Glenn Becks' Native American Name: Speaks with Foot in Mouth

Clearly by the title of this blog I am trying to bring some humor to the situation. Hopefully, I'm not offending any native Americans. However, Roland Martin, liberal journalist and author of "The Roland Report," posted a blurb from an interview with Glenn Beck, conservative commentator for Fox News, in which he stated that President Barack Obama has "deep-seated hatred towards white people." When a fellow panel member pointed out the majority of people Obama interacts with on a daily basis are white, i.e., David Axelrod, Robert Gibbs, Rahm Emanuel, etc, his response was, "I didn't say he doesn't like white people. I'm saying he has deep-seated issues...the guy's a racist." This is nothing new. Obama opponents have been saying this for two years now.

On the other hand, his statement reminded me of 2005, post Hurrican Katrina, when Kanye West said, "Bush doesn't care about black people." I agree that Ex-President G.W.Bush responded poorly to the disaster. His mother, Barbara Bush, clearly made some extremely insensitive remarks about the evacuees' living conditions. She implied that living in emergency quarters was probably a step up from the poverty they were living in before the storm. Nevertheless, Bush really seemed to like some black people, especially black Africans. In fact, G.W. Bush said out of all the countries he visited during his presidency he felt the most at home in Ghana. So, did he have "deep-seated issues" against black Americans only. Well, he did have two black Secretaries of State in Colin Powell and Condeleezza Rice. So why did he leave black American citizens out in the aftermath of a devastating storm to die and fend for self?

Now, in order for Obama, whose mother and grandparents were white,to hate white people, he would have to hate himself. By casual observance, I don't see a particularly self-loathing man in our President. He has certainly had his struggles with his racial identity as a bi-racial man who is a self-identified black man, according to his book, "Dreams of My Father." But, I want to step back for a minute and look at the big picture here because clearly by the denotation of racism, he has not demonstrated that he feels white people, as a race, are inferior. He also has not actively tried to deny white people the basic rights of citizenship. So, he is not a racist by any definition I can find.

So, where does this fear that the President of the United States, a black man, is racist against white people come from? We are all products of a racist country. Racism is learned and then it has to be confronted and unlearned. That is not just the work white Americans have to do; it's the work all Americans have to do. Racial minorities sometimes have "deep-seated" racist attitudes against their own race. Worse yet, these attitudes can be turned against one's self and it can affect a person's mental and physical health and well-being.

Eric Holder, the U.S. Attorney General, has said that we have been "a nation of cowards" when it comes to discussing race. Most non-whites, and many open-minded whites, nodded their heads in agreement and understood perfectly what he was saying. We took it to heart as something we should work on, if by just being braver in the discussion, instead of falling back on hurtful words and unproductive arguments. Being willing to listen. Many whites became deeply offended because they took it personally. They thought this black man was calling white people cowards; therefore the unfounded fear: "It's payback time."

Well, Glenn Beck has been caught in lie after lie. He corrected Barbara Walters when she called him a journalist and said he's a commentator; "I commentate on life." He doesn't verify facts, by his own admission. He just entertains and incites. So, I'll just call him by his new name, "Speaks with Foot in Mouth," and not take him very seriously at all. "The fault, dear Glenn, lies within thyself."

The problem is that he has disciples that bobble-head his every word and who are looking for a reason to hate our POTUS. Hopefully, Glenn Beck followers will wake up one day and forgive themselves enough to respect our President and the office. On that day they'll be able to imagine a scenario in which a man (Obama) can point to an obvious truth, like institutionalized racism and racial profiling, and not feel any hate towards people that look like the people who began and codified these racist institutions.

The Roland Report's link: http://blog.essence.com/news/2009/07/glenn-beck-president-obama-is-a-racist.html