GOP lip service to minorities, young voters won’t work

>> let's get right to our panel. msnbc political analyst karen finney is a former communications director of the democratic national committee and professor james peterson is director of african studies at lehigh university . welcome to you both. professor, we just saw mike huckabee there, a former presidential candidate , telling jon stewart that his party does a pathetic job communicating to nonwhite voters. but is it really just communication or was it their apparent belief that nonwhites want free stuff and food stamps that caused the real problems?

>> it is. you're right. so what they do is they effectively communicate their disdain for the 47% for women , for people of color , for poor folk , and so i think they are being very, very effective in their communication. it's just what are they communicating through all the racialized discourses we have chronicled on your show, for all the ways in which they dismiss poverty, dismiss ideas about the ways in which our society has to work with those folk who need support at certain times in their life. they refer to them as 47% or the takers or the moochers or whatever. they're effective at communicating what they've wanted to communicate so far, martin, and that's why they are where they are as a party right now.

>> karen , it's hard not to regard the republican response as patronizing and cynical. they lose the election and they think all they need to do is offer some quick response on immigration and latinos will flock to their candidate. it doesn't sound that different from holding up a picture of condoleezza rice and saying, look, we have a black woman on our side. when will they realize that tokenism doesn't register as genuine policy?

>> you know, i think there are some people within the republican party who recognize it and i think there's some who recognize that the problem they have is a two-cycle problem. this is not a problem they're going to solve in the next three years with a little spit and polish, right? they may solve it in terms of some senate races here and there, but in terms of a national election, i think one of the things president obama proved is you cannot win, some of us have been saying this for several years now, without a broad coalition of voters, and i think that -- let me just take one example. on the war on women , we've had two years of republicans telling american women it was all in our heads, that we're crazy to think -- there's no war on women . even that clip of bill o 'reilly saying if you think your abortion rights are under siege --

>> you're living in another country.

>> right. but the tone and tenor of the conversation, not even just about access to abortion care services, but to birth control got so out of control in the states and at the national level that we were -- women were furious, so by the time akin and mourdock came along, that was the last straw. i mean, a lot of these guys are pointing to those comments and saying that was our problem. no, your problem is you were disrespecting women for the last two years and we're sick of it and we're not going to let you drag us backwards in terms of the progress we've made. that's the problem. so i think until they understand the fundamental problems, you're right, it's not going to work.

>> so that's the gender issue, but, professor, the president reportedly scored a unanimous victory, and i'm quoting, in 59 voting divisions in philadelphia. mr. romney received no votes whatsoever. in cleveland the president was the unanimous choice of voters in nine precincts. some republicans suggest that perhaps these results aren't legitimate. paul ryan claims to be shocked by the turnout in urban areas , but it's obvious, isn't it? these are the facts.

>> these are the facts. these are legitimate. i'm sure they will be vetted and looked over but they will turn out to be legitimate. it's not the first time this has happened. it happened in 2008 in some precincts in some densely populated , largely african-american areas, mccain received zero votes. it might take on more of a story sort of sensibility now because we do have this -- people think of our country as being divided along racial lines but you have to look where those neighborhoods are. north 23philadelphia, west philadelphia , densely populated , predominantly african-american and latino neighborhoods, there are very, very informed voters in those neighborhoods. it's easy for people to get out the vote and organize the voting populations in those kinds of neighborhoods. again, at the end of the day you have to ask yourself if you're romney/ryan, if you're the republicans , are you even speaking to those people at all in any kind of respectable or respectful way when it comes to politics?

>> i think the answer is no from that election. karen , another problem for republicans is that they can't trust anyone under 30. exit polls show that young voters made up a larger share of the overall electorate this year and they broke in favor of the president by a margin of 24 points. i mean, does this reveal when young people think about their future, they don't think about the republican party ?

>> yes, and actually one statistic i love to remind republicans of is with younger voters, those first-time voters, if you get them to vote three times in an -- so three times if they vote democratic, they're pretty much going to be democrats for life . and so a lot of these younger people who voted for president obama , this is their second time, my friend. we're going to probably get them a third time and that means we're expanding the pool of democrats. again, this is a systemic problem that republicans had. we talked about this in 2007 and 2008 when none of their candidates really went and talked to their college republicans . time and again they have ignored the reality and the changes in this country. they're not talking to younger voters, and, frankly, if they start to pay attention to younger voters, the other rude awakening they're up for is younger voters, millennials, very multicultural, far more independent in their thinking, i don't care who you marry as long as you don't tell me who i marry. they're much more progressive. so the country is changing and the republican party has to decide, i said this before, you can keep hiding under the covers and pretend it's not but you're going to lose. or you can get in the game and recognize that this country is changing and you've got to speak to those changes and the reality of the life that people are living in 21st century america.

>> in the light of that, karen , professor, one full week since election day we're finally hearing from louisiana governor bobby jindal . he says there's been enough of, quote, dumbed-down conservatism and that republicans can't be the party of big business and big banks. but if you take that out, what's left?

>> well, not much according to what we've seen in terms of the republican presidential primary process. karen is right here. when he just look at the mathematics of the demographics of this country, the republican party can't consist of the sort of social policies that they have been pushing, of the ways in which they kind of ail yebt the very demographics that are emerging but it's going to take allotted more than lip service from people like governor jindal to make the kind of changes we're talking about. they have to try to become younger, more diverse, less about religion and more about women 's rights. it's a very, very complicated transformation they have to undergo. the democratic party has to do some of that work as well. the democrats also have to look at the progressive caucus within their own sort of constituency and make sure they're honoring the coalition that put president obama back in office.

>> and, you know, that's a really important point because we will not have barack obama on the ticket in four years, and so whoever is our democratic nominee has to understand you're going to have to work for the black and brown vote and the youth vote .

>> exactly.

>> that's an opportunity for the democratic party but also an opportunity for black and brown folks to come together and say now is the time to get our issues on the table, to make sure we are part of the conversation, that they don't just show up two weeks before an election and try to tell us what they think we want to hear. we are here to stay.

>> one week after the election and karen finney is thinking about the next one. karen