How white liberals shut down conversations about racism

Some of you might be aware of the fact that over the Thanksgiving week a battle about racism was engaged on the Daily Kos web site . If not, don't worry, I'm not going to bring the whole thing here. But I do want to use some of the fallout to help us understand why talking about racism - even amongst liberals - is so hard to do.

What kicked off the conflict at Daily Kos was that a cartoonist posted a diary with drawings of President Obama that resembled a gorilla/monkey. To understand the reaction, you have to be aware of the history of racism being expressed by this kind of depiction. As many challenged the use of that imagery, a battle ensued.

What I found most telling was a reaction by one of the cartoonist's fans at his web site who said this:

Being called a racist is really about as bad as it gets. It’s like being called a pedophile.

I think that perfectly sums up what the problem is here. So lets break it down for a moment.

First of all, a few years ago I quit calling people "racists" after viewing this advice from Jay Smooth. If you've never seen it before, please watch - it might just be the most important thing you ever learn about talking about racism.



Jay expounded on all this later at a TED talk he gave at Hampshire College. That one is a bit longer but is also well worth a listen. In it Jay talks about how we tend to see racism as a binary proposition - either you are or are not racist (as does the person in the quote up above). He offers a different paradigm for understanding racism by saying its not like your tonsils - which you can have removed in one operation. Its more like plaque that builds on your teeth and needs ongoing attention.

What I appreciate about Jay is that he's trying really hard to understand and identify the reasons why white people have such a hard time talking about racism. His approach can diffuse defensiveness. But sometimes a more confrontational style is also necessary. That was the approach taken by Kai in one of the most powerful statements I've ever read on-line about progressives and racism titled: The White Liberal Conundrum.

Some might be surprised to learn that when people of color talk about racism amongst ourselves, white liberals often receive a far harsher skewering than white conservatives or overt racists. Many of my POC friends would actually prefer to hang out with an Archie Bunker-type who spits flagrantly offensive opinions, rather than a colorblind liberal whose insidious paternalism, dehumanizing tokenism, and cognitive indoctrination ooze out between superficially progressive words. At least the former gives you something to work with, something above-board to engage and argue against; the latter tacitly insists on imposing and maintaining an illusion of non-racist moral purity which provides little to no room for genuine self-examination or racial dialogue.

Countless blogospheric discussions on racism amply demonstrate the manner in which many white liberals start acting victimized and angry if anyone attempts to burst their racism-free bubble, oftentimes inexplicably bringing up non-white friends, lovers, adopted children, relatives, ancestors; dismissing, belittling, or obtusely misreading substantive historically-informed analysis of white supremacism as “divisive”, “angry”, “irrational”; downplaying racism as an interpersonal social stigma and bad PR, rather than an overarching system of power under which we all live and which has socialized us all; and threatening to walk away from discussion if persons of color do not comform to a narrow white-centered comfort zone. Such people aren’t necessarily racists in the hate-crime sense of the word, but they are usually acting out social dynamics created by racism and replicating the racist social relationships they were conditioned since birth to replicate.

That demand for a "white-centered comfort zone" was demonstrated years ago when Glenn Greenwald said this in a blog post titled: Awkward Discussions of Race and Obama.

...part of the reason people intently run away from discussions of race...is because it is too easy to unwittingly run afoul of various unwritten speech rules, thereby triggering accusations of bigotry.

At the time I was reading several small blogs by people of color and witnessed the reaction. For example, here's Nezua from The Unapologetic Mexican:

In this analysis (or this part of his post at least) the problem is the various unwritten speech rules. But guess what? There really aren't any. There are just poor attitudes we keep about people who look different. Or who we've been taught to think of differently. And there is a "White" attitude of deciding for everyone else how they should live, be, self-identify, and do many other things. There are old slurs and old tropes that hurt people. These are the things that are flushed out when people speak: attitudes, thoughts, beliefs, manners of speaking that hint at lurking attitudes.

People avoid talking about race because they are scared of exposing their thoughts and views on race. They are afraid they are A RACIST. They are not afraid of "unwritten speech rules." They are afraid that what they really think and feel will cause them to be ridiculed or ostracized in public, or that they may see a part of themselves they have to feel bad about. So they keep the potential to themselves.

But if we keep the focus on Speech Rules, we miss the opportunity to change ourselves.

