'Heroes of Old, Men of Renown'

So, I just got finished reading two monumental history books: The first is The Wonderful Ethiopians of the Mighty Cushite Empire, by Drusilla Dungee. The second is depicted above -- The Destruction of Black Civilization by giant historian, Chancellor Williams. Destruction was published in 1986. I remember the owner of The Know Book Store in Durham, N.C. recommending it to me when I was attending college there. However, for some reason, I never got around to reading it then. Luckily it is still in publication, so I was able to pick up a fresh new copy from Barnes & Noble over spring break. It makes sense now that this book sparked the new zeal for African (Black) studies we saw in the late 1980s, and extending to the late 1990s before fizzling at the millennium. With unquestionable research documented for examination, and some of the best prose you will find in a history book, Williams, handily explains the evolution of human civilization from its origins in the Great Riff Valley (Africa) and its flourish into Nile Valley civilization (Egypt) at the hands of Ethiopian and Nubian (Black) builders thousands of years prior to many invasions -- and subsequent overthrow -- by Asian, and European, conquerors. These invasions and the centuries-long conflict they caused, togther with internal strife, set in place a genocidal cycle of movement-settlement-movement of Blacks ever further south of the equator, and away from the civilizations they founded. This pre/post biblical history unearths and explains much of the obscured, missing, and sheltered contributions of African people to humanity.

Jewels, Gems and Other Assorted Valuables

My new favorite book is Eduardo Galeano's Mirrors: Stories of Almost Everyone (2009, Nation Books). In Mirrors, Galeano exhumes the mass graves of the previously unknown who have salted this earth. Using the art of brevity, the authors holds up a mirror that shows us reflections of humanity's ghosts, the images of international vampires. He reveals the toil of angels.

Innumerable paragraphs stand alone as literary gems and chronicle the ethereal nature of mankind as both an inspiration and a toxicity. None escape Galeano's scrutiny. Not as races, nations, tribes, nor as individuals. Mirrors astounds with stories of Africans, Mayans, Anglicans, Indians and others. More compelling, however, are tales of arrogance, hubris, irony, nobility, happenstance, hate and love. Indeed Mirrors may be an anecdote for the banal education that inoculates the youth of nations. A stimulant for legions of uninspired school children who rarely find any wonder in the antiseptic antholgies, standard in public education.

Eduardo Geleano gives proof that all nations have blood stained banners. And while imperfect, individual liberty and considerate stewardship over the earth are the only cleansers.

Pirates, Bandits or Desperadoes?

The situation in Somalia has been desperate for decades now. Civil war is common in that part of the world. The forces behind it are mostly man-made -- gun runners, political manipulators, religious insurgents, etc. As a result, there has been famine for years . However, in the news today is the manifestation of that story. And it is being mistaken for the story itself.

The media conveniently uses the term "pirates" because of the sensational images it evokes of seafaring naves doing battle with maritime vessels; only now the buccaneers are black teens and not long-haired outlaws from Europe. They carry AK-47s, not sabres. They are still desperate and lawless. Image if gangs from Oakland to Los Angeles were to go unchecked for years...The Bloods and Crips, or some other gang, could likewise turn the southern coast of California into a playground for boat-cruising stick up men...Because someone will always be there to provide the guns, if nothing else.

Image the international tourist trade possible by maximizing this coast line...

War torn Somali soldiers... They have been fighting for decades now.

When the conflicts were mostly on land, this band of desperadoes on pick-up trucks were known in the media as "technicals." They have traded in their trucks for motor boats, so now they are "pirates."
Women in traditional dress. Possibilities for a better future are based on treatment of the women..."The hand the rocks the cradle rules the world."

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nro-jzD7Bwk&feature=rec-HM-rn

OBAMA OPENS UP CUBA

After decades of getting mad at the little kid on the playground for showing us up on the court, President Obama's administration is taking a step toward grown-up diplomacy, by improving our relationship with the people of Cuba. Good for him! Even better for the pro-Cuban lobby, including the Congressional Black Caucus. Their persistence is paying dividends.

