A People With Two Opposing Views on Which Way to Go

For years there has been friction between liberal and 

conservative black people regarding the political 

direction that the country --- especially black people 

themselves --- should move in.  The former think that

improvement of their lives and their outlook on same 

will be best provided by left-of-center politics and 

politicians, with emphasis on an ever-present helping

hand, while the latter preferring limited government and 

a limited role in their lives, allowing for them to find

or make their own path to their personal success.

Former President Barack Obama, the United State's 

one and only black president to date, has weighed in 

on a related matter: Republican presidential candidate  

Sen. Tim Scott, who is black himself.  Obama has 

shown disdain for the South Carolinian, inveighing 

against Sen. Scott's positivity about the United States:
"There's a long history of African-American or other 

minority candidates within the Republican Party who

will validate America and say, 'Everything's great, 

and we can make it,' ". 

For one thing, Obama gets it wrong about Scott's 

view on our country. Scott does not claim "everything's 

great," but Sen. Scott does argue that his family history 

has been a story about going "from cotton to Congress"

in the period of his grandfather's lifetime, demonstrating 

while America certainly has long had its obstacles,

they are not insurmountable and that the country is 

fundamentally good. Obama carped that Scott's rhetoric

isn't sufficiently "undergirded with an honest accounting

of our past and our present." Obama is one of the last 

people who should criticize Sen. Scott, nor anyone else 

for that matter, for a lack of honesty, given his track record 

regarding his own honesty and his relationship with the truth

while in the White House ("If you like your health care plan,

you'll be able to keep your health care plan!" for one example).

If Sen. Tim Scott's words are troublesome to the former 

president, then that's on him, not on Sen. Scott. 

MEM