April 2011 - Centre for Civil Society - University of KwaZulu-Natal

Tea Party activists who insist that Barack Obama was born in Kenya and
was raised with Mau Mau influences inherited from his father, causing the
President to view the English as, god forbid, “imperialists.”
Oddly, some of these Tea Partiers, who are known for dressing up in
American revolutionary garb, are now up arms over someone looking at
English history and detecting imperialism. To do so may qualify you to be
portrayed in Tea Party posters like Obama was, dressed as an African
bushman.
But just as you must not see evidence of imperialism in the British Empire,
you must not see racism in how the Tea Party reacts to the first African-
American president. To do so in Washington makes you unemployable.
No Invasion Here
Similar rules apply to the behavior of countries depending on whether
they’re categorized as “good guys” or “bad guys.”
For instance, in 1979, when the old Soviet Union sent troops into
Afghanistan to bolster the country’s communist government, which was
besieged by U.S.-backed Islamic fundamentalists, that was called an
“invasion.” But on Monday, when Saudi Arabian troops rumbled into
Bahrain to support an embattled Sunni monarchy against the country’s
Shiite majority, it was an “intervention” or a "troop movement" or simply
an "arrival."
On Tuesday, the New York Times’ front-page story suggested that Shiiteruled
Iran, a U.S. adversary, was behaving recklessly when it described the
Saudi action as an “occupation.” The Times added, “Iran even went so far
as to call the troop movement an invasion.”
Bring the smelling salts! Imagine calling a “troop movement” into a
sovereign nation – against the will of a majority of its people – an
“invasion.” Who would say such things?
Yet, while the Times thought Iran was going over the top with words like
“occupation” and “invasion,” other comments – no matter how crazy when
made by prominent Republicans – are treated with respect. So, the Times
described Mississippi’s Republican Gov. Haley Barbour as “testing themes”
when he said the following:
“Let’s look at [Obama’s] record,” Barbour told a Chamber of Commerce
meeting in Chicago. “In the last two years, the federal government spent
$7 trillion and our economy lost seven million jobs. I guess we ought to be
glad they didn’t spend $12 trillion. We might have lost 12 million jobs.”
In a different political era, one might have expected responsible
journalists to note how absurd – and dangerous – Barbour’s “theme” was.
The reason the economy lost seven million jobs was the Wall Street
financial crisis, which occurred on George W. Bush’s watch and was
touched off by reckless gambling and scant regulation. The trillions in
government bailouts were a reaction, not a cause.
While no one can stop Barbour from flipping the chronology – and
essentially lying to the public – one might expect the New York Times to
explain the facts. But the safe career play these days is to avoid speaking
any truth that might get you in trouble.
[The Times’ print edition offered no balance at all, but the online version
did include a paragraph from Barbour’s speech acknowledging that Obama