Max Eternity - After an entire summer of heated discussions and culture clashes at town hall meetings created by the government as a forum to discuss healthcare reform in America, the specter of Southern white supremacy tied-at-the-hip with a particular slice of the blue collar white, working and middle class, erupted in sea of vitriol; putting on full display the racist slant that a portion of America's collective has of the current state of affairs in the United States and its current president--a bi-racial, black man named Barack Obama.

Not suprisingly, FOX News was at the center of it all, with one of it's prime time anchors, Glenn Beck, leading the way.

The climax of this nation-wide fiasco began to reach a fever pitch once corporate sponsors started pulling advertising revenues from Beck's show, after he accused Obama of being anti-white, in so many words, calling the President a racist.  But Beck would not be deterred.  He shifted gears, and within a few weeks Beck had launched another hate campaign. 

It succeeded, resulting in the resignation of one of the Presidents cabinet members;  the Green Jobs Advisor, an African-American named Van Jones.

Seemingly emboldened by Beck and FOX, the stealth tactics of racism shifted into even higher gear, reaching the international stage when a white congressperson , Joe Wilson of South Carolina, shouted out "You Lie!" during a live speech on international TV, given by Obama in a rare joint-session to both houses of congress.

At that point it would seem that centrists, moderates and progressives had had enough and the House of Representatives formally admonished Mr. Wilson.  Then in other unrelated events, respected voices in the mainstream lended their take of all that had occurred; including President Carter who stated that race was a factor in the disrespectful behavior currently being directed at Obama.  But Obama disagreed, saying that race was not a factor.   And it is that latest event which has led to McClatchy News' rebuttal to Obama, effectively endorsing Carter's statement in a piece entitled "There's No Denying Obama's Race Plays Role in Protests."

An excerpt from the McClatchy article:

WASHINGTON — In the pre-dawn hours of last Nov. 5, while much of the nation celebrated Barack Obama's election as the nation's first black president, three white men in Springfield, Mass., doused the partially completed Macedonia Church of God in Christ with gasoline and burned it to the ground.

After their arrest, the men told police they'd torched the black church because they were angry about Obama's election and feared minorities would be given more rights.

At about the same time, newspaper Web sites were filled with millions of hateful messages about Obama, and the computer servers of two large white supremacist groups, the Council of Conservative Citizens and Stormfront.org, crashed because they got so much traffic.

Since 1857, the McClatchy Company is the third-largest newspaper company in the United States, a leading newspaper and internet publisher dedicated to the values of quality journalism, free expression and community service. Building on a 152-year legacy of independence, the company's newspapers and websites are steadfast defenders of First Amendment values and advocates for the communities they serve.