FBI and Reporters Team to Solve Murders during Civil Rights Era

It is not often that we can look at the Martin Luther King Jr. celebration within the context of crime. However, there still are many unsolved murders that occurred during the civil rights era that remain. In 2007, the FBI presented a list of unsolved civil rights murders that they were going to re-open and investigate.

In fact, they have released the names of some of the victims of murders that occurred before 1969. This includes more than 100 unsolved murder cases are under review through the Civil Rights Era Cold Case Initiative, a 2007 partnership between the FBI, civil rights groups, and federal, state and local law enforcement agencies. 

At the end of last year, The FBI reopened investigations into three more Alabama slayings from the 1960s, including one case involving a former state trooper charged in 2007 with another civil-rights era murder.

The cases included the May 1966 killing of a black motorist at the Alabaster police station by James Bonard Fowler, the former trooper charged in 2007 with two counts of murder in the 1965 shooting of Jimmie Lee Jackson in Marion and the September 1963 shooting by Birmingham police officer Jack Parker of a black teenager on the day of the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church bombing.

Now a writer for a small Louisiana Newspaper has revealed information that may lead to the arrest and conviction in the arson/murder of Frank Morris on December 10, 1964 in Ferriday, LA.  Morris was a business owner who allegedly was the target of the Ku Klux Klan. Stanley Nelson, a writer for the Concordia Sentinel has uncovered that a Richland Parish truck driver who was a member of the Ku Klux Klan told them he participated in the arson that killed Frank Morris. In total, three people including the suspects’ son and truck drivers former wife have provided credible eyewitness report s that placed the truck driver at the scene of the arson when the fire was ignited more than 46 years ago. The suspect,  Arthur Leonard Spencer, 71, of Rayville.  Has yet to be charged but is expected to be targeted by FBI soon.

Herman Cain Will Never Get Serious Consideration from Blacks on Democratic Plantation

I am a proud graduate of Morehouse College. I am among a distinguished group of alumni who include Martin Luther King, Jr., Edwin Moses, Spike Lee, Samuel Jackson, Maynard Jackson and current Republican Presidential Candidate Herman Cain. It is unfortunately, most African Americans will not give Cain any objective consideration simply because he is a member of the Republican party. This confuses me and is also an issue of consternation when we look at the history of African Americans.

Cain, the former Godfather’s Pizza CEO, once served as a Federal Reserve Bank chairman in Kansas City, takes heat from the Republicans establishment just as much as the general black community, including former Bush adviser Karl Rove and conservative columnist Charles Krauthammer who said his campaign was all about “entertainment.”

Although a long shot and the fact that many consider Barack Obama, America's first African American president, Cain if elected would be really the first black president into office. This is not about his skin color, but rather his experience. His experiences and history of a robbed heritage, more akin to most African Americans that that of President Obama. Obama can speak of his lineage to Kenya through his father and Ireland through his mother. Most African Americans cannot trace their family history to any specific person, time or place in Africa.
Cain, the son of a chauffeur and a domestic worker in Georgia, graduated from Morehouse College with a degree in mathematics, and he earned a master’s degree at Purdue before joining the Navy. His rise in the corporate world started first at Coca-Cola and then at the Pillsbury Company, where he was an executive overseeing Burger King and chief executive at Godfather’s Pizza.

At 65, Mr. Cain, platform will push for new energy policies to make the United States less dependent on foreign oil. In a recent interview he said, "My great, great grandparents were slaves, and now I'm running for president of the United States of America," he says later. "Is this a great country or what?" He also upset many Tea Party supporters when he stated that African Americans are too poor to tea party. “They can't afford to," Cain said. "So I think the first reason is economics. If you just look at the sheer economics of it. If you look at the typical income of a black family of four it's going to be lower than a non-black or white family of four," he explained.

Now I am a libertarian and see no big difference between democorats or republicans inside thebeltway. My reality is that Cain’s experiences is closer to mine than Obama. Most do not know that it was democrats that fought against integration, both in the North and South. That it were the "Democrat-controlled state legislatures in the South that placed the Confederate battle flag on their state capitol flags." That the democrats founded the KKK (the first Grand Wizard of KKK- Nathan Bedford Forrest was honored at Democratic National Convention of 1868) and the Council of Conservative Citizens. That no democrat voted for the 14th amendment and that then Senator John F. Kennedy – with an eye on the Democrat presidential nomination for 1960 – voted against the Civil Rights Act of 1957.

