NYT Page A1 - Donna Brazile addresses a "notion" re: the black vote

[SOS]

Todays's NYT has an article, front page, above the fold, covering the disillusionment of black voters.
From the article:

"Despite a generally buoyant Democratic Party nationally, there are worries among Democratic strategists in some states that blacks may not turn up at the polls in big enough numbers because of disillusionment over past shenanigans. Democrats’ worries are backed up by a Pew Research Center report that found that blacks were twice as likely now than they were in 2004 to say they had little or no confidence in the voting system, rising to 29 percent from 15 percent. And more than three times as many blacks as whites — 29 percent versus 8 percent — say they do not believe that their vote will be accurately tallied. Voting experts say the disillusionment is the cumulative effect of election problems in 2000 and 2004, and a reaction to new identification and voter registration laws."

Donna Brazile's comment on the above concerns:

“This notion that elections are stolen and that elections are rigged is so common in the public sphere that we’re having to go out of our way to counter them this year,” said Donna Brazile, a Democratic strategist.

Time for some new strategists?

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/10/27/us/politics/27race.html?hp&ex=1162008000&en=d93c2f55a9276a25&ei=5094&partner=homepage

[Totally Committed]

1. The scariest thing about her quote is that she's the Head of the Committee

to counter election fraud for the Democratic Party. She isn't speaking just as a wimp-ass DLC apologist strategist here, she's talking from an official position -- chair of the DNC's Voting Rights Institute. (A position that I feel she should never have been given, but was criticized for that opinion when it was first announced here.)

Read it and weep all you Brazile apologists. She should be NOWHERE NEAR ANY OFFICIAL POSITION WITH THIS PARTY. EVER.

TC

[donsu]

2. Donna is a mole

nt

[Norquist Nemesis]

3. I have little or no confidence in the voting system

and I'm white. :shrug:

[KoKo]

4. It's very disappointing that Brazile is still so involved in the Dem Party

heirarchy while she gets paid to report on CNN. I wonder if she's in charge of deciding which inneffectual spokesperson gets to appear on the MSNBC and CNN. I've yet to see one that could stand up under an attack from the RW Repug they have to counter.

Brazile always presents a "defeatist" view of Democrats. She's not an energizer with a positive attitude. She's a hack.

[ellacott]

5. She reports on ABC too

Not sure what that has to do with anything.

No one commented on the substance of what she wrote. She is just dismissed because it wasn't positive towards the party.

[beaconess]

6. She's absolutely right

She didn't say that election fraud is a myth. She said that the notion that their votes will be meaningless is so common in the public discourse that it is discouraging Black voters - who are already jaded, frustrated and disengaged - from making the effort to vote: "It doesn't matter - my vote won't count, so why waste my time?"

What Donna is talking about is dead on - we have to energize the Black community to get out and vote and we can't do that by consistently beating the "YOUR VOTE'S GONNA GET STOLEN!!!!" mantra so that it drowns out everything else.

Black folks' votes have ALWAYS been vulnerable throughout our history, so this is nothing new in our community - in fact, many of us are slightly bemused at the hysteria among some of those white folks who never said a peep about the disenfranchisement of Black voters over the decades but are now up in arms at the thought that THEIR votes might not be counted. But given the history of Black voter disenfranchisement, telling Black folks their votes won't count will do little if anything to energize us to get out and vote.

That's why the public discourse about election fraud must be counterbalanced with a POSITIVE message that encourages Black voters to go out and vote FOR something in such numbers that the margin cannot be overcome by vote stealing on the other side.

Donna is working in the trenches, not just with the DNC, but with the on-the-ground grassroots and every major Black group involved in the Black voter and civic engagement effort and knows what she's talking about. She's absolutely right.

[ellacott]

7. Very well said!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! n/t

[beaconess]

8. thanks