David Duke’s Political Future

Despite his background as a wizard of the KKK and a neo-Nazi, Duke garnered 55% of the white vote. In his concession speech, Duke stated that the messenger was defeated, but his message was not. And the message has been the same since Richard Nixon railed against forced busing, Ronald Reagan’s campaign rhetoric debased the “welfare queens” and George Bush used Willie Horton and racial quotas as steppingstones to the Oval Office.

Not since 1964, when President Johnson signed the civil rights bill, has a Democratic candidate for the presidency gathered a majority of the electoral votes from what was once known as the “Solid South.” And if Duke, despite his odious past, can convince 55% of the white voters that his message is the same as the one that they have been hearing from Republican candidates for the past generation, the Democrats had better be prepared for a dirty fight (or to fight dirty) in 1992.

S. KARNOVITZ, Van Nuys