Are Afrikan Countries “shitholes”, or Does the Truth Hurt?

I am not defending Donald J. Trump’s alleged comments. However, in his brash way, (if he indeed did say these words, although he denies it) he has a manner at pointing out the obvious, and this is one of the reasons he resonated with the inbred mutant albino (white) electorate in the USA and became the president.

 

But the fact of the matter is that the term “shithole” is a euphemism for a place nobody would want to be for very long. More specifically, it is a place with ragged, unreliable, underdeveloped infrastructure, and severe socioeconomic problems that leads to desperation, poverty, and persistent disorganization. Does this describe any Afrikan nations you know? If not, then what is the reason for thousands of Afrikans to risk life and limb to journey to Europe on very dangerous vessels, piloted by very nefarious people to become second and third class inhabitants? No one risks their life to leave paradise.

 

To be more correct, it goes without saying that there are areas of Afrikan nations such as Ghana, Kenya, and Rwanda that have areas which are as developed as some other Eurasian nations and North America, but these are outliers. They are not the norm. Most of Afrika, (and I am speaking of areas populated by authentic Afrikan people) are still a long way from being dynamic and technologically developed nations. In many places the electricity is unreliable, roads and transportation systems are shoddy, and much of the technological infrastructure is owned and/or managed by foreigners. This includes engineering companies, water delivery systems, and health and medical facilities.

 

Case in point, if Afrikan countries were not “shitholes” as Trump allegedly chose to describe them, would Afrikan leaders like Mugabe and Buhari need to travel to Singapore or Europe for medical treatment? Apparently, they don’t trust their own hospitals and doctors to provide state of the art care. On a related note, I have personally seen doctors working in Afrika from Europe, America, or India who are barely competent and are only in Afrika because they can’t accomplish anything significant in their careers in their home country. The best and brightest Afrikan minds are enticed to go “study in the West” (or east) and then once they graduate at the top of their class at Harvard or Johns Hopkins University, we see a laudatory story about how they are an immigrant who “defied the odds” and “made it” in the USA or Europe. Typically they serve the white establishment and network of institutions while Afrikan nations continue their reliance on ne’er do well misfits, and misguided “do-gooders” with white skins from the west to “help Afrikans develop”. Wouldn’t it be better to just have world class institutions in Afrika in the first place so that Afrikan people can offer the superior care that we are already capable of doing? People often use the excuse that there are not enough skilled Afrikans to become doctors, engineers, pilots, and other technologically sophisticated professionals. Well, my question is, how long does it take to learn software engineering? Civil engineering? Medical science? Construction engineering? Piloting? Does is take more than 4-10 years of university studies? If not, after more than 60 years of independence, what is the excuse for not having these professionals trained, in place, and undertaking industrial projects?

 

Dr. Ben Carson is supposedly one of the best neurosurgeons in the world. He has written many books that are widely distributed around many Afrikan countries and they are read by many aspiring youth. However, he has not participated in developing the medical education system or the medical industry in any Afrikan country that I know of, why? Is he really qualified to be the HUD secretary in the USA when his background is in surgery?

 

Why is it that all of these sycophantic Afrikan-americans who slavishly follow the white liberals around are “offended” at Trump’s supposed remarks? It is because they would rather feel good about the liberal ideology of not pointing out uncomfortable truths which contradict their “one world, one people” fantasy. Do these Afrikan politicians, pundits, journalists, and media figures have any significant programs and policies which are designed to directly connect, and hence benefit Afrikan-americans and continental Afrikans in any demonstrable and measurable way? People decry the school to prison pipeline and the police shootings of Afrikan people in the USA, but where were all of these people when Dr. Umar Johnson and others like him wanted to start institutions to address these circumstances? They were either critical or silent. They are now only REACTING to media reports of what an anti-black man allegedly said (Trump). Dr. Khalid Abdul Muhammed once said that “when you toss a rock into a pack of dogs, the one that yelps is the one who got hit“. That seems to never be truer than in this case.

 

Now, I am not in support of Dr. Umar Johnson per se, I am only using him as an example. I know he was ambushed on a “Black news show” recently and many have publicly criticized and defamed him even though the charges levied against him by the state of Pennsylvania were frivolous at best and baseless at worst, yet many took the opportunity to castigate him openly. Now, I have definite disagreements with what he says at times, but I have never wasted my time to go through the trouble of writing an article or posting a video completely about him and his issues.

