A Day For Progressives To Be Proud

Whether or not you are a sports fan, everyone who cares about where we have gone, and will go as a nation must stop for a moment today and celebrate. Today marks 60 years since Jackie Robinson broke the color line in baseball.

It is all the more remarkable in light of the Imus brouhaha this week. Clearly, progress is incremental. And to those who say this should not viwed through a political lense, I say: WRONG.

The very same voices of "celebration" today, the right-wing, mod-squad of morons who like Rush Limbaugh and his pill bottle spew racist insult after racist insult--before and after downing half a kilo--would have stood up to oppose Jackie Robinson's introduction into baseball in 1947. They would have called it unnatural or decried the role of government in pushing for this (see Mayor Fiorello LaGuardia of New York, a real progressive Republican).

In fact, one year later, when President Harry Truman embraced civil rights in the Democratic 1948 platform, Strom Thurmond bolted the party to run as a Dixiecrat. He eventually (1964) became a Republican, and today these very backward-ass, resentment whores make up the core of the GOP. These same kinds of people oppose the ERA, gay rights, any affirmative action and a variety of other methods to bring us to the point where we are a society that truly is equal.

So take a moment to remember Jackie and what a wonderful man he was. And then remember that this is what you're fighting for.

** Picture courtesy of ESPN