What Michelle Obama Leaves Out
About 'White Flight'
Townhall,
by
Larry Elder
Original Article
Posted By: abuela10,
11/7/2019 7:35:41 AM
Michelle Obama recently complained about "white flight" in her old Chicago neighborhood. By "white flight " she means that whites left her neighborhood as it became increasingly black. "Upstanding families like ours, who were doing everything we were supposed to do and better -- as we moved in, white folks moved out, because they were afraid of what our families represented," she said. "I always stop there when I talk about this out in the world because I want to remind white folks that y'all were running from us. This family, with all the values you read about: You ran from us. And you're still running."
Reply 1 - Posted by:
Nimby 11/7/2019 7:50:56 AM (No. 229017)
Mooch is another arrogant, affirmative action product. What else should one expect from her? Why didn’t they send their kids to HBUs, instead of Harvard and Michigan?
67 people like this.
Reply 2 - Posted by:
hershey 11/7/2019 7:54:35 AM (No. 229019)
Actually, I really don't give a flying f(&% what this he/she has to say about anything...she and her 'husband' need to go back to Kenya and build his outhouse library there, and stay there..
93 people like this.
Reply 3 - Posted by:
JrSample 11/7/2019 7:56:26 AM (No. 229020)
This foolishness is coming from a rich Ivy League woman who lives in Martha's Vineyard. Those of us who live in the real world know to put our kids in AP classes, because the general classes are nothing but baby-sitting time with a bunch of blacks constantly disrupting the class. The teachers can't do anything for fear of being accused of "racism". That idiot Obongo said that if he had a son "he'd look like Trayvon"....baloney, him and his wife wouldn't even let their daughters go to the same school as Trayvon. They are just pandering to blacks to get their votes.
105 people like this.
Reply 4 - Posted by:
PESSIMIST 11/7/2019 7:59:00 AM (No. 229023)
Ms. Obama made the crucial admission in her complaint about "white flight." She concedes that the departure of the whites resulted in "calamitous" problems for the neighborhood.
What she thereby admits is the dirty little secret of all pioneer integrationists like her family in this neighborhood context. Ms. Obama concedes unless whites stay in a neighborhood, its tipping to majority black almost always ruins it. In other words, Ms. Obama wanted hers to be the ONLY (or one of a very few) black families in an all-white neighborhood. She knew too many black families . . . well, you know.
Why is she then blaming white families for their fear of a black neighborhood she shared with them? If her family liked this new neighborhood, and had to endure difficulty getting into it, shouldn't' "White flight" be a good thing for blacks? They could have the whole neighborhood without resistance. But Ms. Obama didn't want that, and she knows it.
If we are to have a truly candid "conversation" about race in this country, Ms. Obama and others will have to admit their own motivations.
78 people like this.
Reply 5 - Posted by:
Jebediah 11/7/2019 8:03:35 AM (No. 229028)
I have to admit that I have never understood Michelle Obama's appeal. She appears to be intelligent, funny, level headed, but when you go down the list you see grievance after grievance re: white folks....everything boils down to that, from a woman who has done really well (having seen examples of her University thesis you really have to wonder how she managed the grade) and yet........... I also recall her anger at Target when a much shorter (white) woman asked her to reach something on a top shelf, and she either bristled because she thought the woman was racist (!) or maybe didn't recognize her? Plus Oprah Winfrey, at one point, was sure she was being aced out of the election campaign because of her weight.
43 people like this.
Reply 6 - Posted by:
Newtsche 11/7/2019 8:16:11 AM (No. 229037)
So sad. As pointless as listening to Mooch may be, imagine being her.
25 people like this.
Reply 7 - Posted by:
Clinger 11/7/2019 8:21:23 AM (No. 229044)
You know what Michelle, I partially agree with you. The sight of some people who might have been wonderful neighbors absolutely triggered a flight response. And how sad it is that the pattern of disproportionate violence perpetrated by blacks would cause the undeserving to be looked upon with suspicion. But to blame people for recognizing the pattern and reacting in a rational manner is ridiculous. If you can't grasp why people react to deadly pattern recognition I can't help you.
