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Wake Up
Questions bring the truth and without questioning lying is made that much easier. Due to this it is extremely important to question the government and furthermore hold it accountable when mistakes are made. Without pressure from the people towards the government, the government may violate the rights of citizens and may fail to realize that the citizens ultimately control the country. As seen in the film “American Blackout” Cynthia McKinney and America question the government on several events that occur including the 2000 Presidential election, the 9/11 attacks and the 2004 election.
It is the year 2000, the end of the 20th century and the start to the Bush “Stolen Election.” Cynthia Mckinney states “I don’t believe the American people even till this day, really understand what happened in Florida 2000.” (American Blackout). As many in the film American Blackout recall, blacks in the state of Florida were being kept from voting. As difficult as it is to grasp such a
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thought, efforts to prevent black votes even included road blocks to stop the blacks from reaching the voting booth. Thousands were even placed on the convicted felon list which in doing so prevents any chance of voting. A whopping 97% of those placed on the list were either blacks or Latinos (American Blackout). The suppression of the black votes in Florida ultimately led to introduction of George Bush into the oval office as Bush stated winning Florida led to needed electoral votes to win the election. Questioning the government on such an event is important as this led to 8 years of George Bush in office. Questioning the government in such manner inserts fear and stop future attempts of such sort from occurring. On 9/11/2001 the unthinkable took place in Manhattan as two planes crash and demolish the iconic twin towers. The nation is left in total shock and disbelief looking for who to blame. While the nation searches Cynthia McKinney finds in who to blame, “Someone like me is going to want to get to the heart of the battle, to the root, to the truth.” (American Blackout). With that said McKinney follows to become one of the first to blame the government in the 9/11 attacks. “Now is the time for our elected officials to be a held accountable... Why aren’t the hard questions being asked?” McKinney stated this after being informed that the government received numerous warnings prior to 9/11 yet chose to ignore the warnings. President Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney even asked Tom Daschle not to investigate the happenings of 9/11 forcing the world to ask, what do they have to hide? As time passes by more and more people rally together searching for the truth and more and more continue to question the government and hold officials accountable. After the occurrence in the presidential election in 2000 one would think that the government would never give another attempt at a dishonest act like the one before hand.
However in 2004 further disenfranchisement of black voters continues in Ohio as officials take voter machines from predominately black areas and move them to more affluent and white areas. Although the voter registration increased by 27% how can the voters vote with machine shortage? (American Blackout). In one area where 62% of the population voted for George Bush in the previous election machines were no problem and lines were not formed. Nevertheless in the inner city blacks wait in stretched lines to vote. Only 2741 machines are delivered with 125 missing and within records all 125 came in predominately black neighborhoods. This forces some to move to other regions to vote and even them some of the voters are not on the list. Their next option? To submit a provisional ballot which will not count towards to
election. “The election is over and the results couldn’t be clearer, why are we wasting our time on silly Hollywood conspiracy theories?” This statement said by Congressman Rick Keller in the American Blackout film is the reason citizens should question the government and hold it accountable for costly mistakes. By letting the government loose on “Citizen Activism and citizen participation is always the answer.” (American Blackout).
Here, though, the focus is primarily on the Committee’s voter registration initiative starting in 1964. This documentary provides a more historical perspective, and offers glimpses into the strategies used in Selma, Alabama to obtain social change. It shows how those within the group questioned the effectiveness of the protests and the march, and
Gilmore argues that African American male political participation between 1890 and 1898 represented a movement toward greater inclusion. She claims that African American males in politics strove for the balance of power between political parties in North Carolina, and that the Populist-Republican victory in 1896 kept African American votes in contention and maintained some African American men in political office for a short period of time. There was an agreement between African Americans and whites that the “Best Men,” middle class African Americans, were to be the only African Americans to hold office. This was because by being dubbed the “Best Men,” they had met certain standards and were suitable for office according to the white politicians. The “Best Men” clashed with the South’s “New White Man,” who sought to re-monopolize voting rights and political power, as well as to completely dominate African Americans. Gilmore attributes the “New White Man’s” goals to these men’s bitterness towards their fathers who were blamed for the defeat in the Civil War, southern underdevelopment, and black progress. Nonetheless, African American men rapidly increased power in politics when many positions became publicly elected.
