In the late 1980s and early ’90s, he may have been the most celebrated figure in the black communities of Baltimore. Carson responded to that adulation by regularly giving his time to talk to young people, who needed to know that there was so much more beyond the streets.The use of the word "mask" here is inflammatory, and it will bring traffic to this NYT op-ed, but I think it's a big distraction from the point Coates is trying to make.
I was one of those young people. I don’t doubt that Carson was a conservative even then. I knew plenty of black people who loved their community and hated welfare. But white conservatives were never interested in them, and they were never as interested in Ben Carson as they are right now. When the presidency was an unbroken string of white men, there were no calls for him to run for the White House. And then he put on the mask.
April 4, 2013
Ben Carson "Wears the Mask."
A mask he put on quite recently, says Ta-Nehisi Coates.
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87 comments:
Just tiresome the left is.
Interesting that Coates, who makes a living writing from the black perspective, and is a liberal, thinks he also knows the white or conservative perspective.
Ta-Nehisi Coates is a racism huckster.
He's the author of the great New York Deli Racism outrage, which turned out, upon closer inspection, to be nothing at all.
Coates is a huckster who sees a white racist under every bed. The colleges and the press love this bullshit, so what can you expect?
We've got a phalanx of black hucksters who make their living unearthing ever more arcane outrages over white racism. Their livelihood depends on it. The racism huckstering is just another form of welfare for blacks. The liberal community is always eager to pay blacks to bitch about racism.
So, how are we supposed to set aside our "racist" tendency to see blacks as welfare hucksters when so many of them are so proud of their welfare, racism huckstering? Like Coates.
This guy needs to get a real job.
I also suspect whomever chose Obama to speak at the 2004 DNC was looking for just such a man, Democrat version. So Obama put on a mask. Not a red mask or a blue mask, btw.
The use of the word "mask" here is inflammatory
I'm sure I'm being dense but I don't understand why that's inflammatory.
Is Coates's point that white conservatives are desperate for a black person to become a leader, and that proves they're racist?
...Although masks must be the TOTD.
MayBee wrote: Interesting that Coates, who makes a living writing from the black perspective, and is a liberal, thinks he also knows the white or conservative perspective.
Remember that Coates is writing for a mostly white audience. He's no dummy. He knows the perspective of that audience quite well.
Really, can he just come out and say what he thinks? I don't get it, and I've read it twice now.
Can someone get that cape and cowl back from Herman Cain? Dick Grayson wants them back.
Ta-Nehisi Coates "Wears the Blinders"
"Not all black conservatives see it as their job to tell white racists that they embody the dreams of Martin Luther King Jr."
If true, that's a relief.
"Ben Carson wears a white wristband" -- Ta-Nehisi Coates
So black people within the GOP aren't individualized? They're all just bearers of the mask?
Or, If Ben Carson wrre going to be authentically loved, he'd have been loved by the GOP prior to the speech that launched him to GOP fame?
When the presidency was an unbroken string of white men, there were no calls for him to run for the White House.
Wrong argument. Lefties were not calling for any Black Democrats to run for president either otherwise Jesse Jackson or somebody like him would have been president by now. They were busy hoodwinking Blacks for votes then. Maybe that is what made Ben Carson reject the Dems then because he saw through them.
Coates' life would have no meaning or joy if he couldn't accuse white people of racism.
We Wear the Mask
WE wear the mask that grins and lies,
It hides our cheeks and shades our eyes,—
This debt we pay to human guile;
With torn and bleeding hearts we smile,
And mouth with myriad subtleties.
Why should the world be over-wise,
In counting all our tears and sighs?
Nay, let them only see us, while
We wear the mask.
We smile, but, O great Christ, our cries
To thee from tortured souls arise.
We sing, but oh the clay is vile
Beneath our feet, and long the mile;
But let the world dream otherwise,
We wear the mask!
-Paul Laurence Dunbar
so Coates thinks Carson is the one doing a minstrel show.
Jesse Jackson Jr. and Al Sharpton were not "articulate and bright and clean" enough.
Well we all have a face
That we hide away forever
And we take them out and
Show ourselves
When everyone has gone
Some are satin some are steel
Some are silk and some are leather
They're the faces of the stranger
But we love to try them on
Well we all fall in love
But we disregard the danger
Though we share so many secrets
There are some we never tell
Why were you so surprised
That you never saw the stranger
Did you ever let your lover see
The stranger in yourself?
