Sometimes I just get tired of listening to Rush Limbaugh’s negativity.  Not that I listen to his radio show on a regular basis, but sometimes I’ll flip through the dial, happen to stop on Limbaugh, and get my fix of foolishness for the day.  Rush has quite the following, and I would say that I am surprised by his success, but there are still plenty of people who look to blame others, especially those who appear different than themselves, for their own problems and shortcomings.  Sometimes these very simple-minded people manipulate  supposed and real differences as a means to support their own selfishness.  Rush Limbaugh pulls their strings like an expert, mental puppeteer.  But Limbaugh is not only the idol of the unenlightened, he also has the ear of some of the most politically powerful Pinnochios who may seem like harmless old granddads, but are perhaps even more divisive than Limbaugh himself.  Limbaugh is a master of divide and conquer, and he is well adept at catering to the fears of many whites who fall—hook, line and sinker—into Limbaugh’s murky brand of poppycock.

With the rise of Barack Obama, Limbaugh’s deceptive ways have become much clearer, as he can use his greatest weapon of divisiveness more overtly, as opposed to beating around the bush.  Race has always been Limbaugh’s not-so-secret weapon, and the election of Obama has afforded Limbaugh the perfect atmosphere (or, so Limbaugh thinks) to open his racism floodgate that much wider.  During Barack Obama’s presidential campaign, Rush Limbaugh attempted to play on the fears of both whites and blacks simultaneously by referring to Obama as a “Halfrican American”.  Like the pontificating puppet master that he is, Limbaugh exploited the term to try and drive a wedge between many white Americans and Obama, while manipulating the term to plant seeds of doubt in the minds of black Americans about whether Obama was black enough.  Moreover, throughout the whole of Obama’s campaign, Limbaugh tried to insinuate race into Obama’s campagin by dropping the real race card, and continues to insult President Obama whenever he can slide a pretty much baseless race-charged idea into the minds of his believers.

One of Limbaugh’s latest racist insinuations is that a Republican president would not have had the unfettered support of the public, like Obama, if they “had ordered the shooting of black teenagers on the high seas.”  He later said that “If only President Obama had known that the three Somali community organizers were actually young black Muslim teenagers, I’m sure he wouldn’t have given the order to shoot. That’s the correct way to look at it. If only Obama had known.”  This notion epitomizes the fact that Rush Limbaugh will go to any lengths  to inject race into an issue involving Obama where there is none.  Not only did he refer specifically to “black” teenagers, and used the word “Muslim” in order to conjure up certain images within the minds of his naive followers, it can be argued that his use of the word “Republican” is just a veiled inference for the term “white”.  In any event, Limbaugh has no shame.

To think that most white or black Americans are so ignorant and jaundiced by America’s ambivalent state of race relations that they would actually question the President’s actions to bring down those who attack American interests—regardless of race—is simply delusional.  Only the very naive, or the dumbest of the dumb will fall for such twisted, racist logic.  I would like to think that even Limbaugh’s followers are immune to such foolishness.

Limbaugh once told an African-American caller to his show to “Take that bone out of your nose and call me back.”  Well, I would like to tell Rush Limbaugh to take the racist bone out of his posterior, keep President Obama and race out of his mouth, and lay the race card down once and for all.  Rush Limbaugh’s manipulation of racism at the expense of the improvement of race relations in America is getting as old and tired as Limbaugh is beginning to look.  It’s time for a younger, smarter, but more mature America to stop “Rushing” to judgments based on undercurrents of racism, and realize that Rush Limbaugh is nothing more than a racist revisionist whose ideas are more fitting for the period of Jim Crow than for an America of the 21st century.

Being that Race Relations is presently the main outlet for my writing, and appears to have the ability to vastly outperform my debut effort at self-publishing, Racial Clarity, I have decided to incorporate much (if not all) of the works included in Racial Clarity on this web site.  In the coming weeks, look for a few more poems under the poetry link, as well as more essays that I hope will inspire you to improve race relations in your world.

Racial Clarity will still be available as an organized book, I just wanted to inform my readers that  at least the written works within Racial Clarity will be somewhere on this web site, albeit not in the same order or form.  As for the images, I am looking forward to offering some of the designs as t-shirts.

