Sunday, July 31, 2016

DON'T BE LATE TO THE POLITICAL REVOLUTION

Feeling Rebloggy
THE PRESIDENT'S CHAIR IS NOT THE ONLY THING AT STAKE THIS ELECTION SEASON 




We don't just need to rid ourselves of Trump. We need to rid ourselves of every senator and congressman that supported him. And November 8th of 2016 is going to give us that opportunity.

SO HAVE YOU REGISTERED TO VOTE YET? If not, Black Girl Collective has a link just for you--->  
http://bit.ly/BGCRocksTheVote



Read more about how many opportunities we have this election season at Franchesca Ramsey's post at

http://blog.franchesca.net/post/148196661817/our-political-revolution-what-this-means-34

Saturday, July 30, 2016

SOME BLACKS IN NORTH CAROLINA JUST GOT THEIR VOTING RIGHTS BACK

FILE THIS UNDER "PROTEST WORKS"
AND PRESIDENT OBAMA DOES TOO

U.S. APPEALS COURT SAYS NORTH CAROLINA VOTER ID LAW HAD RACIALLY DISCRIMINATORY INTENT



"The three judges assigned to the case — all democratic appointees — were unanimous that the Republican-controlled North Carolina legislature violated the U.S. Constitution and the Voting Rights Act three years ago by enacting the measure requiring voters to show certain types of photo ID at the polls.

"The record makes clear that the historical origin of the challenged provisions in this statute is not the innocuous back-and-forth of routine partisan struggle that the State suggests and that the district court accepted," Judge Diana Motz wrote on behalf of Judges James Wynn and Henry Floyd. "Rather, the General Assembly enacted them in the immediate aftermath of unprecedented African American voter participation in a state with a troubled racial history and racially polarized voting. The district court clearly erred in ignoring or dismissing this historical background evidence, all of which supports a finding of discriminatory intent."

The court's opinion bluntly described the legislation as a clear effort to suppress the black vote."
Read more: 
http://www.politico.com/story/2016/07/court-strikes-down-north-carolina-voter-id-law-226438#ixzz4FqH9TBIv 

North Carolina's trying to maneuver black and brown voting rights away is a result of a conservative court gutting The Voting Rights Act of 1964

Supporters of voter ID sound perfectly reasonable when they talk about it. But this voter ID thing is simply the new literacy or constitution tests designed to make sure black and brown people walk away from their own voting rights. These North Carolinian White folk are just like the good ole boys of the 1950s
Making sure people get an ID that proves they can vote sounds easy. 
And it is if you're privileged like I am.

I'm middle class, able bodied, and I drive to work everyday. I have my driver's license as an ID. 
But what if I didn't drive?


I remember having to dig out my birth certificate as ID for something once. I thought my mother had it. She didn't. Then she told me that the hospital I was born in had passed into history. Lucky for me I was born in a huge city and was able to get a new one. But some people really can't get these things replaced easily. What if you're born out of the country where record keeping isn't so important? 


My mother, for example, was born in a shack next to something that looks like a slave masters quarters in the south. I don't think she ever had a birth certificate. I know my grandmothers didn't have them. And one of them never learned to drive.

Getting ID is not that easy if you are young and in school, if you're black and don't drive OR latino and poor OR just elderly. Black, brown,and elderly don't have these kinds of problems exclusively. The white have them too. But black, brown, elderly, and young have these problems in larger numbers.  And large swaths of these particular groups DO NOT vote republican. 


And the U.S appeals court caught onto that in North Carolina.

A lot more people who have the right to vote wind up being eliminated -- in numbers 10x, 100x, or 1000x the levels of any sort of voter fraud in this country. Furthermore,  as far as I'm concerned, the Supreme Court rubber stamped the biggest case of voter fraud this country has ever seen when it put Bush Jr in office. 

So I'm kinda not hearing this voter fraud crap. 

As in North Carolina, the types of ID you can use in these states sooo worried about voter fraud always just happen to favor white conservatives. How else can you explain approving the use of a hunting license in Texas but not your own state issued student IDs?  (Young people lean progressive/democrat not conservative/republican. Killing for fun? republicans get off on that more) 

Read More On Who Has Difficulty Getting Voter IDhttps://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/courts_law/getting-a-photo-id-so-you-can-vote-is-easy-unless-youre-poor-black-latino-or-elderly/2016/05/23/8d5474ec-20f0-11e6-8690-f14ca9de2972_story.html 


Incomplete 2016 Supreme Court


If I understand things correctly, should North Carolina should try to bump this issue to the Supreme Court --which the republican party won't staff hoping Trump will win-- now that Scalia is dead, there ought to be a 4 liberal to 4 conservative judge tie.  And when that happens, the lower court's decision stands.

