So Proud of Our Kansas City Star

Wow.

What can you say but "Wow"?

Our own local paper, the Kansas City Star stunned me and I feel, probably lots of us this week. Their report, their reporting, their confession was just that, stunning. You likely know of what I'm writing. It's this.

The truth in Black and white: An apology from The Kansas City Star

Today we are telling the story of a powerful local business that has done wrong.

In it, rather famously now, the paper confessed and admitted to racism, horrible racism from them over the years when reporting on minorities in the area--specifically, Black Americans.

I'll only post the beginning of the editorial.

Today we are telling the story of a powerful local business that has done wrong.

For 140 years, it has been one of the most influential forces in shaping Kansas City and the region. And yet for much of its early history — through sins of both commission and omission — it disenfranchised, ignored and scorned generations of Black Kansas Citians. It reinforced Jim Crow laws and redlining. Decade after early decade it robbed an entire community of opportunity, dignity, justice and recognition.

That business is The Kansas City Star.

To repeat, there's no word that describes this any better than stunning.

This took guts. This took courage. Just freaking wow.

They could have recognized their past faults internally and vowed to never repeat such things, sure. But this? Confessing to the supporting of Jim Crow laws and redlining and segregation and other obscenities, however legal?

Stunning. Nothing short of stunning.

It went national, too, it was that big a story. This was from the New York Times.

Kansas City Star Apologizes for Racism

NBC News.

Kansas City Star apologizes for decades of racist coverage

Daily Kos.

'We don’t need stories about these people': Kansas City newspaper confesses to tradition of racism

You get the idea. It was covered nationally from virtually every media outlet.

I think there are two huge things to take from this, too, besides the fact that, as I said above, they didn't have to do this cleansing so publicly like this. 

The first is that this was an important move for them, the Star, the newspaper, to own up to but it's much more than that. We all need to own up to what and how we've gotten to where we are. We all, as a people and as a nation, need to know how we got here, where we are today. We need to know our nation's history, our full national history. We need to really know all the details about slavery and our Civil War, sure. But that's for starters.

We all need to also know about our Reconstruction and the failure of it, our failure and how that impacted African-Americans then.

We all need to know, really know about Jim Crow laws, what they were, what they did, the fact that they were legal and the deep, deep damage that they did to those same Americans, African-Americans. That's a great deal to know there alone.

Then there's the "redlining" the Star's story mentions and its corresponding segregation, legalized, thank you very much.

If, as a people, you are kept away, legally, from the best housing and jobs, good education and so, consequently and understandably, also kept away from better paying jobs and careers?  Is it any wonder the wealth of Black Americans today is, still, to this moment, a fraction of white America?

And that's how we got now, here to where we are. It's why still, to this day, so many Black Americans do not and even, for a lot of them, cannot still live wherever they wish. It only makes sense. It's a natural outgrowth of all that then-legalized racism and hate and ugliness. It's why do many cities in the United States--including, of course, our own Kansas City on both sides of the state line--are still so very, very segregated even though that legal segregation was made illegal decades ago now.

So, again, wow. Kudos to the Star.

In their article, they made a great and important point of saying that their paper, over the years, highlighted white people's accomplishments but virtually never Black people's.

In the pages of The Star, when Black people were written about, they were cast primarily as the perpetrators or victims of crime, advancing a toxic narrative. Other violence, meantime, was tuned out. The Star and The Times wrote about military action in Europe but not about Black families whose homes were being bombed just down the street.

Even the Black cultural icons that Kansas City would one day claim with pride were largely overlooked. Native son Charlie “Bird” Parker didn’t get a significant headline in The Star until he died, and even then, his name was misspelled and his age was wrong.

It reminded me of a KCPT PBS broadcast on Kansas City's own Charlie "Bird" Parker. Lonnie McFadden made the very fair and important point that Winston Churchill, of all people, is on our Country Club Plaza.

But not Bird.

