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Sarah Palin’s ‘Moose in the Headlights’ Speech | Giuliani’s Viciousness

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As the country rapidly diversifies, Republicans are presenting a convention that is almost entirely white. To a large extent, the Republican Party still is — The White-Bigot Party.

Only 36 of the 2,380 delegates seated on the convention floor are black. One week after Democrats nominated the nation’s first black presidential candidate on the eve of the 45th anniversary of Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have a Dream” speech, Republicans have only one African American — Fox News’ resident Uncle Tom Michael S. Steele — scheduled to speak last night during prime time at their convention.

As McCain’s 96 year old mother gazed listlessly into the rafters of the convention hall and with ReTHUGlicans and a sprinkling of ReTHUGliTOMS salivating like hungry, poisonous black mambas,…. and howling like a pack of hyenas, Sarah ‘Barracuda‘ Palin delivered a heavily choreographed speech, designed to rally the THUG/BIGOT base of the Republican party.

The speech was delivered right after MAFIA GOON — the former mayor of New York, Rudy Giuliani had finished mocking, insulting and mis-representing Obama’s positions…. and topping it up with a dose of 9/11 fear-mongering.

Rudy Giuliani “The Goon” Rips Into Obama

[Note: During his two "Iron Fist" terms as Mayor of New York, Rudy Giuliani in concert with his police force THUG-HANDLED minorities with "Mafia Viciousness." -- the most notorious events of Giuliani's tenure, included the execution-style killing of Amadou Diallo and the sadistic torture of Abner Louima -- by Giuliani's police force.] — see more info below.

At the beginning of her speech I sensed some tension in her, but the “Killer From Wasilla” unwinded and got more comfortable as the speech progressed.

She spoke of her family, including her eldest son, who is about to be deployed to Iraq in the US Army, and her younger son, who has Down’s Syndrome.

In the speech, she assailed Obama, Biden and the “Liberal” media: “I guess a small-town mayor is sort of like a “community organizer,” except that you have actual responsibilities. I might add that in small towns, we don’t quite know what to make of a candidate who lavishes praise on working people when they are listening, and then talks about how bitterly they cling to their religion and guns when those people aren’t listening.” “We tend to prefer candidates who don’t talk about us one way in Scranton and another way in San Francisco.”

Read…..working peoplehow bitterly they cling to their religion and guns ……is a direct appeal to the White BIGOT VOTE.

The Barracuda (reading a speech prepared by McCain’s THUGS) went on to mis-represent and mock Obama’s record, lying about her own at the same time, and smothering everything with heavy doses of recycled Republican Fear-Mongering.

“And there is much to like and admire about our opponent.” But listening to him speak, it’s easy to forget that this is a man who has authored two memoirs but not a single major law or reform - not even in the state senate.”

   This could be America’s next Vice-President
Sarah Palin Boobs

This is a man who can give an entire speech about the wars America is fighting, and never use the word “victory” except when he’s talking about his own campaign.”

“But when the cloud of rhetoric has passed … when the roar of the crowd fades away … when the stadium lights go out, and those Styrofoam Greek columns are hauled back to some studio lot - what exactly is our opponent’s plan?”

“What does he actually seek to accomplish, after he’s done turning back the waters and healing the planet?” The answer is to make government bigger … take more of your money … give you more orders from Washington … and to reduce the strength of America in a dangerous world.”

“America needs more energy … our opponent is against producing it….,” said Sarah.

Towards the end of the speech, when she got more comfortable, “Dame Sarah” changed gears, dishing out “time-tested” Republican insults: “Taxes are too high!” . . . “Obama will raise your taxes!” . . . “Tax increases!” . . . “He will raise income taxes!” … “He will raise payroll taxes!” … “He will raise investment income taxes!” … “He will raise the death tax!” . . . “He will raise business taxes!” . . . ["Big Government!"] . . . ["Obama will KILL YOU!"] . . . ["Obama is a MUSLIM"] . . . ["Obama is a Kenyan Communist!"] . . . ["The Terrorists are here .. in this hall!"] . . . ["I'll create more jobs!"] . . . ["I'll cut the deficit!"] . . . ["I'll start the war!"] . . . ["I'll keep those Negroes in their place!"]……LOL!, pure PoliTRICKS!

Meanwhile — Overheard: Obama might pursue criminal charges against Bush

Democratic vice-presidential nominee Joe Biden said yesterday that he and running mate Barack Obama could pursue criminal charges against the Bush administration if they are elected in November. Biden’s comments, first reported by ABC news, attracted little notice on a day dominated by the drama surrounding his Republican counterpart, Alaska governor Sarah Palin.

But his statements represent the Democrats’ strongest vow so far this year to investigate alleged misdeeds committed during the Bush years. “If there has been a basis upon which you can pursue someone for a criminal violation, they will be pursued,” Biden said during a campaign event in Deerfield Beach, Florida, according to ABC.

“[N]ot out of vengeance, not out of retribution,” he added, “out of the need to preserve the notion that no one, no attorney general, no president — no one is above the law.” …..[ MORE ]

REFERENCES:

1. Rudy Giuliani — “America’s THUG”

Why Blacks Fear 'America's Mayor': Reporting Police Brutality and Black Activist Politics Under Rudy GiulianiThey call him “America’s Mayor.” But to blacks that title sugarcoats Rudy Giuliani’s real reputation as one of the most racially divisive leaders in the nation. Peter Noel’s book puts Giuliani’s often-ignored record of oppressing the “other New York” front and center in the 2008 presidential race.

Noel was a witness to “Giuliani time” in New York. As the race beat journalist for “The Village Voice,” he reported exclusively on the police brutality that rained down on blacks, and the denigration of black leadership by Giuliani. In this collection of his exposs, Noel provides stunning insights into the most notorious events of Giuliani’s tenure, including the execution-style killing of Amadou Diallo and the sadistic torture of Abner Louima. Both men-like many black victims of Giuliani’s stop-and-frisk policing-were innocent of any wrongdoing.

