Who will Durham Black voters support to replace U.S. Congressman David Price?

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The lineup of potential candidates to replace U.S. Congressman David Price feels like a pileup on Highway 40 during rush hour traffic. The clash between Cary, Chapel Hill and Durham is a reminder of the impact of road rage when too many people are headed in the same direction.

Voters are advised to buckle up while doing their best to avoid reckless drivers.

Rumors of Price’s retirement have circulated for years. Candidates have waited, patiently, for the announcement. State Senator Wiley Nickel, 45, announced his campaign with the news of a whopping $253,000 raised within hours of Price’s press conference. He was ready to go before hearing “ready, set, go.”

Nickel was elected to represent the 16^th state senate district in 2018. He was groomed as part of Vice President Al Gore’s team from 1996 to 2001 and worked as a member of Barack Obama’s White House national advance staff from 2008 until 2012.

Nida Allam, 27, is first Muslim American woman elected to political office in North Carolina. She was sworn in as a member of the Durham Board of County Commissioners on December 7, 2020. With less than one year of service as an elected official, Allam announced her candidacy for congress on Monday, November 8.

Allam served as the Political Director in North Carolina, South Carolina, New Jersey, and New York for U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders’ 2016 presidential campaign and as an organizing director for Justice Cheri Beasley’s campaign for the North Carolina Supreme Court.

State Senator Valerie Foushee, 65, joined the legislature in 2012. She represented district 50 (Orange and Durham) in the state house before becoming a State Senator after Ellie Kinnaird retirement from District 23. She has deep roots in Orange County politics, having served on the Board of Education for the Chapel Hill-Carrboro City School from 1997 to 2008 and the Orange County Board of County Commissioner from 2008-2010.

Floyd McKissick, Jr, 68, is known both for his name and work as a longtime Durham politician. He is the namesake of his father, the former leader of the Congress of Racial Equality (CORE), and founder of Soul City in Warren County, NC. After serving on the Durham City Council from 1993 to 2001, McKissick, Jr. was selected by the Durham Democratic Party to fill the vacancy in the district 20 senate seat after the death of Jeanne Lucas. McKissick was the chairman of the Durham County Democratic Party, which raised questions related to conflict of interest in the selection process.

On March 17, 2004, he was disciplined by the NC State Bar for professional misconduct involving a conflict of interest. The bar determined that McKissick inappropriately represented both sides in a 2000 dispute involving the estate of an elderly man.

McKissick was appointed to the North Carolina Utilities Commission by Governor Roy Cooper for a term expiring on June 30, 2025.

Mike Woodard, 62, has served in the North Carolina Senate since 2013. Before being elected to the State Senate, Woodward was a member of the Durham City Council from 2005 to 2013. He’s also an administrator at Duke University and the Duke University Health System.

Price was first elected to Congress in 1986. He was reelected for three terms before losing in 1994 to former Raleigh police chief Fred Heineman by a margin of less than 1%. In 1996, Price defeated Heineman in a rematch. Price has maintained control of the district for 33 years.

Key among Durham Black voters is the role of Tracy Lovett, Price’s longtime district liaison. Lovett is the daughter of Willie C. Lovett, the former chair of the Durham Committee on the Affairs of Black People and member of the North Carolina Democratic Party Executive Committee. Before his death in 1992, Lovett won the primary to represent Durham in the State House Representatives. As a District Liason, Lovett has sustained relationships with Black Durham residents making it easier to embrace Price, a congressman with no natural ties to Durham.  

Wiley’s strength is in Wake County, where he has garnered several high-level endorsements. Foushee, a Black woman, is attractive to Durham’s Black community, but her limited ties to Durham is a challenge before the primary.

McKissick is a known entity with deep ties to the Black community. Some fear his past issues regarding conflict of interest will be used against him in a head-to-head race against a Republican candidate. McKissick, like all Durham based state politicians, has never been challenged by a Republican.

Woodward is candidate with longevity of service. Recently, he fought proposals to make it illegal to teach Black history in public schools. He knows Durham culture and the issues that resonate with residents.

