See, in a post-racial America, when we see a member of Congress break all traditional rules of decorum and respect by shouting, "You lie!" at the President of the United States during a joint session, we say to ourselves, "That was so rude, he should be censured; his emotions got the better of him."

In a post-racial America, we say, "well of course he is against reform-- his top campaign contributors are health care professionals. Money and corruption remains a very powerful force in American politics."

Sometimes the really savvy observers in a post-racial America speak not of race, but of generic othering-- the grouping of someone into a scary category by accusing them of being Marxist, communist, fascist, Hitleresque, Heath Ledger Jokeresque, or a liar. "People can do that to anybody of any party and of any race, e.g. George W. Bush. This is just a feature of the coarseness of contemporary political dialog," we say.

But in this post-racial America, if someone wonders if this, by all accounts, unprecedented effrontery was in any small way related to emotions embedded in racial themes that are part of our collective history and psyche, well, such a ponderer is herself or himself a racist, trapped in the old America. Yes, in the post-racial America, erasure is paramount, so when a white Congressman from South Carolina, born into the segregated south in 1947, whose two political mentors were Strom Thurmond and Floyd Spence (fellow South Carolinians who were members of the States' Rights Democratic "Segregation Forever!" Party), cannot contain himself when in the presence of the first African American president in U.S. history, we cannot discuss these possible influences on the emotions that caused his outburst. Surely they would be irrelevant to the ideas of a policy maker from South Carolina, a state that held firmly to the Confederate Flag until 2000, that refused to honor the federal holiday honoring Martin Luther King Jr. for 17 years, and is home to GOP operative Mike Green who likes to tweet knee-slappers like: "JUST HEARD OBAMA IS GOING TO IMPOSE A 40% TAX ON ASPIRIN BECAUSE IT'S WHITE AND IT WORKS." That, too, is Post-racial America.

So Mr. Beck, you seem to have this labeling thing down, knowing just when it is okay to call someone a racist, so I am wondering if you could tell me about the gentleman from South Carolina, the Honorable Addison Graves "Joe" Wilson, Sr. (R - SC). Since he apologized, nevermind. Forget I even mentioned any of this. Please.

1. the controversy was created by the white house's handling of the speech, not by cynical partisanship. had the wh been more open about the speech and its content, people would not have felt it was being foisted upon them. (um, ok)

2. the speech is self-serving and self aggrandizing. look how many times he said "I" and how much he talked about himself. (nevermind the importance of trying to connect on a human level with your audience. use of the pronoun "I" more times than the word "country" is a sure sign of a god-complex, anti-americanism, or both.

3. the speech is inappropriate for younger audiences... should we really tell kindergarten students about AIDS? (discussing the speech length or complexity or tone is valid if it is going to be done in a constructive spirit).

preview:
http://hotair.com/archives/2009/09/07/obama-school-speech-released/

gkp

b) tpm covered a sitting mayor in a political scandal in a city that has been in crisis for 3 decades. it was newsworthy particularly given campaign season, democratic charges about republican corruption, and the kilpatrick family's support of obama. as for being the only news outlet-- that is the point of the post. tpm and josh in particular usually stick to what's relevant. if it is dirt, it is posted because of the politics surrounding the dirt. i expect retarded morality from other outlets; i have generally respected most of josh's editorial decisions, and it is my guess that this photo essay was not his call, hence the title.

c) there is a difference between racial motivation , i.e., something would not happen save the presence of race, and something being influenced by a racial lens, be it conscious or subconscious. i raised the question, which is different than making a charge. i don't think it is implausible, given the pathological obsession with black male sexuality/criminality that is deeply embedded in american culture, that some of these cats at tpm and many of their faithful readers were interested enough in these texts to pour over them for juicy tidbits. it is possible that if there were reams of documents in the craig or vitter scandals that would have ocurred; it is possible that folks did that with o'reilly because it is good journalistic practice or maybe it is linked to his particular brand of hypocrisy; but perhaps race and gender tropes continue to factor into the way we view these stories.

d) actually, there was no race angle. rhianna/c.brown is raised in the context that these publications don't give a shit about these 20 year old kids, as evidenced by the recent lambasting she has taken for allegedly "taking him back." they don't care about 1/3 of all u.s. women being the victims of sexual violence or a woman being battered every 12 seconds; they don't care but put on a show of compassion for the first round of headlines to sell some rags. and now the second round of sales is about plastering her victimhood everywhere. so the parallel was about this game we and the media play-- like we care about kilpatrick's wife? or the girlfriend? or the city of detroit? bullshit. and edwards was running for president-- different ball of wax, different stakes, different post-clinton context.

as an african american, american, human being or whatever, you should be offended by the escapism and voyeurism, not to mention criminal intrusion into your fellow citizens' privacy, that passes as news and information.

thanks for playing.