Suggested Answers To The Short Quiz

[johnkarls]

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Question 1

Who was Nelson Mandela?

Answer 1

Nelson Mandela (1918-2013) was a South African anti-apartheid revolutionary who led the long but successful fight against Apartheid from 1952-1995, including 27 years that he led the African National Congress Party from prison (1963-1990).

Universally called the “Father of the Nation” Mandela served as South Africa’s first post-Apartheid President (1994-1999) during which he successfully preached reconciliation, making South Africa the only Sub-Saharan African Nation (Sub-Saharan is a term commonly used to exclude the Muslim Arab nations along Africa’s Mediterranean shore) to entice the bulk of the white population to remain and work together with the majority black population.

Indeed, the 2009 Hollywood movie "Invictus" directed by Clint Eastwood and starring Morgan Freeman as Mandela and Matt Damon as the captain of the all-white South African rugby team, chronicles the true story of how Mandela immediately upon ending Apartheid championed the all-white rugby team WITHOUT CHANGING ITS RACIAL COMPOSITION -- as a strategy to unify the country and bind up its wounds. BTW, despite remaining all white, the South African rugby team won with Mandela’s backing the 1995 Rugby World Cup the year after Mandela became President of South Africa for a true but fairy-tale ending for that particular strategy for promoting reconciliation!!!

Mandela was showered with more than 250 honors, including the 1993 Nobel Peace Prize and the U.S. Presidential Medal of Freedom.

Incidentally, many Mandela biographies credit his tolerant views to Christianity in general, and Methodism in particular. Although his patrilineal great-grandfather was the ruler of the Thembu tribe (one of South Africa’s largest), Mandela was the son of a Morganatic marriage (meaning the offspring are ineligible to inherit the throne). After serving as a shepherd until age 7, Mandela then attended Methodist Mission Schools until entering college where he studied law and lived in the university’s Wesley House (John Wesley was the founder of the Methodist Church).

Question 2

Who was Desmond Tutu?

Answer 2

Desmond Tutu (1931-present) was the first black Arch-Bishop of the Anglican Church (aka Church of England) in South Africa.

He was one of the leading opponents of Apartheid.

As a result of which he was showered with many honors including the 1984 Nobel Peace Prize and the U.S. Presidential Medal of Freedom.

Question 3

Why did Desmond Tutu compare our author, Bryan Stevenson, to Nelson Mandela?

Answer 3

In his April 2015 article in Vanity Fair on Bryan Stevenson and Just Mercy, Desmond Tutu concluded by saying --

“We may not be capable of changing the world in one fell swoop on our own, but when we swim together in the same good direction, we become an unstoppable force.

Good leadership is key …

Good leaders with the ability to identify the challenges and the tenacity to act on them.

Good leaders driven not by personal ambition but by an innate desire to improve the circumstances of the human family and the human condition.

Good leaders such as our extraordinary Nelson Mandela, who chose reconciliation over vengeance, and epitomized the healing power of magnanimity, grace, and love.

Good leaders such as our youthful Nobel Peace Prize laureate Malala Yousafzai, who refused to accept her own victimization—or that of her sisters—and turned the spotlight on the abusers of women and children.

Good leaders such as Bryan Stevenson, who has made it his business to sound the alarm about inequities in the criminal-justice system that reflect gaping fault lines in the social fabric of the land of Lady Liberty.”

Question 4

Could Desmond Tutu have compared Bryan Stevenson to Nelson Mandela in a more specific respect?

Answer 4

Yes.

Nelson Mandela began his career as an attorney defending blacks in Apartheid South Africa.

Bryan Stevenson has spent his career defending African Americans in the Apartheid “Justice” System of Apartheid America.

Question 5

What is the Equal Justice Initiative?

Answer 5

The Equal Justice Initiative is a tax-exempt foundation founded and directed by Bryan Stevenson to finance his efforts opposing (quoting the menu on the EJI website for the “Our Work” section) -- (1) Race and Poverty, (2) Children in Prison, (3) Mass Incarceration, and (4) Death Penalty.

It has a staff of approximately 50 attorneys and social workers.

You can donate to the work of the Equal Justice Initiative on its website = http://www.eji.org.

Question 6

In what two specific categories of criminal justice does Desmond Tutu’s Vanity Fair article say Bryan Stevenson and his Equal Justice Initiative concentrate?

Answer 6

Quoting Desmond Tutu’s article: “death-row prisoners and children in adult prisons.”

