Black United Students Celebrate 40 Years at KSU

Black United Students (BUS) was founded 40 years ago this year, on the campus of Kent State University. The organization has gone through many changes over time. But, much remains the same.

Dr. Larry Simpson, the first president of BUS, returned to the campus November 8, 2008 for a celebration of the past 40 years. He's now the Senior Vice President of Berklee College of Music in Boston, MA, in charge of academic affairs. Over the years his experience with BUS has served him well. As he stated in his keynote address the other night. Being involved in BUS gave him a window into the adult world that he may not have experienced had it not been for BUS. Mostly, it was about learning how to work with other people and function as a member of society.

In his work at Berklee, the world's largest music school, he is still an advocate for students and their success within an institutional environment, as is another former BUS president Dean Tim Moore. Dean Moore is an Associate Dean of Arts and Sciences at Kent State University. He's also a professor in Pan-African Studies where he's taught for over 30 years.

A number of other past presidents of BUS and BUS members were present for the celebration and awarding of Dr. Edward W. Crosby with a Lifetime Achievement Award. He also spoke about the significance of BUS in the formation of 3 academic departments at Kent State University. The Pan-African Studies Department is one of those departments. In 1968 there was no Pan-African Studies Department. Dr. Crosby was brought to Kent to form just such a department. In the beginning it was known as the Institute of African American Affairs (IAAA).

IAAA was crucial to the lives of many of the Black students on campus. Many of them would not have graduated had it not been for the support of IAAA. Many of these students experienced culture shock upon entering the university environment and needed somewhere to go that felt familiar. They also needed help in a number of other ways, including academics, finances, etc. As Dr. Crosby stated so eloquently that night he "clothed himself with students," which served him well in negotiating with the powers that be, while it served the students too.

Affirmative Action laws were in place, but in some ways it seemed as if IAAA was doing all the heavy lifting in that regard. No department on campus had as many Black faculty. To this day many of those Black faculty are still teaching at Kent, although few of them were seen that night. This was a night for the students.

Following the parade of presidents the current members of the BUS executive board outlined their goals for this year. Some of the highlights included working on the Obama campaign and going into neighboring communities to work with the youth. The Progressive Education Community School which was initiated in the late 60's as the African Liberation Tutoring program has had new life breathed into it by the current BUS board. Kaisha Sherills has been instrumental in bringing this program back to life. She is the Community Affairs Officer of BUS and is a real spark plug.

Ashley Tolliver current BUS president and her board did a fine job of putting together a program in less than 2 months. They are to be commended for their efforts. Hopefully, their experience with BUS will be as noteworthy and invigorating as that of past BUS members.

New Governor of New York Hails from Harlem

Eliot Spitzer, Governor of New York State just resigned as the governor and David Paterson will now take his place. Will there be collateral damage from this move? Undoubtedly!

Lieutenant Governor Paterson will now become, not only the first African American governor of New York, but will also become the first legally blind governor in the country.This was stunning news, which broke on the eve of Barack Obama's landslide victory in Mississippi.

As this story devolps it changes the political landscape depriving Hillary Clinton of one more Superdelegate.What is she to do, with backers like Governor Spitzer, who former Mayor Kotch described as "having a screw loose" on CNN last night? And of course, Geraldine Ferraro who refuses to apologize for her racially charged remarks regarding Senator Obama.

It has been a contention of many of Hillary's detractors that she would have a polarizing effect on the government and the country, as a whole. Well, I dare say this may be the tip of the iceberg. As the old saying goes, "birds of a feather, flock together."

In order to belie this thought Senator Clinton needs to not only distance herself from Governor Spitzer, while rejecting and denouncing his actions, but also do the same with Ms. Ferraro.

At this point she has refused to "denounce and reject" the actions of Governor Spitzer. She also has refused to "denounce and reject" former Congresswoman Ferraro, one of her major fund raisers. This puts her in the awkward position of now having to defend the racist statements of Ms. Ferraro. At the same time comparisons have already been made, which will dog her on the campaign trail for some time to come, in regards to the Lewinsky scandal of former President Bill Clinton and the Spitzer affair.

