Actually look at REAL history, as opposed to left wing talking points made by communists. Roger Kimball lays it out for us:1) Does Barack Obama think that American history is unusually “tragic” as compared to the history of other great nations? And (2), what does it tell us that journalists were cheering him when he said that?
Regarding the first, how does American history stack up against other countries you know about when it comes to sadness and tragedy. Take Germany–no, that’s too easy. Take France and start in the time of Julius Caesar or, if that is too long ago, in the time of the Cathars and move forward noting the sadnesses and tragedy. Remember Arnaud-Amaury, the papal legate who over saw the siege of Béziers in 1209? Asked by one of his soldiers how they should distinguish the innocents from the Cathars, Arnaud-Amaury memorably replied, “Tuez-les tous. Dieu reconnaîtra les siens,” “Kill ‘em all. God will know his own.” Or take a look a French life under Louis XIV, or under Robespierre and his fellow virtucrats, or under Napoleon. Ask Alfred Dreyfus about sadness and tragedy. The Dreyfus affair is also convenient for those who thrill, as do many readers of the Times, at the prospect of an orgy of national guilt. And speaking of national guilt, let’s not forget Vichy France: there are lots of opportunities there to indulge in a bit of moral masturbation.
Not that France has a monopoly or even a majority interest in such sadness and tragedy, as a look at the history of the Balkans, or Russia, or India, or China, or Japan, or the entire continent of Africa demonstrates. Indeed, when it comes to the sort of sadness and tragedy that Obama dilated on in Chicago, America has been conspicuously on the mild end of such things. I don’t deny the sordidness of slavery, the horrors of the Civil War, and all the other blemishes one might exhibit to show that America has not been perfect and has suffered its share of historical unpleasantness. But in the scheme of things, does it not seem to be an unusually blessed society, one that has been unusually spared the sorts of sadness and tragedy that form such a grim recitative in many, maybe most other countries?
Obama mentions slavery early and often, but what is more significant: the fact that slavery existed in America in the 18th and half of the 19th centuries (as it did in many other parts of the world) or that Americans took it upon themselves to end it and that today Barack Obama is a millionaire and the presumptive Democratic candidate for President?
And as for “acknowledging” the bad things from the past, what else have we been doing for the last three decades. How much expiation does Barack Obama, or Al Sharpton, or Jesse Jackson want? Just a few days ago, the U.S. Congress formally “apologized” for slavery: I employ scare quotes, because the apology is as meaningless as it is hypocritical. Really, I suspect, what is wanted is not “acknowledgment” but perpetual obeisance to an ever receding, impossible ideal of political rectitude.
See, if Barry would have done some research while
There is probably a lot one could say about the piece The New York Times ran yesterday about Barack Obama’s 12-year tenure teaching law at the University of Chicago. That Obama “never completed a single work of legal scholarship” may seem surprising given that he was teaching at a major research university where, as the Times notes, “most colleagues published by the pound.” Unsurprising is that, even back then, Obama exuded an aura of “self-absorption” and was surrounded by “groupies.”
Kimball also shows us the false premise of some type of racial test the Left is trying to say we will fail if Obama doesn't win:
Which brings me back to the Times’s story on Obama’s career at the University of Chicago. In the course of that story, the reporter confronts the reader with “what may be the ultimate test of racial equality–whether Americans will elect a black president.”
I stopped short reading that because I think it gets the issue 100% wrong. The implication is that if Obama is not elected, then Americans fail the test. But that, I submit, is a racist idea. How many liberals do you know who plan to vote for Barack Obama because he is black, that is to say, for a racist reason?
The true racists are those who won't let us move on from our so-called "original sin". I am not a racist because I won't vote for Obama. However, I would be racist if I thought I should vote for him because he is black. I seem to remember some wise man who said we should judge people not by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character....now that guy, he was a transformational leader.
America may not be perfect, but to say her history is mostly sad and tragic is ridiculous. To say that just because a black man is not elected president, that a whole country is racist, that is just insane. To say that because you don't agree with or vote for somebody, that you wish them death, is just stupid. However, liberals are doing all three.
Let's get beyond the hyphenated American arguments. That Obama can be the candidate has to say something about where America is...I mean, when has France come even close to electing a black man (there are Afro-French, I have seen them) to lead the nation? When has Canada? When has Mexico? When has England (there are blacks in England)? To say, if Obama loses, that America is just showing racism is simply a sad and pathetic joke that shows an intellectual void so big you couldn't get 1980s Roseanne Barr to fully fill it.
