The Black Commentator - e-Mailbox: Janice Brown’s caricature debut

Liberal good intentions sometimes produce contradictory results. Last Friday’s “NOW with Bill Moyers” episode on PBS led with a segment on George Bush’s attempts to pack the federal judiciary with reactionary lawyers. The 20-plus minute piece was keyed to Janice Rogers Brown’s appearance before the Senate Judiciary Committee, October 22, during which Orrin Hatch and his Republican colleagues attempted to divert Democrats from their constitutionally mandated duties by beating them over the head with ’s “Clarence Thomas in a Fright Wig” cartoon. As we wrote in “Testi-lying to the Senate and the People,” last issue:

The Black Commentator was the surprise witness in the hearing room – our cartoon, exhibit A. made out quite well in the madness, by our reckoning, but that was collateral, unintended fallout. Hatch grossly abused his chairmanship, mangled the rules and protocols of the Body – and got away with it. In the face of this assault against institutional norms, all that his Democratic victims and the press found to criticize was a cartoon by Khalil Bendib. Very few among the media even got that part right.

A drawing by an immigrant artist, commissioned by men representing no one but their own publication, an item of absolutely no relevance to the business before the committee, was made to dominate a critical process of the United States Senate: its duty to advise and consent.

Bill Moyers and his crew were determined to spare their audience this experience. PBS viewers who were unfamiliar with the actual events of October 22 – Hatch and his henchmen’s relentless brandishing of the cartoon as an example of “liberal” (!) viciousness and “racism” (!) – were left with the impression of a sober, serious, relatively dignified performance by all the actors. The cartoon made a brief appearance 16 minutes into the segment, as a minor player.

Instead, NOW’s producers skillfully cut and pasted together a version of the hearing as it should have transpired, juxtaposing arguments pro and con Brown’s atavistic, New Deal-as-Socialism approach to the law. The producers provided valuable background that placed the Brown nomination in proper context as the latest Hard Right assault on a half-century of constitutional interpretation. Clearly, the program was journalistically flawed. However, by cleaning up the mess that Orrin Hatch had made, NOW brought clarity to the larger subject. The episode works from the standpoint of public education. Except…

Isn’t the fact that Hatch abused his chairmanship to trash his own committee’s hearings an important bit of information? Doesn’t the public need to know the lengths that the Bush men will go to impose their will on the federal courts? Isn’t there educational value in providing the public with information that might lead them to conclude, as we did, that “Hatch brought the judicial nomination process into disrepute by purposefully disrupting the hearing through his own orchestrations.”

Some will insist that we’re just disappointed that PBS didn’t allow another burst of exposure. In this case, however, the cartoon was the epicenter of the crime – the weapon Hatch used to mangle the committee’s mission, bludgeon the opposition, and befuddle or inflame the public. Were it not for Hatch’s cynical deployment of the cartoon, PBS would not have had to cut and paste a sanitized version of events.

NOW suppressed Hatch’s drama in order to present what the producers considered the meat of the issue: Bush’s bid to dominate the courts. We’re sure Moyers’ people believe they did the right thing in serving up a calmer version of reality. Certainly, the producers solved some of their own problems through artful editing (such as how to explain why rightwing Senators were calling a Black publication and unnamed fellow travelers “racist” and “bigoted.”) We respect, and think we understand, NOW’s motives. But in the final analysis, the “improved” version of the hearing lets Orrin Hatch off the hook. Under liberal editorship, Hatch “got away with it” – again.

The Chairman and the Justice

readers are the most interesting crowd on the Net; they arrive armed with quotes and riffs from the widest range of sources. Here’s T. Girard Marshall’s contribution to the Janice Brown-as-Clarence Thomas cartoon discussion:

I seem to remember that Thurgood Marshall said something interesting just before he retired from the Court. If I remember correctly it was, "A black snake will bite you just as bad as a white one." I think he was referring to his proposed “successor" Clarence Thomas.

I suppose I should be liberal and allow that it is no shame for an African American to be every bit as stupid as some white jerk but I have not reached that point of tolerance yet.

So from the bottom of my imperfect heart, thank you so much for the very
entertaining and truthful cartoon.

Liz Burbank references yet another luminary’s strategic thinking.