This is bound to bring into question her ability to make good judgments in the course of governing the country and making cabinet appointments. It's also not going to do anything to help her recover her African American base, nor will it endear her to the women's rights activists.

As we saw in the Mississippi primary last night her base has been seriously eroded, as Barack Obama took the lion's portion of the youth vote, middle aged adults, African Americans and white women. This leaves Hillary and John McCain with older white men as their base.The closer we get to the convention the more polarized the electorate is becoming.

Senator Obama is the only candidate showing signs of being able to bring together any kind of coalition. Even if he is not able to bring together this same coalition in the south, like he did in the north and the west, he's a good antidote to the polarizing effect of Senator Clinton.

Governor David Paterson will be installed this upcoming Monday. He currently resides in Harlem and was Lieutenant Governor of New York prior to today's announcement.

• "David A. Paterson was born May 20th 1954 in Brooklyn, NY to Portia and Basil Paterson, the first non-white Secretary of State in New York and the first African-American Vice-Chair of the National Democratic Party. The Lt. Governor earned his bachelor’s degree in History from Columbia University in 1977, and completed his J.D. at Hofstra Law School in 1982. He continues to give back to his alma mater by serving as an adjunct professor at Columbia’s School for International and Public Affairs. David Paterson lives in Harlem with his wife, Michelle Paige Paterson, and their two children, Ashley and Alex. Ashley entered Ithaca College in Fall 2006, and Alex attends public school in New York City."

He'll be taking over the governors office only 14 months after being sworn in as lieutenant governor following a landslide victory. We wish him well and pray that he does a good job in his new position.

Will The Real Hillary Please Stand Up?

During the debate on Tuesday 2/26/2008 we saw "the real" Hillary Clinton, feisty, scrappy, itching for a fight. Over the last few weeks Hillary Clinton has exhibited signs of extreme aggravation with the fact that she's been losing ground in the polls and apparently has lost credibility as a viable nominee of the Democratic Party.

In the most recent debate she really showed out by lambasting, not only, Barack Obama, but also deriding the moderator and representatives of the major media. Over the last few weeks it's dawned on me that Hillary has an anger management problem, which has not been fully exposed by the media. However, I've recently come across some citations from a variety of sources close to Hillary and the Clinton camp indicating just that. Aside from everything else that's been said about her health care program vs. Obama's healthcare program this anger management issue, I believe, is the primary thing that disqualifies her for the job of commander in chief of all the armed forces.

One thing that Hillary has made real clear is that she's a fighter and that she'll "fight for us". The question is who's she going to fight. Assumedly, she's talking about fighting the Republicans and Al-Qaida. However, this is not clear. Based on her public record Hillary is not averse to fighting Republicans, terrorists, members of her own party or even White House staff members.

One thing is obvious, she has not been known for building coalitions and bringing people together. She has been known for talking negatively about her own White House staff members behind their backs and deriding them in public, however. Gail Sheehy states Bradford DeLong, a veteran of the Clinton administration who worked with Hillary Clinton on healthcare, had it exactly right when he warned, "We must keep Hillary Rodham Clinton very far from the White House for the rest of her life.", Hillary's Choice (New York: Random House, 1999) p. 11.

Even more telling was the statement by former Clinton Press Secretary Dee Dee Myers indicating her overall temperament,

"Anyone that stood up... was smashed down and belittled,very personally. [N]ot only would she sort of humiliate you in front of your colleagues or whoever happened to be around, Hillary tended to kind of campaign against people behind their back, and that was certainly my experience."

PBS Frontline, 16 Jan 2001
The Clinton Years

There's also a matter of integrity. The Clintons have been known for, shall we say, stretching the truth, as in the case of Gennifer Flowers, where Mrs. Clinton denied knowledge of the affair before it became public. Of course everyone remembers the Monica Lewinsky case and Bill Clinton's denial of any wrongdoing, "depending on how you define sex". Hillary and Bill have both shown us that they can stretch the truth.

