text: The modern republican party has been appealing to its racist base for more than a generation.  I know it once was the party of Lincoln. But Ronnie Reagan signaled his intentions toward minorities when he opened his campaign in a town that was infamous because a black man had been recently lynched there. Bush Sr. defeated Dukakis by appealing to racial fears with the Willie Horton ads.  And Bush Jr. ( aka the disaster) totally ignored a minority community after it was devastated by Hurricane Katrina.    White people are very fond of calling minorities racists.  And it's true that some minorities are racists. But white racism is institutionalized and affects lives. I'd like to have an alternative to the democratic party.  However, republicans have more than demonstrated that any minority who votes for a republican needs to have their head examined!