From the wikipedia entry on the word “Nigger”:
Nigger, also spelled niger (obs.), nigor (obs. dial. Eng.), nigre, nigar (Caribbean), niggor (obs. dial.), neger (obs. U.S.), nigger, niggur, nigga, niggah, and niggar (obs.), is a derogatory term used worldwide to refer to black people.
During the period when slavery was practiced in the United States, and for several decades thereafter, it was a standard, casual English term for black people. The word has since become associated with White Supremacy, and the powerlessness of non-whites in such a system, rendering it a potentially powerful pejorative and abusive term when used by white people to describe non-white people. Today, many people associate white people who use the term with racists and racist organizations like the Ku Klux Klan.
Well, it shouldn’t be that hard to replace the key words for some others that denigrate ‘liberal’ in this short definition. That is if you immerse yourself in today’s political climate and vocabulary. What is lost in this small excerpt is any history or context or future contained within both words. To me, ‘nigger’ has a much longer story and a transcendental quality about it in the end. While today the word ‘liberal’ is handicapped by it’s perception of unfairness of such a label applied and opprobrium altogether for not conforming to a ‘mainstream’ subservience. For example, today any black man of standing will understand the direction and context of the word ‘nigger’ instinctively. And I’m sure will respond (or not respond) to such namecalling in a fashion very bravely and with wisdom. Because he is really just a man of standing, someone with principles, someone who understood the struggle, all those things that go beyond a person’s skin color. Could you expect the same behaviour from our Democratic leadership now if similarly confronted with the label ‘liberal’?
Sen. Russ Feingold is beloved right now for his principles, and for the whole lot of our Democratic Leadership he is the only one to have some to demonstrate for all to witness. I gather he had these principled ideas for most of his tenure, and wasn’t ashamed of them enough to vote against his conscious. At the root level, he would like to see the law be upheld for the sake of our country’s constitution. Realistically by today’s standards, if we want a leader who upholds the Constitutional Law, he or she will have to be somewhat ‘liberal’. Liberals like to see the law followed, especially those that protect civil rights. Just ask our majority party in congress if those members against unlawful spying are ‘liberals’.
Liberals know they are powerless, but that is not because they are ‘liberals’. It’s because of fraud, and nothing else. If we accept fraud (both elections, WMD, torture, spying, Katrina, bribery, Rush Limbaugh), we not only do ourselves no great favors, we let down all our countrymen as well. Fraud really isn’t relative after all; it isn’t who gets to write history first. It happens in real-time and hurts our country immediately, especially when our main leader has an absolute monoculture surrounding and approving his many unlawful actions. By the way, this monoculture has made significant gains in destroying the American way of life and liberty as we knew it. Now it sanctions a serious effort to bankrupt our treasury and compromise the world’s nuclear security as well. We do owe a stand against this to every citizen that came before us. They sacrificed for this country and more than a few died protecting it, and I’m sure those dead would be appalled at our ineffective choices to oppose an imperial administration of this type. Make no mistake (Bushspeak), most of these choices were based on ‘electability’ and what states they represent or could carry. It’s false I believe, Kerry did worst than Gore because his principles were suspect to voters, all voters including his own party. We listened to what he said, and then listened to how he wanted us to hear what he said. No dice. Those undecided knew Bush well enough on his repeated ‘protect-this-country-from-terrorism’ mantra to convince themselves he was the lesser evil in a war against global terrorism. Irregardless of the dearth of facts that would back up his success in this undertaking.
It’s time to come to a crescendo. Make noise Sen. Feingold, you have to carry your party right now. Let us make noise to force the help he’ll need, we have waited for a genuine man of standing so very long now.
