politico - Attorney General Eric Holder finally got fed up Tuesday with claims that the Justice Department went easy in a voting rights case against members of the New Black Panther Party because they are African American.
Holder's frustration over the criticism became evident during a House Appropriations subcommittee hearing as Rep.John Culberson (R-Texas) accused the Justice Department of failing to cooperate with a Civil Rights Commission investigation into the handling of the 2008 incident in which Black Panthers in intimidating outfits and wielding a club stood outside a polling place in Philadelphia.
The Attorney General seemed to take personal offense at a comment Culberson read in which former Democratic activist Bartle Bull called the incident the most serious act of voter intimidation he had witnessed in his career.
"Think about that," Holder said. "When you compare what people endured in the South in the 60s to try to get the right to vote for African Americans, to compare what people subjected to that with what happened in Philadelphia, which was inappropriate, to describe it in those terms I think does a great disservice to people who put their lives on the line for my people," said Holder, who is black. - Continue reading > >
Blog author's comments - The Attorney General of the United States is supposed to represent all people equally. There should not be any preferential treatment with regard to race.
Because the KKK harassed blacks in the 60's, should not enter into the Attorney General's decision making with regard to who breaks the law. He made a very telling comment by saying "my people" not the people.
What he said does not surprise me. Many on the left thought that race relations would improve with Barack Obama as our president. I don't believe that has happened. I think just the opposite has occurred.
I concur with the blog's author and extend my remarks to include the following: I'll use the example taken from a lyric from the production of "South Pacific" wherein prejudice was addressed, to wit:
ReplyDeleteYou've got to be taught
To hate and fear
You've got to be taught
From year to Year
It's got to be drummed
in your dear little ear
You've got to be carefully taught
You've got to be taught
To be Afraid
Of people whose eyes
are oddly made
And people whose skin
Is a different shade
You've got to be carefully taught
You've got to be taught
Before it's too late
Before you are 6 or 7 or 8
To hate all the people
your relatives hate
You've got to be carefully
It would seem that Mr. Holder is a product of such a mindset. Throughout the '60s and thereafter it became the convention to claim real or imagined prejudice to escape accountability for those who had participated in criminal behavior.
Did and does prejudice exist in our society, culture ... indeed it does from all aspects of this population. That does not justify accepting prejudicial behavior today because it occurred in the past. Someone ostensibly educated in the law should understand this point but apparently Mr. Holder has not matured and acquired the wisdom that the position he holds requires. The pity of it is that it simply documents that he is a "small person" unwilling or perhaps unable to confront and resolve the prejudices he owns.
It is time for you to step aside Mr. Holder. You are not equal to the responsibilities of the position that you hold. You are employed by the people of the United States who are a mixture of all colors and persuasions.
We saw a glaring example of the 'race card' played during the O. J. Simpson trial.
Anon - Thanks for your comments, very well said!
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