The politics of desperation is an ugly and nasty political force that brings out the worst in not only politicians, but in the electorate as well. Despite months of brutal attack ads by the Romney campaign and allied Super Political Action Committees (PAC) in key swing states, President Obama continues to lead in multiple national polls.
Desperate for something to stick, the Romney campaign has resorted to attacks that they just invented, or better yet, they have pulled out of their collective asses. The most egregious example is a recent attack ad that claims the president ended work requirements for welfare.
Welfare has long been a political punching bag for Conservatives that have more often than not exploited racial prejudices. In 1976, Ronald Reagan campaigned for the Republican nomination for president by citing an anecdote of a woman in Chicago living the high life on public assistance, thus the term “welfare queen” was born. The image of an African American woman driving a Cadillac while collecting welfare became a political social meme that permeated popular culture.
There, of course, was no woman driving around in a new Cadillac on welfare. Those attacks by Ronald Reagan were not intended to crack down on fraud in the welfare system, but were rather a political ploy to exploit racial animosity among working-class whites.
The attacks on the supposed “welfare queen” resonated with many working-class whites because they relied on the assumption that some other person is getting a free ride on their hard-earned tax dollars. The image of this free rider is more often than not implied as being African American.
Over 36 years have passed since Ronald Reagan promoted the image of the “welfare queen,” and yet the power of using social programs as a tool of political and racial division is still widely used. During a primary debate in January, former presidential candidate Newt Gingrich called President Obama the “food stamp president.”
Now the Romney campaign is resorting to these same attacks in an attempt to stir working-class animosity towards the president. The ad in question claimed that President Obama “quietly ended work requirements for welfare” and that “now they just send you your check.”
Ads such as these often display citations with the names of objective news agencies and dates as a means of proving their veracity. This ad, however, only displayed one actual citation, which was for the conservative Heritage Foundation. The other claim of the ad only showed a date.
There’s a reason that there were no objective citations: The attack was a complete fabrication with no basis in reality. Multiple independent fact checkers such as Politifact have concluded that not only was the attack ad false, but the welfare claim earned the “pants on fire” award which is reserved for only the most egregious lies.
What President Obama did, however, was grant waivers to states to begin experimenting with their respective welfare programs to improve work outcomes. These waivers are only given out to states that promise to increase work outcomes for welfare recipients.
Ultimately, the truth behind the attack ads not only stands in stark contradiction to the claims made by the Romney campaign, but it also pits Romney against the position he held in 2006 when he requested these same waivers during his time as governor of Massachusetts.
Despite being universally derided as a false and misleading claim, Romney doubled down in a USA Today interview and stated that President Obama weakened the welfare work requirements “to shore up his own base.” This brings up the question as to who exactly Romney was implying Obama’s base was. It seems that Romney was implying that Obama’s voting base was composed of lazy welfare recipients who don’t want to work.
These attacks were never intended to be real or factual critiques of the president but rather dog-whistle politics that appeal to working-class white voters. Romney needs these voters to show up on Election Day because the Romney/Ryan ticket is losing in the polls among every minority group.
Romney only leads in the polls among older white males and loses every other group such as women, African Americans and Hispanics. In fact, the Romney/Ryan ticket made history by being the first presidential ticket ever to achieve zero percent support from blacks in a presidential tracking poll conducted by NBC News and the Wall Street Journal.
The campaign tactics and policy proposals of the Romney campaign turn off many minority voters.
With the Romney campaign harsh on immigration, antiquated policies on women’s reproductive rights and a racially tinged attack ad, it’s no wonder they have no support among those groups. While these ads may be effective in the short term, in the long term the United States is poised to become a minority-majority country. These ads will not only lose their effectiveness but will become a political liability for the Republican Party.
While the race for the presidency might become even nastier over the coming months, it’s important to remember that the president’s job is not to do what’s best for a political party or a racial minority. The job of the president is to do what’s best for the entire nation. Dividing the country along racial lines for political gain is not in this nation’s best interest.
