Cornel West calls President Obama “a black mascot of Wall Street oligarchs and a black puppet of corporate plutocrats” while Newt Gingrich is calling him the "food stamp" president - not long after saying the president had a "Kenyan" worldview.
Gingrich is trying to fuel the fires of racism in tea party activists that will help determine the 2012 GOP nominee. In the short term, that might help Gingrich but in the long term it would destroy him as a general election candidate.
West, on the other hand, seems stuck in place with a world view that only sees events through the lens of race. Gingrich and the Tea Party, however, make West's point: Race Matters (a great book from 1993). But race is no longer the defining issue it once was. And West's analysis concerning the president is fatally flawed.
My experience has been that sometimes the left can go so far around the bend they end up sounding and acting like those on the right.
Dr. West. Meet Dr. Gingrich.
Someone could do both these men a favor by waking them up and explaining that they seem to have missed the last quarter century of history.