So I'm wondering if North Carolina will appeal at all. Maybe they'll just wait until the Presidential election is over to decide since I'm pretty sure the republicans are going to set a record for refusing to interview a president's nomination for the Supreme Court. 

However, President Obama, in preparation for events such as these, has been stacking the lower courts with democratic judges.

And this is the outcome. The U.S. Appeals court got to make the final decision. And the decision will stick if Hillary Clinton is elected because she may select the next Supreme Court justice -- assuming the republicans continue the current blockade.

Well done, President Obama. Well done.  You've secured black, brown, elderly, and young voting rights in North Carolina and a secured a few more votes against Donald Trump.

Friday, July 29, 2016

THE ENEMY OF MY ENEMY IS NOT ALWAYS MY FRIEND: MICHAEL BLOOMBERG AT THE DNC


Trump is beyond the pale for some white republicans. Some have even left the overt racists in the Republican Party to join the covert racists that loved Reagan in the Independent Party. 


Michael Bloomberg, a former republican, went to the Democratic Convention and spoke against Donald Trump as an independent. However former Mayor Bloomberg has been a long time enemy of blacks because of his stop and frisk policy. When he was mayor, white cops were encouraged to just walk up to black people, mostly black men, and just put their hands on and search anybody they wanted to for any reason at all.  

But that race based policy wasn't a problem, I guess?  Only Donald Trump's mouth is truly racist? 

Bloomberg's "Stop and Frisk" policy came to the entire nation's attention when Amadou Diallo was killed by 4 white policemen killed Diallo because he took out his wallet, likely in an attempt to prove he wasn't who they were looking for. The white cops said they thought Diallo had something called a "wallet gun' when he didn't have a gun at all and shot him 41 times. 

Diallo is one of the hundreds of black people killed by police over the years, the ones that never made it into national newspapers like they do today because of Black Lives Matter.  

Bloomberg didn't really address Trump's racism that much. Between the lines, I get the impression Bloomberg is upset about the same thing republicans are always upset about:  Donald Trump's ability to upset the financial apple cart. 


"I understand the appeal of a business man president. But Trump's business plan is a disaster in the making...do great damage to our economy...erode our influence around the world... [called Hillary] "sane, competent person" 
~ Michael Bloomberg

All of the above is true. 

And I don't really care why people vote against Donald Trump so long as they vote against him. I hope the independents, real and johnny-come-lately-s rally around Bloomberg's message: Vote Against Trump. I just want folks, who are not black, to know what most black people already know:

The enemy of my enemy is not always my friend. 



Again, black people like myself mostly vote the lesser of two evils. 
Since the 1930s that has been the democratic party. But there have been exceptions to the lesser of two evils vote. If I'd been able to vote when Jimmy Carter was president, I would have with a good feeling in my heart. I was happy to cast my vote for President Obama too, though he's a little too cautious and political for my taste at times.

Yet, anybody who tells me they are "independent", that they stand halfway between the democrats and republicans instead of trying to pull away from the democrats
on the side directly opposite the republicans, probably shouldn't brag in my general direction. I'll probably laugh in their face. Republicans do have good ideas sometimes. And while I can vote for a republican idea, they're better with spending money efficiently when they're not trying to rob poor people to benefit "the middle class". But the people in the republican party pretend they don't see fairly high levels of racism. 

They're not just ineffective and slow and not putting racism as a high enough priority and paternalistic like white democrats. The white republicans have defended and attracted the KKK, skinheads, etc since 1964.  I am not standing halfway between the republican PEOPLE that are nominated for positions. I stand as far away from the republican PEOPLE as I can. I don't stand between the democrats and the republicans. I stand on the other side of the democrats, on the side directly opposite the republicans.  

Bernie Sanders is on the side directly opposite the republicans. And I haven't heard one idea Sanders has espoused that I don't agree with. But I was never convinced, not even for a minute, that he had the ability to execute. He openly made too many enemies too openly. But he did have a very positive effect of pulling Hillary left. And I wish he had begun his campaign earlier and pulled her harder.

So, I hope Bernie Sanders continues to have some influence on Hillary.

I also hope Bloomberg can move the independents to Hillary's camp, but after that Bloomberg can go jump.
Bloomberg's short speech is here

Thursday, July 28, 2016

A MOTHER ON WHEN RACISM AND HER OWN PROTECTIVE WHITENESS BECAME REAL

As a white mother of two black children, three white children, who all have a white father, I have something to say.

Racism exists.

It is real and tangible.

And it is everywhere, all the time.





When I brought my boys home they were the cutest, sweetest babies ever. Wherever we went, people greeted us with charm and enthusiasm.

