US foes seek 'new world order' - Middle East - Al Jazeera English

US foes seek 'new world order' - Middle East - Al Jazeera English

Two Poets on Politics in Oakland

Two Poets on Politics in Oakland:
Ishmael Reed and Marvin X

Below is Ishmael Reed's analysis of Oakland's mayoral race. Ishmael has a brand of optimism that I lack, especially in the political arena. His choice for Oakland's next mayor is a former student of his at UC Berkeley, now a professor at San Francisco State University, Joe Tuman. Ishmael is not alone in his choice of Professor Tuman. My political advisers who visit Academy of da Corner have been backing Joe from the beginning of the race. I've listened carefully to their strategy since they correctly informed me that Ron Dellums would be Oakland's third black mayor. Personally, I have no faith in any elected politicians, white, black, latino, gay or straight. I'm more in favor of a people's democracy. Even if Joe is able to beat out the front runner Don Perata, will he be able to do any more than the previous three black mayors and the pitiful Jerry Brown who served as mayor as a stepping stone back to the governor's mansion? Some would say that even if they did nothing, which they did, it was a blessing to have the previous black mayors, Lionel Wilson, Elihu Harris and Dellums. But Obama has put the nail in the coffin that a black politician is any better, or worse, than a white. He has revealed himself to be a black man with a white heart, as they describe reactionary negroes in the Caribbean. Or we can look at the plethora of presidents (for life) and prime ministers in Africa, another genre of black men with white hearts, whose jails, prisons, dungeons and cemeteries are full of opposition leaders, even their wives (Nigeria), journalists, poets and writers. It doesn't matter what color the next mayor is, nor gender, for sure there will be no radical change.

We need a radical restructuring of the political order, but it will not happen until there is political consciousness among the masses, to the extent they will do as the people are doing in France at this hour, take matters to the street to express their displeasure with politicians who supposedly serve at the consent of the governed. At this hour what America needs is a good general strike for jobs, end of housing foreclosures, amnesty for petty criminals in jails and prisons (2 million or more, 90% under the influence of drugs at the time of arrest, along with mental health issues), a total revamping of the racist educational system, a discarding of white supremacy patriarchal mythology that allows homophobia, partner violence, emotional and verbal violence, plus conspicuous consumption to perpetuate the capitalist world of make believe.If women are 85% of the shoppers at stores and malls, if they boycotted the stores and malls for one week, the troops would come home from Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan and elsewhere. But we keep hoping and praying a Democrat and/or Republican will save us, even after we see their tricknology election after election, no matter what race or gender.

In Oakland at the rally on the night of the verdict in the police killing of Oscar Grant, we saw an example of people's democracy when the rally initially took place in the middle of 14th and Broadway because our Maryor Ron Dellums refused to allow the people, who are his boss, to assemble in front of city hall that they own. There shall be a rally for Oscar Grant this Saturday in front of city hall, but we understand no politicians will be allowed to speak, especially since none of them have forcefully addressed the police killing of Oscar Grant. To the contrary, those in the race for the next mayor are trying their best to accommodate and placate the police department that is nothing more than an occupying army in league with drug dealers. Imagine peace officers absorb the majority of the city budget, 300 million of 400 million. They earn $180,000 with salary and benefits, yet the murder, terror and trauma continues in the hood. Ask anyone if they feel safer in the hood, no matter the alleged crime decrease. That's like Obama telling us the job and housing crisis is actually getting better, after all, Wall Street and the banks are back to business as usual, so hold tight, prosperity is just around the corner, vote for me, I'll set you free, change is gonna come!

--Marvin X (Plato Negro)
Academy of da Corner,
14th and Broadway,
Downtown Oakland
jmarvinx@yahoo.com
www.blackbirdpressnews.blogspot.com

His latest books include Pull Yo Pants Up fada Black Prez and Yoself, essays on Obama Drama,2010; I AM OSCAR GRANT, essays on Oakland, 2010, The Wisdom of Plato Negro (Vol. I and II), 2010, Mythology of Pussy and Dick, toward Healthy Psychosocial Sexuality, Black Bird Press, 2010. Order from Black Bird Press, 1222 Dwight Way, Berkeley CA 94702.

----- Forwarded Message ----
From: "uncleish@aol.com"
To: jmarvinx@yahoo.com
Sent: Thu, October 21, 2010 8:22:21 AM
Subject: Fwd: Mr. Reed -- enjoyed your column on Oakland mayoral race / fyi on ranked choice voitng

Marvin, I mentioned you in this piece that went worldwide. IR

http://www.counterpunch.org/reed10202010.html

October 20, 2010

A New Generation and a New Direction

Professor Joe: Oakland's Next Mayor?

By ISHMAEL REED

When Joe Tuman was my student at the University of California at Berkeley, I don’t remember his receiving any grade less than an A. When I met his parents I could understand why. They were hard working Azerian Americans who provided their sons with good role models.

Since his days at the University of California at Berkeley, Joe Tuman has become a professor of political and social sciences at San Francisco State University and television personality. Now he is running for Mayor of Oakland.

He talked about issues both small and large when Tennessee and I sat down to talk with him at Day of the Dead Coffee Shop at 3208 Grand Avenue in Oakland. Small: He said that some critics are asking questions about his tanned complexion. He tries to explain to them that people from his part of the world have darker skin. They assume that he gets his tan from hanging around expensive beach resorts. Some also wonder why a teacher would become involved in politics. The candidate who is leading in the polls, Assemblyman Don Perata, is a former teacher.

Tuman says that he was drawn into the race over concerns about Oakland’s crime situation. “Violent crime is the point of intersection for a lot of different things.” For me, crime is another code word on the order of busing, welfare, and affirmative action. It’s another attempt to cast blacks as scapegoats for the nation’s social problems, so easy that Glenn Beck can do it, but Tuman seems to have a more sophisticated view of crime than those who use the term in an effort to run against blacks, a southern strategy that’s been used by white candidates and capitalists, like the Koch brothers, since Reconstruction.

Tuman agrees with my North Oakland neighbors that crime has multi-ethnic contributors, a shock to a white Oakland Tribune reporter who interviewed me about violence in Oakland. This white reporter is among an army of white anthropologists, sociologists, novelists, film makers, and university professors, who see the inner city as a “gold mine of opportunity,” the phrase used by salespersons at Lionsgate Studios to woo investors to its black incest movie, “Precious.” Maybe inner city residents should cordon off these “hot zones” and charge admission to those endowed with studio money, grants and fellowships.

This reporter has received a fellowship to talk about the mental problems resulting from violence in Oakland, but I could tell that he hadn’t explored the issue with any kind of depth when he defended “The Wire,” which has become a national drug for people who, apparently miserable in their own lives, can only get their brains’ pleasure centers stimulated by seeing black people brought low, a multi-billion dollar racket. He wants to pick the brains of my neighbors and me. He wants us to be his unpaid informants. We’re supposed to be like Richard Leakey’s Kenyan assistants. We go out and discover the bones while he does the carbon analysis and gets the headlines.

I told Tuman about the experiences of my North Oakland neighbors and me who confront crime that has multi-ethnic contributors, not just blacks. Right now two Asian American gangs are competing for the right to control drug marketing on my block.

On Oct. 14, around the corner from my house, a drive by shooting resulted in the death of an innocent bystander. Asian American gangs are not the only outsiders using black neighborhoods to accrue illegal profits.

For years, blacks and more recently white gentrifiers have tried to close down a local liquor store camouflaged as a grocery store located a few blocks from my home. Its’ front is an outdoor office for the district’s drug dealers and a scene of gunfire and murder. The store owner, a Yemeni-American, comes to our Neighborhood Crime meetings and denies any role that his store plays in such activity, but when interviewed by Otto award winning playwright Wajahat Ali, who, with David Eggers, is writing a pilot for HBO, he admitted to some of the accusations that have been voiced by Marvin X, a playwright and author, who goes by the pen name of “Plato Negro,” as a result of his conducting spontaneous peripatetic classes on the streets of downtown Oakland.