This brutality sparked a new black activist movement. Scores, including Jesse Jackson, were arrested-and Peter Noel was there to cover it. No journalist was more insightful about the rise of Al Sharpton, Khallid Muhammad’sMillion Youth March,” and Giuliani’s demonization of David Dinkins, the city’s first black mayor. There are interviews with major political players, inside accounts of the shifting alliances and violent conflicts between ethnic groups, and a stinging critique of the white-dominated media. And then there is Peter Noel’s interview with Giuliani, which took the form of a street fight in Harlem.

In these eloquent, often searing pieces, written in an outraged and authentic voice, Peter Noel spoke truth to the power of an “Afriphobic” mayor. In this revealing book, he still does.

Sarah Palin’s Speech

1. Speech reactions
2. SATIRE - Palin: I’d Oppose Abortion Even if My Daughter’s Raped By a Moose

GOP Pundits Trash Palin

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Bush has perverted, distorted and tarnished America’s image beyond repair

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The G-8 summit was Bush’s last hurrah as a world leader. What’s one thing he can do to strengthen his legacy?

Bush’s Mideast Dishonor

Writes: Sami Moubayed, in Damascus, Syria

I don’t think Bush needs to strengthen his legacy. It has already been deeply engraved in the history of the Middle East. George W. Bush has in fact ruined the Middle East.

No words can describe my anger at what the United States has tolerated or promoted in the Middle East under the Bush White House. The list is long: the war on Iraq, Abu Ghraib, Haditha, Falluja, Mosul, the war on Lebanon, Qana, and not to forget, the circus in Palestine, the killing in Jenin, and the siege in Gaza, topped with the elimination of Yasser Arafat, a democratically elected leader. These images have always reminded me of Sept. 11, 2001. The blood of these children—in Lebanon, Palestine, Iraq—is no less valuable than that of Americans killed at the Twin Towers. Many Americans have been sending me “hate mail” recently, saying that the Bush Administration has been good to the Arabs and is trying to bring peace, security, and democracy to the Middle East. Sorry to tell them that this White House will be remembered for Abu Ghraib. It will be remembered for the atrocities in Gaza. It will be remembered for Qana.

Bush has perhaps single-handedly re-written the history of the Middle East—certainly against our will. This history has been very bloody and embarrassing for America, and it will affect America’s image for generations to come. Allow me to quote the former and legendary U.S. President Abraham Lincoln, who spoke to Congress on Dec. 1, 1862 saying: “Fellow citizens, we cannot escape history. We of this Congress and this administration will be remembered in spite of ourselves. The fiery trail through which we pass will light us down, in honor or dishonor, to the latest generation.”

In our part of the world, Bush has marched into history in great dishonor.

Each country singled out by the White House as a haven for democracy and progress has been ruined, beyond imagination, by his policies in the Arab World. America’s image has been perverted, distorted, and tarnished beyond repair in the minds of the millions of Arabs and non-Arabs who are disgusted by all the bloodshed we are seeing in Iraq, Palestine, and Lebanon.

Australia welcomes WAR criminal Bush

Everybody in the Arab World holds Bush responsible for all of this madness, along with prime ministers Ehud Barak, Ariel Sharon, and Ehud Olmert. I always wanted to write to the U.S. President and tell him: “Think for a minute, Mr. President, about how history will refer to you 100 years from now. Will you be ranked among great men like George Washington, Abraham Lincoln, Woodrow Wilson, or Franklin Roosevelt? What have they done for America and what have you achieved? Washington achieved independence for America. Lincoln fought the Civil War. Wilson won World War I and Roosevelt defeated Hitler in World War II. You ruined the image of your forefathers—the great men who founded and created the modern United States.”

To a mother whose child was killed in Qana, Washington, Lincoln, Wilson, Roosevelt, and Bush, will all be viewed as criminals. A grief-stricken person will not differentiate between good and evil, or right and wrong. He or she will hold America responsible for the death of their loved ones. I personally have high admiration for the American presidents mentioned above. They were strong leaders with talent, principle, and character. Bush is responsible for ruining their image in the Arab World.

To prove my point, I repeat a phrase that I have used over and over again since 2004, quoting Sen. Edward Kennedy of Massachusetts who said:To many people in the Middle East, the symbol of America is not the Statue of Liberty but a prisoner standing on a box wearing a dark cape, a dark hood on his head, afraid he is going to be electrocuted.

Many discussions were held by American policymakers and intellectuals in the United States, after September 11, on one question: “Why do they hate us?” The answer can be summarized with one simple phrase: “Favoritism towards Israel.” What happened over the last eight years—in Palestine and Lebanon—was an unforgivable crime committed by Israel, under the watchful eye of the United States, thanks to Bush.

I received a very large amount of “hate mail” from Americans and pro-Israeli readers over the last few years in response to the series of articles I have written against the Israeli War on Lebanon, which coincides with July 12, 2008.

Impeach Bush NOW!

These readers were enraged by my condemnation of the United States and Israel, claiming that the “war on terror” was correct and justified. One reader wrote: “You are an ungrateful man and I am done reading your site” because of what I had just written about Israel and the United States.

At the same time, I received many, many e-mails from Arab readers who supported my arguments, saying that Bush’s bias against the Arabs was “an unforgivable crime”—in every sense of the world.

I happen to personally know many of the Arab readers with whom I have communicated. They are not turbaned and bearded fanatics who roam the world with guns, wanting to destroy Israel and the United States. Rather they are fine, Westernized, American-educated and highly cultured Arab men and women (many are actually not even Muslims) who have never carried a gun in their life. One addressed the Bush administration and cursed its policy-makers saying that they have “abused the names of the great men of American history.”

The colossal difference in views, and the accumulating anger on both sides, makes dialogue and understanding extremely difficult—especially in times of war; especially under George W. Bush.

One reader commented on my work, saying that he was “disgusted” because I was “demonizing the U.S. for trying to bring peace and democracy to the Middle East.” He added, “If you are too ignorant and too stupid to see that, then maybe you aren’t worth U.S. blood and gold.” Another reader added, and I quote him at length: “Go buddy up with Syria, go buddy up with Hizbullah, Hamas, Iran, and go live in a piece of … world that glorifies suicide bombing by children, glorifies naked anti-Semitism and ignorance of the Holocaust, ‘honor kills their women and forces them to wear burkhas. Go ahead and chose to keep your part of the world uneducated, unemployed, and hopeless. Go ahead and chose to keep the Middle East the gutter of the world while America has the compassion to try and help you by removing the cancer affecting your region.

