[ By: Melissa Harris-Lacewell ]
Joe Biden once remarked that Barack Obama was “clean” and “articulate.” He is now Vice President. During the Democratic primaries Hillary Clinton invoked Robert Kennedy in a way that implied Barack Obama’s assassination was imminent. She is now the Secretary of State. It is foolish to suggest Senator Harry Reid should step down as Senate majority leader because of his 2008 assessment that Barack Obama’s election was more likely because he is “light-skinned” and free from “Negro dialect.”

If President Obama has demonstrated anything at all, it is that he unperturbed by the racially awkward outbursts of his fellow Democrats.

Republicans hope that reports of Reid’s old gaffe might derail his leadership of the health care reform package. But watching Michael Steele go after Reid is more bizarre than convincing. Steele seems to pride himself on the liberal use of black discursive patterns. It’s hard to take seriously the moral outrage of a self-professed “hip-hop Republican” who explains his tenure as GOP chairman saying “brother still here.”

President Obama may be unconcerned and the GOP may be transparently race baiting, but Reid’s comments did create a legitimate queasiness among many Americans that is worth exploring.

President Obama is a forgiving, beer summit kind of leader, but I am less likely to give Democrats a free pass on issues of racial bias. As I wrote a few months ago here on The Notion, any implication that racism is the sole purview of the Right obscures the continuing and troubling realities of racism within the Democratic Party and progressive political movements.

Still, I remain entirely uninterested in a racial McCarthyism that plays “gotcha politics” with elected officials public utterances. Yes, public officials should be particularly careful when talking about race to media (on or off the record). The opportunities for misunderstanding, divisiveness and assumption of ill intent are heightened in this area of political discussion.

But let’s be honest, if we weeded out every public official guilty of racial insensitivity, the halls of Congress would echo with utter emptiness. The point is not so much public gaffes as it is the creation, support, and maintenance of systemic and structural inequalities. This is why Trent Lott’s wistfulness about a Strom Thurmond presidency is in a different class than Reid’s comments. Lott was longing for a bygone era when structural barriers and entrenched inequality were the norm. Reid was enthusiastic that the same barriers were lessening and that America was ready, albeit with caveats, for a new racial reality.

Rather than being worked up about Reid’s awkward assessment of these barriers, we should be asking whether these structural biases actually make academic and political accomplishments easier for light-skinned African Americans. NC State University historian Blair LM Kelley makes this argument in her piece on Salon.com. She points out skin color bias in the 21st century should alarm us. It shouldn’t be a matter of breezy acceptance, as many Sunday morning pundits seemed to suggest. “Accepting this as a matter of course degrades the quality of our democracy.”

Reid’s assertions about “Negro dialect” also should raise structural justice questions far more important than his offensive use of an antiquated term for black Americans. Because of generations of lower class status and legal barriers to quality education, black children are far more likely than their white counterparts to be raised by parents with inadequate literacy skills. But rather than acting as a leveling ground, many public schools only reinforce these disadvantages. These are the same children relegated to schools with fewer expert teachers, larger classroom sizes, fewer educational resources, and fewer literacy support tools.

This is the racism that should worry us: millions of black American children attend and graduate from public schools that leave them utterly unqualified for public office for their entire lives. As adults these children will always be second-class citizens, unable to participate as rule makers rather than simply rule followers in their own country. Not only does this deprive whole group from full participation in government, it also deprives our country of the skills, talents, and ideas that these citizens might have offered, had we not initially deprived them of the capacity to communicate their ideas effectively in the public realm.

Political theorist Nancy Fraser’s describes imagines justice as “a difference-friendly world, where assimilation to majority or dominant cultural norms is no longer the price for equal respect.” Creating that world is an important task for combating racism.

