Newspapers / Winston-Salem Chronicle (Winston-Salem, N.C.) / July 21, 2016, edition 1 / Page 6
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OPINION The Chronicle Ernest H. Pitt Publisher Emeritus 1974-2015 617 N. Liberty Street 336-722-8624 I 41 \ WWW.WSCHRONICLE.COM Elaine Pitt Donna Rogers Wali D. Pitt Business Manager Managing Editor Digital Manager Our Mission The Chronicle is dedicated to serving the residents of Winston-Salem and Forsyth County by giving voice to the voiceless, speaking truth to power, standing for integrity and encouraging open communication and lively debate throughout the community. GOP won't see influx of black people in 2016 with Trump It might be hard to believe, but African Americans voted in large numbers for GOP candi dates after they received the right to vote. Back then, the Democratic Party was the party of the Klu Klux Klan and others who had disdain for black people. Even the Rev. Martin Luther King Sr. - "Daddy King" - was a Republican back in the day. Richard Nixon, as vice president of the United States, had hoped to count on millions of black people to help elect him president in his race against John F. Kennedy, the Democrat. But one fateful day changed that. Kennedy was able to show concern for a jailed Martin Luther King Jr. and helped get him out of jail weeks before the November 1960 presidential election. The tide turned. Millions of black people voted for Kennedy for president. CNN's series "The Race for the White House" looks at a few presidential races, including the 1960 race. The episode points to that gesture by Kennedy as one that changed the views of African-Americans toward the Democratic Party. It was said that Kennedy would not have won the election without the huge numbers of black people voting for him. "The Wall Street Journal's Neil King reports that in the Journal-NBC Marist poll of Ohio, Donald Trump gets 0 percent of the vote from black Ohioans." Too bad the Republican Party can't figure out how to bring black Americans back into the fold. The presumptive Republican presidential nominee in 2016 surely is not doing that. According to The Washington Post, a new NBC News-Wall Street Journal-Marist poll shows that only 6 percent of black voters nationally plan to sup port Donald Trump. The Post says that the Quinnipiac poll released at the end of June showed Trump winning 1 percent of the vote from blacks. But wait, there's more. The Wall Street Journal's Neil King reports that in the Journal-NBC-Marist poll of Ohio, Donald Trump gets 0 percent of the vote from black Ohioans. Yes, that's zero percent. Neil King reports that's about what Trump is getting from black voters in the polls in Pennsylvania, too. Previous Republican presidential candidates received more support than that in earlier years. National GOP officials have said in the past that they want more African-Americans in their fold. They even had a black Republican National Committee chairman until they ran him away, just like the Republicans did in North Carolina recently to their black chairman. So, where is the gesture from Trump that could turn African-Americans toward the Republican Party? Nowhere to be seen. It ain't gonna happen. Now, we can name the gestures that push African-Americans away from the GOP. How about when Trump singled out a black man at one of his rallies by saying: "Look at my African American over here." At least one of the black people on his "The Apprentice" show has called out his racist tenden cies. African-American Kwame Jackson, the runner up, was "fired" from the show in the first season. CNN Money reports that when he spoke about Trump in April, he accused Trump of appealing "to the lowest common denominator of fear, racism and divisi'veness in our populace." The other GOP presidential candidates had their episodes, too. But they are not as close to the White House as TYump, so we can put them on the shelf for now. No, there will be no gestures from the GOP strong enough to woo black people back, unless hell freezes over. Then, we might consider it. WH/QMTWE 1 MTOcTttlftlHK? LETTERS TO THE EDITOR Thimp-Pence ticket still wrong for North Carolinians To the Editor: Donald Trump's choice of Mike Pence as his vice presidential run ning mate cements why he is wrong for North Carolinians. This ticket would only worsen the economic trends that have cost our economy dearly, as well as divide people when we need to come together as Americans to solve the challenges that we face as a country. North Carolina's families deserve a president who will put Butterfield them and their children first, who will break down the barriers that are holding them back from reaching their economic potential, and who ' will CAMPAIGN party luT * ^ | lines build an econo my that works for everyone. It says a lot that Hillary Clinton laid out her nationwide plan to do exactly that when she came to North Carolina last month. The people of North Carolina do not want to double-down on the divisiveness and wrong-headed eco nomic policies that Donald Trump represents, and now he's given us another reason to vote for the candi date who has put families first for her entire career - Hillary Clinton. Donald Trump, who said he hoped for a housing crisis only because he could profit off of fore