Swedish Culture Minister Celebrates With LIVE Genital Mutilation Cake

"STOCKHOLM (FRIA TIDER). A macabre scene with racist undertones took place on Saturday when Swedish minister of culture Lena Adelsohn Liljeroth attended a tax funded party for the Stockholm cultural elite. The self-proclaimed "anti-racist" Liljeroth declared the party officially started by slicing a piece of a cake depicting a stereotypical African woman.

(Minister) Lena Adelsohn Liljeroth was invited to open the festivities by performing a clitoridectomy on the cake, which she did by slicing off the part of the cake depicting female genitalia. She then proceeded to feed that part of the cake to a performance artist, done up in blackface, his head protruding through the table." (here)

Sometimes you just have to see things with your own eyes to believe that someone with intelligence and authority actually thought it was a good idea. YouTube below: WARNING: VIDEO IS DISTURBING!!!



James C. Collier

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Technorati Tags: Swedish Culture Minister Celebrates With LIVE Genital Mutilation Cake, Lena Adelsohn Liljeroth, Female Circumcision, Genitalia, Blackface, Acting White

Rush Limbaugh Self-Immolation Not A Fluke

It is hard to imagine Don Imus, Mr. Them Sure Are Some Nappy-headed Ho's, giving Rush Fluke's a slut Limbaugh advice, but this is exactly what transpired earlier today. Imus told Limbaugh to load his fat butt onto his Gulf Stream private jet, and fly to wherever and apologize like a man, to Ms. Fluke. Rush countered by pouring a little more gasoline on himself and once again lighting up. (here) The best part is George Will calling the Republicans, especially Romney, cowards for not checking Limbaugh(here). John Boehner said Limbaugh's name calling was inappropriate. Wow, that's tough talk from the Republican leader!

James C. Collier

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Technorati Tags: Rush Limbaugh Self-Immolation Not A Fluke, Sandra Fluke, Slut, Prostitute, Apology, Acting White

Penn State Coach McQueary As Coward, Like Father Like Son

It is no surprise that Penn State Assistant Coach Mike McQueary is now double-talking that he contacted the police regarding his witnessing of the Sandusky rape of a 10-year old boy on campus in 2002. Only thing is that neither Penn State Police, or the campus police, have a record of McQueary saying peep to them, unequivocally. As well, McQueary's grand jury testimony makes no mention of contacting any authorities other than Head Coach Paterno, Athletic Director Curley, and University VP Schultz. Oh yeah, McQueary did first contact his own father (John J. McQueary), presumably the cowardly example-setter who reared his son onto the ill-fated, protect-your-own-ass, path upon which he nows finds himself.

I'm fortunate. My old man would have only had one question, if I had been in McQueary's shoes - can he touch the blunt object I used to smash Sandusky's degenerate scull? Any other question or response would have been unacceptable! Momma McQueary must feel pretty good right about now.

With nearly a decade of silence behind them, I pity the chip-off-the-old-bastard McQueary that he and his old man had no heart to help that poor boy or the other boys they should have imagined, from the clutches of a monster. However, it is the faded hope that had to be in the boy's eyes that night, as McQueary arrived and departed the rape scene never to be heard from, that breaks this father's/son's heart.

James C. Collier

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Penn State Coach Sandusky Suspected Of Preying Upon Poor Black Boys

The case against Sandusky bears an uncanny resemblance to the one against former Boston Red Sox Club House Manager, Donald Fitzpatrick, who was convicted of sexually abusing poor black boys in Winter Haven FL, off-season training home of the baseball team (here). What people are not yet saying about Sandusky is the question, in addition, of if the eight victims were predominantly, if not all, poor and black - and there are at least ten more similar at-risk victims in the queue, if you believe Pennsylvania's Governor.

Why is this question/answer not in the MSM (main stream media), but rather I had to dig to find it? (here) and other out of the way places?

