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College president blames election outcome on 'racism' against Obama
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College president blames election outcome on 'racism' against Obama

In a newly published piece for Time, a New York college president makes the case for why "racism" against President Barack Obama is to blame for the outcome of the 2016 presidential election.

Leon Botstein, president of Bard College in Annandale-on-Hudson, New York, noted in an op-ed posted Tuesday the "unwillingness and failure" of migrants and refugees "to adapt to Europe and assimilate":

The controversies over burkas, head scarves and mosques suggest a widespread anxiety that the new populations, and therefore potential citizens of the future, will undermine and change cherished definitions of European national identities based on shared religion, shared language and, since the 20th century, a commitment to secular traditions.

Botstein then compared what is happening in Europe with the sentiments of many Americans. "White America has prided itself as a nation based on acquired citizenship, freedom of religion and the rule of law, and formed by immigration," Botstein wrote, adding that from the inception of the country, Americans were distinguishable by race and color — not religion or nationality.

But that is no longer the case, Botstein added, pointing to the election of the first black president.

"What post-Trump white America has expressed by endorsing Trump’s campaign to 'Make America Great Again' is not merely anger against elites in general but targeted resentment against the recent history of success by Americans of color. The racism in this year’s election was not about an older stereotype of the Willie Horton-type, but directed against Barack Obama," Botstein argued.

"It is precisely the parity in the achievements of black Americans, those who have become CEOs, scholars, scientists, artists, doctors, lawyers and politicians — and now even president — that has fueled the resurgence of intolerance and anti-immigrant sentiment," he added.

(H/T: Weasel Zippers)

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