(....almost as much as being a RINO -- which sucks almost as much as being a DINO!)

It's music review time!

Last night I went to the Tower Theater and saw Phil Lesh and his band. Had a wonderful evening, and a wonderful day.

Until, that is, I opened some hate-filled junk mail from a guy named Vernon Robinson, who's running for Congress. (That link is the closest approximation to the letter I received.)

It's really a downer to have to blog about this, but if not now, when? (What a stark and ugly contrast to go from the Lesh page to the Robinson page..... Just another among innumerable reasons -- logical and illogical -- that I so hate the Culture War.)

It is undeniable that there exists a heavily-funded movement to locate and promote anti-homosexual bigotry among black conservatives. I think it is important to defeat it even though I can't do much more than complain in my blog, and donate to opposing candidates.

A few months ago, a Gallup poll revealed a growing rift between blacks and homosexuals:

The most pronounced pattern is among blacks. In May, blacks and whites were essentially identical in the levels of support they expressed for legalized gay relations. In July, the percentage of blacks supporting legal gay relations dropped by 23 points, compared to a much more modest 9 point drop among whites.

Previous Gallup research has documented the fact that blacks are quite conservative on moral issues, even while adopting more liberal positions on social issues such as gun control, the death penalty, and welfare. This fact is often surprising to some observers, given the strong tendencies for blacks to identify with the more liberal Democratic Party in this country. The conservative moral positions adopted by blacks no doubt reflect the strong influence of religion in black culture in American society today.

Still, it is not immediately clear why support among blacks may have fallen so disproportionately in July. One can hypothesize that the Supreme Court decision had a greater effect on black's religiosity than others', but it is difficult to document this assertion based on available data.

In any event, I can think of few things more malevolent than Republicans attempting to drive a wedge between blacks and homosexuals.

Yet that is precisely what is going on. Take a look through Robinson's site. His campaign is well-funded, and very slick. A central focus of his campaign is directed against homosexuals and he says what few (if any) white Republicans would dare say if they were running for office.

Robinson's mailing list is generating huge sums of money. I would be willing to bet that most of it pours in from out-of-state homo haters who are delighted to fund a satrap who happens to be a black man -- because the bigotry is dispelled by race. As even the liberals say, in order to be a bigot, you have to be white! (But see this oddball piece about white sexual decadence and corruption of blacks.... Future Republican tactic, perhaps?)

This thinking is confirmed at Robinson's site:

As a black conservative, the liberals will not be able to smear me by calling me a racist the way they always did Senator Helms (not to mention Trent Lott last year and Rush Limbaugh just last month).

Republicans did pretty well with homosexuals, though, considering the enormous propaganda effort to portray Republicans as anti-homosexual bigots.

Robinson ought to make that propaganda effort a little easier.

When propaganda happens to be true, it somehow becomes more believable.

The most irritating aspect of this is that Republicans who simply oppose anti-homosexual bigotry will be called RINOs (Republicans In Name Only) for their efforts. The more such tactics are allowed to continue, the fewer RINOs there will be. The bigots will get their way, and the Democrats will be happy.

NOTE: By "anti-homosexual bigotry" I do not refer to opposition to same sex marriage. I mean the sodomy law people -- those like Robinson who believe homosexuals belong in prison. I am extremely tolerant of disagreement, even of the most vehement variety. My standards are low -- but I am not about to sit around and countenance those who threaten my freedom and my safety. To do otherwise would be to act like the Jews who supported the Nuremburg laws. Those who would imprison me are bigots. Rather hard to reconcile the competing philosophies of those who see homosexual love as love with those who see it as deserving imprisonment. Increasingly, I am of the opinion that the situation is hopeless. (And I dislike hopelessness, by the way.)

Here is what the Republican Party has to say about Robinson. I recognize that there is a Big Tent, but I don't know whether I want to be in it.

Not only is Robinson's anti-homosexual hatred being bankrolled by out-of-staters, his endorsers include some Republicans who ought to be held accountable:

North Carolina. Former Winston-Salem City Councilman Vernon Robinson has launched a nationwide campaign to win the Republican nomination for outgoing GOP Rep. Richard Burr’s seat.

Robinson has raised money from supporters in Colorado, Florida and Wyoming.

Online donors, mostly from out of state, have contributed $80,000. And he has enlisted the backing of Florida Gov. Jeb Bush (R), former House Majority Leader Dick Armey (R-Texas) and former Rep. Vin Weber (R-Minn.).

