Yes

by Michael T. Heath

Created on: October 26, 2010   Last Updated: October 29, 2010

Equivocating All The Way To Washington

Rand Paul wants to have his pie, and eat it too. His comment that he is not a racist and wouldn't discriminate against any segment of society is all well and good, considering he's a physician, and most likely (as an aspiring politician) wouldn't refuse to treat black Kentuckians alongside his white clients. But here's where his logic - and rhetoric - ends. He feels it should be acceptable for any business owner to pick and choose who they want to serve in their restaurants, bars and movie theatres. Presumably, following this line of thinking, if business owners wished to align seating/service/restroom areas within their establishments according to the perceived 'race' of their clientele, that would be fine, too. Paul asserts that this should be the right of business owners: that the federal government has no right interfering in the private choices of any establishment, whether they be 'white' owned or 'black' owned. Both could discriminate to their hearts' content, without anyone official being able to force them to do otherwise.

Why would a politician take such a stand? Are black business owners complaining about having to serve a mixed clientele? Are asian business owners hot under the collar whenever whites frequent their door? Not likely, I'll wager. The audience Paul is sending a signal to is exclusively white folks, some of whom are unreconstructed racists fuming not only about the provisions of the Civil Rights Act, but particularly insulted at the fact that this country has a black president for the first time. And the long-simmering resentments they've managed to contain since 1964 have boiled over since the election of 2008. Tolerance went out the window, in part thanks to rabble-rousers who've whipped ugly sentiments up, playing to these once-hidden hates that still burn in some men's and women's souls.  They talked it up down at the corner bar, out on the farm when country folks got together and, most disturbingly, in church right from the pulpit. Right-wing commentators on radio used more subtle language, but they still whipped their listeners up by mocking the president and other black politicians who dared to take office in today's world. Racist cartoons, jokes and daily speech crept back into the mainstream, returning from forced exile. Public lynching hasn't returned, but verbal lynching came along to replace it. Socially unacceptable behavior also started showing up again, reminding this nation that it hasn't been all that long since Jim Crow laws were widespread across the former Confederate states - including Paul's home, Kentucky.

So it is no surprise that he saw such angry people as an untapped political base for himself as he contemplated leaving his medical practice to throw his hat in the ring. Running for the US Senate is a big deal: in terms of money, in terms of political power once you won. He is no fool. Kentucky seethes with the same social undercurrents which define almost every other state in the union that has a substantial minority population, plus a racist, Jim Crow past. If he wanted to break out of the pack and capture either the nomination or the Senate seat, he needed to show this angry white segment of his state that he (wink) agreed with them. Of course, it would be political suicide to openly state that you were racist in this day and age. The moderate middle - neither liberal nor conservative - often rejects anyone who steps boldly over the line and lets the public know exactly how they stand where issues of 'race' are concerned. So he had to craft a message to that sort of voter that would let them know he would stay out of the way of reactionary elements who wanted a return to the good ol' boy days and states' rights. He said that he wouldn't discriminate himself, but he thought it was up to the individual business owners to decide. It is not hard to imagine where this could go if the Civil Rights Act were gutted: all over the South, the three doors would make a comeback. I'm talking Men, Women, Black. In bars, in restaurants and theatres; in schools, in workplaces, in housing. This isn't the first time progress on race matters has been reversed. After the Civil War and passage of the 13th, 14th and 15th Amendments knocked down the established order of southern states, allowing blacks, for the first time, access to at least a modicum of equality, southern political operatives seethed at federal imposition of policies designed to bring the former slaves (and the few free blacks who lived there) into the circle. The election of 1876 gave the haters a golden opportunity. By swinging electors to Hayes (who had fewer votes than Tilden, the Democrat), southern states wrenched concessions out of the Republican political machine, including prompt removal of federal troops that had enforced the new law of the land. With the troops gone, southern legislatures quickly enacted their own laws - Jim Crow laws - that retuned their black citizens to virtual servitude again. Chain gangs, lynching and intimidation became the norm for all blacks. Segregation - illegal under the 14th amendment - allowed business owners to herd blacks into inferior accommodations, dirty restrooms and separate-but-unequal everything. It wasn't until the 1964 Civil Rights Act was passed over the howls of southern states that things changed for the better. For Rand Paul to suggest that this is the way things ought to be goes well beyond ignorance. It is beyond an oversight on his part. This is pandering to the racist elements of his state, pure and simple, and for him to claim it is the right way is facetious. It is racist in intent. He is racist in intent, plain and simple.

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