NEW YORK CITY ARCHIVES On track: Barack Obama’s conjunction junction
by Ward Harkavy
Can’t get enough of Obama’s January 17 train ride. Here it is again.
Even before today’s inauguration, Barack Obama‘s whistle-stop trip to D.C. brought the best of two worlds to America.
Besides being just a really cool thing to do — complete with speeches by the mellifluous new president to cheering crowds — that trip was truly astonishing.
As a Oklahoma boy who used to ride his bike to the train station to see the 8:55 Oil Flyer pull into Bartlesville in the ’50s, I would sometimes sneak into the “colored” waiting room just to try to soak up the inequality.
I did it when I thought no one was looking, and then I raced outside to take a quick sip at the “colored only” water fountain.
It’s not a protest if no one else sees it. I didn’t face danger. The worst that could have happened was a scolding by the stationmaster. Big deal. A black person who refused to sit in that waiting room and tried to take his or her place in the regular waiting room would have earned much more than a scowl.
Still, that was as much rebellion as I dared, and it wasn’t much, because I was overcome by fear — unlike Rosa Parks, who had to fight off mortal fear to risk the consequences. Nearly a century after “emancipation,” she dared to keep her bus seat on December 1, 1955.
And now there’s a black president? And he took the train to D.C. in a great, old-fashioned whistle-stop tour? That really is the best of two worlds and just as significant a victory for white Americans as it is for blacks.
No more separate waiting rooms. Black Americans aren’t being forced to ride out of town on a rail.
A black president is riding into town. The day after Martin Luther King Jr. Day. A conjunction that your imagination couldn’t have invented.
If you feel like tearing yourself away from today’s historic moment, here are some clickables:
NO PARTICULAR ORDER:
Newsday: ‘Experts: Plane that crashed had prior engine problem’
An aircraft that aviation experts say is the same one that crash-landed in the Hudson River Thursday experienced engine problems in mid-flight just two days before, according to passengers.
Whether that problem had any role in Thursday’s crash of the same plane remained unclear, but the [prior] incident on Jan. 13 proved a harrowing experience for passengers.
N.Y. Post: ‘CONEY IS. PLAN BITES NATHAN’S’
Jewish Daily Forward: ‘Who Won the War?
Israel Touts Overwhelming Victory, Critics on the Right Disagree’
New Yorker: ‘A Lonesome Death’ (The Wire‘s David Simon)
N.Y. Times: ‘Billionaire Reaches Deal On Funding For Times Co.’
Crain’s New York Business: ‘Is Cablevision meddling in Newsday’s coverage?’
Newsday: ‘Newsday, Cablevision execs mum on rumored firings’
N.Y. Daily News: ‘Student auctions her virginity, bids reportedly reached $3.7M’
N.Y. Post: ‘GOV: I’M CLUELESS ON SENATE CHOICE’
N.Y. Times: ‘For the Jobless, Hope and Fear for a New Day’
N.Y. Daily News: ‘New York to lead U.S. in job losses’
N.Y. Daily News: ‘NY, TX top list of states with strong housing markets’
N.Y. Post: ‘TEEN STABBED AT GORY 3-D HORROR MOVIE’
New York: ‘Barack Obama, Party of One’
Wall Street Journal: ‘Fiat to Take Stake in Chrysler’
Crain’s New York Business: ‘BAM launching $300M capital campaign’
New Yorker: ‘Back Issues’
New York: ‘The New Journalism: Goosing the Gray Lady’
Wall Street Journal: ‘Gazans Rally Behind Hamas’
N.Y. Times: ‘Anxiety Grips Restaurants, New Ones in Particular’
N.Y. Daily News: ‘Inauguration means big bucks for prostitutes, coke dealers’
N.Y. Times: ‘At the Office, Taking a Break for the Oath of Office’
N.Y. Daily News: ‘Suit: Man died after being jailed for parking tickets and missing chemo’
N.Y. Times: ‘Bush Commutes 2 Border Agents’ Sentences’
Wall Street Journal: ‘Deficits Restrict Obama as His Promises Come Due’
New York: ‘Christopher Hitchens Blames Torture on Common Americans, Demands “Tongue” From Andrew Sullivan’
N.Y. Daily News: ‘Nearly 1/2 of all women and 1/3 of men prefer the Internet to sex’
Jewish Daily Forward: ‘Hebrew School for All?’
New York is about to witness a historic experiment in the nature of Jewish engagement in American society: the planned opening in August 2009 of the city’s first Hebrew-themed public school.
The school, to be known as the Hebrew Language Academy, will be organized as a charter school, publicly funded but operated by a private not-for-profit association. It must be open to all applicants regardless of religion or background, and its curriculum is to be strictly secular, with no preaching of religion.
N.Y. Daily News: ‘Prominent politician posts picture of herself in shower on Facebook’
‘Madoff’s Ponzi Case Leaves PETA Cowed’
From the Wall Street Journal‘s Brody Mullins:
The downfall of Bernard Madoff has claimed a far-flung, new victim: a plan by the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals to lobby Barack Obama at the inaugural festivities to be a vegetarian.
The animal-welfare organization viewed Mr. Obama’s election as a turning point. So when PETA saw that Mr. Obama would win the election last summer, the group began looking for a way to get an audience with Mr. Obama.
Unfortunately, the plan it cobbled together — which required bidding in an online auction and recruiting a former professional-basketball star/vegan — also involved an investment firm with ties to Mr. Madoff, the billionaire investor who recently confessed to running a $50 billion Ponzi scheme.
Jewish Daily Forward: ‘The Gargantuan Gonif’
Wall Street Journal: ‘Cuomo Subpoenas Madoff Investor’
Wall Street Journal: ‘Vienna Banker in Spotlight as Madoff Fallout Spreads’
Jewish Daily Forward: ‘The Long Arm of Halacha: Jewish Law and the Madoff Scandal’
This article from the Village Voice Archive was posted on January 20, 2009