As campaign season rolls along, Republicans everywhere have been using dog whistle language, and sometimes direct statements, to demean minorities. Republicans seem unable to function without the politics of fear and hate. One Republican candidate for the US Senate faced a terrible dilemma. He could not attack black people, because Michigan has such a large black population, so he went after Asians instead.
…Michigan Senate candidate Pete Hoekstra (R) aired his first campaign ad of the cycle Sunday night, and Asian-American groups are crying foul.
The spot accuses Sen. Debbie Stabenow (D) of helping China by increasing the national debt…
…Claiming an opponent will send or has sent jobs to China is hardly a new threat in Michigan politics. Democrats have used such attacks. One of the most famous ads of the 2010 cycle, from the third-party group Citizens Against Government Waste, featured a Chinese professor of the future talking about the collapse of the United States.
But the broken English and stereotypical music in Hoekstra’s ad have provoked a backlash.
“Really, really dumb,” Republican strategist Mike Murphy said over Twitter. “I mean really.”
The Michigan chapter of Asian & Pacific Islander American Vote, a nonpartisan group, called the ad “very disturbing” in a statement. A member of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights called the ad “blatantly racist.”
A group of Detroit black ministers joined in, arguing that the spot is “no different than him having a black person speaking in slave dialect.”… [emphasis original]
Inserted from <Washington Post>
Here’s the ad.
It’s hard to get more blatant than that.
Chris Hayes covers the racism and explains why Hoekstra’s claims are lies.
Visit msnbc.com for breaking news, world news, and news about the economy
Like most Republicans, Hoekstra blames Democrats for the Debt that he and his fellow Republicans ran up. Their lies are routine now, but it is shameful that the do so in such an ugly way.
17 Responses to “Republican Racism Asian Style”
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One of the talking heads mentioned last night that he’d like to interview the actress in that commercial — I second that – who is she and what did she think she was doing? I certainly wouldn’t want to be in her shoes, I hope she was paid a lot of money for her “night of shame”!
As for that crap of a man – what an idiot! At least he’s not trying to hide his racism, or sugar coat it! An honest racist is hard to find!
“Really, really dumb, “Republican strategist Mike Murphy said over Twitter. “I mean really.”
Shows what they really are… sigh
What Rixar said!
But in reality the ad above is political ad. Rove and his fox news buddys are trying to turn this around to make look like this is the adthat we should all be appalled at
WATCH: Clint Eastwood’s ‘Halftime In America’ Ad
MY Fav
mamabear
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/news/super-bowl-commercials/
Thanks TC for getting this out 🙂 mamabear
YVW, Mama. The software thought your comment was spam, but I released it a few hours later. Right on!
All they have to ask that actress is who gave her the direction to cutely slay her subject/ verb agreement (“Their economy get bad; our economy get good”). Repuglican stereotyping is alive and well. I’m only surprised she didn’t bow 50 times like Charlie Chan.
We don’t know who the actress is and the guy who made the ad refuses to tell.
Don’t buy into the Fear-mongering of the RepublicanTs and Tea-buggers.
Amen!
The “genius” who created this racist ad is Fred Davis, whose uncle just happens to be Sen. Jim “Global-Warming-Is-Hoax”Imhofe (R-OK). Davis is one of the go-to guys who creates sleazy ads for Repubicons.
He really is a piece of work!
More ‘Code Words” to add to Racist Language 101 ?? Really dumb is putting it mildly indeed.
These were not even “code words”. It was blatant.
I have been subjected to racism on both sides of the coin — my mother’s father walked my brother and I to the corner store in Buffalo NY when we were children. When we were near the store, there were a lot of blacks hanging around and my grandfather grabbed me harshly by the shoulder and pulled me close to him saying “Get over here girl or the n. . .rs are going to get you!” He demonised the blacks in such a way that I still remember it over 50 years later as if it were yesterday. I never respected my grandfather after that and couldn’t wait to get back to Canada. The other side of the coin came when I was in my last year of highschool. I was asked to go out to a Christmas party with the cousin of my best friend. He was from Jamaica and we would sit together etc at school talking. I liked this fellow until after the Christmas party when I overheard he and a group of friends talking. He said he only took me out to see how far he could get with a little white girl! Well he didn’t get very far at all and I wanted nothing to do with him ever again.
Why is it that humans cannot see the beauty in each soul? Why cannot people see that, in the words of the Moor in Kevin Costner’s Robin Hood, “Allah loves wondrous variety.”
We all bleed red when cut. We all put our pants on one leg at a time (well except firemen who slide down a pole into bothboots with pants attached!). We all cry when we’re hurt. We all mourn the loss of friends and family. We all have a voice to communicate. We all have two arms with which to hug another. We all need food and water to survive physically and love to survive emotionally. Why then do we insist on shooting ourselves in the foot with racism and greed?
Hoekstra reminds me of the Boers, the Afrikaans of South Africa in the past. What’s worse, not only is he a racist, but he lies such that I don’t think he knows what the truth is. For that matter, how many other Republican/Teabaggers know the truth? The Republican/Teabagger politicians too often are sheeple too — they believe the lies and self interests of their corporate masters! And those that do get a glimmer of understanding but deny it are complicit in this theft of America from the American people.
I think I better stop flapping my jaws now before they become the jaw bones of a jackass.
Lynn, the difference is that the creep who objectified you acted on individual racism. Republican racism is institutionalized.
What else are the Klanservatives going to run on-their record? Racism is about all they have left.
What about sexism and religious hatred?