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Allen Johnson Thinking Out Loud On Night Is Coming

March 26, 2008

‘Night is coming’

David Brooks in The New York Times on Hillary Clinton’s hopes for the presidency:

“The door is closing. Night is coming. The end, however, is not near.

“Last week, an important Clinton adviser told Jim VandeHei and Mike Allen (also of Politico) that Clinton had no more than a 10 percent chance of getting the nomination. Now, she’s probably down to a 5 percent chance.

“Five percent.

“Let’s take a look at what she’s going to put her party through for the sake of that 5 percent chance: The Democratic Party is probably going to have to endure another three months of daily sniping. For another three months, we’ll have the Carvilles likening the Obamaites to Judas and former generals accusing Clintonites of McCarthyism. For three months, we’ll have the daily round of resume padding and sulfurous conference calls. We’ll have campaign aides blurting ‘blue dress’ and only-because-he’s-black references as they let slip their private contempt.

“For three more months (maybe more!) the campaign will proceed along in its Verdun-like pattern. There will be a steady rifle fire of character assassination from the underlings, interrupted by the occasional firestorm of artillery when the contest touches upon race, gender or patriotism. The policy debates between the two have been long exhausted, so the only way to get the public really engaged is by poking some raw national wound.

“For the sake of that 5 percent, this will be the sourest spring.”

Brooks adds:

“The only question is whether Clinton herself can step outside the apparatus long enough to turn it off and withdraw voluntarily or whether she will force the rest of her party to intervene and jam the gears.”

Posted 2 years, 5 months ago at 7:25 am. Add a comment

Allen Johnson Thinking Out Loud On A`Double Standard

March 27, 2008

A double standard?

Boston Globe columnist Derrick Z. Jackson on the Obama-Jeremiah Wright saga: 

“Clinton has her own free pass (on the race issue). She repeatedly has had to dump surrogates for stereotyping Obama. She once led Obama among black voters, yet has lost almost all of them with her camp’s tactics. Yet she faces no pressure to reveal her racial views. And she certainly is offering none in the upcoming Pennsylvania primary, where surrogate and Governor Ed Rendell says, ‘You’ve got conservative whites here and I think there are some whites who are probably not ready to vote for an African-American candidate.’ ”

“Once again, America’s white leaders play footsie with white intolerance while Obama was pressured to bring the nation the head of Jeremiah Wright. Once again, a black person holds the nation’s bag of racial burdens.”

Click here to read the whole thing.

Posted 2 years, 5 months ago at 7:21 am. Add a comment

SAM CURTIS: THE SAME OLE SCHICKADY

TAKEN OUT OF CONTEXT BUT NOT OUT OF THE RACE 

Barack Obama got back to the issues of the campaign today after taking a few days off in the Virgin Islands.

Mr. Obama told an enthusiastic audience in Greensboro, N.C. that although he was young and still had time to run for the Presidency, America couldn’t wait.  America needs change now or it is headed for destruction.

The question before the American voters is whether Mr. Obama is the person to save America?  He thinks he is, and so do I.

Let’ exam this by first looking at his democratic opponent.

Just weeks ago, Hillary Clinton through an ad campaign ask America who would they want to answer a phone at 3:00 AM.  Now she is claiming sleep deprivation in her ”mispoken” declarations of being under sniper fire in Bosnia in 1996.  Of course this sleep deprivation excuse comes days after she repeatedly told the media that she was indeed under sniper fire with her daughter Chelsea.  Also along on that trip was Cheryl Crow and Sinbad.  Turns out Sinbad who is a comedian busted the Presidential hopeful when he stated that he didn’t recall being under attack.  The media decided to do some homework and found footage of trip.  The footage shows a casual Hillary Clinton taking her time with the greeting committee which was accompanied by a group of school children.  These children recited poems to the then first lady.

Senator McCain the republican nominee blames the victims of shady mortgage brokers for their impending foreclosures and don’t think that the goverment should lift a finger to assist them.  Of course, if the government had done their job as regulators, perhaps these tax paying voters would not be in the situation they are in.  John McCain who wants to remain in Iraq indefnitely and admits that he is like a fish out of water when it comes to the economy has a business as usual agenda that may be confused with the baby Bush agenda.  This kind of non-thinking can deliver us back to Hooverville.

Mr. Obama on the other hand wants to assist these trusting citizens.  Again he stressed his plan for health care and his plan for restoring a crumbling economy.  He let it be known that he would represent all of the people and not special interest groups.  Mr. Obama also wants better treatment of our military especially when they return home.  Calling for better pay for public school teachers, education is also an important item on his change America agenda.

