Where’s My Check?

Part and parcel of the modern day reparations debate is the notion of cash payments to every African American should monetary reparations materialize. Not only would this be a disrespectful slap in the face of our ancestors, it would be the most disastrous form of genocide our people will have ever faced.

However, if I were the American government, I’d offer every African American household hundreds of thousands of dollars in reparations for slavery. In return African Americans would have to agree to no more welfare, no more affirmative action, no more quotas, no more favoritism and no more handouts of any kind ever again! I’d use executive orders and get a constitutional amendment, if necessary, to make it stick. I’d do all this with the absolute certainty that in five years or less 75% of that money will be right back in the American treasury.

I’d sit back and watch African Americans buy outrageously expensive homes, cars, jewelry and clothing. I’d watch them smoke crack, shoot heroin, drink liquor and smoke weed. I’d use the John Ashcroft Patriot Act I and II to wiretap and surveil African Americans who use this money to fund criminal enterprises, take the money from them and put them in prison. I’d instruct the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) to go after the slightest oversight or error and conduct audits of individuals caught in that sweep and where possible, make them pay dearly. In short, I’d take away the very last accusatory finger African Americans can point at America to say “you did this to me.” I’d place my government and my country firmly in the position to be able to say “no, you did it to yourself.”

Responsible reparations advocates do not favor cash payments to individuals or households. Instead, they argue for setting up a fund or funds for education, housing, entrepreneurship, etc. In fact, most reparations advocates have not fully outlined or articulated a step by step plan for the management and use of a reparations payment. No concrete indication of who would be in charge of the monies or how individuals or households would directly benefit. Their energies seem to be more directed at first winning reparations. What would be more helpful in advance of any expected reparations payments would be some straight talk to our people about the roles we play in keeping ourselves in poverty and what we need to do to prepare ourselves for any infusion of wealth. Even if advocates thought reparations monies were 20 years away we should be making the necessary preparations NOW and at their strongest urging.

The top lawyers tackling the reparations quest will admit that any litigation can go either way; that’s just the nature of litigation. I will respectfully suggest that our ancestors didn’t bank on 50/50 legal propositions when it came to us having wealth as a people. They stood ready to build wealth that was 100% certain because they’d already done it once and knew it could be done again. All they sought was to be positioned and not hindered. Were they to see us accept money in their name and blood with no infrastructure or plan in place to ensure that wealth remain our birthright they’d snatch the rope from somebody else’s hand and string us up from the highest tree themselves.

A FOREVER PLAN

A good model for us to look at is the state of Israel. They, too, have a birthright claim, only theirs has gotten them their own country. Not only do they have billions in yearly support from America they, as one of the youngest nations on earth, have nuclear capability. All this in less than 75 years. They also had a reparations claim that the world embraced and to this day continue to see the return of stolen wealth and properties. Now, they invite Jews everywhere to come to Israel to live. They have a “forever” plan. Everything they do is designed to create a land of milk and honey for Jews first and then anyone they allow to live among them. And what fuels this posture? A history of slavery, suffering and persecution. Sounds kind of familiar, don’t it?

Part of the Jewish forever plan is to “forever” remember their history and to make sure everyone else remembers too. The other part is to make sure it never happens again. They don’t rely on others telling them it won’t happen again; not even relying on assurances from the entire world that it won’t. They, alone, are making sure of it and they will do it by any means. We need a forever plan and winning reparations from the American government is not it! Unlike Israel, we don’t need our own country. The one we’re in will make a good enough home and springboard to all the world. What we do need to do is stop allowing our enemies (within and without) to deceive us into pushing slavery to the back burner with that “it’s not good for the country” crap. Then we need to elevate and transform our reparations claim into a birthright of wealth claim where it properly belongs.

Many of the world’s people dispute and even outright reject the Jewish people’s biblical claim to land or that the Jews of today are the same people talked about in scripture, yet look at what they’ve managed to achieve. Here we are, the world’s undisputed people of slavery, suffering, death, Jim Crow and institutionalized racism/discrimination and we’re told to “just shut up about it.” We do know for sure that today’s Jewish people are the same people who suffered under Hitler, but is it that alone that gets them the world’s sympathy and respect? No. It’s also their demonstrated ability to translate wealth and world opinion into self‑sufficiency demanding world respect. That’s where our parallel histories diverge. You’d think that we also qualify for our own country and billions in aid yearly, but you don’t see any offers, do you? Oh, we’ve been told to “go back to Africa” many times, but it wasn’t a real offer, just redneck venom because we wouldn’t “shut up about it.”

Forty Million And A Tool comes on the scene at a time when our young people ask us not to be “haters” and so I make clear that no hate at all is aimed at Jewish people or any people who successfully achieve what is claimed to be their just due. The parallels drawn here attempt only to light the proper fire under African Americans and inspire us to learn from the example of others. Forty Million And A Tool is offered to African Americans as a forever plan.  It’s gonna take wealth to build everlasting wealth, but after a good 20 years of wealth‑building under our belt we should be able to guarantee every African American household lifelong financial security that participate in the taking of our birthright.

SOME NUTS AND BOLTS

Initially we’re talking 3 to 5 years to build an infrastructure where our people will see the formation of wealth‑building partnerships and alliances, even early amends from private, corporate and/or foreign entities. During this period and onward the Leadership Council will be entrusted to leverage our funds in all areas of banking, investments, holdings, insurance, health care and entrepreneurship. Also within the first 5 years it’s essential that every African American household be online or have Internet access. To this end we must become our own Internet Service Provider (ISP) on a national level by either building signal towers or negotiating leased access to an Internet backbone already in place. With Verizon, Comcast, AT & T and others to negotiate with, the potential of 40 million subscribers (or even a quarter of that number) will turn all heads and get us the right deal. This venture alone will generate hundreds of millions of dollars for the fund as well as cover Forty Million And A Tool administrative costs.

Leadership Council members with the requisite expertise in financial matters can negotiate debt relief with our creditors, while members knowledgeable in insurance can initiate the shift of our total insurance needs to black­-owned companies that thoroughly insure us instead of look for every excuse not to. In our communities we’ll need to erect resource centers that act as education and training facilities on the grassroots level, teaching the use of information technology and preparing our people for the infusion of wealth.

The above overview is by no means all‑encompassing, as the Leadership Council will enlarge and refine not only these aspects, but tackle much more as well. From my standpoint there are only two non-negotiables: 1) With every phase of the wealth‑building process the health and education of our children remain the #1 priority and 2) Our elderly be the first to see any personal fruits of wealth so that they may enjoy their remaining time among us in comfort and the best health possible. After that, we all can ask “where’s my check?” By then I suspect we’ll know the answer.