About The Author: Melissa Harris-Lacewell — is Associate Professor of Politics and African American Studies at Princeton University. She is the author of the award-winning book, Barbershops, Bibles, and BET: Everyday Talk and Black Political Thought, (Princeton 2004). And she is currently at work on a new book: Sister Citizen: A Text For Colored Girls Who’ve Considered Politics When Being Strong Wasn’t Enough. (Forthcoming Yale University Press) Her academic research is inspired by a desire to investigate the challenges facing contemporary black Americans and to better understand the multiple, creative ways that African Americans respond to these challenges. Her work is published in scholarly journals and edited volumes and her interests include the study of African American political thought, black religious ideas and practice, and social and clinical psychology. Professor Harris-Lacewell’s creative and dynamic teaching is also motivated by the practical political and racial issues of our time. For example, her course entitled Disaster, Race and American Politics explored the multiple political meanings of Hurricane Katrina. Professor Harris-Lacewell has taught students from grade school to graduate school and has been recognized for her commitment to the classroom as a site of democratic deliberation on race. Professor Harris-Lacewell appears regularly on MSNBC. She regularly provides expert commentary on U.S. elections, racial issues, religious questions and gender concerns for both The Rachel Maddow Show and Countdown with Keith Olbermann. Professor Harris-Lacewell is also a regular guest on other television and radio. Her writings have appeared in newspapers throughout the country and she is a regular contributor at TheNation.com. She travels extensively speaking to colleges, organizations and businesses in the United States and abroad. In 2009 Professor Harris-Lacewell became the youngest scholar to deliver the W.E.B. Du Bois Lectures at Harvard University. Also in 2009 she delivered the prestigious Ware Lecture, becoming the youngest woman to ever do so. Professor Harris-Lacewell received her B.A. in English from Wake Forest University , her Ph.D. in political science from Duke University and an honorary doctorate from Meadville Lombard Theological School. She is currently a student at Union Theological Seminary in New York. She lives part-time in New Orleans. Her partner, James Perry, is a candidate for mayor of the city of New Orleans in 2010. She is also the mother of a terrific daughter, Parker Lacewell. | Visit Melissa’s Website: http://www.melissaharrislacewell.com/ |

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 By: Allison Kilkenny
President Obama has long suggested that he would like to move beyond race. The question now is whether the country will let him.

He woke up one Wednesday to a rapidly intensifying debate about how his race factors into the broader discussion of civility in politics, a question prompted in part by former President Jimmy Carter’s assertion the previous day that racism was behind a Republican lawmaker’s outburst against Mr. Obama as the president addressed a joint session of Congress. — via Political Memo – As Race Debate Grows, Obama Steers Clear of It – NYTimes.com.

There is a prevalent misconception that racism is a self-contained problem. The myth goes like this: unless a hooded clansman is burning a cross on an African American family’s lawn, the United States is not dealing with traditional racism. Our country has transcended race, since the election of President Obama, this myth says. Furthermore, race is only a relevant factor when something overtly hostile happens to our leader, who happens to be black (not that any of us notice, since we have transcended the problem of racism). The myth leaves no room for discussions of institutionalized racism, or the acceptance that race and racism are always in the room with us, and not just when President Obama delivers nuanced, thoughtful speeches about them.

Aside from the obvious targets of a Joe Wilson or Rush Limbaugh, the problem of racism infests every facet of the American experience, including the ongoing health care debate, though few politicians and journalists seem to realize racism is bigger than a few of Glenn Beck’s disciples shouting something about Obama being Kenyan. "Race issue lingers over health care debate," an AP headline declares, but what it fails to mention is that the health care debate is also a race debate, and the racism issue does not belong exclusively to the province of zaftig, paranoid white Conservatives, flawed reasoning that comforts many liberals.

Another Reuters headline reads, "Healthcare, anger, and race," presenting the three nouns as if they are separate, autonomous entities. Such compartmentalization seems to suggest we can only talk about one issue (healthcare, anger, or race) at a time. We’re either chatting about Obama’s plans for health care reform, or we’re snickering about those crazy birthers, but we’re never talking about the same thing. However, in reality, the broken healthcare system and anger are subsidiaries of racism, and the three share a deeply interconnected relationship.

According to a study by researchers at Dartmouth, race and place of residence have a huge impact on the kind of medical treatment a patient receives. For example, blacks with diabetes or vascular disease are nearly five times more likely than whites to have a leg amputated. The widest racial gaps in mammogram rates within a state were in California and Illinois with a difference of 12 percentage points between the white rate and the black rate. The country’s lowest rate for blacks — 48 percent in California — was 24 percentage points below the highest rate — 72 percent in Massachusetts. In all but two states, black diabetics were less likely than whites to receive annual hemoglobin testing. But blacks in Colorado (66 percent) were far less likely to be screened than those in Massachusetts (88 percent).

Statistics released by Advocates for Children and Youth, an independent statewide nonprofit organization, show that the infant mortality rate is 8 deaths per 1,000 births in Maryland, with African American babies dying at a 2.5 times higher rate than white babies. African Americans’ life expectancy is six years shorter than whites at birth, two years shorter at age 65, and numerous studies document the relatively poor health and health outcomes of African Americans, reflecting a long history of economic deprivation and barriers to health care.