We really don’t know what Hillary’s position is because she is too busy trying to dig herself out of her Bosnia lie, oops, I mean embellishment.  James Carville referring to New Mexico Governor Bill Richardson as a Judas for exercising his constitutional right to endorse Mr. Obama; Bill Clinton accusing Mr. Obma of picking on his wife which if true is better than what he himself did to her during that whole Monica Lewisky scandal; as well as Hillary’s continual assault on Reverend Jeremiah Wright seems to be the Clinton you can’t believe a word that I say becuase I will do and say anything to win and if I can’t win I won’t let Mr. Obama win agenda. 

The half minute sound byte played over and over again of the controversial statements spoken by Reverend Wright has served its purpose in making white Americans uncomfortable with Mr. Obama.  Denoucing the words where not enough for some.  Because he did not do what they expected and kick his former pastor and spiritual adviser under the bus, they now ponder whether he agrees with the controversial statements. 

A few responsible journalist thought it fair to hear the sermon in its’ entirety before condeming Reverend Wright and Barack Obama.  In doing so Roland Martin found that Reverend Wright was quoting Edward Peck, the former U.S. Ambassador to Iraq, and deputy director to President Reagan terroism task force who was speaking on record to the usual suspects.

Please click below to access the article written by Roland Martin.  At the bottom of his article, you will be able to play the sermon and will see how it was taken out of context. 

It’s the same ole shickady just a different butt hole.

THE FULL STORY BEHIND REV. JEREMIAH WRIGHTS’ 911 SERMON

 

 

 

Posted 2 years, 5 months ago at 6:28 pm. Add a comment

Jeremiah A. Wright’s Side Of The Story

Subject: Letter to New York Times Reporter from Rev. Dr. Jeremiah A. Wright

March 11, 2007
Jodi Kantor
The New York Times
9 West 43rd Street
New York ,
New York 10036-3959
Dear Jodi:
Thank you for engaging in one of the biggest misrepresentations of the truth I have ever seen in sixty-five years. You sat and shared with me for two hours. You told me you were doing a “Spiritual Biography” of Senator Barack Obama. For two hours, I shared with you how I thought he was the most principled individual in public service that I have ever met.
For two hours, I talked with you about how idealistic he was. For two hours I shared with you what a genuine human being he was. I told you how incredible he was as a man who was an African American in public service, and as a man who refused to announce his candidacy for President until Carol Moseley Braun indicated one way or the other whether or not she was going to run.
I told you what a dreamer he was. I told you how idealistic he was. We talked about how refreshing it would be for someone who knew about Islam to be in the Oval Office. Your own question to me was, Didn’t I think it would be incredible to have somebody in the Oval Office who not only knew about Muslims, but had living and breathing Muslims in his own family? I told you how important it would be to have a man who not only knew the difference between Shiites and Sunnis prior to 9/11/01 in the Oval Office, but also how important it would be to have a man who knew what Sufism was; a man who understood that there were different branches of Judaism; a man who knew the difference between Hasidic Jews, Orthodox Jews, Conservative Jews and Reformed Jews; and a man who was a devout Christian, but who did not prejudge others because they believed something other than what he believed.
I talked about how rare it was to meet a man whose Christianity was not just “in word only.”  I talked about Barack being a person who lived his faith and did not argue his faith. I talked about Barack as a person who did not draw doctrinal lines in the sand nor consign other people to hell if they did not believe what he believed.
Out of a two-hour conversation with you about Barack’s spiritual journey and my protesting to you that I had not shaped him nor formed him, that I had not mentored him or made him the man he was, even though I would love to take that credit, you did not print any of that. When I told you, using one of your own Jewish stories from the Hebrew Bible as to how God asked Moses, “What is that in your hand?,” that Barack was like that when I met him. Barack had it “in his hand.” Barack had in his grasp a uniqueness in terms of his spiritual development that one is hard put to find in the 21st century, and you did not print that.
As I was just starting to say a moment ago, Jodi, out of two hours of conversation I spent approximately five to seven minutes on Barack’s taking advice from one of his trusted campaign people and deeming it unwise to make me the media spotlight on the day of his announcing his candidacy for the Presidency and what do you print? You and your editor proceeded to present to the general public a snippet, a printed “sound byte” and a titillating and tantalizing article about his disinviting me to the Invocation on the day of his announcing his candidacy.
I have never been exposed to that kind of duplicitous behavior before, and I want to write you publicly to let you know that I do not approve of it and will not be party to any further smearing of the name, the reputation, the integrity or the character of perhaps this nation’s first (and maybe even only) honest candidate offering himself for public service as the person to occupy the Oval Office.
Your editor is a sensationalist. For you to even mention that makes me doubt your credibility, and I am looking forward to see how you are going to butcher what else I had to say concerning Senator Obama’s “Spiritual Biography.” Our Conference Minister, the Reverend Jane Fisler Hoffman, a white woman who belongs to a Black church that Hannity of “Hannity and Colmes” is trying to trash, set the record straight for you in terms of who I am and in terms of who we are as the church to which Barack has belonged for over twenty years.
The president of our denomination, the Reverend John Thomas, has offered to try to help you clarify in your confused head what Trinity Church is even though you spent the entire weekend with us setting me up to interview me for what turned out to be a smear of the Senator; and yet The New York Times continues to roll on making the truth what it wants to be the truth. I do not remember reading in your article that Barack had apologized for listening to that bad information and bad advice. Did I miss it? Or did your editor cut it out? Either way, you do not have to worry about hearing anything else from me for you to edit or “spin” because you are more interested in journalism than in truth.
Forgive me for having a momentary lapse. I forgot that The New York Times was leading the bandwagon in trumpeting why it is we should have gone into an illegal war. The New York Times became George Bush and the Republican Party’s national “blog.”  The New York Times played a role in the outing of Valerie Plame. I do not know why I thought The New York Times had actually repented and was going to exhibit a different kind of behavior.
Maybe it was my faith in the Jewish Holy Day of Roshashana.  Maybe it was my being caught up in the euphoria of the Season of Lent; but whatever it is or was, I was sadly mistaken. There is no repentance on the part of The New York Times. There is no integrity when it comes to The Times. You should do well with that paper, Jodi. You looked me straight in my face and told me a lie!
Sincerely and respectfully yours,
Reverend Jeremiah A. Wright, Jr. ,
Senior Pastor
Trinity United Church of Christ