 

Furthermore, I am aware that Oprah Winfrey has a school in Azania for girls. However, have any uniquely talented students emerged from that effort? I don’t know, I am asking, and I hope that there have been. This great video by Mr. Superboy223 explains the hypocrisy of Oprah Winfrey regarding Afrikan development both in the USA and Afrika and how she, and other Black people like her, are only interested in being recognized by inbred mutant albinos and don’t really give two shits about recognition from Afrikans or what Afrikan people think about them generally or specifically. They return to the Black community when they need their “I’m Black” card renewed like Omarosa did, then they continue trying to snuggle up to white institutions and white people themselves.

 

In conclusion, I am not impressed with this phony outrage people are displaying at Trump’s reported comments. I just have one word for Donald Trump if he did in fact make this statement (which he has apparently denied doing). MORE ! Give us more Mr. Trump! This is why I wanted him elected, even though I did not vote for him. I wanted him to take the mask off of this fake liberal claptrap so that Afrikan people can see the face of our enemy once again, and then clearly understand what me must be about and what we must be doing. Even if he did not describe Afrikan countries as such (which includes Haiti even though the African Union doesn’t think so) if this possibly media manufactured incident doesn’t inspire Afrikan people on the continent and in the diaspora to seriously take up the Afrikan Power Project, what will? More military incursions into Afrika like France, the USA, and now China are doing? What will it take to put aside our silly, infantile feelings and build a network of strong institutions, connected by resilient infrastructure, operated by a realistic and appropriate ideology designed for the survival and empowerment of actual Afrikan people? This is the only source of outrage we should have now. Not at what our enemies are saying about us, but at why we haven’t moved forward more than we have. I say again here, as I have said in other posts, where is the international Afrikan media outlet that is solely and jealously focused on communicating a viewpoint from the Afrikan worldview and Afrikan interests instead of repeating what the BBC, CNN, France 24, and CGTN have to say? Where are the Afrikan public affairs programs that discuss the real issues we have instead of allowing western media outlets to dominate the market with simplistic tripe like the shows African Voices or Hardtalk where they simply reprimand Afrikan leaders and give fluff pieces about white people and other non-Afrikans going into Afrika to help “empower women”. This creates an image in the public mind which is not useful to the goals of Afrikan power. Until, Afrikans really get serious about rectifying our position in the world, people like Trump and these “good white people” will take turns at insulting Afrikans directly or indirectly, and giving unnecessary aid and assistance in projects that go nowhere and only lead to a continuance of Afrikans’ dependency on others. This, in my opinion, bespeaks of a truly “shitty” situation, if not an outright shithole as Trump describes.

Green Shoots in the Black World?

One can see the visible discomfort of the French President Emmanuel Macron at having to listen to the Ghanaian President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo outline the long overdue necessities for growth and development in Ghana and on the Afrikan continent in general. My concern is not for the anxiety of Macron, but for the veracity of the words President Nana Akufo spoke. You see, we have heard this “bad Black talk“ before. I am not discounting the truthfulness of the problems he identified in his speech and his obvious solutions to them which were elucidated by Marcus Garvey and many prior to him, but I am maintaining a healthy skepticism in my willingness to follow behind soaring rhetoric at the expense of hearing clearly stated policies and programs designed to achieve the goals which President Akufo-Addo conveyed in his speech. It was apparent that Nana Akufo spoke with passion and conviction, but so did Robert Mugabe in the video below. In 1997, Mugabe spoke of objectives which parallel Akufo-Addo’s statements, but woefully little was done in the way of actualizing these intentions.

Upon my viewing the Mugabe video, I saw the following comment posted and it sums up my opinions almost exactly:

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“I heard this speech before and I agree with it. My only questions are, where were the policies? Where were the programs? Africans in American cooned over Slick Wille, swooned over Obama, hated GW Bush and now hate Trump, but have yet to develop one successful independent policy to secure our political future. We have seen more Black lawyers, pundits, celebrities and politicians carrying water for the DNC and Hollywood, but not one of these individuals or groups has developed anything of note to accept his offer. What was the Doctor of Political Science Condi Rice doing at this point? She was on her knees begging GW Bush for a position. Where were the usual suspects, Oprah, MJ, Bob Johnson, the CBC and others doing? They were running after white people. Unless African-American institutions and individuals stop preaching the mantra “we’re in a global world now” and start acting like it by developing independent political and economic policies which are interfaced with African continental policies and programs…we can forget it!