Well, not all people and not everywhere. But, to me, they were the “wacko” exceptions. I thought to myself, “Get over it.”  
Now my boys look like teenagers. Black teenagers. They are 13.


Let me ask you these questions:


Do store personnel follow your children when they are picking out their Gatorade flavors? They didn’t follow my white kids.


Do coffee shop employees interrogate your children about the credit card they are using to pay while you are in the bathroom? They didn’t interrogate my white kids.


When your kids trick-or-treat in, dressed as a Ninja and a Clown, do they get asked who they are with and where they live, door after door? My white kids didn’t get asked.


Do your kids get pulled out of the TSA line time and again for additional screening? My white kids didn’t.


Do your kids get treated one way when they are standing alone but get treated a completely different way when you walk up? I mean a completely different way. My white kids didn’t.


Do shoe sales people ask if your kids’ feet are clean before sizing them for shoes? No one asked me that with my white kids.


Do complete strangers ask to touch your child’s hair?


Or ask about their penis size?


Or ask if they are “from druggies”?


No one did this with my white kids.



Did you tell your kids not to fight back because they will seen as aggressive if they stand up for themselves?


Have you had to honestly discuss with your husband whether you should take your children to the police station to introduce them to the officers so they would know your children are legitimate members of your community?


Have you had to talk to your children about EXACTLY what to say and not to say to an officer?


Have you had to tell your children that the objective of any encounter with police, or security in any form, is to stay alive?



It never occurred to me to have these conversations with my white children. In fact, it never occurred to me for myself either.


There is no question that my boys have been cloaked in my protection when they were small. What I did not realize until now is that the cloak I was offering them was identification with my whiteness.

As they grow independent, they step out from my cloak and lose that protection. The world sees “them” differently. It is sweet when they are adopted little black boys so graciously taken in by this nice white family. But when they are real people? Well, it is not the same. And they still look like little boys. What happens to them when they look like the strong, proud black men I am raising?


The reason why the phrase All Lives Matter is offensive to black people is because it isn’t true. Right now, in America, my black children are treated differently than my white children. So when you say All Lives Matter as a response to the phrase Black Lives Matter you are completely dismissing the near daily experience of racism for those with pigment in their skin, curl in their hair and broadness of their nose.


I am posting this so you can see the reality I have witnessed and experienced, because, frankly, I didn’t believe it was true until I saw it up close, directed at two souls I love, over and over again.

So, please, use this post as a pair of glasses to see the racism that surrounds you. Then we can actually make progress toward all lives being valued and cherished.




~By Kate Riffle Roper




"TRAFFIC STOP" AS TOLD BY THE BLACK SON OF A WHITE MOTHER


from Story Corp

Wednesday, July 27, 2016

5 FANTASTIC FACTS ABOUT "THE BLACK PANTHER MOVIE"



1) The is the first big budget black super hero movie.  After tons and tons of white superheroes, with Don Cheadle and Anthony Mackie inserted for a moment here and there as friends of Iron Man and Captain America, respectively, in a very tokenish sort of way, I am welcoming this change of direction from Marvel.*


2) Ava DuVernay was Marvel's first choice to direct "The Black Panther." But there is still a black director, Ryan Coogler, directing this Marvel Superhero movie.

3) Now that Danai Gurira has joined the Black Panther Movie cast, there are now two black women in a major motion picture, the other is Lupita N'yongo. Let me say it again and clarify: There are two black women in a non-FUBU movie were you won't have to google their parents to figure out whether or not they are black. 

4) Most of the Black Panther origin story was placed inside the movie "Captain America Civil War" This is important. Most directors get bogged down in the first movie, spending way too much time telling the audience how a superhero came to be the superhero rather than starting a story we care about, the part where there's an actual worthwhile enemy to be overcome.

5) Some of the storyline for this first Black Panther Movie is being taken from Ta-nehisi Coates Black Panther Comic (auther of "Between The World And Me")

In other words, after all the 96% white superhero movies we've seen, this superhero movie is blackety-black-black. Coogler better take advantage of the fact that the origin story has already been told in a Captain America-- and jump into a full action story line immediately.  


Tuesday, July 26, 2016

BLACK LIVES MATTER SHOWS UP FOR DYLAN NOBLE, A YOUNG WHITE MAN IN FRESNO

I've been saying this for a while now: With each police murder of black and brown, the police are going to get bolder. Every single time they go to court and get away with it, and it's broadcast across the country, other police hear it and get bolder. This means that the police are eventually going to start hunting white people.

The beating deaths of the homeless don't make national headlines unless they are horrific like Kelly Thomas's death. But I wouldn't be surprised at all to learn that most of the white people killed by police are very poor or homeless.

