Transcripts For CSPAN2 Book TV In Depth 20130810

From any access to african history. Which was not what woodson intended. And so we obviously owe the value of our hire to those people who suffered so much and their families who dissented from those people who worked for 246 years for nothing. We owe them something for that. We owe them the story. We have been asked to expect that people can survive in good sound, psychology health. Ashes and obliterated history. When i was a dmield richmond, virginia, we used to have a phrase that we used all the time from here to tim. But nobody knew what it was. Nobody knew the providence of the world. Didnt know where it was. Didnt know it was a place. Tim buck, which was a cross roads. It was also a site of one the worlds first university. And so still you have all of these man manuscript written between 5 ad and 15 ad. Manuscript of the highest quality written by african and arab scholars. We knew nothing about this. We didnt know anything about one of the we didnt know anything about the queen of shea baa who was described in the bible. She lived all of her live there. Approximately what ethiopia was today. Shiba is now yemen. But it was short to the queen of shib ash. Want bible describes her as a woman of black skin. But in the movie it wasnt. All of our story was taken, and the point of all of this is that people have a history because they need it. People develop cultures and morals and traditions because they need them to stay in good health. Thats how we make social progress and great jamaican who once said that living without your story without memory is like driving without a rear view mirror. Except its more dangerous. To live without your story. The point is that we were cut off from all of that, then renamed when i was a child. We were called know negro. Nobody knew where it came from. What it was supposed to mean. It was parking lot of the world that was built to separate those stolen and used and exploited. From their african story. And so if everyone in the world needs a story, so did we. The same thing is happened to native americans, for example. They have the highest crime rate in the country by the crime rate on indian reservations. The question is why . What awful thing happened . That would cause this situation for them . And the same is true in the case of africanamericans. When it was all over, this awful chapter from the beginning of slavery 246 years followed by virtually century of which people were forced to work for no income in the south and legal segregation. One cant say before the end of the Voting Rights act that the nightmare ended. During that nightmare, untold sums of loves had been wrecked and the social damage is still with us. And so we owe an acknowledgment of that. This is not peculiar to the united you dont acknowledge. The people of turkey dont want to acknowledge the genocide against dominion in 1950 and 9. 5 Million People were killed. China doesnt want to acknowledge the discriminations in western china against the weaker people. Many nations hide from the past. But we owe people the truths truths and the history and the value. We owe them repair. Were not doing that. Not only that we dont even want to talk about it as a society. Host you say the loss of heritage is comparable to the holocaust to some of the other jen sides. Guest holocaust was twelve years. This is 246 years plus a century. People lost their names, they lost their languages, they lost their culture. They lost everything. Many people had their jen genitals severed. Thomas jefferson, when he was 42 years old had a relationship with a 14yearold girl, sally, that he owned. And it wasnt frowned upon. We know what it would be called today. That was routine. We lost any idea of who we were. It was our past, our memory vanished. And we worked ourselves to early deaths. And built the capitol, built the white house, Harvard Law School which was endowed by isaac royal from the proceed of sale of slaves he owned. He and the west indies. These were routine. Many american institutions transferred that they got from the work of people who werent paid. To their friends and making their line rich and impouferring those who were stolen. Host how far back can you trace your familys history . Guest im very fortunate that we have pictures and i can go back to my great, great grandparents with pictures. With my great, great, great grandparents with a story of their lives in the United States. But that is extremely, extremely rare. Host in the book you write what White Society must be con deuced to do own up to slavery and acknowledge itself debt to slaverys contemporary victim. Pay the debt in mastive restitution, rebuild the blackest steam dry destroyed by democktizing access to a trove of history to which blacks contributed prominently. When you talk about slaverys contemporary victims. What do you mean . Guest when segregation ended, there were those of us and i was among i was very fortunate. I had strong parents and intact family. Both of my parents finished college. My father taught history in high school. My mother taught until she stopped to rear her four children. That meant everything to us. While we were humiliated by segregation. We had a home. We a family that was in tact that was sound, that was strong. So many people didnt have that, and so they were exposed to the brut sharp edge of what was happening to them. And i think there were some of us who were in a position to move out and up when segregation ended. I was among that group. Until that time, we and those who were bottom stuck were all in the same boat. We virtually lived on the same blocks together. We were closed in to each other. Some of us were able to go up and out. Others could not. And so we in to two part. Even then. Im not sure that those institutions that fought so hard for us all at one time have fought the same tenth tenth annual battles. So we have the largest prison population in the world. Over 2 Million People. The largest in the world. And two and three quarters of those who face the Death Penalty are black and has panic. Half of the prison population is black. Because of the way peoples lives have been because of unfairness in the criminal justice system. We see that for nonviolent drug crimes. We substitute 14 of those who commit the crime. Roughly if i have a figure to write Something Like 56 percent of those prosecuted and close to 75 of those incarcerated. One someone for powdered cocaine. Another someone for crack cocaine. The powdered is certainly what white people use. The sentence is lower than the crack cocaine which is what black people use. History has been cruel, the system is unfair. In many cases very little has changed for those people. Host in quitting america you write for all of my life i had wished only to live in an america that would but reciprocate my locality. A country that would exsort from the several and diverse mount of the Decisionmaking Authority and ideal of public can do for and unconditional compassion, a country that would say without reserve to its disadvantaged, to its involuntary victims, to native americans, to africanamericans, to the wredgedlypoor of all colors, stripes, tongue and religion that your country wronged you wronged you in separate and discreet ways. Wronged you with horrific and lingering consequences, wronged in in some cases from long ago, and for a long time wronged you to a degree that would morally compel any civilized nations serious and sustained attempt. Guest we dont want to talk about it. We still dont want to talk about it. We run from it. We now call it victimization. So its not to be raised. And its made for someone like me who doesnt like and kind of smallness that allows kind of intimacy and seldom go downtown and not see someone you know. But the biggest priest piece that the woman i loved and married is from there. We decided many years ago that we were going to build there a home there. We if eleven years ago. So hazel and i have been there all that time, and our daughter went to high school there. And finished high school and came back up here to college. So that was one reason. The retired of struggle that defleeted depletedded me. America had drk simply because of things that cant be talked about. It has no tolerance for that kind of it says and i heard if says we have stopped the active crime. So if theres damage, then we are walking away from that. Its as if to say at the end of slavery you could sort of liken this to runners in the race at the starting line. You take a gun, shoot one runner in both legs, and sound the gun you say now run. You cant catch him. People who have had everything taken from them. But in the things that are not material even more important its your software and your entire your plumbing. Its how you see yourself. The confidence or lack thereof which youre trying to run in a race. Was drained from many people. Over that long period. Were talking about the longest running massive crime against humanitarian. The last 1,000 years in the world. Its not like we bomb knack nothing japan and literally minutes. Because if the japanese who survived can remember their literature, their culture and traditions and put it back up again. If the people who lost it all, mothers, fathers, children, traditions, cultures, ways of living. I have jewish friends hazel and i some years ago when we were living went to a bar celebration to see the son launch in to adulthood. When praise give there are things like that that are still practiced in africa. We lost all of them. So your cost to reinvent cultures almost every generation. Its a lot of its a lot of damage. It has to be acknowledged. If has to be reckoned with. Were not prepared to talk about it. Host how much time do you spend in the states now . I come up maybe three time. I got a call to see if i wanted to teach human rights course. I spent all of my life in human rights. I said i would be happy to. I teach human rights course at the penn state. I come up three times a semester. The rest i do by video. Host have you kept your u. S. Citizenship . Guest yes . Host why . Guest my mother and father, my grandparents survived that. Its my due. Host in quitting america the departure of the black men from the native land written in 2004. Have you chase changed any views since barack obama . Guest i remember my mother, when he was nominated, we were in montreal hazel and i were. She called me at the hotel 93. She said, she was crying, she said its the greatest day of my life. America is many places. Its tolerant, accepting within and place where views can be moderated and differences can be reconciled. The candidacy of president obama its not only important to the black