The history of blacks in the White House

A black history lesson:

The History of Blacks in the White House.

Click the below link or the above text.

http://link.brightcove.com/services/link/bcpid1902589447/bclid8326234001/bctid8468417001

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Chris Brown more important than Chris Nobody

Why is Chris Brown more important than 'Chris Nobody'?
by Nsenga Burton
Wednesday, February 18, 2009

Nsenga Burton

Well, well, well. America's sugary pop star couple — a match made in publicity heaven — Chris Brown and Rihanna (the one-named wonder) are exposed. The young stars on the cusp of music royalty, both teenage heartthrobs in their own right, are now embroiled in one of the most publicized cases of domestic violence ever seen.

Although I have a zero-tolerance policy when it comes to domestic violence, I tried to refrain from commenting about the case because a.) everyone and his momma is covering it, b.) the story changes every millisecond, and c.) just when you think it can't get any worse, it somehow manages to do just that. One thing is for sure: The plot continues to thicken as Rihanna's folks have started leaking info (this is not the first time that he has hit her) and Chris Brown used Facebook to, ironically, save face (which was later proven to be a false post).

I find it interesting listening to people justify when it's alright to beat someone. It has been reported that Brown beat her because Rihanna gave him herpes ... allegedly. Even if she did, does that give him the right to beat her down? After all, it was he who chose to lie down with her, so why be mad when he came up with fleas or disease or anything else for that matter?

Some have speculated that the awesome twosome actually broke up weeks ago, but were trying to maintain a "public" relationship because of their scheduled Grammy performance. Depending on which "publication" you read, she got mad and popped him because some girl was text messaging him or he got mad because she was flirting with some guy at Clive Davis' pre-Grammy party. Whatever happened, violence was the end result with Rihanna being beaten, bruised and bitten.

Before I move on to my next point, biting someone is punk sh#t. Yes I said it, and I mean it.

Hitting a woman, even when the woman is stupid enough to hit you is dumb. Why? Because as 19-year-old Chris Brown is learning, you will go to jail. If you can't wrap your tiny mind around non-violence as a philosophy or the fact that you should only touch people in what is clearly defined as "lovingly" or "playfully," then be prepared to concentrate on not dropping the soap.

Chris Brown is just the type to go into the joint and come out with his shirt in a knot. Why? He's young, good-looking, wealthy and obviously thinks he's a tough guy. Let's see how tough he is surviving in the joint. But even though this case is tragic because domestic violence is tragic, what I find most interesting is the amount of attention this case is receiving.

Chris Brown has gone from facing a possible domestic violence charge to making criminal threats, which carries more time than attempted murder. I'm all for throwing the book at batterers, but there is something not quite right about the zeal with which they are going after this brother. It seems as if you have to be a superstar celebrity like Rihanna in order for them to prosecute the case to the fullest. The police don't seem to go after regular folks with the same zeal, and this is problematic.

The degree to which prosecutors decide to prosecute should not be determined by celebrity status. If Rihanna were a D-list celebrity, would Mr. Brown be facing possible attempted murder charges? Would we know about it? Would it be talked about all over the world? Probably not.

Just look at how many celebrities have gotten away with battering their spouses.

Vanilla Ice, Scott Weiland (Stone Temple Pilots frontman), Scott Stapp, David Hasselhoff, Sean Penn, Jamal Woolard (star of Notorious), Don Cornelius, James Brown, Mike Tyson, Dennis Rodman, Warren Moon, Tommy Lee, Josh Brolin and the list goes on and on. Hell, Tyrese Gibson was accused of beating his pregnant girlfriend and no charges were filed. What's sad about it is that some of these people are celebrated with awards, honors and more success after they get arrested.

I find it interesting that the world is so pissed off with Chris Brown, but does not show the same amount of ire when other celebrities beat on women. I also find it interesting that a 19-year-old, who comes from a background of domestic abuse, is being held to a higher standard than men who are twice his age. Why is he being made the poster boy for domestic abuse? Why does this case require a level of prosecution that is unheard of when domestic disputes involve "Chris Nobody" and Rihanna without the record deal and cosmetics endorsement?

Something is terribly wrong here and on many levels. If indeed it is true that this is not the first time that Brown has hit Rihanna or that violence has been an integral part of their relationship, including on her part, why didn't anyone intervene before this? They are young, after all, and need guidance. The adults thought it better to "maintain" the façade of a "relationship" for publicity and are now surprised when it has blown up in their faces?

Why does it take two A-list celebrities to get authorities involved in prosecuting domestic violence cases to the fullest extent of the law? Everyone should be equally protected under the law regardless of the number of Grammy nominations that they receive. That is the true tragedy of this senseless crime.

Nsenga Burton

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Playahata's Figures in Black History

Playahata's Figures in Black History Directory

(click the links below for content)
01) Carter G. Woodson
02) Narmer the Unifier
03) Benjamin Banneker
04) The Warrior Queen Gudit: Conqueror of Ethiopia
05) Blacks in the Revolutionary War: Patriots, Loyalists, and Maroons
06) Mansa Musa: Africa's Wealthiest King
07) Slave Revolts of the Antebellum South
08) St. Maurice, the Knight of the Holy Lance
09) Booker T. Washington: "The Most Powerful Negro in America"
10) Beyond The Mummy: Finding the Real Imhotep
11) Ida B. Wells: Anti-Lynching Crusader
12) Songhai: Africa's Largest Empire
13) W.E.B DuBois: The Souls of Black Folks
14) Great Zimbabwe: Houses of Stone
15) Marcus Garvey and UNIA
16) From Medieval Askum to Modern Ethiopia: Near 1,000 Years of Dynasty
17) Zora Neale Hurston - Novelist, Anthropologist, Folklorist
18) Africans in Medieval Europe: Part I Black-a-Moor Slaves, Soldiers, and Nobles
19) Elijah Muhammad
20) Africans in Medieval Europe: Part II - Perceptions and Legacy
21) Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. & The Civil Rights Movement
22) Kanem-Bornu & The Hausa States
23) Malcolm X (El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz)
24) Ta-Set: The World's First Monarchy? 3800-3100BC
25) The Black Power Movement: Daughters and Sons of Malcolm
26) Gallery of African Kings & Queens Gallery I
27) Independence Leaders in Africa and the Caribbean
28) Gallery of African Kings & Queens Gallery II
Visit the Playahatas at http://www.playahata.com

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The History of Black History

Lesson 01 of 26 History of Black History from our online Black History Class

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The American Negro must remake his past in order to make his future . . . History must restore what slavery took away. - Arthur Schomburg

Black History, as we currently know it, has it's main roots in four figures. Three men, one woman. Three were African-Americans (by today's standards), one was a Puerto Rican. Many others influenced these figures, yet we focus on these four. The Great Grandfather of Black History is W.E.B Dubois. The Grandfather of Black History is Arturo Schomberg. The Mother of Black History is Drusilla Houston, and the Father of Black History is Carter G. Woodson.

