Tag: REv. Al Sharpton

Concern Over Race Relations Reaches All-Time High Under 1st “Post-Racial” President

On By kingsjesterIn Politics1 Comment

th (15)Now well into his last year in office, it is quite apparent that, Barack Hussein Obama, the man who was billed as our first “Post-Racial President”, has done nothing but divide America even further, along Racial Lines.

According to gallup.com,

More than a third (35%) of Americans now say they are worried “a great deal” about race relations in the U.S. — which is higher than at any time since Gallup first asked the question in 2001. The percentage who are worried a great deal rose seven percentage points in the past year and has more than doubled in the past two years.

Concern about race relations in the U.S. has risen during an 18-month period marked by a series of deaths of unarmed blacks at the hands of police officers. These deaths sparked major, sometimes violent, protests and fueled the nationwide rise of the “Black Lives Matter” movement.

Democrats, Liberals More Worried Than Republicans, Conservatives

Concern about race relations over the past two years has increased among Republicans and Democrats, conservatives and liberals, and blacks and whites. But the gap between the groups who were already most worried before 2015 — Democrats, liberals and blacks — and those less worried has not shrunk, and in some cases has widened. Of particular note is the 53% to 27% “worried” gap between blacks and whites, up from the 31% to 14% gap between blacks and whites in the 2012-2014 combined polls.

Race Relations Low on the List of Major Concerns

Prior to 2015, race relations was much less of a concern to Americans, relative to other national issues. In almost every one of 13 polls from 2001 to 2014, Americans were significantly less likely to be worried about race relations than about any of the other dozen or so issues tested. Even this year, though the percentage concerned is up, race relations still ranks near the bottom of the list of concerns, along with energy, climate change and illegal immigration. None of the four elicited a great deal of concern from more than 37% (illegal immigration) of the public, compared with more than 50% for healthcare, the economy, and crime and violence.

Bottom Line

Race relations may not worry as many Americans as do issues such as the economy, affordable healthcare or crime, but Gallup’s polling clearly shows that racial tensions over the past few years have significantly affected public opinion.

Not only are far more Americans — no matter their race or political beliefs — worried about race relations, Americans have also become less satisfied with the way blacks are treated and more likely to list race relations as the most important problem the nation faces.

The rising concern about race relations as the nation’s first black president completes his last year in office is a retreat from the optimism that swept the country in the immediate aftermath of President Barack Obama’s first election win in 2008. A Gallup poll one night after Obama won found that seven in 10 Americans believed race relations would improve because of his victory.

In fact, a mid-2015 Gallup poll indicated that treatment of blacks had not worsened during Obama’s time in office, even while concerns about race relations and treatment of blacks were rising. However, the poll also did not show any significant lessening of perceived racial discrimination among blacks.

In the current presidential election cycle, both conservatives and liberals have attacked Republican front-runner Donald Trump for his campaign’s racist overtones, and conservative pundits are already claiming that history will conclude the Obama presidency worsened race relations. These factors, along with the ever-growing number of racial protests on college campuses and elsewhere, make it unlikely that Americans’ concerns about race relations will diminish in 2016.

Gallup is, of course, a Liberal Organization. However, it is usually the most accurate among the pollsters.

The reference in their article concerning Donald Trump, however, belies a SurveyUSA Poll last September, in which 25% of Black Americans polled, stated that they would vote for Donald Trump over Hillary Clinton.

But, I digress…

Ever since Obama got into office, all I have heard from him is the Rhetoric of Racial Division and Class Warfare.

It reminds me of all the historical conflicts which I used to read about, during the course in college which I took, titled “The Rhetoric of Social Protest“.

Karl Marx knew long ago that all you needed to do to touch the heart of the common man was to convince him of a shared struggle.

Vladimir Lenin took this a step further, by using the concept of a shared struggle to convince the Bolsheviks to help him overthrow the Czar of Russia and murder him and his family during the Russian Revolution.

Forgive me for stating the obvious, but fiery rhetoric spoken by a national leader has consequences.

President Barack Hussein Obama is as responsible for what has happened to Race Relations in America, as any thug wannabe in any city.

However, he is not alone in his responsibility.

Every race-baiter, local & national, who have fanned the flames of racial hatred, has the blood of any innocent person, police and civilians alike, slain in the name of Racial Division.