Furthermore, I have been a member of more than a few African-American organizations and they have woefully narrow goals. Home-schooling, cultural events, and small scale retail sales. We have not done what is necessary to build the corporate structures and governance practices to bring skilled professionals WHO ARE PAID into the fold to plan the strategies we need to take Mugabe up on his offer. We still think that “if you Black, you can join our organization” WRONG! We need people with skills and vision to occupy leadership roles for compensation who can get the job done. Too many organizations just let people in because they have dreads and ‘talk Black’. That won’t get us anywhere”

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After stirring speeches are given in front of people like the representatives of white hegemony, Afrikan compatriots, and the world generally (since most everything now is transmitted through international media apparatuses), we then need definitive policy implementation starting with policy prescriptions that have been proposed by several Afrikan thinkers such as Dr. Chinweizu, Dr. Amos Wilson, Amilcar Cabral, Patrice Lumumba, Marcus Garvey and others. This blog serves as one such outlet to communicate Afrikan-centered policies designed to benefit actual Afrikan people on the continent and in the diaspora. I see my role as not dissimilar from IMA (inbred mutant albino) race-patriots like Zbignew Brzezinski or Heinz Kissinger who wrote books, articles, policy papers, and advised bureaucratic administrators and political leaders as to the most effective actions to take to extend the political power of white hegemony. Many of their recommendations have ended in failure and a loss of power for the European Imperial Project, and some were successful in the short term, but at the end of the day, they were valued by the leadership class for their contributions nonetheless. These inbred mutant albinos did not mince words about their goals in their official writings, and we need Afrikan policy officials to show the same allegiance and determination. The time is long past for simply using mere rhetoric to stir the masses, it is now time for unapologetic action and implementation in order to insure our survival and protection from continual enslavement by our historic and current enemies.

 

I consider the book I wrote “ACBN: Afrikan-Centered Biological Nationalism, A Primer” to be similar in relevance to books like “Strategic Vision: America and the Crisis of Global Power”, “Between Two Ages”, and “The Grand Chessboard”, all written by Brzezinski which outlined the existential problems of power and solutions for the Anglo-American alliance. I consider articles written on this blog and others you can find in my Blogroll section to be commensurate with papers written by Kissinger such as “Peace, Legitimacy, and Equilibrium” (his dissertation) and his numerous op-ed pieces in the New York Times. I am not trying to inflate my ego, but a cursory glance at the literature coming from many so-called Afrikan “thinkers” leaves much to be desired. Even if there are writers creating similar studied works, the results from their adoption by the nation-states of Afrika have yet to be seen.

In addition to creating written works, Kissinger and Brzezinski served on various think tanks and advisory boards as directors and administrators. Are their similar such boards in Afrikan nations? I have traveled to several Afrikan countries and one doesn’t have to look too long or hard until one sees a United Nations outpost or a European Union satellite office. Moreover, there are copious NGOs, and foreign institutes interceding in the process of Afrika forming its own policies and solutions to its own problems. The presence of these organizations distorts the consciousness of Afrikans and they either decide to risk everything to go to Europe or North America to find the “good white person” and job of their dreams, or they develop a mentality that assumes that if they simply beg long and hard enough, someone will take pity on them and just handover the resources that they need and desire to live an enjoyable life. Neither of these solutions are prudent for long term survival and benefit.

So, to conclude, I do wish to work with administrations like Nana Akufo’s if they are sincere, but if this is just a rouse to get Eurasian nations to fork over more resources in an attempt to keep Afrikans on the global plantation, then they can forget it. But, if Afrikan leaders are serious, let us see them implement some of the policies Afrikan-centered scholars have been advocating for the last century. Furthermore, I want to see Afrikan-centered thought instituted in the educational systems so that Afrikans can train and educate Afrikan children up to the high standards that we set for ourselves, and stop seeking “equality” or sameness with our enemies. We need an appropriate education to solve our own problems and not an education in order to make enough money to buy the trinkets that are created and manufactured by foreigners.

Afrika for the Afrikans!

It’s been since time to be about that!

ACBN: A Primer, to be released in September 2017

ACBN: A Primer, is the first book written and published by Kwesi Anan Ababio.

The book discusses essential concepts about Afrikan Centered Biological Nationalism and gives full credit to those who inspired and contributed to the ideas behind the creation of this book.

The book asks and attempts to answer questions like:
⦁ Who is an Afrikan?
⦁ What is ACBN?
⦁ Why Mulattoes and Other Hybrids Are Not Afrikan?…and much more

The 142 page book is an easy, engaging read and includes a contribution by special guest author Gaspar Yanga who writes a brilliant epilogue.

The book has nearly 30 color and black & white photographs, endnotes, a bibliography, and references detailing and supporting the thesis of the book.

