Growing up with White Privilege: How A Fiction Destroys our Life Narratives

Good Morning, Students

We are ready to move on to our next composition assignment. As with previous assignments, you are limited to 2500 words. Make them count. I will, of course, grade for grammar and spelling, along with style (unless you're white, in which case, you get an "A").

Your task is to gloat about how you never had to study in school but got straight A's, not because you did well on assignments and tests, but because your teachers gave you good grades because you were white.

Then, spend some time talking about the sports programs, recreational or school-based, in which you didn't have to do weight training, calisthenics, running, or skill developments, but nonetheless won scholarships, not based on skills and achievement, but based on your whiteness.

Follow this with a brief history of entering the work force, how you were immediately selected as CEO for a Fortune 500 company, not because of an extended track record of successes in prior business ventures, but because of your whiteness.

I will be interested to read your stories.

* * * *

Perhaps you were born with dyslexia. Or, perhaps, your father was killed Afghanistan. Or, perhaps, your mother suffered a debilitating stroke when you were ten. Or, perhaps, you were the victim of a child predator. Maybe you were raised by grandparents who only spoke a foreign language at home.

Maybe the rural school you attended did not get the same funding, quality teachers, or books as the city schools in your State's financial center. The mistakes of your parents' parents were echoed in how you were raised.

Perhaps, in school, studying did not come easy. But study you did. For acceptable grades.

Perhaps, at work, you lacked some of the schmooze of your colleagues, and while many recognized that you were diligent, thorough, and bright, patrimony and nepotism required more of you than you could offer.

So you made it out of childhood. Never having tasted a silver spoon, never having vacationed in Vail or Rome.

So you made it out of school. You got your diploma. You were never inducted into the National Honor Society, but nor were you ever suspended. You got your Associates, or your Bachelor's. But you then spent ten years paying off your student loan debt (no silver spoon, remember).

You landed a job. You worked the job. You gave it the same consistent, dedicated, enduring attention as you had ploddingly applied in other areas of life. Truth is, though, while you might become middle management, or shop steward, you have no likelihood of becoming the CEO.

And all of that is okay with you.

At the end of the day, whether you just didn't have the same charm as some, the same wits as some, the same gifts as some, you've assembled a reasonable, livable life around yourself.

Then you turn on the Sunday morning news programs, or one of the evening cable news programs. "WHITE PRIVILEGE."

The first thing that comes to mind is, "Gosh, I wish I had experienced WHITE PRIVILEGE."

And then the president of your nation, a man who built nothing, who established no industry, who tore no farm out of forests, who actually really and truly brings a blank resume to the office, comes on the news, looks you and everyone around you and says, "You didn't build that."

If it's a conservative channel, he may be followed by some well-heeled folks -- attorneys, businessmen -- who rightly resent the ugly ignorance of the man. But you resent it too. Because, in fact, you did build it.

Whether "it" was the cars for which Henry Ford got credit, the railroads for which Andrew Carnegie got credit, or the energy resources for which Rockefeller got credit, you, or people just like you showed up, day after back breaking, or mind melting day. Digging in mines and digging with their minds.

And there's that ass again, spouting about "White Privilege." It infuriates because the rank presumptions that "white folk" are born two rungs of the ladder up above others was never true in your life, or in the lives of your friends, family, co-workers, and acquaintances.

In fact, "White Privilege" is a lie that attacks the endurance of your spirit. The gumption of carrying forward into a middle American life. It's the drool and spite of a special kind of resentment and hatred.

So, yeah, now you know why I wrote this piece. Because I tire of the spirit-destroying, inhumanity of that particular lie.

Boorda, Clinton and Williams: The Decline of Honor and the Rise of Rascals

The Nation’s Capitol, and the Nation’s military services, were rocked by word that Admiral Jeremy Boorda had taken a gun from his home, stood in his front yard, and ended his life.  It was 1996.  Boorda had heard that Newsweek magazine was following a lead that that would accuse him of wearing two service medals reflecting Vietnam era service to which he had no proper claim. Although Boorda served in the Navy and was stationed within the Vietnam area on ship, his ribbons included the “V” for Valor a designation typically reserved for awards in the theater of combat. Boorda stopped wearing the “V” on his ribbons when a military historical group began seeking information on his Vietnam era service via requests made under the Freedom of Information Act. 

Conspiracy theorists will chasten me for not understanding how this was a murder and an act done to hide deeper, darker secrets.  I beg their indulgence, because the point here depends upon the accepted narrative.

