Nov 23, 2024
Nov 23, 2024
There is no such construct as race in biology despite the overwhelming obsession with it in American life and politics. A white stallion does not think of a black mare as an inferior species. Black jaguars or melanotic butterflies mingle and mate with lighter ones without reservation or discrimination. Skin color based discrimination in humans has socioeconomic and political origins. The fear of darkness in weak humans dependent on group living in a world full of predators, led to anxiety, caution and animosity towards darkness.
Xenophobia is linked to an instinct for survival and manifests in children by the second year. The derogatory designation of left handed persons in a right handed world is seen in the appellation 'sinistral' given to them which derives from sinister meaning unlucky, unfavorable or marked by ill will, suspicion or dishonesty, and merely proves how easy it is for trivial differences to morph into causes for major discrimination.
One of the earliest recorded human prejudice based on color is the Vedic description of the Dasyus and the concept of Varna, which still plagues India socially, economically and politically even though color no longer forms a reliable basis for pigeonholing castes. The ascent of European civilization from the dark Middle Age to exploration, conquest, colonization and particularly enslavement of Africans established racial discrimination. A form of xenophobia towards the orient was prevalent before that as prior beliefs in Europe about strange anatomical freaks and variants inhabiting the east.
The total hypocrisy of Jefferson, his declaration of independence, the inscription on his monument in Washington DC., and his and the founding fathers' actions clearly document that they swept the race problem under the rug and ignored it, till the Civil War fought for economic and not moral reasons, brought it up like a backed up drain. There was brief redress during reconstruction after the war, but once again the race issue and its injustices were swept under the rug till the civil rights agitation of Martin Luther King.
White America has never faced up to its sordid past of native genocide, black enslavement, Irish, Italian, Jewish and Chinese exclusion, Japanese internment and, oppression and decimation of Latin America, Philippines, Southeast Asia, Africa and the Middle East. From childhood in their public schools, white American children are taught sanitized lies and most never learn their true history. African Americans are taught the same lies but their daily life experiences of discrimination make them cynics and skeptics and black liberation theology they hear in their churches adds to the chip on their shoulder. Any black American with intelligence, analytical capability and true historic knowledge is bound to have a feeling of unjust oppression and any similar white American, a sense of regret if not guilt, unless the white is an unthinking Republican or Neo-con incapable of introspection or reflection and with the conscience of a social Darwinist or Eugenicist.
It is impossible for a black candidate to win the party nomination or presidency without appeasing or lulling the dormant prejudices of the majority white electorate. Thus the past and present grievances of any black candidate must be carefully kept under wraps and become invisible. Obama had done a good job of that. The first cat came out of the bag when Michele Obama stated that for the first time she felt proud of her country (presumably because her black husband had achieved a viable candidacy). The minor faux pas was rectified by her spin doctors.
The American press whose pennant is deeply yellow, then unearthed the truthful diatribes of Obama's pastor Jeremiah Wright. To give due credit to Obama, he parried that attack by a really good speech at Constitution Hall in Philadelphia. The much maligned pastor Wright felt miffed and the National press Club, goaded by vested interests, unfurled its yellow flag and baited the truthful pastor into making even more uncompromising statements to further alienate the white electorate. Obama was left no choice but to abandon his pastor's sinking ship to salvage his candidacy, confirming that his ambition trumped his loyalty and his beliefs.
The true nature of the American press was revealed in the debate by the ABC moderators when they spent the hours questioning about flag lapel pins and other inconsequential trivia, while totally ignoring the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq and the housing, credit and economic crisis. What could one expect from pea-brained intellectual midget partisans masquerading as a free press? Other similarly endowed anchors and moderators have done the same in the past and will do so in the future, as long as the time, information and intellect constrained population with a severe attention deficit disorder is available to dupe. Another aspect of US elections is that it is almost impossible to win an American election with Jewish money and media antagonism. This is why former Rep. Cynthia McKinney, Sen. Charles Percy and former President George H. W. Bush lost reelection bids. The Israeli tail wags the American dog, unfortunately to the detriment of both as professors Mearsheimer and Walt have detailed in their book on the Israeli lobby.
This is why Hillary Clinton threatened to annihilate Iran with nukes if it threatened Israel. The fact that Iran has no nukes at present and Israel has hundreds of them was irrelevant. Hillary Clinton will do anything to win. She reminds me of the hypocrite Thomas Jefferson, a man without any sense of decency, loyalty or integrity. As Secretary of State to George Washington, he started a rumor that Washington was senile. He so offended Washington with his duplicity that finally Washington cut off all correspondence and relations with him.
Jefferson as vice president to John Adams, undermined him while serving in his administration and paid reporters to malign the first two presidents. This American custom of misuse of a rotten press persists today except that the president now pays the press to write bogus stories. Hillary's strange cattle trades, shady deals like Whitewater, lies like sniper fire in Bosnia and the obscene enrichment of the Clintons cashing in on prior and future influence peddling, shows their mendacity and power lust. In fairness to Jefferson, he did not use his position to garner illicit riches.
McCain, the republican bozo like his predecessor idiot Bush, is a Trojan horse for the lobbyists who run and ran their campaigns. His policy is perpetual war and tax cuts. He has no ideas about the economy or healthcare and his proposals have no merit as the incisive criticism of Elizabeth Edwards of his health plan, showed. He modified his initial thoughtless and inadequate earlier proposal probably with the advise of his Keating clone handlers. His foolish proposal to eliminate the federal gas tax of eighteen cents a gallon will save a family about thirty dollars but lead to loss of a lot of jobs in highway construction and maintenance, funded by that tax. Electing him would be a replay of the last chapters of The Fall and Decline of the Roman (American) Empire. Crooked leaders, a corrupt press and an idiotic electorate make a powerful explosive and incendiary mixture destined for a national catastrophe.
04-May-2008
More by : Gaurang Bhatt, MD