As you may have heard, First Lady Michelle Obama on Wednesday welcomed a "gathering of poets, musicians and artists" to the White House to "celebrate American poetry and prose." This has become a mini-scandal for the Obama administration due to the fact that one of invitees was the controversial rapper/poet "Common," whose real name is Lonnie Rashid Lynn, Jr.
What is so controversial about Common? Well, for starters, he has offered words of support for two cop killers, Mumia Abu-Jamal and Assata Shakur. Both Mumia and Assata were at one time members of the radical black nationalist Black Panther Party. Mumia murdered white Philadelphia police officer Daniel Faulkner in 1981 and was convicted and sentenced to death, while Assata murdered white New Jersey State Trooper Werner Foerster in 1973, was convicted, incarcerated, then escaped and fled to Cuba, where she lives under the protection of the communist dictatorship to this day. Assata Shakur is also classified as a "domestic terrorist" by the FBI.
So, there's that. Anything else? Yes. Common seems to encourage violence against police (what a shock) with a poem in which he states, "I got the black strap to make the cops run." In the same poem, he says, "why they messing with Saddam? Burn a Bush," a reference to former President George W. Bush.
In addition, NH Journal reports that "Common has also been a vocal opponent of mixed race relationships." Another poet, Jill Scott, appeared at the event, and she too appears to oppose interracial relationships. "[W]hen my [black] friend told me his wife was indeed Caucasian, I felt my spirit...wince," she once wrote.
In conversations I've had with liberals on this issue, they seem to think that it's much ado about nothing, a non-story being pushed by right-wingers who are just trying to harm the President.
I disagree.
Let me try to explain. Allow me to postulate a hypothetical scenario that is the equivalent of this situation, only with the parties and races reversed.
So. Instead of a black liberal Democrat First Lady (Michelle Obama) inviting a black rapper/poet ("Common") to the White House despite his poetry supporting black nationalist cop killers (Mumia Abu-Jamal and Assata Shakur), opposing interracial relationships, and encouraging violence against police officers and a white Republican President (George W. Bush)...
...the hypothetical scenario would have a white conservative Republican First Lady inviting a white country musician/poet to the White House despite his poems supporting white nationalist cop killers, opposing interracial relationships, and encouraging violence against police officers and a black Democrat President.
Now, think about this for a moment. If the latter scenario were ever to happen, the one with a Republican in the White House, don't you think it would be kind of a big news story? That is, don't you think the New York Times or MSNBC or CNN or The Washington Post might maybe make mention of it a time or two?
Now, surely liberals know the correct answer to those questions. They probably don't want to admit it, but they certainly know the answer.
If such a scenario were to take place, the establishment media would go absolutely berserk. It would be a feeding frenzy. MSNBC would be talking about it nonstop for days, probably weeks. The New York Times would run front page stories about it, along with countless opinion columns (all with the same opinion, of course). National Democrats would be giving speeches denouncing the President and First Lady as racist. Marches on Washington would be planned. Letterman and Leno and Conan and SNL and The View and The Daily Show and The Colbert Report, etc. would rip the Republican administration endlessly.
So there's a bit of a double-standard at work here. Obviously.
But there's another difference, too, besides the media bias and the double standards. That difference is as follows: There are no country musicians/poets (at least not that I'm aware of) who write stuff like that. And if there were, they sure as heck wouldn't be invited to the White House to be honored. And if they were - this is the really important part - if some "poet" like that was actually invited to the White House by a Republican administration, conservatives wouldn't be defending it or pretending it isn't an issue or completely ignoring it, like most liberals have done with the Common controversy.
No, conservatives would be openly saying "What in the world are they thinking? That's just plain offensive. This jerk needs to be disinvited ASAP." I can guarantee you that's what our response would be, pretty much unanimously.
But the political left will defend their God-King Barack Hussein Obama and his administration no matter the facts, no matter the circumstances. And that's an important difference between conservatives and liberals.
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