Yes, some Arab storeowners do exchange sexual favors for groceries with poor black women customers. Sometimes these affairs result in children so an Arab storeowner might have an inner city baby momma along with a traditional family.

White bloggers, members of the Angry White Male constituency to which the media market their product, people who get all of their information about urban life from CNN’s farce, “Black In America,” and Hollywood, called me a racist when I wrote that members of their beloved “model minorities” engage in bad behavior, but at a recent meeting, John Russo, Oakland’s city attorney, confirmed our observations. He said that Asian criminals were operating in Oakland’s black neighborhoods. On Oct. 14, Russo made the front page of The Oakland Tribune after he sought to apply a gang injunction to a Latino gang called Nortenos, which would mean that members of the gang would be “disallowed to congregate in public between 10 pm and 5 am, carry or be in the presence of guns, wear or display gang symbols or commit several specific gang-related crimes within a specified ‘safety zone’ in the Fruitvale district.”

“Businesses won’t develop here because of crime,” Tuman says. I reminded Tuman that though I live in a “hot zone,” crime was down 15 percent in Oakland. By businesses he says he means huge concerns like Clorox and Kaiser.

According to The East Bay Express, homicides plummeted 21 percent and overall violent crime dropped more than 15 percent in the first four months of the year. Property crimes are down 21 percent. Though the local Jim Crow media is a Jerry Brown booster, during his last year in office, crime “skyrocketed.” Oakland has sought to deal with the staffing of the police department by floating several measures.

In 2004, voters approved Measure Y. In order to be eligible for $20 million in funding for the police,the number of police officers could not fall below 739. Under this measure PSOs, 60 problem-solving officers, would work in neighborhoods. Because the number of police officers fell below the 739 , after 80 officers were laid off in July, only 682 sworn police officers remain on the force, which means that the city can’t collect the $20 million.

On Nov. 2, voters will vote on two propositions. Measure X would generate revenue by charging owners of single-family homes a $360 parcel tax for the next four years. It’s predicted that this measure will be defeated.

Measure BB has a better chance of passing though Tuman predicts that both will go down. If Measure BB passes, the 739 officer requirement would be eliminated and the city will collect the $20 million. PSA officers will be restored which would help my neighborhood because the only person from downtown who was concerned about our safety was Paul Brekke-Mismer, a Public Safety Officer. I talked to Brekke-Mismer whose job was cut foolishly by the layoffs.

He told me that he’d be willing to come back if he were rehired. Better than that, the next Mayor should hire Brekke-Mismer as an advisor. Find out why he was able to empathize with inhabitants of black neighborhoods while others have failed.

Tuman credited the Dellums administration, considered a bust by the media, for Oakland’s decline in violent crime. He’s one of the few reporters giving Bdelliums credit for anything, including the decline in crime, which according to multiple polls was the number one issue when he was elected.Two other reporters whose opinions counter the consensus among the local mainstream media’s that the Dellums administration was a failure are Robert Gammon and J. Douglas Allen-Taylor. Gammon’s comments appeared in the March 31, 2010 The East Bay Express. He wrote:

“Oakland’s mayor revamped the police department, but hasn't received credit for the substantial decrease in crime.

“Oakland’s crime problem spiraled out of control in the last two years of Jerry Brown's administration. And then it remained high in 2007 and 2008 during Ron Dellums' first two years as mayor of Oakland. Brown, however, managed to escape criticism for failing to slow the crime wave, while Dellums was excoriated for it — despite the fact that his crime numbers were never as bad as Brown's. And now, Oakland’s crime wave appears to be over, yet Dellums isn’t getting credit for that either, even though there's an argument to be made that the decisions made on his watch are partially responsible.”

J. Douglas Allen–Taylor, writing in the much missed Berkeley Daily Planet, which was driven to online status by powerful Berkeley critics, described Dellums' critics as “The big-pocket developers who made a killing when Jerry Brown was mayor and Mr. Perata held considerable 'influence' over a majority of the votes on the Oakland City Council on key development issues. The leaders of the Oakland Police Officers Association police union, who raked in considerable perks and power and millions in overtime during the same period. These interests would certainly like to return to the days when Oakland was like an International Boulevard hooker ripe for their easy plucking, and so have helped direct and fuel an enduring media blitz that has left us with the false impression that Mr. Dellums is a doddering old fool, napping at his desk during the afternoons, and neglecting the business of the city.”

Some of the unfavorable comments about the Dellums administration were a result of his owing back taxes and the impression that his spouse, Cynthia, had too much influence on his administration. He was criticized for spending thousands of dollars for expenses while lobbying on behalf of Oakland in Washington, but his lobbying efforts brought 65 million dollars of stimulus funds to the city. I suggested in a SF Gate cartoon that Dellums, in order to satisfy his critics, take Greyhound to Washington, take his guests to a horse burger diner and stay in a flophouse.

AWM bloggers will probably discount this, but a double standard has been applied to black male politicians by the media and Federal law enforcement since Reconstruction. Defenders of David Dinkins pointed out unsuccessfully that the crime rate in New York City declined, drastically, under the Dinkins’ administration. They were shouted down by the shrill opposition that now dominates public life. In the Oct. 25, 2009 New York Times Michael Powell took a second look at Dinkins:

“Taking office in 1990, just as a Wall Street and real estate collapse pitched the city into deep recession, Mayor Dinkins, the city’s first African-American mayor, stumbled more than once. But he also registered more successes than most New Yorkers realize, and so he laid part of the foundation for today’s New York.

“‘Dinkins faced a very sharp economic downturn, and he was in the very difficult position of coming in with high expectations from many constituencies,’ said John H. Mollenkopf, a political science professor at the City University Graduate Center. ‘Yet he expanded the police force and rebuilt neighborhoods; he deserves more credit than he gets for managing that time.”’

Yet Matt Littman, writing in the progressive Huffington Post, described the Dinkens “regime” as “awful,” while praising Rudy Giuliani whose poll numbers prior to 9/11 was 40%. Some New York firemen attribute the death of their fellow fireman to procedures that were put into practice by Giuliani.

Tuman’s answer to crime is to hire more police; he believes that the layoffs that the city council ordered as a budget saving measure has ended a deterrent to what he refers to as “irrational capitalism,” meaning the drug business, but I informed him that the black players in Oakland’s drug business, the kind of people one sees on television and in Hollywood movies are the underpaid mules and other ethnic groups are making the real profits and are using those profits to grease their way to the suburbs. For example, the Yemeni store owner says that he makes over $200,000 per year in profits, mainly through liquor sales. When I asked him during a public meeting why a Muslim was selling liquor, a policeman, one of those whose role at the meeting is supposed to be informational, abandoned this role and told me that I was out of order. Turns out that the policeman and the store owner and the cop are tight.

Tuman didn’t mention the role of white suburbanites who make profits by arming the gangs who terrorize our neighborhoods. I’m still waiting for HBO to do a pilot about this component of the drug trade. Moreover, my neighbors would also consider him naïve to assert that more police would deter “irrational capitalists,” or, in his words, “regulate” them. Even when we had a “robust,” police force using Tuman’s word, North Oakland blacks and now white regentrifiers have complained about the lack of police protection and during a recent meeting we were told that there would be even less protection as a result of the layoffs, resulting in their refusal to pay toward their “Cadillac” pensions, the adjective used by a perceptive Oakland politics watcher, Robert Gammon of The East Bay Express.