Cain has no chance because African American myopia will vote for anyone who is a democrat without out question. Sad fact is democrats are happy to see blacks ask the government to do for them because they will not have to and take the black vote for granted. The way I see it, democrats are like Church’s Fried Chicken and the Republicans are Ruth Crisp. Democrats will sell us foods that kill us and set up shop throughout our communities. We accept without question for that is reality on any plantation, democratic or republican.

The Tea (Total Extermination of Aliens) Party

If one listens carefully, what is said is often not what is meant. I have come to this conclusion with respect to the ubiquitous Tea Party movement. Sure, pundits and the like would assert that it is a movement aimed at pointing out that people are taxed enough already, but I would disagree. If such was the case they would have reared their ugly head earlier for example, during the first G.W. Bush administration but they did not. Instead they waited until it was evident that a man of color without a traditional European name was elected president of these United States of America.

Even if one accepts the conditional that the origin of the Tea party returns one to the colonial roots of America, it does not past the smell test, historically that is. For their presence in North America began with conquest through violence and disease and a sort of self-righteousness that began with the likes of Christopher Columbus, Hernando Desoto, Bartholomew de la Casa and General Amherst.

Everywhere in the new world the descendants of the Tea party touched,overwhelmingly ended in destruction, death and disease. This is their true order, not taxes. Research supports the contention that the Tainos people living on Espanola when Columbus first arrived number near 8 million but 20 and 50 years later they were down to 28,000 and 200 accordingly. Most of which died from disease brought from Europe and the intentional slaughter by the ones who called themselves conquers. The same is true for the Carib of what we now call St. Kitts, where in 1626 English and French soldiers backed 4,000 into a deep ravine, now called Bloody Point where they were brutally slaughtered and killed.

Such actions are those of individuals afraid of anything different and reflecta collective emptiness in one that parades the conscription that one culture is superior and better than the other. This is the central tenant of the present day Tea party. The representation of culture that hunts for sport and not survival, which live by the concept that nobility, is defined as being the conqueror. Even as late as 1893, when Queen Lili’uokalani was overthrown by US military might and made to give her kingdom of Hawaii to United States, this practice defined this premise and continues presently.

Even their hero’s from Ronald Reagan to David Crockett are suggested as such mainly because of this psychopathy and belief orientation. After all, the battle against Mexico and Santa Anna for the Alamo was really a quest, based on fact to take Texas from Mexico to institute slavery in the state. But it can only be expected since they left a world of intolerance, disease, famine, greed and the plague. They used their good to justify the actions of folk like King Leopold of Belgium to bring Africans to do work they could not do or were too lazy to do for themselves. They made treaty after treaty after treaty with the people who were here before them they referred to as savages who taught them how to survive in their new and strange home. And with each treaty came more death, slaughter and murder, for with such it is easier to steal what is not theirs, fail to recant that one cannot discover what other already subsist upon.

Yes this is the history of the so-called Tea party. This is what is meant when they say they want to “take back America.” It is code for getting back to basics and their roots. They do not feel it is a nation for aliens – people from other nations who were here before they came. It is not a nation for men similar to Barack Obama who have names and skin colors they are uncomfortable with, or Mexicans, Muslims or Arabs as their vehement vitriol enunciates.

The tea party is not about taxes so do not let them fool you. They are no different than the sheep with new clothing. They live by the same credo of those they call terrorist but see themselves as being different even though in their history are of men that bomb churches and kill little girls while attending Sunday school. They are those that persist upon majority and mob rule, who send attack dogs on people and batter them with the force of water from hose. They say that the majority do not desire a Mosque near Ground Zero in New York; the same majority that did not want blacks to attend school with whites or have equal rights or the rights to vote. This is the Tea party. Throw away the “taxed enough already” for just as the Klan can become the Council of Conservative Christians, they really mean the “Total Extermination of Aliens” – period. For the reality for me is that I could not pick a current member of the Tea party out from one of the colonial era if they had sheets over their heads.

Neo-Nazis and Aryans Taking Over Where Tea Baggers Leave Off?

