On The Ninth Congressional District (Race-ing)

(Photo: TSD) Originally

UPDATE (7/14): In case you missed it, a consensus African American candidate was chosen (pre-WREG debate): Nikki Tinker. Her campaign was unaware that such an effort at consensus had been undertaken.

In an odd way, Tinker's best moment in last night's WREG debate came when she strongly refuted the claims that she was playing the race card against Cohen and rationally explained the sense of urgency among some African Americans to keep the only congressional district seat in the state that an African American has the best chance of winning. (Though it might be time for others to break through the barriers elsewhere.)

Also, on another debate note, Cohen responded to a question about race, saying that he wanted to be judged on the content of his character. He also invoked the name of Obama and Shelby County Mayor A C Wharton as men who are moving forward beyond race. He didn't mention Memphis Mayor Willie Herenton; in fact, no one did.

Was that a slight? With such a considerable election machine, who is Herenton supporting?


UPDATE (7/6): So familiar--and not quite.

Commercial Appeal columnist Wendi C. Thomas peered a little deeper at Nikki Tinker's EMILY List endorsement and found something that just doesn't seem quite right.

EMILY List is solidly pro-choice; but Tinker seems to be on the fence.

ORIGINAL POST (7/4): In a Tri-State Defender column, WREG's April Thompson's new father-in-law, William Larsha, frets that this election could be the last chance for blackness in the historically-black congressional district.

An excerpt:

Allow me to report a bit of extremely important information with regard to District 9 as the “historically Black Congressional District” in Tennessee and the current mission to save District 9 so as to “Let Democracy Ring” in this state.

Congressional District 9 could be lost this year as a majority black Congressional district, and once more Tennessee will become the only southern state with no black in the U.S. Congress.

Year 2010 is the next starting period of U.S. Census taking, and in particular, the next re-apportionment, re-districting or gerrymandering period.

Not only that, Tennessee through re-apportionment could lose a Congressional District seat because of an increased Mexican-American population in other states.
The winner in the 2008 Congressional District 9 race will have a chance to manipulate wards and precincts into District 9 becoming a non-black majority Congressional district.

This is not unusual (rather, customary) for incumbents to create advantages to win the next election or elections.

So, for the first time since the Civil War, black Tennesseans may have no chance of being elected in the U.S. Congress. Yet, there are enough African Americans concentrated in the western Tennessee counties of Fayette, Hardeman, Madison and Shelby to create (or gerrymander) at least two majority Black Congressional Districts.

However, the goal here is to “let democracy ring” by electing just one black Tennessean to the Congress.

For several months, a silent group has been working to establish a black consensus candidate for Congressional District 9 because the number of African Americans running represents a recipe for the demise of “Tennessee’s only Black Congressional District.”

Names of persons on this mission are absent from print because they do not wish to be called divisive, racist, or anti-Semitic as I have been so wrongly labeled.

Then, there are blacks with a Willie Lynch mentality that believe none of the black candidates are good enough to represent them in Congress – in other words, “White man’s ice is colder than the black man’s ice.”

Nevertheless, in a few days a consensus black candidate for Congressional District 9 will be announced.

Who will that be? Nikki Tinker? Joe Towns? Dr. Isaac Richmond?

No matter who it is, they won't be able to shed the "racist" label.

ON AN UNRELATED, BUT RELATED, NOTE: Reasons why Obama will win: Davis, Hardin.
*Flyer: Dead Even.