First, for those of you do not know, I am writing this from South Carolina. I am saddened by the fact that this State did not see or take the opportunity to break with the Confederacy and unite in the election of our new President. Second, I write this from a State where many Black and White folk did not believe that Obama could be elected. One of South Carolina’s leading Black State Senators said on TV something to the effect, “The Democratic Party is making a mistake by supporting Obama because a Black man cannot win.” He and many of the other Black elected officials in South Carolina took money to work to defeat Obama. I watched one of these Black Senators on TV tonight just before Obama’s acceptance speech saying how proud he was that Obama was elected. Their constituencies are so forgiving until these politicians will regrettably survive. Some of these politicians are glib enough to pretend that they were with Obama all along. Some of these politicians are also so glib that they will still try to work both sides of the street to undermine Obama. I write this because I worry more about our children and others who do not know what to think or expect going forward. We all need to think about what does “change” mean at the nitty gritty level? We need to translate this for our youth who need leadership in understanding the profoundness of an Obama Presidency.

I suggest:

(1)Change means that all of us who were on Obama’s mailing, phone, and email list have to keep current, stay involved, and accept the Presidents leadership to make change. Pass whatever Obama ask us to do on to our young because they are our future.

(2) Change means that if you or folk you know were on the payroll of the Republican Party and Carl Roves, these folk need to look for new work and redirect their self serving ambitions to serving the total community even without pay. We all know folk who took money from Rove and infiltrated Black organizations just to hold them back or to report to the opposition.

(3) Change means that if you were strategizing your life and career around the idea that you could make money and get ahead by siding with the boss against Black folk or the workers and organized labor, you must now realign your thinking to work with the workers because the market for ass kissers and uncle toms has just crash. Organized labor will regain some strength under an Obama Administration.

(4) Change means that America is not going to slowly go through the apartheid route model to equality. That is, we are not going to have the strata’s of whites, colors, and Blacks with the light skin colors being selected to supervise the Blacks on behalf of the whites. You can no longer expect preferences because you happen to be light skinned or colored. Our first lady is now Black and her children are Black. The President and his policies are going to go directly towards equalization without regards to color or race.

(5) Change means that folk in the red confederacy states like South Carolina who refused to support Obama in 2008 will move in position to support Obama in 2012 and beyond. Money talks and everyone would be smart to listen. Racism will always be here but it is going to go more underground and the young folk will shame their elders into getting beyond race.

(6) Therefore Change means that in some ways Obama will force Blacks and whites to operate differently, take more responsibility, stop making excuses, hold your head up but take nothing for granted because change is coming but it is not here yet.  We must all put our shoulders to the wheel to make change happen especially for our young people. Peace, Cjw

 

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