Posted on 11/22/2002 7:25:25 PM PST by where's_the_Outrage?
NASHINGTO- Teddy Roosevelt, sitting proudly on his oil-W painted horse in the White House room with his name, must have been horrified at Dr. Condoleezza Rice.
As President Bush's national security advisor, she should have known better. She wasn't supposed to say that. Not in a White House peopled with conservative Republicans. Not to a group of black columnists representing major newspapers from around the country.
Not in the Roosevelt Room.
''Race matters in America,'' Rice said. ''It has, it always has. Maybe there will be a day when it doesn't, but I suspect that it will for a long time to come.''
For the record, Rice didn't stutter or backtrack at the end of her interview with the Trotter Group. Instead, she did something that black conservatives aren't known for: She publicly acknowledged the reality and validity of the race question.
Now before you right-wingers get your boxers in a bunch, take a breath. She didn't go Al Sharpton on us, pledging to support reparations. She didn't say that Bush would apologize for the U.S. government's role in the slave trade.
But Rice did increase her credibility with us by affirming her place in the continuing cultural and political struggle that black people in the United States are engaged in - and she did it on her own terms.
Black conservatives, take note: It's OK to admit that race is still a problem in this country. You don't have to sink into denial. The sky won't fall down. The ground won't swallow you up.
It doesn't mean that you have to join Jesse Jackson's Rainbow Coalition, take Congresswoman Maxine Waters to lunch or join the NAACP.
It's safe to take your heads out of the sand and face the truth: While the United States has made tremendous progress on race, it still has a long way to go.
The December 2002/January 2003 edition of Savoy magazine has an extensive article on a class-action discrimination lawsuit that has been filed against Xerox. The plaintiffs contend that sales territories are segregated, promotions are race-based and harassment can take the form of hanging nooses being displayed in some Xerox facilities.
Xerox denies any discrimination, but there is plenty of reason to doubt its denial. According to Savoy writer Marjorie Whigham-Desir, the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission dismisses about 80 percent of the complaints lodged by citizens against employers believed to be discriminatory. But Whigham-Desir reported that the EEOC has affirmed the group and individual complaints against Xerox, finding that ''reasonable cause exists to believe'' the charges that the plaintiffs have made.
And in case you Bill Clinton-haters out there are wondering, this is the 2002 Bush EEOC, not that old, tired Clinton-era model.
So maybe Rice isn't alone in the Bush White House. Maybe the GOP is slowing veering away from the Republican Party of 1964, which dealt a fatal blow to race relations during the GOP Convention led by Sen. Barry Goldwater's Cow Palace Republicans in San Francisco. These Republicans were so hostile toward blacks that Hall-of-Famer and convention attendee Jackie Robinson said: ''I now believe I know how it felt to be a Jew in Hitler's Germany.''
At least we can take comfort in knowing that the Bush administration, whatever it's other faults may be, doesn't buy into the lies that have blocked qualified blacks from serving at the highest levels of government. Certainly, it's a good sign that Rice and Secretary of State Colin Powell hold two of the top four slots in the Bush White House, a point not lost on Rice.
''I think it says to people that there aren't boundaries in which black Americans are not supposed to play,'' she said. ''I think that's an extremely important message to the rest of the world.
''I am African American and proud of it,'' Rice said later. ''I wouldn't have it any other way. I do not believe that it has limited who I am or what I can become.''
Conservative or not, I can respect that. And frankly, it's easier to respect people with whom you disagree when you know you share an appreciation for your common experiences. And so under Teddy Roosevelt's watchful, if skeptical gaze, Condoleezza Rice - a fan of Motown, Clarence ''Gatemouth'' Brown and Kool and the Gang as well as Brahms - gave and gained a lot of respect last week.
David Person's column appears each Friday on the Commentary page. E-mail: davidpe@htimes.com; phone 532-4362.
Yes, I would.
Ummm ... actually, that is the America of today as we know it. Blacks living over here, whites living over there, Hispanics living back there, etc. Or did you somehow fail to notice that?
This failure to mix breeds a lot of nonsense in people's minds in ther feverish attempts to proove that they really aren't racist. Thus forced busing, affirmative action, minority set-asides, reparations, white refusal to even travel through minortiy nieghborhoods, red-lining, "see here's my one black friend how can I be a racist", etc.
