The Color of Ignorance:

During the last American presidential election campaigns, one frustrated politician described President Barack Obama as “not smart”. The man was promptly condemned for his prejudice and was subsequently reminded that the president was, among other things, a Harvard law school graduate. It soon turned out that the ignorant man had no accomplishments, academic or otherwise, that could (even remotely) be compared to that of President Obama.

Now, it was Senator John McCain that came out to describe the United Nations Ambassador Susan Rice as “not bright”. According to her official biography, Dr. Susan Elizabeth Rice attended National Cathedral School, a prep academy in Washington, D.C. She excelled in academics, becoming her class valedictorian, and showed her aptitude in the politic realm as president of the student council. After graduation, Rice attended Stanford University in Palo Alto, California. In college, she pushed herself to excel. She not only earned Departmental Honors and University Distinction, but also became a Harry S. Truman scholar, was elected to Phi Beta Kappa and earned a Rhodes scholarship.

Upon her bachelor's degree in history in 1986, Rice went on to attend University of Oxford in Oxfordshire, England. Here she earned her M.Phil and D.Phil in international relations, and wrote a dissertation that examined Rhodesia's transition from white rule. Her paper won the Royal Commonwealth Society's Walter Frewen Lord Prize for outstanding research in the field of Commonwealth History, as well as the Chatham House-British International Studies Association Prize for the most distinguished doctoral dissertation in the United Kingdom in the field of International Relations.

How could anyone describe a person with the above accomplishments as “not bright”? Senator McCain did. Sadly, a peep into John McCain’s biography revealed that he graduated fifth from the bottom of his class from the Naval Academy at Annapolis in 1958. And this was the same man who obviously was not bright enough to pick a running mate that would have been an asset to his now failed presidential bid.

There is a consolation here for those of us who have ever been victims of prejudice or (and) stereotype. If a whole President Barack Obama and Ambassador Susan Rice could be so stereotyped in spite of their high educational and professional accomplishments, there is absolutely no need for ordinary folks like us to stress over the antics of ignorant and frustrated individuals whose only major accomplishments are their skin color.