By Mark Alexander
Barack Hussein Obama walked into a White House press briefing Friday afternoon, unannounced. He used the briefing to deliver his political assessment of the Zimmerman/Martin case.
I have published two comprehensive critiques of this case, “Race Hustlers and Double Standards” last week, and “What Democrats Won’t Say About Race” this week. Those columns challenge the Left’s promotion and intentional distortion of the case as race bait, to maintain the unyielding sycophantic support of 95 percent of black voters. Without that low-information voter constituency, Democrats would win few congressional elections, and Obama would not be president.
Below, I rebut the key points of Obama’s latest effort to politicize the Zimmerman/Martin case.
O: I gave a preliminary statement right after the ruling on Sunday, but watching the debate over the course of the last week I thought it might be useful for me to expand on my thoughts a little bit.
A: In other words, there is more political capital to be squeezed out of Martin’s death.
O: I want to make sure that, once again, I send my thoughts and prayers, as well as Michelle’s, to the family of Trayvon Martin.
A: How about Obama offering thoughts and prayers to George Zimmerman and his family, whose lives Obama, et al., turned upside down by politicizing this case 16 months ago. Otherwise, there never would have been a trial as there was no basis for the charges — and the jury and virtually every legal expert agree.
O: There are very few African-American men in this country who haven’t had the experience of being followed when they were shopping in a department store. … There are very few African-American men who haven’t had the experience of walking across the street and hearing the locks click on the doors of cars. … There are very few African-Americans who haven’t had the experience of getting on an elevator and a woman clutching her purse nervously and holding her breath until she had a chance to get off.
A: Obama is referencing an unfortunate stereotype, unfortunate because that stereotype is well earned. Black males between the ages of 16 and 35 commit a grossly disproportionate share of crime across our nation. Until that changes, the stereotype profile will not change, nor should it. Most people of all races have decent instincts about threats to their person or property, and they respond accordingly. The problem is not that a particular demographic of our society is subject to increased scrutiny, the problem is that demographic has earned that scrutiny.
O: The African-American community is also knowledgeable that there is a history of racial disparities in the application of our criminal laws, everything from the death penalty to enforcement of our drug laws. And that ends up having an impact in terms of how people interpret the case.
A: The racial disparity in arrests and convictions of blacks is commensurate with the racial disparity of crimes committed by blacks. To suggest otherwise is flatly disingenuous.
O: Now, this isn’t to say that the African-American community is naive about the fact that African-American young men are disproportionately involved in the criminal justice system, that they are disproportionately both victims and perpetrators of violence. It’s not to make excuses for that fact, although black folks do interpret the reasons for that in a historical context.
A: They are not “disproportionately involved in the criminal justice system,” they are disproportionately involved in crime. And then in the same sentence Obama suggests “it’s not to make excuses,” he asserts “historical context” as the excuse.
O: We understand that some of the violence that takes place in poor black neighborhoods around the country is born out of a very violent past in this country, and that the poverty and dysfunction that we see in those communities can be traced to a very difficult history.
A: Actually NOT. The “violence, poverty and dysfunction” can be traced to decades of liberal social policy, which created the urban poverty plantations upon which generations of poor blacks have been enslaved, and which have become breeding grounds for an unprecedented culture of violence besetting our whole nation.
O: Now, the question for me at least, and I think, for a lot of folks is, where do we take this?
A: Apparently, to the political bank.
O: I think it’s important for people to have some clear expectations here. Traditionally, these are issues of state and local government — the criminal code. And law enforcement has traditionally done it at the state and local levels, not at the federal levels.
A: Then why did Obama federalize the case in the first place? Obviously he thought they would win this case. Now, he is attempting to punt the blame back to “the state and local levels.”
O: Number one, precisely because law enforcement is often determined at the state and local level, I think it’d be productive for the Justice Department, governors [and] mayors to work with law enforcement about training at the state and local levels in order to reduce the kind of mistrust in the system that sometimes currently exists.
A: But Obama and his NeoCom cadres fomented the distrust in this case, as they do with every political opening — and to suggest now that he will step in with training to correct the situation is arrogant and ludicrous. We already know that Obama thinks police “act stupidly.”
O: I think it would be useful for us to examine some state and local laws to see if they are designed in such a way that they may encourage the kinds of altercations and confrontations and tragedies that we saw in the Florida case, rather than diffuse potential altercations.
A: Florida’s “stand your ground” law, as well as those of 22 other states, do not encourage tragedies, they prevent them.
O: I just ask people to consider if Trayvon Martin was of age and armed, could he have stood his ground on that sidewalk?
A: No. Zimmerman did not attack Martin. Martin attacked Zimmerman, case closed. And for the record, more blacks, as a percentage of the population in Florida, have invoked the “stand your ground” defense than whites or Hispanics — or even “white Hispanics.”
O: We need to spend some time in thinking about how do we bolster and reinforce our African-American boys? There are a lot of kids out there who need help who are getting a lot of negative reinforcement. And is there more that we can do to give them the sense that their country cares about them and values them and is willing to invest in them?
A: The best place to start would be to reverse the liberal social policies that created the problem.
O: Finally, I think it’s going to be important for all of us to do some soul-searching.
A: Start with your own soul, Obama, if you haven’t completely sold it out.
O: You know, there has been talk about should we convene a conversation on race. I haven’t seen that be particularly productive when politicians try to organize conversations. They end up being stilted and politicized, and folks are locked into the positions they already have.
A: Obama launched the Zimmerman/Martin “conversation on race” so on this point, he is correct.
O: Finally, ask yourself … am I wringing as much bias out of myself as I can; am I judging people, as much as I can, based on not the color of their skin but the content of their character? That would, I think, be an appropriate exercise in the wake of this tragedy.
A: This from the titular head of the Democrat Party, which has turned Martin Luther King’s challenge about color and character upside down. Indeed, for Obama and the Left, color trumps character.