Commentary
Robinswing, Black Kos Editor

I found that leaving the plantation wasn't that hard. For one thing nothing on the plantation was mine anyways. I left the plantation the selfsame moment I realized that hard work is not truly valued. Leisure is what's valuable. Folks who can live in leisure are the respected folks. They are the envy and aspiration of the American Dream. All that bizness about how Americans value working is just so much bullshit. If work had any value, black folks would be treated better. Four hundred years of unpaid working ought to engender a lot of respect. If work was the object of the exercise.

We leave the plantation every time we refuse to buy into the narrative that we are helpless. Each time we are able to see through to the truth we are in effect running away from the plantation. When we stand up for what is right and decent and just we build community. We move off the plantation. Black folks are not the only ones who have to do this. There are fewer of us still on the plantation.


Years ago I met a man who talked about how his family fled Mississippi and share cropping. They loaded their piece of car and pushed it several miles to the highway, started it up and headed north. Leaving the plantation.

During slavery we sang to let folks know when we were leaving. Swing Low Sweet Chariot gave musical notice to everyone but the Boss-man. Music. A huge part of leaving the plantation. Still is. That's what rap is really about.
For the last couple of weeks I have been doing a lot of singing in my head. Music is the way that I deal with life and the things that life offers up to a blackwoman. Stuff you have to. Music is the way I have to.

I don't usually do the blues. I think that there are two kinds of folks in the world. Those who sing the blues and those who inspire others to do so. I like to think of myself as inspirational.

I love jazz and gospel and R&B and classical and I listen to operas and rap. There is always music playing either through the sound system or my head.

The music in my head this week past has run the gamut. One moment I'm hearing Lift every voice and sing, next moment, it's Mama say knock you out!!!

It appears that the week is ending with Trane's A Love Supreme. Winter is over. There is enough possibility in the air that folks that want to can taste it.

Pat Buchanan has up and disappeared. I know that some of you think it is because you wrote those emails and sent all those letter calling attention to his racist rants. No doubt that helped. I'm hoping my spell is working. You know, Backatcha.!!!

Do good, Backatcha. Do wrong Backatcha.

I'm watching the spell of Backatcha ping ponging all over the place.
Bill. Hillary. 'Nough said.

I find myself wondering if living is anything more serious than finding the spell that works for you. All of my life, I passed over the opportunity to seek revenge by invoking the spell of Backatcha. I refuse to let anger and hatred rent out space that ought to be occupied with love and hope. That's what my candidate is all about.

Where I live, love and hope are the fuels of transcendence. Barack never needed to transcend race. I wonder if folks who use the word transcendent even understand that it is an energetic. Obama never had to rise above race. He only needs to rise above racist.

The sound of the last few weeks' worth of media madness was the voice over the loudspeaker proclaiming. Attention, Obama is not on the plantation.

Backatcha.

The Urban Educational System
Sephius1, Black Kos Editor

In America, we tout our education system as the best in world. But in recent years America has been slipping. We were in the top 5, then top 10, then 20. And after that it really doesn’t matter, since we are claiming to be the best and their are 20 or so countries ahead of you. And with test scores fluctuating up and down, overcrowded classrooms, and no across the board standards, it’s no wonder we are slipping. So in starting this series I have decided to talk about this from several different perspectives but all through the lens of the public inner city school systems, which seems to be having a harder time than suburban, and private schools. I will highlight issues, and propose solutions. This is Part I – Strategy At The School Level. Each part will have several sub sections that I present separately each "Week In Review".

There are several prongs of attack, but there must be some method to the madness. And some of the issues I layout will overlap into parts of the series that will be coming.

As I see it, for a youth to be at their best when it comes to academics, it requires an environment that is safe, a school with resources to not only to pay teachers comparable salaries, but to ensure that students have the most up to date books and supplies, one set testing standard that’s not a teach-to-the-test standard, and of course watching the students socioeconomic status. So the subsections I’m going to outline are:

Safety, Health, and the Environment - this includes drugs and other substances that can be abuse, sexually abuse, bullying, dilapidated housing, school buildings and community infrastructures.

Financial Resources - this includes the poverty levels of the students, surrounding community, and the resources the school has available.

People Resources - this includes the identifying the different learning levels of students early, their socio-economic status, those who play parental roles, inter-personal relationships, self-image.

This also includes hiring compotent teachers, having a reward process in place for teachers who do well in the classroom, instead linking a teachers livelyhood to the number of students they pass, getting teachers to think out of the box, and have more robust training for teachers to keep their skill up to date.

Solutions - I wil propose solutions in this section to help develop a strategy at the school level


1.1 Safety, Health, and the Environment


If there is one thing on an inner city kid's mind it is safety. From the time they leave home until they get to school, they are already displaying some of life's survival skills. Sometimes even the home isn't a safe haven. If it is not a struggling single parent home, then one of the parents is a substance abuser, or has a criminal record. And if that isn't the case then the parents work unusual hours, which leave the kids alone for long periods of time, and undoubtedly can cause them to develop unhealthy relationships with things and/or people to compensate for the parents not being there. And if the parent(s) are fortunate enough to have a "babysitter", sometimes the sitter turns out to be incompetent at the very least, or at worst dangerous (eg. child predator, substance abuser, or have a unknown criminal record). And all this is before the child even leaves home. As a matter of fact, the reported cases of child abuse is (on average) 3 million a year but experts says that the actual number is closer to 3 times that amount:

Statistics

• A report of child abuse is made every 10 seconds
  


• 36.7% of all women, and 14.4% of all men, in prison in the US were abused as children
  


• Children who have been sexually abused are 2.5 times more likely to abuse alcohol and 3.8 times more likely to become addicted to drugs
  


• One third of abused and neglected children will later abuse their children

Then the kid has to leave home and pass several run-down buildings which have become nothing but havens for drug dealers, prostitutions rings, and other criminal activities. It is such a problem that alot of inner city kids have learned how to take the "long" route to school. And it's not always the same route each day. These kids have to plan their day to a degree no kid going to a suburban, or private school would have -- how to dodge the drug area, a prostitution area, or other criminal hot spots, and still stop at the store to pick a carton of milk that the kids mother told him to pick when he leaves school because the stores are closed by the time she gets off work. We call this process logistics, or less formal, assessing the situation, and developing a plan. This is a skill set that children will eventually need but inner city kids seem to be introduced to it too soon, and on a level more sophisticated, and more appropriate for adults.

Now, on a more abstract level, imagine having to see a run down community on a daily basis on your way to school. You see the good/bad/ugly, but mainly the bad and ugly. There was a time when the neighborhood kept the value of its surroundings up and watched out for all the kids. I remember one time trying to set some dry leaves on fire with a magnifying glass. I was on the side my house that didn't have windows, so my mom couldn't see me. All of a sudden my mother came out screaming "What are doing...get yo ass in the house...right now....wait til I tell you daddy...". Needless to say I got the whippin' of my life (what if one of those dry leaves had blown into someone else's lawn). I later found out that one of my moms good friends, that stayed in the house facing that side of my house, saw what I was doing and call my mother. Nowadays, if you do something like that my moms friend may have been assaulted, possibly shot. The mentality in most inner city neighborhoods now, is "You leave me alone, I'll leave you alone". And forget reporting a crime. Most will watch but will swear up and and down they saw nothing. No one is watching out for their fellow man's safety, and what does this teach our young people about character, and responsibility.

