Four years ago, when former Secretary of State Colin Powell endorsed Barack Obama, Rush Limbaugh led the charge, accusing Powell of only supporting the Democrat because of race.
In 2012, the same argument is being pushed by the national chairman of Mitt Romney's presidential campaign.
John Sununu told CNN last night, "When you take a look at Colin Powell, you have to wonder whether that's an endorsement based on issues or whether he's got a slightly different reason for preferring President Obama?"
Asked what that other reason might be, the Republican added, "Well, I think when you have somebody of your own race that you are proud of being president of the United States, I applaud Colin for standing with him."
First, I rather doubt Mitt Romney's campaign chairman "applauds" the fact that a respected national figure endorsed President Obama on national television.
But putting that aside, Sununu's comments help capture a narrow, ignorant worldview. From the Romney aide's perspective, if an accomplished American with a celebrated record of public service endorses a successful president, the logical explanation is to assume it's motivated by race. For Sununu, the tired "blacks stick together" caricature is easier than thinking.
This from the same Republican who believes Obama is "lazy" and who pushed the odious and racially charged welfare lie.
A few hours after his CNN interview, Sununu -- or more likely, someone writing a press release for Sununu -- said in a statement he has "no doubt" that Powell's support for the president is based solely on "his support of the president's policies."
This is extremely hard to believe because, well, Sununu had just said the exact opposite. Given a chance to speak his mind, Romney's national campaign chairman, knowing the Powell question was coming and having 12 hours to think about it, immediately focused on race. A perfunctory press release in the middle of the night doesn't change that.
The question for Romney is why he allows such offensive figures to speak on his behalf to national audiences. The question for Sununu is whether every endorsement should be seen through a racial lens. Dick Cheney and Glenn Beck, for example, partnered for a pro-Romney event in Texas last night. Does Sununu assume they support Romney because they're white, or does he only apply this standard to African Americans?
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Where did even these references of skin color even come from? Because when I look at my skin color it certainly is not white and doesn’t even come close to that color. Actually, to call African Americans black is not even right either when it is just more like different shades of brown. The color white is white like a piece of white paper, not shades of brown. This use of these words of these colors is just plainly wrong and not even correct. Is it that a group of people want to think they are more special in the eyes of God than someone else? When that is not even true at all. If you have experiences that bring you in a closer relationship to God, it is because of who you are and not because of your skin color. There is equally people of different shades of skin colors that come to have a closer relationship with God as someone with a lighter skin color. These lighter skin color people who think they know God are really religious hypocrites and do not even understand or accept all of the very statements which Jesus has made. And how can you even expect them to know anything about God? When they are just being very selective on what they want to believe instead of taking all of those things as a whole and understanding how it was for those people who wrote those statements about God and/or Jesus. And on top of it, these people who wrote these things did not even have a white skin color. With this supposed Bible they created, they have actually twisted to what is really true by not even having all the Gospels included. And there is only one real reason why they did this and that was for power, control, and greed thus is not even close to truly representing anything about God in the right way. It is a narrow-minded man’s point of view of falsehoods. And if anything, we are all just really shades of brown.
If you vote for your own, Sununu should vote for someone ugly!
Do Ogres, Trolls, Hags have a political party?
Oh wait Sununu, Beck and Coulter...so yeah
Whether John Sununu believes it himself is immaterial. Rather, it is a strategy to get the race statement out to deflect the impact of Colin Powell's thoughtful endorsement of President Obama, before it peels off some voters.
There is no line these guys will not cross in their takeover bid for the White House,... not putting proven lies out in ads, questionable voting machines, dropping hundreds of thousands of legitimate voters off the rolls, gutting unions, or blocking any of the President's proposals that would have increased jobs and improved the economy so that they could blame the economy for a slow recovery. I have never seen anything like this before.
Just ask Stacey Dash............
Just when I thought that the Republicans might actually settle-in and start arguing actual issues, like jobs.... {cricket sounds...}
My bad... I thought they might actually try to sway some half-way intelligent voters...
Obama/Biden -- Four More !
Sounds like a classic case of projection; ascribing to the other, one's own motivation. It is the GOP's contention that voter fraud is widespread and the instances we have seen have involved the GOP. So, Sununu sees race as the most likely common factor between Obama and Powell and what, Sununu is a member of the NAACP?
C'mon...don't take your 'eye' off the ball. Sununu (although a stupid white fat f$ck) is trying for the media to go 'race over rape'...stop it!
