The McKinney Affair: Rampaging Racism & a Cowardly Caucus

[Jacuma]

The McKinney Affair: Rampaging Racism & a Cowardly Caucus

By Glen Ford & Peter Gamble
The Black Commentator
http://www.blackcommentator.com

There are profound lessons to be learned from the ongoing travails of
Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney (D-GA), under siege by white America at
large, the leadership of her own party, and the chairman of her own
caucus.

In the aftermath of McKinney’s run-in with a Capitol Hill police
officer, we have witnessed an orgy of unadulterated defamation that is
actually directed at Black women in general. In rejecting and denouncing
McKinney’s defense, her tormentors demonstrate that the very concept of
racial profiling was never sincerely accepted among most white
Americans, and that 9/11 is just an excuse for undoing decades of legal
and political struggles against the abominable practice.

So virulent and shameless have been the attacks on McKinney – spewing
caricatures of the six-term lawmaker that reflect whites’ own
hallucinatory visions of Black people – it leads us to conclude that
racists are conducting a kind of ritual, an exorcism to cast the
“militant Black” out of the national polity, once and for all.
Disgustingly, a number of Black voices have joined mob, in order to
prove that they are reasonable and trustworthy Negroes who won’t intrude
on white folks’ illusions of innocence.

Most distressingly, the McKinney affair dramatically demonstrates that
the Congressional Black Caucus has been eviscerated as a body. The CBC
is revealed as collectively gutless, devoid of any semblance of Black
solidarity, without which it has no reason for being.

CBC Hits New Low

We at BC had previously believed that April, 2005, when 37 percent of
the 42 Black House members voted for Republican bills, was the lowest
point in Congressional Black Caucus history. A year later, the CBC has
found a new nadir. On the evening of April 5, undoubtedly on orders from
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, CBC chairman Mel Watt gathered
twenty or so members to browbeat McKinney into firing her legal team and
cease appearing before the media. Watt absented himself from the
beat-down, so that it would not appear to be an “official” CBC event.

As congressional aides wandered in and out of the room, some Members
dutifully echoed Pelosi’s demand that McKinney not frame the March 28
confrontation with the policeman as a “racial” incident, and that she
issue an apology on the House floor the following morning. According to
several sources who spoke with BC on condition of anonymity, and based
on an account given by McKinney staff assistant Faye Coffield to a
weekly Atlanta meeting of the Georgia Coalition for the People's Agenda,
a “consensus” was reached that McKinney would deliver the apology and
abandon efforts to defend herself in the media (although not her legal
team).

The next morning, at the appointed hour, McKinney was prepared to offer
her apology to the House. But Mel Watt had already put the word out that
CBC members were to renege on their part of the deal. The Caucus must
not stand with McKinney when she stepped to the microphone. Mel Watt,
Nancy Pelosi’s poodle, attempted to enforce his Mistress’s wish that
McKinney appear utterly isolated and alone. Nothing should distract from
the Democrats’ non-strategy of doing and saying nothing until mid-term
elections in November. The Republicans must be allowed to self-destruct
without interference. McKinney’s charge of racial profiling was a
distraction from the Democratic non-strategy – so she must be shunned.
Mel Watt was the enforcer – the designated shunner-in-chief.

Pelosi appears to harbor a deep hatred for McKinney, whom she cannot
control. Most recently, the 51-year-old Georgia lawmaker defied the
Leader’s orders, voting in favor of a Republican bill, cynically modeled
on Democrat John Murtha’s measure for a quick exit from Iraq. She was
among only three Democrats, and the only CBC member, to do so. McKinney
also ignored Pelosi’s order that Democrats boycott hearings on Katrina
and leave the field to Republicans.

