Brian Schweitzer’s introduction of polygamy into the presidential race this week was at least two steps out of bounds.
Schweitzer, the populist Democratic governor of Montana, was not being critical of Republican nominee Mitt Romney directly. Rather, he was engaged in an “analysis of the Latino electorate — a standard political ploy designed to raise questions about specific attributes of a candidate while protecting the analyst against accusations of bias or racism.
In this case, Schweitzer targeted Romney’s grandfather, who was an ex-pat Mormon living in a Mexican Mormon commune founded by Mormons fleeing prosecution for polygamy. Schweitzer was not criticizing Romney’s family history, but attempting to explain how this history would be a roadblock against Romney’s ability to make inroads with Latino voters.
While discussing swing states, Schweitzer said Romney would have a “tall order to position Hispanics to vote for him,” and I replied that was mildly ironic since Mitt’s father was born in Mexico, giving the clan a nominal claim to being Hispanic. Schweitzer replied that it is “kinda ironic given that his family came from a polygamy commune in Mexico, but then he’d have to talk about his family coming from a polygamy commune in Mexico, given the gender discrepancy.” Women, he said, are “not great fans of polygamy, 86 percent were not great fans of polygamy. I am not alleging by any stretch that Romney is a polygamist and approves of [the] polygamy lifestyle, but his father was born into [a] polygamy commune in Mexico.”
This is a tried and true political dodge that allows attacks that otherwise would tar the attacker as intolerant into the debate. Schweitzer, after all, is “not alleging by any stretch” that there is anything untoward in Romney’s background or that there is something odd about Mormonism. On the contrary, he tells us, it’s just that some people — women and Hispanics — might find this 105-year-old bit of family history a problem.
“I don’t have a problem with it, but some people do,” and after all, some of my best friends are…fill in your own ethnic subgroup.
There is little difference between this kind of misdirection and the Republican response to the Obama-as-Muslim canard. When asked, they always says something like “I have no reason not to believe him when he says he’s a Christian.” wink, wink, nod, nod.
The fact that we are about to witness a presidential campaign featuring a black Christian Democratic descendant of African Muslims and a Mormon Republican — candidates who even a decade ago would have been unthinkable — should be enough to relegate these kinds of attacks to the scrap heap.
Hank Kalet 