Lando 
Posted on 01/23/2005 7:33:44 AM PST by Lando Lincoln
Another January, another Martin Luther King, Jr. holiday. The observance has to a great extent deteriorated, as have many other holidays, into just a paid day off for people with government jobs and an opportunity for retailers to snatch whatever available credit remains on bankcards.
At the same time, there will be no shortage of worshipful speeches and articles about Dr. King, some of them bordering on idolatry. For the man has moved to the pantheon of secular saints.
Politicians of all persuasions have jumped on the MLK bandwagon. Last year we frequently were reminded that it was Ronald Reagan who signed the legislation establishing the King holiday. The President had misgivings, but was shrewd enough to recognize a veto-proof juggernaut when he saw one.
It’s easy to forget that when the minister was alive he was tremendously controversial. Questioning his methods or motives was not beyond the pale.
Today, saying anything that remotely could be construed as critical of Martin Luther King, Jr. is a certain ticket to being branded a racist or being measured for a tinfoil hat.
And I’m speaking here not about bringing up his alleged marital infidelities or his association with known Communists or even asking why the FBI’s tapings of the civil rights leader — authorized by liberal icon Bobby Kennedy — were sealed for 50 years.
As someone who lived through the period, what I remember most about Martin Luther King, Jr. is what he said about this Nation that now reveres him.
He charged in 1967 that the United States was " the greatest purveyor of violence in the world." He claimed that in Vietnam "we test out our latest weapons on them, just as the Germans tested out new medicine and new tortures in the concentration camps of Europe." He asserted that Americans might have killed a million Vietnamese civilians, "mostly children."
In the same speech, delivered in New York City’s Riverside Church, he detailed his objections to the Vietnam War, a struggle that many citizens viewed as a valiant effort to save people from the horrors of Communism.
The very first reason he cited for his opposition was this:
"There is at the outset a very obvious and almost facile connection between the war in Vietnam and the struggle I and others have been waging in America. A few years ago there was a shining moment in that struggle. It seemed as if there was a real promise of hope for the poor, both black and white, through the poverty program. There were experiments, hopes, new beginnings. Then came the buildup in Vietnam, and I watched this program broken and eviscerated as if it were some idle political plaything of a society gone mad on war. And I knew that America would never invest the necessary funds or energies in rehabilitation of its poor so long as adventures like Vietnam continued to draw men and skills and money like some demonic, destructive suction tube. So I was increasingly compelled to see the war as an enemy of the poor and to attack it as such."
King’s first objection to Vietnam, then, was that it diverted resources from the war on poverty. According to him, anti-poverty programs had been "eviscerated."
That wasn’t accurate even at the time he pronounced it. Lyndon Johnson declared the war on poverty in 1964. By the year King gave his Riverside Church speech, total welfare outlays by the federal government had almost doubled over those three years.
Spending on almost every facet of the welfare state had escalated. More tax dollars were being devoted to education, jobs training, community development and social services. Eviscerated? Not hardly.
Even liberals had qualms about King’s speech. Not with his ignorance of welfare expenditures, but with his irresponsible comments on Vietnam. The Washington Post editorialized that his speech "was filled with bitter and damaging allegations and inferences that he did not and could not document."
The editorial ended by noting: "Many who have listened to him with respect will never again accord him the same confidence. He has diminished his usefulness to his cause, to his country and to his people. And that is a great tragedy."
Martin Luther King exhibited a steadfast devotion to equal rights. He was a man of courage and eloquence. That can’t be taken away from him.
Nevertheless, his memory is severely tarnished by his unwarranted attacks on his own country and his naive faith in the efficacy of the welfare state. Acknowledging those aspects of his crusade isn’t racist. Just reality.
This appears in the January 13, 2005 Oak Lawn (IL) Reporter. Mike Bates is the author of Right Angles and Other Obstinate Truths, which is available at Barnesandnoble.com, Booksamillion.com, Amazon.com or iUniverse.com and can be ordered through most bookstores. http://www.michaelmbates.com
Lando
But Bates is going to do his damndest to try.
I have always wondered why so many people held this womanizing, plagiarizing Marxist in such high esteem. No one had the guts to tell it like it really was. I think the black community has many other leaders and heroes that had a better record in the community.
The government lied to us about Vietnam... it had no strategy for the winning the war. That was apparent to every one by 1968. Its true the Left's reasons for opposing the war had more to do with self-interest than the fact the aim was far from unjust. Could it have been different? What can be said for sure was that Vietnam above all was the beginning of the end of the American people's trust in the ability of public institutions to get things done right.
MLK was a communist. That can't be taken from him either. :-)
Like?
So people have labeled him. But he was also had the courage to step forward as a leader for the black community at a time and in a part of the country where being a leader was hazardous to one's health. You can't take that away from him either.
Just before the 67' riots in Newark, N.J., the King and his merry henchmen strode into town, stroked the fires of rebellion, and as if on cue left the city hours before the riot began.
Actually, it wasn't a riot, it was a looting rampage.
Nice sucker punch!
I can't come up with any respected black leaders from that era either.
Sounds like the scenario that occuredin Cicero, too!
Isn't that the way it was with a great number of King's "visits?" The civil rights rallies and then after he and his entourage (sp?) left there was civil unrest - in some cases very serious "unrest."
Like almost anyone. Edmund Brooke, George Washington Carver, etc. Just look today -- anyone not agreeing with keeping blacks on the plantation is called an "Uncle Tom" because they don't fit the stereotype they have placed upon themselves. Clarence Thomas, Condoleeza Rice, Colin Powell or any other black conservative are just not acceptable.
This is another thing about King that the public seems to have forgotten -- seems that every time he came to town, riots and looting broke out. Amazingly, he claimed to be non-violent, but violence always reared its ugly head when he was present.
True but...uh if my history is correct wasn't the largest buildup of the war performed by a Democrat (LBJ) so I don't believe that the left can wash there hands of Vietnam...as far as Dr. King is concerned, getting your message across without recrimination is a lot easier if you are a martyr...
I was a young officer then and fought a four day battle, in which 27 persons were killed.
The same thing happened in Jersey City, and, I'm sure, accross the country.
We're talking 50 years ago. Jim Crow, white's only facilities, segregated schools, back of the bus, and don't even think of trying to vote or eat at that white's only lunch counter. King stood up and said it was wrong. King, not Carver or 'Edmund Brooke' (could you be thinking Edward Brooke from Massachusetts?). In no small part because of him we as a nation recognize that when George Wallace stood and vowed 'segregation forever' he was 100 years behind the times. King, in his own way, helped make Colin Powell and Condoleeza Rice and Clarence Thomas possible, as any one of the three would be the first to admit.
For example?
I have the guts to tell it like it was. No historical figure is or was perfect, as is no human. Many had skeltons in their closets...affairs, dubious liasons, etc. However, MLK was a catalyst for equal rights in America. He did not do this alone, but he was the one pushed forward as a leader.
Many can talk, as we do here; but few have the tenacity or public charisma to actually effect change. You don't have to love him, you don't even have to like him; however, credit should be given where credit is due. Martin Luther King opened the eyes to injustice in America.
Many gave their lives so that all America's children have the freedoms and liberties that they do. When people are praying for the troops that fight this day to stamp out oppression in the world, they pray for the troops as whole. There is no selection process in that.
Just as MLK himself was assassinated, maybe his character was, as well. Even if he was not perfect, he was human. He had the courage to follow through on his convictions, to correct an injustice. While some people may find it distasteful, he was not just a black leader, he was an American leader. That, IMO, is telling it like it was.
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