How else can we heal? How else can we repair centuries long wrongs and racism if we don't examine ourselves, see where we are, see what we did, see what those ramifications are and then apologize for them and look to rectify them? We must do this as a society. We're long, long overdue.

Anyone, any American who thinks we don't owe Black Americans reparations should, again, study our national history.

And read this article, too.

Quote of the Day -- Important Presidential Edition

 

During World War II, there was a very real and rational fear that American democracy would not survive. The danger was obvious, visceral, and violent. It was promulgated by tanks, bombs, and battleships. It was measured on maps that traced the march of armies, the swarming of navies, and the decimation of cities by aerial assault. America sat within her borders and could feel a world of madness and hatred closing in.

Since the attack came from the outside, the human inclination was to rally within one's own community for safety. That community was riven with its own violent injustices of segregation and the ugliness manifested against its citizens of Japanese ancestry. But the threat from outside was so great and would be likely so unsparing that America hardened its resolve with nearly miraculous levels of selflessness and sacrifice to the cause of survival. The cost was great in blood, particularly of the young overseas, and in treasure.

It is likely that many of you have a sense of where this is going, the comparison I seek to make.

American democracy is once again under a dire threat. Once again there is death at a scale that is incomprehensible. But the threat is of such a different nature that it may be too convenient to deny the full level of danger. This threat comes from within, a civil cleaving that instead of uniting the nation is dividing it. Perilously so.

This is not a violent threat, at least not yet despite some low-level skirmishes. That could change, but there is nothing approaching the reckoning of Nazi forces sweeping into Paris or a Japanese strike on Pearl Harbor. Meanwhile, the mass death we face doesn't lend itself to the visceral images of war. Our killer doesn't have a face or a flag. It is invisible. Instead of sending our young off to battle overseas, we have medical professionals, grocery store clerks, farmhands, and many others commuting daily into danger. We are mostly aware of what takes place within our four walls of isolation and the looming specter of hunger and homelessness for many of our fellow citizens.

But there is of course another deep worry pervasive in this country. It is about America's heretofore unbroken peaceful transfer of power between presidents. It is the notion that all of us, regardless of party, play by and revere the same democratic ideal that we the people have the power to fire our leaders in free and fair elections. This election has revealed a president who doesn't believe any of that, and a party and base that is eager to go along with him. This is not fringe; it is a movement that encompassess tens of millions of Americans. And to defeat it and preserve American democracy will require resolve, patience, ingenuity, and grit.

I believe that the nature of this threat to American democracy is not being taken nearly seriously enough. And in an odd way I find some comfort in that. I still do not believe most Americans want our ideal of representative government by majority rule to end, not by a long shot. It is tempting to laugh off the outrageousness of the court challenges and see a pathetic man desperate to hold on to fleeting power. There is truth in all of this, and I suspect Donald Trump will struggle to own the national conversation as much as he hopes once he loses his perch behind the presidential podium.

Yet the fissures laid bare by this election, and its shameful aftermath, are not going away. And every Republican official who signed their name, or even spoke by their silence, bears responsibility for what has been the most serious attempt to wreck our union internally since the Civil War. I hope, and pray, we as a nation can walk back from the ledge, that the passions can cool, and a new administration can steer our American ship of state back into the safer harbors of our democratic traditions. The struggle will not be easy, but if victory for American democracy does emerge, and I believe it will, we can resolve to make it much more secure so that this doesn't happen again.

In the dark days of World War II, it was almost impossible to imagine a bright and happy future. But that did happen. Today, we have a vaccine coming and a new government. There is danger still ahead, but hope is possible. It is a hope that must be built on hard work and action. But I would go so far as to say a realization of hope is the likely outcome. I have seen America tested many times, and usually we end up in a better place than where we started.

Steady.