However, Pelosi has been the aggressor all along, bent on bringing the
CBC and other progressives to heel as she pursues her spineless
non-strategy for victory by default over the GOP – a scenario that by
definition requires African Americans to mute their own demands, to be
quiet and compliant. When McKinney returned to congress in January 2005
after a two-year hiatus, Pelosi denied her seniority, bumping her down
to freshman status despite her previous ten years on The Hill. Not a
peep from the CBC, cowed by their Leader and, recent events have shown,
packed with members who are themselves fearful that McKinney’s militancy
will raise the bar of constituent expectations for their own
performances on Black people’s behalf.

On the House floor, the morning of April 6, Pelosi/Watt had set McKinney
up for further humiliation. Not only would she be required to deliver an
apology that would be seen as an admission of guilt (by those who had
already condemned and defamed her), but the absence of CBC members at
her side would mark her as a lone “extremist,” a “loon” whose politics
could be dismissed out of hand. Why, even McKinney’s own colleagues
won’t stand with her. She’s crazy (like the rest of those darkies who
cry racism).

According to several congressional sources, McKinney confronted a gaggle
of CBC members, reminding them of the consensus agreement of the night
before, in which they had promised a display of physical solidarity at
the microphone in return for her concessions. White Congresswoman Marcy
Kaptur (D-OH), seeing the commotion, hurried over to the Black circle:
“I’ll stand with you, Cynthia.” Others stepped forward to fulfill their
pledge, despite CBC chairman Mel Watt’s treacherous machinations.

Here is a partial list of those who were videotaped standing with
McKinney when she read the words of apology that had been demanded of
her:

* Elijah Cummings (MD)
* Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick (MI)
* Barbara Lee (CA)
* Alcee Hastings (FL)
* Maxine Waters (CA)
* Bobby Rush (IL)
* Corrine Brown (FL)
* Major Owens (NY)
* Sheila Jackson-Lee (TX)
Marcy Kaptur (OH)
Dennis Kucinich (OH)
Jose Serrano (NY)
Bob Filner (CA)
*CBC members

Only nine of the 20-plus CBC members who had reached
“consensus” on standing with their sister the night before, bucked
Pelosi’s petty dictatorial edict – and straw-boss Mel Watt’s attempt to
enforce it.

Once upon a time, the CBC could collectively call itself “the conscience
of the congress.” No more.

Multi-Profiling and Sheer Malevolence

By bowing to Pelosi, Black congresspersons reinforce her and other
white’s belief that they can pick and choose the African American
leaders and representatives they deal with, and isolate the rest, while
still retaining mass Black support for the Democratic Party. Such Blacks
are enablers of racism, and must eventually pay the price at the hands
of their constituents, who are no different than the Black Georgia
voters who sent McKinney to Washington six times. Worse, in urging
McKinney to drop the “racial” aspect of her defense – to pretend that
she was not racially profiled, when they know that police profiling is
near-universal – they do grave injury to fundamental Black interests.

Days after his attempt to pound McKinney into dust, the duplicitous Mel
Watt related to the Charlotte Observer his own scary run-in with Capitol
police “a year or so ago”:
"I was running to the floor to vote and an officer said, `Can I see your
ID?' and I said, `No' and kept running. I looked back and he had his
hand on his gun. Then another (Capitol) police officer said, `Member.'
He recognized me (as a House member). It just so happened that the first
(officer) was white and the other one was black ... I was probably very
rash. In retrospect, I thought to myself, `You had to be out of your
mind.' I was trying to get to a vote and he had a job to do."

Watt understands very well that the Black officer, who didn’t go for his
gun, but instead called his white partner off, was intervening in a case
of racial profiling. Yet Watt’s desire to stay in the good graces of his
Leader, Pelosi, drives him to conspire against a fellow Black
congressperson, Cynthia McKinney, whose recent hair makeover is said to
have made her fair game to be accosted by Capitol police. Said McKinney:
“Do I have to contact the police every time I change my hairstyle? How
do we account for the fact that when I wore my braids every day for 11
years, I still faced this problem, primarily from certain police
officers.”

