Saturday, April 04, 1970

April 4, 1968: We remember MLK

Image result for martin luther king shot newspaper images

Maybe it's me but certain events are frozen in my memory and I recall them like it was yesterday.

As I remember, I was reading my brand new The Sporting News, the weekly sports newspaper that we used to read before ESPN or the internet.  My parents gave me a birthday subscription and I loved rushing to the mailbox to consume every bit of information.

At the time, I asked myself the classic pre-season questions:  Would Yaz and the 1967 Miracle Red Sox repeat?  Are the Cardinals now a dynasty?  

After all, they had won the World Series in 1964, 1967 and had Bob Gibson on top of their rotation.   

And then the phone rang.  It was my school buddy Harvey with the news that Dr. Martin Luther King had been shot in Memphis.

Then President Johnson spoke to the nation!  By a crazy coincidence, he had just announced days before that he would not be running for reelection in 1968.   

Then all hell broke loose.  Cities were burning from coast to coast.   I shared the frustration about Dr. King's assassination but did not understand what looting businesses had to do with the shooting.  My guess is that all of the chaos boosted Governor Wallace's campaign, or the "law and order" man that election.

Over the last years, we've created a national holiday to remember Dr. King and his words are heard over and over again.

Nevertheless, I've asked myself a simple question:   What would Dr. King say of the state of black America today?  the collapse of the black family?  the black on black crime?  the terrible black Democrat leadership that runs cities like Baltimore and Detroit?    the dependence on government programs?

We will never know but I'll submit that Dr. King would not be happy.

For sure he'd be reminding the "identity politics" Democrats to judge people on their character not the color of their skin.

Let me recommend this one Jason Riley.

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