But here's a little secret for you, we aren't just reacting to skin color. When I see some wannabe badass strutting around with his pants half off in a hoodie at 70 deg F, bassackwards ball cap flashing gang signs flapping his jaw I'm thinking there's a chance he's bad and I don't care what color he is. I see a well dressed person walking down the sidewalk minding their own damned business I'm thinking no problem. Stop relishing in making people uncomfortable by dressing and behaving outwardly just like the criminals for the purpose of blaming me for my difficulty in sorting out the good from bad.
You know what Michelle, I don't know enough about mushrooms to know which ones are edible and which ones will kill you so I don't go around eating mushrooms I find in the yard. When I encounter an apple tree I have no problem plucking an apple and eating it. Pattern recognition is survival. Don’t pattern yourself after danger and I won’t read danger.
124 people like this.
Reply 8 - Posted by:
PChristopher 11/7/2019 8:25:15 AM (No. 229051)
I'm sure your Martha's Vineyard neighbors are real happy to have you next door, too.
55 people like this.
Reply 9 - Posted by:
LesUNo 11/7/2019 8:27:59 AM (No. 229054)
Michelle and her husband had a huge and powerful bully pulpit for eight years. I could cry when I think of how they squandered the opportunity to empower black youth. Instead they convinced the young black community that they were victims. Victims of authority in particular and whites I general.
How this privileged and remarkably untalented couple ever reached such heights is inexplicable. A community organizer and his disbarred wife became the toast of the entire world. What a waste. She was lauded for her intelligence and her style. To me she was the epitome of the angry black woman with a huge chip on her shoulder. In her poorly written senior thesis she whined about how uncomfortable she felt being a black womanizer on the Princeton campus. I have a feeling she is going to settle right in on Martha's Vineyard.
70 people like this.
Reply 10 - Posted by:
starboard 11/7/2019 8:29:04 AM (No. 229056)
Michelle has not evolved. After having every advantage and privilege in this country, she still clings to her anger and the past.
55 people like this.
Reply 11 - Posted by:
Franz 11/7/2019 8:29:19 AM (No. 229058)
Michelle Obama is openly hostile in her attitude toward non-blacks and whites in particular. This attitude is fairly common in Chicago. People notice this hostility. That, combined with the extremely high violent crime rate by blacks in Chicago would make any non-black concerned for their safety.
If she was honest with herself she would realize her attitude is part of the problem. It is expensive and inconvenient to pick up and move, so you know these people feel threatened. Proclaiming that ONLY black lives matter doesn't help.
51 people like this.
Reply 12 - Posted by:
Strike3 11/7/2019 8:30:00 AM (No. 229059)
We run from you because you suck and your girlie husband sucks.
White Flight is not racism, they really do trash the neighorhood, raise crime rates and bring in drugs and danger. S'matter, Mooch, your Martha's Vineyard neighbors beginning to move out? Low class can be smelled from a mile away.
41 people like this.
Reply 13 - Posted by:
MDConservative 11/7/2019 8:32:32 AM (No. 229061)
I am about to become another white fleeing...
My neighborhood was about 50 percent white, 25 percent black, 15 percent Asian and 10 percent Hispanic when we arrived 20 years ago. Today it is 70 percent black, 10 percent Asian, 10 percent Hispanic and 10 percent white.
The diminished number of white residents has nothing to do with racism. Most are retirees with too large houses looking to downsize. When the properties go on the market, black buyers are most likely to make an offer...good offers. It is simply another example of self-segregation.
29 people like this.
Reply 14 - Posted by:
Rumblehog 11/7/2019 8:35:13 AM (No. 229063)
Why don't THEY live among blacks themselves?
Do black neighborhoods welcome whites, like white neighborhoods welcome black families who want to "move on up?"
44 people like this.
Reply 15 - Posted by:
stablemoney 11/7/2019 8:43:25 AM (No. 229069)
Why don't they make black neighborhoods so people want to move there? Why don't people who feel discriminated against make themselves more attractive to others? Why aren't questions like these ever asked, or answered?
