GOP senator on DC carjacking fears: 'I don't buckle up'

[yardwork]

22. Unfortunately it goes way back.

Check out one of the very first movies, Birth of a Nation, released in 1915. The "nation" in the title is the Ku Klux Klan, and in the film it's portrayed as a heroic freedom-fighting response to Black men assaulting white women. That lie - that Black men were sexually assaulting white women - was used to justify atrocities and massacres against Black communities and an entire set of laws known collectively as Jim Crow. It was pervasive throughout the 20th century until the Civil Rights Acts outlawed it, but the hatred and fear are always there.

The Southern Strategy used white people's anger and fear about Black people to promote Republican politicians. The only reason it worked is because the anger and fear were already there.