The DISH

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Vol. 12 Issue 7…Dedicated to the Dialogue on Race…February 15, 2009

Bit of History

Eric Hughes

Eric Hughes was the youngest of Christopher and Helen Hughes' five sons. His parents immigrated to the United States from the tiny Caribbean island of Anguilla, a British protectorate. His father settled in Perth Amboy, New Jersey in the 1920s, where his parents met and married. Although his father was a master carpenter, discrimination against blacks by the carpenters union prevented him from working in his chosen field. Forced to work as a pick-and-shovel laborer in the mill, Eric's father provided an excellent model of manhood, fatherhood and civic responsibility for his children, by making the best of opportunities available.

Notwithstanding Perth Amboy's lack of obvious segregation, not so subtle discrimination was everywhere. Although whites and blacks went to high school together, blacks had their place and accepted it. Consideration and counseling for college was reserved for white students. If black students played sports, they rode the bench. Even though Eric grew up playing with white children, they lived very separate lives.

After graduating from high school, Eric entered the U.S. Air Force (1956), where he was trained in the fields of cryptography and teletype. Even though Presidents Harry S. Truman and Dwight D. Eisenhower had issued orders desegregating the US Military, racist attitudes and practices were openly tolerated. Hughes confessed, "It was military service that shaped my thinking about race in America. For the first time in my life, I lived and worked with white people who hated me because of my race. Whites openly made jokes or expressed racial epithets with impunity."

Following an honorable discharge (1960), Hughes moved to Washington, D.C. where he began 35 years of employment with the U.S. Department of State as a specialized cryptographic operator. Hughes coded and decoded teletype and cryptographic messages sent between over 300 embassies, consulates and outposts worldwide. He learned everything he could to enhance his prospects for promotion. He attended night school and received a B.S. from the University of the District of Columbia in 1974 and M.P.A. from American University in 1977.

The State Department recognized Hughes' exemplary expertise in 1968 when he was selected Communications Center Employee of the Month in recognition of outstanding production. Hughes was selected to accompany and assisted the White House communications staff during President Nixon's third summit meeting at Yalta, and Communist Party Leader Leonid Brezhnev and Secretary of State Henry Kissinger's meeting in 1974.

Unfortunately, the State Department was no different from the US Military. It continued to pass over Hughes for promotions, while promoting lesser qualified white males and females. "There was a 'good old boy' network that included friends and roommates from the 'Ivy League.' There was no way to break through - nothing I did mattered." After talking with high ranking blacks at State and not getting anywhere, Hughes wrote letters to Congress and other high level officials to no avail. Discrimination was total, everyone knew it and accepted it -- except Hughes.

On June 20, 1979, Hughes filed a formal discrimination complaint with EEOC. The EEOC process is fraught with loopholes and trapdoors by which those that discriminate can escape because the purpose of the law was not to end discrimination, only to placate blacks and make them think the government cared. Hughes learned quickly that the EEOC process really favored those that discriminated, rather than the victims. The process forced victims to retain legal counsel in order to get their day in court to air their complaint. Hughes had to take a second job to pay legal fees, while still holding down his regular job at State. The State Department stretched the process out for 15 years; Hughes refused to give in or quit.

"Many people asked, 'How did you keep going?' First, my parents instilled in me strength of character, which enabled me to persevere. They taught me to never countenance unfair treatment as long as there is a way to oppose it. I thought of the countless number of other government employees who needed inspiration and to be empowered to take action and seek justice. Finally, my military service taught me that discrimination is so pervasive in the US that what happened to me was 'business as usual' in America. Knowing all of that, we don't deserve the right to hate prejudice until we spend our lives opposing it." On June 12, 1986, Hughes signed a settlement agreement with the Department of State. The agreement forbade disclosing the conditions of the settlement.

Eric Hughes' fight is a microcosm of the ongoing battle against systemic discrimination and disparate treatment slave descendants face daily because of the color of their skin. Hughes described his 15 year discrimination battle against the US Department of State and a similar 4 year discrimination fight against the U.S. Department of Commerce, which he won also, in his 2002 book The Third Burden: My True Story Of Defeating Discrimination In The Workplace. With blacks being the last hired and first fired, it is a must read for anyone employed by the federal government, especially during this time of cutbacks and layoffs.

Hughes has received numerous awards for his courageous stand and lectures around the country to raise awareness on the pervasiveness of racism, discrimination and disparate treatment black people face in the workplace in America. He resides in Washington D. C. with his wife, Norma. They have two children and four grandchildren. For information about his personal battles contact Hughes at richughes@erols.com. (Source: www.discrimrelief.com)

The Infrastructure of Discrimination

By John Burl Smith

Cause and effect is one of the basic laws of the universe. People in today's ultra modern society are born into a world where things happen and they never ask why. We simply suppose that is the way things are and has always been. We turn on the faucet and water comes out or flick a switch and the room lights up. No one spends time pondering how or why those things happened; it is simply the way the world works.