When America was first established, they had the highest voting turnouts ever in American history. Ever since, America’s voting turn-out has dropped (Fortin). The reason for the high turn outs were because American colonists wanted change from the British’s electoral system. As history writes, American colonist rebel and over time becomes one of the greatest countries ever. Today, Americans are one of the worst countries in vote to registration as they rank 120 in the world (Pintor). Over the summer, I got to learn more about Ohio’s electoral system and voting turn outs in a first hand experience. A decreasing number of voting to registration is not only a national problem, but a local issue as well and there are creative ideas in fixing these
She said “Before Emmett Till, I had known the fear of hunger, hell and the Devil, but now there was a new fear known to me – the fear of being killed just because I was black.” Moody’s mother is terrified that Moody knows about the murder because she recognized this awareness of the blatant discrimination and savage violence of whites towards blacks would make young Moody inclined to speak out and act in retaliation. One of the large obstacles that the Civil Rights movement faced in Moody’s later experience was a lack of participation from people like who mother who were so brainwashed by white dominance that they would rather live as inferiors rather than risk meeting the wrath of segregationists. Moody is infuriated by the African-American community’s acceptance of it’s lowly position in society. In one incident later in the book, Moody is giving out donated clothes to black in need, and the immense crowd that shows up maddens her with their hypocrisy. “ ‘Here they are,’ I thought, ‘all standing around waiting to be given something. Last week after the church bombing they turned their heads when they passed this office. … After I give them clothes, they probably won’t even look at me next week, let alone go and register to vote.” Her prediction is correct, as only about 80,000 out of the 400,000 African Americans in Mississippi participate in the Freedom vote, designed to demonstrate
On the date May 26, 1956, two female students from Florida Agricultural and Mechanical University, Wilhelmina Jakes and Carrie Patterson, had taken a seat down in the whites only section of a segregated bus in the city of Tallahassee, Florida. When these women refused to move to the colored section at the very back of the bus, the driver had decided to pull over into a service station and call the police on them. Tallahassee police arrested them and charged them with the accusation of them placing themselves in a position to incite a riot. In the days after that immediately followed these arrests, students at the Florida Agricultural and Mechanical University organized a huge campus-wide boycott of all of the city buses. Their inspiring stand against segregation set an example and an intriguing idea that had spread to tons of Tallahassee citizens who were thinking the same things and brought a change of these segregating ways into action. Soon, news of the this boycott spread throughout the whole entire community rapidly. Reverend C.K. Steele composed the formation of an organization known as the Inter-Civic Council (ICC) to manage the logic and other events happening behind the boycott. C.K. Steele and the other leaders created the ICC because of the unfounded negative publicity surrounding the National Associat...
Although an effort is made in connecting with the blacks, the idea behind it is not in understanding the blacks and their culture but rather is an exploitative one. It had an adverse impact on the black community by degrading their esteem and status in the community. For many years, the political process also had been influenced by the same ideas and had ignored the black population in the political process (Belk, 1990). America loves appropriating black culture — even when black people themselves, at times, don’t receive much love from America.
Voting is one of the citizens’ rights living in a country. In the past, not everyone can vote. Voting used to be for only white American men. However, our ancestors fought for that rights. Eventually, any American who are older than eighteen can vote, despite their race or gender. In addition, voter turnout is used to keep track of the voting. It is the percentage of eligible voters who cast a ballot in an election. Unfortunately, the voter turnout has been decreasing over time, and it means that there are less and fewer people who actually show up and vote. This essay will discuss the voter turnout in Harris County, Texas.
Hasen, Richard. "Voter Suppression's New Pretext." the New York Times 16 November 2013: A- 19. Print.
"The two races have lived here together. The Negro has been here in America since 1619, a total of 344 years. He is not going anywhere else; this country is his home. He wants to do his part to help make his city, state, and nation a better place for everyone, regardless of color and race. Let me appeal to the consciences of many silent, responsible citizens of the white community who know that a victory for democracy in Jackson will be a victory for democracy everywhere” (Medgar Evers in Jackson Mississippi, 2013). This excerpt is taken from a 17 minute speech by Medgar Evers on May 20, 1963, in response to the vocal criticisms of Mayor Allen Thompson’s view of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) as being ‘outside agitators’.