--Dan Rather

To That America, We Wish Happy Birthday

 

To the country that values citizenry over consumerism, 

that values liberty over enslavement,

that values equal opportunities for all, 

that values the health of one equal to the health of another, 

that learned that separate is not equal,
that put a man on the moon, 

that separated church from state in order that church could be that much more available, 

that helped free the world from Nazi tyranny and 

proudly had women build the machines that did it, 

that invented the blues, 

that overcame pitting brother against brother in order to break the evil of slavery, 

that exported rock and roll, 

that put storytelling on the big screen, 

that gave us Fred Astaire, 

that gave Einstein a home, 

that has a statue in the harbor welcoming the downtrodden, 

that figured out burgers and shakes go so well together, 

that wrote the social contract that has yet to be beaten that begins "We hold these truths to be self evident that all men are created equal..." 

....to THAT America, we wish a VERY HAPPY BIRTHDAY!

--Lisa Wiffledust

Timely Quote of the Day

A good, even important read from Abraham Lincoln and our nation's history. Very timely, I think, what with our new President's actions of these last 2 weeks of his very new Presidency.

Abraham Lincoln's Lyceum Address

Abraham Lincoln's Lyceum Address was delivered to the Young Men's Lyceum of Springfield, Illinois on January 27, 1838, titled "The Perpetuation of Our Political Institutions."  Here's the quote.

"Let every American, every lover of liberty, every well wisher to his posterity, swear by the blood of the Revolution, never to violate in the least particular, the laws of the country; and never to tolerate their violation by others. As the patriots of seventy-six did to the support of the Declaration of Independence, so to the support of the Constitution and Laws, let every American pledge his life, his property, and his sacred honor;--let every man remember that to violate the law, is to trample on the blood of his father, and to tear the character of his own, and his children's liberty. Let reverence for the laws, be breathed by every American mother, to the lisping babe, that prattles on her lap--let it be taught in schools, in seminaries, and in colleges; let it be written in Primers, spelling books, and in Almanacs;--let it be preached from the pulpit, proclaimed in legislative halls, and enforced in courts of justice. And, in short, let it become the political religion of the nation; and let the old and the young, the rich and the poor, the grave and the gay, of all sexes and tongues, and colors and conditions, sacrifice unceasingly upon its altars."

Born This Day, 1827

Indeed, born this day, September 27, 1827 was one Hiram Rhodes Revels and for a few reasons, should absolutely be taught and known by Americans who he was and what he did.

Hiram Rhodes Revels was a minister in the African Methodist Episcopal Church(AME), a Republican politician, and college administrator. Born free in North Carolina, he later lived and worked in Ohio, where he voted before the Civil War. He was elected as the first African American to serve in the United States Senate, and was the first African American to serve in the U.S. Congress. He represented Mississippi in the Senate in 1870 and 1871 during the Reconstruction era.

During the American Civil War, Revels had helped organize two regiments of the United States Colored Troops and served as a chaplain. After serving in the Senate, Revels was appointed as the first president of Alcorn Agricultural and Mechanical College (now Alcorn State University), 1871-1873 and 1876 to 1882. Later he served again as a minister.

One of the biggest things Hiram Revels did was to  be The Black Man Who Replaced Jefferson Davis in the Senate

Too few Americans know this man and know what he did and how important he and it all was.

Quote of the Day -- Timely

What part of equality do people not understand?

The Gettysburg Address

                      November 19, 1863

       

Quote of the day -- On Ignorance or Progress

Like

Quote--and question--of the day

The “democracy movement” in Hong Kong is garnering headlines, but what about America? With Congress gridlocked and dysfunctional, the real work of the nation has quietly shifted to three agencies beyond its direct reach -- the Supreme Court (which returns to work tomorrow, and is dictating much of America’s social policy), the Federal Reserve Board (now handling the nation’s economic policy), and the Pentagon (now dictating much of our foreign policy).

The will of the American people is being supplanted by the views of five right-wing Republican jurists, a committee of economists and bankers, and several generals. We could use a democracy movement in America.

--

Robert Reich

I couldn't agree more. It just shouldn't/can't be run by the Republicans, the very wrong Right Wing or the Tea Party.

Quote of the day -- On Government. And Christianity

American racial supposition No. 2

Not even remotely deniable.