closed homes and who opposes the existence of a federal minimum wage, has now partnered with a vice presidential nominee who fought to shut down the entire federal govern ment multiple times over partisan issues, and as governor pushed through an anti-LGBT bill that cost Indiana up to $60 million. That should sound very familiar to the North Carolinians who have felt the economic damage that HB2 has caused to our state, as well as who could have benefited from the new jobs that HB2 has cost us. By choosing Mike Pence to be his vice presidential running mate, Donald Trump has shown why Hillary Clinton's fundamental cam paign message, that the American people are Stronger Together, will resonate and win with North Carolina voters. U.S. Rep. G. K. Butterfield NC District 1 Wilson Forsyth Board of Elections showed outrageous behavior To the Editor: Absolutely outrageous barely defines the behavior of Board of Elections Republican Commissioners Ken Raymond and Stuart Russell at the meeting Friday, July 15, to determine early voting sites in Forsyth County. The room was packed and more than 20 speakers, young, old, white, black, spoke in favor of using the Anderson Center at Winston-Salem State University as an early voting site. A Wake Forest professor point ed out that many services beyond classes are offered to students at on campus locations and voting should be one of them. A young person spoke about the difficulties of stu dents without transportation getting to an off-campus site and possible long lines there, which could force them to miss a class. An older voter spoke about the importance of imprinting the habit of voting on college students by making the process easily accessible to them. And on and on. The young speakers were pas sionate and emotional; the older speakers were resolute and emphat ic. But the message to the commis sioners was: "You're asking for pub lic input; you have gotten the same message week after week about using WSSU as an early voting site. Why do you refuse to hear us?" Stuart Russell smirked; Ken Raymond vowed he was doing everything possible to make voting accessible. But when the vote came, the Republican commissioners voted to use Reynolds Park, not WSSU. Only Commissioner Fleming El Amin respected the public voice and voted no. Not ONE person in the audience had spoken in favor of Reynolds Parte. Lois Roewade Pfafftown Condolences to families of officers killed in Baton Rouge To the Editor: Our condolences to the families impacted by today's [July 17] tragic shooting of police officers killed in the line of duty in Baton Rouge, Louisiana. While there are many unan swered questions regarding this inci dent, all people of sound mind and good conscience agree that violence threatens the fabric of our nation. We mourn with the residents of Baton Rouge who, within the last several days, have been faced with dual tragedies of monumental pro portion. We hope that the days that lie ahead provide opportunity for the residents of Baton Rouge and our nation to stand together in opposing violence and hate of any kind. Kristen Clarke, president Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law WASHINGTON, D.C. Note: The Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law (Lawyers' Committee), a nonparti san, nonprofit organization, was formed in 1963 at the request of President John F. Kennedy to involve the private bar in providing legal services to address racial dis crimination. For more information about the Lawyers' Committee, visit wwwJawyerscommittee.org. It's time to change N.C. leadership after HB 2 debacle To the Editor: North Carolinians know about the immediate economic fallout from HB2 - the so-called bathroom bill - as performers, businesses and governments have ruled out coming here. As a small business owner, I want to tell you how much worse the damage really is ... for all of us. Right up until the passage of HB2, my arts-related business had been growing steadily; first quarter sales of my ceramics were up over 40 percent from last year. I planned to hire a second employee and had begun building a new studio. That came to a screeching halt in late March with the bill's passage. Sales for the next three months fell by 30 percent. My own state government did what a major reces sion, two presidential election cycles and road construction outside my shop failed to do: make me lose money. Most of my fellow small business owners report similar drop offs. If you don't own a tourist- or arts-related business you may think this situation doesn't touch you, but it does. Not only are my .tax pay ments to North Carolina falling sharply, but my own spending is way down. I won't be adding an employee, and may curtail the sec ond studio. I must put off buying new truck tires, will postpone dental work and have to stop dining out as much. Those businesses get hurt, too. The ripple effects are cata strophic. Gov. Pat McCrory and other state lawmakers have had many opportunities to substantially change or eliminate HB2 and they repeated ly declined. Now it's time to put North Carolina back in business by changing our state leadership. Michael Hofman Owner, Hofman Studios Asheville
Winston-Salem Chronicle (Winston-Salem, N.C.)
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