MSNBC Anchor's Advice for Conservative Media: Stop Inflaming Minority Voters!

The Washington Post's Eugene Robinson and former RNC Chairman Michael Steele. (screen grab)

MSNBC host Joe Scarborough on Tuesday offered his take on the conservative media’s handling of the Trayvon Martin/George Zimmerman case, linking it to the GOP’s inability to win the African-American vote.

“Why is it that Republicans, certain elements of our party, seem to go out of their way to inflame minority voters?” Scarborough asked.

“I know I can count on conservative outlets to have a one-sided view, and to talk about how a dead boy had it coming, and he was on marijuana, he was on pot, he was this, he was that…I would like in my lifetime for the Republican Party to get more than six percent of the African American vote,” he added.

The Washington Post’s Eugene Robinson added: “It wasn’t always this way. Republicans used to get a huge chunk of African-American vote. Now they don’t.”

Former RNC Chairman Michael Steele jumped in, saying that the gains to be made from minority votes are too small to make it worth the GOP's effort.

“Can we put on the table getting more than six percent is not going to happen in the next four years?” Steele said.

“Even if those same voices you’re alluding to, Joe, had come out and were reasonable in their response as opposed to extreme in their response in some cases, there’s still a heck of a lot more that needs to be done than just saying something nice or politically correct in the Trayvon Martin case,” he added.

Scarborough jumped back into the conversation.

“I have a suggestion: just because Al Sharpton is doing something and you hate Al Sharpton, doesn’t mean you help your party or your cause by going in the complete opposite direction,” Scarborough said.

“Maybe sometimes discretion is the better part of valor. Maybe sometimes conservative outlets should sit back and not purposefully antagonize African Americans,” he added.

Steele said both sides are guilty of presenting bogus arguments.

“It’s easier to fall into the stereotype and continue to project that than to actually sit back and recognize the reality that racism is still a sinister part of the culture and environment that African Americans, and quite frankly a lot of Americans, still have to live in,” Steele said.

“It’s easier to project outward that that just doesn’t exist, because ‘I’m not that way, therefore anyone who brings this up must somehow be trying to stoke these flames, et cetera.’ I think it happens on both the right and left. I watched, as you did, to my great frustration, some on our network as well as other networks, stoke the flames in different directions, raising up images of the past with no linkage at all to the case,” he added.

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(H/T Evan McMurry/Mediaite). Featured image