Kudos to Black Commentator, for a brilliant cartoon and an even more stunning reply in your cover story! A glorious double-whammy – you nailed them where it hurts, exposing their hypocrisy for all to see. To paraphrase old Chairman Mao, it's a good thing to be attacked by the enemy if, you know the enemy and yourself well enough to know how to turn the attack to your advantage & his disadvantage. You do and you did.

Click to view entire Janice Rogers Brown Cartoon

As we promised, Janice Brown now has her very own caricature. Clarence Thomas can return to his more traditional handkerchief headgear.

But, for Yasmin Hams, Brown will always be Clarence in a fright wig.

I laughed so hard, so long and out loud, the only thing that made me mad is that I had no one to share this "Toon" with, (I'm the only African American) that works in the IBM office in Kansas City. Most employees are mobile or at other client locations, but when I read the mailbox it made me laugh again when I saw the picture of Janice Brown. Orrin Hatch ought to be ashamed of himself because he is promoting self hatred within our race by promoting Janice Brown. JB is only promoting her own self interest and that is getting richer, because the more she talks against her own people the more the neo-conservatives will line her pockets. I believe she has an ulterior motive and her mission is to get rich.

Brown’s nomination may come up for a vote on Sen. Orrin Hatch’s Judiciary Committee, this month. Hazel Rockeymoore offers some thoughts on inter-party relationships on the panel, in light of last month’s hearing.

As always, I eagerly look forward to your e-magazine every week. On the Janice Brown-Orrin Hatch cartoon controversy, I thought it was "much ado about nothing." I agree with you that Mr. Hatch used the forum to disrupt the hearing. Regarding the Democrat's behavior that day, I don't know what the problem was with Mr. Leahy. But I suspect that the friendship between Mr. Hatch and Mr. Kennedy probably made Mr. Kennedy hesitant to speak out. I think I read somewhere that the two of them are very good friends.

May the Lord bless and keep you as you speak the truth. The Bible tells us that the "Truth shall set us free."

May we have Peace on Earth.

We at have never understood (or maybe understand too well) the camaraderie that exists between "friends" like Kennedy and deadly enemies such as Hatch, one of the architects of the world's largest Gulag, built primarily to incarcerate Black Americans. If the Kennedys truly believed that the Hatches are guilty of crimes against the citizenry, they could not bond at any level with these monsters. But they do, and that speaks volumes.

In 1856 Sen. Charles Sumner was beaten to within an inch of his life by a slaveholding congressman with a cane. We respect Sumner, because he consistently opposed injustice and thereby earned the hatred of evil men. Sumner did not consort with the Devil. The same cannot be said for Kennedy.

Wrathful mail continues to pour in from indignant Republicans and wandering white supremacists, part of a relatively recent phenomenon that we discussed in last week’s Cover Story:

Under the Bush regime, the Right has brazenly usurped the vocabulary of civil rights in defense of their Black and brown hirelings. The Orrin Hatches of America, who have deservedly been called “racists” all their lives, discovered that there are plenty of African American opportunists eager jump into the very short Black line to Republican prominence. Now these white born-again diversifiers experience a kind of liberation in the belief that they are turning the rhetorical tables. They positively revel in labeling Black and white opponents of “their” Blacks as “racists” – as if to say, “back at ya!”

Jim Hill assures us we’re on the right track.

You must be doing something right!

This is yet another example of "race" as a political football in modern America. On the one hand, us "Caulifornya" libruls soundly defeated Ward Connerly's idiotic prop 54 (while simultaneously electing the son of a Nazi as gov), but, on the other hand, good-puppy Democrats are scared of being viewed as supporting Jim Crow-era images (which the cartoon obviously didn't display) when paraded before them by Republicans in a dog and pony show consisting mainly of their many "persecution" paradigms.

In our current upside-down world, Republicans are now claiming the mantle of civil rights, and Bush has given 28 Billion (with a "B") dollars to "faith-based" groups, some of which are minorities and some of which are Moonies and all of which have taken taxpayer money in the midst of a huge recession. How can people fall for this shit?

How can we stop this nonsense, where the Repubs bait the Dems and the Dems cower in response?

How can we reach a point where a person's physical characteristics or sexual orientation or political beliefs have nothing to do with their worth as a person, a taxpaying citizen, a human? Why does it matter so very much to so many people? Excuse my French, er, Freedom, but what the fuck is wrong with them?

