Political Ruminations

Chris Matthews Calls Out Republicans for Race Baiting

On Morning Joe today, along with RNC Chairman Reince Priebus, Chris Matthews responded to Republican criticism on the negative campaigning by Obama by tearing into Priebus. Matthews focused on the lies emanating from the Romney Campaign that focus on race baiting (the welfare ads, and Pres. Obama’s birth certificate):

“ I have to call you on this, Mr. Chairman. But they've both been negative. That cheap shot about 'I don't have a problem with my birth certificate' was awful. It is an embarrassment to your party to play that card.

You can play your games and giggle about it but the fact is it’s your side playing that card. When you start talking about work requirements, you know what game you're playing and everybody knows what game you're playing. It's a race card and yeah, if your name's Romney, yeah you were well born, you went to prep school, yeah, brag about it. This guy has an African name and he's got to live with it. Look who's gone further in their life. Who was born on third base? Making fun of the guy's birth certificate issue when it was never a real issue except for the right wing. ”

Watch the video:

Just a couple of weeks ago, the editorial board of the Des Moines Register also called attention to Romney’s race baiting:

The presumptive Republican presidential nominee wants voters to conjure images in their minds of freeloading moms sitting on couches watching big screen televisions. And he wants voters to think the president is helping them do just that ... but the idea of anyone 'sponging off the system' is apparently something Romney believes voters will rally behind him to oppose. He may be right.

Republicans have a long history of using race in their politics, the past detailed in this 2010 piece by Bob Cesca on the “Southern Strategy” [a must read for anyone serious about politics in this time].

In all honesty, Romney’s campaign strategy most concerns me because it’s based entirely on telling lies. That some of the lies employ the tactic of race baiting just makes it that much worse.

That said, we need to beat the crap out of Mitt Romney in November, both to win the brilliant, decent man who is our president another term, but also to prevent the Republicans and their candidate-without-honor from completing the final destruction of the democracy we love.

Morning Quote: Mitt Romney

Mitt Romney tries to blame Democrats for the contraception wars (which culminated in the bombing of a Planned Parenthood clinic in Wisconsin)  and blusters his way through an interview with the right wing website, Newsmax:

“But there's no question that over the past several weeks, that a discussion about religious liberty was distorted into a discussion about contraceptives. And there was the somehow Republicans are opposed to contraceptives. I think it was most unfortunate twist by our Democrat friends. I think this will pass as an issue as people understand our real position.”

There has been no misunderstanding by Democrats of Republican positions on women’s concerns, Mr. Romney.

And, apparently Independent women understand the Republican position as well. Taegan Goddard:

The Washington Post digs into the latest USA Today-Gallup poll of a dozen battleground states and notes that "among independent women -- a key group of swing voters -- Obama had been trailing Romney by five points in a series of surveys late last year. But that number shifted dramatically in polling conducted in February and March, and the president took a 14-point lead over the former Massachusetts governor, marking a net gain of 19 points."

When Reince Priebus,  the Chairman of the Republican National Committee feels free to publicly make a remark such as this one, it becomes crystal clear exactly how Republicans feel about women.

Morning Quote: Reince Priebus

Republican National Committee Chairman Reince Priebus on the GOP war on women:

“If the Democrats said we had a war on caterpillars and every mainstream media outlet talked about the fact that Republicans have a war on caterpillars, then we’d have problems with caterpillars. It’s a fiction.”