By Major General, USA, (Ret.) Jerry Curry
Enough is enough. Last week 88 year old Shorty Belton of Spokane, Washington, a white American and a veteran of World War II fighting in the Pacific, was beaten to death in the streets of Spokane, for no apparent reason, by two black teenagers, a sort of Trayvon Martin case in reverse.
About this senseless killing there has been almost no outrage expressed by black American leaders like Congressmen John Lewis and Charley Rangel, Reverends Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton, black churchmen, the NAACP and the Congressional Black Caucus, Oprah and the President, or the Ritz-Carlton Democrats. Instead they have chosen to assume the role of victims rather than of responsible adults. They are long on speeches but short on positive action, and any helpful insight they might have is short-lived.
Following in line with their actions during the Trayvon Martin travesty they should all be leading huge civil rights demonstrations protesting the murder of Mr. Belton and demanding that black parents, families, communities and churches get and keep their black teenagers under control. And where is the continuous drum beat of outrage from the national news media that is supposed to inform “we the people.” There is none. Instead, these racial hustlers and parasites have, for the most part, gone mute on the public.
If America’s black leadership isn’t going to take charge of and clean up their own mess, white leaders will have to do it for them. You can’t expect white Americans to keep looking the other way while black teenagers beat their fellow white Americans to death. Evidently black leaders seem to think it is alright for black teenagers to profile Shorty Belton and kill him and they need not comment on how wrong it is, but it’s not right for a white policeman to profile someone black and kill them.
The news media and the current White House Administration don’t seem to care how many white Americans are murdered by black teenagers; rather, their actions and speech encourages racial violence and polarization. The American sub- culture has bred derelict families awash in video games and nose and lip rings, sporting dark green, blue and black tattoos, going around jerking, bopping, weaving, rapping and Hip Hopping, with their baggy pants falling off their butts. This isn’t “cool;” it is embarrassingly crude and stupid, and black leaders should loudly say so.
Today America’s young people wallow in moral decay and an absence of influential parenting that can lead to murder born out of boredom. It is easy for American teenagers to become bored. They live with one parent; don’t have to work to pay rent; and the government and tax payers feed them. They need to go where they can find real work, like to the oil fields of the Dakotas. Additionally, if the government wants to help them, it can put together labor pools as FDR did during the Great Depression. Let them clean out the national parks and help maintain badly needed roads and bridges.
But care must be taken that the work and the hiring of workers is kept under control of private companies not the government. It cannot be allowed to degenerate into make work projects where the workers need only show up and then goof around all day doing little or nothing. In addition to providing work there has to be a way to teach moral values and self- reliance, accountability and a work ethic, things their families, churches and schools should have taught them but didn’t. We do not need crime and drug infested cities like Detroit and Chicago involved in the process, cities that celebrate corruption, criminality, and victimization.
Restoring black families and the positive affect they traditionally have had on our communities and cities has to be one of our main efforts. With 72 % of all black babies being born out of wedlock and half of the others aborted, the black American family and the black community have fallen into decay, disrepute, and disrepair. They need a good old fashioned dose of leadership from people who genuinely care about them, their communities and their futures.
The question is can these families and communities ever be reconstituted again, and do we have a sufficient number of black leaders who can and are able to shoulder the vision and burdens of a Martin Luther King, Jr.? Can Jesse Jackson or Al Sharpton do it? If the answer is no, and I believe it is, then America’s white leadership will have to get rid of them and select their replacements.
Why don’t I suggest that Black Democrats select the replacements? Because Black Democrats are fine for house work, but not for doing heavy lifting. Name one that has put forward a meaningful call to action with a plan to restore the black family and community. You can’t. And black Republicans don’t count in this discussion because as elections show, more than 90% of the black community is Democrat and Democrat controlled.
One of the accusations made by blacks to discourage young black people who are striving to be successful is, “You are trying to act white.” Since white people own most of the major corporations and industries and run all the state governments in this country, it would seem that for a young black American to be successful, he or she would have to follow the work rules laid down by white Americans. This includes dressing for success and practicing proper speech and conduct. If this is acting white, then so be it; and black leaders should loudly and publicly go on the record saying so.
Enough is enough. 88 year old Shorty Belton, a WW II veteran, was beaten to death on a street in Spokane by two black teenagers. Like it or not, his death came about because of deficient character content and a failure of leadership. It was also caused by a failure of adults to teach teenagers the difference between right and wrong and good and evil and how, why and when one should stand and fight for the right. Isn’t it time for all of us to get involved in building a better America?
Jerry Curry is a retired Army Major General, Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense in the Carter administration; Acting Press Secretary to the Secretary of Defense in the Reagan administration; and Administrator of the National Highway Traffic and Safety Administration in the Bush Sr. administration.