community. Its important to other segments of america as well. But he still faces a vicious kind of. Its not the same richmond, virginia, i saw when i was young. I think there were several americas. I had grown tired of at least one of them. Host in the book you write america never helps anyone. Even the starving unless its proposed assistance can be tied to an American Interest either strategic or economic and one cannot always distinguish one from the other. Its guest its largely true in foreign tan. It has to be associated with a strategic purpose. When we look at what we did as a country to haiti. Thomas jefferson did everything he could to defeat the haitian revolution. The only successful slavely vote in the history of the hemisphere. These people turned by an army from spain, armies of 60,000 apiece from england and france twice. And one of freedom opened their door to freeing slaves from all over the world the weapons and they did everything they could to quash the haitian quest for freedom for people who have been enslaved. When they won their revolution, they took with it twothirds of frances foreign income because it was the most valuable colony in the world to france. Now, that survives even until now. Frederick douglass spoke at the chicago world fair in 1893, 94. Mystified about how hostile the United States has always been toward haiti. Hostile toward them because they won their freedom. Of the president. We george bush blocked loans from the Interamerican Development of foundation of 146 million. Loans for water, education, things like that. The International Republican institute arranged and organized the opposition to it. We as a country trained soldier in the Dominican Republic. Trained and armed those rebels didnt figure in to it. The bush when the american soldiers arrived at the home of the president and took him off at 3 00 in the morning to the Central African republican. We had to go there. Maxine waters, a Jamaican Parliament tear, sharon hay webster, the president s lawyer flew off with a plane to rescue him and bring him back to jamaica and Condoleezza Rice threatened the jamie can government to make it very difficult for them. If jamaican accepted it. All because he said the minimum income ought to be raised from 1 a day to 2 a day. That the sweat shop owners essentially white in haiti combined with american authorities to get him thrown out of office. If you look at the history of American Foreign aid. What we do and why we do it. Its not pretty picture. Host in your most recent book unbrokenning aing a you write one is hard put to identify a single episode of organized human suffering in which the u. S. Did not play a direct collateral or instigative role. Guest we didnt recognize haiti until after the emancipation in the United States. From 1804 to the end of the civil war we combined them to smother haiti and destroy haiti. In 1825 france imposed sanctions on haiti saying they had to be paid 21 billion for having a loss of a right to use haitian slaves. Its the first anytime history ever that the winner of a war had to pay reparation to the loser. Wilson invades haiti and kills thousand of people with American Marines and takes the present leader of the revolt in haiti. Nails him up on a board for public display and demonstrate people what the commons consequenceses could be. Then a chain of black president s working at the direction of the United States killed up to 50,000 people. That was fine. The first democratically elected president of haiti, we are responsible for the coup that took him out of office. The Bush Administration did it directly. Covered in the American Press. The American Press said he fled to south africa when he was taken to Central Africa republican. We had to go there to rescue and jamaica brayed american storm to keep him there until he could go south africa. We are responsible for the overthrow in haiti. And the haitians we owe so much because the haitian revolution, first of all, made possible in Louisiana Purchase because napoleon was done with it as a result of that humiliating defeat. Secondedly, after haiti, after that revolution the north atlantic slave trade was ended by britain and the United States. And the last sort of breadth of that was the end of the civil war. Americans know nothing about the story. We owe so much to those haitians, exslaves who defeated four of the most powerful army of the government in well twelve and a half year war. One of the great story in history. Host this month on booktvs indepth program, author and activist Randall Robinson. He is the author of five Nonfiction Books. Here they are. Beginning in 1998. Mr. Robinson wrote defending the spirit. Finally an unbrokenning a any haiti from revolution to the kidnapping of a president. 202 is the area code if you like to dial in and participate in the conversation. You can contact us via email booktv cspan. Org. Or social media. You can make a comment on facebook. Com booktv. Or send us a tweet booktv is the twitter han dahl. What is transafrica . Guest transafrica was the or is the organization that i began in 1976 to galvanize africanamerican opinion on Foreign Policy issues. Particularly issues that concern the black world. U. S. Policy toward africa, the caribbean, and lot latin america. Tran africa, of course, was the organization that used apartheid and the embarrass embassy arrest we were able to organize the arrest of 5,000 people in the 1980 and 1984 and the next year. With working with member of congress we won a support for the set of sanctions that president reagan vetoed veto was overridden by republicancontrolled senate. Because of the work we did and the million we organized to make a difference. That coupled with the great work that was being done in south africa. Lead to a new south africa that we see today. We have been doing that work with a period of time. I have been there for twenty five years when i stepped down. Host whoa are Maxine Robinson . Guest my father and my mother. Already introduced you to them. They had strong opinions, and they were extraordinary and extremely principled people. I remember when my brother max was with abc news as the chicago an corp. He had gone to Smith College to make a schmidt and said things critical of abc. I was so proud of him because i saw my father and the kind of thing he stood for when we were children. Host did that hurt max robinsons career at abc . Guest it sure did. He thought as much as he loved his work, he thought were there a few things more important. Host in you book you write about being raised in richmond. When were you born . Guest july 6, 1940. Host what was your first twenty years like . First 18 years like . Guest two realities. I was happy at home and in our family. We had a big family. It was all i had. Lot of sisters. Everybody was nearby as we saw everybody and a lot of family all the time. And so all of that was wonderful and joyous, but the conditions under which we were living. We could go for weeks without seeing a white person. The experience is when you have them were painful. Every lesson told was designed to teach you you were infour your. And i remember being caddy on the golf course with my father, and encouraged me not to do. Host not to do . Guest no. Dont carry bags for people. And i carry the bag on the green. It it was the country of the junior and the golfer turned to me and said rattle the clubs again and ill wrap one and i dropped the bag and walked off. And went home. A lot of that was like that. Some of them i had witnessing our parents had to accept what was going on. Mother would have to put a cap on her bed before she could try on a hat in the stores in the downtown in richmond. One store on gray street you could go in and stand no one would wait on you. As if you werent there. And we would even go chinese restaurants to get food, the chinese had to live by the rules. We would have to go up some stairs to the kitchen and get the food to carry out or when the bus was empty except for us. We still have to sit in the back behind the line. These things register on your psyche. They are there for a lifetime. From defending the spirit winter 1967 cambridge, montana. You write i have arrived from segregationist virginia to attend Harvard Law School. The firstyear class of more than 500 students. My section is sitting through a report lecture given by a young professor. Country of them is professor freed asked can anyone think of an actionable nuisance we havent touched on today . Mark joseph green says what about black people moving in to a neighborhood . A thoughtful discussion ensues. Henry sanders looks at me. We find blacks all in fact look at each other. Our faces betray little. In any case, the privileged young white solars are 0 give belief use. There are legal arguments the discussion whether or not the mere presence of black institute an inherit nuisance swirl around the five blacks. We say nothing. We cannot dig if i insult. The choice weekend it ventilated rage and silence. We choose silence. Guest mark was running for office in new york recently. I havent seen him since that experience. When he was running for Office Someone read that in the book, and a journalist and asked me of course about it. I told him and something about that was published. Mark didnt deny it. But he said he couldnt remember. I thought about the african proverb, and the axe forgets but the tree remembers. When when you hear bill clinton is the first black president of the united. What are your thoughts . Guest oh my. I think t absurd. I think sometime we have been denied the highest intention for so long that when people attend our church and know the hymns, they play the sax phone reasonably well, we accord them credit that is chargely undeserved. Bill clinton was fleeing haitian refugee who had been fleeing the military dictatorship that we armed. And supported in haiti. He cordenned the place with ships and caught these people and turned them over to their killers. And rwanda in the u. N. It was ambassador madeline al bright who had to take some responsibility for the death of 500,000 toot sincerities in rwanda. Because she single handedly obstructed u. N. Intervenges with the support of bill clinton. A handful of nations in the caribbean and saint Lucia Dominique and a few others banana produce nations had a small slice of the European Market to export their banana to bill clinton fought and threatened with 100 tariff. The European Countries that were giving that Market Opportunity to these caribbean banana bruceers who only produced bananas. He wanted that tiny bit, that slice of Market Opportunity to go to bananas whose ceo was a big supporter of his. He couldnt been as bigger supporter as the black