Here's the thing; blind loyalty is a dangerous prescription that usually ends up with the type of abject betrayal that finds the most vulnerable being exploited. There is far too much information available in this day and age to subject ourselves to such a fate. I fully support Obama as opposed to the quacker-factory clowns that make up the right but I'm angry that he seems to take us, black African Americans, his strongest supporters, for granted. While he has made it clear that he supports gay rights, the military, Wall Street, the healthcare insurance industry, and immigration reform by taking bold steps to meet and strategize with the leadership and rank-and-file of those movements resulting in bold initiatives; we of his own ethnicity are dropping further behind when a simple acknowledgement from our Commander-in-Chief could lift our entire community. Let us know, Mr. President, that you're aware of our pain as we lag in everything from income and wealth to real estate and business ownership while we lead in incarceration, HIV-AIDS, unemployment, lowest mortality rates, and violent crime.
There's a pretty significant dispute happening in our community regarding the President and talk-show host Tavis Smiley and by extension those who support either side even though they need not be mutually exclusive. Unfortunately for Tavis and his supporters, the basic disagreement with the President stems from an egotistical "sword" fight between the two men over who's the most popular intellectual leader in the black African American community. When then-candidate Obama refused to change his schedule to accommodate an appearance on Tavis' show even though he volunteered Michelle as his surrogate, the die was cast. Due to that tiff, Tavis continues to be seen as a self-serving petty individual by a large portion of the AA community, me included, and even aligning himself with a respected academic such as Cornel West has done little to quell the furor and moreover led many people, but not me, to derogate Prof. West for the association.
But those are reals problems that exist in crippling the black AA community and loudmouths like Steve Harvey who represent the worst in bully-pulpiteering attempting to brand anyone an "Uncle Tom" (better said as "Uncle Clarence" as in Thomas & Pendleton) who dares question why a president who hales from a population that supported him 99% would treat his own so cavalierly while constantly cow-towing and capitulating to the far right who have figuratively spat in his face and called him-- well, you know...
There was an old idiom that used to speak to the notion of the "bigger man" that would expect that if President Obama can bring in Prof. Gates and the Cambridge policeman to talk about their differences over a beer; to state that he was going to keep floating ideas out there until #1 Teabag bigot, "eric cantor finds something that he likes"; then I'm old-fashioned enough to believe he can quietly outside the spotlight address the rift between Tavis, Cornel, and himself to settle it for the good of all. The last thing our community can afford is another turf war especially when the stakes in this one are so high. And in this election year, this President is going to need us 110% because I'm of a mind to believe that racism both subtle and overt are going to negatively impact the European vote this time around. No one likes to be taken for granted and I dare posit that there's already been significant damage done to a sizable part of the black AA population when the President rather churlishly admonishes us to 'stop complaining, take off out bedroom shoes and put on our marching boots' or some such nonsense he uttered at a NAACP gathering that I dared not bother rehashing lest I get even angrier all over again...
So count me in as a defender of both responsibility and accountability because if the President doesn't wake up to the reality that we're drowning in our own tears, then he will indeed find himself going down with us...
