Huey P. Newton and the Intrepid Legacy of the Black Panther Party – Keeping It Real

History must be studied and understood in the context not only of the past but just as importantly, the present and future. This present sham of American Democracy and media circus must be understood in this reality. To paraphrase the words of the French philosopher, Albert Camus, “What good does it do a man [or woman] to give him [or her] the vote and then tell him [or her] that he [or she] is free?” And as brother Huey put it, “Democracy means only that the majority will use us when they need us and cast us aside when they do not need us.” [See pages 39, 40, and 58, first edition of the book, To Die for the People: The Writings of Huey P. Newton.

Like the Black Panther Party itself, Huey P. Newton was both a target and victim of the infamous (and no doubt ongoing) COINTELPRO U.S. government activities to “discredit, frame, murder, imprison, and murder” Black political activists. Though tragically murdered in August of 1989, allegedly during a drug deal gone bad, Huey P. Newton conveniently (for the U.S. Government and corporate media), did not live to dispute or present evidence of the events of that fateful day in August. However, one thing is certain: The U.S. corporate media, including the Associated Press, gleefully reported brother Huey’s death in an article dated August 23, 1989, titled, Black Panthers Created Image of “Defiance and Resistance.” The Associated Press article ended by saying, “Today, the Panthers prowl no more.” The corporate media is wrong. The intrepid legacy of the Black Panther Party – of “defiance and resistance” – still “prowls” as long as there is injustice, inequality, militarism, and corporate greed.