community had to him and so that was taken away from those producers and caribbean economies were significantly damaged. When he was asked to reconcile the differences between the use of sale of powered cocaine and crack cocaine. He talked about it but never did anything. On human rights he never ratified he weakened the treaty for the International Criminal court. He never ratified it. I am really dont understand when you look at his record naming blacks to positions, i dont see some of the not so well known things, of course, would reveal that he did some rather unsafer i are things to the black community internationally. I dont understand what he did. Host Randall Robinson writes about former president clinton in the debt what america owes to blacks. What is the last time you talked to the president . Guest president clinton . Host right. Guest i have never talked to him. When i was on a 28day Hunger Strike trying to get him to stop rounding up people and sending the people to their death in haiti, on the 28th day i was hospitalized, i think maybe it was 26th day. Dehydrated, hospitalized. He thought he was going to die, he sent sandy, who was my law School Classmate to talk to me. To see whether i was really dying or not. And sandy came with an offer that if i would agree to end the Hunger Strike he would agree to screen the haitian refugee. Its all i was asking for. When you are fleeing for the well founded fear of persecution under International Human rights law, then all of the nations have an obligation to provide refuge to you. Thats all i was asking for. We were supplying the weapons. But he kept doing it. But when the Hunger Strike publicized all of that and he thought i might die, he sent sandy to an offer. I never once folk him. He simply said to the press that he was glad. I ought to stay throughout doing this. I have never talk to him. Host what did you say to sandy berger . Guest it wasnt the long discussion. I was in bed. Hazel was with me. I largely listened. He told me what the offer was. I told him that i would accept that offer. He asked if i would appear with him on meet the meet the press on sunday which was the next day. Host Randall Robinson is our guest. Were going begin with a call from bruce in georgia. Hi, bruce. Caller hey. Thank you for having me on. [inaudible] im black. I was born on the social south side of chicago. What las the [inaudible] in the last years since maybe 1972 apart from the careers . [inaudible] they closed rank around [inaudible] as she was some kind of martyr. Sue san rice was undersecretary of African Affairs during the clinton administration, she was a lobbyist for the ethiopian and rwanda regimes, and totally integrated with our diplomacy. Thats what africa is. And were all of the wars there in the can go, sick or seven [inaudible] guest let me be briefed by susan rice. Ive been troubled bit associations you have described. I dont know the extent to which the black Political Class has closed ranks or did close ranks around her. Ive been out of the country large part of the time although i try to keep up. But im not priefe to that. I will say in defense of the elected officials. I dont know that we could have won sanctions against south africa without the vigorous support of the Congressional Black Caucus virtually every member of the Congressional Black Caucus went to jail at the south Africa Embassy and did a great deal to support the sanctions effort when we had a discussion about it. I was on the phone from my home in there when we were trying to find a place for him to be after we could take it from the Central African republican. But Maxine Waters was on the call. Charlie rangel was on the call. And the Prime Minister of pj patterson of jamaica was on the call too. He told us that Condoleezza Rice had threatened him and the government of jamaica if we would accept this democratically elected president of haiti in jamaica. And he did it anyway. He the caucus was very supportive then. Maxine was so important so supportive. Maxine waters that she went on the flight with us to the Central Africa republican which was dangerous mission. To go and meet with the president in the Central Africa republican. And say to him she did, i have to be black in congress but im not leaving here without the president. Are you going release him or not . He called washington and he called paris and we whiled with him headed toward jamaica. Him and his wife and american citizen, american born that had been abducted by the Bush Administration with the collaboration and involvement of power and condolezza rice. The Congressional Black Caucus on all of these things. On the haiti issue as well as the south africa issue was soiltdly on the right side of the issue. Host what about the black Political Class in general as bruce mentioned in our call . Guest i think the the bigger problem the bigger problem is an american problem. And that is that most americans dont know very much about these issue. You were justice not knowledgeable. You cant have a healthy democracy without a very enlightened citizen i are. Im not sure that we know enough about what we are doing in the world. If we are generally well read enough. If we are connected to the out world in a way that would give us to believe that people on the outside see us differently than we see ourselves. They know in america we dont know. And so i think that applies to blacks as well as whites. Host gregory van leer, senior. From wood bury, minnesota. Emails in. Marching in protesting are old school strategies. Black folk have not evolved in the digital ankle bracelet in tactic. My opinion is we rely too much on emotional sympathetic apeels, when power and money moves the wheel in washington. What do you see Going Forward that can make for a more effective plan to advance our cause . I love how your mind work. Guest the reason i wrote my latest book which is a novel, has to do with the repair of us from the inside. I think this business of losing access to our story and our history has done a ton of damage to us. And so that ones real power to stand again the winds comes from inside. So it means that we have to know the world. We have to feel that we can change it, and i dont think this is the kind of thing that you can charge to leaders alone. It has to happen for everybody. And so this is a book about a grandmother who has lived previous lives. She was there for the 11th dynasty in ancient egypt when the guy was in charge. And it built an enormous empire and she was there in the first dynasty. Both of these egyptian leaders, a black and we dont know anything about this. We dont know anything about the queen of shiyba. We dont know anything about either th we dont anything of ancient mali where the people knew about the serious star system. They knew about stars that couldnt be seen with the naked eye, and before the age of a telescope couldnt be seen at all. They had known about the stars for thousands of years. How they knew, we dont know. But they knew and named them. And mali, during the mali empire, the mali with a written constitution and human rights flavor to that constitution, we dont know about these things. And if we dont you know your history, you are lost. And this book is about this wise and extraordinary woman who had previous lives. She has seen our history from the age before slavery. And she tells us to our grandson. So that he can be empowered by it. And so i think that is a part of our responsibility. We have to cause our country to give us a different kind of education about ourselves. We could learn something from native americans. Something about climate change, something about how to treatment the environment. Something about culture and tradition. But we dont learn anything about anything. We only teach it one way and that is the history that as straight from the cloth that doesnt fit our particular situation. Host has your method changed . Guest perhaps. Perhaps because its a very lyrical place. It affords friendships of all kinds across and upanddown social economic lines. Its a wonderfully intimate place. Its been very good for me. And good for my family. Host when you are writing at. What are you looking at . Where are you sitting . Guest i dont look at the water. I dont think i can get anything done. [laughter] i go i go in a room upstairs in the house. I turn the ceiling fan on number one and let it move slowly, and it make you contemptlative when you do that. I sit there and hope something happen. Frequently it does. So ive been very happy about that. I wrote my weaks like that. Maybe it reflects that. Host how often do you wear that nice suit there . Guest never. There are occasions i go to the Prime Ministers gala one year, and they are formal occasions that i have to put on. I dont frequently wear long pants. I think its a different place. And different life. I like it. Its made for me. Host before we go back to call. In quitting america. You have a chapter on there. And guest yes. Host an island . Guest two islands. 35,000 people between 35,000 and 40,000 ours and 10,000 on the other. Host by the english . Guest by the english. Wellmanaged democracy. And fiercely democratic. Host chapter seven. As a brilliant red of orange or something inbetween and just a wonderful treat every way. So relocated the tree so we stopped and said how to be get the tree . Unfortunately you have the occasional people to stop you in the middle of a conversation but how much will they take for the tree. So of course, i interested to by the treaty says it is not for sale but i said it is not doing anything there and he said it is not for sale. I said suppose i offer 500 . It was not too thank you could still replant fairly easily in the caribbean iranians so much and he said not for sale. I said suppose i offer 1,000 . No. Suppose i offer 5,000 . The tree is not for sale. This whole business of what we call success, we only have one definition for success in america that has to do with how much money you make i dont think that is there definition. So here, a neurosurgeon but the taxi driver but this is for them not to be a success . What do they mean . But it certainly doesnt have everything to do with it. So to some people it sounds when you start the discussion there kind of crass. How did you conclude your flamboyant tree discussions . Guest i did not get it [laughter] they grow very fast you can get them small. My mother gardens will tell at least 93 so i have spent lots of time in the yard because i loved my hands of the soil just as she and we used to talk about plants. That is one of the things i loved about the caribbean because everything blooms all the time and it is so wonderful. You can get a plan pleiad trees rather