Love was in the air this spring as the media covered every utterance of Rand Paul's pandering campaign to attract black voters.  First Paul met with an expert on arson and rioting, the MSNBC Sunday anchor Al Sharpton.  Paul listened to Sharpton and learned from his race-baiting wisdom, because, after all, who is better to speak to about blacks than Al Sharpton?  (Ben Carson, Alan Keyes, Allen West, and Tim Scott were all unavailable.)

Paul said that the answer to the Ferguson riots is to release more criminals from jail, especially "low-level" drug dealers, a disproportionate number of whom are presumably black.  Then Paul spoke before a group of black students and said that the government should hide the criminal records of ex-offenders so they can more easily get jobs.

So how has that worked out for Rand Paul?  So far in the primary campaign, he has had trouble getting any voters, white or black.  It's almost as if black voters can't be swayed by offering to release black criminals from jail.  The liberal media must wonder, if that doesn't motivate blacks, what else possibly could?

Then came along Donald Trump.  In a recent poll, he is shown as potentially capturing 25% of the black vote.  As Dr. Thomas Lifson noted, this may be due to Trump's emphasis on illegal immigration, and the jobs illegals take away from black people.

That is definitely part of it.  But the biggest part of it is that the Republicans have finally latched onto a candidate who is bold, confident, and articulate.  He is charismatic across racial lines.  He is an example of a candidate who appeals to different races without issuing race-specific appeals, a concept totally alien to the liberal media.  After all, how you can you appeal to blacks without talking about "black issues"?  But the idea that blacks are interested in releasing criminals from jail is itself is racist.  If I were black, I wouldn't want any criminals released from jail, even if they were black.

Mitt Romney and John McCain got almost no black votes, but it wasn't because they were "anti-black."  It's because a crumpled paper bag had more charisma than the two of them combined.

On Sunday, the New York Times published a poisoned love note from insider Republicans who worry that Trump is hurting them with blacks.  Trump criticized the so-called Black Lives Matter movement, said that most policemen are not racist, and said that the cause of the Baltimore riots was a lack of policing.

At a speech in Nashville on Aug. 29, Mr. Trump played down concerns about police brutality, saying that "99.9 percent" of what the police do is good. He said the riots in Baltimore — which broke out after the funeral of Freddie Gray, an African-American who died of injuries suffered while in police custody – resulted from the police not being allowed to exert their authority.

"That first night in Baltimore, they allowed that city to be destroyed," he said. "They set it back 35 years in one night because the police weren't allowed to protect people. We need law and order!"

I think if we can get a nominee who can speak confidently, not apologetically, about issues that affect all Americans, we can win more of the black vote, because blacks, like everyone else, are looking for a candidate who speaks clearly and forcefully and doesn't look ashamed or afraid.

This article was written by Ed Straker, senior writer of NewsMachete.com, the conservative news site.