whyinthehell

“In a letter to the editor of The State newspaper in Clyburn’s hometown of Columbia, S.C., the No. 3 House Democrat said an article published Thursday had sensationalized his perspectives on the ties between Obama’s race and his work as president.

“I have always abhorred the word ‘racism,’ ” Clyburn said in the letter. “I never use it. I believe it is a lethal term, and I am offended that my honest responses to a reporter’s clearly designed agenda would be distorted in such a manner.”

“You know, I’m 70 years old,” the article quoted Clyburn as saying. “And I can tell you; people don’t like to deal with it, but the fact of the matter is, the president’s problems are in large measure because of his skin color.”

Clyburn then described hateful mail, phone calls and faxes he receives as the highest-ranking African-American in Congress. He suggested that Obama receives similar materials.

In his letter, Clyburn correctly noted that his interview hadn’t been arranged to discuss the influence of Obama’s race as the first black president.”

Did You Know?

• The U.S. government kidnapped over 1,800 civilians in Peru and held them in internment camps during World War II …more
• World War II divided the Brazilian Nikkei community into Kachi-gumi who believed in Japan’s victory and Make-gumi who believed Japan could not win …more
• Many Japanese Canadians were imprisoned during World War II and were not released until 1949—four years after the war ended …more
• Japanese Americans served in the U.S. armed forces to fight against Germany and Japan and prove their loyalty as U.S. citizens …more
• A large number of second and third generation Nikkei from Latin American countries have migrated to Japan since the mid-1980s …more

“Densho’s mission is to preserve the testimonies of Japanese Americans who were unjustly incarcerated during World War II before their memories are extinguished. We offer these irreplaceable firsthand accounts, coupled with historical images and teacher resources, to explore principles of democracy and promote equal justice for all.”

About Densho (includes vid):

“Densho is a Japanese term meaning “to pass on to the next generation,” or to leave a legacy. The legacy we offer is an American story with ongoing relevance: during World War II, the United States government incarcerated innocent people solely because of their ancestry.

Densho is a nonprofit organization started in 1996, with the initial goal of documenting oral histories from Japanese Americans who were incarcerated during World War II. This evolved into a mission to educate, preserve, collaborate and inspire action for equity. Densho uses digital technology to preserve and make accessible primary source materials on the World War II incarceration of Japanese Americans. We present these materials and related resources for their historic value and as a means of exploring issues of democracy, intolerance, wartime hysteria, civil rights and the responsibilities of citizenship in our increasingly global society. We encourage use of these resources to expand awareness of our country’s diverse history, to stimulate critical thinking, to develop ethical decision-making skills, and to help ensure that democratic principles are upheld now and in the future.”

For that matter, what does an enemy look like? And what can happen to those people who look like the enemy?

In 1943, President Franklin D. Roosevelt said, “The principle on which this country was founded and by which it has always been governed is that Americanism is a matter of mind and heart; Americanism is not, and never was, a matter of race or ancestry.” 

A year earlier, however, Roosevelt had authorized incarcerating more than 110,000 innocent people based on their ancestry, in what he called “concentration camps.” Although two-thirds were U.S. citizens, they were targeted because of their ancestry and the way they looked. How could this happen?

In 1941 the United States entered World War II after Japan’s attack on Pearl Harbor, Hawaii. Without evidence, key U.S. leaders claimed that all people of Japanese ancestry on the West Coast of the U.S. posed a risk to national security. Justifying it as a “military necessity,” the government forced U.S. citizens and their immigrant elders to leave their homes and live in camps under armed guard.

In 1983, however, a U.S. congressional commission uncovered evidence from the 1940s proving that there had been no military necessity for the unequal, unjust treatment of Japanese Americans during WWII. The commission reported that the causes of the incarceration were rooted in ” … race prejudice, war hysteria and a failure of political leadership.”

“While many conservatives rightly and promptly demanded that Andrew Breitbart apologize for his smear of Shirley Sherrod, some on the right have — inexplicably — kept up their crusade to prove that Mrs. Sherrod is, if not a racist, then a contemptible liar. It’s very odd and has had the effect of making conservative media outlets like The American Spectator appear unhinged.

In a piece on its Web site, the Specator comes to the conclusion that Sherrod told an outrageous lie in her NAACP speech when she said a relative had been lynched.

This is the Spectator’s proof, from Supreme Court documents:

The arrest was made late at night at Hall’s home on a warrant charging Hall with theft of a tire. Hall, a young negro about thirty years of age, was handcuffed and taken by car to the courthouse. As Hall alighted from the car at the courthouse square, the three petitioners began beating him with their fists and with a solid-bar blackjack about eight inches long and weighing two pounds. They claimed Hall had reached for a gun and had used insulting language as he alighted from the car. But after Hall, still handcuffed, had been knocked to the ground, they continued to beat him from fifteen to thirty minutes until he was unconscious. Hall was then dragged feet first through the courthouse yard into the jail and thrown upon the floor, dying. An ambulance was called, and Hall was removed to a hospital, where he died within the hour and without regaining consciousness. There was evidence that Screws held a grudge against Hall, and had threatened to “get” him.

So the Spectator apparently agrees that Hall was viciously beaten to death by law enforcement agents, including the sheriff. Still:

It’s also possible that she knew the truth and chose to embellish it, changing a brutal and fatal beating to a lynching….The image stirred by the image of the noosed rope in the hands of a racist lynch mob was, to say the least, frighteningly chilling. Did Ms. Sherrod deliberately concoct this story in search of a piece of that ugly romance to add “glamour” to a family story that is gut-wrenchingly horrendous already?

I have no idea why the American Spectator would go to such lengths to prove that racist law enforcement officials actually beat a black man to death and were not forced to pay for his crime, in the service of attempting to make his distant relative, Sherrod, look bad.

It is certainly true that the widely perceived definition of “lynching” is to hang a person with a rope. Nevertheless, if this argument is really over semantics, here’s the definition of lynching, from The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language: “To execute without due process of law, especially to hang.”

That’s especially, but not exclusively.”

(via @ctuckerajc)