With Their Lips and with Their Feets: To the Pokey, More Satire, and Reverend Meeks

When we think of communication, we most often think of using language as symbols to convey meaning. But communication scholars have long recognized that communication through speaking and writing is not the only (or necessarily best) way to convey a message.

THIS WEEK, Stephen is hard at work on an article entitled “Media and Human Rights” that will be published in the forthcoming Encyclopedia of Human Rights (edited by Professor Dave Forsythe). While there is some relevance to racialized communication therein, it is largely concerned with two interrelated items: the extent to which freedom of the press is protected or suppressed by governmental structures, and the nature and frequency of reporting of human rights abuses by media outlets. Since the focus of the piece is on “media,” there is an inherent bias toward words (both printed and spoken), but reporting of images (both still and moving) are also relevant.

Nonverbal communication exists alongside verbal communication in THIS WEEK’s points of interest. On the verbal side, we have Barack Obama’s speech in Berlin, where he addressed a number of issues related to terror and oppression (with tacit references to race on more than one occasion) to a reported crowd of some 200,000. (BTW, check out this wicked cool site to get a 360-degree panoramic view of the crowd.) Toward the beginning of his address, he told the audience: “I know that I don’t look like the Americans who’ve previously spoken in this great city.”

Pretty cryptic stuff. We can only assume he was talking about those ears of his.



He referenced historical instances of religious conflict (in the Middle East and in Northern Ireland), ethnic conflict (in the Balkans and the Sudan), racial conflict (in South Africa), ecological conflict (global warming) and ideological conflict (The Cold War). With his repeated call, “This is the moment. . .,” he outlines a set of broad ideals that he claims “this is our time” to address.

The fallout? Short-term, he whooped McCain’s backside on the campaign trail over the past two weeks, garnering most of the media attention. Long term, though, the results are questionable. Will the warm reception by those overseas play into detractors’ script that he’s “not one of us?” Will the monumental speech in front of such a large crowd in Berlin reinforce images that he’s nothing but a skillful orator? We’ll have to wait to see.

One of America’s most popular contemporary orators, Stephen Colbert, wrote a biting satirical piece in this month’s Esquire magazine. The skillful commentary begins with the cover of the magazine.


To celebrate its 75th anniversary, Esquire has taken to replicating historic covers with contemporary twists. Colbert’s cover is a replication of a 1968 cover depicting Muhammad Ali in a pose mirroring a 15th century painting of a Christian martyr. Ali’s persecution was largely in response to his awareness of racial inequality (and power differences generally, illustrated by his public opposition to the Vietnam War – a war in which he refused to fight). Colbert similarly makes the case for racial inequality, but by way of a satirical journey through American history where he demonstrates how the white man has been repeatedly victimized. From the earliest days of the republic (“white men had to work like slaves just to oversee their slaves”) to women’s suffrage (“cutting the value of white men’s votes in half”) to the space race (“when our government launched a sinister conspiracy . . . to shoot all white men into space”) to the 1980s (when “white men were forced to wear effeminate pastel blazers [Don Johnson from Miami Vice] while black men got all the cool sweaters [Bill Cosby]”).

As we consistently note here when reviewing satire, it is a great commentary on power inequality for those who “get it,” but we (seriously) have students who report that their parents love Colbert because they think he’s making fun of liberals.

For a peek at those who are doing the talking with their feet this week, we turn to the sentencing of former Newark, NJ mayor Sharpe James (“he’s our maaaaaaan” -- if you didn’t get the reference, place Marshall Curry's excellent film Street Fight in your Netflix cue right away) to more than two years in prison for corruption. While the conviction of James, who is African American, is a result of one specific incident, the pay-to-play system of politics in Newark during his five terms as mayor is considered to be common knowledge in the city. The only questions centered on whether the ends justified the means – was Newark better, is Newark better, for having had Sharpe James as mayor for a generation? Like the indictment of Alaska’s U.S. Senator Ted Stevens earlier today, James’s sentence is a symbol not of individual malevolence, but of systemic problems that need more radical solutions.

Finally, we turn our attention to Illinois State Senator Rev. James Meeks of Chicago’s south side, who is leading a movement for inner city Chicago students to boycott the first day of classes. More than a simple walkout to protest inequality in funding in Illinois schools, though, Meeks will be leading buses of students to a North Shore suburb to have them attempt to enroll in a well-funded (mostly white) school.