Nobody knows better than Black officers that racism is rampant in the
Capitol Police force. Of the 1,200 officers, 29 percent are Black, and
many still have racial bias suits outstanding. "You have, basically, a
renegade police department up here, that’s been operating under the
protection of Congress," said Charles J. Ware, an attorney representing
the Capitol Black Police Association.

But it’s not just race. Police officers, like workers in any
organization, spend much of their time talking shop. For Capitol police,
the subject of their shop-talk is the members of congress they are hired
to protect. Cynthia McKinney is famous – no less so on Capitol Hill. She
is the Black woman viciously branded as a friend of “terrorists,” the
most uppity African American in the federal legislature. The cops are
quite aware of what she looks like, new hair-do or not.

A McKinney lawyer got it right when he told a Howard University press
conference that his client was targeted for reasons of “sex, race and
Ms. McKinney's progressiveness."

The cops know who McKinney is – they have profiled her politically.
Michael C. Ruppert, former Los Angeles cop and current honcho of the
popular web site From the Wilderness, has felt the police hostility
directed at his longtime friend, Cynthia McKinney:
”I have walked the halls of Congress with Cynthia McKinney maybe eight
to ten times. I have walked into and out of the Cannon and Longworth
house office buildings with her. I have walked to hearings in the
Rayburn house office building with her. I have walked the underground
tunnels from one of those office buildings directly to the edge of the
House floor and its anteroom with her. I can tell you one thing for
certain because I have seen it and I have felt it. Cynthia McKinney and
her staff get treated differently from just about anyone else on the
Hill. It’s subtle, but so is the taste of dirt when it’s in your mouth.”

Although the Capitol police have failed to produce a surveillance tape
of McKinney’s confrontation with their officer, the congresswoman
captured one incident in the movie, “American Blackout,” now being
screened at sites around the country. The film depicts McKinney’s
investigation of voting irregularities in the 2000 elections. One
segment shows the congresswoman being accosted by police as she and her
party approach the Longworth building of the Capitol. McKinney turns to
the camera and reports that police subject her to such treatment “all
the time.”

Does that happen to 535 members of congress “all the time”? Not hardly.

California Rep. Tom Lantos, according to the web reference site
Wikipedia, “ran over a teenager in the Capitol parking area and refused
to stop despite screams from the crowd. He never apologized for the
hit-and-run either." The Boston Globe reported that Lantos was not
charged with hit-and-run, but was only fined $25 for ''failure to pay
full time and attention." However, a teacher accompanying the student
was threatened with arrest by Capitol police when she chased Lantos’
car, demanding that he stop.

Apparently Capitol police are quite zealous in protecting their
lawmakers – if they are white.

In an otherwise inane, anti-McKinney article, Black columnist Earl Ofari
Hutchinson gave some historical perspective to recent events:

“In past years, the Caucus raised heck when a white Republican
Congressman punched a black Capitol police officer and a year later Ohio
Democratic Representative Louis Stokes was hassled by Capitol police.
And the Congressional Black Caucus rushed to their defense.” Not this
time, not for Cynthia McKinney. The Congressional Black Caucus is
broken.

Sex and the Federal City

Around midnight on April 8, Saturday Night Live’s Kenan Thompson
performed a grotesque, bewigged skit in which he conjured up a fat,
sloppy, dull-witted, belligerent, loud-talking, no-listening,
from-deep-in-the-ghetto character who was supposed to be – Cynthia
McKinney. Of course, this TV minstrel’s interpretation bore no
resemblance to the congressperson – daughter of one of Atlanta’s first
Black policemen, a former faculty member at Clark Atlanta University,
world traveler and sought-after speaker, six-term legislator. But that
did not matter. Although SNL does superb work caricaturing public
personalities, its usual standards did not apply in McKinney’s case. The
skit was a dehumanizing assault on Black women as a group, with
“Cynthia” standing in for the female gender of her race.

