In last nights CNN Democratic debate, Barack Obama dismissed the idea that Blacks are losing jobs/wages because employers would rather hire illegal immigrants (who have no worker protection) than African Americans. He called it scapegoating.
now that answer might get alot applause from an out of touch, upper middle class, mostly white audience, as it did tonight. But if you talk to black people who have actually LOST wages/jobs because of the refusal of the government to crack down on employers that hire undocumented workers (workers who come here in part because of the disasterous effects of NAFTA, which Bill Clinton enthusiastically signed into law), you'd get an entirely different reaction.
But this diary aint about Immigrants v Black folks
It's about how the Democratic party has taken the African American vote completely for granted (they know that Black folks would rather have apathy of the Dems than the all out hostility that the Republicans offer).
Our issues almost never get addressed with any depth, the candidates who openly talked about economic justice are now gone, New Orleans is off the radar, fair housing, a broken criminial justice system, institutionalized racism are just not discussed.
Meanwhile Black folks are being forced further and further to the margins, pushed from the mainstream.
50% of black men in the inner city don't graduate high from school, 72% of those dropouts are unemployed.
21% of black men in their 20s (not in college) are in prison
Half of all black men in their 20s without a college degree are unemployed.
24% of black people live in poverty.
We are 13% of the U.S. population but we are almost half of the prisoners.
black families earn only 58% of what the average white family earns. (Black families earned 68% of what white families earned in 1974, so we've actually LOST ground)
45% of blacks born into middle class before 1968 will have lived in poverty.
Half of all people now diagnosed with HIV in the United States are Black,
Blacks with AIDS are seven times more likely to die from it than whites.
NOBODY in the mainstream media talks about this (lord knows Olbermann would rather do 5 consecutive segments on Britney Spears than ever talk about race), NOBODY in progressive talk radio talks about this, few in the progressive blogosphere talk about this. The CBC is MIA, Congress in general is nowhere to be found, the Clinton campaign would rather send surrogates out to alienate black voters than address the issues, Obama runs from this kinda debate like its on fire because he doesn't want to be seen as "the black candidate". Edwards talked about it, but now he's gone, Kucinich talked about it with ture conviction till he was shutout by the media.
This is a Goddamn crisis. And for the people who call themeselves liberals, people who say they care about social and economic justice, equality and fairness.... WHERE THE FUCK ARE YOU! Black people are the backbone of the goddamn Democratic party, we stand up for you and your ideals in every goddamn election. How bout growing a fucking spine and standing up for us.