Politics and Race

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I make no bones about the fact that my beliefs tend to lean a little right of center.  While the majority of the time, my beliefs will be in conflict with Democrats, it is my desire to be fair.  My disagreements with President Obama and his fellow Democrats are strictly ideological in nature.

Unfortunately, too many on the left are quick to find racism as the cause for anybody who disagrees with Barack Obama.  During the election, I took offense at folks on the left who would claim that anybody who would not vote for Obama was clearly a racist.  It didn't matter that I had previously voted for Michael Steele when he ran for the Senate in the state of Maryland.  I guess an African American candidate that is a Republican doesn't actually count.

So I took great offense at Jimmy Carter's comments in an interview with NBC News where he said "I think 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. I live in the South, and I've seen the South come a long way, and I've seen the rest of the country that shares the South's attitude toward minority groups at that time, particularly African-Americans."  

During my commute in the morning, I listen to talk radio.  In the morning that is usually Grandy and Andy with former Congressman Fred Grandy.  In the evening, that is usually the tail end of Sean Hannity's show and maybe a bit of Mark Levin.  Yesterday, I had an early appointment and went into work a little later than usual and was listening to the Joe Scarbourough.  He played a clip of former President Bill Clinton commenting on Carter's comments, "There's no question racism exists in some outbursts in recent months. If he were not an African-American, all of the people who were against him on health care would still be against him. They were against me, too."

On my commute home, I was catching the tail end of Hannity's radio program.  Hannity also played the Clinton clip.  Unfortunately, he only played the portion of the clip where Clinton says racism exists.  He also repeated the same thing on his Fox television show that night.  To put Clinton's comments in the same class as Carter's is irresponsible at best.  Don't get me wrong, the main stream media does the same or worse looking for the extreme examples to perpetuate their biases.

Personally I think that Jimmy Carter is a doddering old fool who should just go away.  I am not naive enough to think that racism is extinct in this country.  Clinton is spot on when he says that there are some Obama opponents that are racist, but the vast majority are not.  Comments like Carter's, however, do nothing but diminish the real cases of racism that still exist.

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