You have to love Sam Amick for going out and asking the one guy we wanted to hear from regarding Josh Howard's little video guestspot. Ron Artest. Amick emailed the man some call Crazy Pills and asked him what he thought of the situation. Here's Artest's reply, courtesy of the Sacramento Bee.
"I think josh howards comment is a reflection on education. I think the schools need to teach deeper in the history classes and make the students aware of racism but also teach them that all people are not bad. "I can relate to not feeling wanted by my own country at times but as I dug deeper I realized that America is divided and we need leaders to bring America closer together. An example where I felt unwanted by my country was when I didn't get a chance to tryout for my national team. I believed it was because my history.
I hope he overcomes this.
Family 1st"
Okay, outside of the random "Family 1st" at the end, Artest actually offers some valuable insight here, outlining the gap between cultures regarding education and how it affects the perception of young people. Sure, he still takes time to point out that he's unhappy about not being chosen for Team USA (which could have been disastrous), but all in all, he seems like the voice of reason in a suddenly very unreasonable world on both sides of the argument over a 1 minute clip on a leaked video from July. Josh, none of the FanHouse crew are grabbing pitchforks over this little blip on the cultural screen, but when Ron Artest is the one we turn to make sense of a situation? That's not a good sign, buddy.