In their recent debate in Cleveland Obama was called on to "denounce" or "reject" Louis Farrakhan, because of alleged anti-semitic remarks that have been attributed to him. Senator Obama did this unequivocally. However, nothing has been said, nor has she publicly acknowledged or apologized for her own, “anti-semitic” remarks, which are quite well documented and attested to by reliable sources. For instance, Jerry Oppenheimer states,

"Hillary hit him between the eyes. She was angrier than Paul had ever seen her. 'You f**king Jew bastard!' she screamed."

author Jerry Oppenheimer
quoting campaign aide Paul Fray
State of a Union
(New York: Harper-Collins, 2000) p. 153

These are words out of Senator Clinton's own mouth. Thus far she has not had to account for them. Is this the kind of person that we feel can finally bring closure to the ongoing war between the Palestinians and the State of Israel? After making similar snide remarks about Mahatma Ghandi (Youtube) from the floor of the U.S. Senate, do we really think that she can now go to India and successfully negotiate with the Indian government concerning nuclear proliferation? Will she be able to direct negotiations with the various Muslim factions in Iraq, so that our troops can begin coming home 6 months after she takes the oath of office, after chiding Senator Obama for putting on the national dress of the Kenyan people, while on a diplomatic mission. Keep in mind, we've seen President Clinton wearing the national dress of Muslim Nigerians. Does this mean her husband is secretly working for Al-Qaida? Is this why she doesn't want to release her tax returns until she's been christened as the nominee of the Democratic Party? In the Bible it states:

“For everything there is a season, and a time for every matter under heaven: . . .
a time to love, and a time to hate; a time for war, and a time for peace.”

Ecclesiastes 3:1

This passage needs to be plastered on the wall of the White House to help it's new resident keep their eye on the sparrow, especially that last passage about war and peace. The war in Iraq has been a major campaign issue and a real rallying point for voters. The people are demanding an end to the war, however both candidates have stated they will not pull the troops out, while leaving the area as a haven for Al-Qaida. That will require a lot of negotiating between forces that have been adversarial for 100's, if not 1000's of years. I personally don't see that Senator Clinton has the credentials to credibly carry out that mission.

The facts are in! Hillary Clinton is not fit to sit in the seat of power, guiding and directing the most powerful nation in the world. I've only listed a few of the more serious charges that can be corroborated here. It's what's not listed here that should concern every qualified voter in America. Because, whomever the next resident of the White House is, it's an absolute certainty that they will have to negotiate a number of situations with the leaders of many nations, and they'll have to do it in a calm and reasonable manner, with an understanding of their perspective and the perspective of their constituents. This is the advantage Senator Obama has over Senator Clinton. As we've seen him on the campaign trail over the last year, and under serious attack during a good portion of that time, by Senator Clinton, he's been able to maintain his cool at all times. This is the mark of a good leader. He's also shown grace and poise after coming from behind as an underdog to a leader in the polls, he's always maintained a decorum that was professional and respectful of the other candidates and their positions.

When Hillary Clinton says she's going to fight for us, I think she really means it! However, after 8 years in the White House with no threat of being ousted by the electorate; and 8 more years as a senator, she's no closer to passing her health care bill through congress, than she was when she started this fight. As the President of the most powerful nation in the world, the question is not will she fight, it's obvious that she will do that. The question is, can she build bipartisan coalitions that will in fact be strong enough to get legislation passed that will benefit all U.S. citizens. Will she be able to negotiate with these leaders, or will she try to bully them? Will she treat foreign dignitaries with respect, or will she belittle them, as we saw her belittle Mahatma Ghandi from the floor of the U.S. Senate (Fox news report on Youtube)? Will she be able to bring together a cabinet of chosen advisers and work with them, or will we see extreme instability in the White House, as cabinet members turn over faster than hamburgers on an open grill? These are important questions that remain unanswered and until now unasked.

Whoever wins this election and eventually occupies the White House needs to put all of their cards on the table. We're still waiting on Senator Clinton to produce her tax records indicating where her money comes from and therefore who she's beholding to. Senator Obama, on the other hand has made full disclosure and has refused to except any monies from lobbyists and PACs. When are we going to get a full accounting of Senator Clinton's actions and finances? I don't feel that anyone can vote for her and, in good conscience and say they feel that she's the best candidate for the job without this crucial information. At best they can say they like her more than the other candidates.

