At City Journal, John McWhorter visits the inspiring life of Zora Neale Hurston.
Thus Spake Zora Zora Neale Hurston’s writing challenged black people as well as white.
One of the last photos of Zora Neale Hurston, taken in the late fifties, is heartrending. Once renowned as a handsome figure who could dominate any room, she sits outside a Florida bungalow, a bloated old woman living in poverty, chatting with locals. As sanguine as she looks, we can’t help wishing that she had been in New York, plugging her latest novel on The Jack Paar Show. But all her books were out of print, and she was supporting herself on piddling jobs, including working as a maid (not for the first time). She seems to have reached the state of mind that her character Janie describes at the end of her masterwork, Their Eyes Were Watching God: “Ah done been tuh de horizon and back and now Ah kin set heah in mah house and live by comparisons.”
Hurston decried the assumption that successful blacks were somehow “beside the point,” arguing that “these comfortable, contented Negros are as real as the sharecroppers.” In saying that the black vote should not be one “dark, amorphous lump,” she anticipated today’s black conservatives in pointing out the pitfalls of reflexively supporting one party: “It’s time for us to cease to allow ourselves to be delivered as a mob by persuasive ‘friends’ and become individual citizens.”
"Now, suppose a Negro does something really magnificent, and I glory, not in the benefit to mankind, but in the fact that the doer was a Negro. Must I not also go hang my head in shame when a member of my race does something execrable? . . . The white race did not go into a laboratory and invent incandescent light. That was Edison. . . . If you are under the impression that every white man is an Edison, just look around a bit."
Please, do yourself a favor and read the entire article by clicking the link below.
There is no shortage of threats to our economy. America's unemployment rate recently hit its highest mark in more than 25 years and is expected to continue climbing. Worries are widespread that even when the economy finally rebounds, the recovery won't bring jobs. Our nation's debt is unsustainable, and the federal government's reach into the private sector is unprecedented.
Unfortunately, many in the national media would rather focus on the personality-driven political gossip of the day than on the gravity of these challenges. So, at risk of disappointing the chattering class, let me make clear what is foremost on my mind and where my focus will be:
I am deeply concerned about President Obama's cap-and-trade energy plan, and I believe it is an enormous threat to our economy. It would undermine our recovery over the short term and would inflict permanent damage. - (More...)
Obama heading West to plug healthcare reform A poll reports that 49% of Americans disapprove of the president's handling of the issue and 43% approve. By Christi Parsons and Mark Silva
Reporting from Washington - As debate over his healthcare overhaul heats up, President Obama is taking off for a family vacation this week that combines classic American sightseeing with the challenge of trying to sell his ideas to audiences out West.
He will be visiting Yellowstone and the Grand Canyon with his wife and daughters starting Friday, but the president also plans to hold town halls in Montana and Colorado to address problems facing the healthcare system and pitch Democratic plans to fix them.
His congressional allies have seen eruptions of anger during healthcare meetings around the country in recent days. But Obama's interactions with voters have been civil as he tries to provide a counterpoint to critics' complaints.
With polls showing Americans are split on the question of how the president is handling the healthcare issue, the White House strategy is to put its chief salesman on the road throughout the August congressional recess. - (More...)
Dorothy Rabinowitz is not surprised that ObamaCare is meeting resistance.
"Neither has she (Linda Douglass) seemed to entertain any second thoughts about the tenor of a message enlisting the public in a program reeking of a White House effort to set Americans against one another—the good Americans protecting the president's health-care program from the bad Americans fighting it and undermining truth and goodness."
"There was no such hand-wringing over the decline of civil debate, during, say, election 2004, when cadres of organized demonstrators carrying swastika-adorned pictures of George W. Bush routinely swarmed about, and packed rallies. There was also that other “breakdown of our media culture,” that will dwarf all else as a cause for embarrassment, the town-hall coverage included, for the foreseeable future. That would be, of course, the undisguised worshipful reporting of the candidacy of Barack Obama."
"The president has a problem. For, despite a great election victory, Mr. Obama, it becomes ever clearer, knows little about Americans. He knows the crowds—he is at home with those. He is a stranger to the country's heart and character."He seems unable to grasp what runs counter to its nature. That Americans don't take well, for instance, to bullying, especially of the moralizing kind, implicit in those speeches on health care for everybody. Neither do they wish to be taken where they don't know they want to go and being told it's good for them."