“If you can’t raise money outside the district in this race, you’re dead,” Robinson told The Hill. Robinson, a black conservative, calls President Reagan, Supreme Court Justices Clarence Thomas and Antonin Scalia and former Sen. Jesse Helms (R-N.C.) his “political heroes” on his campaign website.

The Republican has garnered support at home, too. Sen. Elizabeth Dole (R-N.C.) and Burr, who is running for outgoing Sen. John Edwards’s (D) seat, are backing him.

Robinson campaign manager Chris Younce declined to say how much the candidate had raised in the third quarter of 2003, which ended Sept. 30. At the end of the last quarter, Robinson had more than $156,000 on hand. Younce estimated the primary campaign would cost $1.6 million.

Other Republicans in the House primary are former Wilkes County Commissioner Joe Byrd; state Sen. Virginia Foxx of Banner Elks, in northwest North Carolina; Winston-Salem businessman Jay Helvey; former state representative Ed Powell; Lexington attorney and former Senate candidate Jim Snyder; and Kernersville businessman Nathan Tabor.

The Democrats running for Burr’s seat include librarian David Crawford and lawyer Jeff Gray.

Doesn't politics just suck?

At the very least, it makes it tough to write decent music reviews.....

IMPORTANT UPDATE: I just received an email from Newsmax.com which contained the same solicitation as the one I received from Robinson, and I am reproducing it here for my readers. If you feel as I do, I suggest contributing money to one of the other Republican candidates. If that fails to stop this guy, then the only thing left to do is to contribute to the Democratic opponent.

I am not terribly happy about receiving this the day after remembering all my friends lost to AIDS, either.... I should have written about them. Instead, I read AgendaBender's post -- "A Day Without Bill" -- which I recommend everyone read. I wish that Robinson and his ilk would remember that "sodomites" are human beings, and -- despite the "widows mite" reference in his letter below -- Vernon Robinson is no Jesus Christ.)

Anyway, here follows the actual text of the letter I "reviewed":

Dear NewsMax Reader: Please find below an important sponsored message from Vernon Robinson, considered by many to be the next Jesse Helms. This may turn out to be one of the hottest political races next election year. Please take a moment to read Vernon's message to you. Thank you.