easily and. Host news spent several years to live in the washington d. C. Area. Is it easy to get intoxicated by the power that is available . Guest here . It depends who you are. It did not take with me. I was never interested in that. Not anything necessarily great to say but he essentially i am quite private so i never liked the public side at all. I very much a whole person. Someplace in the world so whatever was happening here half, i had the builtin immunity. Host and you arent very patient. Caller you are on the line. Caller originally i have from mississippi and grew up in the south and i dropped out but eventually i went back in and went to college and moved to ohio and got a job. Sometimes at church talk about history in america and how we treat one another eye of a big fan of Frederick Douglass also with the peace that he wrote the real question for the command in question whether american justice and american the ready, American Civilization is the american in christianity can be made for ever all citizens. But not to be educated by history, as i talk to people about where i came from, my struggles, living in the south, talking to black people they see they do not comprehend what we talk about with the struggle in to where we came from. Host we will get a response from Randall Robinson. Guest i a understand very much how you feel. You can have often much reason or expectation of anything different. I have taken a the position particularly because in my view it is our do that doesnt mean we expect they will materialize in my lifetime or the near term future but it is renovating when you know, it is our do but the question is, what do we have to do with it ourselves to repair ourselves psychically and the emotionally . I see we have to learn as much as we can about our story to read vigorously everything we can put our hands on. We have to make sure our children get the best education and to have the right values and we have to do the best recant with what we have. We can do with what we have but that does not come close over a long long period of time. We all inherit our starting place in line. For those of us listening families that are impoverished. Not just material wealth but social wealth and poverty. But for others of us it was made difficult because of what we had defaced over 246 years catching up without any recognition of that difficulty on the part of the government on the part of a private sector that continued to benefit from that slavery. Nonetheless we have to understand what we are owed and continue to say that notwithstanding of what is accepted on the other side. Host you are watching booktv on cspan2 the first sunday of the month is our indepth program with three hours of discussion with one author and his or her body of work. This month is off 39. If you cannot go through on the phone go to Facebook Like us on facebook can make a comment we have a question on facebook you have seen the diaspora from different parts of the world for 2013, africa and those of african descent still frail with economic viability what are your suggestions to gain the power of it otherwise politics will not work. Guest we need to. We need to retool our values to some extent to overbalance them too entrepreneurship. We need to invest in the energy that there is jerry middle that can be done without money. We have to endow our own efforts. We dont have that kind of money now. We dont have any news broadcast organs so we still depend on other people in the newsroom where decisions are made often by groups of people that dont include any of us to make decisions to tell stories about our situation or history or our gene on dash journey until we are in the position to make that happen. I often thought when i was a young basketball player and it was much better to own the team there and play on the team. We have to get the license your heads for instance in the caribbean, the mothers tell their children when they come to the United States to go to college, i dont associate with africanamericans. They do this of what they see on American Television and watch american reality shows. Those shows picture us in a very unfavorable light to. They dont show us in college or graduate programs or excelling in science or the arts or any of that. They show the worst possible things about us. It is very offputting to watch the shows around the world but seventies making a lot of money from the shows but it is just old wind in new bottles to make use of us that way. Self disparaging. That makes a lot of money for producers and writers and other people behind the camera but we dont make the decision to put these shows on but they are there a and we have to be the position to control these operations. So we have to prepare our young people to aspire to that but also to direct a and greed bite them were not an a position now and hollywood to offer that figure times the New York Times did not cover taking off in the middle of the night to the Central African republic. Guest digit. Host dick did she try to get on the plane with you . With the bicentennial, to describe the hundreds of thousands of people close to 1 billion people to the enthusiastic crowd i do think it is often the case that black writers in publications to things that disparaged the black community. And facilitated upward mobility and i decided she was not the person anyone there from democracy now in the reporter from the Washington Post by and large this story was extraordinary, and not covered by the New York Times. Zip. Nothing. How could did not cover it . What kind of journalism is that . Host from Facebook Page j. Gary along with questionable regimes with africa chided in that trade deal with the african nation build hospitals and schools with infrastructure needs instead of the massive Cash Payments to the warlords. Guest i am fearful of the chinese as well. Because i am critical of the policies of my country and to have a responsibility to practice that criticism of what constructive democracy is all about but china has horrible human rights policies it is a dictatorship it should be ashamed of its own citizens of what it has done in tibet or western china to the weaker people i unquestioning their motives. Host the next call comes from minneapolis. You are on booktv. Caller hello mr. Robinson. I am a new york city kid for 1949 i have seen a lot of america with its history but in particular the Mining Industry worldwide and particularly in africa and also the possible mining in minnesota with Companies Looking at some of the ceos pretty much our american educated and wondering how does washington and wall street in addition to that today . Guest i am i sure i am understand the question. I of knoted expert in mining but i dont know how to approach it because i am not sure of what you are saying. Host on twitter page page, it could you ask Randall Robinson who he thinks would make a better ambassador to haiti than bill clinton and why . Any number of people right now our policy with haiti is so bad we reduce them a service if after 200 years would leave them alone virtually all of our policies have been antidemocratic for haiti. I have felt strongly when i was characterized as of friend of president aristide said that is not the issue. But i have never been for him politically because that is not for me. I was not for Nelson Mandela in south africa but i was for affording the south African People and the haitian people the right to choose for themselves and who love their political leaders would be. The administration has now embraced those elections that they and the Largest Political Party from participating. That is not democracy. We all appreciate the process. President obama took some pains to try to block their misdeeds country from south africa that is the violation of the covenant of civilrights of which the United States is a party you cannot block people from leaving the country or from returning to their country and. So certainly we violate the spirit of a legal and binding obligation under that humanrights treaty. Host where is former president aristide now . Guest he is in haiti haiti, he is back in his home and is operating the school he operated before but he is doing service work host does he have security . Guest i dont know. I dont know what would be warranted. I just dont know. We talk to him by cannot talk about things like that on the phone. We dont touch on that. Host from the departure of a black man you right america is a democracy because america says it is a democracy america is godly and good and perfect because america says it is godly and good and perfect. These truths must be a truce because americas voice is the only voice america hears guest that is very true particularly with these wonderful human rights instruments that came on with the United Nations after 1945 spearheaded by Franklin Roosevelt at universal declaration of human rights with those that followed a and much with the agitation of the developing world for the end of colonialism in the end of discrimination because the United States won the war largely had a bigger stamp than anyone else on the of language so much of what ec with the cover of it of civil and Political Rights you will see in the american constitution. But it is important to realize for all these countries across the world have ratified these conventions but United States has not ratified to protect the interests of children were to protect women and just recently failing to ratify or her care for those of the world with disabilities and voting not to ratify the convention after listening to a plea from Bob Dole Macon the plea from a wheelchair before the senate. And babied not ratified virtually every country in the world. But it is not for us. We are exceptional. No theory of the courts really listen to our own. But in particular a Cuban National rights law. Host good afternoon from california. Caller good afternoon. It is a pleasure to hear from you. What is your opinion relative for daschle reparations for black african slaves in america . My second question is how to we addressed the issue of africanamerican politicians who are Political Prisoners it ameritech . In particular in california. To qualify the question,. Guest that the answer your first question then you come back with the second. Lets talk about reparations. We have supported it reparations for the jews who used as forced labor during world war ii. We have supported reparations for japanese these are proper with the right thing to have died and the japanese to during world war ii internet internment and those in that fashion or one that could call reparations for native americans. But with the question comes up for reparations for the descendants