Wednesday, March 28, 2012

Politics of Resentment

Have you ever owned slaves? I haven’t. After years researching my ancestry in America and in Ireland going back to the mid-nineteenth century, I found no evidence that McLaughlins, Haggertys, Sullivans, McDonnells, Fitzgeralds, or any other branch of my family were slaveholders. Rather, many were near-slaves of British landlords. I feel no guilt about what happened to black slaves in America up to 1865, nor should I.

Neither do I feel any responsibility for discrimination against blacks in America during the 20th century. Catholics (which all my ancestors were) suffered from discrimination under British rule in Ireland until 1922. It continued until the 1980s or so where the McLaughlin branch comes from in Ulster, but I don’t resent British people or Unionist protestants in Northern Ireland today, nor should I. It would only hurt me if I did. That’s history - water under the bridge and over the dam. Virtually every race or ethnic group has suffered at one time or another. American blacks don’t have a monopoly on that. Some of my relatives here in America have suffered from discrimination against white males in the form of “Affirmative Action,” though it hasn’t been an obstacle for me that I’m aware of. I've written about all this in more depth here in a column titled "Heterosexual White Guy."
Growing up in greater Boston during the late 20th century I was infused with resentment of the British. Rather than look in the mirror, my extended family routinely blamed them for whatever difficulties or lack of progress we perceived in ourselves. That resentment was quite readily transferred to Yankee Protestants even after Massachusetts government was virtually taken over by us Boston-Irish-Catholic-Democrats at almost every level and John Fitzgerald Kennedy was elected president. Then it was transferred to “the rich” where it remains ubiquitous in today’s Democrat Party. It wasn’t rational, but that’s how it was among the people with whom I grew up and I was infected.Overcoming that was a long process and I’m finally rid of it, but I haven’t forgotten how it was to think and feel that way. It helps me understand the Democrat Party’s appeal as well as the Obama campaign’s reelection strategy. Both still beat the same drum while America circles the drain under their leadership. It’s all so clear to me lately as, down in Florida, I watch the “Reverends” Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson parrot the same tired victim language along with their fellow race pimps Louis Farrakhan and the New Black Panthers. Blame and resentment are their stock-in-trade. “All our problems stem from white racism and exploitation by ‘the rich,’ not from our own behavior or our own choices.” It’s their mantra.America is stuck because too many black Americans wallow in victimhood while millions of other Americans feel guilty being white. Together, they comprise Obama’s base. His campaign rode that base to victory in 2008 and is revving up to ride it again in 2012. Both the “Occupy” movement and the orchestrated outrage over the Trayvon Martin death may both be understood in that context.The Obama campaign nearly went off the rails in 2008 when the Trinity United Church of Christ in Chicago released a DVD of sermons by Barack Obama’s spiritual mentor, the Reverend Jeremiah Wright. First picked up by ABC News, it then went viral. “The world is controlled by rich, white people” bellowed Wright from his pulpit as other blacks in his congregation stood and ritually chanted agreement. That was just one of a series of outrageous things this reactionary, race-mongering hypocrite spewed from his Chicago church. Though Obama earlier claimed he’d attended Wright’s church for twenty years, he subsequently claimed never to have heard any of that vile filth and was shocked when he learned about it.Yeah, right.

If ABC and the rest of the Mainstream Media hadn’t helped Obama smooth over and then close the lid on this Pandora’s box of campaign-killing material - and if Senator John McCain hadn’t ordered his operatives not to use it against his opponent - much more would have come out and there wouldn’t be a President Obama.

When he was thirty, Obama led a demonstration at Harvard in support of Marxist Professor Derrick Bell, who wrote at the time: “The whole [classical] liberal worldview of private rights and public sovereignty mediated by the rule of law needed to be exploded." Bell believed the US Constitution was racist and was reportedly invited to speak at Wright’s church. Obama was a true believer in all that too, but he’s been able to smooth-talk it over and mitigate political damage. His lapdog US media has given him a free pass up to now and is cooperating fully in Florida as the “Reverends” Jackson and Sharpton whip up another racial frenzy before all the facts are in. Remember Sharpton and Tawana Brawley? Remember the Duke Lacrosse team? Remember Obama said the Cambridge Police “acted stupidly” when another of his black Harvard professors had a snit? When he said last week that, “If I had a son, he would look like Trayvon,” he was clearly implying that Martin was killed because he was black. Remember, this is the Barack Obama who said: “White folks’ greed runs a world in need.” The president is in full campaign mode, stirring up resentment one hand and pretending to transcend it on the other.