In response, I write: What blood and what gold were spilled and paid by the Americans for the Arab World? I am astonished that an educated American would think in such a manner. America did not come to this part of the world to tutor or to educate. This is the biggest falsification brought to the world by President Bush.

Iraq was destroyed and looted under the Americans. There are over 10 people dying per day in America’s Iraq—so much for democracy and education. At one point it was more than 35 people dying per day in Iraq, meaning that more than one death occurs per hour in the “new and democratic Iraq.”

At one point more than 1,500 died per month in America’s Iraq. Mass graves—all created after Saddam Hussein, have been found in America’s Iraq, dug up by the Iraqis themselves under America’s watchful eye. Death squads are free to roam the streets, killing Iraqis by night.

Five years after the US invasion of Iraq, one cannot but wonder how the Americans missed a golden opportunity to create a secure democracy in the country to replace the brutal dictatorship of Saddam Hussein.

Optimists in the Arab world, especially pro-Western and particularly pro-American Arabs, defended the United States until curtain fall, saying that it truly would root out terrorism from Iraq, and bring both stability and democracy to the Iraqi people.

Every one of those beliefs has been shattered - over and over again, since March 2003. As Iraq enters its sixth year since 2003, it is safe to ask: what has been achieved? What can I describe as American “compassion” towards the Arabs?

Apart from the downfall of Saddam, not a single achievement is noteworthy in Iraq. The country today is a “democracy” in civil war - a democracy where human life is being wasted, along with the dreams and security of the Iraqi people. Inasmuch as free elections are a great asset of which all oppressed people dream, they mean nothing if security is lacking.

History will not remember the free elections that took place in January and December 2005 as much as it will remember the notorious pictures of the torture at Abu Ghraib prison. The killings and the death squads that haunt the streets of Iraq will live much longer in the minds of Iraqi people than the image of Saddam’s statue falling in Baghdad.

American soldiers torturing (Lynching) Iraqis at Abu Ghraib prison
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Bush’s America did not come to democratize the Iraqis. It came to expand its sphere of influence, replace that of the former USSR, control the rise of political Islam, rebuild the Iraq it had destroyed, make use of Iraq’s oil wealth, and safeguard the security of Israel. Must I remind my American reader of the scandals of Abu Ghraib? Those pictures alone show how much compassion the Americans have for the Arabs. Must I remind him of the killing of 24 Iraqis in cold blood by U.S. marines at Haditha in November 2005 or of the killing of 11 Iraqi civilians by U.S. troops in the village of Ishaqi in March 2006?

The Arabs remember too clearly that it was the Americans who initially supported Saddam Hussein’s rise to power in 1979, simply because he challenged Iran. It was the Americans who orchestrated the first coup d’etat in Syria in 1949, toppling the democratically elected president Shukri al-Quwatli and replacing him with General Husni al-Za’im, a stooge of the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA), because the latter promised to respond to U.S. needs in the Middle East. These were mainly a crackdown on communism, a ceasefire with Israel, and privileges to Tapline, a U.S. oil company.

The fact that Quwatli had been democratically elected by his people meant nothing to the CIA, the White House or the Pentagon in 1949. The fact that Yasser Arafat, another democratically elected president, was besieged to his office in 2001-2004 also meant nothing to the Americans who said that he was “irrelevant” and completely ignored him—along with the will and choice of the Palestinian people, because he refused to become an American stooge in the Middle East.

The Americans must give to win the trust of the Arabs.

Arabs will only begin to have faith in the U.S. and the Bush White House when peace is brought to the Palestinians, security is maintained in Iraq, and American statesmen show more interest in real Arab domestic issues and democracy.

The Americans have also failed to portray themselves as honest brokers in the Arab-Israeli conflict, which is the cornerstone of grievances to the Arab majority. The real problem that the Americans fail to understand is not Arafat, nor terrorism, nor Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, but land and freedom for the Palestinians. Once that is secured, a majority of Arabs will start to trust America.

The road to peace in the Middle East runs through Jerusalem, not Baghdad. On the issue of Palestine, there is consensus among the 200 million Arabs. Since September 2000, more than 50,000 people have been left homeless in Gaza alone. The Occupied Territories currently suffer from 40 percent unemployment, and in Gaza alone it is over 50 percent. When the intifada broke out in 2000, the poverty rate was 21 percent, and by December 2002 it had increased to 60 percent. In Gaza, poverty today is estimated at over 80 percent.

Due to terrible conditions, food consumption in the Occupied Territories has dropped by 25 percent, and half of the population currently lives off United Nations aid. Malnutrition among infants is 22 percent, the highest in the region, matched only in the Sahara Desert.

Bush Wanted For Crimes Against Humanity

The Israeli Defense Army has generated losses in Palestinian infrastructure estimated at U.S.$1.7 billion in 2002 alone. And that number is likely to increase, given the U.S. alliance with Israel and its generous donation of arms and money. When former secretary of state Collin Powell announced his plan for “democracy in the Middle East” in late 2003, he promised $29 million to promote a democratic culture to the Arabs. Whereas at the start of 2004, the White House gave Israel $300 million in donations to “help combat terrorism.”

In an interview with the Israeli daily Yediot Aharanot, Bush’s Secretary of State, Condoleezza Rice once said, “I first visited Israel in 2000. I felt I was returning home, despite the fact that this was a place I have never visited. I have a deep affinity with Israel. I have always admired the history of the state of Israel and the hardness and determination of the people that founded it.” — Read: The tragic futility of Condoleezza Rice

No remark could have a worse effect on the inhabitants of the Middle East. Rice wrote her doctoral dissertation on the Cold War era and the USSR, and although she has a prestigious background in academia, she sadly has not read her Middle East history correctly. To the Arab street she is trying to appeal to today, the “founders” that she admires in Israel are nothing but invaders who realized early on that in order to survive they must uproot, kill and terrorize the Arabs and Palestinians.

