in the middle of the piece, barrett says the following:
The Democrats in Congress recently administered a public whipping to Dr. Condoleeza Rice for daring to be a non-Democrat black. She was asked more questions than any nominee for Secretary of State in history, and they weren’t polite questions.anyone else see the logical problem with this line of reasoning?
let's assume that barrett was right and that rice really was "asked more questions than any [prior] nominee for Secretary of State in history." and, if you want, we can even further assume that "they weren't polite questions" (although which specific questions barrett is referring to goes unsaid).
doesn't that mean that rice was asked more questions (and less polite ones) than her predecessor, colin powell? somehow this doesn't seem like the best example to paint the democrats who questioned rice as practitioners of "the worst kind of racism."
(google search link via atrios)
...to clarify, i'm not saying that just because you've been nicer to a black person in the past that means you're immune to any racism charge. my point is that barrett's only evidence of racism seems to be that rice was asked more questions and treated less politely than her predecessor. that just seems to be rather flimsy evidence considering that her predecessor was also black.