The police know about these criminal operations including the one that’s been threatening our neighborhood for over five years but nothing has been done about it and those who live in other parts of North Oakland complain that a similar situation exists in their neighborhoods.

Tuman, however, has a solution to the budget for the police department which puts a strain on the city’s budget. According to The East Bay Express, Oakland’s “$414 million general fund budget, which is where the $83 million deficit lies, is taken up almost entirely by police, fire, and debt service the city is obligated to pay. In fact, according to the mayor’s budget, police will cost the general fund about $198 million this year, while the fire department costs about $104 million, and the annual debt service amounts to about $45 million, so that's $347 million for just three items, which leaves only $67 million for nearly everything else city government does.”

Tuman would pay for more police by using a university model for retirement and recruitment. He’d retire officers at 60 or 62 and then hire them back part time as independent contractors.

Since this is the key issue in his campaign, I asked him to write out this proposal so that I wouldn’t misquote him.

“First, with respect to containing/controlling costs for policing: Long term, I believe we need to rethink the assumption that a police officer in Oakland must (on average) cost about $180,000/year with salary and benefits. The city council and even former Senator Perata believe this to be so. The Council limits their approaches to staffing our police department in only two ways: either they want to raise taxes to pay more officers this $180k average, or lay off officers and pay less of them that same amount.

“Even Senator Perata buys into this mentality, saying he would simply find the same amount of money ($180k average) by laying off other city employees to hire back laid off police officers. I think about this differently; I question that amount. Why does it have to be $180k? Why couldn't it be $140K or $145K? Since the police contract is closed for a few more years, and I do not want to go to interest arbitration over this issue, my solution to this would be to begin offering voluntary early retirement incentives to eligible officers (10-15% of the force are within 2-3 years of retirement), and using savings from these retirements to begin hiring a new second tier of police recruits who would come in at a lower salary base. Essentially, gradually manage out my most expensive officers who are going to retire anyway--and slowly replace them with officers at a more affordable salary for the city. With an unemployment rate hovering at 20% for the city, I'm confident we could find many applicants for these jobs, even at reduced salary. More officers, in turn, reduces the need for overtime, and means that both overtime and pension costs will be less, since these are calculated by base salary. This has worked in other bureaucracies; it can work here, too.”

With this proposal, Joe Tuman is inviting the displeasure of the Oakland police union, an organization so powerful that it has interfered with the local mayoral election by actually campaigning against one of the mayoral candidates, Jean Quan, who called for police layoffs.

“Jean Quan will say anything to become mayor,” said Dom Arotzarena, President of the Oakland Police Officers Association. “And her record proves she would do nothing if she got the job. Our city is desperate for leadership. This is the wrong time for Oakland to settle for just another politician like Jean Quan.”

On Oct.12, I received a flyer that denounced Jean Quan. It was sponsored by Coalition for a Safer California an organization whose contributions come from police organizations, developers, and businesses like AT&T and Blue Cross. Every time I turn on the television there are uniformed policemen endorsing this candidate and denouncing that one. The enormous power that millions of whites have given to the police for the purpose of containing the black and brown population will eventually backfire and lead to their repression as well. So powerful is the Gun Lobby it’s announced that it’s going to address policy issues other than the Second Amendment.One of the reasons that Rudy Giuliani defeated Mayor David Dinkins is attributable to his encouraging a police riot against Dinkins.

One of the contributors to CSC is Signature Properties whose president is Mike Ghielmetti. Ghielmetti and Phil Tagami,managing central partner of the California Capital Group. were among the developers who received millions in subsidies during the Brown administration- millions that critics argue, haven’t benefited the city. Brown was also criticized for his close ties to developer, Phil Tagami, sometimes called “The real mayor of Oakland.” So confident is the real mayor that he publicly insulted Mayor Dellums by insisting that he fill out a time sheet for the hours he spent serving as mayor, something that was never required of Mayor Brown who was often absent from city hall.

Ghielmetti’s Oak-to-Ninth project, a 64-acre housing development was opposed by preservationists. Others charged that the subsidies received by developers during Brown’s tenure amounted to “corporate welfare.”

State and local police and corrections organizations often behave in an arrogant manner because California’s shrinking and elderly white population has given them carte balance to deal with black and Hispanic residents anyway they desire and when a policeman murders a black or Hispanic he or she can always get a suburban jury to acquit. One of the reasons for violence in the inner city, usually stemming from competition over drug markets, is the lackadaisical manner by which these homicides are treated by the police, many of them commuters and some of whom belong to far right organizations which view such homicides as a form of population control. If Tuman loses the election it’s because he is asking the police to take a pay cut. He had the chutzpah to take on an entity that views itself supreme--over the Mayor’s office and the city council.

One of Tuman’s rival, candidate Rebecca Kaplan, has been endorsed by black businessman Geoffrey Pete, who said that he was impressed with Kaplan, who promised to help in revising, “Oakland’s outdated and regressive nightclub and cabaret regulations.” She also has the endorsement of the Black Women Organized for Political Action and The Sierra Club. Some have called her an opportunist for switching from the Green Party to the Democratic Party. And though she has received endorsement from some black leaders and groups, it is charged that she is the candidate for young whites who frequent downtown restaurants clubs and coffee shops. People who are pushing blacks out of Oakland. People who enjoy movies that star Reese Witherspoon and queue up before Pizza places and ice cream parlors.

Ms. Kaplan, a lesbian, agrees with Tuman that Oakland police officers are paid too well, as she told The East Bay Express, “The average cop costs the city about $188,000 annually in pay and benefits. She notes that police officers in other cities, from New York to Baltimore, make much less. And she points out that Oakland could have more cops on the force if it paid them lower salaries. ‘We have fewer police officers than other cities because we pay them more,’ she argued. ‘But making the costs so high so that you don't have adequate finances, in my mind, is not a pro-public safety position.’” Ms. Kaplan was among those council members who joined in the protest against the shooting of Oscar Grant by a Bay Area Transit policeman. Tuman said that he was asked to enter the mayoral race as a result of the violence that followed Oscar Grant shooting. Not only was the “violence” exaggerated by reporters like the Time’s Jesse McKinley, but most of those arrested were white out-of-towners, anarchists and not “irrational capitalists.” After running a photo of two black alleged looters, as though the rioters were exclusively black, the SF Weekly on July 9, 2010 provided an update:

Authorities have adjusted the arrest total to 78 -- with fully three-quarters of those arrested hailing from outside Oakland. Why is it that these folks were apparently happy to help Oakland burn, but not live there the rest of the time? Do they find Oakland too dangerous? Were they worried about, er, meeting the wrong sort of person there?

But none of the candidates has been as tough on the police as Jean Quan. Quan, who has the support of Assemblyman Sandre Swanson, labor unions and non-profits criticized the refusal of the police to pay 9% toward their pensions like other city employees. She told the Express, “The union said it wouldn’t start paying 9 percent into police pensions unless the city guaranteed no layoffs for two years. Quan argued that such a guarantee would have been financially irresponsible because voters might reject tax measures in next month’s election.”

The police and their allies have expressed their opposition to Quan by sending out flyers linking her to Mayor Ron Dellums, who is considered a foe of the police union. The flyer passed around in my neighborhood carried the headline: “If you thought Ron Dellums was a good Mayor…You’ll love Jean Quan.” Its main complaint is that Mrs. Quan supported, “Laying off up to 200 police officers while opposing efforts to reduce the City bureaucracy.” Intimidated by the criticism of Dom Arotzarena, the powerful president of Oakland’s Police Union, Mrs. Quan capitulated. She sent a flyer into my neighborhood, which shows her standing in front of a police car and recapping her tough on crime bon a fides.

