jefferson Davis and then to stage a media attention grabbing raid on his Congressional Office? Why has every African-american politician in the Dallas City government been under investigation for a year and why was this story on the front page of the Dallas news paper recently if they havent been charged with anything? Why were the feds so interested in going after Barry Bonds out of all the other juicing athletes that they wanted to pressure another ball player to help them gather evidence on him and him alone? Why is Janet Jackson's breast so much more sinful than any white woman's breast? We have seen more than a few of those on national television, too, but the one the right wing keeps harping back on is the Black one.

Finally tonight, the inevitable story, the one that I knew was coming. We just learned that the FBI had a spy in a black muslin group in Florida that never actually committed any terrorist acts but "talked" about them. For all we know, the FBI agent did all the talking and the others nodded. All they are telling us is that Black Folks were gonna blow us up. Shades of the 1970's.

There are clearly two tiers of justice. White criminals are nabbed reluctantly when their crimes become so glaring that they can not be ignored. African-americans are targetted, stalked, set up, entrapped, studied and finally paraded in front of the public as guilty before they are ever tried in a court of law. And every time it is Al Gonzales's Department of Justice doing the dirty business.

This is war. War against common sense and decency and American values. It is a war to make White people in suburbs vote Republican out of fear for an enemy that does not exist. It is a very nasty attempt to revive racism in a country where anti-Black racism is trying to die a natural death. It reveals the ugliest side of the right wing and of the southern Republican Party which has hijacked the national Republican Party. And I hope that Karl Rove and Pat Buchanan find themselves sorely surprised this fall when their New Southern Strategy does not work.

[Virginia Dare]

1. I'm very afraid that this is what is happening here...

was watching the coverage on MSNBC tonight. I heard the phrases "home grown terrorists" "radical black muslims" and "jihad right here in the U.S.".

Divide and conquer, divide and conquer.

[fortyfeetunder]

3. The monolithic culture muth

When will the rest of America have a clue Black folks are not monolithic? There is diversity within this culture, just like any other culture living in the US. So someone who is short-sighted to think Blacks all think the same way is probably as ignorant as they come. Maybe they need to turn off the video koolaid...

[BlueCaliDem]

12. Blacks may not be monolithic, but with 80+% voting Democratic...

...and probably more after the foul-up after Katrina, the Republican'ts NEED every single Blacks/Latinos/Asian hating white to get out and vote, what with their pathetic poll numbers in their 20's for Congress and mid-to-low 30's for Bush!

Still...80% is well into the majority, and in terms of percentages, can be seen as "monolithic", but it's their votes, not their "way of thinking" that matters to both political parties who are leading America.

To think otherwise, is nothing short of ignorant.

[Julius Civitatus]

10. Not just Black folk: Mexicans, brown folk, illegal immigrants

The 2006 election strategy from Karl Rove is an all-out "Fear Of The Dark Man" tour-de-force.

Rove knows they have it bad, very bad this coming elections. He already used fear of terrists, and fear of gays with relative success. This time around the Republicans have bad for the coming mid-terms, and Rove will bring out the cannons. He will appeal to basest, most primal fears of American white males, and will exploit the fear of dark people to the verge of hate crimes if necessary.

It has already started:

- Huge media campaign demonizing immigrants
- Mexican-Americans vilified as illegal invaders and welfare leeches (Thanks, Lou Dobbs)
- Veiled, and not so veiled blaming of Katrina disaster on NOLA blacks
- Sudden arrests of Black alleged terrorist groups (I will wait until more info comes out before buying into the official, fearmongering story)

It has begun, and it's going to get very, very nasty. Rove will throw everything he got in this veiled racist campaign.

[McCamy Taylor]

28. '"Fear Of The Dark Man" tour-de-force' Brilliant!

If you dont mind, I'm gonna quote you for my new tag line at Salon.

[Divine Discontent]

34. right on...

it's what they've got "black & brown rebel rousers" and "gay queens wanting marriage"


and that ain't shit!


bless yall...



www.cafepress.com/warisprofitable <<<--- check it out!

