Unprecedented: Members of rival gangs Crips and Blood united with Nation Of Islam in the streets in an apparent show of solidarity
Posted on 04/27/2015 11:21:55 PM PDT by Cincinatus' Wife
Louis Farrakhan, rising: With rap’s superstars at his side, the Nation of Islam leader steps forward in the new fight for civil rights
Farrakhan’s Nation of Islam was credited by protesters on the ground in Baltimore with establishing a gang truce in the city to unify black Baltimore against the police. The NOI and its well-dressed Fruit of Islam were on the ground in Ferguson, as well, in a leadership role.
Lord only knows what sort of paranoiac frenzy Glenn Beck would spiral into were he to discover this recent trend in hip-hop: Rappers are increasingly seeking the wisdom and counsel of Minister Louis Farrakhan, leader of the Nation of Islam. And not just the Muslim rappers you’d expect, like Lupe Fiasco or Mos Def; since the beginning of the year, superstar rappers like Kanye West, Young Jeezy and Killer Mike have all met with Farrakhan.
I can see Glenn Beck flying between multiple chalkboards, manically scrawling the connections proving the imminent danger of some coming caliphate. How had we not seen it all along?! ISIS HAS INFILTRATED THE MINDS OF OUR YOUTH THROUGH THEIR HIPPITY HOPPITY!
Beck would be wrong, as usual, to make the ominous links, but the trend does signify something of a shift in attitudes. Black Islam occupies a particular place in the civil rights struggle: Malcolm X’s “by any means” militancy versus Dr. King’s conciliatory nonviolence. The turn toward black Islam might indicate disappointment and an impatience with the lack of progress made during the Obama years.
Kanye West met with Farrakhan in January, bringing wife Kim Kardashian and baby North. The minister and rapper had “a beautiful meeting,” said Farrakhan. The two spoke on the state of rap music in this turbulent time in race relations, and Farrakhan was glad to see rappers “becoming conscious now,” lending their voice to battling injustice. Kanye mentioned the meeting, or perhaps another, on the first single off his upcoming album, referring to Farrakhan as his “sensei.”
Jay Z publicly celebrates black Islam, despite controversially flirting with agnosticism. On his last album, Hov begins the song “Heaven” with a line whose reference likely eluded most listeners: “Arm, Leg, Leg, Arm, Head,” a cryptic naming of Allah used by Five Percenters, an offshoot of the Nation of Islam. Hov has also been seen rocking a chain with a Five Percenter medallion.
Killer Mike, one-half of the critically acclaimed Run the Jewels, met with Farrakhan in January, as well. Like Jay Z, Killer Mike is openly skeptical of organized religion, making each rapper’s acceptance of black Islam particularly stand out.
Even Young Jeezy met with Farrakhan earlier this month. Jeezy–unlike Hov, Mike and Yeezy–does not often tend toward political or “conscious” rap. Jeezy is more of a trap rapper than the others, but he calls Farrakhan his “mentor” and posted a proud photo on Instagram of his meeting with the minister.
Farrakhan is back. He’s fostered relationships with a number of premier rappers, and seeing something of a power vacuum in black leadership, the controversial cleric is moving in to align a more radical approach to racism. He’s rallying black Americans to be ready for an eventual eruption in the face of police violence in communities of color. “You’ve got to prepare your people for what is coming down!” he screams as he recounts the uprising in Ferguson, Missouri, and what he sees as the failure of black leaders to appropriately respond–to actually change a system under which virtually every black man feels threatened. He indicts Obama and former Attorney General Eric Holder, as well as inveterate civil rights activist Jesse Jackson. Black preachers are called out for being “pacifiers for the white man’s tyranny.”
Farrakhan’s Nation of Islam was credited by protesters on the ground in Baltimore with establishing a gang truce in the city to unify black Baltimore against the police. The NOI and its well-dressed Fruit of Islam were on the ground in Ferguson, as well, in a leadership role.
“This is a new generation and they don’t want to hear your compromising talk!” he screams. What they do want to hear, though, is rap music. Rappers are listened to. Kanye West and Jay Z are listened to. Killer Mike is listened to — he even attended the 2015 White House Correspondents Dinner and was ushered about by none other than Arianna Huffington. Jeezy speaks to a different audience than Mike, even, and so on through the growing list of rappers Farrakhan has met with in recent months.