The foregoing exchange came to mind when I got the call from Goomba ... And when the Goomba calls, you answer.
So, though I am not on the formal blogging circuit (at least until June 2010), Nick has asked me to contribute here from time to time. I said "yes" and am honored to do so. I do understand that I am only a naturalized Goomba and that this remains Nick's show (and thankfully so). But still ... I thought it might be fun, and also an opportunity to put some thoughts up without worrying about keeping the operation running/afloat. Nick's got the best combination of commenters, spirit, graphics, humor, and conservatism on the internets. So, it's a pleasure to be a small part.
Here is a little bit of history for the unitiated. Nick and I go way back to Homespun Blogger days in 2004. We are personally responsible for electing George Bush in 2004. I carried Texas, and Nick took care of California. We've had a lot of fun through the years. If you search "Goomba" at my site, you can get a flavor.
I remember when we both got hacked. He was shot up pretty good. His site looked like Miss South Carolina's scrabble board. "They got me good", he said, as I knelt at his blogside. I helped nurse him back, and he recovered to award me a "Golden Meatball", and for that I will forever be grateful. Once you have reached that pinnacle, well, it's all meatsauce after that.
But in all seriousness, I am here to share my thoughts from time to time because I love this site (and the man behind it) so much. I have hung around here because I love coming here, plain and simple. This is a unique place -- conservative, informative, inspirational, funny, proudly American ... human. So, I pledge fealty to Goomba and will lend my keyboard to the cause. And I also pledge to pop his underwear whenever he needs it (which is at least fortnightly). But ... don't expect me to pop Rhod's. I am not getting killed just for the sake of good entertainment on the internets.
Now, in the interest of full disclosure, I think I should tell you exactly how the phone call went down when I got (and accepted) this gig:
Goomba: DC, that you?
DC: Yes, Your Malfeasance.
Goomba: Just a word with you, my Lord. Do you think you could come and join the blog and save my asparagus? We are going down, brother. Comments are down. The remaining commenters are driving me crazy. Obama is going to tax all my profits and use them to provide free medical care to your blog readers. The country is in great need ...
DC: Yes, I know Goomba, my liege. But ...
Goomba: I knew I could count on you. God, I do love you so.
DC: But ...
Goomba: What is it, my dearest cyber friend upon whom I have never had the pleasure of laying mine eye?
DC: That's not true. Remember when your glass eye popped out at Patrenellas and I nearly mistook it for a black olive?
Goomba: Let's not dredge up old dirt, shall we? Thanks for accepting my generous offer.
DC: But wait ...
Goomba: What?
DC: How much does it pay?
Goomba: What the he ... ?! You ungrateful hick! I pull your hillbilly butt fresh out of the trailer park, save your hillary, and offer you a way off of skid row .... and this is the thanks I get!?! Three times what you're making now at your blog. That's my final offer, I swear!
DC: Liar!! Make it four.
(Three minute pause.)
Goomba: Three-and-a-half and a health plan that will cover your zit treatments! For the love of God, man, and the sake of all things decent ... accept my offer or I die!!
DC: Deal. But what of the Impaler?
Goomba: You mean "Rhoderick"? (Laughs). Ar-Hod?!! (Laughs louder).
DC: You wouldn't laugh if he was here.
(One minute silence).
Goomba: I love it when you talk Texan. But ... last I heard Rhod went off the deep end when one of his neighbors rode by with the windows down and a "Boy Named Sue" playing on the radio. He cammoed up and just lost it.
DC: I know. He's been bent about that silent "H" his whole life. He's like Curly and "Pop Goes the Weasel" when "Sue" comes on. ...
(Then it got really good. But that, dear readers, is private. A man has to have standards, after all. Nickie might blab about private encounters, but I remain steadfast in my commitment to provide a counter-balance.)
See you around the 'nets, and thanks, Nick, for the opportunity.
Okay, folks, hug your loved ones, grab your wallets and hold onto your hats. Time to ride to the fight ...
Steve "The Lightning Man" is a newish blogger based in South Carolina. You might enjoy a visit to his site. Be warned, he's a passionate dude!
And, while you're there, and his virtual back is turned, help yourself to one of the collection of posters he's displayed in this post. (Perhaps you'll be tempted to design your own)
One of them will surely enhance the spirit and decor of your blog. Well done, Steve.
Thanks for being yet another soldier in the battle for Liberty.