Race has infrequently been addressed in this fashion possibly because it removes racism from the territory of crazy, right-wing protesters and delivers the blame to larger institutions like the private health care industry, and the United States government at large. It’s one thing to make fun of Rush Limbaugh’s ignorance, it’s another thing to ask multi-billion dollar industries to change their racist practices, or accuse the entire government of being rotten at the foundation. Such accusations would earn a dissenter the title of "race-baiter," or one who "plays the race card." These kinds of platitudes are usually euphemisms for "You’re making me uncomfortable. Don’t rile up the black folk. Shut up."

As much as white Americans hate to admit it, we are always talking about race, even when we’re not poking fun at Rush Limbaugh or Glenn Beck. Race and racism will play a huge roll in the health care reform debate, and not just when Joe Wilson is the topic of discussion. Rep. Donna Edwards has said that proposed legislation overhauling health care would likely address racial disparities in education and health among children. Let’s hope so. At least then the discussion of race and racism may reap some productive rewards instead of more empty chatter about Joe Wilson’s motives.

About The Author: Allison Kilkenny co-hosts Citizen Radio, the alternative political radio show alongside her partner, comic Jamie Kilstein. She is a contributing writer to Huffington Post, Alternet.org, The Nation, the Beast, Counterpunch.org, and 236.com. She is also a regular guest on SIRIUS radio. Allison’s essay “Youth Surviving Subprime” appears in The Nation’s new book, Meltdown: How Greed and Corruption Shattered Our Financial System and How We Can Recover beside esssays by Ralph Nader, Joseph Stiglitz, Barbara Ehrenreich, and Naomi Klein. She doesn’t care if you’re offended by anything she has written. Allison cordially invites you to join her on other social networking sites, such as Facebook and Twitter. VISIT [ http://allisonkilkenny.com/ ]

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Notes: Kunta Kinte is the central character of the novel, Roots: The Saga of an American Family by American author Alex Haley, and of the television miniseries Roots, based on the book. Haley described his book as faction – a mixture of fact and fiction. Kunta Kinte was a Muslim of the Mandinka tribe. Kunta was captured and brought as a slave to Annapolis, Maryland, and later sold to a plantation owner in Spotsylvania County, Virginia near the present-day rural community of Partlow. In the miniseries, the younger version of the character was portrayed by LeVar Burton, and the older version by John Amos.

Apparently, Al Qaeda — who have been watching the recent RACIST Republican tantrums, especially those at the “Million MORON March” of last weekend, want a piece of the action. [ WATCH BELOW ]

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From MediaMatters via Daily Kos: Over at Daily Kos, Markos catches Buchanan marking the 70th anniversary of Britain declaring war on Nazi Germany by arguing that Hitler has gotten a bum rap — he didn’t really want war.

As crazy as it seems, this actually isn’t a new line of argument for Buchanan. He has long held that World War II was not “worth it,” that Hitler needn’t have been deposed, and that the Holocaust was Churchill’s fault, not Hitler’s. MediaMatters catalogued those and other monstrous Buchanan claims in a column back in June. [ READ MORE ]

From MediaMatters: Conservatives on Obama’s stay-in-school speech: “Indoctrination,” “brainwashing,” Communist China, Hitler Youth — Numerous conservatives have claimed that President Obama’s upcoming September 8 speech about “persisting and succeeding in school,” along with classroom activities about the “importance of education,” will “indoctrinate” and “brainwash” schoolchildren. Conservatives have compared Obama’s address to Chinese communism and the Hitler Youth, while also calling for parents to “keep your kids home” from the “fascist in chief.” [ READ MORE ]

Colmes mocks speech conspiracy: Next, you’ll “accuse them of implant chips in” kids so they go “Obama, Obama, Obama“

Beck shares “Worst Persons” silver for endorsement of parents’ keeping children home from school on day of Obama’s address

Beck links Mussolini, “completely unrelated” Obama “indoctrination next week“

Stigall on Obama school speech: “I didn’t say the message was bad,” I just don’t want Obama to talk to my kid alone

Sanity on hold: Fox News warns Democrats: “Don’t meddle with our patriotic music” — Fox News hosts have recently fixated on the House’s decision to terminate a pilot program to — in the words of Bret Baier — “kill the patriotic tunes callers hear when they’re put on hold.” Sean Hannity claimed that it “serves as a lesson to the Democrats: Don’t meddle with our patriotic music,” while Fox & Friends co-host Steve Doocy said the program is “one of the most boneheaded moves of the summer” and claimed “America wins” because the House is once again playing “patriotic” music. [ READ MORE ]

