Feb. 15, 2015

Feb. 15, 2015

Netanyahu's Address to Congress: Arrogance and the Violation of Separation of Powers
By Dr. Wilmer J. Leon, III

NEWS ANALYSIS

Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu

President Obama

“He [the President] shall have Power, by and with the Advice and Consent of the Senate, to make Treaties…shall appoint Ambassadors, other public Ministers and Consuls…” - Constitution of the United States, Section 2.

“…he shall receive Ambassadors and other public Ministers…” - Constitution of the United States, Section 3.

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - There are two interesting and powerful concepts that make the Constitution of the United States unique.  One is “separation of powers” and the other is “checks and balances”.  The United States government has three co-equal branches with defined separate powers and authorities.  Each branch is provided with the ability and authority to check the powers of the other branches. 

It is clearly delineated in Article II of the Constitution that the Executive Branch (President) is America’s preeminent foreign policy maker as evidenced by his diplomatic, treaty powers and his role as commander-in-chief.  In 1936 the Supreme Court confirmed this role by stating in United v. Curtiss-Wright, “… the president is the sole organ of the federal government in the field of international relations.”  It is also important to note that it is the Senate not the House of Representatives that is first in line to consult with the President on international affairs.

House Speaker John Boehner (R-OH) has taken it upon himself to ignore the clearly delineated powers in the Constitution and has extended an invitation to Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu to address a joint session of congress on March 3.  Boehner has three objectives; first, continue to humiliate the first African-American President of the United States.  Second, impact the ongoing negotiations between the Obama administration and Iran in the favor of Israel.  Third, throw Netanyahu a lifeline two weeks before Israeli elections as his political position in Israel flounders.  According to The Times of Israel, “…poll finds dramatic swerve to pessimism among young voters and the right, trends that should worry Israel’s second-longest serving prime minister.”

To their credit a growing number of Democrats are planning to skip Netanyahu’s address.  Most notable of those are President Obama, he will not meet with Netanyahu and VP Biden will be “on travel”.

To date the following members of the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) are on record intending to boycott the address, G.K. Butterfield (D-N.C.), head of the CBC, John Lewis (D-Ga.), James Clyburn (S.C.), Barbara Lee (D-Calif.) and Gregory Meeks (N.Y.).  According to The Hill, Rep. Butterfield said the move marked an "unprecedented overreach of the Speaker’s authority" that "goes beyond the traditions of his office." Rep. Lewis stated, “I think it’s an affront to the president and the State Department what the speaker did…”

Kudos to those who are standing up and boycotting this insult to the office of the president and the overreach by Speaker Boehner but what about boycotting Netanyahu because he represents a government that is engaging in genocide and apartheid? According to Nobel Prize Laureate, The Most Reverend, Archbishop Desmond Tutu "I have witnessed the systemic humiliation of Palestinian men, women and children by members of the Israeli security forces…Their humiliation is familiar to all black South Africans who were corralled and harassed and insulted and assaulted by the security forces of the apartheid government."

Boycott Netanyahu because Israel’s aggression towards Iran will become the sequel to the failed disaster film we’ve already seen, Iraq.

It’s great that members of the CBC are boycotting Netanyahu’s planned speech. But what about the CBC as an organization?  The CBC should stand together on the side of morality and speak with one voice in opposition to Boehner and his henchmen. According to The Hill Reps. Hank Johnson (D-Ga.) and Keith Ellison (D-Minn.) say they're still on the fence while they push for a postponement.

Note to Reps. Johnson and Ellison; Tutu was correct when he said, “People who are denied their dignity and rights deserve the solidarity of their fellow human beings," Tutu said of the Palestinians. "Those who turn a blind eye to injustice perpetuate injustice. If you are neutral in situations of injustice, you have chosen the side of the oppressor."  Dr. King, said “the ultimate measure of a man is not where he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where he stands at times of challenge and controversy.” You are still on the fence between justice and injustice choosing political comfort and convenience?  Really?

I have issues with a lot of the policies that have been supported and implemented by the Obama administration but I have even bigger issues with hatred, bigotry, and oppression. I can’t sit by as an African American man and allow bigots like Rep. Joe Wilson (R-SC) to say “you lie” or former Speaker Gingrich and Dinesh D'Souza to say, "What if (Obama) is so outside our comprehension, that only if you understand Kenyan anticolonial behavior can you begin to piece together (his actions)? Just as an aside, why shouldn’t the Kenyan’s and all colonial subjects oppose colonization?

