the story they are like you, like anybody else can have aspiration. and underscoring they can communicate, they have the love, they have the understanding. i believe at the core of the family and the society and the world. understanding hearing their voices, hearing your struggle to see that they are like you and not fear them. ..

so this is my cricket one that i have proposed. unfortunately i never had time but i think would be very much worth it as a curriculum to educate women and help them with all aspects of being integrated into western society. booktv continues now with "after words." cornel west explores martin

luther king, jr.'s radical political thinking a side of the late civil rights leader that the author argues has been diminished and sanitized. cornel west speaks with khalil mohammed director of the schomberg center for black culture. >> host: dr. west it is a real delight to have you here on the show. i'm grateful myself for being invited to have an occasion to interview you about this new attitude volume on dr. king "the radical king" martin luther king jr. edited and introduced by cornel west. this is a real treasure of some of the most important speeches and letters and publish documents of dr. king so what inspired you to do the project? >> guest: i just want to begin by saluting you in the magnificent work you do at the schomberg. you are a caretaker one of the great institutions of american empire and you do it with such elegance and such vision and

sensitivity under scholarship for me in terms of discourse on hyperincarceration among poor people is crucial. so just being able to spend this time with you my brother is a beautiful thing. let me think of brother martin king we weren't thinking of the same tradition that produced you introduced me. he is one of the great moments in the tradition of a grand people who are in the face of terror trauma and stigma was able to generate levels of love and vision and unbelievable high-quality service to the least of these. he is a christian minister first and foremost candidates is calling. you and i know that brother martin gets sanitized and sterilized. >> host: what you mean by that? >> guest: in his bag handing out gifts to anyone that has a smile on their face in it the guy is saying you know he's the most dangerous man in america

and other black readers are saying they are trying to organize poor people. he is portrayed in the movement. he is un-american. he is a traitor to the country and so forth. what is martin due? you never knew me. i am called to love babies in vietnam, and babies in appalachia, davies on the southside of chicago, babies in harlem babies in ethiopia. i'm a christian minister and for me justice is what love looks like in public just like it deals in private. but there is no martin. without stokely carmichael and so many other diane nash and we could go on and on. >> host: talk a little bit for a moment about the santa claus a vacation with respect to african-americans. i think part of what you are describing is the kind of historical amnesia for the fact that dr. king was not always

well loved within the black community. you cite a remarkable poll from late in his life that says 55% of african-americans did not support dr. king on vietnam and ending poverty and i think it was the handing poverty part that caught me off guard. >> guest: it's true and it's very sad. you have 72% of americans across-the-board and 55% of black people disapprove. you know what whitney young said to brother martin in terms is set back the black freedom movement and martin said what you said make a money in the corporation but it won't get you a foothold in -- black leadership over where to go. martin was saying corporation is not going to dictate what my conscious is. >> host: i know the difference between right and wrong. >> guest: absolutely and all the big money and the thrills and assets to par or is not

going to determine what i say. martin was like coal train. he could've been doing my favorite thing for the rest of his career and been a multimillionaire. we are going to go free jazz. what is coal train doing? being true to himself. this is to me the real standard on what we need in this present moment. we have a lot of black people for example who say they love martin luther king jr. and they talk about speaking truth to power but they don't want to speak truth to the present power. they want to be an accommodation and that's not brother martin and there's nothing wrong with being in an accommodationist if you acknowledge what its limitations are but don't lie to yourself. and act as if you are regressive and prophetic when you are just a cheerleader and a bootlicker.