The United States has greatly improved relations with communist Viet Nam, despite thousands of American soldiers dead from our interventions. We have always maintained open diplomacy with Russia -- even during the "cold war." And we implore the Chinese to buy our debt, when they purportedly have the worst human rights record of any industrialized nation. Why not Cuba?...

Martin Luther King's Birthday

I pride myself with being informed about things; particularly Black History. I have read, or have been made familiar with almost every notable personality in the struggle for civil rights and human dignity this country has birthed from Martin Delaney to Malcolm X, and Sojourner Truth to Rosa Parks. However, no one strikes a sentimental cord in me like Martin Luther King, Jr.

A poetic symbiosis of intellect, bombast, spirituality and human dignity, King was an American original. A man for his times and beyond. His magnificent Letter From A Birmingham Jail stands as a profound indictment of America's social order in the mid-twentieth century. His I Have A Dream Speech was a master portrayal of national hypocrisy. And the I've Been To The Mountain Top Speech was a defiant specter of things to come.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was more than just a speech maker, or a sentimental dreamer. He was a twentieth century prophet. I put him alongside Jesus of Nazareth. Yes, that's right, Christ. Because he, too died for our sins.

Mr. President?

Here we are two weeks after the most historic election in the history of the United States of America , and I am just now getting around to writing about it. In fact, I am primarily writing to stay current with events. The reason for delaying this installment is that so much is being printed on the election that I did not want to be redundant by restating the obvious. Nevertheless, the election of a black man to the highest office in the land warrants an opinion statement from all thinking people.

Probably the most common question people are asking themselves is "What will it mean?" The answer I have settled on is that it means whatever we will attribute to it. So many of us are justifiably proud that I will not begin to diminish the significance of this election with a sobering reflection of the race relations among ordinary everyday people, or the many known and unknown committees, commissions, groups, agencies and councils that manage and inform the direction of the presidency -- irrespective of statements made for public consumption. A black man of an African father and white mother is now the commander and chief of this country, and he lives in the Whitehouse. A place built by African laborers and, for a long time since, denied access to any Blacks other than as its servants.

Let me continue, then, with a litanty of the obvious and hoped-for meanings of President-elect Obama's magnificent achievement. Barack Obama's successful elections means that the presidency is not the exclusive province of white people. It means that he and his campaign team ran a masterful campaign in order to overcome such tremendous odds. It signals that the majority of the (voting) white people are open to change. That they can look past a man's race and evaluate him on more than such superficial criteria. It signals that Black people recognized that for the first time they had a candidate that was of the highest caliber, and they were not ashamed to rally around their race identity in order to make a statment of pride -- anymore than white Irish-Catholics did for John F. Kennedy. Barack Obama's election victory means that American people are more optimistic than cynical about their future. And, perhaps, that they know when they hear an authentic and trustworthy voice.

Ultimately, Mr. Obama's presidency will be judge by more than all the early symbolism that it presents today. However, symbolism is enduring and it can be managed for the long term betterment of a people. For at least the next four years the world, and more importantly for me, black children, will have a towering symbol to point to that will eclipse the once useful, but long since obsolete, examples of strident, often angry, protest politics. In the symbol of Mr. Obama, black children cannot help but recognize that a thoughtful, articulate, accomplished family man is not only a fine example, but one that looks like they do. A man with a family and background like their own who proved that, through a milder thoughtful temperment, an unyeilding intellect, and persistence of character, he could win out against his rivals...And do it with class.

For me, I am hopeful that President-elect Obama's tenure will be a game changer on the international stage, as well as at home. I am hoping for no more bombing of people and countries in pursuit of their natural resources which they refuse to fork over under the guise of some treaty. No more secret operations against heads state simply because they do a little sabre-rattling. I am hopeful for direct aid to long suffering African countries that will allow them to become dignified players in the global economy and aid their people. I am hopeful for an Obama presidency that will greatly improve relations with Cuba in the way we have with Viet Nam. A presidency that shows how diplomacy is not an act of weakness for our country, but of strength and confidence in or power...And that is just for starters!

Yes, there is much to hope for in a Barack Obama presidency. However, this is the man who taught the nation of the 'audacity of hope.'

