No matter who wins Congress, Obama loses
Voters
go to the polls today, and by nightfall the final judgment of President
Obama will have been rendered. And that judgment will likely not be
pretty.
In a fascinating piece by Dave Boyer of the Moonie-owned, right-wing Washington Times this
morning, the dreary litany of broken promises and frustrated hopes of
the Obama administration are delineated. Boyer cites everything from
Obama's failure to close the Guantanamo gulag, to his putting off of
“immigration reform” until after today's election, to the disastrous
health-care roll out, to his Justice Department's refusal to go after
the Wall Street banksters and financiers for bankrupting the economy, to
his renewed imperial wars and confused response to the put-up Ebola
“crisis” – all, and more, explain why today is not a particularly good
day for the president.
Obama's continued low approval ratings, says Boyer, are explained by
these failures. His now-routine heckling by the assembled masses
indicates a disdain and tuning-out of his repeated platitudes and
bromides as to what really ails America and what he has done over the
last six-year period (or will do in his last two) about them. It's
painfully clear now that most people are simply not listening to (or
believing) this man anymore.
Indeed, he has become not simply irrelevant to anything people care
about. Obama is not just the lamest of lame ducks; he is perceived by many
as actually inimical to their concerns.
Interestingly, Boyer says the only reason Obama's numbers are not
even lower is because of his rock-hard support among his most faithful
base members – black people. Boyer shrugs that support off and implies
that it is solely based on black folks' identification with Obama as yet
another beleaguered brother who's been hamstrung by the “white power
structure.” The problem with that, of course, is that Obama represents
and promotes at every turn that white power structure – and to the
detriment of black people. Yes, most black people see clearly that
Obama's Republican and right-wing opposition and obstructionism are
based in a never-say-die racial animus. And many black people do
continue to rally to his side simply to spite that obvious, historical,
tired and time-worn pattern.
However, black people are probably more disappointed and frustrated
with Obama's performance than any other electoral block. Their continued
support of him is therefore a function of that history more than
anything he has done (or not done) to alleviate their always desperate
social, economic and political positioning at the bottom of every single
indicator.
Many black people are finally beginning to realize, for example, that in the unlikely event that the
Democrats took control of both houses of Congress, Obama would not do
anything of particular importance for them. On the contrary, he would immediately revert –
once again – to his original “bipartisan,” "Grand Bargain"-seeking stance, which he demonstrated
during his first two years in office when he, in fact, had both houses
(more or less, Blue Dog Democrats notwithstanding).
Republican control of both houses or even just one will give us more
of the same old, same old obstructionism we've witnessed over the last
four years. Nothing will continue to be done to aid the masses of people
who are practically begging for help.
So, has Obama's been a "failed" presidency? As far as most
progressives (of whatever color) are concerned, yes! But, as much as we
would like to believe otherwise, Obama was not elected to and never
really vowed to pick up the progressive gauntlet.
None of this, however, signals Obama as a weak leader – as
Republicans, conservatives, right-wingers and tea partiers would have
it. No. The man is doing precisely what he was selected to do: Maintain
the status quo.
Finally, as far as black people are concerned, Obama will be
remembered not for any transformational policies or programs, no
visionary ideas or ideals, no positive impact on our lives and life
chances.
He will simply -- and only -- be consigned to the history books as just another black first.
Ebola and white response
As
the Ebola virus has now been confirmed in at least one – and possibly
two – people within the US, let's take a closer look at how this disease
has been responded to in the global North and West versus its
origination point – West Africa.
Over the last six months, Ebola has killed over 3,000 people and
stricken thousands more, primarily in Liberia, Sierra Leone and Guinea.
Although this virus first appeared along the Ebola River in Uganda in
1976, all reputable medical professionals agree that it is spread only
through contact with bodily fluids of not simply an infected but a
symptomatic person. It cannot spread through the air or by simply
touching objects. The symptoms are pronounced and obvious. Fever,
fatigue and flu-like indicators are the three chief indicators of
possible Ebola infection, and may take take up to three weeks before
appearing. Thereafter, severe hemorrhaging from all body orifices
begins. Indeed, it is the massive blood loss which actually kills from
fifty to ninety percent of Ebola-infected individuals.
Until within the last few weeks, the response to Ebola in West Africa
by the West and global North had been one of indifference –
indifference to black life and suffering. President Obama has sent
troops – not doctors – to the area to assist in the building of or shoring up of medical facilities.
From the moment of this virus' first appearance in West Africa, clear
and consistent efforts to preserve white life, and indifference to
black life by the West/North have been glaring, stark, obvious and
blatant.
