The Devil Came Here Yesterday

Though I do not believe in a devil, I thought that Hugo Chavez's speech to the UN was on point. I want to draw specific attention to his call that the UN be overhauled:

I don't think anybody in this room could defend the system. Let's accept -- let's be honest. The U.N. system, born after the Second World War, collapsed. It's worthless.

Oh, yes, it's good to bring us together once a year, see each other, make statements and prepare all kinds of long documents, and listen to good speeches, like Abel's yesterday, or President Mullah's . Yes, it's good for that.

And there are a lot of speeches, and we've heard lots from the president of Sri Lanka, for instance, and the president of Chile.

But we, the assembly, have been turned into a merely deliberative organ. We have no power, no power to make any impact on the terrible situation in the world. And that is why Venezuela once again proposes, here, today, 20 September, that we re-establish the United Nations.

...Point three, the immediate suppression -- and that is something everyone's calling for -- of the anti-democratic mechanism known as the veto, the veto on decisions of the Security Council.

Let me give you a recent example. The immoral veto of the United States allowed the Israelis, with impunity, to destroy Lebanon. Right in front of all of us as we stood there watching, a resolution in the council was prevented.


During the recent bombing of Lebanon we made a similar observation regarding the appartent useslessness of the UN in the face of a clear violation of International Law by Israel. I won't even get into the fact that the sales of arms to Israel that are used against civilians is against US law as well.

You can read the entire speech here:

http://www.counterpunch.org/chavez09202006.html

Edit 9:28PM:

ABC World News Tonight did the usual and completely misrepresented the speech given by Chavez. As expected Chavez's speech was labelled as a "tirade". In contrast U.S. President Bush was labeled as "Speaking to the People". In a medium that is supposed to be "fair and balanced" and "unbiased" these very labels themselves expose a pandering to the supposed US market. While ABC News chose to dicuss Hugo Chavez's reference to Bush as the Devil, the "News" agency repeatedly called Chavez anti-American. However; anyone who has read the speech linked above knows that he has repeatedly separated his position against the current administration from his position for the people of the United States. Let us not forget that while Exxon et.al. were making massive profits on gasoline and heating oil. Citgo, the Venezuelan oil company was offering cut rate oil and gasoline to poor people in Chicago, New York and the Gulf region.

Nor did the ABC "news" broadcast even discuss the fact, brought up by Chavez that the US government has refused to extradite one Jose Posada, an admitted and convicted terrorist. Nor did the so called "News Agency" dare to discuss the portion of the speech dealing with the US complicity in the Israeli bombing of Lebanon.

It is laughable how us "News" agencies repeatedly discuss how other countries press are "state run" when ABC News does the same thing.

Technorati Tags: critique, governance, Hugo Chavez, United Nations

Brusque

Yesterday I posted on the current Pope's commentary about rationality and religion. I specifically avoided the portion of his speech that was supposedly about Islam because I wanted to see what kind of response it would solicit. I was sure that there would be numerous people condemning the Pope's commentary as defamatory to Islam, etc. ad-neuseum. I was not to be disappointed. The NY Times ran an article that featured the following:

“I do not think any good will come from the visit to the Muslim world of a person who has such ideas about Islam’s prophet,” Ali Bardakoglu, a cleric and chief of the Turkish government’s directorate of religious affairs, said in a television interview there. “He should first of all replace the grudge in his heart with moral values and respect for the other.”...

“I don’t think the church should point a finger at extremist activities in other religions,” Aiman Mazyek, president of the Central Council of Muslims in Germany, was quoted as saying in the newspaper Sueddeutsche Zeitung on Thursday, pointedly recalling the Crusades, the Spanish Inquisition and the Vatican’s relations with Nazi Germany.

The French Council for the Muslim Religion demanded that Benedict clarify his remarks. “We hope that the church will very quickly give us its opinion and clarify its position so that it does not confuse Islam, which is a revealed religion, with Islamism, which is not a religion but a political ideology,” Dalil Boubakeur, the council’s president, told Agence France-Press. [back to this in a moment -editor]

In Kuwait, the leader of the Islamic Nation Party, Haken al-Mutairi, demanded an apology for what he called “unaccustomed and unprecedented” remarks.

“I call on all Arab and Islamic states to recall their ambassadors from the Vatican,’’ Mr. Mutairi told A.F.P., until the pope “says he is sorry for the wrong done to the prophet and to Islam, which preaches peace, tolerance, justice and equality.”

“The pope’s statement is highly irresponsible,” said Javed Ahmed Ghamdi, another ranking Muslim, and an Islamic scholar, in Pakistan. “The concept of jihad is not to spread Islam with the sword.”

The Pope's comments were:

Citing historic Christian commentary on holy war and forced conversion, the 79-year-old pontiff quoted from a 14th-century Byzantine emperor, Manuel II Paleologos.

"The emperor comes to speak about the issue of jihad, holy war," the pope said. "He said, I quote, 'Show me just what Muhammad brought that was new, and there you will find things only evil and inhuman, such as his command to spread by the sword the faith he preached."'

Clearly aware of the sensitivity of the issue, Benedict added, "I quote," twice before pronouncing the phrases on Islam and described them as "brusque," while neither explicitly agreeing with nor repudiating them.

"The emperor goes on to explain in detail the reasons why spreading the faith through violence is something unreasonable," Benedict said. "Violence is incompatible with the nature of God and the nature of the soul," the pope said, issuing an open invitation to dialogue among cultures.

Now for those of you without a dictionary handy "brusque" means: abrupt and offhand in speech and comes from the Italian word meaning "rude". Therefore while the Pope was quoting a Christian Emperor, he had already noted that the quote was rude. Now if we look at the comment in the context in which it was spoken, then the Pope is condemning two items. Firstly he is condemning the idea that religion is an excuse or valid reason for violence. Secondly he is condemning the blanket statement made by the emperor. On this basis alone, the individuals and organizations in the preceding quotes are basically full of the proverbial bovine excrement.


However; what is also evident here is that there continues to be a historical ignorance and amnesia regarding Islam and it's spread in various parts of the world. Many Muslims are in a state of denial regarding the numerous Jihads (not the internal spiritual kind) that have happened and happen to this day. That not all Muslims do not engage in physical Holy War does not mean that it does not exist nor that it was at any time seen as a valid means to propagate the faith. Therefore the critics want us to believe that the emperor though being rude was making up the whole Jihad thing.

The second thing I noted was the person who attempted to divorce the political aspect of Islam from it's religious aspect. That was clearly an error. Since Islam is conceived as a way of life politics is also the business of Islam. That political Islam stares us in the face in the form of Sharia. Law is by its nature is synonymous with policy. Thus Islamic law is in fact a political arm of Islam and therefore it is incorrect to say that you can separate politics from Islam. That there are Muslims who do not follow or live under Sharia does not negate that Islam has a political expression. So the preceding quote in which a critic wanted to separate Islam from "Islamism" is also full of bovine excrement.

I think that the Popes message regarding the need for rationality in the dialogs between religions and indeed between the religious and the non-religious is on target. I think that there are many people in the Islamic world who are simply uncomfortable with the idea that someone would even question the faith and it's practices. They live in places where other religions are in some cases forbidden by law to proselytize and in other cases where armed "faith minders" can stop people who they deem not adhering to the faith properly.

All in all I think that some Muslims need to chill the hell out. And I say the same thing to over-sensitive Christians who can't take criticism either. Ask yourself this: How many derogatory comments do you hear about Buddhists? Why is that? Can't talk about that which hasn't happened.

Technorati Tags: critique, Culture, Islam, politics, Pope Benedict, Religion

Windows IE Sucks

So I've wasted much time on getting my custom layout to work in iE. First it showed up at 260 odd pixels wide while showing up right in FireFox and Safari. Now it's broken in FireFox 1.5.0.6 (Page too wide) and is the right width in IE but IE wont show my bolded text. But Safari and Firefox will show the bolded text. All this because of IE. IE sucks.

Reason and Religion

So the Pope went on record discussing religion and reason during a speech in Germany. He is quoted in the NY Times as saying:

he devoted the rest to a long examination of how Western science and philosophy had divorced themselves from faith — leading to the secularization of European society that is at the heart of Benedict’s worries.

This, he said, has closed off the West from a full understanding of reality, making it also impossible to talk with cultures for whom faith is fundamental.

“The world’s profoundly religious cultures see this exclusion from the divine, from the universality of reason as an attack on their most profound convictions,” he said. “A reason which is deaf to the divine and which relegates religion into the realm of subcultures is incapable of entering into the dialogue of cultures.”...

“Today, when we have learned to recognize the pathologies and life-threatening diseases associated with religion and reason, and the ways that God’s image can be destroyed by hatred and fanaticism, it is important to state clearly the God in whom we believe,” the pope said.

“Only this can free us from being afraid of God — which is ultimately at the root of modern atheism,” he said. “Only this God saves us from being afraid of the world and from anxiety before the emptiness of life.”.

