Bundy and racism

A few good takes on the subject:

• LZ Granderson at CNN has one of the smarter takes on Cliven Bundy's extremely ignorant remarks about "the Negroes".

  Bundy is just the lightning rod of the moment, just as Phil Robertson of Duck Dynasty fame was before him, and Paula Deen before that.

  Meanwhile Racism 2.0 is busily working in the shadows, gerrymandering away voting rights and creating legislation that makes pre-emptively shooting dead a young black man who makes you nervous synonymous with standing one's ground. The longer the media allow ignorant relics like Bundy to continue to hog the spotlight -- and the public points at him as the face of conservative racism -- the longer the current incarnation can go unchecked.

  Yup. Bundy is a clownish sideshow whom smarter but equally unreconstructed racists can't thank enough for distracting the rest of us.

  Or at least he was the distraction of the hour, until Donald Sterling stole his thunder.

  Who will be next to tumble out of the clown car that is the far right these days? No idea. While we're waiting, though, let's shine an unwelcome light on the Republicans doing everything they can to shorten voting hours and to challenge likely Democratic-leaning voters at the polls, shall we?

• The thing about Bundy, like a lot of people who get into trouble because they can't edit themselves, is that his repeated "clarifications" of his first press conference only dig him in deeper. Unfortunately, and again, like a lot of people who can't edit themselves, Bundy's "clarifications" also muddy the waters with sheer, confused verbiage. The Reverend Dr. Susan Brooks Thistlewaite peels back the layers of verbiage to show Bundy's multiple "sins of racism".
• The estimable Charles Blow in the New York Times also confronts Bundy's vile "blacks were better off under slavery" rhetoric with pitiless numbers and simple declarative statements of the reality of slavery. This will not affect Bundy and his hardcore allies, of course, because their minds are closed, but one hopes a dose of reality will peel off any unthinking supporters who might be tempted to buy into the idiot freeloader's insipid "argument".