Friday, July 31, 2009

Mr. President,Barack Obama Until You Talk About Power And Privilege,You Can't Talk About Change.It's Hard For White Americans To Deal With Racism.

The meeting between professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr. and police Sergeant James Crowley at the White House was a good public relations stunt on the part of President Obama, but it may provide some positive redeeming political and social value in setting an example on the need for constructive dialogue on a multitude of complex racial issues by the average citizen.
However, until President Obama talks about power and privilege, he can't talk about change. It's very difficult for White Americans to deal with their own racism, and you can't sweep over 400 years of brutal individual and institutional racism under the rug or over a few beers at the White House.

Mr.President, you would like for the issue of race to go away and perhaps that's why you dodge and tap dance around the subject, but racism and race are part of our DNA.
All of the recent attacks from the Republican Party and others questioning the legitmacy of President Obama's birth certificate, his country of origin (Kenya), his citizenship, his religion regarding whether he is a Muslim, that he is coming to take our guns away, he pals around with terrorists, a woman from Delaware who said"I want my country back", he and his wife going to New York to take in a show on Broadway, he's a terrorist, he wants to give reparations to Black people, he doesn't like white people, he's a racist and doesn't like white culture, impeach Obama,Rahm Emanuel needs to put"Gorilla glue on his chair to keep him in the oval office,just say no,he's a Nazi, he's an elitist,he's is an apologist, questioning him and his wife's patriotism, misplaced comments like: "is he an Arab, he is a socialist, absurd inflammatory comments on health care reform, he's an affirmative action baby, why did he stay in Reverend Wright's Church for twenty years listening to those racists sermons, kill him, are all manifestations and by products of overt unadulterated white racism. The code words differ but the message is the same.
The late world renowned famous African American Social Scientist&Psychologist, Dr Kenneth Clark said in 1963: "Racial prejudices are indications of a disturbed and potentially unstable society.
Blogger Black Buzz says America in 2009 has the potential of going back to the days of Plessy vs. Ferguson with its persistent Jim Crow mindset and with the United States Supreme Court doing everything in its power to make the return to Plessy a new 21st century reality. So how can we as a society treat the disease of white racism when the vast majority of whites remain in denial ?
According to the highly esteemed Dr. Alexander Thomas, Professor of Psychiatry, New York University Medical Center, and Director Psychiatric Division, Bellevue Hospital, stated: "To gloss over race in a racist society may in itself be a capitulation to racism". Dr. Thomas further states that: "Racism, unfortunately, is not the monopoly of a single type of personality structure. All kinds of people can be racists: normal and abnormal, paranoid and non-paranoid, aggressive and passive, domineering and submissive."

Thursday, July 30, 2009

President Obama Why Not Serve Thunder-Bird Wine&Irish Whiskey At Your Meeting Between Professor Gates And Sgt. Crowley ?

Harvard Professor Skip Gates acts uppity since leaving the majestic Mountains of West Virgina,and now he claims that he doesn't drink beer,but he grew up on Moon-Shine or White Lightning. Professor Gates would be right at home sipping on some Thunder Bird Wine,and eating hog's head cheese. And I'm quite sure that Sergeant Crowley would consider it a honor if President Obama got permission from Teddy Kennedy to serve a fifth or two of Irish Whiskey even though he is a beer & pretzel guy.

Did Senator Barbara Boxer Go Racial On Harry C. Alford,President Of The National Black Chamber Of Commerce ?

Yes,Senator Boxer we know some of your best friends are colored,and you have done a lot of constructive things over the years for persons of color but that still does not relieve you from the tag of being a racist. Indeed your behavior toward Harry Alford in the Senate Dirksen building on pending legislation known as the Waxman/Markey Bill was appalling and downright despicable. Harry Alford ask this question of you Senator Boxer,"Why did you go racial" ? Mr. Alford further states"That is what racists do". According to Harry Alford" "When racists get up against the wall,their racial persona takes over and all of the ugly comes out like a gusher".
Racism and Bigotry is not confined exclusively to the Republican Party for some of the Country's most notorious racists are in the Democratic Party.

Larry Elder Media Commentator, And Front Man For White Supremacy And Fox News You Have Just Been Inducted Into The National Lawn Jockey Hall-Of-Fame

Wednesday, July 29, 2009

President Obama Rather Than Hold A Beer Summitt Between Gates&Crowley,Why Not Have A Presidential Commission On Race& Reconciliation ?

It appears as though President Obama's Beer Summit meeting between Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates Jr. and police Sgt. James Crowley of the Cambridge,Massachusetts Police Department is all about show& style to mask a gigantic mistake in judgement on the part of Obama in initially responding to a reporter's question about the Cambridge-Gate affair.
Apparently President Obama thinks that the White House is just your typical Irish Pub or some Ghetto Beer Garden that can be utilized to enhance his own political standing for his gross failure in being properly prepared in his response to the incident in question.
I do believe that President Obama may have spoken from his heart about the Gates-Crowley incident,but it was the wrong response for this incident in Cambridge,Massachusetts involving Gates and Crowley. President Obama's high powered aides&advisers basically failed to properly prepare him for the reporter's question on the Cambridge incident.

President William Jefferson Clinton turned our treasured White House into a Cat House,and now we have the so-called allegedly first African American President sitting down with Gates and Crowley to discuss this important incident over a few beers which gives an appearance that this President is trying to reduce the level of tension between Gates and Crowley to curry favor with Whites in the dominant culture.
Mr. President is this the kind of example you want to show for our children&young people that some of our problems can be drowned away with suds and other destructive vices? Shame on you Mr. President.

It must be said that every identifiable African American male from Colin Powell to Ben Jealous has been victimized by racial profiling,and to reduce this important issue over a six-pack or keg of beer is both disgusting and nauseating on your part,Mr President. President Obama didn't whisper a word about the brutal murders of innocent Black men Sean Bell,or Oscar Grant by a group of filthy racist cops. So why was the President so silent on these heinous crimes committed by the police in New York City and Oakland California ?
It maybe appropriate to have a Beer Summit at a Harvard Law Review social function or at a Greek fraternity House,but not in the white House on the very serious and delicate matters of racial profiling, and good police practices in the United States of America.
By going forward with this Beer Summit meeting with the actors in question shows President Obama's lack of depth and understanding on the complex issue of race, and his historical naivety and flawed sensitivity to issue of race in the broader context of the American society.
President Obama's is counting on his polling numbers going up as result of this beer summit meeting and that's what this meeting is really all about,Mr Obama's approval ratings.
I want everyone to know that if President Obama was serious about"Taking The Bull By The Horn" he would establish A Presidential National Commission On Race and Reconciliation. The purpose of this Presidential National Commission on Race and Reconciliation would be to study,evaluate,examine, create programs that promote better understanding of various cultures and peoples and investigate a multitude of realities of racism in the United States and to make recommendations to the President and Congress for policy changes,Executive Orders, or vitally needed legislation that is germane to the present effects of past discrimination. This Presidential Commission should be adequately funded to fulfill its mission and objectives.
If not you,Mr. President,who? If not now,when Mr. President ?
Mr. President Obama" Don't talk the talk" "If you can't walk the walk".

Tuesday, July 28, 2009

All Hispanic Voters Should Remember July,28 09 As The Date That Six Republicans On The Senate Judiciary Committee Voted Against Judge Sonia Sotomayor.

I say to all eligible and potential Hispanic voters don't get mad about the vote of the six Republicans Senators just get even at the polls. You should make the the Dumblicans(Republicans) pay a terrible price at the polls in all Federal& State elections in the future.Hey Jeff Sessions, you ever hear of a political pay back ?

Wednesday, July 22, 2009

The State Of Ohio Lost 30,000 Good Jobs Last Month,And Michigan's Unemployement Rate Is 15.2%

I always thought the 800 Billion dollar Stimulus plan was poorly crafted and did not have enough incentives for real job creation,job growth or retention of existing jobs. The Stimulus bill was loaded with top heavy pet pork projects from both parties that had absolutely nothing to do with stimulating job growth or job development. What a sham and con on the American people !


President Obama needs to go a little slower and methodical in pursuing major health care reform legislation and to make sure every T is crossed and every I is dotted while promoting his health care goals. Leadership is not about dictating to the American public and to both houses of Congress but having the keen ability to lead,guide and direct one's objectives in a consistent manner. What good is a bona-fide health care plan when you don't have a job ?

Tuesday, July 21, 2009

Racist Cop In Cambridge Massachusetts Didn't Give A Damn Whether Henry Louis Gates Jr.Was A Harvard Professor Or A Ditch Digger;There Just "Niggers"!

The racist police sergeant Crowley of the Cambridge Massachusetts didn't give damn whether Professor Gates was a distinguished Harvard Faculty member or just some ordinary Black utility worker. He was just a"Nigger" to him and that's why he invited Gates outside to further provoke him into a possible physical confrontation. Many Caucasian cops and other law enforcement officers all around the United States are of the same racists mindset as Crowley, and the society by in large is in denial about this persistent malignant disease called white racism. The media frenzy about the Gates and Crowley incident will go away after two more weeks of warped misplaced discussion about the issue of race in the context of racial profiling and we won't have any more productive dialogue or action on the subject until another incident involving a high profile person of color is victimized by the racist oppressive police in this country. Men of color are routinely and daily victimized by racists cops and other law enforcement officials but those incidents never get reported by the main stream corporate sponsored media.
Boston Massachusetts,like Philadelphia Pennsylvania have been historical hot beds for overt and covert direct racial conflict,and both towns appeared to be far more racist than a place like Philadelphia Mississippi.
It is very unfortunate that the so-called first African American President,Barack Obama does not enough heart or the will to tell white parents that they need to raise their children to become non-bigoted and non racists,and that those white parents need to practice the Golden rule and to love all thy Neighbors as thyself. Prejudice is a learned behavior and children that are taught to hate and despise others grow up to be bigoted and racists and less tolerant of people who are different than them or the dominant group.Children are the bearers of life in its simplest and most joyous form.Children are color-blind and still free of all the complications,greed,and hatred that will slowly be instilled in them by a racist society and parents through out their lives. Bigoted parents produce bigoted children who carry those bias and prejudices in to adulthood and that's where we are in America in the year 2009. Some whites who voted for Barack Obama for President helped to superficially relieve them of various degrees of white guilt relative to the treatment of all people of color in this country particularly to African Americans, but many fail to realize that we are still stuck in 350 years of brutal on-going systemic and individual white racism. And the election of the first African American President didn't change any of the various institutions that have perpetrated over 350 years of the present effects of on-going naked and blind racism from those institutions.

Indeed racism is alive and flourishing very well in the United States of America,and since the favorable Ricci vs. DeStefano ruling by the United States Supreme Court it appears to be open season on people of color which was evidenced by the racially charged Senate Confirmation Hearing involving Sonia Sotomayor.
Can America afford nationally& internationally to have this overt and structural systemic white and individual white racism on its back going forward in the 21TH. Century ? How can the supposedly great American Empire lecture anyone about human rights,racism,self-determination, tolerance or good governance when we simply don't practice remotely any semblance of those ideas at home,and to say that we do is dishonest and hypocritical.

Sunday, July 19, 2009

Patrick Leahy,Chairman Of The Senate Judiciary Committee Watched Racial Attacks On Judge Sotomayor For Three Whole Days And He Did Nothing !

Why Senator Leahy (D) Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee did you permit the Republicans vicious racial attacks on Judge Sotomayor for at least four days during the Senate Confirmation Hearing on Judge Sotomayor ?
Mr.Leahy you should have questioned Jeff Sessions and his Republicans colleagues on the Senate Judiciary Committee when they all engaged in a well orchestrated relentless racial assault on Judge Sotomayor's suitability,Judicial Philosophy,Temperament,and qualifications of Judge Sotomayor to sit as an Associate Justice on the United States Supreme Court. The Republicans on the Senate Judiciary Committee used subtle coded racial language under the disguise of questioning Judge Sotomayor and anyone that has a slight degree of sensitivity could see that the Republican onslaught on the Judge Sotomayor had obvious racial overtones.
Furthermore Mr. Leahy you could have also questioned Mr. Sessions on why he didn't call any of the 83% African American&Female litigants who had their discrimination claims rejected by Judge Sotomayor on the United States Second Court Of Appeals. Mr Sessions only called a group of New Haven White Fire Fighters plus one Hispanic Fire Fighter to score political points and to appeal to his racist base which is deep in the heart of Dixie and all over the United States of America. And by the way Mr. Leahy your Democratic Party invented racial politics,and your Democrats practiced three hundred and fifty years of white Christian Terrorism against people of color in the United States Of America.

What is vitally needed in the United States Of America is the Establishment, development, cultivation of a true viable well financed third or fourth political Party that will challenge and compete against the monopolistic stranglehold of the Republican and Democratic Parties at every level of government. How is it that in a country of well over 306 million people we have only two main political parties and a handful of fringe parties that do not possess the resources and finanaces to mount any semblance of a challenge to the main players ? The American people need to see that it is in their best interest to break-up this exclusive club of the Democratic and Republican party. Competition is needed to make our elected officials more accountable to the people they serve rather than currying favor with the corporate lobbyists and their respective special interest. It is free open competition that has made America successful in the market place and in this experiment in democratic governance.
The American taxpayers have had poor to marginal mediocre performance for the last forty years in all the systems of governance with very little accountability. Is our failure to act with any degree of urgency to change the present corrupt political system mean that we are satisfied with the status quo, or simply to lazy and comfortable ?

Saturday, July 18, 2009

President Obama Instead Of Lectuiring African Americans About Being Good Parents;You Should Lecture White Americans

The Honorable,President Barack Hussein Obama,you should tell white parents how to raise their children so they will not grow up to be bigots like Jeff Sessions,Lindsey Graham,Trent Lott, Stephen King,Robert Byrd, Russ Limbaugh, David Duke, Dick Cheney, George W. Bush,John Rocker, Phillip Murray, Pat Buchanan, Michele Bachmann,and George Preston Marshall,et.al.etc.
Your speech to the NAACP at its Annual Convention in New York was shameful, mean-spirited, and a-beat-down,and all about self-aggrandizement. Now we all know what the Reverend Jesse Jackson was talking about in reference to your deportment toward African Americans.
Are you taking your cues from your well heeled corporate sponsors,and special interest groups and organizations? The Corporate sponsored media,and pundits loved your speech because you were talking negatively to people of color,and your speech was all about show and style and very little on substance. But most intelligent progressives can see through your phoniness. So when your policies fail don't make any excuses.

President Obama's "Tough Love" Sermon to Africa

by Ron Daniels

President Obama has developed a reputation as an avid reader with a wide range of interests, yet he appears to have learned little about the history of Africa's encounters with Europe and America over the past half-millennium. “He might have done well to read How Europe Underdeveloped Africa where Walter Rodney documents this tragic dynamic.” The history of super-exploitation is by no means over. “Neo-colonialism has been the order of the day as many African nations have been reduced to 'flag independence' where they ostensibly control the political process but have only nominal control over their economies.”

“His approach lacked context and therefore devalued the inestimable impact of the holocaust of enslavement, colonialism and neo-colonialism on current conditions in Africa.”

Barack Obama traveled to Accra, Ghana, for an historic visit to Africa as America's first African American President. Africa and the Black World were buzzing about his journey to the continent where his father was born. President Obama soon made it clear that he was coming to Africa to deliver a sermon of "tough love" on national responsibility and accountability. In a conversation with African leaders and journalists prior to touching down in Ghana, the President bluntly admonished Africans to stop blaming their problems on colonialism, stressing instead that the future of Africa must be in the hands of Africans. Welcomed by thousands of adoring Ghanaians as a son of Africa, in his speech before the Parliament, Obama emphasized that bad governance, corrupt officials and fratricidal conflicts are not attributable to the legacy of colonialism.And, as he emerged from an emotional tour of the slave dungeons at Cape Coast Castle, he said Africans should not see themselves simply as "victims" of this horrendous experience.
While I certainly believe there is merit to much of what President Obama had to say, I was disturbed by his approach. It lacked context and therefore devalued the inestimable impact of the holocaust of enslavement, colonialism and neo-colonialism on current conditions in Africa. Moreover, I would have preferred that the President start with a more uplifting recitation of Africa's extraordinary contribution to civilization and humankind. Using Africa's legacy of achievements as a starting point, I would have preferred the President acknowledge that the European invasion and the trans-Atlantic slave trade "underdeveloped" and devastated Africa, while contributing substantially to the "development" of Europe and America. He might have done well to read How Europe Underdeveloped Africa where Walter Rodney documents this tragic dynamic.
“The former European colonizers have maintained a stranglehold over the economies of their former colonies.”
I would have preferred that the President discuss the systematic carving up of Africa by European powers at the Congress of Berlin in 1884 and the ruthless and sustained exploitation of the continent's treasure trove of resources, further accentuating the development/underdevelopment process. The dissection of Africa was totally executed without regard for existing ethnic/cultural ties and the boundaries of kingdoms and nations of the time. While carving up Africa served the purposes of the colonizers, it sowed the seeds of ethnic strife/tension and dysfunctional states once "independence" was achieved - all of which has played to the advantage of the colonizers.
I would have preferred that the President discuss how the former European colonizers have maintained a stranglehold over the economies of their former colonies thereby continuing to disproportionately benefit from the riches/wealth of Africa. Neo-colonialism has been the order of the day as many African nations have been reduced to "flag independence" where they ostensibly control the political process but have only nominal control over their economies. Moreover, I would have preferred that the President address the serious damage done by the pro-western oriented neo-liberal structural adjustment programs imposed on African nations by the International Monetary Fund and World Bank. These programs were designed to promote privatization of public enterprises as part of the "free-market, laissez-faire orthodoxy of radical conservatives in the U.S.
“He might have done well to read How Europe Underdeveloped Africa where Walter Rodney documents this tragic dynamic.”
While I am no fan of President Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe, someone whom I feel is afflicted by "president-for-life disease," I would have preferred that the President be critical of Britain, and even the U.S., for failing to implement the provisions of the Lancaster Agreement which called for funds to be made available so that land could be purchased from the White settlers. You cannot adequately assess the crisis in Zimbabwe without discussing the fact that Britain, Europe and America reneged on their promise to assist the landless to become landowners in a nation where they were dispossessed by interlopers. Finally, I would have preferred that the President be a bit more humble in pointing fingers at corrupt leaders, agencies and governments in Africa when the greed driven, reckless and irresponsible behavior of the bandits and Barracudas on Wall Street have not only wrecked the U.S economy, but sent the global economy into a terrifying tailspin. And, I am not aware of many Bernie Madoffs on the African continent!
This is the context which could have provided greater credibility and moral authority to President Obama's criticism of corruption, bad governance and fratricidal conflicts on the African continent. My preferences notwithstanding, however, I must admit my utter disgust at much of what I see on the African continent in terms of the failure of African leaders and governments to serve the interest and welfare of the masses of the people. No where is this more evident than in the oil rich nation of Nigeria where millions live in abject poverty in the Delta region, in the shadow of oil rigs and refineries. President Obama is absolutely correct to suggest that it's not colonialism, neo-colonialism or dictates from America or the West that drive Nigerian business interests to line their pockets and become filthy rich while the masses live in wretched poverty. This phenomenon is not confined to Nigeria. Corruption and mismanaged governments abound on the African continent as far too many of its leaders seek to secure and cling to power for self-aggrandizement.
“I am not aware of many Bernie Madoffs on the African continent!”
Far be it for the President of the United States to lecture people of African descent on these crucial matters. As African people we have a moral, ethical and political imperative to demand that African leaders not betray the vision and sacrifice of African freedom fighters like Kwame Nkrumah, Julius K. Nyerere, Ahmad Sekou Toure and other leaders of the anti-colonial liberation struggles. Their goal was not only to gain "independence" but to create new societies, totally divorced from the greed-oriented ideologies of Europe and America. Their vision was to achieve total decolonization of their new nations so that the masses could finally benefit from the enormous riches of Africa. This is the largely unrealized vision/mission which progressive African leaders and Pan Africanists must focus on with relentless commitment, effort and passion in the 21st century!

Dr. Ron Daniels is President of the Institute of the Black World 21st Century and Distinguished Lecturer at York College City University of New York. He is the host of Night Talk, Wednesday evenings on WBAI 99.5 FM, Pacifica New York. His articles and essays also appear on the IBW website www.ibw21.org and www.northstarnews.com. He can be reached via email at info@ibw21.org.

Friday, July 17, 2009

Obama's Condescending, Scolding Speech, At The NAACP 100TH. Anniversary Convention At The New York Hilton Was Short-Sighted !

President Barack Obama's speech to the audience at the NAACP Annual 100TH. Anniversary Convention was condescending,scolding,short-sighted and lacked depth.
When I heard President Obama's shameful speech at the NAACP Annual Convention at the Hilton Hotel in New York City,I thought I was listening to Ronald W. Reagan,George W. Bush or the notorious Bill Bennett.
Obama's speech was full of tired worn out platitudes and innuendo's solely designed to appeal to white America fears and his well heeled corporate sponsors like Goldman Sachs,AIG,Bank of America,George Sporros,etc.
President Obama don't make any excuses if and when your economic and war policies fail in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Thursday, July 16, 2009

Open E-Mail to Patrick Leahy, Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee in Reference to the Appointment of Judge Sotomayor to the Supreme Court

Dear Senator Leahy,

Why have your Republican colleagues on the Senate Judiciary Committee given so much time to the Ricci vs. DeStefano case, when Judge Sonia Sotomayor rejected cases of discrimination involving African Americans 83% of the time while sitting as Judge on the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit? Why aren't there any African American litigants who had their claims rejected testifying against the appointment of Judge Sotomayor to the Supreme court?

Apparently, the disparate treatment involving African Americans and other persons of color is a non-factor or is simply a low priority to your Republican members of the Senate Judiciary Committee. The Republicans' lack of recognition of African American discrimination claims gives an appearance of being racially insensitive and biased toward the plight of African American litigants whose claims were rejected by Judge Sotomayor and by other Judges on the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit.

To be only concerned with the White applicants who didn't get the Supervisory Positions in the New Haven Connecticut Fire Department,and not with Hispanics and African Americans who don't,is showing racial preference.

Your prompt attention to this matter will be greatly appreciated. This e-mail should be made a part of the record in the Senate Confirmation Hearing relative to the appointment of Judge Sotomayor to the United States Supreme Court.

Sincerely,

Ronald B.Saunders

Take a Look in the Mirror, America

by Solomon Comissiong

“Obama spoke as if America and Europe had nothing to do with much of the 'bad' governance that Mama Africa has seen since European invaders began their rape, murder and plunder.”

Almost six months into the “Change you can believe in” Cult (I mean administration), and I am regrettably remain unpleasantly surprised at the number of people who still, despite strong facts, escape reality by thinking that President Obama is some kind of progressive messiah. He is not progressive much less a messiah. I am surprised at the unmitigated hubris President Obama shows each time he spews forth disingenuous, insulting and “coded” rhetoric. However, most regrettable, I am surprised that I am surprised.
President Obama has just concluded his first presidential visit to Sub-Saharan African (second trip to Africa, including Egypt) and, if you listen close enough, you can still hear the echoes of him chastising and scolding Africans for the destabilization of their mineral rich continent. He curiously reminded Africans, and the world, that they (Africans) could not longer blame colonization and slavery for their problems. Previously this month, Obama had said in an interview with
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that “excuses” about neo-colonialism had hindered progress on the world’s “poorest” continent. He sounded eerily like some white American liberal or conservative when they feel the need to lecture black Americans that they can all simply pull themselves up from their proverbial “bootstraps.” They, and Obama, deliberately fail to mention, 1) that many people have no bootstraps by which to pull themselves up, and 2) the role institutional racism played and continues to play in maintaining the equality divide between blacks and whites.
Obama’s speech in Ghana was reminiscent of the time, during his campaign, that he impressed his white “handlers” by stepping into a black church and exclusively scolding black men for being irresponsible fathers, as if this was an issue restricted to that demographic. Obama knew very well that he could not go into a white church with that rhetoric despite the fact that philandering and deadbeat fathering exists in every community. You see, to do that Obama would have to have some semblance of moxie. He is much more comfortable taking the easy “road” when it comes to social issues. Honestly addressing all of the intersectional sides of an issue, including the root causes, appears to be much too difficult for President Obama.
“He impressed his white handlers by stepping into a black church and exclusively scolding black men for being irresponsible fathers, as if this was an issue restricted to that demographic.”
When Obama embarked upon his superficial 24-hour “trip” to Ghana and lectured black Africans about corruption, bad governance, and tyranny, strongly intimating that these were the sole reasons why the vast majority of its people are immersed in a quagmire of poverty and death, he was taking the very easy road: an exercise in false and self-serving logic that his so-called liberal European-American constituents love to hear. He was taking a road that his white conservative European-American adversaries more than agree with. He used cheap rhetorical devices to essentially deny that his own country and other Western nations are equally, if not more, responsible for the destabilized condition in which so many African nations find themselves. He spoke as if America and Europe had nothing to do with much of the “bad” governance that Mama Africa has seen since European invaders began to rape, murder and plunder her soil and her people.
If my memory serves me correctly it was America, via the CIA, that funded a coup that murdered the great Congolese Leader Patrice Lumumba and installed the corrupt Mobutu Sese Seko who, with the aid of the US, cast death, plunder, and destruction upon the people of Congo for more than three decades. The US, on the direct orders of President Eisenhower, caused the assassination of Lumumba because he had the “bold” idea that the vast mineral resources of Congo should primarily benefit its people and not the West. Coincidentally, it was also a US supported coup that was responsible for the overthrow of one of Africa’s most progressive leaders, Kwame Nkrumah, in 1966.
“The US, on the direct orders of President Eisenhower, caused the assassination of Lumumba.”
President Obama knows very well about these American atrocities, and many more, yet omitted them from his speech in Ghana. It would take courage to admit the role Washington has played in the destabilization of Africa – the kind of courage this president lacks.
Instead of providing an honest context for the current conditions confronting Africa, Obama selectively focuses on “bad” African governance and corruption, all the while turning a blind eye to the role the US has played and continues to play. However, can fans of imperialism blame the guy? Obama is reading from the same page of the US imperialist playbook as his presidential predecessors. The rules of the playbook forbidsa US head of state from allowing America to accept any culpability in the violation of other nations' sovereignty. So while all of the good Obamanistas continue to drink their spiked kool-aid he and his minions, like Susan Rice, Kipp Ward, and Johnnie Carson, will continue to build the case for imperial programs such as Africom (African-Command).
Obama can be counted on to advocate for more fettered (structural adjustment-laden) aid from the likes of the World Bank, IMF and USAID. Don’t expect Obama to discuss how nefarious structural adjustment polices have prevented African nations from directing money towards education, healthcare and infrastructure. You best believe that the $20 billion in agricultural aid pledged by the rich G8 member nations comes with some very sticky strings attached. The US president also won’t tell you how these policies induce Western privatization and the hindrance of sales of African exports. He also wont tell you how politically motivated sanctions on Zimbabwe have crippled its economy and its people. Nor will he mention how US sanctions on Iraq contributed to the loss of one million lives, over half of them children. But why would he? That would take courage and a real alteration in American governance. Dare I say that would take good governance?
“You best believe that the $20 billion in agricultural aid pledged by the rich G8 member nations comes with some very sticky strings attached.”
Until America has a leader that is willing to take a long, honest and hard look in the mirror we can expect continuity in US policy at home and abroad. American “leaders” will point fingers at others while evading any recognizable mea culpa in the role they have played in the destabilization of other nations, and continue to play. Just like a well-oiled sports franchise that only acquires players who are best suited for the system, Barack Obama is perfectly suited for the US imperialist system. So when Obama closed his speech in Ghana by saying that America with be with Africa every step of the way, he very much meant it…and that’s not necessarily a good thing.
Solomon Comissiong is an educator, community activist, author, public speaker and the host of the Your World News radio program (http://www.blogtalkradio.com/Your-World-News). He may be reached at: sunderland77@hotmail.com.

Wednesday, July 15, 2009

Jeff Sessions As State Attorney General Of Alabama Unsucessfully Prosecuted Albert Turner,An Aide To Martin Luther King,Jr.

As Attorney General of the State of Alabama U.S. Senator Jeff Sessions unsuccessfully prosecuted Albert Turner,an aide to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and two other Civil Rights workers on election fraud.
Senator Sessions spent hours interrogating African Americans voters in predominantly Black counties,finding only 14 allegedly tampered ballots out of approximately 1.7 million ballots cast. Mr. Turner along with two other civil rights workers were acquitted after four hours of jury deliberation.
Any Black person in state of Alabama that would vote for Jeff Sessions for any public office needs to be relegated to life of slavery;For they are indeed Death,Dumb,and Blind.

What Law School Did Jeff Sessions Graduate From ? It must Have Been George Wallace University !

It certainly wasn't one of the top 15 Law Schools Schools in the country.

Justice Sam Alito,Belonged To Openly Racist&Sexist Club At Princeton That Opposed The Admission of Women And Minorities!

Just because Justice Alito was elevated to the high court doesn't mean that he is free of his known bias toward those protected classes of people. Once a bigot always a bigot ! "If it looks like a duck and quacks a duck it must be a duck "
Alito is a undercover racist just like Senators Sessions,and Lindsey Graham.

Tuesday, July 14, 2009

Senator Jeff Sessions Is Just Mad Because The Senate Judiciary Committee Exposed His Blatant Racism During His Own Senate Confirmation Hearing

The tone of Senator Jeff Sessions questioning of Judge Sotomayor is mean spirited and it also points out his basic lack of understanding of Title VII specially the disparate impact provision of said statue.
I also feel that Senator Sessions is just simply mad and sore because the U.S.Senate Judiciary exposed his blatant racism during his own confirmation hearing to the Federal Judiciary,and the Committee was correct in rejecting him for Judgeship.

Monday, July 13, 2009

President Obama Was Speaking With A Forked Tongue In Lecturing Ghanians On Corruption On The African Continent !

Its very unfortunate that the so-called allegedly first African American President,Barack Obama chose to lecture in a condescending manner Ghanaians and other Africans on graft and corruption supposedly on the African Continent.My dear President Obama you need a reality and truth check.
There is more corruption,graft,and immorality in New York City,The State of NewJersey, and Washington D.C. than on the entire continents of Africa&Asia.
President Obama also failed to point how the CIA duped some sell outs in the Ghanaian military resulting in the overthrow of the legitimate government of one Africa's greatest leaders Kwame Nkrumah. Mr. Nkrumah was one of the most responsible leaders in the world but he advocated African solidarity, unity,Pan Africanism and liberation against white settler rule,and the American Empire could not
stand to see an a Black African leader who was willing to die for the liberation of African lands from the remaining colonial and neo colonial powers in Africa
Also note that the CIA initiated the coup in Ghana when Ghana had the lowest unemployment rate on the continent of Africa.

Senator Sessions,All Judges And Justices Are Affected By Their Background,And That To Believe They Rule Without Their Personal Expierences Is False

The Republican cut-throats on the U.S.Senate Judiciary Committee know fully that all Judges&Justices are affected by their background,and that to believe they rule without their personal experiences affecting them is false.
Senator Jeff Sessions is the same closet racist who said that "The Ku Klux Klan was not so bad until he found that some smoked Marijuana",and he also made disparaging comments about the NAACP. So in my opinion, Senator Sessions has no credibility to speak accurately on any issue.
Typically the Republicans live in their fake world of hypocrisy and unless you live in fantasy land,all Judges&Justices are affected by their background in making decisions on the bench.
Indeed Justices Alito,Kennedy,Roberts,Thomas,and Scalia brought their own personal and political agendas to the high court which accounts for how they ruled&made new law in Ricci vs DeStefano,which had been the law of the land for 38 years.

Sunday, July 12, 2009

French Cops are Racist, Too

If you're Black and tired of getting stopped by the police on the streets of New York City and elsewhere in the United States, then Paris isn't the city for you. “A new study of the Paris police shows that...persons the police consider Black are stopped six times as often as whites.” And Arab-looking people are stopped even more frequently than that. Although racial profiling is illegal in France, the police studiously avoid keeping records on race.

A Black Agenda Radio commentary by Glen Ford

“Researchers interviewed 500 people whom they observed being stopped by police at two mass transit stations.”
Police in Paris practice racial profiling against non-whites at least as vigorously as their counterparts in New York City – and that’s saying a great deal. Anew studyof the Paris police shows that people that appear to be Arab are stopped by police for identity checks 7.5 times more often than whites. Persons the police consider Black – meaning, of sub-Saharan African origin or from the Caribbean – are stopped six times as often as whites.And Blacks and Arabs that are stopped by French police are much more likely to also be frisked.
The sheer volume of people stopped, questioned and frisked by New York City police is awesome. By the end of the year, cops will have stopped 628,000 people, about half of them Black, and most of the rest Latino. Whites make up about 45 percent of New York’s population, but only 10 percent of those stopped by police.
Paris is a much whiter place. In creating the new study, called “Ethnic Profiling in Paris,” researchers interviewed 500 people whom they observed being stopped by police at two mass transit stations. Although Black- and Arab-looking people only constituted about ten percent of the crowds at the two stations, they accounted for 47 percent of those who were stopped by police – a higher rate even than in New York.
“In 1961, the cops went on a killing spree, murdering at least 210 Arabs on the streets of Paris.”
Paris police have a long and murderous history, especially in dealing with Algerians. In 1961, the cops went on a killing spree, murdering at least 210 Arabs on the streets of Paris. One would have to go back to the police riots in New Orleans and Memphis after the Civil War for an historical comparison with the United States.
The French keep their racial minorities out of the central cities, when possible, shunting them off to rings of poor suburbs. In 2005, riots erupted in 300 cities, suburbs and towns across France. The current French President, Nicolas Sarkozy, was then Minister of the Interior with his eye on the top job. Sarkozy played the riots like a French version of Bull Connor, head of the Birmingham, Alabama police in 1963 – the villain who set the dogs on Dr. Martin Luther King’s young demonstrators. Sarkozy tapped deeply into white French racism, calling Arab and Black young people “scum,” “riff-raff,” “thugs,” and “hoodlums.” He declared “zero tolerance” towards violence and sent in companies of riot police to arrest what he called “gang leaders, drug traffickers and big shots.” Apparently the white French electorate enjoyed Sarkozy’s racial antics, and elected him President in 2007.
Racial profiling is illegal in France, as it technically is in much of the United States. But the police get around the law in the same ways on both sides of the Atlantic, claiming they stop and frisk based on where criminal activity takes place, not on the racial characteristics of the citizens on the street. The results of the new study give the lie to police claims. In France, the government conveniently hides and denies racism by refusing to keep data on race. The police leave no paper trail on the ethnicity of who they stop. No data, no legal basis for complaint.

For Black Agenda Radio, I’m Glen Ford. On the web, go to www.BlackAgendaReport.com.
BAR executive editor Glen Ford can be contacted at Glen.Ford@BlackAgendaReport.com.

High Court Tries to Freeze White Privilege in Place

The real “activist” judiciary if represented by the U.S. Supreme Court majority than is determined to re-enshrine white privilege in law. The New Haven firefighters ruling is an assault on Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act. “The High Court decision would preserve an ethnic, clan and family racial protection racket that has been embedded in fire and police departments for generations.”

A Black Agenda Radio commentary by Glen Ford

“What the racist majority is actually attempting to do is to freeze white privilege in place.”
In siding with white firefighters in New Haven, Connecticut, the 5-4 Supreme Court majority treats white dominance in firefighting as a kind of harmless “tradition” rather then evidence on its face of systemic, institutional racism in hiring and promotion. The ruling reflects a general white American worldview, that sees the Irish fireman as an iconic figure, even in neighborhoods that long ago turned Black or Latino. Under the terms of the past world the majority seeks to preserve, the white fireman and cop is a wholesome and “natural” presence, rather than an affront to every non-white resident of the neighborhood.
The Supreme Court majority, in striking down Federal Appeals Court Judge Sonia Sotomayor’s ruling in New Haven, is raising the bar significantly for minorities seeking entrance or promotion in these historically white men’s clubs – the police precincts and station houses. The justices now demand “strong, basic evidence” of previous discrimination. Yet such evidence is everywhere available in the firefighting and police professions. What the racist majority is actually attempting to do is to freeze white privilege in place. In this case, the High Court decision would preserve an ethnic, clan and family racial protection racket that has been embedded in fire and police departments for generations – the most raw and obvious form of on-the-job apartheid.
“A general white American worldview sees the Irish fireman as an iconic figure, even in neighborhoods that long ago turned Black or Latino.”
The white-dominated society, through its media and cultural institutions, actively glorifies this historical white entitlement to jobs by reserving special places of honor for men, and now women, who are third and fourth generation fire and police persons. Most whites do not even question how white ethnic groups, clans and individual families perpetuated themselves in relatively well paid, stable and prestigious civil service employment, from one generation to the next. It is accepted as simply “the way of the world” and a good thing, a comforting situation to most white people – and especially comforting to the sons and daughters that feel entitled to follow their fathers and grandfathers into the firehouse or on the beat or into the white ethnic-dominated construction trades.
The rightwing judges that now dominate the federal judiciary constantly warn against judicial “activism” – when in fact it is they who are on a reactionary political mission to preserve white privilege. They attempt to dismantle key elements of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. As Dr. Ron Walters has written, Title VII of the Civil Rights Act has been “settled law” for 35 years. Its clear intent was to prevent the “protected classes” – which, at the time, meant Blacks – from being excluded from employment as a result of testing devices. The forces of white privilege have been trying to turn the Act on its head, ever since, by framing whites as in need of protection. As if society has ever been weighted against the interests of white men.
The actual impact of testing in New Haven and elsewhere has been to exclude Blacks and Latinos. These are the facts that racist judges willfully ignore. Instead of facts, they substitute color-blind mumbo-jumbo, a thin cover for race privilege preservation.

For Black Agenda Radio, I’m Glen Ford. On the web, go to www.BlackAgendaReport.com.
BAR executive editor Glen Ford can be contacted at Glen.Ford@BlackAgendaReport.com.

Barack Obama or Cynthia McKinney -- Who Represents Black America Toward Palestine, Israel and the Middle East?

by BAR (Black Agenda Report), managing editor Bruce Dixon

Former congresswoman Cynthia McKinney has just returned from an Israeli jail where she was briefly imprisoned, along with human rights activists from several nations, for her second attempt at publicly running the brutal US-Israeli blockade trying to bring coloring books, food and medical supplies. Why are the US and Israel imposing this collective punishment upon 1.5 million civilians. How does McKinney's stand match up against that of our first black president, the most powerful man in the world who calls it a "humantarian crisis" but will do nothing about it? And how do they both stack up against the legacy of Dr. King?
Barack Obama or Cynthia McKinney – Who Represents Black America Toward Palestine and Israel?
By BAR Managing Editor Bruce A. Dixon
“Both Obama and McKinney have traveled to the region more than once in the last several months.”
It's almost an unfair question. Barack Obama's many apologists have explained their lips off telling us how he could not run and cannot govern as president of Black Americans, or the president of Americans neck-deep in consumer debt, or the president of Americans who want an everybody in-nobody out health care system. To get elected and to govern, they wisely assure us, Barack Obama has chosen to be and must be the "president of everybody," if by everybody you mean private health insurers, Wall Street banksters, Pentagon contractors and greedy chambers of commerce everywhere. The president is a grown man, and he gets to make those choices.
So do the rest of us, and on questions pertaining to the Middle East, a Euro-centric place name if ever there was one, every public opinion survey that bothers to differentiate white from black US opinion indicates that African Americans are, in the main, far more sympathetic to the cause of Palestinians than either their white neighbors or their first black president. Barack Obama then, is operating well outside the black consensus on Palestine and Israel, while former Georgia congresswoman Cynthia McKinney swims confidently in the mainstream of black opinion and the prophetic tradition of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
Both Obama and McKinney have traveled to the region more than once in the last several months. The president gave a speech in Cairo sternly advising Palestinians to give up violence in pursuit of justice, while seeming to ignore the grossly disproportionate violence, official and unofficial, of the Israeli settler state against them. Obama acknowledged what he called a humanitarian crisis in Gaza without facing his own and the American role in creating that crisis, let alone advancing any measures that would ameliorate it.
““My suitcase,” McKinney told BAR, “was full of crayons. Somebody in authority should explain why crayons and coloring books for Palestinian children are a threat...”
What President Obama calls Gaza's humanitarian crisis is actually a medieval siege, in which Israel, with the full diplomatic and military backing of the US, its principal armorer and banker, has sealed 1.5 million people off from the outside world. For more than two years practically no Palestinians have been permitted to enter Gaza, either from the Israeli-occupied West Bank or elsewhere. Electricity has been cut to a few hours per day and water to a fraction of needed quantities while the Israeli armed forces prohibit Palestinians from purchasing or receiving parts to build, repair or expand capacity. Hundreds of ordinary items needed to carry on civilized life are also banned, including cement, soap, toothpaste, foodstuffs, medical supplies, books, paper clothing and crayons.
In December 2008, and June 2009 Cynthia McKinney, traveled to Cyprus and in the company of human rights activists from many countries attempted to sail to Gaza with a cargo of cement, coloring books, building, medical and humanitarian supplies in order to illustrate the inhumanity and absurdity of the blockade. Both times, the boats were intercepted by the Israeli navy, their GPS units destroyed, and the craft boarded. This time, twenty-one persons including the Irish Nobel Laureate Mairead Maguire were arrested and imprisoned for several days before being deported.
“My suitcase,” McKinney told BAR, “was full of crayons. Somebody in authority should explain why crayons and coloring books for Palestinian children are a threat. Somebody should tear down this wall.” McKinney took pains to point out that the blockade, as well as the murderous assault that occurred in December, were carried on with arms and fuel supplied by the US, and with its full diplomatic backing. The blockade of Gaza is causing widespread malnutrition among Palestinians, including children, and is doubtless costing lives daily. “All of us need to ask,” McKinney said, “why our government, through the Israelis, is pursuing this barbaric policy toward the Palestinians, and we must demand that it end right now.”
“Why are Israel and the US, with the help of Egypt, imposing this brutal siege upon Gaza? ”
McKinney also brought with her insights on the racial composition of Israeli prisons. She said she met women in the Israeli prison from Ethiopia, Eritrea, Coite D'Ivoire and other African countries. She observed that a huge number of prisoners, aside from Palestinians, were black Africans and Asians. Where Israel formerly depended upon Arab labor to do many of its everyday tasks, since the beginning of its policy of siege it has recruited large amounts of foreigh labor from non-Muslim parts of Africa and Asia to do all the jobs on the low end of the pay and social status scales. Foreigners, of course, have few if any rights in Israel, and can find themselves locked up for extended periods for the most minor of status offenses.
Why are Israel and the US, with the help of Egypt, imposing this brutal siege upon Gaza? After the death of Yasir Arafat in 2006, Palestinians held elections, closely supervised by observers from many nations, and certified by them to be free and fair. But the Palestinians had the poor judgment to elect a political party --- Hamas --- not favored by Israel and the US. Cutting off their trade and travel, what remained of their opportunity to seek work in Israel or visit their Palestinian relatives in the West Bank, only a few miles distant, curtailing their electricity, water, building, medical and other supplies was, according to US and Israeli policymakers, supposed to make them come to their senses. It hasn't worked. Outside pressure has, if anything, made the Palestinians of Gaza stick tighter together, and rally round the government that the US and Israel so disapprove of. It was the Bush policy for nearly two years, and now it has been the Obama policy for all of six months.
While Obama was the president-in-waiting, conducting daily news conferences on his plan for the economy, denouncing the terrorist attacks in Mumbai, India, and browbeating members of his own party in congress into voting trillions of public dollars for Wall Street, Israel launched a full-scale military attack against Gaza, throwing hundreds of thousands of rounds of artillery, including cluster munitions and white phosphorus along with strikes from helicopters and jet aircraft, killing more than a thousand civilians. Barack Obama declined to comment publicly, noting that his inauguration was still a few days distant, and that the US had “only one president at a time.” In a similar legalistic vein, during Obama's Cairo speech he pointedly said that the US did not recognize the legitimacy of “continuing Israeli settlements.” But the Israeli government has, with US government funding been planting armed colonies of Israelis on strategic hilltops and ridges throughout the Palestinian West Bank for more than twenty years now, connecting them with a network of roads which Palestinians are forbidden to travel upon or even to cross under pain of arrest. Obama said nothing about these and other longstanding outrages.
“Next to Arab Americans, blacks are probably the nation's most skeptical group about the fundamental justice of an Israeli settler state”
Almost a year ago, when Barack Obama received the Democratic nomination, the air was thick with
comparisons and connections between his career and that of Dr. Martin Luther King a generation earlier. In the heady moments of Obama's historic nomination and inauguration it was easy for many to confuse and conflate one with the other. But the air is clearer now. The president's selective moralizing on violence and nonviolence, his legalistic evasions of responsibility, his lawyerly distancing from the consequences of his own actions and inactions are more the stuff of Boss Daley than they are the prophetic witness to injustice of Dr. King. Six months into the Obama presidency, the man whose career many saw as the culmination of the work of the apostle of nonviolence has killed more than 700 Afghans, many of them civilians, with airborne robot drones.
Next to Arab Americans, blacks are probably the nation's most skeptical group about the fundamental justice of an Israeli settler state which imparts rights of residence, citizenship, and more on the basis of Jewish identity, while denying these rights to people whose ancestors have lived there for thousands of years. To African Americans who bother to educate themselves at all on the matter, Israel's identity-pass system, its Jewish-only roads, its separate license plates that allow Israeli Arabs and other non-jews to be profiled at a distance, the ongoing settlement policy cited by President Obama, and the raw, unpunished racist violence of Israeli settlers toward Palestinians have all the hallmarks of a modern, twenty-first century apartheid state. Thanks to Cynthia McKinney and others, more of us are becoming educated on the real nature of the Israeli state, and the consequences of American support of it. We expect to see that work continue, and be taken up by an ever wider section of African American churches, student and civic organizations who believe, as did Dr. King that a threat to justice anywhere is a threat to justice everywhere.
We said at the beginning that the comparison was almost unfair. Almost. It's really not unfair at all. Neither Barack Obama nor Cynthia McKinney are being forced or compelled to make the choices they do. They are both grown, well educated, sober, sensible parents and US citizens. But between President Obama and former congresswoman Cynthia McKinney, it's easy to see who is following in the prophetic footsteps of Dr. King, and increasingly, who is Black America's real representative to Palestinians, Israelis, and the Middle East.

Bruce A. Dixon is managing editor at BAR and based in Atlanta GA. He can be reached at bruce.dixon(at)blackagendareport.com

Cynthia McKinney honored America on July the 4th

Tuesday, 7 July 2009, 10:04 amColumn: Franklin P Lamb

How Cynthia McKinney honored America on the 4th of July from an Israel Jailby Franklin Lamb,Beirut

Former Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney returned home today after 6 days being held by the government of Israel while attempting with 21 colleagues to deliver humanitarian aid to Gaza on the vessel, the Spirit of Humanity.
“Don’t sign Miss Cynthia don’t sign!” So chanted a boisterous group of Palestinian teens and pre-teens in Beirut’s Shatila Refugee Camp demonstrating support for the Freegaza Humanity boat abductees on the 4th of July.

The students understood that those illegally arrested while in International waters had been offered a “get out of Jail Free” pass if they confessed in writing to violating Israel’s territorial waters.
The Spirit of Humanity boat, trying to bring emergency humanitarian aid to Palestinians in Gaza, was the topic of a lively discussion during a Sabra Shatila Foundation summer school civics lesson on “International law and the Question of Palestine”. The students were interested in the plight of some of their relatives and countryman in Palestine and the continuing siege of Gaza. Some had just finished their Baccalaureate exams and were wondering how they could continue their education given the severe impediments the government of Lebanon places on Palestinian civil rights, and their post exam relief seemed to energize them for the discussion.
A couple of the students had met Cynthia during her recent visits to Lebanon. When they learned that as a Congresswoman, she had introduced articles of impeachment against Bush, was a consistent anti-war voter during her twelve years in Congress, and that no member in Congress had achieved a more consistent, principled, voting record of issues of civil and human rights, including Palestinian rights, they really connected with the subject of the Freegaza aid boat, the Spirit of Humanity and her travails. “Those supporters of Palestine should not accept a false confession and should stay in Jail if necessary. They are patriots” was a commonly expressed sentiment.
The students understood that in refusing to sign the Israeli government prepared “acknowledgement/confession” the Freegaza group acted consistent with International Law. They learned that territorial waters, as defined by the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea is a belt of coastal waters extending at most twelve nautical miles from the baseline (usually the mean low-water mark) of a coastal state. The territorial sea is regarded as the sovereign territory of the state, although foreign ships (both military and civilian) are allowed innocent passage through it. They learned from media reports that in any case the Humanity was in International waters and that consequently Israel had no right to molest it.
The class adjourned sharing a general consensus that the Spirit of Humanity, enjoyed and will continue to enjoy on every subsequent humanitarian voyage, these freedoms as well as other internationally lawful uses of the sea within contiguous zones, exclusive economic zones, and on the high seas. Needless to report, were it possible for them, the whole class would like to be on the next Freegaza boat.

Dershowtiz discussed the Spirit of Humanity
On July 2, 2009 Harvard Law School Professor and Israeli legman Alan Dershowitz, explained plenty to the Jerusalem Post Alan now has his special blog featured by the JP called “Double Standard Watch” (similar is some ways to Campus and Media Watch) that is instantaneously sent out to hundreds of pro-Israel organizations so defenders of Israel and its US Amen chorus can all be singing from the same Hymnal sheet when critical political and legal matters relating to Israel are raised.
Dershowitz has also blasted the “appalling ignorance” of those who say Israel committed Piracy or Kidnapping. In the likely forthcoming litigation resulting from Israel’s attacks on Freegaza.org boats this past year, Israel’s legal team, Israel may well skate from under current piracy and kidnapping claims. Israel is unlikely to be found to have engaged in piracy or common law kidnapping against the Humanity group. Under customary international law, pirates were considered "hostis humani generis" or "the enemy of mankind" and any country could arrest and try them under their jurisdiction. The 1982 UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) defines piracy as illegal acts of violence, detention, or depredation (plundering, robbing or pillaging) committed for private ends by a private ship on the high seas, i.e. outside the jurisdiction of any country.
The law is fairly clear that ‘piracy” applies to non-State actors unless a State can be shown in court to have employed non state actors in a criminal enterprise.
Kidnapping, as Israel learned in the July 2006 war, applies normally to children and not to soldiers who are captured but not kidnapped. Those on the Humanity were abducted, falsely arrested, assaulted and some battered, and all falsely imprisoned but not kidnapped.
Preparing for the 4th of July, Deschowitz spoke of “phony war crimes investigations of Israel”, tells his readers that “ the UN Human Rights Council is a scandal”, claiming it has condemned Israel more times than all the other 191 UN member states combined”, complains that many consider that Gaza is still occupied due to the blockage and siege “despite Israel having withdrawn in 2005”, asserts that “the very idea of the UN Council conducting an "independent" or objective investigation Israel is preposterous”.
He endorsed Richard Kemps oft repeated statement that “ I don't think there has ever been a time in the history of warfare when an army has made more efforts to reduce the civilian casualties and deaths of innocent people than the IDF is doing today in Gaza."
Finally, Alan condemned Richard Goldstone, recently appointed to lead a Human Rights Council high-level investigative mission to Gaza for allowing himself “to be played” because as a Jew well connected to Israel, it will make it hard for Dershowitz and Israel to condemn his findings. Dershowitz calls on Goldstone to resign to clear the way.
Alan’s July 4th eve celebration JP article was just for warm-ups. At an Independence Day eve gathering at Society Ohabei Shalom Synagogue on Beacon St., Brookline, Massachusetts, Dershowitz blasted critics of Israel and presented a heated and spirited defense of Israel’s June 30, 2009 actions against the Freegaza boat, the Spirit of Humanity. The increasingly shrill AIPAC shill, is reported to consider former congresswoman Cynthia McKinney “dangerous and misguided.”
What may have got Dershowitz off to a crumply July 4th was a spate of critical reports this week concerning Israel’s brutal occupation and its continuing strangulation of Gaza. Among others were the following:
Amnesty International issued a major report claiming that Israel inflicted "wanton destruction" in the Gaza Strip in attacks that often targeted Palestinian civilians during an its 22 day war this past December and January. Among other conclusions, Amnesty said it found no evidence to support Israeli claims that Gaza guerrillas deliberately used civilians as "human shields," but it did, however, cite evidence that Israeli troops put children and other civilians in harm's way by forcing them to remain in homes taken over by soldiers. Accusing Israel of "breaching laws of war," Amnesty said: "Much of the destruction was wanton and deliberate, and was carried out in a manner and circumstances which indicated that it could not be justified on grounds of military necessity."
A UN human rights mission investigating alleged violations committed during the war in the Gaza Strip at the turn of the year resumed its public hearings on 7/7/09.The two-day session in Geneva follows hearings in the Gaza Strip last week that included gruesome testimony of Palestinians caught under Israeli shelling during the 22 day offensive. The session at the UN's human rights headquarters in Switzerland is meant to allow those who were not able to travel to Gaza to provide public testimony, notably witnesses from Israel who were targeted by rocket attacks.
The mission has a broad scope to investigate alleged violations committed by all sides during the offensive in December and January, which Israel said was aimed at stemming rocket fire from the Hamas-ruled coastal enclave. The mission headed by Richard Goldstone, former war crimes prosecutor for both ex-Yugoslavia and Rwanda, has not been allowed into Israel or been given access to the occupied West Bank, according to the United Nations.
The hearings are to allow "victims from all sides in the conflict as well as experts on its consequences to speak directly to the international community of their experiences," said the UN human rights office. Although this kind of public testimony is a novelty for the world body, Goldstone, insisted on it when he accepted to take up the probe A former South African judge, he wanted to apply some of his experience from post-apartheid South Africa.
Special UN Rappatour, Richard Falk, condemned from Geneva Israel’s continuing blockade of Gaza. that "Such a pattern of continuing blockade under these conditions amounts to such a serious violation of the Geneva Conventions as to constitute a continuing crime against humanity. Falk, said Israel's two-year blockade of Hamas-ruled Gaza restricted vital supplies such as food, medicine and fuel to "bare subsistence levels".
Falk called Israel's seizure of the Freegaza boat, Humanity, carrying relief aid for the Gaza Strip "unlawful" and said its blockade of the territory constituted a "continuing crime against humanity". The United Nations special rapporteur on human rights in the Palestinian territories said the move was part of Israel's "cruel blockade of the entire Palestinian population of Gaza" in violation of the Fourth Geneva Convention prohibiting any form of collective punishment against "an occupied people".
The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) issued a Report this this week in which it claimed that Israel was also halting entry to Gaza of building materials and spare parts needed to repair damage from its 22-day invasion late last December.
Alan defends Israel’s actions against the Spirit of Humanity
Israel unsuccessfully sought (since no one apparently signed) to avoid international capability for its criminal conduct against the Humanity group by getting their victims to sign a statement agreeing that they violated Israeli territorial waters.
Dershowitz, wasted no time coming to Israel’s defense. He asserted on July 3, 2009 that “The Palestinians agreed and the International agreed to a blockade of Gaza to prevent arms smuggling.”
In fact, that agreement never happened. No Palestinians have agreed nor did the international community agree to a blockade of Gaza by land or Sea. Nor could they have without an International Convention on the subject because other countries have equal (mare librum) rights to use the world’s seas and could not be deprived of those rights without explicit consent.
Dershowitz also argues that the Humanity had been warned while at sea that it would not be allowed to enter Gazan waters "because of security risks in the area and the existing naval blockade." This assertion also finds no support in the principles, standards or rules of International law. Indeed, accepting for sake of argument that the Humanity group was given such a warning, it had no legal effect and created no legal obligation on the Humanity group. If given, the warning or order was invalid on its face because Israel’s Gazan blockage itself is illegal and there were no “security risks in the area” other than the one created by the Israeli navy.
In addition, the Israeli navy force intercepted, boarded and took control of the Greek registered Humanity with full knowledge that Cypriot authorities had searched the boat for weapons at the group’s request before its departure, and that the Humanity was in international waters heading for Gazan coastal waters from which Israeli vessels are legally barred, and forced the Humanity inside Israeli territorial waters and into the Israel port at Akka (Ashdod). These actions make Israel’s claims that it was trying to prevent weapons and suicide bombers from entering Gaza appear disingenuous.
Israel’s new raft of legal problems include numerous common law and statutory crimes against all those on board the Humanity including, but not limited to false arrest, false imprisonment, malicious destruction of property, conversion of personal property, assault and battery, abduction, theft, for beginners.
The Israel/Dershowitz’ claim that the Humanity was sailing in a “closed military zone” is also bogus. Since its 1967 aggression, Israel has used an obscure 1858 Ottoman Lands Law to create “closed military zones” in order to steal thousands of acres of Palestinian land using complex ‘legal’ and catch-22 bureaucratic measures. These ‘special security areas (SSAS) were designed to meet Israel’s expansionist goals and are now being applied by the Israeli government to International waters. The Humanity had every right and indeed responsibility to reject Israel’s transparent efforts at expanding its control of the high seas. The freegaze boat, the Humanity, enjoyed and will continue to enjoy on every subsequent humanitarian voyage, these freedoms and other internationally lawful uses of the sea within contiguous zones, exclusive economic zones, as well as on the high seas.
Reflecting this obligation, the LOSC reserves the high seas for ‘peaceful purposes’.
Only Military activities that are consistent with the UN Charter are allowed within the ‘peaceful purposes’ for which the high seas are reserved. Israel’s actions on June 30, 2009, reflecting its three year siege of Gaza, clearly did not meet the international standard of ‘peaceful purposes’ and its crimes against the Humanity boat group are part and parcel, as Professor Falk noted, of its continuing crimes against Humanity itself.
Israeli violations of the rights of Journalists on board the Humanity.
Israel's false arrest and false imprisonment of Journalists on board the Humanity contravened its international legal obligations, imposed by international customary law as well as statutory enactments. The Johannesburg Principles on Freedom of Expression and Access to Information of 1995, an amalgam of general principles of international law and customary international law, states that the government of States that would interfere with the work of Journalists bares the "burden of demonstrating the validity of the restriction.” The blanket ban instituted by Israel in November 2008, as its prepared its assault of Gaza and its response did not meet this standard nor did the arrests of Journalists on board the Humanity, including Al Jazeera’s Othman Al-Battiri and cameraman Mansour Al-Ibbi, and Press TV’s Cynthia McKinney.
Israel was required to give the journalists on board the Humanity respect for their life, property and personal dignity based on General principles of the international law relating to the protection of human rights including Geneva Conventions and their Additional Protocols as well as international practice of States and the International Committee of the Red Cross. Journalists on the Humanity were civilians and they share the rights of any member of the civilian population and must be treated as such. Abducting, falsely arresting and falsely imprisoning a journalist is prohibited as are acts or threats of violence, psychological pressure and intimidation in order to pressure them into signing ‘confessions’ or summary ‘convicted’ without a due process court proceeding. Israel’s treatment of journalists on the Humanity grossly violated these international norms.
The International Covenant for the Protection of Journalists (ICPJ), an NGO based in Geneva, condemned the Israeli arrest of Humanity’s journalists and International Lawyers Sans Frontiers has asked the International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) and the Arab Federation of Journalists (AFJ), as well as the Palestinian Syndicate of Journalists and the Israeli Association of journalists to start an immediate investigation into the Israeli arrest of the journalists.
Cynthia Mckinney, without support from her own government, stood up for the principals on which her country was founded 233 years ago and spent Independence Day inside a foreign jail. All people of peace and good salute her and her colleagues who sailed the Freegaza Spirit of Humanity with the universal message of self determination.
*************
Franklin Lamb is doing research in Lebanon can be reached at fplamb@sabrashatila.org

Thursday, July 9, 2009

Senator Ensign(R) from Nevada Is a Little Punk Whose Parents Paid Hush Money to the Hamptons for their Silence About Ensign's Affair with Mrs. Hampton

Is there anyone in the sin cesspool State called Nevada, have any semblance of morals or family values? How is Senator Ensign still in office? Will Eric Holder's U.S. Justice Department look into other additional payments and gifts that the Ensign family may have made to cover up this stormy and illicit affair? Who in the U.S.Senate will cast the first stone? Who in the U.S. Senate is without sin ?

Ron Christie,The Republican Strategist, Has Just Been Inducted Into The Lawn Jockey Hall-Of Fame In Jump Back, Mississippi

The newly formed Lawn Jockey Hall-Of Fame located in Jump Back Mississippi, has just inducted the Republican attack dog strategist, Ronald Christie into its ranks.
Mr. Christie who is a lawyer and a former Special Assistant to President George W. Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney is seen regularly on MSNBC, Fox News and CNN, denigrating African Americans and progressive thinking people in the Democratic Party.
Christie, the Black Republican apologist and strategist is forever trying to convince us that White right-wing reactionary Republicans like Sarah Palin, Dick Cheney and Russ Limbaugh always mean just the opposite or something other than what they've stated or written or that they are badly misquoted, misunderstood, or misinterpreted. Mr. Christie has it backwards and he needs to learn more of the facts of life and nature......it is the dog that wags its tail, not the tail that wags the dog.

Criterion for membership in the Lawn Jockey Hall-Of Fame is one has to have a consistent proven demonstrated track record for being a sellout(House Servant) to your people, community, county, state and country.
I accept Malcom X's definition of a sellout or House Negro for membership into the Lawn Jockey Hall-Of Fame.
Membership is open to all political parties, organizations and individuals in the United States and abroad, and no one from any political party, organization, corporation, and individual is exempt from consideration for induction into the Lawn Jockey Hall-Of Fame.
There is also an International Lawn Jockey Hall-Of Fame, which has its first inductee--Omar Hassan Ahmad Al-Bashir, President of the rogue regime in Sudan.

Michael Steele, Chairman of the Republican National Committee is head of the Lawn Jockey Hall-Of Fame. Present members are as follows :
1. Ward Connerly-Businessman-Front man for White Supremacy
2.Ronald Christie- Lawyer, Republican Strategist.
3.Michael Steele-RNC-Chairman
4. Clarence Thomas, United States Supreme Court Justice
5.Walter Williams-Newspaper Columnist, Professor, George Mason University
6.Amy Holmes-Republican Strategist
7.Juan Williams-National Public Radio,News Commentator
8. Larry Elder-Media Commenatator& Front man for White Supremacy& Fox News.

You may nominate individuals, organizations for said Lawn Jockey Hall-Of Fame at:
http://blackbuzz.blogspot.com/

Who Are the Republicans Who Say They Would Vote For Quitter Sarah Palin For President?

The media made character Sarah Palin has decided to resign as Governor of Alaska because contrary to her public utterances, Sarah Palin has placed her own self serving interests above that of the people of her state.
But who would vote for a confused person like Sarah Family Values Palin who appears to have about as much intellectual curiosity as a misguided Pit Bull Terrier with red lipstick.
The people who would vote for sister Sarah Palin are as follows:
1.George Wallace Democrats
2.Reagan Democrats
3.Pro- Lifers
4.Gun Enthusiasts and Tom The Deer Hunter
5.Right Wingers
6.Reactionaries
7.Holdover Nazis and Kluxers
8.Joe & Suzie Sixpack
9.Poorly educated and low information voters
10. The NASCAR crowd
11. Archie Bunker types in the suburbs and rural areas of America.

Obviously there is great deal of overlapping between the various above
named groups, but this should signal a major red flag to the Democrats for the elections of 2010 and 2012. The States of Ohio and Pennsylvania are full of these poorly educated Joe Sixpack types who have lost their jobs and in many cases are underemployed and unemployed.