Dear
Mr. President.
I
know you're a busy man, busier than usual, because you are preparing
on this auspicious day, to step onto the foot path of the Drum Major
for peace, Dr. Martin Luther King Junior, on this the 50th
anniversary of perhaps his greatest day. I understand that you will
be joined by a host of celebrities and important people including two
past presidents, Clinton and Carter, and I'm also hearing today that
Oprah Winfrey will also take part in today's celebration among
others.
Let
me be blunt, Mr. President, I have a problem with today's
commemoration. My problem being that everything scheduled to take
place today could have and should have taken place this past Saturday
(August 24th) when the people could have attended and
taken part. The first march was for the people. 50 years later what
we have is a gathering for us, talking about jobs and economic
freedom, which we still don't have, despite your promises, followed
by a gathering of the glitterati, 4 days later on the exact date of
the first march. Why two, celebrations separate and definitely not
equal in place of the inclusive demonstrations orchestrated back in
the day? Leaders bent over backward in order to show a united front,
at least for that day and they pulled it off magnificently.
The
excuse that I was given was that today August 28th is the
exact date of the MLK march, so it was important to be historically
and completely correct. To which I say bull. We live in a country
that has changed the dates on every single holiday and national
commemoration with the exception of the 4th of July and
Christmas, for the sole purpose of giving people 3 day holiday
weekends. It wasn't always like that. When I was in school, we
celebrated Lincoln on his birthday. The same with Washington and even
Dr. King. Now there is President's day, two for the price of one, and
never on February 12th (Lincoln)or the 22nd
(Washington).
I
suspect politics is the main reason behind the scripted segregation.
Politics and egos and for those reasons, we the people are once again
left twisting in the wind. Some of us have long been tired of the
symbolism of equality rather than the real deal. We refuse to sing
another verse of “we shall overcome.” The passions kindled 50
years ago on the steps of the Lincoln Memorial are now nothing more
than cinders and ash.
Having
a Black man in the White House, Mr. President, has never been
enough. It was a start, we thought, to fulfillment of Dr. King's
dream as spelled out all those years ago. However I guess nobody was
really listening were they.
As
you prepare to stand in for Dr. King and to talk about peace,
equality, freedom and justice for we the people, the media is
reporting that you are contemplating “limited retaliatory
intervention” in Syria because their president reportedly gassed
his innocent citizens while they slept.
You
have said that a gas attack is where America draws the line in the
sand. The NeoCons immediately started sabre rattling, beating on
their shields, strapping on their boots ready to go to jump into
another unending and senseless conflagration.
Mr.
President you were elected President because we the people wanted
change. We wanted an end to unending warfare where anonymous death
rains down on faceless innocents. Based on your words and promises,
the world awarded you the Nobel Peace Prize, in hindsight very premature to say
the least. In an effort to get out of Afghanistan, we have a drone
war of your making. Now your regime is talking “ Limited
Retaliatory Intervention' which is just another name for Revenge,
and for what. The gas didn't kill over here. It killed in the midst
of a civil war and we don't have a dog in this fight. The American
people are tired, Mr. President.
We
chose you to break the cycle. Someone, and I fear it is you, must
stand up to the NeoCons both within and outside your administration.
If our allies want to go, then let them go, they are not strangers to
imperialism having created the imperialistic prototype a long long
time ago. That's exactly why our country exists today. We can't nor
are we obligated to continue to make the same mistakes over and over
and over.
Today,
as you stand in the place of Dr. Martin Luther King, a man who died
violently while counseling others in nonviolence, there is no
rationalization that you can dream up, that will convince me that the
right thing to do is to send cruise missiles into the heart of yet
another Middle Eastern country. Dr. King was vocally against the war
in Vietnam ( another fruitless exercise in limited retaliatory
intervention), and he would have been equally vocal against
supporting any administration, including yours, so ready and willing
to strike out when we're not even sure as a country, who the enemy
really is.
The
enemy is us, Mr. President. We need to heal ourselves before we
attempt to heal others. Striking Syria is wrong and no way to
remember Dr. King on his day.
Respectfully
yours,
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