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Who'd have figured that the first major blow to Haley Barbour's 2012 White House hopes would be delivered by ... the Weekly Standard? Bill Kristol's magazine is out today with a profile of the Mississippi governor, written by Andrew Ferguson, in which Barbour downplays the upheaval of the civil rights movement and characterizes the notorious White Citizens Councils of the 1950s and 1960s as a force for good.
Who'd have figured that the first major blow to Haley Barbour's 2012 White House hopes would be delivered by ... the Weekly Standard? Bill Kristol's magazine is out today with a profile of the Mississippi governor, written by Andrew Ferguson, in which Barbour downplays the upheaval of the civil rights movement and characterizes the notorious White Citizens Councils of the 1950s and 1960s as a force for good.
May I just say that the "inside the beltway" snooty Weekly Standard is not representative of all conservatives. Just like liberals have their insufferable intellectuals in the media, the right has some some who sit on their high horse, too.
Mississippi was nicknamed by black folks of my dads generation (he's a native Mississippian) "The Murder State." It was BY FAR the scourge of the south...the worst of the worst states during Jim Crow. It was so damn bad that the vestiges remain today moreso there than any other southern state.
I spent my summers down there as a kid with my great-grandparents, and even then (the 70's) the tension was palpable. They simply dressed it up, as they still do, in the guise of "southern manners" and politeness. People in that state know their place, and most people, black and white, remain in it.
Haley Barbour isn't alone....Trent Lott seems to have a pollyanaish memory of those times too. It's simply a load of bull.
Mississippi is almost 38% black, making it the state with the highest black population in the country by percentage and yet it is hell on earth for blacks?
Not denying anything said here but it is a little weird.
Who'd have figured that the first major blow to Haley Barbour's 2012 White House hopes would be delivered by ... the Weekly Standard? Bill Kristol's magazine is out today with a profile of the Mississippi governor, written by Andrew Ferguson, in which Barbour downplays the upheaval of the civil rights movement and characterizes the notorious White Citizens Councils of the 1950s and 1960s as a force for good.
Once again the left uses its favorite tactic--mischaracterize and smear. Barbour was discussing his recollection of the civil rights era in his home town of Yazoo City, not in Mississippi generally, as he was growing up. And he was trying to explain why he thought desegregation was carried out peacefully in his home town. And he attributes that to the resolve and work of a group of white business leaders in the community who ushered in desegregation in the town without conflict. Is any of this inaccurate? I don't know. I wasn't there in Yazoo City in the 60's and early 70's. But if it is accurate how is his personal recollection offensive? Did Barbour downplay the racial problems in other Mississippi communities? Not that I'm aware of.
The one thing Barbour did wrong was to speak about race at all. As a white Republican and, more importantly, a white southerner, he should know better. You see, we can't discuss the history of race relations or even race relations today. Although Dems call for a national conversation on race what they really want is a one-way lecture aimed at certain whites. Bill O'Reilly found this out the hard way and now refuses to discuss race on his show. Barbour would do well to learn that lesson sooner rather than later.
Once again the left uses its favorite tactic--mischaracterize and smear. Barbour was discussing his recollection of the civil rights era in his home town of Yazoo City, not in Mississippi generally, as he was growing up. And he was trying to explain why he thought desegregation was carried out peacefully in his home town. And he attributes that to the resolve and work of a group of white business leaders in the community who ushered in desegregation in the town without conflict. Is any of this inaccurate? I don't know. I wasn't there in Yazoo City in the 60's and early 70's. But if it is accurate how is his personal recollection offensive? Did Barbour downplay the racial problems in other Mississippi communities? Not that I'm aware of.
The one thing Barbour did wrong was to speak about race at all. As a white Republican and, more importantly, a white southerner, he should know better. You see, we can't discuss the history of race relations or even race relations today. Although Dems call for a national conversation on race what they really want is a one-way lecture aimed at certain whites. Bill O'Reilly found this out the hard way and now refuses to discuss race on his show. Barbour would do well to learn that lesson sooner rather than later.
Nonsense. Yazoo County and Yazoo City in particular was no oasis in the midst of what was going on in Mississippi. I have plenty of family in that area who can testify to that. Barbour simply wants to make his city look better than what it was. It was the same hellish existence there that it was everywhere else in that state.
As for O'Reilly...he just feels like an idiot after the comments he made after he went to lunch (or dinner) with Sharpton up in Harlem. If i were him, i wouldn't say anything else about race either.
Amazing, isn't it, the double-standards at work. Haley Barbour's comments are broadcast by the left-bloggeria as proof that Barbour, and by extension Republicans in general, are racist. But when Harry Reid praises Obama for being light skinned and not talking with a "negro dialect" its okay. When Joe Biden describes Obama as being "clean and articulate" (as if that is a surprise) then there's no big deal. Sen. Robert Byrd says "white *******" on a t.v. interview and its simply a gaffe.
It seems that the "D" after a politician's name is a magic letter that exonerates that which condemns those with an "R" after theirs.
Last edited by Green Irish Eyes; 12-22-2010 at 10:33 AM..
Reason: Please don't circumvent the language filters.
Here is how wonderful Yazoo City was during the Civil Rights Era....you know...when according to Haley Barbour, he can't remember it being "so bad." From a 1956 piece from David Halberstam in Commentary:
Look," said Nick Roberts of the Yazoo City Citizens Council, explaining why 51 of 53 Negroes who had signed an integration petition withdrew their names, "if a man works for you, and you believe in something, and that man is working against it and undermining it, why you don't want him working for you--of course you don't."
In Yazoo City, in August 1955, the Council members fired signers of the integration petition, or prevailed upon other white employers to get them fired. But the WCC continues to deny that it uses economic force: all the Council did in Yazoo City was to provide information (a full-page ad in the local weekly listing the "offenders"); spontaneous public feeling did the rest."
Yea...that place was a reeeeaaaaaal oasis of racial cooperation.
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