Far be it from me to challenge this notion of how the world works, but a plumber or an electrician would explain that there is nothing simple or automatic about either process. They understand that behind the walls and under the floor, a whole series of inter-connected systems function synergistically to produce the desired result - water or light. The fact that the individual gets the desired effect is the result of infrastructure or a grid that runs from the source to the outlet and you.

Racial discrimination against slave descendants in the United States of America works much the same way -- it has an infrastructure. When discrimination happens, it is not by accident. Just as with the water or lights, most people never think about how or why it happened, all they know is the desired result occurred. With water or electricity, turning on the switch or tap solves their problem. Moreover, the individual does not see how their getting water deprives their next door neighbor of water. And in fact it does not because they both are hooked into the same system.

On the other hand, problems arise when those not hooked up want a drink or need power. There is a system in place that determines who gets service and at what price. Again, this analogy fits the workings of discrimination in America in that slave descendants have never been hooked up and allowed unrestricted access to the system. As slaves, they were completely locked out of the system - cut off from power and not allowed to drink the sweet water of freedom in which whites bathed following the revolution.

The US Constitution determined who would have access to power in American and under what conditions. The 3/5 Compromise was inserted like a circuit breaker or shut off valve that denied slaves and their descendants access to power and the life giving waters of freedom that bathed the nation as the stench of colonialism was washed away. Throwing out the baby with the bath water, whites used the 3/5 Compromise to erect a system of laws that created a mind-set which justified denying slaves and their descendants access to any switch that opened the system. This created the legal infrastructure of discrimination against slaves and their descendants.

The 3/5 Compromise hard-wired white supremacy, legalizing a mind-set that defined slaves and their descendants as property and not deserving human considerations. This justified systemic social restrictions (segregation) and put in place legal procedures -- how federal dollars and representation was allocated to the states -- that became the infrastructure of discrimination that accomplished the desired effect. Even after court decisions like Brown v Board of Education and laws like the Civil Right Act of 1964 and Voting Rights Act of 1965 were passed, this infrastructure of discrimination was never dismantled. The allocation of federal funds and representation remained and the switches remained in white people's heads.

Research by Dot M. Smith published in the Mid-South Journal of Economics, Vol. 6 No 3 (1982) supports this contention that the infrastructure of discrimination began with the 3/5 Compromise. By looking at unemployment and median family income she established that when these variables are compared a consistent and stable welfare gap between blacks and whites that go all the way back to slavery is revealed. The ratio of black to white median family income fluctuates along an interval of .5 to .65 mimicking the 3/5 Compromise.

Consequently today, like water faucets and light switches, the moment a black face shows up, the system functions automatically once turned on. This is why whites never notice their discriminatory behavior or believe blacks are being treated disparately; the process is hard-wired and functions without thought. Just as in Germany during Adolf Hitler's reign, the system was set up so Germans did not have to think about killing Jews. Names were put on lists, numbers were put on trains, Germans simply did their jobs without questions and millions were burned alive. Unless individuals consciously disconnect themselves from the network, they cannot see that their actions deprive black people of rights. Again, like the water faucet or light switch, whites do not ponder their discriminatory behavior; it is just the way their world works.

For those who find this analysis difficult to believe, Eric Hughes in his book, The Third Burden: My True Story of Defeating Discrimination in the Workplace, draws a real world schematic of this process. Detailing his more than 40 years of service and employment with the US government, Hughes' heart-wrenching story of individual and systemic support of racial discrimination defies comprehension. His story debunks all the justifications for discrimination based on the lack of education, training, appearance, competence, work ethic or not being a team player. Even after displaying all of these qualities and receiving "outstanding" evaluation, Hughes had to fight in court for career promotions.

The infrastructure of discrimination is like rust in the pipes or a short in an electric circuit; the situation will never get better on its own, you have to do something to make it better. Even though the switches are in the heads of whites, Hughes tell blacks, "There is nothing wrong with you. The problem is with the system and you owe it to yourself and your parents, who gave you the best chance they could to succeed, not to accept discrimination when you can do something about it." If blacks follow Eric Hughes' example of resistance, we can dismantle the 3/5 Compromise infrastructure of discrimination.

