Next month, a delegation of elected officials from Newark, New Jersey, is scheduled to depart on a two-week, taxpayer financed trip to Ghana. Billed as part of a "cultural exchange program," the trip includes $ 225-a-night luxury hotel rooms, jaunts to what the itinerary describes as "splendid beaches lined with coconut palms," and a week at the "African-African American Summit" in Accra (conference fees: $ 3,000). A professional videographer (fee: $ 7,900) will record highlights of the trip for future viewing. Under ordinary circumstances, such a trip might have escaped attention in Newark -- since 1993, according to the Newark Star-Ledger, the mayor and city council have billed the city for vacations in Portugal, the Bahamas, Puerto Rico, Florida, Arizona, Boston, Memphis, Atlantic City, Washington, and Chicago. This time, however, the city council decided to shell out an extra $ 7,000 in city funds to bring along an "advisor." His name: Leonard Jeffries.
You may remember Jeffries, a professor who theorized that blacks ("sun people") are physically and mentally superior to whites ("ice people"), thanks to mysterious qualities found in melanin. Jeffries was dismissed from his position as chairman of the black studies department at City College of New York several years ago, when he began screaming during a public appearance about the pernicious influence of whites generally, and Jews specifically, in American society. (In one memorable riff, he denounced the pope as a "cracker.") Yes, that's the Leonard Jeffries going on the junket. At city expense. In a city that is among the poorest in the country.
Pretty outrageous. At least one member of Newark's city council thought so. Cory Booker, a 29-year-old Rhodes scholar and Yale Law graduate who was elected to the council last year, objected to using public money to pay for Jeffries's trip. Rather than come to their senses, some of Booker's fellow council members implied he had become a tool of the Jews. At press time, Leonard Jeffries was still on his way to Ghana.