I really wanted to inject some original thought into Jimmy “Baldwinizing” on the vestiges of America’s most peculiar institution,  Nasir powering through on Jay Elect’s creation, or Ali juking the hell out of America but … why bother? If this needs to be interpreted for you then there is a good chance you just might be in the wrong place friend.

Clark: Jim, what do you see deep in the recesses of your own mind as the future of our nation, and I ask that question in that way because I think that the future of the Negro and the future of the nation are linked.

Baldwin: They’re indissoluble.

Clark: What do you see? Are you essentially optimistic or pessimistic, and I really don’t want to put words in your mouth, because what I really want to find out is what you really believe.

Baldwin: I’m both glad and sorry you asked me that question, but I’ll do my best to answer it. I can’t be a pessimist because I’m alive. To be a pessimist means that you have agreed that human life is an academic matter, so I’m forced to be an optimist. I’m forced to believe that we can survive whatever we must survive. But the future of the Negro in this country is precisely as bright or as dark as the future of the country. It is entirely up to the American people and our representatives — it is entirely up to the American people whether or not they are going to face, and deal with, and embrace this stranger whom they maligned so long.

What white people have to do, is try and find out in their own hearts why it was necessary to have a nigger in the first place, because I’m not a nigger, I’m a man, but if you think I’m a nigger, it means you need it.

The question you have got to ask yourself — the white population of this country has got to ask itself — North and South, because it’s one country, and for a Negro, there’s no difference between the North and South. There’s just a difference in the way they castrate you. But the fact of the castration is the American fact. If I’m not a nigger here and you invented him, you, the white people, invented him, then you’ve got to find out why. And the future of the country depends on that. Whether or not it’s able to ask that question.

Clark: As a Negro and as an American, I can only hope that America has the strength and the capacity –

Baldwin: And the moral strength.

Clark: — to ask and answer that question –

Baldwin: Simply to face that question. Face that question.

Clark: — in an affirmative and constructive way. Thank you very much.

Baldwin: Thank you, Ken.

I’m not one to go about commemorating the “death anniversary” of just about anyone. I don’t find it especially prudent to make light of the day one human being thought it necessary to cut short the journey of another, it just doesn’t sit well with me. Frankly though, the lack of acknowledgment by anyone but those who consider the man a hero irks me just enough to get this point across: Malcolm X scares the shit out of  America.

Yes, I am starting with the premise that Malcolm X still puts the fear of God in the hearts of many Americans. I would say simply “White America” but then I’d just be playing the game my damn self, too fearful to take “Black America” to task as well for moving away from him (cough) Obama (cough). It’s impossible to attribute his relegation to some dark corner of history to much of anything else. I mean there has to be a reason someone as large as he was doesn’t have a holiday right? Why does this man make my country men so uncomfortable?

1. He was a black man who refused like hell to stop reminding you why he was in America in the first place

America for all intent and purposes was not birthed as a “melting pot,” that was simply an accident of growth. The original proprietors of the land, the American “Indian” were not white. However in reality they were never supposed to be a part of the nation, only with the advent of increased expansion and higher slave populations were non-whites even counted in this country. It’s not racist to say this nation was founded for whites, by whites and owes what it is today due to claiming the lands and free labor from non-whites. Capitalism develops so  well when resources and labor are not purchased for any sort of reasonable rate.

Malcolm X repeated this ad nauseum. This makes people very uncomfortable to hear. People often acknowledge the history (to some extent) with deep remorse,  but Malcolm did them one better. He reminds everyone that the current place in society for whites and  non-whites alike are directly related to the highly skewed hierarchical system our nation was founded on.

2. He was framed as the antithesis of Dr. King

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. = Civil Rights leader whose reputation over time has been sanitized and de-radicalized to make sure America had a civil rights hero to “own.” To retroactively make itself look as forward thinking as it hopes it is, America has a habit of rewriting history. Dr. King, the civil rights leader known for his non-violence, was treated as just as much an “uppity nigger” as Malcolm X was. A major difference between them was his willingness to work with whites who he believed were of the same minds to help blacks in this country. However, these very same leaders chastised King and Malcolm alike while those who feared racial equality in this country altogether despised the two equally, they made no distinction between the two.

When teaching King as the peace-loving, America loving leader they fail to mention his anger and resentment towards the American power structure for the very same reasons Malcolm espoused. Towards his death he increasingly became critical of government policies and the progress that was being made. In short, the two were not “polar opposites” as the whitewashing of King’s image today has taught us.

3. He believed in self-defense –not violence for violence’s sake

They call me “a teacher, a fomenter of violence.” I would say point-blank, “That is a lie. I’m not for wanton violence, I’m for justice.” I feel that if white people were attacked by Negroes — if the forces of law prove unable, or inadequate, or reluctant to protect those whites from those Negroes — then those white people should protect and defend themselves from those Negroes, using arms if necessary. And I feel that when the law fails to protect Negroes from whites’ attacks, then those Negroes should use arms if necessary to defend themselves. “Malcolm X advocates armed Negroes!” What was wrong with that? I’ll tell you what’s wrong. I was a black man talking about physical defense against the white man. The white man can lynch and burn and bomb and beat Negroes — that’s all right: “Have patience”…”The customs are entrenched”…”Things will get better.”

