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Barack Obama: Bamboozling America
Worm
Hole -  Crypt
Barack Obama: Bamboozling America

by Larry Pinkney
It's strange sometimes how things occur. Nevertheless, what goes around will
always, ultimately, come around.
A very short while ago I sat staring at the contents of a package I had just
received from the US Department of Veterans Affairs. It was a certificate with
the US eagle and concomitant coat of arms emblazoned in gold at its top, which
read, in relevant part, "The United States of America honors the memory of" my
late father "in recognition" of his "devoted and selfless consecration to the
service of our country in the Armed Forces of the United States." It was signed
by the current President of the United States.

As I stared blankly down at the awarded certificate and thought of my deceased
father, the tears swelled and streamed down my face and I wondered how many
thousands of sons and daughters of US armed forces Black American veterans had
received such certificates honoring their fathers or mothers. I thought of the
pain, futility and the utter horror of combat and of war for the masses of
people. And then, like a lightning bolt, the thought struck me that some in
this nation are actually seriously considering the candidacy of Barack Obama to
be President of the United States and concomitantly Commander-In-Chief of its
potent Armed Forces.

This is a man who has enjoyed the fruits of America at the blood and expense of
Black Americans and others, but who has paid virtually no dues.

This is a man whose father had also enjoyed the fruits of university schooling
in America but subsequently returned to his native Kenya.

This is a man, who also like his father before him, neither served in a branch
of the US military nor in any organization in America opposed to US military
adventurism.

This is a man who as a deeply corporate military industrial complex US
Presidential candidate, has called for "unilateral" US military actions in
other nations. [And why not? After-all, his father, himself, or his wife and
children were not and will not be the ones killing and being killed.]

This is a man who, in Chicago, pretended to support the human rights of the
Palestinian people but who is now known to be a huge supporter of the apartheid
Zionists and their powerful and insidious political lobby in America.

This is a man who dares opportunistically to feign admiration for the late Dr.
Martin Luther King, Jr., but does not share the collective memory, pain and
deep concerns of Black America, other people of color, or even of numerous
white Americans for that matter - in the ongoing struggle for equality and
justice in this nation.

This is a man who has de facto contempt for the past supreme sacrifices made by
thousands of activists from so-called "militant" organizations such the
Organization of Afro-American Unity (OAAU), the Student National Coordinating
Committee (SNCC), the Black Panther Party (BPP), Students For A Democratic
Society (SDS), the American Indian Movement (AIM), the Revolutionary Action
Movement (RAM), etc.

This is a man who is silent about the need for reparations for Black American
descendants of slaves and the genocide of the indigenous so-called "Indian"
peoples on this continent. He is the consummate opportunist who, in reality,
cares nothing about the horrors inflicted upon Black, Brown, and Red peoples in
this nation, and has repeatedly signaled that he plans to inflict even more
"unilateral" military horrors upon various nations and peoples of the world.

This man, Barack Obama, is but a more articulate, younger, and shinier version
of the current and infamous US Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, adorning
himself dangerously and abundantly in superficiality and double-speak.

Times are perilous and how deeply I fear for my Black, Brown, and Red sisters
and brothers. Indeed, how I fear for America as a whole, and the peoples of the
world. It would seem that the US imperialists of the corporate and military
elite may have at last found a black face. Unfortunately, for the moment at
least, some of the American people might very well be blinded by the lightness
of this black face, until such time as the horrors really begin to sink in. But
will it be too late then?

Unlike Barack Obama's father, we Black Americans did not come to this land by
choice, nor do we as a people enjoy white skinned color privilege as did Barack
Obama's mother. Thus, it would be the height of insanity to believe, in any
way, that Barack Obama himself, by virtue of his ethnic background, genuinely
relates to, cares about, or even understands the complex social, economic, and
political challenges faced by Black or White Americans, much less those faced
by Brown and Red peoples in this nation and around the world. He has no
collective memory of the whips, chains, and lynching nooses as do we Black
Americans. This is why he can so easily call for "unilateral" US military
action in other people's nations while simultaneously and hypocritically
mimicking and invoking the legacy of the brutally slain Dr. Martin Luther King,
Jr., who would have been horrified at such a notion. This kind of Obama
insanity is immensely dangerous to all Americans be we Black, Brown, Red,
Yellow, or White; it is a real threat to peoples of the entire planet. It is
horrifying to imagine what Barack Obama would do as Commander-In-Chief of the
US Armed Forces, with or without Congressional approval, and the support of the
elite of the corporate military/industrial complex.

