For what it's worth

The news cycle has become so fast that when events occur, stories are reported, analyzed, debated and then dropped for the next one before the public has the time (or makes the time) to fully absorb the issues they are continuously bombarded with or consider them in greater context.

Whether a major political event (post-election demonstrations in Iran), a dramatic accident (Air France crash off Brazil), a titillating scandal (South Carolina Governor Sanford’s Argentinean rendevous), a global health crisis (H1N1 flu), or the American media’s favorite event, a celebrity death (Farrah, Michael, Walter), it seems each story has about six to ten days to be seriously milked and then, no matter how juicy, it’s cast aside in favor of the next BREAKING NEWS. (Wars, it should be noted, don’t merit much attention other than as a kind of low-grade static hum that never ends but one which news consumers just get used to ignoring).

One story that got huge play last week which already seems to be “dying down,” having hit the critical ten day mark, is the well-publicized arrest of Harvard professor Henry Louis Gate Jr. at his own home. Cambridge police were responding to a call from a passerby who saw Gates and a friend forcing open a stuck door (of Gates’ own home). When police arrived, Gates was inside his house on the phone with the university reporting the door as in need of repair. The police reported Gates was very agitated and upset when the police demanded his I.D.

According to the police, Gates was shouting accusations of racial bias, but he did produce two piece of identification to prove he was indeed in his own home. Gates says that when he asked the arresting officer for his name and badge number, the officer – Sgt. James Crowley – refused to comply. Gates was eventually lured out of his house and onto the front porch where he was arrested for disorderly conduct and taken into custody.

There's something happening here,

what it is ain't exactly clear

The whole incident has been thoroughly reported and debated, but what I think is safe to say is that most Americans in a similar situation as Prof. Gates might be a little cranky with the police after providing two forms of I.D. and proving they were indeed in their own home. Even if Gates was in fact disorderly, why was it necessary for the police to lure him out of his front door where he could legally be arrested and hauled off? Why didn’t the police, having satisfied their duties and determined that Gates was not a burglar, just leave him to rant and rave (if that is what he was indeed doing) inside his own home. How disorderly can a 58-year-old Harvard professor armed only with a walking stick alone in his own home be? Was it really necessary to arrest him?

You step out of line,

the man come and take you away

Whether Gates was black, white, purple or green, one has to wonder, at what point is a law abiding citizen fair game for the police to arrest in his own home? One could easily ask if perhaps both Gates and the police wanted the other one to “bring it on” so they could prove their own points. Only those at Gates’ house at that time can know for sure.

Later in the week, the story gained new, bigger legs when President Obama, usually very eloquent and careful with his words, carelessly used the blunt criticism “acted stupidly” in referring to the Cambridge Police arrest of Gates. This characterization by Obama was sure to backfire and probably he or the people around him very quickly realized that his comments had the potential to do real damage and could come back to bite him in a number of ways.

There's battle lines being drawn,

nobody's right if everybody's wrong

By Friday Obama expressed regret over how he added heat, but not light to the Gates affair and admitted that he could have “calibrated his words differently.” Obama announced that he was considering inviting both Officer Crowley and Professor Gates to the White House for a beer (and presumably some high profile photos of everyone smiling and shaking hands).

By Saturday Gates had publicly said he was ready to move on and, aside from the smiling beer-on-the-lawn moment to come, this story may have run its course or will at least fade into the background as next week’s crises and disasters unfold.

But before we move on to whatever tragedies and scandals next week may offer, it is worth pausing to consider the current atmosphere of racial tensions, particularly black-white relations, in the U.S. today.

There are a number of disturbing examples of many white Americans ongoing fear and distrust of black Americans, not the least of which is the unbelievable story (get ready all you folks reading this outside the United States…) of continuing efforts to demonstrate Barack Obama is not a U.S. citizen.

From early in the last presidential campaign, and still today, Obama has been portrayed as everything from a Muslim to a socialist, a communist, a radical liberal, and a non-U.S. citizen. Such wild claims are easy to laugh off as a hollow scare tactic intended to motivate and excite the uneducated, but the story is being given plenty of attention by CNN commentator, the self-proclaimed “tough, relentless, independent” Lou Dobbs.