"Dick Cheney and Glenn Beck, for example, partnered for a pro-Romney event in Texas last night. Does Sununu assume they support Romney because they're white, or does he only apply this standard to African Americans?"
No, I think it's because they're all extremist lunatics together ... after all, they stick together.
The Sununu comments underscores, to me, what all the Obama loathing is about, and has ALWAYS been about. "They" don't want a black man in the office, period.
Sounds to me like Sununu is reflecting his own reasons for voting for Romney.
Hate and fear should never win. Racism is hate and fear.
Maybe this guy is right, maybe he isn't, but I'm not sure if he thought it all the way through that he'd want to be right. Supposing for a moment that he is, does this compulsion only affect Colin Powell/black people? Sure would help explain why poor whites in the south don't like Obamacare. If you suggest racism on one side, it's only fair to suggest it on the other. I can't say for Powell specifically, but I'm pretty sure plenty of black people are voting for Obama because he is black, and plenty more people are voting for Romney because he is white (or maybe because Obama is black). Just one man's opinion.
I think some of that is true. The only problem is Black people have traditionally voted Democrat anyway, so the fact that we have a Black president really only brought out more Black people than usual to vote Democrat. I mean, it's not like the Republican party has done a fantastic job luring Black people to it's ideas. That said, the 24hr news cycle and abundance of information sources allows what used to be obscure examples of Black people voting Republican (read: Allen West, Artur Davis, etc.) to be seen on the national stage, giving the appearance of legions of Black people voting Republican. Me? I have center left opinions. In fact I disagree with a host of positions traditionally held by Democrats. But after witnessing and being mortified at how people, in the name of Republicans, have behaved the last 4yrs towards the nations first Black POTUS, they have lost me forever. I could never vote Republican, not even for dog catcher.
"The question for Romney is why he allows such offensive figures to speak on his behalf to national audiences?"
The answer is obvious...there are many of Romney's supporters who feel this way. Romney uses his surrogates to say the things his base wants to hear but that a presidential candidate couldn't say personally without getting blasted by the media. It also gives Romney that thing Republicans and bigots love so much...plausible deniability. If the media pressure isn't too intense he doesn't have to say anything and he's satisfied his base. If it public outcry gets too hot for him he can throw his offending surrogate under the bus and come off looking like a hero.
Republican Party version 2012: selling your wives' and daughters' rights for money and power.
Odious - great word. Fit's Sununu perfectly.
By proxy having sununu as a personal rep automatically lowers the level of discourse...sununu of course was not born in The US...but never mentions how he learned "to be and act like an American"....http://www.politicolnews.com/sununu-born-in-cuba-calls-pres-obama-un-american/
His junk talk is embarrassing..but not to romney...he's the sort that always gets someone else to dirty their hands with their filthy mouths...I suspect sununu always picks his turdy talking points by looking at the dirty end of the turd...romney of course has the clean end..
Digusting. I maintain, that the world looks at the US and marvels at how stupid our elected leaders and their spokespersons are. We have the brightest and dumbest people on the planet. The dummy's among us look at the Sununu's of the country and think, 'well of course he's right'. I think this intellectual slide into the abyss has been happening for a while now.
Aside from the repugnant prejudice at the epicenter of this meritless claim, the only thing something this radioactive will do is give the endorsement that much more exposure and that much more resonance. Sununu is a malefic embarrassment and Romney shares in that shame.
