The Slavery Vow

“Slavery had a disastrous impact on African-American families, yet sadly a child born into slavery in 1860 was more likely to be raised by his mother and father in a two-parent household than was an African-American baby born after the election of the USA’s first African-American president”

If you didn’t know this was in the preamble to the Marriage Vow statement signed by a couple of the republican candidates for the presidency of these fine United States of America.  I said was because the social conservative Iowa group, Family Leader, has since retracted it from the opening of the pledge.

I don’t really know what to say.  I am sure someone could look up the statistics and find out whether this is true or not.  I don’t think I care to though.  This is perhaps one of the nastiest, disgusting and naive things to come out of the camp of crazy in about a week.

The suggestion that black children born into slavery were better off in terms of family life than today’s black children is at best stupid.  Apparent the authors of this don’t consider the rapes, the murders, the starvation, the forced separation from your family very important.  Nor do they consider the century old adverse effects it has on a culture and the nation itself worth noting.  It was more than “disastrous” it was pretty much close to genocide.

Even worse the statement tries to tie the “USA’s first African-American president” to the plight in that community.  It’s as if it is President Obama’s fault somehow.  Even worse than that Next Gingrinch didn't sign it making him almost look like a decent human.

I'm sure that had something to do with the word marriage though.

If You Are Failing At Least You Are Doing Something

It had been reported that many politicians want President Obama to fail.  As such they seem to want the economy to crash.  They want the unemployment rate to be as high as possible.  They want to blame the President for high gas prices.  In fact, if it makes the President look bad to the general public, then they would be all for it.

Man, if they could catch his smoking a cigarette then they would be happier then ever.

This whole dept ceiling thing has me scratching my head.  Should it happen?  Why should it happen?  What are we really trying to do?

Recent history tells us that, we have raised the debt ceiling before.  I believe it was seven times during the Bush administration in June 2002, May 2003, November 2004, March 2006 and September 2007.  While many of the same people claim to hate it now were in office, none of them seems to have complained about it then.  In fact, Boehner, Cantor McConnell all voted “yes” to it.

Remember Paul Ryan’s 2012 budget bill?  It was supported by 235 House Republicans and 40 GOP Senators.  Well that little gem added $6 trillion to the US national dept over ten years.

In other words they supported it until it fell into the hands of President Obama.  Nice.

Now I do have to agree that we need to rein in our spending.  However, when I say we I mean all of us.  Every politician should be at the table with some decent and sincere spending cuts.  I think we should end our unpaid wars.  Why get rid of Medicare when we are fighting two wars.  I think they all should be a little more truthful and stop blaming this mess on the middle class and poor people.  Should we tweak the entitlement programs?  Perhaps we should.  Call me cynical, but I don’t think it would do anything for the economy.

Truthfully, I think this whole dog and pony show is so that certain people can make the President look like a failure they claim he is.  A “deal” will be made before the August 2 deadline, simply because there has to be one.

"That would be a financial disaster, not only for our country but for the worldwide economy. Remember, the American people on Election Day said, 'we want to cut spending and we want to create jobs.' And you can't create jobs if you default on the federal debt."

That little gem was by Speaker John Boehner in January.

Today, he's hoping that the President fails.

Young, Gifted & Black

Autum Ashante is a thirteen year old girl who apparently is some sort of genius.  She knows at least three languages, Spanish, Arabic and Swahili.  She has an IQ of 149.  She is a seasoned performance poet among other things.  She also may have been accepted as a freshman at the University of Connecticut.

I say may have been because the University has denied it.  Or rescinded it.  Or something.  It is a convoluted story.  In June, the school confirmed she had been accepted.  However, recently the father claims the school called and told him that they felt she was not academically ready.  Maybe thirteen is too young for college these days.

Still none of this reflects poorly on a child with such incredible potential.  I have to admit that I had never heard of her and she had been in the news before when she was about seven years of age.   During a poetry performance at a school near her home (she was home schooled) she had recited the words:

White Nationalism Put U In Bondage

White nationalism is what put you in bondage
Pirate and vampires like Columbus, Morgan, and Darwin
Drank the blood of the sheep, trampled all over them with
Steel, tricks and deceit.
Nothing has changed take a look in our streets
The mis-education of she and Hegro — leaves you on your knee2grow
Black lands taken from your hands, by vampires with no remorse
They took the gold, the wisdom and all of the storytellers
They took the black women, with the black man weak
Made to watch as they changed the paradigm
Of our village
They killed the blind, they killed the lazy, they went
So far as to kill the unborn baby
Yeah White nationalism is what put you in bondage
Pirates and vampires like Columbus, Morgan, and Darwin
They drank the blood of the sheep, trampled all over them with
Steel laden feet, throw in the tricks alcohol and deceit.
Nothing has changed take a look at our streets.

