Eldridge Cleaver, leading member of the Black Panther Party (BPP) during the 1960s, came to fame because of his ability to organize black Americans and garner national attention for his radical views promoting a black socialist government. He was convicted on rape and drug possession charges as a teenager in 1957 and spent time in jail where he read the works of Karl Marx, Thomas Paine, Lenin and William Du Bois. Only one year after his release from jail, he once again found himself on the wrong side of the law and spent his second incarceration studying civil rights and the writings of Malcolm X. His personal pursuit of "the truth" set the stage for a radical national movement.

During his second incarceration he wrote a memoir, later published in 1968, called Soul on Ice. In his book he admits to raping black women, which were only "practice," before he moved on to raping white women, which was "an insurrectionary act." This book established him as one of the most significant political figures amongst the radical African American community, and the New York Times claimed his book "had a tremendous impact on an intellectual community radicalized by the civil rights movement, urban riots, the war in Vietnam and campus rebellions," and further hailed this work "as an authentic voice of black rage in a white-ruled world."

Maxwell Geismar, a radical writer who wrote the foreword to Soul On Ice explains Cleaver as a man who dissected "the deepest and most cherished notions of our personal and social behavior" with a level of courage few had, and that this "soul of a black folk" became the best mirror for which to view white Americans.

After his release from prison, he established the Black House in San Francisco, a "cultural center" for local black radicals including Huey Newton and Bobby Seale, co-founders of the Black Panther Party. Cleaver soon became the Minister of Information for the BPP, an organization that espoused communist and Black Nationalist ideology, participated in brutality against law enforcement and confrontational and militant practices. With the help of Cleaver, the BPP established the "Ten Point Program," a list of rules that all BPP members had to abide by. Such ideas included the notion that the black community will never enjoy freedom until they fully control all the institutions in their local communities, and that the federal government is responsible to provide every black American full employment and income, housing, free education, free health care and required the release of all black Americans from the entire penal system.

In 1967, Huey Newton killed Oakland police officer John Frey, and during the height of the BPP, reports claim 15 police officers and BPP members were killed during their conflicts. In 1968, Cleaver taught an experimental course at the University of California at Berkeley and married Kathleen Neal, who later became an American teacher as well.

After a police ambush in 1968 that killed 17-year old BPP member Bobby Hutton, Elderidge surrendered to the Oakland police and returned to prison on attempted murder charges. While on bail, he fled to Cuba and Algeria, countries that espoused the communist ideology and third world liberation ideology he spent years studying and preaching. During his triumphant tour, he broke ties with the BPP and established the Revolutionary's People Communication Network in part because he wanted the BPP to continue down a path of escalated armed resistance, whereas Newton desired more pragmatic socialistic changes that would welcome in the non-violent black community.

But after a growing conflict between the Algerian government and Cleaver's entourage, Cleaver later wrote, "I had heard so much rhetoric about their glorious leaders and their incredible revolutionary spirit that even to this very angry and disgruntled American, it was absurd and unreal." He left Algeria and moved his family to France where he claims he converted to Christianity. In 1977, he returned to America and surrendered to the FBI, pleading guilty to assault charges from the shootout with police that killed Hutton.

After his return to America, Cleaver led a colorful life: a "born again" Christian, a professed Mormon and LDS church member, a business owner (inventing the "Cleaver sleeve" for men's dress pants), further run-ins with the law for cocaine possession, Bible school teacher, a Republican Party member, self-avowed conservative and an unsuccessful candidate for a California senate seat. Once a hero to radicals, he became a joke and an afterthought to the advancing socialist organizations of the 1980s.

Late in his life during a Berkeley City Council meeting, he demanded that the group recite the Pledge of Allegiance, a practice abandoned years prior by the council.

"Shut up, Eldridge," Mayor Gus Newport snapped, "or we'll have you removed."

Eldridge Cleaver died in 1988, reportedly due to a losing battle with diabetes and prostate cancer.

