I never understood how a person who was, say, 70% of Caucausian racial make up got away with calling themselves "Black."
Posted on 03/25/2008 3:50:35 AM PDT by Kaslin
I am a typical white person, as Barack Obama might say, and did say, about his white grandmother. Like Rev. Jesse Jackson, I, too, have crossed the street to avoid a group of young black men who have a certain thug-in-the-hood look about them. Am I a racist? Only if Jesse Jackson is a racist. In fact, we are prudent.
On his old CNN TV show, Rev. Jackson and I once debated affirmative action. He favored it. I opposed it. I asked him, "Do you think you have this show because you are good or because you are black?" Jackson was speechless (a rarity) and he went to a commercial to keep from answering.
As I watch the exciting NCAA Basketball Tournament, I notice that most of the players are black. On some teams, all the players are black. Should an affirmative action program create slots so more whites, Hispanic and Asians can play, or should the best players be on these teams, without regard to race? The question should answer itself.
In his speech last week on race, Sen. Obama said blacks and whites have legitimate grievances and that whites who never owned a slave, or supported the slave trade, or knowingly discriminated against any African American have a right to be angry when affirmative action favors someone of a different race for a job for which they feel they are qualified.
The grievances of African Americans are starker. Their ancestors were kidnapped and brought to a country that was foreign to them and enslaved by mostly (but not exclusively) white people. Although the actions of a 19th-century Republican president freed them, 20th-century Democratic politicians discriminated against them, defiantly standing in schoolhouse doors, blocking their way to a better future.
This accusatory back and forth between races will continue beyond the current election unless all of us stop replaying past grievances. One can criticize some of what Obama said (and I have), but his appeal to lay the past to rest and move on to a better future is compelling and worth discussing.
One of the best tools I have seen that could help bridge the racial divide is a PBS documentary series called "African American Lives." Its creator and host is Harvard professor Dr. Henry Louis Gates Jr. The program is a rarity in television. It informs without bias.
This four-part series features Oprah Winfrey, Whoopi Goldberg, Bishop T.D. Jakes, Quincy Jones, Mae Jemison, Dr. Ben Carson, Dr. Sara Lawrence-Lightfoot and Chris Tucker. Using DNA, the program traces their ancestry. Some have firm roots in African tribes, but others are surprising. For instance, Gates, who is African American, found that much of his DNA could be traced back to Ireland.
"African American Lives 2," the sequel to the original program, traced the lineage of comedian Chris Rock, singer Tina Turner, Oscar-winning actor Morgan Freeman Jr., and magazine publisher Linda Johnson Rice, among others. Using courthouse documents, plantation ledgers and slave ship records, the subjects learn surprising things about their forebears. One of Rock's ancestors was a South Carolina state senator. One of Turner's ancestors founded the school she attended as a child, though she didn't know about the genealogical link until the program revealed it in a touching moment.
I defy anyone but the most ardent racist to watch this series and not be transformed by what it reveals. I have spoken and exchanged e-mail with Dr. Gates and he says the main message in these programs is that slavery was more about economics than race.
More than slavery and discrimination, the loss of faith and family can be seen as the root of many of the problems in the black community. Even during the worst of times, black families held themselves together by holding onto God. Today, some have lost that faith and chaos threatens, chaos that Barack Obama - or anyone else - cannot repair.
The New York Times Magazine once did a cover story on prosperous black families in Prince Georges County, Md. What these families had in common, other than race, was that all were intact.
Unfortunately, those families are not typical. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, in 2004, just 31.9 percent of black households had both spouses present, compared to 56.1 percent for white households. Hopefully, when intact black families become typical, many of the self-inflicted maladies in the black community will finally become atypical.
“Am I a racist? Only if Jesse Jackson is a racist.”
Well, I guess that settles it. Cal is a racist.
Everyones genes have been co-mingling for 200 years. If blacks are not allowed to play and reply the slavery (victim) tape in their heads - they get angry and hold the whites hostage for more welfare entitlements. To pacify the angry hoard, white liberals keep them pumped full of the opiate called welfare.
Rather than act as responsible members of American society, the minority underclass has learned that all they have to do to get their fix is bang their tippee cups on their high chairs and thier liberal overlords will serve them up whatever they want. Disgusting.
Belated WELCOME ABOARD!
Their ancestors were kidnapped.
That’s not true! Their ancestors were sold by their own people; it happened then and still happens todays
Taboo subjects are important to be written about by Conservative writers if for no other reason than balance. Yes and there are many more reasons far to numerous to mention.Cal can do it like no other and has here! Kudos sir!
.....”Do you think you have this show because you are good or because you are black?”
and this applies to every profession...I want the BEST surgeon to operate, the best teacher to teach my kids, the best lawyer, the best nurse, etc. I don’t care what “color” they are!! Common sense, pure & simple.
I never understood how a person who was, say, 70% of Caucausian racial make up got away with calling themselves "Black."
Those crackas crossed over! Kind of like Vanilla Ice- er, um Eminem.
Garrett Morris did a parody interview sketch about this in 1976 - and it touched a nerve.
