WASHINGTON — Demonstrators nationwide protesting the fatal shootings of unarmed black men killed by police chanted “I can’t breathe!” ‘’Hands up, don’t shoot!” and waved signs that read “Black lives matter!” as family members of three victims packed a stage in front of the U.S. Capitol, urging thousands of supportive marchers to keep pressing for changes to the criminal justice system.
The march in Washington on Saturday — attended by family members for Michael Brown and Eric Garner, who were killed by police in recent months, and Amadou Diallo, who was fatally shot by police more than 15 years ago — coincided with nationwide demonstrations that spanned from iconic Fifth Avenue in New York to the streets of San Francisco and the steps of the Boston Statehouse. Most were peaceful protests, although about two dozen people were arrested in the Massachusetts capital for disorderly conduct.
“My husband was a quiet man, but he’s making a lot of noise right now,” said Washington protest marcher Esaw Garner, widow of Eric Garner, 43, who died in July after being put in a chokehold by New York City police during an arrest for allegedly selling loose, untaxed cigarettes.
“His voice will be heard. I have five children in this world and we are fighting not just for him but for everybody’s future, for everybody’s past, for everybody’s present, and we need to make it strong.”
Nationally, chanting demonstrators also staged “die-ins” as they lay down across intersections and in one city briefly scuffled with police blocking an onramp to a highway.
For coverage of the entire March, visit C-Span.org.
Battle tested civil rights veterans like Rev. Al Sharpton are still on the front lines of the struggle. Also, there is a new vanguard of young people who are no longer waiting for saviors and leaders. They are seizing the time and organically developing their own organizations and leadership. In cities around the country, young people of all races are marching in the streets and engaging in acts of defiance and civil disobediance. Despite the passage of time, the call for justice remains strong. This is a movement, not a moment.
We should be inspired by their courageous example. The time for spectators and armchair revolutionaries is over. Tweets, hashtags, blogs and Facebooks statuses are good, but they are no substitute for real grassroots activism. We will must get involved in the struggle. Justice for Eric Garner, Mike Brown, Tamir Rice and everyone else!
Good morning, family. Yesterday, President Obama spoke at the National Action Network National Convention. The President called a spade a spade. He called the Republicans out for suppressing the black vote. The Grio reports that:
In an unsparing critique of Republicans, President Barack Obama on Friday said the GOP is threatening voting rights in America more than at any point since the passage of the historic 1965 law expanding rights at the ballot box to millions of black Americans.
“The stark simple truth is this: The right to vote is threatened today,” Obama said in a fiery speech at civil rights activist and television talk host Al Sharpton’s National Action Network conference.
The election-year warning comes as Obama seeks to mobilize Democratic voters to fight back against state voting requirements and early balloting restrictions that many in his party fear will curb turnout in November. The president vowed that he would not let the attacks on voting rights go unchallenged, but offered no new announcements of specific actions his administration planned to take.
The president pinned efforts to curb access to the ballot box directly on the GOP, declaring that the effort “has not been led by both parties. It’s been led by the Republican Party.”
The President spoke the truth. Republicans supported striking down Section 4 of the Voting Rights Act ("VRA"). As Think Progress reports, "the Republican attorneys general of Alabama, Arizona, Georgia, South Carolina, South Dakota and Texas filed an amicus brief in the Supreme Court arguing that a key provision of the Voting Rights Act is unconstitutional." In Shelby County v. Holder, it was Republican appointed Supreme Court Justices who decided to strike down Section 4 of the VRA. Moreover, all around the country, the GOP is deliberately attempting to suppress black voters and other voters who tend to vote for Democrats.
Republicans in Ohio and Wisconsin this winter pushed through measures limiting the time polls are open, in particular cutting into weekend voting favored by low-income voters and blacks, who sometimes caravan from churches to polls on the Sunday before election.
Democrats in North Carolina are scrambling to fight back against the nation’s most restrictive voting laws, passed by Republicans there last year. The measures, taken together, sharply reduce the number of early voting days and establish rules that make it more difficult for people to register to vote, cast provisional ballots or, in a few cases, vote absentee.
