Glenn Ford has always told the truth about Black politicians, as uncomfortable
as that truth might be. I heard part of that video of the meeting with Biden to
which he refers in this article. The Intercept had it. And then there was an
opportunity to hear the entire meeting, but it was too long and too painful to
listen to. I remember, several years after Obama had been elected, talking to
an older African American woman who lived near me in Westbury. I had become
completely disenchanted by Obama by then, for many reasons. One of them was his
indifference to the plight of the poor and working class black people who had
voted for him. But she was still enamoured with him. To her, he was the Black
savior for her people. Glenn Ford may not want to admit to himself that the
majority of the black population is as manipulated as is the majority of the
white population. They saved Biden's candidacy, regardless of his political
history. They listened to that "misleadership class".
Miriam
-----Original Message-----
From: blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx
<blind-democracy-bounce@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> On Behalf Of Roger Loran Bailey
(Redacted sender "rogerbailey81" for DMARC)
Sent: Saturday, January 16, 2021 11:06 AM
To: blind-democracy <blind-democracy@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
Subject: [blind-democracy] You Can’t Shame the Shameless Black Misleadership
Class
You Can’t Shame the Shameless Black Misleadership Class
https://socialistaction.org/2021/01/11/you-cant-shame-the-shameless-black-misleadership-class/
January 11, 2021
By Glen Ford, Dec. 17, 2020
The Black misleaders have been busy selling out Black people for half a
century, but are still only barely tolerated by the rich man’s Democratic Party
and its racist figurehead, Joe Biden.
“The Black misleaders have no bite and have not even dared to bark in half a
century.”
The Black Misleadership Class continues its descent into utter political
irrelevance, dragging 48 million African Americans ever deeper into the abyss
with them. Like a soap opera whose central pathologies endure through decades
of changing casts of characters, the misleaders cling to their demeaning
subservience to the Democratic Party in hopes of one day becoming honored and
respected partners. The Black supplicants are always betrayed, of course, but
prefer a bad marriage to no relationship at all. Indeed, the Black misleaders
and the Democrats have been locked in what Malcolm X would describe as a house
Negro/slave master relationship for so long – certainly since the late Sixties
– that the Black junior partner knows no other way to behave.
In the latest installment of “The Black and the Powerless,” the usual gaggle of
national Black civic organizations are awarded a closed-door meeting with their
love-object, president-elect Joe Biden. The civic leaders respectfully
requested that the Party protect the voting rights of its most loyal
constituency, and use the powers of the executive branch to curtail the police
violence that has plagued the Black community since the days of the
slave-disciplining “paddy-rollers” – in addition to their perennial concern
that more Black faces be elevated to high places in the new administration.
However, as senior editor Margaret Kimberley recounts in a recent issue of
Black Agenda Report, Biden immediately put the house Negroes in their place:
“In a loud voice and in the manner of a bullying boss Biden dashed any hopes
that he would use executive orders to enact policies that he can’t get passed
because of Republican congressional opposition. He accused Melanie Campbell of
the National Coalition on Black Civic Participation, of not reading his policy
paper because she disagreed with him. He was vehement about not using the power
of executive orders to thwart congressional Republicans and claimed concerns
about constitutionality as an excuse for doing as little as he possibly can.”
“Biden immediately put the house Negroes in their place.”
As Margaret Kimberley observed, it is unclear who leaked the Zoom meeting –
either one of the Black participants or Biden, himself, to demonstrate his
eagerness to put the Black notables in their place and warn them not to
encourage Black Lives Matter’s demand to de-fund the police. “We’re not,” said
the Great Incarcerator, ruling out any rollback of the cops. “We’re talking
about holding them accountable.
We’re talking about giving them money to do the right things.”
Melanie Campbell, president of the National Coalition on Black Civic
Participation (NCBCP) and convener of the Black Women’s Roundtable, wrote the
letter that requested the lopsided confab, which included NAACP President
Derrick Johnson; former Department of Justice Civil Rights Division leader
Vanita Gupta; National Action Network founder Rev. Al Sharpton; Sherrilyn
Ifill, NAACP Legal Defense Fund; Marc Morial, president of the National Urban
League; Kristen Clarke, executive director of the National Lawyers’ Committee
for Civil Rights Under Law; and New Orleans congressman Cedric Richmond, who
will serve Biden as director of the White House Office of Public Engagement .
