Don’t You Dare Conflate MLK and Obama

[limpyhobbler]

by Glen Ford

Back in 1964, under prodding from a BBC interviewer, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. predicted that a Black person might be elected president “in 25 years or less.” Four years later, shortly before his assassination, King confided to actor/activist Harry Belafonte that he had “come to believe we're integrating into a burning house." We now see that the two notions are not at all contradictory. At least some African Americans have achieved deep penetration of the very pinnacles of white power structures – integrating the White House, itself – while conditions of life for masses of Black folks deteriorate and the society as a whole falls into deep decay...

One school of thought holds that corporate servants like Obama could not have taken root in Black America if Dr. King, Malcolm X and a whole cadre of slain and imprisoned leaders of the Sixties had not been replaced by opportunistic representatives of a grasping Black acquisitive class. In any event, had King survived, his break with Obama would have come early. Surely, the Dr. King who, in his 1967 “Where Do We Go from Here” speech called for a guaranteed annual income would never have abided Obama’s targeting of Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid in the weeks before his 2009 inauguration. Forty-five years ago, King’s position was clear: “Our emphasis must be twofold: We must create full employment, or we must create incomes.” The very notion of a grand austerity bargain with the Right would have been anathema to MLK.

Were Martin alive, he would skewer the putative leftists and their “lesser evil” rationales for backing the corporatist, warmongering Obama. As both a theologian and a “revolutionary democrat,” as Temple University’s Prof. Anthony Monteiro has described him, MLK had no problem calling evil by its name – and in explicate triplicate. His militant approach to non-violent direct action required him to confront the underlying contradictions of society through the methodical application of creative tension. He would make Wall Street scream, and attempt to render the nation ungovernable under the dictatorship of the Lords of Capital. And he would deliver a withering condemnation of the base corruption and self-serving that saturates the Black Misleadership Class.

He would spend his birthday preparing a massive, disruptive action at the Inauguration.

from http://www.blackagendareport.com/content/don%E2%80%99t-you-dare-conflate-mlk-and-obama

[Cooley Hurd]

1. Is Glen Ford speaking for Dr King?

If not, he really should shut up.

[demwing]

2. Would you care to comment

On your own OP?

[limpyhobbler]

3. I agree with it.

Nobody really can know what anybody would do if they had lived. Glen Ford is just giving his opinion, which I agree with.

[demwing]

4. You believe Obama

Is a warmongering corporate servant?

[limpyhobbler]

5. pretty much

corporate servant yes. I wouldn't have said warmongering but I can certainly see the case for it.

[demwing]

10. Well there it is /nt

[limpyhobbler]

19. what?

[demwing]

20. Listen, I'm glad you are straight forward about your beliefs

I just think they're not worth serious discussion, and that's as polite as my response will get.

[limpyhobbler]

21. "Does Barack Obama represent the political tradition of Martin Luther King?"

That's not worth serious discussion? Sure it is.

Maybe some people don't feel like discussing it. Maybe because they don't like the answer and don't want to have to look at it.

[demwing]

25. If it deserves serious discussion, then discuss it seriously

Pretending that you, or the author, know what Dr King would have done or said regarding the 1st black president of the US is NOT serious, and neither is calling Obama a war mongering corporate servant.

[limpyhobbler]

30. It seemed like a serious commentary to me.

It's an opinion based on Obama's policies.

Maybe you think Obama is somehow the political inheritor of MLK's legacy. I wouldn't know. You never said what you think, but just are tearing this other opinion down.

How is Obama not a corporate servant? To me it seems like he serves the big banks and oil companies.

[obama2terms]

22. What war has he started?

Oh wait he ended one that's right

[limpyhobbler]

33. I think if MLK were alive he would be harshly critical of Obama's brutal drone warfare policies.

Also Obama has boosted US weapons exports to an all time high.

Barack Obama is the world's #1 arms dealer.

He has also supported legalistic coups replacing democratically elected governments in Honduras and Paraguay.

He also supported that disgusting bombing of Gaza that went on for several days in October and November, and is expanding US military involvement in Africa.

If MLK were alive today, I wonder what he would have to say about all this. Nothing good I bet.

[Summer Hathaway]

6. This type of writing

is not only hack-kneed and extremely lazy, it is despicable on every level.

To pretend to know what the current thinking of anyone who has been deceased for over four decades would have been in today's world is as appalling as it is insulting, not to mention utterly ludicrous.

