Here it goes again..

[ls317]

Black legislators in the Indiana General Assembly are expressing outrage today over a racially tinged statement that Secretary of State Todd Rokita made at a Republican party dinner in southern Indiana.
Rokita, a Republican in his second term as Indiana's chief election officer, was the keynote speaker Thursday at a GOP event in Daviess County.
According to the Washington Times-Herald, the local newspaper in that county, Rokita questioned in his speech why so many blacks vote for the Democratic Party.

"How can that be?" Rokita was quoted as saying. "90 to 10. Who's the master and who's the slave in that relationship."

Rokita said Monday that his overall message about the black vote was meant to encourage the Republican Party to continue its efforts to diversify, in part by continuing to reach out to blacks.

But, he said, “The word choice that I used in one part of those remarks was poor, and if I offended anyone then I ask their forgiveness for what was an insensitive metaphor.”

Rep. Bill Crawford of Indianapolis -- one of 12 black lawmakers, all Democrats -- called Rokita's words "personally offensive" and inappropriate for a statewide elected official.

"A half-a-million or so persons of African ancestry are in this state," Crawford said. "To use the analogy of the master-slave relationship implies that people are compelled to do something, that they don't act with their own free will. And I think that in essence what he said was that African-American voters are ignorant, ill-informed, are compelled to vote for Democrats."

Rep. Charlie Brown, D-Gary, who also is black, said he was shocked by Rokita's statement, "especially this close on the heels of the (Don) Imus debacle, that a public official would not have chosen better words."

Imus, whose talk show was on both radio and simulcast on cable TV, was fired last week for using a racist and sexist epithet in referring to the Rutgers University women's basketball team.

[tblue]

1. It wasn't the Democrats who put all those black people on felons lists in Florida.

[bluerum]

2. Insensitive metaphor - hmmm. I will have to remember that one. eom

[ComerPerro]

3. and, lets see, how many Black Republicans are there in Congress?

[Buzz Clik]

4. That's really not too bad for Indiana.

Our southern border (with Kentucky) is porous, and our state is now filled with blithering idiots.

[scarface2004]

5. what he meant to say...

is we should be the master and you should be the slave! but like everything republican, it got bothched!

[MadMaddie]

6. Here we go again? No these people feel they have free license

to express their racism...good let the rest of the country understand their hate...