The Tulsa Forum by TulsaNow

We started this conversation three years ago and it turned ugly.

Now maybe we can rationally explain in our own words why this is happening.

http://www.tulsanow.org/forum/index.php?topic=19750.120

The GOP has three camps. To be as blunt and draw the lines as clearly as possible, there are four separate camps:

1) People for the Joinder of Church and State;

2) Business Shall Set you Free;

3) Libertarians; and

4) The I'm White, Poor, and Angry Party.


Those groups have large swaths of shared beliefs:  Statements of nationalism. Strong on Defense spending. A general dislike of government. A golden age belief that things were always better in the past (they had this belief in the past too). And generally not wanting anything to change. The groups also have a good bit of crossover.

But from there the priorities change.

The Church people want the government to reflect the bible as they see fit; mostly the parts restricting other people from doing things, not the parts about taking care of the poor or loving thy neighbor.  Preventing gay marriage and families (they moved on from interracial marriage and family ~20 years ago), preventing abortions (not by preventing unwanted pregnancies, by making it illegal), enabling government institutes to adopt and preach their religion (monuments, posters, prayers, Bibles as text books, etc.), and preserving our moral fabric (read: hindering alcohol, the sex industry, continuing the war on drugs).

The business people just want laws that cut taxes for the most wealthy (and necessarily cutting benefits for the poorest to offset the same), subsidies large businesses, open up trade, keeps labor in its place, and makes sure everything runs smoothly. Pure self interest capitalism, often with a short term bent so they can collect their bonus money and run to the Hamptons. They are happy to put up with the Church people because they don't really have conflicting agendas. But the Libertarians and Angry people can cause them trouble. Business has been able to run the establishment for a long time now and was a stabilizing rational actor (you knew what they wanted), but is losing control (or has lost control).

The Libertarians piss off the other groups. They don't want the government enforcing a religious code or morals. They don't want subsidies or rules just for big business. And they sure don't want angry people rattling cages all the time for no good reason. The libertarians have been strained within the Big Tent for a while now.

And the Angry people... they hate everything. They hate taxes, they hate having crap government services, and they certainly hate the "establishment." Not at all interested in facts or debate, just wants their bias affirmed. Unhappy with their station in life, and wants to make America great again, but can't articulate what that means, what made us great, or how we get there.  Dislikes the business side of the party, doesn't understand the libertarians, and feels like they should support the church people because that's what the Country was founded on... but doesn't really care about the same goals (or is overtly hostile to them when it comes down to it). Renowned for not knowing much about the issues but having strong opinions, results in pure obstructionism as your idea sucks...but I don't really have a solution. Anti immigration, anti tax, anti bail outs, thinks women, minorities, and college kids have it too easy, and constantly convinced they are minutes away from losing their guns.

- - - -

Clearly I'm being a smartbutt. However, there is a lot of truth in there. There are several different camps with various levels of overlap. And those camps do not share the same goals, values, or philosophy. The business camp has been dominant, and is on a collision course with the Angry people. They do not share many common goals and sometimes are against each other.

The two party system has always sucks. Burn it down and start over. Many of the Republican camps could team with Democrats or Greens or Labor on different issues. By trading horses many groups could get some of what they want. Or we could keep a binary system and bang our heads against the wall a few more decades.

According to that other thread, Ed owes us popcorn!!

I owe you guys popcorn? When did I say that?

But I'll gladly do it. Popcorn is a major weakness right up there with coffee. I'm readily persuaded for either of them.

The link Michael posted above.  Page 9, reply #129.  You said you will have to make the popcorn....

Let's see...there's some Orville Reddenbacker around here somewhere, but it's Her private stash and it'a hangin' offense. I only look dumb.

Your choices are microwave popcorn or old fashioned popped-on-the-stove stuff. We used to have a hot air popper. I miss it 'cause I'd roast coffee in it these days.

But I'm okay with meeting somewhere for popcorn...and beer.

