Article Contributed on: 9/16/2009 11:54:46 AM
Racism is trendy. Racism is hot. Racism is more popular than Jesus now.
In fact, you can't spit a pumpkin seed without hitting at least a couple of racists in the ear. The weird thing is...they're mostly Obama supporters.
Yeah, I know. It's a bit confusing. How is it the same folks who welcomed a historic majority vote for this nation's first African American president are now the biggest race-baiters in the universe?
The answer is simple, and disturbing.
It's the only argument they have for why someone might not be happy with the policies of Barack Obama. Rather than address legitimate questions concerning a 900-billion-dollar Health Care Reform Bill that no one seems to have read, or why a Cap-And-Trade Bill is being pushed through that the president himself admits will jack-up energy costs in a sour economy, or his shadow-cabinet of czars that are magically appointed without much of a vetting process, the Obama camp defaults to good ol' fashioned racism. In fact, I'm probably a racist simply for writing the above paragraph.
It's all around you, baby. Such as Maureen Dowd's snarky column from The New York Times, accusing Congressman Joe Wilson's now famous outburst during Obama's health care speech of being racially-motivated. Or, to use her own words: "...Fair or not, what I heard was an unspoken word in the air: You lie, boy!"
Really, Maureen? Based on what? A Vulcan mind-meld?
Then there's Mike Littwin's equally-snarky follow-up piece in The Denver Post, where the clinically-smug columnist claims (with a straight face): "There's every reason to believe race is a factor in how many view Obama." Of course, he doesn't provide a single example of why that's true, because, in his elitist Liberal circles, it's an accepted truth, as true as water being wet and the sky being blue. White people hate black people. Always. Without question. Also, for pompous hippy-leftovers such as Littwin, it's a hell of an ego stroke: "See how smart and evolved I am? I'm a white guy who knows how evil white people are!"
Even ex-presidents are hopping on the Race Train, such as Jimmy Carter's recent rant that "an overwhelming portion of the intensely demonstrated animosity toward President Barack Obama is based on the fact that he is a black man, that he's African American." Again, based on what? Jimmy offers us no clues as to why he believes this. Then again, he never had much of a clue, anyway.
Still not following me on this? Then consider Newsweek's recent headline, which I encountered for the first time buying smokes at the local convenience store this morning: "Is Your Baby Racist?" The cover features a rather sullen-looking Caucasian toddler, and I can't help but think if the kid had been black, Jesse Jackson, Jeremiah Wright, the Black Panthers, and a few righteous rep's from ACORN would have stormed Newsweek's editorial offices with torches and pitchforks.
It's a most convenient double standard. Whites who criticize the president are not only racist, they are 'genetically' racist from birth, while the folks who make these accusations are, themselves, exempt from any racial motivations simply because they voted for Obama, and continue to support his policies.
What's laughable about this argument is that the millions (yes, I said millions, not "tens of thousands", as characterized by the Washington Post) of Americans who are showing up to the town hall meetings and Tea Parties are not so concerned with Obama as they are with Congress. Americans are not as stupid as the Liberal community requires them to be, and most understand that it's the House and Senate who enact bills that will totally screw-up their lives, and not the Executive branch. Given the rather pale complexion of Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid, it's pretty hard to play the race card in this particular hand of legislative Poker.
What's truly disturbing about racial accusations in American discourse is the willingness of those who claim the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. as their personal hero to toss his philosophies into the garbage whenever it suits them politically. Wasn't he the social genius who desired, above all things, to "live in a nation where (his children) will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character"? Now, there's an inconvenient truth. Under this idea, a leader should be judged based upon his policies and choices, and not the color of his skin. Doesn't it stand to reason the same should be true of his critics?
Try putting that question to political race-baiters such as Maureen Dowd, Mike Littwin, or Jimmy Carter, and instead of a reasonable answer, you'll probably get a snarky, condescending chuckle instead.
That's what arrogant (but useful) idiots do when they have no answer to give.