National GOP leaders have been dumping on Detroit lately and Michigan GOP leaders, including the Governor, seem to be tagging along. They may not be attacking Detroit as their rest of their fellow Republicans have, but they are certainly not defending us either.
For example, Newt Gingrich cited the “destruction” of Detroit as the result of the policies of the “Food Stamp President”. Nothing new there, as Republicans routinely use code words for implicitly racist statements against the President, and minorities in general. It’s called the “Southern Strategy” and it’s been used by Republicans since the Nixon Administration to divide the country by racial lines, pitting Americans against each other to keep power.
The GOP still uses the Southern strategy, the most salient examples being the questioning of President Obama’s citizenship as a metaphor for questioning the citizenship and rights of minorities, especially minority immigrants such as Mexican-Americans.
The “Southern Strategy” may have worked for Republicans in the past, but with the demographics already shifted toward a non-Anglo America, their emphasis will shift to reviving another preferred strategy of denying voting rights to anyone who doesn’t look American or have an American name (“Barack HUSSEIN Obama”).
Be that as it is, one has to wonder why Gov. Snyder and other Republican leaders in MICHIGAN are not strident in the defense of the largest City in the State. Why not? It is certainly in the best interest of the entire State of Michigan for Detroit to succeed and to not have the rest of the country believe that Detroit is “destroyed”.
Could it be that many in the Michigan Republican Party subscribe to the same strategy of dividing the State by racial and cultural lines? Maybe they are the same wolves in sheep’s clothing that the bigots at the top of their Party pretend to be.
Well, Gov. Snyder and other Michigan Republicans can certainly distinguish themselves from the “Southern Strategy” through giving a realistic picture of Detroit to the rest of the country and to publicly and stridently defend Detroit against the race baiting tactics of the National counterparts.
Or not.
Every Michigander of any race should defend Detroit and all of Michigan, and demand the same from Michigan Republicans.