Simply put in 1903 W.E.B. DuBois published a book named "The Souls of Black Folk." Dubois' book taught and inspired both the Puerto-Rican Arturo Schomberg, and the Woman-Journalist Drusilla Houston. The writing of Dubois, and the research of Schomberg taught and inspired Woodson, who created Negro History week with some assistance from members of Woodson's fraternity Omega Psi Phi and others who supported Woodson's activities. As a Pan-Hellenic side note, W.E.B. Dubois is a member of Alpha Phi Alpha, Arturo Schomberg is a member of Kappa Alpha Psi.

Woodson's later activities, most notably the initiation of Negro History Week, have inspired people of African descent worldwide to improve self-racial pride and laid the foundation for the United States of America to recognize February as Black History month. Houston's works have inspired many scholars, particularly scholars who have studied African and African-diaspora history, to further the scholarly work associated with Black History. Put very simply, Woodson's activities reached the common person and general cultural aptitude, while Houston's work reached the scholars.

It's interesting to note that the Mother and Father of Black History had some difficulties. Woodson dismissed Houston as a “historian without portfolio” and didn't consider her to be a serious historian. As Woodson introduced Negro History week in 1926, Houston published her groundbreaking burst on the historical literary scene with Volume I of her magnum opus "Wonderful Ethiopians of the Ancient Cushite Empire Book 1: Nations of the Cushite Empire, Marvelous Facts from Authentic Records". Daddy started Black History week, Mama provided the ancient information that supported Black History week.

Drusilla Dunjee (later Houston) was born on January 20, 1876 in Harper's Ferry, West Virginia. Her parents were Rev. John William Dunjee and Lydia Taylor Dunjee. Houston was always fearful that her works would be lost and forgotten and that they would never reach the audience she desired, namely the children. To some extent she was correct. On February 11, 1941, Houston died in Arizona after years of illness from Tuberculosis. True to faith, her grave reads: “To Die is to Gain.” Visit http://www.abwh.org/ddhouston.htm for more information on The Mother of Black History.

William Edward Burghardt Du Bois was born on February 23, 1868, in Great Barrington, at the southwestern edge of Massachusetts, to Alfred Du Bois and Mary Silvina Burghardt Du Bois. Du Bois was born and grew up in the overwhelmingly white town of Barrington, Massachusetts. Mary Silvina Burghardt's family was part of the very small, free black population of Great Barrington and had long owned land in the state. They descended from Dutch and African ancestors, including Tom, a West African-born man who served as a private for Captain John Spoor's company in 1780, a service which likely won him his freedom. According to Du Bois, several of his maternal ancestors were notably involved in regional history.Alfred Du Bois, from Haiti, was of French Huguenot and African descent.

Schomburg was born in the (previously predominately "Black") town of Santurce, Puerto Rico (now part of San Juan) to María Josefa, a freeborn Black midwife from St. Croix, and Carlos Féderico Schomburg, a bi-racial merchant of German heritage. Schomburg was educated at San Juan's Instituto Popular, where he learned commercial printing, and at St. Thomas College in the Danish-ruled Virgin Islands, where he studied Negro Literature. During grade school one of his teachers claimed that blacks had no history, heroes or accomplishments; this patently false claim inspired Schomburg's life-long quest to find the truth and to document the accomplishments of African-Latinos, such as Jose Campeche and later of Afro-Americans.

Dr. Carter G. Woodson. Born to parents who were former slaves, he spent his childhood working in the Kentucky coal mines and enrolled in high school at age twenty. He graduated within two years and earned a Ph.D. from Harvard. The scholar was disturbed to find in his studies that history books largely ignored the black American population-and when blacks did figure into the picture, it was generally in ways that reflected the inferior social position they were assigned at the time. Woodson decided to take on the challenge of writing black Americans into the nation's history. He established the Association for the Study of Negro Life and History (now called the Association for the Study of Afro-American Life and History) in 1915, and a year later founded the widely respected Journal of Negro History. In 1926, he launched Negro History Week as an initiative to bring national attention to the contributions of black people throughout American history. Woodson chose the second week of February for Negro History Week because it marks the birthdays of two men who greatly influenced the black American population, Frederick Douglass and Abraham Lincoln.

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The Enemy Within

The Enemy Within
January 29th, 2009

by Justin Giboney
Make an objective appraisal of the following statistics because they form the basis of an inconvenient truth that I would like black America to consider:
A study conducted by criminologists at Northeastern University found that since 2000, while overall murder rates nationwide have fallen, the murder rate among black youth is on the rise.
Homicide is the leading cause of death for black males between the ages of 15 and 29.
94% of blacks murdered are murdered by other blacks.

According to the Associated Press, in 2008, more citizens were murdered in Chicago (city with one of the highest black population in America) than American soldiers killed in Iraq.
While external threats to a nation are always a serious concern, more often than not, internal threats present a more immediate and grave danger (see War on Terror). What’s more, sabotage within cripples a people’s ability to fight without. For some time, I have struggled with whether or not many of the more problematic issues in the black community are a microcosm of that same science. Is it possible that at this moment in history, black America’s most mortal enemy is within?

The Tuskegee Experiment:
From the Tuskegee Experiment to Cointelpro, black America’s had good reason to be suspicious of the intent and effect of external forces. To suggest such indignities should simply be forgotten is neither useful nor realistic. In the same breath, these wrongs should not and cannot be used as an eternal crutch. Unfortunately, the vestiges of such cruelness still haunt the psyches of many African-Americans and render us hyper-cynical and prone to entertaining the most far out conspiracy theories. Cynicism can warp reality.

The barbershop has long served as a daily forum for male discourse. There is no better place to gauge the black male sentiment on a variety of topics. However, you will quickly find that these conversations often unveil a deep-seated cynicism. Enter any black barbershop from Tuesday through Saturday and you are guaranteed to hear spirited debates, along with a few outlandish conspiracy theories. You might even hear a story about how the American government is using iPods and ESPN to exterminate the black community. I have heard theories that are so creative, they make a Dan Brown novel seem pedestrian. It is entertaining at times, but disheartening once you realize that some of us actually use such theories to shun responsibility and feed a sense of helplessness and defeatism.

Notwithstanding the atrocities of the past or the inequities of the present, self-responsibility must kick in at some point. As incompetent and irresponsible as the W. Bush administration may have seemed, they were not the cause of all the black community’s problems. Violent crime is one of the most pressing concerns in the black community and we would be sadly remiss if we failed to take the majority of the responsibility in this issue.
credit: seccad Are We Too Apologetic?

For every Sean Bell and Oscar Grant (R.I.P.), there are several hundred blacks killed at the hands of other blacks (not in uniform). Where is the outrage and protest? Our youth are being intimidated and corrupted and our elderly are afraid to step out their doors. Why do we make excuses for the individuals who terrorize our community on a daily basis? Perhaps it is because they are our sons, brothers, nephews, and cousins. We must fight the denial that prevents us from seeing the blood dripping from our collective hand.

Most apologists suggest these perpetrators are somehow absolved because of historical mistreatment and poor backgrounds. In my opinion, those factors do not justify terrorizing your community. A significant number of blacks have always suffered from relatively low socio-economic statuses; however, poor living conditions have never been an excuse for such poor behavior. Moreover, there are several third world countries with significantly lower murder rates, so poverty in itself cannot be a justification.

