Sherrod’s Tragedy

The persecution of a modest official of the United States Department of Agriculture puts the press, the political class and Obama himself in bad standing.

A little-known official of the Department of Agriculture has become the protagonist in a fascinating story that has captured the attention of the country through the course of the week and which should be eternally remembered as an example of the damage that the journalistic temerity, political opportunism and vindictive ideology are capable of inflicting on a society. The incident, in which only the victim herself has demonstrated sensible, humane behavior, constitutes an affront by the entire leading elite.

Everything seemed to end yesterday when Barack Obama himself apologized before the country for the prejudice against Shirley Sherrod, for which he is not the only guilty party but rather one of many. On Thursday he called her on the phone to apologize personally. “[Vilsack] jumped the gun, partly because we now live in this media culture where something goes up on YouTube or a blog and everybody scrambles,” the president said in a television interview.

Sherrod’s name, which is historically African-American, was mentioned for the first time in the media last Monday, when an extremely conservative web site, Breitbart.com, reproduced a quote from her included in a discussion which implied that, in the past, she had discriminated against a farmer because he was white.

Within minutes, this phrase was running all over Internet pages, and TV news channels joined with commentary by analysts, who condemned Sherrod’s conduct as intolerable for a public official and called for her resignation. Less than 24 hours later, an aide to Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack called her to ask for her resignation.

Sherrod tried to explain that it was all a mistake and that her words had been distorted, but no one bothered to listen to her. Only after, when it was already over and the media had completely taken the bait, was Sherrod able to give out a complete copy of her speech and demonstrate that her behavior was not only not racist, but highly generous.

The famous speech, given in March in Georgia at a meeting of the NAACP — the principal U.S. African-American organization — lasted 45 minutes. In it, Sherrod alluded to an event which occurred 24 years ago, when she was working for an NGO which supported modest farmers, in which she convinced a white farmer that he was in the same dramatic circumstances that many black farmers had been suffering through for a long time. The two-minute cut that the media reproduced gave the impression that Sherrod had discriminated against this man, but the reality is that she saved his business and his life. The farmer himself, after the organized scandal, came forward to speak of his eternal gratitude toward Sherrod.

However, none of those who reproduced and manipulated the video cut, nor those who reacted to its content bothered to contact the farmer, nor did the journalists nor the Secretary of Agriculture. No one bothered to listen to Sherrod’s full speech. No one asked Breitbart.com for proof of the validity of its report. Surely this wouldn’t have happened if Bill Gates had been denounced, but Sherrod was not well-known, so she could be attacked without risk.

No one allowed themselves to at least be suspicious of the strange coincidence that Sherrod’s supposedly racist video appeared after the weekend of the NAACP convention, which formulated well-founded complaints about the racism of the members of the Tea Party, an extremely conservative citizen movement.

“I tired myself out saying: wait a bit, read the entire speech. But no one listened to me,” Sherrod said Wednesday, bitter and frustrated.* By this time the Secretary of Agriculture had requested that she return to her job, but now she has no desire to accept.

In this case, the unfaithfulness of some of the agents of daily political action, the negligence of a great part of the media and the panic that some politicians feel when criticized remain evident. The most serious newspapers did not spread the story, and the New York Times has published a condemning editorial, but the Fox network made it into its own cause. What isn’t completely known is the responsibility of Obama himself.

It was his responsibility to begin with, as Vilsack’s direct superior. But there may be more. White House spokesperson Robert Gibbs has affirmed that the president was not informed of this matter until Wednesday morning, and that he never ordered the undertaking of concrete actions against Sherrod. Although this is correct, it is certain that the first black president of the United States, as well as his collaborators, is a hostage to the necessity of appearing before public opinion as a defender of his race.

“If there’s a lesson to be drawn from this episode,” Obama said yesterday, “it’s that rather than us jumping to conclusions and pointing fingers at each other … I’ve told my team, and I told my agencies that we have to make sure that we’re focusing on doing the right thing instead of what looks to be politically necessary at that very moment.”

*Editor’s Note: This quotation, accurately translated, could not be verified.