New York Times columnist Maureen Dowd wrote on Sunday, September 13 that Wednesday’s (September 9) outburst by South Carolina Republican Congressman Joe Wilson during President Obama’s address to a joint session of Congress was racially motivated. As we told you earlier, Wilson shouted, “you lie,” when the president said his health care plan would not cover illegal immigrants.

Dowd writes: “What I heard was an unspoken word in the air — you lie, boy!… Wilson clearly did not like being lectured and even rebuked by the brainy black president presiding over the majestic chamber.”

Liberal columnists are not alone in suggesting that any opposition to the president is race-driven. Texas Democratic Congresswoman Eddie Bernice Johnson tells the Politico: “As far as African-Americans are concerned, we think most of it is.”

And California Democratic Congressman Mike Honda adds: “There’s a very angry, small group of folks that just didn’t like the fact that Barack Obama won the presidency. With some, I think it is (about race.)”

But White House press secretary Robert Gibbs says to CNN: “I don’t think the president believes that people are upset because of the color of his skin.”

It’s fair to say that *some* criticism is racially motivated. But there are plenty of other reasons why this is happening. It’s more partisan tension than racial.

The more conservative factions in this country don’t care that we’re the only nation without a universal health care system, because “socialism” is still a dirty word in this nation. The GOP has taken advantage of gullible citizens and convinced them that if Obama‘s plan gets passed, he’ll kill all the grandparents.  And even before that the Republicans convinced America that Obama has turned this country into a socialist country…even though it was Bush who gave the O.K. to bail out Wall Street a year ago.  In these respects and more, it’s fair to say that criticism of our president is more based on his politics than on the color of his skin.