Reaching Critical Mass

In one of the funnier, or scarier, videos I have seen recently, Breitbart.com’s Editor-In-Chief   Joel Pollak acquits himself well in a heated discussion with Soledad O'Brien of CNN about critical race theory.  A major point of contention revolved around the description of CRT:

“What part of that was the bombshell? Because I missed it. I don’t get it,” O’Brien exclaimed. “What was a bombshell?”

“Well, the bombshell is the revelation of the relationship between Obama and Derrick Bell,” Pollak pointed out.

“Okay, so he’s a Harvard Law student and a Harvard Law Professor, yeah.” O’Brien added.

“Derrick Bell is the Jeremiah Wright of academia,” Pollak stated. “He passed away last year, but during his lifetime, he developed a theory called critical race theory, which holds that the civil rights movement was a sham and that white supremacy is the order and it must be overthrown.”

“So that is a complete misreading,” O’Brien interrupted. “I’ll stop you there for a second — then I’ll let you continue. That is a complete misreading of critical race theory. That’s an actual theory. You could Google it and some would give you a good definition. So that’s not correct. But keep going.”

“In what way is it a critical misreading?” Pollak countered. “Can you explain to me? Explain to your readers (sic) what it is,”

“I’m going to ask you to continue on,” O’Brien quickly replied. “I’m just going to point out that that is inaccurate. Keep going. Tell me what the bombshell is. I haven’t seen it yet.”

Eventually Ms. O'Brien delivered her perspective (probabaly with help from the earbud):

“Critical race theory looks into the intersection of race and politics and the law and as a legal academic who would study this and write about it, he would advance the theory about what exactly happened when the law was examined in terms of racial politics,” O’Brien explained. “There is no white supremacy in that. It is a theory. It’s an academic theory and as one of the leading academics at Harvard Law School, he was one of the people as part of that conversation. So that is a short definition.”

Uh huh.  And Rush Limbaugh sometimes comments on the intersection of public policy and sexual mores.  Nothing to see here.

Pollak fired back:

“I’m glad we’ve got you saying that on tape because that’s a complete misrepresentation,” Pollak hit back. “Critical race theory is all about white supremacy. Critical race theory holds that civil rights laws are ineffective, that racial equality is impossible, because the legal and Constitutional in America is white supremacist.”

Perhaps we can adjudicate this.  Is CRT oriented around some notion of white dominance or white supremacy?  I think we can count on the NY Times to present critical race theory in as gauzy and flattering a focus as possible, so let's see how they described it over the years.  That specific phrase is returned fourteen times since 1981 by the Times search engine.  The first mention is from 1993:

Two New Law Journals Plan To Focus on Asian Americans

SAN FRANCISCO, Jan. 28— University of California students in Los Angeles and Berkeley are working separately to produce the nation's first two journals that will focus on legal issues of concern to Asian Americans.

..."At U.C.L.A., there's the Black Law Journal, which discusses African-American issues, there's the Chicano Law Review, which deals with Latino issues, and other journals that deal with trade and the environment," said Theresa Han, a third-year law student at U.C.L.A. and co-editor in chief of the university's Asian American and Pacific Islands Law Journal. "What we're talking about are issues that specifically affect the Asian-American community, like voting rights, how admission policies at universities affect Asian Americans or how civil-rights legislation affects Asian Americans."

Both journals have adopted as their approach to legal analysis a young and controversial area of legal scholarship known as "critical race theory." The theory holds that to properly understand law in American society, one must recognize that it has systematically subordinated non-whites.

"Law is not just neutral, to be used by good and bad people," said Angela Harris, a Berkeley law professor and adviser to the Asian Law Journal. She noted, for example, how economic competition between Chinese and white laborers near the turn of the century led to the Exclusionary Acts, which suspended Chinese immigration. "Subordination of people of color is woven into the law," she said.

Pollak 1, O'Brien 0.  The obitiuary of W. Haywood Burns mentions he taught CRT courses but offers no definition.

Here is a 1996 book review:

THE COMING RACE WAR?

And Other Apocalyptic Tales of America After Affirmative Action and Welfare.

By Richard Delgado.

New York University, $24.95.

Richard Delgado, who teaches law at the University of Colorado, is an exponent of critical race theory, which argues that American law, both unconsciously and deliberately, oppresses minorities and insures control by white elites.

Pollak 2, O'Brien 0

Here is a May 5, 1997 think-piece:

For Black Scholars Wedded to Prism of Race, New and Separate Goals

By NEIL A. LEWIS

...

Critical race theorists, who are on the faculty at almost every major law school and are producing an ever-growing body of scholarly work, have drawn from an idea made popular by postmodernist scholars of all races, that there is no objective reality. Instead, the critical race theorists say, there are competing racial versions of reality that may never be reconciled.