Ummm, Barack Obama’s mom was white and his dad was from Africa. None of his ancestors suffered the indignities of slavery in America, any more than Hillary Clinton’s did.
“Ummm, Barack Obama’s mom was white and his dad was from Africa. None of his ancestors suffered the indignities of slavery in America, any more than Hillary Clinton’s did.”
Having retired a few years ago from a major public (and very liberal) University in Chicago that is located somewhat close to the area where Wright preached in his Church, I know very well the type of Black that attends Wright’s Church, as I worked with many of them. The University I worked at hired many Blacks from the near southside of Chicago as employees. Many of them have a chip on their shoulder about Whitey (and Jews, and surprisingly or maybe not so, against many Orientals too).
As the University hired many Hispanics from the nearby neighborhoods also, it was interesting that most of the Hispanics and Blacks did not like each other either. Then, of course, just to throw more into the melting pot, there were a bunch of Palestinian students at the University also, who would march around with whatever the grievance du jour was on campus. Lots of Chinese students too, as Chinatown was close by, but I never could tell what they were thinking about any of this.
My point being, I know only too well the attitudes of many of the Blacks in that area of Chicago, and it ain’t pretty. Obama is lying to us. He has been indoctrinated for 20 years by his Preacher’s sermons and by his personal friendship with him. That none of it would have rubbed off on him is total nonsense. Beware the wolf in sheep’s clothing. That is Obama. One of the women I worked with was, like Obama, half black and half white. She was embarrassed by the half white part, and tried to out-Black the Blacks in Blackness as a result. Same with Obama, who has two strikes against him in his own Black community. First, he was not born and raised in America, started out life as a Muslim, and until his middle teen years, did not live here. And he lived much of his life in Hawaii, that has many racial types living there, thus somewhat insulated from the Black mainland experience. He has not had the southern Black experience with blatant racism that still existed for many Blacks growing up in this country up until the 60’s hit and the Republicans helped Johnson finally get the Civil Rights Act passed.
Plus, he has that White side to his family, as much as he has tried to hide it up until now when he had to pull his Grandma out of the White family closet in order to throw her under the train. So, Obama, being politically ambitious, joined this radical thinking Blacker than Black Church to add to his “I’m Black” credentials while building his political career. Unfortunately for him, he is now at a point in his political career where all that Black nationalism and hatred of Whitey, Jews, etc. is now a liability rather than a virtue to give him street “cred”. So he first tried to hide his affiliations with his Black Church and its controversial Preacher, and his friendship with Bill Ayers (the 60’s homegrown terrorist, who, by the way, is now a Professor at the University I retired from in Chicago). However, the cat got let out of the bag, and Sean Hannity kept hitting hard at Obama’s Preacher man. And now that which was once of great benefit to him, is now all to his detriment. I guess what went around has now come around. Obama is a very clever, well spoken con artist, hiding his true stripes from the all too often naive public. But you can’t fool all of the people all of the time, and now, as his own Preacher man said when claiming the U.S. deserved what it got when we were attacked on 9/11, “the chickens have come home to roost.”
In part, because this country has a history of applying the "one drop rule." Meaning that if you had one drop of black (or Indian or Hispanic) blood you were listed as "colored."
Well put. I fear that you are 100% correct.
By his command, roughly 12,000 Irish people were sold into slavery under the Commonwealth. Thousands more were killed on the spot. One was Col. John Durkee’s Father who was sent from Barbados to work on a farm in Mass. In 1630.
Col. John Durkee was the famous revolutionary war hero. He 12 Gen. Back. MY great grandfather. Were you surprised to learn that there were Irish Slaves? NO ONE TALKS ABOUT IT!.
That is a fair answer.
What it has evolved into is a racial spoils system where all groups snap at each others face while each of them is trying to be the first to scale the greased pole to the top of "Victim-hood."
As my daughter was filling out college applications, we had to meander through countless, countless links and on-line forms dealing with race.
Race has become the biggest scam and shake down in the history of this country.
But, "Whites Need Not Apply."
Col. John Durkee was the famous revolutionary war hero."
I'm not disputing the lineage or your proud heritage, but, there is a 146 year difference between 1630 and 1776. Could it have been his great, great grandfather?
Hosea 4:6 "My people are destroyed for lack of knowledge..." That would be a lack of knowledge of our Creator, our God. Lack of knowledge and understanding brings lack of faith and obedience.
It's the root cause of every problem man has regardless of race.
The serpent in the Garden of Eden wresting God's words: "Ye shall not surely die".
Political Correctness wresting the First Amendment to our Constitution: "Freedom from religion".
Not only that, the Arab Muslim North Africans were in the habit of capturing Christian Europeans and using them as slaves or holding them for ransom. For centuries. No one talks about that either. The phrase “worked like a galley slave” is not a random choice of words. There’s also a reason “to the shores of Tripoli” appears in a certain song.
Ever notice how light skinned the good Reverend is?
I wonder what Wright’s ancestry is?
Something tells me he has some typical white blood in him too.
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