its funny this coming from a guy who should have been indicted during his stint under george h bush, Seems Sunni was misappropiating funds and travel for himself and others.Big George saved him by asking him to resign. I wonder how many black people worked in his staff
Its funny how we pretend that racism doesn't exist and pretend its a southern thing.We also fail to realize that its not just the poor an uneducated, this guy knows exactly what he is saying. he is pushing for Romney because he is looking to get back to Wahington
White men that are John Sununu's age were raised during a time of white male supremacy. The black men, or "colored people", in the NJ suburb I grew up in were often the men shouldering the battered galvanized garbage cans onto their shoulders and hauling them up the street. Racism was right out in the open - North and South. Read about Charles Lindbergh's racist beliefs-it will break your heart that such a hero could be so small. If a black man got into a good college, his "abilities" were doubted by the white guys. I had a black friend who was accepted at Princeton as an athlete scholar, but when he and his fellow black athletes protested that they were not playing in starting positions, they were told that they could stay at Princeton, keep their scholarships, but could never compete in any Ivy League games. Affirmative Action is a great program for minorities, but also created tremendous resentment among white boys. Our country has begun a slow ascent towards greater equality and more civil rights - for minorities, for women, and the LGBT community, but we have so far to go. Electing Obama was an extraordinary shift upwards, based in part on his brilliance and inspirational qualities, but also because white liberals of my age saw an opportunity to finally speak out against the racism we grew up in. I am white, and was drawn to President Obama's candidacy in part because he is black. I felt also that the message his Presidency would give to the rest of the world might restore some respect for America. I believe in the man that Obama is. He is real now - not a symbol or a stereotype. And I believe history will smile on his Presidency, and his greatness will be recognized for generations to come. During a time of extraordinary turmoil, financial ruin, terrorism, in a world on the brink of environmental disaster, President Obama remains calm, thoughtful, effective, strong, measured, and good-humored. I thought that the efforts of the GOP to destroy Clinton were unparalleled-they pale in comparison to the wave of conservative hatred for this man. In a Washington that would rather self-destruct than support his policies, it is miraculous that Obama has accomplished so much. Racist fools like Sununu still litter the landscape. Romney and Ryan come from a world of such privilege, whiteness, and wealth that I do not think they understand the human condition. Nor do they have a grasp of global interconnectedness, or acknowledge the underpinnings of terrorism, or perceive the importance of sustainability - both in the environment and as a business model. Obama is a modern thinker - a man of the new intelligence. I pray he has four more years to steer our sorry ship of state towards a better shore. We are fortunate that the Obama family is willing to risk so much for the sake of an America that is not yet grateful for their work, but so much the better for it.
Thank you, John. You speak most eloquently for so many of us.
Jennifer - that was beautiful!
And Lindbergh (for whom a major thoroughfare in my home town was named - bleah!) was a serious @!$%#. When I first learned (years ago) that he'd been a proud supporter of Hitler and of American Fascism, I went from being proud of his aviation achievements as an American to regretting that someone else of better character couldn't have done them first (it seems inevitable that someone would have made the trans-Atlantic crossing sooner or later).
A lot of folks cannot imagine what it was really like to live in the segregated south in the 1950's and 1960's. It was horrible for blacks and not all the easy if you happened to be a white person who believed everybody should have equal rights. Younger liberals may not fully appreciate that it was nearly as dangerous to be a liberal southern 'white boy' as to be a black southerner. The advantage of being white was that if you did not like being beaten, you could keep your mouth shut and go along with the program.
Here is what happened if a white person bucked the 'system': Back in 1961 when I was a 19 year old student at a Texas college, I decided to drive to Florida for spring break. Not being a racist, I was happy to agree to give a black classmate a ride to her home in Alabama on my way to Florida. I made it to Mississippi before I was pulled over and arrested, officially on suspicion of driving a stolen car, but it was made clear to me that my real 'crime' was driving with a black person in my car with out-of-state plates, which suggested to the white policemen that I was 'one of them civil rights agitators'. I was also accused of 'resisting arrest' by repeatedly bashing my head into a police nightstick.
It all ended okay. They could not think of any reason to arrest my classmate so she found a pay phone and called her father in Alabama, who was a wealthy doctor. Soon a (white) lawyer showed up to threaten the cops with all kinds of lawsuits until they decided it was a mistake to have arrested me, profusely apologized, got my car out of the impound lot, and released me. It wasn't exactly a 'win', but it was satisfying to see someone back down cowardly racist cops.
The cops did not know that they were mostly correct in that I really had been one of those civil rights agitators and that was not only time I got beaten up by southern cops.
I didn't realize that Sununu was in bed with Ann Coulter. I don't look forward to seeing their offspring.
Sununu is NOT supporting Romney just because he is white! It's because they both represent the billionares whose vicious greed is destroying the middle class and is pitting race and against race, men against women, and especially, the "have-very-littles" against the "have-nothings."
No surprise. The Republicans have been playing the race card, white supremist version, ever since they came up with their so-called "southern strategy".
The rats are making excuses for those with no axe to grind. Their jealousy and words reek with tempestuous grain. Colin Powell is a respected national figure with credentials above those commenting!
I was wondering which Republican would be the first to say Powell endorsed President Obama just because of race. It's nice to know that John Sununu sank to the occasion.
Wasn't so much that Sununu sank to the occasion, as it was he simply beat Coulter and Rush to it. And I'm not all surprised by it. People are going to have to wake up and start conceding the fact that, those three, along with Beck and Hannity. No longer speak for the Far-Right. The speak for what is now the Republican Party Majority. Every Moderate Republican is now living in an episode of Start Trek: The Next Generation, assimilate or die, because resistance is futile.