Read Ebook {PDF EPUB} April 4 1968 Martin Luther King Jr.'s Death and How It Changed America by Michael Eric Dyson 'April 4, 1968: Martin Luther King, Jr.'s Death and How it Changed America' The rise of Barack Obama as the most popular and potentially powerful black American politician ever is at once a nod to King's legacy and a pioneering venture into new territory. Obama's historic quest for the presidency… has also revealed the complicated politics of race for the Joshua's who seek to blaze a path toward the Promised Land. Obama is, no doubt, the product of a paradox: he rests atop an inverted racial pyramid that he has been credited with overturning, and yet without the fierce rumblings of race that his ascent seems to overcome, his career, and now his campaign for the presidency, wouldn't necessarily be seen as the miracle of transcendence for which they've been touted. Obama's promise as a black man who bears none of the scorn or rancor of his civil rights predecessors is a double-edged razor: one of the reasons he's able to be the man he is – to have the noble bearing of a statesman who wants to get past the arguments of the past – is because those arguments were made, and bitter battles were fought, and in some cases, are still being fought. But the division of labor throws many people off: it appears that the either-or thinking that Obama wants to sail beyond has trapped those who applaud his success. If Barack Obama now, or some black person in the future, should become president, neither Jesse Jackson nor Al Sharpton would be out of a job. A black president can't end black misery; a black president can't be a civil rights leader or primarily a crusader for racial justice. A black president won't stop racism or erase bigotry. A black president won't be the president of blacks alone, but the president of the United States. That tricky but not trivial difference suggests that prophets of the people won't go unemployed when politicians of the race do well. In fact, quite the opposite is true. Obama himself recognized this difference when he answered a question put to him and his peers by journalist Wolf Blitzer during a debate for Democratic presidential candidates in South Carolina on the 2008 King Holiday. "If Dr. Martin Luther King were alive today, why should he endorse you?" "Well, I don't think Dr. King would endorse any of us," Obama responded. "I think what he would call upon the American people to do is to hold us accountable…I believe change does not happen from the top down; it happens from the bottom up. Dr. King understood that. It was those women who were willing to walk instead of ride the bus. [It was] union workers who were willing to take on violence and intimidation to get the right to organize. It was women who decided, 'You know, I'm as smart as my husband; I'd better get the right to vote.' Them arguing, mobilizing, agitating and ultimately forcing elected officials to be accountable. I think that's the key." Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton and a legion of activists are the arguers, mobilizers, and agitators who force the Barack Obama's and other elected officials to be accountable…. Barack Obama has come closer than any figure in recent history to obeying a direct call of the people to the brutal and bloody fields of political mission. His visionary response to that call gives great hope that he can galvanize our nation with the payoff of his political rhetoric: a true democracy fed by justice, one that balances liberty with responsibility. He may be our best hope to tie together the fraying strands of our political will into a powerful and productive vision of national destiny, one for which Martin Luther King, Jr. hoped and died. If King was Moses who couldn't get to the Promised Land with us, then Jackson, Sharpton, and Obama – and Maxine Waters, Carolyn Cheek Kilpatrick, Marian Wright Edelman and many, many more – may be the Joshuas to take us further still. Obama recognized the legacy of the Joshua generation, and exhorted it to fulfill its obligation to lead in a speech at Howard University's Convocation, words that are fit for us all. Most of you know that Moses was called by God to lead his people to the Promised Land. And in the face of a Pharaoh and his armies, across an unforgiving desert and along the walls of an angry sea, he succeeded in leading his people out of bondage in Egypt. He led them through great dangers, and they got far enough so that Moses could point the way towards freedom on the far banks of the river Jordan. April 4, 1968: Martin Luther King, Jr.'s Death and How It Changed America. On April 4, 1968, at 6:01 PM, while he was standing on a balcony at a Memphis hotel, Martin Luther King, Jr. was shot and fatally wounded. Only hours earlier King—the prophet for racial and economic justice in America—ended his final speech with the words, “I may not get there with you, but I want you to know tonight, that we as a people will get to the Promised Land.” Accl On April 4, 1968, at 6:01 PM, while he was standing on a balcony at a Memphis hotel, Martin Luther King, Jr. was shot and fatally wounded. Only hours earlier King—the prophet for racial and economic justice in America—ended his final speech with the words, “I may not get there with you, but I want you to know tonight, that we as a people will get to the Promised Land.” Acclaimed public intellectual and best-selling author Michael Eric Dyson uses the fortieth anniversary of King’s assassination as the occasion for a provocative and fresh examination of how King fought, and faced, his own death, and we should use his death and legacy. Dyson also uses this landmark anniversary as the starting point for a comprehensive reevaluation of the fate of Black America over the four decades that followed King’s death. Dyson ambitiously investigates the ways in which African-Americans have in fact made it to the Promised Land of which King spoke, while shining a bright light on the ways in which the nation has faltered in the quest for racial justice. He also probes the virtues and flaws of charismatic black leadership that has followed in King’s wake, from Jesse Jackson to Barack Obama. Always engaging and inspiring, April 4, 1968 celebrates the prophetic leadership of Dr. King, and challenges America to renew its commitment to his deeply moral vision. more. Get A Copy. Friend Reviews. Reader Q&A. like 4 years ago Add your answer. Lists with This Book. Community Reviews. This was a fine book up until the end. It's a light look into the effects of King's life and death on the Civil Rights Movement. I learned some things, especially about King's connections to Jesse Jackson and his influence on Al Sharpton. It also gives a brief summary of the differences in philosophy between King and other prominent black figures, contemporary with King and later. But then Dyson ends it all with an imaginary interview with King, a "what would King say about his death and about t This was a fine book up until the end. It's a light look into the effects of King's life and death on the Civil Rights Movement. I learned some things, especially about King's connections to Jesse Jackson and his influence on Al Sharpton. It also gives a brief summary of the differences in philosophy between King and other prominent black figures, contemporary with King and later. But then Dyson ends it all with an imaginary interview with King, a "what would King say about his death and about the current times if we could talk to him now?" It's inspired by when Bill Clinton imagined what kind of report card King would give the America of the nineties, so I understand what Dyson is doing but it's bizarre, awkward, and plain distasteful. King is "interviewed" about how he feels about dying, whether or not he likes rap music (he likes the rapid-fire and witty delivery, but he doesn't approve of the violent and misogynistic lyrics), how he now fights for marriage equality, and his feelings about Oprah (he is her "biggest fan.") Dyson's half-hearted imitation of King's cadence in the audio version just makes it worse. To be honest, this phony interview ruined the entire book for me. If the rest of it was exceptional in any way, I might be able to look the other way, but it's not, so I can't. more. Racism. Whenever some intellectually gullible juvenile either sees or hears that word, they assume it’s just about basic hatred among different color lines. What’s really striking is that racism is so much more than just a name you give someone or a stereotype you assume upon physical contact; racism is what we’ve inevitably lived upon. In Michael Eric Dyson’s novel, “April 4, 1968;” many undocumented confrontations and truths from the late Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. are revealed. Written in th Racism. Whenever some intellectually gullible juvenile either sees or hears that word, they assume it’s just about basic hatred among different color lines.