Busted “Hero” Barry Bronzed

“If ever I become entirely respectable I shall be quite sure that I have outlived myself.” – Eugene V. Debs

Apparently, that's true of the late Marion Barry: a half-century fixture of local D.C. government. While the American political landscape is chock full of colorful characters—some lovable scoundrels, others not so much—perhaps none fit this category better than the one nicknamed “Mayor for Life”. In that role Barry served for four terms as the district fell into corruption and insolvency. In 1989, at a D.C. budget hearing, then-Sen. John C. Danforth (R-Mo.) publicly chastised his mismanagement:

“Some governments are corrupt but are known for their competency in running the city. Others are incompetent but considered clean. [Washington's] government is scandalously corrupt and hopelessly incompetent.”

In fact, at his death, he was still in office representing Ward 8, having collectively amassed 16 years on the city council.

On the first anniversary of his demise, current D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser established a 13-member D.C. Commission to "Commemorate and Recognize the Honorable Marion S. Barry Jr". During a ceremony last week at the Wilson Building, a mock-up of the proposed life-sized statue was unveiled. (Reportedly, his fourth wife Cora Masters Barry, hated the hat: a fedora obscuring Barry's famous receding hairline. Well, D.C. Commission on the Arts Director Arthur Espinoza, manager of the project, should get that right!) The anticipated cost—to be raised through both public and private sources—is between $350,000 and $400,000.

This eventuality begs the question: with such a checkered past, does this particular individual warrant a grand commemoration?

First and foremost, Marion Barry was a survivor. Notably, last Thursday, March 9th, marks the 40th anniversary of the “Hanafi siege”, a little-remembered act of terror in the spring of 1977. (Hanafi Muslims were a radicalized, breakaway sect of the Nation of Islam.) These black men armed with swords and shotguns took hostages at three locations: a Jewish organization, a rival mosque and the government building where Barry worked. At 41, he was then a fledgling council member who suffered a chest wound above his heart. He recovered, but a reporter was killed and a security guard later suffered a fatal heart attack.

Another turning point in the then-mayor's life was January 18, 1990. At the Vista International Hotel—groping former girlfriend Hazel Diane “Rasheeda” Moore—the married Mayor was arrested in an FBI sting for smoking crack cocaine. Videotaped during the encounter and arrest, a muttering Barry blamed Moore: “Bitch set me up . . . . I shouldn't have come up here . . . goddamn bitch.” In the digital age, that event has been recorded on the internet for posterity. In the future, how exactly does a silent bronze statue speak louder about Barry's character than his own potty mouth?

For that utterance he became a popular punch line on late-night talk shows. Likewise, he was famous for the remark, “Outside of the killings, Washington has one of the lowest crime rates in the country.” (For three consecutive years, D.C. homicides increased to record-breaking levels, reaching 474 in 1990. The nation's capital was then called the “murder capital”.) Still, as a survivor of gun violence, Barry was lucky to escape a second life-threatening fate that felled so many of his constituents: drug overdose. (Ironically, cocaine use killed his son—and namesake—Marion C. Barry, 36, on August 14, 2016.) Unlike those unfortunates, the older Barry lived a long life, expiring from cardiac arrest on November 23, 2014.

Indeed, this politician had a long history of running afoul of the law. Even in the waning two years of his life, Marion Barry racked up $2,800 in fees from 21 unpaid parking and speeding tickets. In spite of these violations, he caused a car accident after driving down the wrong way of a street into opposing traffic. True to form, this time the elder statesman blamed a “hypoglycemic attack” for his behavior. However, there is no good explanation for a 78-year-old Jaguar-driving community leader not to have car insurance and current tags.

Undoubtedly, the statue is intended to sanitize Marion Barry's reputation to future generations as a “champion of the downtrodden”. In the late 60s, he co-founded a group called Pride Inc. intended to help black men find employment. Later, as mayor, he expanded government to accomplish that goal. Yet, who remembers that compared to his decades-long embarrassing escapades of repeatedly flouting the law? For starters, he spent six months in prison for the “Rasheeda” Moore incident. Put aside his local popularity and visible job titles for a moment. His rap-sheet reads like a hardened criminal's: arrests for drug incidents (1990, 2002), incarceration (1991-1992), income tax evasion (2005), stalking (2009), corruption (2010), public exposure (2011), and political censure for taking kickbacks and accepting bribes (2010, 2013) et cetera.

Marion Barry's backers can superficially immortalize his likeness—but nothing will expunge his lengthy track record of wrongdoing. Even his outspoken supporters would likely acknowledge a deeply flawed human being. In the final analysis, the man's shameless and often illegal antics obscure any do-gooder residue gained early as a civil rights activist. Therefore, perhaps it's kinder to leave Marion Barry's “legacy” unbronzed: a well forgotten, but colorful footnote in local D.C. affairs.