Finally, the kid gets to school. And the first thing they notice are the old rusty lockers, the ceiling panels are stained, and moldy from years leaking when it rains. The air condition has been broke all year, not that you would want actual air blowing through the ventilation system since it hasn't been cleaned in years, either. The pipes are old and falling apart. The desk are old and rusty (and truth be told, not suitable for any one to sit in; c'mon when was the last time you saw someone clean a desk....and I mean with an anti-bacterial cleaner). Classrooms in the inner city schools are more like incubators than places for learning. Rates of respiratory ailments like asthma are higher for inner city children. And it's not only asthma, and it has become generational (especially with "babies having babies"). You now have multiple members within a family unit being diagnosed with asthma, or not being resistant to certain bacterial infections, like staph.

It's hard to wrap your head around everything since there are so many tentacles. Not only must or children have suitable learning facilities, but we must ensure their "route" to educational success. We have our work cut out for us, but it is not hopeless.

Next Week >> Section 1.2, Financial Resources








After watching the Rev. Wright "discussion" I am certain the media will bring this up down the road. Although this article includes too many conservative talking points for my liking, it's a good starting point to begine talking about this issue.(dopper0189)

Slate.com ≫ Affirmative action is probably the most difficult race issue [Obama] will have to face.

In an interview last May on ABC's This Week With George Stephanopoulos, he was asked whether his own daughters should someday receive preferences in college admissions. His response was unexpected: "I think that my daughters should probably be treated by any admissions officer as folks who are pretty advantaged." He added, "I think that we should take into account white kids who have been disadvantaged and have grown up in poverty and shown themselves to have what it takes to succeed." His comments lit up the blogosphere with speculation that as president he might spearhead a major policy change, shifting the basis of affirmative action from race to class disparities.

The ABC statement fits into Obama's record on the issue, which has never been black and white. As a 28-year-old at Harvard, Obama attended meetings of the Black Law Students Association and spoke at at least one event, demanding greater diversity on campus. But his classmate David Troutt, now a law professor at Rutgers, says he was no militant. "There are a lot of people that spent a tremendous amount of time on that issue. They sued the school. They camped out at the dean's office," says Troutt. Obama wasn't among them. His head was in a different place....... More ►

This is something I have long suspected, this article sadly confirms many of my hypothesis.(dopper0189)

NYTimes ≫ Race and the Social Contract

In 1893, Friedrich Engels wrote from London to Friedrich Adolph Sorge, another German Communist then living in New York, lamenting how America's diversity hindered efforts to establish a workers' party in the United States. Was it possible to unify Poles, Germans, Irish, the many small groups, each of which understands only itself? All the bourgeoisie had to do was wait, and the dissimilar elements of the working class fall apart again.

America's mix of peoples has changed in its 200-plus years. Yet when Barack Obama delivered his bracing speech on race, he was grappling with a similar challenge. Realize that your dreams do not have to come at the expense of my dreams, he said. Investing in the health, welfare and education of black and brown and white children will ultimately help all of America prosper.

It is a tall order. Ten years ago, William Julius Wilson wrote that American whites rebelled against welfare because they saw it as using their hard-earned taxes to give blacks medical and legal services that many of them could not afford for their own families...... More ►

NYTimes ≫ The Topic Is Race; the Art Is Fearless

In the 1970s the African-American artist Adrian Piper donned an Afro wig and a fake mustache and prowled the streets of various cities in the scowling, muttering guise of the Mythic Being, a performance-art version of a prevailing stereotype, the black male as a mugger, hustler, gangsta.

On Race and Art In the photographs that resulted you can see what she was up to. In an era when some politicians and much of the popular press seemed to be stoking racial fear, she was turning fear into farce but serious, and disturbing, farce, intended to punch a hole in pervasive fictions while acknowledging their power.
...... More ►

Just for a different flavor.....

Ebony / Jet ≫ Toumast :The music of African nomads finds a comfortable place on contemporary playlists

Toumast founder Moussa Ag Keyna fought for four years with guns. When he was injured and a bullet ripped an open fracture in his leg, he picked up his other weapon, his guitar. The result is Ishumar (Real World Records), an impressive debut of rolling guitar rhythms layered with trance undertones and melancholy lyrics. Enveloped by traditional melodies and contagious electric blues riffs borrowed from Jimi Hendrix and B.B.King, Toumast's music offers the freshest take on the growing genre of Tuareg desert blues.

Formed in 1990, Toumast represents the second generation of Tuareg ishumar musicians. The term derives from the French word for unemployed and was the label given to displaced young Tuaregs searching for work. Clustered in refugee camps, military camps and shanty towns, the young people began to produce music reflecting their fight for freedom....... More ►

((youtube tZqS3xEVaJQ))

Let's hope this ends peacefully, and Mugabe's reign is at an end

BBC ≫ Mugabe's Zanu-PF loses majority

Mr Mugabe's Zanu-PF party took 97 of the 210 seats, while the opposition MDC won 99, final official results showed.
Presidential election results have yet to be declared, but the MDC said its leader had won the election. Zanu-PF said this was "wishful thinking".

The MDC released its own results to back up its claim of victory in the presidential poll.

MDC Party Secretary General Tendai Biti said its leader Morgan Tsvangirai had won 50.3% of the vote to President Robert Mugabe's 43.8%, so avoiding a presidential run-off....... More ►

As a Jamaican-American with strong ties to the island (frequent visitor, own land, married a girl from there) I sadly must say the next story is true. Jamaica is doing a much better job of protecting tourist, but not the people of it's large cities (Kingston, Spanish Town, Portmore).

BBC ≫ Jamaica's poor have been abandoned by the government and left to the mercy of violent criminal gangs, Amnesty International says in a new report.

The human rights group said inner-city Jamaicans were being "held hostage" in the battle between gangs and the state.

Amnesty said Jamaican authorities had stigmatised and "wilfully neglected" inner-city communities....... More ►

Education In America......More ►
┗ by Muzikal203 (Sephius1)

One Black Perspective on the Wright Discussion and Race......More ►
┗ by Vyan (Sephius1)

In Praise of Condi Rice...... More ►
┗ Bandaloo (Sephius1 -- While I don't agree everything, I offer it in the spirit of discussion)

Does the D in MyDD stand for Dixiecrat?......More ►
┗ by Deoliver47 (Dopper0189)

Series by StormBear (The continuation of a great series. - Dopper0189)
┗ Black History: Slave Market of Charleston......More ►
┗ Black History: Inside the Seasoning Camps......More ►

Race, the Rust Belt, and Me......More ►
┗ by paintblue (Dopper0189)

NEW REPORT: The Race Chasm & the Clinton Firewall......More ►
┗ by davidsirota (Dopper0189)


IN CLOSING

As a 26 year old man living in our "post-racial" society I'm often struck at just how far we still have to go. I mean, clearly, I'm not looking to forcibly integrate neighborhoods. But I am looking to equal the playing field completely. A simple acknowledgment of American slavery would work for me. And so it goes.

But I am indeed lucky to live in a time where we've sort of narrowed the gap (as the white Right paternalistically notes and whines about at our alleged ungratefulness). Sort of is still not good enough.