[MadMaddie]

2. Yes I indeed...Racism is alive and well and the * cabal

has opened the floodgates....

[CanOfWhoopAss]

4. Internment camps are just around the corner. (seriously) eom

[The Backlash Cometh]

5. Isn't the pattern clear to everyone?

THIS should be the campaign issue. Republicans rally their base using fear.

First it was the Russians, then the Chinese, then the Jews, then Blacks, then Hispanics, then Feminist, then Gays, then Muslims, now it's blacks again. In JFK's time, they were even afraid of Catholics because they didn't want someone like Scalia interpreting the law. Now they embrace that kind of lunacy because, as Karl Marx pointed out long ago, Religion is the opiate of the people.

Draw a picture. Show these people that they're suffering from GOP induced paranoia in order to control their votes.

[dalloway]

6. This is so F'ing on target!!! THIS is their November strategy....

Turn blacks into the next group to be feared so they can disenfranchise the whole race and justify the damn results in November SPIT OF OUT OF THE DAMN MACHINES THEY CONTROL.

I am BEYOND OUTRAGED and think you've nailed exactly what the plan for November is.

FIGHT BACK AMERICA!!!!!!

FEAR AND BIGOTRY ARE NOT THE ANSWER.

[Higans]

15. Good point, Die Bold control's the whole thing any way.

And there in lies the problem. All This Talk they throw at us is a lot of hot air; cleverly disguised in such a way as to create the possibility that 51% of America might be as Bigoted as they are. The truth is that they don't even count our votes that do get cast. They are going to rig the elections any way, all the rest is just a show. A really boring show that hardly any one watches. and they like it that way. This is the war on Terra Fir-ma. It's the war against the Human Race. When we figure out how to make our votes be publicly counted transparently the show is over. We will get a new cast and fire the Director too.

[KoKo]

7. Thanks for posting this...because it does seem to be the new strategy

/old strategy of racism rearing it's ugly head. And, I for one was upset when liberal bloggers urged William Jefferson to step down when he has yet to be charged with anything. I was glad the Black Caucus stood up for him and couldn't understand why so many liberals didn't see that Jefferson being made a "poster person" for Democratic Morals was just the wrong move at the wrong time.

Nancy Pelosi's strategy of "we should look better than the Repugs" seemed to ring not quite true. And, coming on the heels of what happened to Cynthia McKinney it had a bad feeling. I really wonder why our Dems pay money to strategists when they should really rely on their own common sense. So many of our elected Dems don't seem to have a grip on history or an understanding of the Repuglican Strategy. It's puzzling because we have been dealing with the same strategy for decades.

When will we ever learn?

[Fovea]

8. I bet the psychic weight of having been responsible for this

is staggering. Why else would Pat Buchanan and Kevin Phillips prounounce
anti-conservative sounding jeremiads with such venomnous single minded intensity
in the case of Phillips.

Buchanan's buyers remorse seems sincere, but
Phillips *begged* Democratic candidates to kill
this administration as an act of mercy.

Once, many years ago, a wise weapons trainer once said to me--
"The problem with wanting to win a contest in the worst way is that sometimes you get your wish."

The problem of being a Republican is that the buyer's remorse is bigger these days as the credit card war stays the course straight into the bathtub.

[CanOfWhoopAss]

9. So does this mean Tim McVay was a terrorist? Or is he just a criminal? nt

Not that these men have been convicted of anything. From what I understand they didn't even purchase spit balls.

[Julius Civitatus]

11. Well, they call him a "rebel" now. Only brown people are "terrorists"

I've noticed an incredible shift in the media on what they call "terrorist.' Now that word has become a synonym of brown (usually Muslim) male. White people are no longer referred as "terrorists." They no longer call McVeigh a terrorist. Hell, last time they talked about the IRA or ETA, they never called them "terrorists." They use other euphemisms, but not "terrorist." I'm sure it has nothing to do with the fact that they are white.