Speaking at an Atlanta banquet for music and media figures, Farrakhan and Killer Mike shared an emotional exchange in which Farrakhan implored Mike and other rappers to speak truth to power and to use the mic for dissent. “It’s getting to the point that it’s throw-down time,” he warns, “and you are the one to wake your people up and unite them.”
A particularly contentious period of disagreement coincides with the twilight of President Obama’s tenure and the recent emergence of a robust national discourse about police violence against black Americans, structural racism in general, and white privilege. The recent high-profile beef between professors Michael Eric Dyson and Cornel West exposed a rift in the black academy. Dr. West, Tavis Smiley and others parted ways with President Obama fairly early and now criticize the first black president in no uncertain terms. Killer Mike is similarly skeptical of Obama. (Jay Z, on the other hand, remains in support of the president.)
A radical contingent is emerging, and it appears that Minister Farrakhan is looking to lead a youthful rebellion against what he sees as a dangerously conservative footing. His message is not like the peaceful pleas of Obama and civil rights elders; his anger is more like disciple Killer Mike’s, the rapper who asks on Run the Jewels 2’s most popular song, “When you n****s gon’ unite and kill the police, motherfuckas?” In a sermon earlier this year, Farrakhan announced his challenge to the government, quoting the Quran: “Do you want me…to ask our people to retaliate in ‘matters of the slain,’ a life for a life? Is that what you’re driving us to?!” The congregation of hundreds erupted into a standing ovation.
Farrakhan, 81, is probably not the right person to lead a movement dependent on 20- and 30-something rappers. But his recent reemergence as a venerable leader and teacher does reveal a hunger for radicalism that is not being met by the more placable leadership of Obama and the mainstream elders of the civil rights era. As each new revelation of police violence makes headlines and sends angry Americans into the streets, the chances for moderate leaders to reach the youth seems to diminish. You may have problems with Farrakhan’s violent rhetoric and apocalypticism — it’s hard not to, to one degree or another. But his reentry onto the national stage is nothing if not a product of inaction. He goes away when things get better.
According to the department, they received credible information that various gangs including the Black Guerilla Family, Bloods and Crips have entered into the partnership.
“Law enforcement agencies should take appropriate precautions to ensure the safety of their officers,” the department said in a press release. ....." Washington CBS
"...The Black Guerrilla Family was started by the charismatic George Jackson in 1966 at San Quentin State Prison in northern California. Its identifying tattoos and symbols are the letters "B-G-F," the corresponding numbers 2-7-6, a crossed machete and rifle, or a black dragon climbing a San Quentin prison tower. It's the most political of the four major prison gangs in the California system, and has set a goal to the overthrow the U.S. government. Because of its espoused revolutionary ideals, the gang has an unusual mix of allies and supporters.
At times, even its natural enemies in the Mexican Mafia and Aryan Brotherhood have come to the aid of the B.G.F. Its supporters include the American Indian Movement, Symbionese Liberation Army, Weather Underground, Tribal Thumb, Red Guerrilla Family, Chicano Liberation Front, United Prisoners Union, Venceremos Organization, National Lawyers Guild, and Prison Law Collective.
The gang was founded by George Jackson, a former Black Panther and excellent orator who rallied inmates by speaking about the system's injustice to prisoners, especially black inmates. He believed thst the Black Panthers were not radical enough and didn't represent imprisoned black men well. He vowed to form an organization that would support his imprisoned people like a family and become a vanguard in the coming revolution against the U.S. government.
The group was originally called the Family or the Black Family. It also went by the Black Vanguard and the Black Foco. Lawyers and paralegals from the National Lawyers Guild helped write the constitution for the B.G.F., which is structured on a paramilitary ranking system and Marxist-Maoist politics. Many of the communication systems utilized by B.G.F. involve the Swahili language, and all the leaders have Swahili names in addition to their true names and gang monikers. The B.G.F. oath (see above) was required to be memorized and recited upon initiation into the prison gang......
