Should African Americans still support President Obama?

Should African Americans still support President Obama?

By Roger Caldwell

“Black Americans still find themselves providing ample support for an administration that governs over some of the highest Black unemployment numbers in recent history, the gutting of all regional offices of the Minority Business Development Agency, historically Black colleges dropping in their bond ratings because the President Obama Department of Education made Plus Loan requirements more stringent, and the highest overall rates of poverty since the Civil Rights Movement,” says Pascal Robert, a lawyer, blogger, and online activist.

It is very difficult to argue against these facts, because in many cities the unemployment number for Black men is over 50 percent, overall unemployment numbers for Blacks is double to Whites, and poverty in the Black community is at an all time high. Funding for Historically Black Colleges and Universities is at an all time low, because federal funding has dried up.

There are now 43 members in the Congressional Black Caucus, but it appears that less is accomplished with more. Instead of the CBC providing a united voice, addressing Black issues, they remain quiet, and they are treated by the president and the Democratic Party as being political irrelevant. The CBC has been in existence for 42 years and very few African Americans can actually remember anything they have done.

Many of our political leaders assume because they are Black, and a Democrat, they should be voted in, and returned into office. In 2012, Tom Joyner told millions of his listeners; “Let’s not even deal with facts right now. Let’s deal with our blackness and pride and loyalty. I’m not afraid or ashamed to say that as Black people, we should do it because he’s a Black man.”

I agree with Tom Joyner that African Americans should vote for people that look like them, but we should go another step and hold them accountable to their platform and our community’s needs. Facts are important, and community leaders and state leaders must open up the lines of communication so we know what our political leaders are accomplishing and doing.

As the first African American president many Blacks assumed if they challenged and didn’t agree with President Obama’s administration’s policy, they did not support the president. This thinking is backward, because the goal of politics is to exercise, achieve and apply power and authority to get required results. In 2008, and 2012, President Obama received over 95 percent of the Black vote, and it is time for Black America to push for policies that are going to benefit our community. We still support the president but we want our slice of the pie.

A large part of the African American community is in economic free fall, and it is time for the president to develop a plan for poverty in our community. The CBC should be initiators of a plan that addresses poverty, and the president must be petitioned to take a position. African Americans have lost 80 percent of its wealth since the recession, and the CBC must support resetting some deeply underwater mortgages to today’s fair market value.

Everyone in the country has heard that the president has shovel ready jobs, but where are they, because the African American community needs jobs. It is time for the president to stop protecting Wall Street Banks, and giving them corporate welfare, because they economically have raped the Black community. Mass incarcerations and violation of civil and human rights to African Americans should be discussed in the Black media across the country every week until the president puts it at the top of his agenda.

“The president has said when he benefits all Americans; he naturally benefits African Americans as well. But that’s not going to cut it anymore. When Barack Obama walks out of the White House for the last time as president in January 2017, he should be rejoining a Black community whose fortunes have been substantially improved because he was a two-term president,” says Nick Chiles, Pulitzer Prize winning journalist.