What to do with that damned race card now?

Ever since Madiba passed the reins of power to the ineffectual intellectual, the dominion of the African National Congress has been marked — and marred — by its incomprehensible fetish with the “race card”.

This silliness was trotted out with monotonous tedium every time they were at a loss for a reasonable or logical response to whatever the latest crisis was — which was more often than not. Little wonder accusations of racism and colonialism on the part of our rulers have become completely passé.

Even as presidents Barack Obama and Raul Castro are working to break the 50-year logjam between the United States and Cuba, it is becoming increasingly obvious worldwide that there is less and less stomach for trite fallback positions of the kind to which the ANC has become addicted.

This is not to say the horror of racism is to be neglected or imagined away. The excellent and perspicacious analysis by fellow TL blogger Niki Moore (writing as a “Reader Blogger”) needs no repetition. It says it all.

In fact, the empty-headed get-out-of-jail-free use of the race card by the ANC and its cabal, rather than focusing attention on a centuries-old crime, has had the opposite effect and trivialised the scourge of racism. And accusations of colonialism (whether they have any value at all) have been sucked into the vortex along with it. From the squatter ghettoes of Diepsloot to the narrow alleys of Damascus to the unholy hoods of Detroit to caste-clouded gutters of Delhi, a more serious and mature debate is necessary.

Obama, along with the other enlightened leaders of the free world, have their eyes set on a better future, not a hackneyed past used like bogeyman stories to scare the shit out of the kids.

To the open-minded minority then the AP report over the weekend should come as no surprise.

“WASHINGTON – The Obama administration will ‘with regret’ boycott a UN conference on racism next week over objectionable language in the meeting’s final document that could single out Israel for criticism and restrict free speech, the State Department said (on) Saturday.

“The decision follows weeks of furious internal debate and will likely please Israel and Jewish groups … But the move upset human rights advocates and some in the African-American community who hoped that President Barack Obama, the nation’s first black president, would send an official delegation. [nuff sed!]

“The administration had wanted to attend the April 20-25 meeting in Geneva, although it warned in late February it would not go unless significant changes were made to the draft text.

“Some revisions — including the removal of specific critical references to Israel and problematic passages about the defamation of religion — were negotiated for which State Department spokesman Robert Wood said the administration was ‘deeply grateful’.

“But he said the text retains troubling elements that suggest support for restrictions on free speech and an affirmation of the findings of the first World Conference Against Racism, held in Durban, South Africa, in 2001 that the US cannot endorse.

” ‘Unfortunately, it now seems certain these remaining concerns will not be addressed in the document to be adopted by the conference next week,’ Wood said in a statement.

“Despite the decision, he stressed that the United States ‘is profoundly committed to ending racism and racial discrimination’ and ‘will work with all people and nations to build greater resolve and enduring political will to halt racism and discrimination wherever it occurs.’

“Concern is high that the meeting may descend into heated debate over Israel that marred the last such gathering eight years ago, especially since Iran’s hardline president — who has called for Israel’s destruction — will attend.

“The Durban meeting was dominated by quarrels over the Middle East and the legacy of slavery.

“The United States, under the Bush administration, and Israel walked out over attempts to liken Zionism — the movement to establish a Jewish state in the Holy Land — to racism. The reference was later dropped, but concerns about anti-Semitism remained in the final text.

“Plans to reaffirm the 2001 document were of particular concern to the Obama administration.

” ‘(It) singles out one particular conflict and prejudges key issues that can only be resolved in negotiations between the Israelis and Palestinians,’ Wood said.

“Planning for the upcoming meeting, which is to review progress made in fighting racism since Durban, has been under way for months but was ignored by the Bush administration.

“But once Obama took office, his team decided to engage in the process as part of its broader aim of reaching out to the international community. That has included overtures to Iran, Cuba and seeking a seat on the UN Human Rights Council, a body the Bush administration shunned.

“After sending delegates to a preparatory meeting, the administration announced on 27 February that it would not participate in further planning talks or the conference itself unless the changes were made.”

When ill-considered knee-jerk political mouthings about a deadly serious issue transform the very word we use to describe that issue into something in the class of supercalifragilisticexpialidocious, those politicians abdicate the privilege of being taken seriously.

Now what is the ANC to do with all its stocks of unused race cards and similar idiocies?