25 people like this.
Reply 16 - Posted by:
bpl40 11/7/2019 8:44:42 AM (No. 229070)
The stark reality of American society flies in the face of Ms.0bama's arguments. Black men between 18 and 40 are 2 1/2 % of the population and commit 65% of all violent crimes. An unknown black male confronting you is thirteen times more likely to harm you physically than a white one. Unless you enjoy a seven figure 'retirement' income and live on Martha's Vineyard, these statistics are a nonignorable part of your reality. A middleclass white woman will still clutch her purse more tightly when a black male Harvard professor gets on the elevator. If he is a professor of economics, even I would clutch my wallet tightly! How we got here and why things appear to be getting worse rather than better is the issue we should all honestly face. Rather than hiding behind a blanket one sided accusation of racism.
36 people like this.
Reply 17 - Posted by:
chillijilli 11/7/2019 8:47:38 AM (No. 229073)
Or...perhaps it's just that some people wanted newer homes and more space, which the suburbs provided?
And if the always-tolerant, ever-understanding Michelle insists there was a color factor...OK, then. Maybe it's a cultural thing that white people like as much space as possible around them and prefer new homes to old. I thought ALL cultural proclivities are supposed to be accepted and understood, not attacked.
16 people like this.
Reply 18 - Posted by:
ginadee 11/7/2019 8:47:56 AM (No. 229074)
Truth be known,Mike is more closely related to a type person like the woman trying to cut head in line at in her silver Mercedes at Popeye's Chicken.
She's cut from the same cloth. Michelle Obama and her partner in crime approached the Presidency with all it's glory and might, as if they had just won the lottery. They mistreated the dignity of the presidency and that of the office of the first lady
They offered no dignity, class or couth.
They remain lost not realizing they are has beens. I would rather refer to a former president and his spouse in a more respectful way but it behooves me to garner up any respect for those two grifters.
41 people like this.
Reply 19 - Posted by:
WhamDBambam 11/7/2019 9:11:53 AM (No. 229105)
What the Mooch leaves out? Lemee guess, proper English grammar and understandable diction?
21 people like this.
Mooch is living proof that communists fornicated with retarded baboons
9 people like this.
Reply 21 - Posted by:
Congar 11/7/2019 9:26:21 AM (No. 229125)
White flight was caused by blacks sticking their dirty fists into white’s faces, something too subtle for Michelle’s tiny brain. Also the neighborhoods blacks moved into became sewers in a short time, devastating all property values.
13 people like this.
Reply 22 - Posted by:
law428 11/7/2019 9:26:42 AM (No. 229127)
The ones who talk about race all the time are the most racist of all.
41 people like this.
Reply 23 - Posted by:
Lawsy0 11/7/2019 9:28:51 AM (No. 229128)
Here she goes again; shoving her black privilege in our faces.
26 people like this.
Reply 24 - Posted by:
ledbythnose 11/7/2019 9:28:57 AM (No. 229129)
Just a friendly reminder to everyone keeping score. We liked Ike .... but not Mike.
14 people like this.
Reply 25 - Posted by:
earlybird 11/7/2019 9:34:39 AM (No. 229136)
If Michelle Obama could change one thing about herself - the one thing she cannot change - she would be white.
21 people like this.
Reply 26 - Posted by:
janjan 11/7/2019 9:36:44 AM (No. 229140)
The Obama's couldn't move to a white neighborhood fast enough. And sent their daughters to an expensive private school. These are the last people who should be lecturing the rest of us. Zip it.
39 people like this.
Reply 27 - Posted by:
mseegal 11/7/2019 9:36:57 AM (No. 229141)
Such a "bitter clinger".....clinging to her black racism and grievance mentality.
36 people like this.
