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As I listen to the pundits pontificate about the stark differences offered by the candidates in the upcoming election, I am struck by what might be a marginalization of Black voters by the Democrats.
While the past election saw Black voters, conservative and liberal, vote for Barack Obama en bloc, the upcoming election does not have any standout racial component.
As in most of the elections of the past fifty or so years, the Democrats do not have a chance in the upcoming election without an en bloc vote in their favor by the nation's Black voters.
The problem is that the Black community has been disproportionally affected by the economic problems faced by all. And the Democrats have been in charge of their economic fate, to the extent that government can be, since Lyndon Johnson was President.
They have been promised the world by the Democrat Party and have received more charitable help than any other minority or special interest, but all that help has not taken the form where many in that community were introduced to the freeing independence of economic self-sufficiency.
The liberals and the "progressives," locked into their anti-capitalist agenda, never considered that the best way out of dependency and poverty is through economic opportunity. There are exceptions, to be sure, but the Democrat helping hand of charity was never aimed at stimulating economic independence, entrepreneurship or business development.
Now it seems like we are going to hear from the NAACP that the grass roots Tea Party is somehow racist and holding the Black community down. This is supposed to stimulate the Black community to vote in a couple of weeks to keep the Democrats in power.
I believe it is time for all voters to vote economic interests this election, but none need to do so more than the Black community. The real economic interests of the Black community are fully aligned with those of the Tea Party and some exceptional leaders in the Black community are doing their best to make sure their community knows why. I'll offer one comment below, but there are many more voices of reason that can be referenced.
While some will never give up their interest in playing the race card, it is time for everyone else to reject the racism of leftist groups like the NAACP.
While the past election saw Black voters, conservative and liberal, vote for Barack Obama en bloc, the upcoming election does not have any standout racial component.
As in most of the elections of the past fifty or so years, the Democrats do not have a chance in the upcoming election without an en bloc vote in their favor by the nation's Black voters.
The problem is that the Black community has been disproportionally affected by the economic problems faced by all. And the Democrats have been in charge of their economic fate, to the extent that government can be, since Lyndon Johnson was President.
They have been promised the world by the Democrat Party and have received more charitable help than any other minority or special interest, but all that help has not taken the form where many in that community were introduced to the freeing independence of economic self-sufficiency.
The liberals and the "progressives," locked into their anti-capitalist agenda, never considered that the best way out of dependency and poverty is through economic opportunity. There are exceptions, to be sure, but the Democrat helping hand of charity was never aimed at stimulating economic independence, entrepreneurship or business development.
Now it seems like we are going to hear from the NAACP that the grass roots Tea Party is somehow racist and holding the Black community down. This is supposed to stimulate the Black community to vote in a couple of weeks to keep the Democrats in power.
I believe it is time for all voters to vote economic interests this election, but none need to do so more than the Black community. The real economic interests of the Black community are fully aligned with those of the Tea Party and some exceptional leaders in the Black community are doing their best to make sure their community knows why. I'll offer one comment below, but there are many more voices of reason that can be referenced.
While some will never give up their interest in playing the race card, it is time for everyone else to reject the racism of leftist groups like the NAACP.
NAACP’s Attack on the Tea Party Movement Is A Betrayal of Its Mission to Uplift Black America
by Niger Innis
October 20, 2010
Niger Innis currently serves as the national spokesman for the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE). His father, Roy Innis, has been National Director of CORE since 1968. He works closely with the National Chairman and represents CORE across the country. In additional being a national advisory council member of Project 21, Innis is a founding member of 3rd Millennium, an organization promoting young leaders who will focus on the problems facing the next generation. He is also an advisory board member of the Alliance for Marriage. Niger has appeared on CNN, Fox News, CNBC's Equal Time, and Bill Maher's Politically Incorrect. Innis is a graduate of Georgetown University. Born and raised in Harlem, New York, he currently lives in Westchester, New York.
This morning I had the opportunity to listen to a NAACP conference call that was organized to release its report highlighting alleged (yet unproven) Tea Party ties to racist groups. This conference call, report, and website reminded me very much of the quote from Shakespeare’s Macbeth, “A tale told by an idiot, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing.”
