[Marxism] McKinney, Green Party and the Reconstruction Movement Represent our Resistance (Dr. Lenore Daniels)

[Steffie Brooks]

I'm excerpting this front page article from the current issue of
blackcommentator.com by a member of its editorial board, Dr. Lenore
Daniels. (and giving you the url for the full article)

It is yet another indication that the McKinney campaign is being taken
very seriously by the Black Left.

On various Green Party lists, more and more people are declaring for
McKinney, sometimes for a joint ticket with Ralph Nader for VP, and
one Westchester, NY supporter of McKinney has been pushing the
attractive idea of a McKinney/Sheehan ticket with Ralph Nader as the
designee for Attorney General of the United States.

Steffie Brooks
NYC


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McKinney, Green Party and the Reconstruction Movement Represent our Resistance
by Dr. Lenore Daniels
Black Commentator Editorial Board

http://www.blackcommentator.com/258/258_represent_our_resistance_mckinney.html

snip

Who will speak of the interests of the Black, Latino/a, working class,
and poor?  Who will do more than speak?

To use the words of long time San Francisco activist, Roland Sheppard,
Former Congresswoman, Cynthia McKinney, has decided that she "can't
reform a deformed organization" — this in reference to McKinney's
departure from the Democratic Party.  She announced her bid for
president in 2008, running on the Green Party ticket.  McKinney was
here in Madison, Wisconsin last week at the invitation of the local
Green Party.  Local Green Party leader, Larry Dooley, said that he
believes McKinney "agreed to run as a Green (maybe, in part, because
of the work that Malik and others are doing in New Orleans) so she is
willing to give us a chance." Malik Rahm, founder and head of
Commongrounds in New Orleans, is a firm member of the Green Party.
"If McKinney becomes a candidate, I will become involved in her
campaign," Rahm told me. "The Green Party is a global political party"
with branches outside the U.S. "It is the only party," Rahm added,
"advocating for saving our environment. Fighting for human rights is
crucial, but if you can't breathe or can't drink water, you are in
trouble," he said.  Rahm is aware that the Green Party New Orleans has
a better representation of Black members than in other branches
throughout the U.S.  Rahm acknowledges that we "live in a racist
society," but he is committed to making the Green Party "the type of
Party that it could be." In turn, the National Green Party, "as a
whole," Rahm pointed out, "is missing a golden opportunity" if it does
not reach out to bring in African Americans."

While Malik Rahm believes that this "is no time to organize new
parties," New Orleans is, nonetheless, the home of a new grassroots
party formed from existing organizations — the Greens of New Orleans
and People's Hurricane Relief Fund (PHRF), and others.  The
Reconstruction Party (RP) also talked of McKinney running for
president on their ticket.  According to Bill Leumer, "The
Reconstruction Party: A New Political Development," the Reconstruction
Party is a political party attempting to "offer working class Blacks,
working people in general and the poor an alternative to the two
capitalist parties." The RP developed a year ago by "abandoned"
victims of the hurricane.  "The Party focuses on issues fundamental to
working people." Kali Akuno, lead organizer of RP, said that the Party
still had to work out its "structural and political agenda," and, in
the meantime, the RP expects to meet with McKinney on December 20,
2007.  Sakura Kone, Public Communications, Commonground, looks
favorably toward the efforts of the RP party. While Commonground is a
non-profit organization and, therefore, can't endorse the
Reconstruction Party or McKinney's campaign for president, Kone
recognizes that "Blacks have not benefited" from the thirty years of
Blacks in politics, and it is time, at least for change.

McKinney's Power to the People Campaign offers that chance for change.
 We would have to come together in the recognition that conflict and
confusion is a way of being because it is the way of capitalism for
those seeking Empire and for many on the Left seeking reforms that
maintain their way of life. McKinney's commitment to the struggle of
people on the edge justifies support for her campaign.

I was not in attendance at the press conference or at the
invitation-only session with "local activists" on December 11, 2007,
here in Madison, Wisconsin.  The Left has a determined agenda in this
era of struggle against Empire. As one friend suggested, Blacks in
Madison experienced the "ghost of McKinney" — temporarily.



On that day, however, McKinney called on listeners of Wisconsin Public
Radio, to understand that the "immediate impact of the economic and
political outcome of Bush's agenda has fallen on Blacks and Latino/as.
The continued funding of war has stripped education, employment,
health care, and environmental programs in the Black communities," she
said.  She spoke of the one million Black voters who had their votes
"not counted." McKinney said that she was angry that Blacks were
"disenfranchised" by people who denied them the vote. "In some
communities hope is extremely rare." But these are "the people whose
voices we must hear," McKinney told the radio audience. "War cannot be
our energy policy." She decided to campaign on the Green Party ticket,
because members of the Green Party "supported her in the past." We can
only hope that the Green Party recognizes not just an electoral
opportunity but a movement that would shift the people on the edge
agenda to the front and center of this campaign. Perhaps when McKinney
meets with the Reconstruction Party in New Orleans this week, they
will discuss ways of developing just such a Movement!

The peoples' leader "should be there standing in front of the
bulldozers in New Orleans, willing to get arrested," Roland Sheppard
argues.  "A leader who won't get arrested," claims Sheppard, is no
leader.  He or she is no leader of the people, no leader living with
the people on the edge.  To some extent, McKinney, in Georgia and
Washington D.C., has been that kind of leader standing before the
bulldozers of those who would vilify and criminalize the Black
community.  Let's be pro-active in Cynthia McKinney's agenda because
it is the people's agenda.

Then, I think, we can imagine Malcolm smiling, for once.