He's too insensitive to notice discrimination, let's make him head of the civil rights panel.

Here is your reason to throw up for the day:

"I just assume somewhere in my life some knucklehead has looked at me and my brown self and said that they have given me less or denied me an opportunity," said the chairman, Gerald A. Reynolds, 41, an African-American lawyer. "But the bottom line is, and my wife will attest to this, I am so insensitive that I probably didn't notice."

The New York Times > National > Shift Toward Skepticism for Civil Rights Panel

A conservative black lawyer who says he has never noticed any discrimination in his life? Were he and dr. rice hatched out of the same damn pod?

A man who called affermative action "a big lie" is now in charge of the government watchdog panel for civil rights. Yes, we can expect much from him.

Can we talk about affirmative action for a minute? This back to my earlier post on WASPs in this country who are the biggest fucking babies about so much. Any time the scale isn't tipped in the white, christian's blatant favor on any issue, there is a call to arms. If one more comfortable upper middle-class butthole start crying over affirmative action to me, I am going to kick them in their shins. You don't get an advantage? It should all be merit based? Like hell you don't get an advantage and their are other things besides GPA's. The stinking nekkid emperor got everything in his life on affirmative action instead of merit. He got into an ivy league school because his father went there, not because of his grades. He got business deals, and hauled out of them when he was a miserable failure, because of who is father was. He got political backing and the 'extra' help he needed to take the presidency because of his family. He did not accomplish on thing on his own or by merit his whole life, but he will bitch about Affirmative Action. Affirmative action in my book is anything which gives you an advantage to help you get ahead which is not based on your personal accomplishments. He (and every middle-class white person in America) has recieved it in spades.

And for Mr. Reynolds, you take a good look around and you will see the bigotry. This last election hinged on it. But really, man, just because every instance hasn't crippled you doesn't mean it isn't there. You are from New York? Do you ever take cabs? No, they aren't that tough to hail. If you are in the city, watch a black person, well dressed or not, try to hail a cab. I have on more than one occassion seen cabs with their lights on drive past a black man in a suit just to pick up a white kid in ratty jeans down the block. Trouble with cabs may be an annoying thing, more than threatening, but it is symptomatic.

Racism is not what it was in 1950, but if you think it doesn't play a role in your daily life today, you are an idiot. You can refuse to let it stop you or weigh on your mind and choose to just do with what you have. Fine, all admirable options, but don't try to tell everyone that they are crazy and life is fair and race isn't an issue any more in America.