Boorda’s raft of military ribbons and medals reflected the rise of an enlisted man to the highest rank in the United States Navy.  His, by available information, was a career of dedication and service to the Navy, and to the Nation. That a man would suffer under such pain of feared humiliation for the Navy, for his family, and for himself, that he would end his own life may be odd to some.

If you grew up -- as did I, my siblings and many friends -- in a military family, it makes perfect sense. 

Duty. Honor. Country. 

These were more than just words.  These were ideals very familiar to us.  We saw, then, our fathers doing their duty. By their service, both they and we sacrificed for our country.  By distinguished service, they honored themselves and the Nation they served. 

We also experienced the pain of seeing failings in these principles. 

Our dad, who retired as a Colonel, spent his last duty years as the Senior Courts Martial Judge for the Navy’s Piedmont District.  Never one to bring his war stories to the dinner table, by the time he served in that post, I was old enough to have awareness of the more notorious cases being over which he presided. Murders, assaults, drug dealing, the occasional “conduct not becoming an officer and gentleman” (my recollection is that charge arose when one officer conducted an affair with the wife of another officer while that second officer was deployed).

We had also, of course, followed the news coverage of the My Lai massacre’s aftermath, including the prosecution of Lt. Calley. So we had our understanding of duty, honor and country given full relief both by their exhibition and by their omission in the lives of the military men and women among whom we lived, by whom we were raised.

Duty.

Honor.

Country.

I think it likely that the high personal toll of those ideals weighed heavily on Admiral Boorda’s mind. I regret that the toll was so high. I acknowledge, however, his determination that the threatened exposure of an alleged false claim of entitlement to certain military honors could only be soundly answered by the act of suicide. Of course, he was wrong in that. Suicide was not the only answer, nor was it an answer at all. The Nation, one that then was prepared to tolerate a President using an intern for oral gratification in the Oval Office, would have embraced him forgivingly given an appropriate acknowledgment, resignation, and removing himself from the National stage.

As it turns out, we have a rather high tolerance for high jinx from persons of position, prominence and wealth. To prove the point, simply contrast Admiral Boorda’s wrong – wearing Vietnam era service ribbons to which he was not entitled – with the bold, and bald-faced, lies of Hillary Clinton and Brian Williams.

Brian Williams now seemingly pays the price for having enhanced his resume. Williamshad claimed that, during coverage of the war in Iraq, he was aboard a helicopterthat was forced to make an emergency landing after it was hit by enemy fire.

Williams' tale of danger enhanced an acknowledged danger that no one would have reasonably disputed. Iraqi forces might well have fired on US Military aircraft. There was no need to add the embellishment, or to misreport the fact of his near presence to such danger. Still, without any seeming necessity, he did just that.

His fall came suddenly, when one who knew the pertinent facts stepped forward and contradicted Williams’ established claim. NBC’s news division has suspended Williams without pay for six months. Wags and pundits predict that Williams will not return to his former position.

Then there is the curious case of Hillary Clinton.

On several occasions, Hillary Clinton embellished her telling of the tale of avisit she and daughter Chelsea made to Bosnia back in 1996. As the storygrew wings of imagination, Hillary recounted how she and Chelsea were forced to run from the plane that just landed bringing them to Tuzla, Bosnia,to ground cover.  This mad dash was, Hillary claimed, made necessary by the presence and actions of a nearby Bosnia sniperwho firing on them.

The story had a ring of plausibility to it.  After all, Bosnia, Serbia, we all sort of remember, was deeply involved in some crazy violence and fighting.  Who would doubt the specifics of such an instance when it was so well matched to the generally understood fact that life in these countries, during a time of significant national turmoil, was quite dangerous? Unfortunately for Hillary, witnesses, including the entirely objective witness of the camera, showed that hers was a tale of danger as entirely cut from whole cloth as any Nancy Drew mystery. Ultimately, she was compelled by obvious and overwhelming fact to walk the story back from the precipice of patent prevarication.

Unlike Williams, Clinton’s deliberate lie on a topic where a lie was completely disconnected from any claim of necessity did not result in swift dispatch from the public scene. No. The former First Lady and United States Senator became the Secretary of State under Barack Obama. Imagine the sniggering up the sleeves as foreign ministers underwent prep with their aides for meetings with Secretary Clinton. Just cogitate on what it meant to have this Nation’s international interests guarded by a reputed liar. How unreliable could any assurance she made be thought to be by those invited to place their trust, their nations’ futures, on so shaky a ground as Clinton’s veracity and memory.

So Admiral Boorda, in a terribly sad act, committed suicide as a way, as he understood it, to preserve the honor of military service. Brian Williams tendered a weak apology for his misremembering of the details of an incident due to the “fog of war.”  Hillary Clinton walked back the danger laden details of a trip to a war ravaged Nation.

