RK ARCHIVE - Arlington Sun Gazette Publishes Racist Attack on Walter Tejada

The usual defense of "the newspaper's letters to the editor section is just an open forum" doesn't hold up here. Why?
Because the Sun Gazette editorialized the same sentiments just three months ago in carefully-parsed language:

Considering the Sun Gazette endorsed George Allen even after his Macaca moment, we shouldn't be surprised. But maybe we need to start looking into what advertisers are supporting the Sun Gazette - and whether we should be supporting them.

Comments

Tejada (buckrogers - 1/14/2008 4:25:06 AM)

just because this guy uses the customary right wing and racist rhetoric doesn't mean he's incorrect on the essence of Tejada's world view and the party's willingness to accept a less than qualified candidate because of his race. the democratic leadership that transformed Arlington into what it is today didn't get there on a platform of turning folks' garages into affordable housing and then forcing them to pay their tenants' relocation - benefits that would only available to low-income residents. banning smoking and trans fat is nice, but of course logically not under the domain of a county board since it has no burden of cost for the health care of the population. if you can watch a board meeting when mr. Tejada has the floor and not cringe as you're reminded of our President's intellectual command of the issues, then you're either a better person than I or maybe overlooking the obvious.

"that transformed Arlington (Lowell - 1/14/2008 6:31:04 AM)

into what it is today"

You mean the best place to live in the DC Metro area?

Where am I? (TheGreenMiles - 1/14/2008 9:14:43 AM)

Where am I? I thought I was on a progressive blog? You say "benefits that would only be available to low-income residents" like it's a bad thing. Should the county make sure all its services benefit the wealthy? Food stamps for millionaires that you could cash in at Dean & Delucci, maybe?

Walter will never be accused of being a Clintonian policy wonk, but I wonder if it's a lack of "intellectual command of the issues" that gets people so riled up, or his accent.

Just because you're on a progressive blog (Lowell - 1/14/2008 9:21:41 AM)

doesn't mean that we don't have the occasional right winger coming to share his (almost always "his," by the way) "wisdom." Of course, that "wisdom" usually consists of nothing more than calling all Democrats "far left wingers," "socialists," "Marxists," or whatever Bill O'LIElly and Rush are telling them to say today.

progress (buckrogers - 1/14/2008 1:37:37 PM)

Why is it I'm being called a racist and a right winger for disagreeing with the guy's policy? I think by any measure, you would be hard pressed to paint Arlington as a racist community, yet the top priority of our chairman is to legislate against it. That seems more appropriate for Prince William or Loudoun or any number of truly racist areas in Virginia. I don't think what he has in mind is smart for the county, and after watching the last few years of his performance on the board, I don't think he's overly informed.

If it makes you feel progressive to call me a racist republican when I take the original post from the Gazette out of a racist context and into a substantive level, I can't help that. Name calling and strawmen like "food stamps for millionaires" puts you in the same camp as the minutemen in my book.

Bad racist manners (Hugo Estrada - 1/14/2008 12:24:25 PM)

Thanks buckrogers, for reminding the Gazette that openly racist rhetoric is not acceptable.

The in behavior is to make a racist statement while pretending that you are not, wink, wink.

Do it cleverly, like buckrogers does : denounce racism and then agree with the content, wink, wink.

Says, 'low-income,' rather than 'minorities', which is where he is getting to, wink, wink.

Of course, low-income white families will suffer as well when we stop helping low-income people. :(

But the satisfaction that the racist gets from denying minorities services is so great that they are willing to sacrifice low-income white people in the process.

I love it, "the radical left!" (Lowell - 1/14/2008 7:12:13 AM)

I guess there are 18,766 radical leftists in Arlington County, since that's how many votes Walter Tejada received in the November 2007 election. I presume those 18,766 were among the 53,021 "radical left" Arlingtonians who voted for Jim Webb in 2006. Ha. :)

I'm a little confused, help me (Teddy - 1/14/2008 4:13:59 PM)

understand exactly what the point is here. First, I thought the letter writer was complaining about a sort of reverse racism when Mr. Tejada was elected as Chairman. Then there was a sort of defense of the letter writer based on maybe he had a point in complaining about some of Mr. Tejada's proposals and policies--- as is the privilege of any citizen--- but the rationale of those complaints was actually racism in disguise, some said. Or was it? Please tell me what all these code words really mean, because it has to mean something given all the smoke and fire resulting from the simple posts.