'Magic Negro' CD is Back to Offend Latinos With 'Star Spanglish Banner'

Update: Saltsman has withdrawn from the race for RNC chair.

About a month ago, candidate for RNC chair Chip Saltsman made news by defending his gift to fellow GOPers of a CD containing a song called "Barack the Magic Negro." In several articles, I denounced the CD. I also made repeated reference to an even more offensive song from the same CD:

I didn't want to do this, but the response from the RNC, so far, has been a denunciation of Saltsman from a strategic standpoint, and a defense of him. None of them think there's anything wrong with the CD itself. So, here are just 2 of the 41 songs on that CD. You tell me if I'm being "hypersensitive."

Well, that 2nd song, "The Star Spanglish Banner," has thrust Saltsman's crass gift back into the spotlight. From HuffPo:

the Thursday report by Melissa Merz of NDN, that as part of his already controversial holiday CD, candidate Chip Saltsman included a song called "The Star Spanglish Banner," should be considered news. The song is a generally derisive take on Latino immigrants, composed by Paul Shanklin, the same musical-comedian who penned "Barack the Magic Negro."

Saltsman has contended that the whole thing was meant as a good-humored, albeit ill-conceived, joke. But it hits at the core of what observers inside and out of the GOP see as a major party problem: their incredible failure to win Hispanic votes in the 2008 election.

This story, if it gets any attention, could be even more damaging to Saltsman than the first one. There are enough mainstream media clowns willing to entertain the ridiculous defenses of "Barack the Magic Negro," but this song seems impossible to defend, even speciously.

It is worth noting that Redstate director Erick Erickson, responding to my commentary about both songs, didn't even try to defend "Star Spanglish Banner."

If this story gets any traction, the rest of the GOP will have trouble getting away with anything less than full-throated denunciation.

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