Here is an exchange an Z magazine net (which has fewer posts per day than this list) between Lenora Fulani and then Tim Wise: There are many things that stunned the political establishment about my meeting with Pat Buchanan to discuss his interest in the Reform Party nomination for President. Buchanan is a right-winger; I come from the left. Buchanan has been criticized for being racist. I'm Black. Buchanan is a lifelong Republican, a consummate political insider. I am the ultimate outsider, an African American independent at odds with the Black leadership's insistence that we stick to the Democrats for our political and economic survival. In most respects, Pat Buchanan and I are like oil and water: chemical opposites that can never successfully mix.
Yet, in spite of those extreme differences, there is something that Pat Buchanan might be able to help us do, if he decides to seek the Reform Party nomination: Liberate Black America.
Before you start screaming that I've lost my mind, let me assure you that I am aware that Pat Buchanan is not Malcolm X. But Pat Buchanan as an independent could turn out to be the impetus for a major breakthrough in the empowerment of ordinary Americans by helping to bring the Black working class and the white working class together again.
Buchanan and I both have a deep connection to working class people in America. His anti-corporate populism his protests on behalf of blue-collar Americans who have lost jobs and economic security as a result of government policies that undercut America's manufacturing base has made him a popular figure within the white working class, nowadays known as Reagan Democrats. This blue-collar constituency has been more politically mobile than most, swinging between the Republicans and the Democrats, but aggrieved by both. The Reform Party may turn out to be just the ticket for them.
My political agenda for the last 20 years has been to give the Black working class community some new political tools independent tools like the Reform Party that enable it to break out of its poverty-stricken relationship with the Democratic Party. Unlike blue collar white America, Black America has been immobile politically. It has remained loyally Democratic as the party has catered to an increasingly white suburban constituency, allying it with middle class voters whose economic and social interests are often opposed to theirs.
During the Great Depression, Black and white working people, beset by an unprecedented economic collapse, were joined together in a mass movement. Segregation was still the law of the land at the time. But in the 1930's heyday of industrial unionism, the color barrier was broken as Black and white Americans joined together to resist the economic exploitation of factory owners and industry giants. But the labor movement would undergo rapid changes as it forced its way into Franklin Roosevelt's New Deal Democratic Party coalition. These unions (consolidated as the CIO which later joined with the more conservative and racist AFL) became less independent and less racially mixed. As industries like steel, auto and defense grew, the jobs went to whites. Blacks remained underemployed, unorganized and poor. The Unemployed Councils which had organized the lower strata of Americans, including many poor African Americans were shut down, creating a further schism. Later on Blacks and other people of color would break into the service sector, precipitating a divide within the union movement itself.
Today Black and white working people have increasing interests in common, but we are politically alienated from one another. Race and the manipulations of racial antagonisms have certainly played their part. The race card remains a powerful card in American politics. Nonetheless, there is more to connect us than to divide us. Both need new coalition partners to advance their class interests. Neither can create such a coalition inside the Democratic and Republican parties. And neither can significantly impact on governmental policy making, absent the kind of sweeping political reform that opens up the process and transfers the power to develop and enact economic policy from the hands of the special interests to ordinary Americans. By leading a movement for political reform and self-governance, the Reform Party has the opportunity to bring working people of all races together. Insofar as Pat Buchanan helps to propel this kind of populist alliance, Black Americans will be better off for it.
Lenora B. Fulani twice ran for President of the U.S. as an independent, making history in 1988 when she became the first woman and African American to get on the ballot in all fifty states. Dr. Fulani is currently a leading activist in the Reform Party and chairs the Committee for a Unified Independent Party. She can be reached at 800-288-3201 or at http://www.Fulani.org.
Lenore Fulani is a fraud...and I hope you're reading this. I say that, because back in 1992, when you were also running for president (one of your favorite pasttimes, as opposed to building grass-roots social movements), we were both in New Hampshire during the primary campaign. And I was giving a series of lectures at the Springfield College School of Social Work, as part of a four day swing through the state doing ANTI-BUCHANAN WORK. And after one of my speeches, I got a message from YOU, (given to me by one of the professors there who apparently knows you) thanking me for standing up to this racist bigot, and telling me to keep up the good work. I was always wary of your New Alliance "Party" because of your close association with that Fred Newman character, (or whatever his name is) but at least you were clear on Pat, and so I figured what the hell, and I told your friend to say thanks for me. So what has changed about Buchanan since 1992?...not a damned thing. The only difference is that today, you are as obscure as ever and needed something to put you back in the spotlight. Something to make folks give a rat's ass about your pathetic political "movement." Well the game is up...no one is buying it, and you have no credibility on the left whatsoever. Go post on the Lyndon Larouche board, but folks around here really aren't likely to fall for the "Pat Buchanan can liberate black America" shit, nor the "Pat stands up for working class people" line...none of which is true. Buchanan has blasted unions his whole life, wants to eliminate ALL civil rights laws banning discrimination, as well as OSHA and EPA regulations which are needed to protect working people...To throw your lot in with him is pathetic, and goes a long way towards explaining why I've yet to meet ANYONE in all my years of political work who really takes you seriously.
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