In June of 2016, the Fresno California Police killed a man-child that was only 19 years old by the name of Dylan Noble. He was white but he wasn't poor or homeless. "At the church meeting last week, where a Black Lives Matter banner greeted attendees, protesters said they were trying to figure out what might come next for them.  Many said they were trying to find a way to translate the issues raised by the Black Lives Matter movement to the needs of their own city. 
Some expressed frustration that it had taken the death of a white man to draw attention to the local issue of police shootings.  
Others, like Damon Thomas, who is black, 19 and graduated high school the same year as Noble, said they saw themselves in the teenager. "
Read More: http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-fresno-shooting-20160721-snap-story.html
THE SHOOTING

The video is of Dylan Noble's death is hard to see. Something, a head, hand keeps moving in front of the camera. Dylan did not obey right away. He really didn't. But the cops keep talking about a dog.

It could be the boy was trying to get his dog safe before complying with police commands. When you're white, male, and 19, this could seem reasonable. And based on what the cops are saying to one another in the audio, I'm wondering if Noble didn't keep his body between himself and the dog.

I've seen video of cops shooting dogs that were just being playful. 

Like I already said, the other thing that is very apparent in the video is that Dylan is white. You can tell that just by listening to the audio sans the actual video that he is not afraid enough of the police. 





I couldn't see what the police saw in his hand. But it didn't look big enough to be a gun. Therefore, I have questions about shooting someone twice for non-compliance, such as not moving his hands out at the same time, etc.  Noble was not giving 100% instant compliance. He really wasn't complying but that doesn't mean the police were threatened.


The initial 911(?) complaint was about someone walking with a rifle. Clearly, Noble didn't have a pocket rifle in his fist, in his back pocket, or tucked into his waist band. So why are there 3 cop cars (at least) and all these cops standing around with guns. And you know what else? A teenager, a white one, could very well think it's the biggest joke in the world for people to think he is dangerous.

We might be able to call this "white privilege gone awry."


Even if you're the biggest fan of the police in the world, how do you justify the cops shooting somebody an additional two times after they've fallen to the ground because you've already shot them.

I would not think that a person in pain, having been shot twice already, can comply with moving hands exactly where you say and when say it. 
He was 19. And he clearly did not have the rifle they were looking for. 

Justine Medina, Black Lives Matter Organizer, put together a protest over the police shooting death of this unarmed, white man-child. While Medina says he was disturbed by the disruption of the march of Noble by white people shouting "White Lives Matter" and the flying confederate flags, he said he was more disturbed by the way Noble was killed.
 

Honorable guy, Medina. Smart guy. He understands that Black Lives Matter is really Black Lives Matter Too and that the goal is for white dominant culture to come to see all American lives are not being valued equally by police but they should be.

Noble's friends, reportedly come in a variety of races and ethnicities and don't appear to share the white racist sentiments that came from some of those attending the protest.

“I never saw Dylan Noble with a Confederate flag,” says his onetime high school English teacher, Lou Standifer. “He loved everybody.”
And neither Noble’s race nor the race of others who had been shot by cops at other times was mentioned in the many online postings by those who loved Noble, friends who seem to include every race and ethnicity and sexual orientation."

But there are excuses, explanations leading away from white racism, in the article about yelling "white lives matter" and flying confederate flags anyway. The confederate flag being "a country boy thing" ain't cutting it in 2016.

Hopefully those that showed up weren't actually Dylan's friends. But whoever the white folks that showed up were, they either need to do better or keep their white unintentionally or intentionally racist @$$es at home.  Unity is not going to be costing black and brown a THING this time out.



Read More: http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2016/06/27/dylan-noble-country-boy-shot-by-fresno-cops-loved-everybody.html

A link to the video of Noble's death is here. Judge for yourself.  Violence Warning
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ypEN1ay5i78

Monday, July 25, 2016

ALL HATE IS NOT CREATED EQUAL

Feeling Rebloggy



"Dylann Roof’s wicked deeds were widely and resolutely condemned. Micah Johnson’s attack on police in Dallas have been (and quite rightfully so) condemned as well.

But to move forward, together, as we try to stop police brutality, and also work to end the mass gun violence that is all too common in the America, will necessitate asking hard questions about our national character and values.

It will be tempting for many Americans to look away when they learn something inconvenient and painful about their country. But if American society is to be made more equal, fair, and just for all people it will require that we not avert our eyes because of the uncomfortable truths that we need to confront as a people."

