At the same time, Republicans can be embarrassingly tone-deaf and arrhythmic. As when, putting their diversity on display at the 2000 Republican National Convention in Philadelphia, they posted a mariachi band at the convention entrance. Whoa, that's clever. Why not just hang a banner that says, "Queremos a los Mexicanos!" (Y sus votos.)"
Let the record reflect, some white men may be able to jump, but they cannot dance Mexican. Picture middle-aged white men and women wearing red-white-and-blue golf ensembles and elephant hats, gettin' down at the Cozumel cantina.
In the spirit of "At least we don't behead people," we can appreciate that at least they didn't bring in 50 Cent and the G Unit. (Crib for Republicans: That's a rapper and his group, respectively.)
Contrivance, I think, is the word I'm looking for here. Studied diversity is the problem. Faux soul is the crux.
As is the candidacy of Keyes, who though a thoroughly fine and fascinating fellow, smarter than a thousand Harvard grads combined, more articulate than Noah Webster, is also so far right that he can't be seen with peripheral vision.
In an election where the rising Democratic star is a post-civil-rights human bridge between a racist past and a transcendent future, the Republican offering feels more like a sacrifice.
The uncompromisingly pro-life Keyes may be able to win ultra-conservative Republican votes, but he won't attract those hovering near the middle, where, for example, 64 percent of Americans think abortion is a personal decision. His frequent invocations of God - "The battle is for us, but the victory is for God," he recently said - may be a fervent belief for Keyes, but it isn't likely to sit well among moderates in the center pews.
But, by Jove, Keyes is smart and black like Obama. Politics doesn't get much more embarrassing than this, and Republicans have mocked themselves by trotting out an unlikely winner in a patronizing gesture that is racist in the nicest possible way.