"At every critical moment of our struggle in America we have had to press relentlessly against the limits of the 'realistic' to create new realities for the life of our people. This is our challenge at Gary and beyond, for a new Black politics demands new vision, new hope and new definitions of the possible. Our time has come. These things are necessary. All things are possible."
---The 1972 Black Political Convention Agenda in Gary, Indiana
It is very frustrating as a conscious person of color to tell people that I am a registered Democrat…Obama mania aside, the question still remains, what was the last significant thing that Democrats done for the empowerment of people of color in this country???
Not individual gains and empowerment, but collective gains and empowerment…
How is it that Bill Clinton can be called the Black President, supposedly possessing the ability to empathize with the plight and struggle of Black people and yet cut the welfare rolls without any jobs and at the same time approve the proliferation of both private and federal prisons??? He sent more Black folks to jail than any president in history and yet he wonders why his wife lost the Black vote??? His administration helped to disenfranchise a generation of young Black voters all in the name of law and order and political expediency…
And people say well this is not about race it’s about class…Well I beg to differ in this respect…Although Blacks voted in droves for FDR, his New Deal actually represented a Raw Deal for African Americans who migrated from the rural south to the urban north…Sure his New Deal empowered poor working class and rural Whites, but it also left behind a generation of Black folks mired in the inhumane conditions of the cold hearted inner city without a radiator of hope to heat their dreams and ambitions…Sure he started social programs such as social security and welfare, but these programs were really started to aid White people (there are more Whites on welfare than Blacks, although the media at times does a poor job of pointing that out)…FDR was in essence forced through the political pressure brought by civil rights and labor activists such as A. Phillip Randolph and Bayard Rustin into signing the Executive Order 8802 or the Fair Employment Act which stopped the discrimination in the hiring of Blacks in the military industry complex during World War 2…
In 1912, Pres. Woodrow Wilson manipulated the Black leaders and churches to gain the Black vote only to bring back Jim Crow and usher in the resurrection of the KKK…
Many people in our society complain about the affirmative action programs and quotas which found their roots in The Great Society Program of Democratic Pres. Lyndon B. Johnson…However, what the media fails in pointing out that the main beneficiaries of this program supposedly enacted to right the wrongs of slavery and Jim Crow were and are White women…
There are many examples of other injustices initiated by the Demo- or Dixie- crats, but my point is this…The Democrat Party has not done enough to warrant the seemingly blind allegiance of Black voters to their causes…They have actually crippled the progress of the Black community by not taking Black community issues serious enough to readdress through legislative, judicial, educational, and economic efforts…
In 1972 Black America had a great opportunity at the Black Political Convention in Gary, Indiana to form a viable ‘Third Party’ to address the needs of a Black constituency...This was during the heyday of the Civil Rights and Black Power Movements where anything was possible and the times were ripe for change…However, they failed in their stated mission because many individual Black political personalities did not want to give up the pet benefits they possessed from being a part of a party that stressed tokenism more so than collectivism…
They also had a fear that the more "militant" Black Nationalist strain in forming a Race First Party would scare off their White liberal and sympathetic friends...In other words they still wanted White folks' acceptance and crumbs instead of liberty and justice for all...Now is the time to implement “change” as we speak...Specificity Begets Universality...We must remember that the Civil Rights Movement was a movement initiated by and for Black folks...
For all folks who will call this article a racist one please read the 10 point program articulated by The Black Panther Party For Self Defense http://www.blackpanther.org/TenPoint.htm…The things they were demanding are essential for all of humanity: decent jobs, food, clothing shelter, healthcare and education…Although their purpose was to empower the Black masses, the message they presented had broader and positive implications for all of society...If America take the time to diagnose and solve the ills of Black America, than all of America can be healed…
Also a bought person is never a respected person...People who are of independent mind, spirit and will are more respected than folks who go along just to get along even when it is to the detriment of their own people’s survival…Why should any political party pacify or answer to the demands of their maligned constituents if they know that the same maligned constituents are going to vote their way anyway??? Why should they make special concessions when you already sold your soul and vote to them???
Hypothetically speaking, one Black elected independent official has more power than 50 Black Democratic Congress people combined...Why??? Because that one independent Black vote is a swing vote…And this being a significant election year, people know that an extra effort must be made in catering to swing votes because they can go any direction…So in other words people will have to make compromises and promises that would be beneficial to that independently elected officials’ constituency...When it comes to the Democratic Party there are no strength in numbers when it concerns the souls and plight of Black Folks…
We must put collective success above individual achievement…If that means all Blacks have access to universal healthcare and a quality public school education instead of a Black President then so be it…The way our communities are going we can’t continue selling generation after generation down the river for 30 pieces of silver…Now’s the time to seize the moment to create not just a change but a positive change…Don’t let this opportunity pass us by once more… Yes We Shall!!!
(R2C2H2 Tha Artivist is host and editor of Tha Artivist Presents…W.E. A.L.L. B.E. News & Radio http://www.blogtalkradio.com/weallbe & http://www.weallbe.blogspot.com... He is also the author of James Reese Europe: Jazz Lieutenant…He can be reached by e-mail r2c2h2@gmail.com)
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