FONTENOT PLAYS RACE CARD

The county commissioner for the Liberty area has now thrown down the race card almost twenty months before he faces his re-election bid in November 2012. For reasons unknown, Todd Fontenot(D) did not wait until the traditional campaign season started and instead used the Martin Luther King celebration at Turkey Creek Baptist this Sunday to reveal his judgment that Governor Rick Perry is a racists.

Among several speeches focused on honoring Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and assessing the progress this country has made because of his leadership, Commissioner Fontenot, a two term Democratic incumbent, focused part of his time reminding the audience that Republican Governor Rick Perry did not refer to Barack Obama as “President Obama”. Liberty Dispatch is not sure when and where Fontenot is talking about and we are not sure whether Fontenot is calling everyone who fails to use the term “President” when they refer to Obama is a racist. But we are sure that Governor Perry has also referred to President Bill Clinton as Clinton.

In context, Commissioner Fontenot was asserting that the lack of respect Governor Perry has shown by not including the title “President” when referring to Obama is an example of the continued racism still lingering in the white community in this country. But whether Fontenot’s rhetoric is purely partisan and motivated by an opportunity to excite a mostly black audience or whether Fontenot actually believes what he is saying, many of us would like to point out to anyone spewing this kind of divisive thinking that there are many reasons people across this country have done the same thing Perry has done and it have nothing to do with skin color. Here a just two reasons:

1) Some people simply do not believe using titles every time a public official’s name comes up is a priority – disagree as we may, this has nothing to do with race
2) Some people do not respect Barack Obama and believe his policies are destructive to this country – but their disrespect has nothing to do with race.

Perry has served as the Governor of our state longer than anyone in Texas history. A google search of Perry and racism doesn’t help Commissioner Fontenot substantiate his charges at all. A search does reveal questions about how the President has treated the leader of our state however. A search does reveal an unwillingness of this President to marshal more federal assets to protect the Texas border. A search does reveal a ‘talk to the hand” attitude by this President when he is told his healthcare plan will bankrupt this state. Google searches and personal experience by voters in Commissioner Fontenot’s precinct reveal growing problems many of us have with this President, none having to do with his heritage. So, if Mr. Fontenot wants to chide Governor Perry for bad manners, he should please leave race out of his comments

While Liberty Dispatch believes there is still work to be done to build the color blind society Dr. King spoke of, we do not believe character assassination of our Governor helps build that world nor does it build a good working relationship between our county government and state officials. We are therefore calling for Commissioner Fontenot to issue a public apology to Governor Perry. Because spreading the idea Perry is a racist was done in the black community, we suggest the apology be made there to.

Neither Todd Fontenot or Regis Fontenot will ever be the Afro-American voice in Liberty County. Their hands are unclean and not deserving of any community leadership role much less public office.

Fontenot's use of MLK day to promote himself and his commissioner reelection bid demonstrates his sleazy self promoting and self dealing.

The coming months will be very revealing.