A distinction between King and Malcolm that allows them to be played so well against each other are their stances on the uses of violence or lack thereof. It is comforting for many that a black man who had every right it seemed to be resentful and angry thought not to defend himself with arms but put faith in his fellow-man. Although, Dr. King did not always buy into this edict of non-violence, he did believe in armed self-defense as well.  Malcolm, always giving praises to Allah, still believed Allah intended him to swing back if swung upon.

The idea that he was a gun-toting man who trolled the streets looking for confrontation with whites is one of the most overblown myths of not only his legacy but American Civil Rights history. The disconnect between the portrait of a man who believes in defending his community “by any means necessary” and the monger that he is portrayed as is deeply saddening. I never recall hearing him profess harm towards another who has not harmed you, he simply believed in good old-fashioned American ideals which gives a citizen to protect himself and his castle. American history would lead you to believe that the countries aggressive policy of defending itself was way more Malcolm-like than it was King-like.

4. He was a Muslim

I find it hard pressed to believe that a nation that is founded on Christian principle and ideals would look upon a Christian Minister from Alabama the same they would view a Muslim preacher from New York. We know very well that although the country is full of legal religious freedoms, the laws that govern how we treat one another however are colored by prejudices and personal experiences. If during his time he was treated unfairly, it’s no wonder this country could not even attempt to move toward acceptance of a man who already held unpopular views given our current relationship with the religion of Islam.

5. He wasn’t the quintessential “patriot”

I’m not going to sit at your table and watch you eat, with nothing on my plate, and call myself a diner. Sitting at the table doesn’t make you a diner, unless you eat some of what’s on that plate. Being here in America doesn’t make you an American…. No I’m not an American, I’m one of the 22 million black people who are the victims of Americanism. One of the 22 million black people who are the victims of democracy, nothing but disguised hypocrisy…. I’m speaking as a victim of this American system. And I see America through the eyes of a victim. I don’t see any American dream; I see an American nightmare.

He didn’t pretend to love a country which victimized his ancestors and treated him as not only less of an American but as much less than a man. I guess we’re so used to folks who pretend we’re achieving more progress than we actually are, that for someone to loudly clamor that our accomplishments are for naught, Americans tend to squirm. But heck, could anybody have had more of an American story than he did? I thought we were all about from something to nothing and the beauty of redemption.

When you lie to yourself how can you expect to live righteously or up to your own ideals. America doesn’t own its past or the inconsistencies between what it professes and how it conducts itself enough. You ever wondered, instead of off offhandedly dismissing him as a civil rights extremist or race-radical, why so many  hold this man in such high esteem to this day? There is a damn good chance it’s because he represented then, and still very much now, an honest voice in the dialogue on race in this country.

Recently I recovered postings I did in my earliest days of blogging. Reading past posts from just a few short years ago can tell you a lot about how you have you changed and a lot about how you’ve stayed the same. Many thoughts and earlier musings of mines were reactionary and whiny, however gems can be gleamed in them all. I made no real corrections for basic spelling or grammatical errors, the posts are very much “as is.” Instead of hiding anything I’ve said in the past, like some I would even go as far to call ill informed and narrow-minded, I instead take pleasure in sharing them with you. So, look for posts dating from December 2005 – March 2008 with the tag “Blogger: Early Blogging*”

Growth, progress and critical self-examination  are powerful tools of long-term development.

You might have missed it because the level of coverage that it’s received nationally has been sparse at best but there was a “coup d’etat” in Honduras. As coups that involve the military go, this one was a “relatively” bloodless process. Being of Haitian descent, I think I know a thing or two about the history of these sort of things. Though, there does seem to be some disagreement of how gingerly the soldiers who abducted the President (in his pajamas no less) dragged him from his bedroom. One thing was clear from the onset, both sides were preparing to dig in.

Coup leaders (Robert Micheletti), members of President Manuel Zelaya’s own Liberal Party, immediately took credit along with military commanders for having engineered the ouster of the sitting President. Immediately there was polarization not among politicians (the opposition party not having done much opposing), but among the citizenry that they claimed to be representing. The  coup leaders had a strong general base of  support amongst Honduras’ wealthy and middle classes, which included the business elite and politicians. This gave them enough presence and confidence to press forward. However, in a country of 7.3 million where 59% of the people live below the poverty line, what the hell does that really mean?

“One woman started a kind of kaffeeklatsch with her high-powered friends that grew into the driving force behind a movement that toppled the Honduran president. The other preferred to stay out of politics until the president’s ouster compelled her to protest.”

