If Sen. John McCain and Gov. Sarah Palin are able to highjack control of this nation’s political cockpit, the residents of this country are in for a turbulent ride. McCain was unable to avoid crashing several military jets. His safety record in the sky is scary and it is reflective of the way he would navigate the national security and economic interests of this country. McCain and Palin would be the dumbest duo to gain keys to the White House. It would only prove the late Dr. William A. Jones correct: “Whites are rational
on every subject except race.” Many whites would prefer to drink Jim Jones’ Kool-Aid rather than see a Black man in the White House as commander-in-chief. When President Theodore Roosevelt dubbed it the “White House,” he must have meant that the prime tenant must be a white male. To be fair to Roosevelt, however, he did embrace the West African proverb: “Speak softly and carry a big stick; you will go far.” This was Roosevelt’s signature saying, but the wisdom of Africa is not given any credit. Roosevelt was upset when he was unable to receive the Medal of Honor for his victory at San Juan Hill. President Bill Clinton rewarded him posthumously. He led the “Rough Riders,” a mostly Black group of soldiers. Besides being the only native of New York City to secure a key to the White House, he is also the nation’s youngest president. Southerners protested vociferously when Roosevelt invited Booker T. Washington to break bread with the president and the First Lady. The Memphis Scimitar attacked him for permitting “a nigger to dine with them at the White House.” The Richmond News said, “It will be impossible to feel as we were beginning to feel, that he is one of us.” McCain is one of them. Many whites in the South excused Washington for dining with Roosevelt. They reasoned that the dinner invitation was a command and that no Negro could disobey a white man. White supremacy may have saved Washington from a lynching. On the other hand, Monroe Trotter labeled him as a hypocrite for going to the White House. But Bishop Henry M. Turner told him, “You are about to be the great representative and hero of the Negro race, notwithstanding you have been very conservative.” Compare Sen. Barack Obama. Washington may have had the image of an Uncle Tom in some quarters, but he was no foot-shuffler. He had quietly financed litigation to raise challenges in two Alabama suffrage cases: Giles v. Harris and Giles v. Teasley. He successfully financed a case involving the exclusion of Blacks from jury service. The U.S. Supreme Court reversed the conviction in Rogers v. Alabama in 1904.Wilford Smith, who was Black, also represented Marcus Garvey’s Universal Negro Improvement Association. Washington secretly worked with W.E.B. Du Bois to challenge a railroad segregation law. The president of the Pullman Company was Abraham Lincoln’s son, Robert Todd Lincoln. Abraham Lincoln had been a railroad lawyer. Slavery had been a burden on interstate railroads. Today, voting rights and the exclusion of the Blacks from jury service are still viable issues, but no Booker T. Washington exists to fund them despite the presence of Black millionaires and wealthy social parasites who masquerade as civil rights leaders. For example, O.J. Simpson is being tried by an all-white jury in Nevada. The date on the white calendar is 2008, but the date on the Black calendar is pre-Plessy v. Ferguson. Blacks are still living in Jim Crow, and a Jim Crow sign still hangs on the White House. Whites would prefer to go to hell with gasoline panties on than to see a Black man in the White House. International public opinion, to the contrary, is of no moment to whites. If McCain wins the presidential sweepstakes, he will be the dumbest person ever to occupy the White House. He ranked at the bottom of his class at the U.S. Naval Academy. But for his father and grandfather attaining the rank of admiral, McCain would probably be a small-town, retired cop in Mississippi. As the vice president, Palin would probably be as dumb as Vice President Dan Quayle. Palin was unaware of the Bush Doctrine. Charley Gibson of ABC News had to resuscitate her with leading questions. I knew about the Monroe Doctrine in high school. What’s her excuse? Has Palin ever visited D.C.? She also believes that it is permissible to routinely breach the territorial sovereignty of another country. This is the view of the John Birch Society. She should have been queried about the Platt Amendment and the Monroe Doctrine. The vice presidency was an afterthought at the Constitutional Convention of 1787.This absence of vetting the office of vice president, like McCain has achieved with Palin,is still in causing a state of confusion in constitutional law. So far, this confusion has produced the Twelfth Amendment after the presidential election of 1800; the Twentieth Amendment, commonly referred to as the 1933 “Norris Lame Duck” Amendment; and the Twenty-fifth Amendment, which was ratified in 1967, but was not in play when JFK was assassinated. John Adams described it as “the most insignificant office that ever the invention of man contrived or his imagination conceived.” FDR chose his chief rival at the Democratic National Convention, John Nance Garner, as his vice president. Garner said the vice presidency is “not worth a bucket of warm piss.” This view of the vice presidency certainly changed in 1952. It could be argued that except for the vice presidencies of Gov. Spiro Agnew and Sen. Dan Quayle, all of the presidents since 1952 upgraded the office of vice president. Each of the vice presidents has had more experience in national and international affairs than his presidential sidekick. Palin falls within the class of Agnew and Quayle. Agnew is the only vice president of the United States to be hounded out of office by a criminal prosecution. Watergate sunk Nixon. Less than five months after Quayle lost a spelling contest to a 12-year-old after Quayle was unable to spell “potato,” the voters sent Quayle and President George W. H. Bush packing. McCain is not only dumb, he is also no spring chicken. His presidency will be known as the blind leading the blind. If McCain keels over, an airhead will be the commander-in-chief.The Untied States would be in better hands with Quayle who had, at least, been in Congress 12 years before he ascended to the vice presidency. “Maverick” is an eponym. Samuel A. Maverick was known for leaving his cattle unbranded in Texas. McCain is no maverick. “R” is tattooed over 90 percent of his brain. With his over- whelming support for the Republican Party, McCain is a political toady. If it sounds like an elephant, walks like an elephant and chews like an elephant, it is By now, Sen. Barack Obama should be whipping McCain like he stole something. Obama is keeping McCain’s dirty laundry a secret. Instead, he has thrown a helmet to Sen. Hillary Clinton. Something is wrong with this picture. Obama should have seen the female factor. This gender war started 20 years after the formation of Lehman Brothers. Sept. 24–UAM weekly forum at the Elks Plaza, 1068 Harriet Tubman Avenue (Fulton Street) near Classon Avenue in Brooklyn. Admission is free. Take the “C” train to Franklin Avenue. Oct. 1–Anthony Browder, author of “Nile Valley Contribution to Civilization,” will be the keynote speaker at UAM’s weekly forum at the Elks Plaza, 1068 Harriet Tubman Avenue (Fulton Street) near Classon Avenue in Brooklyn. Admission is free. Oct. 4–United African Movement honors Alton Maddox for 20 years of leadership and service to UAM at 99 Bainbridge Street in Brooklyn from 5 to 8 p.m. The struggle must continue. Reservations are required. Call (718) 834-9034. Oct.11-12–An overnight bus trip to the Blacks In Wax Museum and the Baltimore Harbor in Baltimore and an “Egypt on the Nile” tour of Washington, D.C., conducted by the esteemed Egyptologist Anthony Browder. The tour is a must for Blacks before Sen. Barack Obama enters the White House and who seek not to be a “Sarah Barracuda.” For further information on all events, call United African Movement at (718) 834-9034. See: www.reinstatealtonmaddox.net for “NYC Without a Weekly Political Forum,” “Canvassing Votes on Slave Wages,” “Minority Control Over Blacks and Browns in NYC,” “Blacks Buy the Brooklyn Bridge,” “Critical Thinking and Electoral Politics,” “UAM and Jim Crow Politics” and “Hurricane Gustav: Natural or Man-Made?” “The GOP and Hurricane Gustav”