Many theorists say that because few whites will ever be able to see things as blacks do, real racial understanding may be beyond the nation's reach.

''Critical race theory wants to bring race to the very center of the analysis of most situations,'' said Prof. Anthony E. Cook, an adherent of the theory on the faculty at Georgetown University Law School. ''Its assumption is that race has affected our perception of reality and our understanding of the world -- in almost every way.''

...

''Critical race theory counters colorblindness by saying that race is not simply skin color, and it tries to reveal the ways that race is a category that has been structured out of law and culture and history,'' said Prof. Kimberle Crenshaw of the University of California at Los Angeles Law School, an editor of the leading anthology on the subject.

''Most people think law is being neutral if it doesn't say anything explicit about race,'' she said. ''But it is not usually neutral. It is simply facilitating whatever power relationships were in existence when the law was put in place.''

One important battleground in critical race theory is the criminal justice system: Why, the theorists ask, are a disproportionate number of the men in America's jails black? Many critical race theorists say it is because the system is infected with racism at every level, from prosecutors' offices to judges' chambers.

Pollak 3, O'Brien 0.

Entry 5 is a letter to the editor:

Hitler said it first. Think with the blood!

Hmm, Godwin's Law?  Pressing on, entry 6 is a review by Neil Lewis of a book by Derrick Bell:

Storied Arguments

By Neil A. Lewis

AFROLANTICA LEGACIES

By Derrick Bell.

Bell's long-expressed pessimistic view of racial relations, and the principal pillar of most black critical-race theorists, is that the civil rights movement, with its emphasis on integration, has been largely a failure and that racism has not abated. But to press these arguable positions, Bell sees no need to prove or demonstrate anything; he merely asserts conclusions. In these and previous tales, his truths are simple: black people always behave nobly while white people behave atrociously. In those few instances in which they don't, it is solely because of a cynical if submerged self-interest.

Well, the reviewer doesn't specifically say that atrocious whites use the color of law to entrench their power, but it doesn't sound quite as race-neutral as Ms. O'Brien seems to pretend.  Call it even.

Here is a May 10, 1998 book review:

Race Matters

By Laura Kalman

SEEING A COLOR-BLIND FUTURE

The Paradox of Race.

By Patricia J. Williams.

...Williams helped shape critical race theory, a movement of left law professors who say that equality under the law, while vital, eliminates only blatant racism and who seek through their scholarship to transform the way America constructs race and embeds and perpetuates racism.

My emphasis; Pollak 4, O'Brien 0.

Entry 8, a 1998 review of a Thurgood Marshall biography by Juan Williams, includes this aside:

His core belief was not the radical one that the law itself is an instrument of white power, as, say, critical race theory would have it, but that it was a neutral instrument that could be put to the task of forcing whites to accept blacks as equals.

Pollak 5, O'Brien 0.

Entries 9 from April 20, 2002  and 10 from Jan 26, 2005 mention CRT without defining it. But we get some flavor from the 2005 article about Stanford Law School:

Their courses here resound with the armchair radicalism of Orientalism, neocolonialism, deconstructionism, white studies, critical race theory, queer theory, blah blah blah.

Entry 11 also mention CRT as an aside.  Entry 12 is from the Tom Horne, Attorney General of Arizona, in a letter defending himself from a NY Times editorial:

Students are taught “critical race theory,” which explains privilege as referring to “the amount of melanin in a person’s skin.“ So-called “ ‘white ways’ ... must be recognized, internalized and silently acted on by people of color.” Such statements promote racial resentment.

The Times editors may have given a platform to a conservative but we can't assume they endorse this description of CRT, so it won't be scored.  Still, Tom Horne would agree with Pollak.

Entry 13 by Stanley Fish mentions CRT as an aside. And the Big Finish at 14 is the Oct 7, 2011 obituary of Derrick Bell:

Derrick Bell, Pioneering Law Professor And Civil Rights Advocate, Dies at 80

By FRED A. BERNSTEIN

CORRECTION APPENDED

Derrick Bell, a legal scholar who saw persistent racism in America and sought to expose it through books, articles and provocative career moves -- he gave up a Harvard Law School professorship to protest the school's hiring practices -- died on Wednesday in Manhattan. He was 80 and lived on the Upper West Side.

...He was a pioneer of critical race theory -- a body of legal scholarship that explored how racism is embedded in laws and legal institutions, even many of those intended to redress past injustices. His 1973 book, ''Race, Racism and American Law,'' became a staple in law schools and is now in its sixth edition.