Joseph Weitz, head of the Jewish Agency’s colonial department, said in 1940, “We shall not achieve our goal if the Arabs are in this small country. There is no other way [other] than to transfer the Arabs from here to neighboring countries - all of them! Not one village, not one tribe should be left.”

In 1948, there were 475 villages in Palestine, 385 of which were bulldozed to the ground by Israel.

In 1938, the “founder” Ben Gurion told the World Council of Poale Zion, “The boundaries of Zionist aspirations include southern Lebanon, southern Syria, today’s trans-Jordan, all of the West Bank and Sinai.” Ten years later, as premier of Israel, he said, “Our aim is to smash Lebanon, trans-Jordan and Syria. We shall establish a Christian state [in Lebanon], and then we will smash the Arab Legion, eliminate trans-Jordan, then Syria will fall to us. We then bomb and move on and take Port Said, Alexandria and Sinai.” (Taken from “Ben Gurion: A Biography,” written in 1986 by Michael Bar Zohar). These words have had more of an impact on Arabs, even those who are moderate and Westernized, than the democratic promises of Rice.

As an African-American who grew up inspired by the American Revolution against colonialism, and as someone who has read, if not memorized the Bill of Rights of the U.S. constitution, how can Rice admire a people uprooting, terrorizing and “smashing” another people? — Read: Lynchings in America — A History Not Known By ManyAn hereditary trait that fully explains Abu Ghraib

1935 lynching of Rubin Stacy in Fort Lauderdale, Florida
   1935 lynching of Rubin Stacy in Fort Lauderdale, Florida

1919 lynching William Brown in Douglas County, Nebraska
   1919 lynching William Brown in Douglas County, Nebraska

1936 lynching of Lint Shaw in Royston, Georgia
   1936 lynching of Lint Shaw in Royston, Georgia

Notes: Some lynching victims were first raped or stripped of their ears and fingers. Others were lynched, pregnant or with their children, and some were burnt alive and then the lynchers had their charred bodies sold off, bone fragment by bone fragment, to gawkers.

This is a question asked all over the Middle East, shedding a lot of doubt on Rice’s credibility when talking about democratizing the Arab World, and the support she has from her President. Life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness are the trinity that holds the U.S. together and defines its democracy, yet it has not been applied by the U.S.—Bush’s America—when dealing with the Middle East.

To make things clear to readers: I am not opposed to peace with Israel nor am I anti-Semite. One of my closest friends during childhood and young adulthood had a Damascene Jewish mother. She was a remarkable lady. I am someone who sees no difference between Jews, Christians, Buddhists, Muslims, and Baha’is. All of them have the right to live in peace and security. When Arafat signed Oslo in 1993, I was one of those who strongly supported him. I still think it was the bravest decision he ever took in his life. Oslo was ruined not because of Arafat but because of the outbreak of the intifada on Sept. 28, 2000. The outbreak of violence started after Ariel Sharon’s provocation in visiting the al-Aqsa Mosque. A circle of violence started after that, and all hell broke loose in the Middle East after Sept. 11, 2001. Give me a peace-wanting government in the United States and I will support Syrian-Israeli, or Palestinian-Israeli peace talks. One of my favorite quotes was made by Yitzhak Rabin in 1993, during the signing of Oslo. He said, “To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under heaven: A time to be born, and a time to die; A time to kill, and a time to heal; A time to weep, and a time to laugh; A time to love, and a time to hate; A time for war, and a time for peace.”

That was 15 years ago. These administrations, thanks to Bush, Olmert, and Rice, have spread nothing but destruction, setting Iraq, Lebanon, Palestine—and now possibly Iran—ablaze. That is their legacy. They have not surpassed “a time to hate, and a time for war.” They kept us at a “time to kill and a time to die” never bringing us a “time to heal, a time to laugh, a time to love, and a time for peace.

Note: The picture illustrations, supporting links and anchor text to external resources are by PoliticalArticles.NET.

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About The Author: Sami Moubayed is a Syrian political analyst and historian based in Damascus, Syria. Moubayed is the author of “Damascus Between Democracy and Dictatorship (2000)” and “Steel & Silk: Men and Women Who Shaped Syria 1900-2000 (2006).” He has also authored a biography of Syria’s former President Shukri al-Quwatli and currently serves as Associate Professor at the Faculty of International Relations at al-Kalamoun University in Syria. In 2004, he created Syrianhistory.com, the first and online museum of Syrian history. He is also co-founder and editor-in-chief of FORWARD, the leading English monthly in Syria, and Vice-President of Haykal Media.

United States v. George W. Bush et al.



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Frederick Douglass: ‘The Meaning of July Fourth for the Negro’

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In his speech, Douglass delivered a scathing attack on the hypocrisy of a nation celebrating freedom and independence with speeches, parades and platitudes, while, within its borders, nearly four million humans were being kept as slaves.

   Frederick Douglass (1817-1895)
Frederick Douglass (1817-1895)Frederick Douglass (1817-1895) was the best known and most influential African American leader of the 1800s. He was born a slave in Maryland but managed to escape to the North in 1838.

He traveled to Massachusetts and settled in New Bedford, working as a laborer to support himself. In 1841, he attended a convention of the Massachusetts Antislavery Society and quickly came to the attention of its members, eventually becoming a leading figure in the New England antislavery movement.

Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American SlaveIn 1845, Douglass published his autobiography, “The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass: an American Slave.” With the revelation that he was an escaped slave, Douglass became fearful of possible re-enslavement and fled to Great Britain and stayed there for two years, giving lectures in support of the antislavery movement in America. With the assistance of English Quakers, Douglass raised enough money to buy his own his freedom and in 1847 he returned to America as a free man.

He settled in Rochester, New York, where he published The North Star, an abolitionist newspaper. He directed the local underground railroad which smuggled escaped slaves into Canada and also worked to end racial segregation in Rochester’s public schools.

During the 1850s, Frederick Douglass typically spent about six months of the year travelling extensively, giving lectures. During one winter — the winter of 1855-1856 — he gave about 70 lectures during a tour that covered four to five thousand miles. And his speaking engagements did not halt at the end of a tour. From his home in Rochester, New York, he took part in local abolition-related events.

