Martin Luther King is treated like a saint these days. According to popular mythology, he was the Progressive version of Jesus, sent to cleanse the sins of the white man. The truth is, he was far from a saint. By most accounts, King was a lot like Al Sharpton. He was personally corrupt and a degenerate. His great gift was a talent for manipulating upper middle-class whites, while at the same time appearing to oppose them on behalf of the blacks. Whites believed they could deal with him and blacks trusted him.

King had was a sixth sense about the ruling class whites. He knew that they lacked the appetite for confrontation and were generally in favor of dismantling segregation. Northern whites wanted it gone because they hated southern whites, but upper class southerners wanted it gone too. These whites wanted to be accepted in the national elite and saw segregation as an obstacle. King understood this and played on that divide as you can see in his Letter From Birmingham Jail.

The subtle point, made in the context of the events that got him locked up, was that whites had a choice. They could negotiate with him or fight with the brothers on the street. At the same time, the message to northern whites was that blacks would not submit, so it was safe to back them against southern whites. This two cushion bank shot had the desired effect of weakening the resolve of southern elites, who were put in the same impossible position as South African whites a generation later.

In the end, King’s great gift was not his ability to rally and uplift blacks, but his ability to pit one groups of whites against another. The faction willing to fight would be abandoned and used as a scapegoat. Later, guys like Jackson and Sharpton turned this trick into a racket. They would threaten to riot outside a corporate headquarters until they got paid. Jackson became a millionaire shaking down large companies. Sharpton is less rich, but he certainly lives well scaring white liberals into paying his way.

In post-Colonial Africa, there was a similar phenomena, but in a different context. The white colonials were looking to put a black face on their possessions and went looking for the best and brightest Africans. The Brits went so far as to send them back to England for training and education. Eventually, some rose up and took control as the colonials withdrew. The story over and over with the new African leaders was they all possessed an ability to sooth the fears of the whites, while appearing as authentic Africans.

Time after time, the colonials were lead to believe that these guys were more like them than the typical African. They held no ill will toward them and would continue on the policies established by the whites. Ian Smith of Rhodesia, a skeptic of British policy, was even won over eventually. Once they gained power, however, the new black rulers set about slaughtering anyone they thought was a threat. Eventually, that meant turning on the white farmers and administrators and eventually genocide.

We are seeing something similar with Barak Obama. It turns out that his only real skill is the ability to make upper-middle class white liberals do stuff for him. Otherwise, the guy is incompetent. You see it in this story from the LA Times, of all places.  This is the basic stuff of governance. Governments spy on one another. They get caught. They are always prepared for both so as not to look foolish. Yet, this administration is incapable of this basic duty. This is statecraft 101 and the administration can’t master it.

As an aside, a trouble pattern seems to be emerging with regards to the use of the intelligence services in this administration. They seem to have a flagrant disregard for the normal protocols. The reason those protocols exist is to avoid these sorts of diplomatic blunders. The story makes quite clear that the White House deliberately broke the rules in order to spy on European leaders. That suggests a cavalier attitude toward the limits of the state. Who else are they spying on and what other rules are they breaking?

Anyway, pick an item and the only thing Obama has been able to do well is rally upper-middle class white liberals to defend him from his critics. Everything else has been a mess. He had an opportunity to radically alter government in his first two years and blundered so badly little was accomplished. Even his most slavish fans grumble about the blown opportunities. It turns out that replacing whites with non-whites has a real impact on the basic functioning of western-style governments.

Americans are now getting see up close why Africa has failed. We elected the Robert Mugabe of America politics as President. He’s not threatening genocide, at least not yet, but there are trouble signs that his administration is about to unleash a torrent of anti-white rhetoric. His talk about going “Bullworth” is all about taking the gloves off with regards to race. The last thing America needs is race talk from the mulatto president. That could very well be the price of incompetence. A simmering race war.