...Professor Bell's core beliefs included what he called ''the interest convergence dilemma'' -- the idea that whites would not support efforts to improve the position of blacks unless it was in their interest. Asked how the status of blacks could be improved, he said he generally supported civil rights litigation, but cautioned that even favorable rulings would probably yield disappointing results and that it was best to be prepared for that.

Much of Professor Bell's scholarship rejected dry legal analysis in favor of stories. In books and law review articles, he presented parables and allegories about race relations, then debated their meaning with a fictional alter ego, a professor named Geneva Crenshaw, who forced him to confront the truth about racism in America.

One of his best-known parables is ''The Space Traders,'' which appeared in his 1992 book, ''Faces at the Bottom of the Well: The Permanence of Racism.'' In the story, as Professor Bell later described it, creatures from another planet offer the United States ''enough gold to retire the national debt, a magic chemical that will cleanse America's polluted skies and waters, and a limitless source of safe energy to replace our dwindling reserves.'' In exchange, the creatures ask for only one thing: America's black population, which would be sent to outer space. The white population accepts the offer by an overwhelming margin. (In 1994 the story was adapted as one of three segments in a television movie titled ''Cosmic Slop.'')

I'm going to take a chance and score this for Pollak.  The final score, based on thirty years of NY Times coverage: Pollak 6, O'Brien 0.

So her statement about critical race theory - “There is no white supremacy in that" - is either woefully misinformed or a lie.  And since she has claimed to be re-reading a book books by Derrick Bell, I think she knows darn well she is lying.

 

 

Comments

[Captain Hate]

I think this post could be summarized by stating Soledad O'Brien is an idiot.

[Threadkiller]

Critical race theory just ain't what it used to be...

Wiki before:

Although no set of canonical doctrines or methodologies defines CRT, the movement is loosely unified by two common areas of inquiry. First, CRT has analyzed the way in which white supremacy and racial power are reproduced over time, and in particular, the role that law plays in this process.

Wiki after:

Although no set of canonical doctrines or methodologies defines CRT, the movement is loosely unified by two common areas of inquiry. First, CRT has analyzed the way in which racial hierarchies are reproduced over time, and in particular, the role that law plays in this process.

http://minx.cc/?post=327345

[NotSara]

Well, I saw the clip and was absolutely amazed! I never watch CNN, and O'Brien was simply terrible--condescending, unknowledgeable and also constantly interrupting.

[Ignatz]

Thanks for that link, TK.
Seems to me, on the internet everyone knows you're a dog.

[Appalled]

Soledad O'Brien was caught bs-ing on the air. So what? Do we really want the campaign to be about whether Obama was a garden variety campus radical in 1991? I think Obama is happy to be a tool of The man, provided it gets him reelected, so I don't think he has some deep seeded need to rewrite the Consitution for the purpose of Black Power.

It's the economy, stupid. Add to that the entitlements, Obama's stupidity on energy policy, Obamacare, regulations.

Focus. Concentrate. Remember that Obama wants you to concentrate on the stupid stuff.

[Jane]

Great job TM. WE are all Breitbart!

[Chubby]

TM, that was a tour de force.

[Rick Ballard]

I don't want a summary. The post is simply too good and too thorough a study, using only material from the premier left wing propaganda organ, providing evidence that O'Brien is, above all else, a pathetic liar. I can't argue that she is not stupid but her primary personality trait appears to be dishonesty.

[Danube of Thought]

Great compilation, TM.

[Ignatz]

Interesting to note that Ms. O'Brien, a dedicated follower of lefty fashion, is a card carrying member of the 1%, being married to the "co-head of investment banking at Thomas Weisel Partners." (Wiki hasn't scrubbed that datum yet)

[Chubby]

((It's the economy, stupid. Add to that the entitlements, Obama's stupidity on energy policy, Obamacare, regulations.

as Thomas Sowell pointed out in the Levin interview that is up on RCV, FDR won a large majority when unemployment was twice as high as it is now so focusing exclusivly on the economy might not be such a winning strategy after all.

[Ignatz]

--It's the economy, stupid.--

It's the economy because he has pursued the retarded policies of a garden variety radical.

[Danube of Thought]

Minus 16 at Raz today.

8.3%.

[Ken]

Thanks for doing the research on this. I was in law school in racist Ky. when Obama was at Harvard, and was spared critical race theory.
Although this is more evidence of Obama's radical leanings, I'm afraid it may be too abstract and too old to change anyone's mind at this point. Might have been different in 2008. But now we have Obama's actual record to consider. Here's hoping for a change. Or hoping, for a change.

[MarkO]

I think "Radical" is a fine word to use in the campaign. We don't have anyone on our side smart enough to work a contraceptive type distraction, but, hell, go for "radical."

[NotSara]

Well, Rick Ballard, I can think of other primary personality traits (all bad) which O'Brien has other than dishonesty.

