Friday, September 17, 2010

"Open Letter to My Disinterested and Registered Citizens”

Registered progressives, democrats and independents--on November 2, 2010 we must be heard loud and clear by the power of the ballot and send a clear message to elected officials that desire to stagnate the Republic’s future.

When we don't vote it’s not just your family that will lose out on a prosperous future; it is also many other American families that are left in the wasteland of apathy. Progressives, if we don't vote on November 2, all that we want to achieve for the middle class and the working poor will not come to fruition such as:

• Healthcare/public option for every citizen
• Provide care for senior citizens
• Ensure government is free from corruption
• Create educational and career opportunities for every citizen
• Protect the environment from predators
• Keep a balance budget--consistently
• Implement term limits for elected officials at every level of government
• Address issues like illegal immigration, homelessness, and education with clear and insightful resolutions.
• Eliminate hunger and poverty
• Funding support for small businesses--the backbone of the Republic
• “Objective” Supreme Court Justices

My disinterested and dissatisfied registered citizens--we cannot allow the Union to fall back into the hands of the Republican/Tea Party. They are ineffective and out of touch with the middle class, working poor and poor American. In fact, they spend the bulk of their time saying "No" to implementing a better infrastructure and fighting for tax cuts for the wealthy. The Republican/Tea Party cannot lead America. They “must not” be allowed to lead America.

Progressives, Independents and Democratic voters--we will be the outcome in this election, and in doing so; we'll bring a balance of peace and prosperity to America.



Anthony P. Johnson

Saturday, September 11, 2010

"Our Resolve has Never Been Stronger."

On September 11, 2010, we remember friends, families, and Americans that perished at the hands of terrorist extremists on September 11, 2001, a day that now belongs to the ages.

During one of the darkest hours in the Republic's history, we, the people, united as one and began to rebuild our fractured country and spirit in the face of unfathomable tragedy.

Those who lost their lives on 9/11 will never be forgotten. They perished at the hands of cowards who thought they would weaken our spirit with their treacherous and heinous acts, but they failed. They failed mightily because our resolve has never been stronger, and we will never be a conquered people.

Americans will always triumph over foreign and domestic terrorists that strive to instill trepidation and fear. Ironically, what the terrorists did, in fact, was inspire courage, valor, unity, and patriotism.

To our fallen heroes of 9/11 that are no longer with us now--they belong to the ages.


Anthony P. Johnson

Wednesday, September 8, 2010

"Polls Don't Vote."

The Republican/Tea Party believes that because some polls indicate that Americans are dissatisfied and prefer them to the Democratic leadership, they will reclaim the majority in the Senate and House of Representatives in November.

This comes on the view that some political scientists predict that the Republican/Tea Party could win up to 52 seats in November--more than enough to reclaim the majority.

The Republican/Tea Party is also penning their hopes on their archaic philosophy that if registered progressives, independents, and democrats stay home and don't vote, they will be victorious.

Suffice to say polls don't vote! People vote and be assured registered progressives, independents, and democrats will vote on November 2, 2010, to continue moving the Republic forward and not back into the abyss of chaos.


Anthony P. Johnson

Thursday, September 2, 2010

"A Vision."

I have a vision that one day "We the People" will work to improve our faulty public schools education system, decrease violence, eliminate top heavy administration salaries, and pay teachers a salary they so richly deserve.

I have a vision that senior citizens will never again have to decide whether to purchase food or purchase medicine that they need.

I have a vision that families of the dwindling middle class realize that continuing tax breaks for the wealthy will not be beneficial to them.

I have a vision that we will discuss more of the needs for the "working poor" because their contributions to America are as equally important.

I have a vision that elected officials will continue to fail to serve the will of the 98% of the population.

I have a vision that if we're not careful, this experiment we call Democracy will cease and give rise to a government that will represent the will of only 2% of the population.

I have a vision that citizens will stop being led astray by individuals and news outlets that are fear mongers, race baiters, xenophobic and dividers of the Republic, and start forming their own opinions and make intelligent decisions.

I have a vision that the 15 minutes of fame for Beck, Palin, Fox News and the Republican Party that sow hate and derision among us is just about up.

I have a vision that Bush, Cheney, and their cronies will be bought to trial for betraying the Republic.

I have a vision that every American will read the Constitution once in their lifetime and understand the true meaning of freedom of speech and religion.

I have a vision that citizens will stop saying the Republic was founded on the principles of Christianity--it wasn't!

I have a vision that Progressives will have an opportunity to guide America.

We hold these truths to be self-evident that every citizen in America is treated equal and that they are endowed with the opportunity to achieve economic prosperity for their families and for the Republic.



Anthony P. Johnson

Monday, August 30, 2010

“President Obama Resembles Hitler…Really?”

The next time some people want to compare President Obama to Adolf Hitler there are a few things you should know. Fact is the fate of black people in Nazi Germany from 1933-1945 and in the German-occupied territories ranged from isolation, horrific experiments, to persecution.

After World War I, the Allies stripped Germany of its African colonies. The German military stationed in Africa as well as missionaries, colonial bureaucrats, and settlers, returned to Germany and took with them their racist attitudes. Separation of whites and blacks was mandated by the Reichstag which enacted a law against mixed marriages in the African colonies.