In 1852, the leading citizens of Rochester asked Douglass to give a speech as part of their Fourth of July celebrations. Douglass accepted their invitation. On July 5, 1852, Douglass gave a speech at an event commemorating the signing of the Declaration of Independence, held at Rochester’s Corinthian Hall. It was biting oratory, in which the speaker told his audience, “This Fourth of July is yours, not mine. You may rejoice, I must mourn.” And he asked them, “Do you mean, citizens, to mock me, by asking me to speak to-day?

Douglass proceeded to deliver a scathing attack on the hypocrisy of a nation celebrating freedom and independence with speeches, parades and platitudes, while, within its borders, nearly four million humans were being kept as slaves.

Within the now-famous address is what historian Philip S. Foner has called “probably the most moving passage in all of Douglass’ speeches.

What, to the American slave, is your 4th of July? I answer; a day that reveals to him, more than all other days in the year, the gross injustice and cruelty to which he is the constant victim. To him, your celebration is a sham; your boasted liberty, an unholy license; your national greatness, swelling vanity; your sound of rejoicing are empty and heartless; your denunciation of tyrants brass fronted impudence; your shout of liberty and equality, hollow mockery; your prayers and hymns, your sermons and thanks-givings, with all your religious parade and solemnity, are to him, mere bombast, fraud, deception, impiety, and hypocrisy — a thin veil to cover up crimes which would disgrace a nation of savages. There is not a nation on the earth guilty of practices more shocking and bloody than are the people of the United States, at this very hour.

The Speech follows:

Fellow Citizens, I am not wanting in respect for the fathers of this republic. The signers of the Declaration of Independence were brave men. They were great men, too Ñ great enough to give frame to a great age. It does not often happen to a nation to raise, at one time, such a number of truly great men. The point from which I am compelled to view them is not, certainly, the most favorable; and yet I cannot contemplate their great deeds with less than admiration. They were statesmen, patriots and heroes, and for the good they did, and the principles they contended for, I will unite with you to honor their memory….

…Fellow-citizens, pardon me, allow me to ask, why am I called upon to speak here to-day? What have I, or those I represent, to do with your national independence? Are the great principles of political freedom and of natural justice, embodied in that Declaration of Independence, extended to us? and am I, therefore, called upon to bring our humble offering to the national altar, and to confess the benefits and express devout gratitude for the blessings resulting from your independence to us?

Would to God, both for your sakes and ours, that an affirmative answer could be truthfully returned to these questions! Then would my task be light, and my burden easy and delightful. For who is there so cold, that a nation’s sympathy could not warm him? Who so obdurate and dead to the claims of gratitude, that would not thankfully acknowledge such priceless benefits? Who so stolid and selfish, that would not give his voice to swell the hallelujahs of a nation’s jubilee, when the chains of servitude had been torn from his limbs? I am not that man. In a case like that, the dumb might eloquently speak, and the “lame man leap as an hart.”

But such is not the state of the case. I say it with a sad sense of the disparity between us. I am not included within the pale of glorious anniversary! Your high independence only reveals the immeasurable distance between us. The blessings in which you, this day, rejoice, are not enjoyed in common. ÑThe rich inheritance of justice, liberty, prosperity and independence, bequeathed by your fathers, is shared by you, not by me. The sunlight that brought light and healing to you, has brought stripes and death to me. This Fourth July is yours, not mine. You may rejoice, I must mourn. To drag a man in fetters into the grand illuminated temple of liberty, and call upon him to join you in joyous anthems, were inhuman mockery and sacrilegious irony. Do you mean, citizens, to mock me, by asking me to speak to-day? If so, there is a parallel to your conduct. And let me warn you that it is dangerous to copy the example of a nation whose crimes, towering up to heaven, were thrown down by the breath of the Almighty, burying that nation in irrevocable ruin! I can to-day take up the plaintive lament of a peeled and woe-smitten people!

“By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down. Yea! we wept when we remembered Zion. We hanged our harps upon the willows in the midst thereof. For there, they that carried us away captive, required of us a song; and they who wasted us required of us mirth, saying, Sing us one of the songs of Zion. How can we sing the Lord’s song in a strange land? If I forget thee, 0 Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her cunning. If I do not remember thee, let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth.”

Fellow-citizens, above your national, tumultuous joy, I hear the mournful wail of millions! whose chains, heavy and grievous yesterday, are, to-day, rendered more intolerable by the jubilee shouts that reach them. If I do forget, if I do not faithfully remember those bleeding children of sorrow this day, “may my right hand forget her cunning, and may my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth!” To forget them, to pass lightly over their wrongs, and to chime in with the popular theme, would be treason most scandalous and shocking, and would make me a reproach before God and the world. My subject, then, fellow-citizens, is American slavery. I shall see this day and its popular characteristics from the slave’s point of view. Standing there identified with the American bondman, making his wrongs mine, I do not hesitate to declare, with all my soul, that the character and conduct of this nation never looked blacker to me than on this 4th of July! Whether we turn to the declarations of the past, or to the professions of the present, the conduct of the nation seems equally hideous and revolting. America is false to the past, false to the present, and solemnly binds herself to be false to the future. Standing with God and the crushed and bleeding slave on this occasion, I will, in the name of humanity which is outraged, in the name of liberty which is fettered, in the name of the constitution and the Bible which are disregarded and trampled upon, dare to call in question and to denounce, with all the emphasis I can command, everything that serves to perpetuate slavery Ñ the great sin and shame of America! “I will not equivocate; I will not excuse”; I will use the severest language I can command; and yet not one word shall escape me that any man, whose judgment is not blinded by prejudice, or who is not at heart a slaveholder, shall not confess to be right and just.

