A Nativist GOP Wired to Fail in a Diverse America

Source: American Taino

September 30, 2008

Today's GOP is under the firm grip of a pack of vicious, nativistic and egotistical loudmouths. For a political party its a deathly defect. Neal Gabler call's it the GOP's McCarthy gene. He theorizes that it's this "something deep in the DNA of the Republican Party that determines how Republicans run for office". They are repelled and even angered by diversity.

"Republicans continue to push the idea that this is a center-right country and that Americans have swooned for GOP anti-government posturing all these years, but the real electoral bait has been anger, recrimination and scapegoating. That's why John McCain kept describing Barack Obama as some sort of alien and why Palin, taking a page right out of the McCarthy playbook, kept pushing Obama's relationship with onetime radical William Ayers.

There may be assorted intellectuals and ideologues in the party, maybe even a few centrists, but there is no longer an intellectual or even ideological wing. The party belongs to McCarthy and his heirs -- Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Bill O'Reilly and Palin. It's in the genes."

It's this part of the GOP's political DNA that accounts for the post-9/11 explosion of xenophobia, bigotry and racism. And just like McCarthy's witch hunts in the '50s gravelly wounded the once proud party of Lincoln, so again its modern day base instincts for fear mongering, intimidation, scapegoating and bluster are causing it to implode.

Nativist GOP losers are a growing list, including George Allen, Randy Graf, J. D. Hayworth, Virgil Goode, Lou Barletta, Tom Tancredo, Mitt Romney, Elizabeth Dole, John McCain and Sarah Palin.

It's why the GOP lost the once reliably red states of Florida, North Carolina, Virginia, Nevada, New Mexico and Colorado to Barack Obama.

And it's why the GOP will likely lose Arizona, Texas and even Georgia in the not so distant future.

It's even why the Waco-Tribune -- in the heart of Red Texas -- had this to say in its post-presidential election wrap-up: The big question is if the GOP can reach beyond its far-right constituency and put aside the politics of hate and division that sank the McCain-Palin ticket. Otherwise, party hard-liners will lead it to further defeat.

Unfortunately for the party, that's not likely. As Neal Gabler observes:

And that is also why the Republican Party, despite the recent failure of McCarthyism, is likely to keep moving rightward, appeasing its more extreme elements and stoking their grievances for some time to come.

Related:
A Blue Texas? Latinos Will Decide
GOP's Racist, Anti-Latino Ad in Georgia U.S. Senate Run-off
Latinos Rising Lance a Nativist GOP?
Hispanic voters gaining strength in key states
The GOP's Bitter Harvest to Come
A Xenophobic Zeitgeist - Erasing GOP Latino Gains
WSJ -- The GOP's Anti-Latino Tone is a Loser
Linda Chavez: GOP's Self-Inflicted Wound
Republican Presidential Hopefuls Diss 1,000 Latino Leaders
The Coming Latino Voter Response to the Failure of Immigration Reform
Republicans: nativism is a proven loser
Clint Bolick: The GOP Must Now Prove Itself to Latinos
Linda Chavez' The Company You Keep: In Search of anti-Hispanic hostility
GOP Risks Losing Latino Voters

Photos (Top to Bottom): Joe McCarthy, Patrick Buchanan, Sean Hannity, Tom Tancredo, Lou Barletta)

Hate speech rises in the media

Submitted by jonathan on Sat, 2008-10-04 10:33. Media Justice | Media Literacy/Bias | Newswire

Full Story:

by Joe Torres, Stop Big Media

For many people of color, fighting against our nation's media system is a matter of life and death. Too often, the media have contributed to the racial divisions that still exist in this country by marginalizing people of color in its coverage.

A major reason why this division exists is because people of color do not control the mass dissemination of their own images. Few people of color work in our nation's newsrooms, and fewer own broadcast stations.

People of color make up more than one-third of the U.S. population but own just 3 percent of all local TV stations and 8 percent of radio outlets. Journalists of color make up only 13.5 percent of all newsroom employees working at daily newspapers and 19 percent of the local TV newsroom work force. As a result, stories about people of color are often told by journalists who know little about these communities.