I am not going to turn this into a candidate diary, so I won't go into the many reasons as to why I wholeheartedly support Senator Barack Obama. I will note that whether he wins the nomination and then the Presidency or not, his A More Perfect Union speech is the most brilliant speech in 40 years. It has the ability to make us sit down and just think, and just listen, and then just act.
We are indeed just one nation, and now it's time to sit down, think, listen, and act.

I admit I have much frustration in my almost 3 years here at Daily Kos that our periodic conversations on race fall flat, and some deep annoyance at the naivety of some and the harshness of a few others, whether they were being deliberately hurtful or not. The problem was we simply weren't thinking, or listening. Again, now with A More Perfect Union as our guide, I am hoping that we can.

Sit down, think, listen, and act. - Terrypinder, Black Kos Editor

REMEMBER MLK TODAY for what he lived for, as well as what he died for!

HOW MUCH DOES IT COST TO BUY THE CBC?

You would think the CBC would take heed from their base and stop this madness. But they are pressing forward with the Fox Debate anyways, but as the New York Times reports in, For Democrats, Debate on Fox Reveals Divide

The caucus is bent on salvaging what remains of the debate, and of a relationship that has produced other benefits. Not only has Fox given over precious air time for the debate, but an examination shows that its parent company, News Corporation, has also taken other steps to reach out to the group’s constituency, including making campaign donations to the caucus and its members and creating internship programs at predominantly black colleges.

As I wrote a few day ago I was going to research the financial link between FOX News (News Corp) and the CBC. I didn't have any hard evidence of one at the time I made that statement. But I have found over the years that when politician make a move that seems counter to their normal political behavior money is usually involved. So I will answer the question: How much does it cost to Buy off the CBC?

First price quote:

...News Corporation also gained currency among black and Hispanic leaders by helping orchestrate a campaign to increase the participation of minority viewers in the television ratings system, a task it entrusted to a consulting firm with strong ties to Bill and Hillary Rodham Clinton. Mrs. Clinton, in turn, has established a relationship with Rupert Murdoch, the chairman of News Corporation, who, for example, held a fund-raiser for her last year during her Senate re-election campaign.

It seems that wasn't enough as Bill is very popular amongst Blacks but isn't a member of the CBC.
Second price quote:

Despite a fierce debate within the 43-member caucus over whether to sever ties with Fox News, those representing the caucus in its dealings with Fox have thus far held firm. The network itself has apparently urged the caucus to do just that. There was, for example, a meeting for caucus press secretaries attended by representatives of News Corporation and Fox News, where talk turned to how to publicly present the merits of the debate. (Also working in Fox’s favor is that the debate is to be held in Detroit, the home city of Representative Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick, the caucus chairwoman.)

Find a Congresswoman who is so desperate to hold event in her city she will "sell out"
Third price quote:

The partnership between Fox News and the caucus began in earnest in 2003, when the news channel responded to the caucus’s request for a broadcast partner for its debates for the 2004 presidential election. (Technically, the caucus was sponsoring the debate through an affiliate group, the Congressional Black Caucus Political Education and Leadership Institute; the use of the institute gives the caucus itself some distance, even though several prominent caucus members are on the institute board.)

Fox’s proposal included broadcasting the debates in prime time, giving the caucus a say in selecting moderators and covering much of the production cost, said one former caucus staff member close to the negotiations.

Make a reasonable sounding proposal to your intended -victim- partner, and hope they don't notice that you will cut the debate short, and call it the "Democrat Party Debate".
Forth Price quote:

Months after joining forces with the caucus, Fox News created internships for students at Morgan State University, a black college in Baltimore, in the Congressional district of Representative Elijah E. Cummings, who was then chairman of the caucus.

In June 2003, its political action committee, known as News America-Fox, made a $1,000 contribution to Mr. Cummings’s political committee.

The Fox group later made contributions of at least $1,000 each to other caucus members, including Representatives Sheila Jackson-Lee of Texas, and Gregory W. Meeks and Edolphus Towns of New York. The political arm of the caucus itself received a $5,000 contribution from the Fox group, in May 2006. And on the Web site of its foundation, the caucus lists News Corporation among several dozen corporate sponsors.

For a total of $4,000 in direct contributions, $5,000 to the CBC PAC, and a few -indoctrination studies- internships that were jobs that needed to be filled anyways. You can buy the CBC.

Well the strong negative reaction to the CBC debate is finally starting to leak through to the some of the members.

James Rucker, executive director of a group that has tried to mobilize opposition to the partnership between Fox News and the caucus, said that the news channel was using its association with the caucus to inoculate itself against criticism that its coverage of Democrats in general and blacks in particular was biased.

“This is Fox’s brilliance,” said Mr. Rucker, whose group is known as the Color of Change. “In ’03, they made a brilliant investment. On the one hand, they got to be aligned with the brand of the Congressional Black Caucus. On the other hand, they got to proceed with business as usual.”

Mr. Meeks acknowledged that Fox, in partnering with the caucus on the debates, seemed to be trying to do a little image-building. But he said at least Fox was willing to sponsor the debate, when no other network would.

Mr. Meeks was further quoted as saying:

Mr. Meeks said that he had yet to decide whether to advocate canceling the debate. Fox’s supporters within the caucus have moved quickly to close ranks, even taking the unusual step of sending a letter to candidates seeking the Democratic nomination, urging them to participate in the debate and noting “the importance to African-Americans and others to hear from you.”

While 26 members of the caucus signed the letter, it is also notable who did not, including Representative Maxine Waters of California, a prominent and powerful member of the group.

Asked about the debate in a brief telephone interview, Ms. Waters said only, “I’m opposed to it.”

Thank you Ms. Waters, and hopefully Mr. Meeks comes around.
In the mean time hopefully the CBC members find a spoke person who is "clean, neat, and articulate enough because":

For now, at least, the caucus and Fox News can count on having at least one participant, Mr. Biden. Luis Navarro, Mr. Biden’s spokesman, said in an interview that Mr. Biden would be there because the caucus represented “an important base” and Fox offered an unparalleled forum for a candidate “to hold the Bush administration’s feet to the fire on their handling of Iraq.”

With thanks to dnA for the diary List Of CBC Members Who Signed The Letter Urging Candidates To Reconsider On Fox Debate (and Britain33 )

Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick
Bennie Thompson
James Clyburn
Sanford Bishop
Gwen Moore (?)
G.K. Butterfield
Mel Watt
Danny Davis
Bobby Rush (?)
John Lewis
Keith Ellison
Charles Rangel
Eddie Bernice Johnson
Stephanie Tubbs Jones
Sheila Jackson Lee
Donna Christian-Christensen
Diane Watson
Al Wynn
Elijah Cummings
David Scott
Yvette Clarke
John Conyers
Hank Johnson
Al Green
Corrine Brown

A list of at least some of the members who did not sign the letter.

Julia Carson (Indianapolis)
William Lacy Clay, Jr. (St. Louis)
Emmanuel Cleaver (Kansas City)
Artur Davis (Birmingham, Alabama)
Chaka Fattah (W. Philadelphia)
Alcee Hastings (Ft. Lauderdale)
Kendrick Meek (Miami)
Jesse Jackson, Jr. (South Side Chicago)
William L. Jefferson (New Orleans)
Barbara Lee (Oakland)
Gregory Meeks (Queens)
Donald Payne (Newark)
Bobby Scott (Richmond)
Ed Towns (Brooklyn)
Maxine Waters (Compton)

WEEK IN REVIEW, MAY 25th 2007

There are 26 clueless Black People in America. If they were members of a civics club it would be no big deal. The problem is they are elected officials, they are members of the CBC.
26 members of the CBC have signed letters to Sen. Barack Obama, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton and former Sen. John Edwards urging them to reconsider their decisions to skip a debate cosponsored by the CBC Institute and Fox News. Will they never learn? I am going to look into these 26 and see if they have recieved contributions from FOX executives.

