What is right is not always popular, and what is popular is not always right.
Topics that are controversial are not feel-good essays. Good authors hit nerves and challenge conventional wisdom. Great authors raise pointed questions and dispel conventional norms.
That is why I worry about minorities reverence for Barack Obama. I believe many have become too involved with the subject to be objective. To be critical or question anything he does is considered treason.
Those who have criticized Obama in the past, such as Dr. Cornel West and Tavis Smiley, have been rebutted and vilified. Implying black Americans are smitten by Obama or questioning his record with minorities is considered being a tool or an Uncle Tom.
However, when you examine the record, we are no better off today than when he got elected.
While minorities have been dancing and celebrating, few have noticed that liberals have pickpocketed Obama, urging him to address issues which are not minority interests such as same-sex marriage, immigration and contraception.
Meanwhile, his administration assures us he is not forgetting us.
Then there are black spokesmen Touré and Al Sharpton, who love to jostle with the media about black culture.
These self-appointed pitchmen feel obligated to educate “unsophisticated” minorities on the nuances of politics, explaining why Obama can’t pass any legislation favoring minorities because it might alienate white people.
This reminds me of his first term, when his administration sent black leaders and civil rights groups to diminish expectations for minorities.
I sat at one of those gatherings at the Martin Luther King library in Washington when the Black Caucus briefed us. They told us “he can’t do much right now because it would look like he is showing favoritism.” After I wrote one article that was critical, I was pulled aside and told, “Don’t criticize Obama. Wait till he gets a second term; things will change.”
Although 97 percent of black voters, myself included, waited in long lines to get him reelected, the NAACPs, Al Sharptons and Tourés say we need to wait, it’s too risky for him to look like he is helping us.
While he’s been fighting for abortion, liberating gays and opening borders, the black community has been told any help would be seen as preferential.
The breaking point for me was when Obama suggested Ambassador to the United Nations Susan Rice as a possible candidate for Secretary of State but left her hanging because a few Republicans gave her a hard time. She was pushed under the bus for former Sen. John Kerry; however, Obama sent out the black cavalry to defend him, urging patience and not to question his decisions. Blame the Republicans, they said.
If Jews, gays or Hispanics had voted overwhelmingly for a candidate and then seen their own get denied a post, would they be raising hell about it?
Minorities sat mesmerized as Obama sent Valerie Jarrett and other black surrogates to make statements about how being demanding is belligerence.
I also think it is ironic for our first African-American president to be bombing African countries like Yemen, Somalia and Mali while being diplomatic with terrorist nations like North Korea and China. It disheartens me there are no black voices to condemn the hostile treatment of Islamic nations escalated by the Obama administration.
During the inaugural speech and his State of the Union address, Obama’s generic togetherness speeches were depressing. And after watching his continual pandering to liberals, I got into an argument with someone smittened by Obama and was called an Uncle Tom.
Truth is, I am fed up with black America’s mesmerization of Obama. Criticizing this mythical man is not being a traitor to your race. Objectivity brings perspective and ideas. Obama is not the Messiah.
I don’t need liberals, black leaders or pastors to tell me to wait for Obama. As a minority, I know how to wait. My grandparents waited for 40 acres and a mule, but I can’t wait no more — I’ll be dead soon.
After winning in 2004, George W. Bush said that he had political capital and intended to use it.
Ninety-seven percent of the blacks voted for Obama and should use their capital also. When Obama starts pandering to liberals, minorities should drag him to Chicago, Baltimore, and Philadelphia and tell him to walk through our neighborhoods, visit our schools and see our hungry. We need your help; waiting is unacceptable.
Advocating for blacks’ causes isn’t militant or racist. Its what every group does when they get in power. It is to gain the most advantageous position. That is the American system.
If the black community let liberals turn our first African- American president into Gay Lincoln or President Abortion, it is incompetence of the highest order.
Our history has been one of patience; it’s time to demand action.
