A Portly Politico Two-Minute Update: Personal Responsibility in the African-American Community

As some of you may know, radio talk show personality Rush Limbaugh has been under more scrutiny than usual from the Left lately because of his bid to buy the St. Louis Rams with a group of other investors. Race-baiters of all stripes are coming out of the woodworks to criticize Limbaugh for past statements that are allegedly racist.

I'm not going to comment on whether or not Limbaugh has or has not said racist things. Instead, I want to share a great article by LZ Granderson in which he argues that, regardless of whether or not Limbaugh is racist, the African-American community has to take stock of its own failures.

Here's a key passage from the article:

Limbaugh may be a racist, but he is not the reason there are more black men in prison than in college. We are.

Our issues did not germinate in a vacuum, but I believe the best way to get out of our socioeconomical malaise is to spend less time looking at what white people like Limbaugh are supposedly doing to us and more time looking at what we're definitely doing to ourselves. More time charting a new course based on personal responsibility, not victimhood and the retelling of stories, because let me tell you, some of those stories have been touched up so many times it's hard to know what's true anyway.

You can read Granderson's article here: "Commentary: Don't blame Limbaugh for our faults."

A Portly Politico Video Update: Glenn Beck blames godlessness for America

I found this video on a website called www.personalliberty.com. The site itself can be a bit overboard sometimes (when I took a poll on the site, I was sent e-mails about a book giving tips for surviving the downfall of civilization after an EMP terrorist attack), but this video is incredible. I recently read Glenn Beck's Common Sense (see another recent post for more--and be on the lookout for a review in the near future) and I am now convinced that, despite his occasional emotional breakdowns and outbursts, he has one of the clearest, most powerful visions for what Americans need to be doing right now to rally against an out-of-control, increasingly totalitarian government.

You can find the video here: Glenn Beck blames godlessness for America’s problems

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A Portly Politico Two-Minute Update: The Nobel Piece of Crap Prize

Shock and awe isn't just a term that applies to Iraq anymore. Now that phrase, minus the "awe" part, works for today's announcement that President Barack Obama has won the Nobel Peace Prize.

I thought it was bad when Al Gore won the signature prize for "raising awareness" about global warming/cooling/climate change/lack of climate change, but now this? Evidently Obama was nominated after being President for only two weeks. Heck, I didn't even know that he had been nominated. Now he's walking home with what once was the greatest honor in the Nobel pantheon. Nobody has cared about the Nobel Physics winner since Einstein. Everyone, however, loves a Nobel Peace Prize winner.

The stated reason that Obama won the prize is that he has set a new tenor for global cooperation and is attempting to ease tensions between the United States and the Islamic world. I'm willing to concede that he has a set a new tone for foreign relations, albeit an unrealistically idealist one, but "setting the tone" and actually doing something are entirely different things.

Another point--how are we gauging this "new tenor" of international relations, anyway? Maybe Europeans don't automatically think that we're all imperialistic pigs who love to spend money and watch television anymore, but so what? None of Obama's foreign policy initiatives have borne fruit yet. They may very well in time, although I find that unlikely except in a few instances. If nothing else, awarding a rookie president with less than a year of experience in office with the most distinguished prize in the Nobel family is premature. And that's the best case scenario. At worst, this smacks of just another feather in the cap of the Obama ego machine. Fortunately, we've all come to our senses, even if we did a year too late.

Even readers on MSNBC.com, who tend to be more liberal than not, are overwhelmingly outraged, or at least perplexed, by Obama's win. An unofficial MSNBC poll with comments demonstrates these feelings. You can see it here: Poll: "Is President Obama deserving of the Nobel Peace Prize?"

Source: "Obama: Nobel Peace Prize 'a call to action'"