As a white person, what I learned from listening to these folks was that in order for me to enter into a conversation about race, I was going to have to be prepared to feel uncomfortable. That's what we're avoiding when we scream "How DARE you call me a racist?!" But the truth is that people of color have been living with the "discomfort" (an understatement for sure!) of racism for centuries now. If we're ever going to mitigate that, we're going to have to be willing to take some on ourselves.

But more than that, we're going to have to admit that there are some things we just don't know. Here's Nezua again giving us the best description of white privilege I've ever read.

Mi novia says that it really frustrates White people that no matter how much they know or want to know, there may be an area of experience or knowledge that they cannot access. Bingo, Gringo.

This is another way of saying White Privilege.

How dare the world harbor some sort of Thing that I cannot experience! How dare you insinuate that you possess knowledge I may have to ask you about in humility! How impertinent of you to even imagine that I cannot, with study and great wisdom and effort, also know what it is like to grow up Brown™ in America! The voice of privilege thinks no seat is unavailable, no land unconquerable, no food untasteable, no right deniable, no experience out of reach. It is a slap in the face to this line of thought that there exists an area that cannot be known, even to a WHITE person. Gasp.

Yep, its all about giving up our sense of entitlement and learning a little humility. That's what makes it so hard for us. But I can tell you that when I've been able to do that - a whole fascinating world opens up that I never saw before. Its SOOOOO worth it!!!!!

Beinart understands the role of millennials but not the Obama coalition

I can't say that I have always agreed with Peter Beinart on politics, but a few years ago he took a big picture look at the swings of the political spectrum in one of the best pieces of analysis I've ever read. He's just written another important article in which he attempts to make a case for the emerging "new new left." Once again he makes some important points that many pundits are missing. But there are a couple of big gaping holes in his analysis this time.

Beinart's main point is that up until recently, our politics have been defined by the Reagan/Clinton years. Reagan set the tone with his "government isn't the solution, its the problem," and Clinton solidified that with his ascent to big business, triangulation and suggestion that "the era of big government is over."

Where Beinart gets it right is to suggest that that old frame is over for the millennial generation. But he goes on to focus only on the part about their opposition to the 1%ers in big business and erroneously suggests that President Obama has simply carried on with that part of the Clinton legacy.

It is true that the President didn't use the financial crisis that was underway when he came into office to simply tear down Wall Street as many on the left hoped he would. One can make the case that doing so would have caused even bigger chaos in the world economy and ultimately hurt the already struggling poor and middle class more than they were at the time. But let's leave that argument for another day.

Does the President's failure to go the direction many liberals were suggesting mean he bought into the Clinton legacy of appeasing corporate interests in our political process? Beinart suggests that it does. And yet further down in the article as he's describing the process for the emergence of the "new new left," he points out how Howard Dean initially changed the calculus of political campaigns and Obama eventually succeeded where Dean failed.

...he [Dean] established a template for toppling a Democratic frontrunner: inspire young voters, raise vast funds via small donations over the Web, and attack those elements of Clintonian orthodoxy that are accepted by Democratic elites but loathed by liberal activists on the ground.

In 2008, that became the template for Barack Obama.

The main reason Clinton bowed to corporate interests is that he and the DLC calculated that the only way to avoid another overwhelming loss like the one the Democrats suffered in the 1984 presidential election was to get access to corporate funds for political campaigns (anyone else old enough to remember the Clinton fundraising scandals that emerged as a result? If not, I have two words for you..."Lincoln bedroom.")

What Dean started and Obama finished was to prove that those vast amounts of funds that could be raised via small donations could beat the stranglehold big business had on our political process. Not only did he end the Clinton legacy in that regard, he did so by beating that very same Clinton machine in the process. That allowed President Obama to make pragmatic decisions about Wall Street during the great recession rather than become beholden to them for his political survival.

But an even bigger hole in Beinart's analysis is that he sees the millennial generation confined to their opposition to corporate interests. In doing so, of course he trots out that OWS was comprised mostly of millennias. But what he misses is that OWS appealed almost exclusively to white millenials. At an earlier point in the article, even Beinart has to accede that is not a true representation.

But among Millennials, there are fewer white, Christian non-immigrants to rouse. Forty percent of Millennials are racial or ethnic minorities.

