Some race issues and facts relative to Bernie Sanders.

[merrily]

Last edited Fri May 29, 2015, 04:51 PM - Edit history (3)

First, IMO, anyone who thinks race issues, poverty issues, jobs and labor issues and affordable education issues are unrelated doesn't know Schick from Shinola.

Although he (civil rights icon, John Lewis) was forced to tone down his speech (at the 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom) under pressure from the representatives of other civil rights organizations on the march organization committee, his words still stung. The version of the speech leaked to the press went as follows:

"We march today for jobs and freedom, but we have nothing to be proud of, for hundreds and thousands of our brothers are not here — for they have no money for their transportation, for they are receiving starvation wages...or no wages at all. In good conscience, we cannot support the administration's civil rights bill.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Student_Nonviolent_Coordinating_Committee


Now, to Sanders.

Sanders grew up all too well-acquainted with poverty and racism. Sanders's father was a Polish Jew. Most of the family of Sanders's father had been killed in the Holocaust. His father was an unsuccessful paint salesman. The family lived in a three and a half room apartment in a poor section of Brooklyn.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bernie_Sanders

“The lack of money caused stress in my family and fights between my mother and father,” Sanders explained to TIME in an interview this month. “That is a reality I have never forgotten: today, there are many millions of families who are living under the circumstances that we lived under.”

http://time.com/3896500/bernie-sanders-vermont-campaign-radical/#3896500/bernie-sanders-vermont-campaign-radical/

In high school, Sanders ran for class president on the platform of raising scholarship money for kids in Korea orphaned by the Korean War. Sanders lost that election, but the victor did go forward with the program. In college, Sanders turned to the American civil rights movement, a dangerous activity, especially as Sanders undertook it.

By the 1960s, the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, aka NAACP, established in 1909, was not seen as a threat by white liberals. Still, even working for the NAACP might well get you an FBI file and wiretap. On the other hand, people were not sure what to make of civil rights organizations that sprung up after the sit-ins and demonstrations had begun, such as the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee, formed in 1960, aka SNCC. "In the years that followed, SNCC members were referred to as “shock troops of the revolution."

In the later 1960s, led by fiery leaders such as Stokely Carmichael, SNCC focused on black power, and then protesting against the Vietnam War. As early as 1965, organization leader James Forman said he did not know “how much longer we can stay nonviolent” and in 1969, SNCC officially changed its name to the Student National Coordinating Committee to reflect the broadening of its strategies

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Student_Nonviolent_Coordinating_Committee


Warner C. White, a white minister who was a civil rights activist in Alabama and Mississippi, said during an interview:

North of the border

White's band of clergymen were never attacked. Did his skin color offer him protection?

"Oh no — I don't think so, at all," he said. "Lots of white people were attacked. Heavens: look at the number of murders there were back then."

Was he ever fearful for his safety?

"Yes, absolutely."

Where was that?

"Back in Chicago," White answered. "That's where I met the real hostility from whites."

http://www.burlingtonfreepress.com/news/

Under such circumstances, as a student at the prestigious University of Chicago, Bernie Sanders was a student organizer for SNCC. He also became a leader of the Congress of Racial Equality, aka CORE, at a time when most civil rights leaders were African American.

A few months after he arrived at the University of Chicago, Sanders went to a center in a rough Chicago neighborhood run by a Quaker service group, the American Friends Service Committee. He ventured out to local apartments, painting walls.

http://time.com/3896500/bernie-sanders-vermont-campaign-radical/#3896500/bernie-sanders-vermont-campaign-radical/

In 1962, at age 20, he led Chicago's first civil rights sit in. Standing on the steps of the University's administration building, he protested the University's segregated housing policies: “We feel it is an intolerable situation, when Negro and white students of the university cannot live together in university owned apartments.” He then led his fellow students into the building, where they camped overnight outside the president’s office. This made national news.

He was arrested while demonstrating for desegregated public schools in Chicago. He put up fliers around Chicago protesting police brutality.

After half an hour, he realized a police car was following him, taking down every paper he’d up, one by one. “Are these yours?” he remembers the officer telling him, holding up the stack of the fliers.

id.

In 1963, Sanders and other students boarded buses to attend the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, in which SNCC had played a significant role.

Sanders has never since wavered in his dedication to equality and economic justice for all people, regardless of race, gender, religion or orientation. As a federal official, he has also continued to speak out against police violence, militarization of police, etc. https://www.facebook.com/senatorsanders/photos/a.91485152907.84764.9124187907/10152599730597908/

From Reply 16 below, of mary625:

....Senator Sanders was one of the first, if not the first, official outside of Missouri, that commented on the horrors that happened in Ferguson last summer. (My god that was almost a year ago! )

......he does address social issues and education. He does talk about the police going after young black men. He does talk about community policing.

http://www.sanders.senate.gov/newsroom/recent-business/nyt-learning-from-the-ferguson-tragedy

http://www.sanders.senate.gov/newsroom/video-audio/ferguson

See also: http://www.democraticunderground.com/10026743489

A Senate voting record doesn't impress me greatly. Senators can only vote yea or nay and usually vote with their caucuses. Moreover, the U.S. Senate is a conservative body.

With those caveats, on civil rights, Sanders has a 93% rating from the American Civil Liberties Union, aka ACLU (the ACLU rates on a variety of subjects, including women, NSA, etc.) vs. 60% for Hillary; a 97% rating from the NAACP vs. 96% for Hillary; and a 100% rating from the Human Rights Campaign vs. 89% for Hillary.

