Earth to Tom: Stop Digging
June 2nd, 2009
In a follow-up appearance on "Hardball with Chris Matthews," former congressman and failed Republican presidential candidate Tom Tancredo not only refused to apologize for falsely equating the National Council of La Raza (NCLR) with the Ku Klux Klan, he went on make yet another inaccurate charge.
The best these guys can come up with is the tired old guilt-by-association routine. Challenged to identify something scary about Supreme Court nominee Judge Sonia Sotomayor, Tancredo cited her membership in NCLR.
He then inaccurately attributed a statement NCLR has publicly denounced as "La Raza's logo." (We think he meant "motto," but you never know...)
After NCLR and dozens of journalists and bloggers pointed out that the quoted statement was not NCLR's motto, Tancredo shifted again, saying he wouldn't apologize because NCLR "gave its Chicano Hero Award to José Angel Gutiérrez," who once wrote that Chicanos should "eliminate the Gringo."
Undoubtedly scary stuff to some, except, once again, it's not true. NCLR does not have and never has had a "Chicano Hero Award." José Angel Gutiérrez has never received any of the official awards NCLR does have.[1]
So, Tancredo was attempting to implicate Judge Sotomayor by linking her association with NCLR, then linking to a nonexistent motto, then dropping that argument, but trying to link someone else entirely to an NCLR award that does not exist and was never given. Pretty much par for the course for Tancredo, we think.
(Earth to Tom: Didn't your mother ever warn you that when you're in a hole, the first thing you should do is stop digging?)
2- http://www.racewire.org/archives/2009/06/race_to_the_right.html
3- http://www.dailykos.com/story/2009/5/31/737117/-Rove-Proves-La-Raza-Is-Colorblind!-
4- http://vivirlatino.com/2009/05/31/tom-tacredo-says-nclrkkksotomayor-is-racist.php
5- http://www.latinalista.net/palabrafinal/2009/05/
6- http://pop-tones.blogspot.com/2009/05/standing-up-for-white-man.html
7- http://www.thepurpleyouth.com/2009/05/the-death-of-the-republican-party/
8- http://mediamatters.org/blog/200905310004
9- http://www.jackandjillpolitics.com/2009/05/oh-newtoh-newttake-it-somewhere-else/
10- http://chaze77.wordpress.com/2009/05/30/sotomayor-supreme-court-and-spindoctors/
11- http://southchicagoan.blogspot.com/2009/05/nativists-want-to-make-la-raza.html
12- http://ourlatinamerica.blogspot.com/2009/05/por-que-no-te-callas-tom-tancredo.html
14- http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2009/5/29/736571/-NCLR-responds-to-freeper-attacks
15- http://guanabee.com/2009/05/tancredo-sotomayor-la-raza-kk
16- http://guanabee.com/2009/05/la-raza-sotomayor-tancredo
17- http://guanabee.com/2009/05/la-raza-sonia-sotomayor
18- http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/05/29/director-of-tancredos-ant_n_209171.html
[1] Tancredo may be referring, however inaccurately, to a 1991 NCLR Annual Conference session during which Gutiérrez was one of a dozen or so people recognized for being pioneers in the Latino civil rights movement. Now a professor at the University of Texas,Arlington, Gutiérrez was, in fact, a key player in a number of early organizations, including the Brown Berets, the Mexican American Youth Organization, and the La Raza Unida political party (no relation to NCLR).
Gutierrez is perhaps best known for his hard-edged satire, such as his 1974 book, A Gringo Manual on How to Handle Mexicans and his 2001 companion volume, A Chicano Manual on How to Handle Gringos. Statements like those Tancredo cited are often found in these satirical tracts. As to whether NCLR reflects Gutiérrez's views, he himself has made the distinction that he finds NCLR too "cautious and careful."