In their quest to muddy Barack Obama by his association with Weatherman Bill Ayers, some right wing bloggers dug up a copy of the old SDS/ Weathermen zine OSAWATOMIE which Ayers and company published and distributed while on the lam. What could the title mean, the blimp-necks wondered…
Googling “Osawatomie” revealed it was a town in Missouri associated with the abolitionist terrorist John Brown, who ultimately led the ill-fated armed insurrection against slavery at Harper’s Ferry, which sparked the Civil War and finally decided the matter. The reich-wing bloggers were certain this was the meaningful link, “there is no other Osawatomie listed on the map, anywhere,” one blogger assured readers.
If they had looked inside the first issue, on the inside cover, they’d have found the explanation for why Students for a Democratic Society, frustrated with the false promise of non-violent resistance, had chosen to honor John Brown:
Inset: In 1856, at the Battle of Osawatomie, Kansas, John Brown and 30 other abolitionists, using guerrilla tactics, beat back an armed attack by 250 slavery supporters, who were trying to make Kansas a slave state. This was a turning point in the fight against slavery. For this, John Brown was given the name “Osawatomie” by his comrades.
While some today are excited to paint Barack Obama’s face over the portrait of Abraham Lincoln, I wish it had been John Brown whose example might have inspired Obama. Abraham Lincoln bent to the eventual will of the American people to emancipate the slaves, but it was Brown who led the way.
Back in the late sixties there was all kinds of crap on the Paul Harvey show, precursor to Modern Talk Radio blithering.
Like refering to “Real” Black Leaders, instead of H.Rap Brown and Stokely Carmichael, those “Real” leaders who said that Blacks should wait another generation or two or three or a hundred until White America was willing to accept them as actually Americans, and then another few generations for being Equal to other Americans.
The Rat Bastards said the same thing about Native American and Hispanic “Real” leaders too.
Then Afghanistan, the “Real” leadership in the Northern Alliance v the Actual Leaders in the Taliban and similar groups.
The “Real” leaders of Iraq, also as determined by the Right Wing of the United States.
The “Real” Leaders of the Palestinians, and they also hope to be able to define for the Iranian people who THEIR leaders are as well.
In the “REAL” World that’s called Uncle Tom, it’s called Vichy, it’s called Being a Willing Puppet “real” leader who will lead his people into the American Hegemony of Vassal States throughout the REAL World.