Paranoia strikes deep,

into your life it will creep,

it starts when you're always afraid

Incredibly, Dobbs continues to pursue the “story,” now more than six months into Obama’s term. Dobbs says he believes Obama is indeed a U.S. citizen but that he thinks Obama should present his birth certificate just to dispel rumors. Never mind Obama’s Certification of Live Birth document can be seen online here, Dobbs and others just want to make sure.

Last week Jon Stewart examined CNN and Dobbs' dogged pursuit of the question of Obama's birthplace and, as nobody but Stewart could, brilliantly revealed Obama as having fooled the world with the "Kenyan Prince Birth Announcement Scam."

On June 30 Delaware Republican Congressman Mike Castle was confronted at a town hall meeting by an angry woman toting an American flag who wanted to know why Rep. Castle and other law makers were “ignoring the question of Obama’s birth certificate.” When Castle said that the president is an American citizen, he was booed.

More frightening though, was later in the meeting when the aforementioned crackpot commandeered the meeting and insisted that all in attendance immediately stand and recite the Pledge of Allegiance and Congressman Castle, apparently afraid of looking un-American, joined in with the recitation.

If you haven't read Naomi Wolf's The End of America,check it out. You can see how we barely need any type of fascism imposed on us - many Americans are mentally already there and primed to follow in the steps of the "good Germans" of the 1930s, having deep faith in their Christian God, a deep-rooted fear of both internal and external "enemies," and being unfettered by a comprehensive understanding of people and events beyond their own church yard, gun shop and big box stores.

How else can one explain this irrational fear of America being infiltrated at the very top by a foreign-born black Muslim?

As utterly comedic as all this sounds, it comes against an American cultural and social backdrop in which:

- Political pundit Pat Buchanan recently appeared on MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow show talking about how America was built “by white folks.” See Maddow’s brilliant refutation of his “facts” here.

- Fox News network host Brian Kimeade spoke about how Americans “keep marrying other species and other ethnics (sic).”

A thousand people in the street,

singing songs and carrying signs

mostly say, hooray for our side

- Demonstrators in Paris, Texas protested the dismissal of charges against two white men arrested in the dragging death of 24-year-old Brandon McClelland, an African American man. Last September McClelland died after being dragged 70-feet beneath a truck. The charges were dismissed due to “lack of evidence,” prompting members of a Black Panther’s group and white supremacists to demonstrate outside the court room with respective protesters shouting “black power!” and “white power!”

- In early July, a group of mostly black young day camp children were denied entry and had their pre-paid fees returned from The Valley Club, a suburban swim club in Philadelphia. The club’s president said quote: “There was concern that a lot of kids would change the complexion…and the atmosphere of the club.”

I could go on and on, but you get the point.

The message I take away from this assemblage of stories and statements from America in the summer of 2009 is this: racism in America, far from being stamped out or even driven into retreat, is alive and well.

If you have the time and interest, Chris Hedges presents a truly frightening profile of white Americans who are well-armed and ready to fight to “take back their country.” The 25-minute documentary shows what fear, frustration, military training, liberal gun laws, and a weak education system can produce – it is pretty terrifying stuff.

It’s not enough to fear the Russians, the Chinese, the Cubans, the North Koreans, the Venezuelans, the leftists, the socialists, the communists, the French, the Arabs, the Muslims, the Indians, non-English speakers, Mexicans and other Latinos, many white Americans have a need to fear other Americans, especially if they have African roots.

From Los Angeles to Philadelphia and Paris, Texas to Cambridge, Massachusetts, all the way to the doors of the White House, it doesn’t matter if you are the King of Pop, a distinguished professor, a 10-year-old day camper or the President of the United States, if you are black, it seems you are still held in suspicion, still seen as having to bear the burden of proof that you are who you say you are, that this really is your home and really is your country.

Next week, and beyond, as the news cycle spits out ever-new stories and dramas, it's in everyone’s interest to give the above matters serious thought. What will it take to move beyond these issues of race, and how can we learn from what’s going down?

*Thanks to Buffalo Springfield for the timeless lyrics.