Culture of Minority Life

This past weekend, President Bush interrupted his relaxation at his Crawford, TX ranch and flew back to Washington DC in the middle of the night to sign a bill to allow federal courts to intervene in the Terri Schiavo case. Meanwhile, hundreds of thousands of brown lives go ignored.

Unfortunately, Bush has recently had opportunity to lead or comment on tragedies affecting all of Asia, African Americans and Native Americans. Those communities saw his reactions as apathetic, cynicism and silence.

Native American leaders are openly condemning President George Bush after his continued silence on the school shooting ranking only behind Columbine in casualties. Ten Natives died in Red Lake this week and the pain from the silence has been agitated by the very public and vocal intervention in the Schiavo case.

We can also see an apathy when comparing the subdued response to the more than 100,000 lives lost in the tsunami affected several Asian and African nations. Bush remained at his Crawford ranch and only made substantive remarks and more reasonable donations to aid after he thought he was being criticized as stingy.

In another series of events giving many the impression of cynicism or a total devaluing of Black life, is when President Bush tried to drive home the point of Social Security reform affecting African Americans. He and his staff have repeatedly mentioned that African Americans don't live as long as whites and so they don't collect as much Social Security. His conclusion was to fix Social Security.

African American groups, however, seem to think improving longevity might be a more noble goal.