RIGHTING THE WOES OF BLACK AMERICA STARTS AT HOME

Fox News Channel talking head, Bill O'Reilly, had some very interesting comments to share on his show, "The O'Reilly Factor," during Tuesday night's broadcast regarding race. More specifically about fatherless black children. He's talked on this issue many times over the past couple of years, and he often points out the awful truth about black fathers who abandon their children. Anyone who watches O'Reilly's program on a regular basis will be keenly aware of his deep passion regarding this topic. He minces no words here.

"You haven't seen Barack Obama campaign with (Jesse) Jackson or with Al Sharpton because he knows that the victimization thing is over...white Americans are saying, and rightly so. I mean, let's be honest here. We're white. We don't know what the black experience is. But I'm tired of hearing about 'I left my kids because my grandfather got worked over in Mississippi.' It ain't going to cut it anymore. You leave your kids you're scum.

"I don't care what happened down the road. Any human being. Any adult. Any man knows when you abandon children you're wrong. There's no excuse. And to try to peddle 'it's the government's fault, it's society's fault,' that would be death if Barack Obama ever got involved with any of that."

According to the statistics, which O'Reilly often cites, 7 out of 10 of all black children who are born in this country are abandoned by their fathers. For whites that figure is more like 3 out of every 10. Of course, any child who is abandoned by their father is not a good thing, white or black. But the numbers speak for themselves, here, that this is an occurrence which is very much more prevalent within the black community.

After the recent slip by Jesse Jackson in commenting, unaware that his mic was on and cameras were rolling preparing for a television interview, that he wanted to cut off Barack Obama's nuts for what he calls "talking down to black people," this issue is front and center once again. Jackson was referring to a speech that Barack Obama made recently, where he called for black fathers to take responsibility for their children and be active, positive role models in their lives. What's so wrong about that?

But Jackson blames the government and society for the woes of the black community and has been making this argument for years. So has Al Sharpton. Barack's comments effectively take the burden of responsibility off the shoulder's of the government and society and puts it right back into the laps of black America. In the eyes of the Jesse Jackson's and Al Sharpton's of the world, blacks are but helpless victims because of wrongs of the past, and are therefore predisposed to fail on a number of levels. Government policy should force society to right this.

Of course, I think this is a load of crap and I've said so before. Failure is a choice we make for ourselves. It takes effort to overcome the obstacles presented to us in our lives. While I don't support Barack's run for president, I find it refreshing that his platform doesn't rely on this I'm a victim mentality, and he's not (at least it would seem) afraid to point out that a large part of the black community's woes has been, to some extent, self-afflicted. I think he understands that the government cannot solve all of the problems facing black America, nor that it should try.

In my view, the government cannot enforce the virtues of personal responsibility. But strong leadership can certainly encourage it. I think that if Barack does, in fact, become our next president, that at least on this issue he does present that kind of leadership. Encouraging blacks to step up to the plate and take responsibility for their own lives and their own destiny would be an historical legacy for Barack Obama and the books, and would place his presidency right in step with one of our past greats, Abraham Lincoln.

One can only hope that an Obama administration makes this the primary focus as opposed to say, socialized health care, higher taxes, bigger government...ahem. 'Nuff said.