In its most recent display of arrogance, the police were about to charge the city of Oakland overtime for their attending a charity event in Redding, California! This is an example of their favoring the suburbs where most of them live over Oakland where they get paid to serve. Like Quan, Tuman’s response to the event invites even more anger from an entity, the police union, which in the view of Chip Johnson, The San Francisco Chronicle, puts its needs above those of Oakland’s citizens. In his response to me Tuman wrote:

“As far as the most recent episode of questionable overtime payments goes, let me react in this way:

“I am encouraged by the fact that our officers want to participate in a charity event; this speaks volumes to their willingness to be good civic partners here as well as in other places. I do not feel, however, that in this economic environment it is appropriate to charge overtime costs for this cause… There is a lesson here: everyone in city government (not just the police officers) should be more careful and honest stewards of public funds--and under my administration, they will be just that.”

Tuman would remedy the situation of Oakland’s police being drawn from the suburbs by insisting that more police be hired from within the city of Oakland.

As an incentive, for the police to recruit from the inner city, he’d provide the police, fireman and teachers affordable housing by using vacancies left over from Jerry Brown’s 10K program. Tuman wouldn’t use the term failed to describe the disappointing results of Brown’s 10K plan. He says that by his second term Brown had lost interest in the mayor’s job and was looking forward to the next job. Others have a less polite view of Brown’s administration. One of the charges was that he was too beholden to developers who were his campaign contributors. In 2004, Brown obtained a $61 million dollars subsidy for Forest City, a developer, to build in Oakland. The development called “Uptown” has been beset by problems and instead of condos, the developer, because of the bust in the housing market, has had to settle on rentals. Before that, my real estate agent says that they were just about giving away condos at $125,000 a pop.

Tuman is certainly informed and with more experience might understand the viewpoints of those who live in the hot zone of North Oakland. He says for example that racist practices in the Oakland system of education are unintentional.

After observing my daughter’s run for the school board, I’d disagree. The North Oakland’s district run was tilted in favor of the white affluent Rockridge section of Oakland. The attempt to keep Hispanic and black students from entering the Chabot Elementary School where they would study along side the children of upper middle class white students was deliberate. The successful candidate was focused solely on this school and after her election millions of dollars were directed to this school while some of the schools attended by blacks and Hispanics go without text books.

Having accomplished her goal of directing money to the school where her children were enrolled, she disappeared from public view, only required to attend monthly board of education meetings.

Racism exists elsewhere. The residents of Piedmont Ave.,a tony section of Oakland, are undergoing some soul searching, (or are they) over some recent racial profiling of some black children. The Tribune reported:

“Last week, the City Council held a public hearing reviewing an incident in March where two minority students were stopped and questioned by police walking home from school after someone called to report supposed suspicious activity.

The call was unfounded and police closed the matter after speaking to the students.”

Problems in our district are also complicated by police corruption that could be viewed as racist because the police would not practice corruption in the suburbs where they live. Prof. Jerry Bryant is correct when he says that black neighborhoods have been used to raise ill gained revenue for other groups, traditionally. With the billions passing through hands as a result of drug profits, there is corruption internationally and locally. Some of those who attend the Beat 10Y Market Street Neighborhood Crime Prevention Council Meeting chaired by Vertis Whitaker usually question why the police are so chummy with the drug dealers. The “mainstream” pundits and journalists don’t see some of the police action that we witness. They don’t care to see it. When I challenged two Oakland Tribune reporters to cover yellow on black crime as much as they did black on yellow crime, they didn’t even bother to reply.

Sam Hamod, the poet and publisher, recounts what happened when The Nation of Islam rid Washington D.C. projects of Jamaican drug gangs; the police went after the NOI because they were no longer receiving kickbacks from prostitutes and drug dealers--money that is used to improve the lifestyles of suburbanites. The underground economy in black neighborhoods throughout the nation pays for home improvements, medical bills, college tuition, and vacations for white and colored ethnic groups. In one Harlem precinct, twenty six policemen were charged with corruption.

“A former New York City police officer caught in the sweeping scandal at the 30th Precinct in Harlem was sentenced yesterday to five years in prison for dealing drugs, evading taxes and breaking into property without a search warrant.” The New York Times 9/10/96.

And what has become of Adrian Schoolcraft, a patrol officer who uncovered evidence of racial profiling as a policy for a Brooklyn Precinct?

“Officer Schoolcraft is on suspension without pay on charges that he left a work shift on Halloween in 2009 without permission, and then failed to return, said his lawyer, Jon Norinsberg. He has filed a $50 million lawsuit claiming department officials retaliated against him, including taking him to a hospital in handcuffs that night for psychiatric evaluation, after he reported his suspicions. He has also secretly recorded roll calls that have resulted in allegations that commanders at the 81st Precinct pushed ticket and arrest quotas on officers. The police have denied the existence of quotas.” Times, Oct.15

At one time, black businessmen who were excluded from the capitalist system by the banks could obtain loans from black numbers bankers, but whites took control of that too. The film “Cotton Club” touches upon this subject.

Racism unintentional? My neighbors would disagree. They know that if they lived in the more affluent white sections of Oakland they’d receive better service and better protection.

A recent article in the Oakland Tribune revealed that traffic fines are leveled disproportionately in the down scale sections of the city. When I had to appear in Oakland traffic court to pay a one hundred dollar fine for not coming to a complete stop, I found that 95 percent of those there to pay fines were either black or Hispanic. If, as Tuman says, class, not race determines ones status, why weren’t more whites present?

The practice of absentee landlords renting their properties to drug dealing gangs can also be seen as an act of racism. The lower property value of my neighborhood and those like mine can be attributed to this practice. An abandoned house located on my block was the scene of prostitution and drug dealing before it was boarded up. The city has been promising to demolish it for two years; it’s still there. Such is the power of Oakland’s landlords that she has been able to ignore citations from the city and threats of fines. She owns four properties in North Oakland and is probably the product of a two family home.

AWM bloggers even white progressives--like Robert Scheer who praised the Tea Partiers and Rand Paul (on KPFA, 10,9, ’10), while condemning Obama, Maxine Waters, and Jesse Jackson)--would probably disagree that racist practices are being used against the black citizens of Oakland, but I no longer will take the role of an unpaid research assistant for them. Their minds are frozen in their attitudes toward blacks.

Tuman said that the mayor didn’t have a role in forming school policy, which didn’t bar Jerry Brown from influencing Oakland’s school policy, but could use the office as a bully pulpit. He would direct funds to non-profits who have a track record for improving conditions for marginalized students. He’d also study the approach of schools located in poor districts whose test scores are competitive.

Tuman showed his command of the issues including ways of pumping more revenue into Oakland’s public schools. It was a geekish recital from a young man who is in full command of the facts. His late father would be proud. I promised the elder Tuman that I would include a reference to Babylonian astrology in one of my free associative novels. I told Joe that the promise had been fulfilled.

Judging from the excitement generated by Don Perata at a rally held by my brother, Dr. Michael LeNoir, Don Perata is going to be hard to beat. Having faced down an automatic weapon when his car was hi-jacked and having survived prostate cancer and an FBI probe, the kind of experiences that bring reflection and wisdom, he carried on like a lion in the winter, wounded, but still full of fight, before a crowd of enthusiastic black supporters. The federal probe ended with no charges being filed. Having undergone three 100 percent tax audits, I can’t imagine what a federal probe must be like. Perata blamed the probe on the Bush administration seeking to undermine the power of Democrats. In his mind, he’s already cut Oakland’s budget by eliminating some boards and commissions, which he feels are unnecessary. He spoke of a program for the arts, perhaps drawing revenue to the city by employing its famed creative resources, Rap, Blues, the visual arts.

