Byrd's KKK History Shows Partisan Double Standard

It isn't Democrats that exploit racism to advantage. It isn't Democrats who celebrate southern heritage by waving the confederate flag and minimizing the horrors of slavery. And it isn't a Democrat who recently came out against the 1964 Civil Rights Act's title X which forbids discrimination by private businesses and organizations (Rand Paul R-Ky). Yes, FDR's decision was tragic and wrong. But those were the times. Maybe his decision would have been different had there not been so much anti-Semitism stirred up by conservatives and their supporters. It was also a conservative anti-Semite and red baiter named Pat McCarren who's amended the 1948 Displaced Persons Act to exclude thousands of Jewish refugees from DP camps after the war from obtaining visas to come to the US. Though McCarren was a conservative Democrat, it was mostly Republicans that barred Jewish DPs with the anti-semitic provisions of the 1948 Displaced Persons Act;

"In the second session of the Eightieth Congress, Frank Fellows of Maine,

chairman of the Subcommittee on Immigration of the House Judiciary

Committee, proposed a measure that called for the admission of 200,000 DPsfrom among those who had registered by April 21, 1947. Those admitted were to be charged against future immigration quotas for their countries of origin. In the Senate Revercomb's committee proposed legislation that would admit 100,000 DPs over a two-year period, confine eligibility to those who had been in the DP camps by December 22, 1945, and reserve 50 percent of the visas for agricultural workers. It also suggested that 50 percent of those admitted come from those states of Europe that had been annexed by Russia after the war. Two significant amendments to the bill were passed. One increased the total number of DPs to be admitted to the United States to 100,000 per year for two years, while the other, proposed by Senator William Langer of North Dakota, gave preference to the Volksdeutsche, those Germans expelled from Eastern Europe after the war. Langer, the only member of the Senate Judiciary Committee to oppose even the Revercomb plan in a committee vote, believed that the Volksdeutsche were “much worse off than the so-called displaced persons”, most of whom he assumed “are related to residents [i.e., Jews] of New York City."

http://www1.yadvashem.org/odot_pdf/Microsoft%20Word%20-%203541.pdf

Langer and Revercomb were conservative Republicans who influenced the legislation which kept thousands of Jews stranded in DP camps until 1952 when the Walters-McCarren Act liberalized immigration so as to allow Jewish immigration from Europe.

Slamming Democrats as having a racist history is a cheap shot. The vast majority of Blacks and Jews know these incidents are no longer a relevant measure of Democratic Party tolerance and hence both groups overwhelmingly support Democrats. It is the GOP's extremism and racism today that alienates so many people. They are as bad as the southern Democrats were at one time.

steve of IL 6:49PM July 01, 2010

Amusing to see this sort of post after the Dems pilloried Trent Lot for his praise of Strom Thurman at a birthday party:

" the only people you hear harping on Senator Byrd's KKK past is white Republicans"

Maybe that because of the sort of vapid partisanship the Dems are so good at combined with the fact that the majority of the press is liberal and don't want to even mention if possible any of the flaws that some of their members have?

Yes, there IS a double standard - in BOTH parties and in the press.

Shades of the "useful idiot" syndrome for those who cannot recognise this problem.

enzo of IN 2:19PM July 01, 2010

The Democratic Party is very racist, especially against Jews.

During WW II, a boat-load of Jews managed to escape Europe (the boat was named The St. Lewis). It was headed for Cuba. But Cuba denied the Jews entrance. Not one County in the Western Hemisphere allowed them to land. A movie was made of this sad journey. The title of the movie is Journey of the Damned.

FDR, a Democrat, refused to grant the Jews on that boat admission into the US. So much for the Democrats love of the Jewish Race.

Eventually, with no where else to go, the boat returned to Europe and most of it's occupants were exterminated by the Nazi's.

Britain, Belgium, and France did accept a handful of them. Those who were accepted by Belgium and France quickly saw their fortunes turn as the Nazi's over-ran these countries.

This sad event shows what the Democrats really think about Jews. How any Jewish person could be a Democrat is beyond me.

Vincent Anthony of NY 11:36PM June 30, 2010

On the other Byrd article you used you saved comment that I have seen you use twice.

I gave link and pointed out examples of 100% against civil right issues by Democrats. That's North and Dixie Democrats.

Get your facts straight on that before you speak for "black folks".

Am I a "white Republican" ? How do you know our race ?

Bill Hedges of MO 9:28PM June 30, 2010