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JFK Democrats no resemblance to Obama, progressives

President JFK once famously said, “But I dream things that never were—and I say: 'Why not?'” Today's progressive, Democratic party—and their propagandist creature, the MSM—twists perceptions of truth with the same ease and disdain as it would JFK's inspiring words of leadership into: “I habitually say things that are untrue—and never were.” It is the oxymoronic concept of “leading from behind;” the abdication of responsibility by those who would lead, but are incapable of accepting the inherent responsibility (and veracity) that comes with the job. Indeed, irresponsible power wielded without the check and balance of law promotes widespread government corruption and ultimately degenerates society into chaos. How far America has fallen in a mere 7 years. Ring any bells for anyone?

Serious character flaws notwithstanding, that is the underlying reason for Obama's (and Hillary's) bold-faced dishonesty with the American people wholly ignored (or greatly diminished) by an abetting MSM. The political optics of promoting “big lies” always serves the modern-day Democrat's primary purpose of self-promotion: maintaining and/or expanding personal political power via overreaching government “control” and the corresponding erosion of individual freedom and liberty. That is why the powers-that-be in the Obama Administration disregard the U.S. Constitution and the Bill of Rights with such maddening regularity. We are literally and metaphorically as a “House of Cards,” just waiting for the next inevitable crisis or worse, some real-world eventuality like widespread domestic terrorism or violent insurgency. Historically, America threw off the yoke of British imperialism for far less than what Obama and his ultra-Constitutional minions have done collectively behind the shield of faceless big government on almost a daily basis.

Based upon results, 7 years of observation demonstrates that Mr. Obama is clearly out-of-his-depth. Couple that community-organizing incompetence with a profound anti-American ideology and one sees a man who has skated through the presidency leaving disasters at home and abroad in his golf-playing wake with little more than a winsome smile, his ethnicity, and a detached coolness that appeals to gaff-prone Joe Biden as well as empty-headed millennials who don't differentiate between style and substance. Whatever is behind the mask of his public persona may never be fully known. One can only infer what his private belief system actually is (or name for God he uses) and how that practice informs his life's perceptions. However, contrast Mr. Obama's supposed Christianity with Mr. Carson's authentic example and the truth—very much like the soft-spoken retired neurosurgeon himself—is quiet and plain. In any case, Mr. Obama is a Machiavellian leader of capricious whims: exactly what did America gain from normalizing relations with the brutal, repressive Castro regime after 53 years? By the sum of Mr. Obama's words and deeds, Mr. Kennedy could not fathom such a person as a Democrat let alone a two-term U.S. president.

Despite the shifting sands of the political landscape, proof to Mr. Kennedy would be Mr. Obama's wholesale embrace of the dictator Castro brothers. In retrospect, his views would make JFK a mainstream Republican of today especially in light of his emphasis on public integrity and fiscal conservatism. Indeed, Mr. Kennedy would not recognize what his Democratic party has metastasized into: anti-American progressivism so extreme that an unapologetic socialist, Bernie “90% tax rate” Sanders is mounting a spirited campaign on the Democratic side for president in 2016. Could one imagine what passes for current would-be Democratic “leadership,” the “madhouse” of Hillary, Obama, Biden or Sanders being taken seriously as presidential contenders in JFK's day? Not a chance.

Today, there is no daylight between mainstream Democrats and their unchecked, socialistic authoritarianism where the State, not the individual, is king. Undoubtedly, Kennedy was pro-government programs—but as a means of their original intention, temporary assistance—not what they've mutated into: multigenerational economic cradle-to-grave government dependence. Kennedy wanted to create economic circumstances conducive to his fellow citizens reaching their individual potential. However, progressives à la Obama and his fellow Democrats want just the opposite: to bring everyone down to the same basic level of subsistence with all economic power and decision-making flowing like manna from a centralized, autocratic government they helm. To them—this elite ruling class of “public servant” influence-peddling millionaires beyond the fray—it is better to reign in America divided against itself, distracted by blame. This is the true meaning and purpose of Obama's “fundamental transformation” of America. His Orwellian desire, it seems—for which he unfortunately has had an astonishing degree of success—is to cripple our democracy into a Third World hellhole similar to that of his Indonesian childhood. In this, he is not only anti-Kennedy, he is also anti-Reagan's view of America as a way-showing, First World shinning city upon a hill. To make a political analogy, Obama progressives wish to extinguish Lady Liberty's flame by covering her with the muzzling black robe of the Burka, the Muslim women's garb of silent submission to Islam.

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