Moreover, since Barack Obama has no qualms about "unilaterally" militarily
attacking other nations, there is absolutely no reason to believe that he would
be self-constrained from ordering that Black, Brown, and Red peoples right here
inside of the US be viciously attacked via "police actions;" and quite frankly,
lots of white Americans themselves might not be that far behind from being
sacrificed, especially if they dare to try and get in the way of Mr. Corporate
- "unilaterally" attack them - Barack Obama. Remember: What goes around comes
around. I am reminded of the lyrics to the old song, "Smiling Face Sometime" by
the group Undisputed Truth, and the maddening old song, "Won't Get Fooled
Again" by the group The Who. The question still is: Will we be "fooled again"
in America, this time by a "smiling face" of color? The stakes are incredibly
high.

We Black Americans have often and generally been so physically and emotionally
brutalized in this nation that we sometimes vicariously tie up our hopes and
dreams with others who appear to have somehow accomplished that which we
ourselves have not, due to systemic economic, social, and political oppression.
This is a fact that has not escaped the attention of Barack Obama and his
political advisors/handlers from the corporate military/industrial complex.
Thus, his game is simple: Play on the unfulfilled hopes, dreams, and needs of
Black people. Sell the people a pipe dream in order to attain your own personal
goals. This is what I refer to as political pimping, and this is precisely what
Barack Obama and his advisors/handlers are doing, not only to Black America,
but to the nation as a whole. Through the use of double-speak, Barack Obama
keeps the people from seeing who and what he really is. No friend of Black and
disenfranchised people would have, in any manner whatsoever, praised Ronald
Reagan. Yet, that is precisely what Barack Obama did: He praised - apartheid
"trickle down economics" -Ronald Reagan, who was economically, socially, and
politically the enemy of all middle class, poor, and disenfranchised people,
including (but not limited to) the unemployed, under-employed, single mothers,
and youth. Ronald Reagan caused enormous pain to the masses of Black people.
Yet, through the use of double-speak and the consistent support of much of the
US corporate "news" media, Barack Obama bamboozled the people and to this day
has not been made categorically and seriously to answer for this outrage of
praising one of the worst enemies of Black people in the 20th century. Instead
of stopping and eliminating the actual "excesses" of the infamous US government
sponsored (and ongoing) COINTELPRO activities from "the 1960s and 1970's" to
illegally "frame, discredit, imprison, and murder" Black political activists
and others inside the US, Ronald Reagan increased such activities nationally
and internationally, including the horrendous and bloody "Iran Contra" debacle.
Nevertheless, this is the person who Barack Obama cynically chose to praise!
What an insult and smack in the face to Black America, and indeed to all of
America and the rest of the world by Barack Obama!

To Barack Obama I repeat the still very relevant and powerful words of Malcolm
X: "You have to read the history of slavery to understand this. There were two
kinds of Negroes. And the house Negro always looked out for his master. When
the field Negroes got too much out of line, he held them back in check. He put
them back on the plantation. The house Negro could afford to do that because he
lived better than the field Negro. He ate better, and he lived in a better
house. He lived right up next to his master...He ate the same food as his
master and wore his same clothes. And he could talk just like his master - good
diction. And he loved his master more than his master loved himself...He never
wanted his master's property threatened...That was the house Negro."

Judging from, among other things, how Barack Obama has already sold out the
human rights and legitimate aspirations of the Palestinian peoples to corporate
Zionism, it stands to reason that he will also sell out Black America, our
Brown and Red sisters and brothers, and indeed the whole of the American
people, to the corporate and military elite. It's really just a matter of time,
but sooner or later the people will see, and when they do, may heaven help him.
Some folks presently may be imprisoned by Barack Obama's double-speak rhetoric,
but as Ho Chi Minh so aptly put it: "When the prison doors are opened then
shall the real dragon fly out."

Times are perilous brothers and sisters. We must use serious and consistent
critical thinking. Our very survival is what is at stake now and in the future.
If we are going to "keep it real," and we must do this, it cannot be
superficial. It must be the "real thing." "Ain't nothin' like the real thing."
The Democrat and Republican parties are not the real thing for the masses of
people and neither is Barack Obama.
http://BlackCommentator.com Editorial Board
member, Larry Pinkney, is a veteran of the
Black Panther Party, the former Minister of Interior of the Republic of New
Africa, a former political prisoner and the only American to have successfully
self-authored his civil/political rights case to the United Nations under the
International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. For more about Larry
Pinkney see the book, Saying No to Power: Autobiography of a 20th Century
Activist and Thinker, by William Mandel [Introduction by Howard Zinn].
http://www.blackcommentator.com/
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*Permalink:*  http://pnews.org/ArT/ZuLu/BamB.shtml

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      Today is Monday February 04, 2008*
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On the Internet since 1982
(I have been doing it longer - and I do it better)

Worm
Hole (Links/NaWikis) -  The Crypt
(Views and News)
- Hank Roth (Bio)
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