 
border=1 height="2346">

Here's a photograph of me and Jesse Helms taken last month at his birthday party. I was very humbled when Jesse put his arm around me and said, "I'm proud of you, Vernon." Dear Fellow Conservative: "Jesse Helms is back! And this time, he's black." That's what The Winston-Salem Journal (the largest and most liberal newspaper in the 5th Congressional District of North Carolina) had to say about my campaign for Congress. The radical homosexuals printed the same thing in their publication, which they call "Queer Notes". They scornfully called me, "Helms redux." Of course, they meant the comparison to Helms to be taken as an insult, but I wear it as a badge of honor. For 30 years, Jesse Helms was the number one flag carrier for the conservative movement in Washington, and with him gone, someone needs to step in and fill that void. I'm honored to be accused of picking up where Senator Helms left off. CLICK HERE TO CONTRIBUTE NOW! Some of you may remember all those lonely years, particularly before Ronald Reagan was elected President, when Jesse Helms would be the only vote against some outrageous piece of liberal legislation, only because nobody else in Congress had the courage to stand with him against the Left. Sometimes it was Teddy Kennedy and the welfare lobby coming after Jesse, or the gun grabbers, or the Jesse Jackson crowd, or the environmental extremists, or the lesbian feminists, or the union bosses, or the pro-abortion zealots, or the tax and spend junkies. And sometimes it was just good, old-fashioned communist sympathizers who were mad because Jesse wanted to get us out of the United Nations. But you knew ol' Jesse wasn't going to run from them. He didn't run when the homosexual terrorists erected a giant, 40-foot, inflated, condom-shaped balloon on the roof of his home. And Jesse didn't run when National Public Radio's Nina Totenberg wished death upon him and his grandkids by telling millions of Americans, "If there is retributive justice, Jesse Helms will get AIDS from a transfusion, or one of his grandchildren will get it . . .." This from the woman who says it is Jesse who is intolerant. No, Jesse was always willing to go toe-to-toe with these people, even when he had to go it alone, and I'm ready to do the same as a United States Congressman. CLICK HERE TO CONTRIBUTE NOW! Believe me, I know how lonely it can be to stand alone, because I've had to do it repeatedly as a conservative Winston-Salem City Councilman serving on a Council chock full of liberal Democrats and a few wimpy Republicans afraid of their own shadow, who run from controversy like a Clinton from a Grand Jury. If you haven't heard of me yet, you know many conservatives who have. At one time or another I have been endorsed by Jesse Helms, Jeb Bush, Alan Keyes, Elizabeth Dole, Dick Armey, Gary Bauer, the NRA, Right-to-Life, the Immigration Reform PAC, the Republican Liberty Caucus, Jack Kemp, Bill Bennett, Pat Buchanan, Pete du Pont, Richard Petty, Dr. D. James Kennedy, Gary Aldrich, Morton Blackwell, Tom Tancredo, and Bob Barr. If my name sounds familiar, it may be because The Fox News Channel recently called me "a rising star", "the next J.C. Watts", and "the new face of the Republican Party." The Wall Street Journal wrote, "He's the next black GOP Congressman." and "When elected, Vernon Robinson will be the first black GOP Congressman elected from a Confederate state since Reconstruction." A local newspaper in the district (The Davie Enterprise-Record) said, "He's like a Rush Limbaugh candidate." President Bush honored me with an appointment in his administration and hired me to work on his campaign. That should give you a pretty good idea of where I stand. CLICK HERE TO CONTRIBUTE NOW! Currently I am the senior Republican member of the Winston-Salem City Council, where I represent a heavily Democrat district. In my last election I got an unheard-of 70% of the white vote and 20% of the black vote. I am a proven vote-getter -- the only black Republican in North Carolina to be re-elected to partisan public office and the first black candidate to win the votes of more than one million white voters. This success hasn't come by accident. I earned the confidence of the voters and these national conservative leaders the same way Ronald Reagan and Jesse Helms did - by proving that I am willing to stand up for my traditional American conservative principles - no matter what the political cost, and no matter what the liberal media try to say about me. I don't head for the high grass when the Left turns up the heat. That's just not my style. I put my trust in God, not my finger to the wind, and my record proves it. CLICK HERE TO CONTRIBUTE NOW! I jokingly tell my Democrat friends that their party is made up of "the Old Left, the New Left, and the What's Left." I'm proud to tell you that my voting record has infuriated them all: the pro-abortion fanatics and the radical feminists the atheists who file lawsuits attacking the Pledge of Allegiance & the Ten Commandments the gun grabbers, the illegal immigrants, and the trial lawyers the environmentalist, tree-huggin' granolas and the animal rights extremists the "one world" globalists who worship at the altar of the United Nations the militant homosexuals and the burned-out, hippie peaceniks the race-hustling poverty pimps like Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton the union bosses and the socialists posing as journalists & college professors the government bureaucrats & the tax-and-spend junkies who create their jobs, and the Hollywood elitists - air-headed actors and singers who think we care what they think. CLICK HERE TO CONTRIBUTE NOW! I am pro-Constitution, pro-national sovereignty, pro-business, pro-property rights, pro-growth, pro-family, pro-farmer, pro-states' rights, pro-gun, and