James C. Collier

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Technorati Tags: Penn State Coach Sandusky Suspected Of Preying Upon Poor Black Boys, Joe Paterno, Sexual Predator, Tim Curly, Gary Schultz, Acting White

The Great Slavery Debate: Reparations Twist

When witnessing a debate on reparations, I often feel like I’m listening to people speaking completely different languages. Consider that when unarmed Black Oakland BART rider Oscar Grant was killed by a White police officer on a train platform, Blacks demanded a first-degree murder charge, although it had little chance of being sustained (no malice aforethought). While the accusation made Blacks feel good for a minute, the illusion of fair play departed when the jury opted for a more accurate charge.

When Blacks argue for reparations, it does not mean that they know or care anything about an accurate application. What they care about is a means to take revenge, while getting compensated for the suffering of their relatives (the end). Of course, Whites (and some Blacks) try to explain that reparations do not apply, to a chorus of ‘I-don’t-give-a-bleep what a White man or Uncle Tom thinks’. It’s not about laws or evolving moral codes of the day – it’s about emotion and payback. We need to call it what it is.

Reparations debates will never be resolved until Blacks can inject some objectivity where only emotions currently exist. For their part, Whites will never be a part of the resolution until they can cop to how reasonable it is for Blacks to blame slavery, as the catch basin, for the litany of misdeeds that continued after slavery ended.

Hopefully the day will come when Blacks stop soliciting unfulfilling indulgences from Whites, when what they really want is for Whites to admit that their ancestors outsmarted themselves, not only by kidnapping Africans, but more so by not making Blacks equal opportunity citizens after the emancipation. Both Blacks and Whites need to work (together), minus race cards, at understanding how pretend equality (of opportunity), the sustained post-slavery sin, got us to the dysfunctional mess we find ourselves today. Only then can we start making decisions and taking action to reverse the damage.

James C. Collier

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The Great Slavery Debate: Ungrateful Negroes

When it comes to discussing, or even thinking about, slavery, the great taboo of White folks is embodied in the question forever on their minds and almost never on their tongues, “Why are Blacks so ungrateful to be in America, when Africa is the worst place on the globe in terms of health, jobs, government, education, crime, climate, resources, blah, blah, blah?”

They will go on to say, “sure, slavery was bad for your ancestors, but it ended a long time ago”. They will also say that racism may exist, “but it exist in Africa too, and much worse, with one tribe committing genocide on another”. In the days before political correctness, Whites were fond of telling Blacks that they should go back to Africa, if they don’t like it here. The implication was always that however bad Blacks think America is, it is worse in Africa.

Where White people got off track is in thinking and acting like Blacks are immigrants. “Go home”, has always been the retort for the disgruntled immigrant, and some even made the return trip. But the African ancestry that was forced here is mostly like those people who stayed behind in Europe, China, India, etc. – meaning they are not immigrant-minded. So why did Black people stay here? Out of those that could have returned, they stayed mostly out of spite, and certainly not because anyone offered them a shot at the American Dream. This was the grand screw-up of US leadership before, during, and after the Civil War.

Fast-forward - if Black people could ever find a reason to want to be here, because of the relative opportunity, instead of being here to simply piss-off White people, a lot of the problems of the day would disappear. And ditto, if White people could ever accept responsibility for post-slavery abuse, without pretending to handover the keys to the kingdom, or other counter-productive acts of contrition.

The paradox is that Blacks cannot make Whites miserable about the past and what followed, without assuring their own adjacent misery, and Whites cannot make amends by only pretending to consider Blacks capable and deserving of a fair shot. So we are all miserable together down the crapper.

James C. Collier

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The Great Slavery Debate: The Debt of Slavery

It is a recurring theme within American Black culture that White people owe a special debt to Blacks because of slavery. Certain conservatives try to short-circuit this claim by arguing that slavery was not profitable, but even if profitability was arguable (and it is not), some will still claim it as a theft of service. However, since slavery has always been with humanity, we will need to carefully establish the point, exactly, when it became theft, and worthy of damages.

Nowhere in the bible is it written that slavery is an abomination unto the Lord, or anybody else. There is no commandment against it. People were not stoned or crucified for practicing it, unlike stealing, killing, adultery, blasphemy, and a list of other prescribed avoidances. In fact, the bible and the Koran, the two most enduring rulebooks of history, and the basis of our rules of law, make nary a mention of slavery as anything more than an everyday part of life.

