No wonder Republicans are trying to pretend the Charleston terrorist attack was just some random “incident.” The New York Times reports:
The leader of a white supremacist group that apparently influenced Dylann Roof, the suspect in the killing of nine African-Americans in a Charleston, S.C., church last week, has donated tens of thousands of dollars to Republican campaigns, including those of 2016 presidential contenders such as Ted Cruz,Rick Santorum and Rand Paul, records show.
Mr. Cruz, a Texas senator, said Sunday night that he would be returning about $8,500 in donations that he had received from the Texas donor, Earl Holt III, who lists himself as president of the Council of Conservative Citizens.
The council of conservative racist citizens.
The group is regarded by the Southern Poverty Law Center, a leading authority on hate crimes, as a white supremacist extremist organization that opposes “race mixing” as a religious affront and that vilifies blacks as an inferior race.
None of which has anything to do with America’s history as a slave state. Nope, that all went away a long time ago, before any of us were born.
And Dave Silverman’s going to CPAC, which also featured Ted Cruz, Rick Santorum, and Rand Paul, and giving away free American Atheist memberships, was in no way intended to increase the number of racist and sexist AA members. Because “fiscal conservatism” has nothing to do with racism. Just pure coincidence white supremacists favor “fiscally conservative” politicians.
It seems a pity to simply return the money. Could it not be paid over to some more deserving organization? This would remove the stain from the Republicans without funding yet more hatred.
Here’s the definition of “conservative”: holding to traditional attitudes and values and cautious about change or innovation (or averse to change), typically in relation to politics or religion.
For Americans, this is the most dangerous, toxic position to hold, as we have a history of the worst possible human rights violation: slavery. And our record on women’s rights has been deplorable as well. So conservatives want to do things the old way, the old bad way. It should be deeply humiliating to admit to being conservative. The fact that some hold it as a badge of honor is shameful. They want inequality and human rights abuses. That’s how we’ve always done things, isn’t it? And it worked out *fine* – for us.
From the same NYT article:
“RandPAC is donating the funds to the Mother Emanuel Hope Fund to assist the victims families,” said Sergio Gor, a spokesman for the campaign. Mr. Holt made four separate donations to the Paul campaign last year, records show. The campaign could not confirm the total received but said that all the money it identified from the white supremacist leader would be donated to the fund.