November 3, 1999

Colmes: Is a racist media keeping Alan Keyes from getting his message out? Alan Keyes joins us now from Manchester, New Hampshire. Dr. Keyes, welcome back to the program.

Keyes: Thank you.

Colmes: Look, Dr. Keyes, you don't really know me personally very well. We've met a couple of times. I deplore racism with every fiber of my being. The idea that you would think . . . I was paying you a compliment. I was saying something very nice to you. I think you are a brilliant orator. And it is just too bad for you that that oratory doesn't always translate into the kind of poll numbers you might like. That's what I was saying. And for you to say that was racist, I just don't understand that, Dr. Keyes. And that is certainly not where I was coming from. And if you think a compliment like that is racist, I think, quite frankly, that's your problem, not mine.

Keyes: I think that a comment that dismisses evidence of ability as if it were just some kind of trick of rhetorical skill or something is wrong. When other people give answers that are to the point, that show knowledge, that show that they have brought to bear a depth of experience, that that experience actually qualifies them for the work they have to do, you don't say, "Oh, you speak well, but you can't get the job." When you say something like that, it starts to lead to the suspicion that maybe merit isn't as important as something else. And that is a problem.

But if I can explain the whole problem with the media, I found it when I first stood up for office several years ago, and the only questions I ever got from media people at first were about racial issues. They looked at my skin color, and all they wanted to talk about was race. In my speeches, I didn't talk about race. I talked about the moral crisis; I talked about the pro-life issue; I talked about the Declaration principles. The media people only asked about race.

I fought this for months, until they finally stopped treating me as if I was some kind of racial politician.

Colmes: I don't deny that that happened. I'm sure that has happened. But for you to always say that, to say it to me not knowing me, to presume that that is where I am coming from--look, let me just say this. If I had said to Steve Forbes, "You know, you've got all this money; but with all this money, it's too bad you are not doing, with all this money that you are spending, better in the polls"--that wouldn't be because I am anti-white. I mean, it is simply because you may have a great quality that may not translate to votes. That's all I'm saying. But to say that that is racist is ridiculous.

Keyes: Excuse me for saying so, but what I was saying there was simply that when I stood up to run, media people couldn't look past skin color, and when it finally became clear I was going to refuse to be put into the box of racial politics that all the liberal blacks are willing to jump into, they started to ignore me utterly. And they wouldn't put across my point. Even to this day.

I have a constituency around this country on the moral issues, on the issues that are challenging people to reestablish the Constitution and self-government, and yet the folks in the American media at the national level refuse to hear what I say, because I refuse to play their step'n'fetch'it game of racial politics. I think that it is very telling about the mentality of the media in this country, and they ought to examine this problem.

(Break)

Hannity: Ambassador, welcome back to the program. We are going to get into that issue a little bit deeper here. And please don't put me in a position of being on Alan's side. I know Alan Colmes, and I know the intent was to say you are a magnificent speaker, and no racial overtones, undertones, any . . . it was clearly a compliment that was being paid to you that night. And maybe from where you had just come from, maybe you were kind of worked up. But, could that have been a part . . .

Keyes: It could certainly have been a part. I would not want to suggest that I know anything, or am saying anything about Alan personally. I do have to say, though, that this business of looking at a performance that shows substance, and merit, and background, and knowledge. . . . When G. W. Bush stands up and doesn't even know where East Timor is, we are supposed to laugh that off, as if it doesn't matter. The lack of experience. The lack of ability. The lack of a willingness to address the issues. All of this shows that you are now qualified. When I have the opposite, it seems to me fair to say not, "Oh, he speaks well," but, "You know, he is showing some substance that qualifies him for this office."

Hannity: Ambassador, I've known you, I've been a fan of yours and a friend of yours for a long time, so I know you have all these qualities, and we have had you on this program many times. A funny side note to all of this, Ambassador. I was watching Bill O'Reilly, who is on before this program, and he was interviewing our new Fox contributor, the former Speaker of the House, Newt Gingrich, and I just want to play for you what he said about you:

Gingrich: Terrifically wonderful speaker. A very decent man. Was a great representative of the United States at the UN. But I think in the end, there is just too narrow a base to get to be the nominee.