When Romney decided it was okay to exploit racial prejudices against African Americans to gain votes, he not only showed poor judgment and insensitivity, but he vehemently showed that he is not qualified to be president.
Alex Caraballo can be reached at alex.caraballo@spartans.ut.edu
I find it so interesting that conservatives and republicans by name have conveniently forgotten the past. They have never been fiscally conservative at anytime in history and we are to believe that they now are going to be fiscally conservative. It is a hard pill to swollow from the so called fiscal policies that did nothing for us to create a better economy for us all but now that President Obama is in office, they are so ready to be fiscally conservative. If reducing taxes(and I mean for anyone not just the rich) helps spur the economy and create massive amounts of jobs, how come they did not do that during the last administration and how come those same tax cuts aren’t creating jobs now since we have not changed them. Whether you are a democrat(which I am not) or a republican(which I am not), you have to speak the truth. People pay attention. If a tax increase(for the rich, poor and middle class) is so destructive and would not do anything for us, how come businesses and people were better off and did just find when taxes were higher in the past. People and businesses will adapt to their environment and they will thrive just like they did before. Rich people are not going to die off if they have to pay some more taxes and businesses are not going to fail if they have to pay a little more taxes. Trust me on this, they will do just fine as they have always done. People pay attention
Since when is it the responsibility of the president to “unite all Americans.” By that logic, I think you’ll find that every president has been a massive failure.
C’mon now Alex C… this is not a racist ad. And you should know better by now that the “fact-checkers,” like Politifact, are now as biased as most of the media towards getting Obama re-elected.
The gushing liberal support for Obama, despite his complete failure to lift the economy and unite all Americans, is appalling. The majority of the US major press organizations are nothing more than propaganda outlets for the party in power.
Stand up and deliver the truth.
GAO confirms Obama administration overstepped bounds in welfare law changes (So who are the liars?)
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-gop/2927476/posts
Good Doctor:
If he would have backed up his claims/assertions with those facts, I would never have commented. Thing is- he included none. That was the whole point of my comment. Thank you
Just saying, I am a independent as well and I understand your point well. All campaigns run ads that teeter on not being completely accurate. If you remove all the partisan rhetoric out of the article, the basic point is that the ad is playing to the fears and attitudes of a specific group against another. Mitt Romney doesn’t have to explicitly say that I am trying to reach this audience for us to know what he is doing. This Ad is in my opinion over the line becuase it does in my opinion try to play to a crowd who thinks that Blacks and other minorities gobble up all the welfare assitance. Behind all the partisan Crap, if we are to be truly independent then we must call a spade a spade.
MetLife- we all know politicians run false ads… Part of the game. Problem is: people believe them. Regardless of whether the ad is wrong or not, one can not simply conclude that someone must be racist simply because they ran a false ad.
Besides, he only says this about the ad: “The most egregious example is a recent attack ad that claims the president ended work requirements for welfare.”, and ” “quietly ended work requirements for welfare” and that “now they just send you your check.” Ok, and then??? He goes on to bring up Reagan and his ads. Sorry, but Reagan’s ads and Romney’s are completely different.
Now let’s examine this whole paragraph: “Despite being universally derided as a false and misleading claim, Romney doubled down in a USA Today interview and stated that President Obama weakened the welfare work requirements “to shore up his own base.” This brings up the question as to who exactly Romney was implying Obama’s base was. It seems that Romney was implying that Obama’s voting base was composed of lazy welfare recipients who don’t want to work.”
Nowhere does Romney say anything about “lazy welfare recipients”. In fact, Alex made this part up to make it look like Romney said something worse than he actually did. What Alex does not disclose is that he is an ardent Democrat and Obama supporter who has worked for many campaigns. He wrote an article about Romney running a false ad and has succeeded in writing one of his own. His “opinion” is rife with inaccuracies and assumptions that do nothing to benefit political dialogue.
