Obama's Beer Summit

As I am sure you have heard, this week the president and vice president sat down with Massachusetts Police Sgt. James Crowley and Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates in the Rose Garden for what some have called a "White House Summit" over a beer. Because after all, the President of the United States has time to just sit down with his old Harvard pal and have a beer, doesn't he. I'm thinking of inviting him over for Monopoly next week... If I have a moment.

But this was no casual beer with his old Harvard buddy. It was an obvious planned and calculated political move.

If I may, I would like to address the absurdity of this meeting as well as the racial ramifications which Obama, who claims to be the new hope for his race, are insinuating.

After the deal at Harvard, where the president assured us – before he “calibrated” his words – that “the police acted stupidly,” all the smart people on television assured us that this incident proves we need to talk about race. Crowley called the meeting "a positive step in moving forward" on race relations.

The assertion is both politically correct and preposterous. It is one more string of meaningless words that are nothing more than a call for yet another racial-sensitivity browbeating. This was exacerbated by Obama calling this a "teachable moment for Americans."

There is no dialog about race in America, there is a lecture. The word “dialog” implies two-way conversation, but the vicious rules of this politically correct society dictate that the conversation will be entirely one way. Every white person in America knows that – with the possible exception of the self-deluded and self-loathing white political elite. Every white person in America knows that an honest discussion of race would bring with it career-ending consequences and social ostracism.

For example, repeatedly over the last week it has been said that people of color predominate in America’s prisons. Essentially it is meant to be documentation for an American apartheid.

A common stereotype, but one that is significantly rooted in fact, and often unspoken, is the possibility that non-whites are more likely to go to jail because non-whites are more likely to commit crimes. Unspoken, because the heavy ax of social censure hangs over the head of anyone who would dare say it. Stereotypical, because society places this in the untouchable realm of political correctness.

Another example of speech restrictions that preclude dialog is the notion that the Harvard professor in question is not just a jerk, but quite possibly a racist. His racial motivation and preconceptions have not and will not be questioned or discussed. The cop is freely accused of racism – of treating the professor different because of the color of his skin – but no one dares venture the argument that possibly it was the professor who reacted based on the cop’s skin color.

These are all valid, logical questions, but so pervasive is the orthodoxy of political correctness that they cannot be spoken, thus, there is no dialog. There is merely another opportunity for society to be lectured on its intolerance and cruelty to non-whites. And that lecture doesn’t make racial problems go away, it engenders them. It makes both sides angry with one another and promotes division instead of unity and amity.

The race dialog envisioned by the talking heads – and the president – is one in which the commonly held black view that African-Americans are targeted and persecuted by police will be passed around with the expectation that everyone will agree. The problem with this approach – which has been used for years and years – is that it makes some whites angry and it makes some blacks feel separate and antagonistic. The identity of victimhood and alienation grows in one group and the resentment of being blamed for something you didn’t do grows in the other, further dividing America. Ironically, it is the racial dialog that flames our racial problems, or at least that’s the way many feel.

Unfortunately, voices and opinions are not welcome in the dialog on race. What some feel, but are not able to say, is that they believe the race dialog is pushed by those who stand to benefit and profit from racial tension. Its objective is not to heal the country but to promote careers, hold political power and make money.

If the goal were unity, the topic would be unity, not a focus on differences and different perspectives, but a focus on shared perspectives and shared values. If you want to unite people, you talk about what they have in common. If you want to divide people, you talk about what differentiates them.

Focusing on the differences of the average white and black experiences in America has a tendency to galvanize people on opposite sides of the color barrier. The talking heads know this. They must, yet they continue their nonsense anyway.

What happened at Harvard is that a man got lippy and made a scene in front of a crowd of bystanders. That’s disorderly conduct. He was arrested. Then the political correctness kicked in and the charges were dropped and the cops got dissed by the governor and the president. It broke down right along color lines. The black mayor and the black governor and the black president stuck up for the black professor. Maybe those three should start the dialog on race – and maybe they can start with the person in the mirror.

And maybe someday this country will be free enough for someone to suggest that those three are the ones with the racial bias.