Do you remember when one half of the “Justice Brothers”, the “Reverend” Al Sharpton, led a march in New York City, capitalizing on the deaths of two of Michael Brown and Earl Garner?

During the march, the protesters chanted

What do we want? Dead Cops!

Somehow, America’s Professional Race-Baiters, from the Community Organizer-in-Chief, Barack Hussein Obama, on down, twisted the facts to make it America’s Law Enforcement Officers’ Fault that two thugs got themselves killed in altercations with police officers.

What ever happened to personal responsibility?

President Ronald Reagan once said,

There are no constraints on the human mind, no walls around the human spirit, no barriers to our progress except those we ourselves erect.

Compare it to these words:

It’s not to make excuses for that fact — although black folks do interpret the reasons for that in a historical context. They understand that some of the violence that takes place in poor black neighborhoods around the country is born out of a very violent past in this country, and that the poverty and dysfunction that we see in those communities can be traced to a very difficult history. – President Barack Hussein Obama, 7/19/2014

President Obama, for his own political reasons, reinforces, at every opportunity, the self-fulfilling prophecy that the Black Community is still shackled and limited in their freedom.

Which is an ironic statement, considering, as a Black man, that he presently holds the position of President of the most powerful country on the face of the Earth.

On November 25th of 2014, The Daily Caller reported that

Retired neurosurgeon and potential GOP 2016 candidate Ben Carson believes race relations in America, as a whole, have “gotten worse” under President Barack Obama’s leadership, saying he should take a ”balanced, objective look at things” instead of invoking the race card.

Carson made the comments to conservative radio host Hugh Hewitt Tuesday night.

“I actually believe that things were better before this president was elected,” Carson told Hewitt, “and I think that things have gotten worse because of his unusual emphasis on race.”

“Can you explain more? What do you mean by that?” asked Hewitt. “How did they get worse, and how did he contribute to it?”

“Well, for instance, in the incident with Henry Louis Gates, Skip Gates and him calling out the police, and you know, how they always do this kind of thing, and the Trayvon Martin case, you know, if I had a son, this is what he would look like, rather than trying to take the balanced, objective look at things, and then, you know, what’s happened here,” responded Carson.

“And then the way, which really irritates me to some degree, the way he and a bunch of progressives manipulate, particularly minority communities, to make them feel that they are victims. And of course if you think you’re a victim, you are a victim,” Carson continued.

Back in High School, during the 1974-1975 school year, I was a Sophomore Commissioner on the Student Council with a fellow named James. James was one of those students who were bused to our school. He went on to play football and run track. More importantly, James went on to have a 4.5 GPA, graduate high school as Valedictorian, make a 32 on his ACT, and receive a full scholarship to Harvard, and later, went on to Johns Hopkins Medical School. James worked hard and he achieved.

Millions of other Black Americans have, as well.

The current race-baiting and racially-based pandering by the President, his Administration, and all those who profit from it, locally and nationally, dishonors those who have achieved and has constrained those who might otherwise achieve.

I remember, as a 9 year old in Memphis, Tennessee, watching my parents’ black and white television as the National Guard was called into action on the night that Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated.

I remember after that Civil Defense Announcement that President Lyndon Johnson come on national television to make the announcement of Dr. King’s death. I remember a feeling of helplessness and of fear, as a nine-year-old, that I had not felt before.

It wasn’t just the fact that we were living in Midtown Memphis, that made me afraid.

It was the fact of the out-of-control violence itself, that caused my consternation.

And now, all these years later, I have the same feelings tugging at my gut. It’s not because I can’t take care of myself, trust me, I can.

It is because, those leaders, who have sworn to protect American Citizens, up in our nation’s capital and in cities across America, have skirted that responsibility, choosing to fan the flames of Racial Division, promising to “share the wealth” in the name of “Racial Equality”.

Meanwhile, ever since 2013, Black Youth Unemployment (16-19) remains at a rate 393% higher than everyone else’s in this stagnant economy.

…Even with George Soros hiring Black Lives Matter to protest at Donald Trump Rallies.

So, to summarize, in the last year of the Post-Racial Presidency of Barack Hussein Obama, America’s concern about Racial Division remains at an all-time high.

