Here's some of that new civility we've been hearing about

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We didn't want to news chase but this was just too rich to pass up. Accused of being a felon, then of being responsible for the death of the wife of an out-of-work steel plant worker, is anyone surprised they waited until the 3-hole to play the race card in the next major smear of Team Romney?

Here's Joey Choo-choo Biden in North Carolina Virginia, ummm... appealing to the base?

VICE PRESIDENT JOE BIDEN: They've said it. Every Republican's voted for it. Look at what they value and look at their budget and what they're proposing. Romney wants to let the-he said in the first 100 days, he's going to let the big banks once again write their own rules-unchain Wall Street. They going to put y'all back in chains. He's said he's going to do nothing about stopping the practice of outsourcing.

(italics and emphasis, definitely Biden's)

Color us alternately appalled and amused by these comments. After all, it is this country's crazy Veep Uncle who escapes the basement every once in a while to make our eyes roll at the dinner table. Just a heartbeat away, America, just a heartbeat away. Now, in this era of the new civility, if Team O didn't have a problem with Mitt-as-murderer, they sure as hell weren't going to have a problem with Biden going all racialist. Armed with the fact that no one knew a damn thing about him 4 years ago, it was so much easier to stay above the fray and not be such a sleaze-ball Chicago pol that America is increasingly finding him to be.

Oh, and the tweets:

@EWErickson The party that gets upset when you call Obama a Marxist is cool claiming the GOP will enslave black people. @deanriehm Joe Biden doesn't need know stinking dog whistle. @iowahawkblog If the GOP uses a racist dog whistle, Joe Biden uses a racist kazoo. @deanriehm Signs that your campaign is tanking: your 70-something white running mate from Delaware goes minstral #JoeBiden. @deanriehm #Biden sounding "blacker" than the President. Somewhere, #HarryReid is smiling. @iowahawkblog President Obama won't let Romney & Ryan destroy Medicare as we know it. He appointed time to do that job. (so, "time" is the CMS czar?) @deanriehm The only things missing were a top hat, a megaphone, the bearded lady and 3 rings. #assclown #JoeBiden

(Apologies for the formatting of last two paragraphs. Blogger not responding well to the heat)

Quote of the day

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After a reporter asked Gabrielle Douglas what it felt like to be the first African-American all-around gold medal winner in gymnastics, she responded:

"Oh, my gosh, I forgot about that,"

For a person that trained in Iowa, there is hope that Douglas's reaction is reflective of how young people in America view race.

We can hope.

Video clip of the day

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AlfonZo Rachel of ZONATION brings some much needed perspective to the whole Trayvon Martin travesty unfolding down in Arizona.

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3:15 : According to street law... according to God's law...

Eh, so which is it, pal? Never mind that neither of them are applicable to Florida's penal code. This chump is just trying to justify a, yes, lynch mob mentality.


3:48 : Zo makes an outstanding point regarding Afro-centrism (black separatism) and the Constitution. Wasn't the whole idea of the civil rights movement for blacks to gain equality in the eyes of the law? Wasn't the whole idea of the civil rights movement to be for constitutional equality for blacks and other minoritiess?


Yet, aforementioned chump is making the case for slavery by saying the (white mans') law doesn't apply to him (unless he is) thus invoking the "street law" or whatever which is just an invitation for lawlessness and rule of force vice rule of law, under which slavery would certainly be justifiable.

Yep, just another example of that new civility we've been hearing so much about.

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What's this "we" business, white man?

Attorney General, Eric Holder, gives a speech at the Justice Department honoring Black History Month and about the 1:00 minute mark dutifully informs us that we are in many ways a “nation of cowards” when it comes to dealing with race.

Full disclosure: We were only able to slog through the first 6 minutes of the clip due to unbearable self-flaggelating whining put upon us by Holder.

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We do wonder however, if Holder feels this cowardice was somehow displayed this past November when an American Presidential candidate who looks and talks like most of America was rejected in favor of a candidate who does not look and talk like most of America?

We may be too harsh in this assessment but we can’t help but feel Holder used the term “cowardice” as substitute for perhaps a stronger invective.

P.S. The title is in reference to the response we would get from "Pops" while in our youth if a collective call to action was made that was not entirely to his liking.