These apologists also work off the misconception that the great majority of the young brothers committing these crimes are poverty stricken. On the contrary, I venture to say that a good number of these brothers did not grow up like Jermaine and Dukie in The Wire. There is a pervasive thug and anti-intellectualism mentality in our community that transcends economic lines further than we would like to admit.

Take an honest assessment of the violence plaguing the black community. Can we honestly contend that it does not stem from internal sources? Can we in good faith pawn yet another community issue off on “The Man”? Undoubtedly, we can put a dent in the senseless violence in our community, but the first step is acknowledging the enemy within.

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Young black violence: A three-part tragedy

Young black violence: A three-part tragedy
By: Michael E. RossTue, 01/27/2009
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There's a tragedy plaguing black America and its youth.
The names read like an honor roll of American misfortune. Sean Bell. Abraham Biggs. Oscar Grant III. Adolph Grimes III. They, and too many more besides them, are young, black, male victims of violence in the United States. Those men and others are part of a three-way tragedy that's plaguing black America and victimizing its youth in unsettling ways.
(Read more about youth violence and find resources.)

Part I: Police brutality
The first part of this tragedy is an old one: Young black men targeted by the police. Recent incidents clearly show that the mantle of change embraced in the nation's voting booths on Election Day hasn't fully trickled down to the nation's precincts and station houses.Cases in point: The New Year's Day slaying of 22-year-old Oscar Grant III in Oakland, Calif. A Bay Area transit police officer shot Grant, perhaps accidentally, while the young father of a 4-year-old daughter lay on a station platform floor.On the same day, Adolph Grimes III, also 22, was shot to death in New Orleans by nine undercover New Orleans police officers.Then there was the New Year's Eve wounding of Robbie Tolan by police officers in a suburb of Houston.All this was preceded in November 2006 with the killing of Sean Bell, a 23-year-old man shot to death by New York City police officers. Fifty bullets were fired at Bell, just hours from being married, and two of his friends. These reflect the persistence of a disturbingly durable trend: the tendency of police officers to perceive young black males as an ipso facto threat to society. That trend's evident in other, more psychologically corrosive ways: Police officers frisked more than 500,000 New Yorkers in 2008, 80 percent of them young black or Latino men, the New York Times reported recently.

Part II: Crime against each other
The second part of this tragedy is a rise in the numbers of young black men being slain by others like them. A study released late in December by criminologists at Northeastern University in Boston found that even as murders nationwide have shown signs of stabilizing, the number of young black men and teenagers who either killed or were killed in shootings has increased sharply since 2000."From 2002 to 2007, the number of homicides involving black male juveniles as victims rose by 31% and as perpetrators by 43%. In terms of gun killings involving this same population subgroup, the increases were even more pronounced: 54% for young black male victims and 47% for young black male perpetrators," the report found.Data from the Federal Bureau of Investigation, some of which found its way into the Northeastern study, determined that nearly 10 percent of black people arrested for murder in 2007 were under the age of 18."In a sociopolitical environment that is widely (and incorrectly) viewed as post-racial, attacking such intractable problems comes with a new set of challenges," the report found. "While the celebration around Barack Obama's victory is understandable, the real work has to happen now at the grassroots level."

Part III: Self-destructive violence
But the third part of this tragedy is the most disturbing of all: self-destructive violence. It's a fact supported by scholarly studies and law enforcement agency statistics: that young black males, apparently so locked into a sense of despair and hopelessness, are committing suicide and doing it at an alarming rate.One of the most recent and painfully voyeuristic cases was Abraham Biggs, the Florida teenager who overdosed on prescription medication in November and did it live via webcam.Biggs's death represents one of many suicides among young black men. According to the American Association of Suicidology, taking one's life is the third leading cause of death among young black men, who are seven times more likely to kill themselves as black women. Newsweek magazine, citing the AAS findings, explored the issue in its Nov. 25 issue. Dr. Sean Joe, an assistant professor of social work at the University of Michigan, told Newsweek in November that young black men were less inclined to seek treatment for mental-health and emotional problems — an attitude identical to the U.S. military, whose gung-ho culture frowns on soldiers admitting they need help for mental-health issues."The bigger challenge is redrawing black masculinity in general, and the ways in which men perceive what it means to seek help for mental-health issues," Joe told Newsweek. "The degree to which we can reduce the stigma around seeking help, and get men to understand that it isn't weak to seek help for your issues will greatly affect our ability to reach that community." As we hail the inauguration of Barack Obama and the rise of new American possibility, there's no escaping this national three-part tragedy or an irony too sad for words: At a time when at least the political horizon for African Americans has never been brighter, young black men of our future are having that future denied to them, or they're denying it to themselves.

Michael E. Ross, a frequent contributor to The Loop, is a West Coast journalist who blogs frequently on politics, pop culture and race matters at Culchavox. He also writes for The Root and PopMatters.
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Will America Lose Another Generation ?

Under the Reign of the First Black President, Will America Lose Another Generation of Black Males?

By Phillip Jackson - January 1, 2009
http://www.blackstarproject.org/

The previous generation of young Black males was destroyed between 1985 and 2005. No amount of crying, cursing or hand-wringing can change this because that generation is gone! We need only walk down any city street in almost any predominantly African American community to see residue of the broken lives -- millions of young Black men nationwide. Few people spoke out effectively and even fewer engaged in actions to prevent this silent genocide. The mass destruction of Black American males has been effectively ignored by almost everybody—the government, the media and most of the philanthropic community. Even most of our Black churches and Black communities still stand by and watch the horrific loss of our young Black men.

The resulting negative educational, social, spiritual and economic impact of a generation of Black males’ shattered lives is also ultimately a devastating loss to our entire society. Of course, every single young Black man will not be lost, but here are the facts: Only 2.5 out of 100 of the 102,000 Black males in Chicago public schools are projected to graduate from college by age 25 with at least a bachelors degree (From High School to the Future, Consortium on Chicago School Research, University of Chicago 2006). And only 19 percent of Black males in Indianapolis and 20 percent in Detroit even graduated from high school in 2006 (Given Half a Chance: The Schott 50 State Report on Public Education and Black Males, The Schott Foundation for Public Education).

Testimony before the U.S. Congressional Joint Economic Committee in 2007 revealed that only 50 percent of Black men in New York City were employed and that, nationally, 72 percent of Black male high school dropouts were unemployed. Recent crime data from Youngstown, Ohio, a city with a 44 percent Black population, showed that young Black men between 15 and 25 years old were either perpetrators or victims of 90 percent of Youngstown’s murders. In 2008, Chicago had more than 500 murders, mostly of young Black and Latino men. The Justice Policy Institute predicts that one out of three Black males born after 2001 will spend time incarcerated.

All of these statistics, representing the general condition of young Black men in America today, forecast an abysmal future for Black America. These inexcusable catastrophic outcomes constitute an unnatural disaster. Black America, along with all of America, pays dearly for its collective ineptitude and willful neglect of the nurturing, mentoring, educating, developing and saving of young Black men. No plausible justification exists for a country as great as America to lose another generation of Black youth.

Ask yourself: Who are young Black women going to marry? Who will be good fathers to tens of millions of Black children? Who will build and maintain the economies of Black communities? Who will be the anchor upon which to build strong families in the Black community? Who will young Black boys emulate as they grow into men? Will Black America be a viable and valuable community in 20 years? Or is the better question: Who cares?

