A few of Alan Keyes's online supporters have started
suggesting their man lost this weekend because the Constitution
Party is racist. As I've written before, the CP definitely contains
some very extreme and kooky elements but the Keyesters' evidence
for their specific claim is awfully thin. It seems that a Chuck
Baldwin column was once excerpted on David Duke's website. Yet
the column in question, which
actually appeared on another site, is about remembering the men who
died at the Alamo. It's a fairly unfocused rant but it has
absolutely nothing to do with race.There is also an article on
Baldwin's website by another writer defending the Confederate
Battle Flag.
Keyes's largest bloc of votes at the convention came from the
California delegation. The CP's California affiliate is the
American Independent Party, which nominated George Wallace for
president in 1968. Paul Venable and Ricardo Davis, two of the most
prominent African Americans in the party, were leading Keyes
opponents. The further right you travel, it's never surprising to
encounter a certain amount of wackiness and ugliness, but there is
no real evidence that race played a role in Keyes's inability to
secure the Constitution Party nomination.
UPDATE: Several Keyesters have weighed in to discourage the
anti-Baldwin dirt-digging.
topics:
Constitution, Africa