So, it's come to this...

More than 200 Trinity College students, faculty and staff rallied on campus Monday in response to a racially offensive comment posted on an online message board.

"Something negative happened and we want to turn it into something positive," said Ibrahim Diallo, one of the students who organized the rally. Organizers said they hoped to start a discussion and make it clear that people did not agree with the posting.

The comment, posted anonymously on a website called TrinTalk, disparaged minority students and said their admission to the college correlated with a drop in the rankings of "our fine Trinity." TrinTalk is not affiliated with the college.

Waiting, waiting, waiting…. Ker-plunk…

On Friday, Oct. 31, Lynda Ikejimba '09 announced that she was responsible for the racist TrinTalk.com post that incited a series of events, including last week's student-initiated rally, "Stand in Solidarity," which received coverage in The Hartford Courant.

"I am the person responsible for the outrageous, despicably racist post published on the TrinTalk website," wrote Ikejimba in a campus-wide apology email. "And I am a black woman. I am writing to apologize to all of you for what I have caused."

Two things - One: A 200 person rally in response to a single comment left on an online message board? What's next: 4 people held a rally at Beers with Demo world headquarters over the weekend in response to a completely unrelated, non-sequitor comment left on a post devoted to controllable pitch propellers.

And: What does it say about the nature of race relation in this country in 2008 when the majority of these alleged hate crimes and instances of hate speech turn out to be hoaxes? That the perpetrators claim they are trying to raise awareness belies the reality that awareness has risen… it has risen, indeed!

And to think that all that diversity training may have paid off, afterall.

H/T: The Volokh Conspiracy

Reaganesque....? Believe It.

Because we spent approx. 18 hours in airports and planes the past couple of days, we were unable to see the Obama race speech and all the accompanying commentary surrounding it which is a good thing because after watching it in its entirety on YouTube this evening, we did have a few unfiltered thoughts:

Overall, we thought it was good but it fell short of the mark and certainly did not have the broad sweeping impact that Romney’s religion in America speech did (but guess which one will always be referred to more often down the line?).

Why did it fall short of the mark? Well, for one thing it was too long. He starts off well keeping to the arching themes of race in this country’s history and giving what we felt was a very strong repudiation of Wright’s words and rhetoric. However, Obama starts drifting half-way through his speech, using his call for racial reconciliation as a jumping-off point for better healthcare, education, ending the war in Iraq, etc., etc.… campaign stumping that should have been placed on hold for this occasion.

He then goes on to rationalize the bigotry exhibited by some blacks on real injustices visited upon them in the past and at times, in the present. Fair enough (don’t necessarily agree but…O.K). But then, mystifyingly, he turns around and rationalizes white bigotry on affirmative action and welfare which, in his opinion, formed the foundation of the Reagan coalition. This is pure hooey, of course, and does not even dignify a response.

While listening to all this rationalization for plain old bad behavior without a straight-up unqualified condemnation of the same, a quote came to mind made by Rosalind Carter when speaking of (speaking of…) Reagan that we will apply to the subject at hand: “Obama make us comfortable with our prejudices”. He does. Because he didn’t just come out and say bigotry and racism was inexcusable, he made us feel a little more comfortable with some that we may harbor… its not really our fault, after all….just look at history.
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We will commend him, though, for recognizing part of the greatness of this country is that it is not “static” with respect to progress whether its race, gender or religion. This is a theme pro-Western Civ types like us have been making for years especially with respect to Islam: “yeah, some of our history is not pretty… freely admitted… but we always reserve the right to be smarter and better than we used to be”.

We may have more later but that was what made the strongest initial impressions. Good but not great. Certainly, with all the hoopla surrounding this dust-up the opportunity for greatness was there so we’ll just call this a long single rather than a home-run.

P.S. The nagging suspicion remains…. He wants to use the "crazy uncle” argument but how can you break bread with that same crazy uncle for over 20 years without cracking him upside the skull? Obama says that we all have people in our lives that we love yet have disagreements with but, my g#d, those types of disagreements. And, worse, he never gives any evidence that he challenged Wright on any of his rhetoric over those 20 years. Nice speech but actions do speak louder than words so we don’t believe he is quite off the hook on this one.