And, summer hasn’t even started yet.

Until He Comes,

KJ

 

 

 

 

 

The Ferguson Riots: Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Weeps

On By kingsjesterIn PoliticsLeave a comment

fergusonriots1I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.

New evidence has arisen as to the content of the character of Michael Brown, the 18 year old 6’4″ 290 lb young person, who was shot in a struggle by a Ferguson, MO police officer, giving an excuse for week-long riots, which, even with this new evidence, go unabated.

Fox news.com reports that

Anger spurred by the death of a black teenager at the hands of white police officer boiled over again early Saturday morning in Ferguson, Missouri, when protesters stormed into a convenience store — the same store that Michael Brown was accused of robbing.

Police and about 200 protesters began clashing late Friday after another tense day in the St. Louis suburb, a day that included authorities identifying the officer who fatally shot Brown on Aug. 9. At the same news conference in which officer Darren Wilson was named, Ferguson Police Chief Thomas Jackson released documents alleging that Brown stole a $48.99 box of cigars from the convenience store, then strong-armed a man on his way out.

Just before midnight, some in what had been a large and rowdy but mostly well-behaved crowd broke into that same small store and began looting it, said Missouri State Highway Patrol Capt. Ron Johnson.

Some in the crowd began throwing rocks and other objects at police, Johnson said. One officer was hurt but details on the injury were not immediately available.

Johnson said police backed off to try and ease the tension. He believes looting may have spread to a couple of nearby stores. No arrests were made.

“We had to evaluate the security of the officers there and also the rioters,” Johnson said. “We just felt it was better to move back.”

Meanwhile, peaceful protesters yelled at the aggressors to stop what they were doing. About a dozen people eventually blocked off the front of the convenience store to help protect it.

Gov. Jay Nixon on Thursday appointed Johnson to take over security after concerns were raised about how local police had used tear gas and rubber bullets on protesters earlier in the week. Johnson said one tear gas canister was deployed Friday night after the group of rioters became unruly.

Jackson’s decision to spell out the allegations that Brown committed the robbery, and his releasing of surveillance video, angered attorneys for Brown’s family and others, including U.S. Rep. William Lacy Clay. Earlier Friday night, the Democratic congressman took a bullhorn and told protesters, “They have attempted to taint the investigation. They are trying to influence a jury pool by the stunt they pulled today.”

Family attorney Daryl Parks acknowledged that the man shown in the surveillance footage “appears to be” Brown. But he and others said Brown’s family was blindsided by the allegations and release of the footage. They said that even if it was Brown, the crime didn’t justify the shooting of a teen after he put up his hands in surrender to the officer, as witnesses allege.

Another family attorney, Benjamin Crump, said police “are choosing to disseminate information that is very strategic to try to help them justify the execution-style” killing, said Crump, who also represented the family of Trayvon Martin, the teenager fatally shot by a Florida neighborhood watch organizer who was later acquitted of murder.

The surveillance video appears to show a man wearing a ball cap, shorts and white T-shirt grabbing a much shorter man by his shirt near the store’s door. A police report alleges that Brown grabbed the man who had come from behind the store counter and “forcefully pushed him back” into a display rack.

Police said they found evidence of the stolen merchandise on Brown’s body.

Why would people think that it is okay to act like a bunch of  Attila the Hun’s Barbarians burn, looting, and vandalizing their neighbors’ properties?

What has caused this lack of personal morals, ethics, and responsibility?

I think I know.

Back in the 60s, President Lyndon Johnson (whose big hand I once shook, at his ranch, as a little boy, after his presidential term) and the Democrats, brought forth a plan, called “the Great Society”. It was decided, in order to ensure that everyone would have an equal opportunity in America, that Uncle Sugar would step in to fill in the gaps.

Two seminal pieces of legislation were passed.

First, the Civil Rights Bill that JFK promised to sign, before his assassination, was passed into law. This Act banned discrimination based on race and gender in employment and ending segregation in all public facilities.

It also helped to cement in stone, minorities’ loyalty to the Democratic Party, which continues to this day.

The second bill that LBJ signed into law was the sweeping ECONOMIC OPPORTUNITY ACT OF 1964. It created the Office of Economic Opportunity whose stated purpose was to attack the roots of American poverty. A Job Corps was then established to provide vocational training.

