“We realized at a very early point in our development that revolution is a process. It is not a particular action, nor is it a conclusion…This process moves in a dialectical manner and we understand the struggle of the opposites based upon their unity.”

-Huey P. Newton, To Die for the People

“If history is to be creative, to anticipate a possible future without denying the past, it should, I believe, emphasize new possibilities by disclosing those hidden episodes of the past when, even if in brief flashes, people showed their ability to resist, to join together, occasionally to win.”

-Howard Zinn, A People's History of the United States

The politicos of the extreme right wing are nothing if not consistent in their historical revisionism and distortion of the struggle of everyday Black, White, Brown, Red, and Yellow people, past and present, nationally and globally.

The fascination on the part of the extreme right wing with historical revisionism, distortion, and obfuscation is what a colleague of mine recently and correctly referred to as historical “necrophilia.” And that is precisely what it is, as demonstrated by their latest sordid attempts to distort the legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and the ongoing people’s struggle in this nation.

The legacy of the people’s struggle against oppression, waged by the likes of Denmark Vesey, John Brown, Nat Turner, Tecumseh, Harriet Tubman, Mary Harris Jones, Joe Hill, Fannie Lou Hamer, Malcolm X, Cesar Chavez, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., and so very, very many other Black, White, Brown, Red, and Yellow people, attests to the dialectical, absolutely essential, and ongoing nature of the people’s struggle in this nation, and indeed throughout the world. No amount of right wing or extreme right wing historical revisionism can or will change this reality.

In the name of restoring ‘America’ to its supposed past “honor,” the right wing and extreme right wing exhibit a morbid fascination, akin to necrophilia, of shamelessly revising history to suit their own skewed agendas. They know that the dead cannot speak, but they forget that their legacies can. As they seek to smear and distort, for example, the memory and struggle of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., they disfigure and discredit all that they themselves claim is ‘America’s’ “honor.” They attempt to raise the memories of the dead in their own warped, racist, and greedy images. They dare to commit historical necrophilia.

As critical thinkers, political activists, and organizers, our task is to ensure that the true historical legacies of our freedom fighters be taught and passed on. We must not be distracted or thwarted by these right wing and extreme right wing mockers of the dead, for even as they mock the dead they are, in so doing, mocking the living. This is most fitting, since in reality, what the right wing and extreme right wing have to offer is fear, manipulation, and death; nothing else.

Also, let us not be lulled to sleep by the liberals and pretend ‘progressives,’ who in essence actually facilitate and accommodate the right wing and extreme right wing by their dismal failure to stand up to the corporate / military backed Obama /Biden regime.

We must utterly reject the vultures of the right and extreme right wing, as well as the vampiric corporate / military bloodsuckers of the Obama / Biden clique.

The legacy of people’s struggle in this nation, as in other parts of the world, is alive and well, as so wonderfully delineated in Howard Zinn’s book, A People's History of the United States. We must continue steadfast in the foot steps of this legacy as we uncompromisingly engage in and wage the people’s struggle.

Coming columns will give specific examples of some of the ongoing political struggles being carried out throughout this nation.

We’ve much work to do. Onward my sisters and brothers! Onward!

BlackCommentator.com Editorial Board Member, Larry Pinkney, is a veteran of the Black Panther Party, the former Minister of Interior of the Republic of New Africa, a former political prisoner and the only American to have successfully self-authored his civil/political rights case to the United Nations under the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. In connection with his political organizing activities in opposition to voter suppression, etc., Pinkney was interviewed in 1988 on the nationally televised PBS NewsHour, formerly known as TheMacNeil/LehrerNewsHour. For more about Larry Pinkney see the book, Saying No to Power: Autobiography of a 20th Century Activist and Thinker, by William Mandel [Introduction by Howard Zinn]. (Click here to read excerpts from the book). Click here to contact Mr. Pinkney.