Letters to the Editor
calgodot
Published Letters: 256 Editor's Choice: 6
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Honest Discussion on Race
[Read the article: Can Democrats learn to talk about race?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Here's how honest discussions on race go between blacks and "liberal" whites:
WHITE: Let's have an honest discussion about race.
BLACK: Wow. It's about time!
WHITE: You start.
BLACK: Okay. We have a lot of problems with the white dominance of political and business sectors of American life. It leads to active and passive forms of racism. It engenders a deep feeling of hopelessness among our race as they rarely, if ever, see black people achieving the same levels of success as whites. Other than by dealing drugs, playing basketball (controlled by white owners), or becoming a misogynistic hiphop artist (owned by a white corporations). This is not to mention the overwhelming impact of the war on drugs and the obviously racist legal system, which results in nearly a third of all black men being incarcerated at one point in their lives. The discrepancy leads one to believe the deck is stacked, and not in our favor.
WHITE: But we gave you affirmative action. We gave you welfare.
BLACK: Yes, and those things helped, for a time. But even the effective application of those policies revealed a somewhat paternalistic - and racist - attitude towards our race. White liberals may have had the best intentions in creating those systems, but the end result is generations of dependency, poverty and hopelessness. What we really need are opportunities to help ourselves, rather than handouts which simply make us dependent on our old masters. We need black-owned businesses, black-owned banks, black-owned corporations. We don't need you to "give" them to us - but we need you to make it just as easy for a black American to do it as a white. And it just isn't so. The welfare system essentially created a new form of slavery, and little has been done to correct it.
WHITE: Now don't bring slavery into it. That was a hundred years ago. I don't own any slaves.
BLACK: It was a hundred years ago, and while you may not own slaves, your ancestors may have. Many white ancestors did. The economic power and success of America was built on the bloodied backs of black slaves, and we are still kept from enjoying those rewards in as great a degree as whites. Again, the disparity seems stacked; it may well be accidental or circumstantial, but the failure to correct it in 100 years is not an accident.
WHITE: Well I'm not a racist.
BLACK: Maybe not. But the system from which you derive the essentials of life rewards your race in far greater proportion than my race. While you yourself may not be a bigot, you benefit from a system which is bigoted.
WHITE: Well, there's nothing I can do about that. Giving up my privilege won't help anything.
BLACK: Perhaps not. But simply going along with it won't change anything either.
WHITE: Since I didn't do anything to create this system, and I cannot do anything to repair it, I simply cannot see any solution. I think it is time for your people to put the past behind us and work harder to get along with whites.
BLACK: Then we'll never find a solution.
WHITE: In the end, that's okay with me. I've still got my SUV, house in a nice neighborhood, 24-hour police protection, political leaders who look like me and think like me, businesses which will trust me on sight because of my skin color. I've still got my privilege.
BLACK: But I thought you wanted to have an honest dialog.
WHITE: We did. You go back to work now. I'm going to deposit my refund check and buy a new jet ski. See you on the beach!
BLACK: Yeah. See you on the beach. If they don't cancel the bus route from my neighborhood to the shore. Or if I don't get arrested for daring to walk around in a rich, all-white, beachfront neighborhood.
The biggest obstacle to any honest dialog on race is the refusal of whites to honestly face their part in the ongoing system of racism and privilege known as AMERICA.
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Oh yeah. Life goes on.
[Read the article: Rumsfeld blamed generals for lack of forces in postwar Iraq]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]"Long after the thrill of living is gone."
You can bet millions of dead Iraqis and over 4,000 dead Americans, as well as their grieving relatives, share this sentiment.
Life goes on indeed.
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KateTex is a Real Hillary Supporter
[Read the article: Hillary enters death-with-dignity phase]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]My take on KateTex: she's a 55-year old divorced Pisces female from Texas, who loves Grey's Anatomy and Boston Legal. This would put her right smack in the middle of Hillary's demographic. She's Joan Walsh with a Texas accent.
I'm sure most Democrats wish KateTex (and her doppleganger ProudTexasGirl) were Republicans-in-disguise, but in fact they are the face of your newest Democratic sub-demographic: angry divorced women who admire Hillary for achieving what they could not - a stable marriage and a successful career - and alarmingly equate every male (especially successful ones with attractive wives) to their evil ex-husbands. They'll hang on to Hillary the same way they hang on to their alimony checks and custody agreements: until the bitter, bitter, bitter end.
Cue accusations of misogyny in 5... 4... 3... 2...
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She looks like a drag queen I knew in New Orleans
[Read the article: Should this dress be illegal?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Maybe it's the sunglasses.
Hilarious.
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Betting Pool
[Read the article: Republicans twist Obama's statements about Israel]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]How long before the Clinton campaign begins suggesting that Obama considers Israel to be an "open sore" "apartheid state?"
A. 3 days
B. 2 days
C. 1 day
D. Wow, they're already doing it.