Ben Carson said that black slaves in America were immigrants.

When I first heard about the story, I cast it aside.  Didn’t bother to look into it.  I didn’t see the point in wasting my time trying to confirm or repudiate the claims I was hearing.  Ben Carson is a black guy.  He might have said something dumb, but I’m pretty sure that he’s not a racist (at least not against black people).

But my interest was piqued when I heard that Barak Obama had also said that black slaves in America were immigrants.  Could this be true?  Now I had to find out what both of them had said.  Here’s the quote from Obama:

Certainly it wasn’t easy for those of African heritage who had not come here voluntarily, and yet in their own way were immigrants themselves. There was discrimination and hardship and poverty. But, like you, they no doubt found inspiration in all those who had come before them. And they were able to muster faith that, here in America, they might build a better life and give their children something more.

And from Carson:

There were other immigrants who came here in the bottom of slave ships, worked even longer, even harder for less. But they too had a dream that one day their sons, daughters, grandsons, granddaughters, great-grandsons, great-granddaughters might pursue prosperity and happiness in this land.

What Carson said is so similar in style and content to what Obama had said, it’s almost as if Carson took Obama’s speech and re-wrote it so he wouldn’t get caught by the teacher for plagiarizing.  Reminds me of the Melania/Michelle situation, only  Carson is a better cheater than Trump.  But rather than point out that Carson is a plagiarist, the left decided to go bananas over the content of Carson’s speech.  By “content”, of course, I mean “one single word in the speech”.  How dare Carson refer to slaves as “immigrants”?  They were slaves, and came involuntarily.  That’s not an immigrant.

And the crazy thing is, once people started publishing Obama’s speech, the left just kinda shut up.  I was expecting them to fight back.  I thought that they would try to twist things around.  But there are the quotes above – it would be a lot easier to call Carson’s words plagiarism than to try to claim that there was a morally distinct difference between what the two had said.

I think the left has conceded this one.  They haven’t accused Obama of being a racist.  They haven’t tried to differentiate the meanings.  And they haven’t apologized for their error.

Of course, they can’t apologize for their hysteria.  If they did, they might have to do a little more inward reflecting.  And if they did that, they might come to realize that a whole lot of the accusations they make about racism, sexism, homophobia, xenophobia, and class warfare might be hysteria too.  And if ever they became aware that their accusations are mostly hysteria, they might have to start considering alternatives to their preconceived notions and narrow world view.  And the world might become a slightly better place.  Wait, that doesn’t sound all bad…