Sen. George "Macaca" Allen Hurt By His Bigotry

About a week ago, Sen. George Allen (R-VA) referred to an American of Indian descent as a "macaca" which is a racist slur (derived from the French word for monkey). I'm pleased to see that this act of bigotry has hurt George Wallace Allen:

In an election for the United States Senate in Virginia today, 8/21/06, incumbent Republican George Allen edges Democrat challenger James Webb 48% to 45%, according to an exclusive SurveyUSA poll conducted for W*USA-TV in Washington, DC.

Since an identical SurveyUSA poll released 6/28/06, Allen has lost 8 points and Webb has gained 8 points. Allen's lead has shrunk from 19 points to 3 points.

Interviewing for this poll began 8/18/06, one week after Allen singled out a Webb campaign worker at an Allen rally. Allen has lost support across all demographic groups, but in particular, among younger voters. He has gone from Plus 23 to Minus 17, a swing of 40 points. In Southeastern VA, Allen has gone from a 2:1 lead to a tie, a 31-point swing.

Of course, this foul note in a long history of a symphony of racism doesn't seem to have upset the Christopathic gay-hating base of the Republican Party:

Those who support Ballot Question 1, defining marriage in Virginia as between one man and one woman, vote for Allen by 39 points. Those who oppose Question 1 vote for Webb by 64 points.

Hate is the Republican base.

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Here in Loudoun Co, VA (on the edge between the rural 'Right' and the NoVa mixed bag), the local republican campaign supporting Allen is exclusively promoting "One Man One Woman" as their focus and slogan this year.

For all of the things the Senate needs to deal with, that's all VA republicans can rally around to get a vote out.

Northern VA's a mixed bag - we have mostly moderates, a large educated social-liberal class, and a large batch of Reagan Republicans (a small few of which are academic-conservative enough to be vocally mad at the current congress and administration for their reactionary social policies and their undisciplined fiscal sense).

But crazy as the right may be, they haven't mustered any real power. the "rednecks" may vote republican on a general basis, but they rarely get republican nominees that would actually try stupid stuff like destroying the education system (VA's got an 'A' from Fordham and intends to keep it). Anybody from the south attempt to do that and the DC suburbs and Hampton Roads areas muster a HUGE number of votes to counteract it.

(One example of how the Religion doesn't dominate local politics as much as they wish: the largest church building in Loudoun County, housing some 6000 at a time in a large arena, is 1 block away from Dominion, the largest brewery and brewpub in the state! and there haven't been any attempts to shut it down... )

Allen's already not very well loved in Northern Virginia, but this incident is really hurting him up here where there is a large (and ever-increasing) voting Indian-descended population, many of whom are co-workers to the rest of us up here.

Out west and in the south, less so, and most people probably wouldn't know what the "dirty" word was in the first place, so that's one reason why he's still as stable as he is.

By Joe Shelby (not verified) on 21 Aug 2006 #permalink

Letter to the Editor- Washington Post

I am concerned that the articles about Sen. George Allen's verbal attack on a fellow Virginian are missing the point. The Aug. 15 front-page article seemed to emphasize Mr. Sidarth's feeling of being offended instead of Mr. Allen's objectionable behavior. If Mr. Sidarth had been African American and the senator had used a familiar racial slur, would the story be Mr. Sidarth's hurt feelings or Mr. Allen's choice of language?

It also seems worth mentioning that Mr. Allen's mother is a speaker of French and Arabic who came to this country from Tunisia. "Macaca" is a derogatory slur used by speakers of French in reference to blacks, Arabs and dark-skinned people.

Mr. Allen had reason to have knowledge of that particular slur based on his family background and his own knowledge of French. I don't understand how reporting the news can avoid mention of these facts.

KIM NAOROZ

Richmond

wikipedia has already been updated: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Macaca

The word macaca is familiar to me because it exists in the Portuguese language also and is frequently used to describe rambunctious children. Calling a kid a "monkey" is no big deal, but I never heard macaca used on an adult, which would have been gravely insulting. The racial overtones in Senator Allen's use of the word are pretty clear in context and the simplest explanation is that the man is a racist. Not a word bumbler. A racist.

Just to ensure that Allen has some competition, Tramm Hudson, the putative front-runner in Florida's 13th Congressional District race (the winner will replace shady character Katherine Harris), recently made these amazingly ill-advised remarks while addressing the public. It never shocks me to learn that politicians think such things; the fact that they so often don't know enough to keep their mouths shut when running for office, however, is surprising.

Of course, your comments are worthless because you just hate anyone not as pink as you.