Polimom has a couple of blind-spots, and one of them surfaces right here:
WASHINGTON — A new Republican Party television ad featuring a scantily clad white woman winking and inviting a black candidate to “call me” is drawing charges of race-baiting, with critics saying it contradicts a landmark GOP statement last year that the party was wrong in past decades to use racial appeals to win support from white voters.
Critics said the ad, which is funded by the Republican National Committee and has aired since Friday, plays on fears of interracial relationships to scare some white voters in rural Tennessee to oppose Democratic Rep. Harold E. Ford Jr. Ford is locked in a tight race, hoping to become the first African American senator since Reconstruction to represent a state in the former Confederacy.
The ad is here (having trouble with the embedding — sorry).
There’s a real ruckus being raised about this, but it’s going right over my head, folks. I found absolutely nothing in there that smacked of racism… and on race relations, my sensitivity meter generally takes very little pressure to set off alarms.
However, I’ve run into other disconnects in the past. The last time it happened (here and here), I concluded that there are some things that are targeted so far away from where I’m standing, I’m never gonna get it. Maybe this is one of those?
Unlike me, of course, there are plenty of folks who have no trouble seeing the problem. Joe Gandelman, for example, says:
And what’s the subtext here? You don’t have to be p.c. or a liberal to conclude […]: it’s saying to voters “he likes white women.”
I have enormous respect for Joe’s opinion, but he lost me on this; that’s not what the ad said to me at all. I saw “he went to a party that was hosted by a company often associated with women of loose morals“. Her skin color just didn’t hit me.
Was the ad playing deliberately to this? (WaPo)
“Oh, sure, there’s some prejudice,” Layne said as he contemplated casting a ballot for a black man. “I wouldn’t want my daughter marrying one.” But he’s more concerned about rising medical costs: When it comes to voting, “you gotta look at the person, not the color.”
[snip]
But statewide office seemed beyond [Ford’s] reach in Tennessee, a state with a history of racially divided voting where Republicans had won recent Senate races.
Is this really a target in 2006?
Folks, if there are actually white voters in Tennessee — or anywhere else — who saw this deliberately-designed floozy and thought, “Oh my goodness! That scary black man might try to deflower our innocent damsels”, Polimom thinks they’re ignorant beyond belief.
Have we hit a big Polimom blind-spot?
James Joyner is another thoughtful writer who took a serious look at the ad (and other analyses), and tried to understand things, but partially concluded:
Two problems with that analysis, though. First, as noted above, the Ford-Playboy thing is a GOP talking point in this campaign. Second, the type of voter who still doesn’t know whether he supports Ford or Coker at this late stage of the game is what we in the business call a “moron.” These tend not to be people with a mastery of complex symbolism.
Of course, you know — sometimes a rose really is just a rose (and a floozy is just a floozy).
Is it just me? What did you think when you saw the ad?
As negative campaign ads go, this was a great one: sharp, funny, and with just the right edge. Still not sure Coker is all about, but we don’t want to talk about that, do we?
Was there a white girl in there somewhere? Oh yeah, now that you mention it…
The NAACP and like organizations have two main purposes in life – to find things to be offended by and become offended. Blech.
I think bringing up race as an issue out of that ad is more along the lines of his supporters taunting the state as, “Oh, that’s right, you are a southern state so you aren’t going to vote for him because he isn’t white.” Like as a last ditch effort to detract from the ad being played over and over, the counter response is “I dare you to show that you aren’t racist.”
It sounds to me that if Ford is struggling, it has more to do with him having some family money connections in Tennessee than it does his race. The role of his family in that state’s affairs is not something people outside the state can quite factor in accurately, and I am surprised that it has not been reported on more.
And would it really be so surprising that a Democrat candidate lost a state that has leaned Republican lately? Sure, it is a close race, but without the polls and just looking at previous race results, I think it would be more of an “upset” if any Dem won, than to have lost a close race.
The ad could certainly have been worse. I might not have put any credence in the claims at all, if I hadn’t heard hisCorker’s latest:
http://www.talkingpointsmemo.com/images/2006-10-25_Corker_Radio_Ad.mp3
Whenver Ford is discussed, menacing drums on the soundtrack. When Corker is discussed, swelling strings.
Again, not blatant, easily deniable, but I see a pattern emerging.
Greg — I listened to the radio ad, too. Pretty ambiguous if taken alone (again), but in combination, it’s certainly odd.
