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A weblog about the politics and affairs of the old and glorious City of Albany, New York, USA. Articles written and disseminated from Albany's beautiful and historic South End by Daniel Van Riper. If you wish to make a response, have anything to add or would like to make an empty threat, please contact me.


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February 9, 2014

A Burning House At Midnight

The new City government marches to my neighborhood, discovering Pete Seeger’s important connection to Dr. King, the remaking of Nelson Mandela as a cartoon and a moral sermon from Dr. King

If destruction be our lot we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen we must live through all time or die by suicide.
-Abraham Lincoln, 1838

This year’s march from the State plaza to the Martin Luther King statue in my neighborhood was very special, indicative of the new beginning for our suffering City. Nearly bankrupt after 20 years of Jerry Jennings, wracked with unnecessary problems too numerous to mention, our community is in dire need of some radical restructuring, and fast. If that can be done remains to be seen.

However, what I saw at the King statue this year indicates that cautious hope for the future is a reasonable attitude. A big crowd of politicians marched through Lincoln Park led by our new mayor Kathy Sheehan, who introduced a style of presentation that in itself was a radical departure from how her predecessor conducted this ceremony. And most heartening of all, among those politicians present were none of the Old Boys who ran our City into the ground.

Only One Mounted Cop This Year: Before The March Begins Visitors To The State Museum Admire The Horse
Only One Mounted Cop This Year: Before The March Begins Visitors To The State Museum Admire The Horse

Perhaps as a sign of goodwill from the forces of nature, that Monday was not exactly balmy but the air temperature was reasonable enough with no threat of precipitation. We’ve been having these “polar vortexes” descend upon us this winter, bringing some of the coldest temperatures since the 1970s. Someone commented to me that perhaps if the day was icy cold (like it was the next day) then maybe the speeches would have been as quick and done as past years.

Afterwards I mentioned the high turnout of politicians to City Treasurer Darius Shahinfar, he replied, “That’s because this time everyone was invited!” Certainly. Former mayor Jennings saw this ceremony as his own personal photo op, and as a sign of his favor he only invited a few favorites to stand next to him in front of the cameras. Any other office holder who showed up did so at their own initiative, and could expect to be mostly ignored by His Majesty.

Setting Up Equipment
Setting Up Equipment

A quick look through the intertubes shows something else I’d never seen before, dozens of announcements for the annual program at the auditorium under The Egg in the State Plaza, and open invitations for one and all to participate in the march to my neighborhood. That’s a big first, in past years most announcements were confined to certain churches and certain State workers, and general announcements were nonexistent.

I suppose that was all about control. If the point of the ceremony for former mayor Jennings was to provide photo ops, then the last thing the principals wanted to see was angry groups of taxpaying citizens demanding real progress from their public servants. I keep hoping one of these years to see some current actual rights and equality groups waving signs and chanting, give the corporate media content providers something to censor. Well, maybe that will happen next year, I’m more than sure that Martin himself would have approved.

Here Come The Marchers Through Lincoln Park
Here Come The Marchers Through Lincoln Park

I attended that morning program under The Egg years ago and swore I would never do so again, it was that dismal. The most notable moment of that miserable 2009 program, which was presided over by Eliot Spitzer, were the boos and hisses when Jerry Jennings was introduced to the surly attendees. But reportedly this year the underground program was attended by an overflow crowd of thousands, and was so entertaining and so inspiring that it even impressed media workers.

Not that every politician got to speak and be seen by the cameras this year at the statue, there were too many office holders and important people and besides, like I said, this wasn’t a warm sunny day in May. There were exactly three speakers, Mayor Sheehan, Congressman Paul Tonko and Albany County Executive Dan McCoy. From what I’ve seen so far this month, her honor is making a special point of inviting the Congressman and the County Executive to attend these sorts of functions, apparently looking to develop strong ties with both.

But make no mistake, the new mayor presided, this was her show. “I think the entire Common Council is here,” she said in her introduction, and indeed I spotted all the representatives of the downtown and midtown wards. But notably the representatives of the three most uptown wards, Igoe, Herring and Commisso Jr. were not to be seen.