Though the speech got press because of his quotation about Islam, I think the issue he discusses above is far more relevant. A while back I wrote a post discussing the origins of religion and the possibility that there is no God. There I said:


It is highly likely that the answer to why we are here will simple be: we are the result of a whole mess of accidents, coincidences and extremely good luck. We happen to be alive and we have no purpose greater than or less than any other living thing on the planet. None whatsoever. We simply are born and die. Our matter is returned to the Earth where it is recycled to sustain future life of various forms. Our "consciouness" which artificial intelligence will soon show, is the result of very high level brain function. WHen the brain ceases to function that unique energy that we call "consciousness" will simply do like all other energy does, obey the laws of thermodynamics and dissipate as it seeks more stable forms.

For many people of faith and indeed many people period. The idea that we are here by accident is very scary. That the Pope would state that God can "save" us "from being afraid of the world and from anxiety before the emptiness of life.”

I find this statement interesting given that a Muslim blogger over at Planet Grenada made a similar comment:

I think the talk captures a lot of what I find so compelling in Islam. It isn't about blind faith and emotional displays. It is more about a calm certainty which comes from unvarnished realism; knowing who you are in relation to God and the world.

he says that he didn't mean it the way I have it framed here, but I think that his mind is letting on to the same thing the Pope is saying. Namely his religion is a tool for the believers to find meaning in their lives. In essence the existence of God allows the believer to situate himself in a hierarchy with a loving but demanding authority figure either implicitly or explicitly male in the case of Judaism, Islam and Christianity, who has given us a life map in the way of scriptures and prophets and whome will ultimately make those who are "evil" pay for their misdeed which makes the believers relatively "plain" life worth the effort.

Now I know that sounds harsh and deconstructive but ultimately that is what the Pope is saying. Religion and God exists to comfort mankind. The question I have been asking for a while is can one have a fulfilling life act in a moral manner and not believe? I say the answer is yes as evidenced by the numerous, though minority, people that are atheists who act in a more moral and upright manner than many religious people do. The reason we can make this observation is because many of the reasons for religion and belief in God: the inability to understand physical phenomenon such as thunder, lightning, rain, etc. as well as the need to confront the fear of survival that early humans had to endure, have been removed by reason and science. When it rains God isn't crying. God isn't walking around or angry when there is thunder and lightning. And no, the earth is not the center of the universe and yes there is a universe.

Hence religions that are dogmatic and fundamentalist are threatened by such science and reasoning because such reasoning threatens not only the individual belief but also the men who are in positions of power based on those beliefs. I came to know this before I left the Seventh Day Adventist church. I was under the assumption that the pastor of the church was unfamiliar with the Book of the Dead and related material. It turned out that he was but he would not present this material to his congregation because it would cost him his job. Ultimately truth, which I thought was central to religion was not as important as position.

This ultimately is the reason for why there are conflicts between people and cultures that put belief before reason. Indeed even as far back as the Egyptians, reason was the basis of religion. A religious precept that did not conform with reason was not acceptible. In the case of Khemet we find that upon creation Maat and Maa (order) was the first thing created and formed the foundation of all subsequent things. What is more problematic is when certain fundamentalists fail to even properly understand the origins of their own religions. For example the idea that humanity was made in the image of God is taken very literally by many Christians but the Judaic concept is not literal at all, nor is the Khemetic one. Thus it is not the rational person who is the problem but rather the believer who puts potentially false beliefs ahead of reason and then attempts to impose that on other people. The fundamentalist of any religious stripe is the logical extension of such belief systems which is why I think that the most dangerous belief systems are those that attempt to convert. Most rational people see this. Apparently the Pope does not.

Technorati Tags: critique, Religion

9-11 5 Years Out

Today the US is marking the 5th anniversary of the 9-11 attacks. Many are discussing where they were ad whether or not the US is safer since then. I was on a highway on my way to work when I heard the boom and thought nothing of it. It was later that I found out it was a plane and even then I thought it was an accident, it's happened before. The second strike eliminated that one and all I could think of was "payback". Not the kind of payback many Americans were thinking of though. I was thinking in the Malcolm X vein of Chickens coming home to roost. That Friday at a poetry event I performed a piece I entitled: Beware of Low Flying Chickens.

I was was not shocked that somebody decided that it was time to take US policy back to "we the people". My only question was when and how. My uncle had long been saying that it wouldn't be until Americans felt the same thing that the people they kill for various raw materials, that they would see the error of their ways and that it would happen. He was apparently right on the "it would happen" point but woefully wrong on the "error of their ways" part.

While Disney-ABC tries to rewrite or reframe the history surrounding 9-11, with the cleverly titled "Path to 9-11". Americans are still as dumb and uncaring about non-Americans as they were prior to the strikes. Indeed for those of us paying attention we saw in the reaction of a great deal of Americans that they too would kill as many people as they deemed fit in response to a strike in their homeland by a foreigner. Indeed we see that the suicide bomber in Palestine and Iraq is really no different from the US military except in available arms and international "respectability" in the end, both parties have killed many many civilians in order to "shape the world" they way they see fit.

9-11 provided a unique moment for the United States to examine it's foreign policy and to make changes that would lessen the chances not only of terrorist acts but to remove much of the motivating factors. Instead the military and those private corporations that feed it wound up with a bonanza of profits while the U.S. Constitution was declared, by it's sworn defender to be a "piece of paper", and laws were passed that would have caused the ratification of the Constitution some 200 years ago to not have happened. We found that a large percentage of Americans polled, thought that citizens had too many rights. Indeed 9-11 showed that the U.S. didn't really love freedom so much as it loved profits and so called "safety".

As people ran out to purchase duct tape and a citizen died from duct taping her home because of an Anthrax scare that was snuffed out from the media once the trail went back to a Federal lab, the question put on everyone's mind was "are we safe" Even today drunk, nervous white men can have a Muslim barred entry onto a plane because he is wearing a shirt with Arabic on it. Idiots think they can profile only Muslims because they claim to know what they look like. Never mind that there are Muslims of every race and they all wear a variety of clothing. Never mind that the actual hijackers were wearing "regular" "western" clothing and were clean shaven. No, We'll pick out the Sikh because Americans are generally so culturally ignorant that they can't tell the difference. You are supposed to feel safe because you stand in long lines at subways and Airports before you can get onto a train or plane. Every now and then the government, in an attempt to scare the wits out of potential voters, will raise threat levels as was done recently over the "foiled" plot in London. never mind that to make a binary liquid bomb would be nigh impossible to make on a plane in any quantity that would kill anyone other than the person making the "bomb." you and I, with images of Die Hard III on the brain, are too stupid to question the "authorities" as they snatch the water we were just drinking out of our hands and throw it away.

But let's be honest here you are only as safe as it is difficult to obtain the materials needed to make a bomb and the imagination of the terrorist. Assuming one can get enough of the components to make a bomb, wouldn't that long ass line to get to the gates be a nice place to let one off? I mean all those people there for the killing. People enter airports with huge backpacks all the time. You don't even need to get a ticket to get in line for a screening. I've seen this at JFK myself. Similarly, people in NY are supposed to feel safe because the NYPD are spot checking bags. Are they at all stations? No. Are they at the busiest ones? Probably. If three people with bombs randomly picked stations to go to would they kill anyone? of course. If they got stopped, could they kill everyone in the vicinity? Yes they could. Therefore are you safer? No. You think you are because you see uniforms and guns. Let me tell you, I've been to countries where there are uniforms and guns all over the place and yet people get killed every day.

There is no military means to end "terrorism". Terrorism is a tool used by those who are in a militarily inferior position to inflict casualties on the enemy. It seeks to engage the political apparatus by pressuring the civilian population. The suicide bomber is the most feared tool, which is also the most wasteful use of human resources. There is, unfortunately a sense of pride, of comparing balls, going on here with the war on terror. The "enemy" cannot be negotiated with because the enemy has no valid claim to negotiate from. One does not have to agree that the US should fall under a caliphate in order see that there are valid reasons why some people would like to kill Americans. We just had a show of validity of certain claims when we saw Israel drop US made and purchased bombs on the homes of the Lebanese. Indeed had America learned anything from 9-11, it would have been the immorality of killing innocent people to achieve military aims. Yet all over the airwaves there were talking heads, mostly white, discussing the justification for the killing of 1000's of Lebanese and the wanton destruction of property in order to "free two prisoners".How did that help the US become safer? Explain that one. What then did Americans learn from the 9-11 Attacks. Nothing. Nothing at all. If Americans had learned anything from 9-11, George Bush and much of the Republican party would not be government. I'm not concerned whether the 2004 elections were stolen, the election, had Americans learned anything from 9-11, would not have even been close enough to steal.

