WORLD WAR COLUMBUS: A New Year of War ….

In Philadelphia PA, il professore, Robert F. Petrone, begins the New Year with a 6-class series debunking the Eight Slanders against Christopher Columbus.  The first of the six classes, “Episode 35: Debunking the Myth of Columbus As a Racist,” aired on January 5, 2022, and can now be heard at the 19-minute, 55-second mark (19:55) of the January 5th program, and will soon be archived on its own at the Radio Voice Italia website.  Episodes 36 through 40 will air each Wednesday from January 9 through February 9, 2022, and be archived within days of airing.

In Hoboken NJ, the city has unveiled a 6-foot bronze statue of Frank Sinatra by renowned sculptor Carolyn D. Palmer on the anniversary of his 106th birthday, at Sinatra Park on Sinatra Drive.  Frank Sinatra shares something in common with Christopher Columbus, he, too, was a civil rights activist of Italian descent.  In the 1960s, Las Vegas was racially segregated:  African-Americans were not permitted to book rooms in most hotels, including Sammy Davis, Junior!  Sinatra called for boycotts of these establishments and told their owners that none of the Rat Pack would be staying or performing in their establishments unless they lifted that racist ban.  Indeed, it worked.  Las Vegas began the racial integration of its hotels.  While the display of a Sinatra statue can definitely be seen as a tribute to a supreme performer and someone who did a great deal for civil rights in the 1960s, it does seem somewhat like damage control by Mayor Ravi S. Bhalla, whom, we have not forgotten, dispensed with the annual Italian flag-raising ceremony on Christopher Columbus Day this past year.  Italian American OneVoice Coalition President Manny Alfano wrote to Mayor Bhalla on behalf of Hoboken’s Italian American community about the mayor’s act of damnatio memoriae of the flag-raising ceremony, “your residents … are disappointed because there is no flag-raising ceremony in October to honor their Italian heritage….Celebrating some ethnicities and not others is not equal treatment [n]or [does it] represent[ ] an inclusive atmosphere….Why does Hoboken NJ not fly the Italian Flag during Italian-American Heritage and Culture Month? Flying the Italian flag during the month of October would send a signal to your Italian American residents that you recognize their contribution to Hoboken and also their ancestors that came before them that helped build the Hoboken you know today.  We would like to discuss this issue with your office and look forward to your prompt response.”  Mayor Bhalla never responded to the Italian American OneVoice Coalition’s letter.