[narciso]

No, Appalled this is you voted for, that you were too distracted by the squirrels last time, doesn't mean you get to reproach us for your mistake, I gleaned as much of 'Faces' as I could possibly stand, back in college, and I couldn't have imagined that such a warped world view could have such an influence, then again I was much more naive then,

[Janet]

Joel Pollak was wonderful & so was Amy Holmes on the panel. I loved how Pollak asked O'Brian to define CRT which she was fighting for. I would love more guests to ask some of these "reporters" to define their terms & their belief systems.

Kirk Cameron did good on the Piers Morgan show too pointing out that Morgan was following his own moral code. Agree or disagree with Cameron, but he should be able to voice his beliefs. Piers Morgan, O'Brian, & all the rest of the MFMers are sure voicing their beliefs.

[Janet]

*O'Brien*

[Appalled]

Chubby:

FDR was reelected, overwhelmingly, because he was seen to be doing something about the Depression. Obama does not have that same aura.

Ignatz:

Sometimes you have to argue from results, and immediate policy. When the GOP/ conservative movement wastes its time on these side issues, they seem angry without cause.

[Chubby]

Janet, I was wondering who that was. Yes, she was excellent.

[Ignatz]

GM management continues in the same vein as its pre-bailout idiocies by investing $400 million in a 7% stake in basket case Peugeot.

[Rob Crawford]

ISTR that "Appalled" was previously in the tank for Baraka. Let's not take his advice, OK?

And, seriously, "radical" doesn't come close to what Obama is. He's a Klansman in black face; distinguishable from Robert Byrd only by careful comparison of skin tone.

[Chubby]

come on, Appalled, 0's promising freebies like there's no tomorrow so it's basiclly the same thing. The eonomy is a symptom not a fundamental cause imo. It's not doing well because of the policies of his world view.

[Ignatz]

--When the GOP/ conservative movement wastes its time on these side issues, they seem angry without cause.--

Perhaps with the rise of the internet and the new media the "conservative movement" can now walk and chew gum at the the same time.

[narciso]

Sacre Bleu, really, facepalm with a Cthluthu,
If we're going to waste money, do it a high performance scar, otherwise it's like that SNL sketch, 'the ADOBE' has come to life.

[Soledad's Mustache]

lolwut narc?

[Ann]

OT/Sorry

Janet:

I found out about KONY2012 last night when all the kids were talking about it. It was on all social media.

I started to look at it and it scared me. The Telegraph says Kony has left Uganda. This is all about one black man and it is not KONY.

It is community organizing. Take a noble goal and take advantage of a crisis. Have you heard anything about the Enough program or TRY? It is the new Occupy movement in my opinion. Coming in April to your neighborhood.

[narciso]

That was the car made out of clay, a dig at the Yugo and other fads at the moment.

[Danube of Thought]

I certainly concur that exposing this stuff from Obama's past is not going to have a major effect on the election, but that's not a reason not to do it. No reason it needs to detract from the economy. Hammer both.

[Ranger]

Let us also remember that Soledad O'Brien was able to spend four years at Harvard and not graduate, despite the fact that the school now basically gives all students enrolled in a class an A just for showing up.

[Extraneus]

I don't think he has some deep seeded need to rewrite the Consitution for the purpose of Black Power.

What do you figure is going on with the DoJ, then?

[narciso]

Well we're making new friends that's the important thing, sarc;

http://uk.news.yahoo.com/khamenei-hails-obama-window-opportunity-iran-132439544.html

[Appalled]

narciso:

Obama was not a small government guy. Neither was McCain. 2008 was the last stand of national greatness conservatism, that steaming pile of garbage served up by Frum, Kristol and the boys, sometimes served up with a soupcon of Hucakbee religiosity, and a little populist resentment of the media boys. I did want to go to war in Georgia and everywhere else, and still do the big programs (now 98% earmark free) that would have been McCain.

The story of 2012 is becoming a tale of how the GOP lost the thread of their argument -- how they run to and fro on side issues (with the support of a media that does not love them), mostly because the candidates in the primary, who speak for factions of the GOP, prefer the enemies of rich people, or big media, or anti-religious stuff, to the enemy of a big, overpowering government that cannot accomplish anything except spending more money and meddling everywhere.

I am amazed. In a year like this, with an opposition like this, the GOP is determined to lose. I don't get it -- but am really alrmed by it -- because, if the GOP does not win, Obamacare is permanent, and that is a big, big change you do not want.

[Melinda Romanoff]

Ranger-

She went back, 16 years later, and snagged her sheepskin. 2000 grad.

