Posted on 10/11/2009 8:50:44 PM PDT by smoothsailing
October 11, 2009
Obama and the end of white guilt
By Jeff Lukens
Barack Obama portrayed himself as America's first "post-racial" president, yet he and his supporters continue to play the race card against ordinary Americans who oppose him. Despite a big election victory, Obama is unable to understand that ordinary Americans do not like being bullied. Nor does he understand that they do not like being called racists for political disagreements.
The Obama agenda is desperate and out of ideas. In their desperation, they deal from the bottom of the deck. The race card has never failed them before, and when the logic of their position fails, evoking racism always ends the discussion. Unfortunately for them, this time the discussion will not end. The more they smear everyday Americans with the charge of racism, the more meaningless the accusation becomes.
In the wake of town halls, tea parties and 9/12 protests against Obama's policies, many media pundits — Jimmy Carter, Maureen Dowd of the New York Times, and Newsweek Magazine, to name a few — have branded these patriotic Americans as racists. It is appalling to think that the Left has played this game for decades. Americans of all backgrounds have fought for Civil Rights for too long to have accusations of racism used in such an offhand manner.
Among the many who voted for Obama, there is a growing sense that they have been had. The idea of electing an African-American for president intrigued them. Many voted for Obama with the belief that he was sincere about ending partisan and racial animosities. They believed that he was a new and transformative figure in Washington.
That was then. Now people are wise to his ways and do not like what they see. From runaway deficit spending, to a sputtering economy, to cap and trade, to weak foreign policy, the list of policy failures goes on. The more Obama speaks about his health plan, the more people do not want it. His magical spell may still work in Oslo for a Nobel Prize, but with the public over here, it is gone.
Even with 60 Democrat votes in the Senate, it is doubtful whether Obama will get a health plan passed. He is fading in the polls because everyone knows that his speeches are just words and don't mean anything. It is all a smokescreen to obscure his true agenda of restricting personal freedoms and imposing ever-greater state control.
The Obama presidency is destined to fail due to his doctrine-over-practicality approach to politics, and the impossibility of his plans to succeed. And just as people aren't buying into Obama's policies, people just aren't buying into blind charges of racism either.
Obama and his allies are overplaying the race card so often and so wantonly that such accusations no longer have much meaning. The irony of Obama's presidency is that the demon of white guilt that has haunted the nation since the founding may finally be exorcized. Whatever sense of guilt whites may have felt about the racial injustice in our history has faded with his rise to the presidency.
No matter. With Obama's blessing, Attorney General Eric Holder plans to hire more than 50 new civil rights lawyers to search out racism wherever it can be alleged. Obama's Department of Justice will now set out to undo the emphasis on cases of obvious discrimination, and create a divisive new witch-hunt.
Author, columnist, and research fellow, Shelby Steele wrote his book, "White Guilt," in 2006. According to Steele, the success of the Civil Rights movement in the 1960s showed that America's power structure lacked moral authority. White guilt was an attempt by whites to regain that right by attempting to appear benevolent toward blacks, while many African-American leaders took advantage of white guilt to gain handouts such as affirmative action. The result has been troublesome for both races, and for America as a whole.
While we should confront racism when it occurs, over the years it has become rare and marginalized. Only in a country as colorblind ours is could a black man easily win the presidency when white Americans cast the vast majority of the votes.
With the passing of white guilt from the forefront of the national conscience, perhaps the likes of Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton, Jeremiah Wright, and all the other race hustlers of the land will no longer be taken so seriously. And perhaps the identity politics that has divided the country and sustained the Democrat Party for a half-century can finally be ended.
When Obama and his ways are finally rejected, perhaps then, we can finally live in a country where all will be judged by the "content of their character." This may be one Obama legacy that we can look forward to.
© Jeff Lukens
They would not believe anything prior to the election; being so hell bent on voting for him. Anything, Anything but Bush or Palin....God forbid. And now they feel like they have been had. Well excuse me if I don't shriek with joy at their 'awakening'. Now we're stuck cleaning up a horrific mess that they created. The question is, can it be cleaned up before permanent damage is done.
See my tagline for details.
Being labeled a racist is a joke. It has virtually become a badge of honor. Being called a racist in this day of Obozo means that one is most assuredly NOT a racist.
This author apparently is clueless as to what this fascist is capable of or what is actually being done. He is making the same fatal mistake that many others are making thinking that this is simply incompetence.
I give good odds on the kitten drowning. He probably has a liaison with PETA. The question isn’t whether we can make skeletons rattle in October 2012. The question is which ones, there are so many to choose from.
The “white guilt” is better put as “white appeasement.” Once whitey understands ole blackface as unappeasable, whitey will stop.
Personally, I can’t even focus on 2012....I’m not sure we’re going to make it to 2010. Although, I did get some assurance today from JR who believes we can pull this out. I pray he’s right.
I meant to say “because ‘whitey’”, once... I should decline help from the ‘Department of Redundancy Department’ when I write my next post.
(singing)
I'm a racist.
You're a racist.
He's a racist.
She's a racist.
Wouldn't you like to be a racist, too?
Now I’ve got that tune stuck in my head...dang you! You are such a racist!!!!!!
Be a racist.
Drink Dr. Racist.
Be a racist.
Drink Dr. Racist.
It's stuck in my head, too.
(I'm so racist, I probably think this song is about me.)
Obamacola:
I’d like to build the world a home
And furnish it with love
Grow apple trees and honey bees
And snow-white turtle doves
I’d like to teach the world to sing
In perfect harmony
I’d like to hold it in my arms
And keep it company
I’d like to see the world for once
All standing hand in hand
And hear them echo through the hills
For peace throughout the land
(That’s the song I hear)
I’d like to teach the world to sing
(Let the world sing today)
In perfect harmony
I’d like to teach the world to sing
In perfect harmony
Id like to build the world a home
And furnish it with love
Grow apple trees and honey bees
And snow-white turtle doves
Funny you should post that song. I got a Coke from a drive-through window today and thought it tasted different from any Coke I’ve ever had. Oddly bland...not watered down or made with too little syrup, just...bland. Out of the blue it crossed my mind that the Obama administration is already cracking down on Americans’ sugar consumption. I know that this admin has it in for sodas; I wondered today if the WH is quietly forcing companies like Coca-Cola to “make over” their products. I’m no conspiracy theorist, but nothing would surprise me at this point!
Racist! :)
What about?
Whats good enough for voting folks, aint good enough for me! Me and my DNC, me and my DNC!
IMHO, the independents and moderates who voted for the rats in 2006 & 2008 will be so burned by the rats’ serial moonbattery and lies that it will be a long time before they cast such foolish votes again.
Despite all the comments about how gullible voters are, it’s not that difficult to see. People learn. They won’t be fooled again. It’s as easy as: Fool me once, shame on you. Fool me twice, shame on me.
ND, given the fact that almost half of the voting populace doesn’t pay taxes and the party that represents them wants to give them more reasons to have government take care of them, how we gonna beat that?
I see it the same way.
Democrats who run as centrists because they know they can’t be honest about their true flaming leftist ideology and win are bound to be smacked down at some point by the voters who elected them.
Sheesh, that’s a long sentence! :)
They counted on it continuing to work, but they have made a mockery of it - and well, they have hoisted themselves by their own petard
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