from comments on TBogg » Janeane Garofalo is like Stokely Carmichael, Malcolm X, Angela Davis, and Ron Karenga times infinity .
As a member of the African diaspora that is now successful and stable in the US, I’d like to answer your question about African Americans. Unlike African Americans, I did not face structural and institutionalized racism in my own country, my father was not lynched for loving a white woman, my mother was not beaten for trying to vote, my grandparents were allowed to read and write and own property. Thus, my family had knowledge, skills, wealth, and pride to pass down to each generation. The question is not really why African Americans are the way they are, history answers that. African Americans still struggle to be treated as equals. The real question is why are the poor white trash still poor white trash hundreds of years after the Mayflower and institutionalizing superiority based on the color of your skin. If America gave you every opportunity to succeed based solely on the color of your skin, white people, ask yourself why you are now a failure and scared that “those people” are taking over your country and your government?