Many that never knew Martin Luther King, Jr have tried to use his words in a way he never would have intended. Yes, he advocated non-violence but not passivity, acceptance or denial. Martin Luther …
Source: What Would Martin Luther King, Jr Think About The Age Of Trump?
Shadow Warriors will return February 7, 2017 and honor its second recipient. On January 7th we honored Sevgi Fernandez the founder of Together We Stand whose mission is to proactively dismantle ra…
Source: Shadow Warriors: Returning February 7th (Bonus Photo’s of John Lewis’s Congressional District)
Shadow Warriors will return February 7, 2017 and honor its second recipient. On January 7th we honored Sevgi Fernandez the founder of Together We Stand whose mission is to proactively dismantle racism, discrimination and police brutality through education, advocacy and legislation.
We’ll be back in February with a new honoree. We are continuing to seek suggestions of people doing the work that may not yet have received national recognition. Others may well be known for other accomplishments but not for what they do behind the scenes. Please make any suggestions in the comments section or E-mail to spiveywilliamf@gmail.com. To not miss a recipient. Please press the “Follow” button on the side bar or from a mobile device, scroll down to the bottom of the page.
Until February 7th arrives, were providing some bonus pictures from John Lewis’s Congressional District that Donald Trump describes as,“In horrible shape and falling apart.”
Photo: redconcertconceirge.com Downtown Atlanta
Photo: Expedia.com World of Coca Cola
Photo thek.not.com Hartsfield-Jackson International Airport
Photo: usnews.com Emory University
Photo: glassdoor.com Morehouse University
Photo: pinterest.com Spelman College
Photo: tripadvisor.com Piedmont Park
Photo: villarealestate.com Buckhead mansion
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Photo: Atlantablackstar.com Auburn Avenue Research Library
Photo: twitter.com Curbed Atlanta
Photo: news.wabe.com Mural of John Lewis on Auburn Avenue
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When John Lewis was at Fisk University. Working With Rev. Jim Lawson and alongside Diane Nash to coordinate Freedom Riders and fighting injustice across the South…
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Donald Trump was being thrown out of school after school for being an insolent brat.
When John Lewis was marching on Washington, as the National Chairman of the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee (SNCC)…
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Donald Trump was in Military School in as close to action as he would ever come.
When John Lewis was preparing to cross the Edmund Pettus Bridge…
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Donald was preparing to begin a mediocre college career at the University of Pennsylvania
While John Lewis was being beaten by Alabama police…
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And jailed…
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Fighting for the right to vote…
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Donald was a average student who would later claim both to be the “Valedictorian” and the “Most Accomplished Person In The Class.” All without making the Dean’s List?
When John Lewis began serving in Congress… All the while continuing to fight injustice.
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Donald and his father Fred were marking “C” for colored on rental applications and being sued by the Federal Government twice for racial discrimination.
John Lewis marched with Martin Luther King, Jr. He has fought against hatred, bigotry and racism his entire life. The one thing it’s impossible to say about him is that he’s all, “talk, talk, talk.”
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Donald Trump has never participated in any form of public service. He discriminates in his businesses. He advocated for the death penalty in a full page ad for the Central Park Five who turned out to be innocent. He then protested the City’s settlement after they spent 12 years in jail, falsely imprisoned. He calls Mexicans rapists and drug dealers. Advocated the ban of all Muslims. Mocked the disabled, calls Elizabeth Warren “Pocahontas” and in his own words admits to sexual assault. His closest advisor is a white supremacist and his Attorney General nominee a racist.
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Donald Trump doesn’t have the right to speak John Lewis’s name let alone besmirch his actions and legacy.
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I wrote this four years ago. The “dark vein” has become clogged arteries and a failing heart. I sense things are coming to a head. I would amend slightly my saying that the Republican Party is not inherently racist. This is true overall but the Trump campaign attracted a new flock of Republicans that absolutely are. Racism has found a home there and the attempt to wipe out the entire legacy of Barack Obama has a basis there as well. With a triumvirate of Trump, Bannon and Sessions. Racism will flow from the top down.
