Look, John McCain Has a Black Supporter!

Oh my goodness, the end of the world is approaching! One of the most played up scenes on national news in the past few weeks is from a McCain-Palin campaign rally in Wisconsin at which a Black man urged McCain to "take it to Obama". This struck me as appalling considering McCain's record or lack thereof when it comes to civil rights (the ACLU rates McCain 0% on Civil Rights, the worst possible rating) and initiatives concerning the Black community that any Black person would support, much less defend Senator McCain or beg him to attack one of the greatest community and political leaders of our lifetime who is of multicultural heritage.

Sure, like most Republicans during election season, GOP candidates tend to try to whip up the Latino vote, particularly the reliably Republican-voting Florida Cuban community which tends to be more financially prosperous with a higher per capita income than most other Latino groups. Let's not even mention the fact that recent McCain-Palin rallies have been rife with supporters making racial threats against Obama, saying despicable things like "Kill him [Obama]!", "Terrorist", "Off with his head", and in some cases telling Black media in attendance to "Sit down, N-word". And yes, many of these statements have been caught on camera, so no one can deny that it is happening. What we also can't deny is that in none of these instances have we seen McCain or Palin rebuking their supporters for giving their rallies a distinct political lynch mob vibe. I for one, as a Black man, would not feel comfortable in that type of atmosphere.

As far as McCain's record goes, here are the facts. McCain was one of the few Congressmen to vote against making Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Birthday a national holiday. Earlier this year, he appeared at the National Civil Rights Museum to apologize for his error in judgement. It took him 20 years--when running for President the second time--to make this statement. Now to his credit, in the past, McCain has supported affirmative action, though he says something different now that he is the Republican candidate. If you still don't believe me, consider the following exchange between McCain and a reporter while McCain in Florida with Governor Charlie Crist, was asked on camera, "Senator can you explain why you and your campaign manager have specifically said that Obama played the race card with his comments the other day. Can you elaborate, when you said you fought for equal rights your entire life, what specifically you have done in improving the life of African-Americans?" It took McCain a few seconds of awkward silence and a stuttering response, then asking for the question to be repeated.

Anyway, here's the video from Wisconsin. Thank goodness, AOL Voices posted this video because my wife and I had been looking for it and couldn't find it. Ahhh, the wonders of Youtube! Essence Magazine also interviewed James T. Harris and you can read that interview on Essence.com.

Text from James T. Harris' comments are as follows:

"How you doing Sir. Listen I want to say first of all, God bless you, Gov Palin, you are a Barracuda, we need that...I would also like to say, God bless you Senator for your service for this country and your leadership. Now Senator, at the convention you asked for us to fight for you, you asked that. I have to tell you, I doubt if there is anyone in this room that's taken the--pardon me--@*%-whoopin I have taken for supporting you... (thunderous applause from the all-white audience)

Sir I believe that in the next coming debate it is absolutely vital that you take it to Obama, that you hit him where it hurts in his soft spot. Sir ACORN is out there, we have the good Rev. Wright. we have [Father Michael] Pfleger, we have all these shady characters that have surrounded him. We have corruption here in Wisconsin and voting across the nation. I am begging you sir, I'm begging you, take it to him.

Abortion & The One-Issue Party

Today I read this Huffington Post article about how the Republican party keeps successfully using the abortion issue (as well as gay rights, guns, affirmative action aka "Stop those Blacks from taking our jobs.") election after election, and the American public is complicit in letting them get away with it.

It is quite disingenuous that the Republican party has nothing to offer over 90% of us but continuous war(s), an increasing $500B federal debt and counting, an economic climate resulting in some of the largest corporate layoffs in history, taxes that take more and more out of the little guy's pockets, conspiring with big insurance, health management and big oil to severely limit our choices for competitive alternatives (in Florida for ex, the insurance industry is famous for buying the Republican lawmakers so that pro-consumer laws are not passed in the state), deregulating the financial industry to such a point that it's players feel no shame about a record number of home foreclosures, under-performing schools, supporting our troops in the form of giving them 3-5 consecutive tours of duty without adequate R&R with family, and the list goes on and on.

Has anyone ever considered that in all the years that Republicans have held the White House & even in the years that Republicans have controlled Congress, abortions have NEVER been reduced? (Since 1980, Republicans have been President 20 out of the last 28 years). It's more rhetoric over substance, and as long as the American voters continue to let one party hold one or two issues over us while screwing us on every other issue we care about, then all we have is our own ignorance to blame (refusing to see the truth). The greatest example I can cite is the 2004 election fraud. We KNEW that George Bush was a sorry President made possible by his father having stacked the Supreme Court. But instead of going with the guy who was smarter, had a more accomplished record, a REAL war hero with command experience (not someone who dressed up and posed by fighter planes like GW), we collectively (especially Christians) chose to be hoodwinked and distracted from those issues most important to us by the Gay Marriage amendments which were introduced state by state by the Republican party for this exact reason. Our resulting disenfranchisement has continued until this day.