For specifics as to bills and votes, see: http://www.democraticunderground.com/12778397

Oh, as for having white faces when Sanders announced his candidacy in Vermont, Vermont is 94% white. I would have been offended if he had attempted faux diversity for cameras.

Chicago, however, has many people of color, yet Obama was criticized for all the white faces in a photo of his Chicago 2012 campaign headquarters: http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2012/04/10/an-obama-campaign-photo-that-looks-like-a-young-republican-rally.html IIRC, in 2008, Obama was also criticized for placing white people within camera range for one of his speeches.(The point here is not whether Obama was right or wrong, but that, when people want to find something wrong, they will.)

[villager]

1. The reason they killed King was because he was finally, explicitly linking race and economic issues

That threatened too broad a coalition, too powerful a message, or wave, of change.

So the "coincidental" assassination was set in motion, before the March on Washington.

In a sense, anyone who continues to insist these issues are separate is disgracing the work, and legacy, of MLK himself.

[RufusTFirefly]

3. +1,0000 n/t

[merrily]

6. I came to that view a while ago. Anti-war, too.

It's also my theory that, as the movements of anti-war, economic justice and civil rights were looking as though they might coalesce, they thought they'd give us stuff before anyone decided to rise up and take even more stuff. Hence, we got the Great Society, including the War on Poverty.

I have a comparable view about why we got the New Deal.

[villager]

8. They both "gave us stuff," and "took out leaders" who might have helped move things "too far along"

They were working on maintaining a certain balance, though now it seems they don't even give a shit about that, since one assumes that they assume people are too browbeaten to do anything about it...

[merrily]

9. Yes, browbeaten, but also, they've had time since the 1960s to prepare. All kinds of federal

officials are armed. Homeland Security, the NSA, militarization of state and local police, cameras on streets, etc. etc. ad infinitum.

[villager]

11. True enough. With enough stolen elections and "unforeseen" events along the way...

... to get that browbeaten populace to sign off on all of it...

[Snotcicles]

2. Bookmarking this well put together stash. Thanks for your work. nt

[merrily]

4. You're most welcome. It's a quicker read than it seems. Enjoy.

[Snotcicles]

5. I read it. Wanted to keep it at the ready for future use. nt

[merrily]

7. By all means. Thank you.

[rbnyc]

10. this should be...

...widely circulated.

[merrily]

12. Thank you.

[marym625]

13. K&R all over the place

Thank you so much for all this

[merrily]

14. Aw, thanks, Mary.

Doing it popped into my head for some unknown reason.

[marym625]

16. ha!

Can't imagine

Thank you. Great work putting this together

Unless I missed it, which is possible, you might want to add that Senator Sanders was one of the first, if not the first, official outside of Missouri, that commented on the horrors that happened in Ferguson last summer. (My god that was almost a year ago! )

Contrary to the rhetoric, he does address social issues and education. He does talk about the police going after young black men. He does talk about community policing.

http://www.sanders.senate.gov/newsroom/recent-business/nyt-learning-from-the-ferguson-tragedy

http://www.sanders.senate.gov/newsroom/video-audio/ferguson

[merrily]

17. I did say that he is still speaking out about police violence. However, I will edit to quote your

Reply. Thank you.

[marym625]

18. Oh you don't have to

Just trying to debunk certain comments and thoughts out there

[merrily]

19. Done already. Thanks. Good to have it all in one place. nt

[marym625]

20. Thanks!

Yes this will definitely be a go to post for me

[mmonk]

15. Well said.

[JDPriestly]

21. K,R & Bookmarked for future reference.

Thanks. Great job. I think your should end the questions about Bernie Sanders' views on race.

[merrily]

26. Not sure. Bjorn Against did a great thread in GD. I edited this OP to include a link to it.

Bjorn Against is getting the same old arguments.

[azurnoir]

22. Thank you K&R

[heaven05]

23. This sunday

going to a local bernie sanders for POTUS organizing meeting. I just want to see who comes out to look and see. I'm still watching and listening, but something about this guy, my peer group, is interesting to say the least.

[merrily]

25. An open mind is great. You would know better than most just how risky the things he did were.

The claim that he thinks race is not an issue separate from money boggles my mind. He was not risking his life for economics. By the same token, John Lewis clearly got that racial injustice and economic injustice are related.

[heaven05]

29. exactly

I've gotten people interested in going, so we'll see...

[merrily]

30. Enjoy, and please let us know.

You cannot have any kind of justice without economic justice. However, you can be rich and still suffer injustice because of race, religion, naitonality, handicap, orientation--all kinds of things over which one has no control. I think Sanders understands all parts of this post.

[heaven05]

32. yep

I will let people know of Bernie sentiment from this event in my area. I don't give specifics about where I live, but it's midwest, a largish
well known college town.....been here since 75

[merrily]

33. Let us know what kind of a job you think he did presenting his positions, too. I'm looking forward

to your report and very excited about it, too.

[heaven05]

34. Oh do not misunderstand me

this is a local organizing for Bernie Sanders. We will hope that sometimes in the next 18 months, he will make an appearance here if we make our mark. I sorry if the way I wrote my response led you to believe he would be here in person. That is not he case, yet i am excited that he is going to have a start here with us.

[merrily]

35. My bad. I probably read too quickly. What you are doing is very exciting. Tell us how it went.

[zentrum]

24. Great thread.

Thank you so much for the information. Will pass along.

[merrily]

27. Thank you so much.

[guillaumeb]

28. A great post Merrily

and an excellent counterpoint to the previous post bemoaning the lack of pigment evident in the photos from Senator Sanders' announcement.

[merrily]

31. Thank you so much.