Quickies: The Racism Double-Bind

     Ed Driscoll calls out the Washington Post:

     From Piyush to Bobby: How does Jindal feel about his family’s past?

     .... Jindal’s status as a conservative of color helped propel his meteoric rise in the Republican Party — from an early post in the George W. Bush administration to two terms in Congress and now a second term as Louisiana governor — and donors from Indian American groups fueled his first forays into politics. Yet many see him as a man who has spent a lifetime distancing himself from his Indian roots.

     As a child, he announced he wanted to go by the name Bobby, after a character in “The Brady Bunch.” He converted from Hinduism to Christianity as a teen and was later baptized a Catholic as a student at Brown University — making his devotion to Christianity a centerpiece of his public life. He and his wife were quick to say in a “60 Minutes” interview in 2009 that they do not observe many Indian traditions — although they had two wedding ceremonies, one Hindu and one Catholic. He said recently that he wants to be known simply as an American, not an Indian American.

     “There’s not much Indian left in Bobby Jindal,” said Pearson Cross, a political science professor at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette who is writing a book on the governor.

     Driscoll asks: ‘HOW IS THIS NOT RACIST?’ In view of which I shall present the applicable formulae.

1. If the candidate is a minority Democrat:
   • His race/ethnicity will be used as an asset among the relevant minority voting blocs;
   • Republicans who dare even to mention his race/ethnicity will be thunderously denounced.
2. If the candidate is a minority Republican:
   • He will be denounced to the relevant minority voting blocs as “inauthentic;”
   • Republicans who attempt to use his heritage as an electoral asset will be condemned.

     In the case of a thoroughly Americanized Republican such as Governor Jindal, not only does case 2 above apply, but extra pressure will be brought to bear on the candidate to “acknowledge his roots.” That pressure will definitely come from his detractors, who’ll see it as a way to highlight the candidate’s “insincerity.” However, some might also come from his supporters, out of fear of a reaction against the candidate’s “rejection of his past.”

     Care to make a few casual wagers, Gentle Reader? I’ve got my two-headed coin right here...