A day late, but I THOUGHT of this yesterday. MLK was certainly greatly admired by all Americans. Activist reverends like Sharpton and Jackson have considered running for President, but never had enough support or success.

If he hadn't been assassinated, would MLK have eventually wanted to run for President and could he have been elected at some point before now or in 2008, and would he have been any good?

Yes, no, and no.

"If a city has a 30% Negro population, then it is logical to assume that Negroes should have at least 30% of the jobs in any particular company, and jobs in all categories rather than only in menial areas." (Playboy, 1968)

He 'claimed that the Declaration of Independence and Constitution were meaningless for blacks because they were written by slave owners.' (sorry no citation for this one)

King had dozens of affairs, and supported communist front orgs in the US.

"You can’t talk about solving the economic problem of the Negro without talking about billions of dollars. You can’t talk about ending the slums without first saying profit must be taken out of slums. You’re really tampering and getting on dangerous ground because you are messing with folk then. You are messing with captains of industry… Now this means that we are treading in difficult water, because it really means that we are saying that something is wrong…with capitalism… There must be a better distribution of wealth and maybe America must move toward a Democratic Socialism." -Staff speech, 1966

In his 1989 autobiography, And the Walls Came Tumbling Down, King's close friend and fellow civil rights leader Ralph Abernathy writes that on the night before he died, King gave a rousing speech, had dinner with a woman afterward and remained with her till 1 AM, then came back to his motel to spend the night with a second woman. In the early morning hours a third woman came looking for King and became angry when she found the bed in the room he shared with Abernathy unoccupied. When King reappeared, he argued with woman #3 and wound up knocking her across the bed. (straightdope.com)

By the time he was assasssinated, he had lost the support and favor of many blacks who were tired of waiting and going through a peaceful process to obtain their rights. I think that he became more endearing to white people because they began to realize that the civil rights movement was inevitable, and when they saw the other options around, with the militaristic movements and seperatist and "go back to Africa" type movements that MLK was a pretty good guy. Obviously, death cemented his legacy. Had he not died, it probably would have taken a lot longer for him to have such a high place in America's memory.

President? I do not believe he would have wanted to be president. He had a pretty close view for watching LBJ's presidency implode, and I think he was honestly just a good person, who wanted to right the wrongs black people were facing.

I dunno, but I would have voted for MLK for sure.

At first I thought it said MJK and was about Maynard

Our current president is a former cokehead with several DUIs and several tanked business ventures under his belt. Are you saying MLK couldn't overcome a few character flaws and tenuous connections to communists organizations, especially today when 90% of the population fucks around and no one gives a flying fuck about communism.

Did MLK have billions and a daddy in the pocket of the devil?
Different times , now its all about money ..IMO

I just don't know, Americans are funny folk. The majority want the similar types of entitlement programs as our European friends do, but they don't want to pay for it. You can't have it both ways, its really quite simple. It is funny that we claim to be a bastion of the free market when you can't go a day without someone circle jerking to FDR's legacy. It would have been really easy to paint him as a whacked out socialist outside the mainstream, but whacked out populist policies can also win votes.

no.

I agree completely. It was his death that made him a loved icon. If he had lived and had REALLY started to do some work, white southerners would have learned a new meaning to the word "hate". As if they didn't hate him already.

It's the defining characteristic of the late 20th century American to want all the rewards without any of the responsibilites.

I fully agree. I've had many, many discussions on social issues and American history with politically active black people, and a lot of them rarely discuss MLK, and if they do, they seem to hold Malcolm X, the Black Panthers, Marcus Garvey, etc. in a higher esteem. There are a number of reasons why; the idea that those people advocated an actively and aggressively seeking reform played a role, as opposed to simply sitting and letting white people abuse you until the small amount of sympathetic whites took notice and changed something.

I think X and those others that I mentioned are seen as having taken their own destiny into their hands more. Which is probably why MLK is so revered in American history, while X and the Panthers are not; he's the De La Soul to Malcolm X's Public Enemy. He's a lot more digestable and a lot less confrontational to white America, so the Civil Rights movement is largely attributed to him, regardless of whether or not it really should be.

All of the above being opinion based on my personal experience, of course.



Unrealistic, probably impossible, but I can agree with this in principle.



I've heard this sort of thing from other civil rights activists, so it's not shocking to read that, but I'd like to see a citation that MLK himself actually said this.