Barack Obama "The Best Man"

This reporter has been watching the race for the Democratic nomination with great interest, and apparently so has America and the world. From the outset it appeared that Hillary Clinton was the presumptive nominee. With four other people in the race Barack Obama stood out only because of his race.

Fast forward ahead to the present, eight months later and we have Barack Obama appearing to be the presumptive nominee and Clinton trying to catch up. What happened in the interim? Obama has caught on like wildfire, running through ten states without a credible challenge from his opponent. On T.V. Obama is looking very presidential, much more presidential than Ronald Reagan when he lost the part for the president in the 1964 film "The Best Man". In person he fills the halls he appears in with what could easily be described as devotees. In a recent visit to Youngstown, Ohio Obama not only had the whole crowd rocking, they were in the palm of his hand. They hung on his every word. They all came there knowing what he was going to say, and like one does at a concert with your favorite musician, they waited to hear the part of his speech that resonated with their own feelings. He has found his voice and the people are listening! Not just some of the people, some of the time, but all of the people, all of the time.

Meanwhile, Hillary has been relegated to the sidelines where she lobs potshots at him every now and then. Unfortunately for her, she doesn't have the strength of purpose, or the clarity of mind to be able to focus her aim and score a direct hit. Obama has deftly deflected each and every one of them, including the ridiculous charges of plagarism, lack of substance and "hopemongering". Yes, Obama is a hope monger, and proud of it. He's taken everything that's been tossed at him and like a good martial artist turned the energy behind those blows back on the one who threw them.

Whether he wins or loses this race is not the question. He will come up a winner any way it goes, because he is changing the nature of politics as we know it, right now, not in some distant future. Evidence of this is clear in the primary elections that he's winning, by double digit margins. He is bringing people together from all walks of life right now and giving the American people something to hope for.

In the beginning they tried to label him "The Black Candidate", that only a Black person would vote for. When too many white people voted for him they called him an empty wagon, very noisy, but no substance. A quick look at Obama's record would tend to belie that statement, when you Google him and find out that the issues he most recently brought into his stump speeches are issues that he's been addressing the entire time he's been in Congress, such as the homeless vets, education reform, the economy, the war in Iraq, Darfur and global warming. Obama is not just paying lip service to these issues he's writing bills and getting the votes to have them passed.

The question now is, if Hillary Clinton or John McCain are elected to the highest office in the land can they get the votes they need in Congress? I don't believe they can, not without the popular support of the people. In Obama's stump speech he states unequivocally that the change we seek cannot be made without the support of the people themselves, and he's right. No congressman or woman will want to stir up the ire of their constituents and have them outside their door protesting. This is a real and yet unspoken fear. Obama talks about putting the lobbyists out of business, shutting down their operations. There's no way to do that without the popular support of the people. So, all the talk of empty wagons rolling down the street making a lot of noise, but carrying little goods, is just that, talk.

They say Obama needs a reality check. Well I beg to differ. The reality is Obama is not only the best man, he's the best candidate for the job.

