America's Negro problem just won't quit. The Census Bureau has been using the term "Negro" as a racial identifier on its decennial forms since 1950, later joined -- though not supplanted -- by "black" and "African Am." But when the website thegrio.com recently pointed out that "Negro" was going to appear once more on the 2010 census, many black folks reacted with shock and pointed distaste. Bloggers and pundits condemned the term as a relic of the bad old days of segregation and Jim Crow that has no business in official records anymore.
In The Newz
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15 films that hurt black America
African-Americans have always had a bit of a love-hate relationship with the movies.
While black artists in front of and behinds the cameras have created indelible
performances, stories and images that audiences of all backgrounds cherish
--there has been an ugly side to black representation in Hollywood that is unavoidable
and continues to this day.
>From the very beginning of movies, with D.W. Griffith's racist propaganda film
The Birth of a Nation there have been racist themes and images in mainstream movies.
For much of the 20th century black audiences endured blackface, coons and with
the exception of a few dignified Sidney Poitier roles in the 50s and 60s -- barely any
representation at all. When the blaxploitation genre broke through in the 1970s it did
give more African-American talent a chance to shine but these films largely
glorified violence and crime, as well as brutality towards women.
In recent years, blacks have seen offensive stereotypes passed off as comedy in movies
like Soul Plane and Bebe's Kids. These films remind us that we still have a long way
to go when it comes to portraying our culture and lifestyle accurately and respectfully
on the big screen.
Use this link to view the slideshow: click here>>>
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Center for Wrongful Convictions presents:
My Kind of Town
Chicago's biggest scandal since Al Capone was the Jon Burge tortures, which were on a level with Abu Ghirab. Now Jon Conroy wrote a powerful new play depicting the scandals, called "My Kind of Town."
On Monday, March 8, there will be a FREE reading of the play at the Center for Wrongful Convictions, Northwestern School of Law, in the Throne Auditorium -
375 East Chicago Avenue, from 6 PM to 8 PM.
This is the scandal that might have caused Chicago to lose its Olympic bid. It would be great if people could come out in support of the Center for Wrongful Convictions and the miraculous work it is doing in helping to free people who never thought they'd be free.
In support of the play, John Maki of the Center for Wrongful Convictions put together a video that can be seen here:
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I love me some Ms. Anita Baker!
Please keep her in your prayers!
Anita Baker avoids jail in court battle
Doug Guthrie and Susan Whitall / The Detroit News
Detroit--Singer-songwriter Anita Baker will not go to jail today and is negotiating to allow a judge to research how much her ex-husband is owed in music royalties.
"I think we've gotten to the heart of it," Wayne County Chief Family Court Judge Lita M. Popke said, vowing to complete the necessary documents in court today.
Popke ordered Baker to attend a contempt of court hearing this morning after she failed Thursday to explain why she hadn't followed orders to sign letters authorizing a court-appointed expert on music industry contracts to seek information from record companies about payments for the music she has written and performed.
Baker got her chance to speak under oath to the judge today, expressing her anxiety about being under the threat of jail.
"I just want to go home," said Baker, of Grosse Pointe.
"I want you to go home too," Popke told the eight-time Grammy Award winner.
Baker's 2008 divorce from Walter Bridgforth Jr. called for an even split of royalties from two albums made during the couple's 20-year marriage, "Giving You the Best I Got" in 1988 and "Rhythm of Love" in 1994.
Popke on Thursday said Baker has been uncooperative in an effort to establish how much Bridgeforth is owed. Detroit entertainment attorney Howard Hertz, who represents Eminem among other clients, was appointed by the judge as a music contract expert in an effort to settle the dispute.
When speaking to the judge, Baker pointed out objections to language that might be interpreted as a final decision about money owed to Bridgforth.
Although Baker signed similar letters of direction after her divorce, the new letters contain demands for "mechanical" royalties, or the inclusion of songs created during the marriage on more recent "best of" albums.
Baker objected to the judge that this is an area that wasn't negotiated in the divorce.
"I think I understand Ms. Baker's objection," Popke said before ordering Hertz to meet today with Baker to hammer out new language in the letters to music companies.
"Before you go into that meeting, I want you to understand it's not under the threat of jail or contempt. I am not going to hold you in contempt," the judge told Baker. "I don't want you to feel coerced."
Baker has complained that "experts" have dominated court proceedings since her divorce began in 2007. She has said she wanted to speak directly to the judge.
Much of the court file on Baker's divorce, including documents that detailed the financial settlement between the couple, was ordered sealed in 2007 by Judge Bill Callahan.
Newer documents pertaining to the fight over royalties indicate Baker in 2009 was receiving $200,000 a year from one of the several record companies with which she has held contracts.
Bridgforth has objected to accounting that claims, after expenses, that his half of the royalties from Atlantic and Rhino records amounted to $12,000 in 2009.
Baker's profits also were greatly reduced by production costs. The court file doesn't indicate what Baker has been paid by other sources, including music publishers BMI and ASCAP, and digital sales, satellite and Internet play.
Part of the package of agreed to documents includes a protective order that will keep secret all information discovered by Hertz from everyone but the court and the lawyers involved in the case.
Bridgforth didn't attend the hearings on Thursday or today.
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Michael Jackson Weekend - In August 2010!
www.post-trib.com/news/2070907,gjacksons0226.article
Jackson fans will gather in M'ville
February 26, 2010
MERRILLVILLE -- The world's Michael Jackson fans are invited to Northwest Indiana this summer to celebrate the King of Pop's humble beginnings over his birthday weekend, but they won't be staying in Gary to do it.
Tickets go on sale Monday for the inaugural "International King of Pop Fanvention," to be held at the Radisson Hotel at Star Plaza Aug. 26-29. The Radisson is billed as only "10 minutes away" from Jackson's childhood home.
Promoters are promising tours at the newly renovated Jackson home in Gary.
Gary-based Fluid Productions announced convention plans Thursday and the event is being billed as the only Jackson family-sanctioned event since he died last year.
Katherine Jackson, matriarch of the family is expected to appear at a March 9 to promote the event, said Karen Williams, one of the promoters.
Williams and her team approached the family in October with the idea, and she said they were receptive.
"We were going to do it regardless, but we invited them out of courtesy," Williams said Thursday. "Mrs. Jackson said this is the first event of any substance to come before them, and they were very open to it."
Most of the events held so far in places such as Europe have been one-day affairs with a lot of people crying and mourning his death, Jackson relayed to Williams.
"We've invited people like David Nordahl, who was Michael's personal portrait painter, and he'll talk about his friendship with him over the years," Williams said. "We're hoping he'll also bring some of the originals, but we're not sure yet."
Fans can also expect performances by a new generation of Jacksons: Genevieve Jackson, daughter of youngest son Randy, will perform at the birthday gala for Michael on Aug. 28.
Jackson impersonator Omer Michael Bhatti -- who lives with the Jacksons -- will teach the King of Pop's famous dance moves.
"It's going to be a really good weekend full of variety. Every Jackson fan will have something to do," Williams said.
The Fluid Productions team estimates as many as 12,000 people could descend upon Northwest Indiana for the event, bringing a significant surge in business.
Package sales for the entire weekend will start at 12 a.m. March 1, and tickets for individual events will be released in April
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It was on CNN!
You've been warned!
www.bipartisanpolicy.org/
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Reclaiming Black Identity: Mainstream and Black Media Still Have Work to Do
And How Marketers Can Gain by Filling This Need
 Pepper Miller |
Kenneth and Mamie Clark, legendary African-American psychologists, conducted experiments in the 1940's using dolls -- one white, one black -- to gain insight on racial perspectives. They asked black children a variety of questions about the two dolls and learned a majority of the children -- 63% -- said they'd rather play with the white doll and, in fact, favored the white doll's beauty and indicated the white doll was the better doll overall (good vs. bad).
In 2006, Kira Davis, a then 17-year-old filmmaker, brought attention to the issue of racial identity and the Clarks' experiment, when she won the Diversity Award for her documentary "A Girl Like Me," at the sixth annual Media That Matters Film Festival. Davis recreated the Clarks' experiment and the results mirrored the Clarks' findings. Davis then used the insights as the framework for her documentary, which included interviews with her peers about race, skin color and identity.
"Good Morning America" recently re-created the doll test among African-American girls and boys aged 5 to 9 for one of its three-part series, "Black and White Now."
GMA's results were somewhat better than the previous experiments, yet, "the surprise," according to GMA, "was that a majority of African-American girls said the white doll was the prettiest."
At the 2008, Marketing to Women Conference, Najoh Tita-Reid, former director of multicultural marketing for P&G and creator of the My Black is Beautiful Initiative explained that girls in general, begin looking to validate their beauty at a young age, but many African-American girls don't always find (enough) positive images of themselves in the media:
It was revealing that young African-American girls were recognizing that the culture had identified them as Black, and not mainstream beautiful. At that time, young Black girls, particularly dark skin girls, rarely saw images of themselves and recognized that the media had not affirmed the gamut of Black beauty.Many Blacks who have seen the doll test are quick to point the finger at mainstream media for promoting decades of stereotyping and other negative images. The Black America Study confirms this belief by reporting that only 29% of Black Americans strongly agree that mainstream is doing a good job of portraying Blacks in a positive light. However, the study also discloses that half (50%) say that they don't relate to the way Blacks are portrayed on most Black TV shows.
Leonard Pitts Jr., journalist for the Miami Herald, wrote about the doll tests and lambasted Black Americans' for contributions to their own negative self image in his article, Blacks Often Share Blame for Poor Self Image (Miami Herald, Sept. 18, 2006):
African Americans are, themselves, often the makers and gatekeepers. And under our aegis, the images have, in many ways, gotten worse. To surf the music video channels is to be immersed in black culture as conceived by a new generation, a lionization of pimps and gold diggers, hustlers and thugs who toss the N-word with a gusto that would do the Klan proud.In spite of Black socio-economic progress, Black America still has issues about skin color (light skin vs. dark skin), hair (good hair vs. bad hair), and racial heritage (mixed race vs. single race).
A new generation, afflicted with historical amnesia, blind indifference and a worship of filthy lucre, dances a metaphoric buck and wing, eyes rolling, yassuh bossing, selling itself out, selling its forebears out. Most of all, selling the children out.
The reality is the struggle of having to think about one's identity is still very real for many Blacks, especially bi-racial Blacks who are often pressured to "choose and declare." Additionally, the need to consciously or unconsciously think "Black first" is often equated with fighting the myth that being Black has less value than other races or cultures.
As creators and gatekeepers of images, the media and communications companies have an opportunity to effectively connect with Black Americans in a positive and compelling way by telling stories that have never been told. Think: the My Black is Beautiful initiative mentioned earlier; Commonground Marketing's successful Style Meets Substance campaign for Miller Genuine Draft which celebrates Black men's style, coming of age and their positive contributions to society; or the Tide with Downy commercial, where the image of the Black father lovingly stroking the back of his child who is napping on his chest, is viewed as a caring caretaker. According to the Tide brand team, that commercial helped generate the highest ROI over any Tide brand. Not all programs or advertising need be serious or sappy, but the question: How does this idea add value? should be an important component of the marketing strategy development when targeting Black and other underserved or undervalued segments.
~ ~ ~
Pepper Miller's address has changed. It is now pepper@huntermillergroup.com
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The term 'Negro'? Color it obsolete
When a website pointed out that 'Negro' was going to appear once more on the 2010 census, many blacks reacted with shock and distaste. They see it as a relic of the bad old days of segregation.
Opinion
The Census Bureau says it simply wants to ensure that everybody of color is counted, and that its meticulously vetted decision is based on the fact that more than 50,000 older blacks wrote in "Negro" on the last census, in 2000. But that purely scientific stance hasn't quelled the protests.
I get why. Though it was the accepted term until the late '60s, for those born after that, "Negro" is something they never answered to, a word that sounds only slightly less incendiary than "nigger." Even older blacks tend to use it ironically or sarcastically when they use it at all, as in: "Those Negroes just can't get it together." Its taint goes back to slavery, when Southerners paternalistically referred to even free blacks as "our Negroes." Contrast this unpleasantness with Barack Obama, who has established a 21st century standard of racial consideration that's figuring into just about every discussion of color these days. To blacks of all ages, "Negro" and President Obama sharing the same era just feels wrong -- maybe he isn't post-racial, but isn't he at least post-Negro?
This controversy may be new, but the angst about what to call ourselves is ancient. Over the last 40 years, we have self-identified as "black," "Afro-American" and "African American" in an attempt get out from under the subjugationrepresented by "Negro" and, before that, "colored." But the history of all this is hardly a straight line. "Black" is associated with '60s pride and power, but it was once considered derogatory and far less appropriate than "Negro," which evolved after emancipation into a relatively respectable term. "Lift Ev'ry Voice and Sing," the stirring James Weldon Johnson song that will be performed regularly during African American History Month -- or is it Black History Month? -- started out as the "Negro National Anthem."
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Jesse Jackson: Obama is the result of our struggles.
http://www.suntimes.com/chicago/know/2022150,CST-NWS-black01.article
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Jesse Jackson: Obama is the result of our struggles.
http://www.suntimes.com/chicago/know/2022150,CST-NWS-black01.article
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A bill to end major racial and ethnic disparities in drug sentencing is on the move in the Senate, and we need your help to pass it.
You may already know that there is an enormous disparity between the penalty for possession of crack cocaine and powder cocaine. According to a federal law passed in 1986, a person must possess 500 grams of powder cocaine before they are subject to the same mandatory 5-year prison sentence as an individual convicted of possessing just 5 grams of crack cocaine, despite the fact that, pharmacologically, the two drugs are identical.
This 100 to 1 ratio has had a devastating impact on African American and Hispanic communities.
Authorities estimate that more than 66% of those who use crack cocaine are white. Yet in 2006, 82% of those convicted and sentenced under federal crack cocaine laws were African American. When you add in Hispanics, the percentage climbs to above 96%
To correct this, Senator Richard Durbin (IL) has introduced S. 1789, the Fair Sentencing Act of 2009. S. 1789 may get a hearing in the US Senate as early as next Thursday. Click here to send a letter to your Senators today.
The US Sentencing Commission, the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers and a wide range of civil rights organizations have voiced their opposition to the crack cocaine sentencing disparities and mandatory minimum sentences. President Obama, Vice President Biden, and Attorney General Holder have all expressed their strong support for eliminating this glaring--and racially dubious--injustice.
Please, send a letter to your Senators today. Tell them it's time to end the crack cocaine/powder cocaine sentencing disparity.
Sincerely,
Ben Jealous
Benjamin Todd Jealous
President and CEO
NAACP
PS: For more information on our criminal justice programs, pleae visit the NAACP Criminal Justice Action Center.
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BlackDoctor.org celebrates Black History Month
The State of Black Health
| BlackDoctor.org – The State of Black Health Earlier this year, President Barack Obama delivered his very first state of the union address, and in one of his key points, he addressed the need for the United States to resume its leadership role in helping cure the global economy. Similarly, African Americans have arrived at a challenging crossroads in health, and are still battling preventable diseases and conditions in shockingly disproportionate numbers. But BlackDoctor.org, (BDO) is addressing this need. Right on time for the Black History Month celebration, BDO is planning some exciting things to help highlight some of the top achievements in African American medical history, and to identify what steps we need to take next. The below timeline chronicles the road of African American healthcare – what we’ve done, what we’re doing now, and what we’ll be up to in future to achieve the ultimate goal: happier, healthier lives!
1721 - Onesimus, an enslaved African, describes to Cotton Mather, an influential American writer and religious leader, the African method of inoculation against smallpox. This technique, later used to protect American Revolutionary War soldiers, is perfected in the 1790's by British doctor Edward Jenner's in the use of a less virulent organism. 1783 - Dr. James Durham, born into slavery in 1762, buys his freedom and begins his own medical practice in New Orleans, becoming the first “colored” doctor in the United States. As a youngster, he was owned by a number of doctors, who taught him how to read and write, mix medicines, and serve and work with patients. Durham had a flourishing medical practice in New Orleans until 1801, when the city restricted his practice because he did not have a formal medical degree. 1788 - Dr. James Durham is invited to Philadelphia to meet Dr. Benjamin Rush, who wanted to investigate Durham's reported success in treating patients with diphtheria. Dr. Rush, a signer of the Declaration of Independence and one of America's foremost physicians, was so impressed that he personally read Durham's paper on diphtheria before the College of Physicians of Philadelphia. Durham returned to New Orleans in 1789, where he saved more yellow fever victims than any other physician - during an epidemic that killed thousands, he lost 11 of 64 patients. 1837 - Dr. James McCune Smith graduates from the University of Glasgow, becoming the first “colored” person to earn a medical degree. 1852 - The Jackson Street Hospital, in Augusta, GA, is established as the first institution of record solely for the care of “colored” patients. The founders were a group of charitable minded whites led by Dr. Henry Fraser Campbell of the University of Georgia School of Medicine. There was no “colored” staff in this three story structure, which housed fifty beds, operating quarters, and a lecture hall. 1862 - Freedmen's Hospital is established in Washington, D.C., and is the only federally-funded health care facility for “colored” people in the nation.
1864 - Dr. Rebecca Lee Crumpler, the first “colored” female to earn a medical degree, graduates from New England Female Medical College, Boston. 1867 - Robert Tanner Freeman, born in 1847 to slave parents in North Carolina, is one of the first six graduates in dental medicine from Harvard University, thus becoming the first “colored” man to receive an education in dentistry and a dental degree from an American medical school. 1868 - Howard University School of Medicine is established in Washington, D.C. to educate “colored” doctors. Notably, the school welcomes both “Negro” and white students, including women. 1878 - Dr. James Francis Shober earns his M.D. from Howard University School of Medicine and later becomes the first known “colored” physician with a medical degree to practice in North Carolina. 1879 - Mary Eliza Mahoney becomes the first professional “colored” nurse, graduating from the New England Hospital for Women and Children (Now the Dimock Community Health Center) in Boston. 1881 - The first school of record for “colored” student nurses is established at Spelman College in Atlanta. 1891 - Dr. Daniel Hale Williams establishes the Provident Hospital and Training School for Nurses in Chicago, the first “colored”-owned and first interracial hospital in the United States. Dr. Austin Maurice Curtis, Sr. (a Raleigh native) becomes the hospital's first intern. 1893 - Dr. Daniel Hale Williams performs the first successful operation on a human heart at Provident Hospital. The patient, a victim of a chest stab wound, survived and lived a normal life for twenty years after the operation. 1895 - The National Medical Association is founded in Atlanta, GA, since “colored” people are barred from other established medical groups.