Like most U.S. states, school districts are funded by a combination of state and federal funding, but a sizable portion (in IL, some 50%) of school funding comes from local property taxes, which creates a system that Jonathan Kozol and others have referred to as apartheid. Poor neighborhoods have lower property values and, thus, have a smaller amount of money for schools. Underfunded schools tend to be of poorer quality, which generates a student body with high numbers of dropouts and low levels of collegiate success stories, which makes it difficult for those students to become gainfully employed and increase the value of the neighborhood’s property (and many of the few who do succeed financially do not return).

It is uncertain what will happen when the students show up at New Trier Township High School on the first day of school, but whatever attention the stunt gets will be appreciated by Meeks and others who are concerned about the continuation of privileging the wealthy (who are disproportionately white) at the expense of the poor (who are disproportionately of color).

Perhaps if Rev. Meeks and Sharpe James would simply read Colbert’s history lesson, they would realize whom the real victims are. And if Obama is elected, the victimization will only continue (and likely worsen), so that white American male will forever have to face what Colbert argues is the greatest victimization of all, “being robbed of your ability to be the victim.”

NOTE: We want to take a moment to remind you of more ways to keep track of what is going on with The Project on Race in Political Communication. You can subscribe to this blog via RSS feed (above) or by email (below), share it on your Facebook page (also below), and you can join the RaceProject Facebook group. Subscribe to Stephen’s YouTube channel for updates when he is featured as a political analyst on television. Finally, check in periodically at the main RaceProject site for information and links of interest, including media appearances and information about how to have one or both of us come to speak in your town.

Can't Beat This "View"

The women from ABC’s “The View” are on our radar again THIS WEEK (we have commented on their discussions previously). The timely bloggers are all over this, and most of them have it right on. For more, we suggest you read Carmen Dixon’s astute take at Black Voices, as well as the reader comments from Jonathan Adams’s post at Race Wire (as always, some comments are more sophisticated than others).



This is all a response to an episode two weeks ago (see video below) where Rev. Jesse Jackson was caught criticizing Barack Obama’s campaign rhetoric toward African Americans (has he been dining with Ralph Nader or what?!). A few days after the tape was aired on Fox News, reports surfaced that on a different part of the tape, Jackson used the n-word (not directed at Obama) – a word he has vociferously condemned throughout the latter part of his career.



We will try to add a bit to this conversation.

What’s most interesting to us is Elisabeth Hasselbeck’s adamant statement that we “live in one world,” with Whoopi Goldberg responding vehemently that we do not. This is an excellent illustration of the unfortunate legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. in the eyes of white Americans. We believe that Hasselbeck, like most white Americans today, is sincere when she indicates that she wishes for one world. Hasselbeck is not a bigot; she is, however, racist, but like most whites (progressive or conservative), refuses to admit it. Goldberg used the word “understand” multiple times during the exchange.

What Goldberg may fail to understand – and what Hasselbeck certainly fails to acknowledge – is that it is very, very difficult for whites to understand systemic racism. Whites have lived in a world where their skin color has not been perceived as a negative characteristic. Stereotypes of whites have not served to keep them in disproportionate poverty, and to lead to disproportionate levels of illiteracy, incarceration or unemployment. In short, race really doesn’t matter to whites, and they believe (like nearly everyone) that it shouldn’t matter.

Hasselbeck’s tears were real, and they are of real concern, not because she has a huge audience for her ignorance every weekday, but because she represents the feelings of many white Americans, whether they subscribe to the rest of her conservative political views or not.

We are bound by the limits of our consciousness, and without the lived experience that being a racial minority provides, combined with our broader culture’s incessant focus on the American myth of individualism and equal opportunity, it truly is very difficult for whites to understand.

This is reflected in a recent CNN story that an Obama presidency could make things worse for African Americans. The story (with extensive quotes from RaceProject friend Dr. Andra Gillespie), notes that Obama’s election (and we would argue, his nomination, irrespective of whether he goes on to win) will serve as a signal to white Americans that the barriers of systemic racism have been exaggerated.

If we consider this in combination with a New York Times / CBS poll that was released last week, which showed that Obama’s candidacy is not closing the racial divide, we can envision an Obama administration that will likely attempt to address systemic racism with policies, but will have to work hard to overcome the attitudinal barriers that have been (and will be) solidified by the historic occasion.

That’s okay with us. For those who think that public policy cannot move social justice forward, we need only look at the historic Brown v. Board of Education (1954) case, which failed to integrate public schools (our schools are more racially segregated now than they were in 1954), but effectively provided “mainstream” (white) legitimacy to a movement that would bring about meaningful change for African Americans.

