The worst prejudices and preconceived notions are the ones that you don’t even realize you have. Take this story about African-American Republican candidates in 2010 – particularly Tim Scott, who is well on his way to winning his district in South Carolina handily. A feel-good kind of tale, right? See if you think that after you read this section:
With black unemployment at 15.6 percent, African-Americans are questioning what Democrats have done for them. What’s more, this year’s black Republican candidates were far from being upper-middle-class racial mascots. Scott grew up in a poor Charleston neighborhood with a divorced mother who worked double shifts as a nurse’s assistant. Vernon Parker (who lost his August primary) was born to a single mother in Houston, and grew up in California with his grandmother, a housekeeper.
Still, black Republicans will have to face four decades of skepticism about GOP bona fides on race, not to mention the opposition of a Democratic party with the first African-American president as its head.
Why the heck should anybody expect candidates like Scott to have to deal with that? Continue reading #rsrh Content of their character.