State Police Honor Guard
State Police Honor Guard

Waiting for the marchers to start and complete the physically demanding quarter-mile downhill stroll from the State Plaza to the King statue, I noticed some interesting cost cutting measures. First, the number of Albany police-mounted horses leading the marchers was reduced from three to one. A police sergeant that I asked confirmed that the order for fewer horses came from above, “To save the taxpayers money.”

The other thing I noted was that instead of posting cops or other City employees hours beforehand to close the streets around the marching route, which usually was done in past years, the cops showed up about a half hour before the marchers appeared. They quickly closed the streets with the sawhorses left by the DGS guys on Friday, chased away the cars and then discreetly got out of the way. These were the regular cops on duty, it didn’t look like any City workers were given extraordinary holiday overtime just to close the streets.

Assembly Member Pat Fahey, County Executive Dan McCoy, Albany Mayor Kathy Sheehan and Congressman Paul Tonko Lead And Sing
Assembly Member Pat Fahey, County Executive Dan McCoy, Albany Mayor Kathy Sheehan and Congressman Paul Tonko Lead And Sing

I’ve been noting this clear difference in public style between the new mayor and her predecessor. Jerry Jennings saw public ceremonies, such as this one or ribbon cuttings, as opportunities for self-aggrandizement in front of the media and to hand out the favor most coveted by politicians, positive exposure. In contrast, mayor Sheehan appears to have a sense of the deeper value of ceremony, that it builds ties and confers legitimacy. To put it another way, the new mayor used the wreath-laying ceremony to inform the public and to build connections with the State and with the County.

Eventually the marchers showed up behind the police vehicles and the State police honor guard and the one mounted horse. So many politicians, two waves of them, the biggest politicians in the front wave. And the politicians in the front were singing “We Shall Overcome” all together with deep lusty voices, with quite a bit of passion. It was kind of stunning to hear that, another first.

This has become the traditional theme song of MLK Day, the tune sung by the original Freedom Marchers as they faced firehoses and shotguns and death threats, the song that raised their hopes and gave them courage to continue. Now, I had always thought the song as ancient and buried in the mists of time, perhaps a Negro spiritual or a Protestant hymn. The truth is, I hadn’t really given it any thought and I’ll bet most of you haven’t either.

Regular Folks and Straggling Politicians Followed Behind
Regular Folks and Straggling Politicians Followed Behind

Well, in honor of the passing of the great Pete Seeger on January 27 at age 94, Democracy Now played some old interviews with the man. According to Pete, We Shall Overcome is an old labor song derived from the epic labor battles of the late 19th century. I see no reason to doubt the details of his story, which he told to Amy Goodman back in 2004:

AMY GOODMAN: Pete Seeger, can you tell us about "We Shall Overcome"?

PETE SEEGER: I thought, in 1946, when I learned it from a white woman who taught in a union labor school, the Highlander Folk School in Tennessee, that the song had been made up in 1946 by tobacco workers, because they sang it there to strike through the winter of 1946 in Charleston, South Carolina, and they taught the song to Zilphia Horton, the teacher at the labor school. And she said, "Oh, it was my favorite song." And I printed it in our little magazine in New York, People’s Songs, as "We Will Overcome" in 1947.

Pete Seeger Outside The Re-pub National Convention, NYC 2004
Pete Seeger Outside The Re-pub National Convention, NYC 2004

It was a friend of mine, Guy Carawan, who made it famous. He picked up my way of singing it, "We Shall Overcome," although Septima—there was another teacher there, Septima Clark, a black woman. She felt that "shall"—like me, she felt it opened up the mouth better than "will," so that’s the way she sang it. Anyway, Guy Carawan in 1960 taught it to the young people at the founding convention of SNCC, Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee, SNCC for short. And a month later, it wasn’t a song, it was the song, throughout the South.