[Extraneus]

Ogletree on hiding Obama-Bell video: I was joking

(From http://twitchy.com, the newest sponsor of the Rush Limbaugh Program.)

[Jane]

So Appalled, what are you doing about it? Cause you know, you really should do something.

[Janet]

It is community organizing. Take a noble goal and take advantage of a crisis. Have you heard anything about the Enough program or TRY?

No...but that is the first thing I thought of after I watched the video...'I need to check out the organizations putting this out'. Nothing is simple anymore. It'd be a great teaching moment for Real Ann....looking into organizations & their bigger agendas.

[Dave (in MA)]

Ext., I thought it was nice of Malkin to name her new site after Olby.

[MarkO]

"I don't think he has some deep seeded need to rewrite the Consitution for the purpose of Black Power"

Then you don't believe anything he says either. Good.

[Thomas Collins]

TM certainly has boiled it down as well as it can be boiled down. I would only add one thing. Let's use TM as an example. As a white middle aged male, with a center of gravity of white privilege (an essential aspect of such white privilege being the inability to understand such privilege in any intellectual, emotional of instinctual sense), TM is not able to discuss this until he has been reeducated and sensitized to his whiteness. TM would need to attend seminars run by Van Jones types before he could even dip his besotted white toes into the water of such a discussion. In fact, virtually this entire JOM blog is afflicted with a malady worse than consciously using law to uphold white privilege. White privilege is so embedded in us that we can't even articulate the construct we use to oppress THE OTHER or to see that we are dehumanizing THE OTHER as THE OTHER. Reeducation camps for all JOMers (but don't stop working and paying taxes; the perpetrators of this fraud best benefit from their hustle in a prosperous society).

[Appalled]

Jane:

I have generally taken an all politics is local approach on my outside life. (I am involved on community things and actually fight these sort of fights on the city level.)

Its also taken me a while to get this po-ed, generally because I have a lot of faith in the good sesne of folks, and the idea that self-interest tends to lead to self-correction.

[narciso]

I found this from a Ledeen link, this seems a little out of place, although there have been instances of Islamic radicals, like Buckley's
interrogator coming from there;

http://pdmi.org/2012/02/observer-reporter-khamenei-graduate-of-moscows-patrice-lumumba-university/

[Ranger]

Mel, I know she finally graduated, but I still find it instructive that she couldn't manage it the first time around, given how soft the grading there has been for so long.

[Melinda Romanoff]

narciso-

Arafat was a grad, wasn't he?

[Appalled]

MarkO:

The basis for affirmative actiion is in the Civil Rights Act and has been held not to violate the 14th Amendment. There's no need to rewrite the Constitution.

[NotSara]

Well, I agree with DoT--this video is not going to change the election results, but some people (not conservatives) do watch CNN--not many, but some, and I would hope that O'Brien's blatant slant towards Obama would come through. I was also pleasantly surprised that the unassuming and young new editor of Breitbart can come across so well.

[RichatUF]

Appalled-

Feel like apologizing for your Obama vote and trying to rationalize your next one.

Ann-

The subject of the video is the reason why Obama has deployed advisors to Uganda (the Lord's Resistance Army or some such).

[Appalled]

I see no harm in Breitbart running these sorts of things, by the way. As yet, I do not see what the fuss is about, and I do not see it as a real winner in the election. I also see media bias as a fact that any Republican has to live with.

So sue me.

[Danube of Thought]

I strongly recommend this guy on critical race studies at Harvard Law in the Obama era. I think he nails it (and Obama) very well.

[Thomas Collins]

Appalled, I would argue that the basis for affirmative action is the Civil War Amendments, which gave Congress great discretion in enacting legislation to erase the badges of slavery. SCOTUS should have gone in this direction in the 19th century, and would have if it had adopted the approach of the first Mr. Justice Harlan. In the 20th century, SCOTUS upheld civil rights legislation under the commerce clause. It should have upheld such legislation under the Civil War Amendments.

[narciso]

I don't think so, Mahmoud Abbas is, though;

http://archive.frontpagemag.com/readArticle.aspx?ARTID=29207

[Captain Hate]

I don't think Kristol deserves to be in the same sentence as Frum. I'm not saying Bill is infallible (see Arab Spring) but his Weekly Standard is closer to the gold standard than anything else I can think of.

[Appalled]

RichatUF:

I have acknowledged that Obama vote, have never repudiated it and am not going to today. I've also said I'd vote Santorum over Obama, should he be the nominee with the same pain many of you would feel for Romney. Satisfied?

[marlene]

In your personal relationships,does critical race theory pop up in conversation? Just wondering,because in my (plain vanilla) family there is an interracial marriage and if I asked my B-I-L to discuss this with me,he'd tell me to put down the wine glass. Maybe I need to attend reeducation camp,TC!