In the end, our losses from the lies and dishonesty are disproportionate. Admiral Boorda need not have committed suicide, and could have remained a strong reminder of the equality of opportunity that military service in the United States provides, having risen from enlisted typist to Admiral. He could have continued to provide a resource of understanding about our Naval service, its organization and operations.  Instead, he died on his front lawn at the Navy Yard, and left only the sad legacy of a suicide.

Neither Clinton nor Williams appear so moved by notions of duty, honor and country that anyone appears concerned that a suicide watch would be necessary now, for Williams, or back in 2008, for Clinton. Clinton’s glide path to power appears undisturbed by her open exposure as a liar.  What becomes next of the meteoric Williams’ career will be revealed by time.

Our loss of Boorda is just that, a loss to the Nation. Our despatch of Williams into the Hall of Television Shame seems like no loss at all. That we might even have the opportunity to vote against Hillary Clinton despite her lies about Bosnia, when no need to lie existed, says much about how little honor, duty and country seem to matter any more.

A False Claim and A True Bill

Like all sensible folk, I wasn't watching the Sunday morning talk shows when UN Ambassador Susan Rice appeared on all FIVE network shows.  So, until it was reported later that day and in subsequent days, I did not know that the Administration was asserting that the attacks on our Benghazi compounds resulted from a spontaneous response by people of Islamic faith who were offended by a YouTube video deemed blasphemous of Islam.

By now, of course, we all know that the Obama administration put that precise argument forward.  We know that a man in California who had previously been convicted of another crime had his probation revoked and was returned to jail ... all as part of the federal government's commitment to punish those responsible for inflaming Islamic sensibilities with that blasphemous video.  We also know that Obama's administration -- by sending Susan Rice to those Sunday morning shows -- lied to us, lied to the families of the four Americans killed, lied to the world.

And now that one terrorist has been captured, transported to the United States, and had an appearance in the US District Court to answer to his indictment, we know that the Obama administration knows that it lied to us.

The term indictment is stern.  It draws into the mind images of stringent criminal proceedings.  A judgment, drawn in large terms, that the accused has certainly committed criminal acts.  So, I think it's helpful to know that sometimes an indictment is fairly quick and simple read.  I'm including a link to the indictment below and the relevant text here:

"(conspiracy to Provide Material support and Resources to Terrorists Resulting in Death)

Beginning on a date unknown to the Grand Jury but no later than on or about September 11, 2012, and continuing until on or about September 12, 2012, in Libya, that is, outside the jurisdiction of any particular state or district, but within the extraterritorial jurisdiction of the United States, and pusuant to Title 18, United States Code, Section 3238, within the venue of the United States District Court for the District of Columbia, defendant AHMED ABU KHATALLAH, also known as. Ahmed Mukatallah, did knowingly and intentionally conspire and agree with other conspirators, known and unknown to the Grand Jury, to provide material support and resources to terrorists, that is, personnel including himself and others, as defined in Title 18, United States Code, Section 2339A(bXl), knowing and intending that the material support and resources were to be used in preparation for and in carrying out a violation of Title 18, United States Code, Section 930(c), Killing a Person in the Course of an Attack on a Federal Facility Involving the Use of a Firearm and a Dangerous Weapon, and a violation of Title 18, United States Code, Section 844(f), Maliciously Damaging and Destroying U.S. Property by Means of Fire and an Explosive, and this offense resulted in death."

That's all that it says.  There's a case caption, and a place for the Grand Jury's representative to have signed, indicating the Grand Jury's True Bill.

You do see what isn't there, right?

Nothing about spontaneous rioting responding to an inflammatory video.


Nothing about an inflammatory video at all.


Do you see what is there?

An accusation of CONSPIRACY on the part of the Defendant and others.  CONSPIRACY, a plan of action to accomplish an unlawful result.

But then, with the World Cup underway, and a possible early season hurricane along the east coast, at this point, what difference does it make?

The difference it makes is made only to those that care that they have been manipulated, misled, lied to, used.  Wouldn't you think the talk shows that hosted the lie-fest of the Obama administration would want to be in the forefront of pursuing the lie?  Don't hold your breath for that day to come.

But do something.  Repost this status and the link to the indictment.  Ask the questions.  Call your Congressional delegation at 202-224-3121 and demand ACTION by Congress, not platitudes, not remonstrations, but ACTION.  Obama must be held to account for setting the culture of deceit and corruption that rots his administration, as they say, from the head back.  Hillary must be held to account for the blood of the first openly gay US Ambassador and three brave Americans who were killed, not in spontaneous retaliation to a video, but as part of the aftermath of the Obama administrations incompetent and incontinent destabilization of the Middle East.

