It turns out that racism is everywhere. We used to think it was obvious - contempt for another individual or group, or believing that another person is somehow deficient, because of their skin color. You don't hear or see much of that thinking anymore. But it turns out that we are just as racist as ever, we're just a lot more subtle about it. The great white mass and the racist politicians that represent us (republicans) have finally schemed long enough figure out a way to really pump out the racism, without it being quite so obvious.

The latest paragon of virtue and fairness to point to this new racism is Time magazine. Time is a news magazine that is published on a weekly basis, for people who like their news sufficiently cured and frequently irrelevant. You may remember having seen Time at supermarket checkout stands back in the early to mid 1990s. Time reports on a new McCain ad that pictures the corrupt and black ex-Fannie chief Franklin Raines, then pictures a white woman as the 'victim' of Raines malfeasance. Time evidently believes this is beyond the pale - racism. They accuse McCain of "playing the race card".
Fannie is at the center of the housing meltdown and has been a bastion of corruption, so it is news. Raines is black - sorry, McCain didn't appoint him or have anything to do with his birthing. Raines cooked the books to make Fannie look stronger than it was so that he could get big bonuses - he raked in $90 million over six years. The white woman probably is representative of the average victim of Fannie's malfeasance - many single white women and mothers bought houses during the democrat led period of insane lending, or are the ones working the finances for families in trouble. Should the ad have pictured a black person, or a white man? I can think of hit pieces Time could write about either of those scandalous choices.
So here's the math: McCain can point to malfeasance on the part of any black connected to Obama. But he can't juxtapose them next to whites in any way that makes it seem that whites may have been affected by their corruption. Or maybe picturing raines, and connecting
him to Obama would have been enough for Time to cry foul, since both are black. I guess the math is a little fuzzy.
When normal people see this ad, they think, "Gee, Obama is seeking advice from a fellow at the center of the housing mess, and it's affecting average Americans."
When the mental midgets at Time see this ad, they think, "There the racist republicans go again, here's an ad showing a black man victimizing a white lady."
When normal people see this ad, the mental midgets at Time believe that we are thinking, "Damn negroes! Damn negro Obama! Can't negroes do anything right? Negroes are all corrupt when they get into politics, where negroes don't belong. Here go the negroes again, abusing poor white people. Damn negroes. Martha, did you sticth my hood for me? Where's my rope? Are we taking the kids?" The people at Time who had anything to do with this piece should be ashamed of themselves.  The people at Time don't know any 'average' white people, they can't, or they'd know how repulsive their thinking is to the average white American.

It's not enough that Time perpetuates this lazy race-baiting, they also encourage racialist thinking by being overtly one-sided in their approach. Obama has repeatedly spoken in _explicitly_ racial terms, saying over and over that the GOP is trying to scare everyone because he is black, and because he doesn't look like the rest of the presidents on our money. This is _explicitly_ racial, but you will search in vain for an article headlined "Obama plays the race card" anywhere in Time or anywhere else in the old media. How about Michelle Obama and her scurrilously racist comments? And does Time know or care about the explicitly racist church Obama attended for 20 years? If any figure on the right spent one day in a church with white-leaning beliefs, their entire career in politics would be ruined.

It's a massive double standard, and it exists because Time and the rest of the media are racists, if you accept anything close to their definition. 
If racism is defined as racialism - a fixation on race - then Time is certainly racist.
If racism is defined as animus and preference because of skin coloring, then Time is certainly racist. Not only do they consistently give a pass to bad behavior on the part of minorities, they cheer-lead everything that gives advantages to any race.

Past aspects of Obama's life and past comments by Obama make it clear that he is fixated on race, "White man's greed runs a world in need". Those weren't his words, they were the words of his wise mentor, Jeremiah Wright. But Obama was so impressed with them that he included them in his 2nd autobiography, written at the age of 45 (after he had racked up so many more accomplishments after the publication of his first autobiography). Obama has surrounded himself with people with this same obsession, he attended a church with an explicitly racialist worldview and foundation, and the comments of his bed-mate are telling. Time encourages racism by helping the racist Obama at every turn. Did Time report on Obama's support for reparations? I didn't think so. Reparations is an explicitly racist policy. Had McCain spoken favorably of any policy benefiting whites at the explicit expense of blacks, the campaign would be over.


There is no end to this madness, so long as the insane definition of racism held by the left is allowed to prevail. Another example of how it plays out: It is considered racist to discuss crime statistics in racial terms. The government does collect data on crime in racial terms, but it is basically forbidden to discuss this data. Arguably, with the liberal definition, anything said about minorities can be considered racist if it can be considered a negative. It's fine to say that black unemployment is 12%, for instance - in that case, the unemployed blacks can easily be inferred to be victims of white racism, or the white system. But no failure of character or substance can be assumed or inferred - that would be racist. That is why it's not kosher to report crime in racial terms - most people still buy into the antiquated notion that it's the criminal's fault when he commits a crime, not the fault of society, or poverty, or racism. So the fault is one of character, thus it is taboo to discuss it publicly. One might ask what good reporting on crime in racial terms could possibly do. I can think of a slew of good reasons to report crime in racial terms, enough for another blog.

Racist currents in this country do exist, but you are more likely to find them among blacks and hispanics than among whites. This is little wonder, when you consider that Time and others have been telling minorities for decades that they inhabit a hopelessly racist country. When people are told this on a regular basis, is it surprising if they look for reasons to believe it? Thus the interaction between whites and others is poisoned. It matters not a whit how pure of heart any particular white person is toward minorities, they are automatically suspected of being deficient - morally - because of their membership in a specific race. Is that racism? It certainly fits the classic definition.

The left realizes that race is a giant lever of political power. The democrats have successfully used race for decades to insure they regularly get 90% of the black vote. And they use it shamelessly. Crime was a major issue in the 1980s, and in the 1988 election, democrat candidate Mike Dukakis was taken to task for a policy that allowed convicted violent felons weekend furloughs, unsupervised. One of these people, Willie Horton, killed a man on one of these furloughs. An organization friendly to George W. Bush ran an ad about it - a perfectly legitimate attack ad: The northeastern liberal governor is out of touch with Americans on crime. Unfortunately, the ad was also racist. It said that, "the policy was applied to all prisoners, even blacks". No, actually it said that, "a number of violent black felons had committed new violent felonies while on furlough". No, not that either. It simply said the name "Willie Horton" and showed his picture - he's black. That fact set off a firestorm. It wasn't that there were three white guys who had done the same thing, and the racist republicans chose the black one. He was the only furlough murderer. It was because they showed a picture of a murdering thug to make a point about crime, and that thug was black. That was the racism.

This mindset precludes utterly any real resolution of racial issues. When we're routinely accused of racism when we aren't even thinking about race, how is an open and honest dialogue possible?
The template now in place is rotten to its core. It makes no accounting for the fact that _almost all_ whites have no animus in their hearts toward minorities. If they are seen succeeding, we are cheered, if they fail we are discouraged. On the very rare occasion that a public figure clearly denigrates them, we are outraged (I'm trying to think of when this last happened). When black leaders speak to the higher virtues of their people (and everyone) we encourage them, and sometimes we encourage them even when they speak to envy and contempt. Most of us could care less what a person's skin color is, we truly care more about character.
It is fair to say that most of us encourage our children to think of minorities no differently than they think of anyone else, to think of them as individuals. I don't know what most black and hispanic parents are telling their children, and letting them overhear in the house, but we know what Time magazine wants the little ones to hear and think.

TOTA