~Chauncy DeVega

Sunday, July 24, 2016

THE REPUBLICANS: FROM LINCOLN TO TRUMP TO Alt-RIGHT




AN OVER SIMPLIFIED TIME LINE:
Lincoln to the 2016 Republican National Convention

PART I:
HOW THE SOUTH WAS WON

1)1850s - The Northern Republicans, Lincoln, and Abolitionists  -  The Civil War was fought was not fought over *slavery* but over *slave power*

The North did not want white people with slave power moving into western states. Southern white men were richer than Northern white men due to the free labor (slave power)

The slaves also provided southern men political power. While slaves could not vote, each slave did count as 3/5 of a person and THAT increased official population of each southern state which increased the number of representatives each southern state sent into the House of Representatives. (slave power =political power)

The Industrial North wanted to be stronger and richer than the Planter Class South

The abolitionists in the Northern Republican Party were like a fringe group. If you can envision Green Peace choosing today's democrats over today's republicans if they had to choose between the two then you can imagine the abolitionists relationship to the republicans in the 1850s and 1860s.
2) 1860s Once the Republican North won the Civil War, they become the rich and powerful white business people instead of the southern white democrats. 
 
The North leaves troops in the south after the war. That is, the South is essentially occupied by the North. (I
n 1869 Black men get the vote and are able to vote and elect black people to congress)
3) In 1877 when the southern white candidate won the presidency and the powerful white northern republicans cannot allow this. 

No longer interested in black rights now that they've taken **slave power** away from southern whites, the republican north agrees to take troops out of the south in exchange for letting the northern candidate have the presidency. Abolitionists fade from power and/or lose interest in giving black people a representative share of the pie.

Blacks are then terrorized by southern whites who are recovering from the aftermath of the civil war. Lynching becomes popular. Blacks can't vote anymore. Blacks don't get elected to congress for decades.

4) Republicans centered entirely on business and growth were still in charge of the country when the stock market crashed in 1929. 

The great depression begins.

5) 1930s Democrats came into power and did clean up following the depression using "The New Deal" which expanded the size and role of government power. 

Rich Corporation Favoring Northern republicans hated the New Deal and become anti-big government


"Then, Franklin D. Roosevelt and other Democrats were swept into power and began dramatically expanding the size and role of the federal government, in an attempt to fight the Depression and better provide for Americans (as this map of New Deal projects across the country makes clear).
The Republicans left in Congress generally placed themselves in opposition to this newer, bigger government role."

6) 1930s Southern Democrats, who already believe in "states rights," who still hate the federal right of the federal government for taking away their slaves are already anti-big government. 



7) 1930s - 1940s States Rights loving White Southern Democrats and Rich White Republican businessmen are on the same side against federal government regulation. Some of the white southerners (who still think they should have slaves) leave the democrats for the republicans at this time. 

8) As in the civil war, when white troops are losing their lives at a high rate of speed, and all the hands on deck are needed -- even black hands. 

So some republican presidents do things like integrate some aspects of the military during WWII (to stop the loss of white life. An example of this can be seen in movie "The Tuskeegee Airmen" - 1980s version) 

9) Eisenhower, a republican, as a result of pressure from Civil Rights Leaders, integrates some schools. 


10) 1964 - Lyndon B Johnson, a democrat, signed the Voting Rights Act as a result of high pressure put on him by Civil Rights Leaders. 

This new thing called "the television set" is broadcasting American racist hypocrisy across the globe. And this hypocrisy is being broadcast to allies and enemies only 15 to 20 years after Hitler made it clear ethnoracism can have massively deadly consequences 

11) As a result of the democrats putting the Voting Rights Act in place, the white racist (supposedly defunct) dixiecrats moved into the republican party while the vast majority of the remaining blacks move into the democratic party.  

"I think we just delivered the South to the Republican Party for a long time to come," President Johnson said shortly after signing the Civil Rights Act, according to his aide Bill Moyers. And indeed, Sen. Strom Thurmond of South Carolina switched his party affiliation from Democratic to Republican specifically for this reason.


12) White racists across the country know they have a home wherever the southern white racists congregate.  So that's where they start moving in 1964.

Note: When the economy is better, the numbers of black republicans rises. We, as black people, have a black 1%. Sometimes we've called them "The New Blacks"




PART II:
HOW THE OTHER WHITE SUPREMACISTS WERE WON


13)  1970s Richard Nixon -- The Civil Rights Movement has taught white people what they are not allowed to say even though most still thoroughly believe in most stereotypes/racism. 


Southern Strategy then Dog Whistle Racism become major tools of the republican party

14) 1980s  white racism trends -- The republicans, in particular, rail against "political correctness" and talk about words they are not allowed to say like n*gger,  kike,  d*ke,  f*g,  sp*c, etc as if these words and terms are not precursors to white violence. 

15) 1980s Ronald Reagan becomes a master at southern strategy and dog whistle racism. He coined terms or made them famous."Welfare Queen" and "Black-on-black crime" are phrases he used in speeches. 

