Longing for Racism

There is undoubtedly a sick longing for racism within liberal circles these days.

Rush Limbaugh is an interesting case in point. Like many Americans who spend hours in their cars, I have heard Limbaugh a great deal – and I often disagree with him because he is more ideologically conservative than I am. But not once have I heard him make a statement that was racist. Not even close. But that doesn’t stop Keith Olbermann (and many others) from putting words in Limbaugh’s mouth he increasingly seems never to have uttered. Indeed, they did not have verifiable evidence in the first place that Rush had said such a thing. They simply “wished” it were so.

The root of this “wish” for people like Al Sharpton – who has a “business interest” in the preservation of racism or, more exactly, the preservation of the illusion of racism – is obvious. The root is less clear for others and may be a kind of personal rage. But whatever the case, these false accusations of racism, while often undertaken under the mantle of “liberalism,” are not liberal at all. They are reactionary – reactionary just in the sense it is traditionally defined: “Reactionary (also reactionist) refers to any political or social movement or ideology that seeks a return to a previous state (the status quo ante).”