:sarcasm:

[CanOfWhoopAss]

19. Brown guys armed with stupid ideas and spit balls... thanks for clarifying

[AspenRose]

25. Kind of like 'finders' and 'looters.'

eom

[Popol Vuh]

13. Remember this pathetic statement by John Gibson?

"Do your duty. Make more babies. That's a lesson drawn out of two interesting stories over the last couple of days.

First, a story yesterday that half of the kids in this country under five years old are minorities. By far, the greatest number are Hispanic. You know what that means? Twenty-five years and the majority of the population is Hispanic. Why is that? Well, Hispanics are having more kids than others. Notably, the ones Hispanics call "gabachos" -- white people -- are having fewer."
--John Gibson

http://mediamatters.org/items/200605120006

:puke:

[ninkasi]

14. I am so sick and tired of them

I'm tired, and disgusted with the Republican party, and their hatred of everybody not like themselves. I was born in 1943, while WWII was still being fought. I grew up in Houston, when segregation was a fact. I was used to seeing a total of 4 restrooms in public buildings...one for white women, one for black women, and the same for the men. There were separate water fountains. Blacks had to ride in the back of the bus. If there were only 2 while people on the bus, and the back of it was standing room only, blacks were expected to stand, rather than sit in empty seats reserved for whites.

I remember arguing with my mother about race. I couldn't understand why blacks were treated differently. After all, my parents insisted I go to Sunday School and church, and it didn't seem right for one race to be treated so badly. In the sixties, there was JFK, and RFK, and MLK, and freedom marches, and scared black children trying to get a decent education, while facing the twisted hatred and threats of white adults.

There was VietNam, and the whole tragedy of the senseless killing. When I saw photos of soldiers, some were black, some were white, but all were trying to stay alive in the jungles of a hostile country, while being told to kill people they didn't know, for a cause that was a lie. The U.S. kindly allowed black people to die and be maimed in that war, even though they were discriminated against once they came home.

Last summer, I saw the slow, agonizing death of a city, I saw poor people, unable to leave the city, waiting on rooftops for help that didn't arrive. I saw the chaos of the Superdome, and old people dying in their wheelchairs outside, because there was nobody to help them. This happened while the Republican president ate cake and played guitar, and enjoyed his vacation. Condi shopped for shoes. Then when I looked on the news, I saw resourceful white people "finding food", while the black people were "looting" food, and oh, my God, diapers and infant formula. Two groups of people, doing the same thing, but one praised for being resourceful, the other criticized for "stealing".

Why can't this whole hate thing be put to rest? Why does the Republican party try to destroy everything that could be beautiful and good for America, instead of stealing elections, smearing people, and destroying the middle class and poor to enrich the wealthy? Why do they insist on being able to spy in our bedrooms, and dictate to women whether or not they choose to bear a child? They are so far from being a party that will fight for justice for all races, for helping heal wounds, for bringing peace. They seem to exist in order to dominate others, to hate others, to attack others. I'm sorry for ranting, but why do people respond to hate and fear, profess to be Christian, then in every way act in opposition with the message Jesus spread?

I'm just so sick of them, for so many reasons, but the hatred and distrust of a whole segment of the population, and the hypocrisy of a party which on one hand loves illegal aliens because they want cheap labor, but refuse to fine the companies which hire them. Whatever good the Republican party ever was able to claim has been shit on, spit on, and destroyed by the current crop of savage neocons, who are willing to destroy the rest of the world in order to stay in power.

To my black and brown brothers and sisters, all I can do is apologize for what some members of my race do. I feel so helpless, because I feel like I owe an apology to everyone who is harmed by white man's policies. Remember, though, that although my skin is white, they hate me too, because I'm a woman, and suffer from a disability, and my income is actually below the poverty level. They would gladly let me die, if it cost them anything to save me.

[Karenina]

31. What a beautiful post, Ninkasi!

:hug:

[grasswire]

16. I've been fearing this for years...

...especially because I saw something written years ago by Charles Colson about the coming "problem" of Black Muslims in America's prison systems, and how they were schooling America's prisoners in violence.

The goddamn Bushies are going to start a race war for political purposes. I always figured that was one of their last possible plays.