.......In 1977, a group organized within the B.G.F. in the headquarters cities of Oakland and San Francisco that called itself the Black August Organizing Committee (B.A.O.C.). Its purpose was to unite all Blacks in West Coast gangs on the street and in prison under one banner.
The Black Panther Party (B.P.P.) was founded in 1968 also from Oakland. Eldridge Cleaver from San Francisco, Hugo Pinel at San Quentin, Elmer Pratt at Susanville, Red Burton in Los Angeles and Bobby Seal in Colorado were among the B.P.P. leadership. They had close associations with B.G.F. founder George Jackson and others in the B.G.F. They also supported the B.A.O.C. and the Nation of Islam (N.O.I.) and Louis Farrakhan as well. This strange coalition has lead to the BGF as it exists today..................."
All encouraged through the big racist mouth of Obama IMO.
I suppose that Obama’s just now hearing about this from cable news.
He was watching that for decades in his old church.
There, fixed.
" A former top deputy to Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan tells Newsmax that Barack Obama’s ties to the black nationalist movement in Chicago run deep, and that for many years the two men have had “an open line between them” to discuss policy and strategy, either directly or through intermediaries.
“Remember that for years, if you were a politician in Chicago, you had to have some type of relationship with Louis Farrakhan. You had to. If you didn’t, you would be ostracized out of black Chicago,” said Dr. Vibert White Jr., who spent most of his adult life as a member and ultimately top officer of the Nation of Islam.
White broke with the group in 1995 and is now a professor of African-American history at the University of Central Florida in Orlando.
White said Obama was “part of the Chicago scene” where Farrakhan, Jesse Jackson, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright Jr. and radicals would go to each other’s events and support each other’s causes.
“Even though Chicago is the third-largest city in the country, within the black community, the political and militant nationalist community is very small. So it wouldn’t be uncommon for [Obama and Farrakhan] to show up at events together, or at least be there and communicate with each other,” White told Newsmax......................................
....Obama spoke at length with the Chicago Reader upon his return from the Million Man March. “What I saw was a powerful demonstration of an impulse and need for African-American men to come together to recognize each other and affirm our rightful place in the society," he said.
“These are mean, cruel times, exemplified by a ‘lock ’em up, take no prisoners’ mentality that dominates the Republican-led Congress,” Obama said.
“Historically, African-Americans have turned inward and towards black nationalism whenever they have a sense, as we do now, that the mainstream has rebuffed us, and that white Americans couldn't care less about the profound problems African-Americans are facing."
“Black nationalism” is a current of thought and political action in the African-American community that has been championed by the likes of Farrakhan, Wright, Malcolm X, the Black Panthers and Khalid al-Mansour. Obama discussed his attraction to black nationalism at length in his 1995 memoir “Dreams of My Father.”
Obama further parsed his words in a Feb. 25, 2008, presentation to a Jewish community meeting in Cleveland, Ohio, where he insisted that Wright “does not have a close relationship with Louis Farrakhan.”
And yet, just months earlier, Wright’s Trumpet magazine gave Farrakhan its Lifetime Achievement Dr. Jeremiah A. Wright Jr. Trumpeter Award, saying that Farrakhan “truly epitomized greatness.”
That award was the fruit of a long and deep relationship between the two men, White told Newsmax. In 1984, Wright accompanied Farrakhan on his much-criticized trip to meet Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi, at a time when Gadhafi was considered an enemy of the United States.
Wright also accompanied Farrakhan and Jackson to Syria in 1986, where they successfully negotiated with Syrian strongman for the release of downed American pilot Robert O. Goodman.............."
The two spoke on the state of rap music in this turbulent time in race relations, and Farrakhan was glad to see rappers “becoming conscious now,” lending their voice to battling injustice.
lies. Rap like the Message by GrandmasterFlash spoke of injustice while the top 20 Billboard rap music objectifyies women as sex objects.
"Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan went on a fiery tirade about Ferguson on Saturday — threatening that if the demands of protesters aren’t met, “we’ll tear this goddamn country apart!”
Farrakhan stated in his speech — given at Morgan State University, a black college located in Baltimore, Md. — that violence was justified in response to the decision not to indict officer Darren Wilson and peaceful protests are only in the interest of “white folks.”
