(AllHipHop News) With the troubling events that have happened during this volatile 2016 Presidential Race, it would seem that almost anything on a rapidly deteriorating common sense and decency scale is now possible. As a race has included reference to a candidate’s penis size during an official debate, numerous incidents of recorded physical violence between different political factions at campaign rallies and one candidate for the Texas School Board of Education accusing the 44th commander and chief of the United States of covering up a past as a gay prostitute, it would seem that without much public resistance, things have slipped beneath a line that many would not have ever believed possible just four years prior.
Generally, lame duck presidents wisely keep out of the fray when it comes to the dirtier side of any campaign trail from which they can expect no foreseeable reward. However, in the way that it behooves those with a conscience to try and calm things down at a house party that has taken a turn for the worse before the whole establishment gets burned down to the ground, president Barack Obama, without naming names and citing too much “silence” from other elected leaders, had this to say that was pretty clearly aimed at GOP front runner Donald Trump and the tenor of his campaign: “We have heard vulgar and divisive rhetoric aimed at women and minorities and Americans who don’t look like us or pray like us or vote like we do, ” said Obama, adding: ” Too often we’ve accepted this as somehow the new normal, and it’s worth asking ourselves what each of us may have done to contribute to this kind of vicious atmosphere in our politics.”
Avoiding the misstep of faulting only one side of the equation and taking things further with regards to a divided nation’s thorough self examination, during that same press conference on Tuesday, March 15, 2016, POTUS was equally critical of groups who in their zeal to discount and disrupt these rallies had unwittingly trampled the tenets of free speech in promoting causes such as #BlackLivesMatter, #immigrationreform and other more inclusive sociopolitical views : “We’ve seen misguided attempts to shut down that speech,” Obama said of these protesters and some of their more aggressive actions during Donald Trump’s acutely polarized political rallies, continuing: ” However offensive it may be, we live in a country where free speech is one of the most important rights that we hold.”
As to why Mr. Obama felt the need to hold forth at this moment in time on the issue of the specific path this nation is taking towards the election of it’s new president, the motivation would seem to be firmly rooted in where the country is headed versus raw politics: ” While some may be more to blame than others for the current climate, all of us are responsible for reversing it,” Mr. Obama stated of where things currently stand on the campaign trail, concluding in warning: ” It is a cycle that is not an accurate reflection of America, and it has to stop – and I say this not because it is a matter of political correctness. It’s about the way that the corrosive behavior can undermine our democracy and our society and even our economy.”
Yes, indeed – the disease that hits one branch of the tree can grow to infect all the roots should the scourge be left unabated and untreated. In that vein, it might well prove prudent to follow this two term president’s advice and be mindful that in trying to find our next leader we as a nation don’t allow the rhetoric alone to burn down the whole house in the process.