of slaves, ameritech huge enterprise as i have said said, the august ready human rights crime in the world over the last 1,000 years years, not only is it not discussed and analyzed and thought about it responded to but just dismissed out of he and out of hand. It is not proper or acceptable but the descendants of those people who were ground into the dust under the profitmaking wheels of slavery it is most important thing is people recognize that we recognize the matter what officials america does we know what happened. A and we know there is a story with the longer part of our history occurred before slavery thousands of years with the Great Pyramid was built by a thousand years ago it is now authenticated he was very black as were many of the other pharaohs. But it turns out that we have known much about is cleopatra because she descended from greek ancestry. We do about her bet virtually everything is built by black egyptians all before the arrival of arabs in north africa. We should know history and all of this history but we have been cut off from its. When i was a child seat author of the of this education of the negro was not allowed to the richmond public schools. A harvard ph. D. But his work was not accepted because it would tell us so we want dash what we needed to know about ourselves but we have to break through this because it is the theft of the higher of the material quantification is more important to that is the best of our story. That we dont know who we are. As ever since then when they discover who i am, i will be free. Host go ahead with your second question. Caller my second question is relative to the africanamerican leaders who are currently Political Prisoners in america today. Speak he specifically to people who i know our attorneys, a graduate of usc and ph. D. Holders better leaders in the black Community One individual was sentenced 16 years of the federal prison for mail fraud. And did the other was sentenced tenures for 3,000 of misappropriations that they rightly determined to was not true. They let him go but then another case amanda td years old sentenced five years in prison as it elected official to go to educational workshops and i would like to know your position on it is of those issues and i would like to thank you for your calabria answer to might ants long as a teacher to my first question because we cannot trace their history beyond our grandparents it is critically important we educate our children and teach them who they are so they have more pride. Host we will leave it there. Guest i wish i could be more helpful to you on your second question but i do not have the deaf understanding of the facts of the cases to make a judgment i would have to know more to form an opinion if it needs to be scrutinized i dont have any facts of these cases at all. Host id quiting america all that has seized on the pretense of effort of domestic or racial or social justice ease issues even the empty words of promises have disappeared but still republicans as well as democratic it ministrations those that would sit snub to the president and cabinet the eggs on the condition no to do is made about the general conditions of blacks guest i will give you an example the evening president aristide was adapted from his home before 3 00 a. M. The next morning with the American Marines special forces arrived to take him away to be flown into the night, i call the president an american voice into the foam and i set up by to talk to president aristide. He is not here. Madam there is steve . She is not here. Said allied was cut. Davit smiley chavis wiley was to interview the president february 29th. My wife and who was working in haiti at the time also with the former congressman was making the arrangements for his trip he called to say the trip was off that he just received a call that he had just spoken to secretary of state and that colin powell had said that the slugs, the rebels for coming to portauprince the next days to kill the president and that leader said he would or a do that sunday the 29th of february which was his birthday and he would kill the president on his birthday. That is what powell told williams and we will do nothing to protect or defend the president. Their security agents the Steel Foundation from the west coast saturday check to see if they reduce anything to defend the embassy to help them control the of troubles in the wes said they would not and the president was all alone and the pilot had flown to the north to spot the rebels who were trained by americans and the Dominican Republic and armed, 100 kilometers from portauprince and heading away from that in colin powell had to have known this when they said there were coming to kill him the next day. Colin powell had been saying publicly we would not allow the overthrow of the Democratic Administration the but privately he was trying to frighten president aristide into fleeing. When he did not do that when i thought his life was under threat i called abc news randall kingston at cbs and said it is my id to standing that colin powell has told them theyre coming to kill the president on sunday and they said we have to talk to rondelle and gave them the number they called the then Peter Jennings called back and he will not confirm he had any conversation with secretary of state powell. Go story. But the president knew that the rebels were a long way from portauprince. They didnt go anywhere so they stayed in the city the entire week and into the night than the special forces arrived and took him and his wife against their will we were told at the airport even the immigration papers were inconsistent after saying there were 50 then saying there were zero. But there were 50 the special forces people the eris deeds and other so that is why we had to go to the Central African republic to bring them back to jamaica to where the Prime Minister gave them refuge for seven days before there we go to south africa but the americans and french role in Colin Powells rule is a reprehensible. Host why do you think there is a change for what ron told you or Peter Jennings . To would you have to ask him host did you . Guest the month following we called ron three times and he never returned the call and never spoke to him. Host had you known him for a while . And. Guest for years. Years. Host we have another hour and a half with our indepth program with Randall Robinson the author of nine five Nonfiction Books including what america owes to blacks and mr. Robinson begins this book talking about the u. S. Capitol rotunda and we will show you a of a little bit of video from the cspan archives of mr. Robinson talking about this. Guest she called to my attention when i was writing the book that we will talk about tonight here at the book signing, she urged me to come down to the rotunda. I had been there and i had worked there many times ago but i came for the victims as well and she said look up and i saw up painting on the eye of the rotunda of George Washington the represents to assault the ideals and objectives of democracy in George Washington was surrounded all of whom were white but what did picks American History from history to the age of aviation go douglas, and the truth no blacks period the entire era of slavery is not reflected but down at the ground level there are massive Oil Paintings set into huge stones and no blacks could be found anywhere. Upon examination i discovered there were brought up the river and put into place by the slaves the statue of freedom sits atop the dome of the capital and was cast, disassembled cover reassembled, the forest between the capitol and the white house was cleared by slaves. But not a tablet, not a monument, and that museum exist to commemorate the victims of the american holocaust. Host Randall Robinson is our guest on indepth we have one hour 50 minutes left and georgia you have been very patient please go ahead. Caller please bear with me. I have three questions. First of all, i have been a follower of your work. I really want to thank you for your struggle and all the things you have done for black people all over the world. Guest day que. Caller but first of my three questions what are your thoughts of imperialism as a philosophy . Your work for humanrights for black people in america and all over the world ohio violate civil rights by the american empire existed for for many other empire in history has mistreated their people . Host very quickly your second and third questions we will try to get to all three. Caller would you think about the overthrow in the bf . And the third question thats a radical democrat whittier thoughts of the skiing of africa because he pays the situation in donna that made him president for life against the western imperialists efforts to do anything to remove him for his adversaries. Host are you originally from ghana . Guest yes ibm. Caller yes ibm. Host Randall Robinson comparing it imperialism to the roman empire. Guest we have the military footprint and one of the reasons we are so resistant to ratifying the International Criminal court is we dont want to see a circumstance under which any american would ever be called in front of the International Criminal court for anything at any time. So the countries that dont have that kind of exposure not evolve with the number of wars at the same time or with some of the countrys in a military fashion, they dont have the same desk that the United States has. Vice it describes what we are doing were interested in africa or world war ii but opening the world for american trade and American Products to develop those markets for americans and american businesses, that takes on some of the earmarks of empire. So i think is the fair description to call it the american empire. I dont think the comparisons to the roman empire are perhaps so appropriate because the time is a different but do we use of military to accomplish these objectives . Probably. Are we interested in profits . Yes. We tolerate human rights crimes in china and at the same time we tried to crush cuba it is doing the best it can and do the american embargo with other kinds of medical equipment and their other surgery is in cuba that made it possible and children were dying for the reason nonetheless. We continue to kabul with cuba but we would never consider doing such to chided because it would not be in our interest to do that in china. The killing of more gadaffi . Guest i never believed or never wanted to send u. S. Military to south africa to right the wrongs. I thought it was a mistake. Any time you create for the downfall through undemocratic or military means you find the restoration of order and tranquility of very difficult saying to accomplish. So