Wednesday, January 17, 2007

Tom Tancredo enters presidential race

Tom Tancredo, Republican Congressman from Colorado, recently announced that he is running for president. This could a very good thing for the prospects of the Democratic Party. Think about the impact of the growing Hispanic vote, which in the past has been roughly evenly split between Republicans and Democrats, going 85 or 90% for the Democrats, like the African-American vote.

To see why Tom Tancredo running for president might have that effect take a look at the “Cultural Impact” page from his Congressional Immigration Reform Caucus website. http://tancredo.house.gov/irc/culture.html Whenever Tancredo talks about the harmful effects of immigration, although the first few sentences refer to illegal immigration, most of what he says applies equally well, like that “Cultural Impact” page, to both legal and illegal immigrants. Although he does not come right out and say it, it is clear from the harmful effects he cites and his preoccupation with the southern border that he thinks Hispanics are a big problem.

If you are not Hispanic the racist undercurrent of everything he says and does may not be immediately obvious, but I can assure you that it is very clear to Hispanics. So as long as he is always clearly identified as a Republican and the other Republicans continue to not denounce him and his views I think increased exposure of his views could be very good for the prospects of the Democratic Party.

5 comments:

QCMediaGhost said...

President Tancredo will pick up illegal driver's licenses just as fast as you Democraps hand them out. Ghost

Dave Barrett said...

qcmediaghost,
Republican elected officals are handing out illegal driver's licenses just as fast as any Democratic elected offical.
Republican Chamber of Commerce types oppose rounding up and deporting illegal immigrants just as much as any Democrat.
That's is why it would be such a coup for the Democrats if the Republican Party was to allow itself to be seen as anti-Hispanic as a result of Tancredo's candidacy. The Democratic Party as a whole is not any more pro-Hispanic or any less racist than the Republican Party as a whole. That is why the current situation is so delicious from a Democratic Party viewpoint.
I can't believe that the powers behind the scenes at the Republican Party did not somehow convince Tancredo not to run. They must be distracted or something.

QCMediaGhost said...

It will be interesting to see the initial support (or lack of support) for candidate Tancredo. When someone with strong views on a political issue throws his hat in the ring, the middle of the roaders on both sides will be watching. You use the phrase ‘anti-Hispanic’ and if we may innovate to say ‘anti-illegal-Hispanic’ (or anti-illegal-anyone) it will hopefully keep racism off the table. We could be wrong, but isn’t ‘Tancredo’ a Latin name? Ghost

Dave Barrett said...

qcmediaghost,
I would be glad to refer to Tancredo as anti-illegal-Hispanic if he would confine himself to only opposing illegal Hispanics. But as his web page that I linked to in the article shows he also opposes legal Hispanics. He thinks too many of them have come here and that this is changing the country for the worse. It would be a lie to refer to those views as anything other than anti-Hispanic and racist.
To say that he only opposes illegal Hispanic would be a gross mischaracterization of his views. I try to be as honest as I can. I hope you do the same.

Anonymous said...

Tancredo is a racist. He's against the cultural changes that occur with the influx of hispanics, legal citizens included. His family is of Italian descent and I don't see him trying to get rid of Little Italy in New York or other Italian enclaves and influences. Why isn't he against the cultural changes that the influx of Italian immigrants caused not too long ago? It's because he has a personal problem against hispanics and is a racist. He's an embarrassment to the state of Colorado and to the Republican party.