Did the tribal rulers of Africa think they were stealing the lives of rival Africans when they captured and traded them to Europeans for gunpowder/weapons, utensils and foodstuffs? I think not. Many Africans might argue that they were actually sparing the lives of their kindred enemies by shipping them off, as the alternative was to simply kill them. So it would seem that slavery broke neither laws nor moral codes, a continent away or here, until those practicing it changed their minds about it. This is no different than our current hot-button items of abortion, or same sex marriage. All is allowed until strictly forbidden.

People who argue for repayment nearly always cite reparations paid to indigenous Americans, Japanese internees, and WWII era Jews, but in those cases (here, here, here), laws (treaties) on the books were expressly broken. It seems that the acts of elevating the Atlantic Slave Trade, and slavery in America, to a cut above all other slavery invokes some special status where societal advancement no longer adheres to linearity. The sooner a proper perspective is in place, the better off we will all be.

Finally, perspective is not an invitation to insult and cruelty - slavery did happen and its association with a struggling group is undeniable. Nearly forty years ago a White high school classmate, Paul Ivancie, stated to me, unapologetically, how cool it would be to have a slave. His stupidity brought me face-to-face with the love/hate conundrum Blacks face in this country. There are still Antebellum Whites like him out there - I just hope that when my kids meet such people those words will roll off their backs better than mine.

James C. Collier

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The Great Slavery Debate: Was Slavery Profitable?

Note: There are many who say that the economics of slavery were not very profitable, Thomas Sowell notably, and I would say they are wrong. However, it is important to distinguish (as I will attempt) between plantation slavery economics and the greater commerce value/impact of the triangular trade.

There are two high schools (Part 1 today), and one graduate school (Part 2 coming), of thought on the degree to which this country owes its fortunes to slavery, and by inference to Black ancestry. It is this notion of who benefited and who is owed, intertwined with current dysfunction, which sits as a big bugaboo to progress.

The Atlantic Slave Trade was a profitable component of triangular commerce of that day, but by itself not world changing. In fact, slavery has often been the spoil of a society that was good at something else, mainly war. Having other people to do your loathsome work has been a luxury for the already rich. The Atlantic Slave Trade was a final burst where pure labor was of pivotal importance to a more sophisticated system of commerce, mostly involving sugar and Europe’s sweet tooth for its by-products.

In the labor-starved Americas, slavery is what made the triangular system happen, on the front end. Thereby, it deserves a disproportion of the credit for the very profitable distilled-spirits and textiles on the back end. On the other hand, while plantation slavery made those owners rich, those same owners were not directly responsible for this country’s economic fortune. The overhead required to administer slaves within a system of zero incentive, was high. As a sidebar, had slaves been able to work in parallel to purchase their freedom, the US might have avoided a devastating war with itself.

The Wall Street banks and insurance companies in the north were a different story than the plantations. The slave trade business gave this country a critical foundation in establishing the commerce and banking infrastructure that world leadership would require. The names of those companies and their impact are undeniable – JP Morgan, Chase, Lehman Bros., Aetna, New York Life, to name a few.

So, in answer to whether slavery was profitable, the answer is both no and yes, but much more yes – as it was the lubricant for the most profitable European commerce transactions of the day. This is true even though American plantations were inefficient in their brutal waste and high overhead cost.

Up Next: Part 2 (Graduate School). Just because slavery was profitable does not mean that slaves, or their ancestors, have a rightful claim. The details and context of the day, both legal and ethical, must be applied.

James C. Collier

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Technorati Tags: The Great Slavery Debate: Was Slavery Profitable?, Atlantic Slave Trade, Profitability, Commerce, Triangular Trade, Acting White

The Great Slavery Debate: Origins

Considering that most Americans cannot name all fifty states, or find S. Dakota on a map, it would not surprise me at all that those same folks think that slavery was invented, or re-invented, in the colonies now making up these United States. Unfortunately, what most Americans know of slavery was passed down from people who saw Alex Hailey’s fictionalized Roots mini-series. There is much more to slavery than this, as it has been going on for thousands of years.

