olivant,

I suppose one reason for that could be that black Americans are not too many generations removed from ancestors that were slaves in this country. Slaves were punished for reading, learning. Forgoing intellectualism and sharpening physical prowess among other blacks had been a necessity of survival for blacks in America for hundreds of years. Again, not a choice, but a necessity for survival. Black slaves were punished for showing signs of intelligence. Slavery only ended about 150 years ago. I'm not sure how many races of people historically in civilizations have completely changed their culture in that amount of time, especially when you consider black people didn't even have the same civil rights as white people on paper until about 50 years ago.

America is tough on black people. Harsh. Black people are given a higher bar than any other race. A black person accomplishes anything, a lot of Americans think they were given a leg up due to "political correctness", "white guilt", "affirmative action", even when the first black president was elected. Obama's vision and temperament were far better than those of his opponents. Sarah Palin's family was a walking episode of the Jerry Springer show during the campaign and somehow people even thought she was more qualified to be president than Obama, based on what, I have no idea. Oh, wait, I do...