It is clear that electing Obama would not be a solution to racial inequality, but it may, over time, help Elisabeth Hasselbeck to figure out why a lot of African Americans are okay with saying the n-word, even though they do not want whites to say it.

For more on the “n-word” issue, watch our public debate, or visit Stephen’s YouTube channel.

Thanks to loyal readers Sunny Sunbir and Dr. Michele Ramsey for helpful tips as we constructed this week’s blog.

What’s So Funny ‘Bout Flag Burning, Guns and Fist Bumps?

While the cover of The New Yorker made news on Monday, since we are late with THIS WEEK’S blog, we are going to address it along with last week’s stories. Amongst the immediate flurry of commentary, we will limit our response to what we think might be unique (though this thing has been analyzed from nearly every angle in the past 24 hours).

We have addressed the implications of satire in a number of contexts in this space, perhaps most notably in our review of Black People Love Us and in our recent discussion of African American names. With respect to racial humor (or attempts at humor) more generally, we’ve discussed Don Imus, Boston Legal, and t-shirts with racist images. So as not to be repetitive, we will highlight what we see as the crucial issue with the most recent controversy.
It is clear to us (and to many) that the editors at The New Yorker were commenting on the inaccuracies, paranoia and mischaracterization of the Obamas throughout the course of the campaign. The image is not a caricature of them, but rather a caricature of their detractors. The joke is not on the Obamas, but on the mainstream media, which has served as a vessel for such accusations.

But, as always, the problem with satire is that everyone doesn’t “get it.” As one of our colleagues pointed out at a party last night, the issue is not with readers of The New Yorker – those folks are progressive-minded intellectuals who would not be predisposed to believing such attacks. (It should be noted that Stephen cannot make it through an entire article in The New Yorker because the average length is 3,456 pages. Highlights, on the other hand, has those cool “what’s different between these two pictures” things, which he finds quite stimulating.)

Like The Colbert Report or Talladega Nights, there is a danger of those upon whom the joke is intended to instead take the cover as further evidence to support their predispositions. Unlike those examples, however, the cover of this issue of The New Yorker is more problematic because it is a joke within a joke. The first level is the form of artwork itself: caricatures are designed to exaggerate features or characteristics for effect – usually of a light-hearted nature (think about the artists at fairs and carnivals that make that little mole on your cheek the size of your eyeballs). So to understand what’s happening with a caricature, one has to understand that it is not literal. The second layer of the joke here is the attempt to criticize the “artist” of the caricature. That is, the commentary at work is aimed at discrediting the lens through which the mainstream media is allowing the Obamas to be viewed (“the artist’s eyes”).

As we have pointed out repeatedly here when we have criticized folks who claim that their intent is not racist, we focus primarily on effect rather than intent. It’s clear to us that the intent of the cover was to be critical of the Obamas’ critics. But if the effect is the reverse, it is worthy of attention. We might say that folks should be “smart” enough to get it, but that’s too dismissive. It is important to consider what effect the cover might have (which is not to argue for censorship – the magazine should be free to print the image, but it would be irresponsible for others not to discuss it).

And herein lies the final irony. If our colleague is correct that readers of The New Yorker will understand what is happening (and we believe he is), the trouble with the image, then, is not its existence, but its repeated use and discussion in more mainstream media forums. Uncle Sal and Aunt Joanie may not have ever seen the cover if it were not for CNN, The New York Times, the local papers and television news, etc. So what was originally designed for a specific audience is now enjoying wider distribution, potentially with the result of perpetuating precisely what the editors had intended to criticize.

Charlton has a video commentary on today's New York Post website. You can watch it below.


In other news. . .

Jesse Jackson is apparently matriculated into a degree program at the Geraldine Ferraro School of What the Hell Were You Thinking. Caught on a microphone before an interview, Jackson was openly (and vulgarly) critical of Obama’s occasional focus on personal responsibility in the black community. And Ralph Nader wonders aloud if Obama is trying to not look like Jesse Jackson? We wonder why! But the most interesting part of the story, we think, was the public airing of what we assume is a simmering family feud. Illinois Congressman Jesse Jackson, Jr. blasted his father for the comments. After a substantive defense of Obama’s candidacy, the younger Jackson said the following:

Revered Jackson is my dad and I'll always love him. He should know how hard that I've worked for the last year and a half as a national co-chair of Barack Obama's presidential campaign. So, I thoroughly reject and repudiate his ugly rhetoric. He should keep hope alive and any personal attacks and insults to himself.

