Everyone’s a little bit racist, and I mean every one of every race. We are informed of such by Avenue Q in a delightful song. YouTube it. I know what you’re thinking, “Impossibru!” While it’s not good, you probably have control of it.
It’s like the yin and yang. You have your good side with a dash of not so good. So, while that spot of racism on your shiny tolerance is unpleasant, you don’t ever let it show through. Or do you?
Romney seems to show his. “No one has ever asked to see my birth certificate, they know that this is the place that we were born and raised.” Who would have thought no one would ask the white guy with a common name about his birth certificate? But whoa! Throw a guy who is even just half African American with a name showing his heritage and he must be a Muslim commie terrorist.
Behold the “Birthers” we saw surface last presidential election cycle. They demanded everything: birth certificate, college transcripts, taxes, etc. President Barack Obama delivered it all to them and the only way he could have been more kind about it would be to deliver a custom decorated cake. Yet, it still wasn’t enough and he was still a Muslim, a terrorist and a communist.
My big question is: who cares if we had a candidate that just wasn’t Christian and instead a Muslim? This is America, where everyone is free to worship whoever or whatever they want. Would it be so terrible to have an atheist? Or perhaps someone who follows Judaism? I mean, the last 44 presidents were Christians – 43 of those 44 were white.
There isn’t anything wrong with diversity. America could stand to have more. Yet, we still argue over Obama’s religion, birthplace, etc. It’s insane. Pure and simple insanity. The blunt ignorance of the facts in front of one’s face. It’d be like running into a wall because, even though one is seeing it and
others are showing, they just are not convinced it’s there. So, one keeps running head first into it.
How would Obama even have made it to the State Senate without someone noticing that he wasn’t born on American soil?
Also, does anyone think the Democratic Party is that stupid? Stupid enough as to put a non-American soil-born citizen as the candidate thus giving the opposition the perfect opportunity to strike them down? Clearly they aren’t.
What’s probably worse is that when America requests something legitimate like Mitt Romney’s taxes, he refuses to fork them over unlike Obama who gave everyone what they wanted. Doesn’t that make you think there is something Romney is hiding? Or do you assume “no” because he looks like you? I didn’t think Obama should hide his. Instead I thought “show it to them so they’ll shut up and we can get onto something that is actually important.”
So, why should Romney hide his history if he wants to be a leader in our country? We should know about the practices and ethics, or lack thereof in Romney’s case, of our presidential candidates.
Let’s also consider Romney’s “Keep America American” slogan. A slogan used by the Ku Klux Klan in 1922. What is not American about Obama? He believes in American workers/jobs unlike Romney who ships jobs overseas to make a penny on the backs of uninsured and underpaid foreign workers. Obama shows more American values than Romney. Yet, it is so easy to see Obama as the enemy because he looks different than what we’re used to.
The African-American community turned out in more numbers than ever before for the 2008 election. True, this can be considered some form of racism if many were voting simply because they had a black candidate. I’m not sure how we should feel about it. Candidates should be decided upon because of their character and not their skin, but the chance to finally add diversity to our commander-in-chief is fantastic motivation. I was excited to see the first African American president, as we all should be.
It was history and it showed America is progressing for the better.
Letter by Kyle Shupe, senior from Farmington, Ky.