I did not spend a moment today thinking about how to keep the black man down. Just another day.
I can’t remember ever getting a memo about, or an invitation to a strategy meeting on keeping the corporation white.
So stop telling me everything is my fault.
Don’t get me wrong. White people are great organizers. Look at all those St. Paddy’s Day events we recently held. We just are not organizing against blacks.
I am very aware of how well thought-out the vicious racism of the past was and that it was organized by white people. Some of them were judges, and politicians and business leaders; the so-called respectable people of the community. I would apologize for that, but I wasn’t there. That makes it no less a crime.
I am aware that racism still exists. It is a sad part of the human condition. But it is no longer institutional in America and to the extent it exists, it runs both ways.
But as we have heard over and over again lately from the pastor of an 8,000 member church, one of his 20-year parishioners who is running for president, and all of their media enablers, the problems in the black community today are still the fault of us white people. White guys in particular.
In the Chicago Sun-Times columnist Mary Mitchell quotes a spokeswoman for Rev. Wright, Iva Carruthers, commenting on Obama’s speech. “The sad thing about this is, the people who really need to understand the message – white males – I don’t know if it will have any effect.”
Barack Obama calls for the white community to understand that “investing in the health, welfare and education of black and brown and white children will ultimately help all of America prosper.”
How much larger does he think America’s investment in those areas can get? In real dollars education spending is multiples of what it was four decades ago and test scores have hardly changed. If we have failed perhaps it is time for less government, the prevailing failing authority. Let’s call onto the carpet the people responsible. Is it those evil, suburban white guys again? Well, shame on them – no wait – it turns out that practically all of our big cities are run by liberal Democrats, many of them black. Education is dominated by a teachers union run by liberals, not white Republicans.
Why is Obama willing to let salvation lie in the hands of white people? Would he not be more useful preaching a message of black pride, black ability and self reliance, rather than one of waiting for someone else to love you and hoping, in vain, that the government will? If you think you will succeed, you probably will. If you think you will fail, you undoubtedly will.
The single most important contributing factor to multi-generational poverty is the fact that 70 percent of black children are born to single mothers. Are white guys getting these ladies pregnant and then abandoning mother and child? If so, shame on those white guys. Something should be done. Are black guys the love ‘em and leave ‘em culprits? Yes? Well, shame on them then and leave the white guys out of it. Shame on the women as well.
Too high a percentage of young black men are in prison. Are the courts unfair? We should fix that if it is true, but as Bill Cosby has pointed out, you can argue that a black man getting a tougher sentence for dealing crack than a white guy does for selling cocaine is unfair, or you could stop dealing crack! That’ll fool them. They won’t be able to lock you up.
Are white people putting guns to the heads of black men and forcing them to join gangs, rob stores and deal drugs? No? Then leave us out of it.
Barack Obama referred to a Constitution "stained by this nation's original sin of slavery." How short is the list of nations that never had slavery? Could we just once stop to celebrate the fact that what makes us unique as a nation in terms of slavery is not that we had it, but that America was one of the first nations on earth to outlaw the practice? A lot of white guys died to bring that about. No credit?
The resentment, defeatism and hate that too many black parents and leaders teach their children is so deep that Obama’s preacher, Rev. Wright actually said that Obama is “not a rich man.” He says this why? Is it his knee-jerk evaluation of all black people? Is it the internalized self-evaluation of all black people?
Obama is a United States Senator who lives in a mansion. He is a graduate of Harvard Law. Ditto Mrs. Obama, who lately was earning over $300,000 a year. He has two best-selling books. Chicago Magazine reports that Obama made $737,690 last year (add that to his wife’s income.) That is way more than Democrats are talking about when they scream for more taxes on “the rich.” The Obama’s are the very picture of wealth, power and privilege in America. Did they earn it? Yes they did. Good for them.
I had hope - there it is - that while I could not agree with Obama's socialist policies, he would at least move race relations ahead. Now I know he will not.
I don't think there are simple answers to why blacks still struggle, but Wright's it's-whitey's-fault approach is as simple as they come, and most certainly part of the problem. It's well-known now that you can't solve a problem until you admit it exists. When the rest of America heard what was being preached at Obama's church, they -- to put it mildly -- saw a problem.
How often does it happen that a black person who has done well enough to be interviewed about success gives all the credit to the person who raised him or her? Almost every time. What do they mention particularly? That their parent(s) or grandparent(s) emphasized that life isn’t fair and that they were expected to achieve anyway. Condoleezza Rice says of her parents, "they refused to allow the limits and injustices of their time to limit our horizons." Why isn’t this catching on?
You want to know why white kids succeed? Their parents tell them to. Their parents expect them to. If the school doesn’t provide a book they send their child to the library. You should try the library, it’s free. While the children are doing their lessons the adults could wander over to the self-help section and read “The Seven Habits of Highly Successful People” or something like it. There are plenty of choices. (But not “The Secret,” that’s another get-something-for-nothing book.)
You could point out that while I am busy absolving myself of the problems in the black community I am not doing anything to help. Perhaps that is true, but I didn’t help the Asian children either. How are they doing?
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