Policy Priorities: Where is the American Dream?

By Gary L. Flowers Executive Director & CEO Black Leadership Forum, Inc. March 7-14, 2013 “At the banquet table of nature, there are no reserved seats. You get what you take and you keep what you can hold. If you can’t take anything you won’t get anything, and if you can’t hold anything you can’t keep anything. And you can’t take anything without organization” A. Philip Randolph Once upon a time the “American Dream” was thought to be life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, as defined by an adequate-paying job, a house, and equal opportunity for a higher standard of life. In 2013, recent public policy decisions have sounded the alarm clock of unthinkable unemployment, home foreclosures, and a national feeling of regression for most Americans. New words such as “sequester” have added incomprehension to injury. Where did the American Dream go? In short, too few Americans have profited too much, at the expense of too many in the last 60 years. Tax policy has permitted “American” corporations to virtually pay no taxes while exporting jobs to low-paying countries around the world. “American” banks have been allowed to receive free “bailout” funding with no requirement to make new loans (or restructure them) to ordinary people who were targeted for sub-prime loans to generate more profits for the banks. Moreover, little regulation of hedge funds let them make huge sums of money by essentially betting against the American economy, which opened the door of despair for many. However, the adage “knowledge is power” prevails in understanding how our nation’s spirit of growth for all sectors of economy has been weighted to the wealthy. One excellent source is the People’s Guide to the Federal Budget by the National Priorities Project. The People’s Guide provides basic information in plain language for ordinary Americans to follow their tax money through the federal budget, separate substance from the “spin” of politicians, compare policy priorities in federal budget to those of most people, and increase citizen involvement in how government works at the national, state, and local level. The familiar phrase of “power to the people” is now exampled by the rise of the Tea Party in 2009 and Occupy Wall Street in 2011. In a similar way, the People’s Guide prepares people to affect progressive public policy. Another informational resource is Who Stole the American Dream by Hedrick Smith. In the book Hedrick Smith lays out a historical timeline which reveals how the “American Dream” was built and how it was decimated. For example, Smith’s timeline traverses Henry Ford’s common sense idea in the early 1900’s to pay workers a good wage in order to afford American products such as Ford automobiles. Ford’s policy led to the American auto industry providing annual wage increases, health benefits, and merit promotions that other American industries followed. One result was a CEO to worker income ratio of 40:1 in 1950. From 1945 t9 1973 employee productivity and pay rose over 90%. Smith’s timeline goes on the reveal the agreed personnel policy of leading American CEO’s in the 1960’s, commonly known as the “virtuous circle of growth”, or, in other words, a happy worker is a productive worker. In addition to progressive corporate policy, the Kennedy and Johnson Administrations with outside agitation of civil rights and consumer rights leaders such as Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. and Ralph Nader helped to enact public policy in the form of consumer protections, the Civil Rights Act of 1964, Voting Rights Act of 1965, Immigration Act of 1965, Fair Housing Act of 1968, Equal Protection Agency, and Occupational Safety and Health Agency (OSHA). Simultaneously to progressive public policy formation, Republican Presidential nominee Barry Goldwater reversed progressive partisanship and planted the seeds to what would become today’s Tea Party. In 1971, conservative attorney Lewis Powell (from my hometown of Richmond, Virginia) issued the infamous “Powell Memo” calling for increased corporate policy activism to benefit the wealthy, thereby reversing the progress for ordinary Americans. Accordingly, corporate CEO’s organized the Business Roundtable in 1971 to raise an army of corporate lobbyists to benefit the greedy over the needy in nearly every American industry. From money management to manufacturing; from agriculture to automobiles a race to the bottom ensued for lower corporate taxes and workers’ wages. By 1998, regulations separating commercial banks from investment banks were repealed and a banking bonanza to bilk hard-working Americans began. Like the first 75 years of the 19th century two-thirds of the 20th century would see progressive policy yield to policy for the rich in the last 25 years. We, the ordinary people, must make extraordinary efforts to organize and affect the change we want to see occur by demanding of the government fairness and justice. For example, we should at least support: • Full-employment legislation sponsored by U.S. Representative John Conyers (House Resolution 870) • Moratorium on Home Foreclosures • Forgiveness of nearly all student loans for 5 years • Legislation for livable wages (based on costs in each city/town) • Expand Social Security and Medicare • Enact Employees Free Choice Act • Expand Parent-Plus Student Loan Program • Reinstate Jobs Council • Reinstate Defined Benefit Pension Plans • Maintaining Minority Business Development Agency in Department of Commerce When we fight together, we win!