Indeed, it was only when two American white missionaries
contracted the disease that most white folks in North America even
became aware of the extent of the outbreak. That awareness was prompted
because the missionaries were given an experimental drug and flown out
of Liberia and back to the US. A third white American was flown to Nebraska for treatment. Latest reports indicate that yet a fourth white American – an NBC newsman – has been spirited out of Liberia and back to the US where he is reportedly doing well.
All the while, African doctors and aid workers were regularly dying
from the disease. In mid-September, when the fourth African doctor, Dr. Olivet Buck,
chief of the Lumley Health Center in Freetown, Sierra Leone, died of
the disease, it was revealed that the World Health Organization had
specifically refused to send her to Germany for treatment. Amazingly,
however, and at the very same time, two Dutch doctors stricken with
Ebola were flown home.
The first African doctor to die of the virus, Dr. Sheik Umar Khan, the chief Sierra Leonean physician treating Ebola, was also denied
the chance to receive the experimental drug by Doctors Without Borders.
This is the same drug given to the two white missionaries, and which
apparently saved their lives.
As to the US government's response (under its “first black
president”), it initially announced that a $22-million, 25-bed Ebola
hospital would be built, but only for foreign
(read: white) healthcare workers and patients. Fortunately, outrage
forced the the US to include African health workers. The point had been
made, however: The purpose of the white aid workers and their
governments was not to find a cure or even treat the increasing numbers
of Africans coming down with Ebola. Their principal purpose was to
contain and prevent the spread of this disease outside the continent of
Africa.
What we are witnessing is an age-old story when it comes to black
life and, indeed, this planet's second largest continent – Africa. Black
life has historically been disparaged, demeaned and deemed disposable
by the global North and West.
The image being fostered and nourished in the North/West is that this
is a specifically “black” disease endemic to Africa, and which is if
not caused by, it is at least exacerbated by “uncivilized” and black
cultural practices. In fact, one white media maven, Fox News' Andrea
Tantaros, has said it out loud: Black peoples' use of “witch doctors” has impeded the fight against this disease.
This picture of Africans and Africa as a disease-ridden people and
place began when the first European colonizers – as far back as the
1400s – mysteriously died in droves almost as soon as they got off their
ships in most African ports. Europeans soon learned not to venture into
the African interior for fear of certain death – usually from the bite
of the tste-tste fly and malaria-carrying mosquitoes.
For white folks,
therefore, Africa was, not only Jack London's “Dark Continent,” but a
hopelessly diseased continent as well. This characterization of black
people and their homeland (despite its untold wealth in both human and
natural resources) has persisted right into the present century and
informs white response to the current epidemiological crisis spreading
throughout West Africa.
We are also being subjected to the age-old myth of the “brave” and
“heroic” white saviors who risk their lives for African people. This
construction harkens back to Rudyard Kipling's “white man's burden” view
of the continent and feeds into what has lately been labeled as the “white savior industrial complex.”
Within this meme of black dependency upon white benevolence, however,
no mention is ever made of the many past and continuing evils
perpetrated by white explorers discoverers, conquerors, colonizers and
neo-colonizers across the whole continent of Africa.
As Teju Cole points out in describing the
white savior industrial complex, “It supports brutal policies…[where]
the banality of evil transmutes into the banality of sentimentality.”
And, in a recent interview, Dr. Joia Mukherjee, of Partners in
Health, pointed directly to the white racism behind the West’s Ebola
response by saying,
“I think it’s easy for the world — the powerful world, who are largely
non-African, non-people of color — to ignore the suffering of poor,
black people.”
But even as we watch the in many cases hysterical
response of growing numbers of white people to this epidemic, we must
understand that this response runs deeper than merely than a conscious
indifference to black suffering.
Writing in the BlackAgendaReport.com, Drs. Hudson and Pierre of the
Department of African American Studies at the UCLA, assert that “[This]
is about white supremacy’s desire for Black death and Black suffering.
It is about coming to terms with the fact that there is something
systematic – and sinister – about Black killing globally. It is about
the reality that in a universal context of anti-Blackness, Black lives
don’t matter – anywhere.”
Here's a list of other European (and white American) responses to date:
- Brussels. An African man with a nosebleed was reportedly rushed
from a shopping mall in July. The store he was in was thoroughly
sterilized before he tested negative for the virus.
- The United Kingdom, the body of a woman from the Gambia
who died after getting sick following a flight from the Gambia to
London, was sequestered until she was tested for Ebola. This despite the
fact that she had no symptoms or known contact with anyone with the
virus.
- Italy, some schools have sent out warnings to all students of
African origin that they must now submit additional health certificates
prior to starting school. No such requests were made of white children, a
significant number of whom, had been to Africa on summer vacations.
