"Manners are a sensitive awareness of the feelings of others"

You know what?  I thought we were doing better than this!  Wrong again.

NTSB photo

Yesterday morning, two young ladies about to enter their sophomore years in college, high school friends, were taking pictures from the railroad bridge in Ellicott City, MD.  The train people said they didn't even see them on the track, that just as the train approached the bridge something went wrong and an emergency brake activated, causing the train to jam up.  Fifteen cars on a coal train bound for Baltimore from West Virginia derailed, and the two women were killed.

And shortly thereafter, a very nice person identifying him-or-herself as "Chris Ar" tweeted that "these two idiots were killed trespassing on RR property" and that he or she "actually care(s) more about the engineer on the train, who has to deal with guilt due to the stupidity of these girls."

Say, that was real nice of him or her, wasn't it now?  Before the girls' bodies were recovered from underneath the tons of coal that killed them, this person took time out from tweeting about favorite topics among conservatives, always using filthy, nasty language.  Not that conservatives are the only ones to use intemperate words, but it's not right for anyone.

And then, in the world of sports, someone named Skip Bayless is an NFL commentator for ESPN.  That name "Skip Bayless" just screams out "ESPN NFL commentator" somehow, doesn't it?  But unlike most NFL commentators, who limit their remarks to what people do with their arms and legs, the Skipper decided to weigh in on the annual Washington Redskins quarterback controversy, which dates back to the days of Norm Snead vs Sonny Jurgensen and is an annual feature in the DC sports microcosm.  Instead of having a good team down there, they are glad to have a good argument on the merits of Theismann vs Kilmer.

So this year the Redskins drafted Heisman Trophy winner Robert Griffin III in the first round and, in the fourth round, they picked one Kirk Cousins, who is only a household name in his own house.  But the other night, in a meaningless exhibition game, Griffin III failed to make everyone forget Johnny Unitas, so naturally the good people of DC have started grinding on Griffin.

I guess I should mention that on this team with a name so horribly offensive to native Americans, Griffin happens to be an African-American and Cousins is European-American.  You need to know those facts ONLY for one reason.  This Bayless piped up yesterday morning with this statement:
  
'It's human nature if you're white to root for the white guy'

I guess we can be glad that not too many people take big portions of their worldview from Skip Bayless.  Comments like that take social progress in this nation back to the Jim Crow era, and we need not be there again.  

Of course, he backpedaled faster than a used-car dealer rolling back an odometer, saying that such an attitude is WRONG but he just had to point out that there are people who WOULD think like that.  

Skip Bayless, who sees the need to bring the color of people's skin into a discussion of who should play for the Redskins, say hello to Chris Ar, who can't wait for people to be buried before dumping hatred all over them.

Folks, we're moving backward.   We'll do better tomorrow.