Still Holding This Truth to be Self-Evident

(Editor's Note: I purposely decided to write this a <> day two days late in honor of that thing we black people call CP time)

Because of a great alert from a good friend, I finally caught an episode of the Boondocks on Sunday night. I've frequented the comic strip, and read all the reviews about how good this show is supposed to be. I must say, it lived up to the hype. Believe it.

Here's the gist of what went down in the episode titled "The Return of the King." Instead of dying back in 1968, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. went into a 30-plus-year coma only to wake up in the present day and see "his people" struggling - that's a nice way of putting it - to just uphold the standard set by King's predecessors.

Sure. We have made some progress. King couldn't discern whether or not to get the 20- or 40-gig I-Pod. Techonolgy is great.

But we've regressed tremendously. Two poignant examples: King watched BET (breathe) after midnight. Also, while trying to start a political party, King, who knows little about modern media, employs a media planning group to put together a rally to announce his intentions about they new party.

Of course, things get mixed up, and it ends up being a real party with booty bass and booty shakin. King has to pay just to get in the door, then struggles to get to the mic and get his words across to his people.

He then goes on a tirade that starts with him calling out pretty much ever breathing black person today. His rampage starts with a "You no good for nothing trifling niggas ..."

Seriously. Can you imagine King spewing out the N-word over and over again to get a point across? This is the same man "Who had a dream ..." The same man who stood for non-violence and handling things in peaceful manner.

Yet, he went off like somebody had stolen his Laffy Taffy and I-Pod. And though I spent the majority of the time laughing, it actually made me think, and then think harder.

1. Is this what Martin, Malcolm and Thurgood, would think of our people today?
2. BET really is a piece of shit.
3. Negroes are always late.
4. Black people never support something unless it's a party. You'll see every person you met in college, even those that have graduated, at a party, but never seem them at a political awareness or mentally stimulating event.
5. We don't have any real black leaders right now. No, Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton do not count. I'm talking about somebody credible who stands out in the public forefront.
6. Bill Clinton would have been perfect had he been black.
7. He would have never been president, and he wouldn't have been able to live down the incident with Lewinsky. (Think Jesse Jackson here)
8. Would Martin really be as revered as he is now if he weren't killed in Memphis in 1968? Would JFK?
9. Okay, aside from the In Living Color, The Jamie Foxx Show and Girlfriends re-runs, BET is the worst television network on the air.