In all, nine states have passed measures making it harder to vote since the beginning of 2013. Most have to do with voter ID laws. Other states are considering mandating proof of citizenship, like a birth certificate or a passport, after a federal court judge recently upheld such laws passed in Arizona and Kansas. Because many poor people do not have either and because documents can take time and money to obtain, Democrats say the ruling makes it far more difficult for people to register.
In sum, the President's assessment of the GOP is accurate.
The question is what are we prepared to do combat the GOP's voter suppression efforts. In addition to gathering evidence and filing lawsuits, we must combat voter suppression through intensive voter information and registration campaigns. We must ensure that all African American voters are aware of all new voter laws in their state. We must register record numbers of African American voters and inspire them to actually vote. While we inform the public and register new voters, we must continue to boldly define and vigorously push a black agenda. We must support or oppose politicians based solely on their demonstrated commitment to our agenda. We cannot afford to vote for candidates based solely based on party affiliation. Our agenda must be primary, first and foremost.
A lengthy investigation by The Smoking Gun has uncovered remarkable details about Sharpton’s past work as an informant for a joint organized crime task force comprised of FBI agents and NYPD detectives, as well as his dealings with an assortment of wiseguys.
Beginning in the mid-1980s and spanning several years, Sharpton’s cooperation was fraught with danger since the FBI’s principal targets were leaders of the Genovese crime family, the country’s largest and most feared Mafia outfit. In addition to aiding the FBI/NYPD task force, which was known as the “Genovese squad,” Sharpton’s cooperation extended to several other investigative agencies.
TSG’s account of Sharpton’s secret life as “CI-7” is based on hundreds of pages of confidential FBI affidavits, documents released by the bureau in response to Freedom of Information Act requests, court records, and extensive interviews with six members of the Genovese squad, as well as other law enforcement officials to whom the activist provided assistance.
Like almost every other FBI informant, Sharpton was solely an information source. The parameters of his cooperation did not include Sharpton ever surfacing publicly or testifying on a witness stand.
Genovese squad investigators--representing both the FBI and NYPD--recalled how Sharpton, now 59, deftly extracted information from wiseguys. In fact, one Gambino crime family figure became so comfortable with the protest leader that he spoke openly--during ten wired face-to-face meetings--about a wide range of mob business, from shylocking and extortions to death threats and the sanity of Vincent “Chin” Gigante, the Genovese boss who long feigned mental illness in a bid to deflect law enforcement scrutiny. As the mafioso expounded on these topics, Sharpton’s briefcase--a specially customized Hartmann model--recorded his every word.
In an interview Saturday, Sharpton again denied working as a confidential informant, claiming that his prior cooperation with FBI agents was limited to efforts to prompt investigations of drug dealing in minority communities, as well as the swindling of black artists in the recording industry. He also repeatedly denied being “flipped” by federal agents in the course of an undercover operation. When asked specifically about his recording of the Gambino crime family member, Sharpton was noncommittal: “I’m not saying yes, I’m not saying no.”
If Sharpton’s account is to be believed, he was simply a concerned citizen who voluntarily (and briefly) joined arm-in-arm with federal agents, perhaps risking peril in the process. The other explanation for Sharpton’s cooperation--one that has uniformly been offered by knowledgeable law enforcement agents--presents the reverend in a less noble light. Worried that he could face criminal charges, Sharpton opted for the path of self-preservation and did what the FBI asked. Which is usually how someone is compelled to repeatedly record a gangster discussing murder, extortion, and loan sharking.
In the course of an investigation being run by Spinelli and his partner John Pritchard, Sharpton was secretly recorded in meetings with an FBI undercover agent posing as a wealthy drug dealer seeking to promote boxing matches.