the problems follow you in those cases now when we start covering these things that doesnt say they are not of what comes out with those enterprises i think it was a mistake in libya and the way he was executing and the thought that we could bear some responsibility for that was more than an unfortunate. Host the political situation and on the . I felt he was a marvelous dollar. And a read a great deal of his work and was impressed by it if he had a special connection to the United States as you know, it was a graduate of Lincoln University in pennsylvania and donna was a first country in 1957 to establish with a great deal of pride and i felt i felt that on American Television. But when too much power is concentrated anywhere, generally we see evidence of situations you came to do good or to you do well, i know about the charges but not the extent if they were proven or not. When he was out of the country of course, in china and of course, that was the end of the story he had to say things about the United States of africa and with the interest of africa in both interest of those who would want to make use of that. He would probably collect an amazing and i have found in my experience that those who vigorously try to do anything for their own population to lift people in their own way, they collect enemies of the powerful west very quickly and that was the case of haiti. What was going on president aristide had gotten himself crossways of interest in haiti from monday in the people who wanted the money with the enormous sums of money and he said he had never seen such wealth concentrated that very much looks like the old south africa looks that we dont see from the outside but very much race and class based society. But here was up president to raise the black peasantry because those were the ranks from which he sprang to life in their the road or ease their misery raising their pay from 1 up at 2 per day so that alone had the unforgivable offense to the wealthy and the wes was bound up with that group. There was race and class attracted to the u. S. And american in many as well that wanted to invest in the us what shops that wanted note minimum raise minimumwage raised. Host we are talking with the author of five Nonfiction Books, 1998, the black life of america came out, the debt would america owes to blacks, in 2002 the reckoning. Quitting america of the departure of a black man from his native land came out in the most recent case out 2007 the unbroken in agony. Randall robinson is also the author of this novel which is the story. Guest of a grandmother who has previous lives that she relates to her grandsons and once to be a writer and once to be a great pride of possibility and wants him to know the times in which she takes up a small space and that we have known better times that we will see again and shes tells him of those times when we were in command of the future that that was the greatest nation of the world host a lot of facebook comments. Day participate in social media like twitter or facebook . I have no clue. [laughter] none of it. None at all. I think they must be generational. I am 71. Host you do have a web site id you can see all of his books on the web site but the face the comment comment, you just mentioned we as a people do not have access to Media Outlets but we can have access to the largest media outlet the internet. How can we encourage potential power . I think media is a major force and i think young people understand the potential of the force id we have to use it. Talking about corporate broadcast media deciding people what to tell about themselves but more importantly decide what not to tell people about what is going on in the world that is a lot of power concentrated in very few hands and mismanage largely by small groups in corporate rooms around the country fewer and fewer blacks. Even in publishing. Editors have disappeared from the ranks with the great Publishing House to get serious books published tom black authors these are very difficult times for black people who want to Say Something or things that want to be said very much. But we as a nation should have curiosity we need to tell not fewer stories, but war stories. I want to know the native americans and the wonderful music. The culture, a tradition, becoming one with the earth and the environment. I want to know about the latino americans story and the story of the southwest of america and the story of texas when it was mexico. All i want to know all of that but now that is what American History has to me we have to know each others stories and then some of the fences would fall we would be less inclined to say that our concern stops at the border that we should all be concerned no matter where one lives, we are concerned about their lot and we cultivate that concern rigo their stories. But we dont do not. Host jack comments on facebook so happy to see you here doubt if we could just delete all the Heritage Foundation programs. I read that because we hear this often on the cspan people only watch what they agree with. What do you think . Guest let me say this about cspan first of all. And i have said to brian lamb many years ago, this story, this operation is one of the great contributions to democracy, you have without prejudice, all voices expressing themselves and it is important we all have an opportunity to hear all of those voices. So i think the Heritage Foundation of course, is a voice to be heard. I would not even argue against this slice of life of television that they see as long as they are proportionate. If you tell the story of the American Population but then the story of poverty from appellation, tell it all. If we talk about the less present pleasant expressions from the american range, cover the whole range from top to bottom or east to west or north to south. See the whole picture but that is not what is happening as they see it particularly in the black communities. So i just say we have to have better representation where decisions are made and what to cover and how to do and how to apportion time and resources to each piece of that. Were not going in the right direction but away from that as far as i can see publishing, printing industry, a television, the whole thing about some facility to get people to know what they need to know but the entire world. Not just america so often we found the world knows more about us than we do about them. When i was in tanzania in 1970 i was talking to a kid who was 14 years old and he approached me in the street and started to talk about thomas jefferson. And jeffersonian democracy and i was stunned. There were teachers that i knew and americans generally that could not find a insignia on a map and they know more about you than you do about them. That is sad. Exceptionally some has cost us a knowledge of much of the world. Is almost that one could like it into your years in high school you know, the kids that finished ahead of you you cannot remember anybody in the classic behind you. We happen to think because people are pour they are less important. That is a sad state to be an host Facebook Page. With all due respect i seek your words further in title many blacks to find excuse is said of getting to work to do better be all have our injustices to overcome the you were speaking of 200 years ago. Guest lets subjectified and let me use Human Rights League which from the un if the criteria were not race race, color, religion coverage under common nationality, political opinion you take any one of those to say we will select people from this category by gender or religion or nationality or political opinion and we will take all those people and is laid them for 246 years and follow that with a legally enforced what airtime the work for nothing which is slavery by another name then follow that by legal segregation then take away the names and rename the group so they are no longer africans but they are some strange label of negros. Whatever that is or wherever that came from, and they will be known by that. So they lose all tradition, they yes and no of what to do and what not to of how we do things from the dawn of time. And they dont know themselves in a more. It doesnt make a difference if they are black or not. Take that profile into that to him. And see where his descendants fall after two and a half centuries. It does nothing to do with any particular race. That would happen to anyone treated that way this is not personal. Ive not saying anyone has a responsibility in the individual has any responsibility for what began to happen along time ago. I am saying our government is a Corporate Institution and benefit did and it has a responsibility so if reparations are paid, i was i of taxpayer i would be paying i dont need repair. I say those who have been crushed to get some recognition of what had happened and some opportunity to repair themselves with. Why else do you think we see the disproportionate success failure gap . Wealth assets gap . Rigo that people are equally , the naturally in doubt. That cannot be the problem. How else could it have happened . Three and 1 2 centuries of slavery. Host with first Nonfiction Book defending the spirit of black life in america you right although it is still under fashionable to say it i obsessively black race is the overarching aspect of my dignity of america has made this way or more accurately white americans have made me this way into one to right in the autumn of my life i am less regarding white people before renewing them individually with mistrust and dole dislike. Guest thats right. That was the low point. I remember at the age of five people started to talk about race. I thought it was absurd i could not distinguish one from the other. A reflex remedy was subjected to the kinds of things that we were and still being subjected to. Host miami, a good afternoon you are on with Randall Robinson. Caller good afternoon i a misallocation of living in florida. I has been a follower of your work you came to my undergraduate school when i was in college during sees south africa protest. I remember you vividly. That was 1986. My first question is currently we have the first black president celebrated by america and people in our community so how do you feel about our first black president sending troops into 35 african countries that there is a silence on the part of the black intelligentsia or that he leaked in that regard . To the point they would be astonished seven with the track record and the amount of blood on our hands susan rice would not be appointed secretary of state considering the history she has related to particularly in the condo and i am sure you are well aware of that long extents of damaging history. Host