Ouch! We just want to go on the record and say that we love our dads.

In other higher education news, New York Congressman Charlie Rangel has been attending the University of I Got Caught Being a Hypocrite. Rangel, a long time proponent of the poor and marginalized, was featured in a front page, above-the-fold story in The New York Times that revealed his possession of four apartments in a luxury building in Harlem for which he is paying rent that is significantly below market value. While we find no problem with wealthy people speaking on behalf of those who are disadvantaged (they’re the folks who are best positioned to help in the long run), the occupancy of multiple rent-stabilized apartments is questionable at best for anyone (though legal – as some have suggested, the law is the real issue), but uniquely troubling for someone who speaks for those who have little.

Rangel vociferously defended himself, but his explanations (while valid) serve more to complicate the matter than to exonerate his actions. Rangel is paying the maximum rent allowed by law for those units. Of the three adjacent units that are his primary residence with his wife (the fourth unit is a number of floors down and used for a campaign office, which is another wrinkle in the story), two were apparently adjoined before they moved in. They added the third for more space later. The issue for us is 1) someone with Rangel’s wealth and fundraising ability does not need to have a rent-stabilized office, and 2) the addition of the third unit for extra space is a luxury that most of his constituents could not afford, so for symbolic reasons, we would have hoped that he would have refrained. Wealth is merely a secondary element; the real question is about modeling the type of fundamental lack of greed that Rangel has advocated his entire career. Adding an efficiency to an existing unit is certainly not an egregious example of financial sloth, but symbolically, it is troubling.

Sincere Wishes for Peace for a Man Who Would Have Hated Our Work

We are saddened to learn of the passing of former U.S. Senator Jesse Helms of North Carolina. While his professional life was filled with animosity toward those different than him, his personal life appears to have been paradoxically compassionate. (Many people outside of North Carolina are not aware, for instance, that more than twenty years into their marriage, the Helmses adopted their nine-year-old son, Charles, who had cerebral palsy.)

Senator Helms was one of the last politicians (to date) to explicitly appeal to bigotry and resentment without fear of reprisal. He steadfastly fought for rights of those who had power to keep it, and for those who were denied access to the system to remain on the outside. He openly discriminated against racial minorities and homosexuals, fed off others’ fears of members of these groups to remain in office, and used his power to maintain systems of oppression. (For more analysis of Jesse Helms's racism and bigotry, we direct readers to our 10/26/07 entry.)

During his 1990 campaign against African American Harvey Gantt, Helms ran what has come to be known infamously as the “hands ad,” where he depicted a fictitious white, working-class, married man being denied for a position for which he was “the best qualified” because “they gave it to a minority because of a racial quota.” Admitting that he was only appealing to white voters in a state with a sizable minority population, the narrator in the ad uses second person (i.e., “You needed that job"), which is illustrative of the exclusionary vision of Helms’s America. In his first race for the U.S. Senate, Helms urged voters to elect him because he was “one of us,” as opposed to the “liberals” who he felt were contributing to the erosion of his version of American values.

As a Christian, Senator Helms wished openly to be welcomed to the Kingdom of Heaven. We hope that he gets his ultimate wish, and that the God he loved but so gravely misunderstood during his time on Earth is forgiving and compassionate toward him. It is unclear whether the illness that so debilitated him during his last months allowed him to be aware of what was transpiring politically, but we are confident that being alive and alert to witness the possible swearing in of a black man to the White House would have been more than this proud segregationist would have been able to take.

It has been said that the most important way to give is to forgive, and we urge our contemporaries who are similarly committed to social justice to do just that. We sincerely hope that Senator Jesse Helms find the peace that he worked so hard to deny to so many others during his professional career. Moreover, we wish the senator’s family strength during this difficult time, as he was clearly a loving and compassionate father and husband; there are many who will miss him and who are grieving this Independence Day weekend.

Nader Needs to Be Smacked, City Cars Get Shellacked, Dino Rossi Gets "Whacked"

Over the past ten days, a number of stories have surfaced that cannot escape our attention, even though we would like to "move on" for a bit. Let us explain what we mean.

