Racialism On Steroids

As seen in The Young Turks video here, Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez recently made a well-intentioned, eloquent and impassioned- though doomed to failure- plea to white supremacists

What I want to say to the young men and increasingly to the young women in this country that are falling into the grip of white supremacy that find themselves getting radicalized in a funnel of vitriol towards Latinos, toward immigrants, toward African-Americans, towards all people black, towards all people Jewish, towards all people of different faiths,what I have to say to you is "come back because there is a mother waiting for you. I know it. I know there's a teacher waiting for you, saying 'what happened to my kid'"?

The "kid' at the end kind of ruins the spirit but as Cenk Uygur remarks, "We also, eventually, have to reach out to them and bring them back. So it's bold at this moment for AOC to say "remember, we'll also going to this second part," the first part being condemnation of the words of the likes of Donald Trump and Tucker Carlson.

Uygur acknowledges, though, that Ocasio-Cortez can say such things without the backlash which likely would result from a similar comment by any Democratic presidential candidate with a chance at securing the party's nomination.

That would, of course, exclude the ridiculous Marianne Williamson, who  with her call during the second round of debates for reparations. She makes a splash, Steve M notes, in the media which is "culturally liberal but don't like actually existing liberalism, with its concrete ideas and policies (accompanied, in many cases, by upper-bracket taxes); Williamson's content-free oratory is liberalism without all that icky stuff."

Three years ago, Williamson presaged her call for reparations, sadly within the mainstream of today's cultural liberalism, with a dramatic performance in which she told (at 10:14 of the video below) her rapt audience she would "lead us in an apology from white Americans to African-Americans on behalf of our country."

It is presumptuous of almost anyone, perhaps especially a self-help author, to lead a group of people in an apology for something so serious; doubly so when the apology purports to be for an entire nation of 350+ million people.  Furthermore, some individuals, including those among the Founding Fathers who were slaveholders, were rather more responsible, than, say, white babies born in June, 2019. Nonetheless:  "white Americans to African-Americans on behalf of" everybody.

There you have it: we're all guilty, all to the same extent, whether we've held political or economic power, whether a corporate executive living in Greenwich, Connecticut or a single woman taking care of her elderly mother and who is herself mother of a young man addicted to opiods in southeastern Ohio. And when everyone is responsible, no one is responsible- or at least held accountable.

We're all the same in Williamson's telling, in which is everyone is either a creature of Satan or has been equally and fatally victimized.  It's the sins of the father, judgement falling upon us because of our parents.

Williamson never will be nominated, let alone be elected President, nor hold any elective office. Such individuals who believe they are ordained to lead an apology for 300+ years of sin would not deign to run for a lesser office. However, she can do real damage to the Democratic Party.

Ocasio-Cortez and Uygur recognize that not all whites are created equal; or, rather, not all develop equally. The white supremacists among us are the minority- even the current President was elected with a minority of the two-party vote.  

That is something Marianne Williamson does not, or will not, understand.  However, if the Overton Window is allowed to move starkly in her direction among Democratic candidates, it will further alienate the vast majority of American voters, prompting an issue clearly in Donald J. Trump's wheelhouse.

Share |