A very informative article by a Dr. Hutchinson provided an insightful view of what just played out between Al and Cornell where "The media shoves the chosen black spokesperson into the spotlight and pretends that issues not sanctioned by the chosen one are not issues” then they ignore all the causes they don't like. Most of these so-called leaders have reduced leadership to star and celebrity status, both have gone from the streets to TV. Gone are the days of marching and standing up for a cause “mass direct action" like that of yesterday and it is obvious white leaders no longer have respect for or listening to black leaders today. Seems like some blacks are not willing to give up time, sacrifice and freedom, which reminds me of what Dr. King once said that "There are many Negroes who will never fight for freedom, but they will gladly accept it when it comes". Until then blacks will continue to be marginalized and taken advantage of by both the Democrats and the Republican Party and remain nothing but a weak pawn to whoever seems like the lesser of two evils. I urge people to pay attention to what is happening in the world and before our eyes, remain diligent.
@Trixie - I so applaud you for your posts. No matter how much you may differ from someone, you always make sure your point is clear directed and well stated and I agree on all your comments today.
-prissy3
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Umm I think you have it backwards MTO. Obama is the one who is part of an entrenched political system that if you were paying attention just threw poor people under the bus I swear Barack could tell black folks to jump out the window and ya'll would support it. Speak on it DR WEST. Intelligent discussion should not be silenced because SOME ignorant black folks can't engage in independent political thought. I still want to know why they are cutting social programs yet giving corporations tax cuts! I still want to know why unemployment overall was addressed but black unemployment remained steady I don't care what color the man is he was elected by a constituency that is allowing him to take them for granted. Basically ya'll are dumb.
-romeoalante
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the u.s has gone so far to the right politics dont make sense. its more of a mental institution than anything else. i see these people talking as if they still lived in a democracy, thats their problem. they haven't got the balls to call things their true name.
ElAlexxis 7 minutes ago
Scipio2021 23 minutes ago
Because A) the poor do ALL of the work. When was the last time you saw a single individual build huge industries? Never. It's never happened. Sure, managing or running a business can be a skill, but beyond self-employed small businesses, it's all capital that's doing the work, not the individual who owns it (like someone who's making money off of just owning a property and renting it out rather than producing something of value for society). Basic economics 101.
B) since gov has to be paid for, who do you think does the paying? We've already determined that the lowest echelons of the economic totem pole do all the producing, but with tax cuts for the rich (or in general) those at the lowest suffer the most since there's a depreciation of revenue for programs meant to help them pick themselves back up (and yes, this DOES happen, whether you want to believe it does or not. WAKE UP), and those who benefit most from them (the top 1%) pay less
actually, its thanks to massive tax-cuts and neoliberal ideologies of "free markets and austerity" that have hit the poorest (see: blacks) the hardest. You know, tax cuts for the wealthy that massively distribute wealth from the lowest to the highest echelons of society. So yea, have fun being wrong more.
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Timothy wrote:
I do like Savant's commentaries on labor. His words and other people's words made more committed to the ideology that there is dignity in labor and labor rights is an extension of human rights.
Most of the human race is made up of working people, and we Blacks are (as a group) probably the most proletarianized people in America. Both of my own parents included. Who is against the rights of labor is against the rights of humanity. In fact, virtually all democratic nations recognize the right of labor to organize, and in some countries even a right to be represented in parliament. Mainly Fascist,Stalinist and other authoritarians regimes are opposed to labor as an independent, self-active force.
Also, keep in mind that labor (at least its most progressive elements) was an essential part of the Civil Rights coalition of the 1960s. And anyone who has read Dr. King's writings---from STRIDE TOWARD FREEDOM to WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE, CHAOS OR COMMUNITY--has to be aware of how pro-labor King was.
Indeed, King's LAST campaign in Memphis was in support of impoverished black public employees who were denied the right to collective bargaining, decent wages and benefits.
(Check out the video AT THE RIVER I STAND regarding that campaign).
Also, Coretta Scott King visited Baltimore in 1969 to help our health care workers here to organize 1199E---a union to which I belonged briefly until being fired from Mercy Hospital in connection with it.
And even before the Movement of the 1960s, A. Phillip Randolph was fighting for labor and for civil rights for Blacks people as far back as the 1920s & 30s. His pressure helped desegregate the military. From his Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters, also came E.D. Nixon, who was one of the organizers of the Montgomery Boycott. Randolph himself was the prime organizer of the famous 1963 March on Washington.
Look at the old picket signs of that time, and you see signs of labor everywhere. It wa they who carried signs reading JOBS AND FREEDOM!
Through labor organizing we won the eight hour day, and end to child labor, and numerous other benefits without which a free, dignified and civilized life is impossible.
Collective bargaining is a basic democratic right, and whoever opposed it is an enemy of democracy--in the fine company of Il Duce, der Fuhrer, Joe Stalin and other stalwart anti-unionists.
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