BY TONY BOUZA
I had lunch the other day with a bright, educated liberal. He fulminated over the Left’s excesses, going overboard on race, etc., etc.
I disagreed with him vehemently. We have made progress: 1619-1865: slavery; 1865-1965: Jim Crow; 1965-present: incarceration. White society uses its cops to keep blacks under control. Black leaders call the cops the enemy and defeat recruitment. Poverty exacerbates the problem. Just look at the net worth of black families vs. white ones. Addiction offers escape from awfulness.
America’s No. 1 problem is racism.
When I left the lunch, I stood next to a black guy waiting for the elevator. I recounted the conversation—he scoffed. Yes, to some progress; No, to the notion that much has changed.
I repeated the agenda with my bright, black guy, and he agreed with me. Racism is America’s No. 1 problem.
What is to be done?
We solve our problems through debates. Not with discussions, but with picketing, sit-ins and, I’m sorry to say, even riots. Why is Colin Kaepernick—a talented quarterback in a field crying for such—unemployed? Because he respectfully knelt during “The Star Spangled Banner” to protest police brutality, while draft dodgers demonized him.
And who supports the brutality—in dog whistles and other codes? Imagine our Chief Executive encouraging brutality (“Don’t be so nice” to those people) and praising Nazis in Charlottesville (“some very nice people”). The cops, I promise you, get it. Superpatriot, who avoided service through five deferments, attacked a war hero (McCain) and maligned the family of a fallen warrior. Is there, finally, no decency?
America is in trouble.
It’s not just the president—look at those he enables. Fascists, rednecks, draft dodgers, minimally educated, bikers, gun nuts, misogynists and such. How they love him. They have their predecessors in The American Bund, Father Coughlin and their ilk.
Yes, we’ve progressed.
And, yes, we’ve regressed.
We need to start rowing harder.
And sex?
The only thing I want to say is that there is no museum anywhere in the world that exhibits any work of art that esthetically equals a casually beautiful woman.
As for policing, let me conclude by citing the Chief’s appearance at the Minneapolis Club recently. He swooshed in with an impressive entrance, spoke and received a standing ovation. Minnesota Nice. How nice.
And the gargantuan judgments; four-day work weeks; petting zoo treats like a mounted patrol; public information costs to massage the media; bloated supervisory levels; delayed 911 responses and on and on—all succumb to that harmless pursuit smugly labeled Minnesota Nice. Yet, I confess, it is nice, because within, it encompasses kindness.