Here it comes. God help us all.

[wiley]

17. This is so accurate

[ShortnFiery]

18. Yeah, but this "Southern Strategy" shit is about out of luck!

[msgadget]

20. I think it's working

Thanks to Coulter, Limbaugh, Hannity and the rest it's not only acceptable to be racist (while calling it honesty), it is required of all true conservative patriots. It's such a simple process really. First you get people emotional about something and then you repeatedly and insistently identify the source of their discomfort. You make collaboration and compromise a sign of weakness and the very suggestion of assistance the ultimate act of irresponsibility. It can continue to be successful because even when everyone is suffering together they view the course of events seperately, through different filters. The powerful benefit with little oversight when chaos reigns and it has a helluva healthy head of steam behind it right now.

[itzamirakul]

23. Don't forget to thank our Democratic leaders who did not

"go ballistic" when the African American vote was sabotaged and stolen in 2000 and 2004. Instead, our party spent money to hire a Republican "strategist" in 2004 and spent most of its money in trying to attract the mythical "white centrist vote" instead of protecting its core voting base.

Fcuk them very much.

Edit: spelling

[msgadget]

27. And, thank YOU very much.

Just as the right believes this country would be peachy if only they could have their way, democratic voters are under a similar misconception even though their chosen has been too embarrassed or strategic to address the voting issues of '04. When the studies came out that black men were further disadvantaged by rabid illegal immigration, what did Hillary say? First she rallied with the Irish white immigrants, then those of color and last I heard she was for a fence. Basically she's vying for position and where does that leave us OR the illegal immigrant? Minorities may continue to lose.

As long as both sides are so misled we won't have the representation we deserve. Politicians vying for power trade away our interests because they 'have' to and voters stupidly accept that as part of the majority game. What good will the majority do me if democratic legislation turns out to be watered down, differently marketed versions of what the republicans would've done anyway? Or, if like Clinton I, they embrace and endorse right-leaning policies as their own?

[grasswire]

21. kick

important

[Hippo_Tron]

22. Not to mention their reluctance to renew the voting rights act

Which will backfire on them because if we use it effectively, African Americans will turn out in unprecedented numbers this year.

[durrrty libby]

24. The dems damn well better get a hold of the house and senate,

and do something to reverse this mess.

[Geek_Girl]

26. Standard Operating Procedure for the GOP

get out the hate vote. It's becoming so obvious though this may just back fire on them. I'm thinking we should have a strong plan to mobilize the Black and hispanic communities this election. Given the recent events with anti latino/immigration legislation and the catastrophe in New Orleans, I would think this wouldn't be too difficult.

To counter the GOP racist base, all we have to do is focus on oil prices and the GOP ties to big Oil. Don't forget some of those in the GOP base are from Mississippi and the gulf that have been pelted by hurricanes and many of them had difficulty getting any kind of relief from the government. I live in the south and I know how some of these folks think. They maybe a wee bit racist, homophobic ect.. but they're hurting financially.


Your right it is a war and it's a war that's been going on for a very long time. But I think people are starting to wake up.

[Popol Vuh]

29. COINTELPRO

A couple of videos from YouTube:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p993fs5pR4U

http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&n=2&videoid=690656509

[Totally Committed]

30. There is this aspect to the story, as well:

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=132&topic_id=2692333

TC

[msgadget]

33. Great post, Totally

It deserved far more attention than it got.

[PerfectSage]

32. How's Rove's new southern strategy gonna work...

...if the Bush & Condi affair is true

How's Rove gonna spin that? Condi is a 'homegrown' terrorist who tried to blow up George & Laura's marriage? :rofl:

[The Brethren]

35. I'm amazed

"and he said that if Republican's were smart they would mobilze their base by making them scared of Democrats, especially Black Democrats"

that Buchanan would say this openly, esp. on the Olberman show. Yes, fear sells. And when it's the Republican party with Rove back in the saddle, it will be cutting. It will also help them distract the public from the truth of what they've been doing. I pray most people don't buy into it.