RW-(the original) Dancing Madly Backwards Through A Liberal Minefield

"I'd grown up fearing the lynch mobs of the Ku Klux Klan; as an adult I was starting to wonder if I'd been afraid of the wrong white people all along — where I was being pursued not by bigots in white robes, but by left-wing zealots draped in flowing sanctimony," he wrote in his book.

In the interview at his home, with his wife Virginia at his side during part of it, Thomas talks in detail about the hearings and how he believes they perpetuated the vilest stereotypes about black men — stereotypes about sexual aggression that had long condemned them to death in the South and had been recounted by African-American novelists in harrowing detail. It all, he says was an effort to destroy his nomination and keep him off the Court.

He says he had to be "dehumanized" and "destroyed," because he held views considered heretical for a black man — because, as he puts it, he was in a different ideological neighborhood and refused to buy into the views that whites had "disseminated as the prevailing view for blacks."

"I saw it for what it was, and I still see it for exactly what it was," Thomas says. "I think it was an effort to keep me in my place."

Justice Thomas also has some very pointed words about the way minorities in general and blacks in particular are viewed as inferior because of affirmative action programs. This is an issue conservatives should embrace and make their own like President Bush tried very early on when he talked about the soft bigotry of low expectations.

Conservatives tend to be scared of the issue of affirmative action because of the fact that blacks were placed in a position of disadvantage for so long and the minute you begin to make an argument against the practice you're labeled as a bigot. The answer isn't in lowering standards to perpetuate the myth that blacks aren't capable. This is the myth that allows race warlords like Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton to flourish. The answer lies in making sure the doors are always open for the best and the brightest and the reality is we're already there if we would only accept it and promote striving for excellence.

There was no “schoolyard fight” as a result of nooses being hung on a whites-only tree.

Justin Barker, the white victim, was cold-cocked from behind, knocked unconscious and stomped by six black athletes. Barker, luckily, sustained no life-threatening injuries and was released from the hospital three hours after the attack.

A black U.S. attorney, Don Washington, investigated the “Jena Six” case and concluded that the attack on Barker had absolutely nothing to do with the noose-hanging incident three months before. The nooses and two off-campus incidents were tied to Barker’s assault by people wanting to gain sympathy for the “Jena Six” in reaction to Walters’ extreme charges of attempted murder.

Much has been written about Bell’s trial, the six-person all-white jury that convicted him of aggravated battery and conspiracy to commit aggravated battery and the clueless public defender who called no witnesses and offered no defense. It is rarely mentioned that no black people responded to the jury summonses and that Bell’s public defender was black.

It’s almost never mentioned that Bell’s absentee father returned from Dallas and re-entered his son’s life only after Bell faced attempted-murder charges. At a bond hearing in August, Bell’s father and a parade of local ministers promised a judge that they would supervise Bell if he was released from prison.

Be sure to click the post title and read Whitlock's entire column, it's fascinating what our "news" services choose to leave out of a story.