Have you watched the debates? I am watching the GOP debate right now and that alone should answer all questions as to why the party I belong to has taken the Mr Hanky ride down the crapper. Watching Chris Christie standing behind Trump is also a tell tell sign of holy smokes why am I here. The problem though does not just belong to the GOP. The divide is across the board. That's the issue, everyone has to figure this out and not just say the GOP is divided, everything in this country is divided. Until everyone can start to concentrate on all and not just the Republicans or the Democrates we won't move forward.

The blame game is why we are all divided, plain and simple. I won't change my mind but instead I will blame. That's the problem across the board.

You have dumb and dumber. They'll never figure it out.

People need to change their focus from their differences to what makes us all similar and go from there.  It’s basically a psychosis of exceptionalism or first identifying others by how they are not like ourselves.  That’s got to end for any progress to happen.

JMO, 50 years of racial relations improvement have gone straight down the crapper during the Obama administration.  When you have legislators and pundits claiming opposition to his policies were racially-based, it only goes downhill from there.  With the media homing in on notable killings of blacks by cops or others since Trayvon Martin and looking for any sort of racial protests, this is why the divide has grown.

How many whites, Asians, and Hispanics have been killed by police in the last 3-4 years?

Or have we finally just opened the discussion on racism?

Also, he's not responsible for the racism we all know exist in the GOP.

I'm not sure we can bridge the divide through good intentions and honest discussion, not so long as one party refuses any sort of compromise and disdains bipartisanship. No, I think it will take an existential threat to force us to work together, albeit a temporary measure. These days, I'm not certain another 911 or even a Pearl Harbor would do that.

Interesting conversation, I'm not trying to give a lecture because I don't know anything you don't. But I have had many interesting conversations on race with many different people and been forced to think about it, or at very least hear their perspectives (hey, I have a black friend!). From my arms-length perspective, race relations haven't "gone straight down the crapper," but rather we have not been allowed to sit back and believe everything is fine. Simply because I didn't see it on TV, doesn't mean there wasn't a problem before. From 1920-1950s race relations appear fine, until they got all uppity in the 1960s --- or rather the civil rights movement began speaking up in the 1960s after their fathers served in WWII.

I think we are seeing the same basic feeling. Racial equality in the eyes of the law improved immensely two generations ago --- recall marrying a person of a different race was illegal in Oklahoma until 1967, and only then because of a Federal Judge (1960s was now 2 generations ago for today's college kids). But racism didn't go away: it shifted, it changed, it molded itself - but I doubt it ever really goes away. People look different, act different, and stereotypes apply. When that becomes institutional, it is racism to varying degrees.   

I don't think it was the media reporting on Malcom X or Martin Luther King that caused the divide to grow then, and I don't think it is media coverage of police killings doing it now. The media is inherently lazy. Show them a story line, and they will run with it.  Police vs. Black People is a nice, neat, easy story line. The truth of the matter isn't the point of the nightly news.


Police report killing about 1,000 people per year in the US (fwiw, about 56% of those are armed with a gun). In the last 5 years the number of killing have broken down approximately like this:

White: 2,450 people, 49% (proportional to population would be 3130)
Black: 1,500 people, 30% (660)
Hispanic: 950 people, 17.1% (855)
Asian/other: 100, 2% (355)

More white people were killed by police, but in that white people make up 63% of the population and black people make up 13% of the population - it should be nearly impossible to reverse those numbers.  As it stands, the number of dead black men is some 2.3 times higher than one would expect. A black kid between 15 and 19 is twenty-one time more likely to be killed by police than a white kid in the same age group.

Now, you could argue that there are a number of reasons for that. Social issues, economic issues, education issues - items that lead to more confrontations with police officers, more likelihood of carrying firearms during those confrontations and things other than the color of their skin that led to the death rate. BUT...

Black men make up 6% of the population, and account for 40% of unarmed people killed by police officers.

If cyclists made up 6% of the road traffic, but 40% of the deaths caused by traffic collisions with police officers --- you'd find that number extremely concerning. Even though you can list any number of reasons why a cyclist may be more likely to be killed on the road by an officer. The simple, giant disparity in numbers is tough to swallow --- even if you can't pinpoint why it is happening.