1900 - The Washington Society of Colored Dentists, the first organization of “colored” dentists, is founded in Washington, D.C. 1901 - Dr. Aaron McDuffie Moore convinces Washington Duke to donate money for the construction of Lincoln Hospital in Durham, NC. 1904 - Alois Alzheimer selects five foreign visiting students at the Royal Psychiatric Hospital, University of Munich, as his graduate research assistants, including black Dr. Solomon Carter Fuller. After leaving Germany in 1906, Fuller continued his research on degenerative disorders of the brain and was a widely published pioneer in Alzheimer's disease research. At the time of his death in 1953, the only acknowledgment of his Fuller's work was an Honorary Doctor of Science Degree awarded in 1943 by his alma mater, Livingstone College, Salisbury, NC. 1908 - The National Association of Colored Graduate Nurses (NACGN) is established. (NACGN was dissolved in 1951, when its members voted to merge with the American Nurses Association). 1912 - Dr. Solomon Carter Fuller, recognized by the American Psychiatric Association as the country's first “Negro” psychiatrist, publishes the first comprehensive clinical review of all Alzheimer's cases that have been reported up to this time. He was the first to translate into English much of Alois Alzheimer's work on the disease. 1915 - The NAACP awards Dr. Ernest E. Just the first Springarn Medal for his pioneering research on fertilization and cell division. 1917 - In Camp Upton, NY, Dr. Louis T. Wright, a pioneer in clinical antibiotic research, develops a better technique (intradermal injection) for vaccinating soldiers against smallpox. 1921 - Dr. Meta L. Christy, a graduate of the Philadelphia College of Osteopathic Medicine, becomes the world's first “Negro” osteopathic physician. 1927 - Dr. William Augustus Hinton develops the Hinton Test for diagnosing syphilis in Boston, MA. (He later develops an improved version, the Hinton-Davies Test, in 1931). 1936 - Dr. William Augustus Hinton's book, Syphilis and Its Treatment, is the first medical textbook written by a Negro to be published. 1938 - Sara Delaney's article Bibliotherapy in a Hospital is published in the February issue of Opportunity magazine. (Delaney, chief librarian at the U.S. Veteran's Administration Hospital in Tuskegee, Alabama, was a pioneer in the use of selected reading to aid in the treatment of patients). 1940 - Dr. Charles R. Drew presents his thesis, "Banked Blood," at Columbia-Presbyterian Medical Center in New York. The thesis covers two years of blood research, including the discovery that plasma could replace whole blood transfusions. 1944 - A group of “Negro” medics land on Utah Beach/Normandy on D-Day + 4, as part of a nine-person, all-“Negro” team of medics, which included two officers. Serving with the 687th and the 530th Medical Detachments, they spent most of the rest of the European campaign attached to the 3rd Army while participating in many of its major actions. 1950 - Dr. Helen O. Dickens becomes the first “Negro” woman admitted to the American College of Surgeons. 1954 - Dr. Peter Murray Marshall is installed as the President of the New York County Medical Society, becoming the first “Negro” to lead a unit of the American Medical Association. 1964 - Dr. Geraldine Pittman Woods becomes the first black woman appointed to the National Advisory General Medical Services Council. In this position, she addressed the need to improve science education and research opportunities at minority institutions. 1967 - Dr. Jane C. Wright, pioneer in chemotherapy research and daughter of Dr. Louis T. Wright (see 1917), is appointed an Associate Dean and Professor of Surgery at New York Medical College – at the time, the highest post ever attained by a black woman in medical administration.
1969 - Alfred Day Hershey, PhD., geneticist, becomes the first Black American to share a Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine. He received the award for his research on the replication and genetic structure of viruses. 1975 - Morehouse School of Medicine, Atlanta, GA, is the only black medical school founded in the United States during the 20th century. Since its establishment, the school has sent more than 700 doctors, mostly black, to provide health care in impoverished parts of the country, especially to poorer black communities where access to medical care has traditionally been in short supply. Dr. Louis Sullivan, who became the first dean and president of Morehouse School of Medicine, is also noted as the first black male to head the Department of Health & Human Services. 1978 - Dr. LaSalle D. Leffall becomes the first black President of the American Cancer Society. 1987 - Dr. Ben Carson, neurosurgeon, leads a seventy-member surgical team at Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, MD in the separation of Siamese twins joined at the cranium. 1990 - Dr. Marilyn Hughes Gaston becomes the first female and first African American to direct a public health service bureau: the Bureau of Primary Health Care in the United States Department of Health and Human Services. Her 1986 study of sickle-cell disease led to a nationwide screening program to test newborns for immediate treatment. 1991 - Dr. Vivian Pinn is the first female and first African-American woman to be appointed Director of the Office of Research on Women's Health for the National Institutes of Health, which oversees research on women and insures that they are represented in broad clinical trials. 1992 - Dr. Mae C. Jemison, the first African American female astronaut in NASA history, becomes the first black woman in space, as part of SPACELAB J, a successful joint U.S. and Japanese science mission. A graduate of Cornell University Medical School, Jemison served in the Peace Corps as its area medical officer, from 1983 to 1985, in the West African countries of Sierra Leone and Liberia. 1993 - Dr. Edward S. Cooper is the first African American elected as National President of the American Heart Association. Dr. Barbara Ross-Lee is the first African-American woman to be appointed dean of a U.S. medical school (Ohio University College of Osteopathic Medicine).
1994 - Reginald Ware publishes Heart & Soul magazine, which is the nation’s first healthy lifestyle magazine for African Americans. 1995 - Dr. Helene Doris Gayle is the first female and first African-American Director of the National Center for HIV, STD, and TB Prevention for the U.S. Centers for Disease Control. 1996 - Dr. Ernest E. Just is recognized for his contributions to the biological sciences with a commemorative U.S. Postal Service stamp. 1997 - Dr. Donna Christian-Christensen is the first female and first African-American female physician in the U.S. Congress.
1998 - Dr. David Satcher is sworn in as both the Assistant Secretary for Health and U.S. Surgeon General. 2000 - Dr. Sharon Henry is the first African-American woman to be elected into membership as a fellow in the American Association for the Surgery of Trauma.
2010: BlackDoctor.org pledges to make 2010 the “Healthiest Year Ever” by continuing to be a healthy lifestyle leader, by providing culturally specific screening guidelines, dispelling myths about Black health, and identifying the needs of the black community. Derrick Lane |
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A message from the President Of the United States!
On Tuesday, a catastrophic earthquake struck near Port-au-Prince, Haiti. The full extent of the damage is still being assessed, but the death toll -- already in the thousands -- is climbing fast.
This is the worst earthquake to hit the area in more than 200 years. Entire communities have been ripped apart and as many as 3 million people have been directly affected, including tens of thousands of American citizens who are in Haiti.
Our neighbors in Haiti are racing to confront the enormous devastation -- and the OFA community can help.
Click here for more information about essential relief efforts and ways you can help today.
Footage is pouring in of homes collapsing, Haitians carrying injured family members, and hospitals being overrun in what was already the poorest nation in the Western Hemisphere.
I have directed my administration to respond with a swift, coordinated, and aggressive effort to save lives. Personnel from the United States and our partners in the international community are on the ground in damaged areas right now, working side by side with the Haitian people. They're providing much-needed food, water, and sanitation supplies, saving lives and helping local communities start to rebuild.
Despite the fact that we are experiencing tough times here at home, I encourage those who can to reach out and help. It's in times like these that we must show the kind of compassion and humanity that has defined the best of our national character for generations.
Click here to find out what you can do:
http://my.barackobama.com/Haiti
As this story continues to unfold, I hope you will continue to keep the people of Haiti in your thoughts and prayers, as well as the many Haitian-Americans who have done so much to enrich our country and who are worried about friends and loved ones in this time of need.
Thank you,
President Barack Obama
Please see these photos!
http://www.higherlearningnetwork.org/6.html
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If you see this shirt do not buy it.
Whoever thought of this t-shirt expects us as Christians to purchase the shirt and not read the scripture. Let’s prove them wrong……………..READ THE SCRIPTURE…………DO NOT PURCHASE THE SHIRT!!!
It reads:
Pray for Obama Psalm 109:8
King James VersionPsalm 109.8
8Let his days be few; and let another take his office.
But the verse immediately following the psalm referenced is a bit more ominous: “Let his children be fatherless, and his wife a widow.”
Please don't buy this t-shirt: I would not wish or pray this on any Leader |
PLEASE FORWARD THIS ON
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Text Messages:
Digital Lipstick on the Collar
There is a question that has crossed the mind recently of anyone who has sent a cellphone text message while cheating on a spouse: What was I thinking?
Text messages are the new lipstick on the collar, the mislaid credit card bill. Instantaneous and seemingly casual, they can be confirmation of a clandestine affair, a record of the not-so-discreet who sometimes forget that everything digital leaves a footprint.
This became painfully obvious a week ago when a woman who claims to have had an affair with Tiger Woods told a celebrity publication that he had sent her flirty text messages, some of which were published. It follows on the heels of politicians who ran afoul of text I.Q., including a former Detroit mayor who went to prison after his steamy text messages to an aide were revealed, and Senator John Ensign of Nevada, whose affair with a former employee was confirmed by an incriminating text message.
Unlike earlier eras when a dalliance might be suspected but not confirmed, nowadays text messages provide proof. Divorce lawyers say they have seen an increase in cases in the past year where a wronged spouse has offered text messages to show that a partner has strayed. The American Bar Association began offering seminars this fall for marital attorneys on how to use electronic evidence — text messages, browsing history and social networks — in proving a case.
“How does someone make up an excuse when what is happening is right there, written in black and white?” asked Mitchell Karpf, a Miami divorce lawyer who is also chairman of the bar association’s family law section. “By the time someone shows up with a handful of texts, there is no going back.”
Although most e-mail users have come to understand that messages remain on their computers even if deleted, text messages are often regarded as more ephemeral — type, hit “send” and off it goes into the ether. But messages can remain on the sender’s and receiver’s phones, and even if they are deleted, communications companies store them for anywhere from days to a few weeks. AT&T said that, at most, it saved text messages for 72 hours while Verizon said it saved them for 5 to 10 days.
Lawyers expect the number of cases to grow as younger cellphone users, who are more likely to text than talk, marry. Text messages now outnumber mobile voice calls three to one, according to the Nielsen Company. Monthly messages sent or received jumped to 584 a person in the quarter ending in September, a 60 percent increase from a year earlier.
At the root of the issue is privacy — or rather the increasing lack of it in our show-and-tell digital culture. Text messages are considered private, much as telephone calls are, legal experts say. But if a cheating spouse’s cellphone is part of a family calling plan or regularly left unlocked and unattended on the dinner table or night stand, it is conceivable that a partner who suspects infidelity could make a case for sifting through the in-box.
“People who have something really private to say probably shouldn’t do it in a text on their cellphone,” said Marc Rotenberg, executive director of the Electronic Privacy Information Center, a public interest research group based in Washington.
In Mr. Woods’s case, Jaimee Grubbs, who has worked as a cocktail waitress, came forward with text messages that she said were from Mr. Woods once he was rumored to be having marital problems after he slammed his car into a fire hydrant and a tree on Thanksgiving. Since then, several other women have said they, too, slept with Mr. Woods. He has said in a statement only that he was sorry for his “transgressions” and asked that his family be left alone.
“Personal sins should not require press releases, and problems within a family shouldn’t have to mean public confessions,” Mr. Woods said.
Others, like Kwame Kilpatrick, the former mayor of Detroit, were found out because they used government-issued mobile phones and pagers. Mr. Kilpatrick lied under oath about having an affair with an aide, but his text messages revealed the truth. Nevada’s governor, Jim Gibbons, was accused last spring by his wife in divorce documents of sending more than 800 text messages to a mistress in 2007. He contended that the woman was a friend, but he paid the state $130 for the messages from his phone.
What is more common, though, is suspicion followed up by a confrontation. Doug Hampton, a longtime friend and employee of Senator Ensign’s, said recently on the ABC show “Nightline” that he was alarmed after he had borrowed Mr. Ensign’s cellphone in late 2007 to call his wife, Cynthia Hampton, and found her listed as “Aunt Judy.” Mr. Hampton said he found an incriminating text message and confronted the pair about their affair at a Christmas dinner soon after.
In a recent survey of 2,300 adults about social networking, the Pew Internet and American Life Project found that 12 percent said they had shared information online that they later regretted posting. Posting on a social network is not the same as sending a text message. But Lee Rainie, director of the Pew project, contends it is evidence of an overall cultural shift in which people have become increasingly careless about revealing personal information they cannot take back.
“It is one thing to write a personal note to someone who shares it with her two best friends,” said Mr. Rainie. “It is another thing to text your undying affection and become a laughingstock. What feels intimate and anonymous at the time, perhaps, really isn’t. It can be shared widely.”
Sherry Turkle, a professor and researcher at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, has studied interaction with technology for more than two decades. Unlike with computers, Professor Turkle said, consumers have a deeply personal connection to their cellphones, where they keep contact lists and family photos. “They carry them in their pockets,” she said, “next to their skin.”
One woman Professor Turkle spoke to for a study was so grief-stricken after she had misplaced her cellphone that she described the loss as a death. “People feel it is an extension of their body and mind,” the professor said, but, she added: “Like Peter Pan, we do not see our electronic shadow until it is pointed out to us. We assume it is not there.”
Proving adultery is not the only value of a text message to a divorce lawyer. Last year Mr. Karpf, the lawyer from Miami, represented a husband whose wife was seeking sole custody of their child. The wife claimed the husband had left her and the child. He countered, saying he left because she was physically abusive. She denied it until Mr. Karpf produced several text messages the wife sent her husband apologizing for her inappropriate behavior. “She set up the whole case for me,” Mr. Karpf said.
Robert Stephan Cohen, the lawyer who represented Christie Brinkley in her divorce from Peter Cook, said a spouse’s finding out about a cheating partner by reading their personal text messages would have a profound effect on how such cases were played out, both in court and among friends and family. Mr. Cohen predicted that the battles in even the most routine divorces would become uglier with more text messages as evidence.
“It’s much different than rumor running around about a husband at dinner with a babe in the back booth,” he said. “It’s in the spouse’s face. They read it over and over again. It’s harsh and hurtful.”
archives
Please -Beware of Your Surroundings!
From an N'Spirational Conversations Reader:
Good Afternoon to all my friends. This is from someone who is reliable
Please be careful….. pass it on. It is true!
Good Monday Morning!
I wanted to let you know about the incident that happen to me this past
weekend.
I was car jacked at Walgreens, 87th & Stony Island early Sunday morning
in the parking lot. Thank God the security camera did catch the
footgage, and hopefully the jerk will be caught. The security guard
and clerk in Walgreens heard me screaming to the top of my lungs, and
ran outside to help me. There was a delay in 911 answering the call,
but they did show up in about 8 minutes later.
I'm fine, just a little bruised and sore. I'm angry, but grateful that
I'm here to share the information with you. I'm typically very careful
about my surrounds, and know that God walks with me, It's
quite obvious. The guy came from behind and pushed me to the ground,
took the keys out of my hand, jumped in the car and pulled off. I was
right at the car door when he pushed me down. We believe he was hiding
behind somewhere.
I have been going to this particular Walgreens for the past 30 years,
all hours of the day and night. I grew up in the community, and use to
feel semi-safe. Usually, the police/under cover cops are in the lot or
hanging out on 87th Street, but not this time.
I want to make sure everyone knows about this, please pass this email
along to your friends and family. With the holidays approaching us,
it's about to really get crazy out here.
Meanwhile, we are still waiting to hear from the Police about my mom's
car:
2004 Mecury Sable 4 door, Champaign color, License plate #9146620
Our neighbor who has the same car, different color, was car jacked
about 2 months ago on 91st & Vincennes at about 3pm in the afternoon.
This happened to a man, getting off from work. No one is safe.
Continue to walk with Christ and make sure you pray everyday, make it a
habit.
archives
In Job Hunt, College Degree
Can’t Close Racial Gap
By MICHAEL LUO
Johnny R. Williams, 30, would appear to be an unlikely person to have to fret about the impact of race on his job search, with companies like JPMorgan Chase and an M.B.A. from the University of Chicago on his résumé.
But after graduating from business school last year and not having much success garnering interviews, he decided to retool his résumé, scrubbing it of any details that might tip off his skin color. His membership, for instance, in the African-American business students association? Deleted.
“If they’re going to X me,” Mr. Williams said, “I’d like to at least get in the door first.”
Similarly, Barry Jabbar Sykes, 37, who has a degree in mathematics from Morehouse College, a historically black college in Atlanta, now uses Barry J. Sykes in his continuing search for an information technology position, even though he has gone by Jabbar his whole life.
“Barry sounds like I could be from Ireland,” he said.
That race remains a serious obstacle in the job market for African-Americans, even those with degrees from respected colleges, may seem to some people a jarring contrast to decades of progress by blacks, culminating in President Obama’s election.
But there is ample evidence that racial inequities remain when it comes to employment. Black joblessness has long far outstripped that of whites. And strikingly, the disparity for the first 10 months of this year, as the recession has dragged on, has been even more pronounced for those with college degrees, compared with those without. Education, it seems, does not level the playing field — in fact, it appears to have made it more uneven.
College-educated black men, especially, have struggled relative to their white counterparts in this downturn, according to figures from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The unemployment rate for black male college graduates 25 and older in 2009 has been nearly twice that of white male college graduates — 8.4 percent compared with 4.4 percent.
Various academic studies have confirmed that black job seekers have a harder time than whites. A study published several years ago in The American Economic Review titled “Are Emily and Greg More Employable than Lakisha and Jamal?” found that applicants with black-sounding names received 50 percent fewer callbacks than those with white-sounding names.
A more recent study, published this year in The Journal of Labor Economics found white, Asian and Hispanic managers tended to hire more whites and fewer blacks than black managers did.
The discrimination is rarely overt, according to interviews with more than two dozen college-educated black job seekers around the country, many of them out of work for months. Instead, those interviewed told subtler stories, referring to surprised looks and offhand comments, interviews that fell apart almost as soon as they began, and the sudden loss of interest from companies after meetings.
Whether or not each case actually involved bias, the possibility has furnished an additional agonizing layer of second-guessing for many as their job searches have dragged on.
“It does weigh on you in the search because you’re wondering, how much is race playing a factor in whether I’m even getting a first call, or whether I’m even getting an in-person interview once they hear my voice and they know I’m probably African-American?” said Terelle Hairston, 25, a graduate of Yale University who has been looking for work since the summer while also trying to get a marketing consulting start-up off the ground. “You even worry that the hiring manager may not be as interested in diversity as the H.R. manager or upper management.”
Mr. Williams recently applied to a Dallas money management firm that had posted a position with top business schools. The hiring manager had seemed ecstatic to hear from him, telling him they had trouble getting people from prestigious business schools to move to the area. Mr. Williams had left New York and moved back in with his parents in Dallas to save money.
But when Mr. Williams later met two men from the firm for lunch, he said they appeared stunned when he strolled up to introduce himself.
“Their eyes kind of hit the ceiling a bit,” he said. “It was kind of quiet for about 45 seconds.”
The company’s interest in him quickly cooled, setting off the inevitable questions in his mind.
Discrimination in many cases may not even be intentional, some job seekers pointed out, but simply a matter of people gravitating toward similar people, casting about for the right “cultural fit,” a buzzword often heard in corporate circles.
There is also the matter of how many jobs, especially higher-level ones, are never even posted and depend on word-of-mouth and informal networks, in many cases leaving blacks at a disadvantage. A recent study published in the academic journal Social Problems found that white males receive substantially more job leads for high-level supervisory positions than women and members of minorities.
Many interviewed, however, wrestled with “pulling the race card,” groping between their cynicism and desire to avoid the stigma that blacks are too quick to claim victimhood. After all, many had gone to good schools and had accomplished résumés. Some had grown up in well-to-do settings, with parents who had raised them never to doubt how high they could climb. Moreover, there is President Obama, perhaps the ultimate embodiment of that belief.
Certainly, they conceded, there are times when their race can be beneficial, particularly with companies that have diversity programs. But many said they sensed that such opportunities had been cut back over the years and even more during the downturn. Others speculated there was now more of a tendency to deem diversity unnecessary after Mr. Obama’s triumph.
In fact, whether Mr. Obama’s election has been good or bad for their job prospects is hotly debated. Several interviewed went so far as to say that they believed there was only so much progress that many in the country could take, and that there was now a backlash against blacks.
“There is resentment toward his presidency among some because of his race,” said Edward Verner, a Morehouse alumnus from New Jersey who was laid off as a regional sales manager and has been able to find only part-time work. “This has affected well-educated, African-American job seekers.”
It is difficult to overstate the degree that they say race permeates nearly every aspect of their job searches, from how early they show up to interviews to the kinds of anecdotes they try to come up with.
“You want to be a nonthreatening, professional black guy,” said Winston Bell, 40, of Cleveland, who has been looking for a job in business development.
He drew an analogy to several prominent black sports broadcasters. “You don’t want to be Stephen A. Smith. You want to be Bryant Gumbel. You don’t even want to be Stuart Scott. You don’t want to be, ‘Booyah.’ ”
Nearly all said they agonized over job applications that asked them whether they would like to identify their race. Most said they usually did not.
But after graduating from business school last year and not having much success garnering interviews, he decided to retool his résumé, scrubbing it of any details that might tip off his skin color. His membership, for instance, in the African-American business students association? Deleted.