In this climate of the resurgence of hate and racism, America may be returning to its post-Civil War roots. The impetus is namely the excuse that America has its first president of African descent. There was a white pride march this past spring in downtown Jackson, Mich., whose goal was to “fight for the rights of whites.”

Although we have seen the rallies fostered by the Tea Baggers, there are even more substantially dreaded events scheduled to occur in the coming months. The Georgi-based League of the South has scheduled its 2010 national conference for the 8th and 9th of October at the Atlanta Airport Hilton. Founded in 1994, the League of the South is a neo-Confederate group that advocates for a second Southern secession and a society dominated by “European Americans.”

This Saturday, there will be an Aryan Nations rally at Gettysburg National Military Park. At this event, the members will be allowed to carry firearms on park grounds, under a new federal law that took effect in February. Gordon Young, who leads the Maryland chapter of the organization, has said the group intends to bring two rifles to "protect" the group's national director Paul Mullet. Young, the former head of the World Knights of the Ku Klux Klan, was recently arrested on a statutory rape charge.

In addition, just this week in Arizona, members of the Neo-Nazi National Socialist Movement led by J. T. Ready and Harry Hughes have started patrolling the Pinal County and Mexican border armed with assault rifles. Ready, who has a criminal record, was also court-martialed twice and kicked out of the U.S. Marine Corps.

This is a troubling period in America. While the fringe hate groups and political extremists in white America continue to spew vitriol, many African Americans remain unconcerned and uninformed of the threat that we actually may be facing. We have elected the first African American president in U.S. history, but it seems that after the inauguration, many of us have left Obama out to dry with our reduced activism and support after he was in office. Will we recognize these threats and become more involved beyond voting and maintain our political vigor, or will we define this historical outcome with our inactivity?

Post-Racial? More Like Pre-KKK

Most people don't know who Steve King is. And no, I am not talking about the writer of horror fiction. Congressman Steve King, R-Iowa, is a ranking member of the House Subcommittee on Immigration, Citizenship, Refugees, Border Security and International Law. He is considered by many to be either an extremist or a nut job. To me, his behavior is sadly comical and may even suggest the need for some sort of hospitalization, medication or both.

King, like Rep. Tom Tancredo, R-Colo., is an example of what is wrong with American politics and the festering infection called white supremacy that can lead to irrationalism.

Tancredo claimed in 2008 while addressing the Tea Party National Convention in Nashville, Tenn., that Obama would have not been elected president if America had literacy tests for voters. In the same vein, Rep. King appeared on G. Gordon Liddy’s talk show and asserted that Obama has a “default mechanism” that favors ”the black person.”

Now if any African American politician stated such, the claims of racism would be flying out the woodwork from the GOP and their supporters. But this is a common occurrence for King, who represents the 5th District of his state. Iowa, which has 600,000 people, is 99 percent white.

King has also been embroiled in a decision made to grant amnesty to Obama's aunt, Zeituni Onyango. Onyango was recently granted asylum by an immigration judge, overruling a previous judicial determination ordering her deportation. Congressman King thinks that she should have been deported.

Even prior to Obama’s election, King suggested that if Obama won, al-Qaida would be "dancing in the streets" more so than they did on Sept. 11, 2001.

Given his incendiary comments, it is no wonder he is held in high esteem by the likes of well-known klansman David Duke and the White Nationalist Council of Conservative Citizens.

King needs to be cautious with his rhetoric, given the increase in the number of hate groups in the United States.

It is obvious that the legacy of white supremacy and racism continues and that America is no more post-racial than it pre-KKK

The new white folk – us

In 1954, 0n may 17 The United States Supreme Court announced its unanimous decision regarding the historic Oliver Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, Kansas case. The case specifically targeted the doctrine of “separate but equal”. Thurgood marshall used social science to note the negative impact on the mental and psychological well being of African American students as well as the noted inferiority of the schools that African Americans were forced to attend. His purview was that such school segregation violated the Equal Protection and Due Process clauses of the Fourteenth Amendment. One significant point of evidence was evinced by Dr Kenneth Clark and his wife. Called the doll test, Dr. Clark showed how segregation impacts African American children. In his words:

"I presented these dolls to them and I asked them the following questions in the following order: "Show me the doll that you like best or that you'd like to play with," "Show me the doll that is the 'nice' doll," "Show me the doll that looks 'bad'," and then the following questions also: "Give me the doll that looks like a white child," "Give me the doll that looks like a colored child," "Give me the doll that looks like a Negro child," and "Give me the doll that looks like you." By Mr. Carter: Q. "Like you?" A. "Like you."