I certainly don't condone abortion except in cases where the mother's life is in danger or in extreme cases of health-related complications. As an example, I once had a neighbor named "Mary". Mary was physically limited due to several chronic illnesses & health conditions which she had suffered with her entire life. She and her husband tried for a child, and the Drs. warned her that she was literally risking her life if she tried to birth a child. Well of course they went ahead anyway, and now her quality of life has deteriorated in such a way that I'm not sure how she makes it from day to day. Additionally, Mary's child is severely handicapped as well. Mary herself is to all intents walking dead. In this case, clearly I believe that Mary did the wrong thing by having a child. This situation I cite only as an exception, and it is an exception nonetheless.

The bottom line, though is that we as voters must educate ourselves and find out our local and national candidates platforms and whether they just spout this rhetoric at election time when it counts the most (politically) and whether this matches up with their track record when it really counts (morally). Ask yourself, how is it that we can claim to care so much about a baby before it is born (I myself am pro-life), but yet we stop caring about that baby after birth (the farce of No Child Left Behind which guarantees that schools in better neighborhoods will continue to get state funding while the failing schools in predominately poor neighborhoods who actually NEED the financial assistance will not receive such, no cost-effective health coverage for millions of youth, etc).

Black in America: CNN (Where Do We Go From Here?)

I must say, I was glad to see a major
national news network, CNN run a series, CNN Presents Black in America about the modern lives & struggles of Black families in America. Soledad O'Brien contrasted the disparities as well as the striking similarities between the have's and have nots of Black America. As a bi-racial American, she was the perfect face & moderator for this expose, fitting though since CNN (which I've had the pleasure of touring) is based in one of America's most prosperous Black metropolitan areas, Atlanta.

Let's be real about it though, this series did not teach Black people anything that we didn't know already. Re: Black women--we already know that single mothers and the economic & social struggles they and their families face are one of the most storied representations of the Black experience, HIV/AIDS is prevalent among our women b/c they are faced with lack of preventive care, stigma in the community & lack of support from the church, plus many don't know that they are carriers of the disease. Hypertension, diabetes & heart disease run rampant due to a health care system which is inadequate to meet the needs of poor non-payers, most of whom must go to the emergency room as their only (reactive) health care option. Yes, we already know that Black women are starting to date outside their race to compensate for the lack of educated brothers due to disproportionate incarceration rates among Black men (both byproducts of the Willie Lynch Theory).

Re: Black men, we already know that corporations are more likely to punish Black men coming out of the prison system, hampering their rehabilitation in society, demeaning their self respect & forcing them to resort to undesirable means to support their family. We already know that an educated Black man starts off on a un-even playing field in which a Black man in his job search is likely to be told he is underqualified b/c he is not privileged to be part of many of the social, business or economic networks that his White male counterparts belong to in order to get "the hookup". Oh & we already know that an "over-educated" Black male is going to be branded as "overqualified," meaning, "We dont' want to pay you what you're worth & we don't want you to think you can come in an take our jobs that we own (e.g. reverse discrimination)". (Trust me I had that experience coming out of b-school, MBA). Yes, we already know that society treats light skinned & darker skinned folks differently, no where more apparent that with the touching story of Dr. Michael Eric Dyson, a foremost author & academic & his brother, serving a life sentence for an alleged drug killing. We already struggle daily with the dueling realities of hip hop culture. And the list could go on and on and on and on, but I digress lest I wear myself out with words.

So who was this series addressed to? It was addressed to the White Americans and others who still mistakenly believe that stereotypes, prejudice & racism no longer exist in our "open" & tolerant society. These are the folks who will tell you that 40 years of affirmative action (which has primarily benefitted White women--look up your statistics) is adequate to make up for 400 years of slavery and its resultant economic, social, religious & political oppression. These are the folks that will always champion "personal responsibility" as if our society bears no fault or accountability for the way things are. These are folks that believe that b/c one hard working Black man who went from food stamps to Harvard to closing in on the Presidency, must indicate that we're not as bad as we thought, that now the playing field is officially level for everyone.

Really the only thing to take from the series as a whole was that regardless of how far we have come, we still have a long way to go. Despite folks like D.L. Hughley making it from the Bloods gang as a teen to enviable position of influence in international entertainment (comedy, movie acting, sitcoms, etc) there is still another group that has been forgotten--"the rest of us".