Lincoln, the Movie: What's Missing?

Lincoln, the Movie: What’s Missing? By Gary L. Flowers Executive Director & CEO Black Leadership Forum, Inc. November 22 – 29, 2012 “ ‘Negro History’ is the missing segment of world history” Dr. Carter G. Woodson Dr. Carter G. Woodson was right when he essentially said that Black history is the missing pages of world history. Never was such so true than in the movie, “Lincoln.” While I, as a “weekend historian”, was impressed by Daniel Day Lewis’ portrayal of the 16th President of the United States of America my knowledge of history begged questions: Why were Frederick Douglas, Sojourner Truth, and Harriet Tubman not portrayed or mentioned? Why was the Ancient Egyptian mathematical formula attributed to the Greek mathematician, Euclid? The movie, Lincoln, is politically presidential, yet porous on people who influenced the end of the American Civil War. The holes in the Steven Spielberg’s epic film are rooted in Hollywood’s tendency to omit key historical personalities and events from biopics. History reminds us that Frederick Douglas, Harriet Tubman, and Sojourner Truth all played significant roles in the American Civil War, and thus in the decisions of President Lincoln. For example, in the summer of 1863, Frederick Douglas was invited to the White House and introduced to President Lincoln by Secretary William Henry Seward and Senator Samuel Pomeroy (KS). According to David Blight’s Race and Reunion: Civil War in America Memory, Douglas, said, “I told him I was assisting to raise Colored troops to enlist in the Union Army but was troubled that the United States government would not treat them fairly in three ways. First, Colored troops ought to receive the same wages as those paid to White soldiers. Second, Colored soldiers ought t receive the same protection when taken prisoner. Third, when Colored soldiers perform great and uncommon service on the battlefield they should be rewarded by distinction and promotion as White soldiers are rewarded. Moreover, Douglas relieved public pressure on President Lincoln regarding the Civil War in his speech in Philadelphia three weeks after the President dedicated the Federal Cemetery at Gettysburg, Pennsylvania. Douglas did so by saying, “We are not to be saved by the captain, but by the crew. We are not to be saved by Abraham Lincoln but by the power of the throne, greater than the throne itself, the supreme testing of ‘government of the people…’ of which the President spoke at Gettysburg. The ‘Abolition War’ and ensuing peace will never be completed until the Black men of the South and the Black men of the North shall have been admitted, fully and completely into the body politic of America.” Likewise, in October 1864, Sojourner Truth was invited to the White House to meet with President Lincoln. Following her “Ain’t I a Woman” speech at a women’s convention in 1853 she was a renowned abolitionist. The meeting of Ms. Truth and President Lincoln at the White House is documented in Berry Horton’s famous painting depicting the president showing Ms. Truth his bible. Another omission of the movie Lincoln involves Harriet Tubman. Her many trips delivering enslaved Black people from bondage to freedom provided Ms. Tubman with knowledge of the terrain of the Confederate states. As such, she contributed mightily to Union strategy in the Civil War. According to Benjamin Brawley’s Harriet Tubman , President Lincoln listened to the ideas of Harriet Tubman. And yet, neither of these significant Black historical figures was portrayed or even mentioned in the movie. At one critical point in the movie President Lincoln justifies his position on passing the 13th Amendment to the United States Constitution, which would outlaw slavery on the basis that “all men are created equal…” cited the Greek mathematician Euclid’s theorem that “things equal to the same are equal to one another.” What was omitted in the movie is that Euclid did not originate the theorem by the fact that Black Egyptian mathematicians at the Library of Alexandria Egypt trained him in 300 B.C. When people erroneously condemn “Black History” as a separatists scholarly pursuit we need to look no further than movies made by Steven Spielberg, Clint Eastwood, and other Hollywood directors who—consciously or unconsciously—omit the contributions of Black people to world history and, thus, give un-earned credit to White scholars as the progenitors of higher thought. We must re-insert Black History in the pages of world history.