“We going to die anyway. Let’s die for something,” the radical figure told the crowd to roaring applause.
He even said the parents of teenagers should teach their kids how to throw Molotov cocktails. “Teach your baby how to throw the bottle if they can. Fight,” the minister advised, and then imitated throwing the explosive device......."
Radical Roots
"Valerie Jarrett was born as Valerie Bowman on November 14, 1956 to American parents in Shiraz, Iran. Her later father—a physician named James Bowman—worked as a pathologist and geneticist at a children’s hospital in Shiraz as part of a U.S. aid program to assist developing countries.
Jarrett's mother is the early-childhood-education author Barbara Taylor Bowman (born 1928), who in 1966 co-founded a Chicago-based graduate school in child development known as the Erikson Institute, named after the psychoanalyst Erik Erikson; in 1950 Erikson became a hero to the left by choosing to resign from his professorship at the University of California rather than sign an anti-communist loyalty oath as the school required. Indicative of the Erikson Institute's radical political orientation is the fact that its board of trustees has included, in addition to Mrs. Bowman, such figures as Tom Ayers (father of the former Weather Underground terrorist and lifelong Marxist Bill Ayers) and Bernardine Dohrn (longtime wife of Bill Ayers). Bill Ayers, for his part, called Mrs. Bowman “a neighbor and friend” in his 1997 book A Kind and Just Parent, noting that his neighbors also included Louis Farrakhan and “writer Barack Obama.”
Jarrett's maternal grandfather was a Chicagoan named Robert Taylor, the first African-American head of the Chicago Housing Authority. In the 1940s he was involved with such Communist fronts as the American Peace Mobilization and the Chicago Civil Liberties Committee. Also a member of these groups was Frank Marshall Davis, the communist journalist who in the 1970s would mentor a young Barack Obama.
Jarrett's maternal grandmother, Dorothy Taylor, was a Berkeley, California native who was active with Planned Parenthood in its early years.
When Valerie Jarrett was five, her family relocated to London for one year before settling in Chicago’s elite Hyde Park neighborhood in 1963.
Jarrett earned a B.A. in psychology from Stanford University in 1978, and a Juris Doctorate from the University of Michigan Law School in 1981. From 1981-87 she practiced law at two Chicago-based private firms. In 1983 she married Dr. William Robert Jarrett, son of the Chicago Sun-Times reporter Vernon Jarrett.
Vernon Jarrett (Valerie Jarrett's father-in-law) was a pioneering black journalist in the 1940s. He freelanced at Kansas City’s The Call from 1954-58, then returned to Chicago to become the first nationally syndicated black columnist for the communist-influenced Chicago Defender, where he wrote columns extolling the Communist poet Langston Hughes and lifelong Stalinists W.E.B. DuBois and Paul Robeson. Also in the 1940s, Jarrett was a leader of the Chicago chapter of American Youth for Democracy—youth wing of the Communist Party USA (CPUSA). Moreover, he served on a publicity committee for the Packinghouse Workers Union, a Chicago-based entity dominated by the CPUSA. In each of these endeavors, Vernon Jarrett had close contact with the Communist Frank Marshall Davis. When Jarrett died in 2004, he was saluted in the pages of People’s Weekly Worker, the house organ of the CPUSA........."
[He even said the parents of teenagers should teach their kids how to throw Molotov cocktails. “Teach your baby how to throw the bottle if they can. Fight,” the minister advised, and then imitated throwing the explosive device.......”]
When will a UFO arrive to spirit this nutcase away?
Seriously, no radical like an old radical I guess.
“....Not only are we seeking to improve security here in the prisons, but we are also seeking to improve security throughout our state,” said Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley (D) at a press conference at the Baltimore jail Friday morning. “These are pretty deadly instruments for gangs to use to intimidate witnesses on the outside, to order hits on rival gangs.”
.....The need to crackdown on contraband cellphones has intensified with exposure of the workings of the Black Guerilla Family, a prison gang that’s also known as BGF. The gang blossomed in Maryland’s correctional facilities around 2008, thanks in part to the “proliferation of cell phones inside of prisons,” according to a November indictment.
