Iowa newspaper apologizes for racist attack on GOP candidate Vivek Ramaswamy

The Quad-City Times in Iowa published a really ugly political cartoon aimed at Republican primary candidate Vivek Ramaswamy. Not only was it racist, and very nasty, but it was incorrect, too.

First, the political cartoon and Ramaswamy’s response.

It’s sad that this is how the MSM views Republicans. I’ve met with grassroots conservatives across America & never *once* experienced the kind of bigotry that I regularly see from the Left. Iowa’s ⁦@qctimes⁩ absolutely has the right to print this, but it’s still shameful. pic.twitter.com/5QNwGSJgJb

— Vivek Ramaswamy (@VivekGRamaswamy) June 22, 2023

Vivek Ramaswamy is a Hindu, not a Muslim. And, even if he was a Muslim, so what? In America, we celebrate religious freedom. It is conservative groups that do so most fervently. Republicans defend a person’s freedom to worship as they please. Or, not to do so. It’s an individual’s choice.

This political cartoon was drawn by someone who is clearly suffering from some kind of emotional distress from the Obama days. “Show us your birth certificate”, “MUSLIM”, and the slur about slushies and Apu. Interesting that the cartoonist went after Vivek and not Nikki Haley, right?

Trump stirred the pot about Obama’s birth certificate. There was some confusion by the voting public in general, though, about Obama’s background. He sealed his college records, including those at Occidental College in California, which didn’t help. And, for a liberal cartoonist to attack a Republican candidate over the “Muslim” bigotry is to re-write history. A Republican was president during the 9-11-01 terror attacks and he immediately called for Americans to unite and show no ill will for Muslim Americans. The slur about Apu and the slurpies? That is a character on The Simpsons, an Indian immigrant proprietor who ran the Kwik-E-Mart, a convenience store. The white American actor who voiced the character stopped doing so in 2017. The Woke decided the Apu character was a racist stereotype after many seasons.

Joe Biden made jokes about Indian-Americans owning and working in convenience stores during his campaign in 2008. If I remember correctly, Hillary Clinton did, too. Also, in 2008, Joe Biden described Barack Obama as clean and articulate, so there was that, too.

Believe them when they tell you who they are. Leftists accuse conservatives of being the very people they are. It’s projection.

Vivek is a multimillionaire entrepreneur and a rock-solid conservative. The left falls apart over people of color choosing to be Republicans and conservatives. Democrats take for granted minority voters and anyone who gets off their plantation (or was never on it to begin with) must be shamed and destroyed. It’s sick. Look at what they are doing to Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas. Joe Biden was a member of the Senate committee who tried to “electronically lynch” him during his nomination hearing – Thomas’ term, not mine. He has been mocked and treated disrespectfully throughout his term on the Supreme Court. He’s still standing and now they are trying to eliminate him over ethics concerns. You can’t make this stuff up. The corrupt Biden family is in the White House and it seems to me that Democrats may want to just take a seat.

How about the arrogance of the women on The View attacking Tim Scott for being a conservative Republican and daring to run for president as such? Unbelievable, yet so predictable. Democrats are the most racist of all.

So, realizing how nasty and ugly the cartoon was toward Vivek, an apology was issued by the Iowa newspaper’s executive editor, Tom Martin.

Racist and hateful ideas, words or images have no place in our publications, much less our society.

It’s why we apologize today for letting such an image slip through our editorial process and into our opinion page Wednesday in the form of a political cartoon.

The cartoon, while intended to criticize racist ideas and epithets, uses a phrase that is racist and insensitive to members of our Indian American community.

The cartoon has been removed from our websites and e-editions, and we will not be accepting any further work from the cartoonist.

We apologize to Republican primary presidential candidate Vivek Ramaswamy, the Indian American community and our readers for publishing the offensive material in the Quad-City Times and Dispatch-Argus.

We seek to share diverse ideas on our opinion pages — editorials, cartoons and commentary that provoke thought and constructive ideas.

Dividing and disparaging with any racist images or rhetoric does not fit that mission or our ideals as a local news company.

The oversight that allowed it to run is inexcusable, and we can and will do better.

We are sorry.

Do you see that? All the way down to the very last words – “We are sorry.” That should have been the first sentence. What a phony, and foolish way of saying that Republicans should be attacked for being racist but when a Republican who is Indian-American is dragged into it, that’s going too far. That’s what I got out of it. YMMV.

“The cartoon, while intended to criticize racist ideas and epithets, uses a phrase that is racist and insensitive to members of our Indian American community.” There was no policy or “ideas” questioned in that cartoon. It was quite clear – beat up on the Indian-American Republican for running by tossing random words meant as slurs.

Republican primary voters who are listening to Vivek are not the ones screaming slurs at him. That would be Democrats. They know it. We know it. Expect more of this kind of racist attack if Vivek gains ground in the primary or if he is chosen as the vice presidential candidate. Or a cabinet secretary if the Republicans take back the White House.