Gary Franks, one of two black Republicans in the House of Representatives, will be leaving Congress soon; he was defeated a few weeks ago. And that defeat was celebrated in the ranks of the Congressional Black Caucus, the clique Franks joined upon entering the House and would not quit no matter what manner of ugliness he was subjected to.
And now, upon defeat, Franks finds himself subjected to the worst manner of ugliness imaginable: an open letter by a colleague that accuses him of murder.
William Clay, who represents a Democratic district in St. Louis, is the author of the open letter. It begins by labeling Franks “a Negro Dr. Kevorkian, a pariah, who gleefully assists in the suicidal conduct to destroy his own race.”
Indeed, Franks may not even be truly “black,” as “he had no discernible black personality.” Clay dismisses Franks’s Republican viewpoint as a “foot shuffling, head scratching ‘Amos and Andy’ brand of Uncle Tomism” that he and others have embraced not because they believe in it, but because they have been paid off by The Man. “Oysters Rockefeller or clams casino turns highly miseducated black men’s brains into receptive sponges,” Clay mused, “ready to soak up the latest anti-black invective.” Thus, what Clay identifies as this group’s longterm agenda hardly comes as a surprise: “The goal of this group of Negro wanderers is to maim and kill other blacks for the gratification and entertainment of . . . ultra-conservative white racists.”
Clay’s premise is a simple one: There is only one political agenda that will promote black America’s uplift, and any black who dares to disagree is, according to Clay, infected with “slave-like rhetorical nonsense.” Clay could teach even “ultraconservative white racists” a thing or two about rhetorical nonsense.