- In Voecklabruck, Austria two asymptomatic Nigerian men who had
just traveled from Nigeria last month, were suspected of carrying Ebola.
They isolated before being released after testing negative for the
virus.
- A black woman from Africa collapsed at a business meeting in
Berlin recently. German police dispatched more than 60 police officers
and firefighters to lock down the building, isolating some 600 people
who worked there. The woman, who lives in Berlin and who was rumored to
have just returned from Africa a week earlier, along with two others who
had come to her aid when she collapsed, were rushed to an isolation
ward at Berlin’s Charité Hospital. No one was allowed in or out of the
building as armed police stood guard. In the end, she only had a stomach
virus. She had not set foot in any of the West African nations affected
by the Ebola outbreak. She had, in fact, been in Kenya, a distance of
over 3,200 miles from Liberia, “ground zero” of the epidemic. No, it was
her African-ness, her blackness, which sparked the frenzy.
- And then there was Air France's head of the airline’s union
Patrick Henry-Haye. He wrote a petition to his employers begging them to
stop all airline travel to West African countries affected by the Ebola
virus outbreak. That petition set off a frenzy among air travelers.
More than 700 Air France crew members, including pilots, have signed the
petition. “They say we are trained to spot Ebola,” he told Le Figaro.
“That’s false. We’re not trained to do anything other than put on
rubber gloves and surgical masks and lock suspected patients in the
lavatories. That’s not enough.”
- As things stand now, Air France is the only major European
airline still flying directly to the Ebola-affected West African cities
of Conakry, Guinea, and Freetown, Sierra Leone. Thus, these continuing
flights have amped up concern that the epidemic will land in Europe through Air France's hub in Paris. (For its part, American carrier Delta suspended flights to Monrovia back on August 31.)
- And in the US, with significant help from mainly right-wing
media, Liberians in Texas (and Africans nationwide) are reporting
increased surveillance and harassment by both authorities and “ordinary”
white citizens.
Still, only one person is known to have died
in all of Europe from Ebola. That was Father Miguel Pajares, a
75-year-old Catholic priest who had been ministering to Ebola-stricken
Liberians in the capital Monrovia. He, like his fellow white helpers,
was evacuated to Madrid on August 7 and died August 12, despite being
given the experimental drug Zmapp.
Thus, Europeans' fears of Ebola spreading among them has intensified
exponentially. However, rational health officials are attempting to
head-off an out-and-out panic: “We need to be prudent without being
paranoid,” Italy’s health minister, Beatrice Lorenzin, last month. Her
statement followed an Internet rumor that there were three cases of
Ebola on the Sicilian island of Lampedusa, where many refugees and
illegal migrants arrive from North Africa. “It is not fair to assume all
black people are potential Ebola carriers. That is blatant racism,” she
said.
References
http://time.com/3452341/dallas-ebola-texas-ground-zero/
http://www.usatoday.com/news/
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/01/health/airline-passenger-with-ebola-is-under-treatment-in-dallas.html?_r=0
http://www.wfaa.com/story/news/health/2014/09/29/dallas-presbyterian-hospital-ebola-patient-isolation/16460629/
http://www.blackagendareport.com/
http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2014/08/20/ebola-fueled-racism-is-on-the-rise-in-europe.html
http://www.pri.org/stories/2014-09-15/american-doctor-says-racism-blame-slow-response-ebola-outbreak
http://www.humanosphere.org/human-rights/2014/08/newsweeks-racist-misinformed-ebola-cover-story/
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/monkey-cage/wp/2014/08/25/othering-ebola-and-the-history-and-politics-of-pointing-at-immigrants-as-potential-disease-vectors/
http://www.internationalviewpoint.org/spip.php?article3565
http://www.internationalviewpoint.org/spip.php?article3565
Ferguson Officer Wilson a no-show in separate drug case claiming excessive force
Ferguson
police officer Darren Wilson, the selfsame Officer Wilson who
unceremoniously shot down and killed unarmed 18-year-old Michael Brown
this year, did not show up for a scheduled court appearance in a
separate incident this week.
It was an illegal drug case in which
Wilson was the arresting officer last February.
In fact, all half-dozen of Wilson's cases wherein he is the arresting
or investigating officer have been placed on hold – except for the drug
case against one Christopher Brooks (pictured above courtesy of USA
Today).
This particular case seems to have slipped through the legal
cracks. Indeed, a grand jury (separate from the Michael Brown grand
jury) has been tasked to review the case against Christoper Brooks.
As per USA Today, a judge approved a request by prosecutors Monday to
refer Brooks' case to a St. Louis County grand jury. However, Ed Magee,
a spokesman for Prosecuting Attorney Robert McCulloch (the same
prosecutor “prosecuting” the case against Wilson in the Brown matter)
later said that the Brooks case (as well as all cases involving Wilson) is "on hold" until the Brown matter is resolved.