During one meeting with Sharpton, the undercover agent offered to get him "pure coke" at $35,000 a kilo. As the phony drug kingpin spoke, Sharpton nodded his head and said, “I hear you.” When the undercover promised Sharpton a 10 percent finder’s fee if he could arrange the purchase of several kilos, the reverend referred to an unnamed buyer and said, “If he’s gonna do it, he’ll do it much more than that.” The FBI agent steered the conversation toward the possible procurement of cocaine, sources said, since investigators believed that Sharpton acquaintance Daniel Pagano--who was not present--was looking to consummate drug deals. Joseph Pagano, an East Harlem native who rose through a Genovese crew notorious for narcotics trafficking, spent nearly seven years in federal prison for heroin distribution.
While Sharpton did not explicitly offer to arrange a drug deal, some investigators thought his interaction with the undercover agent could be construed as a violation of federal conspiracy laws. Though an actual prosecution, an ex-FBI agent acknowledged, would have been “a reach,” agents decided to approach Sharpton and attempt to “flip” the activist, who was then shy of his 30th birthday. In light of Sharpton’s relationship with Don King, FBI agents wanted his help in connection with the bureau’s three-year-old boxing investigation, code named “Crown Royal” and headed by Spinelli and Pritchard.
In subsequent denials that he had been “flipped,” Sharpton has contended that he stiffened in the face of the FBI agents, meeting their bluff with bluster and bravado. He claimed to have turned away Spinelli & Co., daring them to “Indict me” and “Prosecute.” Sharpton has complained that the seasoned investigators were “trying to sting me, entrap me…a young minister.”
In fact, Sharpton fell for the FBI ruse and agreed to cooperate, a far-reaching decision he made without input from a lawyer, according to sources. “I think there was some fear [of prosecution] on his part,” recalled a former federal agent. In a TSG interview, Sharpton claimed that he rebuffed the FBI agents, who, he added, threatened to serve him with a subpoena to testify before a federal grand jury investigating King. After being confronted by the bureau, Sharpton said he consulted with an attorney (whom he declined to identify).
The United States government and reactionary forces have a long history of attacking black leaders and organizations. In fact, under the Cointelpro, the U.S. government sought "to expose, disrupt, misdirect, discredit, or otherwise neutralize" black organizations, their leaders, spokesmen and members. Our enemies discredited and neutralized leaders like Marcus Garvey, Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Malcolm X, Stokely Carmichael (Kwame Ture), Huey P. Newton, Fred Hampton and many others.
The Smoking Gun article is an obvious example of such an effort. Clearly, the goal of that article is to discredit Al Sharpton and President Barack Obama. Even worst, the Smoking Gun may incite, whether intentionally or unintentionally, the mafia to kill Rev. Sharpton. Furthermore, shortly after Rev. Sharpton's National Action Network announced that President Obama will be the keynote speaker at their national convention, the Smoking Gun published that article. That timing is not a coincidence.
The Smoking Gun's attempt to discredit Rev. Sharpton fails for the following reasons. First of all, the events described in the article happened over thirty years ago. Second, the mafia is a scourge that should be eradicated. They flood our communities with drugs and guns. They are responsible for murder, extortion, prostitution, gambling and other despicable crimes. Al Sharpton should be commended for helping law enforcement arrest and imprison those thugs. Finally, in light of the F.B.I.'s abysmal track record in the black community, they have less creditability than Rev. Sharpton. Their account of how Sharpton became an informant is questionable. Since Rev. Sharpton has a history of challenging racist police officers, it is not unlikely that former F.B.I. agents would distort the facts in order to discredit Rev. Sharpton.
We cannot allow the opposition to deceive us. Rev. Al Sharpton is a soldier in the struggle for civil rights. He stands up against police brutality, racial profiling, injustice and other forms of racism. He demonstrated in support of affirmative action. He was there for Sean Bell, Amadou Diallo, the Jena Six, Trayvon Martin, Jordan Davis and countless others. He has devoted his life to social justice. For those reasons, I stand with Rev. Al Sharpton.
Shout out to my Facebook family for posting this thought provoking video. Who is right, Cornel West or Rev. Al Sharpton? Please tell me what you think.
