Obama's Blind Spot On Race and The Democrat Party's Racist Past

National Black Republican Association

By Frances Rice

"Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter."
 - Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

In his Philadelphia speech on race, Senator Barack Obama justified his 20-year relationship with his anti-American pastor, Rev. Jeremiah Wright, by castigating as racist a host of people, including his own white grandmother who he later lambasted as a "typical white" racist.  Conspicuously omitted from Obama's culpability list is the architect of modern day racism—the Democratic Party.

Obama's failure to even mention the Democratic Party's racist past, while confessing that he lied about when he first heard Rev. Wright's hateful rants, calls into question Obama's character and judgment.  The shocking words of Rev. Wright can be heard by viewing the video at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hwQWuQVE6sw&feature=related. Without flinching, Rev. Wright damned his own country, declaring that innocent Americans deserved to be killed by Islamic terrorists on September 11, 2001.

Since Obama refuses to end his ties to Rev. Wright and has put forth a false face as a presidential candidate, we need to look behind the mask and examine his past to see the real Barack Obama.

Obama's Slave-owning Relatives

Notably, in his speech, Obama mentioned the slavery history of the family of his wife, Michelle.  He failed to say one word about the unsavory slave-owning past of his own white relatives.  Historical records uncovered by researchers and posted on the Internet at: http://www.freedomsenemies.com/_more/obama.htmshow that Obama's maternal forbearers were slaveholders.  In fact, one of Obama's ancestors, George Washington Overall, owned two slaves as is recorded in the Nelson County, Kentucky 1850 Census.  The same records show that another one of Obama's ancestors, Mary Duvall, also owned two slaves.  All of Obama's slave-owning forbearers were Democrats.

Obama, following in the footsteps of his white ancestors, is also part of the  Democratic Party that: (1) fought to keep blacks in slavery; (2) started the Ku Klux Klan to lynch and terrorize Republicans—black and white; (3) passed the discriminatory Black Codes and Jim Crow laws; (4) fought every piece of civil rights legislation from the 1860's to the 1960's; and (5) attacked Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and other civil rights protesters with skin-burning fire hoses and vicious dogs.

While hiding the racist past of the Democratic Party, Obama refuses to give credit to the Republican Party that: (1) started in 1854 as the anti-slavery party and fought to free blacks from slavery; (2) amended the Constitution to grant blacks freedom, citizenship and the right to vote; (3) started the NAACP to stop the Democrats from lynching blacks; (4) passed the civil rights laws of the 1860's that were overturned by the Democrats when they took over Congress in 1892; (5) founded the HBCUs; (6) started affirmative action enforcement in 1969 to help blacks get jobs and contracts based on merit; and (7) fought the Democrats for over six decades until Republicans finally achieved passage of the civil rights laws of the 1950's and 1960's under the leadership of Republican Senator Everett Dirksen of Illinois.

It defies logic for Democrats to claim that, after Republicans spent over 100 years fighting the Democrats on behalf of blacks and finally won, all the racist Democrats suddenly rushed into the Republican Party.  In fact, those racist Democrats declared that that they would rather vote for a "yellow dog" than a Republican because the Republican Party was known as the party for blacks.  Facts about the racist past of the Democratic Party can be found in such books as A Short History of Reconstruction by Dr. Eric Foner, Unfounded Loyalty by Rev. Wayne Perryman, Bamboozled by Angela McGlowan, and Wrong on Race by Bruce Bartlett.

Exposed in these books are the facts that the chief opponents of the landmark 1964 Civil Rights Act were Democrat Senators Sam Ervin, Albert Gore, Sr. and Robert Byrd, a former member of the Ku Klux Klan.  Democrat President Lyndon Johnson is applauded as a proponent of civil rights.  However, in his 4,500-word State of the Union Address delivered on January 4, 1965, Johnson mentioned scores of topics for federal action, but only thirty five words were devoted to civil rights.  He did not mention one word about voting rights.

Democrat President John F. Kennedy is lauded as a civil rights advocate.  In reality, Kennedy voted against the 1957 Civil rights Act while he was a senator, as did Democrat Senator Al Gore, Sr.  After he became president, John F. Kennedy opposed the 1963 March on Washington by Dr. King that was organized by A. Phillip Randolph who was a black Republican.  President Kennedy, through his brother Attorney General Robert Kennedy, had Dr. King wiretapped and investigated by the FBI on suspicion of being a Communist in order to undermine Dr. King.

