Trump’s Colorblind Message Energizes Black Americans

What a price we have paid for our delusions.

Hi all,

I hope you have been well. I wanted to share with you a great op-ed in the Wall Street Journal by Pastor Corey Brooks about what he wants President Donald Trump to do for his community on the South Side of Chicago.

Since I can’t post the entire article, here is an excerpt:

It would be easy to blame the federal government for failure to realize success. The reality is that we didn’t believe in ourselves. We didn’t have faith in our own abilities. We deluded ourselves into thinking that entitlements were a form of reparations.

What a price we have paid for our delusions. Black Americans have never recovered from losing the culture of opportunity, self-reliance and meritocracy that prevailed before the ’60s. Today, single-parent households are the norm. Illiteracy in reading and math is sky-high. Street violence remains an ever-present threat. Faith in God has declined. But belief in government as our savior remains, shamefully so.

My neighborhood today doesn’t look the same as it did in the 1940s and ’50s. McDonald’s left years ago. So did Walgreens. What remains is a massive housing project, some liquor stores and murals to dead rappers. That’s why Mr. Trump’s words were so bittersweet. My heart aches to see how a once God-fearing and hard-working people betrayed itself into poverty and, worse, into mental enslavement to the government.

I want only one thing from Mr. Trump—to come to my neighborhood and tell the people: “You are on your own.” He’d be echoing Frederick Douglass, who said after slavery, “I have had but one answer from the beginning. Do nothing with us! Your doing with us has already played the mischief with us.”

There are those who would call this an outrage and accuse Mr. Trump of racism. Let them. They want to trap people in poverty. They prefer a permanent underclass. That is why I am asking the president to challenge my people to make something of themselves—sink or swim.

When you give someone that choice, it creates a new energy. There is nothing purer. Looking within and pulling that strength out makes you a somebody, instead of a nobody. It will lead to a new culture of thriving, not merely surviving.

The naysayers warn that some black people will sink. That is true. But people of other races sink as well. We have to learn that we are individuals and stop thinking that we must limit our personal potential out of racial loyalty.

Here is the full article.

My best,

Eli