Chicago Teachers Have the Right Answer

Chicago Teachers Have the Right Answer By Gary L. Flowers Executive Director & CEO Black Leadership Forum, Inc. September 13-21, 2012 Last week, emboldened educators in Chicago who are members of the American Federation of Teachers finally euphemistically said enough is enough and put their collective feet down on the streets by striking against the city of Chicago, and the so-called “reform” of national education favored by the White House and United States Department of Education. Beyond mischaracterizations by the corporate-owned media teachers in Chicago are not looking for a free ride on the reform bus, but are challenging the very structure of American education. In short, the chalk board is divided into two sides: One that enhances and sustains public educators—from pay to preparation, to pensions, and another that would privatize the $600 million American education system to the highest bidder for profit. The question to be answered is whether public education should be privatized? Unfortunately, it seems that Mayor Rahm Emanuel, current Chicago Mayor and former White House Chief of Staff is on the wrong side of the issue. The Chicago teachers have the right the answer. A review of American public educational history is useful. In 1853, against the will of the wealthy and corporate barons the United States established a public school system for all students (in theory). Prior to that only White children of the rich and resourced were privileged to be educated to a high school or college level. Following the American Civil War the Federal Government launched the Reconstruction Period in which public school for Black and White students—albeit separate and unequal—existed. In 1896, The United States Supreme Court ruled in the Plessey v Ferguson case that a racially separate national school system was Constitutional. By the 1930’s Charles Hamilton Houston and Black Civil Rights lawyers challenged the racially separate and unequal national education system that culminated in the seminal Supreme Court case of Brown v. Board of Education, decided in 1954. After Brown, the idea of privatization began by White parents who did not want the children to attend public schools with Black children. White business leaders and clergy aligned to establish all-White, private academies. In the 1960’s such “leaders” realized that their public taxes were going to schools in which Black children were being educated. Thus, the first of education voucher ideas appeared to allow White parents to opt to send their kids to virtually all-White public schools in addition to their private schools. By the 1970’s, courts instituted mandatory busing to public schools to enforce the “all deliberate speed” phrase included in the Brown case. In the 1990’s the concept of Public Charter Schools was developed across the country. The idea was to use public funds to create private schools with private sector money and private investors. Yes, “Public Charter” schools have private investors who seek financial dividends. Public education should be an American right and not a private privilege. In the name of “reform” Charter schools arose as the public school system and it teachers were vilified as failing to educate students. The problem was never the public schools and public teacher unions, but rather the lack of full funding by the federal government and support for public unions that represent public teachers. Currently, the federal government only contributes 9% of public school funding. The other 91% is allotted by state and local educational entities. In many cities Public Charter Schools are used as an alternative threat to public teachers should their test scores not rise. In effect, the White House’s “Race to the Top” educational program forces teachers and school districts to compete for funding. Predictably, teaching the tests to students, and cheating on tests has resulted. Enter Chicago teachers. By standing up to give the right answer Chicago teachers are challenging the entire public school and public union debate. In a revealing sense, the fight that public unions fought in Wisconsin against a right-wing Republican Governor last year is playing out in Chicago against a Democratic Mayor, and by silence the Democratic White House. Hmmmm! If American pubic school students are to compete with their counterparts from China, India, Japan, Germany, and other world powers our nation must declare public education a matter of national security. As such, teachers need to be paid well with livable pensions, public teacher unions need to be supported, facilities need to be upgraded to 21st century standards, and the White House and Congress should support legislation rewards—not punishes—public educators. The children of the resourced will usually do well. But how about the masses of students and the people that teach them? Mayor Emanuel and the White House must get to the head of the class and answer the public/private question right.

