I have to say upfront that I despise racism and other isms that divide people. If we need anyone, we need everyone. Besides, if I ever disliked someone because of their race or for any other reason other than that I had gotten to know them well enough to dislike them, my mother'd come out of her grave and slap me silly!

I think that I sometimes offend others simply because I *AM* blind in this area. It exists, I know it exists, but I simply CANNOT get past the idea that people are people, that a Hispanic mother wants the same for her kids as my own mother did, or that some other group isn't pink inside and bleeds red when stuck.

Maybe this is a good day to say that all men are created equal, and that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, and that among these are Life, Liberty, and the Pursuit of Happiness. And to say also that when any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of people to alter or abolish it and to establish such form of government as they see fit.

The fact that a rich man wrote the above does not make it any the less true.