[Jim Rhoads a/k/a vnjagvet]

I believe CRT is designed to create and maintain the requisite guilt within the "majority" community which can then only be expiated by continuing racial preferences and deference to the "oppressed" minority of choice. Sadly, CRT has been most persuasive to those who consider themselves to be among the elite and privileged. They consider such preferences a small price to pay for maintaing their privileged, elite status.

Of course most of the price is paid by the less privileged, non-elite of the designated oppressing majority; their interests must yield to the needs of those getting the preferences. The rest of the price is paid with OPM.

[narciso]

No Frum belong under the caption for 'stuck on stupid' along with Brooks, and the inimicable Conor F. Sullivan's Kramerica intern,

[jimmyk]

I agree with those who say this won't have much impact unless there are quotes of Barack himself saying outrageous things. Otherwise, it's just a student showing respect for a professor. We all know there's more to it, but it's not really going to get traction. Obama has been president for 3+ years and has an atrocious record in every area--the economy, foreign policy, law, and everything in between.

The associations stuff might have and should have worked in 2008 when he had no record and people were trying to figure out who he was. But instead 53% of the voters decided he was a savior and didn't want to hear anything bad about him. Now after seeing him in action the scales have fallen from most of their eyes, and all the Repubs need to do is keep hammering away at that awful record as president.

[Thomas Collins]

I would respectfully disagree with the following statement in the article linked in DOT's 10:56 AM post:

"But radical, “conviction” politicians don’t decry Gitmo then keep it open, promise to end the wars then reinforce the troops, express outrage at Bush war tactics then maintain rendition and triple the number of drone strikes."

Obama is savvy enough to understand that he needs to keep foreign policy cred to implement his policies. He is pushing the US as far as he can to the visions of Bell and Wright. He realizes he couldn't do it in his first term, and I suspect he realizes he won't have completed his project over the next five years if he gets a second term. But he's trying his best.

[Melinda Romanoff]

Appalled-

Critical Race Theory, in summary, was developed as justification for revolution under the auspices of "inherently racist Constitution". It begat the Original Black Panthers and fuels the current Reparations movement. There can be no solution until they are in position to rule on all things racist, since all things are racist, in their eyes. It's why the accusations of "code words" erupt every now and then in the midst of public debate. Political Correctness covers for this, since the end goal is state control, in the end. They are all fellow travelers.

[Jane]

I have generally taken an all politics is local approach on my outside life.

Then you are aces in my book. Good for you!

[Ranger]

Appalled, I'm a little confused by your statements. First you say:

It's the economy, stupid. Add to that the entitlements, Obama's stupidity on energy policy, Obamacare, regulations.

which doesn't exactly square with this one:

I have acknowledged that Obama vote, have never repudiated it and am not going to today.

So, you deeply oppose what Obama has done, but you won't repudiate your vote for him?

[jimmyk]

I believe CRT is designed to create and maintain the requisite guilt within the "majority" community which can then only be expiated by continuing racial preferences and deference to the "oppressed" minority of choice.

Absolutely, JimR. People like Bell are just race hustlers and extortion artists like Sharpton, but with fancy degrees.

[Thomas Collins]

Marlene, it's not a matter of everyday conversation. But it's present in the thinking of many in powerful positions now (Obama being one). The thinking behind it also permeates the thinking of many leftists who don't write on critical race theory issues. Noam Chomsky comes to mind.

[Ignatz]

--The basis for affirmative actiion is in the Civil Rights Act and has been held not to violate the 14th Amendment.--

Simplicity is a virtue.
Simplistic is not.

[NK]

TomM-- I think Pollak engaged in some polemic here and used 'white supremecy" as a shortcut term. I think the fairest description of CRT is that in NO society is there any OBJECTIVE system of justice, EVERYTHING is a social construct driven by racial hierarchy, and every legal issue must be viewed through that prism. CRT is the legal version of Fish's deconstruction of social sciences. What is absolutely true is Bell in applying CRT to America concluded everything is a result of the white power structure. At the NY Bar Assoc in I think'93-94 at a Housing Comittee meeting Bell was the speaker about CRA; in Q&A I asked Bell how America would be different if historically it was a majority black and former white slave nation. He freely said blacks would be just as oppressive, and whites would be permanently disenfranchised, he considered his theories 'race neutral' they were about political and legal power. Bell was 'Bam's legal hero. Nuf' said.

[narciso]

MCarthy took the same analysis you did TC.

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/293014/re-obama-crits-andrew-c-mccarthy

Yes CRT was the step Dubois forgot on his long trek to Marxism, one could well have imagined Robeson lipsynching it.

