An old and ongoing part of American society

So, yeah, I'm taking this entire bullet from Fred's most recent linkfest. Because it's telling as well as appalling.

The Flood Christian Church isn’t near where any of the rioting in Ferguson, Missouri, took place last week — but it was deliberately torched last Monday night and burned to the ground, “the glass storefronts on each side remain unscathed.” That’s the African American church Michael Brown’s family attends. Burning down black churches is an old and ongoing part of American society. Perhaps you remember President Clinton’s National Church Arson Task Force, an effort that was credited with reducing the number of such black-church burnings down to 670 over a three-year period in the late 1990s.

Ponder that for a moment: 670 in three years — a dozen incidents a week (sic)*. Now imagine a single story of a single white church burned down because its congregation was white. We’d all know the name of that one church, and we’d never stop hearing about this momentous, monstrous tragedy.

Todd Starnes makes a living fabricating indignities suffered by white Christians and promoting a narrative of “persecution,” but when a black Christian pastor receives 71 death threats and sees his church burned to the ground, Starnes’ et. al. don’t seem to care. Interesting.

"Interesting" is one word for it, all right.

* edited to add: Since I tend to read over stats like that, I didn't even notice (though Barry did): 670 in 3 years is not 12 a week. It's 4.29 a week (still a horrible number). So I clicked through to the report, and that's not really accurate. The report says "The NCATF has opened investigations into 670 arsons, bombings or attempted bombings that have occurred at houses of worship between January 1, 1995 and September 8, 1998." So it's actually 3.54/week (again, a horrible number). But then again, that's only the ones they investigated; arsons and/or bombings that weren't reported aren't in that number.

Still, the dozen a week is wrong. Looks like he forgot to multiply by 3 - the number would have been right for 670 in one year.

But the basic message is still the same. 4-5 churches burned or bombed every week is not a good thing just because it's better than 12...