Beinart's big example of the emergent "new new left" is de Blasio's victory in the New York mayoral primary this week. He sees it primarily through the lens of a battle over economic policies. While he makes a casual reference to de Blasio rejection of "stop and frisk" (but fails to even address Bloomberg's racist remarks about de Blasio's family), he doesn't tie it to the idea that millenials of color (and the issues that are primary to them) will have an impact on the "new new left."

Leading in to the 2016 presidential race, Beinart suggests that Elizabeth Warren could pose a challenge to Hillary Clinton and capture this "new new left" due to her strong record of challenging Wall Street and income inequality. This continues the assumption that the issues that are important to black and brown millennials are the same as those articulated by white millennials via OWS. Of course that has almost always been the assumption of white liberals in this country. We've been able to get away with that for decades and so it comes as no surprise that Beinart continues to do so.

I would submit that a day of reckoning on that assumption is fast approaching. National political candidates who recognize that their fortunes are dependent on capturing the Obama coalition going forward are the most likely to help us avoid the consequences of clinging to those old assumptions for too long. As far as I can see, that field is still open for 2016.

Left/Right Libertarianism as the developing threat to progressive change

Three years ago when Jane Hamsher decided to team up with Grover Norquist to try to defeat Obamacare, most of us were shocked by her obvious Obama Derangement Syndrome. And yet today, that effort to hoodwink progressives into signing up with tea party libertarians is a pretty common phenomenon. Lately we've watched these folks:

1. #StandWithRand on his ridiculous anti-drone filibuster
2.  Suggest that we should join forces with the tea party to defeat a budget deal
3. Tell us that America's only hope is Ron/Rand Paul and the Drudge Report
4. Team up with tea party Rep. Justin Amash to defund the NSA
5. Agree with Sarah Palin's "Let Allah sort it out" on the gassing of civilians in Syria 

As someone who is addicted to looking at the big picture, I think it behooves us to take a look at what is happening here. It doesn't take a rocket scientist to figure out that this is exactly the direction folks like Assange and Greenwald have wanted to see things go for a long time. But the question still remains, "why is this sort of movement gaining traction with progressives these days?" There are two things that make this all seem counter-intuitive:

1. The Republican Party is pandering to its most reactionary lunatic base. Not in my lifetime have I seen so much distance between where the two parties would take the country, and
2. We now have the most liberal President we've seen in a generation.

But if we dig a little deeper, those are exactly the things that are providing a platform for this movement towards libertarianism. We all know that Ron Paul actually getting the Republican nomination for president was a pipe dream. But with the disarray that we've seen recently, his son Rand is actually being seen as a serious contender. The Republican neo-cons failed so disastrously during the Bush/Cheney years that they gave an opening to the libertarian alternative.

On the other hand, folks are talking about an ascendant Democratic Party for the foreseeable future unless the Republicans can get their act together (which is clearly not happening yet). The trouble is, too many progressives have spent so long on the outside, that they don't know how to behave when they're finally on the inside. They've convinced themselves that any attempt to actually govern in a democratic republic (ie, compromise) indicates that our leaders have simply sold out to the oligarchs, plutocrats, and military industrial complex. They've perfected the art of tearing down the opposition but don't have a g-d clue about how to rebuild. And so, in their frustration, they simply continue to tear down - opening the gate to libertarianism. 

Oh, and did I mention that both the President and the ascendant Democratic base are neither white nor male? Yep, what's happening is that its time for the good ol boys to regroup.

Make no mistake about it...this is a re-invention of a 21st century southern strategy aimed at the idea of forming a national coalition of white male libertarians during a time when the rights of women and people of color are on the line.

I would suggest that going forward, this developing coalition between left/right libertarians will be a bigger threat to actual progressive change than the vestiges of the Republican Party in its previous incarnation. In the near future, keep your eye on Rand Paul. As long as his bid for the presidency is under the banner of the Republican Party, he's toast. But if he makes a break and runs as a third party candidate, its because he thinks this coalition is big enough to give him a shot.

In the meantime, lets keep our eye on the prize of what a true fusion politics has always looked like and the kind of opposition it has historically engendered. As the saying goes, "Those who don't know their history are doomed to repeat it."

White progressive assumptions about African American politics

I am becoming aware of something that I'll bet many African Americans have known for a while now. So I'm hoping you'll apply that sentiment of "better late than never" to my awakening consciousness.