George W. Bush turned back the clock on ending discrimination against slave descendants by putting affirmation action in the deep freeze. Now with the election of President Barack Obama, the federal government and private industry can begin a thaw by taking positive actions to bring slave descendants up to par with everyone else in America. Clearly there is no justification for not closing the gap Smith has proven exists based on the 3/5 Compromise. President Obama and the Democrats must make a concerted effort to end racism, disparate treatment and discrimination based on race or color. The nation must examine its 3/5 Compromise mind-set and recognize that as long as the people of this nation keep the 3/5 Compromise in the US Constitution, it is reinforcing the infrastructure of discrimination against slave descendants.

Venue for an Artist

When Are WE Going to Get Over It?

By Andrew M. Manis

I tell students that if I were in charge, nobody in America would graduate from college without having read W.E.B. DuBois' 'The Souls of Black Folk' and a large helping of the writings and speeches of Abraham Lincoln.

For much of the last forty years, ever since America "fixed" its race problem in the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts, we white people have been impatient with African Americans who continued to blame race for their difficulties. Often we have heard whites ask, "When are African Americans finally going to get over it? Now I want to ask: "When are we White Americans going to get over our ridiculous obsession with skin color?

Recent reports that "Election Spurs Hundreds' of Race Threats, Crimes" should frighten and infuriate every one of us. Having grown up in "Bombingham," Alabama in the 1960s, I remember overhearing an avalanche of comments about what many white classmates and their parents wanted to do to John and Bobby Kennedy and Martin Luther King. Eventually, as you may recall, in all three cases, someone decided to do more than "talk the talk."

Since our recent presidential election, to our eternal shame we are once again hearing the same reprehensible talk I remember from my boyhood. We white people have controlled political life in the disunited colonies and United States for some 400 years on this continent. Conservative whites have been in power 28 of the last 40 years. Even during the eight Clinton years, conservatives in Congress blocked most of his agenda and pulled him to the right. Yet never in that period did I read any headlines suggesting that anyone was calling for the assassinations of presidents Nixon, Ford, Reagan, or either of the Bushes. Criticize them, yes. Call for their impeachment, perhaps. But there were no bounties on their heads. And even when someone did try to kill Ronald Reagan, the perpetrator was a non-political mental case who wanted merely to impress Jody Foster.

But elect a liberal who happens to be Black and we're back in the sixties again. At this point in our history, we should be proud that we've proven what conservatives are always saying -- that in America anything is possible, EVEN electing a black man as president. But instead we now hear that school children from Maine to California are talking about wanting to "assassinate Obama."

Fighting the urge to throw up, I can only ask, "How long?" How long before we white people realize we can't make our nation, much less the whole world, look like us? How long until we white people can - once and for all - get over this hell-conceived preoccupation with skin color? How long until we white people get over the demonic conviction that white skin makes us superior? How long before we white people get over our bitter resentments about being demoted to the status of equality with non-whites?

How long before we get over our expectations that we should be at the head of the line merely because of our white skin? How long until we white people end our silence and call out our peers when they share the latest racist jokes in the privacy of our white-only conversations?

I believe in free speech, but how long until we white people start making racist loudmouths as socially uncomfortable as we do flag burners? How long until we white people will stop insisting that blacks exercise personal responsibility, build strong families, educate themselves enough to edit the Harvard Law Review, and work hard enough to become President of the United States, only to threaten to assassinate them when they do?

How long before we start "living out the true meaning" of our creeds, both civil and religious, that all men and women are created equal and that "red and yellow, black and white" all are precious in God's sight?

Until this past November 4, I didn't believe this country would ever elect an African American to the presidency. I still don't believe I'll live long enough to see us white people get over our racism problem. But here's my three-point plan: First, everyday that Barack Obama lives in the White House that Black Slaves Built, I'm going to pray that God (and the Secret Service) will protect him and his family from us white people.

Second, I'm going to report to the FBI any white person I overhear saying, in seriousness or in jest, anything of a threatening nature about President Obama. Third, I'm going to pray to live long enough to see America surprise the world once again, when white people can "in spirit and in truth" sing of our damnable color prejudice, "We HAVE overcome." It takes a Village to protect our President!!!

About Me: The author of five books, Dr. Andrew M. Manis is associate professor of history at Macon State College in Georgia. His works include A Fire You Can't Put Out: The Civil Rights Life of Birmingham's Reverend Fred Shuttlesworth (1999) and Macon Black and White. An award-winning historian and Fulbright Scholar, Dr. Manis serves on the steering committee of Macon's Center for Racial Understanding.

News You Use

Rip-offs: Refund Anticipation Loans

In 2002, the Consumer Federation of America National Consumer Law Center published Tax Preparers Peddle High Priced Tax Refund Loans. This report alerted the nation about the millions of dollars being skimmed off the working poor and from the US Treasury by tax preparers and banks offering refund anticipation loans (RAL) to primarily low-income workers that receive the Earned Income Tax Credit, the nation's largest refundable tax credit program.