Get your eBook or paperback copy as soon as it is available! It is essential reading for Afrikan people in the 21st century.

Links and instructions on how to make a purchase will be posted soon.

Email herunefer@gmail.com to reserve your copy before September 4, 2017 to receive an email notification upon release and a 10% discount.

Include in the subject line “ACBN BOOK“.

What is ACBN?

Afrikan-Centered Biological Nationalism (ACBN) is a sociopolitical-economic ideology which defines Afrikans by biological traits for the purposes of organizing a set of socioeconomic relations to achieve power for Afrikan people. ACBN relates to areas of activity within the social, economic, political and spiritual spheres of Afrikan life and existence. The main purposes are to engineer a social system in which Afrikans psychologically and socially seek their primary relations with other Afrikan people for work, education, organization, recreation, and procreation. ACBN is designed to protect the genetic integrity of Afrikans and insure the genetic survival of Afrikans and the Afrikan genome as it has existed from time immemorial.

ACBN defines¹ an Afrikan / Black person as one who is clearly a “close” descendant of people from East Afrika, a region comprised of countries now known as Kenya, Tanzania, and Uganda. Afrikans’ color variation ranges from bronze, dark reddish-brown, dark or nut brown, dark-chocolate color plus “peppercorn” hair. It² does not include people with a non-Afrikan parent or people who are living on the Afrikan continent but do not fit the above described phenotype. It does not include all of humanity based on the darwinian theory of evolution or any other unproven theory of human origin or “Out of Africa” hypothesis.

 

Social relations
ACBN recognizes that it is the set and system of social relations inherent in a cultural civilization that defines how goods and services are exchanged, information is conveyed, and individuals are to succeed based on developing and applying their individual and collective talents within the population. ACBN recognizes that the foundation of this system must reside in building families and extended families via the institution of male and female procreative realities and capabilities. Inter-racialism, or promotion of pseudo-scientific theories such as the “one drop” rule and “Black dominant genes” are rejected. Instead, the relationship between the Afrikan man and Afrikan women within the context of the familial community and its connection to the larger society is fostered and promoted preeminently.

Furthermore, relationships within the collective for industrial productive capacity are encouraged among groups of Afrikan men distinct from groups of Afrikan women. The same is encouraged and promoted for groups of Afrikan women. The youth are socialized into this reality of a division of roles with respect to one’s biological functionality within one’s genetically determined sex. This does not negate the need for Afrikan men and Afrikan women to work together in non-sexual industrially productive capacities as well.

 

Economics
ACBN recognizes that no ideology can succeed or find advocates which does not provide a material benefit to its adherents. Therefore, a practical and viable economic approach which focuses, in part, on Afrikan principles of Nguzo Saba are infused throughout the programs and policies which are adopted. Economic policies are conceived from the basis of the Afrikan worldview which included collective responsibility, collective work, and collective benefit which are balanced by individual commitment, individual development, and individual accountability. Specifically, Afrikan-centered culture and warrior-hood are to be pervaded throughout the economic enterprises which sustain the material existence and comfort for Afrikan people. Expectations to reflect the values, ethics, history, aesthetics and mores of Afrikan culture is demanded and through a system of reward and punishment are reinforced in the conceptual approach to functioning in daily life. To put it simply, in the ACBN society, “you don’t bite the hand that feeds you” and Afrikan people are the ones who do the feeding.

 

Economic policy recommendations will focus on the essential areas a civilization needs to survive such as food production, health maintenance, military, crafts manufacturing and infrastructure building. Strategic areas of growth will also be encouraged so that Afrikans gain control of large and essential parts of economic activity, such as software engineering, mining, aerospace engineering, communications, information technology, weapons technology, medical research, energy and transportation, kwk.

 

Political
ACBN being the ideological underpinning of a socio-political economic system does entertain the formations of schools of thought in the different areas of human activity and intellectual development. This tendency in human affairs leads to the development of factions which seek to satisfy certain constituencies within the social order. Even though this phenomenon is encouraged and the subsequent sub-political formations will be integrated into the society as a whole, all such parties will be counter-revolutionary and conservative with respect to the ACBN ideology and its fundamental foundation in the Afrikan worldview. The essential social theory that provides the groundwork out of which will spring groups which both agitate for representation in the institutional network of society, and seek to have a relevant voice in the distribution of resources, will be that the genetic survival of authentic Afrikans is the basis of our system of social relations and that non-Afrikans do not have a bio-genetic stake in the survival of the Afrikan genome and cannot be considered relevant in the panoply of issues that naturally will arise when engaged in direct and indirect management of the power, wealth, growth, development, maintenance, and well-being of Afrikan people.

