Not Again

This Cynthia McKinney story bothers me.

As the story goes Rep. Cynthia McKinney is going to a meeting at the Captiol Building. She goes to walk by the security check in and is stopped by a police officer. He touches or grabs her shoulder to stop her and she hits him.

She holds a press conference at Howard University with Harry "Bush is a Terrorist" Belafonte and Danny "I Can't Get a Cab" Glover and the shanigans begin.

"Cynthia McKinney, like thousands of average Americans across this country, is ... a victim of the excessive use of force by law enforcement officials because of how she looks and the color of her skin," said one of McKinney's lawyers, James Myart Jr.

"The whole incident was instigated by the inappropriate touching and stopping of me — a female, black congresswoman," McKinney said at a news conference, abandoning the apologetic tone she struck earlier in the week.

McKinney spoke on the campus of predominantly black Howard University, surrounded by more than a dozen African-American children from South Georgia's Coffee County who held signs reading "Is Cynthia a Target?" and "Recognize Our Congresswoman."

Not this sh#t again. I must be getting Punk'd. This has to be some kind of sick twisted joke. The Twilight Zone or Outer Limits or something. These people can't be serious. Let me make sure I'm getting this straight. You are a representative of many years, who is well versed in all the systems set up to ensure you take full advantage of all the rights and privileges allotted to members of Congress. You don't follow the precedures (she admits to not wearing the congressional pin which is used to identify all members of Congress at check points) and when you get stopped, for not having the pin, your defense is he should have recognized you? Are you serious?! There are 535 members of Congress that change every 2 years or so, you expect every single security guard to memorize the faces of every single member. ARE YOU SERIOUS?! What has she ever done to warrant this celebrity she feels she has? Why does she feel so entitled and special that everybody should know her? I've never heard of Cynthia McKinney. I doubt if anybody outside of Georgia has. Much less recognize her. Sounds like a self esteem issue to me.

What really works my nerves is when people throw up the racism defense even when they are clearly wrong in a situation. I hate that. She knows damn well she didn't have any business hitting that officer. If you were not wearing your congressional pin and tried to go by a check point you should get stopped. In this post 9/11 world every measure has to be taken to ensure safety. Thats the whole point of the damn check point! If they just let anybody in he'd be fired! Now they are gonna make all this noise over her "incident" when she is obviously way out of pocket on this one. It takes all the fire out of claims of real racism. In new Orleans this weekend Al, Jesse and them are marching over the whole voting issue they have going on and protesting the "don't let them niggas in" incident with the cops on the bridge. That was racism! That is the stuff we need to be rallying about!

She's not the only using racism as a defense. I've seen plenty of times where my people were clearly in the wrong and threw up racism up because they had no real defense to go with. "Man, they pulled me over for cause I'm black." Man, you was doing 80 in a 45. "Man, them cops keep watching me cause I'm black." Nigga, you out here selling weed.

A few weeks ago the police kicked in the door of a house and arrested 3 black minors (a 14 year old, a 17 year old and an 18 year old) after a crowd of their white neighbors had gathered outside the house. That's racist right? The NAACP was holding press conferences, the mother was crying on TV, people were in an up roar. Well, turns out the the kids were breaking into the houses in the subdivision. They broke in while someone's 11 year daughter was home and she identified them. The house the police kicked in was full of stolen goods. The mother was selling the stuff on eBay. The cops busted in the house after the 14 and 17 year old beat another officer with sticks. Is it still racist?

Racism is out there, I'm not stupid. We need to fight racism on all fronts. I'm all for exposing the problems and fixing it so my kids won't be held back because of their skin color. We also need to fight this fake racism. We need to get to the point where we are acting in ways that doesn't give real racism anywhere to hide. We need to be able to sit back and see a situation for what it is, accept resposibility (that means you McKinney!) if we did something wrong and not throw the racism card without proper provacation. We are always looking for a reason the call a white person racist. Everything ain't racism.