Will the election of America’s first Black male president cleanse its conscience for destroying a past generation and absolve it of guilt for annihilating the next generation of young Black males? What a cruel hoax to believe that if a Black man can become president, then Black men do not have problems that America is obligated to address. Yet Black America cannot trade one Black man in the White House for the million-plus Black men languishing in American jail houses and millions of Black boys failing in American school houses.

In the absence of broad public policy ushering in comprehensive systemic changes, future generations of young Black males are destined to continue destroying themselves, their families and their communities. American social, economic and governmental systems have greatly contributed to the destruction of young Black men who have, in turn, become weapons of mass destruction against Black American communities. All the while America continues its moral high-ground façade concerning international human rights.

Those voices who call for Black men to “step up and be men” are not only wasting their breath but are also part of a seemingly intractable problem. Correcting the issues of Black men will require a comprehensively structured, sufficiently financed, professionally managed, ethically led and committed multi-pronged effort to systemically address and shift the cascading negative outcomes for Black men and boys.

The real shame of this catastrophe is not that America can’t save young Black males; it is that America won’t save young Black males! The resources required are miniscule compared to recent governmental bailouts and expenditures. Saving young Black males is an investment in America! It is as much a spiritual battle as it is a physical and emotional battle. A successful effort to save young Black males must also address habits, attitudes and behaviors that have pushed Black men to the precipice of irrelevance, obsolescence and nonexistence. To date, precious little is in place to stop the on-going destruction and annihilation of young Black males.

Phillip Jackson, Founder and Executive Director
The Black Star Project
3473 South King Drive, Box 464
Chicago, Illinois 60616
773.285.9600 or email at blackstar1000@ameritech.net

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The Black Nationalist Measuring Stick: Who Sets the Standards?

Image by National Geographic

By Dan Tres OMi

When the Rev. Jeremiah Wright mainstream media induced fiasco was raging in the summer of 2008, many evangelical and progressive Christians came out of the woodwork to claim that Rev. Wright did not speak for them. While history has shown that Rev. Wrights approach to Christian Theology from a Black Nationalist perspective is older than the founding of the United States of America and even predates the black evangelical movement, his protractors were correct in assuming that Wright did not speak for them. While I agree that Rev. Wright is correct in his assessment of U.S. Foreign policy and it's treatment of people of African descent, Wright cannot speak for all of the Black Church. The same can be said of Black Nationalists of the extreme stripe.

Some may argue but let's be frank, there are varying degrees of Black Nationalism. Just because one is an adherent to Black Nationalism and is a Christian, it does not make said person less of a Nationalists then someone who practices Islam. If one practices Vodun, it does not make that practitioner of Vodun much more of a Black Nationalist as someone who is an atheist and a Black Nationalist. I have encountered those who never read Cheik Anta Diop or Dr. John Henrik Clarke but help to uplift the Black community each and every day. While some will say they are not true Black Nationalists since they might not wear the Red, Black, and Green (RBG), but their actions speak for themselves. If they are out there on the front lines helping educate Black youth every day of the week then in my humble opinion, they are Black Nationalists through and through.

It bothers me to no end when I hear one set of Black Nationalists downplay someone's contribution because they disagree ideologically or because of the occupation or position one may hold. Like most people, we of the Black Nationalist slant tend to judge a book by its cover. It is no wonder that we continue to let charlatans, agents, and misogynists enter wily nily into our ranks. Then there are those of the Black Nationalist slant who assume that if one just stays Black and dies, then said person is a card carrying African warrior. Both assumptions are far from the truth.

If a police commissioner of a particular city is black and the usual politics of neglecting and abusing Black communities within that city continue unabated, is that police commissioner who happens to be black helpful or harmful to that community? Can we consider that commissioner an ally or an opponent? Remember that every brother ain't a brother. Yet if that police commissioner helps to quell police brutality and misconduct, stamp out police corruption, help to strengthen communities and remove much of the crime throughout that city, wouldn't that commissioner be considered an exemplar? Does the uniform matter if he helps out those who looks like him?

Many choose to follow a hollow stereotype of a Black Nationalist. You know the type: daishiki's downed, arabic name, and the afro pick. Yet individuals such as the Honorable Marcus Mosiah Garvey, Arturo Schomburg, the late Dr. Amos Wilson, and several others did not do those things. In other words, one's actions will speak for themselves. Calling the white man the devil, refusing to work a regular 9 to 5 to support one's family, reading a few books on black history, and accepting an arabic named doesn't mean a thing. Ironically, we tend to consider individuals who perform these acts as true Black Nationalists. Nothing can be farther from the truth.

Making meaningful and consistent contributions that result in the further positive upliftment of our community makes one a nationalist. It could be anything from reading to children in one's local elementary school to mentoring a fatherless child to building bookshelves for a local church to organizing fund raisers for local charities or events. It could be a few times a year or once a week. It could mean earning a degree to create new Departments of Africana Studies in major universities. It could mean getting elected to a city council and helping others implement the right tools to uplift the community.

As a group who considers themselves conscious minded, we should be able to measure anyone's commitment to our struggle. We have the best exemplars and ancestors around. We are the ones who always “do the math” and have access to those who can help us decide who is holding it down and who isn't. The standards have already been set. The blueprint has been provided. Now we just have to go to work.

Remember Your Other 5 (Black) Presidents

Compiled by the DiversityInc staff
http://www.diversityinc.com/public/3085.cfm

February 15, 2008
It has been said that this year was the first time a major political party in the United States nominated a woman or a Black person as its presidential candidate. For women, that is true, but some historians say Barack Obama will not be the nation's first Black president. They say he certainly won't be the first president with Black ancestors--just the first to acknowledge his "Blackness".

Which other presidents hid their African ancestry? Well, it's not Bill Clinton, even though the Congressional Black Caucus honored him as the nation's "first Black president" at its 2001 annual awards dinner. Presidents Thomas Jefferson, Andrew Jackson, Abraham Lincoln, Warren Harding and Calvin Coolidge all had Black ancestors they kept in their genealogical closets, according to historians.

Harding did not deny his African ancestry when Republican leaders called on him to deny his "Negro" history. He said, "How should I know whether or not one of my ancestors might have jumped the fence?"

Does African ancestry make these men Black? If the bar is the one-drop rule, then yes. The one-drop rule is a historical term used during the Jim Crow era that defines a person with one drop of sub-Saharan-African ancestry as not white and therefore must be Black. If that's the bar, then there have already been other Black presidents, says historian Leroy Vaughn, author of Black People and Their Place in World History.

The first president with African ancestry was Jefferson, who served two terms between 1801 and 1809. Jefferson was described as the "son of a half-breed Indian squaw and a Virginia mulatto father," as stated in Vaughn's findings. Jefferson also was said to have destroyed all documentation attached to his mother, even going to extremes to seize letters written by his mother to other people.

President Andrew Jackson, the nation's seventh president, was in office between 1829 and 1837. Vaughn cites an article written in The Virginia Magazine of History that states Jackson was the son of an Irish woman who married a Black man. The magazine also stated that Jackson's oldest brother had been sold as a slave.

