Yesterday the New York Times – a decidedly establishment newspaper that has generally been anti-Bernie from day one – published an opinion by Charles M. Blow, a black man tired of white people telling him how to vote, titled “Stop Bernie-Splaining to Black Voters.”www.nytimes.com/...
After months of tirelessly working on spreading Bernie’s message, and recently focusing on how in particular to get that message to non-whites, I must admit I am deeply disturbed and frustrated by the attitude in Mr. Blow’s opinion. This comes on the heels of another article in which the Black Lives Matter movement leaders explain why they are not endorsing any presidential candidate. www.democracynow.org/... It also comes on the heels of a painful expose of the Clinton “Tough on Crime” legacy and its impact on the black community. www.thenation.com/... Painful because despite overwhelming evidence of the Clintons not giving a damn about blacks, black people still trust them and are loyal to the dynasty. Naturally black people are not a voting block, just like any other, but generally speaking, seem to be a lot more leaning toward Clinton than Sanders. One reason for that is the sheer lack of information about Sanders, since the MSM took such care to not cover him for the first 9 months of his campaign. Instead they created a monster called Trump. It’s all about the ratings, you know. Who gives a shit if we recklessly create a monster in the process of keeping our ratings up? Who cares if hate crimes are being committed in the name of the monster we created? We don’t. (MSM speaking)
I am one of the many organizers of the nation-wide March4Bernie effort, which started off as a desperately needed tool for giving Senator Sanders much needed visibility in face of the consummate mainstream media (“MSM”) blackout. Now that he is finally being seen as a viable candidate, he has the attention, but with it comes a lot of outright negative press, obfuscation, confusion, and even danger. Sanders is going against the establishment, the entire establishment. Pause for a moment and think what that means. It means going against the petrochemical industry, against the private prison industry, against the health insurance industry, against Big Pharma, against Agribusiness, and any and every other Big-Profit-Over-People-and-the-Environment-Interest out there, not to mention Wall Street against whom he declared outright war. www.commondreams.org/... All great and brave souls in decades past who attempted to oppose those interests were assassinated: MLK, Kennedy, Malcolm X – just to name a few. Paul Wellstone’s plane crash remains a mystery too. What I would like these Marches 4 Bernie to demonstrate to the Koch Brothers and their ilk is that we’ve got Bernie’s back, that we are going nowhere, that we are here to stay and, to make their lives hell for a change. But the only way we can accomplish this dangerous, time consuming and all engaging task is to stand together and very loudly demand a rightful seat at the table; We are letting them know we no longer want the crumbs off their tables; we want to sit at the table! Without them, of course. They can go to hell. It is now or never. The planet is reaching a dangerous tipping point. Climate Change has introduced to election politics something similar to what nuclear weapons introduced to international relations. Bernie’s campaign cannot be compared to that of Nader or Dean, or anyone else, except perhaps FDR. We find ourselves on the brink of extinction, and yet two days ago SCOTUS struck a severe blow to President Obama’s Clean Power Plan!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Time to WAKE UP!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! This is not about black and white, in the sense that we must come together as ONE, and not be sidetracked by the attempts of the establishment to divide us. We are all in this mess together. (I am NOT saying All Lives Matter, here; not at all. Black Lives DO Matter. Hell yes. ) Unlike what the DNC is trying to feed us, this election isn’t about democrat or republican. What it really is about is all of humanity standing up to corporate greed! In case you haven’t been following “obscure” news from around the world that are not covered by MSM, all around the world people are rising up against corporate greed and austerity measures. In the United States we are being held in the dark amidst all the news seemingly available. New Zealand and Chile marched in great numbers against the TPP just days ago, Spain has elected a leftist coalition, the former Greek finance minister is launching a pan-European leftwing movement www.theguardian.com/... and the list goes on. The right wing, of course, is also on its reactionary move.
The planet is literally on fire, hence the urgency among those of us who support Senator Sanders for President. He is a deeply compassionate man, who has had his heart in the right place and hasn’t strayed from his message in all the time he’s been in politics, over 30 years total. He has always fought for the oppressed, and is continuously learning, observing, listening, and finding ways to fix problems accordingly. His approach is not piecemeal. He is attacking the beast right in its soft underbelly – campaign finance reform and income inequality. All other ills plaguing our society derive from this systemic shortcoming, or rather purposeful systemic arrangement arranged for the benefit of the 1%. Racial injustice is one such terrible ill that needs to be rectified, and it cannot be rectified unless we have deep systemic change Sanders is calling for. Black people don’t deserve crumbs. They deserve the whole meal. Enough is enough is enough.
Finally, let me introduce myself. I am a middle aged white woman who emigrated to the US from Croatia on the eve of the slaughter that took place there in the early 1990s. I came to this country with my ex-husband, whom I met in Sweden. He is black and lives in the projects in NYC. I lived there with him for five years, at the height of the crack era. I remember walking up 15 flights with my bicycle on one shoulder and groceries on the other while smelling ammonia and struggling to breathe in the repeatedly burnt stairwell. I remember the thin walls, the multiple generations living together, the poverty, the despair all around me. For me the only difference really – beside the color of my skin – was my European education and vantage point. I am poor too, even though I have been pulling myself by the boot straps for decades. I have amassed expensive education and debt, but so far I haven’t been able to break through because I have been afflicted by poverty. Poverty and adrenal fatigue, you could say PTSD even. Poverty kills. I know it. I am a deeply empathetic person and it kills me to see my black brothers and sisters look at me as the other. I know, I’m painfully aware it goes both ways. That doesn’t mean we should stop trying. Bernie Sanders has, among other things, reminded me of the importance of loving one another. Really loving our fellow human beings. I feel my heart opening. That is a good sign, for me at least. We must fight for this man, Bernie Sanders, together. It is not about him. It is about us, as he repeatedly keeps saying. He is only giving us the wherewithal. He is waking us up to American and world socio-economic and political reality, and it isn’t pretty. This is truly our last opportunity to stand up to Corporate greed. If we don’t, we are going to end up in a dystopian society, utterly voiceless and enslaved. The first thing that will be taken away from us will be the ability to organize and share information on the internet, and without that we are doomed. Flint, Michigan, will be a daily occurrence. THINK!!! Don’t let those interests DIVIDE US!!! Join the fight!!! It isn’t a white fight; it is the FIGHT FOR THE VERY SURVIVAL OF HUMANITY AGAINST CORPORATE GREED. Let’s do this together. Let’s stand up to the corporations and get into the driver’s seat. Enough is enough is enough.
In Solidarity