Last Tuesday night Jeff and I ended the evening with our daily ritual:  we walk our dogs Ben and Amber, and one of us waits outside while the other goes into McDonald’s to get two ice cream cones (hey, they cost a dollar and have 150 calories: it’s the cheapest, safest self-indulgence around).  When I cam out Jeff told me he had watched as an African-American man had tried to hail a cab and six consecutive open cabs passed him by before he just gave up and trudged away.

The next morning the New York Times published the results of a new poll about race in America (“Poll Finds Obama Isn’t Closing Divide on Race,” http://www.nytimes.com/2008/07/16/us/politics/16poll.html?_r=1&sq=race%20obama&st=cse&adxnnl=1&oref=slogin&scp=1&adxnnlx=1216504194-kLZ86iAYAyHTJnyqCD4cXg).  In this poll 60% of white Americans said they felt that blacks had an equal or better chance of “getting ahead in life” as whites. 

Yeah, right.  Blacks have as good or better chance of getting ahead as whites in America.  They just can’t get a cab.

Posted by Kevin on Tuesday, July 22nd, 2008 at 12:54 pm.