“Personally I don’t think “the Negro” is suffering because they didn’t learn to pick cotton and might have been better off as slaves. That’s a pretty dumb thing to say, no matter what broader point Bundy was attempting to make.”
I don’t know if Bundy intended it this way but I took “picking cotton” as a metaphor for work in general, not as literally dragging a sack down the rows. Am I giving him to much credit here?
Who knows, I couldn't say for sure. We can only go by his words, and the babbling about "the Negro" and his wondering about the possibility that they might be better off as slaves doesn't put any of his comments in a particularly good light. Talking about observing "the Negro's" sitting on their porch isn't the best imagery either.
Like I said, I suspect he isn't some kind of hater. Some of his comments about Hispanics (another area he should have just kept his mouth shut about) make it clear he's probably fairly compassionate in his own way. He's from a different generation, probably doesn't come into contact with many black people and isn't used to the spotlight and probably should have stuck to the land issues instead of wandering off into his thoughts on race. The problem is his words sound pretty racist whether he meant them to or not. When a person says these kinds of things the words become the focal point of the debate instead of what it was initially.