Black Caucus leaders sent the letter to the entire field of Democratic presidential candidates, but the primary targets were Obama, Clinton and Edwards.

The caucus has 43 members from 22 states, who together represent about 40 million Americans, an official with the group said. Seventeen members of the Black Caucus represent districts that are less than 50 percent African-American, said caucus Chairwoman Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick (D-Mich.), who argued that the issues at the debate will also be of interest to other minority constituencies, such as Hispanics.

“It’s not just a black thing,” Kilpatrick said.

Thompson said presidential debates often ignore issues that are important to minority voters.

“Nobody is talking about the disproportionate statistics that we have in this country as it relates to minority population,” Thompson said. “You can look at healthcare, you can look at education, you can look at employment, you can look at housing, you can look at lending. All those [statistics] show a very bad picture for many constituents we represent.

“So we think Democratic and Republican candidates alike should have an opportunity to say what they plan to [do to] level the playing field,” he added.

By framing their decision to skip the debate as a missed opportunity to communicate to an important Democratic constituency, caucus leaders are ratcheting up the political pressure on the Democratic front-runners.

Thompson said that the CBC Institute, not Fox, would set the debate format and select the questions to be asked. He said Fox merely will broadcast the event.

So far, liberal opinion leaders have praised the Democrats’ decision to snub Fox.

Left-leaning columnist E.J. Dionne wrote last month that Democrats were well within their rights.

“Tell me again: Why do Democrats have an obligation to participate in debates on Fox?” Dionne wrote. “I am an avid reader of conservative magazines such as National Review and the Weekly Standard. But if these two publications teamed up to sponsor a Democratic debate, would anyone accuse Edwards, Obama and Clinton of ‘blacklisting’ if the candidates said, ‘no thanks’?”
The pressure may be particularly acute for Obama, who is a member of the Black Caucus. Obama has irked fellow CBC members by failing to respond to a request made early last year that he host a fundraiser for the Black Caucus’s political action committee (PAC). Clinton received a similar invitation and quickly followed through by headlining a CBC PAC fundraiser in March of 2006.

Once again this is clear evidence why I am such a HUGE E.J. Dionne fan.
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POLITICS
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Last year, Marcus Mason and a handful of other black lobbyists, many of them former congressional chiefs of staff, began working in earnest to boost the number of black aides on Capitol Hill.

Marcus Mason, a top transportation lobbyist, has always had an itch to get places fast.

At 20, he started his own photography business. At 21, he was tapped to run the congressional campaign of Walter Tucker, a Democrat then serving as mayor of Compton, Calif. After Tucker won, the 22-year-old Mason became the youngest chief of staff on Capitol Hill. By his early 30s, he was the No. 2 lobbyist at Amtrak.

Now 36, Mason is a newly minted contract lobbyist with the Madison Group, where he is busy representing the Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railway. He is also pouring his energy into helping other blacks experience the sort of rapid rise that he has had in Washington.

“There’s a lot of great talent out there that just needs to be given a great opportunity to show what they can do,” Mason explained. “Somebody took a chance on me at 21, a real gamble.”

Last year, Mason and a handful of other black lobbyists, many of them former congressional chiefs of staff, began working in earnest to boost the number of black aides on Capitol Hill.

Seizing on the hot demand for staffers after the Democratic takeover, the group established a vetting committee and began collecting résumés from promising candidates. Mason created a résumé bank to streamline the effort, which is already bearing fruit. So far, the group has placed 36 blacks in congressional offices.

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CULTURE
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Trumpeting Diversity A Rare Majority-Black Orchestra Tries to Build Cultural and Racial Bridges

What strikes you first are the musicians -- most are African American, and on this night, they are decked out in, to use street parlance, "high-low" -- blazers over T-shirts and jeans instead of penguin suits and long black skirts.

There is Denna Purdie of Upper Marlboro, a former cellist with "The President's Own" U.S. Marine Band. On violin, Wayman McCoy III, a marketing and sales executive from Germantown. And California resident John Wineglass, an Emmy-winning daytime television music composer, helps on viola.

They number 75 in all -- classically or church trained musicians who come together to play their own brand of music under the banner of the Soulful Symphony, led by native Washingtonian and award-winning musician Darin Atwater, 36. The charismatic Atwater, who lives in Baltimore, oversees music programs at Celebration Church in Columbia. He said he created the symphony in 2000 as a way to present African American cultural expression to a wider audience and to bring more minorities to symphonic music.

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an exhibit at the Senator John Heinz Pittsburgh Regional History Center that examines the black experience in Vietnam in the context of the era's domestic social fabric.

A pair of combat boots. A wristband woven from boot laces with several bullets dangling. A photo of black servicemen standing outside a makeshift African temple.

The items are part of "Soul Soldiers: African Americans and the Vietnam Era," an exhibit at the Senator John Heinz Pittsburgh Regional History Center that examines the black experience in Vietnam in the context of the era's domestic social fabric.

Samuel Black, curator of the center's African American Collections, conceived the exhibit, in part because his older brother, Jimmy McNeil, served two years in Vietnam.

Black was 4 years old when his brother was sent to Vietnam. He died in 1971, unrelated to the conflict, and Black said he really never knew what his brother's experience was.

Black found that much had been written about the role of blacks in other wars, particularly the Civil War and World War II, but there was little about blacks in Vietnam.

As he researched, he found the black experience in Vietnam was linked to social changes on U.S. soil. The civil rights movement was in full swing. The Black Power movement was growing.

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Being of 100% Jamaican decent I am always biased to these stories.
In the cool environs of 10A West King's House Road, Barbara Makeda Blake Hannah announced to a buzzing gathering on Thursday night that her acclaimed novel Joseph: A Rasta Reggae Fable is to be made into a feature film.

The novel, Joseph, now published in paperback, was also re-displayed alongside Blake-Hannah's newest book: Rastafari: The New Creation (December 2006). Both her books have been published by her own media company, Jamaica Media Productions, but more significantly, Blake Hannah secured a publishing deal with Macmillan Caribbean, one of the premier book publishers in the world, through Novelty Trading. The film Joseph is to be produced by Jamaica Media Productions with Grange as executive producer.

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Here is a profile of a man of many first.Wilder's career dotted with firsts

Lawrence Douglas Wilder made history by becoming governor of Virginia, a state where his grandparents had been slaves.

His victory in that 1989 election made him the first black person to be elected a governor in the United States.

Born in Richmond on Jan. 17, 1931, Wilder was raised during the Great Depression in what he called "gentle poverty." During this time, black people and white people were segregated by race and black people were treated as second-class citizens.

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INTERNATIONAL
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The truth about reconciling. We, as South Africans, are not honest about our attitudes to race - and racism, for that matter

So now we have to talk about race, right. We need, according to some, a "TRC process" to deal with the issue of race in South Africa. The big question that has been asked is: "Does race matter?"

Of course not. Racism does. But, okay, maybe I'm just being pedantic about a simple matter of semantics. So one assumes that when people say we should talk about race, they mean we should talk about racism, and that we need a TRC process to deal with racism.