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On “Meet the Press”, Retired General Colin Powell made some wide ranging remarks including some about the Republican Party and how some within it “look down on minorities” and how it is tolerated by Party leaders. He provided examples of language used by Sarah Palin and John Sununu. He discussed the Party’s failure to acknowledge the changing demographic in the country and discussed the need for a thorough self-assessment to make required changes before finding themselves perpetually unable to win Presidential elections. I waited to hear the discussions on the Fox News talk shows and while disappointed, I was not surprised with the result.
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They first attacked the messenger, “How could Gen. Powell say these things after the Republican Party has done so much for him?” “He’s not really a Republican anyway” and it’s part of a plan to deflect from GOP criticisms of lack of diversity in the incomplete Obama cabinet. They pointed to Hispanic Governors and the newly appointed Black Senator within their party. They heralded their diversity within the party pointing to Bobby Jindal and Marco Rubio. They disavowed Powell’s claim the Party had moved drastically to the right and claimed in terms of diversity things in the Party were the “best they’ve ever been!”
To sum it up, Gen. Powell is an ungrateful traitor and the Party is on the right track, with a few misguided individuals that don’t represent the party. My initial response is probably not printable but you can get the secondary response. I’ll preface it by saying that the Republican Party is not inherently racist, many if not most are drawn to the party by economic policies and perhaps a social agenda that may not be racist although the disparity in impact on minorities is well documented. Their problem is that the image of the party reinforces just the things Colin Powell talked about on a daily basis. Even if we dismissed Sarah Palin and John Sununu as being outcasts (Sununu was a leading surrogate for the Romney campaign) and not representative of the Party. Those who are minorities aren’t likely to dismiss the language coming from all of the loudest voices in the party. Mitt Romney went to the NAACP Convention so he could say that he did, and then talked about Black people later that night at a private fundraiser saying they only wanted “free stuff”. Anyone listening to the Republican Primary debates watched as every candidate (except Jon Huntsman) raced to the right to ignore the rights of Hispanic citizens and Bills are being introduced in Congress as we speak to revoke citizenship of brown people born in this country if their parents were undocumented. They wanted to electrify fences and supported roving armed militias to shoot the “enemy”.
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Newt Gingrich painted Obama as the “Welfare President” and the Romney campaign among their many lies claimed Obama wanted to eliminate work clauses in the welfare requirements to pander to “his base”. Sean Hannity and Rush Limbaugh attack the President on a personal level on a daily basis. Commercials attacking China and mocking the Chinese ran incessantly. Anne Coulter, Michelle Malkin and others make a living on disparaging others including minorities and hate is their only message. And lastly and perhaps most important is voter suppression. State by state in Republican controlled legislatures, systematic steps are taken to limit minority voters by removing them illegally from the rolls or causing such long lines as to hope they simply give up. Heightened voter ID laws don’t accept many forms of existing sometimes government issued photo ID’s but if you have a gun license in states like Texas, you’re good.
Have you ever read the comments on even the mainstream Republican web sites? Here are a couple comments from today. The first about Supreme Court Justice Sotomayor benefiting from Affirmative Action to get into Princeton.
“Boy! Sure wish my race would get me into Princeton, a free education at the expense of tax payers. Funny that we give all the minorities free stuff but we don’t give our own free education No… make our own take out loans, they won’t leave the country and they can pay it back.”
Another regarding Colin Powell’s comments on Meet the Press,
“This colored racist has proven what he is and how he thinks. Hey Powell bite me”
Again, the Republican Party in and of itself is not racist. The loudest voices of the Party and its media outlets provide a forum for all manner of racist comments to be expressed either using code words or directly, generally without criticism and then there’s the whole Birther thing which is racist through and through. So while everything I’ve seen on Fox News so far is to deny, deny, deny. If the Party wants to be perceived differently, I’d think they’d need to try actually doing something different. General Powell was the messenger, the message thus far was not received.