Slavery began when hunter-gathering ended, some say about 11,000 years ago. Once agriculture advances produced more food than people in certain areas could eat, people began enslaving others, as they could afford to keep their captives fed. Before that, they simply killed their enemies without a blink. To help our perspective, during the 1,000 or so years of the Roman Empire, 100 million people in an around the Mediterranean area were enslaved.

The lives of slaves have rarely been ‘good’, as some would describe. Throughout time, slaves have been property not people. Their treatment, and very existence, has always been at the whim of their owners. This means they could be killed, assaulted, neglected, or simply worked to death, without repercussions. In most cases slave women bore offspring into slavery, both replenishing and growing the ranks.

Slavery has always been profitable and the foundation of commerce for all societies. Slavery commerce was often the aim/outcome of going to war, where entire societies were enslaved and sold as spoils. It is estimated that 25 to 50% of the world’s population has been enslaved at some time in history. So, the millions of slaves captured and delivered during the Atlantic Slave Trade hold no distinction other than the distance they were transported, and timing with the moral question of acceptability.

The taboo nature of slavery history has fostered a level of ignorance, all the way around, that hinders placing it in proper perspective.

James C. Collier

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Technorati Tags: The Great Slavery Debate – Origins, Atlantic Slave Trade, Milton Meltzer, Commerce, Romans, Acting White

The Great Slavery Debate: The Footing

The second most challenging aspect of a slavery discussion is not getting blasted out of the saddle, with your point-of-view still in the holster. Unless your words are something like, ‘slavery in America was the pinnacle of man’s inhumanity to man’, you barely stand a chance. This is because today’s discussion is most often against today’s morality, rather than the progress of that time. Of course, to say that America’s slavery was not the worst is nothing close to saying that it was anything less than bad. All slavery was/is bad for the enslaved, as well as the society.

The only relative comparison I will make is that the Atlantic slave trade objectively delivered more slaves from Africa to South America (over 5,000,000) than to the North (500,000), and by all accounts, those delivered to the south suffered a much higher mortality. Their life spans were short, only one to five years, due to the grueling work, mistreatment, and harsh conditions on plantations, in mines, and elsewhere. South American slave owners expected to get no more than a few years of hard labor from a slave, and they went about fulfilling this prophecy. The work was 7 days/week, 18 hours/day, no women, no children, bad food, no care, and no mercy.

The most challenging aspect of a slavery discussion is the notion that current Black plight, with respect to crime, unwed parenting, drug abuse et al, is somehow a function of the ‘slavery-at-it’s-worst’ label attached to the American colonies (British and French). I have yet to find a description of slavery, anywhere, or at anytime, that tracks to the dysfunction within today’s Black community. So, I think it must derive from another source. FYI, my authority on slavery is a book entitled, Slavery: A World History, by Milton Meltzer.

My objective, in this series, is not to deny or discount the negative impacts of slavery, then or now, nor is it to absolve its practitioners or their beneficiaries. I will discuss this later. Rather for now, I will say that dispassionate research indicates that current Black plight is not located at the intersection of the two, nor are any solutions. In its proper proportion, slavery informs us in critical ways. When taken out of proportion, it mostly blocks our view and advancement.

James C. Collier

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Technorati Tags: The Great Slavery Debate – The Footing, Atlantic Slave Trade, Milton Meltzer, Victimhood, Immigration, Acting White

The Great Slavery Debate – An Introduction

Perhaps the most recurring historical truism of America is the need for Americans to move past slavery. Mind you, move past does not mean ‘get over it’, in the snide way some people admonish. At the front of the line of the many who need to move on are Black people. In therapeutic lingo, this means squarely facing the past then letting it go, so as not to impede the future.

This weekend I had a spirited debate with some family members, including my 19 year old daughter and her boyfriend. The young Black man, from Atlanta, was the most adamant contender that ‘our slavery’ was worst than previous instances, although he offered no specific difference, other than the distance that slaves were transported.