Look Who's Talking About Latinos

It should come as no surprise that coverage of immigration, especially on talk radio, is often hard to categorize as anything but hateful. Rush Limbaugh and Michael Savage are among the major culprits who routinely demonize Latino immigrants on their programs.

On cable TV, CNN host Lou Dobbs has used his show to crusade against undocumented immigration. More than 70 percent of his programs in 2007 discussed the issue, according to the watchdog group Media Matters.

But Dobbs has had plenty of help from his cable compadres. Bill
O'Reilly and Glenn Beck have discussed undocumented immigration on 56 percent and 28 percent of their programs, respectively, almost always with an anti-immigrant slant.

The news networks have reinforced the idea there is little to know about Latinos outside of immigration. For years, the National Association of Hispanic Journalists has documented in its annual "Network Brownout" that Latinos make up less than 1 percent of the more than 12,000 news stories that air each year on the network evening news. Undocumented immigration and crime were the dominate focus of those stories.

The rise of anti-immigrant sentiment has impacted the Latino community immensely. A Pew Hispanic study released this week found that 1 in 10 Latinos have been stopped by the police or authorities and asked about their immigration status. Half of Latinos surveyed said the situation for Latinos has gotten worse over the past year due to concerns about deportation and discrimination in other areas of their lives, like finding jobs and housing.

Talk Radio Fuels Hate Crimes

Many Latinos believe that talk radio and anti-immigration news coverage has fueled the increase in hate crimes. The Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC) reported that while hate crime statistics are not reliable, all available data indicate a surge in violence against Latinos. According to the FBI, hate crimes against Latinos shot up by 35 percent from 2003 to 2006.

SPLC also reported in 2007 that the immigration debate has increased the number of hate groups more than 40 percent hike since 2000, to 888 today. In addition, about 250 nativist groups have been founded in the past few years, driven by the immigration debate.

The Anti-Defamation League and SPLC report that nativist groups increasingly appear on news programs as legitimate anti-immigration advocates, even though many have spouted conspiracy theories on the air – such as the claim that Mexicans want to take back the Southwest for Mexico.

"This kind of really vile propaganda begins in hate groups, makes its way out into the larger anti-immigration movement, and, before you know it, winds up in places like 'Lou Dobbs Tonight' on CNN," says Mark Potok, director of the SPLC's Intelligence Project.

Latinos Fight Back

It is a difficult fight for Latinos and other people of color to challenge large media conglomerates to improve their coverage of communities of color and to get the hate speech off the airwaves. Many of these talk show hosts are extremely popular and have a large following.

But Latino groups have been fighting back. The National Council of La Raza has launched the Web Site www.stopthehate.com, and the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund has created www.truthinimmigration.org to monitor and denounce hate crimes and hate speech. Meanwhile, the National Hispanic Media Coalition and its allies are strategizing how to combat speech via a campaign at www.latinosagainsthatespeech.org.

In addition, Sen. Robert Menendez (D-N.J.) has called on the National Telecommunications and Information Administration to update a 1993 report on the role of telecommunications in hate crimes.

Why Media Policy Matters

Media consolidation and media policy matters in this fight. As more companies own what we watch and read, it has made it harder for people of color to gain access to the airwaves and to speak for themselves without any gatekeepers.

A study conducted by the Center for American Progress and Free Press last year found that 91 percent of conservative radio talk shows aired on 257 news/talk stations were owned by just five companies. Meanwhile, minority-owned stations were far less likely to air conservative talk shows.

It is critical for people of color to gain access to the means of communications that will allow them to speak for themselves without the permission of gatekeepers. To accomplish this, the voices of people of color must be heard in the halls of Congress and at the FCC calling for legislation to increase minority media ownership and low power FM stations, to put the "public" back into public media,

Additionally, people of color must urge lawmakers to make sure the public has affordable broadband access and fight to maintain a free and open Internet that is available to everyone.

While it won't be easy for people of color to hold the FCC, corporate media and media personalities accountable for their actions, facing daunting challenges is nothing new for communities of color. It is a struggle, however, we must win for the good of our communities and for the good of our nation.

