Thank you Virginia, it is never too late to express "profound regret" for hundreds of years of slavery. May be the rest of the nation will follow.

This morning while reading the online edition of the Washington Post, I was pleasantly surprised to read an article written by Tim Craig, a Washington Post Staff Writer, that the House of Delegates of the Commonwealth of Virginia passed a resolution last Friday expressing “ profound regret” for the state role in the slavery of Africans, and African-Americans. Of course the ‘profound regret” is not yet complete until such time the State Senate approves a similar resolution and the governor signs it.
This story coming out of Richmond, makes me and should make all Virginians very proud that the House of Delegates takes such an important, courageous and leading role and be the first legislative body within the United States to address more than 400 years of shameful, disgraceful and immoral and inhuman acts of enslavement not to mention the destructions of American Indians communities.
This “ profound regret” of course does not come with recognition of the state’s involvement and sanctions in the salve trade, with Republican (no doubt God fearful) legislatures reluctant to participate in an out right apology, which they are afraid, will lay the ground for reparations and compensations. Perhaps the trillion of dollars, Republicans are spending on the war on Iraq can have a better use going toward reparations and compensations to Blacks who no doubts suffered from the most and cruelest crimes ever committed. How could any one imagine, let alone accept the ownership of one human being of another.
This “profound regret” should be a nice and a good way to celebrate the 400 anniversary of the establishment of the settlement of Jamestown. Few years after arriving and settling in Jamestown, these God fearing and good White Christians began to import and trade in “stolen” African slaves, flooding the nation with Black slaves.
It is not so surprising that America, the strongest and most powerful nation and no doubt God fearing nation with profound Judea-Christian values have yet to recognize the wrongs inflicted on tens of millions of Africans and African-Americans, and dare not face its ugly history in promoting and sanctioning 350 years of slavery. We must not forget the fact that it was not until 1968 with the introduction of a series of civil right legislations that America began to over come such a disgraceful history. While the Blacks are no longer owned by Whites, they are never the less entrapped and imprisoned in poor, dangerous, drug infested ghettos, where the very few and the very determined are able to escape the cycle of daily humiliation. Of course, we must not put all of the blames on White America, we must also put the blame on the Black leadership within the African-American community who failed in over 50 years to make a difference and change the lives of the tens of millions trapped in these ghettos. It seems that successful Black leaders once they make it in life, they get the hell out of the ghetto and move to whiter neighborhoods and send their kids to whiter schools forgetting to do something about those less fortunate left behind. With tens of billions of dollars put in the war on poverty, the US records is as dismal as its record on the war on terror and the war on drugs. That should not speak well of the different administrations handling of the issues of poverty and empowerment of Blacks. Of course the only beneficiaries of these programs where the management and the so called “ community leaders” who made it like bandits.
Perhaps it is also never too late for the Arabs and Muslims to admit their role in such business of trading in slaves and perhaps it is never too late for the Japanese to admit their role in the murder of millions of Chinese and Philippines, and it is never too late for the Turks to admit and apologies for the murder of more than 1.5 million Armenians and it is never too late for the Europeans to admit to and apologize for the hundreds of years of colonization of African and Asia and the Middle East. It is also never too late for the French to admit to and apologize for their ruthless and criminal behavior in Algeria and Morocco. And it is never too late for Spain to apologize for its years of Christian Inquisition. Now the next sentence will no doubt generate the most debate and will over shadow the spirit of this posting. I am calling on Israel and world Jewry to admit to and apologize to the Palestinians for the crimes committed by the European Jewish Zionist settlers and the forced exiles of hundreds of thousands of native Palestinians. And of course to apologize for one of the longest inhuman military occupation in modern times and apologize to some 250,000 Palestinians who were wrongfully imprisoned by Israel and of course we need not mentioned the apology for the hundreds of thousands of uprooted trees and the hundreds of thousands of stolen parcels of land and apartments and homes. Thank you Virginia for setting the pace for the rest of the country, perhaps the rest of the world.