I am often asked why I harp on past racial injustices practiced in the U.S. “Those are all in the past. Get over it.”

My answer is two-fold.

“First, we need to be aware of the role that institutional racism and oppression of African Americans played in the founding and progress of our country. It is highly unlikely that America would have become the economic powerhouse that it became without the free labor provided by African slaves. During America’s development, cotton was king, not just in the U.S. but globally. We could compete on the world’s cotton markets, supplying American and British mills with cheap cotton because it cost nothing to pick the cotton. Just saying. Things would have been much different if cotton growers had had to pay a wage to cotton pickers. The economic benefits we all enjoy today are built largely on a bedrock of slavery.”

“Secondly, institutional racism is not only part of our past, it is, shamefully, part of our present. One is never sure whether those who maintain there is no or little institutional racism today are simply honestly ignorance or willfully so. Either way, it is ignorance. For, racism in America is alive and well. We are not a “colorblind” society. And all too often African Americans still do not have unfettered access to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”

It often starts from the cradle and does not end until the grave—sometimes it puts individuals in the grave. Just yesterday the largely black Columbus Ohio school district sent students home early. They announced that they will do so again today and perhaps tomorrow—this because the unusually hot September temperatures have raised temperatures in many class rooms to dangerous levels. And why are so many classrooms so hot, you ask? You guessed it. No air conditioning.

I’ll tell you one thing for sure. There are no such shenanigans going on in our nearly all white school district. Plenty of money here to air condition our palatial schools. Rather, I noted yesterday when I picked up my grandchildren from elementary school that there were several youngsters wearing something with long sleeves to keep warm in the irresponsibly frigid airconditioned temperatures of their school.

The state of Ohio, through their unequal and immoral school funding practices, engages in blatant and institutional racism. In addition, Ohio, like so many states, give a nod and wink to individual racism by allowing white people to create segregated schools via charter school funding. Again, this is simply racism. It is immoral and ought to be unconstitutional.

As an aside, this talk of school reminds us that yesterday was the anniversary of the courageous “Little-rock nine.” Do we find monuments built by predominantly white local governments dotting the southern landscape to commemorate their patriotic feat, I wonder? Surely we all know that what those nine students endured took more courage, nerve and verve than nine Stonewall Jacksons. And the nine did it for a just cause, unlike the treasonous rebel.

Anyway, the racial disadvantages continue as one ages. We think now, for example, of “Whataburger’s” alleged hiring practices in Florida.” According to a recent lawsuit, a store manager


“who is white, was pressured by the restaurant’s general manager to hire white employees but not black ones. Among other things, the general manager, Johanna Risk, directed her to review applications and only interview applicants who had white-sounding names.

“Ms. Burrous opposed and refused to participate in the racially discriminatory hiring directive to hire white — not black — applicants…. Instead, Ms. Burrous continued to hire the most qualified applicants for vacant positions, regardless of race or color..

[The general manager] “told Ms. Burrous that Whataburger’s ‘customer base is white and we want the faces behind the counter to match the customer base,’ the lawsuit says.”[1]


This is not a unique case. It happens every day. As another author has reminded us,


“Employers see names like LeKeisha or Lisa and make substantive decisions based on implicitly held assumptions about the names themselves, even though the résumés are exactly the same.”[2]


We are not even talking about establishing preferential hiring practices for African Americans now. Just simple fairness. But nope, we are not even getting that.

And we won’t talk, here, about the shamefully large number of African Americans, male and female, who die at the hands of America’s police forces nearly every day.
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Yes, there are simply too many ignorant of our past and blind to our present. Whether this ignorance and blindness is willful or not, it will engender a constricted future, not only for African Americas, but for all Americans. And, as Martin Luther King reminded us, the social inequality will produce spiritual death.


[1] Jeff Burlew, “Lawsuit: Whataburger ex-manager said she was told to hire white employees,” USA Today

[2] Eddie S. Glaude Jr., Democracy in Black, chapter 3

If one still needs it, the past week provided yet more evidence of Caligula’s madness.
 
But first…
 
Question:   Since when did Christians cheer and egg on vile public displays of hate-filled profanity?

Answer:     They don’t. There were no Christians in that insane gathering in Alabama—only vile white supremacists were allowed entrance.
 

Question:   How did a man so seemingly ignorant of human psychology ever succeed, even in the insipid craft of business?

Answer:     Graft, corruption, intimidation, victimization, bullying—need I go on?
 
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As soon as—and I mean the very second—I heard Caligula’s hateful and profane comments directed at those he called SOB’s, I knew, I knew with certainty that Sunday NFL games would witness a significant increase in protests against the kind of ignorance and white supremacy he represents.
 
Could that vile man really not know this? Or did he know it? Is this precisely what he was after?
 
This whole episode demonstrates unequivocally that the man is nothing but a stupid, insecure, and paranoid provocateur—whether by design or ignorance is immaterial. He is a man that feeds on satanic contention. He aims to stir up the hearts of men with anger one for another.
 
Now, I do not mean to diminish the vileness of his provocations against American Athletes. We have a very serious white supremacy issue in America. Our police forces are openly murdering people—black people—on American streets. Our judicial system is a racist’s wet dream. But, as several Athletes themselves have asked over the weekend, isn’t a problem such as that that we face with North Korea enough to keep him busy? Shouldn’t he be focused on something like that?
 