According to the report, refund anticipation loans (RALs), which are usurious short-term loans secured by the taxpayer's tax refund, cost from 67% to 774% APR. Sharing many characteristics of other fringe financial products, such as rent-to-own, payday loans, and car title pawn shops, which target vulnerable low-to moderate- income consumers, the refund anticipation loan industry primarily consists of commercial tax preparers and the banks that provide the loans. The banks involved help the industry evade state usury laws.

Consumers in 2000 paid an estimated $810 million in RAL fees. By 2008, 8.67 million RAL users spent $900 million in loan fees. In addition to the loan fees charged by these rip-off artists, they siphon off an additional $670 million in tax preparation, electronic filing, and check cashing fees every year from the Earned Income Tax Credit (ETIC). An estimated forty percent of taxpayers who get a RAL are EITC recipients.

The report also found that many of the consumers that respond to the 'get your refund fast' advertisements do not understand they are getting a loan that is taken out against their anticipated tax refund. Obviously, the advertisements are misleading since they do not mention the tax refund transaction involves obtaining a loan. Some commercial tax preparers involved in RALs include Jackson Hewitt, Instant Tax Service and H&R Block.

In these difficult economic times, consumers are more likely to need their refunds fast and are therefore apt to turn to these rip-off artists for assistance. However, be advised: Fast is not always the best or most economical route to take! If you need your refund fast and wish to avoid getting ripped off, file your taxes electronically. The service is free, if you earned income of $54,000 or less. To find a tax preparer in your area or learn more about electronic tax preparation, log on to www.irs.gov.

Hood Notes

White Recession/Black Depression

By Dot

The National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER), the private, nonprofit, nonpartisan research organization founded in 1920 that analyzes peaks and troughs in US business cycles, determined that the country entered into a recession in the fourth quarter of 2008. At the time of the NBER announcement in December, the national unemployment rate was 6.8 percent. It has since risen to 7.6 percent, according to the Labor Department's Economic Situation Report for January 2009.

Economic downturns, whether shallow or steep, means hard times for some segments of the nation's population. Those hardest hit are the already poor and blacks. Even prior to the NBER announcement that the nation was in the grips of a recession, the black unemployment rate for third quarter 2008, which began in July, was 10.7 percent. It currently stands at 12.6 percent. The white unemployment rate, which is generally lower than the national average, is 6.9 percent.

In every recorded economic downturn experienced by this nation, blacks have borne the greatest share of the economic welfare loss. The current recession appears to be no exception to the historical record. As a general rule of thumb, when the overall economy is in recession, black America is experiencing a depression.

Disgruntled says: According to a recent housing report, one in nine homes in the US is vacant. The vacancy rate has hit communities all across the nation from poor inner cities neighborhoods to more upscale suburbs. In addition, more families are slated to lose their homes as millions are already in the foreclosure process or more than one month late in making mortgage payments. US photographer Anthony Suau won the top prize in the World Press Photo competition with an image of a police officer searching a debris-strewn home in Cleveland, Ohio to ensure the evicted residents had left after a mortgage foreclosure. Not only was the winning photograph excellent, it addressed what jury chairman Mary Anne Golon and other panel members saw as the most important global issue of 2008, the economic crisis which began in the US housing market. As stated by Golon, "The strength of the picture is in its opposites. It's a double entendre. Now war in its classic sense is coming into people's houses because they can't pay their mortgages." As such, Anthony Suau's image perfectly captures these dire economic times.

Disgruntled wants to know: This week two Pennsylvania judges pleaded guilty to taking millions of dollars in kickbacks to send juvenile offenders to privately run detention facilities. Specifically, in a plea agreement, the judges pleaded guilty to honest services fraud and tax fraud, which are likely to carry more than seven years in prison. Prosecutors are alleging the judges, Mark Ciavarella and Michael Conahan, took $2.6 million in payoffs to put juveniles in facilities run by PA Child Care LLC and a sister company. They schemed to shut down the county-owned juvenile detention center, then steered thousands of youngsters to the private facilities. Teenagers, many first-time offenders, were incarcerated for months for minor offenses ranging from stealing loose change from cars to possessing drug paraphernalia. As we already know, incarcerating folks, young and old, is a lucrative business in this country. How do we know this kind of scheme is not run nationwide, given the more than two million people locked up in US prisons?

