Of Mychal Bell, Nooses and Two Americas

Presidential candidate John Edwards has spoken of two Americas. Perhaps America is in need of a remix of that speech. Not since the 1950’s has the United States’ ugly secret of racism been flaunted so blatantly. The day after the march in support of the Jena 6, racist white Americans in Louisiana continue to moon the rest of America by not releasing Mychal Bell.

Some people say that Justin Barker, the white student beaten by blacks, is being overlooked. Those same folks fail to consider that Justin attended an event only hours after leaving the hospital for his injuries. Those same folks are either unaware or choose to ignore the fact that Jena 6 defendant Robert Bailey was attacked by whites at an all-white party only days before the Barker incident. A white convenience store clerk also pulled a weapon on black youths. Is the media talking about that? I don’t think so.

It’s time for the federal government to step in and do what Louisiana governor Kathleen Blanco has failed to do --- investigate the Louisiana judicial and educational systems. What is most disturbing about the Jena 6 case is how quickly law enforcement and education officials dismiss the display of nooses by whites as pranks yet feel justified in charging black teens with attempted murder for attacking a white teen and not filing any charges when a black teen was assaulted by whites. Come on, people, completely ignoring the ethnicity of the folks involved --- that’s just wrong.

This is the America that dictators like Fidel Castro and Hugo Chavez like to talk about. This is the America that Al-Qaeda cites as examples of the hypocrisy of democracy. If you didn’t know it before, you know it now: blacks are still terror victims in America today.

Don’t get it twisted; the America in which we live is the same America in which Republican candidates for president feel comfortable in alienating not just blacks, but Latinos also.

Undeniably there has been progress in the U.S. regarding race relations but when folks charged with meting out justice, flagrantly deny the rights of American citizens without any recourse, America has lost its way.