 

Spiritual
One of the most profound attacks on Afrikans historically was the introduction of foreign ideologies masquerading as religions onto the Afrikan psyche. Much research has been done by Afrikan-centered scholars and researchers to reclaim authentic Afrikan ancestral religions and the diverse way in which they were manifested, recorded, instituted, and practiced. It has been concluded through copious research and in voluminous publications that, for Afrikans, the acceptance of foreign ideologies masquerading as religions is a violent psychological attack and jeopardizes the bio-genetic survival of Afrikans both directly and indirectly. This renders the acceptance of religions which are not designed for the survival of Afrikan people moot and judged by the historical record as being a material and immaterial detriment to the health of Afrikans in the mental, intellectual, and physical spheres of existence.

Therefore, since all civilizations need an ethereal thought system to undergird the conceptual superstructure of the civilization, Afrikan ancestral religions will be promoted and instituted throughout the society to address the spiritual nature of authentic Afrikan people as our ancestors had identified and codified through numerous texts, artifacts, and literature. Since all sane, self-interested geno-cultural groups enshrine the worship of their own image through the depiction of their deities and the practice of ancestral communion, this will be the fundamental spiritual approach with regard to the establishment of the major religious institutions and celebratory rituals commonly known as “holy days” or holidays which will provide the spiritual satisfaction for Afrikans in this area of human life.

Notes
1. Definition taken from the online journal African Centered Biological Journal retrieved from http://www.acbnj.wordpress.com on January 17, 2016.

2. This begins my additions to the definition.

Lightskinism- A New Term

“The European not only colonized the world, but he colonized knowledge and knowledge of the world. He even colonized the image of god!” JHC

The above quote is one of my favorites from Professor John Henrik Clarke because in it, he is basically saying that if Afrikans are to regain any sort of power, we have to start to define knowledge and the concepts that the knowledge describe and refer to in our own self-interested terms, especially if we continue using yurugu’s language. The more correct term I like to offer for consideration is lightskinism.

 

Evelyn Books Higginbotham,

Association for the Study of African-American Life and History (ASALH)

National President

 

Lightskinism is the occurrence of mixed-race people demanding that Afrikans acquiesce to them as being actual bio-genetic Afrikans because IMAs (europeans) have said so or because they are a “conscious” mixed-race person. Furthermore, it’s a disposition that demands Afrikans treat them with deference and/or adoration or it is the deference and/or adoration of mixed-race people by Afrikans over and above actually bio-genetically Afrikan people. We often see this in the area of “Black leaders” in some Afrikan continental nations (Botswana) and the expatriate colonial states like the USA, who are frequently mixed-race individuals and not Afrikan. This is also particularly operable in beauty standards and sexual relations as Afrikans seek to emulate mixed-race people by skin lightening and buying fake hair. However, and most importantly, it is the sexual fetish and fascination Afrikan males (and increasingly some Afrikan females) have specifically for mixed-race women/men in an effort to produce more hybrids through procreation so that there will be more in existence to soothe their shattered egos due to the reality that they are Afrikan without industrial, military, economic, and political power like other major world groups. Hence the only recourse is to attain a fleeting genetic power and the reverence for having had sex with or producing a mixed-race person. This is presently referred to as “colorism”, but the term colorism doesn’t go far enough to explain the phenomenon. This is mainly because some mixed-race people claim that Afrikans are colorist towards “light skinned Blacks” (mixed-race non-Afrikans). This is similar to the charge of reverse racism issued by IMAs. The charge is baseless in both cases because both groups are actively seeking to keep Afrikans powerless on a widespread scale. However, most Afrikans care little to nothing about attaining power over these other groups. Hence it should be correctly termed, “lightskinism”, not colorism.

I welcome your thoughts on this matter.

A Marshall Plan for the African Diaspora!

Hello Bloggers! Thank you for visiting The Lumumba Afrika Report! Below is a response to a blog called The Wattree Chronicle. You can find the original post here. I suggest you read it and then submit any comments you have. However, please follow the established decorum policy as written on the About Me page. I have published my response below in its entirety.

Reply to The Wattreee Chronicle:

Greetings! I read your blog entry and I would like to respond with a line-by-line analysis and critique of your editorial on Cornel West, Tavis Smiley, and Barack Obama. I would like to explain my personal position about these matters and highlight places where we may agree, and point to areas of disagreement. I will preface this by saying that I refer to myself, and others of my “race” as African people, so I will do that here, except when I quote you or refer to information in your article when you use the term “Black”.

