Topic: Media Research Center
The Media Research Center has long despised Univision news anchor Jorge Ramos, mainly for daring to be critical of President Trump. This is taken to a new level in an Aug. 24 post by Ken Oliver (bolding his):
As President Trump recently stated, many media outlets are currently having a field day giving platforms to hate groups, on both ends of the country’s political spectrum.
At Univision, activist anchor Jorge Ramos decided to replay on his weekly Al Punto show his 2016 interview with white nationalist leader Jared Taylor.
In the segment, one of the central exchanges between Ramos and Taylor reveals how both men actually share a similar, race-based view of American politics that is inherently divisive (not to mention un-American).
JARED TAYLOR, WHITE NATIONALIST: You want more power for Latinos.JORGE RAMOS, HOST, AL PUNTO, UNIVISION: Exactly.
TAYLOR: That comes at the expense of my people’s power.
RAMOS: We are 17% of the population.
TAYLOR: Correct.
RAMOS: And we only have three senators. Therefore, we do not have the political representation we deserve.
TAYLOR: And you want more and more.
RAMOS: Of course, because we only have three senators.
RAMOS: Right now, 14 more senators.
As MRC Latino pointed out when the segment originally aired as part of Ramos’ pre-election horror film, titled Hate Rising, both Ramos and Taylor exhibit a race-based logic that is inimical to the core, color-blind ethos of the American political project.
It is, at both extremes, an identity politics gone mad, that only serves to divide Americans, rather than heal and unite them as President Trump has urged. In other words, in Jared Taylor’s America, as a white man he evidently cannot be adequately politically represented by a non-white, nor in Jorge Ramos’ America can Ramos be adequately politically represented by a non-Hispanic.
It is a race-based logic that the vast majority of Americans roundly reject.
The fact that Oliver invokes Trump twice in an item that has nothing whatsoever to do with Trump tells us the level of bias he's going to serve up. Oliver also fundamentally misunderstands the concept of identity politics -- and, thus, the difference between Taylor and Ramos.
Taylor wants all power to be kept in the hands of whites and no other races to have a voice -- he is a white supremacist after all (which Oliver strangely softens as being a "white nationalist"). Ramos is arguing for Hispanic political representation proportional to their portion of the U.S. population, which is not the same thing. Oliver doesn't explain how it's racially divisive to include more Hispanics or any other minority in politics.
That's important because history has shown that minority legislators represent the concerns of minority constituencies better than non-minority legislators, which suggests that those concerns are not adequately addressed by non-minority legislators. And rightly or wrongly, voters use a candidate's race as a proxy for ideology.
No, Mr. Oliver, Ramos is not a Hispanic supremacist, and wanting proportional political representation doesn't make him one. Ramos wants Hispanics to have a meaningful voice; Taylor wants Hispanics to have no political voice at all. Taylor wants supremacy for his race; Ramos just wants a proportional voice. In other words, Ramos and Taylor couldn't be more different in their "race-based view of American politics."
Portraying Ramos as no different from a white supremacist is nothing but a lazy, hateful slur.