A preschool program designed to help disadvantaged students arrive at kindergarten ready to learn, named HEADSTART, was then established. Then came VOLUNTEERS IN SERVICE TO AMERICA (VISTA), which was set up as a domestic Peace Corps. Schools in impoverished American regions would now receive volunteer teaching attention. Federal funds were sent to struggling communities to attack unemployment and illiteracy.

What Johnson told Americans, as he campaigned in 1964, was that the establishment of this “Great Society” was going to eliminate the problems of America’s poor.

It had the opposite effect

The Great Society created a dependent class, which, instead of diminishing as it’s members joined the workforce, increased from generation to generation, relying on the federal government to provide their every need.

Uncle Sugar became Mother, Father, Preacher, and Doctor to generations of Americans. This “plantation mentality” continues to this day.

A couple of years ago, I worked at our county’s State Employment Center Office.

While at the Employment Office, I was able to observe Americans, both Black and White, down on their luck, struggling to find work and survive in this economy. Unfortunately, the overwhelming majority of “unemployed ” who came to this particular office were Black.

I saw Black American Families whose existence living on the Government Dole, had become generational.

It is these people whom Obama and the Democrats have hypnotized into believing that Uncle Sugar loves them, and is their only solution to surviving a stifling existence.

They are so, so wrong.

The strength and vitality of America does not come from the benevolence of a Nanny-state Federal Government.

As the greatest American President of my  lifetime, Ronald Reagan said:

The nine words you never want to hear are:  I’m from the Government and I’m here to help.

Being enslaved to the Government Dole steals one’s ambition.  It takes away any impetus or desire to create a better life for yourself and your family, to challenge yourself to pick yourself up by your bootstraps and pursue the American Dream.  It makes you reliant on a politically-motivated spider’s web full of government bureaucrats who view you and your family as job security.

I watched American citizens trapped in this web of government bureaucracy,  so numbed of any initiative that they once had, that they seemed offended that they actually had to prove that they inquired about three jobs that week in order to keep their “benefits”.  Others seemed puzzled that they had to search through the state data base and pick out a job that they wanted to talk to an interviewer about receiving a referral to, and weren’t just simply handed a job when they walked through the door.

Instead of moving forward, by exercising the self-reliance that Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.  preached so well, these people I saw, were content on being “taken care of” by Uncle Sugar, as if being held down by their own poor, miserable circumstance, was a good thing.

As a Republican, I am sure that it would have offended you, Dr. King, to hear the tenants of  Marxism, i.e., “sharing the wealth” and Class Envy, being “preached” to the same Black Americans whom you tried so mightily to raise up and inspire.

This week,the results of LBJ’s “Great Society” have been the lead story in every television newscast, on every newspaper front page, and on every internet news/political website.

Dr King, I am sorry to tell you that racism and injustice is still going on in America. Unfortunately, it will not end any time soon, There are two many race-baiters profiting off of it.

Including, the President of the United States.

The part of your magnificent speech about “the content of their character” has been purposefully ignored by the professional race-baiters and assorted politicians  (but, I repeat myself) all this past week.

Dr. King, your call for self-reliance  took a back seat to their self-serving agenda, a long time ago.

Until He Comes,

KJ

President Victimhood

On By kingsjesterIn Uncategorized5 Comments

obamahoodiePast Presidents of the United States have all had a famous quotation that survived their time in office. For instance, Teddy Roosevelt said,

Speak Softly and carry a big stick.

John F. Kennedy said,

Ask not what your country can do for you. Ask what you can so for your country.

And, the greatest president of my lifetime, Ronald Wilson Reagan, who gave us a bunch of great quotations, once quipped,

There are no constraints on the human mind, no walls around the human spirit, no barriers to our progress except those we ourselves erect.

Our current president, Barack Hussein Obama (mm mmm mmmm) gave a quote, during an unexpected appearance at the Daily White House Press Briefing yesterday, that will live on beyond his time in office, too.

Unfortunately.

Trayvon Martin could have been me 35 years ago.

Quite revealing, huh?

Is the president saying that he was a 17 year old thug, who was suspended multiple times from high school for suspected burglary, carrying a burglary tool around in his backpack, and chooming?

