Racism lives in ObamAmerica

Hate incidents in U.S. surge

Election seen as factor behind revival of KlanBarely three weeks after Americans elected their first black president amid a wave of interracial good feeling, a spasm of noose hangings, racist graffiti, vandalism and death threats is convulsing dozens of towns across the country as white extremists lash out at the new political order.

More than 200 hate-related incidents, including cross-burnings, assassination betting pools and effigies of President-elect Barack Obama, have been reported so far, according to law-enforcement authorities and the Southern Poverty Law Center, which monitors hate groups. Racist Web sites are boasting that their servers are crashing under the weight of exponential increases in page views.

Even more ominously, America's most potent symbol of racial hatred—the Ku Klux Klan—has begun to reassert itself, emerging from decades of disorganization and obscurity in a spate of recent violence.Kentucky Victim Of KKK Beating Wins $2.5 Million From AttackersA Kentucky teen beaten up by Ku Klux Klan members in 2006 has won $2.5 million in damages from his attackers.

A Meade County jury issued the verdict on Friday ordering Imperial Klans of America's (IKA) Imperial Wizard, Ron Edwards, and former Klansman Jarred Hensley to pay the amount to Jordan Gruver, 19.

The half-Panamanian, half-native American Gruver was 16 when the attack occurred at a county fair. He suffered a broken jaw, broken ribs and trauma after KKK members with steel-toed boots kicked him as he was lying on the ground.Comment:  So much for the claims that Obama's election means the end of racism. When hate crimes dwindle to one or two a year, Americans elect the first Muslim or gay president, and white supremacist groups such as the KKK are disbanded, then we can talk about a post-racial America. Until then, no.

For more on the subject, see:

The post-racial, post-Indian era?
"Real America" = white?
Anti-Indian racism explained