Stedman's Gonna Open a Can of Whoopass on Some Frenchmen...

From the AP...

Whether Oprah Winfrey was turned away from a bit of after-hours shopping in Paris because of a racist employee or a special event, news of the confrontation outside a luxury store has evoked empathy and anger from many American minorities who say they are routinely treated poorly — and sometimes with outright suspicion — by sales staffs in this country.

The incident occurred when Winfrey stopped by Hermes on June 14 to buy a watch minutes after the boutique closed. Though she and three friends said they saw shoppers inside, neither a sales clerk nor manager would let them in.

Winfrey believes the store’s staff had identified her, according to a spokeswoman from Harpo Production Inc., her company. Winfrey’s friend, Gayle King, who was there, told Entertainment Tonight, “Oprah describes it as ’one of the most humiliating moments of her life.”’ Harpo says Winfrey plans to discuss the incident in the context of race relations on her show this fall.

Hermes said in a statement it “regrets not having been able to welcome” Winfrey to the store, but that “a private public relations event was being prepared inside.”

Winfrey has often plugged Hermes products — a $135 tea cup and saucer was featured in her magazine in 2001 and was still on her Web site Tuesday, along with the company’s phone number. But she has said she will no longer be shopping in its stores.

So let me get this straight...Oprah tries to go into a store a few minutes after it has closed. There are customers already inside. (Have you ever tried to kick customers out right at closing? Yeah, not fun.) But because the store didn't let her in after the store closed, it is automatically a racist act?

Now I am not saying she's right or wrong, because, well, I wasn't there. But if you go strictly by what the article says, it is somewhat of a stretch to throw the race card around so loosely. So this is either really shoddy journalism, or Oprah's making quite the judgmental quantum leap here.

Besides, the sympathy factor is rather nil for someone who is making ten blagillion dollars more than me. Yes, blagillion is really a number*.

Until next time...
Dan

*Blagillion is not really a number.