One other thing that article points out- the high number of African-Americans who are paying close attention to this case. That indicates to me that the idea that Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson have created this anger is a false notion. Those two exploiters (I think that's an apt description) have done nothing to foment this, or build it up. They are merely chance surfers on a huge wave. They didn't create the wave, they have no means to control the wave. Their only hope is to stand on the surfboard on top the wave until it finishes (or until they crash). I think this has to be clearly understood in order to evaluate their activities.
I agree with you, Tim. Jackson and Sharpton, though charlatans, are simply playing on the extreme racial consciousness and partisanship that black people have and white people fail to identify because they themselves do not have that extreme consciousness and partisanship. Several posters here will yell at me for stating that conclusion, but the monolothic support for Obama, the recent statements by Marion Barry, and the
news reports like this (among numerous other examples) support that there is a higher degree of racial consciousness and partisanship in the black community than there is the white community.
W.E.B Dubois on the point:
"Although the wonderful developments of human history teach that the grosser physical differences of color, hair and bone go but a short way toward explaining the different roles which groups of men have played in Human Progress, yet there are differences--subtle, delicate and elusive, though they may be-- which have silently but definitely separated men into groups. While these subtle forces have generally followed the natural cleavage of common blood, descent and physical peculiarities, they have at other times swept across and ignored these. At all times, however, they have divided human beings into races, which, while they perhaps transcend scientific definition, nevertheless, are clearly defined to the eye of the Historian and Sociologist. If this be true, then the history of the world is the history, not of individuals, but of groups, not of nations, but of races, and he who ignores or seeks to override the race idea in human history ignores and overrides the central thought of all history."
Louis Andrews on that point:
"Adolph Hitler's posthumous revenge on America;" the fear of whites, that by considering race or ethnic differences important or a matter for discussion brands them as budding Hitlerites.
Blacks generally don't have such fear, some because they presume that blacks cannot be racists since they lack power, but the majority because, "Talking about race for people of color...is the natural thing to do...for whites, talking about race is uncomfortable. It's a wild card." as black legal theorist, Professor Lani Guinier, recently remarked.
I suggest that the fear-driven reticence among whites while talking about race is an aberration, and that worldwide, few non-whites suffer this inhibition. It is important to note that this fear controls most discussion, both among whites, and between whites and blacks. As a result, whites are always at a disadvantage in any such black-white discussion. Honesty and lack of fear naturally prevails.
Whites tend to talk around racial issues, denying any special significance with every word. How many of us have overheard restaurant conversation among whites about a racial matter. Doesn't it always end with agreement that, of course, race is not involved, followed by the self congratulation that they are above all that? For some, this comes from an understandable desire to avoid hurt feelings; for others, from a belief that there really is no significance to human differences.
Perhaps we can begin to see a pattern that explains the observed responses and offers a rationale for the differences in behavior. For most blacks, race is personal and a given. For most whites, race is what the other person has and largely irrelevant to everyday affairs. Importantly, the black does not generally see that for the white it is irrelevant, nor can the white see that for the black it is a given.
NSFW: 
legalese discussion which has no bearing whatsoever to what really happened in this case.
fair enough