Probably. And yet, do we want him focused on North Korea? Look what he has done, the provocation he has instigated, in the past week. “Rocket Man”? Really? What are you, a schoolkid on a 1st grade schoolyard? “Totally destroy North Korea”? Who does he think he is, Doctor Evil?
 
But, it is no joking matter.
 
Did he not know? I knew. I knew the second he delivered that hateful U.N. speech that it would only incite more belligerence from Pyongyang. (His advisors knew it too, for these words were not in the written speech, but were adlibbed by the mad Caligula himself). Was this what he was after? Did he intend to incite? Or is he just stupid?
 
It will not really matter once the bombs start flying.
 
If we decide that he is simply stupid, we must as quickly as possible remove him from office… before the bombs start flying.
 
If we decide that he is not simply stupid, but rabidly evil, then we must as quickly as possible remove him from office… before the bombs start flying.
 
Either way, he is just stupid or insecure enough to need himself immortalized in human history in any way he can. And what better way than to be written into the history books as the second man to engage the immoral use of nuclear weapons. He is well on his way to infamy.
 
You see, to him it is all the same—contending with athletes or contending with North Korea. He must have contention. He thrives on it. This is just how developmentally impeded or abjectly evil he is.
 
While the world will never know peace with America in charge, it has, at least to this point, avoided nuclear holocaust. But with this man, the mad Caligula, we not only face the prospects of war—something we’ve grown enamored of—but annihilation—something we might just wish to avoid.
 
He must be stopped.
 
Stop the madness now.

One of the pages on this site is entitled, “Just Quotes.” I have considered having a corresponding page entitled, “Unjust Quotes.” But, who am I kidding, by quoting Caligula day in and day out I’d only be giving airtime to the crazed lunacy of one mad man—with the occasional exception when some Republican representative or senator talks smack about their unjust health care fantasies of harming as many vulnerable Americans as inhumanly possible.

But, at the U.N. yesterday, Caligula, on several fronts, embarrassed our nation, and terrorized the world. The man is absolutely terrifying. Scares the $#!+ out of me, to be sure! Drunk with his bizarre personal rivalry with North Korea’s insane leader, and in his veiled threat to nuke that fellow rogue nation, Caligula proves himself to be the mimetic double of his mad North Korean brother. In front of the U.N., he brazenly threatened to commit crimes against humanity.

“The United States has great strength and patience, but if it is forced to defend itself or its allies, we will have no choice but to totally destroy North Korea. Rocket Man [what are we, in 1st grade] is on a suicide mission for himself and for his regime. The United States is ready, willing and a able, but hopefully this will not be necessary.”

So, let me get this straight. North Korea can’t be trusted to possess nuclear weapons, but we, the only nation on earth to ever actually use them, can? The same nation that is prepared to use them to destroy 25 million North Korean men, women, and children?
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Maybe, Bush was right. Maybe we do need to act pre-emptively. We must act now and get this crazed lunatic out of office before he pushes the entire globe to suicide. The man is demonic, possessed of an evil spirit.

Sure hope Caligula never turns his love upon me. He loves them, he says—those dreamers. Yet, though they are by every conceivable measure young Americans—innocent and law-abiding… unlike him—he intends to send them to a country they have never known and that has never claimed them. He truly has made them young men and women without a country. Martyrs every one of them.

Sensing, last week, what the mad man was about to do, I posted the passage above to the just scripture page of this sight and asked questions for the reader to consider. Make no mistake about it: removing the protections found in DACA is a vexation of “strangers.” These oppressed dreamers will call out to God—however well-known or unknown he may be to them. And God will see their vexations and hear their plea. Such obscenities as this will, absolutely will bring the condemnation of God upon the nation that elected that man.

For, you see, Caligula’s obscenities pale in comparison to the monstrosity that is those who elected him—including, shamefully, white evangelical (non)Christians. For a little more than a century the federal government has been protector, however imperfectly, to vulnerable peoples who local and state majorities always oppressively scapegoat with impunity. After national defense, this is the most important role of the federal government—to stand against base, provincial, and prejudiced local majorities. This is Republicans’ real reason for hating a strong federal government—it keeps them, as it ought, from acting upon their base, selfish, fearful, and prejudiced inclinations—in America most often expressed through racism, though more recently LGBT have become a favorite target of the mob. Under resurgent Republican influences, the electorate has elected a monstrosity who, far from checking the public’s demons, is giving traction to all that is monstrous. What a perversion!

In his letter written from a Birmingham jail, Martin Luther King Jr reminded us,
​
“There are two types of laws: just and unjust…. I would agree with St. Augustine that ‘an unjust law is no law at all.’
 
“Now, what is the difference between the two? How does one determine whether a law is just or unjust? A just law is a man-made code that squares with the moral law or the law of God. An unjust law is a code that is out of Harmony with the moral law. To put it in the terms of St. Thomas Aquinas: An unjust law is a human law that is not rooted in eternal law and natural law. Any law that uplifts human personality is just. Any law that degrades human personality is unjust.”
 
In announcing the decision, Caligula’s little puppet, leader of the ‘Injustice Department,’ spoke of “law.” He declared that “we are a nation of laws.” Yes, indeed. Ol’ Joe Arpaio can attest to the kind of law intended by the troop of rascals currently in power.