The National Republican Congressional Committee sent a postcard attack ad to my house today complaining that Paul Carmouche (the Democratic candidate for Louisiana House District Four is soft on crime and just "too liberal."
They have more attack ad stuff on their web site and the special web site they set up for these attack ads intended to influence the vote in the runoff election happening this Saturday.
Given that the recent Republican history of using racially charged imagery in political ads, it's no surprise that the postcard ad has a mug shot of a black criminal defendant -- it's just a repeat of the racially charged "Willie Horton" ads that the Republicans used in 1988.
2 comments:
I live in a city with a sky-rocketing murder rate. An Alderman in down state St Louis is advising residents arm themselves (he's AA too if that means anything...)
One thing I've noticed is a reluctance for people to talk about getting tough on crime for fear of being branded racist. One outcome of that I fear is AA's mostly stuck in communities swamped with violent crime and very poor police service.
Worse, in Cook County, the police are getting busted for being the criminals.
There is a real problem out there and I have a feeling crying racism on some of this stuff serves AA's the least as the bear the brunt of the violence from crime... at least in the communities I know. I've suggested the local GOPs pick up on it but they fear these kind of Willie Horton responses.
Bill -- given the incidents in our community where unarmed black men have been shot, unarmed black men in wheelchairs have been shot, etc. -- racism and classism may both be involved here.
The situation in Shreveport and in the American South in general may be different than Chicago.
Here's what I could find about the news coverage on this from 2003:
http://www.courttv.com/news/2003/0822/shreveport_ap.html
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