A specific profile of Black women exists in the minds of vast sections
of white America. As Dr. Abdul Karim Bangura relates in this issue of
BC, in “an analysis of White students’ stereotypes of Black women by
professor of women’s studies and sociology Rose Weitz at Arizona State
University and Wakonse fellow Leonard Gordon at the same university, the
students primarily characterize Black women as loud, aggressive,
argumentative, stubborn, and bitchy.”

White men (and women, and some Black men) on and off Capitol Hill are
eager to vilify and diminish McKinney, to call her a “bitch,” a
“racist,” “crazy” and all manner of epithets. This abuse is actually
directed against the defamers’ twisted idea of who and what Black women
are. So diseased are their minds, they see only their sickness-induced
delusions. White supremacy allows them to translate their delusions into
public policy. September 11 gave them a free pass to run buck wild, with
no apologies, under the umbrella of “homeland security.”

Black Voters Will Decide

It can be no consolation to Rep. McKinney that she is just a convenient
target for what we now recognize as a great resurgence of racism in the
United States. The South rules, a South that is not defined
geographically, but socio-politically. White Americans have become much
more homogenous in the electronic and high-mobility age – to the
detriment of sanity. Their never-forsaken dreams of domestic and
planetary racial conquest were given a Frankenstein-like jolt and boost
by the Bush regime, which spoke directly to the predatory core of
American myth and historical practice. Emboldened, they have snared
Cynthia McKinney in one of their IRTs: Improvised Racist Traps. She
awaits the decision of a grand jury.

The moral and political collapse of the Congressional Black Caucus could
not come at a worse time – but it has occurred. Corroded by corporate
money, dependent on corporate media – with the near-extinction of
independent Black media – adrift in the gulf between the needs of the
Black masses and the narrow aspirations of the miniscule hyper-mobile
Black classes, and still steeped in rank male chauvinism, much of Black
“leadership” cannot abide a genuinely progressive, charismatic female in
their midst. Many also look on in sulking jealousy at the burgeoning
unity and militancy of Latinos, whose grassroots are on the move, and
whose media support their cause.

The CBC cannot even support each other

When CBC members urged Cynthia McKinney to forsake the truth, to hide
the ugly fact of racial (and political, and sexual) profiling, they gave
enormous aide and comfort to the enemy. If there was one victory that
African Americans had achieved in the post-Civil Rights era, it was to
make racial profiling legally, politically and socially unacceptable.
This victory was the fruit of countless suits, demonstrations – all
manner of political struggles – and the legacy of the legions of dead,
maimed, jailed and humiliated victims of profiling who became the focus
of sustained Black action.

September 11 provided the excuse to undo decades of anti-profiling
victories. Profiling is reckoned to be a good thing. Now the racists
seek to reestablish arbitrary and capricious white supremacy, with
legislation that would de facto deputize every police officer as an
agent of “homeland security” who need not respect the constitution in
the case of “suspected” undocumented immigrants. At that point, all
persons of color become grist for the suspicion mill. Just as the
Capitol policeman chose not to “recognize” Cynthia McKinney as a
congressperson, any cop could willfully fail to recognize his fellow
Americans and strip them of their rights. Such a regime already exists
in designated “drug zones” in urban America, where everyone is suspect.

Yet the CBC allows Republicans and racist Democrats to jeer and bully
Cynthia McKinney into a legal cul-de-sac, because she dares to cite
profiling.

The masses of African Americans know the deal – they are profiled
constantly in stores, when observed outside their neighborhoods, on the
highways, when breathing while Black. McKinney’s version of events does
not seem bizarre to them. Although the laughing racist hyenas convince
each other – with the tacit help of CBC chair Mel Watt – that McKinney
is on the ropes, it is the Black constituents of Dekalb County who will
decide if she is “crazy” for standing up for her (and our) dignity and
rights.

