BIGOTS: Colorado Republican says fried chicken causes black and Latino poverty - White people eat it too, y'know. Just think of Colonel Sanders!
Saying black people like fried chicken is an old stereotype. Saying black people and Latinos are poor because they like fried chicken is a new twist. But presented with statistics on racial disparities in the poverty rate, that was Colorado state Sen. Vicki Marble's explanation:
“When you look at life expectancy, there are problems in the black race: sickle-cell anemia is something that comes up, diabetes is something that’s prevalent in the genetic makeup and you just can’t help it,” Marble said. “Although I’ve got to say, I’ve never had better BBQ and better chicken and ate better in my life than when you go down south and you — I love it.”
Marble went on to mention how Mexicans eat vegetables in Mexico but stop eating healthily when they immigrate to the United States.
“These things aren’t good for you,” she continued. “There’s so many attributing factors as to why these graphs look the way they do.”
Also in there somewhere, she mentioned a restaurant called "Type II Chicken," which she had always wanted to eat at, and also that "an idle mind is the devil's workshop." She was rambling, is what I'm saying. Free-associating about the causes of poverty. And her free-associating led her to—actually kind of kicked off with—the idea that black people are genetically flawed and like fried chicken.
Marble's epic four minutes-plus ramble on poverty (which she began wrapping up only when she was cut off by the task force chair saying "it seems like there's a repetition there and I think the point is made") ended with a "question" aimed at suggesting that the War on Poverty had made things worse. So while she mentioned a whole lot of things along the way, her basic points were to blame either people of color or policies to combat poverty or both for high infant mortality and low life expectancy among poor black and Latino people. Which kind of contradicts her statement that she's "saddened" her comments were taken as disparaging and that "I hope our work on this committee will offer real solutions to the health and financial challenges of our vulnerable populations," unless of course you think "black people shouldn't eat so much fried chicken and the War on Poverty made things worse" are real solutions.
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2013/08/22/1233044/-Colorado-Republican-says-fried-chicken-causes-black-and-Latino-poverty?detail=facebook#
