Racism and Double Standards in the Media

In case anyone who reads this does not know it, I am so conservative I squeak.  I am also a lifetime member of the NAACP.  Such a seemingly dichotomy is not as unlikely as the news media would make it seem.  It is interesting to explore this now that the media has given yet another leading democrat a pass on racism.

Senator Harry Reid's remarks on Barak Obama recently published in a new book are just the latest in the pass that the news media and liberals give to old Democrats who are uneasy with their party's new welcome mat to minorities.  But the biggest lie is the one which tells the public that the Democratic Party gave minorities their civil rights.  Here are some facts many do not know:

1. Although Presidents Roosevelt and Truman were committed to Civil Rights legislation, they were never able to get their legislative proposals past by the Democrat Party in Congress.  It is interesting to note that Democrats were the dominant party from 1932 through 1948 in the US Senate and from 1932 through 1992 in the House.  In those years the minority party [Republicans] voted for Civil Rights legislation 90% of the time.  The legislation was defeated by a majority of Democrat legislators in both houses until 1957.
2. Many Democratic Party office holders were also members of the KKK including President Woodrow Wilson, Senator J. William Fulbright, and the current Senator from West Virginia Robert Byrd.  In fact it is interesting to note that the term "Byrd Machine" was used from the 1920's through 1960's to describe the dominance of the KKK in the Democratic party in the south.
3. The decision in Brown vs Board of Education was given by Chief Justice Earl Warren a former GOP Governor of California who was appointed by GOP President Dwight Eisenhower.
4. The Civil Rights Act of 1964 had only 44 Democrat votes in the Senate.  Senator Robert Byrd's 15 day filibuster was halted when 27 of the 31 Republican Senators voted to end debate and bring the bill to the floor of the Senate. 
5. The only Senators from former slave states that voted for the Civil Rights measure were GOP Senator John Tower and Dem Senator Ralph Yarborough.  Tower would thereafter be referred to by the news media as a racist from Texas...go figure.

When I became of voting age the country under the Democratic party leadership was at war with itself.  There were race riots in Northeastern urban areas.  There were demonstrations against the war in Viet Nam.  Incredibly these were blamed on the minority party despite the fact that the KKK was a supporter of Southern democrats and the war was started by Democrats JFK and escalated by Lyndon Johnson.  LBJ had won re-election in 1964 by promising to de-escalate the war. 

I joined the NAACP when asked by a registered Republican to join an organization that believed in the peaceful assertion of rights for all people.  At NAACP meetings I met Black Republicans who owned and published the only family owned black daily newspaper continuously in print since 1892.  The Baltimore Afro-American has been in continous ownership by the family of John Murphy, jr.  The Murphy family members were the leading members of the Baltimore GOP until the 1970's.

Finally, I had the pleasure of meeting and working with Harry Dent in 1972.  Harry was the architect of the "Southern Strategy" of the GOP.  In several conversations with Dent I learned that among his list of objectives was to help create a GOP modeled on the party of Everette Dirkson.  His goal was to give voters an alternative to the KKK dominated racial politics of the southern Democratic party.  The GOP took over in the south by offering an alternate political belief system not by offering an alternate home to racist politicians.

In my experience the most violent dangerous political groups were Democrat.  Most of these no longer exist but it is high hypocrosy to suggest that the GOP had political power from 1932 through 1990 in the south.

I can  give references for all cites in this article upon request.