Apparently Mr. Ford believes he knows, beyond all doubt, what Dr. King's world view would have been in 2013, without any regard to what events, personal and/or political, might have shaped his opinions in the forty-five years he WASN'T even alive - right down to pretending to know how he would have spent his birthday, fer Chrissakes.

If Mr. Ford has a problem with Obama, he should have the balls to state those opinions on his own behalf, instead of cowardly attributing them to someone who is not here to agree them, discredit them, praise them, or vehemently deny them.

This kind of tripe is beyond deplorable, and stinks of someone trying to validate his own political stance by claiming it would be the same position held by a beloved and highly respected American icon.

[monmouth3]

7. Very well said...n/t

[limpyhobbler]

8. I completely disagree with what you just said.

This type of writing is not only hack-kneed and extremely lazy, it is despicable on every level.

Far from being lazy this took quite a a bit of thought to put together. It's not despicable at all. In fact it's quite admirable to speak in defense of our shared values, and to defend the legacy of MLK against comparisons to Obama.

To pretend to know what the current thinking of anyone who has been deceased for over four decades would have been in today's world is as appalling as it is insulting, not to mention utterly ludicrous.

This point is juvenile and trite. Obviously nobody can know what a deceased historical figure would have thought. All adults know that without having to have it spelled out. He's just giving his opinion of what MLK would have done in relation to Obama, based on what he did when he was alive.

Apparently Mr. Ford believes he knows, beyond all doubt, what Dr. King's world view would have been in 2013, without any regard to what events, personal and/or political, might have shaped his opinions in the forty-five years he WASN'T even alive - right down to pretending to know how he would have spent his birthday, fer Chrissakes.

The nature of your complaint makes me think the whole thing is over your head. You're nitpicking on the fact that nobody can know what a dead person thinks. The main point is that Obama does not follow in the political tradition of MLK at all.

If Mr. Ford has a problem with Obama, he should have the balls to state those opinions on his own behalf

He does that all the time. Maybe you should live up to your own standards and say for yourself what you think about the question: If MLK were alive today, would he support Obama's policy of cutting Social Security and Medicare, of indefinite detention and assassination, and obedience to the big banks? Or would he protest against it?

This kind of tripe is beyond deplorable, and stinks of someone trying to validate his own political stance by claiming it would be the same position held by a beloved and highly respected American icon.

To me the point is that Obama is not part of the same political tradition is MLK. Anybody who would try to claim MLK's legacy and pin in on Obama, in order to try to validate Obama's positions, should stop.

[Summer Hathaway]

15. It takes absolutely no thought whatsoever

to fabricate forty-five years of MLK's life, literally out of thin air - years which, of course, he never got to live - and declare what the man would have said, would have thought, would have done in today's world. What it does take is a lot of gall.

"In fact it's quite admirable to speak in defense of our shared values, and to defend the legacy of MLK against comparisons to Obama."

One does not "defend the legacy of MLK" by attributing political positions to him a full four decades after his passing, positions that may or may not have been positions that he would have held. Forty-five years is a long time - time in which anyone who had actually lived those years may have held exactly the same views he once did, drastically different views, and/or anything in between the two. To state that one knows how a long-deceased person would have thought or acted had he lived those forty-five years is sheer conjecture - and a fool's errand in the bargain.

"Obviously nobody can know what a deceased historical figure would have thought. All adults know that without having to have it spelled out. He's just giving his opinion of what MLK would have done in relation to Obama, based on what he did when he was alive."

My point exactly - nobody can know. And yet Mr. Ford speaks as though he DOES know, "based on what (MLK) did when he was alive". Again, living an additional four decades, with all of the events that have taken place in those years, is dismissed as though Dr. King would have lived in a vacuum since 1968, without being informed by those events.

"The nature of your complaint makes me think the whole thing is over your head. You're nitpicking on the fact that nobody can know what a dead person thinks. The main point is that Obama does not follow in the political tradition of MLK at all."

I don't think anyone with even a modicum of common sense would find the idea of someone attributing political positions to a dead man to be "over their head" - on the contrary, I believe most people would find the entire concept ludicrous.

Whether Obama does or does not follow in the political tradition of MLK cannot be known, in that NO ONE can know what MLK's political tradition would have been in 2013, had his life not been ended in 1968.