Lincoln, the nation's 16th president, served between 1861 and 1865. Lincoln was said to have been the illegitimate son of an African man, according to Vaughn's findings. Lincoln had very dark skin and coarse hair and his mother allegedly came from an Ethiopian tribe. His heritage fueled so much controversy that Lincoln was nicknamed "Abraham Africanus the First" by his opponents.

President Warren Harding, the 29th president, in office between 1921 and 1923, apparently never denied his ancestry. According to Vaughn, William Chancellor, a professor of economics and politics at Wooster College in Ohio, wrote a book on the Harding family genealogy. Evidently, Harding had Black ancestors between both sets of parents. Chancellor also said that Harding attended Iberia College, a school founded to educate fugitive slaves.

Coolidge, the nation's 30th president, served between 1923 and 1929 and supposedly was proud of his heritage. He claimed his mother was dark because of mixed Indian ancestry. Coolidge's mother's maiden name was "Moor," and in Europe, the name "Moor" was given to all Blacks, just as "Negro" was used in America. It later was concluded that Coolidge was part Black.

BLACK PEOPLE AND THEIR PLACE IN WORLD HISTORY by Dr. Leroy Vaughn, MD, MBA, is the most radically positive work done in the field of Black history, from ancient times to the late 20th Century. In this chapter, Five Black Presidents, Dr. Vaughn offers a compelling case concerning the heritage of Presidents Jefferson, Jackson, Lincoln, Harding and Coolidge. Dr. Vaughn's research reveals little known facts deleted from main stream history. The World Music sounds of Najite, Sherwood Akuna on bass, round out this entertaining and informative spoken word piece. Photographs are from the Library of Congress (www.loc.gov) and the White House gallery of president's pictures (www.whitehouse.gov). Narrated by J. Nayer Hardin of the Computer Underground Railroad.

First Lady Got Back - Erin Aubry Kaplan

View original article on Playahata.com

First lady got back.

I'm a black woman who never thought I'd see a powerful, beautiful female with a body like mine in the White House. Then I saw Michelle Obama -- and her booty! Free at last. I never thought that I -- a black girl who came of age in the utterly anticlimactic aftermath of the civil rights movement -- would say the phrase with any real sincerity in my lifetime. But ever since Nov. 4, I've been shouting it from every rooftop. I'm not excited for the most obvious reason. Yes, Obama's win was an extraordinary breakthrough and a huge relief, but I don't subscribe to the notion that his capturing the White House represents the end of American racial history. Far from it. There is a certain freedom in the moment -- as in, we are all now free from wondering when or if we'll ever get a black president. Congratulations to all of us for being around to settle the question.But what really thrills me, what really feels liberating in a very personal way, is the official new prominence of Michelle Obama. Barack's better half not only has stature but is statuesque. She has coruscating intelligence, beauty, style and -- drumroll, please -- a butt. (Yes, you read that right: I'm going to talk about the first lady's butt.)What a bonus!

From the ocean of nastiness and confusion that defined this campaign from the beginning, Michelle rose up like Venus on the waves, keeping her coif above water and cruising the coattails of history to present us with a brand-new beauty norm before we knew it was even happening.Actually, it took me and a lot of other similarly configured black women by surprise. So anxious and indignant were we about Michelle getting attacked for saying anything about America that conservatives could turn into mud, we hardly looked south of her neck. I noted her business suits and the fact she hardly ever wore pants (unlike Hillary). As I gradually relaxed, as Michelle strode onto more stages and people started focusing on her clothes and presence instead of her patriotism, it dawned on me -- good God, she has a butt! "Obama’s baby (mama) got back," wrote one feminist blogger. "OMG, her butt is humongous!" went a typical comment on one African-American online forum, and while it isn't humongous, per se, it is a solid, round, black, class-A boo-tay. Try as Michelle might to cover it with those Mamie Eisenhower skirts and sheath dresses meant to reassure mainstream voters, the butt would not be denied.As America fretted about Obama's exoticism and he sought to calm the waters with speeches about unity and common experience, Michelle's body was sending a different message: To hell with biracialism! Compromise, bipartisanship? Don't think so. Here was one clear signifier of blackness that couldn't be tamed, muted or otherwise made invisible. It emerged right before our eyes, in the midst of our growing uncertainty about everything, and we were too bogged down in the daily campaign madness to notice. The one clear predictor of success that the pundits, despite all their fancy maps, charts and holograms, missed completely? Michelle's butt.Lord knows, it's time the butt got some respect.

Ever since slavery, it's been both vilified and fetishized as the most singular of all black female features, more unsettling than dark skin and full lips, the thing that marked black women as uncouth and not quite ready for civilization (of course, it also made them mighty attractive to white men, which further stoked fears of miscegenation that lay at the heart of legal and social segregation). In modern times, the butt has demarcated class and stature among black society itself. Emphasizing it or not separates dignified black women from ho's, party girls from professionals, hip-hop from serious. (Black women are not the only ones with protruding behinds, by the way, but they're certainly considered its source. How many gluteally endowed nonblack women have been derided for having a black ass? Well, Hillary, for one.)But Michelle is bringing those two falsely divided minds together in a single presentation -- finally, unity for the real world! Talk about a power base.

Thanks to Michelle, looking professional and provocative in a distinctly black way will become not only acceptable but also part of a whole presidential look that's more, well, inclusive. Now we'll all be able to wear leggings to board meetings; we'll sport pencil skirts sans the long jackets meant to cover the offending rear at big conferences where we have to make a good impression. It turns out that Sir Mix-A-Lot, he of "Baby Got Back" fame, was not a novelty but a prophet. Who knew? Give that guy a Cabinet post.Many comparisons have already been made between Michelle and Jackie Kennedy. While I appreciate the spirit, I beg to differ. To put it bluntly, Jackie had no back. Same can be said for gaunt Cindy McCain and the short-lived Republican sexpot Sarah Palin. Jackie was trim and perfect, an inoffensive figure who bucked the curviness of the '50s and put American femininity on the treacherous path of smaller-is-better. Jackie was also a blue blood and a society woman -- an elite! -- so although she set new beauty and fashion paradigms, she also followed old ones.Michelle radiates something entirely different. She's black high society but by definition that's not silver-spoon; it's the result of navigating the rough shoals of racism that bet against your success every day. It's hard work. Michelle looks great but also physically strong -- she looks ready to leap into action if she's called to it. She looks like she could kick Barack's ass, if need be. She has a physicality that's unprecedented in a first lady. Eleanor Roosevelt wasn't afraid to get her hands dirty, but she broke from family tradition; Michelle represents black striving that is the tradition. Her very presence, butt and all, is a rebuke to all those presidents who've dragged their feet on equality and justice even though they paid it lip service, from Woodrow Wilson to Bill Clinton. Even more clearly than her husband's, Michelle's prominence is saying to the old guard, step aside. Fist bump? Nah. Booty bump is more like it.

