The Amazing Lee Atwater

[rdean]

Uncovered at Last: Lee Atwater's Infamous 'Southern Strategy' Colloquy | Crooks and Liars

You start out in 1954 by saying, “******, ******, ******.” By 1968 you can’t say “******”—that hurts you, backfires. So you say stuff like, uh, forced busing, states’ rights, and all that stuff, and you’re getting so abstract. Now, you’re talking about cutting taxes, and all these things you’re talking about are totally economic things and a byproduct of them is, blacks get hurt worse than whites.… “We want to cut this,” is much more abstract than even the busing thing, uh, and a hell of a lot more abstract than “******, ******.”

“That voter, in my judgment,” he claims, “will be more likely to vote his economic interests than he will anything else. And that is the voter that I think through a fairly slow but very steady process, will go Republican.” Because race no longer matters: “In my judgment Karl Marx [is right]... the real issues ultimately will be the economic issues.” He continues, in words that uncannily echo the “47 percent tape” (nothing new under the wingnut sun), that “statistically, as the number of non-producers in the system moves toward fifty percent,” the conservative coalition cannot but expand. Voila: a new Republican majority. Racism won't have anything to do with it.

---------------------------------------

It's like he was standing in front of today's Republican Party and giving a very accurate description.

 

[rdean]

I would have though Frank would eat this post up. Considering how much he loves the "n" word.

 

[CrusaderFrank]

[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r1rIDmDWSms]President Lyndon Johnson using the "N" word. - YouTube[/ame]

 

[Mad Scientist]

Looks like he was wrong:

“statistically, as the number of non-producers in the system moves toward fifty percent,” the conservative coalition cannot but expand. Voila: a new Republican majority. Racism won't have anything to do with it.

He was only right about the "cannot" part.

"Gently Socratic".

 

[Political Junky]

Uncovered at Last: Lee Atwater's Infamous 'Southern Strategy' Colloquy | Crooks and Liars

You start out in 1954 by saying, “******, ******, ******.” By 1968 you can’t say “******”—that hurts you, backfires. So you say stuff like, uh, forced busing, states’ rights, and all that stuff, and you’re getting so abstract. Now, you’re talking about cutting taxes, and all these things you’re talking about are totally economic things and a byproduct of them is, blacks get hurt worse than whites.… “We want to cut this,” is much more abstract than even the busing thing, uh, and a hell of a lot more abstract than “******, ******.”

“That voter, in my judgment,” he claims, “will be more likely to vote his economic interests than he will anything else. And that is the voter that I think through a fairly slow but very steady process, will go Republican.” Because race no longer matters: “In my judgment Karl Marx [is right]... the real issues ultimately will be the economic issues.” He continues, in words that uncannily echo the “47 percent tape” (nothing new under the wingnut sun), that “statistically, as the number of non-producers in the system moves toward fifty percent,” the conservative coalition cannot but expand. Voila: a new Republican majority. Racism won't have anything to do with it.

---------------------------------------

It's like he was standing in front of today's Republican Party and giving a very accurate description.

Rove was a student of Lee Atwater.

Lee Atwater - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Personal life

[edit]Illness
On March 5, 1990, Atwater collapsed during a fundraising breakfast for Senator Phil Gramm.[1] Doctors searching for an explanation to what was initially thought to be a mere fainting episode discovered a grade 3 astrocytoma, an unusually aggressive form of brain cancer, in his right parietal lobe.[13] Atwater underwent interstitial implant radiation, a then-new form of treatment, at Montefiore Medical Center in New York City, and received conventional radiation therapy at George Washington University Hospital in Washington, D.C. The treatment for the brain tumor left him paralyzed on his left side, robbed him of his tone discrimination, and swelled his face and body (due to steroids). He spent the remainder of his life in a wheelchair.
[edit]Conversion to Catholicism and new outlook
In the months after the severity of his illness became apparent, Atwater said he had converted to Catholicism, through the help of Fr. John Hardon[14] and, in an act of repentance, Atwater issued a number of public and written letters to individuals to whom he had been opposed during his political career. In a June 28, 1990, letter to Tom Turnipseed, he stated, "It is very important to me that I let you know that out of everything that has happened in my career, one of the low points remains the so-called 'jumper cable' episode," adding, "My illness has taught me something about the nature of humanity, love, brotherhood and relationships that I never understood, and probably never would have. So, from that standpoint, there is some truth and good in everything."[5]
In a February 1991 article for Life magazine, Atwater wrote:
My illness helped me to see that what was missing in society is what was missing in me: a little heart, a lot of brotherhood. The '80s were about acquiring — acquiring wealth, power, prestige. I know. I acquired more wealth, power, and prestige than most. But you can acquire all you want and still feel empty. What power wouldn't I trade for a little more time with my family? What price wouldn't I pay for an evening with friends? It took a deadly illness to put me eye to eye with that truth, but it is a truth that the country, caught up in its ruthless ambitions and moral decay, can learn on my dime. I don't know who will lead us through the '90s, but they must be made to speak to this spiritual vacuum at the heart of American society, this tumor of the soul.
This article was notable for an apology to Michael Dukakis for the "naked cruelty" of the 1988 presidential election campaign.
Ed Rollins, however, stated in the 2008 documentary Boogie Man: The Lee Atwater Story, that "[Atwater] was telling this story about how a Living Bible was what was giving him faith and I said to Mary (Matalin), 'I really, sincerely hope that he found peace.' She said, 'Ed, when we were cleaning up his things afterwards, the Bible was still wrapped in the cellophane and had never been taken out of the package,' which just told you everything there was. He was spinning right to the end."[9]
[edit]Death
Atwater died on March 29, 1991, of his brain tumor. Funeral services were held at the Trinity Cathedral Church in Atwater's final residence, Columbia. A memorial service was held at the Washington National Cathedral.[15]
[edit]Legacy

