PAUL J. RICHARDS/AFP/GETTY IMAGES
‘STILL NOT FREE’
black child — especially no black
male — is safe from the assumption
that he is somehow a threat to the
civil order on any street he walks.
President Obama was moved
this past week to offer his own
personal testimony about the casual slights he had suffered and
the fears he thought he had engendered in whites in passing encounters earlier in his life.
“Trayvon Martin could have been
me 35 years ago,” he said. It was
HUFFINGTON
07.28.13
a stunning statement, and a rare
attempt by Obama to explain the
world from his black perspective.
The day before Obama spoke,
Detroit filed for bankruptcy, owing an estimated $20 billion to
creditors. The city of 700,000 —
once it was 2 million — is over 80
percent African-American and a
mecca of black culture. But the
cheerful pop sound of Motown
now seems like a cruelly ironic
soundtrack to decline.
Then there is the equally loud
echo of political history.
Later this summer, the nation
Jobseekers
form a
long line
outside an
employment
fair at the
Baltimore
Convention
Center.