But I fancy I hear some one of my audience say, “It is just in this circumstance that you and your brother abolitionists fail to make a favorable impression on the public mind. Would you argue more, an denounce less; would you persuade more, and rebuke less; your cause would be much more likely to succeed.” But, I submit, where all is plain there is nothing to be argued. What point in the anti-slavery creed would you have me argue? On what branch of the subject do the people of this country need light? Must I undertake to prove that the slave is a man? That point is conceded already. Nobody doubts it. The slaveholders themselves acknowledge it in the enactment of laws for their government. They acknowledge it when they punish disobedience on the part of the slave. There are seventy-two crimes in the State of Virginia which, if committed by a black man (no matter how ignorant he be), subject him to the punishment of death; while only two of the same crimes will subject a white man to the like punishment. What is this but the acknowledgment that the slave is a moral, intellectual, and responsible being? The manhood of the slave is conceded. It is admitted in the fact that Southern statute books are covered with enactments forbidding, under severe fines and penalties, the teaching of the slave to read or to write. When you can point to any such laws in reference to the beasts of the field, then I may consent to argue the manhood of the slave. When the dogs in your streets, when the fowls of the air, when the cattle on your hills, when the fish of the sea, and the reptiles that crawl, shall be unable to distinguish the slave from a brute, then will I argue with you that the slave is a man!

For the present, it is enough to affirm the equal manhood of the Negro race. Is it not astonishing that, while we are ploughing, planting, and reaping, using all kinds of mechanical tools, erecting houses, constructing bridges, building ships, working in metals of brass, iron, copper, silver and gold; that, while we are reading, writing and ciphering, acting as clerks, merchants and secretaries, having among us lawyers, doctors, ministers, poets, authors, editors, orators and teachers; that, while we are engaged in all manner of enterprises common to other men, digging gold in California, capturing the whale in the Pacific, feeding sheep and cattle on the hill-side, living, moving, acting, thinking, planning, living in families as husbands, wives and children, and, above all, confessing and worshipping the Christian’s God, and looking hopefully for life and immortality beyond the grave, we are called upon to prove that we are men!

Would you have me argue that man is entitled to liberty? that he is the rightful owner of his own body? You have already declared it. Must I argue the wrongfulness of slavery? Is that a question for Republicans? Is it to be settled by the rules of logic and argumentation, as a matter beset with great difficulty, involving a doubtful application of the principle of justice, hard to be understood? How should I look to-day, in the presence of Amercans, dividing, and subdividing a discourse, to show that men have a natural right to freedom? speaking of it relatively and positively, negatively and affirmatively. To do so, would be to make myself ridiculous, and to offer an insult to your understanding. There is not a man beneath the canopy of heaven that does not know that slavery is wrong for him.

What, am I to argue that it is wrong to make men brutes, to rob them of their liberty, to work them without wages, to keep them ignorant of their relations to their fellow men, to beat them with sticks, to flay their flesh with the lash, to load their limbs with irons, to hunt them with dogs, to sell them at auction, to sunder their families, to knock out their teeth, to burn their flesh, to starve them into obedience and submission to their mastcrs? Must I argue that a system thus marked with blood, and stained with pollution, is wrong? No! I will not. I have better employment for my time and strength than such arguments would imply.

What, then, remains to be argued? Is it that slavery is not divine; that God did not establish it; that our doctors of divinity are mistaken? There is blasphemy in the thought. That which is inhuman, cannot be divine! Who can reason on such a proposition? They that can, may; I cannot. The time for such argument is passed.

At a time like this, scorching irony, not convincing argument, is needed. O! had I the ability, and could reach the nation’s ear, I would, to-day, pour out a fiery stream of biting ridicule, blasting reproach, withering sarcasm, and stern rebuke. For it is not light that is needed, but fire; it is not the gentle shower, but thunder. We need the storm, the whirlwind, and the earthquake. The feeling of the nation must be quickened; the conscience of the nation must be roused; the propriety of the nation must be startled; the hypocrisy of the nation must be exposed; and its crimes against God and man must be proclaimed and denounced.

What, to the American slave, is your 4th of July? I answer; a day that reveals to him, more than all other days in the year, the gross injustice and cruelty to which he is the constant victim. To him, your celebration is a sham; your boasted liberty, an unholy license; your national greatness, swelling vanity; your sounds of rejoicing are empty and heartless; your denunciation of tyrants, brass fronted impudence; your shouts of liberty and equality, hollow mockery; your prayers and hymns, your sermons and thanksgivings, with all your religious parade and solemnity, are, to Him, mere bombast, fraud, deception, impiety, and hypocrisy — a thin veil to cover up crimes which would disgrace a nation of savages. There is not a nation on the earth guilty of practices more shocking and bloody than are the people of the United States, at this very hour.

Go where you may, search where you will, roam through all the monarchies and despotisms of the Old World, travel through South America, search out every abuse, and when you have found the last, lay your facts by the side of the everyday practices of this nation, and you will say with me, that, for revolting barbarity and shameless hypocrisy, America reigns without a rival….

…Allow me to say, in conclusion, notwithstanding the dark picture I have this day presented, of the state of the nation, I do not despair of this country. There are forces in operation which must inevitably work the downfall of slavery. “The arm of the Lord is not shortened,” and the doom of slavery is certain. I, therefore, leave off where I began, with hope. While drawing encouragement from “the Declaration of Independence,” the great principles it contains, and the genius of American Institutions, my spirit is also cheered by the obvious tendencies of the age. Nations do not now stand in the same relation to each other that they did ages ago. No nation can now shut itself up from the surrounding world and trot round in the same old path of its fathers without interference. The time was when such could be done. Long established customs of hurtful character could formerly fence themselves in, and do their evil work with social impunity. Knowledge was then confined and enjoyed by the privileged few, and the multitude walked on in mental darkness. But a change has now come over the affairs of mankind. Walled cities and empires have become unfashionable. The arm of commerce has borne away the gates of the strong city. Intelligence is penetrating the darkest corners of the globe. It makes its pathway over and under the sea, as well as on the earth. Wind, steam, and lightning are its chartered agents. Oceans no longer divide, but link nations together. From Boston to London is now a holiday excursion. Space is comparatively annihilated. — Thoughts expressed on one side of the Atlantic are distinctly heard on the other.