In an effort to shift the racist past of the Democratic Party to the Republican Party, Democrats point a finger at Republican President Richard Nixon for his so-called "Southern Strategy."  These same Democrats expressed no concern when the racially segregated South voted solidly for Democrats; yet unfairly deride Republicans because of the thirty-year odyssey of the South switching to the Republican Party that began in the 1970's. Nixon's "Southern Strategy" was an effort on his part to get fair-minded people in the South to stop voting for Democrats who did not share their values and were discriminating against blacks.  Georgia did not switch until 2004, and some Southern states are still controlled by Democrats, including Louisiana until the 2007 election of Republican Bobby Jindal, a person of color.

Democrats also castigate Senator Trent Lott for his remarks about Senator Strom Thurmond in a blatant attempt to unfairly paint the Republican Party as a racist party.  Where was the outrage when Democrat Senator Christopher Dodd praised former Ku Klux Klanner Democrat Senator Robert Byrd as someone who would have been "a great senator for any moment," including the Civil War.  Notably, Senator Thurmond was never in the Ku Klux Klan and, after he became a Republican, defended blacks against lynching and the discriminatory poll taxes imposed on blacks by Democrats.  If Senator Byrd and Senator Thurmond were alive during the Civil War, and Byrd had his way, Thurmond would have been lynched.

Obama's Muslim Connections

While not denying the basic facts about his Muslim connections, Obama and his defenders parse words, Clintonesque style, in a blatant attempt to discredit anyone who raises the issue.  It's important to scrutinize Obama's Muslim background to determine if his Islamic past influences his decisions and actions toward America, including his decision to select an anti-American pastor as his spiritual advisor.

Obama readily exhibits his disdain for our country by refusing to wear an American flag lapel pin, and the video showing him making this anti-American declaration can be seen at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ccbPVMBKQpA&feature=related.  Obama was also photographed with his back turned to our flag and his hands clasped defiantly in front of him during the saying of the pledge of allegiance, and that video can be seen at: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yOtsJufVs5Y&feature=related.  Now that his relationship with Rev. Wright has been exposed, Obama is trying to deceive the public by giving speeches with American flags being used as props in the background.

To more fully understand the extent of Obama's Muslim experiences and how this connection influences his attitude about America, we need to examine some basic, undisputed facts.

Obama was born on August 4, 1961 in Honolulu, Hawaii, and his full name is Barack Hussein Obama.  He is named after his father who was born on the shores of Lake Victoria in Alego, Kenya.  Obama's father was raised as a Muslim and married a white American woman, Anna Dunham of Wichita, Kansas while both were students at the University of Hawaii.  Obama's parents divorced when he was two years old, and when he was six years old, his mother married an Indonesian oil company executive named Lolo Soetoro, who was also a Muslim and who introduced Obama to Islam.

The family moved to Jakarta, Indonesia, the world's most populous Muslim country, where they lived for five years from1968 through 1973.  Obama first attended a Catholic school for three years.  In that school's documents, Obama is listed under the name Barry Soetoro as an Indonesian citizen, and his religion is listed as Islam.  Later, Obama attended a Muslim school where he received Islamic religious training before he was sent back to America to live with his maternal grandmother while his mother and his half-sister, Maya, stayed in Indonesia.

Obama's half brothers and sisters in Nairobi, Kenya are Muslims.  His step-grandmother, Sarah Hussein Obama, is a lifelong Muslim who said: "I am a strong believer of the Islamic faith."  In an April 30, 2007 New York Times interview, Obama's half-sister, Maya Soetoro-Ng who now lives in Hawaii, said: "My whole family was Muslim, and most of the people I knew were Muslim."

Obama, while describing his 1992 wedding, admitted that he was proud of his brother, Roy, who chose Islam over Christianity.  "The person who made me proudest of all," Obama wrote, "was Roy.  Actually, now we call him Abongo, his Luo name, for two years ago he decided to reassert his African heritage.  He converted to Islam, and has sworn off pork and tobacco and alcohol."

If Obama were not a Muslim from the time his religion was recorded in Indonesia as Islam until he "converted" to Christianity, then what was he for 27 years?  We, as citizens, have a right to know this information about the man who wants to be our next president.

