Obama’s
Schemes to Tiptoe Past the Devil
A
Black Agenda Radio commentary by Glen Ford
“A
real dialogue means solving real problems – problems of unearned
white privilege and power."
In
the next weeks and months you are going to hear a great deal from
Black Agenda Report and Black Agenda Radio about the various
proposals for some kind of dialogue on race in the United States. Let
me make it clear from the beginning: we at BAR are not interested in
any kind of verbal duel with liars. There are facts, and there are
lies. The most important fact relating to the history of the United
States is that it was created in a centuries-long project of human
extermination, and replacement of those murdered Native American
millions by millions of Africans who were then classified as beasts
whose only reason for living was to serve the every whim of the white
winners of those two continental race wars. Now that, of course, is
the truth that is celebrated as a kind of white national religion.
The general belief is that God was in favor of killing 19 out of
every 20 or so Native Americans, to make way for Europeans to steal
two continents, and that God also favored the kidnapping of millions
of Africans in order to make the European Americans extraordinarily
rich. This White American God likes his people to be rich, and
doesn’t much care how they go about becoming so. He blesses the
fact that the U.S. spends as much money on weapons as the rest of the
world, combined. U.S. imperialism, it appears, is God’s will,
according to the American religion.
“The
general belief is that God was in favor of killing 19 out of every 20
or so Native Americans, to make way for Europeans to steal two
continents.”
Barack
Obama had a plan. He knew that the only way a Black man could
possibly stand a chance of becoming president of the United States
was to pledge allegiance to the national white historical narrative,
or religion – the Big Lie that says God wanted all those Indians
dead and Africans enslaved, for some higher purpose that will be
worked out sometime in that sweet by-and-by. Very few Black folks buy
into the Ridiculous White Lie, but Barack Obama thought that a
combination of his rich backers on Wall Street and the near-universal
support among Blacks would allow him to safely walk a thin line
between the competing white and Black fires and brimstones of totally
opposite narratives on the history and nature of the United States.
The two stories cannot possibly be reconciled. One is true, and the
other is a lie. Now Obama is caught in between, the mumbling man.
Does
Barack Obama really want to engage in a dialogue on the facts of race
in America? Of course not. That was never his plan. A real dialogue
means solving real problems – problems of unearned white privilege
and power. What else is there to talk about? What other change is
worth having? One million Black men and women are in prison at any
given moment. We have already done hundreds of studies on why African
Americans are incarcerated in such huge numbers. We don’t need a
dialogue about this great injustice. We need our sisters and brothers
set free.
That’s
the only conversation I think is worth having with Barack Obama, his
supporters, or his detractors.
For
Black Agenda Radio, I’m Glen Ford.
BAR
executive editor Glen Ford can be contacted at
Glen.Ford@BlackAgendaRadio.com.
The memorial gathering for Glen Ford was held on Saturday, September 18, 2021 in New York City at the Riverside Church.
Memories of the last 20 years are rarely focused on increased state violence and repression in the post-9/11 world. The damage has largely been forgotten.
The race to the bottom is an imperative of austerity, which is foundational to the history of state violence in the U.S.
Another twenty-year anniversary is the World Conference Against Racism (WCAR) that took place in Durban, South Africa between August 31, and September 8. The George W.
U.S. wars in foreign countries always come home.