When talking about welfare in the North he talks of how sad people must be to have to go get a welfare handout after they've worked so hard. In the south, when speaking on the same subject of welfare, he tells white southerners he understands how mad they must be to see "some young buck" using welfare money for steak 

Reagan even uses the term "state's rights" whenever he can to let white southerners know he is on their side

15) Racial violence explodes in the 1980s as a result of Reagan's making it okay to be a white racist again. However only big stories involving multiple whites in mobs travel across the country via black magazines and black newspapers -- not the one on one cop killings of people like Trayvon Martin, Yvette Smith, Mike Brown, Malissa Williams and Timothy Russell. 


Today's cop murders are practically invisible from 1860 to 2000s. Black people only know about black people being murdered by police in their local areas until Black Lives Matters is able to feed into already organized black social media 

16) 1980s to 2000s  White democrats get to point at overt republican racism and call them racist sans a scintilla of self examination. Paternalism is a favorite brand of racism among liberals but it IS better than the republi-klansmen type racism. Republi-klansmen type racism kills faster and is hands on. Liberal racism keeps black people from getting jobs and keeps higher rates of black poverty high. In other words, liberal white racism kills slowly. 

17) In the 1990s Clinton leads by following popular opinion polls. And he moves further and further right toward a truly powerful white republican party that does NOT look like Trump's giant clown car. The republicans looked organized enough to take over the world in the 1990s.

18) Bush Junior watches people from Saudi Arabia fly planes into buildings on 9/11 after they trained in Afghanistan. Instead of attacking Saudi Arabia after Afghanistan, he attacks Iraq.

Bush junior gets support from a large percentage of white America due to white racism. He wouldn't have gotten an ounce of support to bomb Iraq (and accidentally create ISIS out of the now jobless Iraqi military) if it weren't for white racism in THIS country.


Let's re-imagine what happened in the lead up to bombing Iraq using different countries in a different year.


Imagine there were planes big enough to damage to buildings high enough in 1960 like there were on 9/11.


Now imagine France terrorists, who trained in Spain, flew two big planes into two, nationally symbolic buildings and killed 3000 people.


What kind of speech would the president have to give to convince the entire country to go bomb Germany.  


  1.  when German terrorists didn't fly the planes into building
  2. when  Germany didn't provide space in their country to train the terrorists  
  3. when Germany actually hates the French too 
  4.  BUT we were at war with Germany during WWII, more than a decade earlier  
This basically describes are decision to invade Iraq.


Substitute Saudi Arabia every place I put "France" and "Iraq" every place I put "Germany" and you have the argument that was made to invade Iraq for "regime change" for the benefit of the savages (sarcasm) so we could get access to the oil (reality).


This decision to go to war with Iraq only works within  a white racist framework. My version of the  argument that implies all those white Europeans are alike anyway, let's go bomb the crap out of them because there's no difference between the European Spanish, French and German white people anyway.

But my version of the argument won't white dominated United States. They-are-all-the-same-anyway so let's bomb them to bits only works when you plan to bomb "those people."  


Brown people,  Muslim people, or Brown Muslim people. *Those people are all alike* live in  the middle east or Africa, but not white Europe.  
~Theory paraphrased from Walter Mosley


19) Barack Obama is elected to office. 

The racist Tea Party rises from obscurity as a result, and takes a stand against "political correctness" and is more overtly racist. The Tea Party leaders don't usually make directly racist remarks but they defend constituents that do or pretend they don't see racist signs in the crowds they speak to. 

20) Donald Trump sees how well the Tea Party is doing with their little jabs of overt racism and becomes one of the prominent faces of the "Birther Movement" claiming President Obama wasn't born in this country. 

21) The birther movement having gotten enough momentum from angry white men, who were out voted two elections in a row, Donald Trump decides to use overt racism as a platform to run for president.  Under estimating just how strong white racism is in this country, white pundits for republicans and for democrats are shocked by his meteoric rise...while black and brown people get nervous. 

22) White racists watching Donald Trump rise higher and higher in prominence with every overtly racist comment (his anti-political correctness), and gradually THE "Alternative-RIGHT" is born

"Commonly referred to as the “alt-right,” this group of [clever] skinheads and [well-read] white supremacists (but still ignorant as rocks) has emerged from the shadows and positioned itself as a formidable force in the party of Lincoln and Trump. Its members are young, energetic, educated and persistent. They are homophobic and xenophobic, and they are dangerous.
On Monday night Steve King, the anti-Muslimracist-cartoon-tweeting Republican lawmaker from Iowa who once walked out of the State of the Union because he dislikes Obama so much, revealed in a nationally televised interview on MSNBC that he believed everything good in America and the world came from white people, and he was tired of white people losing."
(read more at link below)

23) Laura Know-Nothing Ingram does something very close to a Nazi Salute at the Republican National Convention. I find it hard to believe that weird wave wasn't done on purpose. But I could be wrong. 