you have to be candid about these things. >> host: we are going to get to that for sure but i do want to ask you more about the book itself. first of all you have already defined the radical changes but in terms of the text itself was the sub board hidden in plain sight in terms of the textual record of his words and his wisdom or did you have to pull up or pull out obscure passages and tax from more well-known speeches that he gave? i'm curious as to the compilation itself. >> guest: sister coretta scott king is legendary and the level of dignity and grace that is beyond description. when i first met her in 1986 at a speech on the u.s. capitol when they brought in a statue of brother martin in 1986. >> host: this is 10 years into the animal fight informing

members of congress the most famous black person in america. >> guest: she said on our first date martin said you have met never met a black socialist have you? she said no i come from the school conservatory music trade he said yes because his hero was that i want to talk sociology and more house and 1960s and talk causes under time, marks and the great sausage -- sociologist that you have studied at indiana university. also norman thomas. of course the essay in the book the bravest man i ever met. who was norman thomas? class of 1905 union seminary in 1911 turn down a big church on a side new york to pastor in harlem. he lost his christian faith and

became a socialist and ran for on the socialist party many times. the vanilla brother in the history of john brown miles horton you go on and on. brothers and sisters fundamentally committed to the freedom of everybody including black people. martin says norman thomas is a fundamental part of who i am. he's not as benjamin mays was. he is legendary and iconic for good reasons but he's a part of who i am. >> host: can i share a story? do you alluded to the story but i find it fascinating. in 1952 martin luther king and carrera are dating and they are not married yet. you cited passage of the end of the book but my sources gave me a little more detail.

the passage here indicates an exchange of ideas and romance between dr. king and karen at the time. what's interesting to your point about norman thomas and socialism they talk about having read edward bellamy's utopian socialist fantasy and for some reason i forgot my full name of it. in this letter he writes and i'm going to read what he says. he says i'm not a conventional baptist minister. i believe in the social gospel. it's not enough to save souls. we need to change society so the soul will have a chance. my father was a capitalist but i don't want to own the lot and ignoring people's needs is wrong wrong. i'm much more socialistic and my economic theory than capitalistic. capitalism has outlived its usefulness. it takes the necessities from the masses to give luxuries to the classes. i found that fascinating because that's 1952.

>> guest: that's her brother laying it out already. when he goes back to jim crow south drd has this legacy incited him. what i love about martin that sets him apart from most black people in black leaders but martin is a part of it and allied as a part of it and stokely is too's radical love. it's a radical love and the radical freedom in a radical love which means from the very beginning he and carother now i'm a different kind. there is benjamin davis in harlem. he's leaving city council and so forth. >> host: a. philip randolph area and. >> guest: a. philip randolph that's right but the mainstream black education when it comes to leadership being explicitly social like that is not the best way to win the popularity of the black masses.

she's going to be pushing him on the pacifism pushing him on critiques of empire. >> host: this comes back to the bigger argument you make in your attempt to make an intervention of shall we say a radical intervention. annually in the run-up to the king holiday we get a lot of the riverside speech. we get a lot of antiwar speechmaking on dr. king but it denies the truth of his own story which is not that he began swept up in the forces of history that took him like a tidal wave into montgomery bus boycott and bailed out on the other end and giving him counsel on how to fight the good fight. it was really just about civil rights and just about the seat of the table and being able to be first-class citizens. in fact he already came with the kind of economic luperon

built-ins up by the time you get to the vietnam to the vietnam war, by the time he has seen the limits of legislative action in the civil rights movement he has already been committed to fundamental revolutionary change. the kind that shifts this country from a faith oriented society to a people oriented society. guess who you are absolutely right. when we talk to our dear brother harry belafonte who meets martin very young. we see that wonderful picture of him the first time they meet rich dialogue harlem epicenter but a'lafonte to bringing the legacy of dubois and paul ropes and barton king rating the legacy of benjamin mays on the one hand and the curious genius

born in atlanta king. of course offered daniel, that's his brother. it's a family affair. it's a family affair. there's no martin without his family just like there is no martin without his movement he the family helps make them and that's very important. especially for young people especially in the ferguson generation who i love so deeply i think they are courageous. philip agnew is a giant. but also brother tory and william barber who is older generation by the great figure of our time. all of these folks who give inspiration as well as analytical illumination from martin king. what they recognize as part of the tradition isolating

individuals on a pedestal that they recognize just like you and i we are who we are because somebody loved us. somebody cared for us and the question is how much loving and caring but we do in the short time we are here from mamas womb to tomb? that is what martin understood. early on he is already bringing this critique capitalism not a trashing of moneymaking or ugly rejection of markets but a subtle analysis that puts poor people and working people at the center. any weapon he could get a poor use could be marxist that the level or the several -- liberal. it might he conservatism in terms of the family. it doesn't have to be a patriarchal family that families important. church. it doesn't have to be a patriarchal church these days.