When McKinney arrived back in Atlanta shortly after her confrontation
with the uniformed profiler, State Representative Tyrone Brooks,
president of the Georgia Association of Black Elected Officials, was
among those to greet and support her: "It's really not about Cynthia
McKinney,” said Brooks. “It's about African-Americans in America who are
victims of racial profiling every day."

Much of the Congressional Black Caucus seem to have lost touch with this
reality. As a body, they have lost their moorings, and must be
rehabilitated, surgically. A bunch of them have got to go.
-----------------------------------------------------------
BC Co-Publishers Glen Ford and Peter Gamble are writing a book to be
titled, Barack Obama and the Crisis in Black Leadership.

[Akyeame Kwame]

BlackCellent Post Jacuma, Solidarity With Afrikan People!!!

AK

[nattyreb]

Like you said in another post, Jacuma, the congressional black cankersore. This part really got me hot, though, i wonder if anybody on Assata Speaks wants to do an Open Letter to Kenan the buffoon (or any better ideas someone may have)? He shouldn't skate scott free for this one:

"Around midnight on April 8, Saturday Night Live’s Kenan Thompson
performed a grotesque, bewigged skit in which he conjured up a fat,
sloppy, dull-witted, belligerent, loud-talking, no-listening,
from-deep-in-the-ghetto character who was supposed to be – Cynthia
McKinney. Of course, this TV minstrel’s interpretation bore no
resemblance to the congressperson – daughter of one of Atlanta’s first
Black policemen, a former faculty member at Clark Atlanta University,
world traveler and sought-after speaker, six-term legislator. But that
did not matter. Although SNL does superb work caricaturing public
personalities, its usual standards did not apply in McKinney’s case. The
skit was a dehumanizing assault on Black women as a group, with
“Cynthia” standing in for the female gender of her race."

[Mekeda7]

Appreciation 4 the post!

[Baba Ahmed]

Let's circulate this to everyone on our listServ...

Big ups Jacuma! I ain't 'bout amerikkkan politricks, but damnit sista McKinney is a sista, in her own making who has dealt with many issues others (specially bruthas) fear to tread. Regardless of what another politrician says that it ain't about her, IT IS ABOUT HER "I am bcause WE are...WE are bcause I am! Another one'em dem sub integrationist. Speading our stuff to include all people. Dude needs to stop play'n a 2nd hand J.J. photo opt thing. Every State's Black Caucas should stand shoulder to shoulder with this CongressWoman Cynthia McKinney!!!

[SheRose]

WHAT TIME IS IT YALL? Well well! So she is an "Uppity Negress" in their eyes? I heard some of them refer to her as. Heh heh. People, I think the sister should be protected and guarded. I overstand better NOW what the sister's up against after reading the following and for those who can't be near her physically, we need to build an invisible fence around her....

Transcript of Representative Cynthia McKinney's Exchange with Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld, Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Richard Myers, and Under Secretary of Defense (Comptroller) Tina Jonas, March 11th, 2005

Sec. of Defense Rumsfeld in House Hearing on FY06 Dept. of Defense Budget

Chairman Representative Duncan Hunter (R-CA) and
witnesses Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld and JCS Chairman General Richard Myers hold a House Hearing on the FY 2006 Budget for the Department of Defense and Military Services.

3/11/2005: WASHINGTON, DC: 2 hr. 5 min.


CMK: Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney (D-GA)
DR: Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld
RM: Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Richard Myers
TJ: Under Secretary of Defense (Comptroller) Tina Jonas
DH: Chairman Representative Duncan Hunter (R-CA)

25:20
CMK: Thank you Mr. Chairman. Mr. Secretary, I watched President Bush deliver a moving speech at the United Nations in September 2003, in which he mentioned the crisis of the sex trade. The President called for the punishment of those involved in this horrible business. But at the very moment of that speech, DynCorp was exposed for having been involved in the buying and selling of young women and children. While all of this was going on, DynCorp kept the Pentagon contract to administer the smallpox and anthrax vaccines, and is now working on a plague vaccine through the Joint Vaccine Acquisition Program. Mr. Secretary, is it [the] policy of the U.S. Government to reward companies that traffic in women and little girls?

