A Chicken Voting for Col. Saunders

Kurt Allemeier has this story in the Dispatch:

A group of Quad-Cities area women who say they've been taken for granted by an ineffectual Democratic Party have formed the African-American Republican Women's Party, a first-of-its-kind organization in Illinois.

The group will install its officers at a 3 p.m. meeting Sunday at Bennigan's in Rock Island.

The Rev. Jacqueline Walls, who serves as the group's president, said it shouldn't be surprising that the first GOP party for African-Americans starts in Rock Island County, a long-standing Democratic stronghold.

"I think it is a prime place to have it because it is so Democratic," said Rev. Walls, of Rock Island's First Judeo Apostolic Church. "They take the African-American vote and take it for granted."

Locally, the party in charge has failed, with jobs leaving the area and little to show in economic development, especially in Rock Island's west end, said Lois Allison, the group's vice president.

"I haven't seen anything for 30 years," Ms. Allison said. "A long time ago, this used to be a place where, if you didn't have a job, you didn't want a job.

"It needs to change here," she said. "If it isn't working, try it another way."

African-Americans are just assumed to be Democrats, with grandparents and parents before them brought up with the party, Rev. Walls said. That has to change.

"The Democratic Party needs to hear us," Rev. Walls said. "We're not going to be pushed aside every two years until they need us.

"I don't think it is inclusive any longer, but exclusive," she said. "They only come to us when they want something."

The group has immediate goals, she said, including building a membership of 100-150 active women ready to work for the primary in March, registering voters and volunteering with candidates.

"It is time to retire some of the people who have been working for us," Rev. Walls said, singling out U.S. Rep. Lane Evans, D-Rock Island. "We need to get someone else in there, some women in there."

There is nothing as blatantly fake as these groups of Republican Blacks. There's been a huge and lavishly funded effort by the Republican party to try to make inroads with black voters, and judging by the recent poll that put black approval of Bush at 2%, it's not going too well.
But they've managed to snag a few black preachers who are willing to do their bidding, and despite massive efforts to get them book contracts, speaking tours, and media appearances, it's gone largely nowhere.

While some of their complaints are likely legitimate, this group and others like them are only in existence due to the efforts of the Republican party to take away tradidional black support from the Democrats. The fact remains that without the black vote, the Democratic party would never again win an election, and the Republicans know it.

Now they've decided to start this supposed grass-roots group here. What do you think?