Pen-Elayne on the Web

Creepy Racist Supersition of the Month

Susie Madrak reports on one more example of George W. Bush's unmitigated arrogance and non-existence sense of appropriateness: "Before speaking to a March 3rd Los Angeles audience at the White House Conference on Faith-Based and Community Initiatives, Mr Bush was introduced by an African-American male, whose head Mr Bush proceeded to rub while grinning and smirking." I don't tend to keep track of racist stupidity, there's way too much of it in the world, but I know I've heard of this skeevy custom in passing (something about rubbing the head of a black man bringing you luck). But specifically, where else has this abhorrent practice surfaced during Bush's presidency? Oh yeah, a little over a year ago Joshua Micah Marshall reported that Ohio Senate President Doug White did the same thing. Other examples (particularly among ignorami) must abound online, but I can't find them at the moment as it's a little tricky to Google on words like "head rubbing luck" and not get a bunch of porn sites, and I fear my MSN Search tracking referrals are scary enough as is.