Interestingly, Magee called this grand jury referral and delay of
pending cases involving Wilson “standard procedure." That is, when
police officers are not immediately available to testify in court, they
are given an automatic, no-questions-asked, benefit of doubt
because...well...just because.
This is particularly interesting because when defendants are “not available” or fail to show up in court -- for whatever reason
-- their cases are never deferred, delayed or put “on hold.” Warrants
for their arrest on sight are immediately issued; and when found, they
are placed firmly behind bars – and without bail until a judge deigns to
grant them a hearing. That indeed is what would have happened to
Christoper Brooks had he not been in court for his preliminary hearing, doncha know.
As for the instant case, Christopher Brooks' attorney Nick Zotos
alleges that award-winning Officer Wilson "roughed up" his client when
Brooks refused to hand over the keys to a locked car parked in his
grandmother's driveway. After the “roughing up” of Brooks and the
forcible taking of his keys, Wilson and his fellow officers say that
they found drug paraphernalia and several ounces of marijuana in the
vehicle.
Zotos wants the charges against his client dismissed for two reasons:
1) The arresting officer did not show up in court for the preliminary
hearing which is where the charges are made and the judge determines
their validity; and 2): "Wilson is compromised as a witness," said
Zotos.
That's putting it mildly. It may the understatement of the year.
Apparently, it was the judge who moved the case to the grand jury, a
motion opposed the by McCulloch's office. And, it is not clear whether
Brooks made the allegation against Wilson before or after Brown was
killed.
As has been widely reported, Officer Wilson was given a police award
last year. But, did you know that that award was proffered for his
actions in this very case – the one wherein he now refuses to appear in
court?
James P. Towey is general counsel for the Missouri Fraternal Order of
Police and a former general counsel for the St. Louis Police Officers
Association. As such, he may be considered an apologist...er
advocate...for all police and especially for Wilson during this
“difficult” period. Towey allows, for example, that Wilson may be
willing to publicly discuss this, the Brown, and any other case in the
future.
Obviously, however, if Wilson is ever charged, let alone
convicted, of any wrongdoing in any of his pending cases, I'm betting
that he will remain closed-mouth. And, of course, Towey would not reveal
the whereabouts of Wilson, who has remained in hiding since his
shooting to death of Michael Brown last August 9.
As to Wilson's award, Zotos was not impressed:
"We give trophies every day for just showing up," he said after the
brief hearing in St. Louis Circuit Court. "If you play on the team, you
get a trophy."
As indicated, the judge in the Brooks case, together with the county
prosecutor's acquiescence, agreed to move the Brooks drug matter to the
grand jury.
The real question is why. Why must this award-winning cop now
suddenly be shielded from public scrutiny? Think about it. There are now
two grand juries sitting in judgment of this one Ferguson police
officer. The secrecy of grand jury proceedings means that Wilson will
not have to testify in “open” court; that his testimony will never have
to be revealed; that the case against him will never have to be made
public.
Obviously and clearly, the fix is in for Officer Darren Wilson. He is
in an undisclosed location, still getting paid, still empowered with
badge and gun and authority. Both of these grand juries, will come back –
whenever they decide to come back – with verdicts of “no bill” – no
wrongdoing in either case against Officer Darren Wilson.
References
http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/darren-wilson-ferguson-police-officer-no-show-for-court-testimony-1.2782152
http://gawker.com/darren-wilson-no-show-threatens-to-derail-year-old-drug-1640793206
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/09/30/cases-involving-ferguson-police-officer-on-hold/16466333/?utm_source=feedblitz&utm_medium=FeedBlitzRss&utm_campaign=usatoday-newstopstories
http://blacklikemoi.com/2014/09/darren-wilson-show-court-hes-accused-manhandling-suspect/
Category
GOP rep. tells army generals to resign en masse in protest of Obama's foreign policy
A sitting member of congress, a Republican, has taken his dislike and
disagreement with all things Obama to an entirely different, and very
likely treasonous, level.
According to the Colorado Independent newspaper, US Rep. Doug Lamborn
(R-Colo.) told a secret meeting of Army generals that it is their duty
to resign en masse in order to not just protest but to derail President
Obama's military moves in the Middle East. His remarks came just as
US-led air strikes continued Friday near the Syrian border with Iraq.
Lamborn,
who is running for reelection against a retired Air Force General, told
a group of voters of his prior meeting with the generals – and he
allowed that he was not the only Republican congress-creature who
advocated mass resignations by Army generals:
“A lot of us," he said last Tuesday, "are talking to
the generals behind the scenes, saying, ‘Hey, if you disagree with the
policy that the White House has given you, let’s have a resignation.’”