“Between them is a yawning political and socioeconomic divide that still threatens the stability of what was once one of the United States’ principal staging grounds in Latin America during the cold war. And what they have to say about how this country’s political crisis began — and about the sacrifices they are willing to make to defend their views — leaves little hope that it will end any time soon.”

This coup has never really been about Manuel Zelaya though he does paint himself as a figure to be loved or hated. President Manuel Zelaya circumvented the Honduran Constitution: “No citizen who has already served as head of the Executive Branch can be President or Vice-President. Whoever violates this law or proposes its reform, as well as those that support such violation directly or indirectly, will immediately cease in their functions.” This alone could have led to his legal ouster but given the relatively little time that was left of his term, it was highly unlikely. It’s debateable whether or not Zelayas moves to have the constitution altered were sufficient evidence to remove him from power. Clearly the man was on a path that was threatening to not only the oligarchy but all those in his way. Aligning with Chavez and taking on the courts was not a move that was going to be seen as gaining him political capital with anyone he needed to play ball with. Still, those who were simply of the population and were not connected enough to help him navigate his mess figured he did indeed do one or seven things right.

Edward Schumacher-Matos  argues in “A Coup for Democracy?” that the issue is simply with the lines of legitimacy and democracy being blurred. People don’t often realize that there can be one without the other. If you follow his logic, actions must be taken against someone who is democratically elected but ceases to act “legitimately”. The problem with his argument is actually one he brought up but didn’t apply to this specific issue. He made the claim that the Honduran government was under assault for their coup actions mainly because of the speed in which it took place and the size. Had Honduras been a larger state then the actions would have been more of a constitutional crisis and not a coup at all. I’d make the claim that if larger states took the same action each and every time a leader stepped out of the bounds of legitimacy, the world would be a coup stricken battlefield (and not just ones backed by the CIA).

The he said / she said of the matter not withstanding where do the people of Honduras fit in? They exist in a hemisphere where they are the third  poorest and one in which is dominated by the United States of America constantly sounding the drumbeat of democracy. Who better to defend a democracy  than a patriot? Who in Honduras is a patriot? Is it the former Vice-President who claims she was trying to prevent a “meglomaniac” from using his powers and popularity to “dissolve the other branches of government and to rewrite the Constitution in order to extend his presidency”? Or is it the school teacher who says that “the president’s ouster was an attack on her own freedom” ? Of the protest she says  “This is not about President Zelaya … this is about my country. Many people gave their lives so that we could have a democracy. And we cannot let a group of elites take that away.” When it comes to Honduras the issues of democracy, legitimacy, and patriotism collide in such a way that it’s very difficult for anyone to stand on the side of right and be 100% right. When Jefferson Davis presided over the Confederacy during the Civil War did he not still think himself a patriot of the United States of America? Is fighting the only way for one to prove oneself a patriot or is it working the system until it benefits you that qualifies you as a true citizen? In the end, sometimes right is simply wrong.

Whatever the case may be, with the recent election of Porfirio Lobo as President of Honduras and the United States sending signals that they will overlook the coup and recognize him, it’s not long before other countries do as well legitimizing the coup. Read more in this New Yorker piece below about the causes, the day by day and the opinions of many on the coup:

The man could very well be a lunatic. Colonel Muammar al-Gaddafi stood before the podium in front of the United Nations General Assembly assailing the institution. His nation was also for the first time carrying the mantle of  chairmanship at these proceedings. He spent an hour and a half ( far past the allotted length) of his life speaking to many who he knew were not listening to a damn word he said. Under attack from media and politician alike in the host nation because of past transgressions, instead of flying under the radar he decided instead to pitch a tent. No, really, like a real live tent. But after failing to get that tent pitched  he managed to pitch one at the podium.

He pleaded with the body to insert itself more forcefully in  issues like: the United States decision to go into Iraq, the Palestinian/ Israeli conflict, the unsolved Kennedy and Lumumba assassinations,  the Kashmir / India / Pakistan / Afghanistan clusterfuck, and revising the structures of the body. The beauty of it being that he spoke to what he believes is a broken system to essentially fix its self. In reading the  immediate reaction to is speech, much of the critique was on style and not substance. Most of the talk was on audaciousness of the man to come here how he did and to carry on how he did. Lost beneath the veneer of what may very well have been a rambling diatribe, the Libyan leader hit the nail on the head. The structure of the United Nations, the weight it gives to the Security Council and the lack thereof given to the rest of the General Assembly, make the institution non-representative of its constituents.

The topic du jour on the global stage is terrorism and terror will continue being abound whether from the  inability to gain a consensus on actions or unbalanced actions. A world body so beholden to the whims of so few can never hope to garner enough credibility to make sure forever and lasting cooperation,  forget peace. The United Nations as it stands is a wounded organization that is by design unable to correct its own structural inadequacies. Respect Gaddafi or not his words ring true.  With the body being nothing more than a conduit for the worlds most powerful actors it is less likely to ensure security and more likely to guarantee insecurity, forever and lasting.