Fox News, the CBC and the Indictment of "Dollar Bill" Jefferson
A Black Agenda Radio commentary by BAR Managing Editor Bruce Dixon
After months of raids,
rumors and leaks from Justice Department officials, the indictment of
William "Dollar Bill" Jefferson, the congressman from New
Orleans was no surprise. According to CBC Monitor, the watchdog
organization which rates African American representatives in
Congress, Jefferson was at best a career underachiever, and at worst
a derelict who consistently failed to represent the political will of
black New Orleans. His self-serving antics during the Katrina
disaster were especially memorable.
"'Dollar Bill' Jefferson deserves a fair trial, and
is innocent till proven guilty. But as a congressman, he was no
bargain and won't be missed."
With some of his
constituents still stranded on rooftops and while others trying to
walk out of the flooded, dying city were being turned back at
gunpoint by suburban cops, Jefferson commandeered a National Guard
detachment for more than two hours and monopolized a helicopter an
hour so he could return to his home in the flood zone and recover his
laptop, some luggage and a box of important belongings. Like all
accused, "Dollar Bill" Jefferson deserves a fair trial, and
is innocent till proven guilty. But as a congressman, he was no
bargain and won't be missed.
In the wake of the injury
Jefferson's disappointing career and current indictment have
inflicted on black America, additional insults have flown thick and
fast, aimed not just at the hapless congressman, but at all of us,
and coming not just from the traditional foes of African American
interests, but from our so-called friends and allies. Following the
lead of corporate mainstream media, white liberals who never managed
to get, let alone stay worked up over the dispersal and permanent
exile of 200,000 black New Orleaneans are egging each other into a
frenzy demanding pieces of Dollar Bill's crooked scalp.
"Caucus
members have granted Fox free reign to besmirch and defame them at
will."
And of course Fox News,
the network chosen by the Congressional Black Caucus to host its 2008
presidential debate marked the Jefferson indictment by spitting
directly in the face of the Black Caucus and its dean, the 40 year
congressman from Detroit and chair of the House Judiciary 
committee
John Conyers. Fox led off the brief segment announcing the 16 count
indictment with a still picture of "Dollar Bill" Jefferson. Then
over printed and audio blurbs on the indictment, Fox producers
switched to video footage of Rep. Conyers walking across a crowded
hearing room past somebody holding a "resign" placard, as though
one bald black guy in a business suite were pretty much the same as
any other. Fox News later issued a ten second on-air apology, and a
response from the office of Rep. Conyers, the second most senior
member of the House of Representatives, has been strangely muted.
Thus is revealed the
nature of the partnership the Congressional Black Caucus has entered
into with Fox News. For a handful of internships to "train"
young black reporters its brand of fair and balanced journalism, and
a few hundred thousand in campaign and other "donations", Caucus
members have granted Fox free reign to besmirch and defame them at
will, to indoctrinate the next generation of black journalists, and to distort black America's voice on the national stage
during the 2008 presidential election.
In a perverse way, perhaps
Fox News is right. It is indeed becoming harder and harder to tell
elected black crooks and cowards from those who hold to the original
mission of the Black Caucus - to be the authentic voice of Black America and
the "conscience of the Congress."
To download or to hear this Black Agenda Radio commentary, click on the mic at right.
BAR managing editor Bruce Dixon can be contacted at Bruce.Dixon (at) BlackAgendaReport.com.
Contributing Editor Ann Garrison continues her reporting from the Horn of Africa.
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