[...] WOODRUFF: [...] The president's relationship with African-American leaders is getting more tense and complicated. NAACP chairman Julian Bond is urging members to register voters who will work for regime change, as he put it. In other words, the ouster of Bush. As our Bruce Morton explains, Bush seems to have added insult to injury by deciding not to appear at the civil rights group's annual convention.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
BRUCE MORTON, CNN NATIONAL CORRESPONDENT (voice-over): The NAACP, 95 years old, is meeting in Philadelphia. President Bush campaigns in Pennsylvania often, including last week, but he won't speak to the civil rights group. He did in 2000 when he was running, but hasn't as president. NAACP president, Kweisi Mfume, says he wrote asking for meetings in 2101 '02, and '03, but...
KWEISI MFUME, PRESIDENT, NAACP: The president never wrote me back. I always got a letter from someone else in the White House stating that his schedule did not permit such meeting, and they would get back to me, essentially. And he never did. MORTON: President Bush in Pennsylvania last week told reporters his relationship with the present NAACP leadership is basically non- existent. Adding, "You've heard the rhetoric and the names they've called me."
MFUME: If the president's new mantle and measurement for dialogue is to only talk and only meet with those individuals or organizations that agree with him, then we are getting closer to the previous regime in Baghdad than we are to a democracy here in America, where nations around the world expect us to be different from everyone else.
MORTON: But there they be a simple political reason for Mr. Bush's non-appearance. Blacks are and have been for years the most constant, loyal element in the coalition that is the Democratic Party.
KEATING HOLLAND, CNN POLLING DIRECTOR: About eight in 10 blacks tell us right now that they are likely to vote for the Kerry-Edwards ticket. Only about one in 10 blacks say that they're likely to vote for the Bush-Cheney ticket right now.
That's very much in keeping with what we've seen in previous elections. Typically, Democrats at the presidential level, Senate level, gubernatorial races win 80 to 90 percent of the black vote, and that's been going on for several decades.
MORTON: So will the Democratic candidate talk to the NAACP? You bet.
KERRY: My friends, I will be a president who meets with the leadership of the civil rights congress, who meets with the NAACP.
MORTON: He'll speak to them on Thursday.
Bruce Morton, CNN, Washington.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
WOODRUFF: Blacks and Latinos are important voting groups in the showdown state of Florida. Up next, we'll get the lay of the land from the state party chair. [...]
| That's the part of "Courting Hispanic Voters" on CNN's "Judy Woodruff's Inside Politics" that caught our attention
[...] There are angry words for President Bush from the nation's largest civil rights group. The NAACP and their leadership are calling on members to work for the president's defeat in November. CNN's Brian Todd is joining us with a look at the war behind the words -- Brian.
BRIAN TODD, CNN CORRESPONDENT: Wolf, this is a story that has blown up over the past couple of days. It involves a political relationship that often been at the very least strained.
(BEGIN VIDEOTAPE)
TODD (voice-over): If what the president calls a non-existent relationship with leaders of the nation's largest civil rights group could actually get worse, then that's apparently what's happening. Leaders of the NAACP say they're furious with the president for refusing to address their convention this week.
KWEISI MFUME, NAACP PRESIDENT: If the president's new mantle and measurement for dialogue is to only talk and to only meet with those individuals or organizations that agree with him, then we are getting closer to the previous regime in Baghdad than we are to a democracy here in America.
TODD: Now the bitterness turns to a full-board attack on the administration on the issues. A pledge of political enmity from NAACP Chairman Julian Bond. African-Americans are, quote, "ready to turn anger into action to work for regime changes here at home." Bond said the GOP appeals to, quote, "the dark under-side of American culture, to the minority of Americans who reject democracy and equality. They preach neutrality and practice racial division."
The White House cited a scheduling conflict as the reason for the president's absence this year. But Mr. Bush, who did speak to the NAACP during the 2000 campaign seemed to go further, describing his current relationship with the group's leadership as, quote, "basically nonexistent," adding, "you've heard the rhetoric and the names they've called me." John Kerry who will speak to the NAACP on Thursday seized on the divide.
KERRY: Friends, I will be a president who meets with the leadership of the Civil Rights Congress, who meets with the NAACP.
TODD: But Democrats have had their own problems with what they have traditionally seen as one of their key constituencies. Last summer, then candidates Dick Gephardt, Joe Lieberman and Dennis Kucinich initially skipped the NAACP convention, then all three showed up and apologized.
SEN. JOE LIEBERMAN (D-CT), FMR. PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: In not coming Monday, I was wrong.
REP. RICHARD GEPHARDT (D-MO), FMR. PRESIDENTIAL CANDIDATE: I thank you and I honor you for letting me to be here today. And I'm sorry that I was not here the other night. Thank you very much.
(END VIDEOTAPE)
TODD: And Julian Bond himself just complained that the Democrats are in his words, "not an opposition. They are an A-men corner" -- Wolf.
BLITZER: All right. Brian Todd in Washington. Brian, thanks very much. [...]
| That's "Bush declines invitation to speak at NAACP convention," Brian Todd's rundown from "CNN Wolf Blitzer Reports"
posted in articles on July 12, 2004 6:11 PM | t (2)
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Bush like most Republicans, and typically of all politcians seeking to be safe in a political year where his incumbency is being challenged pits Black folk into two categories: Good Black folk and bad ones.
The NAACP and other Black people and organizations who criticise him and do not like his polices are among the bad ones.
The other groups and individuals in the Black community that agree with his politics and his administration's polices are the good ones.
I will not include the National Urban League. The Urban League is among the "safe" black political community that rarely chides people like Bush, but they do support Black causes and are out there on the battlefield. Now that the NAACP/Bush squabble has passed us by, there is one important question to be asked -- why did he need to speak anyway at the NAACP Convention? What does he have to say that would endear the convention to support him? He does not need us to stay in the White House. He does need us to stay away from the polls and most of our people will if Mr. John Kerry does not inspire them to polls and support him. The NAACP should keep on hitting Bush over the head with his mistakes. And if they want him back in Texas in 2005, Bad Black folks had better work hard and make sure that we, whites and other people who are tired of him, get out and VOTE!!
Leonard E. Colvin
Norfolk, VA (a bad Black person)
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