Book Review: 'A People's History'

I recently completed a fascinating read. Howard Zinn is the author of A People's History of the United States (1492 - Present). I count it among the most important books I have read. And I claim that it is essential reading for the re-education of the American public -- whom mostly posess only a cursory knowledge of history. Zinn is a known personality in the world of academia, he has been "a historian, playwright and social activist" for many years. In this edition (2003) of 'A People's History' he retells major events in the maturation of this country from [the invasion of] Christopher Columbus to the Bush "war on terror." He reveals obsure events like precolonial rebellions by Davis Bacon, counter expansionist battles by Native Americans, the Ludlow Massacre of 1914, the vacillations of President Lincoln on the issue of slavery, and the many campaigns (wars) for American industrial markets -- many executed without the consent of the public (i.e, un-Constitutionally).

I recommended 'A People's History' for all who claim to value American citizenship. Whether you are on the right or the left -- or like most of us, somewhere in between -- your perspective on the history of United State's will be reshaped.

African Triumph

We must always explain that Black history is not only the story of a sad era in human history, but in fact a story of perseverance... Triumph, in fact.

Book Review: Red Moon Over China

Author Iris Chang is hearby lauded for her profoundly sobering book, The Rape of Nanking (1997). Obviously I am late getting to the book, having first heard of it when the author was interviewed on C-SPAN several years ago. I made a mental note to read it one day, and I finally got around to doing so last month. I am glad I did. In Nanking, Chang (pbuh), chronicles the Japanese invasion of China at the start of World War II in Asia -- several years prior to our participation in 1941. It is a horrifying account of how, in this contemporary area, man and his government armies can be so grossly inhumane to their opponents, war notwithstanding.

My own notion of Japan is probably not unlike that of most Americans. Japan was on the opposing side - but they were likely lackeys for Hitler and his army. Its shining moment was its sneak attack on Peal Harbor, but we quickly smeared that brazen grab at glory with deposits over two of their major cities. Attacks that not not only devastated Japan, but the entire world. Ironically, the United States' response to Pearl Harbor brought about international sympathy for a country that was a chief member of the original "axis of evil." It caused sustained periods of public guilt among Americans, and it obscured Japan's own heinous deeds with its pursuit of supremacy in Asia.

In Nanking, Iris Chang educates us about the true role of Japan during the war. She describes the mentality of a traditionally isolated nation whose culture, traditions and prior defeats spurred its nationalism and made it competitive in the arms race of that time. The Japanese enmity for the Chinese and their quest for expansion, lead them to commit some of the most gruesome atrocities of the war. Crimes against humanity that approximated those committed by the Nazis -- in deed if not in scale.

Chang went to great lengths to verify and document how Japanese armies pillaged and looted Shanghai and Nanking during their invasion at the start of the war (circa 1934). She bravely tells of brutality that is unfathumable to the average person, even today. Acts of rampant and grotesques rape, mass killings and torture. including killing for sport and experimentation. These acts occurred during the Japanese invasion and occupation. They were inhumane crimes on a grand scale committed against soldiers and many more civilians. In deed, I do the history an injustice with this telling. Read the book.

I found The Rape of Nanking was an important read for a few reasons. It has been said often that America's release of atomic bombs over Japan was as prudent an act of military strategy as it was punishing. To that, Chang describes the mentality of the common Japanese soldier and their commanders during this period in history. She gives credence to the notion that our troops would have suffered casualities during a land invasion of Japan that would have been both brutal and innumerable. And it would have prolonged our effort in the Pacific -- as the Japanses were loathe to surrender under any ordinary circumsatnces of war. Nanking gives context to the fears -- even paranoia -- of our government and its drastic action against Japanese citizens here in the U.S. during the war. Finally, and most important, it reminds me that such acts as described by the author have several antecedents, and when they combine to manifest such a virulent evil in men, there is no limit to what can occur.

A final word. Recently I have become accustomed to dropping a line of thanks via e-mail to authors whose books stir something inside me. And so I did with Iris Chang. However, just moments after finding a website where I could register a note in praise of her work, I discovered that she died a few years ago (2004). She did invaluable work for her people, and for all of humanity. All Praise is Due...