We all know that since the passage of the Civil Rights Laws in the 60's and the Republican Southern Strategy, African Americans have been the most loyal base of the Democratic Party. And I'd suggest that since that base was responsible for one of the most successful movements for change in this country, white progressives on the left have - for decades now - assumed that African Americans generally align with their political views (notice that word "assumed" - its always the basis of privilege).

And so, when an African American gets the Democratic nomination for president, the left wing of that party naturally assumes that he will align himself with their cause.

Whoops! Not so fast. If those white progressives had ever taken the time to learn about what black people in their communities actually believe, they might have been spared all this "disappointment" in President Obama. And they might have better understood why African Americans have remained so loyal.

I'll give you an example that I've noticed for a while now but haven't talked about here because it is a contentious issue that I don't (yet?) have a firm position about. If there's anything that's clear when you talk to African Americans, its that their number one issue right now is what is happening to their young people - on the streets, in school, and in the juvenile justice system.

In my professional work in this community I've noticed for some time now that many African Americans don't align themselves with a large portion of the left on their views about education. With a healthy skepticism about the intentions of Republicans, many of them have embraced the idea of alternatives to our public schools (ie, charters and private schools). That's because it is THEIR children who are failing and they don't necessarily have the time or patience to deal with the politics associated with teacher's unions in the public schools.

Most Democrats want to avoid this controversy because it pits one part of our coalition against another. But from the early days, progressives have been critical of President Obama's education reforms.

I noticed this also when I was rather surprised by the strong backlash from many progressives to Cory Booker's Senate campaign. It was interesting for me to see folks who hadn't weighed in on electoral politics in some time get so vehement in their opposition to Booker. I think that rather than simply an overt showing of racism in going after one of the few African Americans to run for Senate, it was more of a privileged ignorance about his positions. Matt Yglesias does a good job of explaining how that happened with respect to education reform.

So there's a lot at stake in painting Booker not as a fairly conventional Democrat who (like Barack Obama and lots of other Democrats) happens to disagree with teachers unions about K-12 issues. Instead, they want to paint Booker as an across-the-board demonic corporate sellout figure who disagrees with teachers unions as part of a general agenda of overclass madness.

The truth is that African Americans are often as divergent in their political positions as white Americans are - with the exception of things like voting rights. But there are strains within the community that part ways very strongly with progressives, not just on issues like education reform but on things like the value of military service and the role of religion in politics (another one where both President Obama and Booker have come under fire from progressives).

Recently there was a lot of talk about how Republicans need to reach out to minority communities if they are going to survive in this new America. I'm beginning to understand that white progressives are going to need to do the same thing in order to avoid alienating themselves with their privileged assumptions.

Who has Obama's back? Those who've been in the struggle all along

Today I'd like to point you all to a diary my friend Denise Oliver Velez wrote back in 2008 when the FISA bill was going through Congress. I don't agree with everything she said (as the saying goes, if I did, one of us would be unnecessary) - but the message is clear.

I have never had privacy. My parents had no privacy. I grew up under the persecution of the McCarthy period, and watched family friends driven out of jobs, and some driven to suicide. I watched my father watch the backs of his friends, and I have learned how to be a trooper since the day I could walk...

The Constitution that has been bandied about here in hysterical FISA diaries of outrage in the last few days has very little meaning for me...The privacy that you are so willing to throw Obama under the bus for has no meaning for me. I’ve never had the luxury to have any...

The Constitution was a series of compromises, and black folks got the worst of them. Legislation is a series of compromises. This country is a series of compromises. The young are impatient. It makes them refreshing but it also makes them stupid. They will throw themselves at the barricades and commit revolutionary suicide in the name of purity...

And so they rant on...in diary after diary after diary...and I sit in wonder and wonder – where were you when we were dying? Where are you when were crying? Who among you challenged COINTELPRO? Who fought J Edgar Hoover? Who among you will go to jail for me? Will die for me, will call out the names of the dead killed by that piece of paper you now brandish like a sword to impale your former Hero? Oh how your Champion has fallen and will you banish him from your side of this game called politics? For I see now that for you it is but a game.

I don’t play games. Games are for children. I’m not in a tournament. Tournaments are for athletes and Knights of the Roundtable in fairy tales. I’m in a war – and this is just one battle, one skirmish in a war that has gone on since Christopher Columbus got lost on his way to despoil India. A war that I will not see the end of. A war that requires a patience that transcends death. A war that may determine if any human beings remain alive to carry on the struggle on this planet when I am turned to dust.