>> host: one of the things you emphasize is you call him my revolutionary christian and i think it's obvious that he is a minister to us all reverend dr. martin are thinking but in some ways his civil actions can get lost in a spacewalk. it seems to me part of what you are saying here is that a spacewalk was critical to his radicalism. guess no one is because the brother would never sell out. you all may sell out when you are experiencing spiritual blackout. when you reach a conclusion that the grounds of your hope no longer can be sustained at the spiritual level and therefore like this only about the goodies available in time and space and i'm going to get as many as i can and as much status as i can. the kingdom of god has become a brand. no the black freedom struggle has become a commercial.

no the beloved community has become an advertisement. we live in a highly market-driven economy. cash rules everything but martin luther comes along and says lo and behold i'm a jazz man. i'm a bluesman. i'm in provocation -- improvisational using every weapon they can to empower these working people beginning on that side of town. a lot of people love martin king because he loved white mothers and sisters. that's a beautiful thing. that shows the charity but he didn't go to jail because he loved white or others. he went to jail because he loved black folk trade when he's in the paddy wagon talking about war and a half hours in the dark with a german shepherd on the weight of retail prison and when he gets out and a young set all they could say was this is a cross we must bear for the freedom of our people, that spiritual.

you know this brother is never going to sell out. >> also that the deep connection to the life that jesus led. we can say it but he actually meant it. his diagnosis of the world was that these people my people are truly the least of these not just here in america but globally. >> i'm glad you mentioned jesus because martin was such a jesus loving free black man the way malcolm wasn't all that loving free black man. joshua was a free jewish man the way toni morrison is a free black woman rooted in her own particular brand of catholicism and the literary genius that she manifests. there's a connection between having your spiritual rich and deep and being free, being in the world but not of the world.

and for martin it had everything to do with jesus, just like myself create. >> host: left him back to the connection to christianity and the blues tradition because that may not be obvious to every listener. what do you mean a christian bluesman? you talked about improvisation but i think he needs -- mean something more than improvisation. you named for catastrophes that martin luther king anticipated and recognized to how does the blues help one deal with catastrophe? >> we have to begin with ralph waldo emerson who said luce's personal chronicle of an individual catastrophe lyrically expressed, where clay expressed. b.b. king said nobody loves me but my mama and she might be jibing too. that's a catastrophe.

every force in the world and the cosmos against you and the one person you depend on could be jibing too. b.b. king sang that song the thrill is gone. how did he sing the song? style a little help from lucille his guitar but muddy waters and that whole tradition as they are playing in his voice. meaning that we are blues people. we have taught the world something about love even though we have been hated and despised like cockroaches. we have taught the world something about justice even though we have been treated so unjustly and unfairly up until this moment. the loose tradition is a tradition of the people who looks catastrophe in the face lyrically expresses it critically examines it, candidly speaks about it courageously the lives and is willing to die for that love.

that's the lovely isley brothers sang about. and curtis mayfield, people get ready. that's the love train and a christian bluesman in the face of american terrorism jim crow in the face of being hated by so many people he responds like b.b. king with a smile, with style, landmarks in the past that constitute wind at his back to engage, truth telling witness bearing living and dying for the people. for the least of us for the poor and working people even though he's not against rich folk. he recognizes it's difficult or rich folk not to fall into what we have and how did the johnson brothers put it, falling in love with the come intoxicated with the full is its ease of bourgeois. you know the line.

you know what i'm talking about. you get intoxicated with the world than what it has to offer, the power and the wealth and so forth rather than telling the truth and bearing witness. >> host: use this term radical love and this is i think the last definition of christian bluesman but you say the king taught and lived his life by a radical love that daily made the cells died. the ego had to be killed which is the ego which is our brand, which is our attachment to the world and the immediacy of the things that make us feel good. in order for a sacrificial self to emerge. so this radical love, how did he teach it? was it in the sermons? was it and how he governed himself? was at the sheer capacity to be courageous amidst chaos? >> guest: that's a profound question because it's hard to know exactly how anybody is able

to muster the love of courage and vision of service that i martin king or heschel or dorothy day does. dorothy day wrote one of the great eulogies of martin king in the catholic worker when she said he was someone who really did die every day. there's no rebirth without death so he is reborn every day. like taking a shower, like a baptism fresh and vital and vibrant. >> host: you can't get stuck on holy saturday. >> guest: holy saturday god is good that there's evidence radical love flowing from the blood of the cross that easter is on the way. ms. -- most christians don't want to talk about good friday or jesus killed as a criminal. like we have political prisons right now.

all of them are bearing witness and the empire comes down on them. martin understood that for not just christian but for any human being who wants to reach a level of integrity honesty and decency as a long-distance runner you have got to kill something in yourself fear. you have got to kill something in yourself. your obsession with position and status and wealth. you've got to kill something in yourself that says somehow it's all about you rather than you being a product at a larger tradition of folks giving you a sense of self-confidence and self-respect greater young people especially the ferguson generation are so hungry and thirsty for this process in learning how to die in killing that fear standing in the face of the police raid the police

look like they are in baghdad rather than ferguson. they stand there with courage and of course my fundamental question always is, how do we channel that legitimate righteous indignation through love and justice rather than hatred and that's martin's question. >> host: you spent time 20 years ago writing about it. >> guest: that's exactly right. >> host: defined at this journey into king's radicalism helps you better understand people from 20 years ago where you are writing race matters to two-day? >> guest: i think so. that is why for me this is my most important text of 13 edited books because this is more at the core of who i am and what i'm about than any other text and i'm dedicating it to my black rather collected west who is the most christ lies -- christ like the most coal train

person like that i know. that's true for so many of us. there are so many on the ground and to look up on television not many coal train like. not too many christlike trade if you look on the ground doing magnificent work day in and day out and they're learning how to die and to relive. and in the new testament that says christians must die daily killed the ego and kill that ambien order to somehow be liberated enough to keep the beloved community in view. and that beloved community the fundamental body ensuring that everybody but especially the poor and working people live lives of decency and dignity. that's why for example martin king would just be overwhelmed

by 500 palestinian babies killed in 50 days and not one mumbling words said by an american politician. the white house, congress, governors or whatever. martin would say, i don't care about the politicians that think cowardly. these precious babies are just as precious as the precious babies in tel aviv, the precious babies in new york, newtown connecticut i'm a los angeles or whatever. and he keeps that moral and spiritual center. that's the key. that's really the key. >> host: i want to talk you -- do about martin sense of history. certainly as a historian i was taken by some of the entries that really articulate a powerful sense of the importance of history and dr. king himself not only is a product of that historical consciousness and

that deep commitment to learning learning. after all he did have a doctorate. guess who you are absolutely right. >> host: but he saw the stakes of historical literacy, they need to know and to understand and to be able to use history in order to criticize the president and to imagine the future is absolutely essential. not just optional. i want to remind you what you are to go busheir with their listeners, king after dubois the great historian social science as a civil rights activist the eventual communist and ex-patriot who moves at the end of his life and is pronounced america's incapable of transformation. here king is giving tribute to dr. dubois attribute that i had not read andy describes in the tribute that in dubois' on work he had identified the keystone

and the arch of oppression of inferiority. and that history books had to lie or it met the capacity to govern. here he is inspired by dubois in 1935 which very well very much would have been part of his educational learning even though he was only 10 years old when it was published. he says in his tribute that dubois writes about the death of a people's history and its consequences. to lose one's history is to lose one's self-understanding and with it the root of pride. it's not enough to be angry he says. people must organize and unite and when history had been distorted american history had been distorted because are too big of a part of the nation to be written out without destroying scientific history.

this is a fascinating not only a fascinating tribute but a fascinating challenge to the listeners of this tribute as we know right now that history is under attack all over the country including and i'm just going to cite this as an example in colorado in september white black, latino and asian students took to the streets against the jefferson county colorado school board because the school board decided that they no longer wanted to allow students to be exposed to history and i'm going to quote here that history must promote citizenship, patriotism and essential benefits of the free market system must show respect for authority and respect for the individual rights. so think about that kind of history you say has been sent a

classified. think about in arizona mexican descendent children can't learn mexican-american history in a state that used to be part of mexico because it's considered anti-american. i'm fascinated by dr. king. he wasn't just making history. he was studying and teaching it. >> guest: and teaching in that way but i'm so glad you mention mentioned this because for me this is one of the great moments in the history of american culture. when you have the greatest organic intellectual in the history of america, that's martin king reflecting on the greatest public intellectual that would be dubois break here in new york and it's not that widely known. we have to keep in mind many of martin friends told him not to go because dubois was a communist. the last thing he wants because people are saying you are

communist, is to go and reflect on this black communist. so what is martin duke? kiss my so-and-so. i'm a free black man. i say what i want trade i do what i want. i would get the tribute to the great w.e.b. dubois. i am who i am because the import dubois love to me. he loved the truth. he loved justice. i love truth and i love justice and dubois was not a christian. he was a post-christian where he went to church in the church wants to them but they almost had to leave the church to promote the gospel. the churches were just too narrow in that day. they were too cowardly and too accommodating to the powers that be. then he says we know history is the history of the present. the past and present eyes intertwined in the third dimension to the future always is the object of our vision

mediated their understanding of the past. our actions you know there's a great speech that martin. thank god he had the courage to give it. >> host: he closes the speech with a refrain about being dissatisfied. the arc of the speech itself is to get to do why what he calls divine dissatisfaction. >> guest: brother martin on the great dubois. >> host: than a refrain that is not be satisfied. his refrain is let us be dissatisfied until every man can have food and freedom and human dignity for his. >> guest: you can see how that in and of itself is a message in the age of obama where you have intellectuals who become obama apologists who were no longer dissatisfied enough to acknowledge wall street crimes

the obama administration conceals. not one wall street -- goes to jail. nasa's surveillance on innocent fold. where's the dissatisfaction martin was talking about? >> host: i'm going to pick one fine detail and this doesn't distract from your logic but i do think general holder prosecuted one man of salvation dissent not long ago. >> guest: but was he a wall street executive directly tied to the operation? i think it was a kind of mirror level person. but it's just so sad that we have a criminal justice system. look at it on the black folks. every 48 hours a young black or brown brother or sister shot by

a policeman or security guard or a vigilante who is deputized to keep the order. every 28 hours. black president black homeland security secretary not one federal prosecution of a policeman. something just isn't right brother. with all the march all the march's hands up hands up not one critique of the federal government that has the capacity to at least engage in massive investigations. i'm glad they didn't -- did think about dismantling the police department ferguson but the police department was going free. they are shooting black folk like i don't know what and they are still going free. we have a black resident in black attorney general. you end up with black faces in high places and still have a system that is an abysmal failure occurs -- young folks.

that doesn't mean our young folks don't need correction but they need love and respect and protection. >> you pointed out the wonderful passage you describe about a blueprint. >> guest: in philadelphia. that's a beautiful moment. right before he dies. >> host: you talk about how young people are essentially moving towards the university of integration. but at the same time elsewhere in his speeches he is talking about integrating so that tension because the blueprint speech focuses on self-worth, on excellence. has the famous angry talks about being a street sweeper and if you are going to be a street sweeper geek be a street sweeper that the angels in heaven will rejoice over. this is the kind of speech that

can be decontextualized as a prescription for personal responsibility. >> guest: and his quest for excellence. >> host: that's the context but i have heard the speech often delivered in the context of dr. king's content of character position. so we are back to the king made for hallmark commercial. in that king, to say that you can't we have palm tree in the top of the mountain be ascribed in the valley is a way of saying you don't even have to have high aspirations. you don't even have to have high demand. if you are going to be a street sweeper just street -- sweep the streets because we need a lot of street sleepers. in that way the lesson from that moment to the present in the absence of a sustained focus on the life he led in the way the radical king presents it as we

have divorced his critique as a burning house. the blueprint as wind winter standard today is a blueprint has several harvard mba said a couple of years there will never 10 was never to talk about race or gender except to say that it does not matter. >> guest: wow. that is something. >> host: excellence, harvard mbas passing on the message to young people amidst other lessons like be hard-working ambitious and do networking but if you think about that and the blueprint the king gave out of context it's the perfect synergy for the parables and politics of personal responsibility which i would argue are right underneath the infrastructure that upholds the last 15 years.

not about racism anymore. not about a critique. it's about individuals who are making bad decisions. if you live in ferguson ipso facto you are suspect and a would-be criminal. there's no person in good character. no person walking in kings santa clausified shoes so it is a high crime area he's saying by definition these are not people's whose rights or humanities we are bound to respect. >> guest: that makes a lot of sense. it's another way the legacy of white supremacy is recast and reinvented that ends up criminalizing us ends up ensuring that your humanity let alone the poor preciousness is not acknowledged. that level of disrespect and of

course that is part of white supremacy, the disrespect of black and yellow people. when he talks about excellence i think he also recognizes that he knows some street sleepers who have depths of integrity and decency that far out measure well-to-do folk driven by gangster proclivity, spiritual black eyes moral a sense of what's right but nothing is blowing because it's getting in the way. martin himself did not believe in material goods and possessions. martin was like that. he was full of that kind of commitment and that's rare but

at least we can aspire to it. the sad thing is we live in the age of the sellout were to be successful at any cost by any means is obsessed with the 11th commandment thou shalt not get caught. think of black leaders these days. when you say the word integrity you comes to mind? there's not a long list. we won't go into it today but we can list the folks who don't fall into it. so you say to yourself what is happening? we are not talking about perfection. when i see you i see a brother at the schomberg institution who is the love and respect for people of all colors but especially black people and you earn it. it's not an inheritance. how do you earn it? day in day out tell the truth and bear witness. we are not talking about the protection of khalil mohammed.

we are talking about here is a brother who like james baldwin said i want to be an honest man. i want to be a decent man did i want to be a person of integrity. your wife, your kids and your great grandfather all of them looking and saying we see a brother with integrity and that's what martin has in mind. we can't keep integrity honesty and decency alive and allowed chicanery or mendacity hiding and concealing then we end up the best that kind of culture produces and this is the age of obama. it's sentimental folks giving good speeches but no fundamental commitment to action. sentimental crocodile tears sentimental orientation. what are you doing now and the

white poor too. vis-à-vis wall street, these of the the military industrial complex. nuclear catastrophe, the imperial catastrophe militarism drones or israeli-palestinian struggle. the same is true in terms of the economic catastrophe. in the last six years the top 1% of the population has 97% of the income growth. we can't say it publicly unless somehow he were to critical. we have had three. first too much death too early too much poverty chronic and not enough self-love to we have black folk to love themselves and respect of themselves eliminated poverty and to many

early deaths. some were inescapable but we can fight some disease. if we have all three of them we would have so many aretha franklin sang curtis mayfield's and the whispers in the dramatics. that is a level of excellence. all of those folks are excellent excellent. >> i'm sure you are reminding me and the viewers on exactly what he meant i excellence in that speech. just a way to think about the times we live in and you refer to it as the age of obama and ferguson. where they come together and where dr. king is james comey the current director of the fbi and i say this at the risk of opening a new file on myself.

guess that's a complement brother. we both have big files. that's a compliment. we are trying to be true to what shaped us. we just have to bear witness. go right ahead. [laughter] >> host: said he gave a speech on february 12 before the law enforcement community and the fbi and i think what surprised many people and certainly surprise the press and others analyzed the speech was that he mentioned dr. king and the file that j. edgar hoover opened up on him with bobby kennedy's approval after the march on washington speech in 1963. he says he keeps the approval the order and approval on his desk as a reminder of the sordid history of the fbi as a way of remembering mistakes that the fbi has made in the past and to hold up dr. king as an example

of a real american hero who was victimized by his own government. now what is fascinating about that is generally speaking that is the way in which we and the story, triumphed over the smallness of people of mind and heart in the moment. and yet the director goes on to talk about implicit bias amongst law enforcement officials not just via the eye but around the country. he talks about his irish forebears who were members of one verse meant but also benefited from their whiteness despite racism in their times. andy talks about the need for engaging in the african-american community on its historical understanding of police brutality as well as white officers in a officers in the larger law enforcement community to come to terms with its own biases. that's all there but here's the part that perfectly mixes that

dr. king that we want to remember up with the doctor king who actually lived. here in this part of the speech talking about the age of ferguson and obama says they answered is a hard truth. this is the hard truth that he mentions. he says if we are so i'm sorry. the truth is that what really needs fixing, what really needs fixing an important qualification does not attach to the truth. if only if you like president obama are willing to speak about perhaps because is so daunting a task through the initiative the president is addressing disproportionate challenges faced by young men of color. for instance data shows the percentage of young men not working or not enrolled in school is nearly twice as high for blacks as it is for white. this initiative and others like it is about doing the hard work and i emphasize to grow drug-resistant and violence

resistant kids especially in communities of color so they never become a part of that officer's life experience. drug resistance and violence resistant kids. that's the real problem that the president is addressing. in all of this superstructure of ideas about the history of leasing in this moment essentially only the president is showing leadership on talking about the real issue of black inferiority. wasn't this exactly what dr. king talked about, the arch of oppression, the key arch of oppression? even for a man who i believe in his heart is saying the right thing and he believes he's saying the right thing and he certainly pushing the envelope on recognizing bias and racism in law enforcement still articulates and retreat to this fundamental understanding that black people are broken and if black people were broken we wouldn't have this problem. >> guest: in other words the damage is always some black

people and not on a vicious system of injustice with decrepit schools that too often generate soul murder among poor children levels of unemployment and underemployment it indecent houses, still not enough available health care. given all of that social abandonment of problem has still put on the backs of these damage people, on the least of these. but every empire from the beginning of time has told those kinds of lies about poor working people. martin is part of this not just black history and not just american history or modern history, human history. going all the way back from the very beginning having the courage to say people in power no matter what color it you are get your boot off the neck of

poor people. we have too many folks when the carrol is black that i want to say a word that the budha still on. do you see what i mean? when martin was around what was his relation to black politicians? he was responsible in some ways for the first black mayor. what did the first black mayor due? not allow him to be on the stage because martin was too radical. he said i understand, i'm doing it out of the masses and they are scared because they don't want to be included in the mainstream of establishment. don't become part of the conspiracy against poor people as a black politician and that's why we have to keep our politicians of all colors accountable. >> host: one does wonder as we move into the beginning stages of the 2016 presidential election where we are likely to have a white president again. >> guest: it's going to be a white president.

>> host: it will be interesting particularly if hillary clinton should win, to see the mental and verbal gymnastics that white people will come up with in order to not criticize the now sitting first woman president if it happens to be hillary clinton around the issues that will no doubt still be front and center. it will be fascinating. >> guest: we have lost so much of our moral authority because we will not tell the truth. when black folk are enough as we act as if we want to protect them by any means and of course we need to protect from the right-wing or the "fox news" or whatever. but you lose your moral authority and what happened to end up with fewer politicians becoming more and more centrist neoliberal financial is privatized militarize.

that's the neoliberal response to problems you see. that's true for clinton or barack obama or the black congressional caucus for the democratic party for the most part. but if you are going to be consistent and have any moral authority you don't bring critique to bear on your black politicians then nobody is going to listen to you. i think the sad thing is black america is going to go in such a deep depression when the obama sleep the white house because it would mean then as he leaves the black suffering and misery still in place. he is going to nice little philanthropic program. not 1 penny from the government. philanthropic program for the black brothers of the black sisters catching hell too traded that black folks will look around and say a what happened? why are they telling the truth?

all we want our positions. all they want is so-and-so. how come you didn't tell the truth? gillani is strong on wednesdays and fridays and other days we pray for that. there are folks who know deep down the tradition that produced them can be cheered to malcolm and martin and stokely and the others without taking a risk and sacrificing your popularity for telling the truth. this is not about popularity. it's about integrity. that is what we love about martin but again he's not the only one. the book is about martin and in a way to better people. it's about a tradition. it is the greatest tradition in the modern world when it comes to people who have had levels of hatred for 400 years and they

dished out martin king fannie lou hamer, curtis mayfield stevie wonder. these are love warriors at the highest level. that's why i am blessed to be a small part of that tradition. when the worms get me i'm going to have a smile on my face. i'm going down with jesus coltrane curtis mayfield and martin. >> host: you mentioned and we have to be closing shortly, that the last sermon that dr. king was to deliver was titled why america may go to hell. now of course we know brother jeremiah wright. >> guest: preaching the sermon that brother martin plan to preach.

>> host: again let's not forget in the course of this conversation that we started with a man who was not only the subject of a national holiday the man who represents the highest achievement of individualism that everyone should aspire to because he was an individual who wanted us to get to the place where we could be seen as individuals and yet here hours before he breathed his last breath he was issuing an indictment on the nation, do you know what that sermon actually was going to be? do we have evidence of it? no trace? >> guest: the great scholar james combs and taylor branch and lewis baldwin and others they might have an idea. i don't know. keep in mind he didn't set america up to go to hell. he didn't say america should go

to hell. he said america may go to hell. why? because militarism, racism poverty, materialism those four diseases but they are diseases that are historical practices at the same time. they are the democratic energies out of america. america is on its way to fascism fascism. big government big banks, big corporations, no accountability. all the wealth hemorrhaged at the top and all those at the bottom fighting over the cross. martin saw that and he was honest in saying america may in fact go to hell and in many ways i think it indicates my idea of brother jeremiah wright and i think history will vindicate her brother. i don't agree with everything he says but he's a truth teller and he speaks his heart and soul in

his mind and in the end it's about the black national anthem. we have got too many echoes out there. we have too many copies and not about originals. an original like martin you speak your voice even when he was wrong. he was wrong in atlantic city. fannie lou hamer, critique. martin, you are wrong. how can anybody criticize martin luther king jr.? you don't use children in birmingham like that. he could have used different language. we understand what you call them a chump. do you use against gangsters and terrorists like the police department of birmingham? he was honest about that. but it was wonderful while malcolm died what did martin say? if this was the spirit. he said he's the most gentle. martin could see malcolm's gentleness and that is why

june 27, 1964 when malcolm hears from martin i will go with you to the united nations to put the united states on trial for the violation of the human rights of black people they almost came together. but martin knew malcolm called me a chump. i understand where he's coming from many went to bar but the love was coming to the language. he was loving the children and the children were being abused. >> host: here we are on the 15th anniversary of bloody sunday that passed recently. any lessons from his life in terms of the choices that he made, the spirit with which he believed in this nation and its capacity for the young people who really do have to carry these traditions forward? any final thoughts for them? >> guest: i think the final

thoughts would be that commits oneself to the highest level of courage. don't be afraid and tell the truth, bear witness. don't be afraid to be unpopular. be humble enough to learn from each other and others of all colors but the bold enough to pierce through all the lies and the crimes being committed in the name of democracy. >> host: and know your history. guess what i know your history but keep the love flowing. in the end what i loved about martin the love is that they have the standard of it all and the rest is -- that's what kept us going. >> host: cornel west thank you this is but an amazing conversation thank you for this book. i know that everyone will find it incredibly viable and will have some soul reckoning to do. >> guest: i salute you.

thanks to c-span always. absolutely calm indeed. god bless you my brother. ..