"To me the point is that Obama is not part of the same political tradition is MLK. Anybody who would try to claim MLK's legacy and pin in on Obama, in order to try to validate Obama's positions, should stop."

Quite frankly, I am not the least bit interested in whether you think Obama is part of the same tradition as MLK or not. And I am certainly not interested in Mr. Ford's fairytales about what Dr. King would have thought - being as Dr. King isn't in a position to think anything four decades after his death.

Mr. Ford's cheap little diatribe, spoken as though he knows what any long-deceased person would have said or done forty-plus years after their passing from this earth, would be no different than some desperate author espousing what Anne Frank would have done with her life had she survived the Holocaust, what JFK would have said or done had he not been assassinated, or what political causes Amelia Earhardt would have championed had she not disappeared.

It is pure, unadulterated fabrication - and deigning to speak with the voice of the dead is insulting to those who, having died decades ago, are in no position to defend, agree with, or disavow what BS someone like Ford is placing in their mouths as though it were fact.

Were MLK still alive today, he might be the most outspoken critic of Obama, or his staunchest supporter, or may have positioned himself anywhere in between the two extremes.

To pretend to 'know' what position he would have held, and to proffer it as fact, is despicable, dishonest, and a desecration of a man who, when with us, was more than capable of speaking for himself.

The fact that you find attributing thoughts, words and actions to a person who has been dead for forty-five years to be "nitpicking" says it all.

[limpyhobbler]

18. If MLK were alive today he would be really disappointed in President Obama.

If you think MLK would support targeted assassinations, drone warfare, and indefinite detention, you obviously don't know anything at all about Martin Luther King.

If you think he would support cutting Social Security, Medicare and veterans benefits, you clearly know nothing about the man.

He would not remain silent on these issues. He would not be an MSNBC Obama cheerleader.

He would support protest movements in the streets. He would protest militarism and the loss of civil liberties. He would work for disarmament. He would physically support labor organizing and actions. He would join pickets against unlawful and unethical home foreclosures. He would support a people's movement for real democracy to take control of the country away from the big banks, oil companies, and defense contractors.

These are my opinions of what MLK would do if he were alive. I don't really know for sure because he's dead and nobody can know what a dead person thinks. However I think it's a pretty good guess based on his words and actions during his life.

[obama2terms]

23. Well let's see here

I am sure there would be some things MLK would be upset about with Obama. When you actually look at Obama's record there are plenty of things MLK would probably support such as: The ACA especially the part that expands medicaid, if MLK would be a gay rights supporter like his wife was he would support that Obama repealed DADT, made it where gay people have visitation rights with their partners in the hospital, stopped defending DOMA, and of course supporting same sex marriage. Also, it doesn't take a historian to know MLK would be livid at the GOP's voter suppression efforts and proud that our president and his admin. sued to combat it. I shouldn't forget about education, kicking banks out of student loans, improving school nutrition ( with Michelle of course), and expanding pell grants. He also signed the Lilly Ledbetter act, expanded hate crime protection, expanded health coverage for children, and ended one war and is about to end another war. When it comes to our veterans Obama improved the post 9/11 GI bill, the Veterans Job Corps. act ( which failed to pass sadly), Obama has done nothing with SS and medicare as far as cuts go, according to politifact this is what Obama did for veterans benefits: Obama’s proposed budget for fiscal year 2012 increases the overall Veterans Affairs budget by more than 10 percent. The numbers are big: from $53 billion in FY 2010 to almost $59 billion in FY 2012.

It provides new benefits for veterans’ caregivers, including health care and mental health services, and invests nearly $1 billion in VA services for homeless veterans and those at risk of becoming homeless.

The White House pointed us to several examples of how VA services have been beefed up, summed up in a comment Obama made in 2009:

"We dramatically increased funding for veterans' health care: more care for women's veterans, for our wounded warriors from Iraq and Afghanistan suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder, traumatic brain injuries," Obama said at a 2009 signing of a bill that funds veterans’ medical care a year in advance.

Separately, PolitiFact has given Obama seven Promise Kept ratings on pledges he made to improve services to veterans, compared with zero Promise Brokens. You have a right to your opinion but I hate to piss on your party but you should really find a better source of information, I don't know where you get this stuff from. No hard feelings though

[limpyhobbler]

32. You make a lot of good points and I agree with much of that.

There is much that President Obama has done good for example on gay rights and protecting access to birth control.

