The downfall of successful black men is running rampant these days, I guess they thought they could play the same games their white counterparts play and still come out on top. Most recently Alphonso Jackson, Secretary of HUD, resigned from his post amid scandal over his alleged illegal conduct involving tilting HUD towards Republican contractors and cronies. His first mistake was becoming a Republican, but that's neither here nor there. Also in the news for the last year or so is one of my home state's Congressman William Jefferson. And we can't forget Kwame Kilpatrick who is accused of perjury for lying about his alleged illicit affair with his chief of staff. He has been accused of soliciting bribes to broker business deals in Africa. Cronyism and bribery are typical in politics, but mots often it involves white politicians, not African Americans. For some reason these men apparently believe they can survive such scandal and still have a career after this. Unfortunately, I find this doubtful, the white public is much less forgiving of non-white politicians and superstars than they are of their own kind. They will want to crucify these men and their political careers will be basically over. Only white politicians can lie, cheat, and steal; get caught; and steal retain their place in the political arena.

As black politicians, whether Republican or Democrat, these men should have known better than to attempt to play the same roles that many of their white counterparts do so well. As much as we want to believe in equality, in some areas, equality is definitely still just a myth. Politics is a ruthless game and it's dominated by white Americans. They know all the unwritten rules and they protect each other. As much as Alphonso Jackson wanted to be one of the "good ole boys," he could never truly be a part of the inner circle. His playing party favoritism was his way of trying to be on the inside looking out instead of vice versa. Sure his so called friends would go along with it, they would make millions and his Jackson's neck would be on chopping block when it caught up with the. It doesn't get any better than that. I wonder now how many of his cronies are standing by him and crying his innocence?

Black politicians on a large scale are hardly elected to major offices and so when we do get an opportunity to be in a position of power we should understand that we have to be twice as good and twice as smart as the next guy in the room. We can't afford to make stupid mistakes, no one will forgive us and it taints our entire population. Because with us, if one does something wrong well than that means every black person is just as guilty or capable of committing the same act. We are judged as a group, regardless of social standing, political affiliation, or religion. Once one black person makes a bad choice we all become guilty of the same behavior; guilt by race. On the other hand, whites are never lumped together, they are judged individually. No one accuses very white man of being a serial killer just because Ted Bundy, Charles Manson, and Jeffrey Dahmer were. Yet every black person is judged based on the actions of a few.

So no matter how much you believe you are equal to your white counterpart, society has yet to accept that belief. We just can't make the same mistakes whites make, because the punishment will be much more severe and once we fall from grace, we can't get up again. In a perfect world we would all be judged by the same standards, but as we all know, this world is far from perfect.