The war in Iraq is yet another example of the fakery that is the "War on Terror". It is known and has been re-affirmed that Saddam had nothing to do with the 9-11 attacks, yet close to 50% of Americans believe that he was directly linked to 9-11. These American citizens believe this even though various administration officials have been caught lying on the subject. Even though Colin Powell, The man to "make the case" for invading Iraq, sat on national television and said he was wrong about the WMD's in Iraq. Even though none of the "40 minutes to launch time" missiles that Saddam supposedly had ready for American troops never materialized, upwards of 50% of Americans believe he was connected with Al-Qaida. That simply makes no sense. We joke about George Bush being stupid but what's the excuse of that 50%?

So 5 years out are you safer? no more than you were on 9-11-2001. Are "we", well..Americans different? No, Americans seem just as willing to kill non-Americans for "national interests" as ever before. If anything Americans have shown themselves to be undeserving of the freedoms their forefathers supposedly enshrined in the constitution. In the old Soviet Union and in Mexico recently, people toook the streets and shut things down for days over election fraud. Yet US citizens are apparently unfazed by the head of state breaking their sovereign document. However; Americans call people who question the Bush administration crazy, and vote them out of office. Yes, 9-11 hasn't changed Americans all that much really and 5 years out, that should really be the sad news.

A Sort Of Homecoming

In the Sept. 11, 2006 edition of the Nation Magazine, there is an article entitled A Sort of Homecoming by HAZEL ROWLEY. This article discussed the "odd" "homecomings" of various black notables:

Langston Hughes was 21 in the summer of 1923, when he boarded a ship in the Brooklyn dockyards heading for West Africa. The 1920s was the Jazz Age, and the time of the black arts movement known as the Harlem Renaissance. As Hughes puts it, "The Negro was in vogue." Caught up in the neo-Romantic "primitivism" was a new fascination with Africa, its tom-tom exoticism, its black vitality. Hughes was as prone to employ these stereotypes as everyone else; the difference was that he was one of the few who actually made the voyage to Africa. Eager to escape the humiliation of racism in America, he hoped to find a truer, freer self in the home of his ancestors. His first sight of the coastline filled him with excitement: "My Africa, Motherland of the Negro peoples!" He would respond viscerally to the beauty of the landscape and the people, but he left Africa feeling rebuffed. Africans treated him like a white man. Years later, in his memoir The Big Sea , he would mock his naïve hopes and illusions...

Richard Wright was another who had no time for Du Bois's romance with Africa;...Africans saw him as an American. The Western-educated elite did not give a damn that he was in their country. As for the Africans he met as he traveled around, Wright found himself at a complete loss. They stared at him and giggled. They evaded his questions. Even their laughter, he felt, was an evasive tactic. He was shocked that people urinated openly, in public. He was (unlike Du Bois) repelled by the women's naked breasts. The poverty distressed him, and he blamed the heinous crime of European colonialism. But he also decided that these people, with their superstitions and ancestor worship (he described these as "rot" and "mush"), did not know how to help themselves. Soon he was writing in his journal: "Africa! Where are you? Are you a myth?... I'm in despair. I find myself longing to take a ship and go home." The book that resulted from the trip, which, ironically enough, is titled Black Power, is honest, almost painfully so, about Wright's complete sense of estrangement.

I want to stop here for a moment. Anyone surprised by the idea that an African-American would be seen as not only foreign but as "white" is simply not a serious black scholar nor are they a Pan-Africanist of any serious stripe. It is an unfortunate occurrence that people confuse the racial categorization of African with the cultural categorization of African. When I as a Pan-Africanist call myself an African, I consider it no different than a White person who has never set foot in France, or parents had never stepped foot in France, calling themselves Europeans or even American. It should be understood that for a great deal of white people American means white and that white designation is imported from Europe. That French "American" is no more French than I am when we discuss culture, yet that individual feels no shame and sees no problem with the logic that they are French, meaning, in reality, white. Similarly, though I designate myself an African, I do not designate myself as a Yoruba, Igbo, Fante, Assante, Mandinka, Wolof, Kikuyu, Shona, etc. I have no proof of any such specific connection, nor do I need to in order to be African.

So what ethnicity is the African outside of America? Simply put the African outside of Africa can be seen as distinct as Kikuyu are from Yoruba. The "new world" Africans come in a variety of ethnicities; We can say we have the Haitian African which can be seen as a subset of the Caribbean African, which includes the Jamaican African , the Guyanese African, the Bejan African, in each of theses groups we see particular Africanisms in terms of culture yet we see a new culture born of the specific history of slavery. I do want to make a special note of the African-American. Unlike the Caribbean Africans, who because they represented the majority of the societies they found themselves in, were able to keep ahold of more specific Africanisms that can be easily traced back to specific ethnic groups in Africa, the African-American ethnic group, especially those in the northern portions of America, is far less Africanised, in general. This is why, when an African-American travels to Africa, he or she is specifically pointed out as American or white. The African-American is far more socialized as a European/American, in terms of socializing and even general views of non-Americans (note I did not say non-whites).

Let me take a page from my own life. When I was at Tuskegee I spent a great deal of time, in my senior year with the foreign students, predominantly Africans. Many of them would live in the married student housing primarily because many of them had difficulties with black American students who generally treated them like shit. In this housing complex you had people from Zaire, Senegal, South Africa, Nigeria, Zambia, Ghana, etc. living together. What was also very interesting to me at the time was the close relationships that they had with people from the Caribbean. They all acknowledged their differences yet in terms of speaking styles, social habits, musical tastes, etc. these groups tended to socialized together with the Caribbean students being the most fluid (they would socialize with African-Americans more often).

I was generally accepted by this group. I say generally because it was clear that I was "American" but I was "different". What made me different was in a large part that I did not fit the mould of the "typical" urban black male that they saw on TV and had the fortune to see up front and personal. I had a wider taste in music and most importantly not only was I interested in the culture, I did not generally have the general condescending attitude that Americans are known for. I also respected their own expertise in terms of experience in relation to my politics. What the experience taught me was that Pan-Africanism, as a social experiment was in fact feasible if the so called leadership created the atmosphere in which it could thrive. I must say though , that relative to the experiences discussed in the article, I was here and not in any of the particular countries that the students had come from.

But in relation to the article, I can relate my experiences in Jamaica, the country of my parents birth. Each time I have been to Jamaica I have been rightly perceived as a foreigner. In fact at one point I was nearly kidnapped by some boys who thought some rich family members would pay for me or that I had money or valuables on my person. I have never felt like a "Jamaican" I did not grow up there, I do not have the general stereotypical "Jamaican man" character. Thus I am not a "Caribbean African" and I recognize that. However, that does not make me an American, nor does it detract from being an African. Thus it is important for those reading this and the article to understand that self designating as "African" does not tie one to any particular group and that it is a mistake on your part to make such an assumption.

Let's examine another portion of the article:

He went to Ghana with a mental image frozen in the early 1970s, and found Accra full of SUVs, mobile phones and blaring hip-hop music. When he and his cousin went to a discothèque one night, Eshun was taken aback by the sleek young couples who emerged from Mercedes sports coupes carrying brand-name sunglasses and handbags. In restaurants, he winced at the way the "big men" barked orders and snapped their fingers for service, and the subservience of the waiters made him cringe. On his walks around the city, he noticed that people fell silent as he passed. In an inland village, a friend pointed out that everyone was talking about him; they took him for a black American with too much money. Leaving Kumasi on a bus, Eshun was disconcerted by the slogan on the seat in front of him: We'll Get You There Alive. Tied to the roof of the bus were a flock of goats that screamed throughout the journey, while the bus driver turned up his radio. At sunset every day, Eshun was attacked by clouds of savage mosquitoes.


In a secondhand bookstall in Kumasi, he came across Black Power . "Given the confusions of my own trip I had nothing but sympathy for Wright," he observes. After a month traveling around, Eshun had the same reaction as Wright: "I couldn't wait to leave."

Well of course Eshun wanted to leave, He had became a London-African by his upbringing. He spent most of his life in a country where there might be mosquitos 2 months out of the year. It is little wonder he found the constant mosquitoes bothersome. But that's not the real "eye opener" here. What is incredibly important here is the ascendancy of Black-American street culture in Ghana or elsewhere. In essence many Africans have embraced some of the very things that many African-Americans despise about the culture they find themselves in. Furthermore, the disconcertion that Eshun felt at the "big men" barking orders, is evidence of the cultural gap that Africans in European dominated (by numbers) societies find when they return to their motherlands. The same can happen when one of the new world Africans travels to another new world African place.

What is lacking in the article, which is soooo blatant, is the lack of perspective from people who do live in Africa and are comfortable there. What of the opinions of people like Molefi Assante or other activists? What of the African Americans who moved to South Africa? What of their current situations? I think the article was intended to throw a wrench into the idea of Pan-African unity rather than actually discuss the issue of a Pan-African identity.