(Emphasis added).
And, to make a mass walk-out by Army leaders attractive, he assured
the generals that if and when they resigned – as a unified group – they
would be seen by real Americans as true American heroes, and “go out in a blaze of glory.”
Even more interesting (and frightening) is that Lamborn is a member
of the House Armed Services Committee. Throughout his eight years in
Congress, Lamborn has remained pretty much a “back bencher,” never
attracting any real attention to himself beyond one doomed legislative
proposal: the championing a House-approved measure to defund National Public Radio.
The Independent suggests that this congressman could not possibly be
serious about urging mass defections among the army's general staff. It
seems to think that this may just be a publicity stunt geared to
energize his flagging reelection campaign.
I, however, believe he is serious, and reflects the views of
not just a number of fellow GOP congressmen and women, but their far
right constituencies as well. Indeed, as a member of the House Armed
Services Committee, there is little doubt that he regularly meets
“behind the scenes” in “executive” or classified sessions, with military
generals. In these meetings, it is quite possible, if not probable,
that he and other Republicans suggest and explore all manner of ways and
means to undermine Obama – including resignations to disrupt Obama-led
foreign policy during a war.
In past administrations, when a member of Congress disagreed with a
president’s foreign policy, he or she usually made passionate speeches
against the policy and/or introduced or supported legislation limiting
or defunding the particular policy with which they disagreed. Not so
with this current group of Obama-haters. The "normal" and "usual" ways
of expressing disagreement with this president have long ago gone
by the boards -- if civil discourse and disagreement by conservatives
and Republicans were ever in place at all vis-a-vis President Obama.
Private meetings with generals in the midst of a war and calling upon
them to “go out in a blaze of glory,” is patently, obviously treasonous
and this congressman and/or the generals who heed his advice should so
be charged.
As stated, Lamborn is up for re-election against retired Air Force
Gen. Irv Halter (D). Halter agrees that Lamborn is way "out of bounds"
with this call for mass defection. He told the Independent that,
“Our elected officials should not be encouraging our military leaders
to resign when they have a disagreement over policy. Congressman
Lamborn’s statement shows his immaturity and lack of understanding of
the American armed forces. Someone who serves on the House Armed
Services Committee should know better.”
Commentary
This move by Rep. Lamborn demonstrates once again the depth of the
outright hatred of President Obama by so-called conservatives generally,
the right wing, and most Republicans particularly.
It seems that these people would rather see the entire country fail
rather than allow any “success” whatsoever by Obama's administration.
The call for army generals to resign in protest is only therefore one
step removed from calling upon rank and file soldiers to desert their
posts.
Yet, this is what Lamborn's “call to arms” really means.
A follow-up step would logically be for these selfsame generals and
deserting soldiers to turn their weapons on the White House itself.
Amazing.
A video of Lamborn's remarks may be viewed here.
References
http://www.msnbc.com/rachel-maddow-show/gop-rep-urges-us-generals-behind-the-scenes-resign
http://www.krdo.com/news/lambron-under-fire-for-controversial-comments-on-obamas-military-policies/28290324
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/tag/doug-lamborn/
Category
Another white cop shoots unarmed black man -- this time for following orders (Video)
On Wednesday, South Carolina state trooper Sean Groubert, 31, was
arrested and charged with assault and battery of a high and aggravated
nature after his dashboard camera surfaced and showed the unnecessary,
unwarranted, and presumably illegal attack.
The video clearly shows Groubert firing at Levar
Jones, a black motorist, at point-blank range as Jones reached into his
vehicle to retrieve his driver's license – at Groubert's request.
After the shooting stops, Groubert is heard telling Jones that he “stopped” him because of a seat belt violation.
The dirty details:
Jones pulls his white SUV into a Shell gas station/convenience store.
His vehicle was completely stopped. He removed his seat belt and exited
the vehicle.
Groubert pulls up on him and asks, “Can I see your license please?”
Jones then turns back toward the still open door to get his license from the vehicle.
Groubert in a panic and rage immediately begins screaming, “Get out
of the car! Get out of the car!” and begins shooting at the unarmed
Jones. Jones had just left his job. He turns and faces this policeman,
throws his hands high into the air with his right hand holding onto his
wallet.
But the officer continues to fire upon him even while his hands are up.
Amazingly – and thankfully – of the total of four shots only one hit Jones in the hip, and his injury is not life-threatening.
Commentary
A recent study has shown that a black man is killed by white police officers, “security” agents, or white vigilante types every 28 hours.
