As she has in the past, New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd struck the tone for the week with a Saturday September 12th column exploring the meaning behind Joe Wilson's recent outburst against President Obama on the floor of the US Capitol.
Wilson's initial brush-off of demands to personally apologize to the House of Representatives and the President have evaporated with the growing controversy over allegations that his boorish behavior is representative of many Americans who simply don't accept Obama as President because of his skin color.
Former President Jimmy Carter went further, suggesting at a speech at the Carter Center that Wilson's comments "were based on racism".
The charge prompted Wilson's oldest son Alan (a candidate for State Attorney General) to dispute charges that his father was a racist.
Slowly the media seems to be giving more serious examination of how race impacts the way people see the president and his policies and what role racist beliefs might have on policy issues on the government's plate.
The House (both Democrats and Republicans alike) voted to demand an apology from the embattled South Carolina Congressman, but it's not just politicians.
I listened to a number of listener calls to NPR answering the question of why the issue won't go away. The vast majority expressed the feeling that not only was accusing the President of lying wrong, but also indicative that the US public has had enough of the juvenile character attacks on the President from Republicans who seem less interested in solutions for the American people than slandering Barack Obama and torpedoing his political agenda.
I don't hate Joe Wilson but it's hard to listen to his insistence that he's not a racist when, as Dowd pointed out, he was a member of the Sons of Confederate Veterans who defended flying the Confederate flag over the South Carolina state capitol.
If there's an upside to this episode it's that the media spotlight and the attention of many Americans is now focused on the realities of our nation and how race impacts our perception; Joe Wilson's comment shows that it does.
1 comment:
I am intrigued...
Do you really feel that the only rationale for Joe Wilson to call Barack Obama a liar is race? Do you really feel that the only motivation for flying the confederate flag is race?
I too, hope to see American culture change for the better, and I know that race is a major stress point in our culture. I am aware of real issues of racism. Yet, it seems there is also a reality of seeing through 'race' colored glasses...
I was amazed at the overt racism against whites that came to the forefront during the Obama campaign (not from the campaign, but from major figures in black pop culture...)
And I am frustrated by the hypocrisy I see on both sides of the issue. I am a Christian and I am continually frustrated by the conservative trend in the evangelical Church (to which I belong) which regularly refuses to see systemic injustice (largely because white, suburban, Christians, are the benefactors of such a system). However, I am just as frustrated by the constant drumming up of racial charges by the other side in circumstances that hardly warrant it, and get incensed by the use of language deemed acceptable when minorities use it, but racist when whites use is. It doesn't help eradicate racism, but rather inflames it.
I guess I see this Joe Wilson flap as a good example.
Why can't Joe Wilson simply be someone who honestly thinks Obama was lying, and just has poor self control? Why can't he simply be someone who is proud of his southern roots, and firmly entrenched in the political tradition of states rights?
I happen to agree with the statement he made (of course it was completely inappropriate to make in that way and in that setting), Obama was being completely misleading. That doesn't make me a racist does it?
I'd love to have a little dialogue with you...
(PS I found you because we are both on the very short list of bloggers who like Beau Geste...)
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