Racism in the Name of Racial Harmony?

Noting that the leftist grip on the culture creates “privilege for some” in America, Project 21 Co-Chairman Horace Cooper laid the blame for current racial problems, and the chaos created by them, at the feet of progressive protesters and their supporters.

“There’s racism that Americans just won’t do,” Horace said, citing the lengths to which the left goes to stir up tensions. “So progressives have stepped up to create it, to fabricate it and even to commit it in the name of racial harmony.”

Horace pointed this out to Judge Jeanine Pirro, who was guest-hosting for the Fox News Channel program “The Ingraham Angle.” Citing the extent of the damage being created by these actions, he added:

We’re never gonna get to where we should be if the racial arsonists today continue their work.

The progressives have got to stop blaming America, stop dividing America. Let’s all sit down. Let’s relax. And let’s stop letting those that would divide us on racial lines win the day.

One of the examples discussed by Horace and Judge Jeanine was a lawsuit brought against the city government and police in Santa Monica, California by the Los Angeles chapter of the Black Lives Matter movement. The class-action suit alleges that the police focused too much on the “peaceful assemblies” protesting the death of George Floyd. The lawsuit alleges mistreatment of protesters, while at the same time blaming the police for allowing looting and mayhem to take place. Horace commented:

Here we have this case where the insurance industry reports nearly $2 billion worth of damage was done by these so-called mostly peaceful protesters. And rather than acknowledge how violent they were, how outrageous their actions were, how damaging their acts were to the community – they’re turning around and suing.

This is remarkable! They’ve already sued Los Angeles, and now we’re gonna see it in Santa Monica as well.

Thankfully, Horace doesn’t foresee the case going very far in court. “Only if there’s a settlement,” he said, “is there any merit to any potential for any victory here.”

Another topic that the two addressed was the University of North Carolina granting tenure to New York Times writer Nikole Hannah-Jones. Originally offered a five-year contract instead of lifetime tenure, and despite the fact that her “1619 Project” work was criticized by historians and corrected by her editors, she was eventually offered tenure after groups like the NAACP demanded more.

Horace said that the trustees’ move to renegotiate the original offer shows that meritocracy is no longer the motivating factor in establishment decision-making:

[I]n the case of UNC, it is remarkable that bullying…, by the Black Lives Matter movement and by the progressive left, is actually what ends up getting tenure for people today, instead of allowing the real process to go by when we evaluate their work, we look at their merits.

And in this particular case, there’s no merit. There’s no room for scholarship. But that’s how it should be done. But bullying is instead gonna carry the day.

Judge Jeanine remarked: “It seems the real privilege isn’t white privilege, but liberal privilege.” Horace replied, “Absolutely right, Judge.”