On this Sunday's Meet The Press, Colin Powell was asked by David Gregory about his views on today's Republican party. Colin Powell spoke candidly about the state of the party as he sees it.
Via Think Progress:
POWELL: There’s also a dark — a dark vein of intolerance in some parts of the party. What do I mean by that? I mean by that that they still sort of look down on minorities. How can I evidence that?
When I see a former governor say that the President is “shuckin’ and jivin’,” that’s racial era slave term. When I see another former governor after the president’s first debate where he didn’t do very well, says that the president was lazy. He didn’t say he was slow. He was tired. He didn’t do well. He said he was lazy. Now, it may not mean anything to most Americans, but to those of us who are African Americans, the second word is shiftless and then there’s a third word that goes along with that. The birther, the whole birther movement. Why do senior Republican leaders tolerate this kind of discussion within the party?
It's becoming old news hearing Colin Powell try to talk sense to his party, and it's a testament to the Republican party to disappoint a guy who worked side by side with George W. Bush, but I found it particularly poignant that Powell went on to say,
"everybody wants to talk about who is going to be the candidate-- you better think first about what’s the party actually going to represent.”
That's why the Republican party deserves no pity. Whom, or what, do they actually represent? The demographics are not on their side, and they refuse to change, or soften in their collective rigidity. They're still trying to pass Sanctity Of Life acts, giving full legal rights to zygotes and amend the constitution to make abortion a capital crime. At this very minute they're threatening to crash the global economy again and again until the American people and the world over recognize the power and divine righteousness of right wing conservatism!
Unfortunately for America and Colin Powell's sobering advice, the Republican party is not listening, and instead of doing all any of that-- because it's humanly and scientifically impossible-- they're working frantically to restructure the way they communicate their already carefully-worded crazy, not to communicate new ideas, mind you, but to better protect an insidiously anti-social platform.
Because everyone knows it is better to look good, than to feel. Anything.