His results showed “that of the children between the ages of six and nine whom I tested, which were a total of sixteen in number, that ten of those children chose the white doll as their preference; the doll which they liked best. Ten of them also considered the white doll a "Nice" doll. And, I think you have to keep in mind that these two dolls are absolutely identical in every respect except skin color. Eleven of these sixteen children chose the brown doll as the doll which looked "bad." This is consistent with previous results which we have obtained testing over three hundred children, and we interpret it to mean that the Negro child accepts as early as six, seven or eight the negative stereotypes about his own group." This was a while back, a time before many of us were born, however there is a similar behavior however it is self directed.

It used to be that the forces of racism were the main culprits of the problems that many African American Currently, there are many trends in behavior that denote some of us are regressing. One such trend is young men calling themselves goons and thugs and gangsters and women calling them Barbie – a white doll. Now some have considered my presentation of such as petty, non-sensorial and even as bull shit. However I disagree. True it may be younger folk doing such but that does not abrogate my responsibility to point out what I perceive needs to be discussed.

It is as if one should not attended to unemployment just because they have a job; or not be concerned about high dropout rates among African American males because their son is graduating and going to college. I suggest that we have lost our way and that our behavior from self –hate, to being self absorbed and materialistic is akin to the manner in which white folks treated use decades past. They were the one that made us feel less than equal; they were the ones who used violence on us; they were the ones that made laws that made it a crime punishable by death to learn to read; they were the ones who considered black as vile and ugly. Not any more for today it is us. We make ourselves feel less if we don’t have certain material to define us; we sing about beating killing and shooting our own kind in popular music as if it is acceptable behavior and even parade it on television via videos and on the radio as if it proffers a benefit to our community; we no longer read and if we do in many cases it is about gossip and/or celebrity and now we proclaim ourselves to be representatives of white beauty, at least some of us with the use of fake hair and proclamations of the aforementioned. Why not Kendra, I mean the black doll has a name – or is it that even today – we associate with the white doll over the black one?

Even today what Dr. Clark noted still occurs. Now I don’t care nor am I trying to ruffle any feathers, however I will not separate myself from acknowledging or trying to openly discuss things that may be detriments to our community. It is sad that folks get defensive and prefer to attack the messenger than accept and think about problem solving. If we should have learned anything from Martin Luther King Jr., it should be tolerance of the opinions of others. He encouraged open discussion and the promulgation of thought as opposed to self-destruction when he wrote "A nation or civilization that continues to produce soft-minded men purchases its own spiritual death on the installment plan” and “An individual has not started living until he can rise above the narrow confines of his individualistic concerns to the broader concerns of all humanity." 459 years latter and we still got major problems folk and we too weak to accept, point out or even acknowledge them. And as such, we may as well put on them white robes for how are we any different from the KKK?

not post racial but rather neo-reconstructive

Now a while back I penned an essay called Negro comfortable up in here. The tractate expressed both my concerns and reservations of the various assumptions that folk, in particular African Americans, would develop as a function of having Barack Obama as the President of these United States of America. Prior to that I wrote two that expressed a comparative concern from the other extreme: From Tobe to Joe Six Pack and Red Rum. But outlined what the election of the first African American President would like yield in disposition for a large portion of WASPs.

I recant vividly the number of threats, even an anticipated terror plot being foiled by Secret Service and FBI with respect to a group in Kentucky. All the time as the home of dixicrats, the South rumbled about how his election would be a representation of socialism that would destroy America as it “used to be.” Now I took that for meaning several things which are not that important for they all focus on fear and privilege – even white privilege. Even on the top end, we have seen South Carolina Congressman Joe Wilson’s angry outburst, calling Obama a liar to his face (and a national audience). But what can one expect from a card carrying member of the Son’s of the Confederacy whose Confederate "Catechism” advocates:

"The preservation of liberty and freedom was the motivating factor in the South's decision to fight the Second American Revolution. The tenacity with which Confederate soldiers fought underscored their belief in the rights guaranteed by the Constitution. These attributes are the underpinning of our democratic society and represent the foundation on which this nation was built."