[Obviously Q-6 was composed before “Our Work” (quoted above) was discovered on the Institute’s website, which also includes “Race and Poverty” and “Mass Incarceration.”]

Question 7

What is America’s Permanent “Untouchable” Under-Caste?

Answer 7

It is most of the population in America’s inner-city ghettos.

America refuses to provide an effective education for its inner-city children which means that (as described below in Q&A-11) since 75%-80% of them live in single-adult households headed by druggies who turn over any receipts to the pusher so the children have to steal just in order to eat, the children know by the age of 5 that they are NOT eligible for their dreams. And that their only realistic career objectives are pusher or pimp, or girl friend of a pusher or pimp graduating to whore.

This under-caste is “permanent” because of these conditions facing its children who then, no surprise, perpetuate the under-caste.

This under-caste is “untouchable” in the worst sense of the lowest caste in India’s Caste System (India’s “Untouchable” Caste) because Americans refuse to “love their neighbors as themselves” and refuse to lift a finger to do anything about mainstreaming this Permanent “Untouchable” Under-Caste.

It would appear from the U.S. government’s constant and consistent reporting for the last half century that approximately 30% of the U.S. population is illiterate as measured by the ability to read the warning label of a can of rat poison, that 30% is probably a good estimate of the size of America’s Permanent “Untouchable” Under-Caste.

In our 6/17/2015 appeal to Pope Francis (currently the first posting in the first section of http://www.ReadingLiberally-SaltLake.org), it was noted that UNICEF confirms that 23% of U.S. children live in poverty.

It would appear that the minor discrepancy between our 30% illiteracy rate constantly reported by the U.S. government and UNICEF’s measurement of 23% of U.S. children living in poverty is probably explained by UNICEF’s more jaded view of what constitutes poverty from witnessing it in the world’s unimaginably-impoverished areas.

Nevertheless, UNICEF states that America’s 23% rate of children living in poverty IS AT LEAST DOUBLE THE RATE in any other civilized country, TRIPLE THE RATE in Germany, Austria and France, AND QUADRUPLE THE RATE in Denmark, Slovenia, Norway, the Netherlands, and Finland!!!

Question 8

What is the significance of America’s Permanent “Untouchable” Under-Caste in terms of AMERICA RANKING LAST among all of the world’s industrialized countries in virtually every measure of civilization (e.g., infant mortality, student test scores, percentage of population living in poverty, percentage of population in prison, etc., etc.)?

Answer 8

We have studied on several occasions how America RANKS LAST among the world’s industrialized countries IN VIRTUALLY EVERY MEASURE OF CIVILIZATION.

And we have always speculated in the absence of any available data, that America might rank first in every category if America’s Permanent “Untouchable” Under-Caste was excluded from the measurements.

Even if, to be fair, the comparably-miniscule poor populations of other industrialized countries were excluded from their measurements.

Question 9

Is one manifestation of America’s Permanent “Untouchable” Under-Caste the fact that the U.S. government has continuously and consistently reported for the last half-century that 30% of our population is illiterate as defined by the inability to read the warning label on a can of rat poison?

Answer 9

Of course!!!

Question 10

Has award-winning author Jonathan Kozol tried, over the last half century, to convince America that it has created a Permanent “Untouchable” Under-Caste as a result of its racism with such bombshell books as: (1) The Shame of the Nation: The Restoration of Apartheid Schooling in America (2005); (2) Ordinary Resurrections: Children in the Years of Hope (2001); (3) Amazing Grace: The Lives of Children and the Conscience of a Nation (1995); (4) Savage Inequalities: Children in America’s Schools (1991); (5) Rachel and Her Children (1988); (6) Illiterate America (1985); (7) The Night is Dark and I Am Far From Home: Political Indictment of US Public Schools (1975); (8) Death at an Early Age (1967)?

Answer 10

Yes!!!

Question 11

Have we studied many times that the typical inner city conditions facing the 178 “I Have A Dream”® Programs in 51 American inner-cities in the 1990’s that provided individual tutors and mentors for an entire inner-city school class (or housing-project class cohort) as it progressed from third grade through high school graduation with a guarantee of college tuition:

(A) 99% of “Dreamers” living in single-adult households;
(B) 95% of total Dreamers living in single-adult households headed by a druggie; and
(C) 75%-80% of total Dreamers living in a single-adult household headed by a druggie who hands all receipts over to the pusher so the children have to steal just in order to eat?