24) David Duke, who was an actual Grand Wizard or Grand Dragon of the Ku Klux Klan is feeling relevant again, relevant enough, thanks to Trump, to run for the senate again -- in Louisiana, where Alton Sterling was killed. 

When Duke made an overture to Donald Trump, Trump was slow to reject him. Trump also seemed to suggest there might be some good groups in the KKK -- but he really didn't know anything about them 




The nickname "RepubliKKKLan" now fits the Republican Party like a glove. 


But there are moderate republicans, aghast at Donald Trump's ethnoracism, homophobia, xenophobia, misogyny, who absolutely will not own that the rabid white racist dogs now running the party that are nothing more than the chickens the republican party leaders have been dog whistle calling for decades are finally at home and roosting. 




Racism piled on racism piled on racism has been coming directly at us, almost silent and sometimes deadly, from republican party for decades. Yet, "reasonable" and "thoughtful" white republicans who are appalled by Trump cannot figure out where the racism came from.
They think the OVERT racism just sprang up whole in Donald Trump and his followers, that it did not come in stages and waves -- now provided extra fuel by a white fear of the **decreasing percentages of white people as compared to black and brown people. (Analysts have been predicting white people will not be the majority by 2060 or so.)

The most fearful of the two parties for decades, worried about "race wars" and being outnumbered by people of color and "immigrants" too, the white republicans think because they can say "white democrats aren't racism free either" that this decreases the level of overt vileness they've executed on black and brown and/or willfully ignored for decades. 


And a bunch of white republicans are completely serious when they say they are flabbergasted by Donald Trump's popularity.***

Republican senators and congressmen have defended the symbols of black destruction such as the confederate flag then claim they don't know that the KKK uses that flag at a march for the same reason their political colleagues keep that flag on their desks.

The white democrats are guilty of enabling and ignoring racism, but the republiklansmen are hands on. The republiklans are THE ONES politically protecting these white cop murderers -- and it is the political protection that counts. 



But the thing that worries me more than these ignorant white republicans determined to defend their ignorance are the black people who think Trump is more of the same ole crap. He's not the same. This white racism is like 1940s and 1950s racism and earlier. 

Black people cannot afford to believe white historians, even white liberal ones "doing their best." White people defend themselves against knowing how heinous their crimes against people of color have been. And when black researchers do research there's often a white gate keeper (publisher) to keep the number of heinous crimes as low as possible

When I was in school, I was taught there were 1 million Native Americans on this continent, not much more than that.  White people made themselves believe that before they taught white history of the U.S. because they didn't want to acknowledge they wiped out  90% of  20 million people (today's estimates based on DNA etc. However these estimates may be minimums too for the reasons stated above)

So when I read black people saying things like white cops TODAY are killing black people like they lynched people back in the 19th century, I get worried that some people actually believe that.

News is traveling so much faster and so much further, it's hard to compare one age to another age. But the thing that never changes is that white people tell the best story they can about themselves. All humans are like that.

When black people were first released from slavery, white southerners were scared of the repercussions they might face. So they became vicious as a type of defense. What we call "civilized" now-a-days wasn't even a factor back in the 19th century. 
These are the same people who gave Native Americans small-pox infested blankets so they could steal their land. 

In the 19th century, white people -- southerners in particular-- weren't even pretending to be civilized. I'll probably never be able to prove it, but there's likely not a snowball's chance in hell the white cops afraid of black skin now are anywhere near as scared as the white people who had owned slaves OR who never owned slaves but enjoyed their status over slaves just because they were white. 

There's no comparing the level of white fear between  1865, 1965, and 2016 and therefore there's no comparing the level of white deadliness. 


We cannot allow Trump to take us back to 1965, 1955 or 1935.




Read an old newspaper. Read Fanny Lou Hamer's biography. The year 1965 was a lot worse than any year in the last decade or so for black people.  We cannot afford to let Trump take us back even that far. 



I expect that we will be pushed and leaned on hard as white people lose their majority numbers. But to fail to show up and vote, even when you only have the choice between the lesser of two evils, is like spitting on Civil Rights Leader's graves.

Some of them died to make sure we could vote. And I got to vote FOR someone two presidential elections in a row when I thought I'd go to my grave only able to vote for the lesser of two white male evils.

I was a little depressed at the thought of returning to voting for the lesser of two evils at the beginning of this year. But that was when Donald Trump was supposed to disappear like the racist cartoon character he kinda is. Now I'm energized. I'm energized to vote against the rabid racist dog who is a card carrying racist, but probably doesn't believe half of what comes out of his mouth -- if he even knows what comes out of his mouth. 