Only two years ago, I get a letter from a professor in Pennsylvania, who uncovered an issue of the United Mine Workers Journal of February 1909, and a letter there on front page says, "Last year at our strike, we opened every meeting with a prayer, and singing that good old song, 'We Will Overcome.'" So it’s probably a late 19th century union version of what was a well-known gospel song. I’ll overcome, I’ll overcome, I’ll overcome some day.

Martin Luther King, Pete Seeger, Charis Horton, Rosa Parks, and Ralph Abernathy At Highlander Folk School, 1957
Martin Luther King, Pete Seeger, Charis Horton, Rosa Parks, and Ralph Abernathy At Highlander Folk School, 1957

AMY GOODMAN: You sang it for Martin Luther King?

PETE SEEGER: In 1957, I went down to Highlander. Zilphia was dead, and Myles Horton, her husband, said, "We can’t have a celebration of 25 years with this school without music. Won’t you come down and help lead some songs?" So I went down, and Dr. King and Reverend Abernathy came up from Alabama to say a few words, and I sang a few songs, and that was one of them. Ann Braden drove King to a speaking engagement in Kentucky the next day; and she remembers him sitting in the back seat, saying, "'We Shall Overcome.' That song really sticks with you, doesn’t it?" But he wasn’t the song leader. It wasn’t until another three years that Guy Carawan made it famous.

There you have it, Pete modestly declined credit for popularizing the song that he revived but claims that he gave it to Martin, who immediately appreciated its value. It is right and fitting that the theme of the Freedom Marches was a labor song. Let us not forget that when Dr. King was cut down in a motel parking lot, he was on his way to lead and support the economic rights of the workers who collect our garbage, some of the lowest and most despised persons in our society.

Listening To The Speakers
Listening To The Speakers

Behind the politicians marching through the park came the low-born filthy scum of the earth taxpaying voters, a fair sized crowd. They too were singing “We Shall Overcome,” not as deeply and as lustily as the politicians up front, but by their faces I could see the conviction with which they sang those words. These regular folks were not here to show off, they were here to recreate and catch the spirit of the movement that Dr. King led.

Somewhere deep in the State Plaza, carefully stored in an obscure closet, is a stack of signs attached to wooden sticks that are brought out once a year for this march. They sport pictures of Dr. King draped with the US flag, and say things like “Voting Rights Now” and “Justice Now” and “Freedom Now.” Nothing meant to be too controversial, and certainly nothing meant to be current to be placed in the hands of The People.

However, as an odd bit of irony this year, those bland State-sponsored signs meant to evoke a distant past have suddenly become relevant this year. For a large majority of Americans the Great Recession of 2008 is still continuing, while meanwhile the effects of non-stop corporate looting have finally become obvious and evident to all. The formerly almost ludicrous “Fair Housing Now” sign, for instance, has become particularly relevant to Albany’s stressed and hurting neighborhoods.

Everyone Listened Carefully To Mayor Sheehan's Stunning Speech

Everyone Listened Carefully To Mayor Sheehan's Stunning Speech

What makes these signs suddenly seem relevant is that we see our more astute politicians have abandoned or rejected the false theme that the fight for rights and equality is a thing of the past. As foreign corporations continue to drain the wealth from America’s economy, and as bigots and other fools embedded in high places continue to gut the Bill of Rights, that tired prevailing story that the big struggles belong to the past rings hollow and deceptive. The smarter politicians acknowledge the reality and have changed their talk.

At least, that fundamental change is true of their speeches and their announcements. This theme, that the struggle for equality, justice and economic rights is more urgent now than ever before, is showing up even in the speeches of hardline corporatists. We heard it in Barack Obama’s recent State of the Union address, we heard it in Governor Andrew Cuomo’s recent State of the State address.

Of course for Obama and Cuomo such talk is just noise to impress and mollify the rubes. Neither of these big politicians give a damn about individual rights and the deadening effects of economic disparity, both are unrepentant corporate socialists who are dedicated to advancing the corporate political agenda. When it comes to the Bill of Rights, neither of these so-called Democrats are noticeably different from the Teabag Dittoheads who currently are holding Congress hostage.