The first half doesn't matter in terms of presidency and I don't know where you get the second from. Citation?



I'm trying really hard to be offended by this and, y'know, it's just not taking. Again, I'm failing to see the issue here. But maybe I'm just a big commie.



This is a whole lot of text for something that could very well have been used as hyperbole shock-factor to sell books. Regardless, the idea of infidelity and groupiedom, again, has no bearing on one's ability to lead effectively. The violence claim seems suspect to me. Might have happened, might be exaggerated, might not have happened at all. But, again, this isn't saying much about him as a potential leader.

I'm sure there are plenty reasons why he shouldn't have been elected, but none of these are convincing to me. That's partially because of differing priorities and sociopolitical opinions between you and I, iris, but there's not really enough meat to your stance to convince me. Relies too much on hearsay, potential fabrication, and broadbrushing him as a communist.



This is why I have a hard time taking people seriously when they talk about how sure they are that Obama could win the White House. I won't ever underestimate the bigotry and racism within some of the ignorant fucks throughout this country. Furthermore, in order for a black president to get elected, he has to be a black man that's been in the public eye long enough for the majority of white people to feel comfortable with him. Up until 6 months to a year ago, 90% of America (regardless of race) would have asked "Who the fuck is this Obama guy?" Bill Cosby has a better chance of winning the presidency, IMO.

And no, that wasn't a realistic statement, before some of the humorless armies of N&Ders jump on that.

Well, it's hard to research such things @ work.

I don't really know enough about the dark side of MLK Jr's life to comment on it, and I suspect that history has been corrected to prevent us from ever knowing what really happened on the dozens of tapes the FBI still holds sealed, that record his private meetings and sexcapades. His life has been re-written to protect what we want him to have been, much like many of our early presidents.

I don't believe that for a second. Other figures from the 60's like JFK for example, have had ALL of their dirty laundry laid out there for the public consumption in the past 40 years. We live in a culture that loves the dirt, and will pay good money to hear about it.

I can't imagine that there is much worse than what we already know in the FBI records, and if there is, it certainly is not being surpressed in order to ENHANCE anyone's image.

"I wish someone would kill four more niggers so we'd get the whole week off." Regular white guy in a northeastern Oklahoma suburb. My answer is no.

That is one of the stupidist things I've ever read. The sweeping prejudice contained in that statement is insulting and ignorant.

Slightly more info:

Apparently King advisors Bayard Rustin (1955-60) was quite the pinko. Poland's commie paper "The Worker" declared King's work to be a project of the US Communist Party (1958, The Worker). King's next advisor was Robert Williams (http://www.afrocubaweb.com/rwill.htm) who convinced Mao Tse-Tung to publically support Dr. King's movement in America. David J. Garrow, who won a puliter prize for his work as King's biographer, said "King privately described himself as a Marxist." SCLC (King's primary rights organization) was headed by Stanley Levison, who was an in and out member of many Commie orgs in the states (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stanley_Levison) whom the FBI monitored for years before he met King. Once he was taken onto King's staff, the FBI began monitoring him again with both of the Kennedys telling King to distance himself from them.

That's a bit more commie connections than most people have, but admittedly, not proof of anything.



This is not entirely true, there are "sacred cows". MLK Jr. is one of them.



Not a DaVinci Code fan huh? Me neither.

According to wiki and numerous sites:

"In January 31, 1977, in the cases of Bernard S. Lee v. Clarence M. Kelley, et al and Southern Christian Leadership Conference v. Clarence M. Kelley, et al United States District Judge John Lewis Smith, Jr, ordered all known copies of the recorded audiotapes and written transcripts resulting from the FBI's electronic surveillance of King between 1963 and 1968, be held in the National Archives and sealed from public access until 2027."

So I guess we will have to wait until 2027 to see hear whats so innocent on the tapes.

I would guess it was done to protect members of teh FBI. That was 1977. King was hardly a "sacred cow" at that point.

WHY??? Why was this man hated so much? Why was Lennon murdered I really cannot grasp this. What drives another to hate another so much to kill them? Especially people so peaceful? I do apologize for coming across so naive, but for the life of me I cannot figure it out, I really am just trying to understand this insanity.

i honestly do think that he could have become president...HOWEVER, just as if barack obama or another minority or even POSSIBLY female president wins...i'm sure there will be some ultra conservative fuck face that decides the country will be better off with a minority president dead.

ultra conservative != racist
racist = racist