For those many, many white people – “conservative,” liberal,
libertarian, or of any other political persuasion – who insist that
“Driving While Black” (DWB) springs from black folks' mass paranoia, or a
trigger-happy penchant to play the so-called “race card,” this story
with its undeniable video should convince even the most ardent white
supremacists that DWB is a real and present danger each and every time a
black person turns the ignition in his or her vehicle.
This time, however, because of (and only because of) the video evidence, it appears that at
least a modicum of “justice” may will out. This cop is actually facing
criminal charges for his actions and, indeed, has already been fired.
According to The State, former officer Groubert could get 20 years in prison upon conviction.
Look carefully at this footage. Listen carefully as well. Jones
repeatedly asks this cop why he shot him. Finally, Groubert says he
stopped him for not wearing his seat belt.
The video shows that Groubert actually passed Jones, backed up, and then approached him.
After being shot, the cop orders Jones to the ground, hands behind
his back. Jones is still trying to figure out why this is happening.
“Why did you shoot me?” he asks. “Sir, I was just doing what you
asked....getting my license.”
The cop finally says he shot Jones because he reached head first into
his car after what he just knew was a gun. He is heard saying as much
just before he fires at Jones who has his back turned to the officer.
Jones, befuddled and injured, says, “I'm sorry.”
The cop never once apologizes for shooting him.
Every 28 hours.
This shocking (and graphic) video may be seen here.
References
http://www.brothersonsports.com/shocking-video-of-south-carolina-cop-shooting-black-man-for-following-instructions/#prettyPhoto
http://abcnews.go.com/US/dashcam-captures-south-carolina-trooper-shooting-unarmed-man/story?id=25749239
http://www.foxnews.com/us/2014/09/25/sc-trooper-faces-felony-assault-charge-after-shooting-unarmed-man-during/
http://www.wltx.com/story/news/local/2014/09/24/video-released-released-of-trooper-involved-shooting/16187305/
http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/09/24/ex-trooper-who-shot-unarmed-man-faces-charges/16178961/
http://www.alternet.org/news-amp-politics/1-black-man-killed-every-28-hours-police-or-vigilantes-america-perpetually-war-its
Current Events
23-year-old Hillary's letter to Chicago 'radical' Saul Alinsky reveals search for truth
As Hillary Clinton gears up for another expected run for the White
House, a previously unpublished 1971 letter between the erstwhile
Secretary of State, US Senator, First Lady and the late leftist and
Chicago-based “community organizer” Saul Alinsky has been published.
The Washington Free Beacon posted a 1971 letter
from the then 23-year-old law school graduate revealing her
still-forming ideological bent and shedding considerable light, with
20-20 hindsight, on Hillary's future intellectual development.
“Dear Saul,” the letter begins. “When is that new book [Rules for
Radicals] coming out—or has it come and I somehow missed the fulfillment
of Revelation?”
“Rules” was (and still is among many former, current and upcoming
“radicals") considered the bible for those who are determined to effect
radical change in this nation-state.
The future New York senator continued:
“I have just had my one-thousandth conversation about Reveille [for
Radicals – Alinsky's prior tome] and need some new material to throw at
people.”
Alinsky’s widely read 1946 practical and theoretical guidebook on the
ways and means of effective (results-oriented) community organizing
became a staple among and required reading for those in the 1960s who
protested America's war against Vietnam, demanded civil and human
rights, Black Power and women's rights. (The Gay Liberation Movement was
in its infancy at the time).
Future First Lady Clinton's '71 letter to Alinsky acknowledged and
thanked him for his work in bringing anti-war and human rights movements
to the "mainstream" of American political discourse -- and for his
profound effects in helping focus her personal world view:
“If I never thanked you for the encouraging words of last spring in
the midst of the Yale-Cambodia madness, I do so now,” wrote Clinton. At
the time, she had just played the role of “moderator” during a Yale
University student election as to whether that campus should join other
campuses which were calling for a nationwide anti-Vietnam War student
strike. She had just graduated and moved to California.
“I am living in Berkeley and working in Oakland for the summer and
would love to see you,” Clinton wrote. “Let me know if there is any
chance of our getting together.”
As to her law school experience, Clinton told Alinsky that she had
“survived law school, slightly bruised, with my belief in and zest for
organizing intact.”
“The more I’ve seen of places like Yale Law
School and the people who haunt them," Clinton wrote, "the more
convinced I am that we have the serious business and joy of much work
ahead, — if the commitment to a free and open society is ever going to
mean more than eloquence and frustration."
The former Republican and “Goldwater Girl” had first met Alinsky as a student at Wellesley in1969.
Alinsky's “Reveille” encouraged community organizers to "fan the
latent hostilities" of poor whites, blacks and browns of the ghettoized
cities while "search[ing] out controversy and issues, rather than avoid
them."