The left wants to portray his political conversion something akin to a hallucinogenic breakdown. The right wants to portray his transformation as the prodigal son returning to American principles. I believe he fell somewhere in between, but whether his transformation was genuine or not eclipses the larger point. He tested his years of political intellectualism in the real world, and he chose to return to America. Somewhere overseas he decided he would rather be a prisoner in America than continue a prisoner of communist rule.

Cleaver once stated, "You're either part of the problem or part of the solution." He represented both. And the brilliance of American citizenship is the right to be both. Years of communist promulgation underneath the protections of the constitution eventually led Eldridge Cleaver to return to the basic principles often taken for granted and overshadowed by "enlightened" thinking. He realized, as I hope the rest of us will, that we got it right the first time.

Yuval Levin wrote one of the best articles I've read in a long, long time in The Weekly Standard. This article dissects Paul Ryan's Republican budget proposal for 2012, and what it offers, as a comparison to the Democrat's agnostic approach to addressing our country's fiscal crisis. Levin writes, "The plan is surely a departure from the status quo, but that status quo is itself a radical departure from the American experience." That line sums up perfectly what we've been saying on this blog. Read the article here.

By Scott Gold, Richard Winton and Maria L. La Ganga, Los Angeles Times
April 5, 2011

Reporting from Los Angeles and San Francisco— For a long time, for all the heroes and the heroics, the Koufaxes and Garveys and hobbled home run trots, the experience of going to a Los Angeles Dodgers game was largely about beating traffic.

Fans arrived late, left early and — at least in the eyes of rivals — didn't seem terribly concerned with what happened in the intervening hours.

But over time, being a Dodgers fan became an almost tribal identity to some. That helped to rebuild a fervent base of support for the team — but brought in, too, an unsettling pattern of fan abuse and boorish behavior that hit another low last week when a Giants fan was severely beaten on opening day.

The violence left even the truest blue Dodgers fans saying something has to change. "It's not right," said Tommy Lasorda, the Hall of Fame former Dodgers manager and, for many years, the face of the organization. "It's just a baseball game."

Brian Stow, 42, a Santa Cruz paramedic, a father of two and a Giants fan, was walking through the Dodger Stadium parking lot with two friends after the Dodgers' 2-1 victory over San Francisco. Stow was wearing Giants apparel, police said, and two young men began taunting him. One of the assailants then cursed the Giants and blindsided Stow with blows to the back and head, police said.

The two assailants repeatedly kicked and punched Stow while he was on the ground. Stow's friends attempted to help, and were also punched and kicked before the attackers fled in a car driven by a woman. Police said it appears there was also a 10-year-old boy in the car.

Stow has a brain injury and is in a medically induced coma at Los Angeles County-USC Medical Center. He remained in critical condition on Monday.

Part of Stow's skull has been removed to reduce the pressure on his brain, said Rebecca Mackowiak, his colleague at a paramedic service. Even if he recovers physically, she said, "he won't be the same person again."
------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Where are the Rick Mondays?

Let's take a break from politics today. Turn off the TV. Put down the remote. If you've been looking for the greatest play so far this year in the newly started baseball season you are in luck.

You've seen the top contenders - the most athletic leap, the most golden glove move, most clutch hit, whatever.....but I've found the greatest overall play of all time for you. It will give you and your friends something to talk about. The day was April 25th, 1976. Dodger stadium.

Coincidentally, Dodger stadium is also where an off-duty paramedic was recently put into a coma as described in the above news story. Watch the video.



After watching the video, I don't know about what comes to mind for you, but for me the initial reaction was to wonder, 'where are the Rick Mondays'? After reflecting some, I've come to the conclusion that there is no time to ponder where they are. The only thing to do is to decide if you are one. And, to prepare your mind and heart for that moment when you may be the difference in recognizing a developing situation by immediate involvement; by taking action. However obvious, simply recognizing that his example speaks volumes is excellent, but only gets you half way there. If you can realize that he didn't have time to ponder anything that day, you've arrived at the destination.

Let's get our head on straight. We know what is right. And what is wrong. Talk with someone today about indifference and what it allows. Talk about Rick Monday. Your Monday moment may be just around the corner.

