In Sanford, Fla., two lives have been taken with a single shot.
The first life, that of Trayvon Martin, was already on a losing path, having been caught with women’s jewelry and burglary tools on one occasion and pot/pipe on another. In an effort to make crime numbers look good, both incidents were deleted from official reports, making officials look great but giving no help or guidance to a young man going in the wrong direction. The failure was not providing role models to teach right from wrong, responsibility, and the path to success. Instead there was only enabling and excuses.
The second life, of George Zimmerman, has been ended, just as effectively, by racism: racism of our leaders, and racism of our media. For, to be certain, George’s life is, if not physically over, certainly a nightmare despite his acquittal.
Although he is half Hispanic and half white, The New York Times has branded him as white, thereby giving race hustlers a target through lies, fraud and deceit, for a cause célèbre. They advocate demonstrations and violence, inciting others to hunt down Zimmerman and kill him. Notice that our president is half white and half black and he is lauded as the first black president.
That these so-called “leaders” care not a whit for black well-being is evidenced by facts. More than 8,000 blacks are murdered each year, 93% of them by other blacks (FBI statistics.) No outcry, no media coverage, no help unless you count increased welfare spending and subsidies that prolong dependency on government and rob a man of his dignity, or ever-increasing minimum wage laws that ensure that unskilled youth can never enter the labor force.
Or look at the voucher system in Washington, D.C., where, given the choice, minority parents take their children out of failing schools and send them to successful schools. These students from poor backgrounds have a 94% graduation rate compared to the public schools’ rate of 55%. There are three times as many applications as there are openings, yet the “leaders” of D.C., under union pressure, cancelled the voucher program! It took Congress to reinstate it.
The Republican Party has supported civil rights for all since at least the Civil War and throughout the Civil Rights movement of the 60s, when Democrats were very busy being KKK members. Martin Luther King was a Republican.
When you listen to the race baiters on the evening news, keep in mind that dividing this country with racial hatred does not help any minority, although it may bring power and notoriety to the race hustlers. Only by encouraging the best from each individual, no matter color or ethnic origin, will we succeed as individuals and as a nation.
Mr. Hebert is chairman of the Republican Town Committee, which supplies this column.