Here we go again.
Following is the first part of this morning\’s New York Times\’ lead editorial, which discusses the racial situation in Ferguson, Missouri.
The editorial content is in rust, with my comments in blue. As always, I ask you to read it all, and decide for yourself who is making more sense.
Formost people, Ferguson, Mo., will be remembered for one awful Augustafternoon, when a white police officer there shot and killed anunarmed black teenager, Michael Brown. In onesentence we already know where the Times\’ sympathies are. How does the Times editorial board know “most people” remember things this way?
Earthto New York Times: some people – maybe a great many of them – remember this as a police officeracting in self-defense. A police officer protecting himself from a young adult who outweighed him by 80pounds, was high on marijuana, had just robbed a convenience store,was walking in the middle of the street (which insured that anycop of any color would stop and tell him to get to the sidewalk), hadtried to grab the officers gun, and according to many witnesses, wascharging at him.
Butthat incident was only a snapshot in the town\’s long andcomplicated racial history – a history characterizedby entrenched segregation and economic inequality, as well as byfamiliar and systemic obstacles that have kept black residents fromholding positions of political power. Whatmade this a racial incident? I have been asking that question for 5months and have yet to get an answer. No racial epithets were passedbetween Brown and officer Wilson. Wilson had no record of complaintsfiled against him by Black citizens. It was only racial because thesharptons and jacksons of the world, joined by a mish-mash of hard leftists, anarchists and other people looking for a “cause”, made itthat way….aided and abetted by The New York Times.
Ferguson\’spopulation is two-thirdsAfrican-American, and yet its mayor, city manager and fiveof its six City Council members are white. So are its policechief and all but three officers on its 53-member police force. Whyis that? Do you claim that Black people in Ferguson are denied thevote? If not, then – other than the racial composition of the police force (an area in which we are in agreement) – what you are complaining about is that you don\’tlike the will of the people. That\’s your problem.
Sincethe district\’s voting-age population is 50 percent white and 47percent black, and since both groups there tend to vote along strictracial lines, the white voters\’ candidates almost always win. That\’svery interesting. What you are saying is that, in Ferguson, most Black people vote exactly the way most White people vote – by race. And, given the fact (also mentioned in youreditorial) that 3/4 of the school-age residents of Ferguson are Black,in the very near future, those same voting patterns will mean that all ormost elected officials will be Black, not White, for exactly the samereason. Now tell me: when that happens, how long will I have to wait for your editorial condemningBlack voters in Ferguson? I\’m betting on the 12thof never.
There it is. Your call.