I am a an independent voter and the way we have to sift through the BS from both sides is pretty ridiculous. Why doesn’t anyone at the Minaret write an article about the misleading, false ads run by Obama and his PAC’s? Not because he hasn’t run any…
Your lecture about putting personal biases aside is comical, at best.
1) Your numbers on the white and black recipients of welfare are essentially correct, but the welfare issue has long been painted in racial terms because it resonates with a segment of white, working class voters. During the RNC, polls showed that many Republicans believe that African Americans vote Democratic because they want “handouts.” Mitt Romney himself suggested that Obama’s welfare position is to shore up “a part of his base.” Gee, I wonder which part that is. Kudos to you for pointing out the baselessness of this perception that the GOP exploits for political gain, though I’m sure that wasn’t your intention.
2) Despite clever RNC seating arrangements intending to make the convention seem more diverse (like putting Puerto Rico near the front), the GOP has a diversity problem. Only 2% of Republican delegates were black vs. 26% of Democratic delegates. The GOP continues to be antagonizing to minority voters on issues of welfare, immigration, women’s rights, and economic distribution. This is why the GOP has serious electoral problems with every group except white men.
3) This will likely be the last election that the GOP makes a play to win on the back of the “let’s make America American again” crowd. It’s a close election, and Romney could still win, but this kind of alienating campaign just isn’t sustainable unless the GOP wants to continue the path to becoming a limited regional party.
4) In the simplest terms: the Romney camp’s welfare claim has been widely debunked. Why, then, do they keep repeating it? Because it resonates. Who does it resonate to? Certain white, working class voters. Why does it resonate to them? Because of the racial issues you want to ignore.
Just saying, you make some valid points and I will admit that we can not conclude that Romney is a racist but I would ask you two questions. Is that Ad racist based on the assumptions that it makes even if it was not intended to be and two, is the ad factual. If the ad is not factual, what is the purpose of running it? In fact I think you know the ad is not factual and thus we must ask ourselves then what is the purpose of a false Ad.
Wow- you didn’t even back up your assertion that the attack was racist. Fact is- 38% of welfare users are white, while 39% are black. In essence, he would be attacking whites just as much as African Americans. Where is that in your article?
You see, you have to put aside your personal feelings when writing an article. Your personal biases come out and anyone who actually knows anything about the subject will know you are wrong. This is similar to what you are pointing out about Romney. Every politician takes part in this all the time- not just Romney. You used the ad to imply that he was attacking African Americans, but fail to show where it even remotely brings up any race. Sure, Romney’s base does not include much of the minority vote, but you can’t claim there is a correlation between his ads and racism. If you do- you are guilty of participating in the same activities you are deriding him for. You can’t just pull the race card, paint someone as being racist without proof. It’s called defamation. However, you won’t care because you are also guilty of being racially insensitive. A quote from Alex’s Facebook page on 08/28/2012: “I didn’t think it was possible but the Republican Convention audience is whiter than NASCAR crowd.” Funny, sure. But imagine if someone would have posted: “I didn’t think it was possible but the Democratic Convention audience is blacker than a hip hop concert.” Again, funny and perhaps even true. However, the media will only show you what they want you to see. For instance, there were many minorities in the crowd, but they only focused on the white faces. Making racially charged comments, criticisms, attacks, whatever against someone without actually including facts is not exactly fair. Unfortunately, many of us do it. As Democrats, we are allowed to attack the Repubs for being insensitive to minority causes or for caring more about white people. Can you imagine if the Repubs called the Prez insensitive to White causes and caring more about his own race? For sure- they would be labeled racist and who knows what. You see, even though this is an opinion column and everyone knows your opinion, you can’t just make unfounded assumptions of someone’s character simply because we do not like them. Instead of attacking other’s, let’s try and get Obama back in office by showing what good it would do. We look like less of an ass and more inclusive. Remember: “The politics of desperation is an ugly and nasty political force that brings out the worst in not only politicians, but in the electorate as well.”