Others in the debate gave examples of the brutality of slavery in the South, from beatings, murders, assaults, to the wrenching apart of loved ones. My offering, that these treatments were within the range of treatments of slaves throughout human history, fell on deaf ears. Nope, the contention remained that ‘ours was worst and this is why Black people are so messed up today’.

Over the coming weeks/months, I will take a look at some questions about North American slavery, against the context of today. Why did it happen? Who benefited the most/least? Why did the founders adopt it, and then fight about it. Who was Jim Crow? What is the social and economic legacy? How has slavery history affected modern-day immigration? What lessons were learned/not learned?

If this weekend was any indicator, it might be kind of interesting.

James C. Collier

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Technorati Tags: The Great Slavery Debate – An Introduction, Atlantic Slave Trade, Confederacy, Victimhood, Immigration, Acting White

Polanski Slips Extradition

So what the heck happened I wonder? Child-rapist Polanski gets ensnared by the Swiss, only to get away. This sounds like a case where the outcome has little or no resemblance to what kicked it off. Yes, the Swiss were ready to hand Polanski over, but on condition that the US show that he was not double-crossed by the judge in the rape case, as Polanski claimed. Unfortunately, it looks like he was indeed double-crossed – at least in the Swiss view.

I tend to believe the Swissies on this one, since they are in the position of looking sleazier by every neutral-minute that this extradition thing hangs on. It looks like Polanski’s original US prosecuting district attorney and judge cut him a sweet deal on the rape charge - 90 days of evaluation in prison - without understanding that the evaluator could cut Polanski loose early, at his/her discretion. Once Polanski was free in less than 90, the judge recalled and reformed the deal – and Polanski skipped.

The real question is why Polanski got such a deal on the rape, in the first place? The Swiss probably feel no compulsion to aid the US in fixing their prosecutorial screw-up in going after Polanski. This is separate from feeling the need to seriously act on the extradition request. Again, I think Polanski showed up on the Justice Dept. radar because he has assets in USB, a Swiss bank on the recent hot seat for helping rich US citizens hide large sums of money from the government. (See earlier post here).

Anyway, AG Holder and crew didn’t do their homework and tried to bluff the Swissies, who it seems told them to kiss-off. The bluff focused on the US not sending a key piece of confidential testimony from the prosecuting DA in the case – information that I would suspect backed up the double-cross claim.

Sure, I wish Polanski was going to jail for drugging and raping a 13 year old, but he plead it out based on a deal offered, and the judge should have lived up to it – which he did not. So Polanski goes free. He still knows he’s scum and that his freedom is subject to the winds off Lake Geneva, or wherever. If he was unaware, Polanski now knows, as does history, of the elusive price tag hiding under the base of Swiss neutrality.

James C. Collier

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Technorati Tags: Polanski Slips Extradition, Switzerland, Rape, Murder, Celebrity, Acting White

Acting White: The Psychology of Gang Rape

On the heels of the much publicized Richmond High School (CA) gang rape of a 15 year old, I found this article on gang rape psychology. It helped me to begin to understand such heinous behavior. Article link here.

James C. Collier

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Technorati Tags: Acting White: The Psychology of Gang Rape, Richmond High School, Violence, Sex, Fraternities, Acting White

Acting White: Polanski vs. The Long Arm Of The Rule Of Law

I was pleased to see this talented man, who would drug and rape a 13 year old girl, entrapped in Swiss irony. This is so juicy, I can hardly stand it. Talk about intrigue. Let’s see the linkage – France and its Jews during WWII, Poland’s Krakow ghetto, Auschwitz death camp, Hollywood, Sharon Tate et al murders, Charles Manson, Jack Nicholson, drugs, rape, judicial misconduct and flight from prison, and finally the Swiss. This man is his own movie, we just need an ending.

The lynch-pin in the deal is the Swiss. The cultural Swiss elite invite Polanski to pop over from France to pick up a lifetime-achievement award, only to unwittingly set him up to get nabbed by the Swiss authorities as a lifetime-scumbag. Freaking hilarious! I liken the predicament of the Swiss to that of spilling hot liquid onto your crotch in public, and then trying to hold in the screaming pain-dance, which only magnifies the attention and embarrassment.

