Via the Associated Press:

A Louisiana justice of the peace said he refused to issue a marriage license to an interracial couple out of concern for any children the couple might have. Keith Bardwell, justice of the peace in Tangipahoa Parish, says it is his experience that most interracial marriages do not last long.

"I'm not a racist. I just don't believe in mixing the races that way," Bardwell told the Associated Press on Thursday. "I have piles and piles of black friends. They come to my home, I marry them, they use my bathroom. I treat them just like everyone else."

Bardwell said he asks everyone who calls about marriage if they are a mixed race couple. If they are, he does not marry them, he said.

Bardwell said he has discussed the topic with blacks and whites, along with witnessing some interracial marriages. He came to the conclusion that most of black society does not readily accept offspring of such relationships, and neither does white society, he said.

"There is a problem with both groups accepting a child from such a marriage," Bardwell said. "I think those children suffer and I won't help put them through it."

If he did an interracial marriage for one couple, he must do the same for all, he said.

"I try to treat everyone equally," he said....

Add to the list of not a racists Georgia businessman Patrick Lanzo, who put up a large sign outside of his bar, reading: "OBAMAS HEALTH CARE PLAN - NIGGER RIG IT". Lanzo explained:

"I've used the N-word most of my life and there is different ways to put your opinion up, but that's just the words I choose to use."...

Despite the presence of a mannequin clad in a Ku Klux Klan outfit standing amid the pool tables, Lanzo maintained he's not a racist.

Anyone know where I can get an uncensored version of the sign?

Source: New York Daily News

Boston police officer Justin Barrett sent an email [1] to the Boston Globe and his National Guard colleagues saying that Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates behaved like a "banana-eating jungle monkey" and that, had he been the arresting officer, he would have sprayed him in the face with OC (pepper spray). Don't worry, though, Barrett isn't a racist, as he later explained: "I regret that I used such words. I have so many friends of every type of culture and race you can name. I am not a racist." [2]

Barrett isn't the only not-a-racist. British National Party (BNP) nominee Clifford Le May urged the London mayor: "Stop ruining our community by stuffing New Addington with violent immigrants who have no right to live among decent civilised white people". He also called his white opponent a "traitor to his race and nation". Le May has refused to apologize for his remarks and insists: "I'm not a racist -- I'm a British patriot." He went on to explain that a New Scientist article said "there's evidence that people in gangs are predisposed to violence. They didn't bring race into the equation, but you can read between the lines." [3]

Le May has plenty of company in the BNP, whose constitution is "committed to stemming and reversing the tide of non-white immigration and to restoring, by legal changes, negotiation and consent the overwhelmingly white makeup of the British population that existed in Britain prior to 1948". [4] After posting racist slurs publicly online, BNP candidate Charlotte Lewis explained: "I am not a racist, I am a racial survivalist and anyone who calls me a racist is a genocideist." [5]

The phrase "not a racist" has become so common that it is now appearing in satire. After an anonymous French Tour de France rider accused British rider Mark Cavendish of complaining about "Fucking Frenchies", Cavendish explained that he wasn't a racist, just an "asshole". The next day:

On the Garmin team bus before the start, there's movement behind the curtain in the doorway. We turn to look just as a booming, disembodied voice announces: "Mark Cavendish is not a racist. He just doesn't like French people." [6]

Sources:

• Justin Barrett's email in question
• Cop apologizes for "jungle monkey" e-mail
• Croydon BNP election candidate investigated over immigrants rant
• Constitution of the British National Party
• Croydon BNP candidate leaves offensive messages on web
• Tour de France diary

One of my favorite satirical sites is The Peoples News, which describes itself as "a satirical look at the lives of Black folks....While the stories are intended to be humorous and entertaining, they are also designed to spark discussions and make people think."