The current climate appears to be one on a continuum of two extremes. The first of which is one of elation, high expectations, balloon boys, Real House Wives of Atlanta and the BET hip hop awards. The next being one of White Student Unions forming at major Universities, Ministers praying for the death of Obama, Nazi symbols being cut on golf courses, a 400 percent increase of death threats to the president, and I will not mention some of the folks with the Tea parties (for I think they were like this before Obama). These are the two ends of the continuum which for me are dangerous for they are not balanced.

And just recently, Georgia’s Republican Paul Broun compared the President to Hitler after referencing a July speech given by Obama sayings “That’s exactly what Hitler did in Nazi Germany and it’s exactly what the Soviet Union did….when he’s proposing to have a national security force that’s answering to him, that is as strong as the U.S. military, he’s showing me signs of being Marxist.”

Now I am as hard on Obama as the GOP, if not harder. However, I deal with facts and policy not the person or individual. I feel that instead of a “post racial” America as many offered, we are instead in a “Neo-reconstruction” period similar to that during the Andrew Johnson Administration. It started a new Southern identity of white aristocratic supremacy which were mainly supported on racist viewpoints and prejudice that lead to the establishments of organizations such as the KKK. Today we see this same locution, one fueled by the fear of difference, which is often manifested in hate. Instead of the KKK, now we have white supremacist and the Tea Parties. People it has only just begun so hold your horses, we aint seen nothing yet. Remember reconstruction came about because of the emancipation of slaves and Black folks being able to hold elected political positions. But none of them were President. And as said in the post "Red Rum - such folks will do all in their power to make certain he fails.

Is u a bich or what

Blessing: My home boy Issac Hayes just died. Dang. Grammy. Hats off folk. Lived up street from me. First home studio ever went in. my neighbor-shaft dang. folk

Point of order: 1] My crab apples are really blooming this year (see pic).

2] Thanks to BlackTVonline for the best black political blog and SJP for honoring me with the Emblem of the helping hand award.

In English class, we use to have to do explicative writing, where we take the stanzas and sections of a book and use the words to make a point. So I’m bout to try this shit with a recent song by TI. The name of this essay is “is u a bich or what.” Now being a south Parkway jones from Memphis , Ten, some of us got certain standards. The recent song by TI called “whatever you like” goes against this understanding. Take the chorus in the hook:

Stacks on deck Patrone on ice And we can pop bottles all night Baby you could have whatever you like (you like) I said you could have whatever you like (you like)

Now tricking, is only reserved for our kids and our women, but then that aint tricking. For if you have it or not, a real ni double g a gone do what needs to be done, within respect to life, liberty and others property for his kids and woman to have. We call that responsibility and it got nothing to do with getting loot nor having Patrone (which aint a good Tequila and got no worm) on ice or not, for it aint hard to tell.

In another verse in the song the author sings”

Anytime you want to pick up the telephone
You know it ain't nothing to drop a couple stacks on you
Wanted you could get it my dear
Five million dollar home, drop Bentley's I swear

Now from the understanding of a trill jones, it aint about stacks on deck unless they invested, in gold, or currency or the education of ones self or children. Now the unfortunate thing is that such dictates that a woman, or even worse all women are just merely objects like slaves to be bought, or purchased, and not enamored with gifts of love. For if love was unequivocally important, then a disclaimer of some sort would be in order. However, the reduced generalization is towards a woman, who think that she is only a form of value in terms of how much money is spent on her – at the crib we call this a ho.

Yeah I want'cho body, I need yo body
Long as you got me you won't need nobody
You want it I got it, go get it I buy it
Tellem other broke niggas be quiet

The aforementioned is a moot point for unless one is gay, they gone want to stick they horse inside a woman. Moreover, it is a reflection of low self-worth and value for the suggestion is that ones money makes the person, in this case man. This asserts that the ability to think, hold a descent conversation or what one can achieve with their mind is not important – to either what defines a man in his pursuit of a woman, or what a woman sees in a man of being of value.

