Lead us not into denial: Race matters in this election

ShareThis

U.S. Rep. John Murtha, the Democrat from Johnstown, Pa, who is the sugar plum fairy for the defense contracting community, said recently of the presidential election that people in this part of the country are racist, especially the older population who are "more hesitant."Now, Murtha knows something about the older generation because he is so old himself that back in the day he arranged for the pharaohs to get chariots. But this was one of those statements that gave candor a bad name.Clearly, he didn't mean to suggest that everybody in his district was racist -- he went on to say that Barack Obama would win Pennsylvania, although not in a runaway. He just blurted out the unvarnished truth because he is so secure that his opponent couldn't get noticed if he were the Archangel Gabriel blowing his trumpet.But as much as I cringed when I heard his impolitic remarks, and wondered whether some golf course in Florida might be better off for his permanent presence, I have to admit that perhaps a little unvarnished truth is what we need. It seems to me that some Americans are in denial about race this election season.I understand. If it were left simply to my own naive instincts, I would say that racial relations are rosy. The evidence of my white man's eyes is that in 2008 America, people of different races seem to get along well, by and large. I see progress. Most people like myself put a premium on respecting other people no matter their race and we assume that this has become general among the population.We assume too much.I work for a newspaper and any newspaper is more than a word factory -- it is a point of community contact, which means that numerous cranks and ratbags also check in. (Ratbag is an Australian word that means, as you would suppose, a bag full of rats.)Long ago, I worked out a little routine to say to ratbags if they should blurt out the inevitable question during their ridiculous complaints: "So are you black?" For callers like this, only my assumed negritude would explain why their complaints were going over like a squadron of concrete balloons."Sir (or madam), let me put it this way," I would say. "If you don't like Catholics, I am a Catholic; if you don't like Jews, I am a Jew; if you don't like gay people, I am a gay person; in fact, I am anything you dislike, excluding the Cleveland Browns, because a Steelers supporter has to have some standards. So if you ask me if I am black, yes, I am black, get it?!"Of course, such callers never got it, but would ring off wondering whether I was really black. So much for my self-righteous vanity.Even if racists never called, I would still have an insight into racist ratbaggery by seeing the stupid e-mails and scrawled letters sent to my colleague Tony Norman, who is always guilty in someone's eyes of the crime of columnizing while black. He also gets telephone calls -- often anonymous -- that vile does not adequately describe.Tony never complains. He laughs it off. I hope Obama does as well, because what I have learned has been an eye-opener for me: The hard cases are out there.I do not mean to pass myself off as a saint of racial enlightenment. We are all descended from our own tribes and some passions and prejudices are hard-wired into us. It seems to me that our first duty is to acknowledge them and move beyond them. It is not liberal or conservative; it is decent.But instead of acknowledgement, I see self-delusion and denial. I see people acting as if it's Christmas because ACORN, a community group that helps the poor to register to vote, has come under a cloud of fraud allegations. I see ratbags delighted to assume guilt despite ACORN's protestations of innocence and the absence of any legal determination. Little Nellie and Her Dog can guess at their motives.I also hear angry people asking how come it is OK for black people to vote for Barack Obama because of his race but not for white people to vote against him because of his race -- isn't it all racism?No, it isn't -- and only someone incapable of making distinctions would think so.Italians have voted for Italians and the Irish for the Irish forever and nobody ever thought this was racism. It all depends on motive, what the voter has in his heart -- and I have yet to encounter a ratbag who loves white people without hating black people.As I believe that those who hate others because of their race mock the God who created all of us in different colors, my prayer is for the racial haters to be the ones who lose the election.My hope is that Barack Obama will win. But my prayer is that if John McCain wins, it will be on the strength of the issues, without any obvious sign that he was carried to victory by the few rats unrepentantly out of their bags and chewing on America's soul.God, bless America, please.(Contact Reg Henry at rhenry@post-gazette.com.)(Distributed by Scripps Howard News Service, www.scrippsnews.com.)