Martin Luther King - a good guy
not really contentious to be fair.

He was an alright thinker but a fairly useless politician.

ouch, that was a gross misinterpretation of the past in so many regards. first and for most he was not a politician, secondly, he was much more then an alright thinker, however you have to dig past the sound bite, montages and news clips, and actually look at the things the man said and did, and that explains his immense popularity. simply put, King is the most significant black nationalist since Garvey, but what separated him was that he was not a black nationalist at all, but rather an activist of equality and justice. since racism happened to be a contemporary injustice, King was a black nationalist, however, he was by no means limited as such. in fact, if you read the Beyond Vietnam speech above, you will see he addressed much more then black issues. so I agree that the soundbite version of King was an alright thinker and useless politician, but that was by no means who Dr King was, or how what he contributed to our society. His contribution was much more significant and wide in scope then just race relations.

bump for the 41st..

nefs igziar yamareh (The-Soul, God Bless It)