“If they’re going to X me,” Mr. Williams said, “I’d like to at least get in the door first.”
Similarly, Barry Jabbar Sykes, 37, who has a degree in mathematics from Morehouse College, a historically black college in Atlanta, now uses Barry J. Sykes in his continuing search for an information technology position, even though he has gone by Jabbar his whole life.
“Barry sounds like I could be from Ireland,” he said.
That race remains a serious obstacle in the job market for African-Americans, even those with degrees from respected colleges, may seem to some people a jarring contrast to decades of progress by blacks, culminating in President Obama’s election.
But there is ample evidence that racial inequities remain when it comes to employment. Black joblessness has long far outstripped that of whites. And strikingly, the disparity for the first 10 months of this year, as the recession has dragged on, has been even more pronounced for those with college degrees, compared with those without. Education, it seems, does not level the playing field — in fact, it appears to have made it more uneven.
College-educated black men, especially, have struggled relative to their white counterparts in this downturn, according to figures from the Bureau of Labor Statistics. The unemployment rate for black male college graduates 25 and older in 2009 has been nearly twice that of white male college graduates — 8.4 percent compared with 4.4 percent.
Various academic studies have confirmed that black job seekers have a harder time than whites. A study published several years ago in The American Economic Review titled “Are Emily and Greg More Employable than Lakisha and Jamal?” found that applicants with black-sounding names received 50 percent fewer callbacks than those with white-sounding names.
A more recent study, published this year in The Journal of Labor Economics found white, Asian and Hispanic managers tended to hire more whites and fewer blacks than black managers did.
The discrimination is rarely overt, according to interviews with more than two dozen college-educated black job seekers around the country, many of them out of work for months. Instead, those interviewed told subtler stories, referring to surprised looks and offhand comments, interviews that fell apart almost as soon as they began, and the sudden loss of interest from companies after meetings.
Whether or not each case actually involved bias, the possibility has furnished an additional agonizing layer of second-guessing for many as their job searches have dragged on.
“It does weigh on you in the search because you’re wondering, how much is race playing a factor in whether I’m even getting a first call, or whether I’m even getting an in-person interview once they hear my voice and they know I’m probably African-American?” said Terelle Hairston, 25, a graduate of Yale University who has been looking for work since the summer while also trying to get a marketing consulting start-up off the ground. “You even worry that the hiring manager may not be as interested in diversity as the H.R. manager or upper management.”
Mr. Williams recently applied to a Dallas money management firm that had posted a position with top business schools. The hiring manager had seemed ecstatic to hear from him, telling him they had trouble getting people from prestigious business schools to move to the area. Mr. Williams had left New York and moved back in with his parents in Dallas to save money.
But when Mr. Williams later met two men from the firm for lunch, he said they appeared stunned when he strolled up to introduce himself.
“Their eyes kind of hit the ceiling a bit,” he said. “It was kind of quiet for about 45 seconds.”
The company’s interest in him quickly cooled, setting off the inevitable questions in his mind.
Discrimination in many cases may not even be intentional, some job seekers pointed out, but simply a matter of people gravitating toward similar people, casting about for the right “cultural fit,” a buzzword often heard in corporate circles.
There is also the matter of how many jobs, especially higher-level ones, are never even posted and depend on word-of-mouth and informal networks, in many cases leaving blacks at a disadvantage. A recent study published in the academic journal Social Problems found that white males receive substantially more job leads for high-level supervisory positions than women and members of minorities.
Many interviewed, however, wrestled with “pulling the race card,” groping between their cynicism and desire to avoid the stigma that blacks are too quick to claim victimhood. After all, many had gone to good schools and had accomplished résumés. Some had grown up in well-to-do settings, with parents who had raised them never to doubt how high they could climb. Moreover, there is President Obama, perhaps the ultimate embodiment of that belief.
Certainly, they conceded, there are times when their race can be beneficial, particularly with companies that have diversity programs. But many said they sensed that such opportunities had been cut back over the years and even more during the downturn. Others speculated there was now more of a tendency to deem diversity unnecessary after Mr. Obama’s triumph.
In fact, whether Mr. Obama’s election has been good or bad for their job prospects is hotly debated. Several interviewed went so far as to say that they believed there was only so much progress that many in the country could take, and that there was now a backlash against blacks.
“There is resentment toward his presidency among some because of his race,” said Edward Verner, a Morehouse alumnus from New Jersey who was laid off as a regional sales manager and has been able to find only part-time work. “This has affected well-educated, African-American job seekers.”
It is difficult to overstate the degree that they say race permeates nearly every aspect of their job searches, from how early they show up to interviews to the kinds of anecdotes they try to come up with.
“You want to be a nonthreatening, professional black guy,” said Winston Bell, 40, of Cleveland, who has been looking for a job in business development.
He drew an analogy to several prominent black sports broadcasters. “You don’t want to be Stephen A. Smith. You want to be Bryant Gumbel. You don’t even want to be Stuart Scott. You don’t want to be, ‘Booyah.’ ”
Nearly all said they agonized over job applications that asked them whether they would like to identify their race. Most said they usually did not.
ARCHIVES
archives
Using the Web to adjust the color on TV
Minorities find a warm reception through online channels
By DeNeen L. Brown
Sunday, November 15, 2009
A black superwoman appears on your laptop in shimmering blue tights, green socks and a midnight blue cape. Her hair in Afro puffs, she is sitting on a promenade bench. She looks worried and a bit worn out. Her makeup is smeared, probably from crying.
She tells us she has just caught her boyfriend with a "second-rate superhero." The nerve of him.
The woman, who identifies herself as Fantastica, climbs a railing on a ledge several stories aboveground.
She holds tight to the rail behind her, breathes deeply, then announces dramatically: "Death over dishonor." And lets go.
You shout at your computer: Girl, don't go out like that over a man.
The camera shifts. You see her falling, slo-mo.
The screen goes black, and already you are hooked to this webisode series "Chick." You haven't yet decided whether you like the character, but you identify with her -- that torment of being on a ledge, fuming. You want to know what happens next.
An agitated voice-over explains: "Have you ever thought you were meant to be someone great like a superhero?"
Los Angeles actress Kai Soremekun created the black superwoman series, but decided not to shop the screenplay to any cable channels or networks. Instead she persuaded friends to shoot and produce the low-budget series gratis.
When it was done, Soremekun posted the "Chick" trailer on Facebook and the miniseries was picked up by Rowdy Orbit, a Web-based network for "culturally relevant" short films created by minorities.
In one superwoman leap, Soremekun skipped even trying to shop the series to a broadcast or cable television studio.
The Web gave her the freedom to fly creatively, she says. How many black female superheroes are on television now? How many black women are writing their own scripts, controlling their own stories, weaving in metaphors about black women in real life who need to be superheroes just to survive?
"In terms of black projects in the studio system, they have been much more cookie-cutter," says Soremekun, a seasoned Hollywood actress, who plays the superwoman herself. "On the Web, you can explore other ideas. "
* * *
Web television has been around since the '90s, but in the past year edgy new shows by, for and about minorities are proliferating on the Internet. Many of the new series take the form of webisodes -- episodes that usually last about five minutes, aimed at the short-attention spans of the all-mighty Millennium Generation.
"You can look at this as revolutionary," says Jonathan Moore, founder and CEO of Rowdy Orbit, which was launched in February. "It is giving people a voice and a platform to express themselves without judgment or red tape holding you down. Now they can go from idea to production to distribution."
For years, minority writers, producers and actors have complained about the lack of diversity on television. Last year, the NAACP Hollywood bureau criticized a "virtual whiteout" in broadcast television. "At a time when the country is excited about the election of the first African American president in U.S. history, it is unthinkable that minorities would be so grossly underrepresented on broadcast television," NAACP President Benjamin Todd Jealous said in a statement.
Robert Thompson, a white professor of popular culture at Syracuse University, says the lack of diversity in programming is counterintuitive, given the breakthrough success of programs such as "Roots" and "The Cosby Show." "The general politics of people who run television may have at some point been close to admitting diversity and people of color, but the fact remains when the NAACP did its report, the results were shocking," says Thompson.
"We are not a country that has suddenly solved race problems," he says. "Even people who think of themselves as forward-thinking and supporting diversity -- 'Oh, my best friend is black' -- won't watch certain shows. Not because they are consciously racist or don't want to see black people on television, but they tend to move away from those shows."
But other factors also lie behind the jump to the Web. One is generational. Just like mainstream broadcast and cable executives, minority players also view the Web as a tool to draw the viewers under 30 sought by advertisers. Research shows that many younger viewers want quicker story lines and characters that don't take too much time to understand and they want them on demand, with the freedom to pause and replay.
Advances in technology have also lowered the bar for those without deep pockets. "Everybody and his grandma can be a filmmaker now," says Paula Matabane, professor of television and film at Howard University.
Web sites dedicated to hosting independent webisodes by and about people of color are emerging. Aside from RowdyOrbit.com, entertainer and entrepreneur Percy Miller, a.k.a. Master P, announced plans to launch Better Black Television next year. Miller says the network will provide family-friendly shows, including shows on fitness, financial planning, sitcoms, dramas and "responsible hip-hop music and videos."
"With BBTV, we're spearheading the initiative to meet consumer demand for family-friendly hip-hop content," Miller said in a statement.
BET.com has also entered the fray with the launch earlier this month of "Buppies," its first original scripted Web drama. The show revolves around Quinci, the socialite daughter of a Hollywood celebrity, and follows Quinci's relationship dramas as she and her friends "navigate L.A.'s young black power elite." The series stars actress Tatyana Ali, who played Ashley Banks, the cousin of Will Smith's character in "The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air."
Denmark West, president of digital media at BET.com, says that although the show's core audience likely will be African American, they are hoping it will have broader appeal, perhaps following in the steps of crossover shows like "The Cosby Show" and "The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air."
"Tatyana Ali is actually an alumna of one of the case studies which is 'Fresh Prince,' an all-African American cast that had mainstream appeal," West says.
"Buppies," which is being promoted on BET Network, is targeted at a young adult audience 18 to 34, skewing slightly more toward women. "Why online as opposed to with the network?" West says. "It's an opportunity to provide original content for the Web . . . and to see what kind of online audience we can attract."
* * *
For many minority players who feel stifled by the entertainment industry, the ability to skip Hollywood and go directly to the Internet is an option made in heaven. "The Internet . . . not only covers black filmmakers but everybody who is looking for an outlet . . . because it bypasses the system," says Thompson.
Moore, a former advertising copywriter, decided to create Rowdy Orbit after seeing the "frustration of a lot of television directors of color who were not receiving opportunities to do good stuff with top-tier clients."
In February, Moore incorporated Rowdy Orbit and so far, he says, the audience has grown to about 2,500 hits per month. Creators have to raise money and produce the work on their own, but will be paid 70 percent of ad revenue -- if any materializes.
So far, there is none, but Moore expects the site to be profitable in about a year, noting that 10 to 12 "exceptional quality" webisodes of 2 1/2 to 5 1/2 minutes each can be produced for the same amount of money as a high-end 30-second commercial. "So the cost benefit alone is staggering," he says.
Some Web series that have been able to generate a substantial following have eventually picked up ad sponsorship. In 2006, the series Lonelygirl15, which was distributed on YouTube, had millions of hits and eventually picked up major sponsorship. "Webisodes are not big-money operations yet," Thompson says. "I think we are just at the very dawn of that."
Rowdy Orbit is now airing a drama series set in Botswana; "Chick," the film about regular people wanting to become superheroes; "Soul Delicious," a soul food cooking show; "Exit Strategy," a drama about a black man trying to break up with his girlfriend; and "Lockout," a Hispanic horror flick.
"Lockout" was created by Ricardo Islas, who converted a traditional long-form movie into 21 short takes for the Internet. The 40-year-old native of Uruguay and senior television producer in Chicago has made dozens of movies, including "The Day of the Dead" and "To Kill a Killer," which was released by Warner Bros. in 2003.
He turned to the Internet to tell more fully realized stories about Latino culture. "This is nothing new that Hollywood and networks in general are dominated by white males. They are being protective of their territory especially since the cake is smaller and there are less shares," Islas says. "What we've been able to do is find our niche. And like in the '70s when black exploitation films were filling a demand, we are supplying what underserved communities demand because main media and main networks are not supplying what they want."
"Lockout is about [a white] American man fired from his job because he doesn't want to move to a different location," Islas says. "He develops a resentment against minorities because he feels they are taking his job."
As the movie progresses, the man encounters more minorities and becomes paranoid. "That is where the horror kicks in."
Melvin Campbell, 41, a cook from New Jersey, created the cooking show "Soul Delicious" two years ago.
"What prompted me was watching television and looking at other food networks. I felt I could be as interesting or better," Campbell says. He didn't even bother to shop the show to a broadcast network or cable.
"For me, it was cutting out the middle man," Campbell says. "It was building an audience without having to go through traditional methods of producers. . . . You are just a click away from millions of people watching you. There is power in that."
ARCHIVES
Speeding tickets: Use of laser guns in Chicago to catch speeders is questioned
Many tickets are thrown out if use of lidar is challenged
Many motorists nabbed for speeding by a laser gun, instead of radar, are seeing their tickets thrown out at Chicago's traffic court because of a legal issue that the city's law department has been unable to overcome.
Within the past year judges in Cook County Traffic Court in Chicago determined that speeds captured by lidar were not admissible because the devices had not been proven scientifically reliable in an Illinois court, said Jennifer Hoyle, spokeswoman for the law department, which prosecutes most speeding tickets in the city.
The judges brushed aside the office's position that such a legal hearing was unnecessary because lidar devices, which use a light beam instead of radio waves, have been used by police departments across the country with no problems for a long time and because some courts outside Illinois already had found them to be scientifically sound.
The devices, widely used by police departments across the state, are the primary speed detectors used by the Chicago Police Department, Hoyle said.
As a result, many drivers ticketed for speeding in the city have been able to skate out of traffic court without having to pay the fine.
"Judges don't share our view that the technology is valid in court," Hoyle said.
The judges's findings do not benefit motorists who plead guilty and pay their fine by mail, Hoyle said. The city has continued to cash those checks.
Judges in traffic courts outside Chicago have not taken a uniform position, said Steve Fagan, a defense attorney who represents traffic violators in Cook, DuPage and Lake counties.
Some judges dismiss tickets that involve lidar, while others view it as legally sound, Fagan said.
The legal procedure required to prove a technology is scientifically reliable -- a Frye hearing, as it is known in Illinois -- is laborious and expensive, experts said. The hearing requires witnesses and can stretch for days.
That's the reason the city law department was reluctant to initiate one against a defendant, Hoyle said.
Since last month the department has begun seeking such a hearing in the small percent of speeding cases in which the defendant has a defense attorney, she said. But each time the defendant has chosen to pay the fine rather than participate.
The department hopes the Cook County state's attorney's office will secure a Frye hearing because that office handles the most serious speeding cases in which the defendant has more invested.
If they fail, Hoyle said, the prosecutors will seek a state law that explicitly recognizes lidar as scientifically reliable.
Meanwhile, the Chicago Police Department plans to continue using the device, said Roderick Drew, a spokesman for the department. "We believe it to be reliable and accurate," Drew said.
Within the past year judges in Cook County Traffic Court in Chicago determined that speeds captured by lidar were not admissible because the devices had not been proven scientifically reliable in an Illinois court, said Jennifer Hoyle, spokeswoman for the law department, which prosecutes most speeding tickets in the city.
The judges brushed aside the office's position that such a legal hearing was unnecessary because lidar devices, which use a light beam instead of radio waves, have been used by police departments across the country with no problems for a long time and because some courts outside Illinois already had found them to be scientifically sound.
The devices, widely used by police departments across the state, are the primary speed detectors used by the Chicago Police Department, Hoyle said.
As a result, many drivers ticketed for speeding in the city have been able to skate out of traffic court without having to pay the fine.
"Judges don't share our view that the technology is valid in court," Hoyle said.
The judges's findings do not benefit motorists who plead guilty and pay their fine by mail, Hoyle said. The city has continued to cash those checks.
Judges in traffic courts outside Chicago have not taken a uniform position, said Steve Fagan, a defense attorney who represents traffic violators in Cook, DuPage and Lake counties.
Some judges dismiss tickets that involve lidar, while others view it as legally sound, Fagan said.
The legal procedure required to prove a technology is scientifically reliable -- a Frye hearing, as it is known in Illinois -- is laborious and expensive, experts said. The hearing requires witnesses and can stretch for days.
That's the reason the city law department was reluctant to initiate one against a defendant, Hoyle said.
Since last month the department has begun seeking such a hearing in the small percent of speeding cases in which the defendant has a defense attorney, she said. But each time the defendant has chosen to pay the fine rather than participate.
The department hopes the Cook County state's attorney's office will secure a Frye hearing because that office handles the most serious speeding cases in which the defendant has more invested.
If they fail, Hoyle said, the prosecutors will seek a state law that explicitly recognizes lidar as scientifically reliable.
Meanwhile, the Chicago Police Department plans to continue using the device, said Roderick Drew, a spokesman for the department. "We believe it to be reliable and accurate," Drew said.
archives
What has President Obama accomplished?
A Reader shared it with me, I had to share it with you!
"I am repeatedly asked to grade the Obama presidency thus far. In place of a
grade, here is a list of Obama's accomplishments as of August 2009.
Robert Watson, Ph.D
Coordinator of American Studies
Lynn University
1. Ordered all federal agencies to undertake a study and make recommendations
for ways to cut spending
2. Ordered a review of all federal operations to identify and cut wasteful
spending and practices
3. Instituted enforcements for equal pay for women
4. Beginning the withdrawal of US troops from Iraq
5. Families of fallen soldiers have expenses covered to be on hand when the
body arrives at Dover A.F.B.
6. Ended media "blackout" on war casualties; reporting full information
7. Ended media "blackout" on covering the return of fallen soldiers to Dover
A.F.B.; the media is now permitted to do so pending adherence to respectful
rules and approval of fallen soldier's family
8. The White House and federal government are respecting the Freedom of
Information Act
9. Instructed all federal agencies to promote openness and transparency as
much as possible
10. Limits on lobbyists' access to the White House
11. Limits on White House aides working for lobbyists after their tenure in
the administration
12. Ended the previous "stop-loss" policy that kept soldiers in
Iraq/Afghanistan longer than their enlistment date
13. Phasing out the expensive F-22 war plane and other outdated weapons
systems, which weren't even used or needed in Iraq/Afghanistan
14. Removed restrictions on embryonic stem-cell research
15. Federal support for stem-cell and new biomedical research
16. New federal funding for science and research labs
17. States are permitted to enact federal fuel efficiency standards above
federal standards
18. Increased infrastructure spending (roads, bridges, power plants...) after
years of neglect
19. Funds for high-speed, broadband Internet access to K-12 schools
20. New funds for school construction
21. The prison at Guantanamo Bay is being phased out
22. US Auto industry rescue plan
23. Housing rescue plan
24. $789 billion economic stimulus plan
25. The public can meet with federal housing insurers to refinance (the new
plan can be completed in one day) a mortgage if they are having trouble paying
26. US financial and banking rescue plan
27. The "secret detention" facilities in Eastern Europe and elsewhere are
being closed
28. Ended the previous policy; the US now has a no torture policy and is in
compliance with the Geneva Convention standards
29. Better body armor is now being provided to our troops
30. The missile defense program is being cut by $1.4 billion in 2010
31. Restarted the nuclear non-proliferation talks and building back up the
nuclear inspection infrastructure/protocols
32. Reengaged in the treaties/agreements to protect the Antarctic
33. Reengaged in the agreements/talks on global warming and greenhouse gas
emissions
34. Visited more countries and met with more world leaders than any president
in his first six months in office
35. Successful release of US captain held by Somali pirates; authorized the
SEALS to do their job
36. US Navy increasing patrols off Somali coast
37. Attractive tax write-offs for those who buy hybrid automobiles
38. "Cash for clunkers" program offers vouchers to trade in fuel inefficient,
polluting old cars for new cars; stimulates auto sales
39. Announced plans to purchase fuel efficient American-made fleet for the
federal government
40. Expanded the SCHIP program to cover health care for 4 million more children
41. Signed national service legislation; expanded national youth service
program
42. Instituted a new policy on Cuba, allowing Cuban families to return "home"
to visit loved ones
43. Ended the previous policy of not regulating and labeling carbon dioxide
emissions
44. Expanding vaccination programs
45. Immediate and efficient response to the floods in North Dakota and other
natural disasters
46. Closed offshore tax safe havens
47. Negotiated deal with Swiss banks to permit US government to gain access to
records of tax evaders and criminals
48. Ended the previous policy of offering tax benefits to corporations who
outsource American jobs; the new policy is to promote in-sourcing to bring
jobs back
49. Ended the previous practice of protecting credit card companies; in place
of it are new consumer protections from credit card industry's predatory
practices
50. Energy producing plants must begin preparing to produce 15% of their
energy from renewable sources
51. Lower drug costs for seniors
52. Ended the previous practice of forbidding Medicare from negotiating with
drug manufacturers for cheaper drugs; the federal government is now realizing
hundreds of millions in savings
53. Increasing pay and benefits for military personnel
54. Improved housing for military personnel
55. Initiating a new policy to promote federal hiring of military spouses
56. Improved conditions at Walter Reed Military Hospital and other military
hospitals
57. Increasing student loans
58. Increasing opportunities in AmeriCorps program
59. Sent envoys to Middle East and other parts of the world that had been
neglected for years; reengaging in multilateral and bilateral talks and
diplomacy
60. Established a new cyber security office
61. Beginning the process of reforming and restructuring the military 20 years
after the Cold War to a more modern fighting force... this includes new
procurement policies, increasing size of military, new technology and cyber
units and operations, etc.