The book Clinton was so eagarly anticipating urged organizers to
"Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it," Alinsky
wrote.
In an indication that she is not and never has been the total
and unrepentant "radical" which today's right loves to aver, she
presciently added this little gem to her l971 letter to Alinsky:
"Hopefully we can have a good argument sometime in the future."
Alinsky's secretary, Georgia Harper, responded
to Clinton's letter telling her that the boss was away on a six-week
trip to Southeast Asia, but that she had taken the liberty to read
Clinton's letter anyway.
“Since I know his feelings about you I took the
liberty of opening your letter because I didn’t want something urgent
to wait for two weeks,” Harper wrote in the July 13, 1971, response.
“And I’m glad I did.”
“Mr. Alinsky will be in San Francisco, staying
at the Hilton Inn at the airport on Monday and Tuesday, July 26 and 27,”
Harper added. “I know he would like to have you call him so that if
there is a chance in his schedule maybe you can get together.”
Interestingly, according to Clinton's 2004
memoir, "Living History," Alinsky had offered her a job after she
finished at Wellesley, but she turned him down in favor of an Ivy League
legal education.
“He offered me the chance to work with him when
I graduated from college, and he was disappointed that I decided
instead to go to law school,” she wrote. “[He] said I would be wasting
my time, but my decision was an expression of my belief that the system
could be changed from within.”
Saul Alinsky
Yes. For the right wing, conservatives, the Tea Party, et al., Saul
Alinsky had a real and present influence in the intellectual development
of both Hillary Clinton (and Barack Obama). Both Clinton and Obama
studied and to a greater or lesser extent followed his methods of
political organization of the poor and marginal.
Thanks to the right wing's takeover of most media outlets (save the
Internet!), Saul Alinsky has come down to us as a shadowy, radical
”Chicago-style” political bogeyman rather than as the actual political
philosopher and grass roots activist whose deep-seated beliefs and
practical application thereof helped to fuel the often real radicalism
of the 1960s. His true meaning and significance in shaping American
politics has therefore been virtually completely obscured by a
correspondent right wing radicalism which has assigned Alinsky,
his motives, and his progidies to an undifferentiated "left wing" world
filled to overflowing only with those who "hate" all things “American.”
This process of delegitimizing Alinsky had begun within his lifetime,
and 23-year-old future presidential candidate Hillary Clinton
recognized both Alinsky's significance and the right's efforts to
discredit him even then. “You are being rediscovered again as the New
Left–type politicos are finally beginning to think seriously about the
hard work and mechanics of organizing,” she wrote.
“Hopefully we can have a good argument sometime in the future.” I
repeat and emphasize these words of young Hillary Clinton because they
capture the mutual respect she and Alinsky shared while simultaneously
acknowledging that there were significant areas of disagreement between
the two.
Thus, these words indicate that Hillary Clinton was no “right” or
“left” wing ideologue – at least not at the time this letter was written
in 1971.
On the contrary, like most young people during those turbulent times
and at that highly impressionable age, she was deeply involved in an
active search for the truth.
References
http://news.yahoo.com/hillary-clinton-saul-alinsky-letters-155526953.html
http://freebeacon.com/politics/the-hillary-letters/
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/09/22/hillary-letters-clinton-saul-alinsky-correspondence-revealed/
http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2014/09/saul-alinsky-secretly-controls-hillary-too.html
Category
Black Missouri politicos form 'Fannie Lou Hamer Coalition,' challenge Democratic Party
A
significant number of black Democrats in Missouri are vowing to
withhold support in the upcoming elections from any candidate –
Democrat, Republican or Independent – whom they deem as “disrespectful”
of the black community.
According to the AP, the just organized Fannie Lou Hamer Coalition,
headquartered in St. Louis, will monitor political candidates' positions
on education, jobs and racial profiling. At this writing, however, the
Coalition, has not pointed to any specific candidates, according to the
St. Louis Post-Dispatch. Still, St. Louis County Chairwoman Hazel Erby,
the Coalition's leader, has indicated that it is adopting a “wait and
see” attitude as to the candidacies of Democrat Steve Stenger and his
Republican opponent state Rep. Rick Stream. Stenger and Stream are
locked in a battle for the St. Louis County executive's post.
It was last week when many speakers at a St. Louis County Council
meeting loudly excoriated Stenger and demanded that he disavow and
denounce his well-publicized support for County Prosecutor Robert
McCulloch, who, in turn, has politically supported Stenger.
The issue, of course, is that McCulloch's police officer father was
killed by a black suspect. McCulloch is now responsible for the possible
prosecution of Ferguson cop Darren Wilson who killed unarmed teenager
Michael Brown on August 9.