Mr. Perata has been endorsed by a number of black pastors, including Bishop Bob Jackson, who heads the 7,000-member Acts Full Gospel Church. When Ms. Kaplan sought Mr. Jackson’s endorsement, he said he told her, “I don’t think you’ve had a chance to warm up your seat yet,” according to The New York Times. On Oct.18, he was endorsed by The San Francisco Chronicle.

Though the local media are harping on Don Perata’s flaws, specifically his role in an Oakland Raiders deal that has left the city millions of dollars in debt until the year 2025, Tuman is the only candidate who comes to the mayoral run with a clean slate. He began as a dark horse, but is now gaining in the polls. He placed second in an endorsement by The Oakland Tribune followed by Rebecca Kaplan. Jean Quan was third. In The East Bay Express endorsements, Tuman placed third after Quan, second and Kaplan, first. Tuman, Quan and Kaplan are hoping that ranked-choice voting will mean that second and third place votes could determine the winner. Perata believes that ranked-choice voting has “deprived voters of substantive discussions.”

Tuman’s debut as a politician has been impressive. He’s open to ideas, too. Having watched “irrational capitalism” at work since the late 80s when these operations invaded my neighborhood, I proposed that tutoring in business might be an alternative to jail for some these underground capitalists, and if successful, the extending of micro loans to those who achieve a certificate. He took note of this idea.

One thing for which Jerry Brown should be commended. For awhile he lived in a neighborhood where he witnessed firsthand the dysfunctional side of Oakland. If elected, Tuman or whoever is elected should do the same.

Win or lose, Tuman represents a new direction and a new generation.

Ishmael Reed is the publisher of Konch. His new novel, Juice!, illustrated by him, is available for pre-order at Amazon. He can be reached at: Uncleish@aol.co

Last Call for Submissions, Poetry Issue, Journal of Pan African Studies

Last Call for Submissions:

Poetry Issue, Journal of Pan African Studies

Deadline November 15

Send to:

Marvin X, Guest Editor

jmarvinx@yahoo.com,

include brief bio and pic,

MS Word Attachment

Tentative Contents

Poetry Issue

Journal of Pan African Studies

Marvin X, Guest Editor

Itibari M. Zulu, Senior Editor

Special thanks:

Louis Reyes Rivera

Eugene Redmond

Bruce George

Gwendolyn Mitchell

Askia Toure

Rudolph Lewis

Amiri Baraka

Dedication to Jose Gancalves, Publisher/Editor, Journal of Black Poetry

List of contributors to JBP

Photo Essay of JBP Poets

Notes on the Poetry issue of Journal of Pan African Studies

A History of the JBP and publications during the 60s, compiled by Rudolph Lewis

A Forum in Response to Marvin X’s Poetic Mission, Rudolph Lewis

Mary Weems

Jerry Ward

Leigh McInnis

The Poetic Mission, Haki Madhubuti

The Poets

Amiri Baraka, Newark NJ

Kalamu ya Salaam, New Orleans

Kola Boof, Southern California

Louis Reyes Rivera, Brooklyn NY

Ayodele Nzingha, Oakland CA

Askia Toure, Boston MA

Marvin X, Berkeley CA

Neal Hall, MD, Philadelphia PA

Hettie V. Williams

Phavia Khujichagulia, Oakland CA

J. Vern Cromartie, Richmond CA

Jeannette Drake, Virginia

Dike Okoro, Chicago IL

Tracey Owens Patton, Wyoming

devorah major, San Francisco

Anthony Mays, Korea

Bruce George, New York City

Itibari M. Zulu, Palmdale CA

Renaldo Ricketts, San Francisco

Nandi Comer

Al Young, Berkeley CA

Ghasem Batamuntu, Europe

Mona Lisa Saloy, New Orleans

Susan Lively, East St. Louis IL

Eugene Redmond, East St. Louis IL

Fritz Pointer, Oakland CA

Gwendolyn Mitchell, Chicago IL

Felix Orisewike Sylvanus, Lagos, Nigeria

Tariq Shabazz, Newark NJ

Rudolph Lewis, Maryland

Kamaria Muntu, United Kingdom

L. E. Scott, Aotearoa, New Zealand

Chinwe Enemchukwu, Florida USA

Mabel Mnensa, South Africa

Kwan Booth, Oakland CA

Rodney D. Coates, East St. Louis IL

Ras Griot, Washington DC

Tureeda Mikell, Oakland CA

Ramal Lamar, Oakland CA

Everett Hoagland, New Bedford MA

Charles Curtis Blackwell, Oakland CA

JACQUELINE KIBACHA, Tanzania, East Africa

John Reynolds III, Washington DC

Gabriel Shapiro

Darlene Scott, Delaware MD

Jimmy Smith, Jr., Chicago IL

Sam Hamod, Princeton NJ

Opal Palmer Adisa, Oakland CA

Amy ”Aimstar” Andrieux, New York City

Lamont b. Steptoe, Philadelphia PA

Avotcja Jiltonilro, San Francisco CA

Tantra Zawadi, New York City

Anthony Spires, San Francisco

Benicia Blue, Chicago IL

Neil Callender, Boston MA

Tanure Ojaide, Nigeria

Pious Okoro, Chicago IL

Nicole Terez Dutton, Boston MA

Iris Tate

Kilola Maishya

Niyah X, Oakland CA

Adrienne N. Wartts, St. Louis MO

Tony Medina, Washington DC

Reviews, Views, News

Reviews

Kamaria Muntu, review of Askia Toure’s Mother Earth Responds: green poems & alternative visions

Views

Two poets on politics in Oakland: Ishmael Reed, Marvin X

Afro-Arab Dialogue on Col. Qaddafi’s Apology for Arab Slavery:

Kola Boof, Sam Hamod, Rudolph Lewis, Marvin X

A Pan African Dialogue on Cuba:

Dead Prez, Carlos Moore, North American African Intellectuals/activists, Pedro de la Hoz

Muslim American Literature as an emerging field,

Dr. Mohja Kahf

News

Chinua Achebe Wins Prize

Bay Area Writers Celebrate Baraka’s 75^th

Photo Essay by Kamau Amem Ra

News from East Boogie, Eugene Redmond

Letters to the Editor

Somalia: System of a down - Opinion - Al Jazeera English

Somalia: System of a down - Opinion - Al Jazeera English

Preview #17, Journal of Pan African Studies, Poetry Issue

DR Congo: Africa's sleeping giant? - Africa... States of Independence - Al Jazeera English

Film Review

Patrice Lumumba

A Film by Raoul Peck

Reviewed By Marvin X
© 2002 by Marvin X

Note: We send out this review on the 50th anniversary of independence in the Congo. Lumumba said he was fifty years ahead of his time, and so it is. But even fifty years later the same problems of poverty, ignorance and disease remain, the Europeans are still there stealing the wealth, although the Chinese have entered the drama. Hopefully, with the Chinese, in exchange for precious minerals, there shall be construction and reconstruction, although we don't understand with a population of seventy million mostly unemployed why Chinese laborers are needed. There seems little jubilation among the population. One Congolese said, "After fifty years of independence, happiness has come to the man in charge and those around him--they eat well and are well paid."

--mx

My African consciousness began with the murder of Patrice Lumumba. After high
school graduation, I enrolled at Oakland's Merritt College and found myself in the midst of the black revolutionary student movement. Students Huey Newton, Bobby Seale, Richard Thorne, Maurice Dawson, Kenny Freeman, Ernie Allen, Ann Williams, Carol Freeman and others were rapping daily on the steps at the front door of Merritt College. Some of them wore sweatshirts with Jomo Kenyatta's picture, sold by Donald Warden's African American Association, which held meetings on campus, and sometimes Donald Warden, renamed Khalid Abdullah Tariq Al Mansour, rapped. The theme was often the African independence struggle, especially the Mau Mau's in Kenya.

