[R-G] 40 Years Later, (The Late) Martin Luther King Still Silenced

[Anthony Fenton]

40 Years Later, (The Late) Martin Luther King Still Silenced
Apr, 06 2008 By Jeff Cohen

Z Commentary

Soon after Martin Luther King's birthday became a federal holiday in  
1986, I began prodding mainstream media to cover the [http://www.fair.org/index.php?page=2269 
  dramatic story of King's last year] as he campaigned militantly  
against U.S.foreign and economic policy.  Most of his last speeches  
were recorded.  But year after year, corporate networks have refused  
to air the tapes.

Last night NBC Nightly anchor Brian Williams enthused over new color  
footage of King that adorned its coverage of the 40thanniversary of  
the assassination.  The report focused on the last phase of King's  
life.  But the same old blinders were in place.

NBC showed young working class whites in Chicago taunting King.  But  
there was no mention of how elite media had taunted King in his last  
year.  In 1967 and ‘68, mainstream media saw Rev. King a bit like they  
now see Rev. Jeremiah Wright.

Back then they denounced King's critical comments; today they simply  
silence them.

While noting in passing that King spoke out against the Vietnam War,  
mainstream reports today rarely acknowledge that he went way beyond  
Vietnam to decry U.S. militarism in general: "I could never again  
raise my voice against the violence of the oppressed in the ghettos,"  
said King in 1967 speeches on foreign policy, "without having first  
spoken clearly to the greatest purveyor of violence in the world today  
-- my own government."

In response to these speeches, Newsweek said King was "over his head"  
and wanted a "race-conscious minority" to dictateU.S. foreign policy.   
Life magazine described the Nobel Peace Prize winner as a communist  
pawn who advocated "abject surrender in Vietnam."  The Washington Post  
couldn't have been more patronizing: "King has diminished his  
usefulness to his cause, to his country, and to his people."

When King's moral voice moved beyond racial discrimination to  
international issues, the New York Times attacked his efforts to link  
the civil rights and antiwar movements.

King's sermons on Vietnam could get as angry as those of Barack  
Obama's ex-pastor: "God didn't call America to engage in a senseless,  
unjust war . . .We've committed more war crimes almost than any nation  
in the world."

In 1967, King was also criticizing the economic underpinnings of U.S.  
foreign policy, railing against "capitalists of the West investing  
huge sums of money in Asia, Africa and South America, only to take the  
profits out with no concern for the social betterment of the  
countries."  Today, capitalists of the West reap huge profits from  
their domination of global media.

Thankfully, we now have the [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b80Bsw0UG- 
U Internet] and [http://www.commondreams.org/views04/0115-13.htm  
independent media outlets] where King's later speeches are available  
for the ages.

If King had survived to hear the war drums beating for the invasion  
and occupation of Iraq - amplified by TV networks and the New York  
Times front page and Washington Post editorial page -- there's little  
doubt where he'd stand.  Or how loudly he'd be speaking out.

And there's little doubt how big U.S. media would have reacted.  On  
Fox News and talk radio, King would have been DixieChicked. . .or Rev.  
Wrighted.  In corporate centrist outlets, he'd have been marginalized  
faster than you can say Noam Chomsky.

One suspects King would be marveling at the rise of Barack Obama and  
the multiracial movement behind him.  But would he be happy with Obama  
and other Democratic leaders who heap boundless billions onto the  
biggest military budget in world history?

In 1967, King denounced a Democratic-controlled Congress for fattening  
the Pentagon budget while cutting anti-poverty programs, declaring: "A  
nation that continues year after year to spend money on military  
defense than on programs of social uplift is approaching spiritual  
death."


Jeff Cohen http://jeffcohen.org/ is an associate professor of  
journalism at Ithaca, and founding director of the [Collegehttp://www.ithaca.edu/rhp/independentmedia/ 
  Park for Independent Media].  He founded the media watch group  
[Centerhttp://www.fair.org/ FAIR] in 1986, and has written and  
lectured about King's life and death for 35 years.