‘Racism!’ They Charged

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E have an amazing tolerance for black pain,” Jesse Jackson told CNN, implying that the Hurricane Katrina relief effort was delayed because those who were hardest hit were poor and black. Jackson else- where drove the point home by comparing the New Orleans convention center, where the refugees were first gathered, to “the hull of a slave ship.” Shortly thereafter rapper Kanye West went off-script on an NBC special intended to raise money for the rescue effort. He informed us that “It’s been five days because most of the people are black. George Bush doesn’t care about black people.”

JM

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John McWhorter

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E have an amazing tolerance for black pain,” Jesse Jackson told CNN, implying that the Hurricane Katrina relief effort was delayed because those who were hardest hit were poor and black. Jackson else- where drove the point home by comparing the New Orleans convention center, where the refugees were first gathered, to “the hull of a slave ship.” Shortly thereafter rapper Kanye West went off-script on an NBC special intended to raise money for the rescue effort. He informed us that “It’s been five days because most of the people are black. George Bush doesn’t care about black people.”