SOPHIA NELSON COMMENTARY: Black Conservatives Listen Up

The moderate Republican argues that electing an African-American chairman may help the GOP with its “black” problem. However, she asserts, black conservatives haven’t exactly done a lot to boost the party’s cred either: "However, the GOP's real problem with black people is not so much that the white conservatives in the party do not reach out to blacks, but that so-called black conservatives do not do enough outreach to black voters. Black conservatives as a group, particularly the prominent intellectuals, seem to go out of their way to attack the black community. Consider conservative author Star Parker’s intellectual meditations titled, Pimps, Whores, and Welfare Brats or Uncle Sam’s Plantation. Ouch! Most black conservative commentators are largely viewed by blacks as opportunistic, attack dogs for the white conservative establishment. This perception is entirely unhelpful in a community that understands that its core interests are in equal access and opportunity, health care and community redevelopment. In short, black conservatives often can't get a hearing on important issues among blacks because they have positioned themselves as hostile to the interests of black people."

She disagrees with Michael Steele's claim that the GOP needs to do more outreach to black communities: "It's not all up to the RNC to reach out to the black community. The black members of the GOP rarely, if ever, stand up and speak out when the party does the wrong thing. Where are the black conservatives when Rush Limbaugh says, 'We are being told we have to hope he succeeds, that we have to bend over and grab our ankles...because his father was black, because this is the first black president, we've got to accept this'? Limbaugh is out of control. He is being overtly racially offensive and both black conservatives and the Republicans in Congress are terrified to denounce him publicly. As long as the blacks who self-identify as 'conservatives' continue to lay down for this nonsense, and continue to attack and alienate themselves from their own community, instead of reaching out, listening and building coalitions within the black community; black voters for the foreseeable future will continue to reject the Republican Party and black conservative ideology."

Booker Rising response: Why did Ms. Nelson leave Republican Party moderates - like herself - out of this analysis? Black Republicans are not all conservative. However, black Republicans as a collective - whether they are conservative, moderate, or libertarian - have a branding problem. By the way, putting such a piece on TheRoot.com, a black liberal website, is not exactly reaching the piece's target audience (Ms. Nelson emailed this piece to me).