I am continuously astonished by how bad Republicans can be. It’s not just that I disagree with their policies, but that they themselves paint their policies in such a ludicrously stupid manner. Take, for example, this incident at a candidate forum in Idaho.
- They discuss discrimination in Idaho. The Republican, Dan Foreman, claims there isn’t any. I’ve gotten used to Republican denial, so that doesn’t shock me.
2. The Democratic candidate, a native American woman, politely “highlighted our weak hate crime laws and mentioned the presence of the Aryan Nations in northern Idaho as undeniable evidence of this reality.” Growing up in the Pacific Northwest, we all knew there was a gradient of bigotry that ascended from the coast to the potato brains of Idaho (partly to avoid confronting the reality of racism in Seattle), so this was already making Foreman look foolish.
3. The Republican then tells the Nez Perce woman to “go back where you came from.” Unbelievable. It’s like a bad joke on a bottom-of-the-barrel sitcom.
Trish Carter-Goodheart has written about the incident.
The last time I was in Idaho, my talk was attended by a bunch of people from Doug Wilson’s church (but not Wilson himself). Doug Wilson was an Idaho preacher who got a boost in popularity because Christopher Hitchens toured with him for a while, something I don’t forgive Hitchens for. Doug Wilson co-wrote a notorious pamphlet titled Southern Slavery
, where he said
Slavery as it existed in the South … was a relationship based upon mutual affection and confidence,the excerpts read in part.There has never been a multiracial society which has existed with such mutual intimacy and harmony in the history of the world. …
Slave life was to them [slaves] a life of plenty, of simple pleasures, of food, clothes, and good medical care.
But oh no, racism and discrimination don’t exist in Idaho.
rietpluim says
Republicans. Because nothing disproves the existence of racism as good as “go back where you came from”.
rietpluim says
*as well as
Recursive Rabbit says
If Republicans don’t like indigenous people, maybe they should go back to Europe…
Thinking about an old article where the author just didn’t understand know how to handle the existence of American “mongrels,” mixed from so many European origins. Think it’d be darkly funny if they were introduced to a group of Europeans who used that kind of language to argue why their particular country shouldn’t take in these “mongrels.”
imaginesabeach says
“Indigenous people, including the Nez Perce tribe, have lived in the Columbia River Basin for thousands of years. Foreman was born in Lake Forest, Illinois.”
bayesian says
this (https://www.boisestatepublicradio.org/politics-government/2024-10-03/dan-foreman-racism-idaho-nez-perce-candidate-kendrick) is also a nice writeup, with a great though not unexpected kicker
“Indigenous people, including the Nez Perce tribe, have lived in the Columbia River Basin for thousands of years. Foreman was born in Lake Forest, Illinois.”
bayesian says
I need coffee, somehow I missed that you already linked the story
timgueguen says
“Go back where you came from!”
“You mean over there, where members of my family have lived for centuries?”
raven says
A lot of white people move to Idaho because it is a racist, christofascist state.
Idaho is one of the fastest growing states in the USA.
cervantes says
You do know that Hitchens became a right wing crank in his later years, right? He was a major cheerleader for the invasion of Iraq, spewed misogyny at every opportunity, along with right-wing conspiracy theories. This is not news.