Republicans as "Racist Zombies"?

It's something of a cottage industry on the left to smear Republicans as racist.

Bigotry knows no ideological boundaries, of course, but prominent lefties have an obssessive propensity to attack the entire GOP electorate as hooded night riders.

A prominent example is Dave Neiwart's post yesterday, "The Race Zombies: Caught Between Hate For Obama, Contempt For McCain:

AlterNet's Gabriel Thompson was in Alabama last weekend for the annual conference of the Council of Conservative Citizens, and his report is well worth the eye-opening read, just to get a sense for what a pack of jabbering cross-burners these folks really are. And as you can imagine, the prospect of an Obama presidency is driving them into a cannibalistic rage.

Check the link, where Neiwart reviews the comments therein, and concludes with this:

The far right ... acts as a kind of echo chamber for the mainstream right where talking points, ideas, and agendas are tested out and gradually shaped. We've already been hearing the "Muslim Obama" crap from a large number of ostensibly mainstream right-wingers, so it's just about a dead certainty the volume and intensity of it will rise as Election Day nears.

What these guys are really scared of is being treated by black people in exactly the same way they have treated them ("Yessuh, Mr. Obama") if/when economic and social positions shift. (This is, incidentally, an old motif that dates back to the lynching-era hysteria about blacks raping white women when, in reality, white men raping black women was a commonplace, both before and after slavery.) And that is the chief anxiety of these men -- that their own mistreatment of their fellow humans will come back to haunt them. As it happens, this is in fact a powerful appeal across many sectors of white society. So expect to hear strands of it woven into the GOP's attacks on Obama

Sure, this is red meat for the hard lefties, but let's take a close look at Neiwart's thesis anyway.

How about the Council of Conservative Citizens? Who are they?

Here's this from the Anti-Defamation League:

Ideology: White supremacy, white separatism.
Outreach: Mass mailings, prison newsletter.
Approach: Advances its ideology by inflaming fears and resentments, among Southern whites particularly, with regard to black-on-white crime, non-white immigration, attacks on the public display of the Confederate flag, and other issues related to "traditional" Southern culture.

Now, that's from the ADL, so let's get a little more from a journalist, Thomas Edsall, known to be sympathetic to the Democratic Party agenda, "Controversial Group Has Ties to Both Parties in South":

The Council of Conservative Citizens, an organization built by supporters of the segregationist White Citizens Councils, the John Birch Society and activists in the presidential campaigns of then-Alabama Gov. George C. Wallace, has developed strong political ties to the Republican Party in the South as well as to the fading conservative wing of the southern Democratic Party.

The group's strong ties to the remnants of the now-defunct White Citizens Councils, a powerful force in Mississippi and other Deep South states in the 1950s and 1960s, gave it an organizational base as well as connections to small-town establishments, such as Rotary clubs. The group soon became part of the political culture – and both parties.

Its ties to the Democratic Party are strongest in Mississippi. William D. Lord, the group's senior field coordinator, said 34 Mississippi legislators, most of them Democrats, are members of the Council of Conservative Citizens. But most of the southern politicians associated with it are Republicans, including members in state legislatures and in prominent state party positions.

Edsall goes on to discuss how prominent Republicans, like Trent Lott and Bob Barr, maintained long-term links with the organization.

Today, however, Lott has denounced his previous open support for segregation (see, "Trent Lott's Segregationist College Days"), and he has apologized multiple times for his ties to Southern racist organizations. President George W. Bush went so far as to formally repudiate Lott's comments on the late Senator Strom Thurmond, saying that Lott's views "do not reflect the spirit of our country."

As for Bob Barr, he has emerged this year as the Libertarian candidate for the presidency, and he firmly repudiated any support from extreme right-wing groups, especially the Stormfront-types who had rallied behind Ron Paul's wayward presidential bid.

As I've noted previously, claims of racial bigotry marked the Democratic primaries this year, not the GOP's. Further, while racial animus remains at the fringe of both left and right factions, prominent Democratic activist bloggers - who claim the "mainstream" of the party - continually sponsor racial hatred as part of their political ideology (see also, "Quotes From Democrats on Race & Anti-Semitism").

Today's GOP is more open and inclusive than ever before, and John McCain himself has denounced the politics of race-baiting (see also," Who’s Playing the Race Card?").

Dave Neiwart and his extreme left-wing partisans have the most favorable electoral environment in decades, but they still can't resist falsely smearing mainstream conservatives as "jabbering cross-burners."