Not the average thoughts of a seven year old.  And naturally the right wing hated it.  Michelle Malkin (who I just don’t get) in particular wrote a Blog labeled “MEETTHE 7-YEAR-OLD RACIST POET” .  Way to go Michelle, always picking on the kids.

Personally I don’t have any problems with what the young lady wrote six years ago.  I don’t have a problem with Tom Sawyer being read in school either although I realize that others may.  In fact, unless the words she used were lies I don’t have any problem with it.  Okay maybe there are no vampires, but still.

That was six or seven years ago and now this called young lady, raised by a single father, can be considered quite gifted.  Whether or not this situation with the college works out or not, I believe she will have a very bright future.  We shall see.

Just remember there are many more gifted children out there.  We have got to tell those stories too.

Being About It

From an EnidNews.com story by Dave Ruthenberg on July 6, 2011:

Court Crandall had an idea. Crandall, a Hollywood screenwriter and advertising executive, wanted to help young people and boost the battered image of the city of Compton, a Los Angeles suburb.

His idea, a simple free-throw contest with the winner receiving $40,000 toward the cost of college, netted far more positive, feel-good publicity than any public relations campaign could have possibly mustered thanks to the generosity of Allan Guei.

Guei, a Compton student, won the free throw contest which attracted over 80 applicants who had to have a GPA of at least 3.00. The field was narrowed down to eight participants drawn at random. It’s not that Guei really turned out to be much of a marksman at the free throw line. The 5-foot-9 student only made five out of 10 attempts, but that was good enough to best the other seven nerve-rattled contestants during the event.

And it’s not like Guei lacked basketball ability. Despite his size, Guei, who lead his high school hoops team to the district finals, accepted an offer to attend Cal State Northridge on a full basketball scholarship shortly after the free throw contest.

Still, the 18-year-old student would later stun everybody, Crandall included, when he announced at graduation ceremonies he would forego the $40,000 and donate the winnings to the other seven contestants. And before anybody becomes too cynical, Guei, under NCAA rules, would have been allowed to keep most of his winnings.

You can read the rest here. 

So when some people say that young black men are a lost generation.  That they are victims of a culture and attitude that causes them to wreck havoc on themselves and those around them, I would suggest that they look up Allan Guei and note that he is the rule not the exception. 

Just because you choose to ignore their stories does not mean that they don’t exist.

Stop Talking About It & Be About It!

In an editorial form the Delmarva Times on June 23, Walter E, Williams laments on the racist assaults created by blacks in today’s society.  In it he states:

These racist attacks can, at least in part, be attributed to the black elite, who have a vested interest in racial paranoia. And that includes a president who has spent years aligned with people who have promoted racial grievance and polarization and appointed an attorney general who's accused us of being "a nation of cowards" on matters of race and has refused to prosecute black thugs who gathered at a Philadelphia voting site in blatant violation of federal voter intimidation laws. Tragically, black youngsters -- who are seething with resentments, refusing to accept educational and other opportunities unknown to blacks yesteryear -- will turn out to be the larger victims in the long run.

You can read the rest here.

What really gets me about this economist’s statement is that he proposes nothing and blames people who have nothing to do with the real problem.  The blame should be squarely on the shoulders of the parents.  Just like it would be if we were talking about Asians, Jews, white, etc.  The president spent years with people who “promoted racial grievance”?  Could that have been his grandparents as he has mentioned in the past?  Holder accuses the country of being a “nation of cowards” on matter of race?  I will always believe Holder in right.  In this “post racial” America where we have elected a black person as president we are still surprised about how much racism there still is and the question being asked is, “Why doesn’t the president do something about it?”  It is as if we want to blame the victim rather than ourselves.

 And for the record it was the former president who didn’t want to prosecute the so-called “thugs” at the Philadelphia voting site.  That was because there wasn’t any intimidation.
I have heard a lot of people echo Professor Williams’ statements about blacks.  My question to them is what are you doing about it?  If you have such a huge problem with this or any segment of America are you going to step up and try to help the people in it?  Or are you going to spend all your time writing in blogs, newspapers or  behind a computer doing nothing but running your mouth?

The truth is that there are literally hundreds of programs out there who help.  There are hundreds of thousands of people out there who donate their time to make a difference.  The stories are out there.  The people exist everywhere.  I have mentored and been a father figure to a few of them myself in the community.  I know there are more like me out there.  We don’t get paid for it and we come out of our pockets to do it when needed.  And we still do it.

My problem about Professor Williams is that some of his opinions may be right be.  Or at least close enough to being right that he can help foster the dialogue and action more.  However, as much as he criticizes the “black elite” of which he is a member, I have yet to see him enter into a community and do anything about the problem.

It is time for the professor and many others to get from the behind the computer and podium and put his words into action.  Join the rest of us.