As far as Obama's trying to cut Social Security, Medicare, and vet's benefits, at various times he had attempted to do these things.

Try googling "Obama medicare age 67" or "obama chained cpi"

[Summer Hathaway]

24. Ah, yet another man

with the gift of knowing what someone who died 48 years ago would have thought, done, or said today.

"I don't really know for sure because he's dead and nobody can know what a dead person thinks."

A rare moment of clarity on your part - except that you left out the fact that a dead person doesn't think. Therefore, not having any thought processes for over four decades, one would be rather foolish to opine on what those forty-five years of missing life experiences would have resulted in, in terms of thought, deed, or the taking of political positions.

And a "pretty good guess" means squat - whether it comes from you, Mr. Ford, or anyone else who deigns to speak for the dead.

This entire discussion reminds me of Mormons 'baptizing' the long-deceased - just smacks of something eerily distasteful and rather deranged.

[limpyhobbler]

35. It's cool to say how a particular political philosopher from history would view modern events.

For example Jesus Christ would not approve of the death penalty.

Also Karl Marx would not approve of the Troubled Asset Relief Program, at least not in the way it was implemented.

John Maynard Keynes would not approve of fiscal austerity during a recession.

And obviously Martin Luther King would not support Obama's drone war, targeted assassinations, and indefinite detention.


Disclaimer: Even though it should be understood, the preceding statements represent only my opinion, since I don't actually have the ability to communicate with dead people.

Try it, it's fun...

If John Dewey were alive today he would oppose charter schools.

John Lennon would have loved 10,000 Maniacs.

Justice Brandeis never would have supported the Citizens United ruling.

If Mohandas Gandhi were here, he would protest Tyson Chicken's meat packing practices.

Albert Einstein would not have liked the Strategic Defense Initiative.

[Summer Hathaway]

36. There is nothing "cool"

about attributing thoughts, words, or deeds to someone who has been dead for forty-five years, and pretending they have any basis in fact - as Mr. Ford did in his article.

I will repeat my initial reaction - as you don't seem to 'get it': No one can possibly know what a long-deceased person would have thought about anything in present times, as the years we live inform us and shape us, often in ways that change our opinions and political positions.

Using myself as an example - because I don't deign to speak with the voice of the dead - many of my views have changed over the last forty-five years. Had I died four decades ago, I would have been remembered as pro-death penalty, strongly anti-military on all levels, extremely pro-Israel without reservation, desirous of living in a commune or kibbutz, and eschewing a career in order to raise as many kids as I could produce.

Forty-five years later, however, I am against the death penalty, have a much better appreciation of why the military is necessary, have little respect for Israel and its actions, hate 'country life' and live in a densely populated city, and have a career that I find much more satisfying than being a stay-at-home mom with a houseful of kids and limited the size of my family to pursue that career.

So had Mr. Ford or anyone else written about how I would have viewed things in 2013, based on how I viewed things before I passed forty-five years ago, they would have been wrong on many, many counts. Very wrong.

Mr. Ford's diatribe assumes that MLK would have lived in a vacuum for all of the years since his passing, and would never have been informed and/or changed by forty-five years of the life he never got to live.

As I said earlier, no one could possibly know whether Dr. King, had he lived all of the years he never got to live, would have been Obama's staunchest supporter or his worst enemy. And to pretend to KNOW the unknowable is as arrogant as it is downright laughable.

[limpyhobbler]

39. Actually it's very cool to learn about the philosophical ideas of liberation and non-violence

developed by the thinkers and leaders of past generations, and then to apply those ideas to the current events.

Sometimes doing that might take the rhetorical form of asserting how a past thinker might have responded to the issues of today.

Such an assertion is an opinion. It's ok to simply state one's opinion without having to always say "this is just my opinion". Because it's implied. There is nothing arrogant about it. Adults understand that when one asserts their viewpoint on a controversial issue, it is always an opinion.

For example I would say: If Jesus Christ were alive today he would protest the death penalty.

While it could go without saying, this is just my opinion. It's not arrogant for adults to state their opinions, even if you happen to disagree with it.

How can I be 100% certain that if Jesus Christ were alive he would oppose the death penalty? I can't be 100% certain. But I don't need so say that expressly. It's implied because adults understand that without being told.

I agree with you, it's possible that in the intervening time he may have changed his mind. But based on his actions in life, and based on the philosophy that he espoused, Martin Luther King would have rejected many aspects the what Obama represents.