The far off and almost fabulous Pacific rolls in grandeur at our feet. The Celestial Empire, the mystery of ages, is being solved. The fiat of the Almighty, “Let there be Light,” has not yet spent its force. No abuse, no outrage whether in taste, sport or avarice, can now hide itself from the all-pervading light. The iron shoe, and crippled foot of China must be seen in contrast with nature. Africa must rise and put on her yet unwoven garment. ‘Ethiopia, shall, stretch. out her hand unto Ood.” In the fervent aspirations of William Lloyd Garrison, I say, and let every heart join in saying it:

God speed the year of jubilee
The wide world o’er!
When from their galling chains set free,
Th’ oppress’d shall vilely bend the knee,
And wear the yoke of tyranny
Like brutes no more.
That year will come, and freedom’s reign,
To man his plundered rights again
Restore.

God speed the day when human blood
Shall cease to flow!
In every clime be understood,
The claims of human brotherhood,
And each return for evil, good,
Not blow for blow;
That day will come all feuds to end,
And change into a faithful friend
Each foe.

God speed the hour, the glorious hour,
When none on earth
Shall exercise a lordly power,
Nor in a tyrant’s presence cower;
But to all manhood’s stature tower,
By equal birth!
That hour will come, to each, to all,
And from his Prison-house, to thrall
Go forth.

Until that year, day, hour, arrive,
With head, and heart, and hand I’ll strive,
To break the rod, and rend the gyve,
The spoiler of his prey deprive —
So witness Heaven!
And never from my chosen post,
Whate’er the peril or the cost,
Be driven.

Frederick Douglass - July 4, 1852

From:

The Life and Writings of Frederick Douglass, Volume II
Pre-Civil War Decade 1850-1860
Philip S. Foner
International Publishers Co., Inc., New York, 1950

AND

The History Place

REFERENCES:

1. Document - United States Declaration of Independence

Document -- US Declaration of Independence
   [Enlarge Image]

2. United States Declaration of Independence — Wikipedia

3. From AfriqueOnline: America is a country born of hypocrisy and nurtured in racism and oppression. How stupendous a hypocrite do you have to be to write a document that declares “All men are created equal” while at that very moment you have two hundred human beings chained in your back yard working as your slaves? America’s political system (which was designed by these hypocrites) is no better that a shell game which gives rich people control and the rest of us the shaft…..[MORE >>]

Frederick Douglass : Autobiographies : Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave / My Bondage and My Freedom / Life and Times of Frederick Douglass (Library of America)

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‘Cheap Suit Spoiler’ Ralph Nader Broadsides Obama

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Nader: “He(Obama) wants to show that he is not a threatening, a political threatening, another politically-threatening African-American politician.” He is talking white — “He wants to appeal to white guilt.”

Independent ‘Narcissist,’ presidential candidate and spoiler, Ralph Nader took a jab at Barack Obama on Monday (see transcript below)

Yes, this is the same Nader that denied Al Gore the votes he needed to win Florida convincingly, in 2000 — in order to beat the current US “President,” Right-Wing ReTHUGlican dictator George Bush.

Ralph Nader

Mr. Nader’s got what he wanted in 2000 and 2004 — to punish the Democrats. He dit it, and now he’s back to do it again.

As the Green Party candidate in 2000, Nader won 2.74 percent of the national vote (including 97488 votes in Florida), placing third. But many Democrats [ME TO] blame him for siphoning off votes in key states, especially Florida, that might have gone to Democratic nominee Al Gore. Bush won Florida by 537 votes (Stolen Votes) and won the election after a 5-4 decision in the U.S. Supreme Court settled a protracted dispute over the Florida vote.

Ralph knows damn well that he cannot win, but will again siphon votes from the Democratic nominee — Barack Obama, and possibly help elect another Republican THUG.

Nader is a delusional narcissist who is destroying his own legacy with these fruitless presidential runs. In a year when the race appears to be tighter than ever, Nader might just be what John McBOMB, Bush’s chosen “Heir to The Slaughterhouse” needs to beat Obama.

Ralph, the “white power structure” you are talking about is so vast and so complex — no one black, white, yellow man or woman will beat it during my time on this earth.

It will require a revolution to do that — probably by other white men and/or women) ….and not Obama.

He (Obama) has just but poked this power structure with one “tiny nail,” and can only “bob and weave” his way around the Labyrinth.

For now — that’s good enough for most of us, and should be for you too.

At age 74 it’s time for you to leave….. | About Ralph Nader |

Partial transcript of Ralph Nader’s comments

Below is a partial transcript of independent presidential candidate Ralph Nader’s comments to the Rocky Mountain News about presumed Democratic nominee Sen. Barack Obama. The interview was conducted on Monday at Nader’s campaign headquarters in Washington, D.C.

Q: “Do you see Barack Obama as qualitatively different than Al Gore or any other Democrats. He talks about taking on lobbyists, not taking money directly from lobbyists … People portray him as being different. Do you see him as being any better than Al Gore or any of the other Democrats that you’ve opposed over the years?”

Nader: “No. I mean, he’s deceiving people. He takes, he takes … In this very building he would take money from corporate lawyers who are not registered lobbyists but whose desks are across the aisle from corporate lawyers who are registered lobbyists in the same law firm. That has been reported more than once in the mainstream press … Six out of seven industries, as of a month ago, have given more money to Obama than they have to McCain, only the transportation industry is more equal opportunity corruption.

“Look at the health care industry. It has poured money into his campaign. The securities industry, the defense industry. No.

“There’s only one thing different about Barack Obama when it comes to being a Democratic presidential candidate. He’s half African-American. Whether that will make any difference, I don’t know. I haven’t heard him have a strong crackdown on economic exploitation in the ghettos. Payday loans, predatory lending, asbestos, lead. What’s keeping him from doing that? Is it because he wants to talk white? He doesn’t want to appear like Jesse Jackson? We’ll see all that play out in the next few months and if he gets elected afterwards.”

“I think his main problem is that he censors himself. He knows exactly who has power, who has too much, who has too little, what needs to be done right down to the community level. But he has bought the advice that if you want to win the election, you better take it easy on the corporate abuses and do X, Y, Z. When I hear that I say, ‘Oh, I see. So he’s doing all this to win the election, and then he’ll be different.

“Well let’s see if it worked. Did it work for Mondale? Did it work for Dukakis? Did it work for Clinton? Yes, but only because of Perot? Did it work for Gore? Did it work for Kerry … ?”