Black voters desire a Black representative. Black women desire a Black woman.

In the race to Congress, Durham Black voters’ matter.

 

 

 

 

The Bethel Experience: Walking in the footsteps of old dreams

It felt like the cold would chill my dreams.  I stepped out of my Ford F-150 to begin a journey that would unthaw my iced heart.  I didn’t know it.  Journeys often begin without our knowledge. 

My friend Clanton Dawson invited me to the lectionary group that meets every Wednesday at the Rock Bridge Christian Church.  Maureen Dickman, the pastor at the church, followed up with an invite when we met at Dunn Bros Coffee.  I was looking for a safe place to unwind and share Biblical and theological thoughts.  I needed more than the Sunday morning shout that came with sitting in the pews at the Second Missionary Baptist Church.

Part of me was fading away after deciding to relocate to Columbia to take care of my sick father.  Most of my nights found me waiting in the dark, afraid to sleep after watching my father fall on numerous occasions.  My desire to preach and participate in worship kept me trapped in between sickness and hope.  My midnight torture was followed by days of walking devoid of sleep.

Caregiving was taking a massive toil on both my spirit and body.  I prayed for time away from cooking, taking vitals, handing out medication, trips to doctors and tending to other household chores.  Surviving with the daily task was worsened by the messages from Durham, NC.  We miss you.  Things are not the same.  Please come back. When will you come back? Why did you leave?

Each note did more to shatter my dwindling hope.  Each day felt like a nightmare.  I needed to preach.  I needed to pray.  I needed a place to remind me that God’s will for me is here. 

I exhaled with each footstep as I approached the door. Clanton was there to greet me. Maureen was happy to see me.  The others welcomed me to the group.  More exhales followed as I contributed to the study.  For a moment, it felt like I was back in the classroom. Yes, temporary relief from the burden.

Then she spoke.  My friend spoke.  My twin shared.  Bonnie Cassida’s body was bruised by a long illness.  She needed relief from the weekly activity of the church.

“Can you preach for me?” she asked through email shortly after our meeting.

It was hard for me to preach that Sunday.  It came after my father was forced back into the hospital due to an infection.  The illness would lead to an amputation.  After weeks in rehab, he returned for more amputation and a longer stay.  Then he broke his femur.  Everything seemed to be falling apart.

The crying worsened. 

“God fix my daddy!” I screamed each night.  “God grant me the strength to be what I must be in this situation.”

It was never enough.  There was more to do than I was able to give.  The urge to preach, to pray and pastor intensified.  Then Bonnie called.

“Can you serve Bethel Church as I take time to heal?”

I said yes.  Saying yes scared me.

There were no comfort zones.  All of my teaching and preaching was offered from the perspective of the black faith tradition.  I agreed to offer service without knowing what to do.  I brought my faith and training, yet something was missing.  Everything was unfamiliar.

There were no amen’s and yes Lord's to set the tone for my preaching.  The idiomatic expression of the black faith tradition was not there to create the context for what I do best.  My preaching was limited.  The mood and issues in the room forced me to step outside of myself and learn from those in need of ministry.

I felt lonely when I preached.  It was a new language in need of translation.  I pulled from my vast library for help. I revisited Theo Witvliet’s The Way of the Black Messiah to address the balance between universality and particularity.  I clung to the teachings of Howard Thurman to rekindle his vision for a multicultural church.  I read J. Kameron Carter’s book Race: A Theological Account and Willie Jennings book The Christian Imagination: Theology and the Origins of Race to connect with the teachings of my friends who teach at Duke University.

I needed more to help me.  I agreed with Carter's contention that race is a social construction used to manage belonging.  I agreed with Bonnie’s vision regarding diversity.  I needed more.  In giving, something was being lost along the way.

I reflected on my conversations with Craig S. Keener, professor of New Testament at Asbury Theological Seminary, before his decision to join me at the Orange Grove Missionary Baptist Church. I told him to read the Autobiography of Malcolm X and meet with me after he finished.  I wanted to be sure he understood black culture and pain before becoming a white minister in a predominately black church.  He came back a few days later.

“I wish I could take my white skin and make it black,” he cried.

He joined us.  We learned from him.  He taught us humility and service.  He was ordained and moved on to become one of the leading New Testament scholars in America.

He tore off his skin and made it black.  Could I do the same?

I preached with hesitation.  I learned to strip myself of the part that limited my being present.  They loved and accepted that part of me that presented itself on Sunday morning.  I felt the message of Frantz Fanon in his book Black Skin, White Mask.  My training allowed me to maneuver around the sensitive matter of race and other divides, but was something lost along the way? Was I becoming something other as I offered a part of myself in ministry?

I kept praying.  The tears followed each prayer.

“Lord, what does it all mean?”

Then it happened.

You are called to this.  Move toward Howard Thurman’s vision.  Embrace King’s dream.  It’s not what is lost along the way; it’s the emergence of a new reality that demands the steps you are taking.

Pause and pray. Weep some more. Still asking questions along the way.

“Send me Lord, and I will follow.”

This is the road less traveled.

Teach me Lord Jesus, teach me.

The decade after the deaths of Martin and Malcolm raises questions related to black radicalism, rage and black identity

The decade after the death of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was bunched with massive conflict.  It was a period filled with deep angst after the shedding of a dream.  Inner cities were consumed with a lingering blues that made it hard to believe in freedom.

The time between the deaths of Martin and Malcolm left the black community dazed by what was left behind.  Some held firm to the promise of equality after integration.  Others fought hard to find space among those unwilling to share a bite of the American dream.

The benefactors of affirmative action were left enraged by their continued struggle after making their way to class privilege.  Ellis Cose wrote about it in his book Rage of the Privileged Class: Why Are Middle Class Blacks Angry? Why Should America Care?  Cose cites a large group of well educated, competent, and prosperous black people who are frustrated.  They feel the disdain of white people who see them as weak and unintelligent. They feel the resentment of unsuccessful blacks.  They endure the complexion-based discrimination of blacks against blacks, while fighting the assumption that all blacks are criminals.

The black community swayed between black pride and self-hatred.  The quest for revolution was met with condescension among those dedicated to promise of integration.  Afros and dashikis were exchanged for low-cut fades and three piece suits. The pursuit to claim a unique racial identity was viewed as a barrier in finding space to fit into the American melting pot.

The decade after the deaths of King and Malcolm witnessed the unfolding of Roots.  Alex Haley made It trendy to claim pride in being connected to the motherland.  Massive imagines of blacks dancing and singing to African beats was juxtaposed against the need to fit.  It was a period of striving blended with a need to claim African roots all while fighting the inner city blues.

It was the decade of black exploitation films.  The rage of the inner cities led to the rise of a counterculture unwilling to bow to the demands of white privilege.  It was the age of redefining black identity by celebrating ghetto culture.  Keeping it black meant more than the celebration of African pride.  It meant keeping it gangsta.

Richard Majors and Janet Billson talk about it in the book Cool Pose: The Dilemmas of Black Manhood in America. They related the mask of cool used by inner-city youth to defend themselves against the injuries of ghetto life.  The pose is yet another way to define authentic black identity.  Does anyone know what that means?

The decade after the death of King and Malcolm forged a deep wedge among a people seeking to define what it means to be black.  Some embrace the culture of the ghetto.  Others find solace in claiming African roots.  Others seek to melt into the larger culture through education, politics and by celebrating the privilege of middle-class social identity.

Lost in most dialogue related to study of race and class in America is a clear focus on the decade after the death of King and Malcolm.  It was an era of protest fueled by police brutality.  Most studies of the decade leave people bewildered by black protest.  Few stop to consider why they were fighting the police while demanding rights many felt had been achieved.

What motivated Huey P. Newton and Bobby Seale to start the Black Panther Party?  Why was Angela Davis arrested?  Why did Assata Shakur escape prison and flee to Cuba?  What is the truth behind the arrest of Mumia Abu-Jamal?  What hasn’t been told, and why is the Fraternal Order of Police fighting so hard to keep people from hearing the rest of the story?

What is the politics behind the telling of the story?  What happened with the Wilmington 10?  What happened in Watts to start that riot?  What happened in Detroit in July 1967 that left 43 dead, 467 injured, over 7,200 arrested, and more than 2,000 buildings destroyed? 

Why did black people burn down their own neighborhoods?  Why did it happen after major Civil Rights victories? Something was wrong in Newark, NJ where Assata Shakur was arrested. 

What led to the armed standoff between Philadelphia police and the group MOVE on May 13, 1985?  Another decade of indifference fueled even more discontent in America’s inner cities. A police helicopter dropped two one-pound bombs on the roof of the house occupied by members of the group. The fired destroyed 65 houses and killed 6 adults and five children.

It’s a period that deserves to be studied.  Underneath the assumptions of guilt are motives and fears that stirred a revolution.  What are those untold stories, and how do each help facilitate views of racial identity and pride?

These are some of the questions that led me to bring Mumia – Long Distance Revolutionary to the Carolina Theatre.  I hope you can join us for the beginning of a broader conversation related to the decade after the death of King and Malcolm.

There’s so much to learn.  Let the learning begin.

Leo Lewis II transitions from the NFL while obtaining Ph.D

Every turn he took they said he was too small.  They said he was too small to play college football.  He excelled. He was much too small to make it in the NFL.  He played 13 seasons.

Leo Lewis III wasn’t heavily recruited out of high school after winning the state championship for Columbia Hickman High School in 1974.  He didn’t get drafted after playing football for the University of Missouri.  He’s only 5-foot-7.  When he played he only weighed 167 pounds.

It’s hard to measure the size of a person’s heart.

Maybe it’s something in the gene pool.  Leo Lewis, Jr., his father, is a legend of the Canadian Football League.  He was a running back with the Winnipeg Bombers and was named All-Pro six times and earned a spot in the Canadian Football Hall of Fame in 1973.  The older Leo had an 11-year career and rushed for 8,861 yards, and averaged 29.1 as a kickoff returner.

Pops has another son, Marc Lewis, who played professionally for the USFL Denver Gold and the CFL’s Oakland Invaders.  All three were too small to play.  All three have big hearts and a determination not to be ruled by the narrow limits people use to measure possibilities.

Leo III was cut or released five times – three times by the Vikings and one each by the St. Louis Cardinals and the Cleveland Brown.  He returned each season to play for the Vikings.  When he retired in 1991, he had played in more games than any Viking wide receiver and was the team’s all-time leader in punt returns.  He outlasted three head coaches.

He kept coming back. He also kept going back to school.

 “I took classes every year after leaving Missouri,” the younger Leo told me.  In 1985, he obtained a Master of Science degree from the University of Tennessee-Knoxville.

He knew his stay in the NFL would be short.  Younger, faster athletes kept vying for his spot on the team.

“You have to prepare for life after the NFL,” Lewis says.  “It can end anytime.”

He now holds a Ph.D.

 In 1997, Lewis earned his Ph.D. in Kinesiology from the University of Minnesota. His work focused on the social and psychological dimensions of sports. 

Lewis was appointed the Director of Player Development for the Vikings in 1992.  He managed the team’s personal and career development programs that included encouraging personal growth in the areas of continuing education, financial management, alternative career exploration, and family assistance.  In 2000, the program was awarded the most outstanding in the NFL.

In 2006, he was appointed associate director of athletics and student athlete development at the University of Minnesota. Lewis prepares student/athletes for the realities that face professional athletes.  He preaches the message that life must continue after the helmet, shoulder pads and cleats are placed in the locker the last time.

Lewis teaches his own story.

“Things are much harder for athletes today,” Lewis says.  “They have so much more expected of them than when I played.”

There’s more time spent preparing to play.  There’s more time spent in the classroom.  There’s more time spent on the road.  Today’s athletes are expected to do so much more.

“We have to stress the importance of academics,” Lewis says.  “It’s what keeps so many from being unable to play.”

Athletes come to college with a variety of needs.  Lewis is developing a program that tailors the student/athlete.  It’s a holistic approach that keeps many from falling through the cracks.  Some enter college prepared for the transition.  Others lack the tools needed to conform to the expectations of college life.

Then there’s the influence of parents. Lewis says his parents stressed the importance of academics.  It’s what kept him going back to take classes - one summer at a time, until he was ready to write his dissertation.

“I had people in my life that steered me in the right direction.  I had parents who reminded me of the importance of education.  It’s important to have people to guide you through making the right decisions,” Lewis says.

Lewis was the little Viking that refused to go away.  He was too small to play.  He had just enough to play.  Just enough to keep coming back.

Maybe it’s because Lewis understand life is more than a game.  Maybe it’s the balance between the field and the books that makes for the rearing of a man.  Maybe it’s there within the balance that true strength emerges above the rest.

Lewis said no to limitations.  He also said no to compromise.  He kept coming back, every off season, until he walked across the stage one last time.  He walked as a man defined by his own will to rise above the fame of football.

There are few better suited to teach young men what it takes to become a man.

Way to go Dr. Leo Lewis III.

 

OMG: He Called Me a House Nigger

“That’s because you’re a house Nigger,” a distraught poll worker yelled at me for refusing to vote for his candidate. I had declined to take the sheet of paper promoting the virtues of the man he supported. I knew who I was voting for and had no need to waste the paper. I’m a green friendly kind of dude.

“That’s okay,” I responded when asked. “I’m not voting for him.” I then made my way to vote for the man he opposed Bill Bell for Mayor.

“I really appreciated your saying that,” a woman passing out the slate for the People’s Alliance told me when I returned. We chatted a bit about the significance of the two tax measures on the ballot. She expressed concern that teachers and assistant teachers would be terminated if it didn’t pass. I talked about the need for a rail system connecting the three counties. That’s when the man yelled at me-“You a house Nigger.”

“And that’s why I’m not voting for Sylvester Williams,” I roared back. “It’s because of people like you that I will never support him.”

I left disgusted with myself for allowing the idiocy of that man to get under my typically thick skin. I’m accustomed to being called names. It comes with the territory of putting your neck out to be chopped by those incapable of reading between and around the lines of what I write and say.

What he called me speaks to the politics of race and pronouncements of legitimate blackness. The expression house Negro comes from Malcolm X’s speech “Grassroots.” He spoke about two ranks of enslaved Africans: the “house Negro” and the “field Negro”. The house Negro lived in the owner’s house, dressed well and ate well, Malcolm X argued.

“He loved his owner as much as the owner loved himself, and he identified with his owner,” Malcolm said. “If the owner got sick, the house Negro would ask, ‘are we sick?’ If somebody suggested to the house Negro that he escape he would refuse to go, asking where he could possibly have a better life than the one he had.”

“The field Negro lived in a shack, wore raggedy clothes, and ate chittlins,” Malcolm argued. “He hated his owner. If the owner's house caught fire, the field Negro prayed for wind. If the owner got sick, the field Negro prayed for him to die. If somebody suggested to the field Negro that he escape, he would leave in an instant.”

Malcolm X claimed there are still house Negroes and field Negroes. His comments were a direct criticism of the nonviolent resistance movement led by Martin Luther King, Jr. It was a consistent theme of Malcolm X while he served as the primary voice of the Nation of Islam. His commentary continues to manipulate and influence the way blackness is affirmed or censured based on the judgment of a few.

What Malcolm X’s speech did within its historical context was to place the power of assimilation at the forefront of public discourse involving the rights of people of color. It revealed the thrust of the persuasion regarding the desire to live within the comforts of being accepted by those with power. Malcolm X unveiled the scandal involving a strategy, planned or not, to pit black folks against one another, and the benefits that come with compromising racial solidarity.

It’s a rhetoric that continues to resonate within sectors of the African American community. It’s the cousin to being called an Uncle Tom. It assumes that a person maintains a position of prominence due to succumbing to the interest of white people. It demands a level of hatred that denies the possibility for moving past the wounds caused by those long ago.

There are a number of assumptions correlated with the contemporary interpretation of Malcolm X’s analysis. To cling to his argument demands the embrace of the submission that all white people are blue eyed devils. One must conclude that white people are created with incapacity to transcend the hatred they have toward black people. One must adopt a logic that refuses to concede the possibility of any good within an entire race of people. To that end, anyone who embarks on developing any form of relationship with the blue eyed devil is, by nature, given into the psychosis of a house Negro.

This is a mindset that continues to fragment advancement toward the celebration of a diverse community. Progressive minded black people are constantly engaged in proving and protecting their status as a legitimate member of the black community. If you write for the white press, you are a house Negro. If you vote Republican, you are a house Negro. If you are highly educated, send your children off to college at a school that isn’t a historically black college or University, you are a house Negro.

The term is often used as a way to demoralize those living with the rewards of hard work. It elevates those on the bottom of the economic threshold by belittling those reaping the advantages normally reserved for white people. The field Negro disputation assumes that those in the house are there because of deep love for the white people in the house.

History suggests that Malcolm X’s analysis of the house Negro is laced with suppositions that we are forced to question. It denies the evidence that indicates many of the houses Negros were placed in the house to serve as the sex toy of the master. It refuses to acknowledge the evidence that points to boys lying at the foot of the bed to warm the master’s feet. It denies the myriad of cases that indicate that boys and girls were raped by the master. The house was a place of torture, not privilege.

What Malcolm attempted to do was bring meaning to the consequences of class division within the African American community. It assumed a position of privilege among those in the house that requires deep critical scrutiny. It also requires an examination of a view of history that fails to considers the particularity of humanity. In other words, not all white people are the same. Not all African Americans are the same. To suggest that everyone in the house felt the same gives far too much power to the influence of living in a given place.

I looked at my critic with rage filled eyes. How dare he make an assumption based on one vote. How dare he make that statement in the presence of white people. How dare he discredit me as a person due to my unwillingness to do things his way.

It only confirmed my vote. Birds of a feather flock together. That bird needs to be locked in a cage to sing alone. That bird sings because he refuses to fly after the doors of the cage have been open.

And for the record, I move between the house and the field. That’s what freedom brings

Why I Hate Country Music

I just remembered why I hate Country Music. I’ve tried to embrace the genre. I’ve listened to Keith Urban’s “Without You” and Toby Keith sing about his broke down shoes in “Somewhere Else.” It’s not the music I dislike. It’s the views of many of the people who listen to that hillbilly swing.

I know, one shouldn’t place all the pigeons in the same hole. The truth is I grew up listening to Country Music. My father introduced me to Charlie Pride back in 1969 by playing “Afraid of losing You Again” and “Is Anybody Going to San Antone” every Friday night with a bottle of Vodka by his side to wash the blues away.

My first gig in radio was with KTGR-AM, the Country station back home. I’ve done my share of releasing the massive stereotypes in my mind related to the people who love Country Music. I keep reminding myself that not everyone is bigoted, and that it’s just the music. Nothing more. Nothing less.

I’ve come close, real close, to making a trip up to Charlotte, NC to watch NASCAR racing. The way I look at it, Country Music and NASCAR are kin. You have to take the one to get to the other. That too may be a stereotype waiting to be exposed, but, hey, that’s the journey I have taken to get to where I am today.

My movement to that campfire meeting where folks wave Confederate flags as a symbol of Southern pride has taken a detour. Hank Williams, Jr. has reminded me of the bigotry that comes with that smugness for the days when colored folks knew their proper place, and white folk ruled down in good ole Dixie.

Williams sang about that pride in 1988 in a song titled “If the South Woulda Won.” The lyrics are enough to make those bumps on the back of my neck stand tall and yell “No he didn’t!”

“I’d prob’ly run for President of the Southern State,” he sings. “The day Elvis passed away would be our national holiday, if the South would a won we’d had it made.”