I don't agree with the Black Lives Matter people. But I get what they are trying to do and I'm glad they are doing it. If a segment of our population is mad and feels like they are being mistreated - I'd rather they speak their mind. I don't think it is necessarily a signal that relations are truly deteriorating.

Sources:
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/apr/21/police-kill-more-whites-than-blacks-but-minority-d/?page=all
http://www.washingtonpost.com/sf/investigative/2015/12/26/a-year-of-reckoning-police-fatally-shoot-nearly-1000/
http://takingnote.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/09/04/the-real-story-of-race-and-police-killings/?_r=0
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Race_and_ethnicity_in_the_United_States
http://www.lovingday.org/legal-map

Race relations have gone in the crapper because a large percentage of the population lost their minds when a black man entered the White House and they took a major political party with them. If you want to disagree with me, see Donald Trump.

And yes, police in the United States kill way too many people of all races, this is not a problem only in the black community, it impacts everyone. But, the impact to blacks and the mentally ill is very disproportionate to others.

I think the reasons for this coming up now so much are 1. everyone has a video camera in their pockets, 2. militarization of the police with left over equipment from our constant wars, 3. black people finally feeling empowered with a black man in the White House, 4. the post 9/11 feeling that police are all heroes and can do no wrong.

Why isn’t anyone acknowledging the obvious racism within the Democratic Party then?  It’s plainly obvious it exists there as well and extends to race baiting.  Racism isn’t about white vs. black, it’s also about black vs. white. 

There’s become a blanket assumption like yours that members of the GOP are racists and xenophobes.  When people disagree with policy positions for pragmatic reasons (such as immigration reform), it gets spun into racial or ethnic hatred.  Note: I have no political party affiliation, I’m simply calling it as I see it.

Why isn’t a Congressional Black Caucus viewed as exclusionary or racist?  Wouldn’t a Congressional White Caucus be viewed that way?  How about black or Hispanic student associations on college campuses?  I’d really like someone to take a swing at that quandary and explain how it is not racial or ethnic exceptionalism which would be met with strong opposition if there were groups like that for white folk.

Obama brought in very bold policies when he came into office, the ACA being the most controversial of all.  There was and is plenty of empirical data to oppose the ACA on pure economic and policy issues.  Defenders of Obamacare morphed it into claims of racism with no evidence to back it up.  Had the exact same policies been introduced by a white president and met the same opposition, what would the claim have been then?

The rest of your points are well-taken. 

Let’s face it, there are deeply-rooted societal issues within the black community regarding the lack of hope and opportunity for young black men.  That has got to change, but no one seems to know how to properly address it.  You can’t simply legislate a strong family unit that helps steer young men away from gang and criminal activity and therefore makes them less likely to end up on the wrong side of the law.

Maybe I am reading into this something that isn't being said so correct me if I am wrong. By what you say the Republicans are the ones that went ape sh$t when a black man was elected president and proof of that is Donald Trump?

As a Republican I did not vote for President Obama because of his policies, not because he was black. As a Republican I am very proud to have a black man as our President because I for one do believe that the party, the true party is a diverse, equality fighting party. The real party has fought for and continues to fight for racial equality much more than Democrat's IMO. I am not saying that to start a fight because I do see the racial hatred within my own party, but that to me is not the real Republican party.

My party stood up against the southern segregation Governors like George Wallace, Ross Barnett, Orval Eugene Faubus, and Lester Maddox. All were Democrat's that caused great harm to the civil rights movement. To be fair though, all of the north Democrat's stood up as well against these types of people, but the party of the Democrat's in the south called out the national guard, blocked schools and called for the arrests of civil rights leaders and so much more. So no, I can not and will not allow anyone blame the Republicans for the racial divide that is in our society today. REAL Republicans stand up for the rights of all, the ones that have taken over parts of the party do not reflect the real values and stances held by the vast majority, and I do mean vast majority.

This racial divide in our country can not be the only reason though. The Republican party has a legacy of equality going back to Lincoln. So there has to be much more than this one topic as to why the GOP is fracturing. After watching the debate last night though I am extremely embarrassed of my party.

Yes, there's a hard core 30%-40% of the Republican Party that are ugly racists. Again, see Donald Trump. 