Featured Photo: notmytribe.com
This is pure speculation. I don’t have a bit of information to support this view. But let’s suppose for a moment that it wasn’t Russia that hacked the DNC and others. Donald Trump has suggested it might have been China, North Korea or “somebody sitting on their bed that weighs 400 lbs.” There is another nation that has the cyber capacity to do the job and possibly the motivation too, Israel!
Israel is the world’s second largest exporter of Cyber Security products with most of their firms capitalizing on the military expertise of the Israeli Defense Force (IDF). In reviewing some of the “evidence” leading to Russia. It includes what amounts to an easily found “signature” of a well-known Russian hacking group. It would have been child’s play for Israel to create the false signature blaming Russia.
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One might say, “Israel is a staunch ally and would never do that to the United States!” The same ally that has a wide spy network in place in the U.S., conducting mainly industrial espionage but no doubt monitoring our politicians as well. That they would do whatever they perceived to be in their best interests is unquestioned.
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What would they gain by influencing the American Election? While Hillary Clinton pledged strong support for Israel. She also planned to continue implementing the Iran nuclear deal which Netanyahu totally objects to. Trump on the other hand vowed to renegotiate or throw out the deal which Netanyahu prefers. During a September 2016 visit to New York. Netanyahu met with Trump almost twice as long as he did with Clinton.
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If Israel were discovered influencing the America Election. You can believe that the American public would never be told. We depend too much on the Israel relationship to maintain whatever semblance of peace still exists in the Middle East. Naming Israel publicly would cause great turmoil within Congress, at the White House and throughout both countries. I could see Intelligence Agencies blaming Russia as blaming Israel even if guilty would be unthinkable.
Again I have not one thread of proof. But this crossed my mind.
Featured Photo: newsweek.com
Many that never knew Martin Luther King, Jr have tried to use his words in a way he never would have intended. Yes, he advocated non-violence but not passivity, acceptance or denial. Martin Luther King, Jr was a warrior; he did battle on behalf of righteous causes. He was fierce, getting on the nerves and in the face of Sheriff’s, Governor’s and President’s for not making their lives easier by accepting the status quo.
Photo: Getty Images
The Age of Trump is my name for the current era, seemingly defined by the reaction of many white people to declining demographic sway, loss of privilege and blaming the wrong people for their economic decline. Instead of looking at the top two percent who are amassing all the wealth. They pull down the other crabs in the bucket that don’t look like them.
Most of the tactics being utilized in the Age of Trump are not new. They can’t even be ascribed to Trump who has yet to have an original idea. He is only the blowhard figurehead of a thinly veiled effort to make white people great again at the expense of all others. He openly has no real values or moral compass, shifting with every wind. He stands for white uber alles, and for that reason alone many voted for him with his promise to, “Make America Great Again!” We now find him on the verge of becoming President. What would Martin think of all this?
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I think Martin would not find this all new. He would look at Jeff Sessions and see Bull Connor. An Alabama official that advocates voter suppression and warns black people about how to speak to whites would be all too familiar. That an FBI Director would take steps which may have turned the tide of an election would not shock. The Director in his time, J. Edgar Hoover, blackmailed Presidents and legislators and tried to convince MLK to kill himself. The voter suppression of today is far less deadly though perhaps equally effective as when people literally died trying to get the right to vote.
I think he would side with “Black Lives Matter.” He would recognize the categorization of them as “radical” and “divisive” which they did to the SCLC as well. He would knowingly nod at attempts to de-legitimize the messenger because they have no response to the message.
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What I call The Age of Trump did not begin when Donald Trump received the Republican nomination for President. Not when he announced his candidacy. It began on November 4, 2008 when a black man, Barack Hussein Obama, was elected President of the United States. The following January, while Barack and Michelle Obama were attending inaugural balls. Mitch McConnell and Republican leaders were clandestinely meeting about how to undermine the new President.
While Donald Trump didn’t initiate the movement that became The Age of Trump. He soon became its unquestioned leader, heading up the Birther Movement and making his appeal to the far right and the ultra-white.
Would Martin Luther King, Jr hate Trump?
“Let no man pull you so low as to hate him!”
Would he be afraid?
“We must build dikes of courage to hold back the flood of fear.”