This is repeated in the song again. Take the following lyrics for instance:

I'm talkin' big boy rides
And big boy ice
Let me put this big boy in yo life

For the sagacious, even if one had the ability to afford such, in a time when oil may be approaching $200.00 a barrel and fuel efficiency in the average car is virtually no existent, the suggestion that buying such vehicles and buying jewelry to match, when it may be the result of a miner in South Africa who is prevented from seeing his wife to mine such, or a young child maimed or killed in a war to obtain such “ice”, is merely a sign of selfishness traditionally reflective of western world belief orientation. There is nothing wrong with obtaining wealth, just letting such define what and who one is. This made more paramount in the following stanza:

Cause errbody know it ain't trickin if ya got it
Ya need to never ever gotta go to yo wallet

Even more problematic is that believing that a woman, or man doesn’t have to work to provide for themselves, or support themselves, may be more harmful to the community as a whole, creating a destitute populous of folks that would rather receive handouts, feel that they should be giving things with out hard work, or in encouraging the belief that I am entitled to things with out work just because I want them.

In summary, although a song and not a poem or piece of well written short fiction, this song seems to represent the suggestion that value can only be in what one is worth and that anything, even a meaningful relationship or another person can be had if the price is right. Moreover it offers the belief that working and providing for oneself moot for any person, especially a woman. From this perspective, the only difference between the aforementioned works is that it is played on radio’s continuously and is more prevelant than books or the written word. The general translation of the song could be literally, "is u a bich or what"; specific to both men and women who abide by such beliefs. The beat is funky and the hook is catchy however, it makes one think that if Kanye West was offered by the KKK to produce a song for them called “Hang that Nigga from a tree”, that many would listen to it, that it would be played on the radio incessantly, that we would say it is just a song and not find it offensive.

vote

Criminal Minded

Now i'm the first main to wanna see al my brothers out of jail, especially the ones who are in there for nothing or for just being black and in the wrong place at the wrong time. And I was one of them folks that used to say free Geronimo Pratt and free Nelson Mandela. But down in these parts, it seems as if we got our priorities screwed up. I mean, I hate jails and prisons, and I don’t want to ever go there. Albeit I have dirt behind m ear, I have yet to be caught for such discretions such to warrant a sentence and prison time.

As many of us know, Clifford “the big red dog” Harris, Jr. is in jail. Not prison yet, but he may soon be. Just as Michael Vick, it is for poor personal decision-making. Would like to say stupidity, but I will hold off for the time being. But in both case, these men, had prior indiscretions that I felt should have warned them to cool it and count their blessings. But for the sake of keeping it real, they kept it real stupid. I just have a problem for folks saying free Vick and Free T.I. just because of who they are, or because they like to watch them play football, or because they like their music or worse, because they think they cute.

I feel that as a people, if folks do wrong, let them suffer, learn and grow. I’d be saying free Vick and Free T.I too if they were innocent. But sometimes we must reap what we sow. I teach my son that there are consequences to his actions and that only he can live by his choices. Especially as a Black man, I tell him he MUST know better.

I remember seeing TI recently on BET and he said, folks better be glad I’m rapping about stuff and not doing it.” I feel now it was a bold face lie. My momma said she would get me out of jail for anything except raping and stealing. So I did neither. But she say if you know you are doing wrong, and something against the law, and you do it anyway – you get what you deserve. Damn, why we got to be so stupid? Nonetheless, I’m more so disappointed in those folks who calling for their freedom. I bet if one of the guns he bought were used to kill their child, wife or brother, they wouldn’t be saying such. Let’s think about what we ask for, because when we need the justice system and their laws applied to the other folks, if they don’t do such, who will be mad at then? I’m sure we won’t be saying free the KKK for fighting pit bulls and purchasing machine guns. Maybe that’s what KRS-One meant when he said ”criminal minded, you’ve been blinded.”

hatters everwhere we go

Yesterday I wrote about my dismay in the Michael Vick stupidity, I mean dog fighting indictments. I also said a little bit of rationale on if such is true, why historically he has shown poor decision making skills and therefore subtracted loot from his personal coffers and ruined his image. But I cannot be remiss if I did not place some inferences in the manner in which politics and its history has contrived to grandstand around the Vick case.