A great number of those racists 30-40 years ago would have been Democrats, mostly what were called Dixiecrats. It is VERY sad that the Party of Lincoln is now being taken completely over by racists and is so reviled by anyone of color. It used to be that the Democrats were the party of the KKK and the segregated south but that's all over now. The shift between the parties on race started in the 1960s with Kennedy and Johnson backing civil rights and followed up with the Republican "southern strategy" of the 1980s. The core group of racists in this country have shifted from the Democrats to the Republicans. This is why the south used to be bright blue and now it's dark red. It's certainly not all Republicans, not even most. But these are the core of your Trump backers.

 

I've had this discussion at-length within other groups.   I was, basically since i first registered to vote, a Republican in the classic mold of "fiscally conservative, socially liberal (or at least libertarian)".  Everything you say is correct about the classic GOP.  However, since Reagan, the party has changed direction and no longer (as a percentage) what the classic party was.   We are seeing this play out in real-time right now, as the GOP is splitting into two disparate camps.  The old-guard that still represents (or at least approximates) the classic GOP, and the newer entrants represented in proxy by Trump.  This is, for better or worse, an inflection point in the GOP and will affect the party for years.

Southern Democrats depended on the support of large numbers of racist white voters who demanded segregation. The party fought for segregation as a way to keep the support of racist voters.

The House and Senate voting on that 1964 bill showed the nation pretty clearly which party stood where. The Republicans overwhelmingly opposed segregation, while Democrats were divided into two factions; one side opposing segregation, and one supporting it; with the greatest passion demonstrated by the pro-segregation side.

During the 1970’s, after the federal courts had made it clear that the states really would be forced to abide by the ’64 Civil Rights Act, the Democratic Party began to lose its grip on the South. Southern voters had always tended to agree with the Republicans on military and foreign policy issues, as well as business and religious issues. Once the segregation issue was off the table, Southern voters began to have little use for the Democrats.

From the 1860’s through the early 1970’s Dixie was solidly Democrat; today the opposite is true.

Today we see the exact same divide in the Republican party due to the Southern take over of the party.

Is there even any reason they are still doing debates?  Policy issues seem lost in 3rd grade student council antics.  It’s embarrassing.

Its amazing how history, or its interpretation, changes with the tides. New writers, new professors, new generations. Suddenly history is rewritten and those who survived it hardly recognize their reality. I would suggest you revisit Nixon's southern strategy of the 1960's which sought to exploit the racism of the south for its own growth.

You make Republicans sound like the moral giants of the last two centuries. Hardly. They were, and are, simply business oriented and the South's business model wasn't to their liking. Its not that they didn't feel solidarity with the south's racist system, they simply couldn't compete with the free labor and thus stood by while they oppressed a different set of labor, namely Irish and Asian. Those DixiCrat Democrats in the south did the same thing to the Democratic party that the Tea Party and the new south are doing to the republican party now. After LBJ turned on them, Nixon brought them in, the party fed them on simple moral ideology and now they want results. Trump is the witches brew of the party. He is the distilled product. Time to enjoy.

A last observation from an Obama supporter. Along with a lot of people, I felt it was groundbreaking that our country elected a black man because I thought it meant we were leaving our past divisive racism. A smart law professor with mixed parentage makes good. We should have all been proud because that is the reality of America. No one is pure anything and success should depend on ability. Little did I know that was an illusion. Instead it has served to enlighten me that we had merely failed to admit that our nations well rooted problems are sprouting new growth.

Yep. There are definitely racist problems everywhere. White people with racist problems. Black people with racist problems. And both parties. Not everything is a racist issue (like you said, ObamaCare as a race issue doesn't make much sense). Unfortunately, when many of your policies seem to have a greater negative impact on minority groups - you will be accused of racism even if your reasons for those policies are other-than race-based. It doesn't help when a segment of your party is overtly racist (in a poll, 20% of self identified Trump supporters would vote to revoke the emancipation proclamation (http://www.nytimes.com/2016/02/25/upshot/measuring-donald-trumps-supporters-for-intolerance.html?smid=tw-share&_r=0), 33% want to ban gays from entering the US, the Muslim stance is well known). This isn't unique to any party, it just so happens that the ball is bouncing more in the Republican Court at the moment.