62. Ended previous policy of awarding no-bid defense contracts
63. Ordered a review of hurricane and natural disaster preparedness
64. Established a National Performance Officer charged with saving the federal
government money and making federal operations more efficient
65. Students struggling to make college loan payments can have their loans
refinanced
66. Improving benefits for veterans
67. Many more press conferences and town halls and much more media access than
previous administration
68. Instituted a new focus on mortgage fraud
69. The FDA is now regulating tobacco
70. Ended previous policy of cutting the FDA and circumventing FDA rules
71. Ended previous practice of having White House aides rewrite scientific and
environmental rules, regulations, and reports
72. Authorized discussions with North Korea and private mission by Pres. Bill
Clinton to secure the release of two Americans held in prisons
73. Authorized discussions with Myanmar and mission by Sen. Jim Web to secure
the release of an American held captive
74. Making more loans available to small businesses
75. Established independent commission to make recommendations on slowing the
costs of Medicare
76. Appointment of first Latina to the Supreme Court
77. Authorized construction/opening of additional health centers to care for
veterans
78. Limited salaries of senior White House aides; cut to $100,000
79. Renewed loan guarantees for Israel
80. Changed the failing/status quo military command in Afghanistan
81. Deployed additional troops to Afghanistan
82. New Afghan War policy that limits aerial bombing and prioritizes aid,
development of infrastructure, diplomacy, and good government practices by
Afghans
83. Announced the long-term development of a national energy grid with
renewable sources and cleaner, efficient energy production
84. Returned money authorized for refurbishment of White House offices and
private living quarters
85. Paid for redecorations of White House living quarters out of his own pocket
86. Held first Seder in White House
87. Attempting to reform the nation's healthcare system which is the most
expensive in the world yet leaves almost 50 million without health insurance
and millions more underinsured
88. Has put the ball in play for comprehensive immigration reform
89. Has announced his intention to push for energy reform
90. Has announced his intention to push for education reform
Oh, and he built a swing set for the girls outside the Oval Office!
Ok, go ahead Righties, rip into all of that and say its nothing."
__________________
Its one thing to be an idiot, its a whole different thing to open your mouth
and prove it to the rest of the world
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Gasoline Grant Assistance Program
Gasoline Grant Assistance Program offered by Free Gas USA, Inc.
READ ALL of the INFORMATION BELOW: This was check out on Snopes, It's Real
Free Gas USA, Inc., a non-profit gasoline grant assistance provider, is offering gasoline grants to low-income individuals that are experiencing a difficult time paying for gasoline to drive to work, medical appointments, children to school or to buy groceries. Gas cards are awarded monthly in denominations ranging from $50 to $1,200. To qualify for a gasoline grant an individual must meet the following criteria:18 years of age or older Legal resident of the United States Own an automobileAutomobilemust be currently licensed and insured
Income criteria An individual's yearly income must be at or below the "very low income limit'' category as defined for specific geographic locations by the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development.
For Cook Countythe amount is $26,400 for 1 person and $30,150 for a household of two. Please note grant applicants must obtain an application via the Free Gas USA, Inc. website. All applications must be submitted with an agency referral form or they will not be processed. Please click on the link below to view the Free Gas USA, Inc. website, download an application and view income eligibility for other counties in Illinois.
http://www.freegasusa.org/services.html
ARCHIVES
Dental Plaque Buildup May Raise Heart Risk in Black Men
White blood cell activity increases in these patients when oral hygiene is neglected, study finds
From: Michael Hargrett mhargrett@acc. org
Source: HealthDay.com
By Robert Preidt
Black males may be at increased risk for heart problems caused by accumulation of dental plaque, a U.S. study finds.
Indiana University School of Dentistry researchers studied 128 black and white women and men and found that a buildup
of dental plaque didn't cause a change in total white blood cell count, a known risk factor for heart problems. However,
dental plaque accumulation in black males was associated with a significant increase in the activity of white blood cells
called neutrophils, an important part of the immune system, the researchers noted.
None of the study participants had periodontal (gum) disease. They were healthy people who were asked to neglect their
oral hygiene as part of the study, the study authors explained.
"We are talking about healthy people who simply neglect oral hygiene and if they were male and black, we found a response
from their white blood cells, or neutrophils, that might be a cause for concern," study leader Michael Kowolik, a professor
of periodontics and associate dean for graduate education at the school of dentistry, said in a university news release.
"If you get a bacterial infection anywhere in the body, billions of neutrophils come flooding out of your bone marrow to defend
against the intruder. Our observation that with poor dental hygiene, white blood cell activity increased in black men but not
black women or whites of either sex suggests both gender and racial differences in the inflammatory response to dental
plaque. This finding could help us identify individuals at greater risk for infections anywhere in the body including those
affecting the heart," Kowolik said.
An elevated white blood cell count is one of the major risks for heart attack, previous research has found.
"While we did not observe higher white blood cell counts as the result of dental plaque accumulation, the increased activity
of white blood cells, which we did find, may also carry a higher risk for heart disease," Kowolik said.
The study was published in the August issue of the Journal of Dental Research.
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In remembrance of 911, take a moment and reflect on how great this nation is and what it could be like without freedom. This should serve as a reminder, just as we did for Bush, no matter what your differences are with the President, in the best interest of ALL AMERICANS we must support HIS decisions. Free will does not mean disrespect. Is this the message we wish to send to our young people? If you do not agree, interrupt, disrespect and alienate ourselves from the process? For example, Fox News the leading Anti-Obama machine did not broadcast the live address and opted with, I believe, Dancing With the Stars. Again, no respect.
My bag, I almost forgot these are the same people who did not wish for the President to address the students and encourage them to do their best in school. CNN revealed a report which showed the areas of the country who were against the telecast heavily favored and voted for McCain with a strong dislike for Obama. One went so far as to say he was destroying the fabric of our country. Which fabric is that? The ones my ancestors made? Or the traffic light, or the creation of the cotton gin? They really appreciated that one...NOT! With all the turmoil in South Carolina, you should be seen and not heard. If you wish to do something productive, clean up your own political mess and get rid of that adulteress governor.
The sad thing was, when asked why they did not approve of him, the only answers they could come up with was hearsay from a third party and virtually no concrete facts to support their position...HM. George Bush addressed the students, lied about the Weapons of Mass Destruction and layed in bed with the oil companies. These same people were quiet as church mouses. My question still remains...Where is the Money? How can a nation in the black at the beginning of his presidency end up in so much red? With the economy is the state that it is in, why are we not demanding accountability? I heard one of our "experts" indicate the other day, Afghanistan is now Barack's war and he can no longer fall back on the premise he inherited it? What? Forget what happen before you got there, it is now your fault. Then we wonder why we are building more jails than schools.
CNN is still without flaws, they went deep down in South Carolina to find a elementary school whose Principal is Black and Constituents were heavily republican and against the telecast. The Principal indicated he had to go in his office and pray but ultimately he had to abide by the community's decision. The reporter had the audacity (Thanks Obama) to ask if the president showed up would he invite him in? The brother was very professional in his answer and responded "of course, he's the president." I know we wanted to say you dog gone right!
We elected him to look out for the masses and not just the privileged few. Respect the Oval Office. No more shout outs or getting up and walking out because you do not agree with something said. It is no wonder we are losing the respect of our global community and becoming the laughing stock of the free world!
The people have spoken, the polls are closed and PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA is in. The reality is the leader of the free world is a Black Man. GET OVER IT!
My bag, I almost forgot these are the same people who did not wish for the President to address the students and encourage them to do their best in school. CNN revealed a report which showed the areas of the country who were against the telecast heavily favored and voted for McCain with a strong dislike for Obama. One went so far as to say he was destroying the fabric of our country. Which fabric is that? The ones my ancestors made? Or the traffic light, or the creation of the cotton gin? They really appreciated that one...NOT! With all the turmoil in South Carolina, you should be seen and not heard. If you wish to do something productive, clean up your own political mess and get rid of that adulteress governor.
The sad thing was, when asked why they did not approve of him, the only answers they could come up with was hearsay from a third party and virtually no concrete facts to support their position...HM. George Bush addressed the students, lied about the Weapons of Mass Destruction and layed in bed with the oil companies. These same people were quiet as church mouses. My question still remains...Where is the Money? How can a nation in the black at the beginning of his presidency end up in so much red? With the economy is the state that it is in, why are we not demanding accountability? I heard one of our "experts" indicate the other day, Afghanistan is now Barack's war and he can no longer fall back on the premise he inherited it? What? Forget what happen before you got there, it is now your fault. Then we wonder why we are building more jails than schools.
CNN is still without flaws, they went deep down in South Carolina to find a elementary school whose Principal is Black and Constituents were heavily republican and against the telecast. The Principal indicated he had to go in his office and pray but ultimately he had to abide by the community's decision. The reporter had the audacity (Thanks Obama) to ask if the president showed up would he invite him in? The brother was very professional in his answer and responded "of course, he's the president." I know we wanted to say you dog gone right!
We elected him to look out for the masses and not just the privileged few. Respect the Oval Office. No more shout outs or getting up and walking out because you do not agree with something said. It is no wonder we are losing the respect of our global community and becoming the laughing stock of the free world!
The people have spoken, the polls are closed and PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA is in. The reality is the leader of the free world is a Black Man. GET OVER IT!
archives
Breaking News: Obama Awarded Nobel Peace Prize
Barack Obama Awarded 2009 Nobel Peace Prize
http://link.email.washingtonpost.com/r/ZTVJ68/FVJN7/R3VAI4/DEMAFC/7MC3P/7V/t In a surprise move, the Norweigan Nobel Committee awarded the 2009 Nobel Peace Prize to U.S. President Barack Obama. Work reaching out to Muslims cited....
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Motorists have been hard hit by the increase in the cost of parking in in Chicago, Illinois that began with a deal struck in February. In the central business district, for example, the cost to park for an hour doubled from $1 an hour to $2 and will quadruple to $4 an hour by 2013. Meters must also now be fed 24 hours a day, seven days a week. The hikes came after Mayor Richard J. Daley (D) leased the city’s 36,000 parking meters to Morgan Stanley for 75 years in return for an up-front payment of $1.15 billion. The Independent Voters of Illinois-Independent Precinct Organization (IVI-IPO), a liberal government reform group, fought back last Wednesday by filing a lawsuit hoping a judge would find the parking meter contract unlawful.
“This is a horrible deal for Chicago taxpayers,” IVI-IPO spokesman Owen Brugh said. “But IVI-IPO intends to hold the city accountable. Even the city of Chicago has to follow the law.”
The suit claims that the city has no legal right to use public resources to enforce parking regulations and repair the privately owned parking meters for the benefit of a private entity. This arrangement, the suit contends, violates Article 8, Section 1 of the Illinois Constitution which that states “public funds, property or credit shall be used only for public purposes.”
The group also argues that state law giving Chicago the right to “regulate the use of streets and other municipal property” does not give the city authority to lease those streets until February 29, 2084. The suit claims such long-term contracts are inherently invalid because they deprive future city councils of any control over the way the streets and parking meters are regulated.
IVI-IPO is upset that although Daley’s administration will have $1.15 billion to spend now, future generations of motorists could pay more than $3.5 billion in parking charges. If the city makes any improvements to city streets that eliminates a parking space, such as adding a crosswalk or bus stop, taxpayers must pay “damages” to Morgan Stanley.
IVI-IPO asked the Cook County Circuit Court to prohibit the Illinois Secretary of State from suspending the driver’s license of anyone who failed to pay a privately issued parking ticket. The group also wants an injunction that prohibits Chicago from spending any public money for the benefit of the parking meter program.
Morgan Stanley operates the meters under the name Chicago Parking Meters, LLC.
MINORITY ENTERPRISE DEVELOPMENT WEEK, 2009
- - - - - - -
BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
A PROCLAMATION
Our Nation's strength rests on the ingenuity and creativity of the American people.
Across our country, almost 4 million minority-owned firms exemplify this spirit
as they create jobs, develop new products and services, and promote community
and economic development. The growth and expansion of these businesses is
an increasingly critical part of our economic recovery and long-term prosperity.
At a time when too many Americans are facing extraordinary economic challenges,
supporting the development of minority owned enterprises will help accelerate the
revitalization of our economy. Of the 630,000 minority-owned employer firms,
these businesses are providing employment and stability to 4.7 million workers
while renewing urban neighborhoods and rural communities. They represent
a key component of future growth for our economy.
Minority Enterprise Development Week is an opportunity to commemorate the
tremendous value minority entrepreneurs and their employees bring to our economy
and our Nation as a whole. They embody the timeless American values of hard work,
integrity, and optimism. They also serve as role models to countless children who
want to start their own business or reach their personal goals. Through their
accomplishments and example, these leaders affirm that, with determination and
commitment, every American can achieve his or her potential and live out their dreams.
NOW, THEREFORE, I, Barack Obama, President of the United States of America,
by virtue of the authority vested in me by the Constitution and laws of the United States
do hereby proclaim August 23 through August 29, 2009, as Minority Enterprise
Development Week. I call upon all Americans to celebrate this week with appropriate
programs, ceremonies, and activities to recognize the many contributions of our
Nation's minority enterprises.
IN WITNESS WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand this twentieth day of August,
in the year of our Lord two thousand nine, and of the Independence of the
United States of America the two hundred and thirty-fourth.
BARACK OBAMA
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Actor Jeffrey Wright on Obama
Editor's note: Jeffrey Wright is a stage and screen actor who has won a Tony, Emmy and Golden Globe. Wright has appeared in "Angels in America," "Basquiat," "The Manchurian Candidate," "Syriana," "W." and "Casino Royale."
Actor Jeffrey Wright says a nation that put a man on the moon should be able to take race out of policing.
NEW YORK (CNN) -- President Obama expressed what many Americans feel regarding the recent arrest of Harvard professor Henry Louis "Skip" Gates -- that the Cambridge, Massachusetts, police responded "stupidly."
Obama is catching some flak for that, but I applaud him for having had the courage to speak his heart and mind.
I wonder if the president himself has ever experienced the blunt end of racial profiling, or if he personally knows of anyone other than Professor Gates who has. Among African-American males in this country, the small minority is those who have not or do not.
Did some prior experience or knowledge inform his response about the Gates incident? I have no facts to back this up, but, to me, it seemed personal. If it was, I understand.
I was arrested last July in Shreveport, Louisiana, outside a bar where dozens of members of the cast and crew of the movie "W." and I had gathered to celebrate the end of filming. There was no bar brawl as widely reported -- nor even a pre-election political argument.
Nine police cars and a fire engine responded; seven people were arrested. Two of the seven suffered minor head wounds at the hands of the Shreveport police. Josh Brolin and I were pepper sprayed by cops, and while face down in the street, I was made to feel the business end of a Taser.
Don't Miss
The truth of what led to the whole morass has never been accurately reported. I was asked to leave the bar by a white female bartender who took exception to a comment I made.
As with Professor Gates, the police in my case backed unquestioningly the suspicion of a white woman that the black man she accused must be guilty of something. Once that die of accusation was cast, a ghost of racial bias, misperception, and the potential abuse of police authority was set free to make mischief.
The bar was one of two places in downtown Shreveport that serves food after 10 p.m. A few nights before my arrest, I had gone there very late after work to grab a bite to eat. It was before closing, and there were a few customers and employees inside, but the door was locked. I knocked and asked, over the music streaming from inside, if I might buy a small pizza. The bartender insisted that they were closed.
"Whatever," I said with a shrug of resignation and walked back to my hotel room.
Four nights later and in a festive mood, we gathered at this same establishment. Upon seeing the bartender who had a few nights before told me that the place was closed, I asked her for a drink, which she poured. I quipped, "Ah you're going to serve me tonight!"
At that, she pulled the drink away and told me that I had to leave. I asked if she was kidding. She went on to say that if I didn't leave, she would call the police. As I stepped away to tell friends what had happened, a call was made to Shreveport police.
Two cops, the first of many, arrived in minutes, and I was physically escorted outside although neither of them had the curiosity to ask what had transpired before they arrived. A mess ensued.
To their credit, Josh and the others arrested followed me outside with a few others from our group. The cops physically released me and were seeming to be ready to let me go altogether when, out of the corner of my eye, I saw another member of the film crew driven headlong into the sidewalk by two newly arrived cops.
Josh verbally objected to their actions, at which point a cop said to him, "You too!" I moved Josh away from the fray and held him. We were then pepper sprayed to separate us, after which Josh knelt in submission and was handcuffed.
Disoriented and blinded by the pepper spray, I remained standing until I was kicked in the knee and forced to the ground. I did not completely relax one of my arms as it was twisted behind me, so I was tasered in the back of my ribs repeatedly, eventually handcuffed, left to lie in the street for several minutes, then arrested and hauled off to jail, and charged with impeding police. The six others were similarly charged -- and it all began with a joke.
Nearly six months later, after a good-size storm kicked up in Shreveport over the incident, prosecutors agreed to drop the charges against all of us arrested that night.
New Year's Day 2009 and the same week in which charges were dropped against us, in Oakland, California, Oscar Grant, a young father, was killed in a BART station, surrounded by cops and in the same position as I found myself down in Shreveport. It seems the BART cop may have pulled the trigger of his firearm thinking that it was his Taser.
Shreveport Mayor Cedric Glover is known as a law-and-order mayor. The day after the encounter, in the presence of his police chief, Glover apologized to me and privately acknowledged that while most Shreveport's cops were good, there were some "devils" among them.
In public meetings regarding the "W." incident, however, he held fast that the responding officers acted appropriately. Either Glover's public statement was dead wrong, or the joke was on us.
Of course, public officials, particularly at the local level, are loathe to criticize law enforcement officers. On a certain level, it's understandable. Cops answer a noble and difficult calling. The pressure must be relentless, and I imagine a cop is largely underappreciated by most except those with whom he or she serves.
A political pat on the back from the executive in charge must be a comforting thing in controversial times, and politicians prefer to duck behind the political safety of the blue wall of silence than upset the men and women who, like our nation's troops, are charged with placing themselves every day in harm's way to keep us safe.
When he was mayor of New York, Rudy Giuliani encamped himself behind that blue wall. After Amadou Diallo, living out the All-American, hard-working immigrant story, was brutally shot down on the steps of his Bronx apartment building, Giuliani refused to question the actions of the cops who fired 41 bullets in killing the unarmed young man.
