Sound Off: March 4, 2019

On calling out racism: “When a white man once posed to Michigan Congresswoman Brenda Lawrence, ‘I don’t want to be called a racist,’ her response was a simple one; ‘Then don’t do racist things... (or) ... your racist behavior becomes your identity.’ When Congressman Mark Meadows put a willing but not-allowed-to-speak black woman, Lynne Patton, a HUD appointee, on the auction block at the Cohen public hearings recently to sell the notion that a single person of color, used as a prop, can all by itself negate an accusation that the accused in question (Trump) is a racist — that indeed, is a racist act, just as freshman Representative Rashida Tlaib courageously asserted. I wholeheartedly agree! And, let’s be clear, her subsequent ‘apology,’ was intended only to clarify (and educate?) that what she was referring to in her statement was that the act itself — using a person of color as a prop — was a racist act, not that Representative Meadows was a racist. Any such inference, I assume, she was leaving to those curious enough to research Mr. Meadows’ past behavior. I suggest that one could start by viewing the infamous online video of Mr. Meadows gleefully suggesting to his audience that, ‘We’ll send him (Barack Obama) back to Kenya, or wherever it is.’”