Obama's Legislative Actions

Considering Obama's Islamic connections, it is not surprising that he introduced a bill in Illinois called "Islamic Community Day" which proclaimed that November 1, 1997 would be the South Shore Islamic Community Center Day.

Obama's other legislative actions in Illinois demonstrate that he is a liberal Democrat who puts left-wing ideology before the best interest of the people.

Incredibly, Obama opposed four times the Born Alive Infant Protection Act that would have prohibited a baby that was born alive from being left to die, simply because the mother said she wanted the baby to die.  He also sided with the Democratic Party's radical pro-abortion special interest group by opposing a bill that defines as a "person" a fully born baby who survives an abortion.

Obama was the only member of the Illinois Senate who voted against a bill that prohibited the early release of sexual predators.  He also refused to vote for a bill that would have increased penalties for drug traffickers.  Obama voted against a bill that made it a criminal offense for convicts to have contact with a street gang while out of jail on bail or on probation.  He even voted against a bill that would have delivered the death penalty to gang members who murder first responders.  Obama sent a shock wave throughout the state of Illinois when he voted to make a criminal out of a homeowner who was forced to use a gun to defend himself in his own home.

As a US senator, Obama voted against the minimum wage bill.  Now, Obama is on the presidential campaign trail promising to increase the minimum wage.  What a hypocrite.

Obama and Black Poverty

Obama, in his Philadelphia speech, loudly denounced the deplorable conditions in black communities.  Yet, he said not one word about the fact that those communities have been run by Democrats for the past 40 years.  The socialist policies of the Democrats have fostered a culture of dependency on government handouts and turned those communities into economic and social wastelands.  Obama also rails against the failure to educate black children.  However, he gives a pass to teachers' union special interest groups that are responsible for black children not being educated.  Those groups are aligned with the Democratic Party and are against school choice opportunity scholarships that would help black parents get their children out of failing schools.  Liberal teachers act against the best interest of black children because they want to keep control of the buildings, and thus the money, but the money belongs to the people, not the buildings.

The root cause of the grinding poverty in black communities that is ignored by Obama is well documented by black Democrat Juan Williams in his book entitled Enough: The Phony Leaders, Dead-End Movements, and Culture of Failure That Are Undermining Black America.

Comments by Juan Williams about how Obama, a rich, half-white Harvard educated man, is using the black community for partisan political gain can be seen at:  http://election.newsmax.com/williams_obama/?s=al&promo_code=4780-1

The sad truth is that Obama is one of those phony, socialist Democrats who wants to push on the rest of America the failed socialist policies that have devastated black communities.

Obama and Corruption

Just coming to light are the sleazy facts about Obama's relationship and shady real estate deal with Antoin "Tony" Rezko, the Arab-American fundraiser and immigrant from Syria.  Rezko has been a friend of Obama's since his days at Harvard, and Rezko was recently indicted for corruption, found guilty and sent to prison.

The details of the Obama-Rezko deal are astonishing and involve the purchase of Obama's Edwardian-style mansion in Kenwood, an up-scale section of Chicago where Nation of Islam Minister Louis Farrakhan also lives.  When Obama sought to buy the grand house, the former owner refused to sell unless Obama also agreed to buy the adjoining land which Obama apparently could not afford.  Obama's friend, Rezko, came to the rescue and bought the adjoining land for $625,000, even though the property could not be accessed from the public street.  This cleared the way for Obama to buy the mansion for $1,650,000, about $300,000 less than the asking price.  Then, six months later, Obama bought one-sixth of Rezko's property for $104,500.  All of these financial dealings raise questions about whether Rezko subsidized the purchase of Obama's mansion in violation of ethical rules.

Also, campaign contribution records show that Rezko made substantial contributions to Obama's 2000 campaign for Congress.  A recent report in a British newspaper, The Times, shows that in May 2005, Rezko was loaned $3.5 million by Fintrade Services, a Panamanian company controlled by Nadhmi Auchi, an Iraqi-born British billionaire.  This is the undeclared loan that landed Obama's friend and bagman, Rezko, in jail.

We ignore the stench of corruption that surrounds Obama at our peril.

As citizens, we must ask ourselves whether Obama has the character and judgment to be our president.  Unfortunately, the answer is no.

Frances Rice, a lawyer and retired Army Lieutenant Colonel, is the chairman of the National Black Republican Association and can be contacted at:  www.NBRA.info