Obama has a dog whistle too

P6, you will not lose me. And, more importantly, I completely agree with your decision and the reasons why. Devowel anybody who complains!! 

over at JJP. Me? I read the entire speech, so I'm cool with it overall. As I said over at JJP, reminds me of his Hampton speech, where, after outlining an entire agenda, the only thing reported was something that was misrepresented - ' quiet riot'.

 But, we're cool, and you will continue to be one of the first sites to be clicked on the Favorites list each morning.

When P6 kicked off this particular thread he referenced a period in the 20th Century when black unemployment was quite low even for unskilled workers and black folks, as a whole, were improving their economic lot. Those times are gone and, sadly, may never return. In any case, it set me to thinking about what black folks accomplished during the period when chattel slavery ended and before the oppressive boot of Jim Crow was placed on their necks. In 1870, for example, a majority of the skilled artisans and craftsmen in this country were black according to a Commerce Department survey.

Today, I was in a local bookstore and saw a newly published book titled The Slaves War - The Civil War in the Words of Former Slaves written by Andrew Ward. I didn't bother to thumb through it. I just picked it up and placed it in front of  the cashier and bought it. Thirty minutes later I was on the bus and I removed the book from the bag and opened it.

The page following the book's dedication page contains four quotes all presumably from former slaves. The one that particularly caught my attention was from an Arkansas woman named Minnie Holloman who said, "For twenty-five years after slave times, there ain't no race of people ever traveled as fast as the Negro did."

Does anyone who frequents this spot on the 'net believe that our ancestors knowingly and willfully gave away all that they had accomplished during those twenty-five years? That black carpenters and cabinet makers, for example, just gave up their trades and decided not to work anymore? This is a huge part of the problem I have with folks who seriously argue that the economic and financial status of black folks as a whole is a matter of personal responsibility. In the aftermath of slavery, we took responsibility and prospered as long as we were allowed to do so. 

This thread has gotten me to thinks as well. I remember, very fondly, the “Million Man March” and the spirit of that event. Farrakhan pointed to some of the same concerns with black men, but there was something profoundly different about how and why it was done, perhaps because he was speaking “to” black men, and not “at or about” us.

Somewhere in that very long speech, he said the following: “But, let me say in truth, you can't point out wrong with malice. You can't point out wrong with hatred. Because, if we point out wrong with bitterness and hatred, then the bitterness and the hatred becomes a barrier between you and the person whom you hope to get right, that they might come into the favor of God.”

Farrakhan also said, “White supremacy has to die in order for humanity to live.”

Too often, in an effort to appease supremacist assumptions about African Americans, many politicians make speeches and pronouncements that are misguided assumptions about who we are and what we need. Now, I am not sure if Obama was has done this, but this debate is on going. What I am sure about is that I am a proud black father of an adopted bi-racial child. I am also a skilled artisans and craftsmen who takes the matter of personal responsibility very seriously.

After living on the negative end of racist assumptions for most of my life, I am hopeful that an Obama will come to realize speeches like the one in question need to be given more in the spirit of the above words by Farrakhan.

I am remembering the song by the Winans: “Lord Lift Us Up Where We Belong”. You have, or will have the bully pulpit now Mr. Obama, so lift us up ….

The process to drive African Americans from or prevent them becoming members of trade and craft unions began during the latter third of the 19th Century during the great wave of northern European immigration. Traditional labor history almost always cites the role that blacks played as strikebreakers as a justification for these practices but fails to address the obvious fact that blacks were not employed in those industries that were being struck. As for the craft unions, black tradesmen were prevented from joining these unions as a matter of stated policy. Many of the constitutions of these unions specifically denied blacks the opportunity to join. See, for example, my memoir "How My Father Grew Up" in the Threepenny Review, Spring 1995. 

ubstu34 -

P6 is changing the editor settings so I can't fix the link. I'll try later.