Things on my mind

Sorry its been a while since I posted anything. I was going to post a few things last week but the blogspot website was down. No excuses though!

First of all, this Senator Craig thing... Who knew there was such a complicated ritual to get some booty in the airport? Joking aside, I could care less if a Senator was gay or not. As long as he/she brings home the bacon and keeps others in check, what does it matter? However, this situation has again shown how most (I certainly can't say all) of the congress are hypocrites. Basically this is exactly the same as the Clinton situation. Everyones big problem with him was that he lied under oath (a minority had a problem that the events took place in the oval office). The crime he was impeached for was lying under oath. Republicans especially jumped all over this. Now one might say the Craig situation is different. But, by entering a guilty plea, and then contending he did nothing, he also lied under oath. Now everyone wants to run him out of town. I personally think Clinton should have been kicked out and so should Senator Craig.

Secondly, what is with this sudden national spurt of racism? Three incidents have come to light in the last couple of weeks. The first is the Jena 6 in Louisiana. Where, after being threatened with nooses after eating lunch under the tree where the white kids ate lunch, 6 young men exploded in a rage and beat the snot out of one of the tormentors. The second is this nasty story coming out of West Virginia where a couple of white people kidnapped and assaulted a black woman. Their torture regimen included making her drink from the toilet and eat feces (in all fairness this has not been explicitly referred to as being racially motivated). Thirdly, here at Ole Miss, a black kid was kicked out of the DKE house, called racially insensitive names, and knocked down some stairs.

Now, I try to keep this blog G rated (when you have as many readers as I do, you cannot afford to alienate anyone), but what the hell is wrong with these people? Look at a calendar, its 2007. I generally think race relations are good and racism is very limited, at least publicly. Then something like this comes up. I guess the positive to come out of this is that 50 years ago, if the Jena 6 would have lashed out, they would have been hung from that tree where as now, the charges have already been reduced from attempted murder to a lesser charge and people around the country are donating money to their defense. Also here at Ole Miss, various student boards and college officials are investigating the matter and have promised to get to the bottom of the problem. Of course, it is well publicized what would have happened at Ole Miss 50 years ago. After all, only whites were allowed to attend at that time. So that is what we can take from this experience. Where as years ago racism was not only tolerated, but supported and protected by the government and society, now racism is relegated to the fringes of society and ones own personal thoughts. Like Pandora's Box, events like these show us that all evils have been released into the world. Sometimes, it is difficult to sift through it all to find that hope still resides here.

-J