Reply 28 - Posted by:
bigfatslob 11/7/2019 10:12:06 AM (No. 229181)
The Obama couple achieved the ultimate goal with 'white folks' or white guilt folks putting them there. What the first black couple could have done was heal the country but what they did was squander their achievement. They both brought racism to a higher level 24/7 for eight long years. When it came to race the Obama's weren't 'authentic' and did exactly what Michelle is talking about practiced a bit of 'black flight' of their own. Their children didn't attend some all black school with low rates of graduation and even lesser use and grasp of the English language that the brilliant Barack espoused when reading from a teleprompter. Now they practiced black flight to Martha's Vineyard to be among whites where the black population is minimal.
Michell and Barack should look inward to find the real racist and live their miserable lives spent looking for 'white folks' showing racism. I never gave any thought in 60 years until the presidency of Obama and eight years after that I can say I recognize racism from this couple and the attention they put on it. Now I can proudly say I'm a racist thanks to Michelle and other noted blacks that I'm a racist thank you Michelle and Barack for the heads up I'll be more cautious now.
Keep it up Michelle us 'white folks' are listening. The Obamas have set this country back over a hundred years to the times of the Civil War and managed to cancel Abe Lincoln in trying to unite this country.
20 people like this.
Reply 29 - Posted by:
felixcat 11/7/2019 10:21:00 AM (No. 229191)
Well, she and Barack seem to prefer hanging out with mostly uber wealthy white people. Michelle - you and Barack have your millions (for no other reason than the color of your skin) so shut up and enjoy yourselves.
21 people like this.
Reply 30 - Posted by:
Enoch Powell 11/7/2019 10:21:22 AM (No. 229193)
Maybe she's talking about herself. I know if I saw her coming, I'd run away...
14 people like this.
Reply 31 - Posted by:
ZeldaFitzg 11/7/2019 10:27:12 AM (No. 229197)
Many years ago we lived in a wonderful neighborhood where we were basically all owning our first homes, living just three blocks from an elementary school. We were all young parents, or young couples planning to start families. Lots of baby showers. Suburb near Dallas, excellent schools. We were pretty much a homogeneous neighborhood, except with one couple being doctors from India. It was the type of 70s neighborhood where the children played outside, both front and back, with supervision. Some of the mothers were home all day, some worked or went to school. We knew all of the neighbors on the block by name, and most by friendship.
One black couple moved in directly across the street. They probably had about the same household income as we did, but both of them worked. We welcomed them and life went on. We were all quite alike with the exception that their furniture was more of the red crushed velvet variety. The neighborhood had no crime that I knew of, and certainly none in our own block The black couple's black friends and family came and went on visits. Within three months, the black couple's house had been burglarized. What a surprise, as we'd had not other burglaries. We were close enough that they gave a dinner for us a few months later when my husband was transferred and we had to move to another part of the state.
So the only black couple in this low-crime/no-crime neighborhood was the only couple having a home burglary. Looking back with a little more life experience, I realize that the black couple had brought burglary with them---not in their own behavior, but in their culture. I am today convinced that some of the their own friends and family, knowing that the household was insured (and rationalizing incorrectly that it "paid for everything"), did the convenient burglary insurance scam so common in some cultures. The black couple moved into a white neighborhood but could not leave their black culture.
23 people like this.
Reply 32 - Posted by:
smcchk 11/7/2019 10:30:20 AM (No. 229201)
My daughter student taught in a primarily minority school. One little white boy was harassed and picked on daily for being white. Hope that little guy got out of the situation. There is a lot of racism, Michelle, and a lot comes from the “minorities.”
20 people like this.
Reply 33 - Posted by:
Italiano 11/7/2019 10:30:35 AM (No. 229202)
I'd move away from Michelle if she were Scandinavian.
20 people like this.
Reply 34 - Posted by:
jacksin5 11/7/2019 10:36:35 AM (No. 229209)
Michelle's " I was a poor Black Child" schtick is getting old. The American Dream post WWII was to make your money in the City, then move to the 'burbs to be able to afford enough room to raise your kids. It had nothing to do with escaping Black People. As the Blue Collar jobs either went South, or Overseas, working people went where the work was, the new class of dependents, created by the War on Poverty legislation, stayed and made the city populations what they are today.
10 people like this.
