In light of the publicity that has surrounded the case of the Jena 6 recently, we should all take the time to think about the state of race relations in our country. It won’t take long to realize that what happened in Jena was no isolated incident. Racism is alive and thriving in America today, no matter what the right-wing would have you believe.

It was African-American bloggers, who first picked up the story of Shaquanda Cotton, a 14-year-old black girl from the East Texas town of Paris who was sentenced to up to seven years in prison for shoving a hall monitor at her high school. The judge who heard her case had given probation to a fourteen year old white girl charged with arson. After the bloggers and their readers bombarded the Texas governor with protest letters and petitions, Texas authorities freed Cotton, days before Al Sharpton had scheduled a rally on her behalf.

This is but one of many racial injustices that happen every year in this country. Most go by unnoticed. I am sick and tired of the pseudo intellectual racist pundits like Michelle Malkin and Sean Hannity and the many other bigots of Fox Noise railing against people of conscience and fairness like Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson, as well as against affirmative action and other efforts that fight the institutional racism that still permeates this nation. This country was built upon pillars of racism and we still haven’t addressed the root causes. First we slaughtered the Native Americans, then we enslaved, abused and killed African-Americans, today we vilify Latinos.

It’s time all people stood up to end the disease of racism once and for all. Things are not better today, No, racists are just better at hiding who they are and what they do.