Column for July 22, 2010

I hate racism in any form. I don't care from whom it comes or in what direction it is aimed. Racism comes with a huge amount of hypocrisy, and we have been witnessing it to a huge degree on the national political scene. When racism is alleged, it is something against which there is pretty much no defense. Just the accusation, even if it is erroneous, brands someone with a label from which there is often no coming back. But I guess that depends upon who your political allies are. Politics does make strange bedfellows, as the saying goes.

In December of 2002, United States Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott made some kind statements about Strom Thurmond at his 100th birthday party. He praised South Carolina Senator Thurmond for his long service, which included a bid for President in 1948. Thurmond ran for the presidency on a platform of racial segregation. He also voted against the Civil Rights Act and against making Martin Luther King Day a federal holiday. The latter I do not see as racist at all, but that is another topic for another day. These comments, which did not particularly support Thurmond's racist views, were met with scorn from left wing hacks and media. Within about two weeks, Trent Lott resigned his position as Senate Republican Leader.

Just recently, fellow politicians honored another stalwart of Congress. West Virginia Senator Robert Byrd recently passed away. Byrd was another man who had a serious problem with racism and segregation. Byrd actually recruited 150 men to start a new chapter of the Klu Klux Klan. Byrd is recorded as having written, "I shall never fight in the armed forces with a Negro by my side...Rather I should die a thousand times, and see Old Glory trampled in the dirt never to rise again, than to see this beloved land of ours become degraded by race mongrels, a throwback to the blackest specimen from the wilds." Byrd also filibustered against passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Byrd did eventually renounce his views, but that was well into his adult life.

I believe that it is hard to refute that the quote and actions of Byrd were overtly racist. And yet former President Bill Clinton excused Byrd's Klan activity as just something that Byrd did "trying to get elected". If you are willing to sell out your soul like this, it is not merely "trying to get elected".

Current President Barack Obama, a man for whose color Byrd's activities tended to show disdain, eulogized Byrd as a "distinguished gentleman" and a "Senate icon" that "climbed to such extraordinary peaks".

I guess one can be forgiven for being overtly racist but not for praising the career of one whom was overtly racist. Then again, that all depends upon the side of the political spectrum from which you come. I find that incredibly hypocritical.

When we hear something overtly racist such as the recent comments by the leader of the New Black Panther Party, "Minister" King Shamir Shabbaz, why does the same press that lambasted Trent Lott not snow up and cloud all over Shabbaz? Shabbaz expressed his abject hatred for Whites saying, "I hate White people. All of them. Every last iota of a cracker I hate him…You want freedom you’re going to have to kill some crackers. You’re going to have to kill some of their babies."

Why have the same political hacks that skewered Senator Lott and gave a pass to Senator Byrd not come out against such hate filled evil rhetoric? Instead, the Obama administration has dropped pursuing a case against Shabbaz and his group for voter intimidation. It was a "slam dunk" case against these men for standing outside of Philadelphia polling places during the Presidential Election of 2008, carrying weapons.

A Department of Justice attorney even resigned over that case because the Department of Justice would neither prevent nor allow him to testify on the case. In his words he "was told by Voting Section management that cases are not going to be brought against black defendants [for] the benefit of white victims."

Had the defendants been sheet wearing Klansmen, their actions would have been equally despicable, but I bet they would have been prosecuted to the fullest extent of the law by the Department of Justice run by a Black man who reports to a Black President.

Folks, again, I don't care from whom racism comes or in what direction it is aimed. It is wrong, it needs to stop, and we should not tolerate it in our government, our churches, our community, or our families.