Reply 35 - Posted by:
fairplay 11/7/2019 10:39:53 AM (No. 229211)
Most prejudice is out of fear rather than hatred. All races have it !
6 people like this.
Reply 36 - Posted by:
Metalman2 11/7/2019 10:43:50 AM (No. 229215)
I experienced similar things as a freshmen in High School in Warwick, New York from the white kid perspective. We moved from Turlock, California where the sun shined every day and life was good to, in my case, hell. There was a home for wayward boys in town and for some reason many came to the public high school. It would cost me 50 cents to use the bathroom. I was pushed and punched everyday. There were "kids" attending school who were 19 years old and carried knives with them. We moved to Ada, Michigan where I went to school with the Devos's, the Van Andels, the Siedmens, and others of like achievement. Different worlds !!
14 people like this.
Reply 37 - Posted by:
bighambone 11/7/2019 10:50:01 AM (No. 229224)
The actual reasons that black students are disproportionately suspended or expelled from public schools throughout the country are that black students disproportionately fail to follow the instructions of public school administrators and teachers, along with disproportionately perpetuating violent incidents that are actually criminal assaults against both students and teachers. The disproportionate amount of black perpetrated crime around the country in relation to the percentage of the black population, and the possibility of becoming a crime victim, or dead, as the result of black perpetrated violent crime is the main reason for flight, both black, white and others, from black dominated communities. Only those black communities can fix that that societal situation and not the politicians and political operatives who fraudulently deflect blame.
13 people like this.
Reply 38 - Posted by:
zephyrgirl 11/7/2019 10:59:32 AM (No. 229237)
Years ago, I lived in a neighborhood bisected by a four-lane street. The houses on one side were mostly occupied by whites and the other side by blacks. One day a black coworker who lived on the opposite side to mine asked for a ride home because his car was in the shop. I drove him to his side of the neighborhood (one block away from my house) and was appalled at the condition of the houses there - yards with no grass or high weeds, rusted gutters, chipping paint and driveways with big nasty cracks. That's when I started thinking about moving. It wasn't skin color, it was the obvious deterioration of the neighborhood.
16 people like this.
Reply 39 - Posted by:
Luckyx3 11/7/2019 11:16:54 AM (No. 229258)
someone please remind mooch that her husband wouldn't have been elected if it wasn't for white votes - he could have done so much to ease race relations but chose to impose his socialist agenda instead (Obamacare)
13 people like this.
Reply 40 - Posted by:
inspectorudy 11/7/2019 11:28:14 AM (No. 229270)
I live in an upper-class neighborhood with a very low crime rate. It is a mixed community with people of all races. We do have an area where lower-cost housing is available for families to get a start here. My kids rode the bus to middle and high school and the only extreme situations in their lives happened on the school bus. Black kids who for some reason are almost always bigger than their white contemporaries constantly bullied and physically abused white kids on the bus. It was both black boys and black girls who also are much bigger than their white counterpoints. Since we were already in a beautiful area with great schools we were not going to leave but what Mr. Elder says happened to him happened to my kids too. I don't know the answer but Jesse Jackson was right when he said that he was relieved when he heard steps behind him and when he turned the kids were white!
8 people like this.
Reply 41 - Posted by:
udanja99 11/7/2019 11:41:12 AM (No. 229283)
Mooch, it isn’t skin color. It’s behavior.
14 people like this.
Reply 42 - Posted by:
DVC 11/7/2019 11:48:31 AM (No. 229293)
It was rising crime and sinking housing values that made people leave while they could salvage SOME of their life's investment in their homes.
8 people like this.
Reply 43 - Posted by:
Calico Al 11/7/2019 11:51:10 AM (No. 229295)
After the blacks moved in and the whites moved out, how many of those neighborhoods/cities improved?
10 people like this.
Reply 44 - Posted by:
JackBurton 11/7/2019 11:54:27 AM (No. 229297)
Maybe if the black kids didn't beat up the white kids as school....
Just sayin'.
4 people like this.
Reply 45 - Posted by:
DennisM 11/7/2019 12:10:40 PM (No. 229315)
Larry tells it like it is. Won't be on the Christmas card list of any of those on the left.
