Why Nobody’s Paying Attention to Black Folks These Days, Including Our So-Called Leaders
by BAR executive editor Glen Ford
“The Black Misleadership Class has no intention of taking any position that might discomfort this president or reveal their own impotence.”
While the Congressional Hispanic Caucus met at the White House to press for immigration reform, on
January 25, traditional Black organizations gathered at Washington’s Mayflower Hotel to further refine their so-called “
Black Agenda,” for presentation to President Obama at some future date. The
five broad goals are really more like a set of suggestions for Obama’s consideration, talking points on economic parity, educational opportunity, voting rights, healthcare disparities, and criminal justice reform – nothing remotely resembling demands. Obama need never worry about any drama from this crowd.
Malcolm X would have derisively called them the Big Four-Plus: the National Urban League’s Marc Morial; Ben Jealous, of the NAACP; National Coalition of Black Civic Participation president Melanie Campbell; Rev. Al Sharpton, head of the National Action Network and Obama’s Black political pit bull; plus an assortment of 50 or so other notables.
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SA
March 7, 2013 at 11:45 pm
We, the people, need to create a list of concerns and complaints and then present them to our Black Leaders, then We need to support them as they push the agenda.
Davchi
March 1, 2013 at 8:14 pm
This is exactly why white folks in every avenue of America is overlooking black people, because even though the president is black there is such a dishevel in so-called black America that black people out of every other race of people are so much clones of the white man that their is no thinking for self. Black people is doesn’t matter whether you’re a Dem., Rep., Indp., Progr., or no affliation,in the words of brother Malcolm you have been had, hoodwinked and bamboozled. Anytime there is a spectrum of black from Herman Cain to Clarence Thomas to Al Sharpton toCornell West how much more fractured, fragmented and F**ked up can a people be especially with only a symbolic black president that can see the explosion of any unity the white man has done deliberately.
ST
February 11, 2013 at 5:41 pm
Right! And that’s truely the crux of the problem. Blacks are upset with the president because he’s black and haven’t done anything noticeable for them, but where is the demand? Where’s the black agenda being presented and by whom? What is the black agenda?Hispanics had a specific agenda that their representatives help push through. The LGTB community has a specific agenda that they rallied behind. Jobs is NOT a specific agenda. All Americans are looking for more jobs in this country. This is not a uniquely black agenda despite the fact that our unemployment rate is twice as high. If it is, there needs to be a way to present our plight to the president. It’s the so-called black leaders who should be presenting it. That’s how you get something pushed through in Washington. Where are they? Not only that, where’s the pressure on them? Where’s the demand that they present an agenda or do something? We (blacks) need to be more sophisticated in who we target and how. It’s not a question of whether or not President Obama cares about black people. It’s a question of HOW are we going to approach him to get what we want. No one has even addressed this openly.
ST
February 11, 2013 at 5:41 pm
Right! And that’s truely the crux of the problem. Blacks are upset with the president because he’s black and haven’t done anything noticeable for them, but where is the demand? Where’s the black agenda being presented and by whom? What is the black agenda?Hispanics had a specific agenda that their representatives help push through. The LGTB community has a specific agenda that they rallied behind. Jobs is NOT a specific agenda. All Americans are looking for more jobs in this country. This is not a uniquely black agenda despite the fact that our unemployment rate is twice as high. If it is, there needs to be a way to present our plight to the president. It’s the so-called black leaders who should be presenting it. That’s how you get something pushed through in Washington. Where are they? Not only that, where’s the pressure on them? Where’s the demand that they present an agenda or do something? We (blacks) need to be more sophisticated in who we target and how. It’s not a question of whether or not President Obama cares about black people. It’s a question of HOW are we going to approach him to get what we want. No one has even addressed this openly.
ST
February 11, 2013 at 5:41 pm
Right! And that’s truely the crux of the problem. Blacks are upset with the president because he’s black and haven’t done anything noticeable for them, but where is the demand? Where’s the black agenda being presented and by whom? What is the black agenda?Hispanics had a specific agenda that their representatives help push through. The LGTB community has a specific agenda that they rallied behind. Jobs is NOT a specific agenda. All Americans are looking for more jobs in this country. This is not a uniquely black agenda despite the fact that our unemployment rate is twice as high. If it is, there needs to be a way to present our plight to the president. It’s the so-called black leaders who should be presenting it. That’s how you get something pushed through in Washington. Where are they? Not only that, where’s the pressure on them? Where’s the demand that they present an agenda or do something? We (blacks) need to be more sophisticated in who we target and how. It’s not a question of whether or not President Obama cares about black people. It’s a question of HOW are we going to approach him to get what we want. No one has even addressed this openly.