The Five Black Presidents of The United States of America

Joel A. Rogers and Dr. Auset Bakhufu have both written books documenting that at least five former presidents of the United States had Black people among their ancestors। If one considers the fact that European men far outnumbered European women during the founding of this country, and that the rape and impregnation of an African female slave was not considered a crime, it is even more surprising that these two authors could not document Black ancestors among an ever larger number of former presidents. The president’s names include Thomas Jefferson, Andrew Jackson, Abraham Lincoln, Warren Harding, and Calvin Coolidge.The best case for Black ancestry is against Warren G. Harding, our 29th president from 1921 until 1923. Harding himself never denied his ancestry. When Republican leaders called on Harding to deny the "Negro" history, he said, "How should I know whether or not one of my ancestors might have jumped the fence." William Chancellor, a White professor of economics and politics at Wooster College in Ohio, wrote a book on the Harding family genealogy and identified Black ancestors among both parents of President Harding. Justice Department agents allegedly bought and destroyed all copies of this book. Chancellor also said that Harding's only academic credentials included education at Iberia College, which was founded in order to educate fugitive slaves.Andrew Jackson was our 7th president from 1829 to 1837. The Virginia Magazine of History Volume 29 says that Jackson was the son of a White woman from Ireland who had intermarried with a Negro. The magazine also said that his eldest brother had been sold as a slave in Carolina. Joel Rogers says that Andrew Jackson Sr. died long before President Andrew Jackson Jr. was born. He says the president's mother then went to live on the Crawford farm where there were Negro slaves and that one of these men was Andrew Jr's father. Another account of the "brother sold into slavery” story can be found in David Coyle's book entitled "Ordeal of the Presidency" (1960).Thomas Jefferson was our 3rd president from 1801 to 1809. The chief attack on Jefferson was in a book written by Thomas Hazard in 1867 called "The Johnny Cake Papers." Hazard interviewed Paris Gardiner, who said he was present during the 1796 presidential campaign, when one speaker states that Thomas Jefferson was “a mean-spirited son of a half-breed Indian squaw and a Virginia mulatto father.” In his book entitled "The Slave Children of Thomas Jefferson," Samuel Sloan wrote that Jefferson destroyed all of the papers, portraits, and personal effects of his mother, Jane Randolph Jefferson, when she died on March 31, 1776. He even wrote letters to every person who had ever received a letter from his mother, asking them to return that letter. Sloan says, "There is something strange and even psychopathic about the lengths to which Thomas Jefferson went to destroy all remembrances of his mother, while saving over 18,000 copies of his own letters and other documents for posterity." One must ask, "What is it he was trying to hide?"Abraham Lincoln was our 16th president from 1861 to 1865. J. A. Rogers quotes Lincoln's mother, Nancy Hanks, as saying that Abraham Lincoln was the illegitimate son of an African man. William Herndon, Lincoln's law partner, said that Lincoln had very dark skin and coarse hair and that his mother was from an Ethiopian tribe. In Herndon's book entitled "The Hidden Lincoln" he says that Thomas Lincoln could not have been Abraham Lincoln's father because he was sterile from childhood mumps and was later castrated.Calvin Coolidge was our 30th president, and he succeeded Warren Harding. He proudly admitted that his mother was dark because of mixed Indian ancestry. However, Dr. Bakhufu says that by 1800 the New England Indian was hardly any longer pure Indian, because they had mixed so often with Blacks. Calvin Coolidge's mother's maiden name was "Moor." In Europe the name "Moor" was given to all Black people just as the name Negro was used in America.All of the presidents mentioned were able to pass for White and never acknowledged their Black ancestry. Millions of other children who were descendants of former slaves have also been able to pass for White. American society has had so much interracial mixing that books such as “The Bell Curve”, discussing IQ evaluations based solely on race, are totally unrealistic.1. Andrew Jackson was the first president to have an attempt on his life2. Thomas Jefferson's wealth died before he did. At his death he was living with a Black Woman, as the father of their Black Children. Wasn’t he the one who insisted on the phrase "All Men Are Created Equal"? What did those words betray? Why would a White slave owner push that theory at that time?3. Abraham Lincoln was killed in office. For almost a week while he was president, hundreds of Black people were targeted and killed on the streets of New York in response to his policy. The White rioters even killed a Black child when burning down the Colored Orphan Asylum. Dr. Vaughn writes "Lincoln's presidential opponents made cartoon drawings depicting him as a Negro and nicknamed him "Abraham Africanus the First." The picture book has the cartoon.4. Warren Harding died under unclear circumstances that could have included murder The year he was elected, the Negro Wall Street riots happened where hundreds of Black folks were brutally killed in Tulsa, Oklahoma. Rosewood, Florida’s Black community was also the target of rage killings.5. Calvin Coolidge - though he was president during the prosperous roaring 20's, never received much credit for his work and within a year after he left office the country fell apart with the stock market crash. According to Groiler "The number and variety of Coolidge's accomplishments as president were substantial. Unhappily, wiser ones were needed to meet the growing problems of the time. His major achievements--tax and debt reduction and the Kellogg-Briand Pact renouncing war--were soon made mockeries by the events of the 1930's, and his lesser accomplishments were largely forgotten with time's passage." Reads like PhD level historians have decided to kill his reputation. He was good while he was there but nine months after he left things fell apart so he wasn't that good. Nine months can unravel a lot of things. The Roaring 20's were among the best times this country ever experienced.