Q: “Do you think he’s trying to, what was your term, ‘talk white?‘”

NADER: “Of course. I mean, first of all, the number one thing that a black American politician aspiring to the presidency should be is to candidly describe the plight of the poor, especially in the inner cities and the rural areas, and have a very detailed platform about how the poor is going to be defended by the law, is going to be protected by the law, and is going to be liberated by the law. Haven’t heard a thing.

“I mean, the amount of economic exploitation in the ghettos is shocking. You’d think he’d propose a task force to at least study it. I mean, these people are eroded every day. The kids, bodies are asbestos and lead, municipal services discriminate against them because it’s the poor area, including fire and police protection and building code enforcement. And then the lenders, the loan sharks get at them, and the dirty food ends up in the ghettos, like the contaminated meat. It’s a dumping ground for shoddy merchandise. You don’t see many credit unions there. You don’t see many libraries there. You don’t see many health clinics there. This is, we’re talking 40-50 million Americans who are predominantly African-Americans and Latinos. Anybody see that kind of campaigning? Have you seen him campaign in real poor areas of the city very frequently? No, he doesn’t campaign there.”

Q: “What do you think the purpose of that is?”

NADER: “He wants to show that he is not a threatening, a political threatening, another politically-threatening African-American politician.”

He wants to appeal to white guilt. You appeal to white guilt not by coming on as a black is beautiful, black is powerful. Basically he’s coming on as someone who is not going to threaten the white power structure, whether it’s corporate or whether it’s simply oligarchic. And they love it. Whites just eat it up.”

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Bigotry ‘Impresario’ Don Imus Crosses The Line Again

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John Donald Imus, Jr. Has a Long Record of Incendiary Remarks.

The latest:

On Monday, WABC anchor Warner Wolf read a report about footballer Adam “Packman” Jones dropping his nickname, “Pacman.” Wolf also mentioned that Jones had been arrested six times since he was drafted in 2005.

Imus then asked, “What color is he?”

“He’s African-American,” Wolf said.

“Well, there you go,” Imus said. “Now we know.”

Imus said through a spokesperson that he was misunderstood.

“I meant that he was being picked on because he’s black,” Imus said.

“I find the inference of [Imus'] remark disturbing because it plays into stereotypes,” said the Rev. Al Sharpton of the National Action Network, which was part of protests that led to Imus’ firing last year.

“I’m truly upset about the comments,” Jones said. “Obviously Mr. Imus has problems with African-Americans. I’m upset, and I hope the station he works for handles it accordingly. I will pray for him.”

Imus was fired last year for making racial comments about the Rutgers women’s basketball team.

Imus called the Rutgers University women’s basketball team “nappy-headed hos,” and for good measure the show’s executive producer, Bernard McGuirk, called the team “hard-core hos.” Later, former Imus sports announcer Sid Rosenberg, who was filling in for sportscaster Chris Carlin, said: “The more I look at Rutgers, they look exactly like the [National Basketball Association's] Toronto Raptors.”


Radio "Shock Jock" Don Imus

   CLICK PIC FOR LARGER IMAGE

Over the years Imus has made numerous racist slurs on TV and Radio — The long string of racial slurs and inflammatory comments is well documented by Media Matters …..[MORE]

He has also been accused of making offensive remarks off the air. Here are some examples:

1. In a 1984 interview, answering a question about Howard Stern, Don Imus said: “yes, Howard’s a slut too, Lloyd…Plus a Jew bastard, and should be castrated… put in an oven.”

2. Imus referred to African-American sports columnist Bill Rhoden as a “New York Times quota hire.

3. In 1993, Imus referred to PBS anchor Gwen Ifill, a black woman (then with the New York Times) as a “cleaning lady.

4. As reported by New York Times columnist Bob Herbert, in the course of a 1998 interview with Mike Wallace on 60 Minutes, Imus told a producer off-camera that McGuirk was hired to perform “nigger jokes.

5. Robin Quivers claimed that when she worked with Imus at WNBC, Imus called her a “nigger” to her face. Both Howard Stern and Quivers have also claimed that he screamed “Nigger, Nigger” at an African American secretary named Becky during their time at WNBC.

6. Imus has also repeatedly referred to Arabs as “ragheads.

7. He has berated many female newsreaders, including MSNBC’s Contessa Brewer, which caused her to leave Imus’s show. After she left the show, Imus went on a tirade, saying, “With that fat ass she’s got, she wouldn’t be one of ‘em,” [a news 'babe'.]. Imus said on the air, “That skank has to spend three hours with makeup in the morning.” The tirade was allegedly tied to comments overheard from Contessa’s calling Imus “a cantankerous old fool” at a 2005 dinner in a restaurant when she was still a newsreader.

8. During a show a producer also made fun of poet Maya Angelou.

9. On a December 15, 2004, show, Imus referred to publishers Simon & Schuster (under same ownership as CBS Radio) as “thieving Jews,” and later in the show issued a mock apology, saying the phrase was “redundant.” In October 1998, he described media critic Howard Kurtz as “that boner-nosed . . . beanie-wearing little Jew boy.

10. Imus’s show routines sometimes have contained derogatory epithets for homosexuals, including “faggot” or “lesbo” and various terms describing homosexuality.

11. Imus has also made fun of Irish, Jews, Italians, other nationalities and all political positions.

Don Imus is just but a speck in a huge crop of right wing extremists in America’s media — THUGS hiding behind TV and Radio, screaming and snorting their “Hate Rhetoric” like Hyenas in “extreme sexual heat,” fueling anti-immigrant xenophobia and the baseless hate of “Foreigners” and non-whites in America — Blacks, Latinos, Immigrants…you name it.

Media Matters for America has extensively documented, bigotry and hate speech targeting, among other characteristics, race, gender, sexual orientation, religion, and ethnicity continue to permeate the airwaves through personalities such as Glenn Beck, Neal Boortz, Rush Limbaugh, Bill O’Reilly, Michael Savage, Michael Smerconish, John Gibson, Lou Dobbs, Sean Hannity, ….[MORE]

…and these bonehead “airwave” morons are not always white. Here is “The Honorable” Pastor James David Manning outlining the seven winners of the “National Bigot Award.” Message originally preached on 28 May 2008.

LOL!

Sick Moron!

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