Technorati Tags: Africa, Black Education, critique, Culture, Pan-Africanism

John Stossel is Stupid

John Stossel of ABC fame has a new segment on his "Stupid in America" series. On Good Morning America we had clips of a charter school in Harlem that is doing well compared to the public school in the same neighborhood. In the brief segment on GMA, he said how the reason for the failure of the public school was because the government has a monopoly on education and since there is no competition the schools do not need to compete and therefore fall behind. Charter schools by comparison know that they can be shut down by the state and therefore make sure that they are innovative and succeed. John Stossel thinks we are stupid.

The biggest problem with this whole line of thought is the assumption that Charter schools are under the same mandate as public schools. They are not. The fact that they are under different mandates means that comparing them is like comparing apples and oranges. Yes, they are both fruit, but they are not the same thing. Public schools by law are required to service every and any student that lives in it's district. They have to deal with the very bright and motivated to the slow and disabled. They have to deal with the well behaved as well as those with discipline problems. In short, public schools cannot pick and choose it's clientele. in contrast, charter schools can limit enrollment and are under no legal requirement to expand enrollment to teach a growing population of students. Therefore while a charter school can create classrooms of a particular size and maintain that size, a public school must cram students into available space or create space, as in trailers and the like, in order to fulfill their legal requirement to service the public's children.

In essence, charter schools can attract students with parents who are more concerned with their children's education. It can remove students who are a drag on the progress of other students. If a charter school does not want to deal with students with poor English language skills, it is free to do so. A public school must accommodate those students. Charter and private schools can, if they choose to, require entrance exams and other barriers to entry. Whereas most public schools, by mandate cannot. It can do things that public schools cannot simply because they can make choices that public schools are legally unable to. In short charter schools create a tiered schooling system by skimming off the most motivated and most able students from the public school system and leaves the rest to the starved for cash and resources general public schools.

It is insulting then, to then claim that the apparent success of charter schools is based simply on the meritocratic achievements of said system. Does this mean that public schools are perfect? No. There is clearly a need for change in the public school system. However, contrary to the rants of certain conservatives, these changes cannot be made by cutting funding for schools. Nor can they be done by creating legislation that creates mandates that go un or underfunded.

So in reality, tonight John Stossel will simply show that he is stupid.

Technorati Tags: Black Education, John Stossel

The Work Of The Klan

When I responded to a recent commentator about various "ills" in African-American communities I did not respond to the portion about doing the work of the KKK. I wanted to address this because it is something bandied about by commentators of various stripes. Basically, the charge is that black boys (mainly) are doing the work of the KKK by killing other black boys (mainly). Since the KKK is best known for it's lynchings of black people (mainly but not exclusively men) then black men who kill black men have merely taken over the task. On it's face it appears like a decent argument but I don't think that it is. I think that the role of the KKK is misrepresented in regards to it's purpose. We know that the KKK rose from the various White Citizens Councils that sprang up in the wake of the South losing the Civil War and the Reconstruction era. The main purposes of these groups were to maintain white supremacy in America. To that end they enforced and when the opportunity arose passed legislation whereby they could restrict the economic, social and political freedoms of black people. Ultimately the aim was to keep black folks in check. I want to stress this point. The Klan did not exist in order to just kill off black people, but to make sure that black people did what they were supposed to or allowed to do. If we look at the Klan in those terms then who is doing the Klan's work? Is the black man gunning down another black man really doing the work of the Klan? Well let's ask it this way, does black on black violence serve to keep blacks in "their place"? If black on black violence does keep blacks "in their place" then what motivates such black on black violence? If black on black violence is motivate by poor educational opportunities, or music videos or music or TV or things largely out of the control of black people, then it would seem then that it would be those venues that are doing the work of the Klan by introducing a limited scope of black culture and therefore limiting black aspirations (in the general).

But I don't want to focus to much on street violence of black males, rather, let's look beyond them at the community at large. Again, if we look at the purpose of the Klan as being to control the aspirations of black people by "keeping them in their place" then what about institutions that vilify and marginalize certain strains of black thought, such as Black Nationalism or Pan-Africanism? Indeed one can say that by marginalizing that type of thinking among black folk that the agents of the larger society are, in fact, doing the work of the Klan. They can effectively silence thought that is not approved. Indeed we have the ability to lynch (and to be sure, lynching is not only a tool of terror but a tool of silencing) without the use of a rope. But I want to take this even furher, if black people are capable of doing the work of the Klan then in the context that we are discussing here, it is possible that blacks, not involved in violence are also doing the work of the Klan. As an object lesson, we review the ousting of representative McKinney. This happened largely at the hands of blacks. In essence, the rebellious black person that McKinney was was deemed "out of bounds" by the dominant society. Thus McKinney needed to be eliminated and she was (not that she didn't have a hand in her own defeat but thats not the point here).

Back in the day(tm), there was a cadre of blacks, usually ministers, could be counted on to back the Klan line of "knowing our place". They were the well known go betweens, the "responsible leadership" that could be counted on to reign in negroes who got out of line. Alas they are still here with us. A question that should be on the minds of those concerned with various ills in black communities is what could have been different had a different, unnapproved, approach had been taken. What if Brown v. Board had been decided differently. What if Affirmative Action hadn't been created? What if BET was black owned for black people? Questions, questions.

All of this is speculative, but I wanted to put the idea out there that the Klan was much more than a terrorist organization, it was an organization with a normative situation it wanted enforced. In looking at the Klan in that light I think we can see Klan agency in many situations many not as obvious as black on black violence.

Technorati Tags: critique, KKK

American Big man Part X

So a judge has ruled what should be the obvious: The wiretapping as conducted by the government is illegal. The judges reasoning echo's the arguments I have presented in the American Big Man series. noteably:

AUMF does not directly give or imply that the President may wiretap US Persons without following Title III, the FISA statute or the 4th Amendment. The opinion also adds that there is nothing in the AUMF that appears to included wiretaps as "force", an argument I didn't even think of at the time.

The US Constitution grants the president the authority to circumvent the 4th Amendment, and the FISA court represents the minimum standard by which US Persons can be tapped.

The "State's Secrets" argument is null and void since the president and other administration members had already publicly stated what they were doing and that they had bypassed the FISA court.

The President cannot legislate nor can he decide which laws he wishes to comply with. It is congress that passes laws and the president either vetoes or approves of them. Once the law is on the books the president is constitutionally bound to uphold and follow them. By deciding on his own to bypass the FISA court, the president is effectively "legislating". I hadn't thought of this particular angle but I think it was good that the judge took the time to enumerate the office and powers of the President and the Congress. She also pointed out that the president had ample time and opportunity to approach the Congress to have FISA amended (something I think should NOT happen), but failed to do so.

The only real weakness I see in the decision is the standing of the plaintiffs to bring the suit. Had the justice department not been in the pocket of the administration they would have been able to bring charges against the president themselves once he admitted in public to breaking the law. Because of the refusal of the Justice Department to do it's job this group had to file this suit. I expect that this decision will be appealed and I do hope that it goes to the Supreme Court.

Technorati Tags: governance, politics, privacy, US Constitution

The Book Of Coming Forth By Day

The Book of Going Forth By Night and Coming Forth By Day, AKA The Egyptian Book of the Dead will be the subject of a History Channel documentary tonight:

Premieres:
Tuesday, August 22 @ 8pm ET/PT


It's a story that spans 4,000 years, older than the Bible...and it's all true. It was lost for thousands of years, discovered a century ago, and its true meaning recently resurrected by the miracle of computer graphics! The reason the Egyptians built the pyramids, it's the first written description of any religion--and is the likely source of the 10 Commandments! In this 2-hour special we follow the ancient scroll from creation around 1800 BC near the site of the Egyptian city of Thebes, to rediscovery (and theft!) in 1887 AD. Join us in a tale that spans from the age of papyrus to the age of silicon...and beyond. Biblical scholars agree that portions of the Old Testament are direct descendants of the Egyptian text, and some archaeologists argue that Moses must have read and carried a copy of it with him when he fled Egypt! And now, a new generation is reexamining the ancient text for wisdom that can still affect our inner lives! TVPG cc

Before this airs read my blog post, Abrahamic what and see if Sondjata was lying to y'all.

Andrew Young II- Response to Comment

An Annonymous commentator from Seattle Wa. or thereabouts posted a comment on my recent post regarding Andrew Young's recent comments about various racial groups business practices in black communities. He, and that is an assumption, posted:

yeah and the facts also prove
1) blacks are more likely to committ crime
2) have children out ot wedlock
3) belive in governement dependancy
4) name their kids stupid faux-african names like "lamisha"
5)use anger to intimidate people

why shouldn't people openly talk about it without being labelled racist? In my neighborhood there have been 2 murders recently where the murderers have been young black men and the victims elderly Asian women. hmmm. yet if they associate blacks with crime/violence the AA community whines. how unfair. black people are the new KKK

So let's address this. Do the facts prove that blacks are more likely to committ(sic) crime? Well if we watch the news, videos, etc. that would seem to be the case. Indeed the facts as they were point to blacks being incarcerated at a rate disproportionate to their population. If we simply took incarceration as the indicator of black criminality, I wouldn't be in a position to argue. However; other facts throw an entirely different light on the subject. In a blog post discussing Bill Bennett's inflammatory remarks about aborting black babies to reduce crime I pointed out the following:

According to the Bureau of Prisons as well as the Bureau of Justice Statistics there are 4,919 black male inmates per 100,000 black males in the United States (June 2004). If you divide the black population (~40 mill) in half and do the math (20 mill *4919)/100,000 you would get a total of 983,800 black male inmates or 2.45% of the total black population.

