Shirley Brown the Red Herring

I won't bother you with the fine details of this story.  If you haven't seen it, you're probably better off staying with the rock you've been living under.

Here's the skinny.  Shirley Brown works at the Department of Agriculture, an Obama appointee.  She's a black woman.  This is important, so remember that.  She gave a speech that was startlingly honest.  When a poor white couple came to the department for help, it gave her pause.  That's all.  Andrew Breitbart, Fox News, and Bill O'Reilly later, she was fired.

My issue is this:  Blacks in the America have cause for racism.  That doesn't make it right, but it is completely justifiable.  The reason why it's a problem because as a public official, her duty is to all Americans.  But, various American authorities have been viruluently anti-black since the country's inception.  Many of them had public heads who were completely open about their racism.

So for a blackwoman to feel two ways about helping a poor white couple, that's A-O-K.  She did help them, and the family went public, thanking her profusely for aid.

Here's the kicker, and this is what pisses me off.  Glen Beck and his ilk are the first to decry "white racism."  But "white racism" is a shield, a red herring, and blackhearted lie for what is actually racism against blacks.  These proponents, so vociferously defending the beknighted white class from their oppressors, are guilty of outright racism.  I don't care how many black friends they have.  No one can legitimately deny that minorities have it worse in this country than the white majority.  Are their poor whites?  Of course.  Do I feel for them?  Absolutely.  Would I like them to find government aid?  You bet I would.  But are they victims?  No.

I'm still reading Nixonland.  Yes, still.  I hope to finish it before I finish my degree in three years.  That's my goal.  But Nixonland is a really prescient piece because it discusses exactly the last time the U.S. was this racially bestirred.  Yeah, whites today got it pretty good.  Equal housing laws are pretty good right now, no thanks to white racists who voted against the Fair Housing Act in 1968 (Title VIII of the Civil Rights Act) so there aren't any riots.  And ghettos, though still nasty, aren't even a quarter of what they looked like forty years ago.  But that doesn't mean we can't go back there.  And people like Glen Beck, Bill O'Reilly, and Andrew Breitbart are pissing gasoline on the hay in the barn.

And it will work.  The hate will build, and this laughably entitled "post racial era" will end in a heart beat as the violence escalates.

Freedom of speech doesn't give you the right to be an asshole.  Someone needs to put that on a bumpersticker for me.