Sidney Blumenthal has speculated that, had Atwater lived, he would have run a stronger re-election campaign for Bush than the President's unsuccessful 1992 effort against Bill Clinton and Ross Perot.[16]
Atwater's political career is the subject of the feature-length documentary film Boogie Man: The Lee Atwater Story.[9]
[edit]

 

[Mr. Shaman]

Uncovered at Last: Lee Atwater's Infamous 'Southern Strategy' Colloquy | Crooks and Liars

You start out in 1954 by saying, “******, ******, ******.” By 1968 you can’t say “******”—that hurts you, backfires. So you say stuff like, uh, forced busing, states’ rights, and all that stuff, and you’re getting so abstract. Now, you’re talking about cutting taxes, and all these things you’re talking about are totally economic things and a byproduct of them is, blacks get hurt worse than whites.… “We want to cut this,” is much more abstract than even the busing thing, uh, and a hell of a lot more abstract than “******, ******.”

“That voter, in my judgment,” he claims, “will be more likely to vote his economic interests than he will anything else. And that is the voter that I think through a fairly slow but very steady process, will go Republican.” Because race no longer matters: “In my judgment Karl Marx [is right]... the real issues ultimately will be the economic issues.” He continues, in words that uncannily echo the “47 percent tape” (nothing new under the wingnut sun), that “statistically, as the number of non-producers in the system moves toward fifty percent,” the conservative coalition cannot but expand. Voila: a new Republican majority. Racism won't have anything to do with it.

---------------------------------------

It's like he was standing in front of today's Republican Party and giving a very accurate description.

Rove was a student of Lee Atwater.

.....Both, of whom, were Disciples of the Grand Master of Republican campaign-manipulation.....

.....Donald Segretti!!

 

[rdean]

President Lyndon Johnson using the "N" word. - YouTube

‘Hymies.’ ‘Hymietown.’ — Jesse Jackson’s description of New York City while on the 1984 presidential campaign trail.

“I think one man is just as good as another so long as he’s not a n*gger or a Chinaman. Uncle Will says that the Lord made a White man from dust, a ****** from mud, then He threw up what was left and it came down a Chinaman. He does hate Chinese and Japs. So do I. It is race prejudice, I guess. But I am strongly of the opinion Negroes ought to be in Africa, Yellow men in Asia and White men in Europe and America.” Harry Truman (1911) in a letter to his future wife Bess

“There�s some people who�ve gone over the state and said, �Well, George Wallace has talked too strong about segregation.� Now let me ask you this: how in the name of common sense can you be too strong about it? You�re either for it or you�re against it. There�s not any middle ground as I know of.” — Democratic Alabama Governor George Wallace (1959)

People change. Especially when they grew up in the south in the 40's and 50's.

You have no excuse.

 

[CrusaderFrank]

Where's yo Dollah?

 

[LordBrownTrout]

So I guess you're racist now if you want to cut taxes. Thanks for the heads up on the evolving cultural stupidity.

 

[rdean]

So I guess you're racist now if you want to cut taxes. Thanks for the heads up on the evolving cultural stupidity.

Taxes have been the lowest they've been in the last 60 years. At some point, people need to support this country. Republicans don't understand that. For them, it's "every man for himself".