The black middle class, lost in the shuffle

I was glancing thru the NYtimes on sunday an i happened across an op ed piece by Henry louis Gates. In part it sys...

LAST week, the Pew Research Center published the astonishing finding that 37 percent of African-Americans polled felt that “blacks today can no longer be thought of as a single race” because of a widening class divide.

From Frederick Douglass to the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., perhaps the most fundamental assumption in the history of the black community has been that Americans of African descent, the descendants of the slaves, either because of shared culture or shared oppression, constitute “a mighty race,” as Marcus Garvey often put it.

Then later on sunday afternoon i saw this issue discussed by the Mclaughlin Group. They too were surprised.

What??? Blacks dont share the same brain?
They dont all think alike? In talking to some friends of mine we all had the same reaction... DUH!

Despite the fact that we of the black "Middle Class" have different values, education, social standing , etc. The media, and most of white america continue to see us as one monolithic group.

There are many of us. Myself included, who are far more conservative than the media gives us credit for. If you really want to see a disenfranchised group, talk to the black middle class. The Republican party doesnt want more than a few black folks. They need to keep the distinction clear between them and the Dems. The Democratic party doesnt talk about anything that s important to us. So where can we go ? Who will represent our interests . Address our concerns. I have watched every one of the democratic debates and not once have they mentioned JOBS. Thats what is our main concern. Healthcare for the poor? They already have healthcare. The war in iraq. None of them are going to end it soon anyway.
The concerns of the black middle calss are lost.

It's my hope that the mainstream media will begin to recognize some of us sometime soon.