Tell readers why Newt is racist

In the third paragraph of the article that appeared in the Jan 26 edition of the Indiana Daily Student titled “Gingrich and the rhetoric of blame,” the IDS Editorial Board stated, “We say the Presidential candidate’s language verges on racism.”

Well, I say if you are going to say something like that, you should tell the readers why.

You say, “Beneath Gingrich’s unsavory oratory lies obvious indications of racism.” Apparently, you thought they were so obvious that you did not need to tell the readers what they were. Nowhere in the article do you ever attempt to justify or explain why “the Presidential candidate’s language verges on racism.”

In fact, you don’t even bother to tell the readers what language you’re referring to.

So, what did Newt Gingrich actually say? Well, he has called President Obama the “food-stamp president” on multiple occasions including, during the Fox-sponsored South Carolina debate.

And you ask, “Why would a Republican frontrunner for president choose to bring up an issue such as food stamps?” Well, in the first sentence of your article you say Juan Williams questioned Gingrich “about his questionable food-stamp president moniker,” and then six paragraphs later you turn around and ask why Gingrich is talking about it.

He was talking about it because he was asked about it, but you seem to suggest that he was talking about it on purpose in order to “play to the biases and prejudices of the audience he speaks to: in this case, the voters of the heavily right-leaning state of South Carolina.”

So if you’re saying Gingrich’s language is racist and he used it on purpose to pander to South Carolinians, what you are saying is the state of South Carolina is racist?

It wouldn’t be hard to arrive at that conclusion, considering you also describe the South Carolina crowd as “going wild” after Gingrich “stood by his racially charged words.”

What else did he say?

“Really poor children in really poor neighborhoods have no habits of working and have nobody around them who works. So they literally have no habit of showing up on Monday. They have no habit of staying all day. They have no habit of ‘I do this, and you give me cash’ unless it’s illegal.”

Is this racist? I don’t think it is. Is it a nice thing to say? No. Is it even true? That’s highly questionable, but you shouldn’t say something is racist just because you don’t like it.

I say the readers of the IDS not only deserve to know what you say, but also why you say it.


­— cdyanzer@gmail.com