White males are represented by 717 male inmates per 100,000 white males. In 1988 the white/black population ratio was 6.44. If we assume this number to still be accurate then our hypothetical white male population would be 128,800,000 people. Doing the math we did for the black population, we would get another 923,496 inmates. If we put these numbers together we get close to the total prison population of the US as of June 2005 (2,131,180). What immediately jumps out is that following Bennett’s logic, if we aborted every white baby, we would see the same drop in crime, since eliminating all white babies or all black babies would produce, mathematically, the same drop in inmates, and the crimes they committed.

Therefore, mathematically, whites and blacks are incarcerated at the same numbers. So the claim that "blacks are more likely to commit crimes" doesn't quite hold up. But if we look at this further then other things appear. How often do whites get away with jailable offenses that blacks do not get away with? Or how often do white lawbreakers get away with crimes that blacks who commit lesser crimes (or non at all) get jail time for? Back in September of 2004 I wrote about a NYU student who, well, lets read:

In an incredible (and true) story, a 19 year-old New York University undergraduate student was recently arrested and charged with committing three felonies, including criminal sale and possession of a controlled substance, and criminal sale of a controlled substance on or near school grounds – each charge carrying a maximum sentence of 25 years in prison. The undergraduate student sold high-grade marijuana, cocaine and hallucinogenic mushrooms to an undercover New York City police officer on eight separate occasions from the lobby of her dormitory. But that’s not the incredible part.

Despite facing up to 75 years in prison for her offenses, the student, a white female from a wealthy family, will actually never see a prison cell if she satisfies the gracious terms of the deferred prosecution agreement brokered between a Manhattan District Attorney and the defendant’s private attorney. The sweetheart deal – brace yourself for this one – includes 10 months at a drug rehabilitation center in Idaho followed by 8 months of work or school, and 5 years probation. Moreover, she will be permitted to plead guilty to lesser charges (perhaps misdemeanors) in 2006, pending successful completion of her “sentence.” Perhaps most importantly, her case was handled by state, rather than federal, authorities, allowing her to avoid severe federal mandatory minimum laws that would have likely resulted in a lengthy prison sentence.

So we have at least one instance where a white person who should have found herself in jail, not receiving jail time for all manner of drug charges. Meanwhile:

Kemba Smith was a casualty of America’s “war on drugs.” Like the New York University student, Kemba was a college student in 1995 at Hampton University. But unlike the New York University student, Kemba never handled or sold drugs but was in an abusive relationship with a drug dealer. Unlike the New York University student, Kemba is Black, which is a critical distinction.

Law enforcement spent months trying to make a case against Kemba’s boyfriend, but he was murdered before police could catch him. Incredibly, Kemba was sentenced under federal sentencing guidelines to nearly 25 years in prison for her “involvement” in the crack cocaine conspiracy. Although prosecutors admitted that she had never sold drugs, Kemba was held accountable for the crack cocaine distributed by her boyfriend. It wasn’t until President Clinton granted Kemba’s petition for clemency that she was finally freed after serving 6 ½ years of her sentence.

Right then. If this is indicative of the "justice" system, then the supposed "less crime prone" white population is patently false.

Does this mean that there are not criminal black killers out there? no doubt but there existence does not prove blacks being more likely to commit crimes, just that they are more likely to commit crimes that are easy to see, solve and perhaps prosecute.


Next.

2) have children out ot wedlock True. Statistically, black children are more likely to be in single and female headed homes. First I would say that who's business is it if a woman decides to have a baby without a husband? Secondly, I would only want to deal with that issue in the context of minors and people who are not in an economic situation to care for children they birth.

Next

3)3) belive in governement dependancy I'm not entirely sure what that means, but if that means that blacks are more likely to think that the government ought to provide a safety net for its citizens, you can count me in. If this is some thinly veiled "welfare queen" argument the writer should know that there are more white people on welfare (government dependence) than blacks, though blacks, being disproportionately poor relative to their population, are over represented in the idea of who's on welfare. Also, I find it hypocritical to point out black so-call "government dependency" ideology when businesses are actually the largest recipients of government largess in the forms of tax breaks, zoning changes and eminent domain. I won't even get into the largely white population that benefit from current "tax reform" passed by congress. Dependency indeed.

4) name their kids stupid faux-african names like "lamisha" Exactly who's business is it what someone want's to name their child? and who are you to discriminate against someone for having a name you don't like? But aside from that, Had the history of Africans in America been different, say, no slavery, forced name changes, etc. you'd have a population that would be able to name their children culturally appropriate names. So if you don't like the "fake" names, perhaps you ought to take that up with the Washingtons, Jeffersons and Hamiltons.

5)use anger to intimidate people Now this is the typical white male (or female) fear talking here. Blacks must be angry all the time because they want to intimidate people. I'm not even going to get into this one since it is clearly a situational issue and therefore prima facie non-factual.

to the closing comment:

why shouldn't people openly talk about it without being labelled racist? In my neighborhood there have been 2 murders recently where the murderers have been young black men and the victims elderly Asian women. hmmm. yet if they associate blacks with crime/violence the AA community whines. how unfair. black people are the new KKK .

It is never racist to state observations. It is never racist to ask a well thought out question? Heck definitively a 'racist" must ask questions because , definitively a racist is one who is studying a race and therefore must ask questions and seek answers. now a White Supremacist or one who ascribes to it's philosophy will ask such questions with the intent of proving a certain point of view, which in this case would be the supposed inferiority of blacks ie: they are criminal, baby makers who give their kids silly names, think the government should support them and as part of their criminal nature seek to intimidate people. That two black men killed two elderly Asian women must prove that blacks are criminal regardless to the fact that black criminals make up less than 3% of the total black population. Such facts are ignored in favour of racialized conspiracy theories of blacks desires to decimate non-black populations through killing sprees. But to point that out would be "whining".

Lieberman and Lamont

First: Why was Jesse. Sharpton and Waters in Connecticut and not Georgia? I'm going to especially point that question to Sharpton who himself had been vilified and slandered in the media before getting suited up. This erstwhile "pro-black" man who came to the aide of Tawana Brawley" felt it was more important to support a rich white man in Connecticut then to help a relatively broke black woman in Georgia who speaks more truth to power than Lamont has in his entire short political career.

Ok.

I have said for a while now that I believe that the Democratic Party has been infiltrated. I think the DLC is the subtle arm of this infiltration. However we have now seen that the Republican party is now so bold as to openly support candidates within the Democratic party even when registered Democrats have voted that candidate down. That there has not been a huge response from Democratic Leadership on this is a serious serious problem to me. Lieberman has been on air repeating Republican talking points or shall I say "talking lies" for the better part of two weeks now. If Lieberman is going to talk like a Republican why not drop out of the Democratic Party and register as a Republican and run on the Republican ticket? I think that the people, if they are bright, should vote down any candidate who has the backing of an opposing party and do so on principle. Their failure to do so will further undermine the Democratic party (full disclosure: I am not a registered anything). Ultimately I think that the Democratic party is in real jeopardy of splitting up into progressive and so called "moderate" camps and we could see a conservative, moderate, liberal party system. I for one would be very heartened if those bold members of congress who are "progressive" immediately formed a new party that while it would be small would put that party on the map with a sizable representation in congress and would be another party to be negotiated with on close legislation. But that's off topic. I do hope that the people of Connecticut reject Lieberman simply for not playing by the long established rules that he himself has said should be respected AND for becoming a mouthpiece of a party he claims to be the opposition to.

Andrew Young's Comments

Coming off this years Garvey recognition I'm back to posting. First, because people have been coming here looking for commentary about it, let me discuss Andrew Young's supposed 'racist" comments regarding retail ownership in black communities. I'm not going to defend Andy Young because this man has sold out (for whatever reason). Previously he was a pro labor leader, now, well up until recently he's been a front for anti-Union Walmart as well as other companies that regularly exploit workers.The Black Commentator has an excellent article on the subject. However; let me get back to the topic at hand.

The NY Times reported:

Instead, people who have known Mr. Young for decades seem rather satisfied that his comment that Jewish, Arab and Korean store owners had “ripped off” black neighborhoods, “selling us stale bread and bad meat and wilted vegetables”...

