On: Mitt Romney -- Some advice

by: Joshua Howell

There is a wall which keeps Republicans and African Americans separated, incapable of engaging in healthy and meaningful dialogue.

Consider the three attempts of this campaign season alone.

First came Donald Trump: wealthy, tanned, caught in what was apparently the 1950s. This marvelously detached billionaire thought it good politics to boast of his “great relationship with ‘the Blacks.’” (For humor’s sake, imagine President Obama attempting to assuage racial divides by speaking of his superb relationship with “the Whites.”)

Then followed Ron Paul. He, with surprising ingenuousness, thought African Americans would overlook his opposition to the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the racist passages of his newsletter. They didn't, nor should Mr. Paul have expected them to. 

Last was Mitt Romney, whose needless ejaculations of “who let the dogs out?” and “bling bling” (on, no kidding, Martin Luther King, Jr. Day) had all the trappings of an overseas tourist who doesn’t speak the language -- well intentioned, naive and a tad insulting.

Mr. Romney's "quiet push" for African American voters.

And yet despite these foibles (or, perhaps, because of them), one should be heartened to learn of Mr. Romney’s “quiet push” for African American voters.

Make no mistake: this attempt is destined for failure. Many he visited were “personally offended” and chanted persecutions of “Get out, Romney, get out!”

But conversation must commence somewhere, even this one. The problem with Mr. Romney's “push” has little to do with his tawdry slip of the tongue, nor the fact that he is white and the president is black.

For most African Americans, voting Democrat is akin to church on Sunday and soul food with family -- it is a cultural norm, this informed by history, political philosophy and economics. It is a norm not merely inflected by remembrances of the Civil Rights Act, the necessity of welfare, nor black-Democrat politicians. To the contrary, preferences for big government long predate them.

This left-leaning loyalty harkens back to Reconstruction, when the country, tired and wan, its back broken after four years of civil war, offered newly manumitted slaves work at the Postal Service -- otherwise known as a facet of that pernicious federal government which had recently trampled states’ rights.

The relationship progressed into the Jim Crow Era, when “the Blacks”, unable to find private sector work, flooded into public sector jobs to make do and feed their families.

And who could forget Ronald Reagan, who slowed the rate of government growth and cut spending on social programs as part of what was deemed “trickle-down economics?”

(Alas, none of that wealth managed to “trickle down” to African Americans, leaving many to understand J.K. Galbraith’s criticism when he said, with marvelous imagery: “If you feed enough oats to the horse, some will pass through to feed the sparrows.”)

But regarding today: Nearly 20 percent of gainfully employed African Americans work for some form of government (the largest percentage of any racial group) and these make 25 percent more than their counterparts in the private sector.

Simply put: For African Americans, big government has yielded big results, and they intend to keep it that way into the foreseeable future.

Time and time again, lurches in equality have come with the enlargement of DC at the expense of states’ rights. In between, the slow yet substantial rise of the black-middle class has come with jobs in the public sphere. That’s good ol’ fashioned tax-and-spend economics, directly antithetical to Republican orthodoxy.

Did Mr. Romney deserve the welcome he received? Certainly not. It was mean-spirited and distasteful. But his difficulties arise because few (if any) of his policies speak to the aforementioned. Yes, there has been a precipitous drop in the availability of government jobs (not to mention the current fiasco of a postal service). But cutbacks would surely have been worse under a Republican Administration.

If Mr. Romney is earnest in his quest for African American votes, it is imperative he understand that the black community’s support for the left is like a boulder, dense and large -- one election won’t change a thing. It can't be destroyed with dynamite, it must be eroded as with a patient stream over decades.

It will take shifts in policies and changing norms for this to occur, yet it’s worth doing. Such a transition would not only benefit Republicans, but -- now having two parties vying for their attention -- “the Blacks” as well.