Is a politician's unwavering fidelity to law enforcement officers the best approach, or does it promote a police culture of impunity and retard progress on law enforcement issues?
What if after the Diallo tragedy, political leadership in New York inspired the passage of serious legislation to keep in check the presumption of criminality that cops so often direct toward young men of color. What if that had led to similar acts nationwide around these issues?
Gates might not be headline news today; Grant might not have died; and New York police Officer Omar Edwards, an African-American undercover officer shot down two months ago by a white fellow officer while chasing a suspect through a Harlem street, might be alive today to toss a football again with his son. iReport.com: "Shame" on Gates
I'm not presuming to blame Giuliani alone for what has become a systemic problem in our country -- that would be absurd, these issues predate him -- but when political leaders in this country express compassion only for those for whom they perceive it to be politically expedient or fail to challenge law enforcement and incarceration issues that cut to the core of the history and culture of race in America, they fail us all. They exemplify what U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder meant when he spoke of the cowardice with which we as a society approach race dialogue in this country.
These are messy, even bloody issues, but the cost of not addressing them is too draining of our societal health. Among other things it fosters a society in which too many young Americans internalize the aura of criminality that's projected onto them and handcuff themselves to self-imposed limitations that stifle us all.
Going to prison rather than to college becomes a rite of passage. They wear their pants below their behinds in solidarity with their friends, brothers, uncles or fathers who aren't allowed belts while incarcerated, though perhaps the low-hanging pants are a defiant gesture to society at large for continually presuming them to be miscreant.
This past week the Apollo 11 crew was at the White House welcomed by the president of a new generation of dreamers. Our great nation put a man on the moon, but it can't train its cops to distinguish between an ordinary brown-skinned brother and a criminal. At its least injurious, as with Gates and myself, this leads to bruised pride and reputation; at its worst, Grant or Edwards gets killed.
President Kennedy famously said, "We choose to go the moon ... and do the other things not because they are easy, but because they are hard." Maybe properly educating, screening and training our nation's police is one of "the other things." My son is 7 years old. May our generation have accomplished this other thing before he's a young man, and before we've sent a man to Mars.
The challenge is one that many Americans are willing to accept -- one, that for the sake of our children, all Americans should be unwilling to postpone.
The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Jeffrey Wright.
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15th Annual Black Harvest
International Festival of Film and Video, August 7-September 3
The Gene Siskel Film Center of the School of the Art Institute of Chicago presents its15th Annual Black Harvest International Festival of Film and Video. The Midwest’s largest festival of the Black experience on film, Black Harvest showcases Chicago premieres of 21 features and documentaries and 22 short films.
Special events include opening night A Black Harvest Feast (August 7) featuring five short films which convey the spirit and vibrant feeling of the festival with a number of filmmakers in person. Harmene Hartman, publisher/editor-in-chief of N’DIGO, will receive the Deloris Jordan Award for Excellence in Community Leadership in person.
Hill Harper will receive the Gene Siskel Film Center Renaissance Award and convey his gratitude via DVD.
NBC 5’s LeeAnn Trotter will emcee the program.
Other events include “Date on State” (August 14),
Real Men Cook (August 21), advance screenings of
The Nine Lives of Marion Barry (August 9) and
Blaxploitation parody Black Dynamite (August 15 and 20),
festival panel discussion How to Get a Movie Made (August 15), and a number of filmmaker and special guest appearances.
The Gene Siskel Film Center is located at 164 N. State St. Learn more about Black Harvest at www.siskelfilmcenter.org or call 312-846-2800
archives
President Obama's Speech to the NAACP!
NAACP Centennial
New York, New York
July 16, 2009
View it on YouTube: click here>>> (thanks to QHayes)
archives
How important is your food?
Will there be enough?
What can you do?
http://www.worldfoodprize.org/press_room/2009/june/ejeta.htm
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In Pictures: The Wealthiest Black Americans
Oprah Winfrey tops the inaugural Forbes list of the Wealthiest Black Americans,
as recession cuts into the fortunes of others.
Oprah Winfrey tops the inaugural Forbes list of the Wealthiest Black Americans,
as recession cuts into the fortunes of others.
By Matthew Miller
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The Video Shell Oil Desperately Doesn't Want You to See
The Video Shell Oil Desperately Doesn't Want You to See
By Han Shan, Huffington Post
Business as usual: Shell is trying to suppress the truth.
View the Video:
DIMONA, Israel -- As a young African-American man in late 1970s Chicago, Atur Yirmeyahu was contemplating the fairly standard dilemmas of whether to go to graduate school and ask his girlfriend of three years to marry him.
Business as usual: Shell is trying to suppress the truth.
View the Video:
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Subject: A BLACK GIRL ESCORTED TO SCHOOL: 1960 and 2009 THEN: A Black girl escorted to school - 1960
On November 14, 1960 , nearly 49 years ago, 6 year old Ruby Bridges faced hostile crowds, and had to be escorted by U.S. Marshalls , because she was the first black child to attend previously all-white William Frantz Elementary School in New Orleans , Louisiana . Ruby was 6 years old. (The Great Norman Rockwell created the painting above depicting that event.)
That morning, she had only been told by her mother that she was going to be attending a new school that day and 'had better behave.' Little did little Ruby know that she would be bombarded with jeers and even death threats; and that she would end up being the sole child in her first grade class because all the other children were kept home by their parents. All because Ruby was Black.NOW: A Black girl escorted to school - 2009
On January 5, 2009 , nearly 49 years after Ruby attended her school, 7 year old Sasha Obama, faced cheering schoolmates as she is escorted by her Mother and U. S. Secret Service Agents to Sidwell Friends Elementary School in Washington , DC . Her Mother, the current First Lady of the United States of America , had Secret Service escort because Sasha's daddy is now the 44th President of the United States , Barack Obama:
GLORY BE TO GOD, FOREVER MORE!
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Urge Governor Quinn to Sign the Torture Bill!
Chicago Police Commander Jon Burge and officers under his command tortured over 100 African-American men
into confessing to crimes that they did not commit using electric shocks to the genitals and other parts of the body,
by use of cattle prods, beatings and by the use other unlawful methods. All of the torture victims were wrongfully
charged with crimes and the coerced statements were used to send them to prison. Presently 24 of the torture
victims languish in Illinois prisons. The Torture Act will create an independent commission to conduct inquires
into claims of torture committed by Jon Burge and officers under his command.
On May 2009, the Illinois General Assembly passed the Illinois Torture Inquiry and Relief Commission Bill
“Torture Commission”. The Senate passed the bill in March followed by passage in the House in May, 2009.
Governor Pat Quinn has yet to sign the Bill into Law. We urge his signature immediately.
WHAT YOU CAN DO TO HELP
1. Every Monday starting June 1, 2009, telephone, letters, faxes and emails to Gov. Quinn
at the following: http://www.illinois.gov/gov/contactthegovernor.cfm
2. Urge Gov. Quinn to sign HB 48, the Torture Bill, immediately.
3. Springfield Office
Office of the Governor
207 State House
Springfield , IL 62706
Phone: 217-782-0244
TTY: 888-261-3336
4. Chicago Office
Office of the Governor
James R. Thompson Center
100 W. Randolph , 16-100
Chicago , IL 60601
Phone: 312-814-2121
Chicago Police Commander Jon Burge and officers under his command tortured over 100 African-American men
into confessing to crimes that they did not commit using electric shocks to the genitals and other parts of the body,
by use of cattle prods, beatings and by the use other unlawful methods. All of the torture victims were wrongfully
charged with crimes and the coerced statements were used to send them to prison. Presently 24 of the torture
victims languish in Illinois prisons. The Torture Act will create an independent commission to conduct inquires
into claims of torture committed by Jon Burge and officers under his command.
On May 2009, the Illinois General Assembly passed the Illinois Torture Inquiry and Relief Commission Bill
“Torture Commission”. The Senate passed the bill in March followed by passage in the House in May, 2009.
Governor Pat Quinn has yet to sign the Bill into Law. We urge his signature immediately.
WHAT YOU CAN DO TO HELP
1. Every Monday starting June 1, 2009, telephone, letters, faxes and emails to Gov. Quinn
at the following: http://www.illinois.gov/gov/contactthegovernor.cfm
2. Urge Gov. Quinn to sign HB 48, the Torture Bill, immediately.
3. Springfield Office
Office of the Governor
207 State House
Springfield , IL 62706
Phone: 217-782-0244
TTY: 888-261-3336
4. Chicago Office
Office of the Governor
James R. Thompson Center
100 W. Randolph , 16-100
Chicago , IL 60601
Phone: 312-814-2121
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Black Hebrew Polygamists Begin To Gain Acceptance In Israel
By Stephanie Rice
Before the year was over, he had decided on a wholly unorthodox way forward. Scrapping the university plans and breaking up with his girlfriend, he left his hometown for a sleepy desert settlement in southern Israel.
He has hardly seen his family in the three decades since he packed his bags, but here, in this working-class Negev town, he says he has found his rightful home. Yirmeyahu is part of the 2,500-strong Hebrew Israelite community settled in one of three neighboring villages.
The first group of vegan, polygamous and ethnically African-American settlers arrived in 1969, following their young, charismatic leader, Ben Ammi Ben Israel. Ben Ammi, formerly a Chicago factory worker named Ben Carter, preached that black Americans were descendants of one of Israel's lost tribes and needed to return to their homeland.
To the Hebrew Israelites, or Black Hebrews as they're known here, Ben Ammi is the Messiah and their exodus from America an escape from oppression and violence.
Yirmeyahu said he grew up in a crime-ridden neighborhood, experimented with drugs in college and "shudders to think" what might have become of him if he had stayed in Chicago.
"The most common cause of death in the black community was handgun murder," he said, sitting on a bench in the village courtyard on a recent afternoon, a group of teenage boys playing basketball nearby. "I've been shot. I've wrestled with individuals with guns. The black experience -- the captivity -- it wasn't a picnic."
Life hasn't always been carefree here either. For decades, the group battled the government for the right to live in Israel. They refused to officially convert to Judaism to satisfy the religious nationalists who doubted their authenticity, arguing they didn't need to prove themselves to anyone. There were mass deportations, and newcomers often resorted to sneaking in, sometimes posing as tour groups.
"It was a big struggle," said Hagit Peres, a Ben-Gurion University professor and anthropologist who has studied the Black Hebrews. "They didn't get anything easily, and many left during the process."
In recent years, some of that tension has dissolved. There was a turning point in 2003 when the government awarded the community permanent residency, allowing them to join the army and apply for full citizenship. Several weeks ago, the government approved a citizenship application from a Black Hebrew man for the first time.
"It's a great victory for us," said Avichiel Ben Israel, a spokesman for the group. "It shows us that the God of Israel lives. We see it in a very historic manner -- after 40 years, being recognized."
Hiskiyahoo, the director of the one of the nearby villages, said the citizenship is validation that Ben Ammi's teachings are correct and that community members are following the right path in their quest to create what they call the Kingdom of Yah, or "Kingdom of God," on Earth.
"All the things he said have come to pass," Hiskiyahoo said.
To be sure, the Black Hebrews have come a long way in their relations with government and society here. They run a successful national chain of vegan restaurants, more than 300 of their youth are serving in the army and their choirs regularly perform throughout the country. In 2006, Israelis even chose Black Hebrew singer Eddie Butler to represent them in the Eurovision song contest.
"Before, people thought that we were a cult," said Avichiel, the spokesman. "That perception has changed now that people have the opportunity to visit and see that it couldn't be farther from the truth. We have a culture, a way of life."
But while their lifestyle has similarities to Judaism -- they practice circumcision, celebrate Passover and observe the Sabbath -- there are major differences that still raise eyebrows among Jewish Israelis. There's the polygamy, for example. It's common for men to take several wives and have more than a dozen children -- a practice Avichiel says stems from an uneven female-to-male ratio and strict purity rules that keep women from fulfilling their domestic role during their periods and after childbirth.
"There are more women than there are men, it's really practical," he said, sitting on a couch in an office with a framed photo of Ben Ammi staring serenely from the wall. "During menstruation, she's set aside and doesn't prepare food. After childbirth she's isolated for 40 days after a boy, or 80 days after a female. So you kind of need more than one."
Yirmeyahu, the Chicago native, has only one wife and no children but hopes to marry two more women and have at least 10 kids. He is also hopeful he will be among the next to receive Israeli citizenship. "I was never an American anyway," he said.
www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/05/04/black-hebrew-polygamists_n_195620.html?view=print
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Couple's 'buy black' experiment becomes a movement
ATLANTA (AP) — It's been two months since 2-year-old Cori pulled the gold stud from her left earlobe, and the piercing is threatening to close as her mother, Maggie Anderson, hunts for a replacement.
It's not that the earring was all that rare — but finding the right store has become a quest of Quixotic proportions.
Maggie and John Anderson of Chicago vowed four months ago that for one year, they would try to patronize only black-owned businesses. The "Empowerment Experiment" is the reason John had to suffer for hours with a stomach ache and Maggie no longer gets that brand-name lather when she washes her hair. A grocery trip is a 14-mile odyssey.
"We kind of enjoy the sacrifice because we get to make the point ... but I am going without stuff and I am frustrated on a daily basis," Maggie Anderson said. "It's like, my people have been here 400 years and we don't even have a Walgreens to show for it."
So far, the Andersons have spent hundreds of dollars with black businesses from grocery stores to dry cleaners. But the couple still hasn't found a mortgage lender, home security system vendor or toy store. Nonetheless, they're hoping to expand the endeavor beyond their Chicago home.
Plans are under way to track spending among supporters nationwide and build a national database of quality black businesses. The first affiliate chapter has been launched in Atlanta, and the couple has established a foundation to raise funds for black businesses and an annual convention.
"We have the real power to do something, to use the money we spend every day to solve our problems," Maggie Anderson said recently at a meet-and-greet in Atlanta. "We have to believe that black businesses are just as good as everybody else's."
Now, the Andersons are following up with 4,000 people who signed up for the experiment on their Web site to gauge their commitment and set up online accounts to track their spending. Hundreds have also joined the experiment's Facebook page, Maggie Anderson said.
Gregory Price, chairman of the economics department at Morehouse College, said black visionaries like Booker T. Washington and Marcus Garvey made similar calls to action.
"The idea is a sound one, given that black Americans are still underrepresented in the ranks of the self-employed and that entrepreneurship is a key component to wealth," Price said.
There are one million black businesses in the United States accounting for more than $100 billion in annual sales, according to the National Black Chamber of Commerce. The latest U.S. Census numbers report that blacks have more than $800 billion in expendable income each year.
The Andersons track their spending on their Web site and estimate about 55 percent of their monthly spending is with black businesses for things like day care, groceries, car maintenance and home improvements.
One of the businesses highlighted by the Empowerment Experiment is Brenda Brown's Atlanta wine boutique, a shop with a growing black clientele. She said the project can help overcome the problems many black consumers lament.
"When we were a community of black folks who could not go to the white stores, our community of black stores flourished," Brown said. "When we were given the opportunity to go into the white store, it was like nothing else mattered anymore and we wanted to go to the white store, regardless of what the black store provided. We could have the same or better products if we supported (black businesses) in the same way."
Lewis Peeples, 45, lives in a black neighbor still got that 'the white man's water is colder' mentality," he said. "We can't take us for granted. When we go to our establishments, it's almost like we're doing a favor. That ought to be a given for us."
The Andersons remain encouraged by their momentum online and in the media. At the end of 2009, they hope to show $1 million in spending with black businesses among supporters across the country.
"The response has been so huge," Maggie Anderson said. "We think so much can come out of this. We're in movement-making mode now."
Price, the Morehouse professor, said defining the project's success won't be easy, since the real barriers to black advancement are poor access to capital and lack of training opportunities.
"It would be nice to see some real, hard data," Price said. "Otherwise, it could just be an episode of ethnic cheerleading."hood in southwest Atlanta but didn't think to spend his money with black businesses until a friend told him about the project.
"So often, we make purchases and decisions and aren't even mindful that there is a a need to support our own businesses," said Peeples. "Now, I'm reaching out and making sure I know that I have an option when I look to make a purchase."
Two months ago, he committed to patronizing black businesses and found a black dry cleaner 10 minutes from home. Even when he was dissatisfied with his black doctor, he was able to find a new one. He suggests both to friends and refers others to the experiment's Web site, where he tracks his expenses.
Dallas Smith, who owns a commercial real estate firm in Atlanta, said mainstream retailers have undervalued black consumers. He lives in a black neighborhood in southwest Atlanta, where he tries to dine at black restaurants. He lamented the lack of quality businesses catering to black customers and said blacks should appreciate such businesses more.
Visit the website for more info.
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Interesting?
Check it out!
from the Rebel Report
Putting Today's 'Pirate' Attack in Context
A US ship, owned by a Pentagon contractor with ‘Top Security’ clearance, was seized off the Somali coast. Reports say the US crew has retaken the ship. But the question remains: Why are the pirates attacking?
By Jeremy Scahill
The Somali pirates who took control of the 17,000-ton “Maersk Alabama” cargo-ship in the early hours of Wednesday morning probably were unaware that the ship they were boarding belonged to a US Department of Defense contractor with “top security clearance,” which does a half-billion dollars in annual business with the Pentagon, primarily the Navy. The ship was being operated by an “all-American” crew—there were 20 US nationals onboard. “Every indication is that this is the first time a U.S.-flagged ship has been successfully seized by pirates,” said Lt. Nathan Christensen, a spokesperson for for the U.S. Navy’s Bahrain-based 5th Fleet. The last documented pirate attack of a US vessel by African pirates was reported in 1804, off Libya, according to The Los Angeles Times.
The company, A.P. Moller-Maersk, is a Denmark-based company with a large US subsidiary, Maersk Line, Ltd, that serves US government agencies and contractors. The company, which is based in Norfolk, Virginia, runs the world’s largest fleet of US-flag vessels. The “Alabama” was about 300 miles off the coast of the Puntland region of northern Somalia when it was taken. The US military says the Alabama was not operating on a DoD contract at the time and was said to be delivering food aid.
The closest US warship to the “Alabama” at the time of the seizure was 300 miles away. At the time of the seizure, the US Navy did not say how or if it would respond, but seemed not to rule out intervention. ”It’s fair to say we are closely monitoring the situation, but we will not discuss nor speculate on current and future military operations,” said Navy Cmdr. Jane Campbell.
The seizure of the ship seemed to have been short-lived. At the time of this writing, the Pentagon was reporting that the US crew retook the ship and was holding one of the pirates in custody. At this point, it is unclear if the crew acted alone or had assistance from the military or another security force.
Over the past year, there has been a dramatic uptick in media coverage of the “pirates,” particularly in the Gulf of Aden. Pirates reportedly took in upwards of $150 million in ransoms last year alone. In fact, at the moment the Alabama’s seizure, pirates were already holding 14 other vessels with about 200 crew members, according to the International Maritime Bureau. There have been seven hijackings in the past month alone.
Often, the reporting on pirates centers around the gangsterism of the pirates and the seemingly huge ransoms they demand. Indeed, piracy can be a very profitable business, as the following report from Reuters suggests:
A rough back-of-the-envelope calculation shows that the operation to hijack the Saudi tanker, the Sirius Star, cost no more than $25,000, assuming that the pirates bought new equipment and weapons ($450 apiece for an AK-47 Kalashnikov, $5,000 for an RPG-7 grenade launcher, $15,000 for a speedboat). That contrasts with an initial ransom demand to the tanker’s owner, Saudi Aramco, of $25 million.
“Piracy is an excellent business model if you operate from an impoverished, lawless place like Somalia,” says Patrick Cullen, a security expert at the London School of Economics who has been researching piracy. “The risk-reward ratio is just huge.”
