Sorry, Honey, but Truth Trumps the Race Card

Kyle-Anne Shiver
Thu, 17 Sep 2009 21:00:00 -0700
Opinion

It takes a bit of real grit these days for a white Southerner to talk publicly about the race card. But there are some things so egregiously off the mark that only a coward would remain silent in the face of them. So, count me in. I'm a Southerner. I'm white. And I'm about as riled as I've ever been.

It took a whole bottle of Pepto-Bismol last weekend to ease my nauseated response to Maureen Dowd's little Yankee-female-dog screed about Joe Wilson's blatant-only-to-her racism. But then I realized, upon further viewing and reading, that she wasn't alone in her un-American rampage against the First Amendment. Politico's Jonathan Martin did a whole column on the various highly positioned Democrats who see racism behind every tree of Obama dissent. The TV folks tread a bit more lightly, sticking to the coward's refuge of innuendo and suggestion.

Now, did I miss something extremely important in the fine print on our presidential ballots last year? Was there some fishy legalese specifying that if Barack Obama were elected, then I as a citizen would thereby give up my right to free speech and would have to walk barefoot over hot coals if I criticized any of his policies? Did I miss some dictate down there on the ballot in my Southern state that notified me of my loss of U.S. citizenship in the event that Barack Obama would become the first black president? I don't think so.

Could these white, liberal, poppycock-spewing media folks possibly be more genuinely racist? Protecting a black president like he's some kind of child, unable to take up for himself, is the most reprehensible form of racism, and every single black voter in these United States ought to be absolutely outraged by it.

Purely as a public service, let me state the obvious unequivocally. Real Americans of my own generation fought long and arduously to topple Jim Crow, burying the sinful legacy of our past. And some even died so that President Barack Obama could be elected — not only elected, but so that he would also have the rightful honor of being just as publicly scorned, ridiculed, disliked and embattled as every white-male president who has preceded him. In absolutely equal fashion he must be treated, or else the whole civil rights movement was for nothing and Martin Luther King Jr. spoke his valiant words in vain. Affirmative action favoritism — a white-liberal-racist invention — does not extend to the presidency of the United States of America. Period.

The establishment media needs to understand once and for all that if they're not willing to be colorblind protectors of the people's right to know, then they will be — in perfect capitalistic fashion — moved right off the stage posthaste.

Which brings us back to the matter of Joe Wilson and whether or not he was speaking truth to power when he claimed the president was lying about coverage for illegal aliens in H.R. 3200. President Obama may not have been telling a bald-faced lie, but he was definitely lurking too close to the liars' den. Within hours of the president's speech before Congress, the White House made a formal announcement that provision for checking citizenship status needed to be added. Furthermore, two such amendments had already been offered by Republicans, but both were roundly rejected by Democrats. That's entirely too much circumstantial evidence on the side of Joe Wilson for the likes of Maureen Dowd to be casting such inflammatory stones down this side of the Mason-Dixon.

Now, down to a little more turkey-talking on the president's speechified claims about the governmentalization of our health care system. A number of establishment-media big-leaguers have taken on the truly colorblind role with which the fourth estate is commissioned. And their factual assessments of the president's claims are not terribly favorable to Obama's credibility.

All the while casting his foes as those who "smear," "spread falsehoods," "use scare tactics" and otherwise "bear false witness," President Obama himself smeared, spread falsehoods, used scare tactics and otherwise bore quite a bit of false witness.

Investor's Business Daily enumerated 15 distinct, quite problematic instances of misinformation uttered by the president in his speech before Congress. Whether one chooses to call these "lies" or "misinformation" probably depends upon one's own proclivity for candor.

The Heritage Foundation debunked 10 false claims in the speech. Reason Magazine, a fierce supporter of the president's election, published a column calling it like it is, "Obama's Lies Matter, Too." The not-known-for-racism group, FactCheck.org, listed six big areas where the president fudged the truth in very carefully worded ways that seemed intentionally misleading.

So, the next time some insanely condescending liberal tries to pull the race card from his hand and lay it on the table like it's some kind of cockamamie trump card, be ready and armed with the truth. Because, honey, truth trumps the race card every single day of the week.

And that's exactly how MLK envisioned it. It's all about character. It ain't about race.

Don't you media elitists dare rob MLK and all of us who fought alongside him of that victory by shielding the first black president like he is some kind of boy. He's a man. Equal to his white-male predecessors in every single respect. And if he can't take the heat in the hottest darned kitchen on the planet, he needs to get the heck out and take his nanny press with him.