Something is wrong with him. I've seen evil card carrying racists before. And I've heard them say things that don't begin to make sense But this card carrying racist has something wrong with his brain.  Even if all of this is just this racist's way of getting all the attention he can get before he dies of old age, this man is beyond bizarre.

Vote against Trump. This matters. 

   
REPUBLLICAN NATIONAL CONVENTION AS
THE alt-RIGHT DEBUTANTE BALL

Read More: 

http://www.theroot.com/articles/politics/2016/07/the-alt-right-debutante-ball-how-a-racist-group-hijacked-the-gop-and-rnc/

Accidentally posted 7 24 16. Updated 7 29 16

Saturday, July 23, 2016

PROTEST WORKS: WNBA RESCINDS FINES OVER BLACK LIVES MATTER PROTEST SHIRTS


Women's National Basketball Association said players violated uniform rules by  wearing shirts that address Black Lives Matter. 


Players were fined.


Players from the Liberty and Fever boycotted their obligatory post-game news conference Thursday night at Madison Square Garden in New York City and recorded their own. The players said they were there not to answer any basketball-related questions but to speak only on the issue of Black Lives Matter....

 

Two days later, The Women's National Basketball Association said it is rescinding fines imposed on players who violated league uniform rules in expressing support for the "black lives matter" movement.
http://www.nbcnews.com/news/sports/wnba-rescinds-fines-issued-over-black-lives-matter-protest-n615536


Protest that hits the wallet works fastest.  The Color Of Change support of the players refusing to play made this turn around quickly.

May more and more people see this example and follow it. 

ON REPUBLICANS SURPRISED BY REPUBLIKLAN RACISM

The rabid racist Republican Convention occurred this week.  I've been reading things here and there and everywhere. And it's become apparent that several "moderate" republicans think that the overt over-the-top racism they are seeing in republican party now just sprang up out of nowhere.

I read a calm, well thought out, article written by a republican a few days ago. When he said the words "self-examination," I thought he was actually going to try to think. But he immediately defended his good white self and his good white friends and his good white family and couldn't imagine anybody really thinking that Ronald Reagan and one bush or another are actually racist -- or no more racist than is ordinary, or not any more imperfect that democrats. 

His thoughtfully worded minimization of the white racism sooo clearly exhibited by every Republican that's ever been, including Lincoln if you judge him by today's standards just made me exhausted. 

In this calm, thoughtful article he made sure he'd never have to listen to anybody tell him just HOW it is the white racists know which party to go to by saying "the lefties will just say we brought this on ourselves" It hasn't occurred to him to talk to black and brown people as if we have sense, as if they --as white people-- are the ones biased in favor of self.

It hasn't occurred to him that there are VERY FEW hardcore "lefties" among black people because we just vote for the lesser of two evils. Black people, for the most part, aren't biased by a strong dedication to the left. Blacks know there's racism on both sides of the fence. Blacks also know, for the most part, which variety of racism kills black people faster  -- the republican variety that never sees any racism even when there are a dozen unarmed black bodies on the ground with a white cop standing each one of them  


Just like the civil rights leaders weren't brainwashed by the communists to be dissatisfied with our limited lot in life, black people who are fighting to have Black Lives Matter TOO when police are summoned have not been brainwashed by white democrats. 

Black people see democratic racism too. But the pre-Hitler like blather coming out of the republican party is coming out of an overt white racism that has always been there. 

Always. 


I won't go back and judge Lincoln by today's standards. But I will judge the white people around Lincoln at the time and those who tell Lincoln's white-washed story over and over again today.  


The first thing you have to understand about the motivations of Lincoln's northern republicans is that that they were not so much anti-slavery as they were anti-slave power.  

Pre-Civil-War, the south was creating raw materials (growing cotton)  using slave labor and the north was doing manufacturing of goods (shirts) and didn't need slaves. The free labor (slave power) was making southern democratic white men richer and more powerful than northern republican white men. Furthermore, the House of Representatives is/was based on the population of each state. Though slaves couldn't vote they did count as 3/5s of a person which meant the white southern democrats had more voting power in the House. 

Again, the republican party of Lincoln, mostly located in the industrial north was more against "slave power" than it was "slavery"

One of things that Stephen Spielberg got right in the movie "Lincoln" is that the republican abolitionists were considered the extremist fringe in the republican party. The thing Spielberg got VERY wrong was to erase how devoted the majority white northern republicans were to becoming more financially powerful and more politically powerful than the white southerners by removing white southerner's free labor (black slaves).


When you have white privilege, as Spielberg does, you tell the part of the story that makes you and yours look good and feel good. But you do everyone a disservice when you erase the uglier parts of history.  You wind up having white people so comfortable with white racism that they don't recognize it when it bites them on the ass from the inside.