Also, during McCulloch's 25 consecutive years as county prosecutor,
he has not once successfully prosecuted any police officer for the use
of excessive force, police brutality, or police misconduct of any kind
whatsoever.
Stenger has left no wiggle room in the matter, though. He dismisses
the uproar and disapproval of Ferguson's heretofore non-voting black
population as of little consequence to him politically because his
appeal is directed to the larger, white, rural, and pristine suburban
enclaves – the vast majority of St. Louis County.
Thus, Stenger's response to the black people of Ferguson?
"The answer is, 'no,' I'm not going to denounce Bob McCulloch,"
Stenger said, according to the Post. "He has been our elected prosecutor
for 25 years, and by state law he has been charged with doing a
complete, thorough and unbiased job. And I truly believe he will do
that."
Thus, the Fannie Lou Hamer Coalition, and most black people
throughout this nation-state, rather reasonably suspect that McCulloch's
personal and professional history preclude and disqualify him from
handling Wilson's prosecution. Indeed, his obvious and personal biases
and prejudices will unduly influence his decisions in the investigation
Michael Brown's death at the hands of police officer Darren Wilson.
As for the Republican in the county executive race, Stream has said
that he supports not only the naming of a special prosecutor to handle
the investigation in order to "remove all doubt about having a fair and
independent investigation,” but he has also called for the appointment
of special prosecutors for future police shootings.
Erby has issued a statement thusly: "We are all serving notice that
we are not going to support candidates just because they have an
insignia of a donkey behind their name."
Stenger, currently a fellow county council member, has pooh-poohed
Erby's and the Coalition's efforts, saying that he does not expect them
to impact his relationship with her or the council.
"I value her opinion and concerns a great deal," he said. "Directly
and indirectly she has expressed her concerns for her community and our
community. I hope this is the first step toward a meaningful dialogue."
Fannie Lou Hamer
Beginning life as a Mississippi sharecropper, Fannie Lou Hammer (1917 – 1977) became a towering and iconic voting, civil and human rights
leader.
Like Harriet Tubman, Sojourner Truth, and so many, many
nameless others before her, by the time of Hamer's death at 59, she had
captured this nation-state's imagination and focused its attention on
the plight of downtrodden blacks nationwide with a determined and
unstoppable will rivaled only by her contemporary Dr. Martin Luther
King, Jr. himself.
Fannie Lou Hamer was a driving force during the Mississippi Freedom Summer of 1964.
As a child and adult, Hamer suffered all and more of the then usual
indignities reserved for black people at that time. Among many other
atrocities, including beatings and over-work, by the age of 13, she was
picking 200 to 300 pounds of cotton per day. She received only the bare
minimum of “education.” And, like 99 percent of black Mississippians,
she endured the absolute denial of any voice whatever in the political
affairs of her country, state or city. As a black woman, she was, in
fact, the victim of forced sterilization by the white powers that be in
Mississippi under the theory that if something was not done, blacks
might someday actually outnumber whites and could and surely would
reverse the racial table on them.
And so, in the early '60s when the Civil Rights Movement came to Mississippi in the form of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee,
Hamer jumped at the chance to get involved. Registration of
Mississippi's 400,000 unregistered black people was SNCC's primary
focus. Later she served as Vice-Chair of the Mississippi Freedom Democratic Party. She became the face and voice of Mississippi's disenfranchised blacks when the MFDP challenged the Democratic Party at its National Convention in Atlantic City, New Jersey.
It was her down-home, plain-spoken manner and unquestionable belief
in the absolute righteousness of her peoples' plight and cause which
rocketed her to national fame and effectiveness as a civil and human
rights activist.
Space does not allow for a more complete exposition of Fannie Lou
Hamer's impact on the civil rights movement. I invite you (especially
young people) to look her up.
Suffice it to say, though, that the black politicians of Missouri
could not have chosen a more appropriate namesake for their movement to
revamp Missouri's antiquated white political power structure, and force
it -- kicking and screaming, of course – into the 21st century.
References
http://www.mynextfone.co.uk/breaking-news/st-louis-mo-ap-some-black-democrats-say-they-h30335.html
http://www.commondreams.org/news/2014/09/17/ferguson-protesters-demand-justice-council-meeting
http://breakingbrown.com/2014/09/black-st-louis-politicians-reject-disrespectful-democratic-party-form-fannie-lou-hamer-party/
http://www.stlamerican.com/news/local_news/article_5509968c-3e8c-11e4-b8fa-d3c00efcf341.html
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2014/09/17/1330422/-What-Type-of-Racists-are-They-62-of-White-St-Louis-Residents-Support-the-Killing-of-Michael-Brown