(GNN) - The US Secretary of State lost her cool at a meeting in Kinshasa, Congo, as she was asked what her husband thought about Chinese aid to the troubled nation.
She is in the midst of a grueling trip to Africa, bringing a message of US commitment to the unhappiest corners of an unhappy continent. Yet it is now likely to be remembered, if at all, for a profane answer to a question involving her husband – a question that almost certainly was mis-relayed to her in translation.
Yesterday she became the first Secretary of State to visit Goma, ground zero of the civil war that for a decade has ravaged eastern Congo. This visit will probably be eclipsed by her reply at a town hall meeting on Monday with university students in the capital Kinshasa.
Unfortunately the translator messed up the question, originally in French. What did President Obama think of concerns about massive Chinese aid to the country, he apparently meant to ask. Alas the President in question was identified not as Mr Obama, but her own spouse, Bill Clinton.
"You want me to tell you what my husband thinks?" she replied, glaring with anger. "My husband is not the g*dd*m Secretary of State, I am. If you want my opinion, you little shit, I will tell you my f**king opinion. I am not going to be channeling my f**cking husband."
The room fell to silence as Clinton gestured to security offices to escort the translator from the gathering. Afterward, aides said that the student had apologized to Mrs Clinton, explaining that he had intended to inquire what President Obama thought about the China's loan offer. But the damage had been done.
Just three hours later, visiting a religious snake sanctuary in Angola, Mrs Clinton struggled as she strolled with a large poisonous serpent when an observer, in broken English, inquired whether the Secretary of State was having difficulty walking with an asp that size. Yet again, Clinton glared and this time slapped the young man with the back of her ample hand.
Finally, that evening at a State dinner in Johannesburg, South Africa, Mrs Clinton's hands were pried from around the neck of the Chinese Minister Xait Juong, when Xait, using a substandard Soviet-era translation book, and intending to ask if Clinton would care to join in a spirited limbo dance, haltingly requested if she would care to "boogie under my wiggle stick."
All in all, it was an unfortunate series of events. The misogynists who love to cast powerful women as thin-skinned and irrational will never let her forget it.
Everybody seems to be posting information about the House's proposed government health program. Now, it's my turn. Take a read of this:
Page 57, under section 163:
"be authoritative, permitting no additions or constraints for electronic transactions ..." (C) "be comprehensive, efficient and robust, requiring minimal augmentation by paper transactions or clarification by further communications;" and, finally, (D) enable the real-time (or near real-time) determination of an individual’s financial responsibility at the point of service and, to the extent possible, prior to service, including whether the individual is eligible for a specific service with a specific physician at a specific facility, which may include utilization of a machine-readable health plan beneficiary identification card;" ... (E) "enable, where feasible, near real-time adjudication of claims ..."
The government has the sole authority to move money out of patient bank accounts without constraint and in real time. Under (4)(C) of this subsection it says the government would have the capability to "enable electronic funds transfers, in order to allow automated reconciliation with the related health care payment and remittance advice..."
This program will tie your health records and financial records to IRS records.
If you trust the government, this won't bother you.
If you want the government to have automatic access to your financial records, you'll sleep fine at night.
If you want the government to have the power to remove money from you accounts without your authorization, just go dust off the Obama sticker on your Prius.
But if it concerns you, read on:
Page 16: States that if you have insurance at the time of the bill becoming law and change, you will be required to take a similar plan. If that is not available, you will be required to take the gov option!
Page 22: Mandates audits of all employers that self-insure!Page 29: Admission: your health care will be rationed!
Page 30: A government committee will decide what treatments and benefits you get (and, unlike an insurer, there will be no appeals process)
Page 42: The "Health Choices Commissioner" will decide health benefits for you. You will have no choice. None.
Page 50: All non-US citizens, illegal or not, will be provided with free healthcare services.
Page 58: Every person will be issued a National ID Healthcard.
Page 59: The federal government will have direct, real-time access to all individual bank accounts for electronic funds transfer.
Page 65: Taxpayers will subsidize all union retiree and community organizer health plans (example: SEIU, UAW and ACORN)
Page 72: All private healthcare plans must conform to government rules to participate in a Healthcare Exchange.
Page 84: All private healthcare plans must participate in the Healthcare Exchange (i.e., total government control of private plans)
Page 91: Government mandates linguistic infrastructure for services; translation: illegal aliens
Page 95: The Government will pay ACORN and Americorps to sign up individuals for Government-run Health Care plan.
