Recently, when appearing on 'AC 360' to discuss the firing of Shirley Sherrod from the United States Department of Agriculture, I found myself confused. My daughter, standing in the other room watching, asked me why Sherrod was fired from her job. I explained to her that there was an allegation that she made racially discriminatory remarks toward whites and that she was also accused of not helping a family as much as she could have.

"Well, she should have been fired then," my daughter said. "It's wrong to be racist." I then explained to my little girl that none of the allegations were true, that the video-taped evidence against Sherrod had been fabricated, and that the family she was accused of discriminating against actually thanked her for saving their farm. "Oh, then she got her job back, right," my daughter stated, not even presenting her statement as a question. "I mean, our president is black, so he took care of it, right?"


"Actually no. The politicians don't like admitting when they're wrong and she has almost no power to fight them back," I then had to explain.

As I mentioned on the show last night (NAACP President Ben Jealous was on a few minutes earlier), I am absolutely befuddled about why Sherrod has not been reinstated to her position with the USDA. Not only should she be given her job back, she should be compensated by the government for the fact that her long and productive career has been so irresponsibly slandered.


What was most shocking about Sherrod's forced resignation was that she wasn't even given a chance to reflect on her decision. During a three-and-a-half hour car ride, she was asked to pull over to the side of the road and text her resignation letter on her Blackberry. The White House and the USDA didn't conduct an investigation of the video before deciding to squeeze the trigger on this woman's 40-year professional career. Instead, it took a leap before even looking.

Perhaps Bill Cosby and Michael Eric Dyson have the best words to describe this situation: "Come on, people." This significant display of incompetence is ridiculous. I hope Sherrod is given justice, whether it is through the Obama administration or through the courts. Either way, this woman deserves to be compensated, rewarded and honored for her illustrious career. To continue to punish a woman in her sixties for something she did not do is simply wrong.

If President Obama was willing to speak up on behalf of Henry Louis Gates last year over a minor dispute with a police officer, I am certainly hopeful he will be willing to speak up behind closed doors for a woman who lost her entire career. Failing to speak would reinforce Sherrod's message that the elite and wealthy serve themselves a double standard that the rest of America is not afforded. It also sends a message that government officials choose to allow extremists who fabricate video evidence to make their personnel decisions for them. The liars are being allowed to manipulate our reality.

UPDATE: Breitbart-Smeared Shirley Sherrod Not Sure She'd Take Her Job Back, From Gawker.com:

"I am just not sure how I would be treated there," Shirley Sherrod said in a nationally broadcast interview. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said Wednesday he would reconsider the department's decision to oust Sherrod over her comments that she didn't give a white farmer as much help as she could have 24 years ago.

She said later in a broadcast interview that she might consider returning if she had the chance, saying she's received encouraging calls, including one from the NAACP.

Dr. Boyce Watkins is the founder of the Your Black World Coalition and a Scholarship in Action resident of the Institute for Black Public Policy. To have Dr. Boyce's commentary delivered to your e-mail, please click here.