But a frequent topic was the 1961 brutal murder of the democratically elected Congolese Prime Minister, Patrice Lumumba. The brothers were well read and in their raps they documented the facts and figures of the African liberation struggle. They gave reference to such books as Kwame Nkrumah's Neo-Colonialism: the final stage of imperialism, where he documented the riches of Africa, especially the Congo, that the West coveted and committed mass murder to maintain. Patrice Lumumba was the first African leader I'd known about who was assassinated, and the brutal way he was eliminated helped expedite my African consciousness, especially learning how his so-called comrades betrayed him to continue the Western world's plunder of the Congo's vast mineral riches.

On one level, it was hard to believe, since I was attempting to get blackenized and didn't want to face the reality of black treachery. As students, most of us were Black nationalists, not yet the revolutionary black nationalists we would soon become, that allowed some of us to employ a class or Marxist analysis to the Pan African struggle, which Nkrumah's writings brought to the table.

The brothers leaning in the Marxist direction were Ken Freeman, Ernie Allen, and maybe Bobby Seale, all of whom were associated with SoulBook magazine, a revolutionary black nationalist publication featuring the writings of LeRoi Jones, James Boggs, Max Stanford, Robert F. Williams, Sonia Sanchez, Askia M. Toure', myself and others, although I was a budding writer, just out of high school and knew nothing about Marxism.

If I had, it would have helped me understand the class nature of Lumumba's final days. I couldn't comprehend how Mobutu, Kasavubu, and Tshombe could be so wicked to conspire with the white man to kill their brother. It would take the black hands of Malcolm's murderers for me to begin to understand.

Actually, I wouldn't fully understand until years later after reading a monograph by Dr. Walter Rodney, himself the victim of assassination in Guyana, South America, entitled West Africa and the Atlantic Slave Trade, in which he carefully deconstructed African social classes and their role in the slave trade, detailing how the political, military, judicial, and even religious institutions became corrupt and expedited our removal from the Motherland.

Amiri Baraka sings to us:

My brother the king
Sold me to the ghost
When you put your hand on your sister and made her a slave
When you put your hand on your brother and made him a slave
Watch out for the ghost
The ghost go get you Africa
At the bottom of the Atlantic Ocean
Is a railroad of human bones
the king sold the farmer to the ghost....

It is hard to believe it has been forty years since the death of Lumumba, maybe because in the interim we've had innumerable cases in Africa and even in America of similar acts of treachery. Supposedly black ministers were involved in the death of Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr. Black elected politicians have been selling out the black community for at least the past thirty years, especially since the 1972 Gary Convention of the Congress of African People. We have no choice but to see our struggle as class struggle, race being incidental.

We cannot have any illusions that a black face will save us, only black hearts. Those who study the Bible and Qur'an know the history of all men is the story of treachery, deceit, lust, greed, jealousy, envy and murder -- but the glass can be seen as half full: the history of man is also about good transcending evil, liberation defeating oppression, ascension after crucifixion, joy after sorrow, victory over defeat. Yet, how many prophets survived? How many righteous people survived and continued in their righteousness, rather than succumb to iniquities?

Men of Lumumba's character are rare upon the stage of history, men dedicated to the liberation of their people, men who are confident that no matter how great the odds, freedom will come soon one morning.

Raoul Peck's film was depressing because it showed a leader in a Indiana Jones snake pit full of vipers and cobras of the worse sort, snakes who danced to the rhythm of Western drums, not those of the mighty Congo, for Lumumba's mission appeared doomed from the start, he said himself that he was fifty years ahead of his time. This may have been the truest statement of the movie, for only ten years remain before the half-century mark in the modern history of the Congo or Zaire. Maybe in the last ten years of his prophecy, the people of Zaire will become truly free.

What the movie failed to give us were the deep structure motivations for the behavior of men like Kasavubu, Tshombe and Mobutu. Yes, the Europeans were there, had been there stealing the wealth, especially of Katanga Province which held 70% of the nation's riches, but we needed to see the very beginning with Belgium King Leopold's butchery, including his role in the European carving up of Africa at the 1890s Berlin Conference. We need to know the custom of chopping off limbs so en vogue today with diamond seeking armies in Zaire, Sierra Leone, Liberia, and elsewhere originated with King Leopold. Only then can the unaware and unread understand what demonic forces created such inhuman beings as the three main characters that surrounded Lumumba and ultimately brought about his downfall. From the movie we are tempted to say his own people did him in, but we know better, we must know better-think of diamonds, chrome, uranium, plutonium, cobalt, zinc and other minerals.

Look at Zaire today with several competing armies from neighboring countries (Rwanda, Uganda, Angola, et al) warring over the same minerals for the same European masters who instigated the treacherous actions of Kasavubu, Tshombe and Mobutu. Their names have a poetic ring that we should remember forever as the sound of death in a people, the sound of condensation and the lowest rats in creation, but understand they represent class interests and their class mates are visible throughout Africa and the world, even in the American political landscape: we have Clarence Thomas, Ward Connelly and Colin Powell -- new world rats, but rats none the less, who are every bit the measure of the Congo Three.

And let us not forget the reactionary behavior in the black liberation movement, the murder by incineration of Samuel Napier in the Black Panther fratricide, the assassination of Bunchy Carter and John Huggins by the US organization in the BSU meeting room on the campus of UCLA, the Muslims setting a prostitute on fire in San Francisco and other terrorists actions such as the Zebra killings.

Even the Black Arts Movement had its psychopathic shootouts with the wounding of Larry Neal and other acts we need not list. Shall we neglect to mention the hip hop generation also has its catalogue of madness such as the east coast/west coast killing of rap giants Tupac and Biggie Small. Let Lumumba be a lesson for us all. Let's learn from it and move to higher ground. Some of our madness is simply that -- we cannot attribute all evil acts of man to white oppression, although white oppression in inexcusable. We must take responsibility for Black Madness.

We are happy the director created a screen version of this historic drama. The actors made us feel the good in Lumumba and the evil in his associates, black and white, for the whites performed their usual roles as arrogant, paternalistic colonial masters whose aim was to hold power until the last second as we saw when they released Lumumba from prison to attend independence talks in Belgium. We saw the stark contrast of character in the speeches of Lumumba as prime minister and Kasavubu as president. Lumumba was strong, Kassavubu capitulating even on the eve of freedom, signaling his intent to remain a colonial puppet.

For those who came away like myself, and one could sense the sad silence in the audience as they departed the theatre, a friend remarked that we must not give up hope because the enemy will never tell you when you are winning.

For more writings and/or information on Marvin X go to

www.blackbirdpressnews.blogspot.com

www.parablesandfablesofmarvinx.blogspot.com

Sermon for Sunday October 3, 2010: Remember Me

When Mike Wallace asked Sister Thea Bowman how she would like to be remembered, she replied, “I want them to say: She tried.”

How do you want to be remembered?

It is your last testament; the way you are remembered, if you are remembered.

If you are not then the silence will be your testament.

Will you be remembered? How will you be remembered?

Remember Me: Sermon for Sunday October 3, 2010

I want to be remembered.

I want my name said.

Remember I was the daughter of Ernestine,

who was the daughter of Nettie,

who was the daughter of Connie,

whose mother I do not know,

but still remember to remember.

I want to be remembered for remembering.

I want to be remembered as a bridge.

Remember I tried to help us get there.

I want to be remembered for being a shelter.

Remember me for building and sharing.

I want to be remembered for being a loyal friend.

Remember I loved you

even when you were an imperfect vessel.

I want to be remembered for my loving black heart.

Remember how I loved unconditionally

until it was impossible.

I want to be remembered for saying the words whispered in my ear.