We started The Project on Race in Political Communication in the summer of 2001 as an umbrella label for the research upon which we were about to embark, as well as to signify the immense amount of work that social scientists still had to do before we could comfortably say that we have a solid understanding of the racial dynamics implicit in political communication. In the fall of 2006, we began This Week In Race to call attention to the myriad elements of racial discourse that surface on a regular basis and to provide accessible scholarly analysis of those issues. We could not foresee in 2001 – or even in 2006, to be honest – that there would be an African American candidate as a major-party nominee for president in 2008. As a result, much of this space in the past year and a half has been devoted to Barack Obama, which is a much narrower focus than we would like. Still, while other stories are deserving of our attention, none are as salient as those about Obama. That said, we appreciate any comments our regular readers (or new readers) might have about the content of TWIR. Please leave those below.

The most visible racial communication put forth over the past week or so was Ralph Nader’s remarks to the Rocky Mountain News that Barack Obama was “talking white” and playing into “white guilt.” Here’s what he said:

There's only one thing different about Barack Obama when it comes to being a Democratic presidential candidate. He's half African-American. Whether that will make any difference, I don't know. I haven't heard him have a strong crackdown on economic exploitation in the ghettos. Payday loans, predatory lending, asbestos, lead. What's keeping him from doing that? Is it because he wants to talk white? He doesn't want to appear like Jesse Jackson? We'll see all that play out in the next few months and if he gets elected afterwards.

Let’s unpack his remarks a bit. First, let’s examine the validity of Nader’s claims.

1. Barack Obama is half African-American. True.
2. Obama hasn’t vocalized a plan for a crackdown (strong or otherwise) on economic exploitation (in the ghetto or anywhere else). True.
3. Obama wants to talk white. Doubtful, but we can’t technically rule it out, we suppose.
4. Obama doesn’t want to appear like Jesse Jackson. We don’t even know what that means. That he won’t be reading Green Eggs and Ham on Saturday Night Live?

Nader continued:

I mean, first of all, the number one thing that a black American politician aspiring to the presidency should be is to candidly describe the plight of the poor, especially in the inner cities and the rural areas, and have a very detailed platform about how the poor is going to be defended by the law, is going to be protected by the law, and is going to be liberated by the law. Haven't heard a thing.

We wonder what, precisely, qualifies Ralph Nader to know or feel confident to determine the “number one thing that a black American politician aspiring to the presidency” should be doing. Does he not recognize how condescending it is to tell Barack Obama what he should be doing AS A BLACK MAN? This continues a very old tradition of paternalistic treatment of African Americans by whites. “We know what’s best for you, so here’s what you need to do.”

The truth is that Nader is correct in terms of his analysis of the situation in poor areas. Obama undoubtedly knows it, too. And if that’s the case, there are only two options: 1. Obama doesn’t care about folks in those communities, or 2. he has made a conscious decision not to address those issues in public during his campaign.

In his accusations, Nader either assumes the former (which is quite presumptuous given the paucity of evidence to support it) or is too stupid to recognize smart political strategy when he sees it (given his success at presidential runs, this is a possibility). Does he really think that Obama would have secured the Democratic nomination if his campaign had been centered on helping folks in impoverished areas? While those of us concerned about economic inequality might dream of such a successful campaign, it is completely unrealistic to expect that ANYONE, but specifically a black candidate, who has to constantly battle stereotypes about his race, to be successful employing such a public persona. Just because Obama is not talking about it does not mean that he is not planning to address it while in office.

It is revealing that we have very few black leaders publicly making such claims. Does Nader just know better than they do what a black candidate should advocate, what the black community most needs? The difference between black leaders and voters and Ralph Nader is that the former are smart enough to understand that calling attention to what might be considered “stealth” plans to help those whose voice in the electoral process is not traditionally strong would be counterproductive.

Ralph, please listen to us for a second. If you really are concerned about the folks who are being exploited economically (and your life's work makes it clear that you do), do you really think that undermining the campaign of the one candidate who might actually be in tune with those concerns (as much from his community activism as from being African American) is really a good idea?

And finally, Nader displayed his remarkable grasp of the obvious:

He wants to show that he is not a threatening . . . another politically threatening African-American politician. He wants to appeal to white guilt. You appeal to white guilt not by coming on as black is beautiful, black is powerful. Basically he's coming on as someone who is not going to threaten the white power structure, whether it's corporate or whether it's simply oligarchic. And they love it. Whites just eat it up.

You don’t say! He’s a black candidate running not just against an opponent, but against stereotypes of black males as lazy, violent and untrustworthy, and his plan is to appear to be not threatening? Wow, Ralph. You’re right. What a stupid idiot this Obama character is!