“Now I don’t blame anybody,” he said, a day after apologizing for his remarks and resigning from the Wal-Mart payroll. “It was stupid of me to say in that context. No, it wasn’t stupid of me. I said it in the appropriate context. But I didn’t think about how it would read.”...

Mr. Young made his comment to a reporter from a black newspaper, The Los Angeles Sentinel, responding to a question about Wal-Mart’s effects on mom-and-pop businesses.

“I was giving a rational explanation of a historic phenomenon,” he explained later. “Can you talk about ethnicity objectively without it being demeaning or stereotypical?”

He added that he had also discussed black merchants who overcharged the poor.

“The way this came out it makes me sound like I’m refuting everything I’ve done over almost 70 years, frankly,” Mr. Young said.

He defended his work, saying, “I still think that Wal-Mart is good for poor people.”

Now given that I don't agree with Young's position on Walmart, it is interesting that he apparently has been given the Cosby treatement. By the Cosby treatment I mean that it appears that the outrage is based on selective quoting that has been taken out of context (I do not currently have access to the article in question). What is perhaps most hypocritical of the so-called black leadership who have taken Andrew Young to task on his comments is that no one has even made a motion to disprove what he has said. By immediately labelling his comments as "racist" the statements have been made to appear untrue. I would presume then that James Baldwin is a racist as well since he made similar comments about jews in black neighborhoods in his books.

What about the known fact that black hair care supplies are very prevalent in black neighborhoods? There is a documentary on the internet (Search YouTube for it) that documents this. Now, I'm not going to personally denegrate Koreans for doing business since it is in my opinion the fault of black people for not supporting black businesses that provide the service. But still in terms of facts, Koreans make a nice piece of change by doing business in black neighborhoods.

Let me deal with the Arabs. It is known in black neighborhoods (the ones much of the so called black leadership do not live in), that many corner stores are owned by Arabs. Again, I'm not going to denegrate Arabs because of it, but there's nothing racist about pointing it out. It is not racist to point out that some of these Arabs sell pork which is forbidden for them to eat, sell or handle (if they are Muslim). And blacks in these neighborhoods know this. It is known that many products are priced well above the costs in other non-black neighborhoods. Now there are potentially some reasons for this, such as the smaller item count driving up the per-unit price. Perhaps the costs of insurance for being in a "dangerous" neighborhood is a part of higher costs. I don't know, and perhaps that needs to be discussed, but again if you have an ethnic group making a lot of money (relatively speaking) selling goods at a relatively high cost in poor black neighborhoods then it is not wrong to point it out. Are they "blood sucking"? I don't know, I haven't seen the data but has anyone seen the data? If not how can you simply condemn a comment when even the criticizer does not have evidence to disprove the comment?

Jews: I'm not in possession of information that shows that Jews run hair shops or food places in black neighborhoods. So I can't say. I can say that it is known that there are some Jews who do (or have) owned many properties in black neighborhoods who make quite a nice living off of the rents paid by those tenants. Again, I'm not denegrating this group for conducting business, but if a group of people are making their living from the rents of blacks I can talk about it. If, say in Harlem, the owners of property previously rented to black people, are moving to gentrify the neighborhood and doing upgrades that they were unwilling to make when the neighborhood was "for blacks" then I can ask the question about the motives of those owners.

So, in short Andrew Young may have been out of order in his comments, but none of the critiques or reports thus far have proven it. They have all, so far, parroted the "it was racist (meaning incorrect)" line without even providing proof. I guess that's what we call "reporting" now.

Technorati Tags: critique, politics, Andrew Young

Technorati and Authority

Authority, in the context of this post is defined as:
a book or other source able to supply reliable information or evidence.

While writing about Cynthia McKinney's loss last week I did a Technorati search on the subject to see what was posted online. There was, as expected a great deal of posts on the subject most of which were downright personally nasty. so in order to try to cut through the chatter and reach blogs that had real information, pro or con, I decided to sort the results by "authority". Of course I was expecting authority to be defined as I had it above (taken from the dictionary). when I saw that many of the libelous and insulting posts were at the top of the results returned I began to wonder what exactly Technorati considered "authoritative". It appeared that the qualification for "authoritative" was the number of links a blog (or article) received. So you can post material that is factually incorrect and potentially libelous material and be ranked as a "highly authoritative" blog or blog post on the matter because a whole lot of people have links to your blog. So I revisited the definition of "authority" to see if perhaps I missed something. Well one definition is:

The power to influence others, esp. because of one's commanding manner or one's recognized knowledge about something.

This definition reminded me of the definition of "popularity":

The state or condition of being liked, admired or supported by many people

it seems to me that, at least on this subject, many of the "authoritative" bloggers were authoritative only in their perceived influence on others by means of measuring their inbound blog links rather than the actual accuracy or veracity of their blogs or blog entries. But the blogs are not authoritative in the first instance nor are they strictly authoritative based on the second definition. Indeed it appears that in reality these blogs "Authoritativeness" is based on their actual popularity which is ultimately the only thing that inbound links can actually measure by themselves. The scary thing about this is that as I've noticed in my stat reports, students as well as other people, apparently use blogs for reference material. I've noticed a number of people coming in from Word documents with term paper like names. Now using my blog as a reference is not a problem because I don't simply post my opinion. 99% of the time I provide direct links and extensive quotations from primary sources.

Last night I was sort of watching a re-run of Rambo: First Blood on UPN-9. One thing that has changed at the network is the new "My UPN" or
"MY 9" logo. I cannot help but to think that this is a direct consequence of the "Myspace" phenomenon where anyone can post their thoughts about anything and try to get themselves or their favorite band or whomever promoted to alpha my-spacer by getting linked to by as many people as possible. This My-spacification of information is what I see at Technorati. information is based not on the veracity of the information posted, but on the popularity of the author. This My-Spacification, this cult of popularity is a problem to me. The pressure is to conform to and cater to a peer group and to give them that which maintains ones popularity rather than the pressure to grow that comes from the valuation of ones contribution being based on accuracy and critique.

Ah well, here's to not being considered authoritative.

;-)

Technorati Tags: critique, Technorati

Who Let These Fools Talk?

Yesterday, It was with dismay that I watched a video which confirmed an early report of some of McKinney's crew having verbal altercations with members of the press. While I can completely understand the frustration at watching McKinney be insulted on a near daily basis and watching the media make wholly false claims against her, the following actions were simply out of line.



Firstly, this shows a low level of discipline within the campaign. Bodyguards are not spokespersons. It is not their job to speak to anyone at all. Period. As I've said in my coverage of the Capitol Police incident and in the previous redux on McKinney's defeat, there is and was a clear lack of foresight and judgment on the part of the people who have been allowed into McKinney's circle. People who are driven by their own ego rather than the good of the person they are supposedly working for. They have apparently forgotten that McKinney is not a member of a group like the NOI in which she can say and do whatever she pleases so long as the volunteer followers agree with her. She is, was, in a position that was predicated on the satisfaction of an electorate that could remove her rather than the other way around.

In the end comments such as: "I'm gonna get your Jewish Ass" were wholly unexcusable. Just as I am comepletely opposed to people who assault McKinney or call her a "bitch", "Ghetto Slut" and "Ho", I must object strongly to that unneccessary comment including the party with the Yarmukle on comment.

Clearly some members of the NBPP or whomever else was involved ought to read the Note to so called POC revolutionaries Because we have a clear violation of rule 4:

4) Name calling: Oh I think a lot of people fall down here. Most times conscious people are seen as being mad all the time. They are probably right. Often times I notice that persons who cannot defend their positions (even when they have the right one), end up name calling. Oh yes, your buddies will probably love you for "telling that cracker off" or whatever the opposition happens to be. Problem is, a lot of people who may have been with you may be turned off by your mouth (pen or keyboard). You simply never know who is in the audience and what they will respond too. Since even the most sailor mouthed person can understand to an intelligent and coherent argument, there is no need for the name calling. Worst yet, your opposition will use your sudden lack of vocabulary to smear you in the eyes of the audience. People will look at you and think that the foulness coming out of your mouth is indicative of what you stand for. Hey, I understand how easy it is. On occasion I've even fallen off that wagon. But be sure, you are being watched and listened to. Watch. Your. Mouth.

Technorati Tags: Cynthia McKinney, politics

The Arabs are Making it all up!

I happened upon this website
in which we find a YouTube clip where a man says that the destruction that we have been seeing in Lebanon for the past few weeks is not the result of Missiles and bombs. No. It is faulty construction! Apparently we are merely witnessing buildings self-destruct.

Did I mention the laughing in the background?

