al calloway.jpgAlthough the language called “Washington speak” which print and electronic media outlets and talking-heads used to bombard the American public dropped a falsehood called “entitlements” on us and  claimed that Social Security is such a case, don’t get caught-up in that game. Social Security is not an “entitlement.”

Even President Barack Obama has used the term “entitlements” in order to communicate with the American people through a cloud of falsehood surrounding such a notion, such a contrivance to obfuscate and deceive. So, from the far-right neo-conservatives came the embellished falsehood that the “entitlement” Social Security is actually a Ponzi scheme.

The truth is that Social Security is a debt owed to American seniors who worked all of their adult lives until retirement. It is a savings account with the government of the United States of America which allows deductions to be made before paychecks are received. Seniors are not “entitled” to these funds, they are owed their money; that’s money that they worked for and earned.

All residents of the United States of America, whether eligible voters or not, must now help save America from the anti-American behemoths who want only a democracy among themselves so they can escalate filching our country to the bone.

Make a resolution now to do everything in your power to cause the re-election of President Obama. Those who can vote, make sure of your eligibility and not only vote for Obama but also make sure everybody you know also votes for Obama in November. Everybody, start organizing now, house by house, apartment building by apartment building, block by block, precinct by precinct.

Those young and old who cannot vote are just as vital to the process as those who can vote. Become a campaign worker. Volunteer. Hand out literature, place yard signs, work in a campaign office. Erroneously, too many voters think that casting their votes is all they need to do. No! Get involved in every aspect of the democratic process in your churches, clubs and neighborhoods.

Ultra-powerful, super rich sources, the behemoths of Wall Street and their minions on Washington’s K Street, have orchestrated a far-right fascistic takeover of America by marginalizing the middle class and dumping the poor and near-poor into abject poverty.

These are the oligarchs who have been and continue to oppose tax cuts for working Americans. President Obama wisely went before the American people and proclaimed that this fascist plutocracy that controls so much of Congress (my words, not his) missed what $40 means to the average American. Obama invited some average Americans to tell the rich and super-rich what a difference $40 makes in their families’ lives.  

Wall Street oligarchs generated an historic economic downturn during the Bush administration that handed over a near depression to President Obama when he entered the White House. Don’t get it twisted; Obama saved the Union and white nationalists of both political parties have powerfully obfuscated that fact.   

Wall Street developed a financial innovation called the Swaps Market that is now reputed to be a $700 trillion secret liability — a global swaps market — where they bet on defaults. It is an unregulated shadow market. Obama must be re-elected so that the Justice Department can continue its probe into how the economy was rigged so the super-rich got richer while the country almost went into a depression.

Obama is your only defense against every vestige of democracy being methodically eliminated. Minorities are always first. For example, while there have only been 311 cases of voter fraud nationally in a decade, 38 states have introduced legislation to require government identification in order to vote; 25 percent of blacks and 19 percent of Latinos have no government-issued identification.

Frightening to the point of excruciation is the reality that any one of the Republican candidates for president, all trying desperately to out right-wing one another, is even considered. Terrifying! So what is it like for black Republicans? Will black Republicans actively campaign for any one of these candidates, all of whom proudly proclaim their white nationalist ideology?

Black Republicans can stay in their political party, which they cannot turn to the center or divest of its avowed white nationalism, and do the right thing. Vote for Obama.

Happy New Year.


Al Calloway is a long-time journalist who began his career with the Atlanta Inquirer during the early 1960s civil rights struggle. He may be reached at Al_Calloway@verizon.net

Photo: Al Calloway