Letters: Race and presidential talk

Re “Obama’s no-excuses credo,” Opinion, May 26

Let’s change the race dialogue from a discussion about victims — similar to David A. Lehrer’s and Richard J. Riordan’s Op-Ed article — to a discussion about perpetrators.

Throughout the history of our country, white men have perpetrated continued injury and insult upon blacks, first through slavery, then through Jim Crow laws, now through the so-called war on drugs and the prison-industrial complex. Ignoring these episodes, Lehrer and Riordan fall back on the classic “bootstraps” advice to black people.

In the interest of bringing some fact-based journalism to this issue, I’d like to read what Tavis Smiley and Cornell West (whom the authors singled out as “advocates of doom and gloom”) have to say.

Bill Hunker

Aliso Viejo

While I have supported President Obama, I, an African American, disagree with some of the sentiments expressed in his commencement address at Morehouse College, a predominantly black men’s college in Atlanta.

During his presidency, Obama has spoken directly to corporate heads, bankers, clergy and other groups, but rarely has he scolded or lectured them about their shortcomings. On those rare occasions when he has mustered the courage to speak to African Americans, our alleged deficiencies appear to have been his obsession.

Morehouse graduates are not slackers seeking excuses. They are proud black men who have prepared themselves for a successful future.

Rather than repeatedly criticizing black people, Obama and the Democratic Party should issue an unequivocal statement of gratitude to their most loyal constituency for keeping the president in office.

Legrand H. Clegg II

Compton

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