Racism Watch - 6/22/12

Pulling the Sheets Off the Racist Media. Much like with the Clinton presidency, there has been a consuming effort by the conservative media (and the Republican Party) to delegitimize the current Democratic presidency. The difference this time is that right-wing name-calling has been ramped up and a runaway lack of civility is now worn like a  badge of conservative honor. Recall that following Obama's 2010 State of the Union Address, conservative media players responded to the president's policy-heavy speech by calling him  a "grating," "flippant," "arrogant" "jerk" who's "cocky"  and can't hide his "fake sincerity." This, of course, after Glenn Beck strolled onto the set of Fox & Friends in July of 2009 and announced the President of the United States was a "racist" with a "deep-seated hatred for white people."

You probably can't even count the number of insults and smears that have been hurled at Obama by the GOP press, although Sally Kohn recently did a nice job of highlight some of the more vile broadsides: 

• "We're now governed by people who do not like the country" -- Rush Limbaugh re: President Obama
• President Obama wants to "destroy capitalism" -- Hermann Cain
• President Obama "certainly isn't one of us" -- John Hinderaker
• President Obama "doesn't put America first" -- John Hawkins
• Questioning President Obama's patriotism -- David Limbaugh
• President Obama is "ruling" the US according to the dreams of his "philandering, inebriated African socialist" Kenyan father -- Dinesh D'Souza
• President Obama was "born in Kenya and raised in Indonesia" -- Donald Trump

And it's not just the fringe players, either. Supposedly serious pundits who work at places like the Wall Street Journal have also spent an inordinate amount of time calling the president names instead of actually critiquing his policies.  Journal columnist Bret Stephen lashed out at the president (and former Harvard Law Review editor) by calling him "stupid," while Peggy Noonan has labeled Obama a "boring" "loser" and a "walking headache" who ought to just "shut up." Erudite commentary this is not. [MORE] 

GOP Congressman: Police Should Target Muslims Because they’re Responsible For 90 Percent Of Terrorism. Rep. Peter King (R-NY) has a long history of demonizing American Muslims. But appearing on Fox News yesterday, King continued his factually challenged attack on Muslim Americans: What I am very concerned about is that while the overwhelming majority of Muslims are good people, the fact is even though Muslims are 1 percent of the population, almost 90 percent of the terrorist crimes are carried out by the Muslim community. And there are not enough people in the community willing to step forward and speak out against this and cooperate with law enforcement.

While the scope of King’s assertion is unclear, the reality is that a small percentage of terrorist attacks and plots in the U.S. are the result of Islamic extremism — 56 percent have been perpetrated by right-wing extremists (white people!), 30 percent by ecoterrorists and 12 percent by Islamic extremists. [MORE] 

Anti-racism ad campaign in Minnesota town called 'racist.' A controversy over an anti-racism campaign some local critics say is itself racist is roiling the Iron Range city of Duluth, Minn. The Un-Fair Campaign addresses what it calls ‘white privilege’ with billboards, posters and online videos assigning guilt to people with taglines like, “Is white skin really fair skin?” and “I am a white man. That’s unfair.” The ads are plastered across a city where 90 percent of the population is Caucasian.

The campaign aims to “raise awareness about white privilege in our community, provide resources for understanding and action, and facilitate dialogue and partnership that result in fundamental, systemic change towards racial justice,” according to its website. A coalition of co-sponsors including the City of Duluth, the University of Minnesota-Duluth, the NAACP, League of Women Voters and the YWCA hopes the effort will “result in fundamental, systemic change towards racial justice.”

But Phil Pierson, the creator of the STOP Racist Unfair Campaign, wants the signs to come down.  His group is trying to have the billboards removed from city streets and has petitioned the Duluth Human Rights Commission, one of the sponsors of Un-Fair to end the campaign. Fox News has [MORE].