Forgive me for being cynical, but I don't think that a "truth and reconciliation process" will work when we talk about racism.

For one thing, there will be no truth.

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Toronto Star: Almost two years into the redevelopment of Regent Park, relocated residents insist their community bonds are being bulldozed in the name of gentrification.

Almost two years into the redevelopment of Regent Park, relocated residents insist their community bonds are being bulldozed in the name of gentrification.

The $1 billion project has stressed out most of the 1,160 people displaced so far in the redevelopment of the subsidized housing project.

Residents initially thought they had the right to return to an apartment in the area. But they're now realizing the city-owned landlord, Toronto Community Housing, is counting on many not coming back. "People are worried that it will only be for the rich," says relocated resident Sureya Ibrahim, 29.

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HEALTH
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Public Health Predominately Black Communities in Boston Have Higher Rates of Lupus; Exposure to Petroleum Products Examined as Cause

Residents of two predominately black communities in Boston -- Roxbury and Mattapan -- have higher rates of lupus compared with other neighborhoods, according to a report conducted by the state Department of Public Health, the Boston Globe reports.

Concerns about the rise of lupus diagnoses among black women from three Boston neighborhoods prompted the department to conduct a comparative study based on neighborhoods. For the study, researchers examined local care providers' medical records from 1999 to 2004 from all of the city's 17 neighborhoods.

Researchers found 178 cases of definite or probable lupus diagnoses between 1999 and 2004, and 37 of those cases were among people from Roxbury. According to the public health department, five out of every 100,000 Boston residents are diagnosed with lupus annually; the rate in Roxbury is 10.4 lupus diagnoses per 100,000 residents and the rate in Mattapan is 7.9 diagnoses per 100,000 people.

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LAW
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Justice Dept. Sues New York City, Citing Bias in Hiring Firefighters

The United States Department of Justice filed a civil rights suit against New York City yesterday over the Fire Department’s written entrance exam, which black and Hispanic candidates fail at much higher rates than whites. The suit claims that the city has never proved a link between test scores and performance as a firefighter.

Tyler Hicks/The New York Times
A group of black firefighters gathered at City Hall for the announcement of a suit against the city.
The suit is the latest in a series of legal attempts going back decades to diversify the Fire Department, which is more than 90 percent white. Three percent of the department’s 11,000 firefighters are black and 4.5 percent are Hispanic, a tiny proportion in a city where more than half the population is black or Hispanic.

The city’s testing practices “do not select the firefighter applicants who will best perform their important public safety mission, while disproportionately screening out large numbers of qualified black and Hispanic applicants,” Wan J. Kim, assistant attorney general for the Civil Rights Division, said in a statement.

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Maybe some one should have informed a manager that Black Woman have been wearing braids for thousand of years.
Hairstyle Leads to Unemployment and Allegations of Racism

What is trendy? What is inappropriate? Those are the questions at the center of a personal dispute at one Virginia correctional facility, which has now left one woman without a job and another woman in fear of getting fired.

The NAACP of Virginia says the way one warden is interpreting a department of corrections grooming guideline is nothing short of racist and they are now taking their fight to the state Capitol.

"They fired me on May 16th...and said that I had an extreme hairdo...I am now not allowed back on the compound," said Donna Alison.

Alison is now jobless after her superiors fired her for having braids in her hair. The issue is a February 2007 grooming guideline that leaves some interpretation up to a supervisor.

"'Supervisors will judge the appropriateness of a particular hairstyle by the appearance of headgear when worn'...and here's the kicker...'Extreme or eccentric or trendy haircuts or hairstyles are not authorized,'" stated King Salim Khalfani with the NAACP of Virginia, quoting the guidelines.

For Alison, and her former colleague Juanita Hudson, they say their braided hairstyles are not eccentric or trendy.

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Milloy: Seeking to Close the Book on a Bad Law. No other drug law makes such a peculiar distinction between different forms of the same drug. Blacks comprisie 80 % of those charged and convicted of crack-related offenses.

For Arthur Burnett, a senior D.C. Superior Court judge, few drug cases have tested his judicial temperament like those involving crack cocaine. What infuriates Burnett most is not the users but the law itself: a five-year mandatory minimum prison sentence for possessing five grams of crack cocaine -- about as much as two packets of sugar.

No other drug law metes out so much punishment for such a small offense, Burnett points out.

No other drug law makes such a peculiar distinction between different forms of the same drug: If a person has powdered cocaine, it takes 100 grams to get five years -- even though crack is nothing more than a heated mixture of powdered cocaine and baking soda.

Worse yet, with blacks comprising 80 percent of those charged and convicted of crack-related offenses, the law is widely perceived as being unjustly applied.

And "mandatory" means there's no case-by-case consideration.

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WEEK IN REVIEW, MAY 18th 2007

Eugene Robinson of the Washington Post once again proves why he is one of best progressive editorialist A Question Of Race Vs. Class. Affirmative Action For the Obama Girls?

Barack Obama doesn't think anyone should cut his two daughters any slack when they apply to college -- not because of their race, at least. In the unlikely event that the Obama family goes broke, then maybe.

In an interview broadcast Sunday on ABC's "This Week," Obama waded into the central issue of the affirmative action debate: race vs. class. Perhaps typically, Obama's remarks were more Socratic than declarative. He didn't really answer the question, he rephrased it. Maybe the way he posed it, though, will lead to a discussion that's long overdue.

He seemed to side with those who think class predominates when he said, "I think that we should take into account white kids who have been disadvantaged and have grown up in poverty and shown themselves to have what it takes to succeed."

It's hard to disagree with that proposition, especially as economic inequality worsens in this country. Harvard University (where Obama went to law school) has taken the lead in guaranteeing that money will not be an obstacle for qualified low-income students.

But Obama seemed to agree with those who point to the lingering effects of racism when he noted that "there are a lot of African American kids who are still struggling, that even those who are in the middle class may be first-generation as opposed to fifth- or sixth-generation college attendees, and that we all have an interest in bringing as many people together to help build this country."

That observation points to circumstances that have to be taken into account. Diversity, in my view, is very much in the national interest. But diversity is a process, not a destination. We have to keep working at it. And since a college degree has become the great divider between those who make it in this society and those who don't, affirmative action in college admissions is one of the most powerful tools we have to increase diversity.

This is my personal oppinion. I am very much a believer in the fact that Class matter more then race. But hat doesn't mean race isn't important. I think part of learning is having to live and learn next to people who are different then you.

As for Obama's assessment of his daughters' privileged status, that's just a statement of the obvious. With such Type A, high-wattage parents, those girls probably will have the grades and test scores to get into any college. And if they don't, they will benefit from a different affirmative action program -- one that for many generations has ushered the academically undistinguished scions of prominent families into the nation's most selective colleges and universities.

Let's not pretend that college admissions has ever been a level playing field. Obama graduated from Columbia; his wife, Michelle, from Princeton. This means that at those two Ivy League schools, their daughters will be "legacy" applicants, just like George W. Bush was at Yale and legions of Kennedys have been at Harvard. Given the Obamas' power and fame, admissions officers at the schools they attended -- and probably at other elite schools, too -- are going to find a way to let the Obama girls in.

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POLITICS
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When to play ethnic politics? Tread carefully when competing for the late Juanita Millender-McDonald's seat.