One must never underestimate the blindness that attends hubris and arrogance. Hence, those like Boehner and his ilk will blindly ignore established protocol and violate the Constitution that they have sworn to protect in order to insult the first African American President and support an apartheid regime like Israel. Failing to speak out with a unified voice and for the right reasons will only lead us further down the rabbit hole of hatred, bigotry, ignorance and eventual annihilation.

Dr. Wilmer Leon is the Producer/ Host of the Sirius/XM Satellite radio channel 126 call-in talk radio program “Inside the Issues with Wilmer Leon” Go to www.wilmerleon.com or email:This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. www.twitter.com/drwleon and Dr. Leon’s Prescription at Facebook.com  © 2015 InfoWave Communications, LLC

Feb. 15, 2015

CBC Members: Boehner Invited Netanyahu Speech ‘Disrespectful’
By Zenitha Prince 

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - Members of the Congressional Black Caucus say they are boycotting Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s March 3 speech before Congress, which they deem a sign of disrespect to President Obama that they won’t tolerate.

“To me, it is somewhat of an insult to the president of the United States,” said Rep. Greg Meeks (D-N.Y.), as quoted by Politico.com. “Barack Obama is my president. He’s the nation’s president, and it is clear, therefore, that I’m not going to be there, as a result of that, not as a result of the good people of Israel.”

Netanyahu’s speech—at the behest of House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio—is intended to stymie multilateral talks between the P5+1 (five permanent members of the UN Security Council—United States, Russia, China, United Kingdom and France—plus Germany) and Iran over its nuclear war program. White House officials and other world bureaucrats see the deal as a diplomatic channel to reintegrate the isolated country and foster better relations and security in the Middle East. But, Netanyahu believes the plan demonstrates a naiveté about Iran’s true intentions.

“I’m determined to speak before Congress to stop Iran,” he said in the first of several tweets on the matter Feb. 10.

“I am going to the United States not because I seek a confrontation with the President, but to speak up for very survival of my country. Iran is a regime that is openly committed to Israel’s destruction,” he added.

But Boehner’s circumvention of the White House and State Department in issuing the invitation, and Netanyahu’s defiance of established protocol, which would have required him to confer with the president before a visit, was a slap in the face of President Obama, his Democratic allies said.

“It is very disrespectful to this president, and what concerns me more is that I think it’s a pattern that is starting to develop from this speaker that we’re getting more and more disrespectful of the office of the presidency,” said Rep. Cedric Richmond (D-La.). “I think it’s silly and petty.”

The speaker of the House argued that he did inform the White House—the same day he issued the invitation—and that Netanyahu’s visit, which comes just two weeks before he runs for re-election in Israel, is necessary to Congress’ deliberations over legislation that would impose additional sanctions on Iran—legislation the president already promised to veto.

“I gave ‘em a heads up that morning,” an unrepentant Boehner told CBS’ “60 Minutes” in an interview that aired Jan. 25.

“There’s nobody in the world who can talk about the threat of radical terrorism, nobody can talk about the threat that the Iranians pose, not just to the Middle East and to and to Israel, our longest ally, but to the entire world, but Bibi Netanyahu,” he added. “The president [in his State of the Union speech] didn’t spend but a few seconds talking about the threat, the terrorist threat that we as Americans face. This problem is growing all over the world. And you know, the president is trying to act like it’s not there. But it is there. And it’s going to be a threat to our homeland if we don’t address it in a bigger way.”

But Black leaders say Netanyahu’s speech is an unwelcome and impertinent intrusion by a foreign minister into U.S. legislative affairs.

“It’s not just about disrespect for the president, it’s disrespect for the American people and our system of government for a foreign leader to insert himself into an issue that our policymakers are grappling with,” said Rep. Hank Johnson (D-Ga.). “It’s not simply about President Obama being a black man disrespected by a foreign leader. It’s deeper than that.”

CBC members Reps. Maxine Waters, D-Calif., and Keith Ellison, D-Minn., were among the co-signers of a letter by Capitol Hill Democrats asking Boehner to postpone Netanyahu’s speech. The address could undermine the negotiations with Iran, the lawmakers said, thus endangering U.S. foreign policy and security interests.

“As members of Congress who support Israel, we share concern that it appears that you are using a foreign leader as a political tool against the President,” a draft of the letter read. “Our relationship with Israel is too important to use as a pawn in political gamesmanship…. When the Israeli Prime Minister visits us outside the specter of partisan politics, we will be delighted and honored to greet him or her on the Floor of the House.”

CBC Chairman Rep. G.K. Butterfield (D-N.C.) said he, like many other caucus members, will not be attending the speech. He said, however, the CBC is in talks to set up a meeting with either Netanyahu or the Israeli ambassador.