your other two questions . Caller regarding haiti , the fact our relationship we are outsourcing the leadership of that country to other entities what idiocy as a possibility to resolve that difficulty to destabilize and what could be done . I wish it was that simple to leave them alone. Host did you have one more . Caller alas question is how can we possibly weaken the spirit of the black elite and uneducated but have become so complex it in the silencing of the descent from what is happening for those better under the party of the regime. Guest i will start with haiti. When i said perhaps we should leave it alone i met alternative to what we have done over 200 years. Even Frederick Douglass did not figure out why we have been so hot style with a speech she gave to the worlds fair in the 1890s was a speech appropriate now when he talked about the haitian president sounded as if he knew president aristide but that is standard from the u. S. Open last 200 years. What distinguishes haiti from the rest of the caribbean . Democratic, is stable governments with friendships with the United States, open government where all the freedoms are injured wade, a speech and religion and the rest. Haiti is extraordinary with 8 Million People the art is a worldclass some of the best painters of the world and has everything going for it but why has the u. S. Signaled out heydey for this type of program . I am not quite sure that any of us have figured this out but perhaps it is on a strategic water passage the causes it to invite such intense interest from the United States perhaps because haiti has gold and diamonds and all of that offshore pass to do with that all our the acre that jefferson and George Washington in so many felt with the exception of one of the early americans, the thomas paid who spoke out what the u. S. Was doing because he had the temerity to strike out on its own entry made african it is the most african country in the caribbean and i feel the religion is when you die you will return because they still remember africa. The art is inspired by africa. Haiti is a country of 1,000 proverbs and others have been forgotten. Haiti is a country that knows its history to invite the acre of western society they remember their history. Said the allegis school in jamaica to speak to High School Students drop far from haiti and i asked a group of 15 yearold if they do through if they knew a man in they did not i asked if they knew who snoop dog was then they all knew him. The additive also hold western community so for that reason i am suspicious of our embrace of haiti and it bothers me it is extreme to say what i said but sometimes one has to wonder if they would be better off if america left them alone. Host president obama is african policy . Guest i am concerned about that. I just think when you get American Military involved with your military, the disengagement does not come without consequences. Typically these things lead to a bad and for the country involved with your country becomes a of a strategic usefulness to the United States coming you find the bid is meant of their own democracy will be infinitely more difficult to a minister host the company said spirit of black elites of america and how to awaken them . Guest as i have gotten older, i have become more disinclined to judge people. Said judging that i do i try to make it myself usually. I think we do sayings and others think are not the right thing to do out of an absence of knowledge or consequences i the most americans respective of race know very little of what goes on in countries around the world in response to american policies american aid over involvement and often it is not a constructive relationship are not in the 10 entries interest but you are ill informed there is very little in america to give you opportunities to be well informed to. Three demonize the when usually. Even winston and churchill at the beginnings said it is better to jaw jaw rather than war war. We ought to embrace our differences, and the humanrights but we dont do that we almost celebrate our ignorance and i talk about all of us, all classis, whites and blacks from the top of government to the bottom of society, we do that because were the most powerful country in the world we do a disservice. Leadership should be principled and we should recognize perhaps opportunity is fleeting to save us from ourselves we dont know the point of which we would have done so much damage that it becomes unlivable with those environments so irreversibly that no one can live here but we cannot support that kyoto accord itself could be too little too late we cant because we are exceptional and listen to no one on anything. The worst kind of devastating stupidity to see a country that we like to describe that greatest in the world and we all have a responsibility were all democrats and we have to account for what it does so we all have to be a blatant cato something and participate. We dont do that very well either were divergent and it has done us know service here. In defending the spirit you talk about greeting people by looking at the face shape or the characters on their face the shape of their face. Guest did i say that . Host. Guest i cannot do that [laughter] host i am not just making that up. Guest i wrote that a long time ago. Host california please go ahead. Caller you are just a marvelous and wonderful human being. I like to comment, i have so many things but particularly mr. Obama is policies with the drones and lecturing to black people about their inadequacies and his support of the 1 with wall street and retroactive community and it is very disheartening in the most important thing is why did he try to strong norm the president of south africa to keep president aristide there . You watch a be a good man at democracy matt democracy now, i was going to email you the thought i could not bore you with my frustrations but it was the same point again and again. Guest i will say that president has to be because he did everything to respond to president aristide wishes to go home. He and his wife mildred in the two girls in in south africa for a long time. The South African government was a wonderful host but they wanted to go home. I cannot read president obama is mined i dont know why he extended resources to block his homecoming it was a violation of the human rights law and sadly so i disagree very vigorously with the president and his role. Host in quiting america what you wrote when i was a small boy in Grammar School i developed a diversion of grouping people by the arrangement of their facial piecers summer eyes or of mouth or a chief or a school or a smaller number of faces that were just planes and angles the vast majority of cases fells way to natures comical disposition to mix and match but those streamlines the bowels were warm and the continents were called. Guest yes that is very true. I wrote that and i thought that way of before the First Impression is overturned by access and knowledge that it would deliver it have a certain message to have a straight geometric slashing exact in this to them to give the impression of precision and rectitude and scientific perfection in their round faces with soft features that were warm and fuzzy that would seem to suggest Something Else was psychological and makes no sense but this was a child a child came to see how often i could come close to the truth with my reckonings. I dont know how well i did. Do think there is the Science Behind this . [laughter] host all that i know is that i did read it on your book. [laughter] i am writing this for a 76 show black man who is following you and your brothers career. He would like to know where he could get a picture of you and your brother and goes on to tell his story raised in what sport in the b. C. And is still feels there is injustice in america and concludes that america talks about the Founding Fathers as if they were not slaves to also sold black children because of the color of their skin. I dont know how to answer that question about america. I do think that it is, that it concedes nothing without a demand and never has. Never has and never will. Is it probably true that this expresses itself. It we cannot dismiss the sufferings of others that they had relegated to another place on cspan. So perhaps that is what happened. I cant begin to guess what its like on the other side. I used to wonder when i was a child why these people were being so cruel to us. And what must they be like i took some groceries when i was a grocery boy executor sold so had never seen a law like this before. My father was a teacher, so we had four children. But i noticed the family began to talk about intimate things. But economy. They spoke of these things is if i went there. I was invisible. What does that tell you about people. We still show movies in america on turner classic movies. Movies in which white characters from the 1930s they register fresh with me still. Black characters, males are always scared out of their skin. Their eyes are wide, the lights are enveloping. They are scared of everything that the white female characters were not afraid of. Black women characters are always come are usually overweid the white characters are petite and pretty. All of the bowing and scraping, it is just as offensive to me now as it was when i was a little boy. They still show it. Host should not be on tv . Guest it should not be on tv. It was humiliating than. It is humiliating now. But it makes money. Host a girl named laura tweets ntu, Randall Robinson, what started the aids program in africa, the one good thing. Guest the aids program. I suppose i succeeded or not. I dont know what else to say about president bush. I mean, i dont think he was concerned substantively about a great deal of things and certainly not about black issues that were going on. So i am at a loss for words to comment about this. Host rodney in baltimore, please go ahead with your question or comment for Randall Robinson. Caller its a pleasure to be with you. The reason im calling is about black wealth disparity. Talking about the housing sector and lower wages and employment. Africanamericans are doing worse under that administration more than the last previous top four administrations. Guest the unemployment among blacks is now 16 plus percent. And so whites are doing marginally better and blacks are doing significant rewards. The Market Forces and factors, i think that is a good question to put to the president. I should say at the same time that no one wants more than i do to be able to see president obama succeed. It is very important to the black community. That he had a successful president. And i think that is why blacks have not been