Source URL: www.stopbigmedia.com/blog/2008/10/01/hate-speech-rises-in-the-media

AGAIN!!! Another attack in Shenandoah follows beating death of Mexican immigrant

SOURCE: Cynthia I

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SOURCE philly.com :http://www.philly.com/philly/hp/news_update/28495034.html

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SOURCE:

---------- Forwarded message ----------
From: La Voz de Aztlan <News.Subscribers@aztlan.net>
Date: Wed, Sep 17, 2008 at 11:18 AM
Subject: Another attack in Shenandoah follows beating death of Mexican immigrant
To: La Voz de Aztlan Subscribers <News.Subscribers@aztlan.net>



LA VOZ DE AZTLAN
Los Angeles, Alta California
September 17. 2008

Another attack in Shenandoah follows
beating death of Mexican immigrant

A vicious assault in Shenandoah, Pennsylvania of a 21 year old Mexican man
by the name of Javier Alcala Jr. on Friday comes just two months after the
brutal racially motivated murder of Mexican immigrant Luis Ramirez.

Both MALDEF and LULAC have requested the FBI and the US Department of
Justice to investigate the case to determine if this new assault is a racially
motivated hate crime.

Javier Alcala Jr., claims that three skinheads beat him on the head with a
metal object, bound and blindfolded him with duct tape and then proceeded
to torture him. He says that they used a "drill" and a "torch" to terrorize him.
Alcala adds that he was then beaten to unconsciousness and dumped
in a street. He was taken to Saint Catherine Medical Center and the police
notified.

Javier Alcala suffered a head injury, damaged teeth, bruises and an arm
injury. According to Shenandoah Mayor Tom O'Neill, police have interviewed
the victim twice, including once at a hospital. The immigration status of Alcala
is unknown but the mayor said the police had difficulty interviewing the victim
because he was extremely frightened.

Attorney Gladys Limon of MALDEF said the organization was made aware
of the assault on Javier Alcala after a community member called Saturday.
After speaking with the person who called MALDEF, Ms. Limon said she
called the Department of Justice and the FBI. Ms. Limon said she also
spoke with the victim by telephone on Saturday.

Department of Justice spokeswoman Jamie Hais said Tuesday that the
Criminal Section of the Justice Department's Civil Rights Division is opening
an investigation into the Friday incident. FBI spokeswoman Jerri Williams
said that an FBI agent from the Allentown Resident Agency is also reviewing
the attack.

Ms. Limon said, "We have not received any information as of yet that indicates
that this was racially motivated." Ms. Limon added, "What we do know is that
this was a serious crime against a young Mexican man in Shenandoah and
it requires an immediate and full investigation."

LULAC National Executive Director Brent Wilkes said the group is also looking
at the incident because of the rising number of hate crimes against immigrants
in the U.S. "Our concern is that the anti-immigrant rhetoric that's been pretty
visible in media and in policy discussions is starting to embolden people to
take the next step in terms of getting violent with immigrants, or people who they
perceive to be immigrants, which primarily means Latinos and their communities,
" Wilkes said.

http://www.aztlan.net/another_attack_in_shenandoah.htm

_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
Related La Voz de Aztlan reports:

Racist Whites kill another undocumented Mexican immigrant
http://www.aztlan.net/shenandoah_anti-mexican_hate_crime.html

Witness to beating death of Mexican immigrant by Whites interviewed
http://www.aztlan.net/arielle_garcia_interview.htm

Charges finally filed in the hate killing of Mexican immigrant
http://www.aztlan.net/charges_in_hate_killing.htm

Arab-American Severely Beaten by Islamophobics in California
http://www.aztlan.net/arab_american_beaten.htm


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http://www.latinosagainsthatespeech.org
http://elrinconcitodeaurora.net/docs_pub/hladc-sf/savage_protest_press_release.pdf
http://elrinconcitodeaurora.net/docs_pub/hladc-sf/savage_protesta_comunicado_prensa.pdf
http://elrinconcitodeaurora.net/docs_pub/hladc-sf/anti_savage_press_release.doc
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