You say that it is not Barack Obama’s (BO) job to address “Black” issues. However, BO doesn’t have a problem addressing the issues of homosexuals, “Latinos”, Euro-Americans (whites), the financial sector, the health insurance industry, and the military-industrial complex. His supporters argued, during his first campaign for the presidency, that “he can’t say anything for African-Americans or else white people won’t vote for him.” Well this statement alone speaks to the implicit knowledge of the existence of persistent white supremacy as a functioning ideology. It was also argued that he was attempting to become the president for all US citizens, not just African-Americans. Well, I would like to ask rhetorically, aren’t Africans-Americans US citizens too? If so, why can’t he address our issues? It seems that this position is more of a tactic to neutralize any criticism from this constituency and absolve the President of any responsibility to answer our grievances whether historically or currently. This lays the foundation for the next President, especially if he or she is a Euro-American, not to do anything or even acknowledge the special circumstance of Africans in America. The next President can take the position that assumes if the “first Black President” doesn’t need to do anything to address your collective issues, why should the new non-African-American president do so? This is a dangerous precedent because for one thing, Africans in America are not immigrants. To quote Claud Anderson, we are “non-immigrants”. Which gives us a special status, not unlike the indigenous nations of people whose treaties with the USA have been illegally broken and they have been remanded to concentration camps called reservations. This is eerily similar to the concentration camps to which many African men and increasingly African women are being sent, which are called prisons. We as Africans still in America should consider these parallel phenomena.

Next you say that the Africans in America should stop “waiting for a messiah” and “it is the responsibility of the Black community to address Black issues.” That sounds good, but the problem with that is that no other ethnic group does this. Remember the Tea Party? How about the so-called Latino demonstrations in the last decade? The “Latinos” cannot write and pass the legislation themselves, can they? This position you take is a fantasy that is a veritable propaganda campaign to convince people of the “boot strap” theory of economic success which defies the very history of government action to intervene on the part of Euro-Americans at key points in the history of the socio-economic development of the USA. For example, the Aid to Families with Dependent Children (AFDC) program was created during the Great Depression and was limited to Euro-American women whose husbands had deserted them. This case is interesting because it seems that when a community is economically deprived, the families break apart. Do you think we can apply this knowledge to analyze the situation of any other group in the USA? Secondly, even though we are not taught to think of it in this way, the wave of immigration from Europe in the late 19^th century and the early part of the 20^th century was a huge government program for Europeans only. It was a government supported initiative to increase the population of nominal white people in the USA. The government wanted to specifically dilute the large percentage of the population which were Africans. Where is the similar program like this for Africans from the continent? Oh yeah, I forgot, it was called slavery.

Moreover, you bemoan the fact that because we are adults now, and have a large (dispersed) consumer group that we should be doing things to “turn our community around” because “we have the resources to do the job”. Well, I agree with both points, but asking a person who is making $18,000 a year to start an economic program to “turn the community around” is beyond the ability of that person to do. Furthermore, if several people making a salary in the same range get together, they could still only barely make an impact unless there is a large institutional structure with several departments to direct and recruit membership by creating an economy of scale to even be effective. This is where I part with this “boot-strap” theory which, in my opinion, is essentially a “blame the victim” cop-out. The people who should be initiating this are the people who are continually let off of the hook in this equation, which is the wealthy class of Africans and the African leadership from the five spheres of influence. This is what Dr. Umar Johnson refers to as the SPREE–Status individuals (e.g. school superintendent, chief of police), Politicians, Religious leaders, Educational academics, and Entertainment professionals. These are the people with the financial capital, the influence, the intellect, (ostensibly) and the organizational ability to create these institutions into which Africans can invest a small portion of their consumer income for community building. It has happened before (e.g. Marcus Garvey), so why aren’t they doing it now? I know, we can point out that Garvey ultimately failed, but today there is no FBI program targeting Africans in America anymore to infiltrate and sabotage our institutions. We can do what we want without fear from the white man and institutional white supremacy stopping us, right? Oprah is a billionaire, and I don’t here a mumbling word from all of these “boot-strap” theorists and Obama defenders about the responsibility that she, Cosby, Johnson, and Jordan are avoiding. They could easily create a 25 to 50 million dollar endowment to start an African-American think-tank and investment fund to address the specific issues that concern the African community. They could employ the thousands of African university graduates from the USA, the Diaspora, and the African continent itself to develop programs, policy initiatives, remedies, recommendations, and strategies to address these issues. They could create a national credit union and find people with experience in finance and banking who are African and primarily market this opportunity to all African-Americans to invest in an interest bearing fund and open a savings or checking account for personal banking. This investment fund could be used to build business and projects which would yield a retirement stipend for its shareholders. It could go to invest in African communities in the USA and establish relationships with other Africans in the Diaspora and on the continent for the purposes of educational, cultural, and economic training and partnership programs. Exchange programs could be set up for African students to come to the USA or for Africans in the USA to go to Africa and to participate in language and cultural exchange programs.  University students could do study abroad programs, and a scholarship fund can be set up for African students to study in majors which are in need on the continent and within the community. Students accept the scholarship as a loan with the understanding that they must serve for a demonstrable minimum amount of time working on issues in the community to change the reality of Africans on the continent and in the Diaspora in order for the debt to be forgiven. Community learning centers and media distribution networks could be set-up and franchised to disseminate knowledge of our history and issues that are important to us as Africans.  These places could employ the thousands of teachers that are being laid-off and fired from public schools across the USA. Why don’t they do something like what I have just described? I am no millionaire, and I don’t have the caché of the African intelligentsia, nor the influence of the entertainment moguls to do this, but they do. And yet we continually blame the guy on the corner with a 40 ounce beer and sagging pants or the single mother with too many children for not “doing something” to change their communities, and no one calls out the big fish for doing the same thing—which is nothing at all!