That's my first question. My second question, Mr. Secretary: according to the Comptroller General of the United States, there are serious financial management problems at the Pentagon, to which Mr. Cooper alluded.

Fiscal Year 1999: $2.3 trillion missing.

Fiscal Year 2000, $1.1 trillion missing.

And DoD is the number one reason why the government can't balance its checkbook. The Pentagon has claimed year after year that the reason it can't account for the money is because its computers don't communicate with each other.

My second question, Mr. Secretary, is who has the contracts today, to make those systems communicate with each other? How long have they had those contracts, and how much have the taxpayers paid for them?

Finally Mr. Secretary, after the last Hearing, I thought that my office was promised a written response to my question regarding the four wargames on September 11th. I have not yet received that response, but would like for you to respond to the questions that I've put to you today. And then I do expect the written response to my previous question - hopefully by the end of the week.

27:26
DR: Thank you, Representative. First, the answer to your first question is, is, no, absolutely not, the policy of the United States Government is clear, unambiguous, and opposed to the activities that you described. The second question -

CMK: Well how do you explain the fact that DynCorp and its successor companies have received and continue to receive government contracts?

DR: I would have to go and find the facts, but there are laws and rules and regulations with respect to government contracts, and there are times that corporations do things they should not do, in which case they tend to be suspended for some period; there are times then that the - under the laws and the rules and regulations for the - passed by the Congress and implemented by the Executive branch - that corporations can get off of - out of the penalty box if you will, and be permitted to engage in contracts with the government. They're generally not barred in perpetuity -

CMK: This contract - this company - was never in the penalty box. If you could proceed to my second question, please.

DR: The second question - I've forgotten what the second question was.

CMK: I think Ms. Jonas knows it.

DR: Okay.

29:00
TJ: Thank you Ms. McKinney. I appreciate the question and I appreciate your interest in our Department's financial condition. We are working very hard on that program. I've just come back, recently -

CMK: I understand that you're working hard on it, but my question was who has the contract? How long have they had that contract, and how much money have we spent on it?

TJ: There are - In general we spend about $20 billion dollars in the Department on information technology systems. The accounting systems are part of that. I can get you the exact number for the record, of what we spend on our current, what we call "legacy systems," and those that we're moving toward.

CMK: And who has the contract?

TJ: That would be a multitude of individuals that have -

CMK: Could you name some, please?

TJ: Well, I think of the top of the, off the top of my head, well, I would rather not; I'd rather provide that for the record.

CMK: That's not privileged information, is it?

TJ: I'm sure it's not.

CMK: Well, please. We still have time, so, please.

TJ: I would be glad to provide for the record; I don't want to talk from the top of my head and be incorrect.

DR: On your first question, I'm advised by DR. Chu that it was not the corporation that was engaged in the activities you characterized but I'm told it was an employee of the corporation, and it was some years ago in the Balkans that that took place.

CMK: It's my understanding that it continues to take place, and that -

DR: Is that right?

CMK: Yes.

DR: Well if you can give me information to that effect, we will -

CMK: I'm sure you are interested in all of the information that I have and I'll be more than happy to provide it to you.

DR: Good. Thank you.

CMK: But I would also like to get information from you, for example, the information that I just requested about who has those contracts.

DH: Let me assure the gentlelady that we'll make sure that this exchange of information takes place and that, Mr. Secretary if you can get back with us on the DynCorp -

DR: We will -

DH: - story, we'll get that to the gentlelady.

CMK: Thank you, Mr. Chairman.