If only the conveniently-neutral Swissies had done the same thing with the Nazi’s when they came to retrieve their WWII booty, looted from the Jews et al. There would have been less need to hunt down the low-life Hitler-bastards from all corners of the world. But, in Polanski’s case, why now? It can't be that he is an expendable Jew in some of their minds (at least), can it?

It would be interesting to know if Polanski had cash stowed in UBS, the Swiss banking giant that just coughed-up the names of rich American tax scofflaws. He does own a Swiss ski chalet. This would have popped him onto a freshly-Windexed cross-tab screen at DOJ (felon and tax cheat), under Obama. Letting Polanski walk when the DOJ/IRS is coming down hard on rich, law-abiding, tax-cheats is not good prosecutorial business - it looks selective. Add to all of this the fact that the O-man’s got two budding girls of his own, so no slack in the Obama House. VIOLA ROMAN, YOUR BUSTED!!!

Anyway, it will be interesting to see how it plays out, and definitely get ready to see this one on the big screen (but don’t look for a Spike Lee Joint). I can already imagine the agents in H-wood lining up the guys to play Roman. The Rule of Law - gotta’ love it baby.

James C. Collier

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Technorati Tags: Acting White: Polanski vs. The Long Arm Of The Rule Of Law, Switzerland, Rape, Extradite, Charles Manson, Acting White

Acting White: Laotians Find Brit Orobator Guilty

In May, I wrote (here) about Samantha Orobator, Nigerian-born Brit who had been sitting eight (8) months in a Laotian prison, on heroin smuggling charges. The length of her pre-trial detention, without benefit of legal counsel, and subsequent pregnancy during said detention were both cause for concern that she was not being treated fairly, under the most basic practice of jurisprudence.

As of today, Ms. Orobator has plead guilty. She was sentenced to life in prison, rather than the mandatory firing-squad, for her particular crime, specifically because she is pregnant. There is speculation, accompanying family denials of her rape in prison, that Ms. Orobator arranged her insemination while in custody awaiting trial, in order to spare her own life under the government’s pregnancy-exception to capital punishment.

I would not be surprised if the length of her pre-trial detention was facilitated by a hope on the part of authorities that she would avail herself of this escape route, thereby saving them the world-scrutiny and disdain for executing a gullible, ignorant woman. In any event, it seems that she was indeed guilty of smuggling and deserving of whatever the punishment of the land.

What remains is whether Ms. Orobator will be allowed to serve her sentence in Britain or Laos, who have an exchange agreement. In both venues there is the possibility of parole, but in the case of Laos, her chances of surviving, under notorious prison conditions, are sketchy. As a twist, circuitous British law may have her serving more time at home, than in Laos. Of course, there is still no question that prisons in the UK are more desirable, even if the stay is longer.

I hope young people everywhere take a lesson from this dreadful situation, which appears to be one of her own doing, having little to do with race, except that Nigerians seem drawn to this particular illegal trade in this country (here).

James C. Collier

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Acting White: Samantha Orobator Battles Weak Rule of Law

A 20 year-old Nigerian-born Brit, Samantha Orobator, sits curiously 5 months pregnant into an 8 month stay in a Laotian prison, on charges of attempting to smuggle 680 kilograms (1.5lbs.) of heroin out of the country. Conviction carries a mandatory death sentence. It is fair to say Ms. Orobator is headed for a ‘kangaroo’ court, if you know much about Laos. I have no idea of this woman’s innocence or guilt in the matter, but she is fighting at least two up-hill battles.

The first battle pertains to getting into trouble in a country, like Laos, with a trailing rule of law. This means things like due process, right to counsel, right to control one's own defense, right to summon witnesses, right of cross-examination, right to exclude evidence that is improperly obtained, chain of custody, hearsay, right to appeal, etc. do not apply. The second battle is getting into trouble in a place where your home country carry’s little or no weight - diplomatic, military, foreign aid, or otherwise.

