it s also a big deal when you have african-american senators in this country. this is not something that happens that often and more often than not it s by appointment. and before that the only one was roland burris who briefly served. before that a man named barack obama and before that and then there was everbrooks before her. the big question is can he get is it you re from south carolina. and i m getting a little ahead of myself but he ll now have the advantage of incumbency which is, are we at a point where tim scott could win statewide office in the state like south carolina? in full disclosure, i helped with the green petr candidate that ran for the senate against demint and alvin green. i think tim scott could get a significant amount of black votes. like white voters voted for j.c. watts, white folks will vote for people they perceive represent their interest regardless of their color so y50i6r7k tim scott has a chance to be ebb elected to that seat and hold
i m chris he s here with the mayor of atlanta, democrat, kaseem reed. and dylan glen and kevin alexander grey of counterpunch.org. not times you get a former staffer and a writer from counterpunch.org at the table. no big deal. power here. that s right. mayor, i want to talk to you about we re talking about tim scott who is an african-american congressman recently appointed to fill jim demint s senate seat in south carolina and it s a big deal, largely because how require african-american senators are and that it is south carolina, a state whose history is as acutely colored by racial politics as any state in the union i would argue. you re the maier of atlanta. yes. georgia is a place that whose demographics in politics are changing in a way that a lot of people think it might be the next state. we have virginia and neither
was the party that was most likely to push for equality and opportunity. the party of lincoln. what s happened is, blacks have left the republican party in droves to the democratic party starting in part because of the deal because at the end of the day what black people were doing are voting in their interests. i think what tim scott represents is someone who is black who has into the been smorting the policy interests of the black community. that is interesting. i also agree that actually, if we would be talking about any black senator because it s unique. if you go back and look at the history of south carolina and politics in south carolina. strom thurmond and blacks relationship with strom thurmond. he won 30%. any republican who wean 30% of black voters today would be every high school kid that graduated from high school when i came up, got that lottery from stro strom thurmond. if your family had problems in the military, you didn t call the red cross first. you call
a 47-year-old south carolina native and a member of the house tea party caucus. after running for congress in 2010 and beating strom thurmond s son, his fact act was to overturn obama care. and scott will be the first black senator from the south since reconstruction. the first black republican senator since edward brookes of massachusetts lost the re-election bid in 1978, and the only black senator currently serving. tim scott will be the seventh black senator in the nation s history and on three occasions have african-americaning been elected to the upper chamber. only one time has a blaek senator been both elected and re-elected. the governor is aware and she sounded self-conscious about the governor reerting an eastern american. it is very important to me as a minority female that congressman scott earned this
multiracial coalition and these are the numbers, right? but the blacks in that multiracial vote out of solidarity. what are the ideological constructs of that? what are you demanding of democrats? sometimes some of us see very little outside of your black. i m black. i m going to vote for you as opposed to the white man. wait a second. that s something let me just say, when white people on fox news make that point people go crazy. i don t believe that at all. the conversation we had about colin powell is accurate. he would have gotten a significant amount of the black vote because of his core. because of his values and because of his policy positions. so he would not have taken a number of policy positions that alan west takes or that tim scott hold on i let you speak so i want to finish what i m saying. the policy position of democrats have been more aligned with black interests which is why black people used to be