Ordinary black women have waited a long time for this. Oh, we've suffered. In a country simultaneously obsessed with consumer excess and weight control, we've been caught in the middle. Throw race into the mix, and we've been downright strangled. The expectations run something like this: It's OK for black women to be heavier than most, but we still have to conform to a universal (that is, white) standard of thinness and shape. This means that, even if you're 120 pounds, your butt better not account for more than 2 percent of that.Women's magazines talk endlessly about whittling down thighs and waistlines, even jawlines, but butts are still so racially loaded -- so to speak -- they're not even part of the conversation (the closest it gets is "hips," but even white women know that's not equivalent). In other words, butts have never been mainstreamed. And like so many other black characteristics, it endures a double standard. A white woman with an ass can claim to have an exotic appendage that boosts her stock; a black woman with a booty is merely ordinary -- worse than that, she's potentially uncultured, unqualified, ghetto in the most unfabulous sense of the word.I winced when I heard about "The Daily Show" spot in which two people in Florida disapprovingly described Michelle as a "horse" with a big "tuchis" -- I give them the tuchis, but the animal reference was jarring. Of course, Michelle's been described very unkindly all year; one blogger called her King Kong's sister. The primal antipathy to all things black has stood right alongside the euphoria of the Obamas' rise, and it's unnerving, to say the least. Michelle, for her part, gritted her teeth -- she actually does that -- and continued smiling and waving. That's politics, but it's also what aspiring blacks have always done in the face of insult and resistance: Bear it. Walk through it.I can't talk about Michelle's butt without acknowledging her hair, another physical feature that stirs anxiety about black female difference. Let me just say that I hope that gets unleashed, too. How sad that, in order for a black family to prevail -- because Michelle and the girls were all running for office, not just Barack -- they had to sublimate their blackness like crazy, starting with the visuals. Michelle's ethnic butt might have snuck under the radar, but an ethnic do wouldn't have stood a chance. But now the game is over. The jig is up. Time for us all to let the hair down and let the booty hang out, to put our hands in the air like we just don't care.

Will the black aesthetic take over the White House, as many whites openly fear? As that Republican sexpot might say, you betcha. Of course the reality is that black aesthetic is a huge part of American aesthetic and American culture, from fashion to music, language to a physical sensibility that can only be described as bodacious. It's time that we admit all this and give it its place. Michelle started the official coming out with that blazing black-and-red Narciso Rodriguez dress she wore on Election Night, complete with dangly silver hoops that gladdened the hearts of sisters everywhere. She was hiding nothing, and this time she wasn't gritting her teeth about it. She was smiling.........And it was bootiful.

- Erin Aubry Kaplan

http://www.erinaubrykaplan.net/

Erin Aubry Kaplan is a Los Angeles journalist and columnist who has written about African-American political, economic and cultural issues since 1992. She is currently a contributing editor to the op-ed section of the Los Angeles Times, and from 2005 to 2007 was a weekly op-ed columnist – the first black weekly op-ed columnist in the paper’s history. She has been a staff writer and columnist for the LA Weekly and New Times Los Angeles. She is a regular contributor for many publications, including Salon.com, Essence, Black Enterprise, BlackAmericaWeb, Ms. and the Independent. She is also a regular columnist for make/shift, a quarterly, cutting-edge feminist magazine that launched in 2007.

http://erinaubrykaplan.net/thebutt.htm

Stories by Erin Aubry Kaplan :
Rice and the New Black ParadigmWhen it comes to black history, Condi makes cynics of us all.Posted on Feb 3, 2005
Bringin' Da Funk"In yet another American political performance, black people yet again dutifully did their part."Posted on Aug 9, 2004
Cosby's DemonsWhen Bill Cosby chastised blacks for racism, he revealed his own demons, and ours.Posted on Jun 2, 2004
Duped by Wal-MartEmploying devious tactics, Wal-Mart managed to fool an 82-year-old woman into becoming a poster girl for Wal-Mart. That's one customer lost.Posted on Apr 2, 2004
Aristide DevelopmentA black population with a slave past is done in by killing indifference. Sound familiar? In the end, in the eyes of the most powerful country on Earth, black folks just don't matter, and poor black folks matter least.Posted on Mar 8, 2004
Black Like I Thought I WasThe surprising outcome of a DNA test proves a man's race while throwing his blackness into question.Posted on Oct 7, 2003
Department of Homegirl SecurityThe war forced me into an absolutism I never had and don't quite like. In this newly divided world, you're either with me or against me.Posted on Apr 28, 2003
Thoroughly Modern MammyOf coons, pickaninnies and the gold dust twins: Why do black curios stay chic?Posted on Dec 23, 2002
HAL on EarthEvolution Robotics' ER1 will open the pod bay door -- and pour you a beer.Posted on Sep 27, 2002
The Empress's New ClothesSerena Williams, the world's top tennis player, is known for a mean backhand, a killer serve and the sexiest outfits ever to be worn on a tennis court.Posted on Sep 23, 2002
Into the GrooveWithout Janet and Madonna, there'd be no Britney, or Christina Aguilera, or any number of aspirants to the dance throne who, interestingly enough, are not black anymore, but black-inflected.Posted on Aug 16, 2002
Breakfast of ChampionCongresswoman Barbara Lee, who cast the lone dissenting vote in the House's measure to authorize military force in Afghanistan, tears up the roots of despair.Posted on May 10, 2002
The Wonderful World of LifetimeEven as Lifetime's series "Any Day Now" fades into reruns, the show wins raves from loyal followers and new ones alike.Posted on Apr 26, 2002
The Feminine MistakeAre whites making more progress in the gender wars than blacks? Is dressing skimpily in public an admirable goal? The hard questions of post-post-feminism catch up with one young writer.Posted on Dec 12, 2001
White Man With AttitudeHow Randy Newman went from pop music's reigning schlub to movie-music royalty.Posted on Dec 4, 2001
Waiving the FlagI understand America's need to fly flags, our need for symbols bigger than the biggest words. Then why was I shocked when my husband brought one home?Posted on Oct 4, 2001
Float On: Talking with Forest WhitakerWhat do hip-hop, black history and Japanese samurai culture have in common? Forest Whitaker explains in an interview devoted to his new movie, "Ghost Dog."Posted on Apr 1, 2000

I stand corrected about Obama

I Stand Corrected by eyecalone

On November 4th, 2008 something happened, that from this day forward will probably be described using a long list of clichés, so I will describe it using the most appropriate one – historic. Perhaps attempting to in some way exorcise more than 3 centuries of the demons of racial injustice and exclusion the people of the United States elected their first African-American president. This President Elect was not just any African-American either. The President elect was an African-American first generation immigrant in a sense, with a East African name and an Islamic middle name. Sure one of his parents is White, and he was essentially raised by Caucasians, but in the social order of American race relations, Barack Hussein Obama is undoubtedly a Black man.

Honestly if anyone had asked me about such a possibility 8 or even 4 years ago I would have ruled it out. It was a possibility that I would have been confident I would see in my lifetime, and once Barack Obama showed viability in the Democratic primary against Hillary Clinton, I began to believe. However, in a country that, allegations and proof of election fraud aside, had just elected George W. Bush twice the United States as a nation, just seemed too prejudiced, frightened, and angry for such a thing to happen.

Or perhaps, I was too cynical.