Mayor Sheehan Interviewed After The Ceremony

Mayor Sheehan Interviewed After The Ceremony

But our local politicians can’t hide all that well behind spin doctors, press secretaries and the corporate media filter. Unlike Obama and Cuomo, the locals are seen regularly by a significant number of their voters every day, and of course the internet remembers much of what they say and do. It’s a lot harder to maintain lies and deceptions when you’re face to face with the people who can take away your job.

Mayor Sheehan, with all of 17 days in office on MLK Day, is the politician most vulnerable to public opinion right now and thus the least likely to toss deceptions and doubletalk. She gave a hell of a speech, and afterwards I asked her for a copy so I could show it to you. With a grin she pulled the papers out of her coat pocket and waved them at me, but I think it evident that she has more important things to do than copy speeches and send them to some blogger.

Will Mayor Sheehan Still Be Grinning Next Year?

Will Mayor Sheehan Still Be Grinning Next Year?

Her honor’s speech was rather long, but it was listened to all the way through with rapt attention, I saw a lot of wide eyes as she spoke. The theme was the “Equality Agenda,” which she has developed as a cornerstone of her hiring practices for City jobs. As an echo of that speech, here is a quote from the email announcement that Ms. Sheehan sent out for this event:

Through his leadership and commitment to non-violent civil disobedience, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. led our nation through enormous changes; moving us away from intolerance and injustice and bringing us closer to the ideals of freedom and equality upon which our country was founded.

Yet on this important date of remembrance, we must not forget that racism and crushing poverty still exist and affect the daily lives of thousands in our City and State. We must work every day to fulfill Dr. King's dream of equality for all. Remember his words: "Our lives begin to end the day we become silent about things that matter."

I certainly never heard Jerry Jennings say anything like that. Mayor Sheehan has been setting a rhetorical agenda that other politicians have been compelled to follow, either willingly or unwillingly. Her passion is evident, but naturally we will soon see if these are empty words or the beginning of a new and better approach to City government.

County Executive Dan McCoy Delivers His Remarks

County Executive Dan McCoy Delivers His Remarks

County executive Dan McCoy spoke next, he seemed to be caught off guard by the mayor’s passionate speech and did his best to string together the appropriate phrases off the cuff. I’ve noted his interest in solving old nagging problems in Albany neighborhoods, problems that the Jennings administration either ignored or perpetuated. On the other hand, I’ve talked to some union activists who consider him a job destroyer with ties to questionable outfits, so I don’t know what to think.

Congressman Paul Tonko, who by his face looked momentarily thrown off by the mayor’s speech, quickly recovered and, as is usual for him, finished with an ad hoc speech that almost matched the mayor’s in intensity and vision. Again I saw impressed looks on the faces of the listeners. His commitment to such basic American ideals come easily to him.

Congressman Paul Tonko Delivers Another Rousing Speech

Congressman Paul Tonko Delivers Another Rousing Speech

I have to say that I was surprised to learn that Mr. Tonko voted for the Farm Bill in Congress that included some $6 Billion in cuts for food stamps, cuts that would heavily impact New York State. Immediately afterward he voted for each of the amendments that called for restoring those cuts, but none of those amendments had any chance of passing. Undoubtedly our Congressional representative was pressured by President Obama to vote for the Farm Bill, certainly it would have been dangerous for him to ignore such pressure even though the bill has such a negative impact on his constituents.

Still, I think we are very fortunate to have a Congressional representative who is responsive to his constituents and their needs, this is very rare these days. The Wife has talked to him a lot about civil rights issues, and he’s been very receptive to her. On the other hand, whenever I see him I have to reintroduce myself, and invariably he stares steadily at me and slowly nods, I can almost hear him thinking, “Oh yeah... this guy.”