United Airlines' Unfriendly Skies for Black Pilots

United Airlines’ Unfriendly Skies for Black Pilots By Gary L. Flowers Executive Director & CEO Black Leadership Forum, Inc. May 31-June 7, 2012 Last week twenty-four long-term employees of United Continental Holdings, United Airlines, and Continental Airlines filed a lawsuit in San Francisco, California alleging race discrimination, retaliation and harassment in violation of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and State Fair Employment laws. I vividly remember United Airlines television commercials of the 1970’s featuring the phrase “Fly the friendly skies of United.” In 2012, the skies appear to be anything but friendly for Black pilots as they seek an employment policy from United Continental that allows them to be promoted to the management ranks, as their White colleagues are so often elevated. The issue basis for the lawsuit is not new. In 1976, a consent decree was issued to United Airlines for race discrimination against African American employees. The 1976 consent decree stalled in 1995. In 2010, African American pilots and Operations Supervisors who were members of the United Coalition for Diversity filed Equal Employment Opportunity Commission complaints for discrimination. Following the EEOC complaints, United Airlines hastily hired three African Americans for management positions. But that is not the point. United Airlines—the world’s largest airline—does not know its own history relative to promoting Black pilots. In an official 2012 United press release one of the Blacks quickly hired for the management position of Chief Pilot for the Northeast Region, Captain James Simons, Jr., was falsely touted as the “first” African American Chief Pilot at United Airlines. Wrong! Actually, Captain Alfonzo “Rick” McCullough was the first Black Chief Pilot at United. Ironically, in 2012--the same year that Americans lauded the much-heralded feature movie, Red Tails, which highlighted the competence, courage, and commitment of Black pilots known as the Tuskegee Airmen in the 1940’s who faced blatant racial discrimination—Black pilots are still fighting for equal opportunity as their colored colleagues did some 70 years ago. United airlines cannot salute the Tuskegee Airmen in magazine ads and simultaneously refute evidence of current racial discrimination. Like the Tuskegee Airman today’s Black pilots are extremely competent. While piloting airplanes may have been their passion through U.S. Air Force and other training routes to the Captain’s chair those who filed suit are extremely qualified to serve in management. For example, 22 of the plaintiffs have Bachelor’s degrees, 3 have earned Masters of Business Administration (MBA’s), 1 has a Masters of Science, and 1 has a Masters of Arts. Yet, by being passed over for management positions at United and Continental Air Lines none of them seem to “qualified” for jobs their less-credentialed White colleagues now occupy. And America wants to claim we are a “post-racial” nation! Predictably, African Americans and people of color are woefully underrepresented in managerial ranks in proportion to their total numbers in the United workforce. Worst still, there seems to be an air (pun intended) of retaliation for “whistleblower” pilots. Of the 13 pilots who filed EEOC complaints in 2010 none of them have been promoted to management despite filing scores and scores of applications. The three Blacks who were hired in 2010 either did not complain or were brought in from outside of United’s ranks. What United pilots are seeking can be summed up by the words of Captain Leon Miller who said, “The struggle for inclusion at United Airlines is a long-standing issue that many have tried to address over a long period of time…we must break the glass ceiling and stop retaliatory actions, and make a corporate culture change that is truly inclusive.” Amen. In 2001, following evidence of racial discrimination at the automaker Toyota USA I had the experience of organizing informational pickets in 24 American cities with the Rainbow PUSH Coalition. As a result, Toyota admitted being a bad actor in the transportation industry and committed to a 10-year 8 billion dollar diversity plan throughout the company. While airlines are somewhat different than automakers the principle developing a measurable plan for inclusion is in the best tradition of American ideals. United may learn a lot from the Toyota model. The United States of America was founded on the principle of I pluribus unum (out of many, we are one). The same should hold true for Black pilots in the so-called friendly skies of United Airlines.

Supreme Court Arguments on Health-Care Law

Supreme Court Arguments on Health-Care Law
By Gary L. Flowers
Executive Director & CEO
Black Leadership Forum, Inc.
March 25-31, 2012

This week, the Supreme Court of the United States hears arguments on the Affordable Care Act (health care reform) proposed by the Obama Administration. Since his inauguration, President Obama has framed health care reform as his signature domestic policy priority.

A brief recent history of health care reform in the United States of American reveals that our nation is one of few global nations, which allows private health-care companies to profit from providing health services. In most other industrialized countries around the world, government, referred to as a “single payer” system, provides health care. Under such a system all citizens qualify for health care paid for by the government. Good idea.

I believe health care should be a right of every citizen, rather than a privilege for those who can afford to pay for health services. I do not believe “health profiteers” commonly known as health care insurance companies should exist. Think about it: Why should we pay health insurance companies (in the middle) when paying directly to health providers such as doctors and hospitals is cheaper?

