SOMETHING TO THINK ABOUT

Thought of the day for Saturday May 2nd, 2026.. The Year I was born the Voting Rights Act was Signed, But Will it Survive Trump 2.O..       

                      I can vividly remember the night in 2008 when Barack Hussein Obama, his wife and two small daughters took to the stage on a warm night in Chicago. They wanted to thank those who supported them, who put race aside, for once judged a black man by the content of his character and not the color of his skin. For those who truly believed that America had finally lived out it's creed, that we were entering a "Post Racial America", the recent Supreme Court decision that struck down key segments of the landmark Voting Rights legislation, dealt a major blow to Black Americans, puts the future of our right to vote in jeopardy. While many of us were jubilant to see a Black man elected to the highest office in the land, there were those who those who silently seethed, they did not welcome change. Who was Barack Hussien Obama? With a name like that, black skin he clearly was not one of us. How dare he stand before the world as the face of the American People. Had America changed that much, what this what was touted as "Progress".  

                       For those angry men, who for decades saw their hold on power slipping away they vowed that there would never be a repeat of what they viewed as a mistake , an error in judgement. The American People had been indoctrinated with "Un-Christian ideals, with liberalism and a loss of conservative values. These men were going to correct that, they were going to dismantle all of those hyper liberal ideals that were destroying their country. One of those mistakes was the passage of the "Civil Rights Act of 1964, followed one year later by the signing of the "Voting Rights Act". For one young man he was just ten years old when the late President Lyndon Baines Johnson signed the legislation, he grew up with an apparent aversion to black people having the same rights that he enjoyed. He was raised with the belief that the playing field" had been leveled, that there was no longer a need for obtrusive legislation like the Civil Rights, Voting Rights Acts. That young man became a lawyer, graduating from Harvard Law School. He then went on clerk for Judge Henry Friendly, then Justice William Rehnquist. He went on to hold a number of positions within the Justice Department, a department that he would later see dismantled under the Trump Administration. Since 1982 that young man would work his way up the ranks of the Justice Department, eventually being appointed to the highest court in the land, that man John Roberts is now the Chief Justice of the Supreme Court. Since that time has been seeking ways to over turn both the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts. For years he sat on the Court waiting for a time when so-called conservatives would have a majority, for the past several years those that purport to be conservatives have held a 6-3 majority. In the past twenty years they have stripped away protections we once believed were inviolable.  

                      I grew up with the belief that the right to vote I was born with, yet understood full well that my parents did not have that right. I thought that privilege would last long after I like my parents had transitioned, but now that is uncertain. I have a daughter that as yet has not voted in state or national election, what do I say to her? How do I explain to her that the rights that our ancestors fought and died for are going away, that the country that I raised my right hand and took a solemn oath to defend this nation with my life is being pulled backwards to a dark time in American history. This recent Supreme Court decision regarding re-districting in Louisiana has larger implications, what happened in Louisiana is just the beginning, already many Republican held states are planning to re-district, disenfranchise black voters. The Court is seeking to make it nearly impossible to challenge racial gerrymandering, to elect representatives that look like us, that understand our particular struggle in America. A great man once said " Power without a demand concedes nothing", we (Black People) have not made any specific demands, in fact it is rare that we make demands of any sort, accordingly the powerful in this nation have conceded nothing. They are reclaiming what the ancestors gave their lives for, the right to be treated as human beings with rights not given by men in three piece suits, but by the divine, that we enter the world "With Certain Unalienable Rights" but as God giveth others posing as the agents of God try and take away