Post-race America?

As much as I'd like to think that America has moved beyond race and into that heavenly place where people are judged only by the content of the character, there comes a story that shocks me back to reality.

For example, consider this story from an Alabama television station. The head of the Alabama NAACP has asked that Mobile's Azalea Trail Maids not be allowed to march in President-elect Obama's Inauguration Day parade because the dresses worn by the Trail Maids remind him of the plantation in "Gone with the Wind".

To which one reader wrote: "Sweatshop clothing, and not antebellum Southern attire, would be a more poignant cause for the NAACP to herald. It takes some audacity, and not a little ignorance, to complain about the Trail Ladies when, like most Americans, the mouth pieces of the NAACP are likely wearing clothes made by 21st century slaves."

 Yikes. Perhaps we've not moved as far as I had hoped. What do you think about all this?

 You can see the story, along with video, here. I expect we'll be hearing more about this from the talking heads in cable TV "news". But you can bet, that venue will add more heat than light to the debate.