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It is
being a badge of honor for either Bernie or Hillary to be
cast into the role of the suffering, brave and stoic white
"bwana" who puts his or her neck on the line so that "you
people" could sit down at the grown ups table.
Each
side is bringing out anything and everything to show the
critical African-American voting bloc that its candidate
should be anointed with the coveted jewel of being, "down
with black people.”
Bernie
even met with Al Sharpton and rappers to show that he has
street cred and that he is no johnny-come-lately to the
civil rights struggle. Why, there is even a picture far back
as 1963 that shows Bernie being arrested in Chicago
regarding his involvement in the desegregation of housing.
Of
course, Hillary brushed off her resume to show that since
the crossing of the Red Sea, she was all in it to win it for
people of color and that no white person who is running for
the presidency can hold a candle to her stellar record.
Even
civil rights icons such as the lion John Lewis and
Representative Clyburn of South Carolina have been on
national TV propping up the civil rights credentials of
Hillary.
It is a
trope worth repeating again and again: The Democratic
presidential nominee needs the brown and black vote to get
into the White House since it appears that Donald Trump will
be the Republican nominee and that he will sway a lot of
blue dog
Democrats (white males in both the North and the South) to
switch allegiances and go Republican in the fall.
It is a
sad reality of national politics that brown and black voters
are wooed and coveted every two or four years but when that
quick shotgun marriage is done, it is business as usual and
the urgent political and economic needs of the black and
brown communities become old news.
In
other words, same-O, same-O.
Come to
think of it, shouldn't there be a litmus test of some sort
to give to these
politicos
when they come knocking at your door or want to stand in
your church pulpit so that you can test and see if they have
any grasp of Black America?
To that
end, I was able to personally commission the august Chicago
polling firm of Black & Blacker to provide to my dear
readers a sampling of questions that Bernie and Hillary
should be required to answer (no tutors and cheat sheets)
during a live BET televised interview.
These
questions are designed to get a snapshot of the knowledge
that these politicos have of the black community and to see
if they are simply fronting or are making it real.
At the
end of these sample questions, I will be asking my readers
to reimburse me for the considerable cost of this polling
test.
One: Who
was Crispus Attucks?
Two: What
are the origins of the Brer' Rabbit stories?
Three: What
does C.O.R.E. mean?
Four: Who
was Dr. Martin Luther King's favorite gospel singer?
Five: What
is meant by the word: octoroon?
Six: Name
five historically black colleges or universities
Seven: What
was George Washington Carver famous for?
Eight: What
is Beyonce's real birth name?
Nine: Name
the black man who has been given credit for laying out the
design of
Washington,
D.C.
Ten: What
famously named congressional district did the late Adam
Clayton Powell represent?
Eleven:
What novel was the late Alex Haley famous for?
Twelve: In
the Baptist Church, what is the purpose of the mourners’
bench?
Thirteen:
Name the U.S. Supreme Court case that held that there are no
rights of a black man that a white man must respect.
Fourteen:
What is Juneteenth Day?
Fifteen:
Who was Nat Turner?
Sixteen:
What year was the case of Brown v. Board of Education
decided?
Seventeen:
If I said, "Yo Mama!"...is that a good thing or a bad thing?
Eighteen:
What year was the March on Washington and were you there?
Nineteen:
What was Madame Walker famous for?
Twenty:
What was the biggest slave port on the East Coast?
Twenty One:
True or False: In the U.S. Constitution, black people were
once counted as 3/5's of a man.
Twenty-Two:
Where do chitlins come from?
Twenty-Three: What does the phrase, "last hired and first
fired" mean.
If the
candidates miss more than five of the above questions, you
need to consider whether or not they are in fact, "down with
black people!"
Now,
due to the considerable monies that I expended for the above
polling, I am gently asking each reader to send me a non
traceable money order for $35.89 plus shipping and handling
fees of $4.22 so I can recoup my costs.
If you
are unable or unwilling to do it, then I say to you: "Yo
Mama!"
Contact
Lafe Tolliver at
Tolliver@Juno.com |
