White Man's Burden: 21st Century Style

In 1899 Rudyard Kipling penned his classic poem warning about the burdens taken up by American intervention in the Philippines ("The White Man's Burden").  Now there is a 21st century version, which author Shelby Steele calls white guilt and the American past.  Steele says that America is paralyzed by the prime cultural event of the postwar period: the destruction of white skin as a source of moral authority.  In its place is limitless white guilt that ties the hands of our military and political leaders, and emboldens our adversaries.  We fail not because we lack the power to win, but because we lack the will.  This is a superb column.