Unless you've been living under a rock for the past several days, by now you are very well aware of the controversy surrounding Melania Trump's plagiarism of Michelle Obama's 2008 DNC speech.

From Trump himself and like-minded individuals I've seen comments about how liberals are blowing "a few lines of a speech" way out of proportion and are turning a blind eye to Hillary's email scandal. I do concede that party loyalists will often defend their candidate at all costs, which is why I am proudly an independent voter. But Hillary's email scandal is a symptom of a larger disease in the political system that we've consciously been aware of--and done nothing about--for years. As long as we allow big money to puppeteer our politicians, big-shots like Hillary Clinton and all other representatives who participate in such a system will get off scot-free, while Average Joe from Tennessee could face prison time. Truth is, Hillary Clintons have been around since this country was founded.

But the fact that Melania Trump stole words and phrases, however, unacceptable in and of itself, is a symptom of the much larger disease black people have been screaming about for centuries. That is, as my one of my good friends points out, black features are great--just not on black people.

Regardless of where you stand on the Obamas, you have to come to a consensus that what Melania and her speechwriter did was wrong. Stop telling us that Melania "looks better" than Michelle so that's all that matters. Stop licking those old Obama-And-His-Teleprompter 2.0 wounds.

Not every criticism of President Obama is unfounded. Anyone can have a legitimate, substantive complaint regarding Obama's economic, social and foreign policy--no president is exempt from that. But the overall reaction to Obama's presidency has had a distinct, extralimital racial layer that has transcended the valley of reason and forced many of us to vehemently defend him in that regard.

For years we heard that Obama's acceptance to Harvard and subsequent rise to the politics were the result of Affirmative Action rather than by hard work. For years black people have heard our leaders and peers tell us to stop claiming entitlement and pull ourselves up "by our bootstraps." But when we actually pull ourselves up, bitter attitudes rife with resentment taint the effect of our personal success and dismiss our achievements as statistical noise. It's no wonder that congressman Steve King can't think of a single contribution that minorities have made to civilization. Black and brown genius has often been rediscovered, reinvented, and reintroduced to the public as a totally unrecognizable, gentrified genius.

For years we were told that Michelle Obama, although she obtained two degrees and had a successful run as an attorney and, eventually, as the First Lady, is actually a classless "tranny" who also looks like a monkey and has no respect for family values. Naturally, people of this mindset would classify Melania Trump, a former supermodel who has some non-family-friendly photos in her repertoire, as the epitome of class, femininity, and family values. Of course, the history of the black woman's portrayal is one of a hypersexualization and hypermasculinity. She can never "aspire" to the pedestal of virginal femininity. From the "mammy" figure to big-boned, attitude-ridden television characters, black womanhood has been trivialized and appropriated for audience enjoyment.

For years we've heard that Obama's presidency is the reason why America will never vote for another black president, presupposing that this country actually belongs to white men and that they just leased it to Obama to see if he could handle the reins. Forget about the fact that we're supposed to be a melting pot and that we are all Americans, no matter what background. No one has ever said that Jackson's "Indian Removal," Nixon's "Watergate" or Bill Clinton's Lewinsky scandal means that America will never vote for another white president. The amount of melanin in a candidate's skin has no relation to their electability.

I could go on, but these arbitrary standards by which we judge the Obamas have got to stop. Being consistent means sticking to your principles no matter who is in charge. Right is right and wrong is wrong, no matter if the person has a (D) or an (R) by their names. In 2016, it's time to take up the cause of reason and rationality, not racism and reaction.