Select Page

Racism is an in-house problem for Democrats

Racism is an in-house problem for Democrats

Since the end of the Civil War … since the 1960s civil rights era … since yesterday … the problem of institutional racism in America has been at the doorstep of the Democratic Party.

There is an almost universal understanding of the malignant role of the Democratic Party in the defense of slavery.  They seceded from the Union to defend it.  More than 400,000 Americans died to defeat the Democratic Party’s war for the preservation of slavery.

Most Americans understand the malignant role of the Democratic Party played in pursuing violent White supremacy through segregation and oppression of Black Americans.  There is no controversy over who imposed those Jim Crow laws … whose legal systems thwarted equal justice … who blocked access to the ballot … who used terrorist paramilitary groups, such as the Ku Klux Klan, White Citizens Councils, Knights of the White Camelia, and Red Shirts, to vandalize, injure and murder … for more than 100 years after the Civil War.

The Democrat Party’s long history of violent racism has diminished, but not yet ended.  It has remained part of the urban landscape in most of the major Democrat-controlled cities in America.

In an inexplicable irony, the very people who have – and do – suffer from the residual of institutional racism overwhelmingly support the political party most responsible for their plight.  The Democratic Party has gained their loyalty with promises of generational welfare dependency – providing meager sustenance to those trapped in the segregated ghettoes — in trade for the upward mobility and constitutional rights that most Americans enjoy.

It is more than odd that Blacks trapped in the misery of ghetto life vote for the same people they occasionally protest and riot against – the same political leaders they blame for the police brutality, unequal justice, high unemployment, poor education, unsafe streets, and inferior city services.

I got back to this subject through two revelatory interviews on MSNBC.  In the one interview, Charles Blow, of the New York Times, was talking about the racism found in America’s cities.  He specifically mentioned New York City and Chicago, among others.  He described the situation perfectly.  But he omitted the obvious.  The who.  Who is in charge?  Who is responsible?

All the cities he mentioned have been controlled by Democrat political machines for generations. Even where you might have a Republican mayor occasionally – like John Lindsay and Michael Bloomberg, in New York – the apparatchiks are all Democrats – and both Lindsay and Bloomberg became Democrats.  Chicago has not had a Republican mayor since 1931 – and rarely has a Republican served on its 50-member city council.

But like most observers of institutional racism, Blow fails to connect the two most obvious dots.

In the second interview, former Buffalo, New York mayoral candidate India Walton has this to say about her city in the aftermath of the race-motivated mass shooting at the Tops grocery store that killed 10 innocent people.

“There are a lot of people in this community who are devastated, but not surprised. Buffalo is racist. Buffalo is racially segregated. There’s a line that separates those who have from those who have not, and that is Main Street. Anything east of Main Street is where 85 percent of the black folks in the city live. It’s been that way.”

Walton said that Buffalo is the sixth most segregated city in America.  As did Blow, Walton said New York City is also segregated and racist.  And like Blow, she did not connect the dots between the obvious institutional racism and those in charge.

Buffalo has not had a Republican mayor since 1965 – and only three since 1934.

For more than 100 years, the Democratic Party has proclaimed fealty to civil rights at the national level, while drawing most of its political power from the racist political machines that have ruled over the high-population cities,  Democrat Presidents like Woodrow Wilson, Franklin Roosevelt, and John Kennedy talked civil rights while turning their backs on the Democrat political machines in the urban centers – and before that, to the “segregation power” of the Dixiecrats of the old south.

Fortunately, there seems to be an awakening among Black voters … Black parents … and Black community leaders.  It is seen in the modest – but measurable – shift of Black voters to the Republican Party.  It may seem small now, but it portends a much more significant realignment in the future.  The same thing is happening among segregated Hispanics.

The comments by Blow and Walton are like an incomplete sentence with the last word so obvious, it does not have to be stated.  The dots connect themselves.

What is even more amazing is the fact that the oppression of segregated minorities can continue even when there is Black leadership – because all the political power, prestige, and financial benefits of oppression are still available to those running the political machines and their cronies.  That is why Black oppression remains in cities like Detroit, Chicago, Baltimore … and Buffalo.

There are two things that are true.  While the residual of historic racism still exists in America, the masses of Americans are not racists.  Billions of times each day, people of all backgrounds interact peacefully, and happily as friends, neighbors, co-workers, and lovers.  We protect each other and save each other’s lives. 

Yes, there are some on the fringe who harbor hate and take up violence – and they come from all communities.  But they are not enough to characterize the people generally as racist.  Institutional racism is cancer with identifiable loci.  The most obvious indicator is segregation – and all the obvious tragic consequences of segregation.  Find generational segregation and you will find institutional racism – AND you will find long term Democrat governance.

So, there ‘tis.

About The Author

Larry Horist

So, there ‘tis… The opinions, perspectives and analyses of businessman, conservative writer and political strategist Larry Horist. Larry has an extensive background in economics and public policy. For more than 40 years, he ran his own Chicago based consulting firm. His clients included such conservative icons as Steve Forbes and Milton Friedman. He has served as a consultant to the Nixon White House and travelled the country as a spokesman for President Reagan’s economic reforms. Larry professional emphasis has been on civil rights and education. He was consultant to both the Chicago and the Detroit boards of education, the Educational Choice Foundation, the Chicago Teachers Academy and the Chicago Academy for the Performing Arts. Larry has testified as an expert witness before numerous legislative bodies, including the U. S. Congress, and has lectured at colleges and universities, including Harvard, Northwestern and DePaul. He served as Executive Director of the City Club of Chicago, where he led a successful two-year campaign to save the historic Chicago Theatre from the wrecking ball. Larry has been a guest on hundreds of public affairs talk shows, and hosted his own program, “Chicago In Sight,” on WIND radio. An award-winning debater, his insightful and sometimes controversial commentaries have appeared on the editorial pages of newspapers across the nation. He is praised by audiences for his style, substance and sense of humor. Larry retired from his consulting business to devote his time to writing. His books include a humorous look at collecting, “The Acrapulators’ Guide”, and a more serious history of the Democratic Party’s role in de facto institutional racism, “Who Put Blacks in That PLACE? -- The Long Sad History of the Democratic Party’s Oppression of Black Americans ... to This Day”. Larry currently lives in Boca Raton, Florida.

36 Comments

  1. Brent

    It’s so funny that democrats want to paint republicans as racist while they are the people who divide us into groups. As they troll for victims they actually hold people back. And notice that I didn’t refer to anyone being minorities. That term is racist because it offers the opinion that some are lesser people. But you won’t get democrats to see it that way. They are the party that teaches people of color that they are too stupid to vote or get voter ID. Actually us conservatives encourage everyone to vote. But the empty pie in the sky offered by democrats should be ignored

    • frank stetson

      Yes, it should be ignored. And yet it isn’t. Makes you wonder how they could get you so wrong. Why would they not understand the things you do the way you do. But yet they do. At least that’s what the votes say.

    • Jaakko Talvitie

      Education is the very foundation of a Civil Society – However, Quality of Education is not necessarily question of MONEY – There has to be fundamental changes in our APPROACH, APPRECIATION and ATTITUDE.

      It all depends where people get their information. As all of us know, if you repeat the miss-information often enough (and from multiple outlets), it will become a generally accepted fact – There is no critical independent thinking anymore, and investigative news reporting went out the window with 24/7 news cycle.

    • Ac

      Larry, the fact of systemic racism lays at the door step of both parties and everyday it’s stepped over and passed over. It is like pile of excrement messy and stinking. No one takes the initiative necessary for its removal, clean-up, and prevention.
      Racism’s cause is dirt on the hands of all people through our nations history from before either political party existed as both are evolutions of parties early on from colonial times.
      Democrats have attempted more Civil Rights legislation and accepted all races into their tent. While Republicans are against strong government introducing social policy correcting obvious inequalities in our various systems navigated by everyone.
      A knee jerk reaction byRepublican lawmakers is the nay vote on bills originating in the Democratic caucus and possibly a few Republicans sign on for bipartisan optics. The cynical conservative view is that everyone as individuals are responsible for their own health, wealth, and life success on their own merit. Government, then, by conservative definition has its own responsibilities to secure the boarders, maintain law and order, oversee monetary stability, and administer and hold safe public lands. In all government has responsibility over the result is ensuring life , liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.
      This scheme worked for those fortunate to be white, possibly able to be fairly financially independent, born and raised in entitlement, educated in the better schools, college entrance assured, employment choices open, purchase a home in a chosen neighborhood, the police let you go on your way.
      In a parallel world all those rights we white folks take for granted are dreams for people who do not look like white folks. White folks can be of either political party, but Republicans are predominately white. Historically, in the 20th and 21st Centuries Republicans eschew being involved in changing how government in laws, police conduct, as and the court system treated the un-entitled poor and vulnerable non white population.
      Democrats have been and are today a political party opening it’s tent to a more varied class of individuals across races, countries of origin, faith beliefs, and more progressive political views.
      Now, the Democratic Party has not gone as far and as quickly as needed and required for those deprived of equal rights under the law.
      Republicans with very few exceptions are uncomfortable accepting others not like them in close proximity physically, social occasion, church fellowship, community board membership, and especially living next door.
      White Republicans left homes and endemic problems in cities, relocating in rural suburban all white townships. TheGreat Migration of black folks from mostly southern states filled the void left in city neighborhoods. This influx of people new to city life, northern culture and weather, and unfamiliar with social customs, they brought their own customs and culture with them. Of course the Democratic Party came into offices and controlled the cities. Republicans leaving created a vacuum of leadership. This resulted in chaos in leadership and the best people did not fill the public offices where decisions were made and city government policy got hammered out. Power in government and control over city finances and asset resources did go to the highest bidder, the influential citizens, or favorite cousin.
      Greed for gain in power and status government office can bring happens to be a vice that does not distinguish between political parties. So, Republican conservatives who despise government control and policy demands on public response by the individual will naturally point accusing fingers at the opposition. In the same moment kicking the can of responsibly across the aisle.
      Discrimination practice against any race; for that matter, any individual citizen or person on US soil is undemocratic and therefore, unbecoming of our country’s name and our American spirit.
      Dressing down Democrats for every social/political sin or some perceived mental fabrication on. your own part is your MO. Why resort to the usual and customary defamatory line,?
      Surely, your expertise can lead to writing critical exposition on some other subject on the world horizon.
      Years ago, on several occasions I seemed to randomly cross paths with the same person. Usually, our meeting came at a time when neither of us were pressed for time and could talk.
      He always began the conversation with a his opinion on a story heard in the media. He left no misunderstanding about his thinking and what perspective he had on the issue that day. Not once did he allow an opening in his monologue for my thinking. His preoccupation with delivering his own judgement uninterrupted he gave no place for discussion.
      Each of these speeches given amounted to a sermon with out three points, but all has the same summation. This was not a summation of his subject of the hour. He concluded with the the same troubling for him possibility. What if, I am mistaken and there is life after death.
      And, after that he would resume walking. As he always did accompanied by his patient dog
      What does it matter if one spends life in pursuit of owning the whole world, but in the process loses their soul? The agnostic may have no problem with a soulless body.
      Assuming in the pursuit wealth had accrued to the body.

      owns the whole world

      Mm

      M

      • larry Horist

        Ac … Did you finally pass out as you were penning you long irrational screed?

    • larry Horist

      READER ALERT. Most of the posts on my commentaries are now coming from one whacko reader who uses a new screen name for each post. Not sure why he thinks such a childish approach is a meaningful contribution to civil dialogue — but I assume that is how he gets his rocks off. That is just the kind of approach you would expect from a low IQ leftwing nutcase. Just thought I should let you know.

      • Robin

        Can you ID him/her?

        • larry Horist

          He has been using goofy phrases as screen names — which makes sense in view of his goofy comments. Now that that cat is out of the bag, he may employ some other screen names.

      • Larry Horist

        Larry, when you started to allow some idiot post under liberal posters names and misrepresent the original owners of that name’s ideals, to the point where there would now be 3 Bens… I decided to make a different “name” under each post be my “name”.
        I suppose I could just post under the name of Larry Horist from now on if it bothers you so much.

      • frank stetson

        Whatttsa matter Larry, you no like Joe’s concept of free speech? I was surprised your name could be spoofed, thought it was just us second-class free speechers in Joe’s universe. Can’t spoof him, get’s blocked. Guess it’s different when the “owner” feels the pain his reader’s have been feeling and screaming about for months.

        As I told Joe, most websites fix this issue in minutes blocking any duplication. It’s a choice that PBP does not make. The only rationale I can think of is laziness or thinking conflict equals $$$$ is that’s how you want to make your money. Certainly can not really be free speech.

  2. Les

    All people are racist, some a lot more than others. Racist are of all colors not just white, I have heard blacks make real racist remarks, if done by whites they would have been in big trouble. This will never go completely away.

  3. ANDY FISHER

    The Democrats always seem to point fingers and accuse Republicans of whatever terrible things they do and have been doing for many years

  4. Trebor Retsbew

    I cannot understand who so many are so uneducated about the history of this USA, do a favor and look it up, “when the Democratic party was the Conservative party in the USA. “, You will find out that the Democratic party was the Conservative party up until about 1964. So in fact it was the Conservative party no matter what they called them selves who actually fostered and protected slavery, KKK, and Jim Crow laws. Even today doing things to marginalized minorities at every turn, from voting to education.

    • Larry kuhn

      I love colored people.

      • Tom

        Me too Some of my best friends are colored.

      • Ben

        Yeah, and the color is white.

      • Ben

        Yeah, if the cokor is white.

        • Frank

          It’s all pink inside

          • Ben

            Omg, the third graders are back.

            Where’s that disaffected high schooler when he’s needed. 😉

  5. Over my dead kids body

    NeEd mOrE gUnS!!!
    RIP to all the students and teachers that were killed today.

    • Mark

      Yes, we need more guns. But in the hands of qualified people. And yes, we need armed people at all schools. Celebrities and politicians have a hell of a lot of security. Why not our kids? Evil cannot be stopped with bullshit gun control laws. It’s common knowledge that it’s illegal to shoot people under most circumstances, but crazy people and criminals don’t give a rat’s ass about laws. We need to realize that children and law abiding people have more right to live than fucking cowards attacking kids. So I’m upgrading my NRA donations and will only vote for progun candidates. We live in evil times and there’s more ways to enact violence than with guns

      • Larry Horitz

        Laws don’t work, that’s what the Texas AG said. Why bother having any laws?
        Yet republicans are passing more and more restrictive laws on a daily basis. Don’t say gay, don’t teach about race, don’t have reproductive autonomy.

        Amazing the mental gymnastics y’all can do.

  6. Dont oick on white supremAcy

    * Since the end of the Civil War … since the 1960s civil rights era … since yesterday … the problem of institutional racism in America has been at the doorstep of the conservative white male…
    Fixed it for you Larry

  7. Unburdened by fuckery

    “White supremacy should not be the main target,… we should not be pursuing people based on the way they vote”
    Marjorie Taylor Green.

    Larry, is it your contention that MTG is supporting democrats?

    • Joe Gilbertson

      Funny how white supremacy was dying and almost gone until Obama became president. Thanks, Obama

      • Stan

        The democrats stepped up efforts to troll for victims.

      • frank stetson

        Joe,
        You have to be kidding, right? You can’t be laying this at Obama’s feet, can you? The first Black President, after Clinton :>), was the starting point for the return of White Supremacy you say? You have got to be kidding.

        Most, about 80%, of all murders caused by US extremists, are caused by right-wing extremists.

        Ever wonder why we never heard about Obama death threats? That’s the kind of guy HE is. Thanks, Joe.

        Try the concept that white supremacy was buried until Donald J. Trump enabled them in order that he could become President. Then he continued to court them with hisdog whistles and tropes. It appears he thought this his best chance to expand the Trumpublicant Party or TP. Now most White Supremacists are part of the TP which used to be able to claim they were “the party of Lincoln.” Now they lay claim to being the tool used to wipe one’s ass. Now David Duke belongs to the Trumplicant party. Wendy Rodgers, Republican State Senator says Whites are being replaced, she a Trumplicant. Mage Green says Zionist supremacists are forcing immigration aimed to breed us out of our homeland. It’s on tape. Another Trumplicant, this one on steroids. Paul Gosar is also spoke, on tape, at a white supremacist rally he had the invite to. Stephen King was also publicly advocates white supremacist views as well. Madison Cawthorn and his hero Hitler “ha ha” tweets are always memorable. The list is much longer. All Trumplicant Congresspeople supporting Donald J. Trump and White Supremacy.

        White Supremacists vocally support Donald J. Trump as in return he encourages them. They look to the Republican Party as their party of choice. Who supported the 1/6 insurrection but The Proud Boys, Oathkeepers, the like who were enabled early on when Trump boldly announced: “Proud Boys, stand back and stand by! But I’ll tell you what, somebody’s got to do something about antifa and the left,” Somebody’s got to do something…..and these are my boys….. I wonder who handles security at the Trump rallies?

        White-nationalist leader Richard Spencer once said: “There is no question that Charlottesville wouldn’t have occurred without Trump.” But Joe blames it all on Obama?