Page 102: Those eligible for Medicaid will be automatically enrolled: you have no choice in the matter.
Page 124: No company can sue the government for price-fixing. No "judicial review" is permitted against the government monopoly. Put simply, private insurers will be crushed.
Page 127: The AMA sold doctors out: the government will set wages.
Page 145: An employer MUST auto-enroll employees into the government-run public plan. No alternatives.
Page 126: Employers MUST pay healthcare bills for part-time employees AND their families.
Page 149: Any employer with a payroll of $400K or more, who does not offer the public option, pays an 8% tax on payroll
Page150: Any employer with a payroll of $250K-400K or more, who does not offer the public option, pays a 2 to 6% tax on payroll
Page 167: Any individual who doesn't have acceptable healthcare (according to the government) will be taxed 2.5% of income.
Page 170: Any NON-RESIDENT alien is exempt from individual taxes (Americans will pay for them).
Page 195: Officers and employees of Government Healthcare Bureaucracy will have access to ALL American financial and personal records.
Page 203: "The tax imposed under this section shall not be treated as tax." It really says that.
Page 239: Bill will reduce physician services for Medicaid. Seniors and the poor most affected."
Page 241: Doctors: no matter what specialty you have, you'll all be paid the same (thanks, AMA!)
Page 253: Government sets value of doctors' time, their professional judgment, etc.
Page 265: Government mandates and controls productivity for private healthcare industries.
Page 268: Government regulates rental and purchase of power-driven wheelchairs.
Page 272: Cancer patients: welcome to the wonderful world of rationing!
Page 280: Hospitals will be penalized for what the government deems preventable re-admissions.
Page 298: Doctors: if you treat a patient during an initial admission that results in a readmission, you will be penalized by the government.
Page 317: Doctors: you are now prohibited for owning and investing in healthcare companies!
Page 318: Prohibition on hospital expansion. Hospitals cannot expand without government approval.
Page 321: Hospital expansion hinges on "community" input: in other words, yet another payoff for ACORN.
Page 335: Government mandates establishment of outcome-based measures: i.e., rationing.
Page 341: Government has authority to disqualify Medicare Advantage Plans, HMOs, etc.
Page 354: Government will restrict enrollment of SPECIAL NEEDS individuals.
Page 379: More bureaucracy: Telehealth Advisory Committee (healthcare by phone).
Page 425: More bureaucracy: Advance Care Planning Consult: Senior Citizens, assisted suicide, euthanasia?
Page 425: Government will instruct and consult regarding living wills, durable powers of attorney, etc. Mandatory. Appears to lock in estate taxes ahead of time.
Page 425: Goverment provides approved list of end-of-life resources, guiding you in death.
Page 427: Government mandates program that orders end-of-life treatment; government dictates how your life ends.
Page 429: Advance Care Planning Consult will be used to dictate treatment as patient's health deteriorates. This can include an ORDER for end-of-life plans. An ORDER from the GOVERNMENT.
Page 430: Government will decide what level of treatments you may have at end-of-life.
Page 469: Community-based Home Medical Services: more payoffs for ACORN.
Page 472: Payments to Community-based organizations: more payoffs for ACORN.
Page 489: Government will cover marriage and family therapy. Government intervenes in your marriage.
Page 494: Government will cover mental health services: defining, creating and rationing those services.
If you're interested, or want to show this to friends or family, read the whole pile of manure by clickingHERE
Talk about kicking a neighbor while he's down: Nevada is spending $250,000 for an ad campaign that compares California legislators to talking chimps and tells business owners they can “kiss their assets goodbye” if they stay put.
It's the latest salvo in a generally friendly rivalry that's taken on a harder edge with both states among the recession's hardest-hit areas and desperately fighting to stay afloat — California recently had to issue more than $1 billion in IOUs to survive a prolonged budget crisis while trying to slash a $26.3 billion debt.
Nevada leaders paint their clever but biting campaign — aimed at California business owners considering a move — as simply a matter of helping the Silver State fight high unemployment and diversify an economy heavily dependent on struggling casinos and tourism. Nevada business advocates are pitting their state's low taxes against rising workers' compensation rates and fears of bankruptcy in California.
But there is clearly a certain amount of grim glee at getting under the skin of their Golden State counterparts. Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman said he can't wait for the new ads and a chance to needle California leaders about picking off companies and jobs.
“It's going to drive them bonkers,” Goodman said. “We're going to crush them.”
