African-Americans, my dad, and the United States Government

From Sully:

"I was chatting with some friends after the Maher show. They'd been against the war from the beginning. They were African-American and said it was obvious to them that the WMD argument was what they called "game." They weren't surprised. I was. I believed George W. Bush. And I trusted him. And as the evidence has poured in that my faith and trust were betrayed, my surprise has turned to rage. I'm not a generally angry person. But if I have placed my trust in someone on a matter of this gravity and I find out they lied, bungled and betrayed me and others who trusted them, then all I can say is: they picked the wrong guy to bamboozle."

I suppose that one of the "African-American's" that Andrew refers to here is Harry Belafonte, who had also appeared on Maher's show that night. If so, Belafonte's distrust of GWB should have been of no surprise--no more then any other African-American who historically has been skeptical of the US government since the government accepted and institutionalized slavery (Dred Scott decision and beyond) and segargation (Jim Crow). In general, blacks, whether we want to admit it or not (and usually we don't when we are in the company of whites) know like the Native American that whites (and let me clarify, rich-landowning, powerful whites) speak with a "Forked Tongue." How could we not? Remember the old saying, "Fool me once, shame on me, fool me again..." well beside the Native American no one has gotten as fooled by white political leaders than the Afro-American. Black cynicism is so deep rooted in this country that it becomes, politically and culturally, part of our idenity. Even Black leaders are distrusted, and why not? To be a black leader means playing the white man's game. Whites have no choice but to view this cynicism as racism, and perhaps even blacks feel that it racism, but if one gets periodically kicked in the ass by people who (at least on the surface) look alike isn't it at least understandable if one gets prejudiced towards that particular figure?

Now that being said, let me talk a bit about my father's particular distrust towards George W. Bush. My father, sharing in many of the biases African-Americans share in regards to white politicians, found a unique skepticism towards our current president for reasons that are still unknown to him or I. When questioned, my father's only response is, "I don't know why, but I didn't trust that snake from the moment I saw him." Yet I've been wondering this myself, and the only answer I can come up with is that something about GWB's record compouned my father's inherent distrust. Here comes a canidate who's dodged the draft, failed at finding oil in Texas, failed at taking a Baseball team to the World Series, and then was, at best, a mediocure Governor, yet he's the man to lead America? To my father, I suppose, he looks at him as not only as a white canidate, but as an inept white canidate. Yet another "surprise" that seems to have shocked the world. You might as well have voted Corey Haim as President. On second thought, that might have been a better choice.

Frankly Sullivan can take his rage and cram it. How dumb, how delusional, are whites (at least poor/ Christian fundamentalist/ conservative whites) not to see the forest for the trees, or the body bags for their free trade ideology. Maybe the conquest of Hawaii should have enlightened them, or the invasion of Cuba? No? Then how about the overthrow of Mossadegh by the CIA? The Gulf of Tonkin? The invasion of Granada? The invasion of Iraq? And we haven't even touched civil rights yet!

Still every cloud does have its silver lining--and something that both my father and I have hope in is that the Bush reign will awaken regular Americans of all colors that they have been bamboozled from the very beginnng, and that "cleaning house" aren't just words that politicans use rhetorically but is the responsiblity of the people. And, furthermore, cynicism is a good thing. Let me not say that all white politicans are bad or corrupt, but this particular breed of politicans--rich, established, and generationally powerful, need to go. Blacks may be the first to distrust them but, in the end, it is all of us that get screwed.