This story is about a reunion of the Texas First Battalion with the 442nd Regimental Combat Team.  The two units first met during the bloody WWII battle in the Vosges Mountains.  The First Battalion’s 217 members were completely surrounded when the segregated Japanese American 442nd RCT was sent in on a suicide rescue mission.

814 casualties.

For 217 men.

From the New York Times:

As a child, Kim Eun Mi Young hated being different.

When her father brought home toys, a record and a picture book on South Korea, the country from which she was adopted in 1961, she ignored them.

Growing up in Georgia, Kansas and Hawaii, in a military family, she would date only white teenagers, even when Asian boys were around.

“At no time did I consider myself anything other than white,” said Ms. Young, 48, who lives in San Antonio. “I had no sense of any identity as a Korean woman. Dating an Asian man would have forced me to accept who I was.”

Another blackface incident, this time at West Virginia University:

Three West Virginia women’s soccer players blacked their faces for a Halloween event last week.

Photos surfaced earlier this week on Facebook showing three players in black makeup with padding on their buttocks.

Jennifer McIntosh, executive officer for the President’s Office for Social Justice at West Virginia University, confirmed the incident occurred at a “fun, team event” for Halloween.

“They were not in blackface. I mean, as we consider blackface,” McIntosh said.

Yeah, I couldn’t make this stuff up.

This is Joseph Cao (LA).  He was the lone Republican to support President Obama’s healthcare bill.

Another blackface incident.   Another white student who is not pictured also dressed in blackface.    This is apparently a repeat of 2007, in which two Ph.D. students dressed in blackface.  The university’s statement?  Yeah, it’s offensive but it didn’t break any rules.

Among other things, what this tells me is that Northwestern remains a highly segregated institution.  Because if any of these students assumed black friends would be at the party, would they dress like this? 

A friend used to teach at Northwestern and reported many of the issues faced by black students and faculty.  Basically, the white Northwestern students and staff members perceive Northwestern to be a white institution.  Among the incidents I remember is a black female professor who was frequently assumed to be a secretary, a partner of an employee who was arrested by the campus police for “suspicious behavior,” black students who were stopped in the cafeteria and asked for extra condiments, black professors whose students thought they were in the wrong classroom because the students presumed the professors would be white.

Thanks to Melanie for the link.

I was laughing at this Elie Mystal opinion piece about post-racial America. Here’s a quote:

If he [Barack Obama] can do it, why can’t you?

Whenever a homeless white person asks me for change, I always sneer at him and say: “You can’t be serious. You’re white. Look at Bill Gates. Why don’t you go invent an operating system instead of trying to freeload off of society you lazy white man.”

Oh wait, I never say that. Because that would make me a giant prick.

My mom would say that. In fact, she has sometimes said, “He’s white, what’s his problem?”

I have to admit I’ve thought similar things. You can call me a giant prick. Just don’t say anything about my mom.

So I went to the old folks’ home to visit, because one of my white relatives is being moved to intermediate care. This is a different wing of the complex. I had just talked to another relative, so I knew the general direction to walk. There was a reception desk along the way, so I stopped there to ask a question.

The white woman sitting there didn’t look up at me. And then the phone rang, so she answered the phone. She then engaged in a lengthy telephone conversation, never once glancing up. I knew she was intent on ignoring me when she said, “No, I have the e-mail right here,” called up her e-mail program on the computer and began reading aloud the contents of the e-mail. It was very obvious that she was talking with a work colleague.

So I walked away.

It is apparently not acceptable for a person of color to walk away from a white person, although it is perfectly acceptable for a white person to ignore a person of color for an extended period of time.

Because she freaked.

She dropped the phone on her desk with a loud clunk and bolted to her feet, yelling, “Where are you going?” I said that I was visiting a resident. She was visibly agitated and said that I had to sign in first. But I noticed that when I approached the desk she backed away and stood out of reach behind her chair.

Next time I’m going to just keep walking.

So Sunday an American won the New York City Marathon for the first time since 1982:

Meb Keflezighi, who won yesterday in New York, is technically American by virtue of him becoming a citizen in 1998, but the fact that he’s not American-born takes away from the magnitude of the achievement the headline implies.

Source.

Keflezighi was born in Eritrea. So apparently he isn’t a “real American”:

Nothing against Keflezighi, but he’s like a ringer who you hire to work a couple hours at your office so that you can win the executive softball league.The positive sign was that some American-born runners did extremely well in yesterday’s men’s race.

If any of them stand on the top step of the podium in Central Park one day, that’s when I’ll break out my red, white and blue.

“Nothing against Keflezighi …” That’s like “I’m not a racist, but …” He’s a ringer, you see, because he was only brought here when he was 12 in order to beat true Merkins in the marathon. Taking away the glory of some true, “American-born” runners.

So the sportswriter got called on this bit of stupid. What did he have to say?

Here’s what the dude said on his twitter: “If u move here @ age 12, u aren’t American-born. USA running still has a problem even w/Meb win.” Here’s what he said in his follow-up article:

I said that Keflezighi’s win, the first by an American since 1982, wasn’t as big as it was being made out to be because there was a difference between being an American-born product and being an American citizen. Frankly I didn’t account for the fact that virtually all of Keflezighi’s running experience came as a US citizen. I never said he didn’t deserve to be called American.

Just that the writer wouldn’t honor him as an American. That’s all.

I heard the word “Oriental” used to refer to people three times this weekend, and somebody told me that her kid had slanty eyes just like mine.

Some sportswriter referred to Yao Ming as “the 7′6″ Chinaman.”  And then I noticed Angry Asian Man reported that somebody called Yi Jianlian “the Chinaman.”

Guess they didn’t get the memo.