But this type of coverage of the pirates is similar to the false narrative about “tribalism” being the cause of all of Africa’s problems. Of course, there are straight-up gangsters and criminals engaged in these hijackings. Perhaps the pirates who hijacked the Alabama on Wednesday fall into that category. We do not yet know. But that is hardly the whole “pirate” story. Consider what one pirate told The New York Times after he and his men seized a Ukrainian freighter “loaded with tanks, artillery, grenade launchers and ammunition” last year. “We don’t consider ourselves sea bandits,” said Sugule Ali:. “We consider sea bandits those who illegally fish in our seas and dump waste in our seas and carry weapons in our seas. We are simply patrolling our seas. Think of us like a coast guard.” Now, that “coast guard” analogy is a stretch, but his point is an important and widely omitted part of this story. Indeed the Times article was titled, “Somali Pirates Tell Their Side: They Want Only Money.” Yet, The New York Times acknowledged, “the piracy industry started about 10 to 15 years ago… as a response to illegal fishing.”
Take this fact: Over $300 million worth of tuna, shrimp, and lobster are “being stolen every year by illegal trawlers” off Somalia’s coast, forcing the fishing industry there into a state of virtual non-existence.
But it isn’t just the theft of seafood. Nuclear dumping has polluted the environment. “In 1991, the government of Somalia collapsed,” wrote Johann Hari in The Independent. “Its nine million people have been teetering on starvation ever since – and the ugliest forces in the Western world have seen this as a great opportunity to steal the country’s food supply and dump our nuclear waste in their seas.”
According to Hari:
As soon as the [Somali] government was gone, mysterious European ships started appearing off the coast of Somalia, dumping vast barrels into the ocean. The coastal population began to sicken. At first they suffered strange rashes, nausea and malformed babies. Then, after the 2005 tsunami, hundreds of the dumped and leaking barrels washed up on shore. People began to suffer from radiation sickness, and more than 300 died.
…
This is the context in which the “pirates” have emerged. Somalian fishermen took speedboats to try to dissuade the dumpers and trawlers, or at least levy a “tax” on them. They call themselves the Volunteer Coastguard of Somalia – and ordinary Somalis agree. The independent Somalian news site WardheerNews found 70 per cent “strongly supported the piracy as a form of national defence.”
As the media coverage of the pirates has increased, private security companies like Xe/Blackwater have stepped in, seeing profits. A few months ago, Blackwater executives flew to London to meet with shipping company executives about protecting their ships from pirate attacks. In October, the company deployed the MacArthur, its “private sector warship equipped with helicopters” to the Gulf of Aden. “We have been contacted by shipowners who say they need our help in making sure goods get to their destination,” said the company’s executive vice-president, Bill Matthews. “The McArthur can help us accomplish that.”
According to an engineer aboard the MacArthur, the ship, whose crew includes former Navy SEALS, was at one point stationed in an area several hundred miles off the coast of Yemen. “Security teams will escort ships around both horns of Africa, Somalia and Yemen as they head to the Suez Canal… The McArthur will serve as a staging point for the SEALs and their smaller boats.”
All of this is important to keep in context any time you see a short blurb pop up about pirates attacking ships. “Did we expect starving Somalians to stand passively on their beaches, paddling in our toxic waste, and watch us snatch their fish to eat in restaurants in London and Paris and Rome?” Hari asked. “We won’t act on those crimes – the only sane solution to this problem – but when some of the fishermen responded by disrupting the transit-corridor for 20 percent of the world’s oil supply, we swiftly send in the gunboats.”
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The company, A.P. Moller-Maersk, is a Denmark-based company with a large US subsidiary, Maersk Line, Ltd, that serves US government agencies and contractors. The company, which is based in Norfolk, Virginia, runs the world’s largest fleet of US-flag vessels. The “Alabama” was about 300 miles off the coast of the Puntland region of northern Somalia when it was taken. The US military says the Alabama was not operating on a DoD contract at the time and was said to be delivering food aid.
The closest US warship to the “Alabama” at the time of the seizure was 300 miles away. At the time of the seizure, the US Navy did not say how or if it would respond, but seemed not to rule out intervention. ”It’s fair to say we are closely monitoring the situation, but we will not discuss nor speculate on current and future military operations,” said Navy Cmdr. Jane Campbell.
The seizure of the ship seemed to have been short-lived. At the time of this writing, the Pentagon was reporting that the US crew retook the ship and was holding one of the pirates in custody. At this point, it is unclear if the crew acted alone or had assistance from the military or another security force.
Over the past year, there has been a dramatic uptick in media coverage of the “pirates,” particularly in the Gulf of Aden. Pirates reportedly took in upwards of $150 million in ransoms last year alone. In fact, at the moment the Alabama’s seizure, pirates were already holding 14 other vessels with about 200 crew members, according to the International Maritime Bureau. There have been seven hijackings in the past month alone.
Often, the reporting on pirates centers around the gangsterism of the pirates and the seemingly huge ransoms they demand. Indeed, piracy can be a very profitable business, as the following report from Reuters suggests:
A rough back-of-the-envelope calculation shows that the operation to hijack the Saudi tanker, the Sirius Star, cost no more than $25,000, assuming that the pirates bought new equipment and weapons ($450 apiece for an AK-47 Kalashnikov, $5,000 for an RPG-7 grenade launcher, $15,000 for a speedboat). That contrasts with an initial ransom demand to the tanker’s owner, Saudi Aramco, of $25 million.
“Piracy is an excellent business model if you operate from an impoverished, lawless place like Somalia,” says Patrick Cullen, a security expert at the London School of Economics who has been researching piracy. “The risk-reward ratio is just huge.”
But this type of coverage of the pirates is similar to the false narrative about “tribalism” being the cause of all of Africa’s problems. Of course, there are straight-up gangsters and criminals engaged in these hijackings. Perhaps the pirates who hijacked the Alabama on Wednesday fall into that category. We do not yet know. But that is hardly the whole “pirate” story. Consider what one pirate told The New York Times after he and his men seized a Ukrainian freighter “loaded with tanks, artillery, grenade launchers and ammunition” last year. “We don’t consider ourselves sea bandits,” said Sugule Ali:. “We consider sea bandits those who illegally fish in our seas and dump waste in our seas and carry weapons in our seas. We are simply patrolling our seas. Think of us like a coast guard.” Now, that “coast guard” analogy is a stretch, but his point is an important and widely omitted part of this story. Indeed the Times article was titled, “Somali Pirates Tell Their Side: They Want Only Money.” Yet, The New York Times acknowledged, “the piracy industry started about 10 to 15 years ago… as a response to illegal fishing.”
Take this fact: Over $300 million worth of tuna, shrimp, and lobster are “being stolen every year by illegal trawlers” off Somalia’s coast, forcing the fishing industry there into a state of virtual non-existence.
But it isn’t just the theft of seafood. Nuclear dumping has polluted the environment. “In 1991, the government of Somalia collapsed,” wrote Johann Hari in The Independent. “Its nine million people have been teetering on starvation ever since – and the ugliest forces in the Western world have seen this as a great opportunity to steal the country’s food supply and dump our nuclear waste in their seas.”
According to Hari:
As soon as the [Somali] government was gone, mysterious European ships started appearing off the coast of Somalia, dumping vast barrels into the ocean. The coastal population began to sicken. At first they suffered strange rashes, nausea and malformed babies. Then, after the 2005 tsunami, hundreds of the dumped and leaking barrels washed up on shore. People began to suffer from radiation sickness, and more than 300 died.
…
This is the context in which the “pirates” have emerged. Somalian fishermen took speedboats to try to dissuade the dumpers and trawlers, or at least levy a “tax” on them. They call themselves the Volunteer Coastguard of Somalia – and ordinary Somalis agree. The independent Somalian news site WardheerNews found 70 per cent “strongly supported the piracy as a form of national defence.”
As the media coverage of the pirates has increased, private security companies like Xe/Blackwater have stepped in, seeing profits. A few months ago, Blackwater executives flew to London to meet with shipping company executives about protecting their ships from pirate attacks. In October, the company deployed the MacArthur, its “private sector warship equipped with helicopters” to the Gulf of Aden. “We have been contacted by shipowners who say they need our help in making sure goods get to their destination,” said the company’s executive vice-president, Bill Matthews. “The McArthur can help us accomplish that.”
According to an engineer aboard the MacArthur, the ship, whose crew includes former Navy SEALS, was at one point stationed in an area several hundred miles off the coast of Yemen. “Security teams will escort ships around both horns of Africa, Somalia and Yemen as they head to the Suez Canal… The McArthur will serve as a staging point for the SEALs and their smaller boats.”
All of this is important to keep in context any time you see a short blurb pop up about pirates attacking ships. “Did we expect starving Somalians to stand passively on their beaches, paddling in our toxic waste, and watch us snatch their fish to eat in restaurants in London and Paris and Rome?” Hari asked. “We won’t act on those crimes – the only sane solution to this problem – but when some of the fishermen responded by disrupting the transit-corridor for 20 percent of the world’s oil supply, we swiftly send in the gunboats.”
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"Black is in!" |
Since slavery supposedly ended, so called African American, Blacks and Negroes have not had the pleasure of being proud of who we are. Well, the time has come and you can hold your head high! The most powerful politician in the world is Black. PRESIDENT Barack Obama!
Black
The top female tennis playersin the world are Black. Venus and Serena Williams
Dr. Ben Carson
TIGER WOODS On another note:
must be kicking himself. Moral of the story, don't try to be someone other than who you already are. God made you that way. Rejoice in yourself! Others do. So should you. (IF you doubt me, look at all the plastic surgery going on in the world today from tanning salons, lip injections, Victoria's Secret Panties with BUTTS! and more we aren't even aware of!) SMILE! |
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TO THE AFRICAN COMMUNITY IN CHICAGO!
In 2007, the United Nations General Assembly designated 25 March as an annual International Day of Remembrance of the Victims of Slavery and the Transatlantic Slave Trade.
The first Remembrance convened on March 25, 2008, at the United Nations in New York . The Secretary-General of the UN; the President of the UN General Assembly; the Permanent Representatives of Tanzania, the United Kingdom , Barbados , Cape Verde and the United States ; and Congressman Donald M. Payne delivered messages. Harry Belafonte gave the keynote address.
The first community-based Remembrance convenes from 7:00 to 10:00 pm on March 25, 2009, at the Jacob Caruthers Center for Inner City Studies, 700 East Oakwood Blvd , Chicago , Illinois. Undergound Bookstore and Pan-African Roots are the organizers of this Remembrance.
Chicago is the economic and political capital of the African community in the United States . It elected 20 city councilpersons of African descent out of 50, 3 out of 7 congresspersons, 1 out of 2 senators and the President of the United States . Chicago is the spiritual, legislative and legal center of the Reparations Movement in the United States . It is therefore fitting that the first community-based commemoration convenes here, one month before the Durban Review Conference convenes in Geneva , Switzerland . As you perhaps know, the Durban Review Conference is the follow-up to the 3rd World Conference Against Racism which was held in Durban , South African in 2001. The United States has threatened to boycott this meeting again!
This Chicago-wide Remembrance will recognize and honor religious and faith leaders and representatives from institutions that have indelible footprints in the struggle for liberation of African descent people. These leaders and the institutions that they represent have contributed significantly to the local and global historic and contemporary expressions of liberation theology and prophetic witness on behalf of African and Oppressed Peoples throughout the world.
This Remembrance will also recognize and honor student leaders, educators, lawyers, judges, media workers, community organizers, movement leaders, elected and appointed officials who have made sterling contributions to the struggle against racism, racial discrimination, segregation, colonialism and apartheid; and for reparations and the right to return to and reclaim our ancestral and just land. We have asked the Diplomatic Community in Chicago , Washington , New York and Geneva to send their Remembrances, and join us! We will invite the media.
Underground Bookstore and Pan-African Roots ask you to join us at this historic Remembrance.You will meet people you have not seen in years, and a new generation of youth who will also leave their footprint in history. Bring your family, parishioners and neighbors, co-workers and students! You and they will not want to miss this reunion of old friends and new ones, this renewal of struggle and spirit.
We demand the enforcement of the Chicago Slavery Era Records Disclosure Ordinance, and the immediate release of all slavery era records!
Stay Strong!
Bob Brown
Co-Director of Pan-African Roots and the
Kwame Ture Work-Study Institute and Library
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Do NOT put off today for tomorrow!
I called Richard a week ago today (Sunday) to invite him on my tv show to talk about his work and Chicago Radio Personalities. He agreed and we had talked about the last 2 weeks in March for taping. Monday morning I get an call stating he had passed away!
Always a lesson in living. Dying is inevitable. I had put this project off for several years, and now Richared won't be included in the show, and I am almost angry at myself for not moving forward sooner.
Lesson. Move forward even when you don't feel like it, don't have time or any other excuse you can come up with. Time waits for no one.
Time is on your side whether you believe it or not.
Move forward. Stay positive. Stay on purpose, no matter what.
Rest in peace Richard. We'll miss you madly!
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Just in case you didn't know, Michelle Hoskins was one of the first people I interviewed as a success story for The Passion Priniciples: Pathways to Purpose, Power & Profit!
Join the movement! Don't complain about what you don't have when you don't support your own. Think Global, not local. Your purchase does make a difference, just like it did when you voted for President Obama!
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| Students and Community Organizers Launch Countdown to Break the Silence Congo Week |
Washington, DC - September 20, 2008 - The United Nations says the conflict in the Congo is the deadliest in the world since World War Two. Since 1996, it is estimated that nearly 6 million people have died in the Congo due to conflict and conflict related causes. Throughout the past decade, Doctors Without Borders has consistently reported that the Congo conflict is one of the top ten most underreported stories in the world. Student leaders and community organizers have responded to the silence surrounding the loss of life in the Congo by organizing throughout the globe to Break the Silence and raise awareness about the situation. They aim to mobilize young people and others in 100 countries and on 1,000 university campuses to participate in a global teach-in and week of activities from October 19 - 25, 2008. Who: Key student leaders representing American University, North Carolina A&T, Howard University, The University of Maryland, Bowie State, University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, Friends of the Congo and other supporters. What: Launch of countdown to Break the Silence Congo Week, October 19 - 25, 2008 When: 10 a.m. - 12 noon, Monday, September 22, 2008 Where: National Press Club 529 14th Street, NW 13th Floor, Zenger Room Washington, DC 20045 For more information about the Press Conference, please call Friends of the Congo at 202-584-6512 or email info@friendsofthecongo.org. Visit www.friendsofthecongo.org or www.congoweek.org for more details. --------------- About Friends of the Congo (friendsofthecongo.org) The Friends of the Congo (FOTC) is a 501 (c) 3 tax-exempt advocacy organization based in Washington, DC. The FOTC was established at the behest of Congolese human rights and grassroots institutions in 2004, to work together to bring about peaceful and lasting change in the Democratic Republic of Congo, formerly Zaire. About Congo Week (www.congoweek.org) Congo Week is a global initiative led by students to raise awareness about the situation in the Congo and provide support to the people of the Congo. |
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Be sure and spread the news!
New Exoffender Skills training @ Kennedy King College
Chicagoland Youth and Adult Training Center is starting a 16-week training program on September 15, 2008 to train exoffenders to repair small engines and outdoor power equipment. This is a skill that could lead to employment and business ownership. Participants will receive vocational and soft skills training, employment placement assistance and have the opportunity to earn a small stipend repairing small engines while in the program. Classes will be held 3 nights per week (M, W, F) from 5pm to 9pm at Kennedy-King College, 63rdand Cottage Grove.
WARNING: CYATC training programs are run “boot camp-style” which means students must be on time for classes; and actively participate in classes, job placement and other related activities. Students who are late either during the program application and orientation process or for classes will not be admitted into the program or will be dismissed from the program. All students are expected to help each other succeed. The first two classes graduated 26 of 28 students and lead to the placement of almost 60% in new or better jobs. This program is for exoffenders interested in changing their lives by learning a trade and finding employment. If this is you give us a call.
For more information contact CYATC @ 773 783-4022. Training is free for participants selected.
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AFRICAN FESTIVAL OF THE ARTS -
THIS WEEKEND IN WASHINGTON PARK
SCHEDULE:
Entertainment
World Music Stage
Fri. 8/29 Sat. 8/30 Sun. 8/31 Mon. 9/1
2:30 - 3:30 P.M. DJ Music DJ Music DJ Music DJ Music
3:30 - 4:15 P.M. SPIRIT Tribute to Motown Odies Williams New Orleans Revival
4:45 - 6:00 P.M. Siji/ DJ Music Youssoupha Sidibe Roland Brown Voices
6:30 - 8:00 P.M. Fertile Ground Ray Martinez New Orleans Revival Diblo Dibala
Dee Parmer Stage
Fri. 8/29 Sat. 8/30 Sun. 8/31 Mon. 9/1
2:30 - 3:30 P.M. DJ Music DJ Music DJ Music Trinity
4:30 - 5:45 P.M. SPIRIT Raices Habaneras Mulgrew Miller Samba 1/Featuring Dill Costa
6:15 - 7:15 P.M. Antoine Les Nubians New Orleans Revival Nicholas Payton
7:45 - 9:45 P.M. Al Hudson New Orleans Revival Rachelle Farrell Kool & The Gang
Hip Hop Stage (presented by George S. May Foundation for the Arts/ PAUSE Initiative)
Fri. 8/29
6:00 - 9:00P.M A Chi City Celebration hosted by Rhymefest featuring Mikkey Halsted, Town Gabbz,
Teefa, Dave Jeff, J4, Black Orchid, Amina, Cool Out Chris, DJ Roosevelt Treasure Chest and more.
Includes the Chi City Fashion Show presented by the hottest urban boutiques in the city.