In either case, I stand corrected!
The 2008 election was a monumental moment in history that I am glad I was alive to see, though I’m hardly teary-eyed or politically swayed by it. I maintain my skepticism (more like outright rejection) about the prospects for making meaningful change through the less right-wing, portion of the American single party system, the Democratic Party. By my estimation the Democratic party continues to function like a pressure release valve for the public’s discontent with this system and prevents truly meaningful and far reaching progressive changes to American society. In fact it even discourages and limits any serious discussion of such change.

For all the sloganeering about “change” and Obama’s campaign being based on it, I’m still a little hazy on what the extent of what these “changes” will be. In fact if those most responsible for the groundswell of public support that ushered Barack Obama into office don’t hold his feet to the fire I fear an Obama administration may look eerily similar to the Clinton years. Already as Obama looks to build his cabinet many of the top names on his list are Washington insiders and a surprising number of Republicans. Although I can’t really fault President Elect Obama, for these proposals as he has consistently made his “centrist”, moderate Democrat views apparent in his speeches, writings, and public appearances. It is only large numbers of his “progressive” supporters who have failed to hear him, preferring to paint him with the brush of what they would like him to be, instead of what he has already told you he is. I suppose after 8 years of the disastrous policies of the Bush administration people feel they can get into all the specifics later, they just know they don’t want any more of anything that looks like more of what they have been getting.

Still, there is something special about this moment.
As an African-American man whose political views, would place me soundly on the left of the political spectrum, I also find myself fighting two wars. I find myself looking at the 2008 election from many angles and with a variety of emotions, but mainly a combination of apprehension and hope.

As novel as it may be to have an African-American president for the first time, I am apprehensive on a number of fronts. As one of the faux-news correspondents on the Daily Show jokingly put it on election night, Barack Obama is being handed America as a crap sandwich - a steaming economic crisis patty between two sesame seed wars. At this point there may be a limited amount that can be done to stave of further crisis or to deliver on any of his “promises” as it will likely take more than 4 years to unravel the damage done by the last few administrations. If things do not immediately turn around, there will definitely be attempts from sections of this society to saddle him with the blame for the nation’s decline. And although Obama’s ascendancy may represent progress on some fronts, it hardly represents the arrival of full equality for people of color in this nation though that will certainly be one the most prevalent arguments made. If Barack Obama can become president then racism, institutional, etc, is over and we must all be equal, and now we can finally get rid of any programs meant to redress centuries of exclusion and denial of fundamental rights and equality – right? If nothing else Obama’s election is the rebirth of the American myth that this nation is a meritocracy and that anyone can become anything they want in America through hard work alone.

I also worry that so many newly invested people now believe the job is done and will become jaded and politically apathetic again when/if this singular act of electing Barack Obama as President doesn’t produce the results they hoped. And lastly, but not least, I am apprehensive because at the end of the day this election may have breathed new life into a fading empire. It will be putting a very new face on possibly the same old thing especially in the arena of foreign policy. Obama’s election has ushered in a new era of goodwill and hope internationally as the world rejoices and waits to see what will happen now, and if the empire’s new ambassador will truly be different from all those previous in something more substantive than his appearance. If he proves not be a significant change from their most recent experiences, those feelings of goodwill and the opportunities for dialogue internationally may quickly revert to the old feelings of seething anger and distrust that have haunted America’s dealings internationally, recently more than ever.

Lastly I worry – in fact I already know, that Obama’s election will render many people, especially African-Americans incapable of thinking critically about his policies. It is clear unless he does several things bad on the policy front, to the point of being reminiscent of the Bush Administration, Obama will be beyond reproach in many communities of color. In the Black community there is only room for two images on the mantel place in “Big Mamma’s” house, one is Barack Obama and the other is Jesus.

Despite my misgivings there is hope and an appreciation of the sheer magnitude of this event. Even if the Obama administration is politically not the “change” so many had hoped for, as a Black man it is a public relations coup. So much damage has been done to the image of Black people internationally and in America especially, by the media and entertainment that the United States produces, that the image of Obama and his family is of tremendous value. The day after the election I had no less than 3 of the teenagers that I work with say that they were reevaluating their life outlooks, hopes, and dreams based on Obama’s achievement. One of the more rough around the edges of that group, actually told me he no longer “wanted to be a ‘gangsta’” after witnessing Obama’s election. Obama’s regal persona, intelligence, charisma, and a host of other positive personal traits provide an alternate image of Black manhood for children of color, the value of which is hard to underestimate. Using a different set of positive adjectives, a similar argument can be made about Obama’s picturesque family, his powerful, beautiful, and capable wife Michelle and the beauty of their relationship. It gives a whole new set of images in America and on a world stage on how Black men and woman relate romantically or at least how they should.

I left my home to go to Harlem’s 125th street after Obama’s surpassing of the 270 electoral vote count total needed became more or less official, not because I couldn’t sleep due to the noise of the evening, but because I felt a need to read the pulse of people at that moment. Before I was able to walk two feet from my doorstep I was passed by a group of 6-8 brown children smiling, laughing, and chanting “O-ba-ma! O-ba-ma!”, as they walked hurriedly down the block. There was something magical and palpably special about the night and as I walked towards 125th street there were people of literally every color chanting and visibly ecstatic about the night’s events. There were people yelling from cars and cab drivers honking their horns. It had the feeling of a city after a major sports team wins a championship after decades of losing. The excitement and hope, and specifically for people of color, pride, was unlike anything I have ever seen before. Only time will tell what, if anything, any of this will mean once the euphoria wears off but it was a sight to see.

Lastly there is the fact that despite the outpouring of support from people of color, particularly Blacks Americans who have consistently voted above 90% for the Democratic candidate in any recent election, Obama’s election would not have been possible without a majority of support from White Americans. The Republican ticket made every possible appeal to backwardness and prejudice that they could get away without openly being accused of racism, and this time it wasn’t enough. The perfect storm of looming economic disaster, disgust with the Bush administration and the outpouring of support from younger White voters exposed a bit of a generational divide among White Americans. Of course racism in America is nowhere near conquered, at best maybe there is a dent in the armor, but this occurrence perhaps signals more hope for the current generations and those of the immediate future, than I had been willing to concede in the past.

Like the President Elect this election has me inheriting two wars. I still long for much more far-reaching and meaningful progressive change for every ethnic group in this country. The kind of change that is not even allowed to be discussed in mainstream media venues. On another war front, I realize there is a tremendous amount of work that must be done in the Black community to redress centuries of trauma at the hands of the exploitative and racist economic and social system that is America. Sometimes these struggles overlap, while other missions are mainly for one of these wars. However based on what I’ve thus far seen and the almost irrational exuberance about the results of the 2008 election this may be a period where I’ll find it most rewarding to shift my resources to the war front that involves repairing the Black psyche. My intuition tells me that the next few years I may find it hard to convince many people that it is the system that must be challenged when they now see themselves so thoroughly as part of the system.

Yes We Can!

Yes We Did!

Now it remains to be seen what exactly have we accomplished.
http://www.playahata.com/?p=4949

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Here are a few about President Obama

Photo Credit - David Schwartz

"Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy, in a May 1961 radio broadcast noted the United States' problems in the area of equal rights for Negroes. He focused on the progress that had been made and for an awareness that everything pointed to continuing progress. "There's no question that in the next thirty or forty years a Negro can also achieve the same position that my brother (John F. Kennedy)has as President of the United States, certainly within that period of time." This did not happen in 1968 as folks are claiming.

