[Peace-discuss] Flag flap

[C. G. Estabrook]

[From Sam Smith's Progressive Review <http://prorev.com/>.  --CGE]

PICKUPS FOR DEAN CONT'D, & SO FORTH

THE CONTINUED controversy over confederate flags on pickup trucks is a
reminder that one of the functions of political campaigns is to take our
minds off our problems. It is especially fun when we can argue about
symbolism rather than reality because that way no one can actually keep
score.

It does get confusing, though. After introducing a new idea about whom the
Democratic Party should approach, Howard Dean was excoriated by Al
Sharpton who, while entertaining and often right, falls somewhat short as
a mentor of morality. Sharpton was joined by some white southerners who,
in attacking Dean's stereotype, implicitly projected their own - that of a
south in which all the bad stuff has passed. Funny that Trent Lott never
got the word.

Then, in an act of iatrogenic politics, Dr. Dean wounded himself further
by describing as 'loathsome' the symbol of his proposed new constituency.
That's not the best way to reach out and touch someone.

Besides, it also raises the question of whether the Democrats' Jefferson
Day dinners should be cancelled since their namesake also had some pretty
loathsome view on ethnicity.

The stereotype business can be tricky. Not only did some southern pickup
drivers complain, but Claude Henry Sinclair Jr., commander of the Sons of
Confederate Veterans camp in Lancaster, SC, told the Washington Post that
he saw yet another kind of stereotype: "I don't have a pickup truck."

To be sure, Dean might have done better if he had used (as one of our
readers suggested) the term 'NASCAR dads,' but in fact, politics uses
stereotypes all the time. And a campaign meeting at which someone asks,
"How do we get to the Jews?" has quite a different import than the same
question asked at a KKK meeting.