Remember me swinging nouns and verbs like swords.

I want to be remembered for my courage.

Remember me standing in the valley of the shadow

with truth in one hand

a desert eagle in the other.

I want to be remembered as being a part of the paradigm shift.

Remember me as a mother of lions.

I want to be remembered as a warrior.

Remember me as a guerilla in your midst.

I want to be remembered as a fierce enemy.

Remember I am Nzinga, born again,

Nat Turner & Harriet, used to be me.

I want to be remembered for acting up.

Remember me setting fires on stages.

I want to be remembered for the words.

Remember me crying over the news.

I want to be remembered like Garvey.

Remember to forgive my sins

look for me in the whirlwind.

I want to be remembered for my love of nation.

Remember us from doors of no return

spread like ocean seed from shore to shore.

I want to be remembered for my determination.

Remember that if I can

I’ll come again

a warrior still

rising again and again

my love won’t sleep.

Remember me.

--Ayodele Nzingha

October 2010

Preview #16, An Afro-Arab Dialogue on Arab Slavery

Preview #16, Journal of Pan African Studies, Poetry Issue
Guest Editor, Marvin X

A Dialogue Between Poets Rudolph Lewis, Sam Hamud and Kola Boof

This dialogue follows the apology for Arab Slavery by Col. Qaddafi of Libya, North Africa (see Preview #15). It is good that we can reason together, especially in light of so much ignorance on the planet, along with propaganda and revisionist history. We think our Sudanese sister writer, Kola Boof, makes the most persuasive argument in defense of Black Africa. Elijah tried to warn us about the Arabs, but we want to be so right that we are wrong, as Sun Ra taught me. How much progress have we made when we give up the white man for the Arab?

We oppose oppression everywhere, especially in Africa, the Middle East and most especially in America, whether by the white man or the Arab man in the hood who sexually exploits our women and short changes our children.

Arab slavery in Africa and the Middle East is going on as we write, just as the sex trade is flourishing on the streets on America, so we must not be starry eyed about Muslims or Christians, both peoples have the propensity to do good and evil. Ancestor Betty Shabazz said find the good and praise it!
--Marvin X
Guest Editor, Journal of Pan African Studies, Poetry Issue

Rudy

Qaddafi's apology follows on the heels of that by the United States for its plague visited upon the Guatemalians. By that of the Congress of the United States for its exploitation of the African Americans who built the Capitol at slave wages.

Qaddafi's statement is indeed more remarkable than the latter two apologies. The United States of America has yet to apologize to its kidnapping and enslavement of the sons and daughters of Africa.

Nor has it apologized to Mexico for its theft of much of what we call the Southwest, including California, Arizona, and New Mexico.

Nor has it thanked the Haitian people for its aid in acquiring the Louisiana Territory, which makes up much of what is the Midwest and the Northwest sections of the present-day United States.

For those with an interest, you may like to read Chinweizu's take on Arab slave trade:

http://www.nathanielturner.com/blackenslavementarabeuropean.htm

I challenge Saudi Arabia and Iraq to make similar apologies. Of course apologies without payment is little or no apology at all.

Loving Africa and Africans madly, Rudy

Sam to Rudy

hello rudy,
we are on the same page about qaddafi's apology; he has always been forthright and from meeting him back in the 80s when reagan was lying about "libyan hit squads," to today,he is a true muslim, not one who pretends or stands on ritual.

but as to some of the materials you quoted from bernard lewis, i would not take him as anhonest scholar, because he was an economist and knew little of Islam, and made up a lot of things and exaggerated others;no true scholars of islam or arab history trust his work because of his use as a zionist propagandist against islam and the arabs. i knew bernie lewis before i went to teach at princeton,and often argued with him while here in princeton; true arab and muslim historians, many of them jews, abhored his bad scholarship on arabs and islam,and often slanted and biased writings against islam and the arabs.

do not get me wrong, thereis, and has been, a lot wrong in the ara ban dmuslim worlds, but the prophert muhammad tried to help correct that. but, as with all religions, not all of it takes.
for instance, in one of the earliest of arab classical poems, there is "Antar," that deals with a black member of the tribe who desires the hand of teh chief's daughter, the chief andhis family ar white. the chief says, "no." but later, when antar proves himself in battle, the chief says, "yes, to the marriage" and antar becomes the leader of the tribe in t ime. this showed racial discrimination at that time, but certainly not slavery as we had it in the west.

but let us go on to other matters that i hope will clarifiy matters a bit more. i know this is a touchy subject and some would not dare touch it, but ishmael and marvin both know that i am willing to go where others fear to tread. but this also to let you know that i agree with qaddafi, and an apology is owed,as, it must be in from america and from other arab and muslim countries, and they must also apologize to Allah for their misdeeds,then and today, if necessary.

but also, malik al shabazz, malcom x, was not fool. he saw some things tha the'd never seen, but he saw the real islam, not that which was culture bound in the arab or islamic world where p eo ple do ritual instead of the real practice of the faith.

1. there was, and still is, discrimination in the arab and muslim worlds; but, you must understand, the Qur'an is against it.
2. slaves in the muslim world, were like indentured servants in the west, but bernard lewis, one of my former colleagues at princeton, was a notorious creater of materials, especially against the arabs and islam. he was one of those whose task was to split islam and the african americans in america and the world with his books. he also had dual citizenship with israel and america, so u can see where his sympathies lay.
3. slavery in america was always brutal, with no sense of human relationships or human respect; in the muslim world, from what i have read from other scholars in history, was, as i said, more like indentured servants, and families were not split up as happened in america and europe. slaves were often prisoners taken in warfare. until the europeans came, we hve no record of them being "sold" as chattel, which was, and is inhuman, but after the europeans came, there is no doubt that many went for the money or whatever. this was against qur'anic law, to "sell" another human being. if u have that person as a, as in western term, "slave" you must treat him or her with respect, feed , house, and clothe them and let them do their prayers, etc, and they do the work you assign them. after a certain amount of time, they may leave if they wish; they are not bound for life. this is not to justify this matter, but to make clear that the term "slavery" doesn't have the same meaning in arabic as it does in english, and islamic and arab types of slavery, though not good, were not at all like slavery in europe and the americas.
BUT BERNARD LEWIS AND HIS FRIENDS NEVER EXPLAINED THIS DIFFERENCE BECAUSE THEY HAD THERI OWN AGENDA.
4. qaddafi always comes out with the truth, as he did in other matters in the past. i didn't see this quote, but he has always been forthright on behalf of africans, african americans and native americans (what he termed, "the red indians", so as ot distinguish and make clear that they were not indians at all, for to be an indian, u had to have been from india!)

i'd say more, but i hope this helps clarify some matters. this is not that i disagree with you, but that there are matters here that i felt needed clarification.
unfortunately, bad discrimination exists and has existed for too long in the world; rememeber spike lee's, School Daze--it showed among african amerians discrimination based on light,tan,brown, black and blue blacks at an african american college; i taught at howard univ, and it was evident there while i was teaching there from 1988-95.
we hve to do away with all discrimination of that sort; the qur'an speaks against discrimination, but what alleged "muslims" do may be the opposite, but that is not the fault of Islam,nor good muslims,no matter what their color.
peace, salaam,


Sam to Rudy


rudy,
i'd also like to add something important that i wrote ishmael about, and will send it as an added essay for marvin's blackbird jrnl; the americans and europeans fed the muslim "slaves" pork intestines, who were among the earliest "slaves" brought to E and Am, from Sierra Leone and Mali. yes, the only meat they would give them, or only food they would give them was pork, and the intestines, full of shit, as their food.