But I know my role in that war. I’m an aging foot soldier. I’m a protective grandmother, a woman, a black woman. I don’t forget, and I don’t forgive, but I do my duty and I stand as one among thousands. I say proudly, "Barack. Young man. I got your back." I will fight all and any who have falsely claimed to be a part of this struggle, but turned tail at the sight of the first puff of smoke. I will denounce them as cowards.

The way I see it, women and people of color know that RIGHT NOW they are in the fight of their lives to maintain the forward movements people like Denise and her generation struggled to attain.  And she's not about to get distracted from that fight by the games the purists want to play. You go girl!!!!

The left's version of white male patriarchy

About a week ago, @root_e tweeted a link to this story. Fair warning: it literally made me sick to my stomach.

Personally, I enjoy mavericks. In the article, its clear that Matt Taibbi and his pal Mark Ames are trying to cast themselves as such. But its also clear that Taibbi and Ames have an even darker view of that role than Sarah Palin does. In their version, it gives you a pass to abuse and exploit vulnerable people. For example, talking about their time in Russia:

They say they also take advantage of what they like to call the “white god factor” and make trips to the provinces. “Tens of millions of people live in dire circumstances, stranded in the center of the world’s largest continent, with little hope of going anywhere,” said Mr. Ames. “Which means–sexual opportunity for me.”

I'm really at a loss to describe how vile that is. But then, I probably don't need to. Most human beings with an ounce of empathy get it.

All of this is part of telling the story of these two privileged white boys and their struggle with finding meaning in status-driven capitalist America.

Mr. Ames and Mr. Taibbi are fairly typical men of their generation: raised in upper-middle-class America (Mr. Ames in San Jose, Mr. Taibbi in Boston) in the ideal-light Reagan and Bush years, they are well-educated but defeated by regular work and frustrated by American women, whom they find smug and ambitious. Mr. Ames and Mr. Taibbi say that in Moscow they finally found a home; a city as chaotic and as brutish as they are, a place where a man can still make a beast of himself and write about it with impunity.

I suppose its possible to feel some empathy for the challenge it is to grow up white, privileged and male in this country (cough..cough). The truth is, I think that racism, sexism and greed take their toll on all of us. This article pretty well describes the sickness that can ensue for this particular group. But rather than owning it as part of their own dysfunction, these two seem to be reveling in it. They come off just like two alcoholics celebrating their illness.

That is the form that white male patriarchy takes on the left side of politics. And of course the Rolling Stone now gives a platform for Taibbi to continue to share his disoriented rambling rants with the rest of us while Ames looks to be relegated to the more obscure pages of something called the Not Safe for Work Corporation (subscription required). I don't know about you, but it looks to me like these two have settled into some comfort with their privileged status rather than challenging the beast within.

Tackling that beast should be even more important on the left than it is on the right. Until men like this take that on - I have no more use for their brand of maverick than I do Palin's.

A "southern strategy" for the 21st century

No one can deny that the the Republican Party is in disarray these days. We recently saw a group of Senators challenge Sen. McConnell's leadership by breaking a filibuster on Obama administration nominees. A bipartisan group of Senators passed comprehensive immigration reform - including a pathway to citizenship for undocumented workers and the Republican establishment/grassroots is split down the middle on whether to support it in the House. Sen. Rand Paul has chosen to support Sen. Enzi in the primary challenge coming from Liz Cheney and Senators Ted Cruz and Rand Paul have joined Sen. Gillibrand in her fight against military sexual assaults - which Bill Kristol called a "pseudo-crisis."

And yet folks like Greenwald and Serwer are feigning surprise that yesterday the vote on the Amash Amendment in the House was bipartisan. Either they haven't been paying attention or their surprise is disingenuous.

In case you didn't notice, there is a theme that runs through my litany describing the disarray up above...and his name is Rand Paul. That's the same Rand Paul too many liberals decided to stand with in his ridiculous filibuster and who's father Edward Snowden voted for in 2012.

No one doubts that Rand Paul is in the early stages of a campaign to run for president in 2016. His only hope for success given the sad state of affairs in the Republican Party is that he can develop a coalition of tea partiers and lefty emos (ie, white people) to challenge the national dominance of the Democratic Party. Today's article by Greenwald (linked above) is nothing short of a clarion call for just that.