My swing... It used to bother me too. I was tempted to put "Black Student Association" on my resume just to try and get extra interviews. But...

Every minority group in Congress has its own caucus, not just based on race. Each subgroup that has specific interests to look out for has a group to get together and discuss those interests and tries to form voting blocks on said issues. Race, gender, states, economic associations, religion (these are all real)... Sikh Caucus, Blue Dog Caucus, the Bike Caucus, Mens Health Caucus, International Student Exchange, Hearing Health, LGBT, Rural, Prayer, Steel, and on and on and on. There is a Wine Caucus, Small Brewers Caucus, and a Veal Caucus.  For ethnicity there is an Irish Caucus, French, Turkish, Kurdish, Chinese, Mexican and several Hispanic caucuses, Japanese, Tunisia, Turkish, UK, Hong Kong, Egypt, Finland, Scotland, Switzerland, Serbian, Slovak, Singapore, Romanian... you get the point.

The reason they aren't racist is because they are representing a group of voices and the concerns of those voices, not to exclude others, but to make their voice louder. White people are overwhelmingly well represented (49% of the population, 83% of representation), but still have many groups that are essentially white caucuses (from Armenian to Rural to Swiss). In America, black people lost their identities when they were sold into slavery and had them beaten out of them. We shouldn't be punished for the sins of our ancestors (mine weren't even here!)... this isn't a guilt trip. Rather it is an explanation of why we don't have caucuses for Zulu's, Hutu, Tusti, Ethiopians, Shantis, Ghanese, etc. etc. etc. is because the vast majority of black people in America have no clue where they are from.

Their cultural identity has been replaced by "Black" or "African American" whereas my household flies German and Irish flags on occasion. Whatever your cultural/ethnic identity is worth to you - its generally there to embrace or disregard as you see fit. My German history is very important to me during Oktoberfest and when making jokes, otherwise not-so-much, but that's my choice. But I digress...

Many white ethnicities formed their own influential caucuses in the past. The Irish infamously had Tammany Hall.  The Eastern Europeans banded together in many different areas at different times. Black people got into the game late with cohesive representation of their interests.


As stated above, are representing a common interest. There is no "white law caucus" because there are few issues that the vast majority of white people would all caucus in favor of.  There is no sense of common need to caucus in support of most things. Whereas the Native American, Asian, Hispanic, and Black Communities feel the need to join together to address issues they feel are important to their communities.

I don't view an LGBT group trying to address issues in their community as exclusionary. I don't view women's group trying to address their issues as exclusionary. I don't view Jewish groups advocating for their positions that way either. So why view black groups in that manner?

Keep digging....there still is much more to the story and the dance continues.

There was always just as much racism in the north as in the south.  As for the guy everyone trots out as the best President ever because he freed the slaves - well, he made it clear on many occasions that he was NOT an abolitionist - just morally opposed to slavery, whatever that means.  It was an abomination.  In 1858 in a debate with Stephen Douglas (another one who was not an abolitionist), Lincoln said, “I will say then that I am not, nor ever have been, in favor of bringing about in any way the social and political equality of the white and black races,”   Then went on to say he opposed blacks having the right to vote, to serve on juries, to hold office and to intermarry with whites.

Was also big on the idea of shipping freed slaves to Liberia - a US created country specifically created as the place to ship ex-slaves....

Republicans in general were NOT abolitionists any more than Democrats were at that time.

The media runs against time constraints and economics.  Numerous outfits share stories through the AP.

There's very little investigative anymore...there's no money or time.

I've dealt with it my entire life seeing how racist and xenophobic they are. The response to Obama being President made it even more clear that it exist. I think they are jackasses. That view won't be swayed on here either. The sad part is I agree with them on a lot of fiscal policy.

The racial groups exist because of the racism and/or disenfranchisement. Not a hard concept to understand.

We have the small scale example in place.  It is essentially what Mitt Romney oversaw in Massachusetts, but without all the wailing and gnashing of teeth.