Technorati Tags: critique, Middle East, Lebanon

Death Knell of Black Protest Poltics: The Case of Cynthia McKinney

Cynthia Mckinney was defeated last night by Hank Johnson in a run off election in the 4th district in Georgia in which McKinney garnered less votes than in the initial primary and her lowest numbers since her defeat by Denise Majette. There are many reasons for this defeat which we will go into soon, but what the reader ought to know is that the statements reported by a variety of Georgia voters indicates that the era of Black protest politics is all but dead. I'll get back to that point in a minute. First I think it instructive to look back on this event and see what problems there were both internally and externally. First I will begin with the internal.

The McKinney camp should have known better than to run a low profile campaign. This assumes that McKinney had the funds to do otherwise. In 2002 when she asked her famous questions: "What did the president know?" "When did he know it?" and "did any of his friends profit?" all guns were pointed at her. That set of questions became the basis of a non-stop smear campaign lead by the Republicans. Publicly this line of questioning, which was actually vindicated in various news reports in both mainstream and "alternate" media as well as the 9-11 commission, caused the media to label her as a "looney conspiracy theorist". After all, at the time, most Americans bought the line that the President knew nothing of any plots to hijack planes (which is now known to be untrue). We also know that at least two of the 9-11 hijackers were known by the CIA and FBI prior to 9-11. We know that they had concerns about these individuals and we know that these concerns were dismissed by the president. These are now known and vindicate McKinney's questioning. The media implied that McKinney said that the president allowed 9-11 to happen so that his buddies could profit from the war. However, there is no quotation anywhere, in any literature that says that. That said, we do know that the war in Iraq was premeditated. We know, from documentation that 9-11 was seen as the perfect justification to execute the premeditated plan to invade Iraq and we know that the war in Iraq would have been done regardless to whether WMD's were located there or not. We also know that Haliburton, Kellog, Brown and Root among other companies with close ties to the President and Vice-President were awarded no-bid contracts for "rebuilding" Iraq as well as "security forces". In essence the President's "friends" have, in fact profited off of the war, predicated on outright phoney "intelligence" under the cover of 9-11 terrorism prevention logic.

Furthermore, it was McKinney who during a congressional hearing was able to put into the congressional record the fact that there were multiple "war games" taking place on 9-11 which may have contributed to the slow response to not 1 but 2 "missing" planes. I say "may" because those individuals who were being questioned on this matter were afforded "lunch breaks" that allowed them to avoid answering the questions. Therefore; to label McKinney "loony" for actually asking the same questions the 9-11 committee asked; to label Mckinney "looney" when the facts on the ground support her line of questioning either directly or indirectly means that there is some political reason why McKinney needed to be labelled "looney". Part of this is that if McKinney's positions are validated then there would be repercussions for both Democrats AND Republicans.

I'm not entirely sure whether McKinney had done so, but I do not believe that her campaign had done anything substantial to address this issue which in reports around the web and press can be seen as one of the reasons so many were sour on her. For example, this information could have been printed up and mailed to or put into peoples mailboxes over the two years after she regained her congressional seat. A sit down with the constituents on this matter in a manner that could not be spun by the media would have been a perfect means to plant the seed of questioning in their minds about the veracity of the information used against McKinney. It may not have convinced all the people, but it would have put a rational, "I met her and she's not foaming at the mouth" feel to her.

The second problem with her non-campaign campaign was that her staff apparently forgot about the Denise Majette incident. Apparently they thought that Denise Majette won only because of some white majority hiding somewhere in her district. No, She won because a significant part of the black voting population in her district voted for her. McKinney's priority should have been to find out why this portion of the black community voted against her. Sure they may well be "Uncle Tom House Negroes" but as district constituents they should have been allowed to put their concerns to her and she should have addressed them, yea or nay. Again, I don't know the specifics of her campaign, but the low keyness of it would appear to me contributed significantly to her defeat because to many voters she was simply MIA.

The third problem with her campaign was that she missed the debates. I understand that many times the incumbent actually wins these things by denying their opponent validation by refusing to debate with them. When you're popular you can do this. When people are calling you "looney" and you've previously lost your seat, you don't miss debates. Debates are the one place where you can put out information for free and uncensored. These were missed opportunities for McKinney to humanize herself to her critics and, most importantly show that she is not "nuts." Renember that because a large number of folks thought she was "nuts" they would tune in to see what "antics" McKinney would do "this time." Those were opportunities to put a lie to the idea. Speaking of nuts I have to discuss the police incident.

I said in a previous writing that it was a huge, HUGE mistake for McKinney to hit the police officer in DC. It was even worse that it happened during an election year. Her advisors did her a great disservice by not having her apologize immediately. I would say that politically this incident probably cost her the most points. If you read the papers and internet posts regarding her "representability" this one incident comes up frequently. The picture of your congressperson "flipping out" does not do any campaign good. Did the cop deserve to be hit. I think so. They are trained to recognize congresspersons on sight. That whole "she had different hair" thing is ridiculously "racist". The proof of this is in the interviews with some Black Capitol Police who have stated that not only is it common for blacks including congresspersons to be harassed, but Cynthia McKinney had written a letter asking for the DA to be disciplined over "racist" remarks made to black DC police. Therefore it is highly, highly likely that the police "had it out" for McKinney. Personally I am of the opinion, having had similar rude and inappropriate behavior directly my way by police officers, that police officers who are doing something illegal are, at that moment held in no higher regard or afforded any other authority than a private citizen. That said, as I posted before, that the average citizen would be arrested on the spot for the same incident (if not shot), the whole incident appeared to be of a "self important" congresswoman who thought she didn't have to follow the rules all of us are subject to.

The External Factors

Having discussed the faults in the McKinney campaign machine itself, I want to address the external issues that contributed to her political demise:

High on the list is AIPAC and other American Israeli support PACS. Somewhere about 2002 AIPAC asked McKinney to be a signatory to some statement about supporting Israel. She refused. Since then McKinney has been in their cross hairs. It is known that Denise Majette received a substantial amount of support from Pro-Israeli PACS and individuals which allowed her campaign to reach proportions that her recognition would otherwise not allow. This time around Hank Johnson received massive amounts of "local" money after he became a viable challenger to McKinney. I question the "localness" of this money given that I can give to an organization in Georgia and then that organization can give to a particular candidate. No one can say that I, from NJ, gave to such and such a candidate. I think that the persons and organizations behind Majette learned a lesson in indirect contributions. I can't prove it so one can take this with a grain of salt but I may decide to investigate this angle further.

The second and related groups are the Republican PACs and Republican operatives who also contributed to Hank Johnson, which he admitted to. That black folk in the 4th district, who are mostly registered Democrats would not find that objectionable is interesting and will be discussed later. clearly though those black individuals were more put off by their perception of Mckinney than by the Republican party. It is to me a breech of political etiquette for a rival party to divert funds to a candidate of another party. it's not illegal, but given that I have been saying that the Democratic Party has been infiltrated, I think such actions as these are further evidence to this claim.

The third group, which is largely a subset or superset of the above mentioned group is the press and internet. For example, on election day a radio station in Georgia apparently ran a story about a McKinney being arrested. Now if I was an undecided voter and I heard that McKinney had been arrested, I would not be voting for McKinney. I have no doubt that those who programmed that event knew exactly the impact it would have on the election. But larger than this is the reports that McKinney supports terrorism. The charge was that members of Muslim organizations like CAIR supported McKinney. Since these organization supported or were sympathetic with the Palestinians or Hamas, then they were terrorist organizations therefore McKinney supports terrorism. In fact Hank Johnson, at a debate said that since McKinney had Arab names on her list of donors, she supported terrorism. Now this clear "racist" remark was not only repeated by numerous Conservative and Jewish press it seemed to have been alright with the black voting block. Hank was not called "looney" for such a remark because in America it is OK to claim that any Arab is a terrorist. There is political cover for such speech. Related to this "all Arabs are terrorists" line, there was the oft repeated report that McKinney had apologized to the Saudi Prince at the time, when Rudy Guiliani refused is $10 million dollar gift to NYC because the Prince said that the US ought to reconsider it's foreign policy in the Middle East. Again and again McKinney was cited as being in league with terrorists because she shares this sentiment. However; this sentiment is exactly the sentiments of a great deal of diplomats and foreign policy experts. Is Jimmy Carter in league with terrorists? Would the press be allowed to smear Jimmy Carter in such a manner? I won't even get into Mr, Guiliani, who thinks its ok to shoot at unarmed black men 41 times. Or thinks that police should shoot and kill a black man who under-cover narcotics officers ask to buy marijuana from but are refused. Overall the press, specifically the online conservative press as well as outlets such as the AJC, and specifically a black female writer for that publication who should have known better had a field day allowing misinformation on Mckinney stay front and center.

The last external factor in this was the Democratic Party or better yet the DLC. One comment you hear from the voters in Georgia (and Connecticut as well) is the "ability to work with colleagues" I agree that the ability to work with colleagues is important. It was Nancy Pelosi who should have returned McKinney to her rightful seniority when she returned to congress as is done for everyone else. This clear example of discrimination was allowed to happen by the leadership of the Democratic Party including the members of the Congressional Black Caucus. Though reported in outlets such as the Black Commentator, the people who could do anything about it were simply MIA. The Black Congressional Caucus, as well as the majority of Democrats were similarly MIA when McKinney was called a "bitch" by a Senate Republican, on record.

