"Blacks at the President’s Table" is the third in BlackAmericaWeb.com's five-part The Bush Report Card series examining the impact of George W. Bush's presidency on black America. Coming Tuesday: economic issues in the black community.

Click here to read "The Bush Report Card, Part One: How Has Urban Black America Fared?"
Click here to read "The Bush Report Card, Part Two: Blacks, Iraq and the War President."

A popular joke throughout the black community labels Bill Clinton as the nation’s first black president, but many supporters of President George W. Bush consider our current Commander-in-Chief to be the man who’s made an effort to put more blacks in power positions.

Depending on who you ask, Bush, who will face the nation in his annual State of the Union Address tomorrow, is either a man looking to have one of the most diverse cabinets in presidential history or a man looking to pull the wool over the eyes of the black community.

Alphonso Jackson, secretary of the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, said it’s the former, calling Bush a man who has made a commitment to bettering the lives of Americans in general, and black Americans in particular. A longtime friend of Bush, Jackson understands that many blacks don’t agree with his opinions of the president, but he wishes they would understand and appreciate that there are blacks -- himself, Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice, and Domestic Policy Adviser Claude Allen among them -- with considerable clout at Bush’s table.

“Black Americans should be pleased that this president has had two black Americans (Rice and former Secretary of State Colin Powell) give him the best advice that you can get, in terms of handling the war,” Jackson told BlackAmericaWeb.com, adding that he has long known Bush since their days in Dallas, where Jackson was head of the city’s housing authority, dating back to the late 1980s.

“I am dealing with a person I know and has a compassionate heart and listens to us, especially Condi and I,” Jackson said, adding that Bush will always reach out to he and Rice seeking guidance on a variety of domestic and international matters, even something like the best way to properly celebrate the late Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. on the national holiday held in his honor.

Congressional Black Caucus Chairman Melvin L. Watt (D-NC), said it’s good that Bush has appointed blacks to key positions within his administration, but the race of the person doesn’t matter when the work they represent doesn’t fully benefit blacks -- especially when it comes to healthcare, employment and education.

“I don’t minimize the importance of racial diversity in his administration,” Watt told BlackAmericaWeb.com. “But the problems I’m talking about really transcend race. If a black person is pursuing a policy that is adversely affecting black people, that doesn’t make the result any more palatable to me.”

Watt said blacks should lift one another up, but we should also be willing to hold blacks in power accountable. In regards to those blacks in Bush’s cabinet, as well as black Republicans who have become the face of the party’s outreach effort, if the GOP isn’t doing what it can to make America better for everyone, Watt says they need to speak out and see that changes are made.

“Right now, the administration is pursuing policies and in many cases, those policies are being carried out by black people,” Watt said. “That doesn’t make the impact any less adverse. As proud as I am to have a secretary of Housing and Urban Development of a secretary of State be black, if those policies they are pursuing are not advantageous to us, than we have to say that. It’s not personal, it’s about politics.”

But conservative talking head Armstrong Williams does believe that far too many blacks make it personal when criticizing or ridiculing administration figures like Jackson, Rice and Powell. Because blacks have traditionally had a deep mistrust of the Republican Party, there's a tendency to hold that against those who line themselves up with Bush.

“These are people with real power. We need to celebrate the fact that these people are where they are rather than make personal attacks against them as if they’re slaves,” Williams told BlackAmericaWeb.com. “We should always want to be in positions of power, no matter who the president is.”

Williams blames in part the media -- and black media in particular -- for failing to tell the stories of how influential blacks have been in terms of initiating and carrying out policy.

(Williams was paid nearly a quarter of a million dollars by the Bush administration to push its controversial educational initiative, No Child Left Behind -- a conflict of interest scandal that led to Tribune Media Services halting his weekly syndicated column and TV One cancelling his punditry show, "On Point," and dropping him from his regular slot on "America's Black Forum.")
 
Admittedly, there have been some stumbling blocks, Williams said, pointing to the miscalculations that have lead to a mess of a war and the slow response to Hurricane Katrina. But overall, Williams said, blacks have flexed more political muscles than ever before.

“No one ever writes about it. Condi Rice gets more time with the president than anyone else except his wife,” Williams said, adding that the administration is attempting to prep the next generation of leaders through its distinguished White House Fellows Program, a committee on which Williams sits. The current class of Fellows includes four blacks -- the highest number ever -- key positions with NASA, Veterans Administration, Treasury and the First Lady’s office. Williams says he doesn’t know what’s more disappointing, the fact that people are promoting this bit of diversity or the fact that more blacks aren’t even aware of the program to apply and possibly be accepted.

Regardless of their difference in political views, both Watt and Williams agree that blacks have made significant gains in the world of politics. And like it or not, it will be Bush and his party that may be credited with playing in role in adding some soul to the hallowed halls of Washington politics.

But many contend that if the black community wants to raise voices of concern, it's important to impress upon white Democratic leaders that the party must stop counting on the black vote and start realizing blacks' potential to succeed in offices and positions of various levels. It’s a notion that journalist Farai Chideya chimed in on during a 2005 BlackAmericaWeb.com interview.

“Republicans have been skillful about pushing a slate of non-white leaders to high levels of the administration,” Chideya said, adding that Democrats have failed to do the same. “It’s a remarkable turn.”