749 Who Has A Dream?

749 Who Has A Dream?

A reminder of a sweaty and sweltering day 47 years ago: a button. Two inches wide. Got a pin-it-on pin that's rusted. Got a black hand and a white hand shaking hands on it. Got a union label. Some words, too. "March on Washington for Jobs & Freedom." It's not a reprint or a replica or a reasonable facsimile, it's the real thing. It made the trip back from Washington on that Wednesday and was a gift, if memory serves, from an African American man who also was the local Republican Committeeman. The memory of its exact provenance is hazy. But something like that.

That was, in a later era's parlance, "The Mother of All Marches." And the mother of all following sermons, Dr. King's "I Have A Dream" speech. Jobs and Freedom. Nifty idea. We're still short of the former and the latest co-opters of the King legend are prattling and braying about a fake lack of the latter.

In a day's time (8/28/10,) the Koch (pronounced coke) Brothers oil and gas money will bring a new hoard to the Lincoln Memorial, rent-a-protesters and all, and led by the mad man Glenn Beck, with Sarah Palin as the lead background singer.

Let's get the most important matters out of the way first: Beck is the loony who thinks he's the latter day MLK, or wants us to think it. Second, he's calling for money that supposedly will go to some shadow outfit that supposedly helps the children of soldiers pay for their education. According to the fine print, that'll be done with what's left after covering the cost of the event. Which means ... what? 59 cents? Ya gotta read the fine print.

This thing is billed as "non-political." Who's he kidding? Its occurrence on the date of the 1963 march is "coincidental." Who's he kidding? This mess is called "Restoring Honor," decorated with such phrases as rededicating ourselves to the values of the country's founders. Doubletalk. George Orwell would be proud that his twists of the language are still in high use. He might not be too pleased with the people using it.

What does all this restoring honor stuff mean? Our original population and our original territory have expanded geometrically since the days of the revolution. So has our technology and our understanding of much of the world around us. And here you have this twerp ranting about how President Obama "hates America," and frothing at the mouth over immigration, taxes, so-called big government and all the rest of today's punch drunk tea partying wackos.

This rally is about two things: drumming up audience for Beck's weirdly hysterical broadcasts and his equally weirdly hysterical political agenda, details of which are unnecessary to relate to regular readers of these posts.

The 1963 rally was a cry for unity. And that unity, partially achieved, is being torn at from two dis-unifying polls. The Beck crowd is one. The other is the expanding anti-white culture among some urban Blacks. The Beck poll knows what it's doing and why. The other side may just be ignorant. Or not.

So here comes a "leader" whom we'd have locked away in Bellevue if we knew of him a decade ago, and the right wing's poster babe, the Typhoid Mary of politics.

Here's hoping that just before the event they'll have a nice breakfast together -- preferably one centered on those just-recalled salmonella eggs. It ain't as good as Typhoid. But it'll do.

I'm Wes Richards. My opinions are my own but you're welcome to them.®

©WJR 2010