Bob Herbert - Incoherent Hypocricy

So I read this this morning in Pravda The New York Times... Bob Herbert sneering at Karl Rove and Newt Gigrich for .... uh, sneering...

It’s hard to fathom the heights of hypocrisy currently being scaled by the foaming-in-the-mouth crazies who are leading the charge against the nomination. Newt Gingrich, who never needed a factual basis for his ravings, rants on Twitter that Judge Sotomayor is a “Latina woman racist,” apparently unaware of his incoherence in the “Latina-woman” redundancy in this defamatory characterization.

Um, Ralph, can you queue that Sonia Sotomayor quote, please?

“I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would more often than not reach a better conclusion than a white male who hasn’t lived that life.” - Sonia Sotomayor

So apparently it's ignorant redundancy when a White European American Male uses "Latina Woman" ... but when a Latina uses it, it's not. (Perhaps that's the "empathy" they're looking for) When a Latina suggests a female hispanic (don't want to get in trouble with Herbert's cluelessness and redundancy cops) would make a better judge than a white male ... calling her a racist is not defamatory -- unless the same deference to the benefit of the doubt would be given a white male making the converse statement.

Karl Rove sneered that Ms. Sotomayor was “not necessarily” smart.

Notice he said "not necessarily" smart, not that she isn't smart (although the actual context is that Charlie Rose said that she was "very smart", to which Karl responded "not necessarily"). And by Bob Herbert's own yardstick, our Latina is clearly clueless and incoherent, so maybe Karl is on to something. (I also seriously doubt that Karl "sneered", but it fits the mass character assasinating narrative Bob's working up here.)

Herbert goes on to say:

It turns the stomach. There is no level of achievement sufficient to escape the stultifying bonds of bigotry. It is impossible to be smart enough or accomplished enough.

I guess we're ignoring Reagan apointee Sandra Day O'Connor and Bush 41 appointee Clarence Thomas.

Again, I've yet to see anybody complain that she's unqualified because of her race or gender. Her apparent ideology (content of her character)? Yes. Race or gender, no. Well, except for the people who argue that her race and gender are very important components in what makes her qualified. But that's not the opposition.

And yet opposition to her on grounds that in her own words she indicated her race and gender would make her a better judge than a white male is "racist". And we're just supposed to say, "yeah, you're right" and ignore the fact that if a white male had said the converse, he would have been disqualified instantly. Somewhere, the Bob Herberts of the world have to know this, but it doesn't compute in their Progressive worldview so it is just thrown out to the curb with the trash without a second thought. As if it were not even worthy of a second thought.

The amount of disrespect that has spattered the nomination of Judge Sotomayor is disgusting. She is spoken of, in some circles, as if she were the lowest of the low. Rush Limbaugh — now there’s a genius! — has compared her nomination to a hypothetical nomination of David Duke, a former head of the Ku Klux Klan.

Really? What did Rush actually say? Go listen for yourself. In context. Hyperbole? Sure. Got the point across? Yup. It's clear that Rush has more going on between his ears than Mr. Herbert does here.

Ms. Sotomayor is a member of the National Council of La Raza, the Hispanic civil rights organization. In the crazy perspective of some right-wingers, the mere existence of La Raza should make decent people run for cover. La Raza is “a Latino K.K.K. without the hoods and the nooses,” said Tom Tancredo, a Republican former congressman from Colorado.

Imagine an organization whose mission it was to promote the interests of white people called "The Race". Just for a moment. Because it seems to me that now, again by his own standards, Herbert is ignorant of the Spanish language. That's literally what "La Raza" means. Just sayin'.

Are we supposed to not notice that these are the tribunes of a party that rose to power on the filthy waves of racial demagoguery?

Huh.

• Lincoln. - Republican. Martin Luther King Jr. - Republican.
• 1854. Democrats passed the Kansas-Nebraska act that overturned the Missouri Compromise... allowing the importing of slaves into the territories.
• After the Civil War, 23 blacks (13 ex-slaves) were elected to Congress. All as Republicans. (The first black Democrat wasn't elected to Congress until 1935.)
• Democrats opposed the "40 acres and a mule" after the Civil War. Vetoed by Democrat Andrew Jackson.
• A little lesson here... in 1867, 170 people, 150 of them black, formed the Texas Republican Party. Not the "Black" Texas Republican Party. The Texas Republican Party.
• The Emancipation Proclamation? 100% of Republicans voted for it. 23% of Democrats voted for it.
• 14th Amendment? Every voting Republican voted for it. No Democrats voted for it. (Maybe this is why they're not concerned with "equal protection").
• 15th Amendment, guaranteeing Blacks the right to vote? Same scenario as the 14th Amendment.
• In 1872 during congressional investigations, Democrats admitted creating the KKK in an effort to stop the spread of the Republican Party and to re-establish Democratic control of the southern states. Blacks, who were solidly Republican at the time, were the primary targets of the KKK's violence.
• Southern Democrats (such as Al Gore's father, Al Sr.) debated against the 1964 Civil Rights Act and the 1965 Voting Rights Act.
• At least a majority of Democrats (64%) voted for the 1964 Civil Rights Act (80% of Republicans voted for it).

There's more.

The deal is, the Republicans as a rule (far, far more than the Democrats) have been for equal treatment, and have been demonized in the past 30 or so years as being racist for not wanting to go beyond that and elevate minorities to a special status. It is not the Republicans being inconsistent. It's the Democrats buying minority votes and convincing them that they are dependent on Democrats to keep those mean Republicans from putting them back under the boot.

I am not saying there are not racist Republicans, nor am I saying all Democrats are, or were, racists. Lefties can point to examples But you can't ignore the numbers and the trend over our history.

Where were the right-wing protests when Ronald Reagan went out of his way to kick off his general election campaign in 1980 with a salute to states’ rights in, of all places, Philadelphia, Miss., not far from the site where three young civil rights workers had been snatched and murdered by real-life, rabid, blood-thirsty racists?

Just what is Bob insinuating here? That Ronald Reagan must be a racist because he kicked off his campaign in Philadelphia, Mississippi, where 16 years earlier real-life, rabid, blood-thirsty racist Democrats in the KKK snatched and murdered three young civil rights workers?

It was always silly to pretend that the election of Barack Obama was evidence that the U.S. was moving into some sort of post-racial, post-ethnic, post-gender nirvana.

Pretty silly indeed when you consider that race and gender seem to figure prominently in the decisions this administration makes, and that is no different from the way Democrats have operated ever since they subjugated minorities as slaves of the Democratic party.