So there we have it. A perfect storm of organized subterfuge, self-destructive behavior and outright abandonment that culminated to cost McKinney her seat, which I do not think she will ever get back. More important to me though, is the sign that this defeat indicates for black protest politics. One would have hoped that the increase in affluent black people in Georgia's 4th district would have meant that a stand up person such as McKinney would have a relatively easy time of it being able to raise funds from a local, affluent group of black folks who could insulate her from the racists whites around her who have, as of today called her a "bitch" and a "Ho". Instead we have seen that this affluent class of blacks are far from their humble roots. Instead of "truth to power" they actually voted for a person who made a clearly "racist" remark that in other circumstances would be directed at them. Instead of holding the Democratic Party's feet to the fire for it's blatant discrimination against McKinney, this group has voted for someone less likely to "rock the boat." Indeed these voters have forsaken the letter from a Birmingham jail written by their native son Dr. King Jr. in which he lamented even the black clergy and other leaders for their willingness to "go slow" and "not rock the boat" and to stand up for principle. Indeed it would appear that with their newfound wealth and societal acceptance, they are slowly becoming that which was marched against. To vote McKinney out of office because the police harassed her, when we know that police do, in fact harass black people, is a poor political decision (even though it was a bad decision on McKinney's part). To call McKinney "looney" because she dared to be the first to ask the important questions regarding 9-11 and the Iraq war, is a bad political decision. When the purpose of congressional representation is simply to see how much money the representative can get out of the treasury rather than the sworn oath to uphold the constitution, which no one can say McKinney has not done. then black voters become no better than many of the people of other races they read and talk about in private. And if that is the direction that the "upwardly mobile" affluent class of blacks are going, then Black protest politics, which has been traditionally rooted in steadfastness, truth and fairness is dead and is being replaced with a politics compromise on principle, unethical behavior and selfishness. One only needs to look at Andrew Young, who went from labor activist to a front man for corporate exploitation. My how the potentially mighty have gone to sleep.

Technorati Tags: critique, Cynthia McKinney, governance, Leadership

McKinney Watch

According to the 2000 census reports, if 30% of the black electorate in the 4th district vote for Hank along with any more than 90% of the white electorate, McKinney will be defeated. Denise Majette beat Mckinney by taking that 30% last time. I won't comment again on the subject until after the election.

Joe Knippenberg on Cynthia McKinney for Congress

Joe Knippenberg, one of the targets of my post endorsing Cynthia McKinney has apparently posted a link to that post from his blog here. That link got my attention when I noticed a large number of people coming in from the same location. It turns out, by Joe's own words, that he is not Jewish. He says:

Not that it matters, but I’m not Jewish. In the part of the world from which my father hails, lots of non-Jewish names end with "berg."

So, not being able to verify this information, I'll need to take Joe at his word and offer the corrective of that portion of my previous post. I would say that I find it odd that A) he doesn't say where this place is and B) what he doesn't acknowledge that Jewishness is actually supposed to be inherited from the mother. But that's neither here nor there given that it appears I was incorrect in accessing Joe's ethnicity.[edit 8-7-2006] Knippenberg is apparently a German name dating back to 1309]

That said the rest of Joe's "corrective" consists of:

Cynthia McKinney has a substantial record of supporting radical opponents of Israel. You don’t have to be Jewish to object to that. And I haven’t yet said anything about the way in which she has dealt with the substantial Jewish community in her district.

The hatred and disdain that she and the aforementioned supporter display approach that displayed by someone like David Duke. I don’t have to be the precise object of the hatred and disdain to object to it and vote against the person who displays it.

So, Joe, the non-Jew, is clearly a Israel supporter perhaps even a Zionist. He critiques McKinney for not being held hostage to the "jewish Lobby" and those conservative Christians who want the end times to come and whos support of Israel is really not for the benefit of the Jewish people (whom will be burnt to an eternal crisp upon the second coming). No you don't have to be Jewish to object to 'radical opponents of Israel' but you don't have to be a non-Jew to oppose Israel either. Of course, given the irrational means by which Israel is "defended" it is unclear what constitutes "radical opposition" To Israel. Is being opposed to extra- judical killings of Palestinians "radical"? Is being opposed to second class citizenship for non-jews in Israel radical? Is being opposed to the means by which Israel was created, namely removing the previous inhabitants from their homes, radical? Who determines what is "radical opposition" to Israel?

Of course, like the critique that met the scholarly work on the "Israeli Lobby" some time ago, Joe 'berg takes a book out of his Jewish friend's playbook Link people critical of Israel to a KKK or other White Supremacists. An old, and I shall say, tired, tactic. Of course, if you object to the policies of Israel you must hate jews, want to put them in ovens, kill them on the side of the road for traveling with Negroes..oh yes, that;s right, good old southern white men did that last one, and good old white men in Europe (perhaps where Joe's ancestors came from) did that.

What is truely telling about Mr. Knippenberg is that, like too many of his Jewish counterparts, he attempts to distract a credible critique of his writing by attempting to smear the author as a bigot. The talking heads over at his blog are having a field day on the "Cohen, Hamburg, etc." name game playing and not a single one has taken on the central critique offered on this blog. Simply stated, rather than deal with the issue that Jewish organizations bought Denise Majette (and said so in print). Out of state Jewish organizations provided economic "assistance" to other races affecting black incumbents. Hence Joe's (and Hank's) critique that McKinney is getting "out of state" financial support and support from "gasp" Muslims, is hypocrisy at it's highest level.

But no, Knippenberg would rather we be "conventional" Negroes who "keep our heads down" and ignore the facts.

[update: Joe's been checking us out and posted an "update" to his original link. Does he dispute the central facts in the original Cynthia McKinney post? Does he even acknowledge the fact in the original McKinney post? Of course not. No instead he posts a link to This article which he seems to believe I will dismiss because it is a Jewish Newspaper. No, not quite. As the dear Provost ought to know, a scholar does not dismiss information because of where it comes from but rather based on it's veracity. Of course, for a Pro-Israel individual such as Joe 'berg, the positions quoted in the paper are beyond reproach. clearly such a statement as:

Mr. Tayeh's comments appeared in a letter to the editor in the November 28 issue of The Hill, a Washington weekly. "What is more disturbing to me is that many of these pro-Israeli lawmakers sit on the House International Relations Committee despite the obvious conflict of interest that their emotional attachments to Israel cause," he wrote, identifying himself as a member of Ms. McKinney's staff. "The Israeli occupation of all territories must end, including Congress," he added.

cannot be true. Cannot be based on verifiable information. Nay, though Others have come to the same conclusion. it must be as this paper puts it:

"the most vile anti-Semitic canards that have been invoked against Jews throughout the ages,"

Yeah, we know the drill. Should I again remind Mr. knippenberg about who put who in gas chambers?

But of course the shrilliness, kind of like truthiness, continues with comments like:

Rep. Eliot Engel of New York said he found it "very hard to believe" that a congressional staffer would send a letter "without that member of Congress, or anyone in their office, knowing about the letter."

No, of course not. Just as we are not to believe that Bush leaked or allowed the leak of a CIA operative. After all managers in any situation allways, allways, allways know what communiques are leaving their offices. Allways. Without fail. Well look, right; I am currently observing a legal situation at a university where a correspondence went out that should not have, which landed the author in
"hot water" because the subject was defamatory and the object of defamation was 'accidentally" sent a copy of it. I'm glad Rep. Engel runs such a tight ship though.

Of course that's not the real issue. Joe's issue is that:

cKinney has a history of consiorting very closely with confirmed enemies of our long-time ally. She speaks about the U.S. being an "honest broker," but that presupposes an equivalence between Israel and those who dispatch suicide bombers to kill innocent civilians and who apparently will not be satisfied while the state of Israel still exists.

Where to start? Anyone has McKinney, on record or off that states that she supports destroying Israel? Anyone? OK.
Next I agree that there is no equivalence of Israel and Hamas or Islamic Jihad. Israel has billions of dollars of US military equipment with which to bomb, assasinate or otherwise hold Palestinians hostage. There is no equivalent. Israel is a settler state not unlike Aparthied South Africa. I bought this up earlier and Joe still hasn't found the time to address that. Joe doesn't have a problem with colonizing an area of the world. He believes those colonized ought to roll over and play dead or at the very least "keep their heads down". Of course anyone who disagrees with Joe's line ought not be in office, in which case the only people who should be in office are those who support Israel. In this case then the comment quoted in the Forward that:

"The Israeli occupation of all territories must end, including Congress,"

Would have to be correct, no?
[/Update]

Technorati Tags: critique, Cynthia McKinney, politics