I agree, nobody can actually know 100% for sure how a historical figure would view current events.

I would have thought that was so obvious it could go without saying.

Adults understand automatically and implicitly that nobody can literally know what a deceased person would have thought if they had been alive. So people should be able to just skip over that mundane point and move on to the interesting part of giving their opinions on what historical figures would think of some current issue, without having to rehash the fact that it's just a guess, and just an opinion.



(in my opinion)

[Summer Hathaway]

41. ...

"I agree, nobody can actually know 100% for sure how a historical figure would view current events. I would have thought that was so obvious it could go without saying."

Unfortunately, Mr. Ford - and yourself - have taken the position that based on MLK's previous statements, his current position on things could be obviously discerned.

"nobody can literally know what a deceased person would have thought if they had been alive. So people should be able to just skip over that mundane point and move on to the interesting part of giving their opinions on what historical figures would think of some current issue."

I don't see having been deceased for four decades as a "mundane point one should skip over". Nor did Mr. Ford proffer his diatribe as 'opinion', but as a statement of fact.

Nice attempt at back-peddling - but my initial position still stands: Given that, as you are now saying, "no one can literally know what a deceased person would have thought" about today's world, it is the height of arrogance, not to mention abject stupidity, to insist that Mr. Ford (or anyone else) is in a position to proffer thoughts, statements and ideas that would have been held by MLK as though it were a fact.

That is exactly what Ford did, and is exactly what you defended - until your position was pointed out, by myself and others, as completely indefensible and downright absurd.

You keep bringing up what "adults" would think about this nonsense - and that repetition leads me to believe that you are defensive about being perceived as "an adult". And with good reason.

Adults don't put words into the mouths of dead men in order to validate their own currently-held positions. Adults don't stick their hands into the backs of long-deceased leaders and manipulate them like Muppets. Adults don't attribute thoughts, words, and actions to corpses and pretend they are 'channeling' what the dead would have, could have, should have said or done.

You might want to consider growing up and actually being an adult, instead of defending your incredibly immature and childish positions. And that's what they are.

[limpyhobbler]

43. Do you understand that a person can present their opinion without expressly labeling it an opinion?

[Summer Hathaway]

44. Mr. Ford does not

offer this article as being his opinion. Had he done so, he would have used words like, "Based on MLK's life as lived, he would probably have said ...," or, "Dr. King's past actions would lead one to believe that his present-day position would be ..."

Instead, Ford presented his 'opinion' by attributing thoughts and deeds to MLK in today's world as though they were indisputable facts. And, as you have admitted, such 'facts' could not possibly exist, given that Dr. King has been deceased for over four decades.

It is sloppy writing at best, and total BS at worst (and my opinion is that it is more the latter than the former.)

It is a defense Fox-News has used many times over the years, when caught broadcasting factless, baseless stories: It was just our opinion, and we thought the viewing audience would understand that.

Shoddy work, shoddy journalism, shoddy writing. It is what it is. And the fact that MLK is obviously not here to dispute, agree with, or deny what Ford has attributed to him makes it truly despicable.

Maybe Ford should stick to expressing his opinion about the words and actions of living people, who are still in a position to refute or confirm what he chooses to attribute to them. But maybe that's the whole idea - using the dead to advance an agenda is so much easier than actually debating those who can actually respond.

[limpyhobbler]

45. I feel like you don't understand how to tell facts from opinions.

Just because somebody asserts something strongly doesn't mean they are presenting it as a fact.

"The Dallas Cowboys Suck!" That's an opinion, even though I didn't say, "based on their past behavior and innate evil, I postulate that that Cowboys will continue to suck forever".



Anyways would you be equally concerned about this if the article had presented the opposite idea, claiming that Obama is an outstanding inheritor of MLK's legacy of leadership? Or is it that you just don't like this because it criticizes Obama?

[Summer Hathaway]

47. It has nothing to do with Obama

or any other part of the content. It has to do with that content being based on attributing thoughts, words, and political positions to a dead person - who cannot agree with, refute, nor in any way opine on what is being attributed to him.

I can easily tell fact from opinion. What angers me is when someone takes one and tries to pass it off as the other.

You obviously don't get the distinction. Which is why I am done with this conversation.

[Politicub]

13. +1

[Still Sensible]

17. Exactly.... Its pure conjecture bullshit

One could surmise that MLK would have despised the President, as this person does...