pro-life. I support the death penalty and am disgusted that there are people who believe a convicted murderer like Charles Manson has a right to life, but unborn children do not. A nationally recognized expert on education reform, I authored North Carolina's Charter Schools Act, and founded two non-profit corporations. One promotes school choice and the other provides scholarships to private schools for poor children from inner-city homes. Today's public schools are caught between the massive government bureaucracy and the vile teachers' unions. Most of the public schools serving the inner city are nothing but pre-prison, pre-welfare programs for the students sentenced to attend them. The answer is market-based reform, not "Midnight Basketball" and more wasteful spending. As a black Republican, I will be especially reviled by the Left. That's because I will be able to say the kinds of things many conservatives are afraid to say out of fear that the liberal media will brand them racist. For instance, the greatest threat facing young blacks today has nothing to do with white racism or displaying the Confederate flag - it is ILLEGITIMACY, which has reached a shameful 71% among American blacks. A lack of morality and personal responsibility is at the root of the problem. And we have a federal welfare system that encourages and rewards such behavior! This must change and I'll be the Congressman who can make it happen. CLICK HERE TO CONTRIBUTE NOW! Nor will I be bashful about insisting that the federal government abolish all racial preferences, quotas, and set-asides. I was so outraged by the Supreme Court's recent ruling in the Michigan law school case (allowing race to determine who is admitted into public colleges) that I am already working with legal scholars to devise a lawful means for Congress to withhold federal funds from any institution (private or public) that uses race in its admissions process. My record on this issue is particularly strong. It was my lawsuit against the University of North Carolina that put an end to its practice of electing trustees according to strict racial and gender quotas and providing blacks-only scholarships at taxpayer expense. As you can see, I'm NOT a Jesse Jackson / Al Sharpton kind of black guy. The only thing I have in common with those two is a good tan! In fact, while Al Sharpton was defaming New York law enforcement officers by falsely claiming they had raped Tawana Brawley in an alley, I was working hard on the Winston-Salem City Council to get raises for our policemen. And while Jesse Jackson was chasing women and television cameras and shaking down corporations for contributions so he could pay hush money to his concubine for their love child, I was serving my country, earning an honest living, and working hard at raising a God-fearing family. CLICK HERE TO CONTRIBUTE NOW! And Jackson and I have very different notions of what a family is. For Jackson and many left-wing public figures, a family can be everything from "Hillary Clinton's Village" or "Heather's Two Mommies" or "Daddy's Roommate" to a transvestite, two lesbians, a pedophile, and a partridge in a pear tree. In my opinion, that does not a family make. My concept of family is the same as the one God ordained in the Garden of Eden thousands of years ago - one man, married to one woman, with so many children as God should see fit to entrust to their care. In my case, that means me, Helene (my wife of 20 years), and our three children, the youngest two of whom we adopted when their mother died of cancer at age 41. That's the kind of family I grew up in, too. My father was a Tuskegee Airman, and my mother was a nurse. But more importantly, they were devout Christian people who taught me right from wrong. Because of my strong Judeo-Christian upbringing, I can assure you I will not bow to the forces of political correctness on social issues. I'm proud of my beliefs, and I will vote accordingly. I will vigorously oppose homosexual marriages and adoptions, as well as "gay" Scoutmasters. I just don't see how it's a good idea to put a homosexual in a pup tent with your thirteen year-old son. And yet the liberals call us bigoted for saying that. What is the world coming to? CLICK HERE TO CONTRIBUTE NOW! As an Eagle Scout myself, I was furious when the United Way threatened to withhold funding from the Boy Scouts unless homosexuals were allowed to serve as Scoutmasters. While other Republicans ran scared from the issue, I organized a counter-threat to boycott contributions to the United Way unless it backed off the Scouts - and it quickly did just that. Dr. James Dobson featured my efforts on his Focus on the Family radio program, and called it "a victory for people of faith across the nation". That's the same aggressive spirit I will bring to Washington, if you'll help me. CLICK HERE TO CONTRIBUTE NOW! Of course, now that our Supreme Court has "discovered" a right to commit homosexual sodomy, it is more important than ever that we send to the Congress men and women whose sense of decency does not change with the political winds. If we don't, then homosexual marriage and adoption (and worse) won't be far behind. I have a copy of the Constitution, and I've looked all through it, and nowhere do I find any right to engage in homosexual sodomy, take the life of an unborn child, or discriminate against white people. I know I'm supposed to look in the "emanations" and the "penumbras", but I couldn't find those in there either. Maybe I have to get myself one of those "livin' constitutions" - you know, the kind that changes from year to year depending on which liberal justices are sitting on the Supreme Court at that particular time. You see, my copy of the Constitution is the old-fashioned kind. It still says what it said when they wrote it. CLICK