Here are some recent stories:

• Undercover Democrat Michael Steele Sabotages GOP
• African Americans Thankful Multiple-Birth Mom Isn’t Black
• March 16: This Day in African-American History (1621): Samoset, a Mohegan Indian, arrives at the Plymouth Colony with a message to the Pilgrims that he thinks says "Welcome, my name is Samoset." But tragically, his prankster friend, Leroy, had actually taught him to say "Please tell your countrymen back home to come steal our land and wipe us out."

The site also contains occasional true stories that are beyond satire, such as this one about child abuse and welfare fraud that is too tasteless for me to post here.

Good news from The Wall Street Journal:

One promise of [Obama's] victory is that perhaps we can put to rest the myth of racism as a barrier to achievement in this splendid country.

In related news, Marie Curie's 1903 Nobel Prize in Physics put to rest any myths about biases against women in science.

Reported by Sean Quinn at election site FiveThirtyEight.com:

So a canvasser goes to a woman's door in Washington, Pennsylvania. Knocks. Woman answers. Knocker asks who she's planning to vote for. She isn't sure, has to ask her husband who she's voting for. Husband is off in another room watching some game. Canvasser hears him yell back, "We're votin' for the n***er!"

Woman turns back to canvasser, and says brightly and matter of factly: "We're voting for the n***er."

Apparently, the economy and other concerns are trumping racism.

This reminds me of the 1991 Louisiana bumper sticker: Vote for the Crook. It's Important.

From Salon:

A California Republican group's latest newsletter shows Barack Obama on a $10 food stamp. The picture shows Obama eating fried chicken, watermelon and ribs, an image that harks back to old derogatory stereotypes about African-Americans.

Diane Fedele, the president of the responsible organization, Chaffey Community Republican Women, Federated, says the image was distributed without any racist intent. "I never connected," she told a local newspaper. "It was just food to me. It didn't mean anything else."

The press secretary for the state Republican Party has denounced the use of the image, the Associated Press reports, and has also pointed out that the group is a volunteer organization not directly responsible to the party.

Fedele has apologized "to anyone who was offended."

The July 21 New Yorker features the above cover, satirizing the racist coverage of the Obamas mentioned in my previous post. According to the BBC, the Obama campaign called the cartoon "tasteless and offensive", and the McCain campaign also criticized the cartoon.

In a statement, The New Yorker magazine said the cartoon "combines a number of fantastical images about the Obamas and shows them for the obvious distortions they are."

The New Yorker said the cover, called "The Politics of Fear", was a critique of unfounded allegations that have tried to portray Mr Obama, a Christian, as a closet radical Muslim.

"The burning flag, the nationalist-radical and Islamic outfits, the fist-bump, the portrait on the wall? All of them echo one attack or another. Satire is part of what we do, and it is meant to bring things out into the open, to hold up a mirror to prejudice, the hateful, and the absurd. And that's the spirit of this cover," the statement said....

The New Yorker said that this week's edition carried two "very serious" articles about Mr Obama.

But Obama spokesman Bill Burton dismissed the cartoon, saying: "The New Yorker may think... that their cover is a satirical lampoon of the caricature Senator Obama's right-wing critics have tried to create, but most readers will see it as tasteless and offensive. And we agree."

Rather than spoil the jokes or violate copyright, I'll just link to my favorite single cartoons on racism:

• Tom the Dancing Bug
• The K Chronicles

If you have favorites, add links in the comment section.

I recently got to spend time with my adorable six-year-old nephew. While we were eating carrots, I mentioned Bugs Bunny, then asked if my nephew knew who he was. He said that he knew who Bugs Bunny was but asked me: "Who is Bugs Bunny's black friend?" It took me a moment to realize who he meant (answer below) and the different ways that children and adults view color.

Keith said this reminded him of Stephen Colbert, who also likes to talk about his black friend. It reminded me of a paper by Amy Bruckman, in which she recounts an African-American girl's creating a "black dog" as her avatar.

Separately, my sister-in-law mentioned that my nephew's teacher said he knows his colors well, except he confuses brown and black. Perhaps it's because most of the people we call "black" are really brown.

In case you couldn't figure out the answer, Bugs' black friend is here. I hate to think what the cartoons suggest about race relations.