He has his own PBS television show. He has written a new book “FAIL UP” and has a radio show on Public Radio with co-host Dr. Corneil West a professor at Princeton. Who is this person? None other than Tavis Smiley. Mr. Smiley was doing the talk show circuit promoting his new book. He is a guest on the Bill Maher show from time to time and is a public supporter of President Obama.

In a recent interview he was asked about the release of the President’s birth certificate and the role that Donald Trump played in the process. Smiley answered by stating that Trump never had any intention to be a legitimate candidate. He characterized the actions as appealing to a base voter, as bottom feeding and possibly race baiting. Well one thing is for sure, if that was the intent of Mr. Trump’s posturing then it worked. Tavis continues to proclaim that he “is not one to throw that “r-word” around” you know racism because it can come back around like a boomerang and bite you in the ass. He states that it really does not matter who uses the word but you have to be careful and judicious when you use it. He says that there are some things that can only be explained this way.

Well let’s start with the President and his birth certificate, you know the real long form one that he has just presented. The mother’s race Caucasian, the father’s race African. Now I’m no expert and I know that 1961 was a long time ago but conventional wisdom tells me that African was not a recognized race back then. Negro, black possibly colored in some southern states but African, I don’t think so. Assuming that this was the true description on the birth certificate then the President, the guy who is for change, for telling the truth, for transparent government was forced to show his birth certificate by as he put it “a carnival barker”. He never volunteered the information. And in fact he has run away from his white roots for most of his life, except that time a Harvard when he changed his name to Barry to get elected president of the bar review.

Smiley claims that deconstructing this President’s birth certificate on public TV has no other basis but racial. He claims that it is race baiting and serves no other purpose. He asks for any other rationale why this president is subject to this nonsense. Well I tell you why. He constantly mis-represents himself, changes his image for his own convince and decides to be the person that gives him the greatest advantage. He holds himself out there as the first African-American president. I was never one to question the president’s nationality. He was American to me from day one. He is my president after being duly elected. He has performed as I expected him to. However, he is not the first African-American president. He is the first mixed race president, the common term for this is Mallato.

Smiley is disappointed that Trump forced this. He feels that Donald is pimping the media. That he thrives on the exposure. That it’s like air or water or blood in his veins. Here in lies the hypocracy of Mr. Smiley, he is doing the exact same thing. He is seeking media exposure for his TV show, his radio show and his new book. He needs a certain level of civility in our national discourse, he is not trying to demonize Donald. He says this right after he makes fun of President Bush mis-pronouncing “Strategery”. I guess its ok if Tavis does it but not Donald!

His new book is called “Fail Up” talks about failure and how you learn more from your failures than you learn from all your successes. He talks about how he cussed out a professor and as a result he took 16 years to get his college degree. He talks about getting a credit card and a checking account and mis-managing it, writing bad checks and ending up in jail to embarrassed to tell his parents.

He quotes the Nobel Laureate Samuel Becket, “Ever try, Ever fail, no matter; try again, fail again, fail bigger. Failure need not be final and it need not be fatal. Failure will lead to success. I hope he does not think the President should fail up. That is not what we expect of our leaders. WE need to respect, protect and sometimes correct the president. The people of this country should be showing the president what they expect and he should be listening really well because at this point if he Fails Up he’ll be out of a job next year.