Madison Park

In early 2009, the Obama administration made a surprising, probably unprecedented accusation against Westchester County, New York—a pretty liberal place. According to the Obama administration, Westchester was an instrument of white supremacy — not the good liberals who live in Westchester, Bill and Hillary Clinton and Alexandria Ocasio Cortez, many others. No one accused them of being bigots. The problem was the buildings they lived in. All those single-family homes — row upon leafy row, set back from the street, well-tended lawns and mailboxes — were examples of racism — literally "structural racism." The only solution, the Obama people announced, was much greater density: more subsidized housing complexes in Westchester, more hi-rise apartment buildings, maybe some drug-addicted vagrants living on the sidewalk, begging for change. Only if Westchester became more like the Bronx could it become non-racist.