this was to help break them from islam, and to insult them and their religion, in order to help break their spirits.
that's why, as i told ishmael, it's ironic that chittlins is a big food among african americans, when it was the food the white men used to break the spirit of those from africa. bernard lewis and others never mention this; but this comes from some of my own research and reasoning, knowing the history of the early people who were brought from africa (as i said, most were muslim).

the next step was the get them to become christians; they would often reward those people with better food, etc. those who did not give up islam were more brutalized by the europeans and americans (that is if can measure degrees of brutality, when all brutality is wrong!)

again, this is not an apologia for arabs or muslims in the middle east, but rather, an atte mpt to clarify matters so that though there were many, too many, w rongs, some of the matters needed to be clarified. i also agree, more than just words should be given. as a muslim, born and raised in america, from lebanese parents, i know there was, and is, still discrimination among arabs and muslims, and among xian arabs toward others,black, tan and white, but if they followed Islam and a proper Christianity, they would not have discrimination based on race, color, ethnicity, religion, or whatever.
peace, salaam,

Kola to Sam

Excuse me,

But this APOLOGY is meaningless considering the fact that
SLAVERY has not ended in Sudan, Mauritania or any of the
Arab nations that import them. Even in Libya, Khadafi's own
country, Black slaves can be found toiling on Arab farms and
homes.

Arab enslavement of Blacks, not mention genocide, is nowhere
near over.

And what the hell is an apology worth?? What does it do really?

Is that what you want for everything your ancestors suffered
500 years in America----Words?

And as an African mother from Sudan...I completely rebuke
this drivel written by SAM at Princeton. The irony of hatred
in the Afro-Arab world is much more diverse & much more
dimensional than what you have boiled it down to.

I relinquished my Muslim faith years ago; I try to speak Arabic
as little as possible. I do not feel in any way...sympathetic to
Khadafi's words (especially since I was once employed by the
man at White Bride, Tripoli) or to yours.

Kola Boof
Sam to Kola

hello kola, i hear what you are saying. the imam at your mosque was obviously a lying fool, who knew nothing about islam; thus, u can't condemn the religion for his abuse of u and others or the lies he spread.
as to the history u speak of, these are matters you know more of, beng on the ground, than i. as to palestinians sterilizing women to keep them as slaves, etc. this is something i know nothing about so cannot say if it is true or propaganda against islam.
as witih all peoples, there are some good ones and bad ones, not just among the arabs, but among all people. but, as with stereotyping of all sorts, it may apply to some, but not to all.
may Allah/God bless you, and help you find peace,
sincerely,
dr.hamod

Kola Boof to Sam Hamud

I'm not condemning the religion Sam Hamond.

I'm saying....why should we give a damn about the
Arab Muslim populations period???

The people being Genocided in Darfur....ARE MUSLIMS.

Many of these victims are MUSLIMS...but their skin is Charcoal
Black. THAT is the issue; not religion.

Your conversation is irrelevant. We should be concerned
about OUR AFRICAN SLAVES...and what OUR ancestors
would want us to do.

Not about the "feelings" of the Arab Muslims or Muslims
in America.

All this whining & "poor baby" Head-Patting that the Muslims
are receiving is a disgrace when we're doing NOTHING AT ALL
to save, defend or highlight the suffering the Black Slaves
and the Genocide targeted tribes in Africa!!

The whole conversation about "Islam" should be totally irrelevant!!
Would we care that the German Nazis were Christians or Catholics?
NO.

What we should care about are Black Africans.

Kola Boof
Rudy to Sam

Sam, I have a sliding scale of concern and concerns. First and foremost are the people of my birth, that is, African Americans. They are my family and I will defend them to the death.

Second, some of my like minded Americans (of all colors). Third, the African Diaspora and black Africans of like minds. And then others slide down my ladder of concern and concerns.

I have a concern for Islam as well in that some of my ancestors who came to America were Muslim and many of my friends are Muslim and have taught me much about Islam so that I have prayed with my palms and my forehead to the ground turned toward the rising sun. My interest is thus attached to its Spirituality rather than its rituals and theological concerns.

I have a keen interest and concern for the sufferings of all people, whether Jew or Palestinian. I have never been a fan and upholder of callousness toward the sufferings of others.

I do appreciate and respect the remarks and views of both Sam Hamod and Kola Boof. I am not an authority on the Quran or an historian of Islam and the Middle East. But they are among my intellectual interests.

As one involved in the struggles of my people since a teenager, I indeed find this new Arab development of noteworthy interest so much so that I have published the news on ChickenBones.

My concerns about Darfur and Sudan are such that I have corresponded with Bankie Bankie and have web pages dedicated to the happenings in South Sudan:

I favor a separation of South Sudan and await anxiously the vote. As far as Gaddafi I trust him as far as I could throw hi. He is too self serving for my comfort.

Loving yall madly, Rudy

Kola Boof

FACTS & HISTORY:

East & North Africa have been enslaved by Arab Muslim
Invaders (now Arab Imperialists) for 1,000 years.

Today, 2010, in Sudan...

Today in Sudan...we have slavery & genocide and it is
based on "Skin Complexion"...Colorism....the "Blackest/Purest"
must be wiped out and obliterated to break down Black blood
(authentic Africans) and MASS PRODUCE the Arab Rape Baby
who then in turn embraces more &more Arabization and
mixing until the White Arabs have conquered Sudan the same
way they conquered the rest of North Africa.

This is how they destroyed EGYPT and gradually "whitened"
and "whitened" it.....Queen Cleopatra's Intermarriage Law
(making it ILLEGAL for an Egyptian to marry an Egyptian)
being the 1st salvo in Cesar's quest to conquer the Blood,
not just the land.

When I was a child in Omdurman, Sudan...THE MOSQUE taught
us that the "Blacker you were"..the less loved by Allah you were.
That blackness was Allah's curse & that we should feel nothing
about slaughtering & pillaging the "Charcoal" original people.

In Mauritania, the Arabs "raise/breed" a Slave Class of Africans
from birth. These particular slaves believe they were born to
be nothing more than slaves & love their Arab master fiercely.

There are no PLANTATIONS in Sudan.

Dinka girls sell for $14. They are taken at ages
6, 9, 12 and kept in the homes as "bed slaves" and
maids.

Black Boys are chained to the back of Arab homes
& fed from doggy bowls. When it's time to do labor,
they unleash and work the Boy slave, beating him
if need be.

Even Palestinians have Dinka girl slaves. They sterilize these girls
so they can rape them w/o producing more Black males.

Jordan...Syria...Lebanon...Saudi Arabia...Iraq....Palestine
....Egypt...

In each of these nations you will find TODAY (RIGHT NOW)
Black women working in the kitchens with their tongues cut
out of their heads---you will find Black Sex Slaves, MALE &
female; you will find Blind African Men in the streets living
on 3 cents a week for "slave" work.

I am not surprised that MANY Colorstruck Black Americans don't
immediately notice this "trick" or that they identify with their
"Brown Brothers" (light skin, slick hair, brownish)....totally
preferring to look like these Bastardized Arabs and disassociate
with the Authentic Cushitic Peoples; the real true Black Africans.

I am not surprised that Black Americans "Make Excuses" for why
we should identify with KHADAFI and sell out the never ending
suffering of our own ancestors---whether they be West African
Slave Trade or the East/North African Slave Trade.

THE WHITE DEVIL in America....don't have shit on the Arab
Islamic MONSTER still pillaging & destroying true African culture.

Swahili is not an indigenous "African" language...but an Arab
Slave language combining African Bantu with dominant Arab
language and then FORCED on Eastern Africa nearly 1,000 years
ago through INVASION.

_______________

THESE are Facts & History of the Afro-Arab world
...and these abuses & horrors are CURRENT.

This is what needs to be discussed if it's truly KNOWLEDGE
you're claiming to seek.

Kola Boof