DR: We'll get back on both of the first two questions but the Congresswoman has raised the other question twice now, and I'd like to have general Myers respond, because you mentioned it in the last Hearing and I think it'd be helpful to get the answer even though we're on red, if you don't mind, Mr. Chairman?

DH: General Myers, go right ahead.

CMK: But I would like to have the answer in writing as well, as I thought my office was promised.

RM: Okay I don't know about the promise, Congresswoman, but could you repeat the question to make sure I'm answering the right question; this is a 9/11 question.

31:25
CMK: The question was, we had four wargames going on on September 11th, and the question that I tried to pose before the Secretary had to go to lunch was whether or not the activities of the four wargames going on on September 11th actually impaired our ability to respond to the attacks.

RM: The answer to the question is no, it did not impair our response, in fact General Eberhart who was in the command of the North American Aerospace Defense Command as he testified in front of the 9/11 Commission I believe - I believe he told them that it enhanced our ability to respond, given that NORAD didn't have the overall responsibility for responding to the attacks that day. That was an FAA responsibility. But they were two CPXs; there was one Department of Justice exercise that didn't have anything to do with the other three; and there was an actual operation ongoing because there was some Russian bomber activity up near Alaska. So we -

CMK: Let me ask you this, then: who was in charge of managing those wargames?

DH: General, why don't you give the best answer that you can here in a short a period of time and we'll - the gentlelady wants to get a written answer anyway, and then we can move on to other folks.

RM: The important thing to realize is that North American Aerospace Defense Command was responsible. These are command post exercises; what that means is that all the battle positions that are normally not filled are indeed filled; so it was an easy transition from an exercise into a real world situation. It actually enhanced the response; otherwise, it would take somewhere between 30 minutes and a couple of hours to fill those positions, those battle stations, with the right staff officers.

CMK: Mr. Chairman, begging your indulgence, was September Eleventh declared a National Security Special Event day?

RM: I have to look back; I do not know. Do you mean after the fact, or

CMK: No. Because of the activities going on that had been scheduled at the United Nations that day.

RM: I'd have to go back and check. I don't know.

END




This is a transcript of Rep. McKinney's remarks on September 14 at the reception for the Congressional Black Caucus. September 18, 2002

This is an important week for all of us, although it is a particularly important week for me. This week we had three very successful Braintrusts: Afro-Latinos and their rising tide of political empowerment all over Latin America; Hip Hop Power and the importance of Hip Hop as a communications medium in the absence of a real communications industry other than Radio One now, inside our community, owned by our community spreading the good news about our community;

And finally, COINTELPRO II: The Murder of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. where we learned that there really are linkages between the murders of JFK, MLK, and RFK. And that the COINTELPRO process was "to neutralize" the black leader--in the words of the CIA--assassinate, and then replace that leader with someone whose skin color was black, but whose loyalty was to their plan and not us. Yesterday, Judge Joe Brown told us unequivocally that the so-called murder rifle was NOT the weapon that killed Dr. King.

So, I think we did some very important work in these three braintrusts, connecting, communicating, and educating. And at least for the next two years, I will not be at the CBC Weekend as a Member of the House of Representatives. As everybody probably knows by now, I didn't cross the finish line first this time. Despite the fact that I easily won the Democratic vote, 40,000 Republicans maliciously crossed over and overtook the Democratic Primary. And because AIPAC had telegraphed in newspaper articles that they were going to target both Earl Hilliard and me, the Democratic Party was paralyzed.

Therefore, if Alabama represents the heart of the civil rights movement and Georgia represents its brain, the black body politic has sustained a mortal blow.

What does this portend for the future of independent black leadership in this country, particularly given what we learned really happened during the COINTELPRO period, and what will happen soon now that the USA Patriot Act, Homeland Security, and the Funding for the War on Terrorism Act have significantly changed the legal landscape.

The Operation TIPS program of John Ashcroft, by the way, is nothing new in the annals of the FBI, but executive authority always seemed to be there to override such ambitions. That's not the case now. And so, I'm proud of the votes I cast against those bills and I'm proud of the legislation I've authored that really does seek to move our country forward.

