I just left my hot cup of French Roast coffee and a Tastycake downstairs because a comment to the post “On Abdul El-Sayed” ruined my morning.
Somehow, I left out “except Richard Nixon” in the paragraph that was supposed to note that every U.S. President except Obama and Nixon had blue eyes. I don’t know how that happened: I thought I had written it. But while the comment, from a good friend, should have offered a correction (as is, sadly, often necessary especially when I write one late at night), instead the commenter accused me of being racist. The eyes bit was mentioned in a section about American leadership templates, which, while I might have written it slightly differently has it been mid-day and I were a bit fresher, I stand by it nonetheless Here’s the corrected version:
“Not too long ago, it would be impossible to imagine a serious candidate for the U.S. Senate named Abdul El-Sayed. Americans just didn’t elect people who had non American-sounding names. It was a silly bias, but a comforting one. When I wrote my thesis hypothesizing an American Presidential type, I noted that no American President had been elected who didn’t have an American-sounding name. (No, nobody thought of Dwight Eisenhower as German, for obvious reasons.) Not only that, every American President from Washington to Bush except Richard Nixon has had blue eyes. Barack Obama blew that template to bits, both in name and in eye-color.”
As I wrote just now in a correction prompted by that comment:
“I certainly knew about Nixon’s eyes: there is a controversy over their color: he is stated in some sources as having black eyes, and others call them dark brown. But he and Obama are the only brown-eyed boys: Trump restored the Presidency to its blue-eyed tradition. The Name Game has a chapter in my honors thesis, which was,indeed a controversial one: three chair-holding professors in the Harvard Government Department reviewed it, and couldn’t agree on the grade; eventually they compromised on magna cum laude. The observation about Presidents’ names was not original, and I had it thoroughly footnoted to a historian who specialized in the narrow field of Presidential character. Perhaps today’s DEI, bias-over-reality, conservative thought-suppressing Harvard College would have slapped me down for that section, but then it no longer is a top tier, trustworthy institution.”
I completed the correction this way:
“Fact: the template for the American Presidency in the minds of Americans is powerfully influenced by another fact. Every President before Barack Obama was white, male, born on the mainland and raised by Christians. He changed that mold, and if he had been a good President and better human being, he would have changed it more. I have reached the end of my patience with progressives and Democrats, yes, even Trump-Deranged friends, stooping to race-baiting when they have neither the information, the integrity nor the wit to counter opinions (and facts) they find inconvenient, as they appeal to emotion or worse. I wrote in the reply to an old and cherished friend’s accusation of racism in the comments to this post, ‘Shame on you.’ Shame on all of them.”
I stand by that, too.
Ethics Alarms 
Try not to let these folks live rent-free in your head the way they let Trump live rent-free in theirs. Accusations of racism, sexism, homophobia, xenophobia and all the other phobias are all they’ve got.
President Obama was a toxic influence on race relations, nearly as bad as Woodrow Wilson (but, obviously, not the same). The belief that we must have a multi-ethnic Legislative branch has ushered in race-baiting, America-hating (but historic!) Representatives and Senators with no willingness to understand American values and traditions. Ocasio-Cortez, Hakeem Jeffries, the Squad and the rest are a direct result of Obama’s emphasis on skin color as a qualification for public office.
There is nothing racist about pointing that out.
Jack,
Maybe I am wrong, but I thought the “racism” accusation was meant to be tongue-in-cheek. I could easily see myself doing the same thing.
I don’t know; knee-jerk accusations of racism never seem serious to me.
(But, you are probably more familiar to this particular commenter to judge.
-Jut
Trust me, it wasn’t. And that’s why I am so annoyed.
If that’s the case, then I really do not understand how it is racist, much less “This is “the worst racist white supremaceist BS you’ve ever written.”
Except that you mentioned Obama, which makes anything you say racist.
But, seriously, I could have easily said, “You know, Nixon had brown eyes too. What the hell do you have against Nixon. Oh, that’s right…the crimes.”
Essentially, you said something true about Obama (he had brown eyes), something false about Nixon (by implication, he had blue eyes), and something false about Obama AND Nixon (by implication) that Obama was the only one with non-blue eyes.
Seriously, why do you hate Nixon so much?
-Jut
From your host! Alert! This is a banned commenter who is using the hoary and unethical device of sneaking by with a new user name. He also, in this deleted post, uses the guaranteed magic words, “I dare you to leave this comment up.” That would be impossible as a matter of policy, but the comment also is obviously brain-meltingly stupid, as it contains this howler: “You are also an American progressive radical in numerous aspects of your political philosophy.”
He might as well have written tha he knows I’m a secret aardvark.
Alizia reincarnate…
PWS
No, this is a banned commenter incarnate.
If it wasn’t Alizia, it sure sounded like her.
PWS
Jack,
You have every right to be angry about the race baiting, especially when it comes from a good friend. Yes, your good friend owes you a public apology for this but I suspect it’s not likely to happen, at least publicly.
Why is it so hard for people to show some genuine integrity and respect and publicly apologize when they have publicly wronged someone in such a blatantly obvious way? Just apologize sincerely (#1 on the Apology Scale) and move on with life, you will be better person for it.
On the flip side of that sincere apology coin is, we really shouldn’t forget about honest forgiveness…
There are few things in life that are more important than family, genuine integrity & respect, sincere apologies, and honest forgiveness.
Everyone, including me, should watch/rewatch the videos in this post on a routine basis, Comments Of The Day (2): “Desperate Ethics Quote Of The Week: Louis C.K.” (November 11, 2017)
I was kind of shocked by the racist accusation as well. Maybe an eyeist. Is that a word? (Joking. I don’t really think you’re an eyeist.)
I was curious, though, about the blue eyed presidents claim. That seems amazing. So I started Googling. (I love to Google.)
I found a couple of websites with lists of presidents by eye color, including this one:
https://list.fandom.com/wiki/United_States_presidents_by_hair_and_eye_color
There was also an article from the Chicago Tribue in 1988 (so pre-DEI) that claims there were multiple presidents with brown eyes and several others with hazel eyes.
https://www.chicagotribune.com/1988/10/03/history-shows-that-the-eyes-have-it/
I assume those sights are accurate, but who knows. It is the internet.
In any case, even if those sights are correct and you’re wrong, there are an astounding number of presidents with blue eyes: 26, according the the Tribune.
Maybe the voters were racist?
What happened to my comment? It didn’t make it through moderation.
I made a joke about you (Jack) maybe being an eyeist (vs. a racist), then linked to a recent website and an article from the Chicago Tribune that both said there were 4 brown eyed presidents and a few hazel eyed ones as well, though there were still an astounding number of blue eyed ones.
Did you cancel me for positing that not all the presidents were blue eyed, or was it just a wordpress error?
Sorry, I was away from the office for a while. It’s up. Interesting. As usual, it’s impossible to know what sources to trust. I’ll check out the link.
The Trib one was behind a paywall. The list fandom one is also the one cannibalized most by the AIs, but one of its brown-eyed Presidents makes sense: JQ Adams. Blue eys are recessive. John had blue eyes, but my best source says that Abigail was brown eyed, increasing the liklihood that JQ ended up that way as well. Some day when my sock drawer is organized, I’ll do a serious inquiry, but right now whether there were two or 4 brown-eyed boys (mine are brown) doesn’t disprove the narrow ethnic range of our concept of the Presidency and its occupants.
Anyone calls me a racist, sexist, homophobe ….
Next words out of my mouth “how long have you been a pedophile?”