Yesterday, I attended the One Nation March. Unlike the Glenn Beck's "Restoring Honor" March or even Rev. Al Sharpton's "Reclaim the Dream" March, this march truly reflected America's beautiful racial and ethnic diversity. There were whites, African Americans, Hispanics, Asian Americans and Native Americans. Teacher unions, labor unions, civil rights groups, environmental groups, peace groups and LGBT groups joined the march.
The general theme was jobs, justice, education and peace. The main goal of the march was to motivate progressives to remain engaged in the political process. Hopefully, more people will be inspired to participate in the most important march, the march to the polls on November 2, 2010. If we do not turnout for that march, our gains such as health care reform, may be eliminated by a Republican dominated House and Senate. The President's relatively progressive agenda will be obstructed if the Republicans and their extremist Tea Party wing win control. We must fight them with every ounce of our energy.
However, voting is not the end of the process. We must continue to push the President and Congress to address problems such as unemployment, poverty and war.
This past weekend marked the 47th anniversary of the great 1963 March on Washington where Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered his historic “I Have a Dream” speech. The Nation’s Capitol hosted two major demonstrations, Glenn Beck’s Restoring Honor Rally and Rev. Al Sharpton’s Reclaim the Dream March.
Glenn Beck held his Restoring Honor rally on the Washington mall in front of the Lincoln Memorial, the same location where King gave his famous I Have a Dream speech. For the most part, there were no political signs, no political speeches, and no guns. However, I noticed a few “Don’t Tread on Me” flags. Making a thinly veiled swipe at the Obama Administration, Sarah Palin voiced opposition to efforts to "fundamentally transform" America. The rally was a strange mix of extreme patriotism and evangelical revivalism. To create the illusion of diversity, there were quite a few token African American speakers and singers. However, the overwhelming majority of the participants were white.
Despite Beck’s efforts to describe the date as a coincidence, according to Salt Lake City Tribune writer Leonard Pitts’s article titled Memo to Glenn Beck, Beck said, on this radio program three months ago,
“This is a moment that I think we reclaim the civil rights movement. It has been so distorted and so turned upside down. ... We are on the right side of history. We are on the side of individual freedoms and liberties and damn it, we will reclaim the civil rights moment. We will take that movement, because we were the people that did it in the first place!”
Consequently, Beck’s rally has generated a lot of controversy. The date and location are peculiar because Beck and his Tea Party comrades are opposed to most of aims and objectives of Dr. King and the Civil Rights Movement. Dr. King sought to unite all people regardless of race. Beck, Palin and other Tea Party public figures divide the people with their vitriolic rhetoric and incessant race baiting. For instance, Beck described President Obama as someone who has “a deep seated hatred for white people.” He also described America during this Obama era as “Planet of the Apes”. Sarah Palin has been at the forefront of the racist, Islamophobic opposition to the building of a Muslim cultural center two blocks away from ground zero. After Dr. Laura Schlissinger’s racist “N” word rant, Sarah Palin advised Schlissinger via Twitter “don’t retreat…reload!”
Dr. King urged the federal government to actively address the problems of racism and poverty. Beck and friends advocate for a limited government and support tax cuts for the wealthiest Americans. During his interview on Fox News Sunday, Glenn Beck acknowledged that he opposes the Civil Rights Movement’s economic agenda. Dr. King was a man of peace who opposed American imperialism and militarism. Beck and friends romanticize militarism and drape it in the garb of exaggerated patriotism. Dr. King advocated progressive liberation theology. Beck condemns such theology.
If King, Roy Wilkins, A. Philip Randolph and the other prominent 1963 March on Washington organizers were alive today, Beck and Palin would call them Marxists and socialists. As others have said, such civil rights heroes would be on Beck’s conspiracy chalk board.
Moreover, right wing conservatives like Glenn Beck have revised history to suit their political purposes. They have reduced Dr. King and the Movement down to a single phrase, “judged not by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.” The Right has attempted to neuter and, in the words of Cornel West, Santa Clausify Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Under the guise of creating a color blind society, some conservatives have used that "content of character" phrase to eviserate everything that King stood for. In their upside down bizarre world, white men are the victims and African Americans are the racists. Affirmative action and other measures designed to promote racial diversity are viewed as reverse discrimination.