He and others say they want to erect one billboard outside California's state Capitol building in Sacramento. (More...)
The United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) computer models have proved just as wrong in predicting global temperatures as the Met Office has been in forecasting those mild winters and heatwave summers, says Christopher Booker of The Telegraph.
Everyone has enjoyed the discomfiture of the Met Office, caught out over its April forecast that we were in for a "barbecue summer" – not least because this is the third year running that our weathermen have got their predictions for both summer and winter hopelessly wrong. In 2007 and 2008 they forecast that summers would be warmer and drier, and winters milder than average – just before temperatures plunged and the heavens opened, deluging us with abnormal rain or snow according to season.
"When Mr McIntyre made Freedom of Information requests to see the data used to construct the HadCrut record (as he has chronicled on his ClimateAudit blog) he was given an almighty brush-off, the Met Office saying that this information was strictly confidential and that to release it would damage Britain's "international relations" with all the countries that supplied it."
One cause of the blunders that have made the Met Office a laughing stock is less widely appreciated, however. It is that the multi-million pound computer it uses to assist its short-term forecasting for Britain is also one of the four main official sources of data used by the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) to predict global warming. In this respect the IPCC's computer models have proved just as wrong in predicting global temperatures as the Met Office has been in forecasting those mild winters and heatwave summers. More...
On the heels of the much commented upon Joker poster of President Obama, a new poster has emerged from an another anonymous artist that has people chattering once again...
Don't be misled. These new posters featuring Barack Obama's face imposed over the likeness of Tinky Winky may appear benign, but they're not.
Their intent is far deeper and insidious: to stir ugly racist thoughts in America's subconscious.
On the surface, the posters don't add anything new to the discussion. Obama has been called a “socialist” before. But, subliminally, the posters draw heavily on stereotypes of the worst kind.
Consider the following evidence:
- First, the obvious: Purple is only a tick or two away from black on the color spectrum, so it's clearly no coincidence that Obama's likeness was imposed over Tinky Winky and not Dipsy, Laa-Laa, Noo-Noo, or Po. Tinky Winky is an unspeakably devious subliminal reminder of the pigmentation of our President's skin.
The Army National Guard is now recruiting individuals to fill job positions described as an internment/resettlement specialist according to job postings on Monster.Com and other employment based Internet sites such as one listed here. In other words, they are recruiting individuals to man facilities that could be used to house political dissidents, so-called terrorists and other individuals that the government doesn’t like. The term “resettlement” indicates that individuals holding this job position could also be responsible for moving people to other locations against their will. It is a documented fact that the U.S. government has numerous facilities at their disposal that could easily be used to house large numbers of people. Combine that, with this new job posting by the Army National Guard, and it seems as if the U.S. government is continuing to prepare for an eventual popular uprising.
Let’s look at some of the evidence we have of the U.S. government’s intentions to establish the infrastructure that could be used to house large numbers of political dissidents, so-called terrorists and other individuals the U.S. government wants locked up.
HR 645 the National Emergency Centers Establishment Act is a proposed bill in the U.S. House of Representatives that would authorize FEMA to build no less than six National Emergency Centers throughout the U.S. on closed or open military facilities. These facilities are to be designed to house large numbers of people. Why would emergency centers need to be built on closed or open military facilities unless there was a need to keep people from coming in and out of them?
One in 78 adults in the UK came under state-sanctioned surveillance last year
"Under plans unveiled earlier this year, the police and security services would gain access to the public's every internet click and phone call.This would include, for the first time, monitoring the use of social networking sites such as Facebook."
TheDaily Mail reportsthat surveillance on civilians has reached frightening new levels.
Britain's extraordinary march towards a surveillance state is revealed today by shocking new figures.
They show that one request is made every minute for officials to spy on someone's phone records or email accounts.
The number of Big Brother snooping missions by police, town halls and other public bodies has soared by 44 per cent in two years.
Last year there were 504,073 new cases - an average of 1,381 a day. It is the equivalent of one adult in 78 coming under state-sanctioned surveillance.
The snoopers are using a law originally aimed at terror suspects. But their targets include people suspected of storing petrol without a licence and bringing a dog into the country without quarantining it.
Liberal Democrat spokesman Chris Huhne said last night: 'It cannot be a justified response to the problems we face in this country that the state is spying on half a million people a year.
'The Government forgets that George Orwell's 1984 was a warning, not a blueprint. We are still a long way from living under the Stasi - but it beggars belief that is necessary to spy on one in every 78 adults.'