        The Republican party used to be the party of Lincoln, the family-values party. In those days, the Democrats could never take the high ground of that values hill. Now the Trumplicants have supplanted those values with their own warped hateful nationalism featuring the replacement theory as their rallying cry. Watch the Don as he incorporates this in his obtuse manner of whistling for the dogs to come home. Come home to the Trumplicant party so they can do something about the left. Stand by!

        I wish Republicans would boot white supremacy from their party and retake the soul of the party which the Trumplicants have destroyed. Joe is lost but Larry is just misguided as to where the line that he stepped over with Trump actually is. Like many old school Republicans, he holds his nose because he thinks he is getting what he wants. Hopefully he will grow a spine, be reborn, and retake his party making it once again the party of Lincoln, civil rights, conservative budgeting, fierce warriors against Putin, small Federal government, and the other good stuff while chucking these Trumplicant fuckheads and their exclusionary ideologies. America thrives on diversity. Stating that it’s “Funny how white supremacy was dying and almost gone until Obama became president. Thanks, Obama.” Saying the first Black President revived White Supremacy is stupid. It was always there, just under the rock until Donald J. Trump and the Trumplicant Party let it out.

        • Marcus

          We republicans don’t give a damn about bothering blacks in any way. So enough of the race baiting. Our party doesn’t talk down to blacks like they are idiots. We don’t troll for victims. We don’t put people in separate groups. You dickheads play the race card because you have no other talking points that really work. By the way, I’m black. So come and tell me I’m not black or too stupid to have voter ID. Then I would kick your ass

          • ben

            Well, either you are stupid or you are missing all those opportunities to kick some verbal ass around here since many are saying exactly that if you are black you are to stupid to have voter ID having been groomed by Democrats. And they ain’t liberals, buddy.

      • Larry HoriSt

        Joe,
        Any fact based evidence you can offer for your claim? Aside from the conservative white males feeling emboldened to force violence upon the American people? I wasn’t aware that prior to that racism had disappeared.

      • Jeff stasco

        Perhaps your reasoning is that having a Black president fired up the white supremacy movement? I can’t fathom any other way you can blame him for the rise of white supremacy.

        Ok now I’ll get back to my main job of trolling for victims.

  8. But her emails

    Fox News host Tucker Carlson is drawing praise from white nationalist outlets for mainstreaming their “great replacement” conspiracy theory after a white supremacist allegedly killed 10 people in Buffalo, New York, in a massacre apparently inspired by it. The Fox star has drawn compliments from the notorious former Ku Klux Klan leader David Duke and been toasted by racist outlets like VDare and American Renaissance for bringing their message to his millions of viewers.

    Pretty sure none of these people identify as liberals or democrats.

    • Joe Gilbertson

      I understand that white nationalists all like peanut butter. We should ban peanut butter.

      Never mind that you are making all of this up, your logic is bad too.

      • Ben

        Butter emails did not make one thing up. It’s all documented.

        “Fox News host Tucker Carlson has repeatedly invoked the “great replacement theory” on his show, platforming a racist and antisemitic conspiracy theory that has inspired several mass shootings, including the recent attack in Buffalo, New York.

        A New York Times investigation identified more than 400 episodes of Carlson’s show in which he pushed core tenets of the conspiracy theory.

        Minutes after claiming he was “still not sure exactly what it is,” Carlson again promoted the theory, claiming that Democrats were conspiring to transform the electorate.”

        “I know that the left and all the little gatekeepers on Twitter become literally hysterical if you use the term ‘replacement,’ if you suggest that the Democratic Party is trying to replace the current electorate, the voters now casting ballots, with new people, more obedient voters from the Third World,” he said the same month. “But they become hysterical because that’s what’s happening, actually.”

        https://www.politifact.com/article/2022/may/19/tucker-carlson-feigned-ignorance-over-great-replac/

        You could just not watch Fucker Carlson.

  9. Jeff Stasco

    Larry your evidence of racism in “Democrat-controlled cities” is circumstantial at best. You’re not connecting any dots, showing how Democrat sponsored policies are racist or keeping Blacks in ghettos. Just as you’re ignoring how the racist Democrats of the South became racist Republicans in the 1960s when LBJ started pushing for civil rights, or how the current Republican Party is reversing decades of voting rights progress, or how the current Republican Party provides a comfortable home for white supremacists and purveyors of “replacement theory.” As usual in your single-minded fervor to make Dems look bad, you exhibit a selective view of history and its relevance to the current day.

    • WAlter

      White lives matter. White power

  1. Remember the title: “More woman victimization from the left.” The author, without a shred of evidence, presumes that there are…