DETROIT (AP) -- The NAACP is needed now more than ever because the Bush administration has done little to support blacks, the civil rights organization's national chairman said Sunday as its 98th annual convention opened.
From the administration's slow response to Hurricane Katrina to the war in Iraq and immigration issues, Bush has seen his presidency questioned, Julian Bond, board chairman of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, told an audience of about 3,000.
The number of Americans living in poverty has increased by more than 5 million, to 37 million, during the Bush administration, Bond said.
''And the gap has grown between the haves and the have-nots,'' he said. ''Almost a quarter of black Americans nationwide live below the poverty line, as compared with only 8.6 percent of whites.''
Bond called present-day inequality and racial disparities cumulative and the result of racial advantages compounded over time.
''Many Americans maintain ... that racial discrimination has become an ancient artifact,'' he said. ''At the NAACP, we know none of this is true, and that's why we are dedicated to an aggressive campaign of social justice, fighting racial discrimination.''
He noted that the Supreme Court, which includes two justices nominated by Bush, upheld rulings saying school systems could not voluntarily use race in assigning students to schools.
''The Bush court removed black children from the law's protection,'' Bond said.
And the possibility that New Orleans' heavily black Lower Ninth Ward, ravaged by Hurricane Katrina, will never be rebuilt is comparable to a ''lynching'' because the work of generations was wiped out in a single day and black landholders are being dispossessed, Bond said.
''Katrina served to underscore how the war in Iraq has weakened, rather than strengthened, our defenses, including our levees,'' Bond said. ''The problem isn't that we can't prosecute a war in the Persian Gulf and protect our citizens on the Gulf Coast at home. The problem is that we cannot do either one.''
Amen! I'm not black, and I'm not poor. But Mr. Bond's comments could not possibly resonate more forcefully with me.
I can't wait to have a new president to replace the corrupt, neocon thugs who've been mishandling the presidency for the past seven years. Perhaps she'll even be black.
I don't want to get off on a rant here . . . . But while I'm at it -- I generally believe in karma, and I seldom if ever wish bad things on another person. That said, on the day that Dick Cheney's mechanized heart finally stops, I plan to celebrate like it's independence day all over again. That man has no respect for the rule of law, no respect for our Constitution, no respect for the separation of powers, no respect for the environment, and no respect for anything but the primacy and unfettered wealth of himself and his close associates. He may believe he is righteous (as his misguided lesbian daughter does), but he is wrong. He is corrupt to the core, and I hope he burns in fucking hell forever. Hah!