disposed to be harshly critical of him. Because of the things that we might think he should have done. But that has not done. I think the political space he operates in is very small in these kinds of issues. And i dont know if he is willing to push out that space to do more things if one uses a measure. Lacks have done worse than other communities since the beginning of his presidency. Host we have a caller from alabama. Caller Randall Robinson, how are you. Guest i am good. Caller i have a couple of questions. The first question is where is the longitude and latitude of st. Kitts. Guest you know where san juan puerto rico is. About 300 miles due east. Caller what cruise line would you recommend . [laughter] guest i am at a loss come i dont know much about that. Host recommending tourism. Guest all of the cruises come to st. Kitts and it will be there. Caller the second question. Did you go to school with Patricia Evans . Guest i dont think so. Guest yes, i knew moses well. He is a good friend of my sister, so yes, i knew him. But the others im not so sure. I Left High School over 50 years ago. Post reported that question come from . Paco shed a sister named teresa. And of course i am going to highly recommend that you introduce yourself to the cyberworld. I will go on your website and barley are both. Guest on the first to tell you that i need help. Caller i will be the first to ring your doorbell. [laughter] host that was alfred in thomasville, alabama. Speaking of your website, i forgot bridget had asked for that gentleman who wanted a picture of you and your brother. We have contacted you via your website. Guest the picture was taken by every magazine in the studio in chicago. Perhaps they still have them in their files for ebony magazine. Host defending the spirit, august of 1982. The family has become rich and famous but he is not happy, he is a journalist, but he reads the news and hes not pleased with himself. Guest he wanted to do more than that. He wanted to cover conventions. He wanted to interpret the news and he was being asked to accept the role of the copy. He wasnt happy with that. Host when did he die . Guest lets see, the year has been its been about 20 years now. He died when he was 49. Host did he die of aids . Guest yes, he did. You wrote about where it originated and how it began. What are your thoughts on our . Guest it is terrifyingly prevalent in global communities. And it is now a really terrifying force in womens situations as well. And its a big factor and there are certain states that are not allowing last time i looked, because they dont want to come to terms with the incidents of sex in prison. And men bringing aids home to their wives. That sort of thing. These are big issues that trouble us. And aids is less talked about. But there is still no cure. One can take a cocktail of medicines and control it if you dont have a fullblown disease. But it is a big problem in poor communities in a big problem in poor countries. In africa as well, of course. Host sharon and denver, this is indepth with Randall Robinson. Caller good afternoon. Guest harry doing . Caller i am doing okay. This has been a very enlightening couple of hours and i very much appreciate it. Guest thank you, sir. Caller pointing out the responses that you gave give a little bit ago, the gentleman that talked about the things that happened. A couple hundred years ago. I hope you understand how the nature of this question is now. Im curious what you have to say about foreclosure. The panel did not reported in 2010. At that point they had sent me analysis of the impact that the foreclosure, which we consider has had on the black and hispanic community. We have determined that it had close to 400. And it seems like not only is this something that is very difficult to put on the table, things like that roll the clock back quite a few years. All of those other cities as well one without that were burned down during the 20s. This kind of wanted to get your take on that. Guest we are talking about what it means to the families financing where one puts virtually everything that one house into a home thinking that that is the safest place that one can put it. And then so i cant agree with you more. That we are going to be reassured that something will happen in response that they ought to be some recourse to make these people work. But it doesnt seem to be on the horizon. I am every bit as concerned about it as you are. Host this email is from diane in brooklyn. We have 10 minutes left in the program. Excuse me, mr. Robinson for me seem like a brilliant and thoughtful wellintentioned man. I have learned many things listening to you and wish it had been more publicized. I am sympathetic to your cause. But i have a problem. The question is how can you expect black youth psychologically capable of overcoming the terrible wound that you have on your people, when you keep passing on to your children the victim mentality which im sad to see that you maintain. Guest i do not think that i can satisfactorily answer that question. I dont think i can answer that for this person. I dont try to answer that question, quite frankly. I think that those who have endured in those who have been wounded and those who are in trouble know what i am saying. They understand that. Host dian has another question. If i was going to read one of your books, which one should i read . Guest well, i dont know what to tell her in brooklyn. She doesnt seem to have an open mind. I guess i would ask her if she has read and has been thoughtful about these things. But at least she can understand how we conveyed from one generation to the next with disabilities sustained. Her people tend to hurt people. When you have space to love and you are holding off, you always begin by loving yourself. To love yourself, you have to know your story. When i was little boy and i had discovered its significance and its antiquity, that all of this came from egypt. And all of egypt came from ethiopia before the dawn of time. It isnt science of matter, its literature. So much is borrowed from ancient egypt. When i was a child, i needed to know these things. Just as many need to know about ancient rome and ancient greece, ancient anything red that people who look like them have accomplished. If they need that, so july. I do not need to know what their people dead. I need to know the story of my people. Host we have heidi from freeport, maine. Please go ahead with your question. Caller thank you so much, mr. Robinson. I appreciate the work that you have done against apartheid and whatnot. Not just a fan but i would like to know how you feel that music plays in the role of apartheid and what it isnt forcing upon Oil Companies from investment portfolios. Guest when you mention mentioned danny schechter, i have not seen him in a sum of years now when i was in law school. We had taken over. We protested the Harvard Holding of oil shares in its portfolio because of what the gulf is doing to exist portugal and its warmaking against the effort to win independence from portugal. He was a stump speaker on these issues at the time. I think that a disinvestment is always a good tool to use in trying to win social goals. I dont think the South Africans were able to understand anything the beginning is at hand. At the time we were being told all of the time what we were suggesting wouldnt work. The assistant secretary of state from africa was saying that constructive engagement was the best way to go forward, to simply talk to the South Africans about being nicer. And we said that hasnt worked and we have tried it for very long time. The moment the sanctions were passed and the bottom line was affected. South africa began to become the new nation and a new society. I think that can happen on so many matters that youre trying to change. Host why did you not accept Honorary Degree . Guest because i got there that day and george what his name, i opened the paper that morning and found out that i had come all the way up from the caribbean to accept it and i was deeply honored. We had worked so hard to make this possible. And i was profoundly honored. I got up that night and i opened the paper to see that the tenant was to be honored he was part of making this illegal and immoral war in iraq. It was the bombing of iraq and thinking about innocent civilians during the night that the war had ended the thing was justification before the United Nations to make this possible with the fig leaf of Security Council and cover. It is despicable and he was at the very center of it. The Honorary Degree from georgetown had been lost for me until i came up to meet with the georgetown people to tell them about this. Telling them that i could not accept it and then i went home. Host i just have to speak with you. This has been a very deeply moving and inspiring thing today. Caller as one if you could speak on the local situation. Of course we know about the International Monetary fund and maybe we will meet one day. Guest i hope so. We have met all of the International Monetary fund requirements. The labor party has reduced the debt of the country almost by half over last two years. The democracy is an energetic one that people say many things in the public square. As the parties are fenced with each other, it is healthy and open. It is free and i have really enjoyed the great privilege of living there in an ideal way to be a participant in the process of her wonderful country. Host we have another question, a gentleman from indiana. In the 90s, which leaders have impressed you the most and which have disappointed. I think that when answering a question, i am not in politics and i dont have anything to lose. I have always felt that somehow i ought to be had meant to say what i think. But i will not say things when people have accorded me an opportunity to meet with them. And i will not say things will be offensive to those people later on. I have had my feelings hurt before and i know what it feels like. I dont think thats useful. Host we are going to quote your book, Randall Robinson has in his book, i try to love america. But i cannot love things. No one in good health can. Imagine a world of material wealth is devoid of people. I try to love america and its people, the dominant majority, their depiction of me and their treatment of mine. I have had to try to love america but they would not love the african whole of me. Thus i could not love america. I have come to know that i have tried to love americas ideals and promise and process. These things could mean no more to me than they have to those that conceived them were written on were cited and ultimately betrayed them. Then i stopped trying to love america. With that has come a