Rope, and keep the change

Chris Britt notes the expanding range of the right-wing's appeal to bigotry, and, unlike others who have marveled at the phenomenon, he does not assume that they are painting themselves into a corner.

Nor does he play the game of "They all do it," in which we throw up our hands over the perfidy of Congress, a foolish endeavor that gained Will Rogers big laughs and makes stupid people feel wise, but gains nothing substantive for anyone other than the anarchists on both fringes.

First, the phenomenon: In case you've been in a lighthouse with no access to anything, or hanging out exclusively in groovy leftist coffeehouses, it turns out that Trayvon Martin was asking for it.

Apparently, George Zimmerman didn't single him out as a young black man, but knew from his hoodie that he was a criminal type, since it is well-known that only criminals wear hooded sweatshirts. (Zimmerman would, I assume, know this because he is a Dolphins fan.)

And, besides, Martin had smoked marijuana, though in such trace amounts that the judge had to ponder the toxicology report for some time before deciding that the defense could use it.

Besides which he had been in minor trouble and had reportedly even posted remarks online that indicated his belief that white people aren't always completely fair to black people and that he resented this.

And when he was talking to a friend that night, rather than saying, "Oh my goodness, there appears to be a Caucasian person following me around," he used slang.

And, it must be noted, George Zimmerman's mother is from Peru, which means George is Hispanic, not white, just as Alberto Fujimori is Hispanic, not Asian. Except that Fujimori is full-blooded Not-Asian, while Zimmerman is only half Not-White.

(Which should matter, since many of the same keen observers of racial issues claim that Obama is only "half-black" and so doesn't really count as a Negro. Though, having advanced that opinion, they also believe that being even half-black makes his use of a TelePrompter necessary, whereas it was only a convenience for the half-dozen or more all-white presidents who preceded him. Which is to say that Zimmerman is, to them, enough of a beaner to not be racist -- though in their world, minorities are actually more racist than white people -- but white enough to deserve a trial the fairness of which was proved by his acquittal.)

Anyway, just as a woman who had a baby out of wedlock six years ago and has been known to have sex with men to whom she is not married and who wears short skirts is guilty of provoking her own rape, Trayvon deserved to be shot and killed because he wasn't that nice doctor in "Guess Who's Coming To Dinner."

I said before, and one of the jurors on the case has since confirmed, that race wasn't a huge factor in this and that the verdict was more a result of the law than anything else.

That is, the law pretty much allows you to stalk and kill anyone you fear, as long as you annoy him to the point where he turns around so that you don't shoot him in the back.

Willie Reed, the black witness who testified in the trial of Emmit Till's murderers, died the other day in Chicago, where he'd gone to live under a different name, knowing his testimony had put him in mortal danger.

Thing is, the verdict in the trial of Till's killers was a foregone conclusion in 1955 Hattiesburg, despite the fact that the death was clearly illegal.

In the death of Trayvon Martin, the outcome of the trial was in doubt, and Zimmerman was saved by the fact that Florida has changed the law so that what he did was okay, as long as the jury couldn't prove he didn't feel threatened.

So, getting back to the cartoon, the right wing is now awash in people who feel free to announce that it's not racist to be suspicious of niggers, as long as you don't call them that. Unless you heard them called that when you were a child, in which case it's quite all right.

Not all conservatives feel that way, I'm sure. But you lie down with the dogs, you get up with the fleas, and, just as Huey Newton had to live with the results of not telling Eldridge Cleaver to shut his fat yap, and of allowing any poseur in a black car coat to call himself a Panther, so, too, the GOP must live with the results of not reining in the idiots of their own fringe.

It is a mistake, however, to take the position, as many cartoonists have, that this flood of racist, sexist, homophobic, nativist ignorance and bigotry will spell the end of the Republican Party.

When Nixon and his crew began to sweep up the disaffected under the term "Silent Majority," they had to play certain cards close to their chests, in part to avoid revulsion, but in large part because of the Fairness Doctrine, under which broadcast stations were required to allow equal time for opposing views.

Nobody was likely to demand equal time to rebut some vague comments about patriotism, but if you started slinging around racial terms or outrageous remarks about women, gay people or immigrants, there would be a line outside every TV studio and radio station in the country.

So they got rid of that rule, with the result that, the first time I heard Rush Limbaugh, I thought he was some backwoods jackass on some backwoods radio station. When I realized he was speaking to a national audience, I was horrified but as it became apparent that his audience was large and listening, I was even moreso.

Make no mistake: The moment for asking, "Have you no sense of decency, sir? At long last, have you left no sense of decency?" is long past.

The barbarians are not at the gate. They are in the livingroom, feet propped up, eating Doritos and watching Doomsday Preppers, because the National Geographic has, indeed, no sense of decency, and because, as Lenin reportedly said, if you want to hang a capitalist, he will sell you the rope.

Comments

[Julia]

The oddest juxtaposition vis a vis Trayvon's guilt or innocence came from reading a remark on Facebook my Texas cousin made about Trayvon being a pothead (and therefore, I assume, deserving to be shot to death by someone he'd never met and who did not know his background. It was a JUST VERDICT, she stressed.) The assumption that drugs = irredeemable human being is one I can comprehend, if not understand. But in the next post, there was the wailing and gnashing of teeth because Cory Monteith had died of an overdose: so young! so tragic! such a loss!

[Mary in Ohio]

And I am SOOOOOO happy that my native state (Motto: We spend more per-public-school-pupil than Tegsis and Miss Hippy, at least...) has taken up this view of the argument:

http://www.ohio.com/news/break-news/ohio-gun-group-raises-12k-for-george-zimmerman-1.415905