That makes sense. For the 2000 election he redid his song “We Are Young Country” to “This is Bush-Cheney Country”. He has made contributions to Michele Bachman’s 2012 presidential campaign, and has explored a run for the 2012 Republican nomination as a Senator from Tennessee.

“I’d make my Supreme Court down in Texas, and we wouldn’t have no killers getting’ off free,” he continue in his ballad in homage to the days when black folks were property. “If they were proven guilty, then they would swing quickly, instead of writin’ books and smilin’ in TV.”

When ESPN decided to fire Williams for comments he made on the Fox News Channel’s Fox and Friends, he responded like a politician ready to throw his name in the hat. “After reading hundreds of e-mails, I have made MY decision," he wrote. "By pulling my opening Oct 3rd, You (ESPN) stepped on the Toes of The First Amendment Freedom of Speech, so therefore Me, My Song, and All My Rowdy Friends are OUT OF HERE. It's been a great run."

Those rowdy friends are circling the wagons. Shucks darn, what done happened to America if a white man can’t say what’s on his mind? The tone of arrogance in his response denotes a deep sense of racial privilege that has to be checked at the door. Williams has benefited from singing that rowdy friend’s songs to begin games dominated by those colored boys he apparently despises so much.

The attacks and lack of sensitivity involving our nation’s first African American president have become shocking. It’s informative to consider that Williams made his comments on the heels of the controversy involving Rick Perry. Why would Williams talk about golf partners instead of the rock bearing the name of the hunt club on Perry’s property-Niggerhead?

For those who missed it, On Monday, October 3, 2011, in a morning interview with Fox News Channel's Fox and Friends, Williams in reference to a June golf game where President Obama and House Speaker John Boehner had teamed against Vice President Joe Biden and Ohio Gov. John Kasich, stated that match was "one of the biggest political mistakes ever."

"Come on. That'd be like Hitler playing golf with Netanyahu," He stated. He went on to say that the President and Vice President are "the enemy" and compared them to "the Three Stooges".

When anchor Gretchen Carlson later said to him, "You used the name of one of the most hated people in all of the world to describe, I think, the president." Williams responded, "Well, that is true. But I'm telling you like it is."

The comparison is not new. A number of videos have circulated on YouTube that likened Obama to the most hated man ever to live (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eS2rJP-udUs and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yTp_atr2G9E&feature=related). By making the comparison, Williams toyed with a common theme with that good ole boy network that views Obama as the incarnation of evil.

In defending his comments, Williams evoked his Constitutional rights to free speech. In doing so he inserted the issue of race. "Always respected the office of the president," He began. "Every time the media brings up the tea party, it's painted as racist and extremists – but there's never a backlash, no outrage to those comparisons ... Working-class people are hurting – and it doesn't seem like anybody cares. When both sides are high-fiving it on the ninth hole when everybody else is without a job – it makes a whole lot of us angry. Something has to change. The policies have to change."

I agree with that statement. People are hurting. That’s why people across the country are rallying against Wall Street. The problem with Williams, the tea party and those who want to go back to the good ole days, is the assertion that it’s the black dudes fault. What he and others have done is to minimize the President of the United States to the lowest possible caricature possible-the re-embodiment of Adolf Hitler.

They do so by questioning his birth certificate, by calling him a socialist and by blaming this presidency for the upheaval caused by a dude named Bush.

That, my friends, is at the root racist. Williams and those who follow him want us to imagine what it would be like if the South had won. One thing is certain, there wouldn’t be a black man serving as President, and that is the reason for calling Obama the enemy.

So, I’m done with my quest to embrace Country Music. I’m done with NASCAR and Confederate flags. Like it or not, we are here to stay.

Pass me the Nina Simone CD!
School children sitting in jail
Black cat cross my path
I think every day's gonna be my last

Lord have mercy on this land of mine
We all gonna get it in due time
I don't belong here
I don't belong there
I've even stopped believing in prayer

Don't tell me
I tell you
Me and my people just about due
I've been there so I know
They keep on saying "Go slow!"