Posted 2 years, 5 months ago at 1:12 pm. Add a comment

SAM CURTIS: THE SAME OLE SCHICKADY

Patriotism According To The Fox In The Hen House


On Tuesday March 18, 2008, Barack Obama gave a memorable speech regarding race in America.   The speech came as a result of some fiery sermons delivered by Reverend Jeremiah Wright, Obama’s minister and spiritual adviser.


On the Friday before the week of Obama’s speech The U. S. Federal Reserve pledged a record $30 billion in taxpayers money to guarantee Bear Stearns assets while struggling homeowners who are tax payers and who are also at the core of this financial crisis default on their mortgages.   The media’s focus was on Jeremiah Wright’s sermons.   


Serious comments were zeroed in on Reverend Wright’s allegations as to the Federal Governments participation in infecting the Black community with the HIV virus.  It has been entitled the conspiracy theory, and is felt by many outside of the Black community to be without merit.  The usual suspects vehemently shout from their fair and balance bow tie wearing airwaves to the high heavens that it is not only without merit, but also is anti-American and/or unpatriotic.  Their rhetoric continues in the aftermath of the Obama Race In America speech.


While the usual suspects continues the full court press, responsible journalist and politicians are now properly focusing on this financial debacle.  Focus is necessitated since this bailout dwarfs the $3.6 billion deal the Feds brokered in bailing out hedge fund Long-Term Capital Management.   Those pre 9/11 funds came from a consortium of banks rather than taxpayers pockets.


The Fed’s who gave its’ blessings on Sunday March 16, 2008 to JP Morgan’s plan to buy Bears Stearns for $2 per share- a snippet of the stocks worth on that Friday’s trading contends that it would not have been in the best interest of the country to sit idle and permit Bear Stearns collapse.  In the Feds opinion it was necessary to throw a lifeline to the fifth largest U.S. Investment Bank whose collapse would have the potential of dragging down other financial firms.  Although this lifeline could cost the taxpayers who would be on the hook for billion of worthless securities should Bear Stearns assets lose value, the Feds presume that a collapsing financial firm poses more of a serious imminent threat to the U.S. economy than struggling homeowners who are facing foreclosure.


Despite the Governments contentions, as to why it is providing this record bailout at taxpayers’ expense, it is now facing some pointed criticism. 


Texas U.S. Representative Ron Paul a recent Presidential contender and a vocal critic of the Fed, said the latest steps smacked of panic and would pile more pressure on the downtrodden U.S. dollar, inflicting added pain on taxpayers already struggling to cope with rising inflation.  “To me, it’s an immoral act. It’s deceitful and it’s stealing from the people who saved money. It should be unconstitutional because technically they have never been given direct authority to create money out of thin air,”


Could Representative Paul be accusing our Government of printing money and stealing from the citizens it is sworn to represent and protect?