Would he be bitter?
“Never succumb to the temptation of bitterness.”
Would he lose hope?
“We must accept finite disappointment, but never lose infinite hope!”
In the Age of Trump, Martin Luther King, Jr would do now as he did then. He would lead. He would organize. He would advance the struggle and prioritize. He would form coalitions and grow the movement. You would not find him at pity parties. Lamenting everything Trump. He would lead. He would organize.
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During the Age of Trump, we have seen major protests, some of which resulted in violence. In Ferguson, Oakland, Los Angeles, Dallas, Baltimore and Brooklyn. Some would ask, “What would Dr. King think?” Remembering his desire for non-violence. Here’s what he did say after outbreaks in his day:
“A riot is the language of the unheard.”
During the Age of Trump there are many that are unheard. Martin Luther King, Jr would not advocate violence. But he would act. No doubt his life would be threatened now as before. What would he say?
“A man not willing to die for something is not fit to live!”
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Martin would call out for us to get involved. Each according to their gift. He would not seek consensus, he would mold it. Dr. King is no longer with us. Others must take his place. Maybe him, maybe her… maybe you? The Age of Trump is not the time to do nothing.
“Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter!”
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When you’re a Republican elected official and you learn your new President was hand-picked by Russia. What do you do?
Do you recognize how complicit you were in ignoring the evidence always before you? You knew about the ties Paul Manafort the Trump former campaign manager had to Russia and that he’d accepted 12 million in cash from them. And you said nothing.
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You heard Trump’s son talk about the extensive Russian investments into the Trump businesses. And you ignored it. You watched as Trump himself spread the Putin love. Taking his side against our own President and calling him a better leader.
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Trump has acted for the last couple years like a man that someone in Russia had pictures of doing something horrible. We now know that’s likely to be true. I personally didn’t need to know about Trump paying prostitutes to pee on a hotel bed. It’s an image that may be hard to get out of my mind. Especially if I consider what Trump was doing at the time.
So if you’re a Republican that has discarded any thread of personal integrity as you bowed down to Trump. If you’ve ignored his inclusion of white supremacists among his advisors and a racist as the Attorney General. How do you ever retrieve the moral high ground, when the Trump voter even now will turn on you if you attempt anything. You knew he selected Putin’s friend as Secretary of State, and you only watched.
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Will you continue to do as you’ve previously done which is to ignore and deny as you have since Trump won the Republican nomination? Many of you knew who and what he was before he won the nomination. You called him a racist, a con man, a liar and a fraud. You knew all these things to be true but praised him anyway.
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So now you see these reports about Trump and Russia. If there’s anything you know is that these stories will not simply go away. New details will come out. Additional proof will appear. Perhaps a urine stained mattress with DNA?
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This is a question you’ll have to answer for yourselves Republicans. I’ve got nothing for you. What are you going to do?
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President Barack Obama will be departing the Office of the Presidency in a short time. During his tenure he served with a grace that will be sorely missed during the next four years. When you were sworn in you were met with a level of obstruction and resistance that was unprecedented in American History. Elected officials from the other party conspired to block your every initiative. Even ones they themselves believed in. They didn’t confirm your Federal judges. They denied your last Supreme Court Nominee even a hearing for over a year. They heckled you during a State of The Nation address. Through it all you were steadfast and never gave them the satisfaction of having got to you.
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Now as you depart. The same people are making every effort to destroy your legacy. They want most to destroy the Affordable Care Act, admittedly having no plan to replace it and caring nothing for the twenty million people that would lose their healthcare. They elected to replace you with a man of questionable intelligence, no policies longer than 140 characters and a history of racism and sexual assault.
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You weren’t perfect. None of us are. I have no doubt you did your best and what you thought to be best for the American People. Even those that voted against you. Thank you for your service! You and Michelle were better than they deserved.
Featured Photo: Maroon.org
I’m watching the confirmation hearing of Jeff Sessions for Attorney General and have a few takeaways. I’m not an attorney by the way but do play one on my blog.
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ENIGMA IN BLACK 