Hattiesburg and White African-Americans.


On Saturday night around 8:30 PM Officers Benjamin Deen (34) and Liquori Tate (25) were shot to death after making a routine traffic stop in Hattiesburg, Mississippi.  Deen was a former “Officer of the Year."  Tate had just graduated from the Police Academy in 2014 proud and anxious to serve his community.  As of today, four suspects are under arrest; two charged with capital murder and two more with obstruction of justice and being accessories after the fact.

I saw the story late Saturday on the Drudge Report.  When I turned the news on Sunday morning I waited for the story to be reported.  I waited some more.  Then I waited some more.  Eventually it made the news…but always the 3rd or 4th story on the air, and that included Fox.  Monday night brought more of the same.  CNN barely reported it at all.  Fox had some righteous indignation, but that was it.

One of the two deceased officers was black.  All of the arrested were black.  Where is the Federal government looking for injustice?  Where is Al Sharpton or Jesse Jackson?  Where are the talking heads from NBC, CBS, ABC, CNN, and MSNBC to investigate the circumstances surrounding the murder of two Mississippi policemen at the hands of young black men?   Where is the Attorney General of the United States calling for an investigation?  Where is the President of the United States…or does he just think this is justice for Mississippi’s past misdeeds?  He shies away from states that didn’t vote for him….really.  

Hattiesburg is the antithesis of all racial narratives currently being foisted on the public by a liberal press.  By acknowledging Hattiesburg, the press would have to acknowledge the serious and dangerous situation within the African American community. Could the actions of police be justified in other communities such as Ferguson?  What does this do the narrative in Baltimore?
 
The result is the press ignores whatever hinders the political point it is trying to make.  That ignorance extends even to situations that the press presents as showing the problem.  Case in point: three of the arrested officers in Baltimore were African Americans.  MSNBC skirted the issue when anchorwoman Melissa Harris-Perry said that the three arrested black police officers were in fact “White African Americans.”   Are these shirttail relations to White Hispanics?  To what lengths will these people go?

The sad thing is that the very serious problems facing the African American community in the cities, and poor whites outside of the city, are being ignored.   The violence against police today…any police…is directly related to the permanent underclass that has developed in this country over last 50 years.  Life chances are non-existent in a growing segment of American culture.  No hope.  No education. The disintegration of the family.  Lack of male role models.  Rapidly increasing drug use.  All of these things feed an increasingly disaffected and growing population that is willing to lash out at any authority figure race notwithstanding.

It’s time to put aside labels and tell the truth.   In this country we are white, black African Americans, white African Americans, brown Hispanics, white Hispanics, Asian and Native American….we are all Americans.  And we have to fix this. And we have to pay attention to the mantra “All lives matter!” because they do...including police lives.  And we have to heed Rodney King's question “Can’t we all just get along?”  And those words have to be understood across all segments of our society from the most inner parts of our cities to the suburbs to the countryside. 

It’s time to put rancor aside, man-up, and take responsibility for our own lives…and respect each other in the process. The news media has to put away its agenda. The politicians have to stop race baiting.  The ethnic segments of our country have to take responsibility for the true problems each faces.  It has to come from within. If we wait for somebody else to fix it, we will be waiting a long time.  A bad situation will get worse. If we wait for the government to fix it, it will be disastrous.  

In the meantime, pray for those fallen officers and all police officers who protect all of us from the suburbs to the most dangerous of neighborhoods.  

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