Clearly, Biden was not impressed by these would-be power brokers, knowing that
the Black misleaders have no bite and have not even dared to bark in the half a
centurysince they collaborated in shutting down the Black Liberation Movement
to become operatives of the rich man’s duopoly. In the 21st century, the
misleaders have so debased themselves at the feet of Democratic power, it is
impossible for the Party’s leaders to pretend they represent a constituency
beyond their own dark faces.
“Biden was not impressed by these would-be power brokers.”
The Party has long understood that the Black civic organizations – having no
mass movement behind them – need the Democrats more than the Party needs them.
Back in 2004, during the Kerry-Bush presidential contest, the Democrats
humiliated and defunded the whole Black civic society menagerie, cutting them
out of the seasonal get-out-the-vote money that many had grown dependent upon
for operating expenses — as well as to maintain the illusion of a Black
partnership with Power. As I reported for The Black Commentator in “Black
Anger, White Money: A Crisis for Black Leadership,” Democratic fat cats like
George Soros decided that the money men who subsidized the Party could jettison
the Black civic nuisances at no political cost.Operating through so-called
“527” outfits and paying “$8 to $12 an hour for door-to-door canvassers,” the
white Democratic billionaires “supplanted (usurped might be a better word) the
electoral functions previously performed by mainstream Black organizations such
as the 84-member National Coalition on Black Civic Participation (NCBCP).”
“Democratic fat cats decided that the money men could jettison the Black civic
nuisances at no political cost.”
Unceremoniously dumped and defunded at the height of the (losing) campaign, the
so-called “civil rights community” nonetheless continued to beg for a mission
that would make them seem important to their political masters.
“It’s insulting that none of us who have been responsible for most registration
and turnout are at the table determining priorities,” said Rev. Jesse Jackson,
Sr., of Rainbow/PUSH Coalition. NCBCP executive director Melanie L. Campbell
declared, “There is something wrong when groups who have closed the gap on
enfranchisement with our track record and our history of protecting the vote
are not getting funding.” The late Professor Ron Walters, a board member of
NCBCP, sensed that the Democrats saw Black civic organizations as more of a
burden than an asset. “There appears to be a dedicated campaign by the party
leadership, the Kerry campaign and now ancillary funding organizations to build
some political distance between themselves and key traditional leaders of the
party base,” said Walters.
Sixteen years later, the “civil rights” community are singing the same tired
song, still desperate to justify their status as a barely tolerated annex of a
rich white man’s party.
The next year, 2005, Hurricane Katrina struck New Orleans, scattering
two-hundred thousand Black residents to the four winds. Fearing that a
too-close association with Black people would hurt the Democrats’
chances to recapture the U.S. House in 2006, Party leader Nancy Pelosi refused
to hold hearings on the catastrophe and barred Black Democratic congresspersons
from attending Republican hearings on Katrina. As I wrote in The Black
Commentator article “Katrina Shock: Therapy for Black America ”:
“Only Georgia congresswoman Cynthia McKinney broke the Pelosi-invoked boycott.
She attended every session, and made good use of the experience, challenging
the administration’s witnesses every step of the way. The rest of the Black
Caucus abstained from the hearings except for the occasional appearance of New
Orleans Black Rep. William Jefferson, who, as a representative of the affected
region, was given a pass by Pelosi.”
“Nancy Pelosi refused to hold hearings on the catastrophe and barred Black
Democratic congresspersons from attending Republican hearings on Katrina.”
The Black Caucus has never – and should never – recover any vestige of dignity
after putting the Democratic Party ahead of hundreds of thousands of poor and
exiled Black people. They are still kissing Pelosi’s butt and draping her with
kente cloth. Shameless and worthless, the vast bulk of the Black Caucus are
totally in sync with their new leader’s racist politics and will not have to
pretend to be soulmates with Old White Joe. In 2014, 80 percent of the Black
Caucus voted to continue the Pentagon program to arm local police departments
to the teeth, and in 2018 three out of four Blacks in the House supported
making cops a “protected class.” They hate Black Lives Matter and its “defund
the police” demand as much as Biden does, and have no solidarity with anyone
except their own grasping, self-centered, hustling class.
The only solution is an independent, people-centered movement.
Glen Ford, Black Agenda Report Executive Editor can be contacted at
Glen.Ford@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
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George H. Smith “It is my firm conviction that man has nothing to gain,
emotionally or otherwise, by adhering to a falsehood, regardless of how
comfortable or sacred that falsehood may appear. Anyone who claims, on
the one hand, that he is concerned with human welfare, and who demands,
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reason. To advocate irrationality is to advocate that which is
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