David Webb: In the wake of tragedy

This past week, America’s cultural mettle was tested when it faced a racist’s murderous actions. The tragedy in Charleston, S.C., where nine people at the historic Emanuel AME church were murdered, is horrific. The families of the victims have stood strong. The response by the community is best described as heroic. A united America rejects racists. 

There were a few exceptions. 

{mosads}We should care that many anti-gun types, the president included, have wrongly classified the gun as the problem in this massacre, not the user of the gun illegally. J. Todd Rutherford, of the South Carolina House of Representatives, tried to blame Fox News and its viewers. And President Obama failed when he used the N-word on Marc Maron’s podcast. The presidential microphone is magnified worldwide, no matter if it’s from a podcast or the White House podium. Obama doesn’t have the guts to say the N-word from the podium; no president should use it in any context while in office.

Obama, by the way, didn’t go to France after the Charlie Hebdo terrorist attack, but he will go to Charleston for the funeral of the minister in this attack. The community doesn’t need the invasion that comes with a presidential visit. Speaking from the presidential podium to the nation would be enough. 

Our skin is an organ; it does not think, it does not formulate ideas. It is merely the genetic result of our parents. While we are cured of institutional racism, which requires codified law and societal acceptance that no longer exists — just look at the reaction by all ethnicities — there will always be racists in every society. Bias and prejudice are part of the human condition. 

We have our flaws and challenges, and still stand as a great nation. To echo the words of my friend Lee Greenwood, I’m proud to be an American. 

For the past week, I’ve been out on the road with the 2015 High Five Tour for our seriously wounded warriors. I am doing what I think is necessary: helping raise awareness and money for the 2015 mission “Mobility Is Freedom.”

Something else happened along the way. I traveled first to Detroit to drive Rosie, my favorite Mustang Cobra, and then to Chicago for events with the United Automobile Workers at the Ford stamping plant and the Ford assembly plant. Next, I worked my way west to Des Moines, Iowa, and then to Omaha, Neb. I then arrived in Cheyenne, Wyo., for its brewfest — a brief stop that included the tradition of having a buffalo ribeye for dinner. I left Cheyenne late, going to Laramie for an overnight stay before heading out to Salt Lake City early in the morning. 

As I left Laramie, the sun began to rise, and my heart rate begin to get lower. I could feel the relaxation come over me as I drove into the West, with the sun behind me in the growing hills and mountains ahead of me to the left and right. I saw herds of cattle and snow fences, the occasional house and the wide-open sky with a few puffs of clouds. Along the way near a river, I realized that I get it — I get the attraction for many to go West and head for areas where the pace is a little less than New York, and the days can be as long as the sky is wide. I’ve seen the amber waves of grain in the cornfields of Iowa and in other places, but it’s the rising hills of Wyoming with their gentle beauty and magnificent views that I hope the reader gets to experience at some point in their life. 

I’m a New Yorker, and I work in the fast-moving field of the media. I will be back there in a couple of days, but I’ll be a little bit more relaxed, and I’ll have a visual memory to remind me of the beauty of America and the love that so many of us share for this diverse and great nation. 

Unplug in some fashion and appreciate when you can. It’s worth it, and you will gain some much-needed perspective. 

Webb is host of “The David Webb Show” on SiriusXM Patriot 125, a Fox News contributor and has appeared frequently on television as a commentator. Webb co-founded TeaParty365 in New York City and is a spokesman for the National Tea Party Federation. His column appears twice a month in The Hill.