What was reiterated on the call by the NAACP and it’s minion of “progressive” allies was the same old, unproven, nonsensical charges against the strongest modern grass-roots movement in decades.
“The Tea Party used the N word against a Black Congressmen during the Healthcare Debate.” Indeed Ben Jealous, CEO of the NAACP had the audacity to reload this charge in spite of Andrew Breitbart’s $100,000.00 challenge to anybody that could document the occurrence and in spite of the Tea Party Federation’s unanswered challenge to the Congressional Black Caucus to have a joint investigation of the phony incident.
The most illuminating part of the call came when “progressive” ally, Larry Cohen of the CWA (Communication Workers of America) revealed the real agenda of the attacks on the Tea Party by the Left, “We disagree with the agenda of the tea party Movement… They advocate slavery,” and this classic gem, “We don’t need 19th century capitalism.”
What this potpourri of “progressive” groups are really trying to do is inspire an uninspired liberal base of voters, days before the predicted November election bloodletting.
Over the past month, President Obama has also been putting a full court press on African Americans to turn out to vote in this mid-term election. Not surprisingly, mainstream media writers are puzzled by the muffled response from what is viewed as the President’s core constituency.
The answer can be found in one number - 49%. That is the unemployment rate for black teens.
It is one thing to talk about empowerment, and quite another to deliver it. And the legacy of the Reid/Pelosi leadership in Congress which has been embraced by President Obama is that young black people have no hope of finding work. Parents know that when their kids can’t find an honest job, all too often the temptation is to make money with one that is not as honest. That is nothing but the furthering of the cycle of poverty which continues to plague the African American community in our nation.
Reid, Pelosi, and Obama cannot shift the blame for the painful fact that half of all young African Americans who want a job cannot find one. It is their policy decision to increase the minimum wage which is directly responsible for it.
Even former Clinton pollster Doug Schoen identifies the Pelosi/Reid minimum wage law as causing dangerously high unemployment among African American teens in a recent column in the Huffington Post.
Is it any wonder why African Americans are questioning why we should enthusiastically support the failed and disastrous economic policies of Barack Obama, Harry Reid, and Nancy Pelosi?
Unfortunately, the self-appointed spokesmen for blacks, the NAACP, doesn’t view 49% unemployment among black teens as a civil rights issue, instead in their partisan zeal, they have become little more than a GOTV arm of the Democratic Party. In their dying gasps of attempted influence, the NAACP is trying to create a climate of fear in the black community this election season by pushing false visions of white sheeted tea partiers taking over America. Desperate to regain relevance, they use 1960’s imagery to an audience that for the most part hasn’t seen it, lived it and doesn’t buy into it. Most African Americans have very familiar wants: safe neighborhoods to live in, a job, educational opportunities, and most importantly, a strong economic future for their children. Instead, the NAACP is attempting to hand us outdated platitudes that play on the basest of fears.
If the NAACP were anything more than a partisan shill, they would be leading rallies across America demanding that the minimum wage be lowered. Professor David Neumark of the University of California at Irvine has found that for every 10% the minimum wage is raised, minority teen unemployment increases by 6.6%. Obama, Reid, and Pelosi raised the minimum wage by more than 40% in January 2007, and black teen unemployment skyrocketed from a still too high – 29.1% to 49% this past month.
The ultimate irony is that House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer crowed at the time of passage that, “Dr. King once said: ‘Equality means dignity. And dignity demands a job and a paycheck that lasts through the week.’ Today, we heed those words.”
Four years later, I repeat back these words to Mr. Hoyer, “Dignity demands a job.” The ill-advised minimum wage increase has stripped that very dignity from young African Americans, and now these very same Democrats have the arrogance to ask blacks to come to their rescue.
Is it any surprise that African Americans are resisting the same old scare tactics, and instead are questioning whether the promises of the left are really anymore than chains of dependency. By virtually ignoring unemployment horrors among black teens occurring on the ruling party’s watch and not holding them accountable, the NAACP is betraying its mission and constituents.
If I were Obama, Reid, Pelosi, and Hoyer, I wouldn’t look to the minority communities to throw me a life preserver this November. After all, we are already paddling as hard as we can to keep ourselves afloat under the weight of their misguided policies.
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