The Martin Luther King Day speech from New Orleans that DESERVED to get attention

[infrogmation]

Wynton Marsalis at Tulane

Comments

[meekorouse.livejournal.com]

thank you! That's the sort of speach I think that a lot of people were hoping for yesterday.. and you are right in that it's a shame it's not the one being played for cnn & everywhere over and over..

The one that we have here.. in LA, Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa,(one wonders if there aren't 10 of him he's everywhere) was in the MLK parade yesterday in LA and his words though brief were mellow and appreciative and worthy of repetition.. because despite whether folks like LA's Mayor or not (and I kind of do despite him not being my Mayor) he was saying that Dr King wasn't fighting the peaceful fight just for black America but for everyone.. for all the disenfranchised people of our country. =)

He noted that if it weren't for the civil rights act & the voting rights act he wouldn't be here as Mayor.. He's the first Hispanic American Mayor of LA in many many years.. seanyoda was saying (since I didn't look it up) that it's possible his the first Hispanic Mayor of LA since California was an American state. =) Ok I'm rambling. =) Thank you again for posting the link. =)

from the LA times:

The parade's grand marshal, Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, was participating in King Day speeches just before the parade and was a few minutes late for its motorcade. The pearl-colored convertible, with children as passengers, left without him. After about five minutes, the mayor arrived in a sport utility vehicle and jumped into his parade vehicle with the youngsters.

"I would not be here if it were not for the civil rights movement and Martin Luther King," said Villaraigosa, the first Latino mayor in Los Angeles in more than a century. He was later seen walking the parade route.

[asienieizi.livejournal.com]

Thanks for posting that. It's a shame that the other one was all that was being plastered around including photoshopped images of Nagin dressed as Willy Wonka.

[seide.livejournal.com]

Thanks for posting that.

[gentlemanj.livejournal.com]

A good speech--pity he had to include the praise for the Stalinist Lincoln Brigades in with the legitimate praise of genuinely democratic accomplishments.

The Lincoln Brigades were brave, fought well, and left a legacy; unfortunately, they were run by, with, and for the Communist Party, which was 100% behind Joseph Stalin. I find such praise to be enough to make me suspect the man's political background to be close to the C.P.U.S.A.

[infrogmation.livejournal.com]

If all you have to go on is the reference to the Abraham Lincoln Brigade, I wonder if you might be reading too much into it. Accurate or not, they got a lot of press in mid century celebrating them as idealists who were early to jump into the fight against Fascism. I don't know what he's read about them, and Marsalis didn't elaborate on the point.

I don't know the details of Marsalis' political views, but his advocacy of keeping an eye on the government and playing jazz seem to make being a hardcore Stalinist unlikely.