Don't be afraid to try again
Everyone goes south
Every now and then
You've done it, why can't
Someone else?
You should know by now
You've been there yourself
Once I used to believe
I was such a great romancer
Then I came home to a woman
That I could not recognize
When I pressed her for a reason
She refused to even answer
It was then I felt the stranger
Kick me right between the eyes
Well we all fall in love
But we disregard the danger
Though we share so many secrets
There are some we never tell
Why were you so surprised
That you never saw the stranger
Did you ever let your lover see
The stranger in yourself?
Don't be afraid to try again
Everyone goes south
Every now and then
You've done it why can't
Someone else?
You should know by now
You've been there yourself
You may never understand
How the stranger is inspired
But he isn't always evil
And he is not always wrong
Though you drown in good intentions
You will never quench the fire
You'll give in to your desire
When the stranger comes along.
But white conservatives were never interested in them
Except for Jack Kemp. We're talking '80s and '90s, right?
From Wikipedia:
Although Kemp coaxed Bush to support a $4 billion housing program that encouraged public housing tenants to buy their own apartments, the Democratic Congress allocated only $361 million to the plan.
But that plantation metaphor is just some cracker racism according to Mr. Coates.
Interesting that, with Carson having been in the news seemingly about every other day since the great speech debacle (you know, the one he couldn't have written himself...), Ann chooses this particular snippet to focus on.
Things that make you say hmmmm.
Let's see. Dr. Carson couldn't have written his speech himself, now he's wearing a mask (in other words, isn't really black (whatever that means)).
I mean--if we're always supposed to look at her work for connections and hidden meanings and so forth.
When the presidency was an unbroken string of white men, there were no calls for him to run for the White House.
True, but only because at that time Carson was politically unknown. But there were plenty of people calling on Colin Powell to run back in 2000. He declined. I don't know if he would have gotten the nomination had he tried, but he certainly would have had a good shot.
James said...
Jesse Jackson Jr. and Al Sharpton were not "articulate and bright and clean" enough.
I thought it was because they had that ol' negro dialect?
A man of mediocre talent shows even he can get published in the NYT by doing the race hustle.
Shit, AJ, Toure has built a whole life, including published books and a tv show around it.
Anyone can be famous if they just accuse the pinktones of oppressing the browntones.
It's a rule.
Did Steel call himself a 'hip hop republican' or does that come from Coates?
His rise began with a meandering speech that mixed policy, humor and victimization in February at the National Prayer Breakfast
What a shock that conservatives might only notice a man when he speaks at the national prayer breakfast instead of to small groups like Coates 20 years ago. That clearly makes their interest inauthentic.
Carson wears a mask but Coates is very transparent.
I read Coates' piece. It's actually decently done except for the stupid parts (beginning, middle and end).
How on earth can someone say they have no doubt Carson was conservative even then, yet conclude with the accusation that Carson put on a mask [in order to be noticed and loved by the pinktones, of course].
Either the man was conservative (or classically liberal) then or he wasn't. If he was then he's not wearing a mask now, is he?
Besides. I thought people were supposed to grow, evolve, mature, change...or is that only when "republicans" turn on the party and act like raving libtards (see Powell, Colon (sic).
Republicans made a HUGE mistake in the 1960s by allowing Civil Rights to be coupled with The Great Society welfare programs. Civil Rights could have been about Liberty, Independence, and Personal Responsibility. Instead, it became about Liberty and Dependency, and Victim-ology. Republican's mistake in this was seeing the expansion of liberty below the "rights" or powers of states -- i.e., Republicans chose States Rights over Individual's Rights. Because of this mistake, Democrats were able to co-op the civil rights argument and create a nearly permanent welfare state. It seems like Ben Carson gets this.
BUT, now we're faced with a similar civil rights challenge. As David Brooks rightly notes, when the gay movement focused on promiscuity and bathhouses, it was difficult to make civil rights progress. Today gays and lesbians are focused on forming families, marriages, and serving in the military -- all deeply virtuous and honorable institutions. Yet, we, as Republicans, we this as a threat to our culture -- once again siding against Liberty and Civil Rights. It's difficult to take Ben Carson seriously, when he is empowering the same mistake to be repeated that led to the current welfare state.