(Click here for a Tim Russert video although Tim has a bad date.)

Since Obama's victory The Imani Foundation have received numerous articles. Here are a few of them:

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Honored to cast my vote - Irileria Muhammad

We are all celebrating the elevation of Barack Obama to the White House. Black people are represented everywhere from the projects to Pennsylvania Avenue . Now, one of the most powerful men in the world will look just like us. While black people are celebrating, we don't see the silent challenge that is being issued by Barack. Barack has set the bar and now we will all be expected to rise up to it. How far do we have to go? Let's look at what I have learned from Barack.

1. By example, Barack is challenging men to be fathers to their children. Many photo-ops showed his children, and some of the most endearing moments on the campaign trailed involved his relationship with his daughters. What type of standards is he setting in their lives by being there, being involved, and simply, being daddy? He has silently issued a challenge to all men, black men in particular, to become the fathers their DNA claims they should be.

2. By example, he is challenging our community to put education back in its proper place, as the number one priority in our community. His days at Harvard definitely benefited his drive to become President. The fact that he was an educated, articulate man is what made him stand out in the beginning of this journey and that education and ability to exercise critical thinking will carry him further, and we need to make sure that it is carrying our children.

3. By example, he is showing us that no man can get to where he aspires without a strong woman behind him, and when push comes to shove he can and will protect her at all costs. This is a lesson that needs to permeate in our community where black women are treated like sex objects. We are mistreated and undervalued, yet he never stop saying how much his wife means to his dreams. He is challenging us to have better relationships and make black love, and all love, important.

4. By example, he is showing us that we are are only excuse. Whatever we choose to do or not do can no longer be blamed on the "white man". He does indeed have great influence on circumstance, however, he can only create obstacles, not roadblocks, as Barack has proven. If he can make it from his circumstances to the most coveted address in the world, what is stopping you from opening that business, going back to school, buying that house...etc...There are no excuses for failure anymore. We voted them away.

I could go on an on. I am truly honored to say that I was able to cast my voted for a man, a BLACK MAN, with such integrity, values, and promise. I ask that we all pray for his success, as the future of our country really does depend on it. Let's all reflect on what this historic event means in our own lives, and how we can continue to shine a light of positivity on our lives and communities so that we may reap from the harvest of this most amazing seed that has been planted!!!

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness that most frightens us. We ask ourselves, Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, fabulous? Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world."

Living in the light,
Irileria Muhammad evolutionofagoddess@hotmail.com

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Obama won, will we ?

Kwasi Imhotep KWA708@aol.com

CONGRATULATIONS TO PRESIDENT-ELECT BARAK OBAMA!

RACIST EUROS ARE HAVING A VERY BAD HEADACHE THIS MORNING THAT WILL LAST AT LEAST 4 YEARS, AND THEIR ONLY REMEDY IS TO EMBRACE JUSTICE.
IN THEIR MINDS, TO HAVE AN AFRIKAN-DESCENDED PRESIDENT WHOSE AFRIKAN ANCESTORS WERE/ARE SUBJECTED TO THEIR DEADLY RACISM IS SIMPLY UNTHINKABLE. THEY CAN'T ACCEPT THAT THIS SO-CALLED "BLACK/AFRICAN-AMERICAN" ,BOTH OF WHICH, OF COURSE, ARE FALSITIES, (WRITE ME FOR MORE DOCUMENTATION ON THIS POINT) WILL SOON BE THEIR LEADER.

NOW THAT OBAMA HAS BEEN ELECTED, WHAT DOES THAT MEAN FOR AFRIKANS IN AMERICA? DON'T BET ON RACISM DISAPPEARING, OR DWB, OR UNLAWFUL PEDESTRIAN STOPS AND SEARCHES, OR OUR EXTREMELY HIGH UNEMPLOYMENT RATE, OR OUR HIGH RATES OF DIABETES, HYPERTENSION, (MUCH OF WHIC IS DIRECTLY RELATED TO OUR HIGH STRESS LEVELS AS AN OPPRESSED PEOPLE), HIGH DEATH RATES, EXTREME POVERTY LEVELS HIGH JAIL IMPRISONMENT RATES, HIGH INFANT MORTALITY RATES, AND ON AND ON.

WHY DO I SAY THIS, BECAUSE WE HAVE LEARNED TO LOOK AT ALL HUMAN EVENTS IN THEIR HISTORICAL CONTEXT. SOUTH AFRICA IS AN EXAMPLE THAT COMES TO MIND. HERE IS A COUNTRY THAT HAS AN 85% INDIGENOUS AFRIKAN POPULATION THAT THROUGH THE AFRIKAN NATIONAL CONGRESS, SWAPO, AND OTHER AFRIKAN-LED REVOLUTIONARY GROUPS WAGED A MILITARY WAR AGAINST THE INVADING EUROS (@15% OF THE POPULATION) TO LIBERATE THE COUNTRY FROM RACISM, DEATH, POVERTY, AND GENERAL HELL AT THE HANDS OF THE EUROS. AT THE END OF THE REVOLUTION, NELSON MANDELA WAS NAMED PRESIDENT OF SOUTH AFRICA. ALLEGEDLY WITH THE AIM TO RIGHT THE WRONGS OF THE EUROS.AND TO EFFECT SOCIAL, ECONOMIC, POLITICAL CHAMGE IN THE FORTUNES OF HIS PEOPLE. TODAY, INDIGENOUS AFRIKANS STILL SUFFER HIGH POVERTYY LEVELS, POLICE BRUTALITY, LOW ECONOMIC OPPORTUNITIES, LITTLE POLITICAL POWER, AND STILL LIVE IN CRIME-RIDDEN AREAS SUCH AS SOWETO. WHERE'S THE JUSTICE? HERE YOU HAVE AN 85% AFRIKAN PEOPLE WHO ONLY CONTROL 15% OF THE LAND, WITH AN AFRIKAN PRESIDENT IN THEIR OWN COUNTRY, STILL BEING DOMINATED BY THE 15% EURO POPULATION THAT CONTROLS OVER 85% OF THE LAND AND NIMMENSE NATURAL RESOURCES!

NOW OBAMA HAS NOT MADE ANY PROMISES TO US, YET HE ASSURED ISRAEL THAT HE WOULD BE OWN THIER SIDE AND DEFEND THEM AGAINST THE ARABS, HE VOTED TO REDISTRIBUTE THE WEALTH OF OVER $700 BILLION,TO A FEW WALL STREET "BANKS" WHO ARE BUSY PAYING HUGE RAISES AND BONUSES TO THEIR EXECUTIVES OF OUTR TAX DOLLARS. WHAT ABOUT US?

LET'S ALL HOPE THAT DR. WRIGHT'S PRO-AFRIKAN SERMONS WILL ULTIMATELY HAVE AN EFFECT ON OBAMA'S POLICIES. I HAVE THE SNEEKING SUSPICIONTHAT WE STILL NEED TO KEEP THE PRESSURE ON HIM TO DO THE RIGHT THING BY US FOR OUR SUPPORT OF HIM.

ALUTA CONTINUA........

KWASI

KWA708@aol.com