The Death of a Leader

Constance Baker Motley died yesterday. She was one of the less nationally well-known lawyers for the NAACP (I hadn't heard of her until now), as well as a state senator in NY and the president of the borough of Manhattan. Everytime someone of her stature dies, it calls for someone to step up and fill her place. Without people as corageous as her, there would be far more injustice in this country than there is and many peole would have suffered far more. It should reaffirm the desire, especially since Hurricane Katrina exposed the face and scope of American poverty, for more focus away from oppressive imperialism and repressive 'patriotism' and towards improving the condition of those at home who are oppressed by the invisible force of poverty, whatever its cause.