AS CANDIDATES LINE UP to run for the congressional seat of the late Juanita Millender-McDonald, it is tempting — inevitable, perhaps — to identify them by ethnic group. The Long Beach/South Los Angeles district is the stand-in for much of a region that once was characterized by an African American voting majority and political establishment but has become increasingly Latino. Every vacant seat raises the question: Is Latino power beginning to eclipse the black political structure?

So there is Latina state Sen. Jenny Oropeza, African American Assemblywoman Laura Richardson and other candidates who, like it or not, will be depicted as champions of their respective ethnic communities. The election may presage other district transitions. Will county Supervisor Yvonne Brathwaite Burke be succeeded by another African American or by a Latino? What about Los Angeles City Councilwoman Jan Perry? If growth or shrinkage in the roster of black elected officials is the only indicator of political power, it is easy to understand the fervor with which African Americans try to retain a seat.

Ignoring the ethnic factor verges on dishonesty. Racial and ethnic identity among historically marginalized minorities has a long and obvious history in the democratic process. Elected officials naturally group together to promote common interests. Rep. Tom Tancredo (R-Colo.) was being naive or disingenuous when he wrote Millender-McDonald earlier this year asking to abolish her Congressional Black Caucus and similar groups, such as the Congressional Hispanic Caucus, on grounds that race has no place in politics. We don't live in that ideal world just yet.

But that doesn't mean those caucuses are doing right by focusing on power consolidation at the expense of constituent service. Millender-McDonald's multiracial district remains plagued by large pockets of poverty and gang violence that affects all of its people. Any good candidate should be embraced by any ethnic caucus.

Also see Gay Leaders Continue to Label Black Politicians Homophobic Until Proven Friendly
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Sunday Shutout: The Lack of Gender & Ethnic Diversity on the Sunday Morning Talk Shows. Guest lists that are overwhelmingly white and overwhelmingly male.

Not only are the Sunday morning talk shows on the broadcast networks dominated by conservative opinion and commentary, the four programs -- NBC's Meet the Press, ABC's This Week, CBS' Face the Nation, and Fox Broadcasting Co.'s Fox News Sunday -- feature guest lists that are overwhelmingly white and overwhelmingly male.

And the top-rated Sunday show -- Meet the Press -- shows the least diversity of all. The NBC program is the most male and nearly the most white (Face the Nation beats it out by 1 percentage point), and it has the highest proportion of white males to all other guests.

A breakdown of the guests who appeared on the Sunday shows in 2005 and 2006 shows that men dominate these shows. In fact, men outnumber women by a 4-to-1 ratio on average.

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In Philadelphia, Michael Nutter, a reformist candidate given no shot has captured the Democratic mayoral nomination.

"Philadelphia's next mayor must run this city differently than John Street has," Nutter's first campaign commercial intoned. "Michael Nutter will."

There is, of course, much more to the man than his history with Street.

He is a former financial adviser and disco deejay, a husband and father. He is a Baptist who was born a Catholic, an African American politician without much of an African American political base. He is a political reformer who has been a ward leader since 1990, a charisma-challenged policy wonk whose dry wit has been the prime source of humor in this year's mayoral forums.

"No candidate is more informed," said supporter Leslie Anne Miller, the former general counsel to Gov. Rendell. "No one has better articulated positions on a variety of issues, because he's actually taken the time to think about the issues."

Before resigning his Council seat last summer to run for mayor, Nutter had solidified his reputation as the body's most independent and arguably its most accomplished member.

He played a key role on such issues as banning smoking in public places, writing new ethics rules to address the pay-to-play system, enacting campaign finance reform, keeping the wage- and business-tax cuts in place, and hiring 100 more police.

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CULTURE
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The growing divide between poor and middle-class blacks

The May Essence magazine examines the growing divisiveness between poor blacks and the black middle class today. Of course there is a divide: Those of us who've "made it" have been taught to despise those who didn't. However, we've also been taught that if we turn our backs on poor blacks, we're no better than racist whites.

The article begs for discussion and debate. As an educated black woman, am I my brother's keeper? Do I have a responsibility to my community?

It always amazed me how whites were fearless about drawing distinctions between their middle and poorer classes. White college friends and later co-workers didn't flinch in mixed company when describing someone as "trailer trash or poor white trash."

But for us, referring to someone as "ghetto" to describe another black person to a white person was the ultimate betrayal.

Not anymore. Over the past 10 or 15 years, the mythic unity among blacks has crumbled.

In a scorching and highly acclaimed standup routine in the late '90s, Chris Rock wielded the "n" word like a burning cross. To paraphrase, he said he loves black people. "But I hate n------!"

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: A survey exploring life, love, work, motherhood, money, sex, religion and relationships has found life differs for black and white U.S. wome

More than 90 percent of African-American and white women reported that racism remains a prevalent force in U.S. society, according to the survey for Women in Black & White.

Fifty-six percent of African-American women reported feeling marginalized due to their race, compared to 5 percent of white women; however, white women feel that gender is the more defining factor.

Fourteen percent of black mothers worry -- compared with 1.5 percent of white women -- that their daughters will be viewed as sexually available due to their race.

Although white women live in households with higher annual incomes, black women are more financially independent, with a higher percentage having checking accounts solely in their own name -- 95 percent compared to 83 percent of white women. Ninety percent of African-American women had a savings account, compared with 80 percent of white women.

Ninety percent of black women worked outside the home, compared with 78 percent of white women.

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It's open season on hip hop's thug

Geoffrey Canada smacked the problem right in the face.

As a Harlem community worker with 20 years of experience dealing with and nurturing young people, Canada said that the message coming out of hip hop was deadly and irresponsible. The lyrics imply that cooperating with the police is being an Uncle Tom. Canada found this reprehensible and said that it amounted to saying to criminals that the community was theirs to have.

Prof. Douglas Thompkins began the discussion by pointing out that, no matter what the history of police community relations had been, he saw that the black community needed to change its attitudes because losing the rule of law means that black people live in subhuman conditions in their own communities and those inhuman conditions were created by violent criminals.

There were many of the usual explanations for crime, such as slavery, poverty and police harassment that came from the audience of students and from some John Jay professors, but the panelists - with one exception - did not give in to the regular line of excuses. Almost everyone rejected the idea that black or Latino criminals were helpless victims buffeted around by external influences. They made choices; they had to be accountable.

Thompkins has credibility. He served 18 years in prison and was the leader of a Chicago street gang. He understands that police overreaction or excessive force is something that must be factored in and protested against. Thompkins said that when refusing to cooperate with police became synonymous with minority identity, that attitude brought a kind of hell to the black and Latino lower-class communities. In summarizing, John Jay Prof. David Kennedy felt that we are on the verge of a new kind of civil rights movement in which the people oppressed by crime move to liberate themselves by reprimanding the police whenever they resort to excessive force.

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bringing baseball back to African-Americans. Seaford grad, former major leaguer on tour to renew interest in sport

DeShields, 38, describes his role in the venture as that of a "businessman." Unlike Boyd, a 47-year-old right-hander who fancies himself a reincarnation of ageless pitcher Satchel Paige, DeShields harbors no illusions of making a comeback as a player. He's perfectly content to watch his 14-year-old son play on a traveling team. He just wishes more young African-Americans were as interested.