Disgruntled feels: Robbed! I fail to understand the logic behind giving banks and insurance companies hundreds of billions of dollars when everyday families are losing homes and jobs. These entities are already robbing folks by charging exorbitant interest rates for credit and high premiums for insurance coverage. A better use of taxpayer money would be to distribute the remaining Troubled Asset Recovery Program (TARP) funds to the estimated three hundred five million Americans that make up this country. Imagine, every American could be a millionaire with money to spare. With less than a billion spent, the government could still fund infrastructure projects and begin its green revolution. Think about it! Instead of us getting rich, money has been leaked like a sieve to the thieves on Wall Street with more to come. There ought to be a law! Folks should be protesting against the den of thieves that perpetuated this fraud. We have been robbed, not once but twice; our grandchildren and their children will be stuck paying the interest and principal on this boondoggle.

Mailbox: E-Mails, Faxes and Telephone Calls

Email www.commondreams.org... Kucinich: 'Keep People in Their Homes, the Banks Will Get Their Money as Well'...WASHINGTON - February 11 - Congressman Dennis Kucinich (D-OH) today made the following statement on the ongoing foreclosure crisis: "According to today's Wall Street Journal, Moody's economy.com claims that nearly five million families could lose their homes to foreclosure between 2009 and 2011. Now is the time for our government to take a controlling interest in mortgage-backed securities and then direct loan modification, lowering principle and interest rates, extending terms of payments and keeping people in their homes. "Banks are not lending money. They are hoarding money, because they fear their own balance sheets understate their losses. Instead of giving the banks more of taxpayers' money in the hopes that banks will loan the money to keep people in their homes, the government must take charge to save the homes of so many American families. Keep people in their homes, the banks will get their money as well. "It’s time to stand up for the dream of American home ownership by saving the homes that are in jeopardy."

Email www.ap.com Official: Economic crisis tops list of US threats...By Pamela Hess...The economic crisis has trumped bullets and bombs in the intelligence agencies' latest assessment of threats to the United States. Sounding more like an economist than the war-fighting Navy commander he once was, National Intelligence Director Dennis Blair told a Senate panel Thursday that if the crisis lasts more than two years, it could cause some nations' governments to collapse. And a number of allies the United States depends on might no longer be able to afford to meet their own defense and humanitarian obligations, he said. Blair said already the financial meltdown, which started in the United States and quickly infected other countries, has eroded confidence in American economic leadership and belief in free markets.

Email www.latimes.com LA car wash owners accused of mistreating workers...Los Angeles prosecutors are accusing carwash owners of dirty employee practices. The city attorney's office filed 176 charges Monday against Benny and Nissan Pirian, their manager Manuel Reyes and their businesses. City Attorney Rocky Delgadillo claims workers were treated almost like "indentured servants" at four washes in Hollywood, Northridge and the Los Feliz area. They allegedly worked without overtime pay, rest or lunch breaks, drank water from a washing machine, received no proper medical treatment for cuts and burns and were harassed if they tried to unionize. The Pirians face nearly 86 years each in jail if convicted. Reyes, who is accused of using a machete and a baton to threaten workers and unionizers, faces 2 ½ years in jail if convicted.

Email www.nytimes.com Cuomo blasts Merrill executives on bonus plan...New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo laid out further details Wednesday about $3.6 billion in bonuses Merrill Lynch & Co. executives received, calling the investment bank's executives irresponsible. Cuomo detailed the size and scope of the bonuses in a letter sent Wednesday to US House Financial Services Chairman Barney Frank. "In a surprising fit of corporate irresponsibility, it appears that, instead of disclosing their bonus plan in a transparent way as requested by my office, Merrill Lynch secretly moved up the planned date to allocate bonuses and they richly rewarded their failed executives," Cuomo stated. In the letter, Cuomo said he requested information on Merrill's expected bonuses as early as October 29, but never received any details about the size of the bonus pool and criteria it planned to use to make the payments. The Merrill bonuses were paid in late December, just days before Bank of America Corp. completed its purchase of the New York-based Merrill.

Email www.ap.com Housing group to protest at executives' homes...By John Christoffersen...A non-profit housing advocacy group said Monday it will rally at the homes of those it calls "financial predators" - investors and banking executives it says are balking at helping struggling homeowners refinance their mortgages. Neighborhood Assistance Corp. of America demonstrated Sunday at the Greenwich, Connecticut home of William Frey, chief executive of Greenwich Financial Services, and the Rye, NY home of John Mack, chief executive of Morgan Stanley. Hundreds of demonstrators wore bright yellow shirts and signs that read, "Fix our loans, save our homes." There were no arrests. Bruce Marks, chief executive officer of the Boston-based group, said the organization was setting up a "financial predators registry" of uncooperative executives.