And that inner-city children knew by the age of 5 that they were NOT eligible for their dreams? And that their only realistic career objectives were pusher or pimp, or girl friend of a pusher or pimp graduating to whore?

Answer 11

Yes!!! Yes!!! Yes!!!

Question 12

Was it any wonder that under such conditions, those 178 “Dreamer” classes in 51 American cities were typically preceded and succeeded by classes with SINGLE-DIGIT graduation rates?

Answer 12

Not for anyone who stopped to think about it honestly!!!

Question 13

Is it easy for America to delude itself vis-à-vis these SINGLE-DIGIT graduation rates by failing to add back to the denominator all of the precious children who have been killed or incarcerated before graduation? And by refusing to disclose statistics for specific high schools while, instead, grouping their results with those of high schools with higher rates?

Answer 13

So it would appear.

Question 14

Have we studied how America’s non-parliamentary form of government featuring only two political parties that focus solely on the Middle Class means that America will never mainstream its Permanent “Untouchable” Under-Caste?

Answer 14

Yes!!!

Question 15

In other words, how America’s lack of a parliamentary form of government means that there is NOT a multitude of political parties, among which is one representing the interests of its inner-city ghettos and, sooner or later, one of the major parties will need its votes to achieve a parliamentary majority, as a result of which the interests of the inner-city ghettos will be addressed?

Answer 15

Unfortunately!!!

Question 16

In “Inner-City Holocaust and America’s Apartheid ‘Justice’ System (In Honor of Jonathan Kozol and In Memory of John Howard Griffin)” -- described in the third and fourth sections of http://www.ReadingLiberally-SaltLake.org -- was America’s judicial system commonly described in correspondence with inner-city clergy as a “segregated toilet”?

Answer 16

Yes!!!

Question 17

So why are we so surprised when we read about Bryan Stevenson’s horror tales???

Answer 17

If we really are surprised, then God only knows why!!!

Question 18

Is there any hope for America when its 21 top U.S. and California governmental officials and its 43 news-media superstars refuse to permit $84 billion OF PRIVATE FUNDS to provide tutoring/mentoring programs for inner-city children accompanied by a guarantee of college tuition???

[Details are contained in Sections 3 and 4 of http://www.ReadingLiberally-SaltLake.org.]

Answer 18

Probably not!!!

Question 19

Was the “Question Presented for Review” in the petition for the U.S. Supreme Court to accept an appeal in the litigation that the 21 top governmental officials and 43 news-media superstars refused to support:

“Can state court judges order their decisions which they know are diametrically-opposed to well-settled law, not to be published or cited (a strategy labeled ‘the segregated toilet’ in correspondence with 51 inner-city clergy who represent the 10 million inner-city children who have been disclosed from the outset as the ‘real parties at interest’ in this law suit) in order to flush away the rights of the 10 million inner-city children without disturbing the rights of first-class American citizens -- without violating the ‘Equal Protection of the Law’ requirement of the Fourteenth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution?”

Answer 19

Yes!!!

Question 20

After reading Bryan Stevenson’s “Just Mercy” are we surprised that the U.S. Supreme Court refused to accept the appeal over the treatment given by America’s Apartheid "Justice" System to the 10 million inner-city children???

Answer 20

If we really are surprised, then God only knows why!!!

Question 21

Until the last decade or so, our pols frequently claimed that America was a “Christian nation” but Christ had only two commandments: (1) love God, and (2) love your “neighbor” as yourself followed immediately by the Parable of the Good Samaritan to illustrate that EVERY human being is your “neighbor” -- so aren’t the proponents of erasing every last vestige of Christianity from “the public square” really doing nothing more than trying to eliminate the hypocrisy of Apartheid America which obviously does NOT love its inner-city neighbors???

Answer 21

So it would appear!!!

Question 22

Did Pope Francis and the President of the U.S. Council of Catholic Bishops shun our 6/17/2015 Six-Degrees-Of-Separation E-mail Campaign requesting Pope Francis to “Carpe the Diem during your impending U.S. visit to challenge U.S. clergy to organize such programs [tutoring/mentoring for inner-city children with a guarantee of college tuition] and ..... challenge their congregants to become the Surrogate-Parent tutors and mentors to minister to the 23% of American children that UNICEF confirms live in poverty”???

Answer 22

Yes!!! Both of them blocked our e-mails after the first got through!!!