As we’ve gotten around to casting votes to select a Republican presidential nominee, the antiblack rhetoric has taken center stage.
You just have to love (and despise) this kind of predictability.
And he's right; there's nothing that galvanizes white Republicans more than the fear of, and disdain for, black people. How do I know this? Because I've been around white Republicans all my life. And I know how they talk about black people when there aren't any around.
Take a friend of mine, Charlie. He's a huge Republican.
Charlie, like a lot of us who worked at the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, lost his job when electronic trading made the vast majority of floor brokers obsolete. And also like a lot of us, he bounced around from job to job for a few years in search of a new career. But unlike most of us, Charlie developed a crippling back injury which prevented him from working. Divorced, unemployed, and unable to work (and without health insurance), his life spiraled downward until he found himself living rent-free in an apartment owned by one of his friends.
It was at this point that Charlie contacted me through Facebook.
I called another old friend of ours from the Merc and the three of us went out to lunch one Saturday a couple of years ago. We shared old stories, exchanged some gossip and had a few laughs over cheeseburgers and beer at a tavern in Forest Park.
Afterward, Charlie confided to me that not only was he broke, but he had also been forced to apply for food stamps. I desperately wanted to tell him about the soup kitchens in which I occasionally volunteered. While they serve a lot of little old ladies who wouldn't otherwise eat, they also help people who are temporarily down on their luck. But I knew my friend had too much pride; so I just didn't tell him. Instead, I "lent" him a few bucks and wished him good luck.
On the drive home, all I could think was: There, but for the grace of God, go I.
But the story has a happy ending. My friend was able to get surgery for his back, paid for by some charity program at a hospital. Healthy again, he secured a job through friends as the personal assistant to one of the Exchange's most powerful men. Slowly, he's getting back on his feet. And I'm glad for him.
So what does Charlie have to do with Blow's piece in the Times? Well, lately I've noticed that my (still) Republican friend has been posting some things to Facebook that I find a little, well, racist. For example, in late November he posted:
"I love Christmas lights because they remind me of Obama supporters -- they all hang together, half of them don't work, and the ones that do aren't that bright." From an e-mail today!
And I thought, is this the same guy who was out of work for so long? And on food stamps? Boy, how quickly some people forget!
Blow, by the way, also mentioned that:
The largest group of [food stamp] beneficiaries is by far non-Hispanic whites.
Like my friend.
So what's the morale of this story? I'm not sure. Maybe it's that the safety net isn't a "hammock," as Republican Congressman Paul Ryan has suggested. Maybe it actually is a "safety net," for those who fall off the high wire -- even for Republicans like Charlie. Or maybe it's that, if you do find yourself having to rely on the safety net -- even for a short time -- it might change your perspective a little; you may develop some compassion for the most vulnerable among us.
At the very least, maybe you could skip the mean-spirited Facebook postings.
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