Sat. 8/30
12 PM Until Showtime Special Guest DJ spinning Hip Hop, House and R&B
4:30PM Special Ed
5:15 PM M’reld
5:45PM Swamphouse
6:15PM The Lady of Rage
6:45 PM NoTryDo.Sincere
7:15 PM Big Daddy Kane
Sun. 8/31
12 PM Until Showtime Special Guest DJ spinning Hip Hop, House and R&B
4:00PM Khari Lemuel
5:00 PM Keith Murray
6:15 PM Uneq’ka and Just Flow
7:00 PM Nice and Smooth
Mon. 9/1
12 PM Until Showtime Special Guest DJ spinning Hip Hop, House and R&B
4:00PM The Main Thang
5:00 PM Black Sheep
6:15 PM Rhymefest
7:00 PM Brand Nubian
| Pavilions Chrysler Financial Pavilion Chrysler Financial is committed to enriching the communities and regions where we live and operate. Through our support of events such as the African Festival of the Arts and Fiesta del Sol in the Chicagoland area, we are able to implement positive, long-term and lasting social change in the areas of financial education and community advancement." View the new 2009 Chrysler vehicles and learn the smart financing options to purchasing the car of your dreams! Film Pavilion (Presented by ICE Theaters) View a variety of short and feature length films that are produced by filmmakers of African ancestry, and interpret the culture and experiences of peoples living in all parts of the African Diaspora. Enjoy free popcorn, get free movie posters and learn more about the Black World Cinema independent film screenings only at your neighborhood ICE Theaters Fine Arts Pavilion The Festival is world renowned for its assembly of artists from around the Diaspora featuring original paintings, sculptures limited editions, prints, photographs, and ceramics. Some of the artists this year include Stacey Brown - festival artist of the year- Emerson Williams, Uwa Hunwick, Bayo Iribhogbe, Frank Frasier, Melvin King, Rondell, Nii-Oti, Akosuah Bandele, Marvin Sims, Ousmane Gueye, Dana Easter, Dimali, Isodor Howard, Samuel Akainyah, and Dayo Layoe. Author and Book Pavilion (Presented by Say it Loud) Best-selling and emerging authors share their cultural interpretations and the legacy of storytelling in the Griot tradition. Enjoy author-facilitated workshops to learn marketing and other aspects of publishing; spoken word, live readings, and book signings featuring authors such as Felicia Pride, Bil Carpenter, Sharon McGee, Erica and Monica Simmons of Double Stitch, and Third World Press among others. Meet the Artists Media Tent (Hosted by Swank Society) Get signed autographs and take pictures with celebrity performers. Swank Society will stream live interviews from their media tent. African Marketplace Shop with over 300 artists and vendors to find African goods and find valuable treasures that make wonderful Holiday gifts. Buy wholesale items and artifacts. The Drum Village Come celebrate The Drum. The Dance. The Experience, an exploration of the influence African and African-American heritage had on the cultural arts in Chicago for more than 40 years. This pavilion showcases interactive music education sessions and cultural performances rooted in African traditions; historical artifacts, photos; performances; and demonstrations by artistic Drummers and Dancers from around the world. Master drummers Olu Shakoor and Baba Tyehimba Mtu lead sessions that teach drumming techniques. Bring your old drums for re-skinning. A spontaneous and collaborative environment encourages all to participate in the rhythmic experience and share their gifts with others. . Bank of the Nile Food Court Allow your senses to come alive as mouth-watering smells lead you to a food court rich in delectable and authentic African-cuisine. Experience exotic fare from the diverse cultures of Africa including Egusi from Nigeria; Wolof rice from Senegal; Jerk chicken, goat-meat and fish from the Caribbean; and other spicy, appetizing dishes from across the African Diaspora. And don’t miss out on the distinct Cajun and Soul foods from the different corners of the world. Beer and Wine Garden (Presented by Heineken and Wines of South Africa) Enjoy the full-bodied, refreshingly smooth spirits, wines, and beers. Children's Pavilion (Presented by Target) Youth of all ages can learn and enjoy games, music, dance, storytelling, theater, arts and crafts all day long! Contributors include: Hyde Park Arts Center, the Field Museum and other family-focused institutions that offer fun, educational and interactive programs. Many social service agencies will be represented in the pavilion to provide answers to family, parental and children’s questions. Spirituality Pavilion Engage or observe sessions and conversations with African priests, spiritualists, healers, nutritionists, and herbalists. Try the diviners and other readers to uncover your hidden paths. Health and Fitness Pavilion-Wellness Village ( Presented by Blue Cross Blue Shield of Illinois) Stop by the Wellness Pavilion for free health screenings including blood screenings and Sickle testing. And just as students head back to school, the Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Illinois Care Van will roll out to the Festival grounds on Saturday (one special day) for FREE immunizations. Parents who accompany their child with shot records can get up-to-date immunizations. Don’t miss your chance to receive promotional items and giveaways including healthy living recipes and lifestyle wellness tips. Cyberspace Pavilion This new festival educational center offers free seminars, workshops, advice applications from technology professionals along with internet, e-mail access and more. Quilting Pavilion The Nubian Quilters invite you to “ come and stitch with us!” The African-American quilting tradition is centuries-old, dating back to the American colonial period. Further, enslaved Africans brought with them techniques of piecing, appliqué and embroidery. The contemporary quilts of today can be categorized as art as textile artist evolve the quilt making tradition. Come join us at the quilting pavilion to learn traditional and contemporary techniques of quilt design. Let's keep the tradition alive! This is HipHop Stage and Pavilion Designed to remind us of why we fell in love with hiphop in the first place. Complementing the stage performances, the programming is rounded out by exhibits paying homage to the beginning elements of the culture; as well as discussions led by HipHop artists and community leaders exploring Chicago’s music industry, HipHop and the global connection, immigration, HIV/AIDS, raising Black boys and more. Visit the pavilion and stage area to get the full experience. Take a moment to reflect on the African influence in HipHop, and leave with the understanding of why THIS is HipHop!" |
ARCHIVES
Barack Obama Nomination Acceptance Speech
Michele Obama
Joe Biden
Hillary Clinton
Bill Clinton
Al Gore
Ted Kennedy
Caroline Kennedy
More from the Democratic National Convention 2008 Denver
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August
is the month of celebration for those under the astrological sign of
Leo!
As we celebrate this month, lets' be reminded, it's also the month of romance. Romance yourself, starting with self love.
After self love, comes love of everyone else.
Mechelle Obama, is a prime example of that. In case you missed it like I did
(attended the Listening Party for Robin Thicke) you can still enjoy it anyway.
_____________
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/22425001/vp/26398912#26398912"
after you read the story, come back and read this:
By DARLENE SUPERVILLE, Associated Press Writer Tue Aug 26, 12:48 AM ET
DENVER - It was Michelle Obama's speech, but her husband said it highlighted one of his attributes — one he says voters should want in a president.
"Now you know why I asked her out so many times, even though she said no," Barack Obama, the Democratic presidential nominee-in-waiting, told delegates by satellite Monday night after she delivered the first major speech of the Democratic convention.
"You want a persistent president," he said.
In her speech, Michelle Obama told cheering delegates jammed into the Pepsi Center and a nation watching on television that she and the possible future president have shared their hopes and dreams, and their struggles, too.
Afterward, their daughters — Sasha and Malia — joined her on stage and Stevie Wonder's "Isn't She Lovely" blared from the convention hall. Microphone in hand, the girls began smiling and waving at their father after his familiar face popped up on a large screen erected on stage.
"How about that Michelle Obama?" Barack Obama said. He told her: "You were unbelievable."
"You also look very cute," he said.
Anyone who travels as much as Obama does can get confused about where they are on any given night, and Obama is no exception. He mistakenly said he had watched the speech at the home of a St. Louis family — despite the cue card affixed to the camera as a reminder that he was actually 230 miles away in Kansas City, Mo., where had scheduled a campaign appearance Tuesday.
Sensing the flub, 7-year-old Sasha apparently was prompted to ask: "Daddy, what city are you in?"
"I'm in Kansas City, sweetie."
Obama asked their opinion of their mother's performance and it was unanimous. Both thought she "did good."
After several "I love yous" and Sasha — the hammier sister — blew her dad a kiss, he signed off for the night.
"Listen, I want you guys to look after the girls, look after mommy before I get there and I'll see you guys on Thursday, all right," he said. "Love you guys."
In Kansas City, reporters asked Obama how it felt to watch his wife. During the speech, and a biographical video shown before she spoke, Obama occasionally wiped his eyes.
"You notice my younger daughter is the ham," he said.
"She was unbelievable. But I'm not surprised. When she does something, she does it well," he said of Michelle. "She told her story. It's a story that a lot of families can relate to. Her dad struggled, worked hard. And here, his daughter, is addressing the nation."
Barack Obama closes the convention Thursday night with his acceptance speech at Invesco Field at Mile High.
___
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Network Before You Need Work
Article written by Zelda Robinson
See Details at:
http://www.latinamericanchamberofcommerce.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=138&Itemid=1
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Associated Press writer Beth Fouhy in Kansas City, Mo., contributed to this report.
Chicago Gang Initiations
Some of you may already have heard this, but I wanted to be sure I didn't miss anyone.
The 'car bump' gang initiations are beginning again in Chicago and may, in fact, spill over into the suburbs, as well.
What happens is that, the wanna-be gang members will bump into the back of your car and if they can get the driver to step out of the car, that's the driver they decide to blow away right there on the spot; thereby, earning their way into the gang.
So, if any young men or women rear-end you, just take down their license plate and go to the police to file a report --
DO NOT get out of or stop your car or even react -- just keep going.
Please let everybody you know (men and women) about this.
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Inspirational Icon Contest.
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One of a kind STOP SMOKING BOOTCAMP!
If I can stop, so can you! Learn what I did to kick the habit!
This Stop Smoking BootCamp will work if you attend sessions and be WILLING to work on yourself and the issues that cause you to smoke in the first place.
It’s not easy, but it can be done!
If you work with me, I’ll work with you and help you kick the habit once and for all. I’ve been smoke free since 1979! Let’s make 2008 your year to quit!
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24 Hour Broadcast Center
Hot Line (312) 409-6619
Set those TIVO’s & VCR’s Higher Learning NW TV Show
Sundays at Midnight Chicago on Channel 19/COMCAST 19
Wisconsin/Minnesota Channel 7
DIMONA, Israel -- As a young African-American man in late 1970s Chicago, Atur Yirmeyahu was contemplating the fairly standard dilemmas of whether to go to graduate school and ask his girlfriend of three years to marry him.
BIPARTISAN, BICAMERAL RESOLUTION OFFERS APOLOGY FOR ENSLAVEMENT
AND RACIAL SEGREGATION OF AFRICAN-AMERICANS
| HOW IS MAJOR MEDIA REPORTING JUNETEENTH TODAY??? From: Mark Allen <newbldi@aol.com> Juneteenth (June 19th) is the oldest nationally celebrated commemoration of the ending of slavery in the United States. >From its Galveston, Texas origin in 1865, the observance of June 19th as the African American Emancipation Day has spread across the United States and beyond. Today Juneteenth commemorates African American freedom and emphasizes education and achievement. It is a day, a week, and in some areas a month marked with celebrations, guest speakers, picnics and family gatherings. It is a time for reflection and rejoicing. It is a time for assessment, self-improvement and for planning the future. Its growing popularity signifies a level of maturity and dignity in America long over due. In cities across the country, people of all races, nationalities and religions are joining hands to truthfully acknowledge a period in our history that shaped and continues to influence our society today. Sensitized to the conditions and experiences of others, only then can we make significant and lasting improvements in our society. © JUNETEENTH.com |
A bipartisan, bicameral resolution passed by the U.S. Senate today provides an apology for the enslavement and racial segregation of African-Americans. The measure comes as the nation celebrates Juneteenth, the oldest nationally celebrated commemoration of the end of slavery. It was sponsored by Senators Tom Harkin (D-IA) and Sam Brownback (R-KS) and in the U.S. House by Congressmen Cohen. It is expected to be taken up by the U.S. House shortly.
“Numerous states and even corporations such as J.P. Morgan and Aetna have apologized for their role in slavery and
Jim Crow. But slavery and Jim Crow, and their continuing consequences are not the historical baggage of one state,
one region, or one company. They are an enduring national shame,” said Senator Harkin. “It was the nation that
enshrined slavery in the Constitution and Congress that passed laws such as the Missouri Compromise and Fugitive
Slave Act. It was the nation’s Supreme Court which bolstered slavery and affirmed segregation in Dred Scott v. Sandford
and Plessey v. Ferguson. This resolution acknowledges and apologizes for a past collective injustice. And it is long over-due.”
“I am pleased that Congress has officially offered an apology for slavery and it’s long overdue,” said Senator Brownback.
“The formation of my home state of Kansas was centered around slavery and came to be known as Bleeding Kansas.
I believe that this official apology will enable our nation to begin healing our racial wounds rooted in the institution of slavery.
I do not pretend that this apology is a panacea but it is a much needed catalyst for reconciliation. It is vital that together
we are able to reconcile the hurt and shame of our past and begin together a brighter future for all Americans.”
“Last year’s historic vote in the House on a similar Slavery Apology resolution put us squarely on the path toward reconciliation
and healing. Today’s actions by the Senate have moved us further down that road. Slavery and Jim Crow are stains upon our
nation and our government. As we strive toward the goal of a more perfect union, we must acknowledge our past mistakes
that we have made on that journey. I thank Senators Harkin and Brownback for their efforts,” Congressman Steve Cohen.
After making detailed findings regarding slavery and the system of de jure segregation known as “Jim Crow,” the resolution
reads that the Congress:
Acknowledges the fundamental injustice, cruelty, brutality and inhumanity of slavery and Jim Crow laws;
Apologizes to African-Americans on behalf of the people of the United States, for the wrongs committed against them
and their ancestors who suffered under slavery and Jim Crow laws; and
Expresses its recommitment to the principle that all people are created equal and endowed with inalienable rights to life,
liberty and the pursuit of happiness, and calls on all people of the United States to work toward eliminating racial
prejudices, injustices and discrimination from our society.
This resolution is not novel or unique. In 1988, Congress apologized for the internment of Japanese Americans held during WWII.
In 1993, Congress apologized to native Hawaiians for overthrowing their king. In 2005, the Senate apologized for its failure to enact
anti-lynching legislation. Last year, the Senate adopted as part of the Indian Health Bill an amendment apologizing to Native
Americans. The resolution, therefore, addresses a glaring oversight that Congress has not, on behalf of the nation, acknowledged
and apologized for slavery and Jim Crow.
The measure is supported by various civil rights groups, including the NAACP and the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights.
For more information contact:
Kate Cyrul (Harkin) 202-224-3254
Brian Hart (Brownback) 202-228-3107
Steven Broderick (Cohen) 202-226-7916
archivesThe Wealthiest Black Americans
"It is an honor to be here, in the city where the NAACP was formed, to mark its centennial. What we celebrate tonight is not simply the journey the NAACP has traveled, but the journey that we, as Americans, have traveled over the past one hundred years. It is a journey that takes us back to a time before most of us were born, long before the Voting Rights Act, the Civil Rights Act, and Brown v. Board of Education; back to an America just a generation past slavery. It was a time when Jim Crow was a way of life; when lynchings were all too common; and when race riots were shaking cities across a segregated land. It was in this America where an Atlanta scholar named W.E.B. Du Bois, a man of towering intellect and a fierce passion for justice, sparked what became known as the Niagara movement; where reformers united, not by color but cause; and where an association was born that would, as its charter says, promote equality and eradicate prejudice among citizens of the United States. From the beginning, Du Bois understood how change would come - just as King and all the civil rights giants did later. They understood that unjust laws needed to be overturned; that legislation needed to be passed; and that Presidents needed to be pressured into action. They knew that the stain of slavery and the sin of segregation had to be lifted in the courtroom and in the legislature. But they also knew that here, in America, change would have to come from the people. It would come from people protesting lynching, rallying against violence, and walking instead of taking the bus. It would come from men and women - of every age and faith, race and region - taking Greyhounds on Freedom Rides; taking seats at Greensboro lunch counters; and registering voters in rural Mississippi, knowing they would be harassed, knowing they would be beaten, knowing that they might never return. Because of what they did, we are a more perfect union. Because Jim Crow laws were overturned, black CEOs today run Fortune 500 companies. Because civil rights laws were passed, black mayors, governors, and Members of Congress serve in places where they might once have been unable to vote. And because ordinary people made the civil rights movement their own, I made a trip to Springfield a couple years ago - where Lincoln once lived, and race riots once raged - and began the journey that has led me here tonight as the 44th President of the United States of America. And yet, even as we celebrate the remarkable achievements of the past one hundred years; even as we inherit extraordinary progress that cannot be denied; even as we marvel at the courage and determination of so many plain folks - we know that too many barriers still remain. We know that even as our economic crisis batters Americans of all races, African Americans are out of work more than just about anyone else - a gap that's widening here in New York City, as detailed in a report this week by Comptroller Bill Thompson. We know that even as spiraling health care costs crush families of all races, African Americans are more likely to suffer from a host of diseases but less likely to own health insurance than just about anyone else. We know that even as we imprison more people of all races than any nation in the world, an African-American child is roughly five times as likely as a white child to see the inside of a jail. And we know that even as the scourge of HIV/AIDS devastates nations abroad, particularly in Africa, it is devastating the African-American community here at home with disproportionate force. These are some of the barriers of our time. They're very different from the barriers faced by earlier generations. They're very different from the ones faced when fire hoses and dogs were being turned on young marchers; when Charles Hamilton Houston and a group of young Howard lawyers were dismantling segregation. But what is required to overcome today's barriers is the same as was needed then. The same commitment. The same sense of urgency. The same sense of sacrifice. The same willingness to do our part for ourselves and one another that has always defined America at its best. The question, then, is where do we direct our efforts? What steps do we take to overcome these barriers? How do we move forward in the next one hundred years? The first thing we need to do is make real the words of your charter and eradicate prejudice, bigotry, and discrimination among citizens of the United States. I understand there may be a temptation among some to think that discrimination is no longer a problem in 2009. And I believe that overall, there's probably never been less discrimination in America than there is today. But make no mistake: the pain of discrimination is still felt in America. By African-American women paid less for doing the same work as colleagues of a different color and gender. By Latinos made to feel unwelcome in their own country. By Muslim Americans viewed with suspicion for simply kneeling down to pray. By our gay brothers and sisters, still taunted, still attacked, still denied their rights. On the 45th anniversary of the Civil Rights Act, discrimination must not stand. Not on account of color or gender; how you worship or who you love. Prejudice has no place in the United States of America. But we also know that prejudice and discrimination are not even the steepest barriers to opportunity today. The most difficult barriers include structural inequalities that our nation's legacy of discrimination has left behind; inequalities still plaguing too many communities and too often the object of national neglect. These are barriers we are beginning to tear down by rewarding work with an expanded tax credit; making housing more affordable; and giving ex-offenders a second chance. These are barriers that we are targeting through our White House Office on Urban Affairs, and through Promise Neighborhoods that build on Geoffrey Canada's success with the Harlem Children's Zone; and that foster a comprehensive approach to ending poverty by putting all children on a pathway to college, and giving them the schooling and support to get there. But our task of reducing these structural inequalities has been made more difficult by the state, and structure, of the broader economy; an economy fueled by a cycle of boom and bust; an economy built not on a rock, but sand. That is why my administration is working so hard not only to create and save jobs in the short-term, not only to extend unemployment insurance and help for people who have lost their health care, not only to stem this immediate economic crisis, but to lay a new foundation for growth and prosperity that will put opportunity within reach not just for African Americans, but for all Americans. One pillar of this new foundation is health insurance reform that cuts costs, makes quality health coverage affordable for all, and closes health care disparities in the process. Another pillar is energy reform that makes clean energy profitable, freeing America from the grip of foreign oil, putting people to work upgrading low-income homes, and creating jobs that cannot be outsourced. And another pillar is financial reform with consumer protections to crack down on mortgage fraud and stop predatory lenders from targeting our poor communities. All these things will make America stronger and more competitive. They will drive innovation, create jobs, and provide families more security. Still, even if we do it all, the African-American community will fall behind in the United States and the United States will fall behind in the world unless we do a far better job than we have been doing of educating our sons and daughters. In the 21st century - when so many jobs will require a bachelor's degree or more, when countries that out-educate us today will outcompete us tomorrow - a world-class education is a prerequisite for success. You know what I'm talking about. There's a reason the story of the civil rights movement was written in our schools. There's a reason Thurgood Marshall took up the cause of Linda Brown. There's a reason the Little Rock Nine defied a governor and a mob. It's because there is no stronger weapon against inequality and no better path to opportunity than an education that can unlock a child's God-given potential. Yet, more than a half century after Brown v. Board of Education, the dream of a world-class education is still being deferred all across this country. African-American students are lagging behind white classmates in reading and math - an achievement gap that is growing in states that once led the way on civil rights. Over half of all African-American students are dropping out of school in some places. There are overcrowded classrooms, crumbling schools, and corridors of shame in America filled with poor children - black, brown, and white alike. The state of our schools is not an African-American problem; it's an American problem. And if Al Sharpton, Mike Bloomberg, and Newt Gingrich can agree that we need to solve it, then all of us can agree on that. All of us can agree that we need to offer every child in this country the best education the world has to offer from the cradle through a career. That is our responsibility as the United States of America. And we, all of us in government, are working to do our part by not only offering more resources, but demanding more reform. When it comes to higher education, we are making college and advanced training more affordable, and strengthening community colleges that are a gateway to so many with an initiative that will prepare students not only to earn a degree but find a job when they graduate; an initiative that will help us meet the goal I have set of leading the world in college degrees by 2020. We are creating a Race to the Top Fund that will reward states and public school districts that adopt 21st century standards and assessments. And we are creating incentives for states to promote excellent teachers and replace bad ones - because the job of a teacher is too important for us to accept anything but the best. We should also explore innovative approaches being pursued here in New York City; innovations like Bard High School Early College and Medgar Evers College Preparatory School that are challenging students to complete high school and earn a free associate's degree or college credit in just four years. And we should raise the bar when it comes to early learning programs. Today, some early learning programs are excellent. Some are mediocre. And some are wasting what studies show are - by far - a child's most formative years. That's why I have issued a challenge to America's governors: if you match the success of states like Pennsylvania and develop an effective model for early learning; if you focus reform on standards and results in early learning programs; if you demonstrate how you will prepare the lowest income children to meet the highest standards of success - you can compete for an Early Learning Challenge Grant that will help prepare all our children to enter kindergarten ready to learn. So, these are some of the laws we are passing. These are some of the policies we are enacting. These are some of the ways we are doing our part in government to overcome the inequities, injustices, and barriers that exist in our country. But all these innovative programs and expanded opportunities will not, in and of themselves, make a difference if each of us, as parents and as community leaders, fail to do our part by encouraging excellence in our children. Government programs alone won't get our children to the Promised Land. We need a new mindset, a new set of attitudes - because one of the most durable and destructive legacies of discrimination is the way that we have internalized a sense of limitation; how so many in our community have come to expect so little of ourselves. We have to say to our children, Yes, if you're African American, the odds of growing up amid crime and gangs are higher. Yes, if you live in a poor neighborhood, you will face challenges that someone in a wealthy suburb does not. But that's not a reason to get bad grades, that's not a reason to cut class, that's not a reason to give up on your education and drop out of school. No one has written your destiny for you. Your destiny is in your hands - and don't you forget that. To parents, we can't tell our kids to do well in school and fail to support them when they get home. For our kids to excel, we must accept our own responsibilities. That means putting away the Xbox and putting our kids to bed at a reasonable hour. It means attending those parent-teacher conferences, reading to our kids, and helping them with their homework. And it means we need to be there for our neighbor's son or daughter, and return to the day when we parents let each other know if we saw a child acting up. That's the meaning of community. That's how we can reclaim the strength, the determination, the hopefulness that helped us come as far as we already have. It also means pushing our kids to set their sights higher. They might think they've got a pretty good jump shot or a pretty good flow, but our kids can't all aspire to be the next LeBron or Lil Wayne. I want them aspiring to be scientists and engineers, doctors and teachers, not just ballers and rappers. I want them aspiring to be a Supreme Court Justice. I want them aspiring to be President of the United States. So, yes, government must be a force for opportunity. Yes, government must be a force for equality. But ultimately, if we are to be true to our past, then we also have to seize our own destiny, each and every day. That is what the NAACP is all about. The NAACP was not founded in search of a handout. The NAACP was not founded in search of favors. The NAACP was founded on a firm notion of justice; to cash the promissory note of America that says all our children, all God's children, deserve a fair chance in the race of life. It is a simple dream, and yet one that has been denied - one still being denied - to so many Americans. It's a painful thing, seeing that dream denied. I remember visiting a Chicago school in a rough neighborhood as a community organizer, and thinking how remarkable it was that all of these children seemed so full of hope, despite being born into poverty, despite being delivered into addiction, despite all the obstacles they were already facing. And I remember the principal of the school telling me that soon all of that would begin to change; that soon, the laughter in their eyes would begin to fade; that soon, something would shut off inside, as it sunk in that their hopes would not come to pass - not because they weren't smart enough, not because they weren't talented enough, but because, by accident of birth, they didn't have a fair chance in life. So, I know what can happen to a child who doesn't have that chance. But I also know what can happen to a child who does. I was raised by a single mother. I don't come from a lot of wealth. I got into my share of trouble as a kid. My life could easily have taken a turn for the worse. But that mother of mine gave me love; she pushed me, and cared about my education; she took no lip and taught me right from wrong. Because of her, I had a chance to make the most of my abilities. I had the chance to make the most of my opportunities. I had the chance to make the most of life. The same story holds for Michelle. The same story holds for so many of you. And I want all the other Barack Obamas out there, and all the other Michelle Obamas out there, to have that same chance - the chance that my mother gave me; that my education gave me; that the United States of America gave me. That is how our union will be perfected and our economy rebuilt. That is how America will move forward in the next one hundred years. And we will move forward. This I know - for I know how far we have come. Last week, in Ghana, Michelle and I took Malia and Sasha to Cape Coast Castle, where captives were once imprisoned before being auctioned; where, across an ocean, so much of the African-American experience began. There, reflecting on the dungeon beneath the castle church, I was reminded of all the pain and all the hardships, all the injustices and all the indignities on the voyage from slavery to freedom. But I was also reminded of something else. I was reminded that no matter how bitter the rod or how stony the road, we have persevered. We have not faltered, nor have we grown weary. As Americans, we have demanded, strived for, and shaped a better destiny. That is what we are called to do once more. It will not be easy. It will take time. Doubts may rise and hopes recede. But if John Lewis could brave Billy clubs to cross a bridge, then I know young people today can do their part to lift up our communities. If Emmet Till's uncle Mose Wright could summon the courage to testify against the men who killed his nephew, I know we can be better fathers and brothers, mothers and sisters in our own families. If three civil rights workers in Mississippi - black and white, Christian and Jew, city-born and country-bred - could lay down their lives in freedom's cause, I know we can come together to face down the challenges of our own time. We can fix our schools, heal our sick, and rescue our youth from violence and despair. One hundred years from now, on the 200th anniversary of the NAACP, let it be said that this generation did its part; that we too ran the race; that full of the faith that our dark past has taught us, full of the hope that the present has brought us, we faced, in our own lives and all across this nation, the rising sun of a new day begun. Thank you, God bless you, and may God bless the United States of America. |
By Jeffrey Wright
Special to CNN
Special to CNN
Editor's note: Jeffrey Wright is a stage and screen actor who has won a Tony, Emmy and Golden Globe. Wright has appeared in "Angels in America," "Basquiat," "The Manchurian Candidate," "Syriana," "W." SHAFT and "Casino Royale."
