Do Condi and Colin Make the Republicans a Diverse Party? I recently received the following comment: you said "whites hold nearly all positions of power in our nation." . . . perhaps this is true in the democratic party, but it's not in the republican party. Examples that come to mind are, Collin Powell (Secretary of State) Condi Rice (National Security Advisor and Secretary of State), Alberto Gonzalez (Attorney General), Clarence Thomas (Sup Ct justice appointed by republican). It appears it's the Democratic party which is responsible for "white people holding nearly all positions of power." Well Tom's right that there are at least four non-whites in the Republican Party. I decided to research the percentages of minorities currently serving in elected office. There are 540 members of the Congress (House + Senate combined) but only 74 of them are minorities. This means that whites make up 86.3% of the House even though whites were only 75.1% of the population in the 2000 census. When you account for the fact that the percentage of whites has certainly decreased since the 2000 census, the property right granted by white skin becomes apparent. Minorities are underrepresented in most professions as well. For example, 90% of attorneys are white. The senate.gov website reveals some numbers that prove which party is more diverse. 25 Hispanics are in the 108th Congress. 20 are Democrats, 5 are Republicans. 39 African-Americans serve in Congress. All are Democrats. Let me restate that. There are zero elected black Republican officials in the Federal Government. 7 Asians serve in Congress. 7 are Democrats, 0 are Republicans. 3 Native Americans serve in Congress. The Republicans finally have an advantage (albeit with a ludicrously small sample size) 2-1. Altogether, 68 of the 74 non-whites in Congress are Democrats. 91.8% of the elected minority Congresspeople are Democrats. Tom's claim that the Republicans are the more diverse party is patently false. But Tom is likely not alone in believing that the GOP really is more diverse. I'll tell you why. Just like a bad sitcom, the GOP knows the power of the token black guy. You bring in one or two blacks and suddenly people get the impression that your party isn't full of racists. All of Tom's examples -- Condi, Colin, Alberto Gonzales and Clarence Thomas -- are tokens. All four of these people are aggressively working to harm their race, but that's not the point. You can always find self-hating members of any group and the Republicans welcome those people. That's why you have the occassional gay Republican. The Republicans don't have token minorities on board in order to win minority votes. Non-whites are more keen to the abuses of the Republican party and demonstrate that fact in massive numbers at the ballot box. Blacks voted for Kerry 9-1 in 2004; a majority of Asians and Latinos voted for Kerry as well despite Bush's victory. The reason for these token minorities is to make white people feel safer. Most whites abhor overt racism. People won't vote for a party that is openly racist, so the presence of Condi and Colin make moderate whites feel more comfortable voting Republican. All of this isn't, of course, to say that Condi and Colin aren't perfectly qualified for their positions, despite their political leanings. It's just that the Republicans should have more minorities than the few token ones they do now. Clinton appointed double the minorities that Bush has when you factor in appointments that do not require Senate approval. Most importantly, the number of non-white males working for your administration has nothing to do with what your policies do for non-white males. The pro-corporation, anti-affirmative action, anti-public schools, pro-tax cut, pro-war agenda of the Republican party aggressively favors the interests of those with entrenched privilege, aka white males, over those without, aka everybody else. The Democrats' overwheming advantage in minority representation in Congress, however, speaks volumes as to which party non-whites prefer. The numbers for women are equally troubling and also reveal the Democrats' huge advantage in terms of representation.