BLACK ELECTED LEADERHIP NOW MEANS NOTHING

The fact that Black elected leadership now means nothing in the face of a system whose choice has been made regarding us Black people. These officials are really powerless, but the fault is not with them, but the system itself. Even they know that their elections are a false hope that will inspire ill-informed Black folk to continue to have false confidence in the political system. In spite of all of the yahooing and the love-fest about "public service" there is only one reason to hold elected office and that is to exercise power. Our miss-elected officials in the Black community are really happy with nothing more than the perception that they are serious players at the table of power, yet cannot actually exercise any power. Every interest group, lobbyist, and other ethnic groups knows this, with the exception of us Black Americans. My perception of President Obama is what it has always been and always will be; a mediocre politician, and “centrist" creation of the moneyed elite and the useless Democratic Leadership Council. The DLC has never recognized or even believed in our legitimate Black interests. In reality, it sees the Democrats "ties" to us Blacks as being one of the main obstacles to getting Democrats elected, and re-elected. Its only goal is to collect enough votes from its traditional base (middle class white’s) to get its hand-picked people into office where they can join the Republicans in getting rich by being in cahoots with Wall street and the military and prison industrial complexes. You Black folk should not be surprised that our Mr. Obama has consistently exercised power for the benefit of everyone in the traditional power structure with the blinding exception of the Black community. In fact, his main "interactions" with us Blacks have either been in the form of waving, radio interviews, sneaking away, or taking evasive action when Blacks may be around, or using attacks on Black people to help him score points with his real friends on the mostly White right, and on Wall Street. There is no such thing as the lesser of two evils in the American political system. As Black people, neither the Democrats nor the Republicans, nor the so-called Tea Party is our friend. It is time to be daring and vocal, immediately start voting for the third, fourth, and fifth party candidates. It is also time to stop looking for some imaginary superhero to save us and to begin taking control of our own destiny. It is time to start looking outside of the red, white, and blue box which restricts our thoughts, and blinds many of us to the fact that the world outside of the United States is rapidly changing. We cannot continue to remain the powerless lawn jockeys of a fading system and hope for the best. That is not a good plan. As I now see, and you should too, the nation has made a choice, and it is one that threatens the long-term survival of Black people. The country’s public policies are now becoming the equivalent of weekly, random selections of Black people who would be taken to a secret place and shot. Black suffering and our permanent, worsening conditions we face are not an accident of fate or the result of outrageous patterns of Black behavior. No, they are intentional. They have become national policy. The nation has made its choice. We, however, seem to have also made ours. Our willingness to not break with our old tired ass ways, to not assume our own agenda, and to strongly advocate and implement our own alternatives, theoretically, practically and with an urgent degree of unison has resulted in our choice of going along and hoping for a brighter day.