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Does it matter to Latino Voters that Mitt Romney’s dad was born in Mexico?

Nothing to see here, folks ... just political manipulation.

Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney made a bold and sketchy play for Latino voters this week, reminding the public of the already public but rarely emphasized detail that Mitt Romney’s father was born south of the border. Yep, Daddy was not born on U.S. soil, but in Mexico after Romney’s grandfather, a Mormon polygamist, sought refuge there during his flight from Utah to avoid polygamy charges.

Romney reminded folk of this family history this week to widen his appeal to Latino voters. Having no shame, he actually told the Hispanic television network Univision that he was trying to get more Latinos to vote Republican.How naive can one man be?

Is this the same man who, during the 2008 election, posed with a group of black voters and said “Who Let the Dogs out....hoot, hoot?” It’s very telling that’s he’s always so awkward around ethnically diverse voters.

Romney’s family lore doesn’t make him understand Mexican-American perspectives or issues. So, it’s a moot point. Cultural heritage and commonality are about more than location and family ties. They are about emphasizing and logically embracing certain principles and values – ones that empower the ethnic group and allots them more protection and participation in the U.S.

Since Romney believes it’s OK for his dad to immigrate to Mexico but finds it an anathema for Mexicans to immigrate here and seek legal status, he’s clearly a hypocrite who identifies with Mexican-Americans in no authentic way.

This is mere pandering and another pathetic ethnic overture by Romney to attempt to be palatable to voters. It won’t work. Who let the dog out, indeed!

Republican candidates out of touch with diversity, leaning on trite stereotypes

Republican Presidential candidates Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum are disturbingly out of touch with the black American experience. It seems they’ve gotten most of their ideas about what real life is like from watching Snoop Dogg videos, Jerry Springer, or KKK educational videos.

This week, Gingrich and Santorum seemed to imply that black people in general have no pride or ambition in life, subsisting only to mooch off others and avoid work.

The idea that blacks are innately lazy is actually a stereotype leftover from slavery and share-cropping days when plantation masters, who themselves did no labor, would chide blacks for being lazy if they took a break from picking cotton. Stereotypes often have a strategic purpose, to reinforce the nobility of a ruling group and dehumanize the non-ruling group.

What they said:

Rick Santorum (when addressing a virtually all white crowd in Iowa): “I don’t want to make black people’s lives better by giving them somebody else’s money … I want to give them the opportunity to go out and earn the money and provide for themselves and their families”

How noble. Does Santorum realize that many blacks have worked multiple jobs, sometimes while going to school, to support their families – even when all they could get were jobs as maids and janitors?

Yes, there is a segment of the black population involved in crime and hanging out on street corners, but surrounding those people are families trying to avoid those elements and improve their quality of life.

This is the danger of seeing a whole group of people through one lens. The most fascinating thing about Santorum's comments are that they were in response to someone who didnt even ask him about black people. A young man simply inquired about how to improve the economy.

Newt Gingrich: “If the NAACP invites me, I’ll go to their convention and talk about why the African-American community should demand paychecks instead of food stamps.”

This is paternalism and cultural elitism at their finest. Does he really think without his “enlightenment” it wouldn’t occur to blacks to seek work rather than assistance?? And why does he think blacks by default are on assistance? I'm pretty sure the NAACP convention isn't waiting on Savior Gingrich to come and state the OBVIOUS merits of having a job.

Within the black community, there has been much consternation about the disproportionately high unemployment rate, even among those with advanced degrees who hunt for jobs. Yet, Republican front runners continue to apparently believe these job seekers are all out of work out of simple laziness.

If these two politicians are so divorced from the motivations of America’s diverse peoples now, can you imagine the detachment and stereotyping if either are elected?

Iowa not diverse enough to be voting barometer for American people.

Maybe it’s time to hold the first caucuses of election season in a more diverse place.

As the Iowa caucuses draw nearer, it’s hard to believe a monolithic place like Iowa remains the barometer of the American voting public in 2012. Iowa is 91.3 percent white and mostly an agricultural area. Can it really give a true picture of the political leanings of the U.S,. which is a multicultural nexus of whites, blacks, Latinos, Asians and other ethnic groups? Can farmers identify with the political tastes of people in urban areas and in the suburbs?

I remember driving to Iowa with my dad who went to Drake University. Nothing but cornfields as far as the eyes can see. It wasn’t all rural. Des Moines, in particular, was very cultivated. The people were friendly and accepting, but yes, they all looked alike racially. There was little diversity. That was in the 90s.

Has Iowa changed much? Not really. This state, which kicks off election season with its Iowa Caucuses Tuesday, has 10 percent less black people and 11 percent less Hispanic people than the United States’ general population.

According to the U.S. Census Bureau, the citizens of the United States of 74 percent white, 12.6 percent black, 16.3 percent Latino, 5 percent Asian, and less than 0.2 percent Native Hawaiian and Pacific Islander.

Guess what percentage of blacks is part of Iowa’s population? Less than 3 percent.

Hispanics? Just 5 percent.

Two percent of the population is Asian.

I have no beef with Iowa, but I think it’s time to change the tradition of making the Iowa caucuses the premier election event of the nomination season. It’s simply not cosmopolitan enough. People in Iowa live in their own little corner of the world, which hasn’t really evolved to reflect the melting pot of America.

Whatever voters there decide on Tuesday won’t likely be representative of my voting stance and concerns – or those of many other diverse Americans.

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