Didja hear the one about the black friends who got all perturbed because they had to sit next to David Duke on a Greyhound? How about the black welfare queen who was upset over the size of her check? Or the joke about the black couple arguing over who was the real father of their kids?

You think saying such things isn't funny, that they're racist, that they should be condemned by the mainstream media, and the home of whoever articulated such insensitive remarks should be picketed by Al Sharpton? If so, you're right because they are racist.

However, if someone spouts comparable venom on network television, they're applauded€"as long as the butt of the jokes are white people.

Former NBA star Charles Barkley hosted €SNL€ last Saturday and appeared in a sketch titled, €White People Problems.€

According to Barkley and the €Saturday Night Live€ writers, the €problems€ of white people consist of friends irritated because they weren't seated together on an airline, €a caucasian crisis€ occurred when an annoying white customer at Arbys questioned the clerk as to whether Arbys' chickens are raised on organic farms, and when a nasty white couple was confronted with the dilemma of disinviting friends from their 5-bedroom summer home.

Interspersed throughout the skit are a shot of €nursery school applications,€ Barkley's comment that the airline couple's issue is just €white noise,€ his dismissing the Arbys' incident as €awkward . . . a white people word that can be applied to every situation,€ and blowing off the disinviters with, €That problem is so white it should go snowboarding.€

See the 3:45 skit here http://bit.ly/x72k4f.

€SNL€ has often treaded over the edge of decency and taste but €White People Problems€ was, of course, simply meant as a satirical swipe at shallow white superficiality and insensitivity.

Nothing wrong with that, right? And Barkley's swipes were evidently enjoyed by the mostly-white audience which erupted in uproarious laughter with each lame crack.

Try using similar witticisms aimed at African-Americans and the wit would be banished to the same Land of Ostracism where €Seinfeld's€ Cosmo Kramer, aka Michael Richards, found himself after erupting against a black heckler.

Racism is pernicious whether employed against whites against blacks or by blacks against whites. The chief difference in America today and in the entertainment world is that black racism is acceptable but white racism is not.

I guess black racism is funnier to some people but it isn't to all people. Maybe that's what Barack Hussein Obama meant when he referred to €a racial stalemate€?