The White House confirmed that the president and vice president would not be attending the speech nor meeting with Netanyahu, which is in line with longstanding policy of not meeting with democratically elected officials shortly before their election to avoid the appearance of interference or undue influence in a democratic election. 

Feb. 15, 2015

Remembrances of the Assassination of Brother Malcolm X
By A. Peter Bailey

SPECIAL COMMENTARY

A. Peter Bailey, shown here in conversation with Malcolm X, was a charter member of his Organization of Afro-American Unity and editor of the organization's newsletter.

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - I was in the Audubon Ballroom on February 21, 1965, the day Brother Malcolm X was assassinated, a murder that I believed then and still believe today resulted from a collaboration of elements in the leadership of the Nation of Islam, the New York City Police Department and the FBI. Below are excerpts exactly as written in a 1965 essay that I wrote during the three days following the assassination:

Brother Malcolm X has been assassinated. Once again, as has happened many times in U.S. history, a black man who was considered a threat to the white racist system has been murdered by other black men. Nat Turner, Denmark Vesey, Marcus Garvey and countless other black leaders were all destroyed by blacks working in alliance with the white power structure. We have to assume that it was an alliance because the FBI and local police forces and the press have constantly bragged that they have infiltrated the Black Muslim movement, thus they know every move the Black Muslims make. If this be true, and they are the ones who made the claims, then they were either lying about the infiltration or they knew that Bro. Malcolm’s life was in danger and made no attempt to stop the plotters…

The FBI and the police force have almost completely immobilized the Communist Party with successful infiltration; only recently they and the NYC police force were able to infiltrate a small group of black men and accuse them of plotting the bombing of certain monuments. Yet now they and the press want us to believe that an organization, which both claimed had been infiltrated by agents, plotted a crime of gigantic magnitude without the infiltrator finding out about it? It is no doubt that if the Black Muslims had planned to bomb or assassinate Wagner or some other comparable figures, they would have been halted before any such plan could succeed.

There are many of us who believe that there are others who desired the death of Bro. Malcolm. For instance, those people who had him banned from France, those same people who worried about the effects of his trips abroad, those same people who dreaded the consequences of his trips south. He had spoken in Alabama and was due to speak in Mississippi. These people also would benefit from the removal of Malcolm X. He didn’t fit their pattern. He didn’t waste time criticizing Wallace, Barnett, Clark, Bull Conner and other individual villains speaking for white supremacy.

He recognized that these men were products of an evil system, a system which has, for over 350 years, treated non-white people as sub-humans. He recognized that the above individuals were able to operate so freely because the system allowed them to do so. …

Bro. Malcolm saw those things occurring and recognizing that the federal government was either unable or unwilling to protect the lives and property of black people, he called for a new approach. Domestically, he told black people to unite and adopt a program of self-defense; internationally, he called for black people to look elsewhere for allies in the struggle for human rights. He said that our struggle is only a part of the worldwide struggle where formerly oppressed people are throwing off oppression and asserting themselves. He told us to make use of the U.N., especially the Commission on Human Rights, as other minority groups have done, most notably the Russian Jews.

He traveled throughout Africa, the Middle East and Europe telling any group who would listen that black people in the U.S. needed their help in their struggle for human rights. He felt that Afro-Americans have a psychological complex about being a minority and that if they tied their struggle to the struggles of oppressed people throughout the world, it would help them, psychologically, in their own struggle.

These two approaches by Bro. Malcolm, the call for self-defense and the internationalizing of the racial struggle, profoundly disturbed the power structure and their allies. …

The press gleefully took his words out of context and tried to paint him as a monster when reporting his death. They claimed credit for there even being a Malcolm X. They scoffed at him by saying that he had a handful of followers, and, as one said, he had built up a myth. They were practically dancing over his body. The New York Times and the New York Herald Tribune, those pious, hypocritical prostitutes of the daily press, gave Zeus-like editorial about what a terrible man he was, the Herald Tribune saying that he was no loss to the Civil Rights Movement.

It must be said that the press devoted a fantastic amount of space and time to the death of such an “insignificant” man. Their very press coverage of his death and the reaction of the people and other leaders showed that the Human Rights Movement suffered a considerable loss with the assassination of this articulate, forceful black man.

He presented an image that white America is not used to seeing in black men. They resented and feared not only what he was doing, but even more so the potential of what he could do in the future. Bro. Malcolm pointed this out very clearly when he told an antagonist on a radio program that if people like him would spend more time helping and protecting the Rev. Martin Luther King and his followers and less time searching for material with which to attack him and other nationalists, the U.S. would be a better place to live.

