With Barack Obama's victory in the Democratic Iowa caucuses this evening we have further evidence for the vast decline in racism that has occurred, at least within the white community, in the United States. Iowa is a state that is 95% white with less than 2% African-Americans in its population. In parts of rural Iowa the percentage of non-white people is even lower such that even college aged residents of some areas can truthfully state the times and places in which they have actually seen, let alone spoken, to a non-white minority. Despite this lack of contact...the white people of Iowa were able to look past race and give Barack Obama a plurality of votes in the Iowa causus for the Democratic Party. This was not for lack of other options. A racist Iowan could have voted for either a white woman (Hillary Clinton) or for those unable to stomach the Clintons, a white male in John Edwards. Face it...the people of Iowa have shown pretty clearly how little race means to them in selecting the next President for the United States. This is a good day for America, or most of America.

While one can certainly feel sympathy for the disappointed trial lawyer Edwards or heiress apparent Clinton, the real looser today is the group of race hustling black politicians from Jessie Jackson and Al Sharpton to the less well known leaders of the NAACP, Urban League and other so called representatives of the black community. These "leaders" maintain their power by invoking the image of all pervasive white racism to explain their own failure to provide solutions to the problems endemic and largely home grown to their communities. As more and more evidence for the lack of prevailing racism in the white community becomes clear, the harder and harder it will be for the black community to continue to be beguiled by the lies and distortions of the race hustlers. Yes...racism does still exist in the white community...but it is NOT the dominant factor in explaining the status of the black community in America today. Over the next 10 months the black community may well have to confront the reality of racism versus the mythology of racism. Which is more important...preserving the myth of racism by supporting the patronage system that Jessie Jackson and others would bring in tandem with the wife of the first "black" President by supporting Hillary Rodham Clinton? or Having the opportunity to elect the first African American President in Barack Obama. It appears the black community will actually have to confront racism at last...the racism of its own leadership. Regardless of who wins the nomination for the Democratic Party or the Presidency...the people of Iowa have served America well this day. Dr. King would approve!