by Dr. Ridgely Abdul Mu’min Muhammad

Historically it can be said that when "white folk sneeze, Black folk get pneumonia". So
what happens when white folk get pneumonia? The downturn in the American economy has resulted in the
loss of 2.6 million manufacturing jobs. On February 20, 2004 Senator Chris Dodd wrote a letter to
President Bush asking Mr. Bush not to hide these loses by re-classifying service jobs, such as fast
food workers, as manufacturing work.

In a way re-classifying fast food workers may be appropriate. They are implicitly saying that the
fast food industry does not serve "food" but manufactures something made to look like
"food", i.e. "Mad Cow burgers" and "Frankenfood". A steady diet of
this manufactured stuff can be attributed to obesity, high blood pressure and diabetes, all major
plagues in the Black community.

In the meantime a report by Mark Levitan found that in New York City in 2003 nearly half of Black
men between the ages of 16 and 64 did not have jobs. The prospects for these Black men getting jobs
are narrowing since many manufacturing jobs have gone overseas and now American companies are
"outsourcing" high tech jobs overseas as well. David Zielenziger in a December 2003
article called "US Companies Moving More Jobs Overseas" writes:

"Morgan Stanley estimates the number of U.S. jobs outsourced to India will double to about
150,000 in the next three years. Analysts predict as many as two million U.S. white-collar jobs such
as programmers, software engineers and applications designers will shift to low cost centers by
2014."

If Mr. Richard Russell is correct, and "workers overseas can get the jobs done at around
one-fifth the cost that those same jobs can be done in the US…", then the question must be
asked: Why should those jobs come back when the goods that they produce can come in America
basically duty-free? Add to this the growing trade deficit and debt load, America is quickly
becoming a "Third World" country, selling raw products and buying back manufactured
products. Soon she will have to make a decision on how she will pay back her tremendous debt load.
She will be forced by the international bankers to cut services and infrastructure development for
her people (tightening her waist), in order to pay back the debt.

The Honorable Elijah Muhammad warned us that America would be closing down her factories and
would put Black people on the streets. We are looking at that day. Where will we go? In 1910 Black
people had a population of about 10 million and owned over 15 million acres of land. Whites in the
South used brutality to run Blacks off their land while their white cousins in the North opened up
temporary jobs in the North. Now those jobs are being taken off shore.

Today 40 million Black people now own less than 3 million acres of farm land. As bad as slavery
was, slavery did not break our spirit of self-reliance. We bought 15 million acres in our first 45
years after slavery, but now we sell our inheritance for a new car or bag of dope. We are so bold as
to laugh at the farmer, but yet we still love to eat. We have traded "common sense" for a
"B.S." degree.

Even now most of our remaining land is in the South while we are being herded into
"concentration camps" in the big cities of the North. Four and six lane "defense
highways" encircle the Black communities with video cameras watching almost every inch. New
"noise" walls are being built along these "loops" to divide Black communities
from the grocery warehouses. Water systems and power grids are being sold to foreign investors. Both
can be cut off with a flip of a switch.

If anarchy breaks out in the cities, where will Black folk flee? White folks have family and
friends who own land in the countryside. Everywhere Black folk try to run will be owned by somebody
else. It would be wise to leave these cities, now. The jobs are not coming back and neither are the
grocery stores, unless you put them there.

Where will you go, what skills do you have to survive and what goods or service can you produce
and sell to your neighbors? What "trade" have you mastered? A four year liberal arts
degree can’t fix a car, build a house, make a dress, fabricate a tool or grow a blade of grass.
You have been set up for the kill. The people who were the producers and artisans for America have
been reduced to a group of "lottery players" waiting on "a dream". Instead of
using their brains to make things happen, they are engrossed in dreaming up the right set of numbers
in games of chance.

In 1991 Minister Louis Farrakhan implemented a program of the Honorable Elijah Muhammad’s
called the "Three Year Economic Savings Program." We presently work on a 1600 acre farm in
Georgia that was obtained through the donations to this program. We urgently encourage you to
participate in this program with your financial support. Along with acquiring land, we are working
with other Black farmers to set up distribution systems to the cities. However, most cities do not
have independent Black owned stores or coops. Please read past articles in the "Farmer
Newsletter" on www.MuhammadFarms.com to learn how to set up a coop in your city.

For those of you who do not want to participate directly in a "Nation of Islam"
program, please keep your eyes and ears open for the debut of the "Black Family Land
Trust." Black leaders and organizers are preparing an instrument to save, protect and increase
Black land ownership that will give everyone a chance to be a part of the solution

And for those of you who are seeking reparations but are not asking for land, we want you to do
this exercise for us. Stand up. Now, levitate off of the ground. Now think, how much money
(reparations) can someone give you so that you can exist without land to plant your feet?

And if you think that voting for a new "white" president will save you, remember what
Min. Farrakhan said in his 2004 Saviours’ Day address: “Black people are so angry with President
Bush that they’re willing to give Senator Kerry a free ride. Getting rid of Bush and getting John
Kerry … will mean you’ll get more of the same.”

Help save the land we still have, pool our resources to get more and "fly home" to the
South. Some may argue that Africa is our home. However, according to the prophecy of Abraham, we are
not to leave the land of our 400 hundred year affliction until we acquire great
"substance". Credit cards and non-productive trinkets are not "substantive
assets." Let us first work our way out of the cities (Babylon) back to the land in which we
soaked our sweat and blood (the South) as we prepare for the great Exodus.

Peace, Doc