Nelson Mandela In His Cell On Robbin Island

Nelson Mandela In His Cell On Robbin Island

This year the death of Nelson Mandela was draped over Martin Luther King by the corporate media. Somehow the two men were stuffed and mounted and shoved into the same glass display case along the back wall of the corporate museum of dusty dead dreams. The plain fact is that other than having a profound effect on modern history, the main similarity between the two was that they were both black men.

Nelson Mandela was the leader of a revolutionary army that was prepared to destroy South African society, and as time went on the Apartheid government of South Africa understood that they would soon be on the losing side of a civil war. His jailers realized that the only thing holding back these military forces of destruction was Mr. Mandela himself. So they dared not murder him or even torture him, and as the story goes, even the prison guards addressed him respectfully as Sir.

At a crucial point, with all the power cards in his hands, Mr. Mandela allowed the Apartheid minority regime to quietly fold and exit the game without giving up their winnings. Some say that Mr. Mandela sold out to the forces of evil, others say that he prevented a catastrophe that would have ruined most everything and everyone in his nation, thus he preserved a possible viable future for all. It is a matter of record that soon after leaving prison he served as the leader of his nation, and he died peacefully of an advanced old age.

 Martin Luther King And State Police In Montgomery Alabama, 1965

Martin Luther King And State Police
In Montgomery Alabama, 1965

Standing up to the most powerful empire on Earth, Martin Luther King did not have command of a military force, and he was not interested in attempting to overthrow the regime. Early on he rejected the prospect of promoting civil war in his own country as impractical and self-defeating because such a terrible and extreme course of action was, he believed, unnecessary. Right to the end he considered adherence to the Bill of Rights what was needed to bring all minorities along with the majority to a place where all could enjoy equal rights and equal opportunities.

In response he was shot down like a stray dog at age 39, probably by his own government. The evidence presented at a civil trial proved that the “lone gunman” who took the rap for the murder could not have fired the fatal shot, it was not physically possible. Later, extreme radical right politicians embedded in high places, such as Ronald Reagan, tried to ruin Dr. King’s reputation and fought bitterly to prevent the establishment of this day in his memory.

The Mayor and The County Executive Lay The Wreath At Dr. King's Feet

The Mayor and The County Executive Lay The Wreath At
Dr. King's Feet

Plenty has been said outside the corporate media about the homogenization of Mr. Mandela, watered down the same way as Dr. King has been repackaged as a caricature. Australian journalist John Pilger, writing in Truthout, had this to say:

Nelson Mandela was a great human being who became a celebrity. "Sainthood," he told me drily, "is not the job I applied for." The western media appropriated Mandela and made him into a one-dimensional cartoon celebrity tailored for bourgeois applause: a kind of political Santa Claus. That his dignity served as a facade behind which his beloved ANC oversaw the further impoverishment and division of his people was unmentionable. And in death, his celebrity-sainthood was assured.

And the ever extraordinary journalist Greg Palast, in his characteristic no-bullcrap style, pointed out that “The ruling class creates commemorative dolls and statues of revolutionary leaders as a way to tell us their cause is won, so go home.” To this he added:

From Fox News to the Bush family, the politicians and media mavens who body-blocked the anti-Apartheid Movement and were happy to keep Mandela behind bars, now get to dress his image up in any silly outfit they choose. ...He joins Martin Luther King as another bronzed monument whose use is to tell us that apartheid is now "defeated" - to quote the ridiculous headline in the Times. It's more nauseating than hypocrisy and ignorance. The Mandela Barbie is dressed to serve a new version of racism, Apartheid 2.0, worsening both in South Africa - and in the USA.

As an American who was not part of his culture, I do not understand Nelson Mandela, I cannot. I admire his accomplishments but I do not truly know the reasons for the things that he did or chose not to do. I haven’t heard any commentators admit that. This understanding belongs to the people of southern Africa.

