Is This Post-Racial America? Don't Delude Yourself

Some conservatives believe, even say out loud  - - think talk radio - - that we've moved into some sort of post-racial America, where discrimination is all but gone.

For these conservatives, the conceit is a self-serving delusion.

Take a look at these three stories that moved this weekend and draw your own conclusions:

*  Firearm targets with the unmistakable silhouette of murdered Florida African-American teen Trayvon Martin were printed, advertised and sold out.

"My main motivation was to make money off the controversy," the seller told Local [Florida television station] 6.

The prints were sold in packs of 10 for $8.

"The response is overwhelming," the seller told Local 6. "I sold out in two days."

While the seller wouldn't confirm how many printed targets were made or sold, he did say that some were sold to Florida gun dealers.

In the ad, the seller states that “obviously we support Zimmerman and believe he is innocent and that he shot a thug.”

* Minority teens are stopped and frisked in New York City in hugely disproportionate numbers, says The New York Times:

On Friday, the Police Department released data showing that the stops have occurred at an even higher pace for the first three months of this year.

The city has repeatedly argued that the program helps to keep guns off the street. But the N.Y.C.L.U.’s analysis found that the proportion of gun seizures to stops has fallen sharply — only 780 guns were confiscated last year, not much more than the 604 guns seized in 2003, when officers made 160,851 stops. 

Young black and Hispanic men continued to be stopped in disproportionate numbers. They are only 4.7 percent of the city’s population, yet these males, between the ages of 14 and 24, accounted for 41.6 percent of stops last year. More than half of all stops were conducted because the individual displayed “furtive movements” — which is so vague as to be meaningless.

*  Whites received Presidential pardons between 2001-to-2008 (the George W. Bush presidency) at a rate four times more frequently than did African-Americans, and in a case investigated by The Washington Post, after the official pardon review procedure was tainted by withheld evidence.

The work of the pardon office has come under heightened scrutiny since December, when ProPublica and The Washington Post published stories showing that, from 2001 to 2008, white applicants were nearly four times as likely to receive presidential pardons as minorities.