In 2009, the debate over health care reform in America briefly focused on a “public option” for Americans, which would have allowed citizens to choose purchasing government-issued health care or buy health care services from a private provider. Ultimately, the Obama Administration chose neither a single-payer system nor the public option, but offered a plan to financially penalize people who do not buy health insurance from private providers.

Immediately thereafter, individual states filed lawsuits asserting that the Obama plan would unconstitutionally force Americans to purchase health care. The states argued that the federal government was going too far, and it should allow states to choose how and from whom citizens would buy health care. Thus, sets up this week’s argument between the federal government and states in the Supreme Court. At issue, is the constitutionality of the “individual mandate”, and whether private insurance companies can refuse to cover people because of their medical history or charge higher premiums for those who have had previous conditions. In a practical sense, the arguments center on the power and authority between states and the federal government to regulate services to the people.

The portion within the Affordable Care Act that has garnered most attention is the “individual mandate.” Under the law, effective in 2014, the 33 million American citizens and their descendants who currently do not have health insurance must be covered. If not, people would have to pay a penalty, referred to as a “shared responsibility” payment. The name “shared responsibility” comes from the fact that medical payments of uninsured people who get sick are born by the government and taxpayers. Therefore, the proposed penalty provides an incentive for individuals to “share” in the responsibility of health care costs. The Obama Administration argues that individuals who pay the penalty are not in violation of the law. However, those who do not secure health insurance and do not pay the “shared responsibility” payment would be lawbreakers. Hmmm?

If the federal government can “strongly insist” that individuals purchase private health insurance it should rescind the anti-trust protections that health insurance companies now enjoy, allowing such companies to unfairly collude on health care premiums. In short, Congress should regulate excessive profits by health care companies as it does for other American industries. As long as there is a profit incentive within our nation’s health care industry America will remain a sick society.

Where Would Dr. King Stand on Wal-Mart Workers?

Gary L. Flowers
Executive Director & CEO
Black Leadership Forum, Inc.
August 21-28.2011


This week the nation and the world celebrate the life and legacy of Reverend Doctor Martin Luther King, Jr. with the dedication of his memorial on the National Mall in Washington, DC.

For Americans, Dr. Martin Luther King should not only have a national memorial in Washington, but also should have his face on Mount Rushmore, rather than stone images of American presidents whose policies were antithetical to the ideals of Native Americans (Sioux, Lakota) on whose sacred land the faces of George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt, and Abraham Lincoln were forged.

History reminds us Dr. King is the true architect of American democracy. For example, Washington said freedom fighters that formed the Black Republic of Haiti should “…starve to death.” Jeffersonian Democracy as it was called only permitted White males to vote and own land. Teddy Roosevelt was a rabid racist who supported the bigoted movie “Birth of a Nation”. And while Lincoln moved the policy pendulum closer toward racial equity with his Emancipation Proclamation and his support for the 13th, 14th, and 15th Amendments to the U.S. Constitution, it took 95 years for freedom, citizenship, and voting to be enforced by federal law. Enter Dr. King.

Dr. King is the architect of American Democracy because he influenced progressive public policy for ALL Americans, regardless of race, religion, or resources. As Dr. King marched outside on Main Streets of America President Lyndon Johnson coerced in Congress for the passage of seminal legislation in the 1964 Civil Rights Act, 1965 Voting Rights Act, and the 1968 Fair Housing Act that still impact American justice today. More than any other quality Dr. King was a “man of the people.” At 26, fresh out of graduate school with a PhD he, along with Mrs. Rosa Parks, led the Montgomery. Alabama Bus Boycott to challenge federal law’s application to state laws of racial segregation in transportation. He walked with the people for 381 days. At 34, he marched with students in Birmingham, Alabama to secure a public accommodations bill in Congress. At 39, he brought dignity to sanitation workers in Memphis, Tennessee by advocating for their right to organize and receive fair wages.

Today, the workers at Wal-Mart—the world’s largest company—face such issues as respect, fair-paying jobs, and a voice in workplace policies similar to those faced by Memphis garbage workers 1968. To date, Wal-Mart officials have taken a rigid stance against worker’s right to organize, which assures lower wages. Predictably, the poverty-level jobs do more harm than good for individual employees as well as the communities in which they live.