This week Robert Byrd, the old ass Senator from West Virginia, describing the alleged activities associated with the Vick case described in the Vick case as "sadistic" and "barbaric." More specifically, he said, "Let that word resound from hill to hill and from mountain to mountain, from valley to valley across this broad land," he thundered, raising his right hand. "May God help those poor souls who would be so cruel? Barbaric! Hear me!"

In 2001, the senior senator from West Virginia, Ex-Klansman Robert Byrd, casually used the phrase "white nigger" twice on national TV. This being sometime after he said he ended his ties with the KKK in 1943. Although it is documented that since then, he wrote to the Imperial Wizard of the KKK three years after he says he abandoned the group. He wrote, "The Klan is needed today as never before and I am anxious to see its rebirth here in West Virginia" and "in every state in the Union." Not to mention he was the one who filibustered the landmark 1964 Civil Rights and the nominations of the Supreme Court's two black justices, liberal Thurgood Marshall and conservative Clarence Thomas.

I also want to mention the role of the Federal government, who coincidentally eight days after the Feds bumrushed Vick’s Virginia estate, we saw George W. Bush sign the Animal Fighting Prohibition Enforcement Act. Actually it was eight days after the Vick house incident, changing it from a misdemeanor to a felony. Maybe this is why some people of color wear T-shirts and say, “George Bush hates black people and deserves to be convicted of treason.” All this tells me is that it is more than time for use to start watching our backs cause there are haters everywhere we go (Young Rich and Gangsta).

The New Civil Rights Battle

Man, let me make one query, what is the new civil rights battle currently and of the future? No, it is not gay rights, but if you do not have an answer, I will take the liberty to proffer that it is simply to get these fools back in line in the African American community.

See, I was raised in Memphis, and I recant vividly the presence of National Guards on my street telling me I could not go outside and play in my own front yard the night Martin Luther King, Jr. was killed. My uncle along with his entire student body cut high school that day and the following day to go down town and wreck some feces. My momma worked at the hospital they took Dr. King to – pronounced dead on arrival. He was transported to the hospital in a bread truck she told me.

Now, unlike in the pass, often the enemy is we and our penchant for self-destructive behavior. Now, we have momma’s stabbing and killing their kids, Momma’s giving their sons guns to go and kill other children and high school coaches taking part in drive-by shootings. Last but not least, there is the presence of the new KKK – so called lyricist in the rap game that promote drug dealing, copulating with other men’s women, disrespect for family bonds and relationships, killing as if life is worthless and material in the form of diamond encrusted watches, teeth, and cars with spinning rims as being more valuable than thought or scholarship in the form of dialectical rumination. Ergo, I submit to you that this is the new battleground for civil rights in our community and that I find myself guilty too, if I cannot get these fools back in line.

The New Knights of the KKK

The Knights of the Ku Klux Klan used to wreak havoc around these parts. Now they have basically banished, or better yet morphed and transformed into either: 1) white men with blue eyes in business suits, or black men driving expensive cars, wearing big platinum chains, with dreds, fades and gold-teeth encrusted with canary diamonds. Yep, bitch I am speaking to you and as you can see, some of you folk is bitches too. I am so sick and tired of young men from my loin that claim to the public that what they have, and doing crime, defines who they are and a makes them what they have become.

It really is the best dream of the Knights of the KKK – I mean have people they despise and deplore do their dirt for them. To make it simple, they continue to encourage the stereotypes and promote self destruction to the extent that it has reached pandemic proportions. I hear songs that proclaim the manliness of killing and shooting another. I hear songs that encourage women to be unfaithful to their commitment to their men. I hear songs that give confidence to the ill importance of school. There even seems to an inordinate amount of songs that target “baby mommas” and how delightful it is to receive sexual gratification from this select bevy of women. And last but not least, songs that proclaim the material riches that you accrue are more important than anything else – in particular if they are displayed on one’s car.

The Ku Klux Klan was formed in the Late 1800’s as a social club by a group of Confederate Army veterans White superiority and violence were used to show blacks there place in American society for lack of a better phrase. Please folk, especially my men in the entertainment industry, lets try and check ourselves and decide what type of legacy you desire to leave for your kids and others, one of self-enhancement, or one of self-destruction by a new invisible empire.