Furthermore, the pathologies that afflict Africans in America are well documented and we know the cause. Yet this cause is taboo, and the critics of Africans’ plight in the USA say that to solve these ills, we should stop talking about the cause and take personal responsibility. This is laughable, because the perpetrators of the problems which were the beginning of our woes have never taken any responsibility. Radical new approaches like what I have laid out need to be taken, but they are not being done, why?

You say we should “fight for our piece of the pie”. Well, what if there is poison baked into the pastry? The basis for the foundation of the USA cannot be overlooked, and to say now that we should just seek to benefit from the centuries of organized criminality which resulted in our enslavement is severely misguided. No one has said that “we should wait for someone to come to our rescue and twist political arms”, that is what the financial elite and wealthy bankers on Wall Street do, but we should recognize that among many Africans in America, there is pervasive mis-education about the world and our history in the world. There is a lack of understanding about our fundamental circumstances in the USA, and an inability to talk honestly and frankly about our history in this country including analyzing the goals, strategies, and outcomes of the Civil Rights movement to come to a understanding of whether or not it accomplished what we sought. I would argue that it hasn’t or else we would not have our present predicament. In relation to this, I agree with your critique of the self-appointed leadership, but the reason they are there is because the Black Power/Liberation movements and the Civil Rights movement were co-opted, and crushed. Into the vacuum of leadership came the present bunch of buffoons, and there exists today no widespread grassroots organization into which ordinary Africans can seek membership. This is the negative outgrowth of the political assassinations and the misdirection of the Civil Rights movement into electoral politics, it was not due to the shortcomings and peccadilloes of African-Americans.

The tendency of refusing to vote is not only limited to the African community either. The average percentage of voters each election year is roughly 37% during a congressional only year and about 50-55% during a presidential election, the African population in the USA is 13%, so some others think voting is worthless too, not just us. Moreover, you speak of the empty churches that don’t open to employ people for babysitting jobs, and ridicule the preachers for absconding to the suburbs with the parishioners’ money, well, these churches actually operate under a government program called the Faith-based initiative (FBI), started by George W. Bush, (a former president of the USA) to actually control the organizing ability, political culture, and the actions of these churches, which explains why you see the activity you mentioned.

Additionally, in a few paragraphs in your piece, you made allusions to African-American behavior like “watching Kobe’s jump shot” and to paraphrase “parents allowing their children to watch hip hop videos that are instilling negative values”, well this may be a valid point, however, in order for this to be really understood deeply, we have to study the history and nature of the mass media and the propaganda apparatus themselves. Without doing such, we are really limited in knowing the full impact and function of things like professional sports and music videos. If we understand this, and the pervasive saturation of these media in our culture, it would be very difficult not to know why it has the impact it does. To put it bluntly, it produces this behavioral effect by design! Since we don’t have education programs to inform people of what the effects of the media are now and historically, especially concerning Africans and the depiction of us, there is no way we can criticize people for exhibiting the behavior they do after consuming these media, especially if we don’t understand the phenomena ourselves.