Like so many current and former black players, DeShields is passionate about the subject. He alleges that Major League Baseball, while spending time and resources promoting the game in Latin America, has neglected inner-city communities and alienated young blacks.

Most major league teams, including the Phillies, have created academies in the Dominican Republic and Venezuela. Foreign-born players aren't subject to the amateur draft, so teams have concentrated their scouting efforts outside the U.S. According to the Central Florida report, a record 29.4 percent of major leaguers last season were of Latino descent.

Sixty years after Robinson's debut, DeShields believes blacks are being left behind.

"It's sort of a mirror image of American business," he said. "Take jobs out of the country, outsource them, and Americans don't have jobs. That's what it comes down to. Major League Baseball has set up facilities in other countries. They're getting these kids for cheap because there's no world draft. It's really unfair to our kids.

"Major League Baseball isn't really interested in developing our kids, so we have to do it ourselves. That's basically what we're trying to do. Every day, all day, we have to put that same type of effort with our kids."

Boyd, the tour's ringleader, has roots in New England from his time with the Boston Red Sox and in the independent Can-Am League when he pitched for the Brockton Rox. DeShields said many of the initial stops will be in that region, with the barnstormers facing Can-Am League teams this week in Brockton, Nashua, N.H., New Haven, Conn., and Quebec City.

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LAW
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Patricia J. Williams writes that fifty-three years after Brown v. Board of Education, the Supreme Court is poised to rule on two cases, in Seattle and St. Louis, which put the future of school integration at risk.

May 17 is the fifty-third anniversary of Brown v. Board of Education, the iconic case we celebrate for having ended the notion that racially separate education could be considered "equal." Yet the meaning of that case has always been the subject of dispute. I grew up in a household where we learned that segregation was bad because it was premised on the stigma of inferiority. Segregation licensed the isolation of African-Americans from the benefits of citizenship; it limited access to a full range of public spaces, not just schools. I took it for granted that such provincialism ultimately hobbled both whites and blacks as well as the anxious "in between" groups, such as recent immigrants and Asian-Americans. We cannot be full participants in a democracy if we have built impermeable walls around our various identity groups.

From the beginning, of course, there was an alternative narrative, voiced mostly by apologists for Jim Crow: that freedom of association should allow us to live in ghettos if we choose. The most interesting exposition of this view--interesting because it's from a refugee from Hitler's Germany--is probably Hannah Arendt's controversial 1959 essay "Reflections on Little Rock." "It has been said," she asserts, "that enforced integration is no better than enforced segregation, and this is perfectly true."

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Today, Reggie Henderson will vote. It's a right most Americans take for granted. Not him. Not if you're an ex-felon like Henderson. Not if you've been locked up.

Today, Reggie Henderson will vote. It's a right most Americans take for granted. Not him.
Not if you're an ex-felon like Henderson. Not if you've been locked up.

You see, in the United States, if you've committed a felony, voting is an iffy proposition. Henderson, 34, is lucky he lives in Pennsylvania, where ex-felons and those on parole and probation are eligible to vote. In New Jersey, ex-felons can vote, too. Not so simple in Delaware. There, ex-felons have to wait five years before they can have their voting rights reinstated.

And it's a good thing that Henderson, who rebuilt his life and now operates three barbershops, doesn't live in Florida. The Sunshine State, land of hanging chads, bans ex-felons from voting - for life.

Can you say disenfranchisement? Prohibitive voting laws in 35 states mean that at any given time, 5.3 million American citizens - a disproportionate number of them African American men like Henderson - get no political say in their lives. Not only have they been locked up, they are locked out of the democratic process.

Forty years after passage of the National Voting Rights

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HEALTH
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Hartford Courant: Autism And Race. Parents, Advocates Seek More Prompt Diagnoses Of Minority Children

When Ronnie Bonner Jr. was 21/2, his mother, Corendis Dawson-Bonner, was convinced that he had autism. While her pediatrician said not to worry, Dawson-Bonner was sure that his lack of language development, eye contact and social interests were symptoms of the disease.

"We would have a roomful of kids, and he would be off in his own little corner of the world," Dawson-Bonner remembers. "He didn't engage."

In the next few years, doctors and other professionals would pin a wide array of labels on Ronnie - including developmental delay, attention deficit disorder, hyperactivity and a social and emotional disorder. Even obsessive-compulsive disorder and oppositional defiant disorder were mentioned.

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INTERNATIONAL
Income inequality between races in Brazil has narrowed over the past decade but a black woman still earns only half what a white man makes, a United Nations report showed.

Income inequality between races in Brazil has narrowed over the past decade but a black woman still earns only half what a white man makes, a United Nations report showed on Thursday.

The difference in income between blacks and whites in Brazil narrowed by 31 percent between 1995 and 2005, according to an International Labor Organization study of global workplace discrimination.

The income gap narrowed because of successive minimum wage hikes, lower inflation and declining real wages for white men, the report said.

Brazil also made progress in advancing policies to reduce race inequality, said Lais Abramo, ILO director for Brazil.

"There are many countries that don't even want to recognize race discrimination," she said.

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A young girl fast for peace in Jamaica,

"We have the power to be successful in anything as long as it's positive!"

Today and tomorrow, she will continue to spread this message during her 12-hour-a-day fasting and reading for peace and purity at the Kingston and St. Andrew Parish Library.

It all began at 6:00 a.m. yesterday and already, there has been an overwhelming response to what Choc'late calls her 100 per cent crime-free initiative.

"A lot of times as youths, what we may hear especially from adults are negative things - we don't have self respect, we don't have discipline we don't have a sense of direction - however my motive is to tell the youths what we have. We have the power of making the right choices! We have the power of accepting responsibility for our action! We have the power of doing anything!" she said.

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MONEY
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Black Expo heads to S. Africa

An Indiana Black Expo delegation is leaving Thursday for South Africa, the first of two trips to Africa aimed at humanitarian exchanges, economic development and forging an international presence for the organization.

Joyce Rogers, Expo's president and chief executive officer, and Alpha Garrett, communications director of the organization, will travel with state Rep. Vernon Smith, D-Gary, for the 11-day trip.
And next month, Rogers, Garrett and representatives of a local consulting firm will travel to the West African nation of Senegal.

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Black Men Can't Coach? While The Ncaa Considers Changing Its Game Plan, Many Black Football Head-Coaching Candidates Remain On The Bench

In early may, the University of Alabama had an opportunity to make history by hiring the first African American head football coach ever in the Southeastern Conference -- and fumbled the ball. After firing football head coach Mike Price over an incident involving a stripper, the university -- upon the urging of the Rev. Jesse Jackson -- began interviewing Sylvester Croom, an African American running backs coach for the NFL's Green Bay Packers. But in the end, Miami Dolphins assistant coach Mike Shula, a white man, got the job even though Croom was equally (and some say more) qualified.

This is but the latest incident in which qualified African Americans have been turned down for head-coaching jobs within Division 1-A football, collegiate sports' elite.

In fact, attend one of the 50 or so Division 1-A college football games played on any given Saturday this autumn and you'll see that nearly half the players battling it out on the field are African American. Also, a good portion of the officiating team is black. Many of the fans cheering and jeering are African American as well. But take a look at the sidelines to the fellows wearing the headsets and you'd be hard-pressed to find a coach who isn't white.