If everyone would be more honest and open and simply state forthrightly with their mouth what they have already acted upon with their feet, America would be better off, and we would have a much better handle on the mixed ethnicity issue and its effects on us as a society.
Instead, everything is done in euphemisms and silently for fear of the race police. So instead of de-racializing society, this attitude breeds the exact opposite - everything must be passed through the race prism.
What he said may have been wrong, but just because he is proud of his german heritage doesn't mean you have to use Hitler as a slap in the face. Thats a nice subtle cheap shot you laid in there, that was uncalled for, there were alot of ways you could have taken shots at him for what he said, why you took the low road, was unnessary.
For starters, only a few decades ago, Southern Senators and Representaives, were ALL Dems . The KKK, though somewhat represented in a few Northern and Midwestern states, didn't firld political candidates there.
The Civil Rights Act, was ONLT passed with the help of the RR-E-P-U-B-L-I-C-A-N-S , as the Dems voted against it ; including Al Gore Sr. !
The nomination, of Richard Nixon, for the presidency, of the USA, in 11968, was seconded, on T.V. yet, by a prominant, black C-O-N-S-E-R-V-A-T-I-V-E woman, from Chicago !
OK, I think anyone who considers skin tone important is a dumbass. So I guess "race" matters a little bit after all.
Apparently, the way I phrased my question made more than a few people think I was black and write accordingly.
Wonderful! I'm a lineal descendant of Roger de Washbourne, of the Norman de Washbourne's who came over to England, thumped some Anglo-Saxon's around in 1066, and took up running large estates and opressing the peasantry. Ours was Little Washbourne and Great Washbourne in Gloucestershire. North on A435 out of Cheltenham, then right on B4077.
I haven't traced back those Normans far enough to find any colorful names like Skull-Splitter yet. ;-)
There aren't any blacks, living around me, now; however, having lived most of my life in big cities ( Manhattan & Chicago ), I have lived in neighborhoods, where, IF you could afford to live in them, it didn't matter what your race was. In Chicago, you had a far more difficult time getting into certain clubs, if you were a Jew, married to a Jew, or your great grandparents had been Jews, than if you were black. As to schools, my daughter went to THE finest private schools , and yes, some of her classmates were black. Some were of Asian descent, and in boarding school, some were Asians, some were Europeans, some were South Americans, and some were just Americans...of various races , religions, regions. She had and has friends from ALL of those groups; as do her father and I.
Since my daughter is married to an African ( Afrikaner ), my future grandchildren are going to be able to call themselves " AFRICAN - AMERICANS " , on PC aapplications and that makes me laugh my socks off! :-)
Adults who have felt the sting of racial discrimination, try to make this country a better place for their children.This is the goal.Many strive to achieve it.
I am not black.My fraternal white grandmother detested me, and my brothers, her own grandchildren, because my mother was "a half breed heathen Indian".I was born in 1958.
Am I bitter? DUH. But I moved on, and so can all of us, in the USA.We are the only society with a chance of doing so.The trick is not to pass the "sins of the fathers" to the children.
I was raised in a racist environment.My grandmother hated me, but she really, truly hated black people even more. Anyone who expects me to apologise for her attitude against blacks, can KMA.If anyone expects me to justify it,KMA.
Do the "victims" of race baiting ever stop to consider the relative youth of our society as the USA? Even today, in 2002, in various parts of the USA, the old saying " the only good Indian is a dead one" is accepted as a commonly known truth.Why do some blacks feel they have some kind of edge on racial discrimination pain, because their ancestors were imported live? As opposed to conquered and slain, Native American indigenous people?Please!Try to buy a clue here.
This is the 21st century.Get over it, and try not to pass barbaric racial or religious hatred to your children.It may be a part of your adult experience, but it need not be your child's.
Of course, race matters.It will probably take a few more generations before it does not.If we train our children that the racial hatred of the past is condoned or accepted, it will never go away.
Adults must use our logic to overcome childish impulses.WAKE UP EVERYONE.AN ENEMY OF ALL HUMANITY IS BEATING AT THE DOOR.WE CAN CHOOSE TO ADVANCE, OR WE CAN REVERT TO ABSOLUTE BARBARISM.
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