When we are challenged to not be the stupid party, thinking these issues all the way through in a deeply principled fashion is what that challenge means. The welfare state leads to a profound lack of personal responsibility, a lack of ownership in the success of our nation, and destroys any sense of personal, family, or community accountability for one's actions. Abortion, Obamacare, and our Debt are simply symptoms of a much deeper issue. Ronald Reagan said that virtue is the cornerstone of democracy and that when virtue is lost, so is the democracy. How deep or shallow we define virtue is at question today. Do we expand liberty and increase personal responsibility, ownership, and accountability. Or do we continue to be the stupid party that has shallow principles, is unable to adapt to change, and simply clings to a past that never really existed in some failed attempt to controls behaviors that seem strange to us. That's the choice and it's critical to the Republic we make good choices.
It's not hidden. Ann hates anyone superior to herself and picks at such targets in bitchy ways, unless she is compelled to acknowledge their mastery. She does not feel Obama superior to her and so is comfy with him. She was on the fence with Romney. She knows Carson is worth ten of her and lays this down. She knows where Richard Fernandez stands in comparison to her and any mention of him on this board is excised.
No, she doesn't hide it, at any rate, not well.
Coates writes a litany of other black Republicans he despises, some of whom are far older than he and before his time. To paraphrase Althouse regarding Carson about two months ago:
If it was Carson himself, alone, I'd be extremely impressed. And extremely surprised.
Surprise, surprise, surprise! Carson was not the first nor the last to speak his mind. It was pretty shameless of Althouse to denigrate Carson like that just two months ago. Are we seeing evolution both our eyes?
Republicans made a HUGE mistake in the 1960s by allowing Civil Rights to be coupled with The Great Society welfare programs. Civil Rights could have been about Liberty, Independence, and Personal Responsibility. Instead, it became about Liberty and Dependency, and Victim-ology.
I think that the victimology thing was built into the system by the Court's "self-esteem" language in Brown v. Board of Ed.
Whatever liberals can do to marginalize a black conservative - they will do it.
To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven:
Blogger Tom said...
Republicans made a HUGE mistake in the 1960s by allowing Civil Rights to be coupled with The Great Society welfare programs
___________________________________
They didn't allow anything. They were in the legislative minority.
Gee, I seem to remember conservatives willing to talk about a presidential run for Powell back in the Nineties, despite his well-known social liberalism and RINOism in general. Hell, I had a Swann for Governor sign in my window in '06. Still think he would have been better than the Governor of Philadelphia. There was talk of having Rice replace the ailing and un-presidential Cheney in 2004. People like Coates were fond of accusing authors of such proposals of "tokenism" back then, if I remember correctly.
We have all these stories everyday, and if they aren't purely political, we find what is about them, and it seems that on domestic policy it all comes down to two sides that don't really change and are pretty simple:
The Right says: 1) leave people alone, 2) expect them to take care of themselves and each other 3) respect our traditions
The left says: 1) The government can solve everything with enough money and power, and we have a responsibility to make it do that. 2) Those who don't agree are seriously flawed by greed and racism.
That pretty much covers it, doesn't it?
Ta-Nehisi Coates sez ...
... a distinguished neurosurgeon who went from the depths of Detroit poverty to the heights of Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore. But his current status among conservatives isn't so much rooted in Carson's redemptive rise from rags to respectability, as it is in the belief that he is, in the long winter of Obama, the one they've been waiting for.
So sayeth the college drop out son of a stay-at-home Black Panther father. We all have our burdens to bear, eh.
I stopped reading at that point...why bother? I'm going to be "told" what I think about a neurosurgeon? I am partial to neurosurgeons, and their teams of various races (race having nothing to do with saving lives)...one saved my better half's life 22 March 2006 when she was 15 minutes from death.
This political putz is going to tell me I am not impressed by Carson's accomplishments, which vastly overshadow Coates' own, but only like his black face potential GOP candidacy?
Mr Coates is entitled to his opinion, even when they are wrong. And I am entitled to mine. I have no need to entertain Coates.
This is like the racist dog whistle. If you hear it, you're the dog. If you see the mask, that's how you explain things you don't want to believe.
But white conservatives were never interested in them, and they were never as interested in Ben Carson as they are right now. When the presidency was an unbroken string of white men, there were no calls for him to run for the White House.
Revealing how Coates manages to interpret progress as a negative isn't it? It's almost like he has some sort of internal belief and interprets all evidence in furtherance of it.
Tom wrote: Republicans made a HUGE mistake in the 1960s by allowing Civil Rights to be coupled with The Great Society welfare programs.