Again, I am no a fan of Tavis or Cornel, but to say that they should have “wait(ed)” until Obama was sworn in to criticize him is ridiculous. Let those two do whatever, they want. We know what they are. They are part of the Entertainment and Education classes of the African petit bourgeoisie, so to expect anything at all from them or Al, Jesse, and others is unrealistic. Their function is to either support the system, or to be the official critics, beyond which no criticism is allowed to be even heard. There are several more incisive critiques of Obama that have much more relevance, but they are being drowned out and ignored so that West and Smiley can give benign, unfocused criticism about something as unspecific as poverty. They haven’t addressed any of the issues that I have mentioned in this piece, and what I have said hardly scratches the surfaces of what could be pointed out as failings on the part of Obama and the Africans of exceptional accomplishments in America. And regarding your accusation of Tavis Smiley’s figurative demand for Obama to “kiss his ring”, Obama did go on his show on October 18, 2007. It is on YouTube for crissake’s! Why would you make such a large oversight?

I won’t readdress your criticism of Cornel West since I already stated what I think about him, but I find it ironic that in a post where you are basically defending Obama’s decision to ignore the African community for his own higher moral and intellectually superior reasons, you then criticize the major media for hyping Cornel West as an intellectual. Don’t you think the media has assisted in creating the image of Obama as the same kind of superior intellectual? Why would not the media be wrong about both men concerning their aptitude for the positions they hold? It seems that the brunt of your attack in the piece is directed at the most powerless in the entire equation—African people—and that you further use your energy to attack the supposed spokesmen for these people, Smiley and West, all the while defending the most privileged, aloof, and elitist of them all, another Ivy League graduate, Barack Hussein Obama himself!

Then confusingly in the twelfth paragraph, you say that the media are “dragging Black people through the mud”, but in the opening six paragraphs, you basically do the same thing. You say that the media are embracing West, and we should be skeptical of these media figures, and then immediately say that Africans should stop listening to people who “tell us what we want to hear” but listen to people who tell us what we “need to hear”. People are prepared to hear what they are prepared to hear. If they have been indoctrinated and mis-educated for decades, how are they supposed to know what they need to hear? It sounds like more blaming the victim to me, I think you should really start examining the history and structures of the United States’ indoctrination system from the media to education in order to understand why it is so easy for a person like Cornel West to be offered as an acceptable intellectual, and why people have the basic assumptions in the first place to accept what he is saying as profound, or at least to accept his image as an intellectual. If you study this history, I think you will find out why we are behaving in this manner. If you haven’t already seen the lecture or read her book, see or read “Post-Traumatic Slavery Syndrome” by Dr. Joy DeGruy.

Lastly, you say that Obama’s shortcomings are in failing to address the threat of the GOP. Why do you think he is doing that? He is a smart man isn’t he? Maybe his actions are done intentionally, and the real owners of the USA, the powers behind the throne, don’t want him to succeed in his articulated campaign agenda, so we have what amounts to political theater where we have the good cop / bad cop motif. You know the routine. It’s similar to the Charlie Brown and Lucy bit. It’s when Obama tries really hard to get things passed, but those nasty old Republicans just won’t let him do it. Darn! You sit back and watch and say something to the effect of:

I wish he had a majority in the house and senate, and then he could really make things happen.

Oh but wait, he did have  majorities. However, because he didn’t fulfill his campaign promises, the Democratic voters stayed home and the Tea Party crazies came out in droves to vote the way they always have voted—on a straight white nationalist ticket. So much for our friends the white liberals!

Finally, you said condescendingly that “race was the last war and this one is about class”. My friend, class has always been the war. I think it was Khalid Muhammad, who said it best: (to paraphase)

“Some people say it’s a class issue. Well, wherever the black-white dynamic exists, you’ll find the White is the upper class, and the Black is the lower class.”

Class isn’t just about a well-paying job and a nice house. It is about self—determination as a nation of people, and social wealth built up between members of that nation. It is about a group having their own holidays, folk-ways, mores, festivals, rights of passages, language, names, and world view. It is recognition by other nations that you are protected from ill-treatment because one belongs to a strong nation that can come to the aid of its people through defense systems. It is about having for each individual deferential privileges which are distinct from others who are not members or citizens of your nation. It is about commanding assumptions from others of possessing strength, character, moral values, and intellect that are deemed to be present without one having to disprove a negative. It is so much more the merely, having a degree and working in a multi-cultural, post-racial environment. Obama, West, and Smiley represent none of that.

Thanks for reading!