On April 1st, supporters of Stalin spoke at New York University's "Academic Freedom in the 1960s" conference. Ellen Schrecker, a Yeshiva University Professor and author delivered the keynote address. She wrote The Age of McCarthyism: A Brief History With Documents in which she explains that anti-communism in the United States was created by "[z]ealous partisans who often made the eradication of the so-called Communist menace a full-time career," and goes on to say that "in some respects they were the mirror image of the Communists they fought." She also explains that conservatives have a tradition of harboring "characteristic paranoia" that aims to subdue minority groups in an effort to infiltrate their economic and social ideology throughout America. What a gem. (Interestingly enough, this "esteemed" professor has taught numerous courses on American Colonial History, Civil War History, The United States and American Politics.)

Schrecker shared the stage with Rutgers University Newark Professor and author H. Bruce Franklin, who holds to the belief that “[Stalin is] one of the greatest heroes of modern history.” In his introductory essay for his book The Essential Stalin, Franklin writes: “I used to think of Joseph Stalin as a tyrant and a butcher … but, to about a billion people today, Stalin is the opposite of what we in the capitalist world have been programmed to believe.”

I'm not a history buff by any means, so I did a quick online fact check about Joesph Stalin. Under his regime, the death toll is estimated at around 20 million (although some claim the number is closer to 40 million) due to organized poverty, starvation, labor camps, executions, torture, and other sadistic acts. Stalin killed many talented and gifted Soviets during the Purges of the 1930s because he felt anyone with unique abilities posed a threat to his regime.

Additionally, Stalin's forced labor camps, or gulags, incarcerated political dissidents and innocent Soviets for such heinous crimes as showing up late for work (a three-year sentence), telling a joke about a government official (up to 25 years) or committing petty theft and other minor crimes (up to 10 years). No, he certainly wasn't a tyrant and a butcher. Just a misunderstood man with a rough childhood, much like my neighbor. Count me out as one of his billion Facebook fans.

Reverend David Smith, Catholic priest and full-time professor with Emeritus status at the University of St. Thomas in Minnesota, spoke recently at a rally outside the state capitol in protest of the United State's support of the nation of Israel. He has been very busy recently at St. Thomas researching, writing, and working to strengthen "peace studies." During this time, he traveled with the Michigan Peace Team to the West Bank and Gaza, living in Beit Sahour near Bethlehem. "He helped Palestinian farmers pick their olives, slept in tents and caves with farmers threatened by Jewish settlers, and joined Palestinian nonviolent demonstrators protesting Israeli-only roads and the separation barrier."

In his long professorship, he has created many courses for St. Thomas in which he linked the Scriptures with justice issues (red flag, anyone?). Eric Foner, professor of American History at Columbia University, was interviewed by bigthink.com in 2009 and spoke about his favorite figures in American history, which include critics, radicals and fridge socialist figures who have "stood outside the accepted political boundaries." He goes on to say that "without the socialists, you would not have had an era where the government took responsibility for the economy," and that "the driving force for the change of good" in our country has been those "people at the margins."

All across the country, professors are teaching young adults about World and American history. What are they teaching them? Valid question. When those of us choose to ask this question and speak up about the ideology of our "academic elite," we often hear one common rebuttal: free speech. Those professors have free speech, the students have free speech, and what takes place in the classroom is a healthy dialog of alternate viewpoints. This rebuttal is a red herring. The issue is not whether professors have a right to free speech, thus students have a right to hear the drivelings of free speech. The issue is why do these professors hold these beliefs. Why do we have American professors who are "big fans" of Stalin, Chavez and Mao Tse Tung? Why do we have American professors who turn taciturn about honest history, including the faith of our Founding Fathers, Israel's right to defend itself, and how socialism is not a "failed experiment" that deserves another opportunity?

Do not let the liberals continue to use rhetorical tactics to avoid the items of significance. We are not debating the merits of free speech. The argument cannot be whether or not professors have a right to speak about such radical, liberal beliefs. The argument must be why they hold those beliefs. Call them out. Call them all out.
Just like an iceberg, we cannot debate what is seen above water, because the issues we are facing begin far below the surface.