Stop right there. Why are you blaming Goldwater? How much more truthful if you had written:
Democrats made a HUGE mistake in the 1960s by coupling Civil Rights with The Great Society welfare programs.
Why this eternal switching of blame? It's akin to trying to force Republicans to change now today to align with Dems on social issues.
I think Coates is trying to say conservatives foolishly believe Carson will change the way we talk about race in America.
Or is that he'll change the way we see race in America? I can't remember all the superpowers people foolishly see in these black politicians who spring up out of nowhere to transform us.
but I think it's a big distraction from the point Coates is trying to make.
What point is that? Republicans want to be hip riding the coattails of a black man like Democrats are doing with Obama?
Here's what Tom will write in the future:
Why did Republicans allow Democrats to bankrupt America because they opposed SSM?
chickelit said...
Stop right there. Why are you blaming Goldwater? How much more truthful if you had written:
Democrats made a HUGE mistake in the 1960s by coupling Civil Rights with The Great Society welfare programs.
Why would this be truthful? The coupling is great for Democrats.
I think I mentioned it at the time, but for the first month or so of hearing and really liking Ben Carson, I had no idea he was Black, but I liked what he was saying a lot. This blog was the first place I heard about his skin color. It wasn't mentioned at the right wing places I was reading and hearing him.
It's good for Blacks that he's Black, but otherwise I'd prefer he was a handicapped lesbian transsexual.
Aridog sez:
So sayeth the college drop out son of a stay-at-home Black Panther father. We all have our burdens to bear, eh.
You forgot the 7 kids with 4 women from the "stay at home" father.
What does stay at home father mean, do you suppose? Welfare recipient? I mean, if you're writing your official bio and your father did anything at all worth mentioning, don't you gussy it up and mention it?
Coates:
Since the dawn of the Obama era, conservatives have been on the lookout for such a man. In 2004 they dispatched Alan Keyes cross-country to take up the mantle of the Conservative Black Hope and deliver an early knockout to Obama. Keyes had never lived in Illinois and his voters barely knew him, and voted accordingly. But it did not matter who he was. What mattered was their plan.
Yeah, Keyes was embarrassing, but he was nobody's first choice and nobody's Great Black Hope.
He was slotted in at the last minute because Obama had already personally destroyed two opponents by having their divorce records unsealed and publicized. People were not lining up to run against the unscrupulous Obama team at that late point.
I'm sorry was Ben Carson known to anyone outside Baltimore when he was preaching to black youths 25 years ago? Or is that white conservatives fault?
I knew plenty of black people who loved their community and hated welfare. But white conservatives were never interested in them,
Well, when you 'claim' to hold conservative views but religiously vote for the other side in every election, it stands to reason conservatives might lose interest.
"When the presidency was an unbroken string of white men..."
Well he can certainly keep using that line to discount everything good he wishes Republicans would stop doing. It really screws with his stereotype when they do the right thing.
Shorter Coates: Blacks can be conservative as long as they shut up and do not get publicity.
Coates is not in my opinion a race hustler. He's thoughtful. Which is why his position is even more sad and revealing. The pressure to denounce black conservatives gets even to him.
"When the presidency was an unbroken string of white men..."
219 YEARS IN A ROW!!!
FACE!
The plantation metaphor refers to a popular theory on the right. It holds that the 95 percent of African-Americans who voted for a Democratic president are not normal Americans voting their beliefs, but slaves.
Not quite. The plantation metaphor holds that liberals generally react to the appearance of a black conservative as if the entire race were their property. To equate this with believing that they're slaves would require us to hold that the liberal belief in question has a basis in reality. (Well, there's a first time for everything.)
There was this episode of Mad Men where Peggy invites her mother over for dinner to announce she and her boyfriend will be living together, though unmarried.
The mother is displeased, to say the least. She lays into Peggy and calls her stupid, basically, because her boyfriend is a Jew and he's just using her for practice.
I don't recall anything about a mask, though.
David said...
Coates is not in my opinion a race hustler. He's thoughtful.
To be more accurate Coates, like Friedersdorf, is thoughtful within the narrow range they're interested in. They demonize outsiders.
Great black hope? Great white hope? Jeez I will settle for a great bean counter who can at least balance our budget for a nanosecond or two.