She first presented her insights with an elaborate historical background of how, a century later, the Jim Crow Laws are still present in our society. Alexander introduces us to the Cotton family who were denied their right to participate in the American electoral democracy on not only one or two occasion, but on several occasions. Alexander suggests that this denial is a generational wrong by the government, as she highlights the injustices that the Cotton family encountered as black individuals born in the United States. Jarvious Cotton’s great-great-grandfather could not vote because he was a slave. His great-grandfather was beaten to death by the Ku Klux Klan for attempting to vote. His grandfather was highly intimidated by the Ku Klux Klan. His father was subjected to a literacy test that prevented him from voting. Now, Jarvious Cotton cannot vote because he, like many other black men in the United States, has been labeled as a felon and is on parole (Alexander 1). According to Alexander, once one is given the title of a “felon” the old forms of discrimination arise: unemployment, housing, education, public services and denial of the right to vote the list goes on and on (Alexander
Sobel, Lester A. “Vote Campaign in Selma.” Civil Rights 1960-66. New York: Facts on File 1967.
With the passing of the Fifteenth Amendment, Blacks earned the right to vote. This, although powerful in appearance, had little effect on the segregation that Atlanta’s white population had adopted. Black voters boosted the presence of the Republican Party, but not enough to over through that of the Democrats. As Atlanta’s growth subsided and the military presence was lifted, blacks left the inner city, taking refuge on the outskirts of town. Atlanta had seemingly succeeded in its goals. It welcomed northerners with open arms, but dealt with the blacks by simply shunting them to one side. Over time, blacks and whites simply lived life apart from one another.
...s in the political elections. None of what has happened would be explained above if the North and the Supreme Court if they did not team together and give their approval to disenfranchisement laws when these things were in complete violation of the Fourteenth Amendment. The poll tax lived on for couple more decades, until the Twenty-Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution was completed in 1964 where it then declared poll taxes unconstitutional in all states. This large disparity between the black voters and white voters in Louisiana, therefore, it had become common to southern states in the 1900’s because of the disabling poll tax. This above event was a complete and total challenge for the black voters of the United States when the Fourteenth Amendment was being challenged by those who didn’t want to follow the rules that were given to them by the Supreme Court.
Michelle Alexander starts by talking about a guy named Jarvis Cotton’s who father, father's father, and fathers father father didnt couldn't vote because of Klu Klux Klan intimidation and poll taxes. Cotton couldn't vote either because of a felony conviction. Our country coerced African-American males as a key to the original union; even at this period in time black males aren't still able to vote due to their criminal backgrounds. They are faced with prejudices not just in the criminal system but also in housing, employment, voting, food stamps, jury service much like what blacks were faced with when the Jim Crow laws were enacted. Alexander was delighted when we got our first black president Barack Obama and thought of Jim Crow as being a thing of the past. Alexander hadn't noticed a new racist social system, and when she began working for the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) she seen that there was racism in the criminal justice system but that was it.However she found more like the War on Drugs that a lot of people think got started during the epidemic crack in the eighties and nineties, but then president Ronald Reagan actually declared it before the drug got all over the news. Also surprisingly the so-called War on Drugs began when the country was seeing a decrease in illegal drug usage.The war made the United States incarceration rate higher than anywhere else.
These are the words of Jesselyn Radack, a whistleblower who promoted transparency by exposing the truth to Americans. From the birth of this country, Americans have valued transparency in the government. Still, there are instances where the government is allowed to keep secrets from the American people. There has been ongoing debate on whether the American Federal government should be allowed to keep secrets from the American people. Whistleblowers are important is this debate because of their fail-safe method of creating transparency. There are three central reasons to prevent government secrecy. First, Secrecy goes against our American values. Second, Americans should have a transparent government. Third, Secrecy can harm the government and American people. To summarize, Governmental secrecy must be stopped because it is unconstitutional and undemocratic, transparency is a necessary check of the government, and governmental secrecy can lead to corruption.