Barack Obama, Chris Matthews and Courtney Fortson

Hello there, Earthlings.

The blog subject title is a bit misleading, but pay no attention to that. The hot names get the lead, but this post is mainly about our own Mr. Fortson, who turned in one of the greatest halves of college basketball in the history of the game on Thursday night. I'll also have a little something on the Matthews-Obama racism thing at the end.

Against Mississippi State in Arkansas, Courtney Fortson, who played his high school ball at Jeff Davis, dumped in 33 second-half points and led the Razorbacks to a come-from-behind win over the Bulldogs, who were leading the West Division coming in. For the game, Fortson had 35 points on 9-of-17 shooting from the field and 14-of-18 from the free throw line.

I'll go ahead now and ask the question that's on your mind: We couldn't use this guy at Auburn/Alabama?

The answer: Yes, you could have. But it would've taken work, and neither the Tide nor Tigers put in the same effort that Arkansas did. The Razorbacks recruited Fortson in high school and never backed away from him, even when grade issues popped up and a trip to junior college became a necessity. As far as I know -- and I asked Fortson about this during his senior year -- only Arkansas, Cincinnatti and Alabama State stayed with him all the way. Maybe there were others, but those were three teams who he felt had a shot and who never backed off.

Of course, we shouldn't overplay this, either. The guy was lighting up the scoreboard last tonight, but he was also suspended for a few games and hasn't exactly been the model teammate at Arkansas. I mean, we're not talking Wall, Bledsoe or Cousins here. But he is a guy Auburn or Alabama could have used. I mean, he wouldn't help Auburn as much as any guy over 6-foot-6 would, but hey, who could?

Anyway, congrats to Mr. Fortson. Nice to see a local guy do well.


Now, for the Matthews-Obama uproar.

This is stupid. In case you don't know what's going down, following last night's State of the Union address, Chris Matthews, who is one of the talking heads for one of the endless number of network news shows that tell us what we should think and why, said he had forgotten during the speech that President Obama was black. Obviously, Matthews, who is a big Obama supporter, apparently meant it as praise -- implying that Obama's presidency has helped some, including Matthews, I guess, take a significant stride forward when it comes to race relations.

Unfortunately, the comment wasn't exactly viewed as a positive by many people.

Several black leaders have criticized Matthews for inadvertently treating being black as if it's some sort of disability. Basically, they say the goal isn't to make anyone forget they're black, it's to eliminate the discrimination that comes because they are.

Two things here.

1. If we're ever going to get to a point in this country where race is truly no big deal, everyone has to stop making every little incident or statement a big deal.

2. White people, please stop trying to tell black people that everything's OK now and the dream has been achieved.

That's all, folks.

phot cred: University of Arkansas, AP