Just like Cap and Trade.  A good solid Republican initiative right up to the point where a Democrat agreed and then it became evil.

There is plenty of evidence of racism, too.  At least in 30% or so of the Republican party...those people who are not Trump fans...

As Heironymous points out, there is much more nuance to the story of American racisim, but the emphasized text below is simply false. The degree of racial animus in the south is exponentially higher than in the north. The abolition movement was led by northerners who flocked to the Republican Party after its formation, and resisted by southerners and northern Democrats. This is why it is so ironic that today mainly southern Republican office-holders, among other Republicans, can be found arguing that blacks were better off under slavery than under freedom, the identical argument made in the early 1800s. The South remains a place where white supremacy is celebrated. Aside from a few nut cases such as Michelle Bachmann, northern politicians don't speak anything remotely like the same racial language their southern colleagues speak. I fear, however, that the Southernization of the GOP is bringing Southern racial attitudes into the northern mainstream.

Lincoln was above all else a pragmatist, a breed rarely understood by activists in either party today. Whatever his opinions on the institution of slavery, Lincoln's primary objective was the preservation of the Union. He understood slavery to be evil but also understood that abolition would drive the Union apart. He believed that slavery would die out on its own and drew the line at expansion to new states and territories. This was the main issue between northern Democrats and northern Republicans before his election. To add some context to Heironymous's citation of Lincoln/Douglas, Stephen Douglas was the principal author of the Kansas-Nebraska Act, which included a sovereignty provision that would permit slavery to expand into the new states. Because of this provision Lincoln opposed the Act. Lincoln and Douglas first debated over that issue in Peoria, IL. Lincoln's Peoria Speech laid out his opposition to slavery well before his presidential campaign. The full text of the speech can be found here: http://quod.lib.umich.edu/cgi/t/text/text-idx?c=lincoln;cc=lincoln;rgn=div2;view=text;idno=lincoln2;node=lincoln2:282.1 (http://quod.lib.umich.edu/cgi/t/text/text-idx?c=lincoln;cc=lincoln;rgn=div2;view=text;idno=lincoln2;node=lincoln2:282.1), but a short quote sums it up:


Lincoln, on October 16, 1854.

Even the Emancipation Proclamation, now considered to be a bold stroke for freedom, was nuanced. It abolished slavery only in the rebel states, preserving it in slave states that remained in the Union: Kentucky, West Virginia, and Maryland.  And Lincoln never publicly supported black suffrage. But he clearly saw the slaves as human beings who were entitled to respect rather than chattel to be owned. At the same time, he was trying to walk the tightrope between progress on the issue and war. His election alone provoked the South to attack. That should sound familiar to us today.

My main objection to Heironymous's contribution is threefold: it indulges in false equivalency between northern/southern and white/black racial attitudes, it underestimates the participation of abolitionists in the Republican Party after it's formation in 1854, and it portrays positions taken in the heat of a presidential campaign as being definitive of Lincoln's entire philosophy.

My contribution is sketchy in that it is so incomplete.  Backfill is left as an exercise for the interested observer.  Nuance is one major key in all of this.  

As for north/south attitudes, well there was and is still a lot of northern racism.  The degree and action level is less - for example, there were nowhere near as many lynchings in the north compared to south through the late 1960's.  If you keep someone out of your housing - as Trump and his Daddy and many other Yankee's have actively done - or keep someone in menial labor with no possibility of advancement, well that is still racism.  And it isn't just white/black or black/white.  It's white/asian, asian/white, black/mexican, mexican/black.  Any/all of the possible combinations.  It's a constellation of interconnected hatreds, dislikes, and mistrusts.  If you aren't one of us, you are the "enemy".  It IS human nature at some level for some reason.


Lynchings by state, 1882 - 1968

http://law2.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/shipp/lynchingsstate.html

The best analysis I've read of what is happening to the Republican party-
http://finance.yahoo.com/news/forget-trump-heres-whos-really-101500374.html?soc_src=copy

The Freedom Caucus is like a tumor that doesn't mind destroying the host to feed its hunger.