WHO COULD BE SURPRISED AT OBAMA’S RACIAL MESS?

"Tainting the tea party with the charge of racism is proving to be an effective tactic for Democrats," Mary Frances Berry, a former chairman of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, told the Webzine Politico Tuesday (7/20).

"There is no evidence tea party adherents are any more racist than other Republicans, and indeed many other Americans," said Ms. Berry, who is now a professor at the University of Pennsylvania. 

"But getting them to spend their time purging their ranks and having candidates distance themselves should help Democrats win in November.  Having one’s opponent rebut charges of racism is far better than discussing joblessness."

In 2008, liberal journalists discussed using false charges of racism to discourage news coverage of Barack Obama’s long time association with his hate-spewing pastor, Jeremiah Wright.

"If the right forces us all to either defend Wright or tear him down, no matter what we choose, we lose," Spencer Ackerman, now of Wired magazine, said in an email to colleagues on Journolist.    "Instead, take one of them — Fred Barnes, Karl Rove, who cares — and call them racists."

Journolist was a list-serve created by the Washington Post’s Ezra Klein.  He shut it down this week after conservative journalists Tucker Carlson and Andrew Breitbart obtained emails members sent to each other.

But when the race card is played clumsily, it can backfire, as the National Association of Colored People and the Obama administration learned also this week.

Just hours after Mr. Breitbart posted Monday (7/19) a two and a half minute excerpt of a 43 minute speech Shirley Sherrod made to an NAACP audience in March, a superior was on the telephone demanding she resign as director of rural development in Georgia for the U.S. Department of Agriculture.  The White House wanted her gone, Ms. Sherrod said she was told by Deputy Undersecretary Cheryl Cook.

The White House denies involvement.  But Politico reported that at a staff meeting Tuesday morning, Deputy Chief of Staff Jim Messina praised aides for moving quickly.

"We took decisive action, and it’s a good example of how to respond in this atmosphere," Politico’s source said Mr. Messina said.

In the excerpt posted by Mr. Breitbart, Ms. Sherrod talks about how she was reluctant to assist a poor farmer who had come to her for help because he was white.  The audience murmurs appreciatively.

The administration moved so fast it gave Ms. Sherrod no opportunity to tell her side of the story.  The incident occurred 24 years ago.  In the portion of the speech that was not aired, Ms. Sherrod describes how she overcame racial prejudice to provide aid to the farmer, and how they later became friends. 

"How is it possible that such a bright man as the president repeatedly acts without the facts when it comes to a topic so explosive as race?" asked Juan Williams of National Public Radio and Fox News, who is black.

Perhaps the administration is sensitive because it dropped a slam dunk case of voter intimidation against the New Black Panther party days before a federal judge was to rule it its favor.

NAACP President Ben Jealous issued a statement Monday night praising Ms. Sherrod’s firing.  "Her actions were shameful," he said.

The NAACP reaction was odd, because it had in its possession the tape of the entire speech.

Why would Mr. Jealous pop off without first reviewing the tape?  Ms. Sherrod said she thinks it’s because the NAACP is on the defensive for accusing tea partiers of racism.

Mr. Jealous now says he was "snookered" by Mr. Breitbart.

If Mr. Breitbart had the whole tape, and released only a misleading portion of it, he’s committed an offense as vile as Think Progress did when it chopped up the remarks of a tea partier, who was standing next to his black wife, to give the false impression he was racially prejudiced. 

Mr. Breitbart said his source sent him only the portion of the tape he aired.  Even if he had no intent to deceive, it was reckless of him to release the excerpt without learning more about its context.  He owes Ms. Sherrod an apology.

But it wasn’t Mr. Breitbart who fired Ms. Sherrod without giving her a chance to tell her side of the story.  To liberals as well as conservatives, the administration appears rash, cynical, weak and disingenuous.  The Drudge Report headlined its story about this as Obama’s "Racial Mess."

Who could possibly be surprised?  With his background, who in their right mind could expect anything less of Mr. Obama?

Jack Kelly is a former Marine and Green Beret and a former deputy assistant secretary of the Air Force in the Reagan administration. He is national security writer for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette.