The Decline of Black Politics: From Malcolm X to Barack Obama

[randys1]

Last edited Sat Apr 12, 2014, 11:56 AM - Edit history (1)

http://kevinalexandergray.com/


http://davemarsh.us/


I am new here and respectfully ask that you invite me into your discussions.

I post this thread solely for discussion, as I am learning still, as we all are.

I listen Sunday morning on Sirius to Dave Marsh "Live from the land of Hopes & Dreams", Dave is a famous rock critic for Rolling Stone and SNCC former member.

His co host or guest is Kevin and when the two of them get going, you know you are listening to prooooooooooogressives to the extreme, socialists kind of, but then I am a Democratic Socialist myself, which just means I am for universal health care and energy not being owned by private interests, etc.


Anyway, here is what Kevin has to say...

During the 2008 Democratic National Convention that ended up nominating Barack Obama, I flew out to Denver with the Reverend Jesse Jackson. Many people know that Jesse Jackson and I go way back. I could share many stories about that trip. But, the scene that replays the most in my memory is walking down the street in downtown Denver and coming across a black vendor selling T-shirts with Obama’s face superimposed over Malcolm X’s in the famous photo where Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm meet and shake hands. I stopped dead in my tracks. I cussed aloud; saying, indignantly, to this fellow I didn't know, “That’s fucked up!’

please click on Kevin link and check out the short video


Let me go on the record and say the only thing worse than a centrist Democrat like Obama or Clinton is any and every republican alive, combined or individually, etc. i.e. I worked on the Obama campaign and I would again and I will work for Hillary, as the alternative is unthinkable.

[JI7]

1. why do you say Obama is a centrist ? was FDR a right winger for opposition to anti lynching bill ?

also why did he say the guy selling those shirts was "fucked up" ?

[1StrongBlackMan]

2. I would agree ...

President Obama IS a Left of Center Democrat, making him a centrist. Don't be swayed to the DU mantra where Centrism is a bad thing ... it is the only space that a national leader can occupy.

[JI7]

3. well it is often relative and who you compare them to, i think maybe sanders is to the left

of obama,but i'm not sure elizabeth warren is. although many internet activists would like to claim so.

i think obama really is more liberal than many may think. but he also understands the system and tries to work it get things done.

i mean, it's easy to hold the most liberal positions and brag about being the most liberal or whatever. but what can you get done, that matters also. in kucnich's time in congress he did not really get anything done.

but obama got things done including helping to get rid of some of the weapons in ukraine from the soviet days. this meant that with the crimea situation one thing that one never had to worry about large scale weapons being used.

[1StrongBlackMan]

7. Agreed ...

And I think it important to note, that what makes Sanders and Warren is their economic stances, and little else, which makes them DU god-like figures ... has anyone heard either of them making note of the 50th anniversity?

[JI7]

10. i actually think these people probably have a negative view

of civil rights because it gets in the way of their "class not race" positions. i have for years been hearing from certain types about how the dem party sold out white men. it really took obama being president for me to really see the racism in it and the resentment they feel towards minorities.

i'm not referring to sanders or warren here but those who claim to support them .

the support they showed for possible run by Schweitzer is a better example of this. they were quick to latch on to a guy just because he criticized obama. even though he made the very offensive comment about how the only positive thing he can say is something about being the first black pres . but i think it was this comment which is what they really connected to.

[1StrongBlackMan]

11. Exactly ...

i actually think these people probably have a negative view of civil rights because it gets in the way of their "class not race" positions.

The most harsh critics of President Obama, here on DU, have absolutely nothing to say on civil rights issues, except on the areas of privacy and weed (and maybe gay rights, if the happen to be gay).

[MADem]

12. EW thinks the non-gender specific little guy should catch a break.

She's also a strong supporter of the military, and she'll defend government contractors who produce products the Pentagon wants to dump if it means keeping jobs in the Bay State.

Most people aren't all one thing or the other...and all politics is local. It's a poor politician who doesn't put the desires of their constituents front-and-center.

[Jamaal510]

13. All a person has to do

to test whether or not Obama is a true progressive/liberal is ask one of the Koch brothers or Sheldon Adelson. If Obama were half the center-right-Rockefeller Republican-right of Nixon president that I hear some on the Left allege, they wouldn't even have bothered to spend so much money against his agenda.

[freshwest]

14. Correct! We are known better by our enemies than our sunny weather friends.

[randys1]

4. i think he thought comparing the two was unfair to the former

and i believe Obama is far from being a liberal or progressive, maybe he cant be and be successful, not up to me to know

i didnt say he was a rightwinger so why would you say that about FDR?

Look, I like Obama and what he has done in the face of the greatest obstruction times 100 any president has ever faced ever


and i campaigned for him and would again given the alternative, but we need liberal policies and I dont care who brings them

we need socialized medicine and if it was up to me bunch of other basic necessities like heat and access to the internet and cell service would be socialized and oil and so on...

the idea that we allow for profit companies decide what we will pay for heat that we need to survive, or electricity or internet, try and survive today without the internet or a cell phone...and oil, my god...that should be nationalized tonight

It feels good to discuss these things though, maybe together we can make some shit happen...

[JI7]

5. so opposition to anti lynching bill is liberal ? my point is that in Obama's case people refuse

to look at the system he is working in . while in FDR's case they do consider the times when things like his opposition to anti lynching bill and japanese internment comes up.

many people think we need this and that . jesse ventura always said the right things that most here would agree with but he was a shitty governor . how is someone going to get something done.

Kucninch got a lot of support on DU but he didn't really get anything done in his time in congress.

[JustAnotherGen]

6. I think what randys1 is saying is

We DO have to look at the system Obama is working in.

The obstruction - it sucks.

At the end of the day - we are one step closer to Medicare for all.

We can even HAVE the discussion about disparity in wealth.

I think in 80 years the discussion about this Presidency will be one about "transformation" on the cusp of a dramatic demographic shift in America in the face of environmental challenges we've never seen.

Folks "uphold and white wash MLK" around here. Bring up Malcolm X or Medgar Evers and they get stunned. To me - just me - comparing President Obama to any of these three brilliant minds does a disservice to all four.

Did their souls fly the day he got elected? I'd like to think they did.

Did they say - "Hey kid. You've got a long hard row to hoe. Godspeed.". I'd like to think so.

If any one of them was alive today . . . They would probably be saying . The world has changed since 1960 - not just America - the world. How could you possibly expect him to work within the same framework and take the exact same approach we did?

just my loose change on a Sunday morning!

[randys1]

9. Good morning

We cant say to Obama, "OK Black-man who is the first prez to have to prove where he was born, first Black prez, us white folk have completely farked up this place for 200 yrs, sure we had some good runs here and there, but now it is a total mess, FIX IT"

OK Black prez, the first one to be called a liar during a SOU speech...the first one to be obstructed by rightwing garbage so badly that it is amazing we are still here, FIX IT!

Crazy...

And climate change, wow, my two big things are

https://twitter.com/DidTheyLetUVote

which is my twitter acct and climate change...for instance, dont even get me started with Keystone, if that is approved i will flip out

I often have said that while i am no fan of Hillary, she should have been elected in 2008 and by the time Obama could be elected in 2016 the rightwing filth would have run out of energy and hate to some degree having spent 8 yrs hating Hillary for being a woman, that by 2016 we would be more mature and able to handle the first Black prez with a name like Barack Hussein Obama...

or not

[randys1]

8. i got that backwards

you threw me off with the FDR thing

and you just taught me something

Franklin Delano Roosevelt did not support the anti-lynching bill (even though his wife Eleanor tried to persuade him to do so) because he needed the southern vote and did not want to alienate those voters.

I didnt know about this, I am not sure what it has to do with my original comment but thanks for the background info...