My first reaction was an emotional one when I read the article about former Washington State University College Republicans President James Allsup quietly grabbing a precinct committee officer position in the county Republican Party. My first thought was my dad went to war to fight the Nazis. So did millions of other Americans. A bloody, muddy, slaughtering war. And we won. And now to have this guy Allsup spouting his Nazi ideology yet managing to grab a position as a PCO in Whitman County. It kind of choked me up, but it also made me mad.
Don't get me wrong, Allsup can say what he wants. That's free speech. That's part of what Americans have fought for over the centuries - the right to say what we want. But I have the same right - and after reading that this man has gotten a toe-hold in the Republican Party in this county, I decided I want to speak up. I want to say, loud and clear, that he doesn't speak for this Republican. I condemn his ideas.
While I never vote a party-line, I do run for the county prosecuting attorney position as a Republican. I have done that because, to me, being a Republican means supporting equal rights and equal treatment under the law. It means promoting respect for our country and our system of government. To me, being a Republican means promoting social justice, and it means working to keep Whitman County a great place for anyone to live and raise a family. Of course, when I think about it, all those things are American values, not just Republican or Democratic values.
These values were supported by Republicans from Abraham Lincoln, who kept the Union together and ended slavery, to Dwight Eisenhower who, with a Democrat named Roosevelt, kept civilization together and defeated the Nazis. I'll stand with those values, which is what being a Republican, or being a Democrat, or being an American, means to me.
And I will exercise my free speech. I will condemn Allsup's push to preserve his white "European" race from the imagined-perils of Americans who happen to not look exactly like him. I will speak until I have no more breath to say it: Allsup can try to put a nice new dress on his old despicable Nazi ideas, but I recognize them for what they are. They aren't Republican. They aren't American. They are not me.
Denis Tracy lives in Pullman and is the prosecuting attorney for Whitman County.
