You would think that two black men running for the Senate in any state would be celebrated as an example of how far we have come on race in the USA.

It would be nice if we could, but it’s obvious that the Walker candidacy was a cynical ploy to just put up any black person in hopes of peeling off black voters just because of his race. He was clearly not qualified, and his 100% refusal to accept abortion for any reason even though he had benefited personally for him showed that pro-life voters don’t really care about abortion as much as they think women are just baby holders for a few months.

I hope this ends his career. He can go join the same speaker circuit that Sister Sara Palin is on and run around the country fleecing the rubes for $100 a ticket while he talks about werewolves, vampires, and his days on the police force.

Nobody should forget what was required of the people who voted in favor of the 1964 Civil Rights Act: they risked ending their political career by doing so, regardless of their party affiliation.

However, blindly saying “more Republicans than Democrats[sic] voted for it” is committing two things:

A) Overlooking the fact that neither of today’s parties is what they were in 1964. Both have moved significantly to the right, with the republicans now essentially authoritarian
B) It ignores the interaction between party and region. If you break things down by “South” meaning the 11 states that were the traitors in the Civil war, and “North” the other states, the final voting numbers look like this.

House By region and party (yea-nay)
Southern Democrats: 8 to 83
Southern Republicans: 0-11
Northern Democrats: 145-8
Northern Republicans: 136-24

Senate by region and party (yea-nay)

Southern Democrats: 1-20
Southern Republicans: 0-1
Northern Democrats: 45-1
Northern Republicans: 27-5

Simpson’s Paradox anyone?

It also overlooks the fact that the racists flooded to the Republican Party, not the Democratic Party (for the most part: there were, no doubt, some of the racist goons in the non-politician population who stayed with the Democratic Party b/c they realized that was the better place for working people: dirtbag Byrd was an odd case the Democratic group would have better kicked out than kept).

Whoever wins this race in Georgia – it does not support or demonstrate white supremacy (in my opinion of course). You would think that two black men running for the Senate in any state would be celebrated as an example of how far we have come on race in the USA. Things are definitely better today than they were during Jim Crow and certainly better now than before the civil war.

As you say, those things had been in the Republican Party for a long time

Longer than many today realise. Goes right back to before the start of the Naval War of 1812 with the likes of Jefferson, Monroe and Madison employing filibustering (in the sense of making unauthorised war) techniques to acquire new territory.

@ppnl:

Yes, I see I didn’t make my point well. Let me try this: Reagan was the first real driver to show the right that repeating lies often enough (all types: racist, misogynist, anti-gay, political) while embracing the worst of society could be a very effective tool. As you say, those things had been in the Republican Party for a long time, but they tried to hide them. He showed having them in the open didn’t result in any penalty and actually attracted support

Regan didn’t start the path. He just put the finishing touches on it.

The south had a longstanding bitterness toward the republican party due to the civil war. With the civil rights movement in the 60s the republicans sought to use racial divisions to change the power balance in the south.

It is ironic that the party that was born to fight slavery became possessed by the undead spirit of the old confederacy. But that began long before Regan.