I thank you for your continued support of Race Relations.   Although I have been a little busy of late, the content of Race Relations is sure to get a little bit more interesting due to the coming writings from the book.

There are two myths that I want to address about President Barack Obama in reference to black Americans. The first myth is the notion that somehow with Obama’s election as president, racism in America has ceased to be a profound problem.

Yes, it’s a beautiful thing to see that a large number of whites transcended their own racism, prejudices, reticence, and/or other questions about the electability of a black president and voted with their hearts and minds for Obama. But let there be no mistake that most blacks do not have the education, drive, finances, and luck that Obama has been blessed to possess. Moreover, the same  prejudices, gaps and racial disparities that existed between whites and blacks on November 4, 2008, exist today. Furthermore, some of these racial disparities have endured for hundreds of years, regardless if people want to admit or not.

Obama is not a wizard who can waive a magic wand and erase all of the ills of America away with one fail swoop, and especially the entrenched racism in America that has dogged this country for hundreds of years. But his election is a huge thumbs up for  multiculturalism, ethnic diversity and equality. Just the fact that Obama and his family are positive images of a successful black family—and in fact, the First Family—in America will have at least a passive affect upon the minds of all Americans. This symbolism will hopefully dispel many of the racial stereotypes that have taken root in the American psyche, as well as counteract the belief that blacks are a monolithic culture where everyone thinks alike. Like the fictional Cosby Show of the 1980s, the real life Obamas will chip away at the undercurrent of ignorance and skepticism between the races.

Perhaps Obama will use his bully pulpit by speaking directly about the negative effects of racism in America from a social and economic perspective.  If  nothing else, he will confront issues that directly affect a disproportionate number of blacks and other racial minorities, as well as most whites in this country. Being a product of multiculturalism and ethnic diversity himself, but also being able to overcome the racism in America that he has experienced, Obama may be the perfect representative to speak to blacks and whites.  He can show blacks that you can make it notwithstanding the racial barriers that still exist, but he can also speak to whites about how racism in America is still very much pervasive and detrimental to the social and economic future of America.    Maybe Obama’s image and voice will move the country towards the day when people refuse to believe that blacks voted for a man solely because he is black, which is a second myth.

I have heard whites and blacks insinuate that blacks voted for Obama simply because he is black. To me, this is a condescending notion that skirts on racism itself. The assumption is that blacks are one big hive of drones that makes decisions based on nothing but a person’s skin color. This is ludicrous, and far from the truth. Don’t get me wrong, it’s almost a certainty that some blacks may have voted for Obama because he is black, just like some whites voted against him for the very same reason. But, the large preponderance of blacks voted for Obama because they agreed with his stance on the issues—the very same reason why even more whites voted for Obama.

I have been in some heated arguments with some members of my family about this very same subject. I have attempted to explain that Alan Keyes would have garnered more support from blacks if color was the standard by which blacks make decisions about their political leadership. My brother-in-law exclaimed that, “Alan Keyes was never electable!” I told him that people were saying the same thing about Obama before he won the Iowa caucuses. If people were totally honest, the main reason that many whites and blacks were probably saying and thinking that Obama was not electable at the time was because of his skin color. After Iowa, the whole world realized that perhaps Americans would be true to themselves and vote for the person whom they identified with in regards to the issues. And, it was only then that a large majority of blacks really began to take notice and decided to support Obama. Before Iowa, most blacks—particularly the ones with political and economic power—supported Hillary Clinton. So, it is really intellectually dishonest and very shortsighted to say that blacks voted for Obama because he is black.

Now, as I alluded to before, I am not saying that Obama’s skin color wasn’t taken into account in the minds of many blacks on Election Day, but I am saying that Obama’s ethnicity was not the definitive factor for the overwhelming majority of blacks when they voted for Obama during the primaries, as well as Election Day. Obama was the best at saying the things that America wanted to hear during a very important campaign. This is the main reason that most Americans—including blacks—voted for Obama. His beliefs, general outlook about the direction of the country, and solutions to deal with American and global problems were judged by the majority of Americans as what this country needs in order to thrive as a society, and lead the world into the future.