[Thomas Collins]

One irony is that the spur to such theories is actually an aspect of intellectual whiteyball, not traditional thinking of African American philosophy. Hegel, Marx, Engels and Kojeve are the nurturers of this line of thinking. The anti-slavery movement was motivated by thinking diametrically opposed to critical race type thinking.

[narciso]

You can hear Cornell West echoing this, which isn't a surprise, since he was a protege of Cone at UTT,

http://www.commentarymagazine.com/2012/03/09/derrick-bell-jewish-neoconservative-racists/

[NK]

JimmyK-- I only met Bell the one time, and he was charming and candid. The strikes/walkouts were real close to race hustling street theater, and no doubt his legacy is the race hustlers like Jackson, Sharpton and ACORN. But I can't call Bell a race hustler. I agree with TCollins, he's a leftwing academic BS artist like Chomsky and Fish, he just used the race prism.

[Sue]

What if the video shows his wife, FLOTUS, trespassing and protesting? Will that change anyone's opinion of what the 2 were up to during the 90s?

[Sue]

I want someone to ask her the question. "Is that you protesting?" Simply ask her the question.

[Jane]

That David French article resonates as true to me. I think he is probably spot on.

The thing about this presidency that hits me every day is how he has exported Chicago politics to the entire country. I'm not sure we can beat that. Hell if he gets another term I assume I will be audited and/or jailed for my activism. So the question becomes - do I stop or risk it? And that is precisely the message he wants to send.

[Jim Rhoads a/k/a vnjagvet]

Don't forget Gobineau, TC.

[RichatUF]

TC-

Surprise, surprise...I'm surprised that false counsciousness didn't make it into the discussion.

So Obama's a true believe of Liberation Theology (the gospel of Marx) and of Critical Race Theory (derived from the gospel of Marx) and people wonder why Obama's economic program has failed (maybe he can get some crackerjack journalisters and economists to work out another 5 year plan to explain it to the bitter clingers-or just call the wreckers racist and be done with it).

[NK]

TCollins-- I disagree with your 10:45 a bit. Bell's CRT did not believe whites could be re-educated, not on a society-wide basis anyway. Instead, my recollection is that Bell believed in whites paying reparations, and blacks using the reparations for a separate society within America. Black separatism, that's where CRT led, that's my recollection anyway.

[NotSara]

The answer is no, Sue.

[jimmyk]

NK--fair enough, perhaps I should have directed my comments at the actions rather than the person. But I can't see how actions like strikes to demand that black woman be hired as a professor are any different from what Jackson and Sharpton do. The gentlemanly demeanor is what's required at HLS, but the actions speak louder to me.

[narciso]

Just a whole other flavor of inanity,

http://proteinwisdom.com/?p=38246

[Rocco]

Wise does not agree with all of Rev. Wright’s charges. His point though is that any criticism of the country, particularly by a black, is deemed threatening and must be condemned. This was the fate of Paul Robeson, W.E.B. Du Bois, and so many others, including recently Ward Churchill. And until the nation – or much of it – is willing to debate and not simply condemn critics of our history and current policies, those who are critical will always be vulnerable to those Wise describes as “the flag-lapel-pin wearing leaders of this land--who bring shame to the country with their nonsensical suggestions that we are always noble in warfare, always well-intended, and although we occasionally make mistakes, we are never the ones to blame for anything. Nothing that happens to us has anything to do with us at all. It is always about them. They are evil, crazy, fanatical, hate our freedoms, and are jealous of our prosperity. When individuals prattle on in this manner we diagnose them as narcissistic, as deluded. When nations do it--when our nation does--we celebrate it as though it were the very model of rational and informed citizenship.

How many times has Obama apologized for this country?

http://blog.revdrpaulsmith.org/2008/03/23/from-derrick-bell-barack-obama-and-the-rev-jeremiah-wright-issue.aspx

[AliceH]

I wonder if there are people who now regret having voted for Obama in 2008 who are now delighted to have a convenient explanation for how they could be so wrong... Look! The media never told us about this, or about this, or about this... If I had KNOWN about blah blah, I would not have voted for him.

The purpose of vetting Obama now is primarily as a means of vetting the media then for those 2008 voters who ARE surprised and disappointed by the president.

[NK]

TCollins-- agree with your 11:12 completely.

[Hermesss]

Best part is when the panelist tries to get Pollack to say his is afraid of blavks. Too bad the jerk didnt know that Pollack's wife is black.

[Extraneus]

Why would Obama and Holder come in and re-vamp the DoJ to institute racially biased law enforcement if they didn't truly believe the CRT b.s. that America and its Constitution and laws are fundamentally racist? They already had 99% of the black vote sewn up.

I think it's a good idea to expose Obama's racism this time around. Surely his associations with Wright, Bell, Holder, Skip and the rest are evidence of it.