I wonder, as I think about the Administration's decision to fabricate a false cover story for Benghazi, how this LIE will come back to haunt Obama.  I'm an attorney by trade.  If I put on my thinking cap, I believe I could come up with five different ways of showing that the Government has changed its story, that it boldly declared a completely inconsistent theory of the cause of the violence on September 11, 2012:  the supposed offense among faithful Muslims to the blasphemous video.  On top of that, I don't doubt that Obama's lie to America, repeated five times in a three hour period, that the middle east had been inflamed by the blasphemous video will echo in an argument that the attack was the result of a provocative insult to Islam and its Prophet.

With all the webs of deception spun by this Administration, I'm surprised Obama, Clinton and Rice didn't compete for the role of Shelob in "The Desolation of Smaug."

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You can read the indictment for yourself here

Clap On! Clap Off! Clap On, Clap Off, James Clapper! Liar's Time to Exit

There is no end of lying in Washington.

Glenn Beck recently highlighted the Obamalies website, which catalogs a series of lies from this administration's father of lies, Barry Slewfoot, er Soetoro here.

As the scandals multiply, as the coverups spread, as Obama draws down in a Jim Bakker style protective fetal mode of suspicion, denial, shifted blame, and obfuscation, no doubt the Obamalies website will become inundated with weekly, then daily, then hourly and finally minutely lie updates.  Enjoy the read here.

In the face of the furious frenzy of falsifications, Congress seems to have adopted the advice of erstwhile Texas gubernatorial candidate Clayton Williams, whose 1990 run for Texas governor was helped into a grave of his tongue's own digging when he remarked that if a rape was inevitable, a woman should relax and enjoy it.

Congress may be working hard behind the scenes to bring these lies and lying liars who tell them to bar.  I doubt it.  For example, all signs indicate that the House Republicans are being warned off Benghazi by Boehner, which, if true, is a boner in itself, Boehner's biggest boner, in all likelihood.  In any event, it is doubtful the Democratic Party controlled Senate is likely to take action on one of the lately uncovered big boners of a lie, but why not hold out hope.

What lie, you ask?

The whopper served up to the Senate Intelligence Committee by James Clapper, the Director of National Intelligence. 

The deets are set out, among other places, in a recent Hot Air Blog here, relying on a heads up from Instapundit here, after a nod to the problem in The Hill here.  The essence is this:

While testifying before the Senate Intelligence Committee, Clapper was asked quite directly whether the NSA was collecting data on large numbers of Americans.  He gave a firm and clear, "No," in response.  Okay.  All well and good, he supposes.

Then along comes the pesky Guardian article (given wings by information from Booz Allen Hamilton employee Edward Snowden) revealing a broad sweep of American domestic telephony on the Verizon network by the Obama administration.

Given the opportunity to clarify (clarify is Beltway blather for explain your previous lie), Director Clapper chose the only obvious course that ever appears to a liar, he doubled down for deceit.  This time, where he had been asked, and had answered no, on whether the National Security Agency was collecting data on millions of American, he went for the obfuscatory clarification.

Here, as reported on the National Journal website, is Director Clapper's clarification:

"Director of National Intelligence James Clapper said Thursday that he stood by what he told Sen. Ron Wyden, D-Ore., in March when he said that the National Security Agency does not "wittingly" collect data on millions of Americans.

"What I said was, the NSA does not voyeuristically pore through U.S. citizens' e-mails. I stand by that," Clapper told National Journal in a telephone interview."

Pardon me?

Here, again, is the exchange between Senator Ron Wyden and Clapper:

"Sen. Wyden: Does the NSA collect any type of data at all on millions or hundreds of millions of Americans?

Director Clapper: No sir.  It does not. Not wittingly. There are cases where they could inadvertantly perhaps collect, but not wittingly."

You can watch this exchange here (if you do, advance in to the two hour, eight minute mark, and you will find the question and answer).

So, now, what did Clapper say:

(a)  The NSA does not collect any type of data at all on millions or hundreds of millions of Americans

or

(b)  The NSA does not voyeuristically pore through U.S. citizens' emails?

While I wait for your answer I'll play the obligatory quiz show theme music, which you can listen to here.

Yes, you can clap on.  You can clap off.  But with the Clapper and National Intelligence, we will all be in the dark about the extent of domestic surveillance.  Time to clap off Clapper.