It’s a good thing that whites did eat it up or else he would not be where he is now.

To be fair, there is a fine line here. But Obama and the black folks who support him can hardly be called Uncle Toms, as Nader suggests. Further, if they are to be considered as such, it is not up to white folk to make that determination. If we wish to have a thoughtful discussion of whether Obama’s strategy is too much Booker T. Washington and not enough W.E.B. DuBois, there is certainly merit in that. But to publicly accuse him of selling out his race is counterproductive to what we might assume to be a common cause of moving toward a more socially and economically just nation.

For his part, Obama has released two new television advertisements to correspond with his Middle America tour to prove his “patriotism.”





Both ads follow a pattern that we revealed in an article published in The Journal of Black Studies last year:

[M]inority candidates (Blacks in this instance) use racial appeals too. But Blacks use racial appeals for different reasons than their White counterparts, and they construct racial appeals in different ways. Whereas White candidates attack, Blacks advocate. The dominant image in Black candidates’ ads with racial appeals is their own, not the White opponents’. And when appealing to race, Black candidates more often than not focus on substantive issues rather than talking about their own or their opponent’s character. When one looks back at the actual ads of Black candidates that feature a racial appeal, one can clearly get a picture of why such appeals are used. First, they are likely to be responding to and defending themselves against a race-based attack made their White opponent, thereby invoking racial language as well because it was the substance of the initial attack. Second (and in most cases), Black candidates are inoculating themselves—if not from possible race-based attacks from their opponent, then from likely stereotypical attitudes held by Whites. Third, Black candidates are using racial appeals targeted toward other Blacks in contests against Black opponents.

In an endnote, we indicated that in the second condition (one that is evidenced by Obama’s ads released this week), that “[g]enerally, such forms of inoculation take place in election contests where the Black candidate is running in a majority White district.” Since winning the presidency requires gaining a majority of Electoral College votes and Electoral College votes are won by winning (in most instances) a plurality of the statewide vote, Obama is effectively campaigning in fifty-one majority-white districts.

Expect to see more of this as we move into the summer and toward the conventions. In effect, Obama has to show white Americans that while he is black, he is not a repository for their stereotypes. Does that mean he is “talking white,” as Nader claimed? If by “talking white,” one means appealing to white voters (who make up the overwhelming majority of the electorate) by diffusing their unjust, harmful and debilitating stereotypes, then we suppose so.

While this was going on, dozens of city vehicles in Orlando, Florida were vandalized, apparently by rouge supporters of Hillary Clinton. Some of the cars contained racial epithets and other insults about Barack Obama spray painted on the cars.

And finally THIS WEEK, lest the Democrats become too smug about their inclusiveness now that the Clinton campaign’s racial insensitivity has come to a rest, there is this story out of Washington state, called to our attention by Race Project Senior Research Assistant Shannon Lausch. The state Democratic Party produced an attack ad against Republican gubernatorial nominee Dino Rossi that played on stereotypes about Italian Americans and organized crime. In a spot that charges Rossi with a number of shady relationships, the theme song from The Sopranos plays in the background.




After complains by the Italian Club of Seattle, the Party re-issued the ad without the music from the popular program about mobsters. In a pathetic apology, Party spokesperson Kelly Steele issued the following statement:

It's a catchy song, which we thought jibed stylistically with our communication about Rossi's designated attack squad — the BIAW — who continue to pour millions into false and misleading attack ads against [Democratic incumbent] Gov. Gregoire.

Ok, Kel. We got it. What a co-inkydink that attacks on an Italian-American opponent centering around shady business deals (in the CONTRACTING industry, no less) happened to be accompanied by a “catchy” song that calls to mind the mafia. Are you kidding us?!

Then, to top it off, Steele continued:

That being said, we'd like to apologize to Rossi's friend [Italian Club of Seattle president] Mr. [Brian] DiJulio, his organization, and anyone else we may have inadvertently offended. The video will be replaced shortly with an identical message regarding Rossi and the BIAW's sleazy attack campaign, using a different song.

The implication here is that the offense taken is not even genuine, but rather merely a product of Rossi’s “friendship” with the president of the club who complained. This is inexcusable and would never have happened in an area with a larger Italian American community such as New York, Chicago, Pittsburgh, St. Louis, Boston or San Francisco. Clearly, the Washington Democratic Party saw the risk of offending a few Italians as minor compared to the payoff of playing off negative stereotypes for political gain. Pretending that it was an accident is possibly more insulting than the act itself.