HERE TO CONTRIBUTE NOW! And I do have a simple solution to Alabama Chief Justice Roy Moore's Ten Commandments dilemma. The Congress simply needs to do what Jesse Helms and Henry Hyde recommended a quarter century ago - pass a federal statute removing all jurisdiction from the federal court system to hear cases involving the issue. It's clean, it's efficient, it's absolutely binding on the court, and it's as good as done if I get elected. On the question of taxation, let me simply say that in all my years in public office I have never voted for a tax increase of any kind, PERIOD. In Congress I will join those 42 courageous men and women (including Majority Leader Tom DeLay) who support the "Fair Tax" legislation, which would abolish the current code (and all individual audits, and the I.R.S. itself!) and replace it with a simple, flat, national sales tax. CLICK HERE TO CONTRIBUTE NOW! As a graduate of the United States Air Force Academy with a degree in Middle Eastern Affairs and a former Missile Combat Crew Commander, I can assure you I am also a staunch supporter of veterans' interests, and you will not find another member of Congress who places a higher priority on national defense. And I have to tell you that in matters of national defense and foreign policy there is much work to be done. Yes, Ronald Reagan destroyed the Soviet Union, and yes, our military is the best in the world -- but you are not as safe as you think. The world is changing, and so are the threats we face. We have no shield against intercontinental ballistic missiles, and it's getting easier and easier for the bad guys to get them. Communist North Korea (whose standing army is larger than our own) now has the nuclear bomb, and has openly bragged that it intends to sell nuclear weapons to terrorists, including Osama Bin Laden, if the United States makes policy decisions that don't please it. And remember, a ragtag band of Arab misfits used public transportation and a handful of box-cutters to kill more Americans in the World Trade Center attack than the Japanese killed at Pearl Harbor. What do you think an organized terrorist could do with a nuclear bomb? CLICK HERE TO CONTRIBUTE NOW! The mastermind of that attack, Khalid Shaik Mohammed (whom we have captured), recently told U.S. officials that Al Qaeda was planning to carry out future attacks, including the firebombing of the Washington Metrorail, by smuggling operatives and equipment over our unguarded Mexican border. We have troops in 120 countries around the world, but we won't defend our own borders with Mexico and Canada! Our immigration policy is nuts, and the INS is corrupt and incompetent. Remember the D.C. area sniper? He was here only because of an INS foul-up! Over 400,000 foreign students have overstayed their student visas, and we simply have no idea where they are! Over thirty thousand of these are from Muslim countries. Do I have to spell out for you why that is a problem? CLICK HERE TO CONTRIBUTE NOW! My alma mater, the United States Air Force Academy, recently found it had 23 illegal aliens working for it - more than the number that carried out the September 11 terrorist attacks. But these illegal aliens were actually working for a military service academy! Aliens routinely cross our borders for free medical care in American hospitals, to pick up American welfare checks, to have their babies born here (so they will be American citizens eligible for benefits), to work in sweat shops, to smuggle drugs, and, yes, occasionally to plot and carry out terrorist attacks on our citizens. As a Congressman, I will work with Congressman Tom Tancredo (who has endorsed me) and the Congressional Immigration Reform Caucus of which he is the chairman to address these shocking failures in federal immigration policy. Enough is enough. CLICK HERE TO CONTRIBUTE NOW! Now is definitely not the time to relax. Now, more than ever, you deserve a Congressman who will stand tall on the tough issues and not waffle even when everyone else heads for the hills. More than 20,000 conservatives (folks just like you) have already responded to my promise to fight the loony Left on every issue, no matter what the political cost, and I thank God for each and every one of them. 14 Generals, 60 Colonels, and 30 church pastors have become contributors. That's the good news. The bad news is that my five millionaire opponents already loaned themselves more than $1,000,000, and have promised to spend more than SIX MILLION DOLLARS to defeat me. Ouch! My family budget doesn't have that kind of money! CLICK HERE TO CONTRIBUTE NOW! I've spent my entire adult life in public service, and I'm just not a wealthy man. I've never tried to make one dime off of my status as a Winston-Salem City Councilman. I sure didn't get rich in the Air Force either, or as a business professor for ten years, and I didn't inherit any millions. Remember, my dad was a serviceman and my mother was a nurse. My wife is a librarian for goodness' sake! We're just simple people trying to fight our way through all the millionaires (who all seem to want to buy a seat in Congress) with our simple, conservative message of limited government, a strong national defense, and a Congress whose policies reflect a Judeo-Christian ethic. But don't go feeling sorry for me, because I'm not ashamed of being middle class. My public service has made me rich in every way except my pocketbook. It's just that in 2004 the simple fact of the matter is that if you don't spend at least TWO MILLION DOLLARS getting your message out, the closest you'll get to Congress will be watching it on C-SPAN. CLICK HERE TO CONTRIBUTE NOW! No, I have to depend on you and thousands like you who dig deep, and give sacrificially because they know the election of an aggressive, black conservative to the Congress would be a