Valentines Day III

Great question: on the modern day Republican Party (guest post)

I ask you:

What Exactly Do Republicans Stand For?

Trying to figure out exactly what the Republican Party stands for has been something I’ve pondered for quite a while.

If you listen to their rhetoric, the answer is easy.  However, looking at reality, it completely contradicts nearly everything they say they support.

They don’t stand for freedom, as they continue to support legislation that denies basic freedoms for homosexuals, women and people who follow religions other than Christianity.

They don’t stand for small government, as they’ve recently supported constitutional amendments that define marriage and redefine what constitutes being an American citizen.  Not to mention they were the party which orchestrated one of the most intrusive piece of legislation our nation has ever seen—the Patriot Act.

They don’t stand for a fiscally conservative government, especially considering there has yet to be a single Republican president since Eisenhower, who served from 1953-1961, who has balanced the budget.  In fact, every Republican president since Eisenhower didn’t just increase our deficits— they set records for growth in our national debt.

They don’t stand for Christian values, because Jesus Christ stood for love, hope, compassion, acceptance, helping those less fortunate than ourselves, not judging others and forgiveness—traits which the Republican Party seems to strongly oppose.

They don’t support...our military, as Republican Presidents have frequently sent our military into pointless wars where hundreds of thousands have been killed, or severely wounded to the point where they will suffer from these disabilities for the rest of their lives.

They don’t stand for constitutional values, as they frequently support violating those constitutionally-upheld laws which they disagree with.

It’s really easy to come up with a nice slogan, some rhetoric or a tagline that sounds good—hell anyone can do it. But I was always taught that actions speak louder than words.

In one breath conservatives say they’re for a fiscally conservative small government which protects our freedoms, yet their actions completely contradict that.

So looking at those actions, I really don’t have a clue what it is these people believe in.

_________________________________________________________

Except the wealthy. Supporting the wealthy and corporations.  They certainly have that down pat.

On Equality

Quote of the day

 

And it could be the oppression merely of wealth and money and possessions.

A brief history of race in America

First, we owned African-Americans in the United States. They were brought over by boat, sold into slavery and that's where they stayed, their entire lives, until they died. If they were "lucky", their master(s) weren't completely horrible and abusive and/or tortuous to them while in this state.

Keep in mind, too, that, during this lifetime of slave work, besides being paid nothing, they were also almost entirely uneducated, formally. Most didn't know how to read or write. The ones who did were taught how to read and/or write if and only if it helped their master(s).

Then we "freed" them, after 200 years of this slavery, in 1863 with the "Emancipation Proclamation." Of course, they weren't really freed as they owned nothing--nothing--and most had nowhere to go. Besides the fact that the defacto social and political system still held them very much down. Many black men, especially, in the South, were arrested for "vagrancy" and sold to corporations for their labor. Still in slavery. That lasted until the 1940's, too. (See link below).

All during this time, they were at least under-educated, still, if not uneducated, as the masses would have it. "Separate but equal" was declared the law of the land and everything was hunky-dory.

Then, finally, in the 1960's, they were, again, officially, given the right to vote and the right to "fair housing." Of course, this was only on paper and segregating this minority to its own side of town still went on, as we have learned or as we know.

So deep-seated racism permeated our country from our inception right up to today and yet still, so many people across the nation--mostly white but other races, too--think that somehow, some way, African-Americans are not supposed to have any problems today, culturally, socially, economically or otherwise.

Isn't that just a nice, tidy, convenient conclusion?

Links: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Emancipation_Proclamation

http://www.slaverybyanothername.com

Quote of the day

"You always know the mark of a coward. A coward hides behind freedom. A brave person stands in front of freedom and defends it for others." --Henry Rollins, American spoken word artist, writer, journalist, publisher, actor, radio DJ, activist and former singer-songwriter.

Quote of the day, Sunday edition

"Man will never be free until the last king is strangled by the entrails of the last priest." --Denis Diderot

Independence Day. And still equal rights have to be fought for in America

"We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness."

Remember those?

So what's your problem?

Quote of the day

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