Following World War I and the Treaty of Versailles in 1919, the victorious Allies occupied the Rhineland in western Germany. The use of French colonial troops, some of whom were black, in these occupation forces exacerbated anti-black racism in Germany. Racist propaganda against black soldiers depicted them as rapists of German women and carriers of STD’s and other diseases. The children of black soldiers and German women were called "Rhineland Bastards."

The Nazis, at the time a small political movement, viewed them as a threat to the purity of the Germanic race. In “Mein Kampf,” Adolf Hitler charged that "the Jews had brought the Negroes into the Rhineland with the clear aim of ruining the hated white race by the necessarily-resulting bastardization."

African German mulatto children were marginal in German society, isolated socially and economically, and not allowed to attend the university. Racial discrimination prohibited them from seeking most jobs, including service in the military. Then with the Nazi rise to power in 1933, blacks became a target of racial and population policy. By 1937, Himmler and his Gestapo had secretly rounded up and forcibly sterilized many of them. Some were subjected to medical experiments while others mysteriously disappeared.

Further, the racist nature of Adolf Hitler's regime was disguised briefly during the Olympic Games in Berlin in August 1936, when Hitler appeared to allow 18 African American athletes to compete for the U.S. team. But the fact of the matter was actual permission to compete was granted by the International Olympic Committee and not by the host country.

Adult African Germans were also victims. Both before and after World War I, many Africans came to Germany as students, artisans, entertainers, former soldiers, or low-level colonial officials, such as tax collectors, who had worked for the imperial colonial government. Hilarius Gilges, a dancer by profession, was murdered by the SS in 1933, probably because he was black. Gilges' German wife later received restitution from a postwar German government for his murder by the Nazis.

Some African Americans, caught in German-occupied Europe during World War II, also became victims of the Nazi regime. Many, like female jazz artist Valaida Snow, were imprisoned in Axis internment camps for alien nationals. The artist Josef Nassy, living in Belgium, was arrested as an enemy alien and held for seven months in the Beverloo transit camp in German-occupied Belgium. He was later transferred to Germany, where he spent the rest of the war in the Laufen Internment Camp and its sub camp, Tittmoning, both in Upper Bavaria.

European and African Americans were also interned in the Nazi concentration camp system. Lionel Romney, a sailor in the U.S. Merchant Marine, was imprisoned in the Mauthausen Concentration Camp. Jean Marcel Nicolas, a Haitian national, was incarcerated in the Buchenwald and Dora-Mittelbau Concentration Camps in Germany. Jean Voste, an African Belgian, was incarcerated in the Dachau Concentration Camp. Bayume Mohamed Hussein from Tanganyika (Tanzania) died in the Sachsenhausen Camp, near Berlin.

African American prisoners of war were especially faced with illegal incarceration and mistreatment at the hands of the Nazis, who did not uphold the regulations imposed by the Geneva Convention. Lieutenant Darwin Nichols, an African American pilot, was incarcerated in a Gestapo prison in Butzbach. Black soldiers of the American, French, and British armies were worked to death on construction projects or died as a result of mistreatment in concentration or prisoner-of-war camps. Others were never even incarcerated, but were instead immediately killed by the SS or Gestapo.

So the next time citizens in America want to compare President Obama to Adolf Hitler and the Nazis, please think intelligently before you speak and remove all doubt.



Anthony P. Johnson

Wednesday, August 25, 2010

“Remember, Remember the 2nd of November.”

As I sit here on the bus listening to one of my favorite artist “VS,” I look around at the other riders wondering, "Do they know what their Republic is currently mired in? Do they even care?"

The major character in one of my favorite movies of all-time "V for Vendetta" blamed the citizens in England for allowing the country to fall under a totalitarian government because the citizens willingly surrendered their freedoms of speech, religion, and the press so they would be protected by the government against liberals, Jews, Islam, gays, lesbians and terrorists. It appears when cast on the wall of life, fiction and reality has become one.

I watch as citizens first began protesting having a community center built two and half blocks from Ground Zero, which is their right to "demonizing" Islam and those that practice it which is racist, prejudice, and xenophobic. I also hear politicians campaigning for placing poor people in prison buildings for being poor and unhygienic, politicians who want to repeal the 17th Amendment and oil companies like Chevron attempting to infringe upon journalists 1st Amendment Rights.

As the president begins the withdrawal of troops from Iraq and Afghanistan, there are individuals in our government--"Bastards of War" if you will--that would rather deploy them to Iran and North Korea because they complete the tri-fecta of George W. Bush’s cartoonish theme of the “Axis of Evil.”

The Declaration of Independence and the Constititution protects everyone except illegal immigrants. If we’re not careful some will attempt to re-write them to protect everyone except Asians, Latinos, African Americans, Jews, Muslims, Native Americans, the sick, and impoverished. When this occurs, I should relocate to North Korea where they make no pretense of loving liberty, and they can be taken literarily and without the aura of hypocrisy.

As I sit here on the bus listening to one of my favorite artist and as I look around at the other riders, I wonder, "Do they know what their Republic is currently mired in? Do they even care?"



Anthony P. Johnson

Tuesday, August 24, 2010

“In A Whisper.”

It is important to remember that democracy is more fragile than communism, socialism, oligarchy or a totalitarian government because democracy can dissipate in a whisper when those at the seat of its government are inept and corrupt. Democracy will become extinct if we continue to misinterpret among the citizens derision, hate and destruction for freedom of speech and of religion.


Anthony P. Johnson



* This article appears in the August 24, 2010 Metro Newspaper.