The Senate:Digging for Dirt in Dixie (GOP goes whack over black candidate)

[NVMojo]

March 27, 2006 issue - Harold Ford Jr.'s bid for a Senate seat from Tennessee sounds like a long shot. First there's the party issue: The Democratic congressman is running in a state that George W. Bush carried by 14 points in 2004. Then there's the race issue: Ford wants to be the first black senator from the South since Reconstruction. And don't forget family: Ford's uncle and aunt, both veteran Tennessee pols, are fighting, respectively, charges of bribery and election fraud.

Given all that, you'd think Republicans would be breathing easy. Hardly. Earlier this month, the Republican Senatorial Campaign Committee unveiled fancyford.com, a Web site that documents Ford's supposedly lavish lifestyle. Drawing from FEC expenditure statements, the site portrays Ford as an international dilettante with a penchant for Armani suits, four-star hotels and day-spa pedicures. In precious fonts and soft pastels, the site tells viewers how to "party like Ford" and displays four buxom Playboy bunnies as a reminder that Ford attended the Playboy Super Bowl party in 2005.

It may seem like an odd complaint coming from Republicans, who know a thing or two about posh pads and parties themselves. But RSCC spokesman Dan Ronayne says the site reveals Ford as an out-of-touch elitist, "more D.C. than Tennessee." The very existence of the site also reveals something about the Republicans: they are so worried about Ford's candidacy they're going negative five months before the primary.

They have reason for concern. During five terms in the House, the 35-year-old Ford has established himself as one of the Democrats' most polished stars. Back home, he's gone out of his way to highlight differences with liberal party leaders, opposing partial-birth abortion and gay marriage. When asked by NEWSWEEK if he's a "Nancy Pelosi Democrat," Ford grows annoyed. "I ran against Nancy Pelosi," he says, recalling a 2002 bid for House minority leader.

more...

http://msnbc.msn.com/id/11903425/site/newsweek/?rf=snwnewsletter

[Skinner]

1. Is it just me...

...or does the choice of the word "fancy" seem to suggest something more insidious than simply painting Ford as an elitist?

IMHO, the choice of the word "fancy" seems to place a lot more emphasis on "day-spa pedicures" than on "parties with buxom playboy bunnies."

[formercia]

2. Better than a redneck with bear claws.

Is the GOP insinuating that bad hygiene is good?

Shades of 'Blazing Saddles'

Whe 'da white womens at?

[OKNancy]

3. I think it's even worse

I think it means: pimp

[NVMojo]

4. as in another way to "swift-boat" the Dem candidate

[meow2u3]

7. "Fancy man" is also racist

It implies all black men are pimps.

Imagine Ford giving the rethugs a taste of their own racist medicine and giving the rethug some racist nickname. The GOP would pee their collective shorts!!

[tom_paine]

5. Unquestionably. The are overtly suggesting he is gay.

The customary Orwellian Bushevism.

If they could find a word that could call him n****r (and they will), expect www.darkyford.com before too long (not "darky", though, but you can just bet the Busheviks will find the right words to appeal to their KKK-base for his color).

The Busheviks make me as sick as any Totalitarian Scum throughout history have.

[Skinner]

6. That's exactly what I was thinking.

Disgraceful.