Regrets Only

IN his address to the recent meeting of the NAACP Julian Bond crowed that the group was the “biggest, baddest civil-rights organization in the country.” President Bush’s natural assumption has been that repairing the breach between himself and black Americans would require reaching out to this big bad group.

But the NAACP’s behavior in recent times has disqualified it from any claim to represent progressive black thought in this country. This year, chary of appearing before the organization responsible for an attack ad that linked him to a lynching death, Bush resorted to the fig leaf of a “scheduling conflict.” He need not be so indirect next year. If Bush is seriously committed to the Advancement of Colored People, his first step will be to dissociate himself from this irrelevant shell of an organization.

IN his address to the recent meeting of the NAACP Julian Bond crowed that the group was the “biggest, baddest civil-rights organization in the country.” President Bush’s natural assumption has been that repairing the breach between himself and black Americans would require reaching out to this big bad group.

But the NAACP’s behavior in recent times has disqualified it from any claim to represent progressive black thought in this country. This year, chary of appearing before the organization responsible for an attack ad that linked him to a lynching death, Bush resorted to the fig leaf of a “scheduling conflict.” He need not be so indirect next year. If Bush is seriously committed to the Advancement of Colored People, his first step will be to dissociate himself from this irrelevant shell of an organization.