Hannity: And he said one other time, "terrific speaker." He almost said the same thing as Alan said. And I think everybody recognizes your ability to communicate, your passion, your principled approach to politics. And I think that's all Alan was saying there.

Keyes: Well, I would certainly think that may be all he is saying, but at some point I think we need to examine the logic that is going on here. I have watched people describe the qualifications that are needed for leadership in the next president. And they talk about how it has to be somebody of principle, somebody with the ability to communicate, somebody who can rouse people to passion and get them moving, and so forth and so on. It is like they are describing the effect that I have produced on many of the folks who hear what I have to say around the country. And then when it comes to looking at what I actually do, they ignore the fact my substance corresponds to what they describe as the leader that we need to win this election. Why is that going on?

Colmes: We'll be right back with Dr. Alan Keyes and my defense attorney, Sean Hannity.

(Break)

Hannity: Right now, we continue with Republican presidential candidate Ambassador Alan Keyes. He's from New Hampshire tonight. Ambassador, you know what? Racial politics--Democrats have been using that card now for a long time. And we just had Senator Daschle saying that the Republicans have expressed an array of anti-minority sentiment. The President has played that card. Al Gore has said, when speaking to the NAACP, that Republican politics are wrong for African Americans, that they don't even want to count you, African-Americans in the census. They have been playing this card unfairly, and using this divide for America, and I want you to comment on that.

Keyes: Well, I think it is a disgrace. It is one of those things I have been fighting through my whole public life and career. I think it is possible to stand up, talk to people, one American to another, appeal to the common principles, the common sense, the common hopes and fears that we have as a people--particularly when we deal with the moral issues that bind us together. I think that the brand of divisive racial politics the Democrats practice is pernicious. I think it is used to abuse black people and deprive them of what ought to be their rightful political position. And I think it is a mistake.

Hannity: When you say it is pernicious, I want to ask you--do you think, in a way, that the Democrats, the ones who accuse the Republicans often, including the President, the Vice President, Tom Daschle and others, that they are racist inasmuch as they will use people to gain political points?

Keyes: Well, I think it is obvious. It is a corollary of what I was saying about the media. There are certain elements in this society that refuse to let us be Americans, that refuse to let us speak to each other without stepping into all these racial categories, and some of them that, for their political advantage, push us into those categories to keep us divided so that they can exploit those divisions. I abhor this.

Hannity: It's almost like the very thing that they are accusing the Republicans of--they are the ones that are guilty of this. They are the ones that are willing to, a) divide the nation, and b), use people as pawns in their game, is what I am suggesting.

Keyes: I think, sad to say, that's exactly what we see. And it comes to a head intensely every four years, as they try to pull back together their coalition at the national level.

Colmes: Dr. Keyes, Jesse Jackson is also very gifted in his communication skills. Would he be further along politically if he were not black?

Keyes: Well, meaning no particular offense, one of the things that Jesse Jackson never had any trouble getting, whatever was going on in terms of his support and everything else, was free attention from the media and all of this sort of stuff. Why? Because they were willing to go along with him because he always played racial politics. He always acted as if what he had to say was somehow specially directed at race and racial problems. I won't do that, and I don't do that. And as a result, this media wishes to say, "You won't play the racial game? Get out of our face." Well, I won't play it.

Colmes: You're polling now, ABC just came out with a poll, 5%. CBS has you at 3%. Cnn/Gallup at 3%. Are those phony polls? Are you really doing much better than that? And is that because of your being kept down, and would you do better otherwise?

Keyes: I really don't know that I have any way of knowing, but I'll tell you this--these other candidates, even those who poll behind me in these phony polls and don't have the support I have and the appeal I have, they have been appearing on the mainstream programs, on ABC, Meet the Press, Face the Nation, all of these other sort of things. These people never give me that invitation, in spite of the evidence of intense support that exists, in spite of winning the Alabama straw poll, in spite of winning straw polls in Tilton, New Hampshire, in spite of turnouts at rallies in the hundreds and sometimes over a thousand that I have had in different parts of the country.

Hannity: Ambassador, their loss is our gain. We always love having you on the program. As always, thank you for being with us, Ambassador Alan Keyes.