Michelle wouldn't know the truth if it bit her on her a*%.
5 people like this.
Reply 46 - Posted by:
RedWhite&Blue2 11/7/2019 12:21:08 PM (No. 229322)
Harriet Tubman
The Mooch
Candace Owens
Van Jones
Black voters
Brexit
Hmmm I’m sensing a theme in today’s must reads.
4 people like this.
Reply 47 - Posted by:
web 11/7/2019 12:28:13 PM (No. 229328)
I would run from the Mooch wherever she was, because I am afraid of what her family represents. What's wrong with that?
2 people like this.
Reply 48 - Posted by:
jeffkinnh 11/7/2019 12:29:25 PM (No. 229330)
Whites, and others that can, leave because of high crime rates and thuggish behavior. No one wants to live among that no matter what races live there, especially if your kids are at risk. Then the Black community doesn't want Black criminals arrested and refuse to help police identify criminals. The crooks are out and about in your neighborhood. Part of this mentality is the corruption of Black "leadership", like the Obamas, that sell victimhood.
The good thing is that Trump's economy is making some Blacks take a hard look at their culture and how toxic it is in some cases.
4 people like this.
Reply 49 - Posted by:
msjena 11/7/2019 12:32:46 PM (No. 229336)
A lot of the people who fled from Michelle's old neighborhood are today's white liberals.
5 people like this.
Reply 50 - Posted by:
gramma b 11/7/2019 12:45:53 PM (No. 229340)
I agree with every negative thing said about the entitled affirmative action queen. She's a person of, maybe, average intelligence who has been given things she hasn't earned all of her life, solely because of the color of her skin. Yet she remains resentful. I'm surprised, however, that no one has mentioned the courage and integrity it took for Larry Elder to write this article. Number 7 hit the nail on the head. It is unfair that good, upstanding Black families -- and people like Larry Elder -- have to suffer from conclusions drawn because of the disproportionate amount of crime and low achievement in the Black community. But, Michelle is blaming the wrong people. She shouldn't blame those who run from the crime, she should blame the bad actors of her own race and call them out.
4 people like this.
Reply 51 - Posted by:
bamboozle 11/7/2019 12:53:26 PM (No. 229344)
This from the woman who forced the schools to starve their students?
5 people like this.
Reply 52 - Posted by:
chase9365 11/7/2019 1:28:54 PM (No. 229369)
What is she talking about?
She has bought a property on a freakin island!
Pretty much one of the whitest places on the plantet!
Obummer and Moochele are not living in the hood! So shut up!
4 people like this.
I wouldn’t want to be her neighbor, but it’s because she’s trash.
Happy to have a non-trash people of any race.
2 people like this.
Reply 54 - Posted by:
qr4j 11/7/2019 3:44:06 PM (No. 229456)
I know that this is pipe-dreaming, but I wish folks who talk like Obama and Holder could sit down and have a reasonable discussion with someone like Larry Elder. I would like to bear witness to a respectful conversation based upon facts. If we could deal in facts -- and not just feelings -- we could create solutions to the problems of racism in this country. But it takes respectful conversation.
2 people like this.
If white folks are so bad, so evil why does the 0bama woman wear her hair white? How many hours in the chair does that hair take?
0 people like this.
Reply 56 - Posted by:
winnie1 11/7/2019 3:45:00 PM (No. 229459)
Hey Mook I see you are gaining on us at a rapid speed because you are "Moving On Up"! Why you buying expensive homes in white neighborhood?
2 people like this.
Reply 57 - Posted by:
paral04 11/7/2019 8:23:49 PM (No. 229610)
White people left because you moved in. Nothing to do with your race.
2 people like this.
White flight ? Why did this money hungry woman run from the black neighborhood ?
Always the victim. Always with the excuse. If blacks were held to the same standard as whites, things might be different. Sixty years later and it's still "You don't like me cause I'm black" Like I told one in the early seventies "I wouldn't like you if you were purple"
Mooch have new dentures or veneers like Joe ?
0 people like this.