Actor Jeffrey Wright says a nation that put a man on the moon should be able to take race out of policing. |
20th ANNUAL AFRICAN FESTIVAL OF THE ARTS ROCKS
WASHINGTON PARK LABOR DAY WEEKEND
One of the largest events focusing on African culture will return to Chicago as the must-attend event of the summer.
Africa International House (AIH) will present the
20th Annual Chrysler Financial
African Festival of the Arts
Labor Day weekend,
Sept. 4 – 7, 2009, in Washington Park,
51st and Cottage Grove.
Festival hours are 10 a.m. to 10 p.m.
The African Festival of the arts celebrates 20 years of Africa and Africans throughout the Diaspora and especially in Chicago.
Washington Park, located a stone’s throw from President Obama’s Hyde Park neighborhood, will be transformed into an African village filled with artists and artisans, music, dance, drumming, the exotic aroma of African cuisine and more than 250,000 festival-goers seeking to experience the continent and culture of Africa.
This year’s theme is “History, Traditions and Legends,” which, according to Festival Producer and Africa International House President Patrick Woodtor, is indicative of the cultural influence of Africa from ancient times through present day and beyond. “This year’s Festival represents 20 years of our mission to educate our audiences about Africa, the cradle of all civilization, while celebrating her significance and impact on mankind,”
Woodtor said. As always, the Festival offers something for everyone. At the heart of the Festival is the African Marketplace featuring more than 300 artists and vendors with a variety of African and Afrocentric wares including fine art, artifacts, crafts, fashions, jewelry, masks, collectibles, baskets, beads, fabrics, textiles, museum quality African art, furniture, household goods and gift items. Additionally, the fine arts, film and quilting pavilions will have a diverse array of offerings.
The Children’s Pavilion will be filled with activity to entertain and educate young festival-goers. The Wellness Village will focus on health and fitness. The Spiritually Pavilion will explore ancient belief systems and the roots of religion. Festival favorites such as the Drumming Village and the Bank of the Nile Food Court will keep festival-goers in Washington Park all weekend long.
The entertainment line-up will include performances by world-renowned jazz pianist Ahmad Jamal, South African songstress Lorraine Klaasen, vocalist Julia Huff, musician Booker T. Jones, Congolese touring ensemble Soukous Stars, the first US tour of the Cuban group Los 3 de la Habana, Spirit dance troupe, and more.
The 20th Annual African Festival of the Arts presenting sponsor Chrysler Financial is joined by sponsors including State Farm Insurance, BlueCross BlueShield of Illinois, Target, Illinois Department of Human Services, National Endowment for the Arts, Illinois Arts Council, Black McDonalds Owner/Operators Association, US Bank, UIC Sickle Cell Center, Cricket, Chicago Park District, Wine Cellars Distribution, Chicago South Loop Hotel and United Africa Organization. Media sponsors include NBC5, Citizen Newspapers, The Africa Channel, Power 92.3 FM, Soul 106.3, WYCA Rejoice 102.3, Bronzecomm.com, Soleil’s To-Dos and Click Around Chicago.com.
Festival tickets are $10 in advance and $15 at the gate. For tickets, sponsorship opportunities and more information, call (773) 955-ARTS (2787) or visit www.africanfestivalchicago.org.
The mission of Africa International House is to serve as a center that exposes and educates all people to the individual works and collective contributions of African cultures.
NEW YORK (CNN) -- President Obama expressed what many Americans feel regarding the recent arrest of Harvard professor Henry Louis "Skip" Gates -- that the Cambridge, Massachusetts, police responded "stupidly."
Obama is catching some flak for that, but I applaud him for having had the courage to speak his heart and mind.
I wonder if the president himself has ever experienced the blunt end of racial profiling, or if he personally knows of anyone other than Professor Gates who has. Among African-American males in this country, the small minority is those who have not or do not.
Did some prior experience or knowledge inform his response about the Gates incident? I have no facts to back this up, but, to me, it seemed personal. If it was, I understand.
I was arrested last July in Shreveport, Louisiana, outside a bar where dozens of members of the cast and crew of the movie "W." and I had gathered to celebrate the end of filming. There was no bar brawl as widely reported -- nor even a pre-election political argument.
Nine police cars and a fire engine responded; seven people were arrested. Two of the seven suffered minor head wounds at the hands of the Shreveport police. Josh Brolin and I were pepper sprayed by cops, and while face down in the street, I was made to feel the business end of a Taser.
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The truth of what led to the whole morass has never been accurately reported. I was asked to leave the bar by a white female bartender who took exception to a comment I made.
As with Professor Gates, the police in my case backed unquestioningly the suspicion of a white woman that the black man she accused must be guilty of something. Once that die of accusation was cast, a ghost of racial bias, misperception, and the potential abuse of police authority was set free to make mischief.
The bar was one of two places in downtown Shreveport that serves food after 10 p.m. A few nights before my arrest, I had gone there very late after work to grab a bite to eat. It was before closing, and there were a few customers and employees inside, but the door was locked. I knocked and asked, over the music streaming from inside, if I might buy a small pizza. The bartender insisted that they were closed.
"Whatever," I said with a shrug of resignation and walked back to my hotel room.
Four nights later and in a festive mood, we gathered at this same establishment. Upon seeing the bartender who had a few nights before told me that the place was closed, I asked her for a drink, which she poured. I quipped, "Ah you're going to serve me tonight!"
At that, she pulled the drink away and told me that I had to leave. I asked if she was kidding. She went on to say that if I didn't leave, she would call the police. As I stepped away to tell friends what had happened, a call was made to Shreveport police.
Two cops, the first of many, arrived in minutes, and I was physically escorted outside although neither of them had the curiosity to ask what had transpired before they arrived. A mess ensued.
To their credit, Josh and the others arrested followed me outside with a few others from our group. The cops physically released me and were seeming to be ready to let me go altogether when, out of the corner of my eye, I saw another member of the film crew driven headlong into the sidewalk by two newly arrived cops.
Josh verbally objected to their actions, at which point a cop said to him, "You too!" I moved Josh away from the fray and held him. We were then pepper sprayed to separate us, after which Josh knelt in submission and was handcuffed.
Disoriented and blinded by the pepper spray, I remained standing until I was kicked in the knee and forced to the ground. I did not completely relax one of my arms as it was twisted behind me, so I was tasered in the back of my ribs repeatedly, eventually handcuffed, left to lie in the street for several minutes, then arrested and hauled off to jail, and charged with impeding police. The six others were similarly charged -- and it all began with a joke.
Nearly six months later, after a good-size storm kicked up in Shreveport over the incident, prosecutors agreed to drop the charges against all of us arrested that night.
New Year's Day 2009 and the same week in which charges were dropped against us, in Oakland, California, Oscar Grant, a young father, was killed in a BART station, surrounded by cops and in the same position as I found myself down in Shreveport. It seems the BART cop may have pulled the trigger of his firearm thinking that it was his Taser.
Shreveport Mayor Cedric Glover is known as a law-and-order mayor. The day after the encounter, in the presence of his police chief, Glover apologized to me and privately acknowledged that while most Shreveport's cops were good, there were some "devils" among them.
In public meetings regarding the "W." incident, however, he held fast that the responding officers acted appropriately. Either Glover's public statement was dead wrong, or the joke was on us.
Of course, public officials, particularly at the local level, are loathe to criticize law enforcement officers. On a certain level, it's understandable. Cops answer a noble and difficult calling. The pressure must be relentless, and I imagine a cop is largely underappreciated by most except those with whom he or she serves.
A political pat on the back from the executive in charge must be a comforting thing in controversial times, and politicians prefer to duck behind the political safety of the blue wall of silence than upset the men and women who, like our nation's troops, are charged with placing themselves every day in harm's way to keep us safe.
When he was mayor of New York, Rudy Giuliani encamped himself behind that blue wall. After Amadou Diallo, living out the All-American, hard-working immigrant story, was brutally shot down on the steps of his Bronx apartment building, Giuliani refused to question the actions of the cops who fired 41 bullets in killing the unarmed young man.
Is a politician's unwavering fidelity to law enforcement officers the best approach, or does it promote a police culture of impunity and retard progress on law enforcement issues?
What if after the Diallo tragedy, political leadership in New York inspired the passage of serious legislation to keep in check the presumption of criminality that cops so often direct toward young men of color. What if that had led to similar acts nationwide around these issues?
Gates might not be headline news today; Grant might not have died; and New York police Officer Omar Edwards, an African-American undercover officer shot down two months ago by a white fellow officer while chasing a suspect through a Harlem street, might be alive today to toss a football again with his son. iReport.com: "Shame" on Gates
I'm not presuming to blame Giuliani alone for what has become a systemic problem in our country -- that would be absurd, these issues predate him -- but when political leaders in this country express compassion only for those for whom they perceive it to be politically expedient or fail to challenge law enforcement and incarceration issues that cut to the core of the history and culture of race in America, they fail us all. They exemplify what U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder meant when he spoke of the cowardice with which we as a society approach race dialogue in this country.
These are messy, even bloody issues, but the cost of not addressing them is too draining of our societal health. Among other things it fosters a society in which too many young Americans internalize the aura of criminality that's projected onto them and handcuff themselves to self-imposed limitations that stifle us all.
Going to prison rather than to college becomes a rite of passage. They wear their pants below their behinds in solidarity with their friends, brothers, uncles or fathers who aren't allowed belts while incarcerated, though perhaps the low-hanging pants are a defiant gesture to society at large for continually presuming them to be miscreant.
This past week the Apollo 11 crew was at the White House welcomed by the president of a new generation of dreamers. Our great nation put a man on the moon, but it can't train its cops to distinguish between an ordinary brown-skinned brother and a criminal. At its least injurious, as with Gates and myself, this leads to bruised pride and reputation; at its worst, Grant or Edwards gets killed.
President Kennedy famously said, "We choose to go the moon ... and do the other things not because they are easy, but because they are hard." Maybe properly educating, screening and training our nation's police is one of "the other things." My son is 7 years old. May our generation have accomplished this other thing before he's a young man, and before we've sent a man to Mars.
The challenge is one that many Americans are willing to accept -- one, that for the sake of our children, all Americans should be unwilling to postpone.
The opinions expressed in this commentary are solely those of Jeffrey Wright
Listen to Mary Mitchell on "Chicago Speaks" every Sunday from 6 to 8 a.m on WVAZ-FM (102.7).
Moutry had gone out to Mr. Ricky's 141 Club to celebrate his birthday.
Mr. Ricky's used to be located near E2.
The shootout took place in a parking lot outside Mr. Ricky's 141 Club.
For instance, on Monday, several people were injured and 22-year-old Cortez Moutry of Chicago Heights was killed near 142nd Street.
Despite this painful episode, the bad behavior at black clubs continues to vex owners and put them at risk.
"Maybe one person would have died -- and one death is too many -- but to have 21 people die in this kind of situation is unheard of."
"Had this been the House of Blues, I don't believe those kids would have been left in there 30 minutes.
"Except for a couple of people, most of the victims' relatives realize now that it wasn't our fault," Hollins said.
Hollins said he and Kyles would appeal the judge's sentencing. Their next hurdle is to stay out of jail pending the appeal.
It is surprising that absolutely no one has been held accountable for such an inept performance.
Some of the 21 people were dead before the city's first responders could figure out a way to get people out of the building.
Although the city's Housing Court has punished Kyles and Hollins, very little has been said about how poorly the city performed during the disaster.
In fact, Kyles had been desperately seeking beefed-up police patrols when the tragedy occurred.
Too often, the patrons threatened Kyles' dreams and his livelihood because of the violence they brought in and around the club.
At the time of the disaster, Kyles had sunk just about everything he had into E2.
Still, prosecutors were wrong to dismiss Kyles' motivation for keeping the club open as "greed."
Although Kyles wasn't the owner of the property, he was the person who was ultimately held accountable for not following a court order.
I knew what Kyles was trying to do on that corner. His goal was to provide an upscale entertainment venue on the Near South Side. I also knew about the roadblocks he faced.
I agree.
"Justice has not prevailed and justice has not been done," said U.S. Rep. Bobby Rush after the sentencing.
On the other hand, politicians and community leaders who knew Kyles did not want to see him go to jail for what happened.
On one hand, grief-stricken relatives who had to bury young loved ones blamed the club's owners.
The tragedy had divided the community.
Kyles and Hollins were found guilty of violating a 2002 Housing Court order to close an upper floor of the bar.
He described Kyles as being "stunned" by the sentence.
"The fix was in," Hollins said about the judge's ruling in an interview Wednesday.
Since the tragedy, Kyles and Hollins have had to use all of their resources just to stay out of jail.
The city has used all avenues in its efforts to punish someone for these deaths.
But how do you hold patrons accountable without seeming to punish the victims?
If people had not fought on the dance floor and the security guard had not used pepper spray, there would not have been a stampede.
More than the structural damage that the city contends was the problem, it was a chain of events started by the club's patrons that led to the catastrophe.
Given how the tragedy unfolded, the court should have shown that mercy.
When Associate Judge Daniel T. Gillespie imposed the sentence, he remarked, "If there was ever a case that cried out for mercy, it would be this case."
At the time of the tragedy, Kyles had been a respected business owner and lawyer.
On Feb. 17, 2003, 21 partygoers were trapped at the club's entrance after a security guard used pepper spray to break up a fight in the crowded club and people rushed to the door.
As you may recall, Kyles and Hollins were the operators of E2 nightclub when 21 people died in a stampede.
Justice wasn't served in E2 sentencings
'Most of the victims' relatives realize now it wasn't our fault'
archives
EXECUTIVE CLEMENCY & EXPUNGEMENT SUMMIT
COOK COUNTY BAR ASSOCIATION & COOK COUNTY BAR ASSOCIATION FOUNDATION
KICKS OFF THE NEW YEAR WITH PARTICIPATION IN "THE FRESH START"
EXECUTIVE CLEMENCY & EXPUNGEMENT SUMMIT
Date: Saturday, January 2, 2010
Time: 8:30 A.M. - 2:30 P.M.
Location: New Zion Christian Center
14200 Chicago Road Dolton, Illinois
Continental Breakfast and Lunch will be provided for CCBA volunteers
Attorney Volunteers can earn One (1) CLE credit at CLE offered on site
at New Zion Christian Center - Dolton, Illinois
from Cook County Bar Association (CCBA), An Accreditated MCLE Provider
in the State of Illinois at a CCBA CLE, that will take place from 8:30 a.m. - 9 :30 a.m.
Opening Session Speakers
Illinois State Representative Constance "Connie" Howard - 34th District
Abishi "A.C. Cunningham - Cook County Public Defender
Representative from the Office of Dorothy Brown, Clerk of the Circuit Court of Cook County
Sincerely,
~Marian E. Perkins President - Cook County Bar Association
November 26, 2009
This week, a Cook County judge sentenced Dwain Kyles and Calvin Hollins to two years in prison for "indirect criminal contempt."
The charges sound, well, almost trumped up.
