By Edwin Cooney
I wasn’t the least bit surprised a week ago last Friday,
July 19th, 2013 when President Obama issued his thoughtfully eloquent
statement in the wake of the recent acquittal of George Zimmerman in the
killing of Trayvon Martin. I know
Mr. Zimmerman is therefore not guilty of murder, and will forever remain so
under the Constitution, but I, like many others, believe that George Zimmerman
was as deliberate in his intent and in his ultimate actions as O.J. Simpson was
(although he was acquitted in the killing of his ex-wife back in 1994).
The truth is that law, rather than justice, prevailed in
both cases. In both instances, the
prosecution failed to prove its case.
For his ordeal, O.J. Simpson afforded himself a legal “dream team”
consisting of Johnnie Cochran, Robert Shapiro, Robert Kardashian, and F. Lee
Bailey. In Mr. Zimmerman’s case,
the prosecution was forced to make its case absent any witnesses hence its justifiably
difficult task died aborning.
President Obama’s task as our national leader was to provide
some perspective for you and me, regardless of how we feel about Mr. Zimmerman,
so that we might more successfully examine our own understanding of how we’re
all perceived in today’s increasingly cynical society. So, you might well ask, how did
American society become so cynical?
As I see it, this era of national cynicism began “once upon
a time” almost fifty years ago. As
I was told, on the morning of Saturday, November 23rd, 1963,
Americans awakened stripped of their innocence. John Fitzgerald Kennedy had been abruptly taken from our
midst by an act we couldn’t imagine any decent and reasonable person would
possibly want to commit. Young and
vital, well educated and erudite, a force for positive energy in our lives
despite some personal shortcomings, Kennedy was our president and cultural
leader. Hence, for nearly fifty years
now, it has become fashionable to be skeptical about
everything from race, religion, politics, war, sexual orientation, guns, sports,
marriage, parenting, and beyond.
It’s only inevitable, therefore, that the children of the JFK
assassination era took on their parent’s cynicism!
Now, for the second time in that fifty year period (the presidency
of Ronald Reagan marks the first time), we have a president who possesses a
powerfully winning way about him.
In addition to being our president, he is also, by dint of his race and
inclinations, a civil rights leader.
Unlike some of the most successful or prominent black
preachers and politicians who have become nationally prominent since the
immediate post World War II era, Barack Hussein Obama (he apparently decided
during his teens not to use the nickname Barry he was given as a boy) has
sought to calm the waters of uncertainty and discontent that have become such
an integral part of race relations.
Hence his stunningly effective March 16th, 2008 speech in the
wake of the controversy over his personal preacher, the Reverend Jeremiah Wright. On that occasion, Senator Obama spoke
frankly but in a non-accusatory way of the history and the consequences of the
historic relationship between blacks and whites in America.
A week ago Friday, the president demonstrated once again his
mastery of his intellect and his emotions as he acknowledged the birthright
dilemma faced especially by most black males in America. At the same time, he forthrightly
acknowledged how their behavior towards both whites and people of color too
often given credence to the fears John and Suzie Q Citizen have concerning the
possible intentions and behavior of black males. What he had to say neither accused nor excused, nor did it
subscribe to any political solution.
What the president’s 18 minute analysis did do is to salve
the raw nerves of a nation buffeted once again by the powerful poison of race
differential first introduced to the North American continent back in 1619.
For it was in that “Year of Our Lord” that English settlers
(one can’t quite call them founding fathers) decided that one set (or race) of
God’s children was sufficiently inferior so that one could reasonably strip
them from their families in far off Africa and bring them to Virginia to be
treated and cared for like pack animals.
A little more than two centuries later, the United States Supreme Court
found blacks equal to property and t deserving only of the care a man’s horse
or gun should have.
As the President observed two Fridays ago, we’ve come a long
long way since another incident that occurred fifty years ago next month on
August 28th, 1963.
On that occasion, another black leader, Dr. Martin Luther
King Jr., asserted that every man ought to be judged by the content of his
character rather than by the color of his skin. Without minimizing the ongoing existence of racism, President
Obama acknowledged the existence of a national healing presence. Every generation, he asserted, handles
racial sensitivities a little better than the generation before.
Thus, if your assessment of the Zimmerman verdict was that
genuine justice had been done, the president didn’t argue with you. On the other hand, if you felt anger
and resentment in the wake of Zimmerman’s acquittal, the President didn’t offer
traditional “liberal pie in the sky medicine,” but one could easily get the
impression that there exists a leader at the national helm who not only
understands and sympathizes with your pain, but who also has a personal stake
in a better tomorrow. Indeed he does: their names are Malia Ann and Sasha
(Natasha) Obama.
Meanwhile, President Obama keeps an ever watchful gaze into
the national looking glass as he should.
It’s part of his job and a guarantor of our national security.
RESPECTFULLY SUBMITTED,
EDWIN COONEY
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