Several comments suggest that I blame Republicans for all the ills in the world, and not Democrats. And I certainly have a bias here. I simply believe that left to their own devices, Democrats will spend the country into oblivion and seperate the nation from constitution, thus destroying liberty, in an attempt to achieve equality of results. And, in the process, assume a dictorial level of power. While I hope intelligent Democrats combat this, I don't put a lot of faith in it. I think it's possible for Republicans to get this and that's where I choose to put pressure. Good chance, this won't be effective either. I guess I just think that challenging Republicans to think deeper is about the best chance we have to get out of the mess we're in.
...but I think it's a big distraction from the point Coates is trying to make.
I take it the point Coates is trying to make is that, if you make a list of all the people who have been GOP frontrunners, or in other ways rose to some headline-grabbing prominence since President Obama was elected ( including, but not limited to: Bachmann, Perry, Cain, Steele, Gingrich, Romney, Eastman, Paul, Paul, Ryan, Rubio, Cruz, and now Carson ), then ignored all those that were not black, all the rest would be black.
Which shows the Republicans are racist. Or something.
The article is no different than multitudes of others of a similar bent. It may be dressed up in more readable prose, but, ultimately it is the same progressive drivel. The comments there are more of the same. Between them they reflect and prove that which they seek to disavow. Any minority whom does not hew to the progressive propaganda must be "uncle tom" or a "disgrace to his race" or some such racialist rubbish. Any impediment, indeed, every impediment faced by any minority must be the fault of white people. If the schools that you send your children to are of low quality, it's the fault of white people. If there are too many fatherless children, it's the fault of the white people. If there isn't "fill in the blank" it's the fault of the white people. None of these nitwits ever consider that taking even a little personal responsibility, making people responsible ,would alleviate many of the "slights" that they purportedly suffer from. Poor schools ? How many of your neighbors contribute to the tax funds that support those schools ? How many of your neighbors actively support their children's education at home ? Low income ? Did you bother to get an education ? Do you bother to continue your education ? Do you continue to elect people who line their pockets at your expense. None of that is the fault of anyone but yourself. If you don't like your situation fix it. Stop blaming everyone else because you won't drag your carcass off of the couch. Stop expecting that anyone else should rescue you from your own ignorance and stupidity. It's not racism or racist, it's your choice and your fault. Accept the consequences of those choices, after all, you, willingly, made them.
Phrase falls flat I guess because people generally don't know about the Lone Ranger anymore.
Putting on THAT mask was a good thing.
When the presidency was an unbroken string of white men, there were no calls for him to run for the White House. And then he put on the mask.
PHX asks why that's inflammatory. It's because he's tying in the wearing of masks to "unbroken string of white men." He's using the word "mask" in a racial way, thus subtly calling Carson an oreo. He's black on the outside (mask) but white people love all that white goodness on the inside.
Has anyone ever dared suggest to Tonto or Tansy, or whatever the Hell his name is that he's the one wearing the mask?
Tom said...
Republicans made a HUGE mistake in the 1960s by allowing Civil Rights to be coupled with The Great Society welfare programs.
After the '64 election, Republicans didn't have a voice. LBJ had a rubber stamp Congress.
Coates is not in my opinion a race hustler. He's thoughtful.
No, he's just using an NPR voice--that soothing tone--to work his racial agenda.
If he was Al Sharpton, he would just say, "Uncle Tom" or "oreo."
Actually, I don't even know if Al Sharpton would say Uncle Tom anymore.
This actually may be a good sign, that the racialist left has to be more subtle, at least when they attack black people.
Carson, by the way, has no NPR voice and says what he thinks. Kinda like Bill Cosby. This idea that he's hiding his beliefs doesn't seem to fit him at all.
It's the left--the inventers of PC language--that wears masks, all the time.
I think Obama, for instance, has a very masked persona. He's an extremely guarded speaker and rarely shows any emotion.
Carson, in sharp contrast, usually seems to be speaking his mind, and sometimes gets in trouble for it.
Phx. The mask is what the KKK wore to hide their true identities. Carson joined the KKK when he became a conservative because to be one is to be the other. See?
Coates just insulted more than half the world's population which is not white but acts "white."
As for conservative, perhaps he should read our national charter, The Declaration of Independence, and our organizational document, The Constitution, to acquire a better understanding of America.
Is Coates an unassimilated alien? He seems blissfully unaware of the American character or the people in this world.
Oh, well. I am certain that some human or civil rights business will not correct his ignorant slander.
