When Eric Holder called the U.S. a "nation of cowards" when it came to race, it really irked the racists.
Conservative Pat Buchanan suggests in an article for Human Events that if you are black or Hispanic, you are more likely to be a gang member, solely because you're black or Hispanic -- not because of a long history of racism, discrimination and poverty. Not because the education that the poor and people of color get is unequal to the education that white people get.
What about slavery? That's not something that easily leaves the psyche. The legacy is passed down from generation to generation and as a nation, we have never confronted what it means to all of us. People like Buchanan like to say that happened a long time ago, so why should it matter?
How do they equate skin color or ethnicity with crime? Do they really believe that black people and Hispanics actually have a different gene or something? That God (we know the Buchanan types are good Christians) gave them criminal tendencies. That they're wired to commit more crimes than white people? That they're inferior because of their ethnicity?
Then Buchanan veers off into another favorite conservative scapegoat, "illegals." Right wing extremist reasoning: If only we didn't have "illegals" America would be a crime free nation. They're taking all the jobs! They're causing all the crime!
For the Buchanan types, illegals equals Hispanics, much in the same way that they believe that Muslims are terrorists. It's so much easier for a small mind to paint a whole swath of people in a manner that fits their world view because to think any broader would mean they would have to change their whole way of life.
Why can't everyone see that this is moronic:
What further proof is needed that mass immigration from the Third World is taking jobs from Americans and driving down their wages when they do find work?
Here is a problem more serious than whether black and white elites are getting together on weekends to gabble about race.
How do these people have such teeny tiny minds? How do we protect our children from their hateful influence? It seems hate is passed down from generation to generation. Fortunately, it seems the younger generation is proving to be more evolved and wiser.
Buchanan didn't talk about gay people in this story, but he may as well have. Because for them, it's gay people who are corrupting the family. Right wing extremists like Buchanan have a scapegoat for everything. They are cowards.
Human Events:
"It is not safe for this nation to assume that the unaddressed social problems in the poorest parts of the country can be isolated and will not ultimately affect the larger society."
Fair point. And what are some of those social problems?
A 70 percent illegitimacy rate in black America, an incarceration and crime rate seven times that of white America, a 50 percent dropout rate in many urban high schools, African-American graduates reading and computing on average at eighth-grade levels.
And about these problems what is the black leadership doing?
Unlike Bill Cosby, the heroic Holder was virtually mute. Rather, he is upset that "on Saturdays and Sundays" we don't go to church or hang out together. But why are the free associations of Americans, of whatever creed or color, any of Eric Holder or Big Brother's business?
Having insulted us, perhaps Holder will start doing his own sworn duty.
Buchanan reasons blackness and Hispanicness causes gangness:
Last month, USA Today reported that the FBI estimates there are now 1 million gang members in the United States -- up 200,000 from 2005 -- and these gangs are responsible for 80 percent of all U.S. crimes. From other studies, young Hispanics are 19 times as likely as white youth to join gangs, while African-Americans are 15 times.
These millions of teenagers, and unskilled and less-educated young adults with no jobs and little prospect of finding them, are recruiting pools for criminal gangs.
Who is getting the jobs for which these native-born black and Hispanic young could quality? Illegal aliens hold literally millions of them.
Last week, the CIS reported, "An estimated 6 to 7 million illegal immigrants are currently holding jobs. Prior research indicates they are overwhelmingly employed in lower-skilled and lower-paid jobs."
Exactly what sort of jobs?
"Illegals are primarily employed in construction, building cleaning and maintenance, food preparation, service and processing, transportation and moving occupations and agriculture."
What causes gangness is Buchananness that still pervades this country. Buchanan proved Holder's point -- until racism is dealt with, these larger social issues can't be dealt with. We are a nation of cowards because those of us who know better haven't faced down Buchananness.