However, recently Wal-Mart hourly workers gathered at the corporate headquarters in Bentonville, Arkansas to petition for improved working conditions. The “Associates” believe that Wal-Mart is stronger as a global company because of the collective values its workers embrace—hard work ethic, compassion for one another, and honesty. Together workers have launched the “OUR Wal-Mart” Campaign that calls on company executives to do the following:
• Practice the words of founder Sam Walton in “…listening to everyone in your company…”
• Allow workers to join OUR Wal-Mart partnership without workplace retaliation
• Ensure confidentiality through “open door” policy by written resolution to worker issues by allowing co-worker witness testimony
• Recognize that most hourly worker earn less than $10 per hour, rather than the $13 per hour promoted by Wal-Mart
• Recognize that most hourly worker are given less than 40 hours per week, rendering ineligible for full-time benefits
• Work closely with “Associates” to partner for the good of the entire company

I believe if Dr. King were alive today he would reiterate the words prophetically proclaimed at Mason Temple in Memphis on the rainy night of April 3, 1968 (the night before he was assassinated). On that night, Dr. King essentially said, “…God sent me here to say you are not treating his people right…” He went on to say that while companies such as Coca Cola and Sealtest Ice Cream have the right to make a profit they also have a moral and Godly duty to treat their employees with respect deserved. Dr. King would call for partnership over protest, dignity over dollars, and collectivism over confrontation.

Wal-Mart may well represent “America, Incorporated.” As such, the same American ideals espoused by Dr. King, Congress, and the White House over the past 50 years should be basis for a corporate giant partnering with its common workers. In order for our nation to rise out of recession Wal-Mart, the White House, and the workers must put partnership first.


In linking leadership,

Gary L. Flowers
Executive Director & CEO
Black Leadership Forum, Inc.
1090 Vermont Ave., NW
Suite 1290
Washington, DC 20005

Consciousness Over Cookouts

Consciousness Over Cookouts
By Gary L. Flowers
Executive Director & CEO
Black Leadership Forum, Inc.
July 26-July 3, 2011


“Fellow-citizens, above your national, tumultuous joy, I hear the mournful wail of millions! Whose chains, heavy and grievous yesterday, are, to-day, rendered more intolerable by the jubilee shouts that reach them. If I [we] forget…’may my right hand forget her cunning, and my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth!...to pass lightly over their wrongs, and to chime in with the popular theme, would be treason most scandalous and shocking, and would make me a reproach before God and the world.’”

Frederick Douglas
July 4, 1852

As the United States of America celebrates another Independence Day (July 4), recognizing a principled stand by early American colonists against the tyranny of England’s King George, we should learn from the words of Frederick Douglas who in 1852 eloquently cited the hypocrisy of our nation to celebrate the liberty of independence amidst the institution of slavery.

While African Americans are free from the brutality of physical bondage our minds, in the words of Douglas, seem to “…chime in with the popular theme…” of hot dogs, hamburgers, John Phillip Sousa, and fireworks.

In short, we need to place consciousness over cookouts.

Douglas’ contemporary, Harriet Tubman, reminds today’s African Americans that worse than the institution of slavery may have been the reality of many Black people who did not recognize their state of enslavement.

July 4, 2011 may well mark the most perilous position for Black people in America since slavery. For example:

• The first generation less educated than the previous since 1865
• 76% of seniors testing positive for HIV
• 70% of un-wed births
• 60% of U.S. home foreclosures
• 50% high-school drop out rates
• 50% of U.S. jail population

Yet, despite a fearsome fire burning our heritage house of honor we joyfully eat, drink, and be merry cooking outside in the yard. We must put the family fire out.

What must we do short of cancelling cookouts? First, we must know our history—tragic and triumphant. Second, we raise our conscious level from the basement of “Dancing with the Stars” and “American Idol” to the rooftop relevant pursuits that lift one another. Lastly, we must turn to each other and not on each other. WE is a lot stronger the ME.

If Black people to not recognize that all of us—the wealthy and the without—are still seen as the wretched by most of America we should have another cookout. Only this time we may find ourselves served up as seared slaves again.


Gary L. Flowers
Executive Director & CEO
Black Leadership Forum, Inc.
1290 Vermont Ave., NW
Suite 1290
Washington, DC 20005