Sorry for the rant. I just found the story fascinating, yet humorous if the event weren't so blatantly stupid and full of lies and misrepresentations and just plain scary in an Orwell sort of way.

You guys are making a difference, pissing them off; otherwise they wouldn't spend so much time attacking you.

Keep on, please.

Regarding the Hatch attack’s impact on ’s numbers: our logs indicate that Hatch’s minions made up about 20 percent of the four-fold increase in visitation to during this period. Thus, the net effect of Hatch’s televised orchestration was very much to our direct benefit, while 's national "profile" was enhanced beyond measure.

Folks in Jesup, Georgia, couldn’t figure out what got into John Eden.

You guys are the absolute best! This column had me laughing out loud and pounding my desk! I loved the cartoon in the first place, the whole show is hilarious, or would be if not so tragic. How could anyone not see the clear intent of that caricature? Lock-jaw of the brain! Liberal race-o-phobia! Very interesting in how it reveals the deep racism of the liberals, who in their own way have long been using black people, poor people, working people, all of us, for their political ends.

I suppose Ted [Kennedy] has been more helpful than harmful over the long run, but I love the image of him sputtering and choking, trying to be sure he didn't say the wrong thing, afraid of seeming racist unless he spoke against the cartoon.

If Kennedy were younger we'd have had to conclude he was drunk on October 22, which would have reflected better on him than his incoherent impotence that day:

“As others have stated, the kind of cartoon that is displayed here and all that it suggests, and that, obviously, I have been on this committee for some number of years, and we have really been free from, uh, this kind of activity, suggestion. In more recent times some of the suggestions have been raised but, uh, it has no place, anyplace in our society, particularly not here.”

All things considered, Buffalo, New York activist Loretta Renford enjoyed the spectacle.

Bravo! I waited all week to read your comments on this furor over Ms. Clarence Thomas... Oh, I mean Janice Brown's ...ugh...ugh...comments...Burp!

The Hatchet Man did a fantastic job of placing his big foot in his hypocritical mouth. The big to-do about displaying the picture and all those groans and feelings of being upset, and disgraceful overtures, were at best, a joke. For they as officials display the same kinds of sentiments daily as they argue, define and target people of color to deny them benefits.

If I could draw caricatures, I could really find some ugly symbols to depict quite a few irritants in government, as well as in other areas of the political spectrum.

I can hardly contain myself reading the Black Commentator today. Great stuff!

In New Jersey, Noel Piercy got a big kick out of Janice Brown’s newly created caricature.

OMG! [Oh My God!] Ruthless, pointed, brilliantly conceived & skillfully executed, and utterly hysterical to boot. A classic!

I first found your site following a link to the brilliant and very moving article about Kucinich and Sharpton. Saw the Brown/Thomas cartoon & article after hearing about it on NPR.

Bob Moran also appreciates Khalil Bendib’s talents.

The Janice Brown as Clarence Thomas cartoon is hilarious. Keep up the good work because it's great when the Far Right gets pissed off.

Carol Christen writes:

The Cover Story was beautifully reasoned, as usual. It is too true what you write about the right wing, about racism, and all the rest.

Richard Clement is on Tom Patrol in Lansing, Michigan.

I love the Janice Brown cartoon. Thanks for the information on a new and emerging Uncle Tom coming up in the ranks. Keep up the good work.

Janice Brown managed to appear as if on the brink of tears throughout much of the morning and afternoon of October 22 – which raises worrisome questions in the mind of a writer named Andrei.

As a judge, regardless of her political convictions, she will have to make decisions. Invariably someone will praise her and someone else will blast her (in cartoon and prose form). If she was close to tears over a cartoon, how will she handle reactions to her decisions, if she becomes a judge? Maybe I'm a bit unsympathetic here, but after years of insults (due to my being an immigrant) I'm a bit surprised that a cartoon could do so much damage to someone who will face criticism for as long as she would stay on the bench. If she is so fragile, perhaps she is not fit to be a judge.

Most of the pro-Brown (or anti-cartoon) mail we receive is straight-out redneck-racist. A relatively few letters arrive from Black “conservatives,” who typically charge that is the equivalent of a Black overseer on a Democratic plantation. (Clearly, these people have never read .) Such writers usually try their best to be insulting and, since the publishers of do not belong to any self-flagellating religious sect, we don’t bother to share these letters with the readers.

However, Leon Pickett is smart enough to write with the delete key in mind. His letter makes the cut.