[RichatUF]

and blacks using the reparations for a separate society within America

How Weather Underground of him.

[Sue]

Tom made Hot Air's Headlines. Expect some guests today. This column will be viewed far and wide. Great job, dear leader!

[NK]

RichardUF-- CRT, Liberation Theology, ACORN street hustling (SouthSide chapter)-- that's our boy Barry.

[Thomas Collins]

NK, you may have a better handle on CRT in your 11:27 AM post than I have articulated. My memory is that there is an aspect of CRT holding that reparations could be part of the white consciousness evolving, but I may be mixing this up with another line of thought. Or, it may be present in some CRT thought but not Bell's.

We need a collection of CRT thinking comparable to Professor Ward's web pages on anarchsim (now remember I'm staying out of the kerfuffle of whether BFF is Professor Ward; I'm simply referring to the web pages).

[Rocco]

An eagle-eyed reporter for the ABC affiliate in Cedar Rapids, Iowa, noticed something missing from Democratic presidential contender Sen. Barack Obama's, D-Ill., lapels.

"You don't have the American flag pin on. Is that a fashion statement?" the reporter asked, at the end of a brief interview with Obama on Wednesday. "Those have been on politicians since Sept. 12, 2001."

The standard political reply to that question might well have been, "My patriotism speaks for itself."

But Obama didn't say that.

Instead the Illinois senator answered the question at length, explaining that he no longer wears such a pin, at least in part, because of the Iraq War.

"You know, the truth is that right after 9/11, I had a pin," Obama said. "Shortly after 9/11, particularly because as we're talking about the Iraq War, that became a substitute for I think true patriotism, which is speaking out on issues that are of importance to our national security, I decided I won't wear that pin on my chest.

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/story?id=3690000&page=1

[Extraneus]

That's a great point, Alice. People who need an excuse in order to repudiate their 2008 vote should be given what they need.

[Captain Hate]

Best part is when the panelist tries to get Pollack to say his is afraid of blavks. Too bad the jerk didnt know that Pollack's wife is black.

Pollack must've been smiling inside quite a bit as the guy kept digging deeper.

[Thomas Collins]

Well, Drexel University looks as if it has a pretty good CRT collection (see LUN). Perhaps that Soledad O'Brien youngster from CNN might want to consult it before she speaks on CRT again.

[NK]

TCollins-- I wouldn't sweat the details of trying to analyze "CRT"; it's a bunch of leftwing academic poo. Unfortunately, the current POTUS believes in that academic poo. Ever wonder why 'Bam was so weak on Constitutional Law? Because he believes there is no Con Law or 'justice', only power.

[NotSara]

Exactly! AliceH.

[RichatUF]

NK-

I recall that during the 08 campaign (and during the first year of the administration) we talked in the comments section of coming up with Obama's beliefs. Spengler had a good take (an article); Kurtz had the great "Radical In Chief"; and D'Souza has "The Roots of Obama's Rage".

Or more to the point-if people wanted to know just how radical Obama is there was and is plenty available now although it will be nice to see it "vetted" properly with raisng gas prices and 8+% unemployment.

[bgates]

Soledad O'Brien was caught bs-ing on the air. So what?

So if we do things your way, voters have two sources of information about the economy for the next six months: their own lying eyes, and "The Everything's Getting Better Show", hosted by the impeccably nonpartisan Soledad O'Brien.

I also see media bias as a fact that any Republican has to live with.

At various times, slavery, Soviet Communism, and a Democratic House were facts that any Republican had to live with.

[NK]

TCollins-- I did take a quick look at the CRT LUN. You know what happened to CRT? in the '90s Bell, West and Ogletree and others got some faculty slots for acolytes, they either moved on to government jobs or got tenure, and got fat and lazy like most tenured faculty (sorry Dana) and the publications petered out. Pitful waste of resources.

[Porchlight]

OT, saw it in the HotAir comments at the page linking TM's post:

Orson Bean is on for a full hour with Dennis Miller to talk about his son-in-law Andrew Breitbart.

[GMAX]

Critical race theory is grievance mongering and race baiting all rolled up in one package. And nothing Soledad OBrien or any other prog tool says, is going to convince me otherwise.

This is indeed the second verse of:

"A white man's greed runs a world in need."

Author Unknown ( to the prog media ).

[centralcal]

On my drive into work this morning there was some breathless CBS news reporter saying some drug (normally used for heart conditions, I believe) was found in a study to STOP RACISM! I kid you not. Supposedly, patients were given some sort of psychological quiz and all their racism just disappeared into thin air!!!

Man oh man - I can see it now - Obamacare will provide everyone with free anti-racism pills (through force, of course).