BRIEF COMMENTS ON RACISM, ZIMMERMAN BY HESSELL

                                 THE BRIEF COMMENTS OF BILL HESSELL, Ph.D


                                                           On Racism

Tragic that racism is still so alive and well in the US,  and that it is re-asserting itself in almost every aspect of life here, especially effecting black youth--no jobs, inner cities crumbling, police profiling, public school system deteriorating, reduced higher education opportunities, and little justice in the court system.  Not as blatant as racism in the south 200 years ago, but racism none the less--more covert, but brutally painful in its deviousness and dishonesty.  We may have elected a black president, but the fact that his administration has been virtually stone-walled by the power structure in Congress from effectively dealing with the nation's main concerns is not reassuring, to make a black president look bad the well-being of the nation is being sacrificed.

                                                   On The Zimmerman Trial

                                                           More on Racism

While the nation's initial reaction to Obama's election was one that suggested that our racist heritage had markedly lessened, the stronger, more lasting reaction suggests that there has been a major intensifying, a virtual rebirth of gross racism, as evidenced not only by the vilifying of Obama by large elements of our population, a vilifying he in no way deserves, and now by a major miscarriage of justice in a southern state where a black teenager was killed without cause by a volunteer white neighborhood guard, who was pursuing the teenage against police instructions.  Voting rights are also under attack in minority areas, battles thought long ago won apparently have to be fought again.  No justice comes easily, and our court system tragically can't be depended on to help.

Tragic that racism is still so alive and well in the US,  and that it is re-asserting itself in almost every aspect of life here, especially effecting black youth--no jobs, inner cities crumbling, police profiling, public school system deteriorating, reduced higher education opportunities, and little justice in the court system.  Not as blatant as racism in the south 200 years ago, but racism none the less--more covert, but brutally painful in its deviousness and dishonesty.  We may have elected a black president, but the fact that his administration has been virtually stone-walled by the power structure in Congress from effectively dealing with the nation's main concerns is not reassuring, to make a black president look bad the well-being of the nation is being sacrificed.