(ThyBlackMan.com) It seems each day I am reminded of how poorly informed the average American is. This is especially true for the average African American, who speaks of politics through the jaundiced lens of faux progressivism and protecting our president and his political party no matter what they do. But for some reason, I think this is because as a community, things have changed. When I was growing up in Memphis during the city sanitation strikes, African Americans never trusted the government or politicians, even if they were black. I mean when someone like Adam Clayton Powell, Jr. goes out of his way to threatened to accuse Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Bayard Rustin of having a homosexual relationship, just to protect white racist democrats, unless the protest they had planned in 1960 at the Democratic Convention was cancelled, it is easy to see why such was the case and why the majority of us, traditionally never trusted democrats or republicans regardless of race.
Today, African Americans actually believe in and trust the government to do what is best albeit facts suggest otherwise. The stark reality is that things will only continue to get worse and we with our heads in the sand, will accept anything our political puppet masters tell us. Unfortunately, by the time we wake up, it may be too late and like everybody else, we will find out that the government is coming after us…even if we did nothing wrong.
Some may say this is an overstatement, but for the folk that do assert such, I suggest you read the Bill of Rights and the history of the French Revolution, as well as observe the parallels for themselves. The problem is that having a Mulatto President got black folk thinking it is all good. Just the presence and appearance of our swarthy-skinned President makes people think it is alright, making them accept without question, or even more problematic, not pay attention to the real world around them.
But if we would just look around, we would see that the gap between what the poorest make and what the wealthiest bring home has reached levels not seen since the Great Depression. According to the current administration, we are in year five of the “economic recovery” yet we have no job creation in concert with many companies cutting their payrolls. Add to this the observation that U.S. food prices are up nearly 20 percent so far this year and steadily rising. To believe the words of any politician, in particular this administration about the economy is getting better borders on psychosis.
What did we get by awarding the current administration with 93 percent of the African American vote in 2012 and 95 percent among that group in 2008? Economically we are worse than we were in 2009 and our participation in the labor market has been steadily falling farther since that same year. Simple truth is that since his election, economic improvements have occurred for all other ethnic groups in America with the exception of blacks.
Now the next step is domination by police and military enforcement. Now “the most transparent administration in history” has just ordered U.S. Army to seize every Apache helicopter in use by the National Guard and prior to this, the U.S.Postal Service, EPA, IRS, NOAA, the Department of Education & 90 agencies, have been and are purchasing and storing BILLIONs of round of hollow point ammo and thousands of military rifles for domestic use only. Not to mention that recently, the administration convinced their plutocratic buddies in the cell phone market to agree to add a phone kill switch beginning in July 2015 which they say is about the rash of cell phone thefts but is really about is about disabling cell phone cameras to keep the free people from posting and sharing government abuse and violence to other via the internet. Maybe even worse is that the FBI just announced that they plan to have 52 million photos in its NGI Face Recognition Database by next year (everybody, not just criminals)
And if you want to see two examples of this, that have nothing to do with race, all we have to do is look at what happened with Miriam Carey and more recently with Nevada rancher Clive Bundy. The Carey story tells us one thing: that if you are a black woman, you cannot get scared with men in swat regalia in mass pull guns out on you when you are with your child. Doing so gets you murdered legally and the Whitehouse will cover for this murder, call all the news media and tell the world you was shooting at police, trying to attack the Capitol, was crazy and on major medication when in fact she had no gun, and the autopsy report, made public six months after she was shot dead revealed that the 34-year-old woman had no drugs in her system and was struck by five bullets from behind, two of which were in the head.
Clive Bundy and the Bureau of Land Management, whose Director was Sen. Harry Reid’s (D-Nev.) former senior adviser and son (RoryReid), is being forced by the government to give up his land, or have his cattle killed until he does: land which his family has worked over 140 years. Why, because Reid’s sons represents a large Chinese energy company that wants to build on the land. Some say well both are wrong. I just disagree, if the government can say any land is federal, then they can even claim your land and home by asserting such, like they did this man here.
Fact remains, no matter where we look, we see the military training in public streets and preparing for martial law right in broad daylight, and we don’t say anything. Likewise we see Nationwide,Police assaulting and murdering innocent people with zero consequences, even when they are handcuffed in the back of cars .Why? Because we are silient, don’t want to rock the boat and say nothing about the administration of our current President even if it is true. They way things are today, policing in USA is roping in as many people as you can, see how many have guns or warrants, and then basically throw back the innocent ones. The problem is that they end up sweeping up a lot of innocent people and charging them with pointless crimes, fueled by a war on drugs that only results in the mass incarceration only the poor and people of color and more prisions. And each year, Obama’s Budget show federal prisons (not Education) is here he sallocates most of our tax dollars. For example, Obama’s FY 2014 Budget requests a total of $8.5 billion for federal prisons a 3.5 percent increase over the FY 2012 appropriated level.
We as a people and a nation need to be honest with ourselves. As it currently stand, we are immaterial and disposable. The United States is no democracy, but actually an oligarchy run by plutocrats, inclusive of our present President. Ours now, due to our own ignorance, is a government dominated by the political influence of the elite and wealthy Americans for their benefit alone over what is best for ordinary citizens. Don’t sleep, what they did to Miriam Carey and are doing to Clive Bundy, has nothing to do with race and they will do it to you and I also.
Thoroughly enjoyed your article. You are spot on when you say the average American is poorly informed. Thank you.
Your facts are wrong on Bundy. Although his family has used the land for decades, it was always federal land and both he and his forts there owed grazing fees which are standard and common in the cattle business. To say “The government wants the land to grant it to a Chinese company” (paraphrasing here) is disingenuous and flat out wrong.