Lou Dobbs and his hate groupies: By now, CNN’s Lou Dobbs, with his single-minded obsession over all things anti-immigrant and his bizarre embrace of the loony birther movement, is well known for trafficking in disturbing, misleading, and often inaccurate garbage. Escaping under the radar of many, however, are his close associations with an organization that has been described by experts as a “hate group.” [ READ MORE ] [ LOU DOBBS - AN ANTI-IMMIGRANT BIGOT. A RACIST, XENOPHOBIC EXTORTIONIST ]

FEAR AND LOATHING IN PRIME-TIME CABLE NEWS
Watch Buchanan falsely imply that Malaria can be passed directly from human to human! Incredible Lies

GOP Senator To Town Hall: Obama Determined To Turn Terrorists Loose On U.S. Soil — “I never dreamed I would see an administration try to disavow all the things that have made this country different from all others,” Inhofe told more than 300 people at a town hall meeting in the Grove Community Center. “I have never seen so many things happening at one time so disheartening to America.” Inhofe found a highly receptive audience. Many wore T-shirts of a local organization called Get America Back. Its Web site promises “a plan to eliminate the socialist government and return Americas (sic) freedoms.”

The “plan” is a link to a YouTube video by Lloyd Marcus, a Florida artist and singer making the circuit of anti-Obama “Tea Party” rallies.

Wednesday’s audience was similar to those at town hall meetings throughout northeastern Oklahoma in recent weeks. Concerns centered on the administration and Democratic-controlled Congress.

Inhofe gave his constituents plenty to worry about. “Every institution that has made this country the greatest nation in the world is under attack,” he said at the end of the 75-minute session.

During those 75 minutes, Inhofe said President Barack Obama is disarming the military, is destroying everything good about America and is determined to turn foreign terrorists loose on U.S. soil.

The good news, he said, is that he does not think the Democratic leadership can push through health-care reform or the more controversial parts of its energy bill. He also said he continues to be proven correct in his claim that global climate change is a hoax. [ READ MORE ]

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I just finished re-reading the book — “The I Hate Republicans Reader: Why the GOP is Totally Wrong About Everything.” I wish the author could update it to 2009.

From Publishers Weekly – Clint Willisis mad as hell, and he isn’t going to take it any more. For readers similarly mad-who think Republicans are “insufferable stinkers” or that they’re “small-minded, selfish, arrogant, power-mad, murderous little twits” – this book will surely satisfy. This anthology gathers dozens of pieces, including excerpts from bestselling books by Michael Moore, Molly Ivins, Eric Schlsosser, and pieces by Paul Krugman, Paul Begala and other well-known liberal voices. Alan Dershowitz highlights the injustice of the Supreme Court’s decision in the 2000 presidential election; Hunter Sl. Thompson remembers Richard Nixon after his death (“He was the real thing-a political monster straight out of Grendel“); Paul Begala recounts the “mutually beneficial relationship” between former Enron CEO Ken Lay and George W. Bush. As election time nears and the 2004 presidential election gears up, liberals will appreciate this handy reminder of Republican wrongdoing. [ READ ALL REVIEWS]

In 888 Reasons to Hate Republicans: An A to Z Guide to Everything Loathsome About the Party of the Arrogant Rich, the author(s) list numerous reasons why you should hate Republicans. Here are a few:

 1.   Republicans stand for raw, unbridled EVIL and GREED and IGNORANCE smothered in balloons and ribbons — READ: Sarah Palin, Glenn Beck.

 2.   Pat Buchanan

 3.   Republicans believe that when Christ comes back he’ll be a social conservative with a trickle-down strategy for salvation — including HEALTH CARE!

 4.   Republicans care more about their dogs than they do the homeless

 5.   Republicans live in suburbs where they never have to confront their RACISM

 6.   Republicans consistently include electric chairs, firing squads, gas chambers, hanging, lethal injection, and the Right to Life as planks in their party platforms

 7.   They prefer property rights to civil rights

 8.   They define the pursuit of happiness as the pursuit of dollars

 9.   They prefer redistribution of wealth from the middle class to the truly wealthy

10.   Clarence Thomas

11.   They laugh at the three stooges, not WITH them

12.   The only VALUES Republicans are really concerned about are property values

13.   Republican employers have an unhealthy interest in their employee’s urine

14.   Spiro Agnew (Nixon’s Dick Cheney), “a flat-out knee-crawling thug with the morals of a weasel on speed.”

15.   Republicans: Bloodthirsty Bitches and Pious Pimps of Power:The Rise and Risks of the New Conservative Hate Culture

Want More? Here are 41 Things You Have To Believe To Be A Republican Today

Hilarious – Comedians Hate Republicans Too!

   Bill O’Reilly’s Cousin: Here is one member of the Republican Party’s BASE — A SOUTHERN STRATEGY
   Sucker/Victim!

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