To say that there is a major sea change underway - not just in terms of surveillance policy but broader issues of secrecy, trust in national security institutions, and civil liberties - is to state the obvious. But perhaps the most significant and enduring change will be the erosion of the trite, tired prism of partisan simplicity through which American politics has been understood over the last decade. What one sees in this debate is not Democrat v. Republican or left v. right. One sees authoritarianism v. individualism, fealty to The National Security State v. a belief in the need to constrain and check it, insider Washington loyalty v. outsider independence...

The sooner the myth of "intractable partisan warfare" is dispelled, the better. The establishment leadership of the two parties collaborate on far more than they fight. That is a basic truth that needs to be understood.

Basically he's saying that the partisan battle against the lunatic caucus in the Republican Party needs to end and we should join forces with those who support "individualism" (ie, libertarianism). We all know who swells the ranks of the anti-establishment wing of the Republican Party. Digby over at Hullabaloo put it more bluntly when it comes to the looming battle over a budget deal.

The way to stop this is to get enough Democrats in the House to join with the Tea Partiers so they cannot get a majority. It's got to be done.

As the beast that is the white male patriarchy in this country is dying, these folks are suggesting that we throw them a lifeline and join their cause. Remember...these are the same people who are attacking things like voting rights and women's rights and immigration reform.

Now I'm no supporter of the "National Security State" - or, more broadly, the military industrial complex. But I happen to believe President Obama when he says he wants to end perpetual war and have a rational conversation about surveillance. The folks who don't believe him have always assumed he's a liar - regardless of what he actually does. And so they prefer to join forces with folks who have a history with southern secessionists and yet tell whoppers like this:

During a visit to Iowa, the junior Kentucky senator and 2016 contender told Yahoo! News that he's going to continue to do his part to lure blacks and Hispanics to a Republican Party that has been plagued by an inability to win over minority voters.

“I’m not easily dissuaded, so it’s not something that makes me shrink away, it makes me come out even stronger to say that I don’t think there’s anyone in Congress who has a stronger belief in minority rights than I do,” Paul said.

Only a blind white privileged person could possibly swallow that one. He's not reaching out to blacks and Hispanics (who know better), he's trying to assuage the discomfort white emos might feel in their support of him.

Make no mistake about it...this is a re-invention of a 21st century southern strategy aimed at the idea of forming a national coalition of white male libertarians during a time when the rights of women and people of color are on the line. There is not one iota of doubt in my mind about where I stand on that one. And its not with Rand.

Speaking of victims...Tavis Smiley SOOO wants to join that party

I just finished writing about the need to empower victims when I ran across this story about Tavis Smiley.

Smiley contends that members of the Obama administration, whom he didn’t identify, have pressured sponsors to drop their support of his projects, including his anti-poverty initiatives.

Oh puhleeze! Does Tavis really think the White House cares about his sorry-ass "projects?" And just what "anti-poverty initiatives" is he talking about? The only one I've heard about lately is that he and his buddy Cornel West wanted us to petition the White House to sponsor an anti-poverty conference. You know...one where guys like them could preen for the cameras to TALK about how horrible poverty is without DOING a g-d thing about it.

And what sponsors are they that Smiley thinks the White House might be trying to pressure? Of course he won't say. But perhaps he's talking about his relationship with the plutocrats (one of West's favorite words) at Wells Fargo and their "Ghetto Loan" program. No? Mr. Smiley's spokeswoman identifies the one sponsor that's sticking with him:

Wal-Mart Stores Inc., the PBS show’s underwriter since the start, has “consistently stood by our side,” said a Smiley spokeswoman.

Yes, you read that right. Mr. Smiley's major sponsor these days is Wall-Mart - the largest purveyor of poverty in the country.

One other fascinating tidbit from this article:

Smiley speaks to an overwhelmingly white audience on his Public Radio International shows and on TV, and said he appreciates the opportunity to introduce them to a different perspective.

In other words, the African American community has pretty much abandoned Mr. Smiley and he's eeking it out on PBS with the elite white liberals who are their base. But in a classic case of avoiding any personal responsibility for that - he's attempting to claim the victim mantel and blame it on the nasty folks who occupy the White House. I'd suggest that Mr. Smiley go take a look at what President Obama said to those young brothers at Morehouse last week..."no more excuses."