Unfortunately, the Restoring Honor rally will legitimize Glenn Beck and the far right Tea Party movement. The crowd size speaks volumes. Apparently, hundreds of thousands of people participated in the Restoring Honor rally. Like rapper Jay Z says, “man lie, women lie, numbers don’t.”
Now, to end on a more positive note, I also watched Rev. Al Sharpton’s “Reclaim the Dream” rally. The central theme was: “We have made progress but we have not arrived yet.” Other speakers included National Urban League President and CEO Marc Morial, NAACP President and CEO Benjamin Todd Jealous, U.S. Rep. Eleanor Holmes Norton, D.C. Adrian Fenty, Warren Ballantine , Black Farmers Association leader John Boyd, U.S. Department of Education Secretary Arne Duncan and others.
The “Reclaim the Dream” speakers addressed a wide array of pertinent issues including poverty, inner city violence, mass incarceration, unemployment, educational and D.C. statehood. During the rally, John Boyd pointed out how approximately 80,000 black farmers filed race discrimination complaints against the United States Department of Agriculture and no one was fired. However, Shirley Sherrod was fired on the spot based on half-truths and distortions. Mr. Ballantine summed up my view the rally when said, “A dream without a plan is nothing more than a wish.” As Sharpton stated during his speech, the Reclaim the Dream rally cannot just be a one day event.
Judging by the size of Beck's crowd, they are apparently ready and organized to “take the country back.” Commemorations are great, but the real question is “are we ready and sufficiently organized to move this country forward”?
As reported in the Washington Post, according to the authors of Game Change, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said “that the country was ready to embrace a black presidential candidate, especially one such as Obama -- a light-skinned' African American 'with no Negro dialect, unless he wanted to have one.”
After this statement was revealed, Sen. Reid issued the following apology. "I deeply regret using such a poor choice of words. I sincerely apologize for offending any and all Americans, especially African Americans, for my improper comments." In addition, he called President Obama and apologized. In response, Obama stated, "I accepted Harry's apology without question because I've known him for years. I've seen the passionate leadership he's shown on issues of social justice and I know what's in his heart. As far as I am concerned, the book is closed."
Democrats such Congressman James Clyburn, former Congressman Harold Ford and even activists like Rev. Al Sharpton accepted Reid’s apology. The Congressional Black Caucus is issued a weak press release regarding the issue. On the Today Show, in an accommodating manner, Ford simply described Reid’s statement as “unusual”, and Gwen Ifill asserted that Reid's statement was not demeaning. Attempting to excuse Reid’s statement, Virginia Governor Timothy M. Kaine contended that the statement was made in the context of praising Obama’s candidacy for president. Similar to Joe Biden’s gaffe referring to Obama as the first clean and articulated African American presidential candidate, Reid’s condescending praise of Obama is an insult to the African American community.
Basically, Reid said that Obama is an exceptional Negro. In other words, he is not like most Black people. He implied that Obama is an honorary white person. In essence, the Senator alluded to the notion that a lighter complexion is superior or preferable to a darker one. Unfortunately, such sentiments may reflect the opinions of many white voters who helped elect President Obama. Obama was raised by his Caucasian mother and grandparents. His background made it easier for white voters to identify with him. It would have been more difficult for white voters to identify with him if had a darker complexion and was raised by Black parents.
Furthermore, Reid insinuated that it was an extraordinary feat for an African American politician to speak standard proper English. He used the antiquated segregation era term “Negro” to imply that most African Americans only speak Ebonics. Furthermore, Reid insulted Obama by suggesting that Obama is a phony who can pretend to be Black when necessary.
Although the book may be closed for Obama and the Democrats, it remains open for the African American community. This is not a Democratic Party or Republican Party issue. While I appreciate Sen. Reid's demonstrated commitment to social justice, his record should not serve as a basis to excuse his racist statement. It is extremely disappointing that no prominent African American politicians or organizations have strongly condemned the Senator’s racist comments. Where is your heart? How many more apologies will the President accept?