The requests to intercept email and telephone records were made under the hugely controversial Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act 2000.
A total of 653 state bodies, including 474 local councils, are allowed to use its surveillance powers.
“When I see the American flag, I go, 'Oh my God, you're insulting me.'”
“When Communist U.S.S.R. was a superpower, the world was better off. The right-wing media is trying to marginalize the peace movement.”
“You have to have a lot more dedication to what I'll call 'the machine,' ... I have 20 percent dedication. What's needed is 110 percent. You can't have it with the level of apathy I have.”
"You know, there's nothing more interesting than seeing a bunch of racists become confused and angry at a speech they're not quite certain what he's saying. It sounds right and then it doesn't make sense. Which, let's be very honest about what this is about. It's not about bashing Democrats, it's not about taxes, they have no idea what the Boston tea party was about, they don't know their history at all. This is about hating a black man in the White House. This is racism straight up. That is nothing but a bunch of teabagging rednecks. And there is no way around that. And you know, you can tell these type of right wingers anything and they'll believe it, except the truth. You tell them the truth and they become -- it's like showing Frankenstein's monster fire. They become confused, and angry and highly volatile."
"These guys hate that a black guy is in the White House. But they immigrant bash, they pretend taxes and tea bags, and like I said, most of them probably couldn't tell you thing one about taxation without representation, the Boston tea party, the British imperialism, whatever the history lesson has to be. But these people, all white for the most part, unless there's some people with Stockholm syndrome there."
I'm bumping this post back up the list because of the quality of the comments. Please feel free to add your opinion. This thread is excellent reading.
Who is this man? He's Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel, brother of White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel.
What's his job title? He is the top healthcare adviser at Obama's Budget Office.
What policies does he promote? In his speech to the American Medical Association, President Obama said what White House health advisor Ezekiel Emanuel and Office of Management and Budget Director Peter Orszag have said in print some time ago. The only way to control health care costs is to get doctors to provide less care — fewer tests, fewer procedures, fewer everything.
Dr Emanuel wrote an entire article on this subject in the Lancet on January 31, 2009. Emanuel advocated allocating health resources in order to maximize collective life years. Suppose a 25-year-old and a 65-year-old have a life threatening disease. Since the 25-year-old has many more potential years of life ahead of him, he should receive preferential treatment, says Emanuel.
In a different article written for the Hastings Center Report, Emanuel said health services should not be guaranteed to "individuals who are irreversibly prevented from being or becoming participating citizens." He continues, "An obvious example is not guaranteeing health services to patients with dementia."
What does this mean? It means that Obamacare will be a virtual death camp for the elderly, the mentally ill, and the very young. "Dr." Emanuel wants to care for the economic health of the state, not tend to needs of people. His goal is to cut costs. (Obama calls that "making difficult decisions.") Emanuel wants to trim the high price of health care by literally eliminating people who are a drag on the system, like the elderly.
How can Democrat Senators and Congressmen support this kind of health care? They and their families are exempt from Obamacare.
One of the last photos of Zora Neale Hurston, taken in the late fifties, is heartrending. Once renowned as a handsome figure who could dominate any room, she sits outside a Florida bungalow, a bloated old woman living in poverty, chatting with locals. As sanguine as she looks, we can’t help wishing that she had been in New York, plugging her latest novel on The Jack Paar Show. But all her books were out of print, and she was supporting herself on piddling jobs, including working as a maid (not for the first time). She seems to have reached the state of mind that her character Janie describes at the end of her masterwork, Their Eyes Were Watching God: “Ah done been tuh de horizon and back and now Ah kin set heah in mah house and live by comparisons.”Hurston decried the assumption that successful blacks were somehow “beside the point,” arguing that “these comfortable, contented Negros are as real as the sharecroppers.” In saying that the black vote should not be one “dark, amorphous lump,” she anticipated today’s black conservatives in pointing out the pitfalls of reflexively supporting one party: “It’s time for us to cease to allow ourselves to be delivered as a mob by persuasive ‘friends’ and become individual citizens.”
"Now, suppose a Negro does something really magnificent, and I glory, not in the benefit to mankind, but in the fact that the doer was a Negro. Must I not also go hang my head in shame when a member of my race does something execrable? . . . The white race did not go into a laboratory and invent incandescent light. That was Edison. . . . If you are under the impression that every white man is an Edison, just look around a bit."