I'm glad to know that in 2003, Black Americans don't have to worry about the hateful actions of white racism; just the hateful actions of BLACK prejudice and self loathing (the cartoon expertly speaks to this fact). I guess the crabs in the barrel strike again! The funny thing is that if you take a look around, racist and prejudiced people with views like yours are increasingly being moved to the fringe. I won't attack you (collectively), as you so routinely attack others; however I will challenge your methods.

You very well may have good reason to oppose the ascendancy of Powell, Rice, Thomas and now Brown; however, by vehemently attacking the PERSONAL (not professional) character of these individuals, you commit a noxious new form of 'Black on Black crime' that leaves you and your side with a whole array of self inflicted wounds. Perhaps you have an argument or a leg to stand on, but when your craft peddles in personal attacks your ignorance (i.e. lack of knowledge) shows and you fail to win over or (at the very least) educate any reasonable person.

Nevertheless, I personally wish you and yours the best and hope that you amiably achieve your aims by engaging those you disagree with in civil discourse.

So says this kid from the ghetto.

Our attacks against Black operatives for the Hard Right are meant to be personal. We are students of their activities, and almost certainly know much more about this numerically insignificant band than does Mr. Pickett. As we wrote, last week:

The Hard Right spends millions each week to finance its “alternative leadership” for Black America, mercenaries modeled on Thomas, Rice, Powell, and now, Janice Brown. Black people cannot keep these pretenders off the airwaves; we don’t control the media. We cannot by ourselves defeat their nominations on Capitol Hill; we don’t have the numbers. We can’t stop the rich from funding bogus Black front groups; it’s not our money. But we can heap scorn on the rascals, and thus deny them legitimacy as “spokespersons,” “leaders” and “role models” for our communities. We can confront them with our anger at every public and private opportunity, so that young people will think twice before considering a career in the enemy’s camp. We can stop giving them awards, or tolerating those who award them. We have the power to loudly reject the servants of Hatch and Bush and rich foundations, to expose their sources of funding and their true political allegiances.

Janice Brown follows in the shuffling steps of Clarence Thomas, the Most Hated Black Man in Black America. She deserves to become a pariah in the community she is “paid to subvert.” She has earned her cartoon.

People for the American Way has issued a new report, titled “Committee Hearing Reinforces Case Against Confirmation of Janice Brown.”

Electoral strategy

Freedom Rider columnist Margaret Kimberley urges Al Sharpton to mount a third party campaign in the general election, focusing on those states in which he will do no harm to the national Democratic ticket. (See “Third Party Candidate with a Difference,” October 30.) “It’s the electoral votes, stupid,” says Kimberley. Ivan Cohen wishes it were not so.

It is astounding in a "republic" that will pass itself off as a "democracy" when it is trying to score "points" on the international stage there is no direct election of the president of the United States. There is a direct election for mayors, aldermen, county commissioners, school board representatives, state senators, state house of representatives, United States Senators and the House of Representatives. I would have do research as to what the "founding fathers" had in mind when they set up this type of government. I cannot get psyched up over this "arrangement". In this new millennium, the electoral college represents the "horse and buggy days". I remember a Senator Birch Bayh of Indiana trying to get an amendment in place for direct election of the president, the powers that be would have no part of it. I agree with Margaret Kimberley, the political system does favor only two parties in this country. That does not speak well of this country.

Whose “civilization” is it?

In his October 30 commentary, “Terror, Imperialism & the Meaning of Faith,” Somalia-born banker Ahmed M.I. Egal explored “the ‘Conflict of Civilizations’ thesis which provides the philosophical underpinnings of the New Imperialism.” Egal challenged the moral and historical underpinnings of the very “concept of ‘civilization’ as commonly used in this debate.”

The enforced expatriation of some one hundred million people of African descent to the New World for economic gain from their slavery was initiated, regulated, enforced and justified by the European Powers of 19th century Europe and refined by their brethren in the Americas. European settlers in the Americas, Australia and Africa perpetrated the most calculated and methodological extermination of indigenous peoples in order to usurp their territories and their wealth. Lastly, the most barbarous and evil regime of the last century which plunged the entire world into war and which scientifically exterminated six million people purely on the basis of their ethnicity originated and thrived in Europe. So please let us, the descendants of the enslaved, the colonized and the exterminated, not hear from the descendants of the slavers, the colonizers and the exterminators about our lack of “civilization.” It is grotesque.

