A Barack Obama presidency would certainly be a first - the first time that "most black people will end their historic progressive politics and applaud this country's criminal activity just because the head criminal looks like them." Despite the fact that African Americans overwhelmingly agree with the thrust of Rev. Jeremiah Wright's critique of American society, history and government policies, they will undoubtedly vote in huge majorities for the Illinois senator who has repudiated Wright. "Obama's campaign has been filled with a laundry list of lies" and promises to continue on that track. But, as with Colin Powell's lying, international lawbreaking term in high office, "most black people [will make] excuses for him and for his crimes." Although verbally less bellicose than Hillary Clinton, Obama is no less the warmonger in substance.
vs.
By now most people understand the correctness of a prediction I made the last time we had this public discussion about Barack Obama’s candidacy, that it would excite and arouse Black people politically in a way that they haven’t been since at least the 1988 Jesse Jackson campaign. I said at that time, as well, that it would be the Left and progressive’s task to see that that general wave of excitement could be used to reenergize the Black Liberation Movement itself. This task remains and in the present situation of Obama/s strong standing both in popular vote and delegates, it is most imperative that we find ways to utilize this energy and emotion in a more permanent form. A form that will allow the Afro American people to choose and fight their enemies and choose and support their friends.
WHEW!
I actually hesistate to discuss the positions of some activists because I know their determination makes my arguments a waste of both our time. But I think the actively anti-Obama contingent is in a quandry now. They absolutely cannot support McCain without losing all credibility because they're pushing for a Black Nationalist president. Supporting McCain would require some serious rationalizations; the psychic contortions would break lesser minds.
Yet the reality is you can not get a Black Nationalist president right now, and I'm not sure you ever will.
If you're one of the "voting supports the oppressor" types, relax. You took yourself out of the picture long ago. To the rest of you, the question is, now what?
Bookmark/Search this post with:
Delicious
Digg
Reddit
Newsvine
Furl
Google
Yahoo
One of the points Adolph
One of the points Adolph Reed made in his discussion with Melissa Harris-Lacewell on Democracy Now (literally listening to time share shtick as we speak so i don't have time to link) is that there is space between electoral politics and opting out. If we don't acknowledge that we end up being caught between a rock and a hard place. The middle ground is mobilizing locally and nationally around our interests between election cycles and during elections. Now some of the radicals are no better than the militia folk here because they are millenialists. They don't have anything concrete to mobilize and organize around. It's either all or nothing.
But us? Adolph's thing has been making post-secondary education free. Someone else might be about increasing the amount of loot spent on public transportation. These types of activities can shape the types of policies that elected officials latch onto in order to hold onto, develop, or increase their voting shares.
there is space between
Agreed. But militating against a candidate, even for valid reasons, is not staying out of electoral politics.
They both make valid points.
Yeah, in the end, we'll probably have to organize a movement against some policy Obama propososes. Clearly, he could be better as far as dealing with racism, but he's tons better than McCain and Clinton put together. I really like the idea of fortifying a second wave of black freedom movement. Despite the undeniable, I tend to track this way.
They both make valid
Ain't that always the way? Mr. Baraka got a little snippy with the competition, though.
"There must be some way out
"There must be some way out of here," said the joker to the thief,
"There's too much confusion, I can't get no relief.
Businessmen, they drink my wine, plowmen dig my earth,
None of them along the line know what any of it is worth."
"No reason to get excited," the thief he kindly spoke,
"There are many here among us who feel that life is but a joke.
But you and I. we've been through that, and this is not our fate,
So let us not talk falsely now, the hour is getting late."
All Along the Watchtower...
princes kept the view...
This is slightly off-topic but lately I have been listening a lot to a wonderful version of this song from a 1970s album called the "Gospel of Bob Dylan". The album, which was a producer's concept, was recorded by a group that was called "The Brothers and Sisters." I don't think they ever toured or recorded another album but I love this one.
PT Speaking of Dylan and
PT
Speaking of Dylan and gospel, did you ever hear the compilation of Dylan's born again Christian material performed by gospel artists? It was released about five years ago. On it, Dylan does a version of his song "Gonna Change My Way of Thinking" with Mavis Staples that is just dynamite. I don't have a link for it, but you should check it out. I think the song expresses the mood of the country right now.
"Yet the reality is you can
"Yet the reality is you can not get a Black Nationalist president right now, and I'm not sure you ever will."
America would not elect a Black Nationalist president even if a clear majority of the electorate were African Americans. I have been watching Glenn Ford, Margaret Kimberly and several other good people stitch themselves into a net over the issue of Barack Obama for months now and, sadly, I knew they would not get any further from where they began. I always felt that they needed to take a more reasonably pragmatic position. I don't mean that they should have ignored or made excuses for positions that Obama took that they found unacceptable. Since they knew or should have known, however, that he was going to attract wide support from the black electorate they could have expressed their opposition in a principled way while still maintaining some degree of solidarity with the masses of black voters.
and this is the middle way
and this is the middle way right? expressing opposition in a way that mobilizes african americans between cycles, rather than in essence saying that black people are drinking the koolaid "yet again".
"and this is the middle way
"and this is the middle way right?"
I would not use this expression for all kinds of reasons that I'm sure you could appreciate but we're on the same page here.
yes. clinton and the
yes. clinton and the neoliberals pretty much negated the possibility of ever using that or "triangulation" in a progressive fashion.