I thought that Jim Crowe was Dead in My Home State

But there are still wackos out there apparently.

Growing up in the farthest bit of Northwest NJ, I knew that racism existed. In my hometown-there were a handful of African American families, and by using the term handful I am being generous.

I had friends whose parents still used hateful terms for Blacks, Jews, Catholics, anyone who wasn't Protestant and white.


We all knew growing up the the KKK still existed not far from where we lived. Crosses being burned or marches down the main street in my hometown? Not really-but they were still there.


So here I am thinking that was all in the past-that at the end of the 1980's, perhaps multiculturalism had come finally come to the northern tip of my home state.


Then the news I read this week.


I'm appalled by what happened in Roxbury Township NJ, a town where I used to work.


From NJ.com-the online presence of the Newark Star Ledger-



Supremacists distribute fliers attacking Obama
Leaflets are delivered in some Roxbury neighborhoods over weekend
Tuesday, September 23, 2008
BY LAWRENCE RAGONESE
Star-Ledger Staff
"Some neighborhoods in Roxbury were blanketed over the weekend with campaign literature from a white supremacist, anti-immigration group that bluntly raised the issue of race regarding presidential candidate Barack Obama, offending some recipients and angering Democratic leaders. "


Excuse me-angering Democratic leaders? Shouldn't this anger everyone?
Democrat or Republican?

And the kicker is that nothing can be done.

It's free speech. Hateful, yes. Free, also yes.

And then this from my own backyard-courtesy of Baristanet.com. The full link is below...

"...we learn of an incident of hate vandalism in Baristaville, at the Ridgewood Avenue School in Glen Ridge. Here is the text of the flyer sent home to parents,

Early Wednesday morning, September 24, 2008, a faculty member at the Ridgewood Avenue School noticed that the cover of a library book on Senator Barack Obama had been defaced with an image of a noose. The book had been part of a library display on the upcoming presidential election and was among a group of books that also included a book on Senator John McCain. "

http://www.baristanet.com/2008/09/ugliness_gets_local.php

Wait a minute-did I just read the word....

Noose?

What is this Mississippi in the 1960's people?


I'm shocked and saddened, and pretty MAD.

I though we were better than all of this people!