Martin Luther King Preaching

Martin Luther King Preaching

But Martin Luther King was an American like me. If I study him closely I begin to see myself and my fellow Americans, and the man left so much behind to study. I recently discovered (thanks Roger) Dr. King’s 1957 speech “A Knock At Midnight,” which was a disturbingly accurate analysis of our lives today:

...Modern man faces a dreary and frightening midnight in the social order... Midnight is the hour when men desperately seek to obey the eleventh commandment, "Thou shalt not get caught." According to the ethic of midnight, the cardinal sin is to be caught and the cardinal virtue is to get by. It is all right to lie, but one must lie with real finesse. It is all right to steal, if one is so dignified that, if caught, the charge becomes embezzlement, not robbery. It is permissible even to hate, if one so dresses his hating in the garments of love that hating appears to be loving. The Darwinian concept of the survival of the fittest has been substituted by a philosophy of the survival of the slickest. This mentality has brought a tragic breakdown of moral standards, and the midnight of moral degeneration deepens...

...At midnight men are altogether ignored because of their limited education, or they are given bread that has been hardened by the winter of morbid class consciousness.

Indeed, whom do we admire in 2014, what is the most successful sort of person today? Look at Jamie Dimon, CEO of JP Morgan Chase, who collected for his parasitic corporation many hundreds of billions of dollars in profits by laundering money for Al Qaida, Russian mobsters and Mexican drug cartels, and is directly responsible for the 2008 housing collapse which we are still grappling with today. This slick snotball, a personal favorite of the Obama administration, was just rewarded with a $20 million dollar annual raise. And why not?

As much as I’d like to see the likes of Jamie Dimon impaled alive on a stick and slowly roasted over a fire while he screams in terror and agony (not kidding about that) the last thing I want to see is the society in which I live overturned and destroyed by revolution and civil war. But if we don’t want that to happen, how do we deal with the Jamie Dimons? How do we eliminate these parasites without destroying ourselves?

Martin Luther King And Harry Belafonte Interviewed In Sweden, 1967

Martin Luther King And Harry Belafonte
Interviewed In Sweden, 1967

I ran across a story in Salon, which related this tale from Harry Belafonte. About a week before he was murdered, Dr. King faced a group of his erstwhile supporters in Mr. Belafonte’s New York City apartment, who criticized Dr. King for being “too radical.” In particular Andrew Young, future mayor of Atlanta and future UN ambassador, attacked Dr. King for his critical attitude toward capitalism.

Exhausted, and no doubt discouraged, Dr. King told the group, “What deeply troubles me now is that for all the steps we’ve taken toward integration, I’ve come to believe that we are integrating into a burning house.”

Asked by the group what then should they do, Dr. King replied, “I guess we’re just going to have to become firemen.”

The Wreath At Dr. King's Feet

The Wreath At Dr. King's Feet

 


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If you are having difficulties posting a comment, please email Daniel Van Riper. We are experimenting with our spam filters, and we do not want to exclude any legitimate commenters, just spammers!


Posted by:Joe
Posted on:02/10/2014
Comments:
Very good post. I wish you would post more often. I'm not certain whether your hopes for the new mayor will materialize, but it's interesting to note that you're putting that burden on her (lest she forget).


Posted by:Roger Green
Posted on:02/11/2014
Comments:
Yup, good stuff. She really is a fiscal corner, much of Jerry's making, and I don't know how this plays out without a lot more state largesse than I expect.


Posted by:PK Miller
Posted on:02/11/2014
Comments:
Wonderful column, Dan. I went to the MLK program at the Egg and was also quite impressed. Trekking to Lincoln Park & back was just too much. I kinda regret not going but some days walking is just not in the cards. Mayor Sheehan comes across as good people, personable, down to earth. McCoy is a windbag &I fear a stealth right winger. It's what comes of an unknown elected sans opponent--a coronation vs. election.


Posted by:Joe
Posted on:02/12/2014
Comments:
McCoy is neither a right nor a left winger. He's a no-winger. He's an opportunist trying to cash in on the voters' lack of attention. He's also an ignorant and ignorant people can be harmful leaders. The nursing home stunt was a clear indication of what this man is up to. The deal had corruption written all over it.


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