Or am I, like Obama’s grandmother, just thinking like a “typical white person”?

9 comments:

Anonymous said...

Tom , reading your column is like breathing fresh air and makes me think for a moment that reason might prevail, that truth could still be heard in these dark times . But then I just have to open the New York Times or listen to the nightly news to see how quickly THAT balloon deflates . My voice , your voice , one or two others maybe , all these cries in the wilderness will be silenced by the liberal press steamroller and the deafening sound of ignorance and the leftist propaganda machine.

Anonymous said...

Barry soetoro's parents were CIA. his past is a mystery.
Breitbart had the goods on him------ from the same Harvard speech you mentioned, but not edited like the one that was released. Breitbart was murdered. Obama has jailed Whistleblowers with the gusto of a nazi. Speaking of which, Kennedy's grandfather was a nazi sympathizer and a bootlegger. That's why his son was picked to be president. They thought he would be easy to control. But he was to sign an executive order ending the fed. Next thing you know he's dead..go figure.

Sheriff arpaio has the goods on Barry but the corporate media ignores and makes fun. The birth certificate is a joke. So is his selective service registration debacle.

The biggest mistake you make is classifying him a liberal. What? Please explain how a neo con agenda is liberal? Please...He is a war mongering corporate shill who,is shredding our constitution. I am at a comlete loss as to why you want to play backwoods racist instead of exposing the truth about Barry----- he's a CIA product with a definite agenda. And via ndaa he has ended democracy as we know it. They want us to be all riled up,over race. Makes it easier to keep killing the bill of rights. And yes, Barak is going to wish he never mentioned the treyvon killing. It's gong to come out that treyvon indeed assaulted the other guy.

Anyone interested in Barry soetoros rise to power. Should watch The Obama Deception , YouTube it.

Winston Smith said...

Martin Luther King jr.'s niece on the recent shooting:

"Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s niece is criticizing the Rev. Al Sharpton and the Rev. Jesse Jackson for politicizing the Trayvon Martin shooting and leveraging racial tensions to rile up Americans."

Read more: http://dailycaller.com/2012/03/28/alveda-king-sharpton-jackson-should-stop-playing-race-card-over-trayvon-martin/#ixzz1qRDxIrrS

Anonymous said...

Amen.

Rhonda said...

If a woman dresses like a hooker, she will be looked upon and treated like a hooker. If a man dresses and acts like a gangster, he will be looked upon and treated like a gangster. Trayvon beat the crap out of Zimmerman, and acted out the person he was portraying. BUT that still doesn't mean that he deserved death.

Anonymous said...

Jesse and Al have never been good for much else except stirring the pot. All this nonsense about the birth certificates and nazis and Kennedy, is not really relevant.
But everyone has their cause and even the white folks can talk usless trash.

Anonymous said...

Uhm, how is a fake birth certificate not relevant? He is the president!! His past is beyond shady. Breitbart had a heart attack the night before he was to release a bombshell on Obama? come on.....

The Kennedy stuff, while true, is not so relevant here.

Anonymous said...

Just demonstrating more of that compassionate catholic ideology huh, Tom? I believe one of the main tenets of Catholicism is to be selfish, self satisfied and have no compassion or empathy for those less fortunate, or different than you. Isn't that what the good book and Jesus taught?
That only white people deserve to be treated like humans?
I thought so... And I'm sure, growing up in sh&@hole massachesetts that you weren't exposed to racism towards blacks. Just the English, right? Not to mention, I'm sure your worldview is expanded more than the average joe as you have many colored friends. Thanks again for clearing up what is right and wrong.

Anonymous said...

Buttercup....read what Martin Luther kings niece has to say.
And, all the facts aren't in yet. Treyvon may not be the little angel they are portraying. Keep inmmind the media is selling Obama. However, he never, ever, should have been shot. And Zimmerman should be tried, no doubt. But Obama is spinning this for reelection. He apparently had no compassion for the sixteen year old son of anwar al awaki. Whom he executed via a drone strike. No due process...???? In america? Hey, he may well have deserved death...butnin america we have a constitution and Obama pays no heed. Amazing...