Friday, September 16, 2005

Race-baiting Redux II

[The resident race-baiter at the Lexington Herald-Leader is a lady named Merlene Davis. In her Sunday column of Sept. 4, she was at her best, accusing everyone she could think of – of every bad thing she could think of – of every bad motive she could think of – of course, especially if they happened not to be African Americans. In her Sunday column of Sept 11, Ms. Davis, still at her best, explained all about why hip-hopper (whatever that is) Kanye West said in the wrong venue that the president hates black folk. She even gave a lecture on freedom of speech. In her column of Sept. 15, she kept up the attack. Below are some excerpts (in black) from this most recent column, with some comments (in red):

I think the slow response to the needs of the poor black people in New Orleans -- who withered on highways under the unforgiving Southern sun or died waiting for help that didn't come for days -- was due to their financial situation and skin color. Since you used “and” instead of “or” in your description (financial, skin color), what about the dead or withering who were white?

Even if those black people were on welfare or if the single mothers had far too many children with far too many fathers, they deserved to be treated with dignity. They deserved to be treated with compassion, not dignity. You will not agree with this if the Bible means nothing to you, but the Bible is my source for this assertion, although natural law for the civilized militates against indiscriminate breeding, which is characteristic of animals. Fornication and adultery are categorically condemned in scripture, as well as by an ordered society, and those who practice either are neither dignified nor morally eligible to expect respect. The children born of these unions (7 of 10 in the black community and far too many in the white) are virtually doomed to be behind, right from the start. Legally, they have no fathers of record, thus no mandated (who can afford a palimony suit?) paternal support, either financially or morally. Too often, they exist on welfare, a minimal, short-changing condition. Far from demanding dignity for these people, you should take the lead in setting them straight. In the Danville paper the other day was a picture of an evacuee family in Lancaster – mother (50), daughter (maybe 20), the “fiancé,” and their two children, with a third due in November. The grandmother said they had it better there than in New Orleans, but why weren’t the daughter and fiancé married, at least after the first child, if the child actually was his? In the black community, it’s the fiancé who is the sire, and in the white community it’s the live-in boyfriend. The former just deserts sooner or later, while the latter often beats the child to death, with the silly mother as an accomplice, and they go merrily off to the Big House. This is the reason Roe/Wade should stay intact, and I’m quite conservative. Until you and your folk get hold of this problem, you will fall steadily behind. Dignity? Like esteem, it must be earned.

Poverty is suffering enough without being treated like disposable animals. Poverty doesn’t suffer; people suffer because of poverty. The “disposable animal” thing is beneath contempt, and you should be ashamed. Disposable animals are the ones that are eaten. You have heard of hamburgers, I presume.

Thank God for the news media during this tragedy. I'll bet if you ask any of the survivors who suffered needlessly after Katrina was long gone, they would say that if it were not for the unflinching eye of the worldwide press, the days of inaction might have stretched into a week. Consider the interesting information the media furnished, to wit, that the poor New Orleans folk didn’t get out because they were too poor to own cars. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, in 2004, on average, only 8.7% of housing units nationally did not have a car attached to them. In New Orleans, the figure was somewhat better – only 8.6%. The figures for Mississippi and Alabama, respectively, were 7.7% and 6.4%, meaning that in all three areas the car situation was better than in the rest of the country. Or, have you noticed the inordinate numbers of cars all over New Orleans pictured by the media every day, that have been under water? Did you notice the five-lane traffic out of New Orleans before the hurricane hit? Did you notice that some 60% of New Orleans folk, when polled in the week before the hurricane hit, flatly said they would NOT leave. The smart ones left. The others didn’t, and the availability of cars had nothing to do with it.

I have never been prouder of my fellow journalists. Are you kidding? They all became editorialists on the spot, grandstanding in the water and blowing smoke. Journalism was not their bag. Whining and screaming marked their performance, even in print, and they looked hopelessly ignorant in the process.

And the Bush administration has never been shown to be more naked than during those dreadful days. Obviously, the emperor with no clothes was New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin. A more inept, pathetic creature than this guy didn’t and doesn’t exist. Either he was too dumb to have a clue, or too egotistical to know how self-serving and dumb he was…or both. In any case, multiple deaths are on his hands, and you don’t have to be told why. Every school-bus and city bus, all available (the no-driver thing just won’t wash) days before the storm, that went under the water stand awash now to condemn him as a virtual criminal.

Our government, Democratic and Republican, closed its ears and eyes to the Gulf Coast disaster. And the mere fact that some of you sent e-mails blaming those left behind for their situation instead of blaming those who could have saved them is a sign of something truly wrong with this country. No government closed its eyes and ears. You don’t seem to understand, especially in light of the extensive damages caused in Florida alone during the last two years by lesser storms, that a category 5 will, by definition, cause effects beyond any human ability to foresee, except that it will wreak absolute havoc. New Orleans suffered, not primarily because of Katrina’s immediate impact, but because of the levee-rupture, which was not even noticed until 24 hours after the storm hit. The wonder is that, considering the absolute failure of both Nagin and Governor Blanco, rescuers accomplished what they did in as short a time as they did it. It was amazing.

Why is $2,000 good enough for the folks in the gulf when hundreds of thousands of dollars were handed to the families of those lost in the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11? That’s a fair question. Stay tuned. You haven’t seen yet what the total outcome will be, but, while Katrina may not produce millionaires, the people will be cared for, as dislocated families are after every hurricane. But relocating and settling 150,000 families is something so off the level of consciousness of average people or of any government that overnight miracles simply will not happen, though many miracles have already been seen. A lot of them were wrought by white guys hanging off helicopters or slopping through the toxic waters of the city, trying to save people from an actually unimaginable disaster.

Just how much more must the poor give up before we realize the compassionate conservative, a theme our president espoused and liberals went right along with, does not exist? They haven’t been called upon to give up anything, and they certainly will not be called upon to give up anything else. Hurricanes do not call for giving up anything. They just take, thank you very much.

During the reign of Louis XVI of France, his wife, Marie Antoinette, was accused of saying the poor should eat cake if they had no bread. The French Revolution soon followed. Surely you’re too smart to go down that road.

It would be better to acknowledge the approaching train than to walk on the tracks in denial. Amen, sister! I used to be a locomotive engineer in another life, and I can attest to that.

And so it goes.

Jim Clark

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