Michael:
Specifically when he became American. Carson became American when he recognized individual dignity and the unalienable rights, and responsibilities, of each human life.
I'd like to know what the point is that Althouse thinks he is trying to make. It seems to me that he is just rationalizing to convince himself that conservatives don't care about their fellow conservatives who happen to be black but just want to use them as tokens and so therefore its okay for liberals to vilify him.
From my perspective, it seems to me that we conservatives are delighted when a black person shares his conservative beliefs and we hope that he will have influence in the black community so what is wrong with that view. One advantage we conservatives have over liberals is that we know and have more contact with blacks and we know that a lot them share a lot of our values. Given that knowledge, we know that many of them shouldn't be voting for the liberal Dems based on their core values and not to forget the disaster the Dems have been to the black community the last fifty years.
"He then cast himself as a victim of political correctness, besieged by white liberals" I consider that statement to be false, its nothing more than spin. Yes, I'm sure he has always been a conservative or a long time conservative but it was only when he shared his conservative views that he did in fact become a victim of the liberals, it was actually when he took off his mask that he was subjected to liberal abuse.
When did "blacks" ever ask Ben Carson to run?
I guess Coates is trying to say the GOP looks at race too much when casting about for their next great hope. But his accusation doesn't really work, because the fact is race is used *against* republicans all the time. The tea party looks so white! Both men running on the ticket last year were so white! Policies like voter ID are racist! Being against affirmative action is racist!
So it makes sense that, in a time when we nominate people for the Supreme Court because they are Wise Latinas, or make big announcements that the head of Secret Service is, for the first time ever a woman!, a party would seek to change the tally, to remove that as a talking point.
But let's not pretend its just a one sided thing. Sure, the GOP got excited about Alan West and he failed to get re-elected. But who has ever gotten excited about a national stage for Waters, or Conyers, Or Jackson-Lee? These are people constantly elected to office whom nobody attaches any hope. What does that say? It's the mirror image of the same problem.
There's a reason Democrats had to wait until a little known State Senator cleared the field and got elected to the Senate before they had themselves a big hope. It wasn't due to their deep bench of viable black candidates, although they'll use the numbers on that bench against the GOP. But Obama was the only one. I mean, they even put posters of Obama with the label Hope right on it.
So all Coates is saying is, if the GOP tries to play this game like Democrats do, I will cast aspersions on their people. And I suspect Althouse nods along, even though she was taken in by the last Mr Hope.
Carson has been called a House-nigger by many on the left. I would opine that, au contraire, Coats is the perfect example of a House-nigger on the leftist Plantation--dutifully defending his masters by attacking a major threat to Plantation life with his tortured reasoning--obviously given his previous writings, the only kind of reasoning Coats seems to know
The plantation metaphor refers to a popular theory on the right. It holds that the 95 percent of African-Americans who voted for a Democratic president are not normal Americans voting their beliefs, but slaves.
Slaves to the Democrats? Pretty much. I worked on the campaign of a moderate Republican -- a Black Republican -- back in the day and I was appalled at the reaction of the Black community. Of course nearly all of the Black vote went to his opponent, a lackluster liberal white Democrat while the "word" was put out that our candidate was an "Uncle Tom" and an "Oreo" and about ever other insult to suggest that this fine, honorable, accomplished man was nothing more than a pawn and a dupe.
Sort of the crap Ta-Nehisi is dishing out about Ben Carson.
A corollary to the plantation theory is the legend of the Conservative Black Hope ...
No, the corollary to the plantation theory is the "house n*gger" theory, which is that there are people like Jesse Jackson, Al Sharpton, Ta-Nehisi Coates, among others, who are granted status out of proportion to their abilities in return for keeping track of who might be leaving the plantation and helping Massa keep them there. In the antebellum South the House n*ggers worked indoors, wore real clothes instead of the tattered rags of the field hands, and slept in the mansion -- servants quarters to be sure, but vastly better than the leaky and drafty slaves quarters the field hands slept in, so they were highly motivated to inform on the hands. Today media whores like Sharpton and Jackson have their faces on TV and Ta-Nehisi has a regular gig writing drivel for the Atlantic. But that's way better than what they'd have if they were judged by the abilities and by the content of their character instead of their willingness to say what their masters in the liberal establishment want them to say.
Does it matter that this abolitionist truth-teller serves at the leisure of an audience that is overwhelmingly white? Not really.