Well, one out of three, anyway…

However, considering he was raised in Hawaii, by his rich white grandparents, and attended a very prestigious private school, I do believe that he is prevaricating…again.

But, wait, boys and girls, there’s more. As they say in Redneck Fairy tales, instead of “Once Upon a Time”,…Y’all Ain’t gonna believe this sh…err…ummm…Mess. (Caught myself.)

There are very few African American men in this country who haven’t had the experience of being followed when they were shopping in a department store. That includes me. There are very few African American men who haven’t had the experience of walking across the street and hearing the locks click on the doors of cars. That happens to me — at least before I was a senator. There are very few African Americans who haven’t had the experience of getting on an elevator and a woman clutching her purse nervously and holding her breath until she had a chance to get off. That happens often.

And I don’t want to exaggerate this, but those sets of experiences inform how the African American community interprets what happened one night in Florida. And it’s inescapable for people to bring those experiences to bear. The African American community is also knowledgeable that there is a history of racial disparities in the application of our criminal laws — everything from the death penalty to enforcement of our drug laws. And that ends up having an impact in terms of how people interpret the case.

Now, this isn’t to say that the African American community is naïve about the fact that African American young men are disproportionately involved in the criminal justice system; that they’re disproportionately both victims and perpetrators of violence.  It’s not to make excuses for that fact — although black folks do interpret the reasons for that in a historical context. They understand that some of the violence that takes place in poor black neighborhoods around the country is born out of a very violent past in this country, and that the poverty and dysfunction that we see in those communities can be traced to a very difficult history.

And so the fact that sometimes that’s unacknowledged adds to the frustration. And the fact that a lot of African American boys are painted with a broad brush and the excuse is given, well, there are these statistics out there that show that African American boys are more violent — using that as an excuse to then see sons treated differently causes pain.

I think the African American community is also not naïve in understanding that, statistically, somebody like Trayvon Martin was statistically more likely to be shot by a peer than he was by somebody else. So folks understand the challenges that exist for African American boys. But they get frustrated, I think, if they feel that there’s no context for it and that context is being denied. And that all contributes I think to a sense that if a white male teen was involved in the same kind of scenario, that, from top to bottom, both the outcome and the aftermath might have been different.

Once again, Obama made it all about himself. (As long as he has himself, he’ll never be alone.) However, he went even further than that.

A sitting President of these United States actually promoted Black Victimhood and Racial Division.

Just in time for his fellow traveler Reverend Al Sharpton’s planned “Demonstrations for Trayvon” in one hundred American cities today. Obama basically gave implied consent for the continued racial strife being stirred up by the Professional Race Baiters.

As I’ve mentioned before, I live right outside of Memphis, TN, in NW Mississippi. I have seen racial strife. In fact, as I recently wrote, I was 9 years old when Dr. King was killed. Additionally, I was in ninth grade when forced busing started. A lot of my friends left our middle class public school for the private schools, which quickly sprang up.

Memphis, while it is valiantly hanging on, has areas within it, that resemble the bankrupt city of Detroit. The same thing happened to my hometown as happened up there: all the taxpayers left town.

But, I digress…

Remember the earlier quote from President Reagan?

There are no constraints on the human mind, no walls around the human spirit, no barriers to our progress except those we ourselves erect.

Compare it to these words:

It’s not to make excuses for that fact — although black folks do interpret the reasons for that in a historical context. They understand that some of the violence that takes place in poor black neighborhoods around the country is born out of a very violent past in this country, and that the poverty and dysfunction that we see in those communities can be traced to a very difficult history.

Evidently, President Obama believes that the Black Community is still shackled and limited in their freedom.

Which is an ironic statement, considering, as a Black man, that he hold the position of president of the most powerful country on the face of the Earth.

Back in High School, I was a Sophomore Commissioner on the Student Council with a fellow named James. James was one of those students who were bused to our school. He went on to play football and run track. More importantly, James went on to have a 4.0 GPA,  make a 32 on his ACT, and receive a full scholarship from Harvard, and later, Johns Hopkins Medical School. James worked hard and he achieved.

Millions of other Black Americans have, as well.

Yesterday’s speech by the president dishonored those who have achieved and constrained those who might achieve.

Until He Comes,

KJ