A Black Agenda Radio commentary by Glen Ford
It is no longer unthinkable that Barack Obama could face Newt Gingrich in November. If that happens, the political lines will be unequivocally drawn around race – and only race. But Black people will have no defender. “The issue in a contest between Obama and Gingrich will be the same as between Gingrich and Juan Williams, a slimy Black right-winger who claims African Americans wallow in a culture of ‘victimhood.’” Sound familiar? Maybe that’s because “the coded language and euphemisms of white supremacy are deployed by both Republicans and Democrats, and forms the core of American political speech.”
For “cracker” references, read the story.
Newt Gingrich: King Cracker
A Black Agenda Radio commentary by Glen Ford
“Gingrich is drawing a racial line in the sand, just as the segregated Atlanta Crackers baseball team did on their playing field.”
It now seems possible that the presidential election could wind up being a contest between the quintessential corporate Democrat, Barack Obama, and Newt Gingrich, King of the Crackers.
Now, before any radio station considers pulling this commentary from their airwaves as some kind of hate speech, let me inform the listeners that “cracker” was a label proudly worn by masses of white folks, and especially popular in Gingrich’s state of Georgia. From 1901 until 1965, the Atlanta Crackers
Newt Gingrich knows all about Georgia Crackers. The Atlanta Crackers baseball team was still going strong when Gingrich went to high school in Columbus, Georgia, and they played their last game the year he graduated from Emory University, in Atlanta. It was very popular to be a “cracker” in Georgia in those days…and, apparently, it still is, throughout the South, including South Carolina, where Gingrich won the Republican presidential primary.
The former House speaker from Cobb County, Georgia, just outside Atlanta, won a standing ovation when he rejected reporter Juan Williams’ suggestion that Gingrich was purposely insulting Black people
“Gingrich’s verbal weapons are simply sharper than most, but President Obama deploys a milder version of anti-Black rhetoric.”
The problem that Gingrich presents is not so much that he pollutes the public conversation with raw rhetorical racism. The coded language and euphemisms of white supremacy are deployed by both Republicans and Democrats, and forms the core of American political speech. Mass Black incarceration, mass Black unemployment, and de facto housing segregation are the domain of both major parties. Gingrich’s verbal weapons are simply sharper than most, but President Obama deploys a milder version of anti-Black rhetoric, sometimes even on Fathers Day
The real problem is that the issue in a contest between Obama and Gingrich will be the same as between Gingrich and Juan Williams, a slimy Black right-winger who claims African Americans wallow in a culture of “victimhood” and who blames teachers unions for what ails the public schools. Sounds very much like President Obama. Juan Williams is worth $3 million to FOX News. Barack Obama’s re-election is worth trillions to Wall Street, which will back the corporate Democrat, just as they did in 2008. Gingrich, by drawing a racial line in the sand, only helps Obama draw attention away from his own service to Wall Street. So, the King Cracker from Cobb County actually has done a great service to corporate America, whose candidate will reap the votes of most folks who don't think of themselves as crackers.
Except for those of us who know that building a movement is much more important than voting for evil.
For Black Agenda Radio, I’m Glen Ford. On the web, go to BlackAgendaReport.com.
BAR executive editor Glen Ford can be contacted at Glen.Ford@BlackAgendaReport.com .
Daryle Lamont Jenkins is Executive Director of the One People’s Project, which seeks to combat right wing groups and individuals by exposing their threat to the world. He joins us from New Brunswick…
Dr. Gerald Horne was a guest on Sputnik's The Critical Hour, with Dr. Wilmer Leon and Garland Nixon. He discussed the realignment of African nations away from the US and former colonizers and towards…
The US is ushering a new foreign policy doctrine through “The Global Fragility Act.” We need to not only understand these new forms of imperial practice, but to also see the cunning use of language…
Progressives made a mealy mouthed appeal to Biden to engage in talks regarding Ukraine. He slapped them down and they in turn slapped themselves.
Corporate media fail in the most basic of journalistic standards when covering China. The recent 20th National Congress of the CPC was an opportunity to convey important information instead of "China…
