Republicans and Duke’s Election
Political chickens don’t always come home to roost, but Atwater and Bush are hosts to at least a small pullet, as moral consequences are measured these days, in the election of Duke to the Louisiana legislature.
It was Atwater who invoked the atavistic fear of blacks in the white voters of this country, which was crucial in winning the presidency for George Bush, by making Willie Horton the nightmare issue he became.
Was it a certain sense of guilt that made him and Bush (and Ronald Reagan, too) try so hard to get this Ku Kluxer and race-hate inciter defeated?
Like Atwater, he knew what it takes to get elected and he went for it, regardless of the truth, good taste, or guilt by association.
FREDERIC E. PAMP
Santa Ynez
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