They Will Be Singing The Blues…
The Republican Party is afraid, very afraid. They understand that if a census is to be completed in the United States in 2010 their already weak party will get weaker. There are multiple reasons why the Republicans are shrinking, but I will look at what I think are the two most important reasons.
The Republicans alienated Latin-Americans with the immigration fight and the recent Sonia Sotomayor “Racialist” rhetoric. This affects states like Georgia, Arizona, Nevada, and Texas, once GOP strongholds that are moving more and more to the middle. Republicans have also alienated the moderates in states like Pennsylvania, Iowa, and shockingly Virginia and North Carolina.
The Latin-American population in America is higher than blacks and will grow exponentially larger in the next 20 years. With such a large base comes a larger influence and one that will change the political map in this country for generations. The Republican Party once the rising party of choice for many Latin-Americans, is now the party of purely right wingers and that has driven out much of the moderates. The more Republicans allow people like former Congressman Tom Tancredo to speak, the more they alienate a much needed base and ignore the needs of people who want health care and jobs, you know, just like everyone else. Many Democrats see opportunities in Texas and even Georgia and Republicans there are playing it carefully. They do not want to be associated with the bigotry and hatred being spewed by a party that has moved away from anything moderate.
Texas would be what pundits call a “game changer”, this is why Republicans fear the census. Since they refuse to hold back on their harsh rhetoric and refuse to adjust to the changing times, they would rather make the census a virtual impossible act to complete. They decreased funding during President Bush’s administration, they have held up the nomination of the Census Director, and they understand very well the difficulties of performing the constitutional deed in the first place. When redistricting takes place in Texas and even Georgia, Democrats will have the most to gain. Texas especially will be free from the Tom Delay gerrymandering that hindered Democrats and local politics for a decade. The Republicans have dug a deeper hole with the inane rhetoric against Judge Sonia Sotomayor. Judge Sotomayor is of Puerto Rican descent and is very proud of her heritage and culture, this sparked some nasty words from people like Karl Rove, Newt Gingrich, and Rush Limbaugh. They and many others on the right accused Judge Sotomayor of being a racist, power hungry, and lacking the intelligence to lead. Let the social and political alienation begin.
Under Nixon, Democrats faced an exodus from Southern Democrats to the Republican Party which damaged the party for generations. Under Obama, Republicans are doing their best to alienate the moderates and push them into the Democratic Party. This will have a profound effect on politics in states like Iowa, Pennsylvania, Virginia, North Carolina, Indiana, Ohio, Texas, Arizona and so on. With new census data there comes redistricting and with most of these states having large urban-suburban sprawl, families that seem to be struggling about the fall of both rust belt and the sun belt “empires” have had to hear the Republican reaction to government be a resounding No. Many of these families are trapped in districts that are unproportional and violate the Voting Rights Act of 1965 and because of those on the far right, they maybe there for another decade or so. These are moderates trapped in a bubble and it is extremely unconstitutional to prevent the census from happening. America wants change, well this is how change happens.
-The Graduate