Mary Gravitt agrees. The purported “civilizers” pervert language and turn truth on its head.

It does my heart good to see that someone besides myself realizes that this so-called War on Terror is actually a Race War and a reinvigorating of Colonialism.

Why is it that as African Americans we can be so persuaded to believe that the "heart of the man" has changed in his quest to conquer "the heart of darkness." We have been duped into believing in a Eurocentric view of freedom. We have forgotten that when they say "Peace and Security,” then sudden destruction will come.

Brother Ahmed understands and I hope it is not too late for us to understand.

When the Bush men go on a "freedom" and "liberation" hunt, you can hear the bloodhounds baying. We know what that's about.

Black radio is crucial

The Internet promises to spawn new and exciting ways to wield technology as a tool for social change. However, for the foreseeable future Black-oriented radio will remain by far the dominant communications mechanism serving (or disserving) African Americans.

In our May 29 Cover Story, “Who Killed Black Radio News,” we chronicled the drastic decline in Black local radio news coverage over the past three decades, even as African American ownership of radio stations increased seven-fold.

As we have learned to our despair and horror, Black ownership guarantees nothing and, in the case of Radio One, ensures that entertainment, disc jockey chatter and syndication become standard fare. Most importantly, the absence of news operations at Black radio stations results in atrophy of existing Black political groupings and the stillbirth of new organizations. Talk shows do not empower communities, vibrant grassroots organizations do. And these organizations can only flourish when their activities are given proper coverage in the media that their constituencies listen to - Black radio.

L. Ward read the piece, but still has questions.

Black Radio news people, having been among the most articulate, better educated, highly respected and politically connected in the Black Community, seemed to just lay down without a fight as their gigs just seemed to vanish off the face of the radio dial. I'm curious as to why they didn't seem to use their influence to maintain a presence on the airwaves. By the way, did your organization notice the "Lack of Black " on the recent RMA Awards television broadcast? Odd, considering that Billboard Magazine published its first ever all Black Top Ten Chart a couple weeks back. They took our Black News and eliminated it and are still attempting to control our Music. What do WE do?

Fight the Power. Organize and agitate in your own community. And don’t give Black-owned radio a free pass. (See similarly titled May 1 commentary.)

C. Wright, of Henderson, Nevada, is a very generous person.

Your articles in are so informative, insightful, enjoyable, empowering. Look forward to reading more, more, more. Energized to fight this junta in the White House. Thanks.

In Philadelphia, Dave Simpson is glad to escape the propaganda, every once and awhile.

I've recently began to enjoy your website and it offers some respite from thinking I'm crazy some days while dealing with the Armstrong Williams and George Bushes on a regular basis. Please continue to tell it like it is and I will get more of my friends to tune in.

Dr. Eugene Jones runs with a progressive crowd in – Thailand.

Somehow, I began getting your e-mail summary by accident but I think it is great. As an American citizen living in exile (teaching university Political Science in Thailand), I have tried to keep up with what is going on there. I rejected the right-wing media (CNN, Fox, etc) long ago and have been concentrating on Information Clearing House, Antiwar.com and A.N.S.W.E.R. but have not been able to get much from the Black perspective.

Thank you so much and I hope you continue to send me the summaries.

Four more Black Eunuchs of War

“History will render its immutable judgment on U.S. Representatives Harold Ford, Jr., William Jefferson, Albert Wynn and Sanford Bishop. These men are like the Sultan's eunuchs, for whom submission is a trait of character; the mere presence of Power dominates them, completely.” ( Briefs, October 17, 2002).

When George Bush demanded a blank check to make war against Iraq in October of last year, only four members of the Congressional Black Caucus signed on the dotted line. We dubbed them the “Four Eunuchs of War.” As noted by Leutisha Stills, of Oakland, California, two of the eunuchs – Harold Ford, Jr. (D-TN) and Sanford Bishop (D-GA) are back for an encore, having last week voted to contribute $87 billion to Bush’s Iraq occupation and corporate makeover. Ford and Bishop were joined by Julia Carson, of Indianapolis, and freshman Atlanta area Representative David Scott.

Ms. Stills wasn’t surprised at Sanford Bishop’s vote (“I think you knew that was coming”), and offers this assessment the other three: