Blogger of the month

The widely syndicated rad-lib cartoonist Tom Tomorrow's site contains not only links to his familiar work but a terrific blog that says everything about today's issues I'd like to say, only I'm not as well-connected and articulate. Today's post quotes a FAIR story pointing out that mass-media accounts of the work of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., on the annual celebration of his life, invariably omit the still-controversial radical views on peace, poverty and class that marked King's later work:

There are forty million poor people here, and one day we must ask the question, "Why are there forty million poor people in America?" And when you begin to ask that question, you are raising a question about the economic system, about a broader distribution of wealth. When you ask that question, you begin to question the capitalistic economy. And I'm simply saying that more and more, we've got to begin to ask questions about the whole society. We are called upon to help the discouraged beggars in life's marketplace. But one day we must come to see that an edifice which produces beggars needs restructuring. It means that questions must be raised. And you see, my friends, when you deal with this you begin to ask the question, "Who owns the oil?" You begin to ask the question, "Who owns the iron ore?" You begin to ask the question, "Why is it that people have to pay water bills in a world that's two-thirds water?" These are words that must be said.