For instance, the legislation to override the President's executive Order denying our troops their rightfully earned overtime pay. George Bush has asked our young men and women to make the ultimate sacrifice, but he doesn't want to pay them for it.

And the legislation I authored to stop the use of weapons with depleted uranium which seems to be causing health effects and abnormal births and even deaths among the troops of our allies and maybe even our own.

I'm proud of the bill to stop the importation of coltan into the United States, the source of so much pain and suffering in eastern Congo because it's a key ingredient in our computers, palm pilots, Sony Playstations, and Oneboxes that people are willing to kill to get their hands on it.

I'm proud that we extended the benefits for our veterans who are suffering from Agent Orange because those benefits were about to expire and I authored the legislation that was passed into law to help them. But I'm most proud of my work to hold this Administration accountable to the American people.

And after I've asked the tough questions, here's what we now know:

* That President Bush was warned that terrorists were planning to hijack commercial aircraft and crash them into buildings in the US;

* That in the weeks prior to September 11, 24-hour fighter cover was placed over the President's ranch in Crawford, Texas;

* That in the weeks prior to September 11, Attorney General Ashcroft stopped flying commercial aircraft and instead flew Government aircraft;

* That the US received numerous high level warnings from a wide range of foreign intelligence services warning of impending hijackings and terrorist attacks;

* That a number of FBI agents were pleading with their superiors to conduct intensive investigations into the suspicious activities of various men in US flight schools;

* That in the days prior to September 11, highly suspicious stock market activity in aviation and insurance stocks took place indicating that certain well-placed people had advance knowledge of the attacks.

And now this week we learn that the FBI had an informant living with two of the actual 9-1-1 hijackers. All of this has become public knowledge since I asked the simple question: What did the Bush Administration know and when did it know it.

Now against this backdrop of so many unanswered questions, President Bush wants us to pledge our blind support to him. First, for his war on terrorism and now for his war in Iraq. How can we, in good conscience, prepare to send our young men and women back to Iraq to fight yet another war, when we have tens of thousands of our service men and women poisoned and still suffering from the first war?

And what of those veterans who are sleeping on our streets? Within five minutes of where we are today, you can walk there, and see them, and talk to them: Vietnam Veterans, Gulf War veterans, veterans of our wars. George Bush can count me out of his war-making plans.

Throughout my career, we have proudly brought blacks and whites, Asians, and Latinos together. I'm proud that everywhere around me the human rainbow has been represented. And I know that as we continue to speak out on behalf of the poor and the marginalized in this country, my supporters across the spectrum, and across America will be right there with me.

And that as we continue to speak out on behalf of those who are sick and tired of greed being more important than human needs, my supporters will be right there.

And finally, as I ponder the future of America where voices of dissent are snuffed out by selfishness and intolerance, I'm reminded of the words of Bobby Kennedy, who we learned yesterday, was considering Martin Luther King, Jr. as his Vice Presidential running mate. Bobby Kennedy, truly a great man who selflessly lived and died for his country, shaped an entire generation with his thoughts, his words, and his deeds.

And it was Bobby Kennedy who reminded us that: "The task of leadership, the first task of concerned people, is not to condemn or castigate, or deplore: it is to search out the reason for disillusionment and alienation, the rationale of protest and dissenta*"perhaps, indeed, to learn from it. And we may find, that we learn most of all from those political and social dissenters whose differences with us are most grave: for among the young, as among adults, the sharpest criticism often goes hand in hand with the deepest idealism and love of country."

END

[Kushnology]

These devils wan't to bring sister McKinney down because she exposes corruption while fighting the status quo. If you don't play along with these miscreants then you pay the price. They're trying to make an example out of McKinney.

God bless Cynthia McKinney!

[Mekeda7]

Much Appreciation for your post SheRose!