nightmare to liberals like Tom Daschle and Nancy Pelosi. I want to put a burr in Ted Kennedy's saddle. I want to put a bee in Hillary Clinton's bonnet. I want to give Barney Frank a Maalox Moment. And with your help I can do it! CLICK HERE TO CONTRIBUTE NOW! There is a great deal at stake. My principal opponent is a self-described "feminist" obsessed with gender quotas who lobbied for Teddy Kennedy's so-called "Equal Rights Amendment" (ERA). As a state senator, she voted to fund blacks-only scholarships, and raised taxes and fees more than 100 times. She even voted to create special rights for homosexuals and has supported the adoption of children by homosexuals. I am nauseated at the prospect that this woman may get elected to the Congress! Won't you help me keep that from happening? Before you write her off as a kook with no chance to win, let me remind you that she is a fat cat (one of five blow-dried millionaires running against me) who has the financial ability to get her own spin, her own twisted message, to the voters anytime she wants, even if she never receives a single contribution. That's why I want to ask you to become one of my 20,000 skinny cats. CLICK HERE TO CONTRIBUTE NOW! Of course, I have some large contributors, too - business owners (large and small), real estate, construction, banking, and insurance executives, doctors, lawyers, accountants, engineers, and wealthy retirees -- but much of my money has come in smaller checks from people of modest means for whom the contribution was truly a sacrifice. I have been humbled by the overwhelming support I've received from thousands of patriotic Americans who care about their country's future. Several people have actually sent a single dollar bill. One dollar. These smaller contributions always come with a personal note apologizing for the fact that they couldn't send more. Unemployed people, retired people on fixed incomes, single mothers with children to feed, a Marine Corps private, a grocery bagger, a waitress, a truck driver, a laborer, a struggling farmer, a home-schooling mom, a widow, a teacher, a school bus driver, a janitor, a nun - these people send their money with a note apologizing to me that they couldn't send more. Folks, we've even received contributions from Christian missionaries on the mission fields of China and Costa Rica. What a sense of responsibility that lays on my heart. CLICK HERE TO CONTRIBUTE NOW! The truth is that the small contributions barely make up for the cost of mailing a letter, but so help me, I love to get them, because they remind me of what Jesus said in the story of "the widow's mite": "I tell you the truth, this poor widow has put more into the treasury than all the others. They gave out of their wealth; but she, out of her poverty, put in everything - all she had to live on." (Mark 12: 43-44) When the campaign road is hard and the hours are long and the food is bad and my wife is mad that the grass isn't mowed, and my three young children miss me because "Dad's at a meeting" ("meeting" is a dirty word in my house), and I have 12 messages waiting on the answering machine from constituents who want to know why their garbage hasn't been picked up - when these moments come I think of the faith all my widow's mite contributors have placed in me, and I'm ready to go back into the fiery furnace. Could you send your widow's mite (and maybe a little more) today? Your contribution isn't just a good motivator for me; it is absolutely necessary to enable us to get our message out. Voters can't stand with me if they don't know where I stand. CLICK HERE TO CONTRIBUTE NOW! Unlike my opposition (five millionaires!), I cannot loan my campaign a million dollars. Unlike my opponents, I won't receive thousands of dollars from the Left's usual suspects - the greedy trial lawyers, the radical feminists, the teachers' unions, the homosexual lobby, the environmentalist extremists, and the limousine liberals. The liberal special interest groups have already targeted me because they know that if I'm elected, the national media will cover every conservative pronouncement made by "the black Republican Congressman." That's why I hope and pray you will lend me a hand. Could you donate as much as $500 or $1,000? I realize that's a lot of money, but such a large gift will pay for a television commercial. CLICK HERE TO CONTRIBUTE NOW! Or if that's too much, could you send $250, $100, $50, or even $35? Whatever amount you give, please send it in today. CLICK HERE TO CONTRIBUTE NOW! My mother always said, "Many hands make light work," and once again her wisdom lifts my spirits. If every good conservative like you gives what he or she can, together we will get our message out, we will match the millionaires dollar for dollar, and we will win this election. I know that President George W. Bush and Majority Leader Tom DeLay can sure use my help on Capitol Hill! Whatever amount you send, please supplement it with prayers for my family and this campaign - an even more valuable and precious gift! And may God bless you as He has blessed America. With warm best wishes, Vernon Robinson P.S.: As honored as I am to be compared to Jesse Helms, the truth is that I may be even more effective than he was. As a black conservative, the liberals will not be able to smear me by calling me a racist the way they always did Senator Helms (not to mention Trent Lott last year and Rush Limbaugh just last month). I was very humbled when Jesse Helms put his arm around me and said, "I'm proud of you, Vernon." Jesse had already said that to the group assembled, but to receive that vote of confidence from a man I have revered for so long brought a tear to my eye. Won't you help put somebody like Jesse Helms back in Washington? Your gift to my campaign will do just that. CLICK HERE TO CONTRIBUTE NOW!