The gang collected dues, along with a tax on drugs and other contraband that was smuggled into the jail, all of which was overseen by a “Minister of Finance,” according to the indictment. A gang leader, Tavon White, impregnated four female guards — one was impregnated twice — during a three-year stay, according to the indictment. Two guards had “Tavon” tattooed on their bodies.
The indictment states that BGF members and associates engaged in criminal activities “including, but not limited to, trafficking in controlled substances, bribery, extortion, money laundering, obstruction of justice, assault, robbery, murder and witness retaliation.”....."
Unprecedented: Members of rival gangs Crips and Blood united with Nation Of Islam in the streets in an apparent show of solidarity
"Washington (CNN)Newly sworn-in Attorney General Loretta Lynch said Monday night the Justice Department will continue its investigation into the death of Freddie Gray and send two top officials to Baltimore in an effort to quell the riots unfolding there.
Lynch met Monday evening with President Barack Obama to discuss the riots in Baltimore. The meeting was not called specifically as a result of the situation in Baltimore, the White House said, but Lynch told Obama she'd be monitoring the situation there.
"As our investigative process continues, I strongly urge every member of the Baltimore community to adhere to the principles of nonviolence," Lynch said in a statement. "In the days ahead, I intend to work with leaders throughout Baltimore to ensure that we can protect the security and civil rights of all residents. And I will bring the full resources of the Department of Justice to bear in protecting those under threat, investigating wrongdoing, and securing an end to violence."
Obama also spoke with Baltimore Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake on Monday, while his senior adviser, Valerie Jarrett, spoke with Maryland Gov. Larry Hogan, the White House said. ...
.....Hogan, the recently elected Republican, signed an executive order Monday evening declaring a state of emergency and activating Maryland's National Guard. In a statement, he said the "looting and acts of violence in Baltimore will not be tolerated."
.."Look, people have the right to protest and express their frustration," Hogan said at a Monday night press conference. "But Baltimore city families deserve peace and safety in their community, and these acts of violence and destruction of property cannot and will not be tolerated."......
"...........................Before getting to the new things in Believer, here’s a brief summary of what I’ve previously reported on Axelrod’s upbringing:
David Axelrod was born and raised in New York in February 1955 before moving to Chicago in the 1970s to attend college and begin a professional path that would take him into journalism, political campaigns, and eventually the bosom of Barack Hussein Obama. In a very interesting twist of fate in Chicago, Axelrod (like Obama) had his own mentors there — namely, in the Canter family.
The Canters were old hardline pro-Soviet communists, so much so that the senior Canter, Harry Jacob Canter, was actually brought to Moscow during the height of the Stalin period to work for the Soviet government as an official translator of Lenin’s writings. Harry was active in the old Industrial Workers of the World and had been secretary of the Boston Communist Party. He was not shy about his political enthusiasm. In 1930, he ran for governor of Massachusetts on the Communist Party ticket. After that, he sojourned to the Motherland, taking his entire family to Moscow with him, including his son David, who one day would come know David Axelrod.
The Canter family returned to America (Chicago, where the Communist Party was founded in 1919) in the 1940s. In an amazing irony, the Canters actually knew and worked with Obama’s old communist mentor, Frank Marshall Davis. I even found the Canter names in Davis’s communist newspaper, The Chicago Star. Remarkably, one of the Canters was on the board of a group called the Progressive Publishing Co., which purchased the Star from Davis in 1948, helping grease the skids for Davis’s departure for Hawaii, where he would eventually meet a young Obama.
(For the record, as I’ve noted separately, Davis — again, Obama’s mentor — also knew and worked with Valerie Jarrett’s grandfather and father-in-law in Communist Party/left-wing circles in Chicago in the 1940s.)
The Canter family member who knew David Axelrod best was David Canter. He and another old communist maneuverer from Chicago named Don Rose would mentor David Axelrod and help him secure his first major newspaper jobs at the Hyde Park Herald and then the Chicago Tribune. Axelrod is the first to admit that those jobs launched him......"
He’s less relevant than bell bottoms.
Farrakhan walked into the voting spot to vote with Ayres and 0bama in 2008.
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