by BAR executive editor Glen Ford
Since the onset of the Obama phenomenon, Dr. Martin Luther King’s birth and death days have been “polluted” by false and ahistorical comparisons between Obama and MLK. The two men represent opposite political poles: one, a radical opponent of imperial war and concentrated economic power, the other, an ally of Wall Street and commander-in-chief of “the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today.” In focusing on King, the man of peace, Tavis Smiley’s PBS special corrects a history that has been distorted, sometimes beyond recognition – not the least by the revisionist and poseur in the White House.
Diversity is little more than black faces in high places, not the goal of radical transformation that puts power in the hands of ordinary people.
For an occasion so momentous, not much has changed.
HBCU scandals don’t die, they multiply like vultures stalking a starving child. Black misleaders prey on Black students and faculty for their own advancement.
Letters from Our Readers by Jahan Choudhry, Comments Editor
Only transformational programs, like single payer health care, can erode the coherence of the White Supremacist Bloc, and at the same time galvanize the numeric majority of the nation.
