Colbert King Jokes about Segregation

Colbert King, columnist for The Washington Post, wrote a sarcastic piece against Patrick J. Buchanan writing:

Speaking of our place in America, MSNBC contributor, author and former Republican presidential candidate Pat Buchanan reminds us in his just-released book, "Suicide of a Superpower: Will America Survive to 2025?," of what black folks have been missing. I never knew we had it so good.

Writing about the segregation era, Buchanan observes, "Back then, black and white lived apart, went to different schools and churches, played on different playgrounds, and went to different restaurants, bars, theaters, and soda fountains. But we shared a country and a culture. We were one nation. We were Americans."

Gosh, I didn't know that. Buchanan and I grew up in the same segregated Washington, D.C. I don't recall black folks having much of a say in the decision to live "apart." The situation about which Buchanan speaks so wistfully was, to my recollection, a racial apartheid arrangement strictly of white people's making. And Lord help us if we strayed across the line.

King ought to know better than to joke or make light about segregation.

 

Even though African-Americans suffered horrific discrimination and enormous injustices, Buchanan observes correctly that Blacks in that era considered themselves Americans, no-less, no-more than others "across the line." 

 

Although King dishonestly and slyly tries to say Buchanan was discussing the affects of and treatment during Segregation;  Buchanan was clearly not. 

Martin Luther King, Jr. was as American as Richard M. Nixon, regardless of their condition or politics.