Santa Clausifying Martin Luther King, Jr.

[marmar]

from truthdig:


Santa Clausifying Martin Luther King, Jr.

Posted on Feb 1, 2013
By David Sirota


Every year, right around the time between Martin Luther King Day and the beginning of Black History Month, the effort to distort Dr. King’s life and legacy seems to intensify. Some years, we see conservatives preposterously assert that if Dr. King were alive today, he would join today’s neo-confederate Republican Party. Other years, it is deception via omission—we see replays of Dr. King’s 1963 “I Have a Dream” speech, but do not see any of his speeches about war and poverty.

Princeton professor Cornel West accurately labels all this the “Santa Clausification” of Dr. King, and if you have ever heard or read a snippet of King’s 1967 Riverside Church speech, you will understand how apt the label is. You will also understand why this year’s most grotesque attempt to Santa Clausify Dr. King’s life is at once abhorrent and yet somewhat encouraging.

As The Guardian’s Glenn Greenwald first reported, the United States Air Force’s Global Strike Command last week posted an online essay saying that Dr. King would cheer on soldiers “ensuring the most powerful weapons in the U.S. arsenal remain the credible bedrock of our national defense.” Further, claimed the Air Force, “maintaining our commitment to our Global Strike team ... is a fitting tribute to Dr. King.”

At the same time, the U.S. Marines commemorated Martin Luther King Day by tweeting out a famous King line—“a man who won’t die for something is not fit to live”—in a not-so-subtle attempt to depict him as a war supporter. That was a follow-up to a 2011 article posted on the Defense Department’s website with the headline: “King Might Understand Today’s Wars, Pentagon Lawyer Says.” ......(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.truthdig.com/report/item/santa_clausifying_martin_luther_king_jr_20130201/

[xocet]

1. K & R

Here is a link to the Greenwald column that is mentioned in the article:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2013/jan/22/martin-luther-king-military-weapons

[area51]

2. Another King quote:

"Of all forms of inequality, injustice in health care is the most shocking and inhumane."

[malthaussen]

3. The man's dead. He can't defend himself.

I look to seeing arguments MLK supports Jim Crow in the not-too-distant future.

-- Mal

[Solly Mack]

4. K&R