I Still Have a Dream (but it is getting murky) August 28, 2010
Posted by judylobo in Photography, Politics, Videos.Tags: 1963, Bob Herbert, Jr., March on Washington, Martin Luther King
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August 28, 1963 was a momentous day. Forty seven years ago (yes, I was really young) I was lucky to be among the 250,000 other people in Washington, DC that historic day along with my sister and new brother-in-law (who thought my going to the March alone was not a good idea). We headed down to DC, from Brooklyn, in their green VW Beetle not knowing that we would be witnessing history. If you look carefully at the photo on the left you might see the three of us on the right side of the reflecting pool (we are waving and smiling).
Luckily, my sister is the saver of mementos in the family and during a recent trip down memory lane, in one of the family souvenir boxes, I stumbled across the March on Washington pin (below) that she had saved from that day. Thank you, Terry for taking care of our treasures.
My memories of that day are murky, grainy. I remember it was hot and I had never been with so many people with one purpose in mind. It was life altering. I continue to fight the good fight to this day. And that day did change things. It changed the course of civil rights in our country. Shortly after the March, the Civil Rights Act (1964) and the National Voting Rights Act (1965) were passed.
Bob Herbert writes eloquently about today’s Glenn Beck self-aggrandizing event. “America is better than Glenn Beck. For all of his celebrity, Mr. Beck is an ignorant, divisive, pathetic figure. On the anniversary of the great 1963 March on Washington he will stand in the shadows of giants — Abraham Lincoln and the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Who do you think is more representative of this nation?
Consider a brief sampling of their rhetoric.
Lincoln: “A house divided against itself cannot stand.”
King: “Never succumb to the temptation of becoming bitter.”
Beck: “I think the president is a racist.”
Those feelings of hope and promise that I felt 47 years ago, as a young girl, are always stirring inside me. Today’s rally in Washington by that divisive, hate monger Glenn Beck soils that day for all of us. I too, still have a dream, but these days it is getting very murky.
Interesting how the same people that say building a ‘mosque’ on the hallowed ground of the Burlington Coat Factory slaps America in the face are the same ones that planned this rally. Shame on Glenn Beck and the Fox political machine.
Who do you think is more representative of this nation?
I hate to say this, because I disagree with the man completely, but it’s Beck.
Unfortunately.
The beauty of this country is that we allow pigs like Beck and Palin to voice their opinions– so long as we are standing by with big sticks for when they get out of hand.
Judy – thanks for another chance to listen to his wonderful voice. I wish that I could have been there also.
BungalowBILL – I have copied your line above and used it as a FB post. Thank you. PS – I already have friends clicking ‘like’.
Thank you Judy for celebrating the power of that day. And of the simplicity and truth of those wonderful quotes.
wow…that was a month before I was born…lol…Beck has been getting called on his crap by Jon Stewart, but unfortunately Beck’s fans were primed for decades by other bigoted entertainers, so he is reaping those ‘rewards’….hopefully he’ll be rememebered as well as Morton Downey Jr. (who?)
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