Could one suggest that Dr. King would disagree with certain actions or positions? Absolutely.

One could also suggest that Dr. King might have turned out to be among PO's biggest supporters and used his pulpit and counsel to push the President leftward.

Any of these would be nothing more than a guess.

If the OP wants to attack the President, he can do so on his own without assuming that a martyr would agree.

[JoePhilly]

29. Hiding behind MLK is a great tactic.

If you disagree with the author, clearly you've also attacked MLK, who can't defend himself, being dead and all.

See ... now don't you feel bad for attacking MLK ... and so close to MLK day??

[Bluenorthwest]

27. hackneyed. Not hack-kneed

hack·neyed
/ˈhaknēd/
Adjective
(of a phrase or idea) Lacking significance through having been overused.
Synonyms
trite - banal - commonplace - threadbare - platitudinous

[cbrer]

9. One was a man of peace. The other won the Nobel peace prize. nt

[limpyhobbler]

11. somehow they both won a Nobel Peace Prize.

One deserved it.

[cbrer]

12. Thanks

For the reminder. You're spot on.

[Politicub]

14. You're just a ray of sunshine, aren't you?

[limpyhobbler]

16. What's your point?

[Shivering Jemmy]

26. That "dialogue" with you has very little

[limpyhobbler]

31. That made no sense

Thanks for trying

[JoePhilly]

28. Apparently, today is "Speak for a famous dead person" day.

Its always fun to read a not-famous person speaking quite authoritatively for a very famous dead person.

Not only does the not-famous person get to be as sanctimonious and indignant as they want, they also conveniently avoid the risk of having the dead person they claim to speak for refute anything they said.

And of course it is impossible for anyone else to refute anything that was said on the dead famous person's behalf, because to do so requires yet another not-famous person to try and crawl inside the famous dead person's head, and again, speak for them.

If only FDR and Lincoln were here to provide their perspectives.

Sadly, I can't speak for them.

[limpyhobbler]

34. It's cool to say how a particular political philosopher from history would view modern events.

For example Jesus Christ would not approve of the death penalty.

Also Karl Marx would not approve of the Troubled Asset Relief Program, at least not in the way it was implemented.

John Maynard Keynes would not approve of fiscal austerity during a recession.

And obviously Martin Luther King would not support Obama's drone war, targeted assassinations, and indefinite detention.


Disclaimer: Even though it should be understood, the preceding statements represent only my opinion, since I don't actually have the ability to communicate with dead people.

[JoePhilly]

37. Actually, you can not make those claims with any authority.

In each case you claim to know whether these folks would approve of a specific policy.

But you have no way to be sure that they would approve or disapprove.

You could argue that the positions they espoused when alive do not, in your opinion, align with the positions of others, but you can not claim to know how they would actually respond.

Try to recall that these dead people were not "perfect". Their own lives and positions included a variety of contradictions.

The notion that ay of us could KNOW what they would say now is bullshit. But one could argue that the positions they took when they were alive, are similar or dissimilar to some one in government today.

And those similarities and dissimilarities could be discussed.

But as soon as one decides that they get to speak for the dead famous person, they ensure that an honest discussion is no longer possible. Question them ... and you have attacked MLK by proxie.

[limpyhobbler]

38. I agree, nobody can actually know 100% for sure how a historical figure would view current events.

I would have thought that was so obvious it could go without saying.

Adults understand automatically and implicitly that nobody can literally know what a dead person would have thought if they had been alive. So people should be able to just skip over that and move on to the interesting part of giving their opinions on what historical figures would think of some current issue, without having to rehash the fact that it's just a guess, and just an opinion.

[JoePhilly]

40. But it is not so obvious.

Rather than place MLK into 2012, let's place him in say 1776 and the years after in which we adopted the Constitution.

I mean, if we can bring MLK FORWARD, we can also take him BACK to when the founders wrote the Constitution.

Would MLK support the original Constitution ... yes or no?

btw ... the OP did not present an opinion, but they claimed to know exactly what MLK would actually think.

[limpyhobbler]

42. It was his opinion. One doesn't have to say "this is my opinion" because it's implied.

I don't think MLK would have supported the Constitution because it included slavery and he would be against slavery.

[stevenleser]

46. I don't think conflating an activist with a politician or religious leader with a politician is good

Other than that, there is no point to this post.