Stubborn.
That noun and verb best describes the two candidates for governor of Indiana and the conundrum that African-American voters face in making a decision Nov. 4th.
Both incumbent Republican Gov. Mitch Daniels and his Democratic challenger Jill Long Thompson are stubborn individuals. Daniels is stubborn in his policy positions and style of governing. Long Thompson is stubborn in the way she’s conducted her campaign.
Most African-Americans will be voting against Daniels. The reasons transcend his party and go more to his style of governing. Daniels’ Day One dismissal of the collective bargaining rights of state employee union members angered many Blacks. His insensitive and incompetent first BMV Director Joel Silverman rankled many.
Privatization has been a dirty word among African-Americans here since the reign of Steve Goldsmith. Daniels fierce devotion to privatizing state institutions turned many Blacks off to the governor.
Daniels’ proposed lottery privatization rankled a community who likes to play the lottery. When Daniels first proposed privatizing the lottery, this columnist openly said the move violated federal law. I brought up my concerns directly to Daniels, who dismissed it with an assurance that “his people had researched the matter” and that he was right and I was wrong.
Last Friday, the feds told Daniels that states couldn’t privatize their state lotteries under the federal lottery laws. Daniels folded his lottery privatization attempt.
(Mitch, just want to say that I Told You So)!
Mitch’s stubbornness to privatize at any price is why many Blacks are wary of a Daniels’ second term. Blacks know that Daniels’ other centerpiece privatization (after the Toll Road) is his privatization of FSSA. Blacks and I know that the FSSA privatization has already been a train wreck in the smaller counties of Indiana where’s it’s been implemented. If it is implemented in Indiana’s largest counties it will be a disaster.
FSSA clients want more, not less, contact and interaction with their caseworkers and live human beings in FSSA offices; not computerized voices and answering machines.
As I said, the African-American majority voting for governor is voting against Daniels, not voting for his opponent Jill Long Thompson.
She has not given our African-American community reasons to vote for her; only reasons to vote against him. Unlike Barack Obama who’s articulated a clear vision of what he’ll do if elected, Long Thompson’s platform is opaque to African-Americans.
And that’s the fault of her campaign. It’s not the worst campaign a Democratic governor candidate has waged, but it’s in the top three.
A major fault in a campaign of many was Long Thompson’s failure to understand and endear herself to Indiana’s largest block of Black voters — Indianapolis.
At this column’s deadline, Thompson has yet to run any ads in Black media directed to Black voters. None the entire year, primary and general; though she squandered millions in ineffective, dumb TV ads, some with no Black faces at all.
No Indianapolis Black elected officials have publicly spoken out for her as surrogates in interviews or campaign appearances. Her appearances during the year in our Black community were few and far between.
When Daniels appeared in our Black community, he was warm and outgoing. Thompson was just the opposite.
Jill Long Thompson needs a huge margin of 50-to-70,000 votes out of Marion County to have a shot against Daniels. A margin fueled by Black voters.
Even though undecided Blacks have started to come home to Jill, it may be too little, too late.
Mitch Daniels defies description at times. He can be doctrinaire and dogmatic. But he can also display the compassionate, moderate attributes of his first political mentor — Richard Lugar.
As much as our community is wary of Daniels, compare him to another Republican governor.
Last week on our “Afternoons with Amos” program, I spoke with Bishop Dave Thomas and the Rev. Dr. Alonzo Patterson, two influential leaders of Alaska’s African-American community.
Both told me about their governor, Sarah Palin. They told me that she’s refused to listen to the grievances and concerns of Black Alaskans. She’s appointed no Blacks to state boards and commissions. There’s just one Black staffer in her office. Palin took the position that she “didn’t” have to appoint Blacks to her government. Gov. Palin’s been insensitive in refusing to recognize and honor Black events in the state or attend events in Black Alaskan communities.
Bishop Thomas and Rev. Patterson were amazed when I told them what Indiana’s Republican governor does the things that they’ve asked their Republican governor to do.
We all know how African-Americans will respond to Barack Obama. How they respond to Mitch Daniels and Jill Long Thompson determines Indiana’s next governor.
What I’m hearing in the streets
Republican desperation caused the Indiana Republican Party to put out a racist tinged color mailer trying to link Barack Obama with crimes committed by ‘60s radical Williams Ayres when Obama was 8 years old. But the Indiana GOP made a mistake. They not only mailed the hate literature to GOP and independent voters’ neighborhoods, they also mailed it to neighborhoods in Black majority Zip Codes like 46218, 46208, 46222, 46254 and 46235. The mailer stoked the already red hot anger Blacks feel towards the GOP and its anti-Obama hate.
The closeness of the Indiana’s presidential race among whites was best epitomized by the Indianapolis Star’s shocking decision not to endorse either Obama or John McCain for president.
The Star’s all white eight person editorial board was split down the middle.
The non-endorsement is a major victory for Obama and denies McCain momentum going into the last days.
Early voting is the in thing this year. As of deadline, 32,713 have early voted in person in Marion County. That’s more than all the absentee voting in 2004. Three early voting locations aren’t enough for a city/county of 900,000. Both parties blame each other for the lack of additional sites.
Early voting is a concept whose time has come. Both parties and county officials should plan for more early voting locations in 2010.
Go vote. Early today or Nov. 4! See ‘ya next week!
Amos Brown’s opinions are not necessarily those of the Indianapolis Recorder Newspaper. You can contact him at (317) 221-0915 or by e-mail at ACBROWN@AOL.COM.
