A Disappointing Parade
The parade of Republican potential presidential candidates before an audience in the state of Iowa reflected the problems that those candidates will have in courting the Tea Party’s conservative vote, without neglecting the moderate independent vote that is needed to reach the White House.
The meeting, organized by Republican congressman Steve King and the Citizens United group, was attended by governors, senators, politicians and businessmen seeking the support of the Republican base that, according to the electoral calendar, will be the first to pick their presidential candidate.
It’s difficult to estimate how many Republican presidential contenders we have right now, since new potential runners appear every day. One would think that the more candidates the more variety of ideas, but it’s not like that at all.
Virtually everyone attacked Obamacare without presenting alternatives. They complained about low wages but only offered the same old recipe of tax cuts for the private sector. They criticized President Obama’s foreign policy on terrorism and, of course, they blamed immigrants over and over- for taking away American jobs. All of this while invoking God.
It’s regrettable than somebody like King, and an organization like Citizen United, are the first ones to pick the Republican nominee. The absence of ex Florida governor Jeb Bush is indicative of the problem a moderate candidate faces when it comes to immigration, in the middle of a contest to see who punishes the undocumented the most.
What we’ve seen in Iowa is disappointing for those of us who believe that Latinos gain when two political parties are willing to compete for their support. The discourse we heard over and over was an exclusionary one, with a demagoguery that does not leave any room for difference of opinions.
It’s true than in Republican Iowa there are no Latinos, but during all those speeches accusing Obama of being divisive, there was no space for different opinions.
The big Republican tent that supposedly includes everyone, was nowhere to be seen in Iowa. Instead, there were plenty of cloned candidates with the same message of intolerance, where the only valid measurement is to think like them