Fifty years later, I stand by those words written by a then angry, grief-stricken 26-year- old supporter of Brother Malcolm. Efforts have been made by various sources to ignore, demean or downgrade his brilliant and memorable legacy. They have been unsuccessful.

In fact, if we, as Black folks would follow the Master Teacher’s wise, thought-provoking, concrete guidelines on how to most effectively promote and protect our cultural, economic and political interests in what is basically still a White supremacist society, we would be much further along in the drive for equal rights, equal justice and equal opportunity.

A. Peter Bailey, whose most recent book is Witnessing Brother Malcolm X, the Master Teacher, was a charter member of the Organization of Afro-American Unity founded by Malcolm X. He was the editor of its newsletter.

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Feb. 10, 2015

Civil Rights Leaders Accuse Republican of ‘Blatant Political Posturing” in Lynch Opposition
Late February Vote is Expected

By Hazel Trice Edney

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - Dozens of civil rights leaders have signed a letter appealing to Republican Sen. David Vitter (R-La.) to end his opposition to the candidacy of Loretta Lynch, being vetted as America’s next attorney general. Nominated by President Obama to replace the resigning Attorney General Eric Holder, Lynch would be the first Black woman to serve in the office.

A group, led by Wade Henderson, president/CEO of the Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, and Marc Morial, President/CEO of the National Urban League, has sent a letter, pushing to influence Vitter, a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, to drop what the rights leaders describe as political opposition to Lynch.

“Your opposition appears to be based wholly on politics unrelated to the nomination and fails to consider the outstanding merits of this exceptional nominee for this historic nomination,” the letter states. “As Ms. Lynch clearly demonstrated at her confirmation hearing before the Senate Judiciary Committee on January 28, and as some of your Republican colleagues as well as those who testified or submitted letters on her behalf confirmed, she is extraordinarily qualified for the job.”

The letter continues, “This blatant political posturing is inappropriate in general but especially so in this case because it involves a presidential cabinet nominee. Your behavior raises questions about your ability to serve fairly on the Senate Judiciary Committee… Ms. Lynch is a strong, independent prosecutor, who has twice headed one of the most important U.S. Attorney offices in the country, and who has decades of experience as a lawyer and leader.”

The Senate Judiciary Committee vote on Lynch’s nomination is slated for the last week in February. Lynch will need all Democrats and at least three Republican votes to survive the committee hearings and be considered by the whole Senate, where another battle awaits. So far, Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah) is the only Republican on the Committee who says he will vote for her. He says she is qualified and committed to working with Congress.

Vitter has declared his opposition to Lynch, claiming she "has established a clear anti-gun record".  Republicans are largely supported by the National Rifle Association; therefore gun ownership and usage are staple issues for right wingers. Recalling confirmation hearings, Vitter said he "didn't get any clear answers" on whether the Second Amendment and gun industries would be attacked under her leadership.

But, the letter, signed by dozens of leaders of non-partisan organizations from multiple racial backgrounds, is adamant about Lynch’s qualifications. Among other leading signers are Cornell William Brooks, NAACP; Lee A. Saunders, American Federation of State, County & Municipal Employees; Barbara Arnwine, Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights Under Law; Sherrilyn Ifill, NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund, Inc.; Jo Ann Jenkins, AARP; Jacqueline Pata, National Congress of American Indians; Thomas A. Saenz, Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund; Marcia D. Greenberger, National Women's Law Center; Michael B. Keegan, People for the American Way; Priscilla Ouchida, Japanese American Citizens League; Mark Perriello, American Association of People with Disabilities; and Michael Lieberman, Anti-Defamation League.

The adamant opposition to Lynch is somewhat unexpected. Lynch has received bi-partisan approval in her appointments as U. S. attorney for the Eastern District of New York, where she has served since 2010. However, the current political climate is unique given rampant Republican opposition to President Obama’s policies, including immigration issues, where rancorous disagreements continue. However the organizational leaders, who represent thousands of voters, have vowed to continue fighting for a full Senate vote for Lynch.

The letter also accuses Vitter of political posturing for a campaign for Louisiana governor.

“Your use of this responsibility for political gain is shameless and leads us to question the integrity of your decisions. It appears that your overtly political action is connected to your effort to run for Governor of the State of Louisiana. In fact, the website set up for your gubernatorial run includes a page asking visitors to sign a petition to oppose the nomination of the Attorney General because of the President’s executive actions. We urge you to take down this and similar posts and to rethink your blanket opposition to this truly qualified nominee.”