Tag: Martin Luther King

"Politicians can't say the love Dr. King and how he stood for love and unity but then...refuse to support his agenda," said Rev. Dr. William Barber at an event honoring Dr. King on Monday. » Subscribe to MSNBC: http://on.msnbc.com/SubscribeTomsnbc About:…

The host asked King about Attorney General Robert Kennedy's prediction, an audacious one at the time, that a black man could be elected president in 40 years. King thought it would not take that long: "There are certain problems and prejudices and mores in our society which make it difficult now. The day after the election of President Barack Obama front-page stories in newspapers all over the country, including The New York Times, quoted black parents saying things like, "For the first time in my life I can truly look my child in the eye and say, yes, you could become president someday." As recently as the 1950s, polls showed that the majority of Americans said they would never vote for a black person for president, no matter how qualified. But we (the 'Joshua generation') still got that 10 percent in order to cross over to the other side." Now this "90 percent" occurred before Obama's election and re-election, so presumably, we carved into the remaining 10 percent. But, oh what a difference a few years makes. Similarly, in 2013, the National Institute of Justice, the research and evaluation agency of the DOJ, published their study of whether the police, as a result of racial bias, stop blacks more than other drivers. He died 20 years before Obama got elected. Uncle Eddie would have called this moving the goal post.