If so, what would be his factual basis of accusing a Government who lied about weapons of mass destruction to justify the invasion of oil rich Iraq?  What would be his factual basis of accusing a Government who is now at war in Iraq, a war costing us billions of dollars per day, a war that is being financed by borrowing from the Chinese government?  You know, the people who are now killing peaceful protesters in Tibet; the people who put lead in our children’s toys, the people who put poison in our dog food without a flinch from our government which is supposedly based on democracy and not greed.


No one is accusing Representative Paul of being anti- American and/ or unpatriotic.   In fact we would and should expect this kind of criticism from the Representative as well as other U.S. citizens including Reverend Jeremiah Wright.


Reverend Wrights’ HIV allegations have long been accepted as more than possible in the Black community and with good reasons.


Remember the Tuskegee Experiments?  No this was not an experiment to see if black men could fly airplanes during WWII.


The Tuskegee Experiments, also known as the Tuskegee Syphilis Study, was clinical study conducted between 1932 and 1972 in Tuskegee Alabama in which 400 poor illiterate sharecroppers were denied treatment for syphilis.  These individuals plus 200 in a controlled group without syphilis did not give informed consent. and were not told of their diagnosis.   Instead, they were told that they had bad blood and could receive free medical treatment, free rides to the clinic meals and death insurance in case death in return to their participation.


In 1932, when the study started, syphilis, a sexually transmitted disease frequently led to a chronic, painful and fatal multi-system disease.  Treatment for syphilis at that time was toxic, dangerous and of questionable effectiveness.  Therefore the goal of the study was to determine if patients were better off not being treated with the toxic remedies. 


By 1947, penicillin had become the standard treatment of syphilis.  Rather than treat all the subjects having the disease with penicillin, and closing the study, the researchers withheld the penicillin and information about such treatment and proceeded to use the subjects to study how the disease would spread and kill.   It should be noted that the subjects were also prevented from accessing treatment programs that were available to others in the area.  The study continued until 1972 when a leak to the press resulted in its termination. 


As we can see, both men have good reasons for their criticism of our Government.  The only difference between these two men is Ron Paul is a white elected official and Reverend Wright is a black private citizen.   Our Constitution does not confer its rights based on race.  Therefore each man has the right to express his opinions about Government actions without regard to race.  After all the Government belong to all the people, and not just a select few.


This is what Barack Obama’s campaign is about.  Obama wants to take our Government away from the special interest groups and give it back to the citizens.  Barack Obama wants to represent all the people regardless of race creed, gender and sexual preference. 


If elected Obama will upset the apple cart, and change the status quo.  Those few who profit off the status quo, does so at the expense of the citizens.  The mortgage crisis is a prime example of such profiteering.  Bears Stearns and other financial institutions’ personal greed overpowered safe sound financial decisions.  Citizens who are also customers of these financial institutions depend on the executives who are paid exuberant salaries to make safe sound decisions with their investment money.   Yet this was not done.  Now we have many citizens being foreclosed on, and many citizens who will lose their life savings.  Bear Stearns is now being bailed out at taxpayers’ expense, the same taxpayers who face becoming homeless, the same taxpayers who will be stuck with billions of worthless securities if Bears Stearns assets should lose value.


The usual suspects who disguise themselves as journalist so that they can fit comfortably under the “without malice umbrella”, maliciously brainwash some of these poor souls into thinking that their problems lie with the Mexican who comes across the border to pick fruit so that he can feed his family, or with Blacks who they feel get special treatment at the white populations expense because they are black.  The subjects of the Tuskegee Experiments and their families were not given special treatment at the expense of white citizens because they were black.  They of course was taken advantage of and used like guinea pigs because they were black.  The white citizens who are just as susceptible to syphilis benefited from the study.   Reverend Wright who has lived through this and similar atrocities used his sermon to remind his African American congregation, that such has happened, can and perhaps has happened again.   Reverend Wright has done no more than what a Rabbi might do when speaking of the Holocaust. 


The usual suspects don’t speak to this.  Never is the blame placed where it should be placed.  To do so would put them out of business.  Yes, they make millions off of their hate baiting rhetoric.  They are no more than foxes in the hen house and should be treated as such.   This is what will happen if Obama is given the opportunity to unite the country.

Unite we must in order to preserve the union and move forward.  If not we will be a chaotic nation living in the streets while the status quo including the usual suspects live comfortably off the misfortunes they have created for us in the name of greed. 


Focus on the true issues that plague our nation.  It is still the economy stupid.  Don’t buy into the propaganda being peddled by the usual suspects.  It’s the same old schickady just a different butt hole.  


 

Posted 2 years, 5 months ago at 7:38 am. 1 comment