Republicans aren't allowed to get excited over a man who stands up and speaks truth to power? Why not? Ben Carson is very intelligent, and he surely knew the downside of what he was doing when he stood up at that prayer breakfast and spoke the self-evident truth about Obamacare. I'm sure he was aware that it would trigger the race hucksters like Ta-Nehisi coming after him to eviscerate him in print. But he did it anyway. He is what he is, and Ta-Nehisi is what he is.
Blacks are brainwashed slaves; you can’t expect them to know what’s in their interest.
Considering their support for Obama despite the consequences of Obama's economic policies on the Black community, that may be the one true thing Ta-Nehisi wrote in his entire column.
I had some things to say about this, but they've all been said and said very well.
Thanks
I have only this to add.
CEO-MMP said...
James said...
Jesse Jackson Jr. and Al Sharpton were not "articulate and bright and clean" enough.
I thought it was because they had that ol' negro dialect?
Politicians on the left are very adept at putting on the ol' negro dialect when they think it will serve their purposes.
Obama himself, Bill Clinton, Hillary, slow Joe, and AlGore just to name a few.
Why does anyone care what Ta-Nehisi Coates writes?
He's black.
Got it.
"Coates, who makes a living writing from the black perspective"
That's what Coates sez. Actually, he makes his living putting a black face on white liberalism.
A MASK if you will.
Coates knows about masks.
Progressive Projection.
It takes chutzpah for someone with a name like Ta-Nehisi (is that faux African? Or just faux faux) to criticize someone else for wearing a 'mask'.
> I simply believe that left to their own devices, Democrats will spend the country into oblivion and seperate the nation from constitution, thus destroying liberty, in an attempt to achieve equality of results. And, in the process, assume a dictorial level of power. While I hope intelligent Democrats combat this, I don't put a lot of faith in it.
Okay, so let's see what you do about this.
> I guess I just think that challenging Republicans to think deeper is about the best chance we have to get out of the mess we're in.
You do know that's twaddle, right?
Repubs aren't perfect, but unless you're actually in a position to change them (and you're not), you can either support them or not.
The effects of that have nothing to do with your intentions. (Supporting a Dem because the Repub wasn't good enough is supporting a dem.)
@althouse: a big distraction from the point Coates is trying to make.
Really? Seriously? There was something worthy of being called a point in what the monster Coates was trying to say?
The guy is just totally enslaved to the Liberal demon that possesses him. I doubt at this point there is anyone home inside his body anymore.
Lo! I am come to autumn,
When all the leaves are gold;
Grey hairs and golden leaves cry out
The year and I are old.
In youth I sought the prince of men,
Captain in cosmic wars,
Our Titan, even the weeds would show
Defiant, to the stars.
But now a great thing in the street
Seems any human nod,
Where shift in strange democracy
The million masks of God.
In youth I sought the golden flower
Hidden in wood or wold, [ 1 ]
But I am come to autumn,
When all the leaves are gold.
Gold Leaves by G. K. Chesterton
"Really? Seriously? There was something worthy of being called a point in what the monster Coates was trying to say?
The guy is just totally enslaved to the Liberal demon that possesses him. I doubt at this point there is anyone home inside his body anymore."
4/4/13, 2:01 PM
Nucking futs. Is this what the religious right has come to?
Coates barely qualifies as being in the same species with Carson.
What is the point Coates is trying to make?
That because no one paid attention to those black men before (none that Coates noticed, and he's free to make up whatever he wants to occupy the hearts of white men) that changing times prove something BAD?
He's just stuck on stupid, isn't he. But would he have a career if there was equality and people knew about it? He'd have to talk about something other than race. Does he know how?
Inga... What Coates is saying about Carson is utterly vile.
And no one but crazy right-wing extremists even seem to notice. Why?
Do we so completely and utterly dismiss Coates that whatever he says is just a nice black guy we can feel good about having a prominent presence that all we hear is "bwwa bwaa bwaa bwap bwap bwaa bwaa". Like Charlie Brown grown-ups.
Why does no one listen to what Coates SAYS?
Why does it take a fringe-winger to speak about clear and blatant and hateful racism when it's Coates?
I hope we're better people than that, and will defend the objects of racist slander.
In this black racialist's world Carson's history only began when he "sttod up" to BHO. He was like the 95% and bang he became consevative so he could become the darling of the right.
Coates' stupid writing is just a vehicle for libs to pontificate about how desperate the repubs are.
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