If she is guilty, then she will pay a heavy price and there is little to do. If she is innocent, but guilty of not knowing or paying attention to where she was and the threat that accompanied her, she deserves all the help in the world. For instance, you never check luggage through places like Laos or allow others to touch even your carry-on (at curbside). As an inadvertent mule, bad things would have awaited her on the back-end of her journey. For now, we should assume her innocence and hope that heightened media attention (including bloggers) kicks governmental pressure into high-gear. She deserves fairness and is clearly not getting it.

Stay Tuned.

James C. Collier

Update: Interesting BBC article explaining some of the cynicism.

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Acting White: Palin Billed Sexual-Assault Victims

The New York Times, via AP, is reporting that as Mayor of Wasilla, Sarah Palin began the practice of billing victims of sexual-assault the cost of their rape-kits. Perhaps this was just budget stupidity, but it could be worse. It seems that the rape kits contain a morning-after pill that clashed with Palin's strict religious views against abortion, even in the case of rape. And if we go up the would-be chain-of-command, John McCain has consistently voted against a bill pushed by Joe Biden that would make states ineligible for federal funds, if they charge these victims for exams and supplies. Keep an eye out for more on this.

James C. Collier

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African American Seeks to Prove A Genetic Link to James Madison

African American Seeks to Prove A Genetic Link to James Madison - Washington Post

I do no care if the founding fathers personally held slaves. Whether each owned slaves does not change the fact that they were, individually and collectively, responsible for a system of government and laws that enslaved people, period. Those that did not hold slaves were no better or worse than others, for they all benefited from and enforced the practice.

Furthermore, any offspring of slave women and slave masters, founding fathers or not, deserve no special recognition beyond any other slave offspring of the time. To recognize them as special is to somehow, posthumously, recognize, and thereby reward, these white men who exploited black women in the most despicable of manners.

As for the comparison between George Washington, who is believed to have freed his slaves upon death, and James Madison, whose slaves were sold instead, we must be careful not to read too much into this difference. Slaves were generally affixed to the actual plantation property, and mortgaged along with it. Settling the indebtedness of the estate was the overriding determinant of whether slaves were sold upon the master’s death. Inasmuch as this settlement was carried out by executors, with only a fiduciary responsibility to the estate and debt holders, the slave master’s wishes, whatever they might be, could only come into play after all debts were paid.

I, for one, am dubious of black people who go looking for their white ancestry with the implicit hope of proving themselves worthy of any kind of attention, due to the fact.

James C. Collier

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Acting White: Race Chicanery in the Media

ABC News: S.C. Teachers Accused of Sex With Boys

In the aftermath of the VT tragedy there has been much talk about the relevance of race and its place in the discussion of the event. I contend that the Pandora’s Box of race is relevant except when it is clear that it is not relevant. The VT killing spree is exceptional, by definition, thereby making the killer’s race important in considering all the facts that may unearth his motive(s).

Alternately, the race of a common mugger, in a city with thousands of muggings is not relevant, except if the perpetrator is either still at-large and the description would aid capture, or the alleged crime was carried out in manner that connoted special racial motivation. Simply being a different color than the victim is not proof of racial animus.

It is the mere difference of race that many whites leap upon, when they challenge the hypocrisy of media systems that do not automatically include the race of non-white perpetrators. Inasmuch as those whites feel that race dominates our thoughts and behaviors, they may be correct. However, history reveals a myriad of non-racial motivators behinds human action, and our understanding of race has simply not yet advanced to the point of discerning itself so clearly.

Having said this, this day I borrow from my white brethren in their media outrage. Today, I found out that in late March of this year two white female teachers in Clinton, South Carolina stand accused of sexuality abusing six black boys, students in their school. The story was written by an AP correspondent but not, to my knowledge, picked up by either the Washington Post or the New York Times. This alleged crime is appalling and the race of both the teachers and the students is important, as it goes directly to the question of what was motivating them. But why did I have to take a plane, a train, a bus, and a taxi, to find out this happened?

When people commit heinous acts we deserve to know about it. Their race, if it is relevant, should be included in the reporting, including being spoken of as a potential motivator. This communication needs to happen without the political correctness filter that short-circuits discussions of race and its influence. Every issue is not about race, but knee-jerk white-washing of events will keep us stupid and fighting each other forever.

James C. Collier

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