Meanwhile, they are apparently pulling the ad (link) — so I gather this is indeed one of my blind spots.
Yep, I think we’ve hit a “big Polimom blind-spot.” Perhaps you are just too pure of heart to see it. Having grown up in northeast Mississippi, not far from the Tennessee state line, and having attended college in Tennessee, I can assure you that this is egregious race-baiting that will certainly appeal to a particular segment of the population in that area of the world – mostly older white guys. It might just be enough of a segment to put Corker over the top. I hope not.
People really watched the add and the only thing that stuck was the white woman asking the black man to call her? Somehow I have the feeling that anyone being influnced by the white woman/black man inuendo would not have been a Ford voter anyway.
Robert writes: “…anyone being influnced by the white woman/black man inuendo would not have been a Ford voter anyway.”
Good point, but the goal may well have been to drive anti-Ford votes up. “Be sure to get out there and vote for the other guy because this uppity Ford feller is going to grab all the pretty white women and turn them into his harem. Mark my words, boys.”
Nothing wrong with increasing voter turnout, but once again this kind of approach increases ‘against’ votes rather than ‘for’ votes.
I don’t think it’s a blind spot… You’re not blind because you can’t be expected to see something that’s not there. Racialists will always see race in everything whether it’s there or not.
But just a few random thoughts about this topic:
1. Aren’t the overwhelming majority of most playmates “white”? So, wouldn’t the caricature in the video make sense?
2. Isn’t “Junior” half-white? I wonder how his “white” mother feels when he refers to himself (or is referred to by others) as being “black”. At least Tiger Woods refers to himself as “Cablinasian” to recognize all aspects of his racial heritage — it seems “Junior” just throws half of himself away…
3. Is it just me, or does this whole silly exercise remind anybody else of those Dr. Seuss characters with the stars on their bellies?
That James Joyner bit at the end is the funniest (and most apt) bit of political commentary I’ve read in a long time. Thanks for finding that
I’ll admit, my first thought when I saw that ad wasn’t that the “floozy” was a white woman hitting on a black man. And that’s probably a function of my being too young and too moderate/nonracist to think in that way. But the problem is that there are people who think that way, and yes, they are in the state of Tennessee just as much as they are in the state of Georgia (where I live).
In response to The Umpire’s comments: Hopefully (and from what I can tell from Polimom’s writings), Caty, TX is a fairly colorblind city. If you’ve lived in the Southeast for any period of time, you know that those places are very few and very far between here. Yes, there are people who cry racism every time someone who isn’t white encounters difficulty. But we’re also talking about a state with a history of racism since its creation. Whether or not it was intentional, what a lot of middle-aged and older white men will see is a black man who goes after white women at playboy parties. I don’t know what else to say except that that’s the way that it is.
Quite simply, in our society, biracial people are identified (by others) as whatever part isn’t white. No, it’s not right, but it’s the way we think.
Patrick wrote: “Quite simply, in our society, biracial people are identified (by others) as whatever part isn’t white. No, it’s not right, but it’s the way we think.”
But it’s not just that “others” identify “others” as their non-“white” genetic background… but many “bi-racials” do it to themselves.
All I can say is that if I were “Junior’s” white mother, I’d be more than just a little bit offended.
(Oh, and it’s Katy… not Caty — but I don’t necessarily agree with your assessment of the town. There’s a big difference between “Katy” and “Katy-proper”…)
It’s certainly a true statement that Katy is not populated solely by the color-blind. However, I’d say the issues out here are more related to illegal immigration than the floozy discussion we’ve been having on this thread (speaking of which… this is a great dialogue!)
Regarding mixed ancestry and/ or bi-racial people — I think society applies the labels strenuously, and mercilessly. And the pressure on a person with one parent who is black and another white to “be black” (as opposed to being able to choose to “be white”, or even multi-ethnic) comes hard from both sides of the color-chasm. Yes, there are bi- or multi-ethnic people who choose to identify themselves as black, but it’s very hard to choose another identity instead (see: Tiger Woods).
And I cannot possibly comment without responding to Dorothy, who made my whole day with “Perhaps you are just too pure of heart to see it.”
I’m pretty sure that’s not how I ended up the way I am, and I’m shocked that any number of people haven’t hastened to assure you of that. (smile…)
I thought his parents were just light skinned