TOM WALKER -> ED HULETT wrote:
 TW> Your Dad is Indeed a Mighty MAN. And I salute Him.
 TW> Too bad more couldn't have listened to Him instead of Jackson and
 TW> Sharpton.

Larry Elder's dad.

 TW> He is as MIGHTY as the Man that said this;

 TW> "I have learned that success is to be measured not so much by the
 TW> position that one has reached in life as by the obstacles which he has
 TW> overcome while trying to succeed. Out of the hard and unusual struggle
 TW> through which he is compelled to pass, he gets a strength, a confidence,
 TW> that one misses whose pathway is comparatively smooth by reason of birth
 TW> and race."

 TW> For the Unknowing that was Booker T. Washington. One of the Real
 TW> Thinkers in the day of the Foundation of the NAACP that urged the Hard
 TW> Work route instead of the Pity Party route they chose.



 EH>> By LARRY ELDER | Posted Thursday, November 06, 2008 4:30 PM PT

 EH>> "Does Obama's victory, as a black man, make you feel that you can do
 TW> anythin
 EH>> Someone asked me that on election night.

 EH>> It is a caricature of America that, pre-Obama, major obstacles blocked
 EH>> achievement. It is equally a caricature that Obama's win suddenly
 TW> creates
 EH>> opportunity that did not exist before.

 EH>> Hard work wins, my dad always told me. My Republican father, who
 TW> disdained
 EH>> Democrats who "give people something for nothing,"
taught my brothers
 TW> and me
 EH>> work hard, stay focused, live within our means, and at all times avoid
 EH>> self-pity.

 EH>> My mom and dad always said, "Ninety percent of the people don't care
 TW> about y
 EH>> problems. And the 10% are glad it's you."

 EH>> Born in Athens, Ga., and eventually raised in Chattanooga, Tenn., my
 TW> dad nev
 EH>> knew his biological father. The only father figure in his life was
 TW> harsh,
 EH>> distant and cold. His mother, because he made "too much
noise" for her
 EH>> then-boyfriend, threw him out of the house at age 13.

 EH>> So this penniless boy, living in the Jim Crow South as the Great
 TW> Depression
 EH>> loomed, started knocking on doors. He finally got a job running
 TW> errands and
 EH>> tending the yard for a white family. One day, the family's cook
 TW> failed to sh
 EH>> up. But my dad, having watched her in the kitchen, whipped up a
 TW> passable mea
 EH>> The family let the other helper go, and a cook was born.

 EH>> Seeking more money, my dad applied for and got a job on the railroads
 TW> as a
 EH>> Pullman porter -- then the country's largest private employer of
 TW> blacks. He
 EH>> traveled all over the country, making a mental note of California
 TW> because, h
 EH>> says, its beauty and warm weather seemed open and inviting, and the
 TW> people
 EH>> seemed more fair.

 EH>> World War II broke out. My dad enlisted as a Marine. He served as a
 TW> cook and
 EH>> became a sergeant. The military ultimately stationed him on Guam as
 TW> we prepa
 EH>> to invade the islands of Japan, an invasion that never took place
 TW> because of
 EH>> Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

 EH>> My dad returned to Chattanooga, where he went to an employment
 TW> office. The l
 EH>> at the desk told him he walked through the wrong door, directed him
 TW> back out
 EH>> the hall, and told him to enter through the "colored
only" door.

 EH>> "That's it," he angrily told my mom, whom he had just
married. "I'm
 TW> going to
 EH>> California, and in a few days, I will send for you."

 EH>> My father arrived in Los Angeles and went from restaurant to
 TW> restaurant to f
 EH>> work. "Sorry," he was told, "you have no
references." "Sorry, you
 TW> have no
 EH>> credentials." "Sorry . . ." He, of course, knew why.

 EH>> He went to an employment office. The woman said, "We have no
 TW> openings." My d
 EH>> said, "I'll sit until you do." He sat in that office
from opening
 TW> until clos
 EH>> for a day and a half. Finally, the woman called him to the desk and
 TW> said: "I
 EH>> have a job. It's for a janitor. Do you want it?"

 EH>> My dad worked at that job for nearly 10 years, while working a second
 TW> full-t
 EH>> job for nearly as long and cooking for a white family on the
 TW> weekends. He
 EH>> somehow managed to go to night school to get his GED and save enough
 TW> money,
 EH>> while in his 40s, to start a small cafe near downtown Los Angeles.

 EH>> He ran the cafe, which provided my brothers and me weekend and summer
 TW> jobs,
 EH>> until he was in his 80s. One day, my dad and I decided to clean out
 TW> the gara
 EH>> We found a letter he wrote to my older brother, then two years old.
 TW> My dad s
 EH>> he feared that if something happened to him, my brother would need
 TW> guidance:

 EH>> May 4, 1951

 EH>> Kirk, my Son, you are now starting out in life -- a life that Mother
 TW> and I
 EH>> cannot live for you.

 EH>> So as you journey through life, remember it's yours, so make it a
 TW> good one.
 EH>> Always try to cheer up the other fellow.

 EH>> Learn to think straight, analyze things, be sure you have all the
 TW> facts befo
 EH>> concluding, and always spend less than you earn.

 EH>> Make friends, work hard, and play hard. Most important of all
 TW> remember this
 EH>> the best of friends wear out if you use them.

 EH>> This may sound silly, Son, but no matter where you are on the 29th of
 TW> Septem
 EH>> (Kirk's birthday), see that Mother gets a little gift, if possible,
 TW> along wi
 EH>> a big kiss and a broad smile.

 EH>> When you are out on your own, listen and take advice but do your own
 TW> thinkin
 EH>> and concluding, set up a reasonable goal, then be determined to reach
 TW> it. Yo
 EH>> can and will, it's up to you, Son.

 EH>> Your Father,

 EH>> Randolph Elder

 EH>> Dad is now 93 and, thankfully, still with us.

 EH>> So, yes, Obama's historic victory makes a statement about the long,
 TW> hard,
 EH>> bloody journey. Obama makes people believe. Some of us always did.

 EH>> Copyright 2008 Creators Syndicate, Inc

 EH>> http://ibdeditorials.com/IBDArticles.aspx?id=310860990234292
 EH>> http://snipurl.com/56w3g

 EH>> --
 EH>> "The ultimate result of shielding men from the effects of folly is
 EH>> to fill the world with fools." --Herbert Spencer

 EH>> "The republican is the only form of government which is not
 EH>> eternally at open or secret war with the rights of mankind."
 EH>> -- Thomas Jefferson

 EH>> Linux User# 416016
 EH>> Linux Machine# 385029

 EH>> --- Thunderbird 2.0.0.17 (X11/20080925)
 TW> (1:123/789.0
 TW> ---
 TW>  # SLMR 2.1a # 0


-- 
"The ultimate result of shielding men from the effects of folly is
to fill the world with fools." --Herbert Spencer

"The republican is the only form of government which is not
eternally at open or secret war with the rights of mankind."
-- Thomas Jefferson

Linux User# 416016
Linux Machine# 385029

--- Thunderbird 2.0.0.17 (X11/20080925)