The stats paint a grim picture: of the 117 Division 1-A football teams, only 3.4% of them have black head coaches. They can literally be counted on one hand: Tyrone Willingham at Notre Dame, San Jose State's Fitzgerald Hill, Tony Samuel at New Mexico State, and Karl Dorrell at UCLA, who was hired following last season.

By comparison, more than 20% of the coaches in Division 1-A college basketball, the second most popular -- and profitable -- sport on many campuses, are black. It's difficult to find worse stats for black coaches even among the ranks of major professional sports. During the 2001—2002 season, the NBA boasted the highest percentage (48%) of African American head coaches, with 14 counted among its 29 franchises. Though the NFL's statistics are abysmal, NCAA football still lags behind its pro counterpart, which had two African American head coaches (6%) among its 32 franchises during the 2002 season (Marvin Lewis has since been hired by the Cincinnati Bengals, bringing that rate up to 9%). Even Hispanic-dominated Major League Baseball had eight African Americans (26%) calling the shots.

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Tavis Smiley will headline a two-day conference aimed at maximizing the economic power of the black community.

Renee Reed had a problem.

The Miami resident wanted to refinance her home, but felt that the bank wasn't giving her a good deal.

Her financial advisor suggested she work through her church, New Birth Cathedral of Faith, 2300 NW 135th St. in Opa-locka.

New Birth is part of the Collective Banking Group, a coalition of 60 African-American churches in South Broward and Miami-Dade whose mission is to maximize the combined financial power of church members and use it for their benefit.

It worked for Reed, who said she saved about $5,000 in interest and fees once she had the weight of CBG behind her. She was treated better, she said, and got a lower interest rate.

''I've never had such a good relationship with a bank before, and the difference is because of CBG,'' Reed said.

Starting Friday, CBG is sponsoring a two-day Empowerment Conference in Hallandale Beach, at which church members and others can learn about managing credit, home ownership and financial practices for faith-based organizations. One featured speaker will be Tavis Smiley, the African-American author, radio personality and motivational speaker.

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RIP
Yolanda King, Daughter of Civil Rights Leader, Dies at 51

WEEK IN REVIEW, May 11th 2007
New Bush nominee found to have race-baiting past

President George W. Bush's pick for a top position at the State Department may have failed to follow through on a commitment she made to African-American and Latino lawmakers to address diversity issues in America's diplomatic corps.

Henrietta Holsman Fore, the current Undersecretary of State for Management, was nominated Monday to serve as Deputy Secretary of State and Administrator of the US Agency for International Development. But one Congressman was concerned that racially insensitive remarks she reportedly made 20 years ago could call her fitness to serve into question.

"I still think that a person that has a background of this nature puts her at a disadvantage, and when you get into something as sensitive as USAID, where you're dealing with developing countries, and people of color, I 'm not so sure how she will be perceived by the leadership of countries she has to work with," Rep. Donald Payne (D-NJ), a member of the Congressional Black Caucus, told RAW STORY in a Wednesday interview.

CULTURE
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'Radio Golf': A clear signal of black class struggle

An elegant, accomplished black man runs for political office espousing a populist message but finds that his smooth assimilation into the upper echelon of society is held suspect by some black Americans.
If that sounds vaguely familiar, it might be noted that Radio Golf (* * * out of four), the final installment in August Wilson's 10-play cycle tracing the experiences of black Americans through the 20th century, premiered in 2005, when a newly elected senator named Barack Obama was a rising superstar. That's not to suggest that Wilson, who died of cancer later that year, foresaw Obama's presidential aspirations, but it's a safe bet that the playwright could have predicted some of the tensions and contradictions cropping up in coverage of the candidate's current campaign.

Radio Golf, which opened Tuesday at Broadway's Cort Theatre, deals with similar conundrums in tracing the mayoral bid of Harmond Wilks (Harry Lennix). Unlike Obama, Wilks owes much of his success to privilege, having been provided a plush real estate job by his father. But unlike his pal Roosevelt Hicks, a Tiger Woods-worshiping corporate climber with whom Wilks plans to redevelop Pittsburgh's embattled Hill District, Wilks is prone to sympathize with the disenfranchised

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It seems that is a on going "rethinking" of Mormonism and it's relationship with Black People. A number of stories of late have been poping up on the internet (or internets to quote the comander guy). Salt Lake City mayoral candidate Jenny Wilson has the backing of the Utah Democratic Black Caucus and a plan to promote diversity in Utah's capital city. . Wilson, a Democrat, announced the endorsement and unveiled her diversity agenda Saturday to coincide with Cinco de Mayo.

"Salt Lake City is rich in cultural and ethnic diversity," she said in a press release. "As mayor of Salt Lake City, I will celebrate and advocate for Salt Lake's diverse communities. Promoting diversity and economic opportunity will be a cornerstone of my administration."

Along with this there is now a Black LDS Organization. Why this is important is clear from PAST LDS teaching Mormon racism in perspective. Also see PBS ("Religion and Ethics," March 31, 2006):African-American Mormons
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.Art collection a story of race

Walking through, she points out 17th and 18th century documents that outline, from business and political perspectives, the economics of slavery. Those are the jumping off point of the exhibit, which is a chronological mix of art and artifacts.

Works by artists of the Harlem Renaissance are among her favorites. "They capture the dignity and beauty in ordinary African-American life," she says, adding "they humanize." She points to "Portrait of a Girl," a 1940 oil painting by Charles Alston. He was a leading figure in the New York artistic community who taught artists such as Jacob Lawrence, represented in the exhibit by "John Brown Series, #8," a 1977 serigraph.

Pieces deeper in the exhibit, such as Ed Dwight's 1986 bronze sculpture "Old Masai Woman" are a reflection of Shirley's taste for late modern and contemporary art. "I buy the dead artists, and she buys the living ones," he says with a laugh.

The exhibit will be on tour for two years and Kinsey says they're already "missing" certain pieces. But, that's not a bad thing, he says. "We now have pieces that jump off the walls, that were never appreciated like they should have been because they were too crowded."

Besides, he says, they're still shopping.

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Looking for a good role model for your kids? Brainy, black & pint-sizedAn animated, globetrotting role model is born. Teddy P. Brains is his name, a bookish, curious, eyeglass-wearing kid who lives in Metroville, U.S.A. But Philadelphia is really his home

HE'S THE valedictorian of his kindergarten class.
He travels to South America to learn about the rain forest and its importance to the cycle of life.

And he follows his parents' advice to "ask questions, seek answers."

Teddy P. Brains is his name, a bookish, curious, eyeglass-wearing kid who lives in Metroville, U.S.A.

But Philadelphia is really his home.

See, Teddy is a 3-D animated character who came to life right here in a Port Richmond studio from the brain trust of two Mount Airy producers.

The bespectacled kid with a love for entomology also happens to be African-American.

He and a cast of characters star in the newly released DVD "The Adventures of Teddy P. Brains: Journey into the Rain Forest," aimed at children ages 5 to 8. The DVD can be found in Barnes & Noble, at Amazon.com and at www.teddypbrainstv.com, among other outlets.

Public television has featured multicultural casts since the debut of "Sesame Street" and "The Electric Company" in the '60s and '70s. Diversity still reigns on PBS educational shows such as "Cyberchase" and "The Magic School Bus," which ran from 1994 to 1998. These days, a young Latina is "Dora the Explorer."

But the Philadelphia creative team behind Teddy P. Brains may have come up with the first children's cartoon to focus on an African-American child in an intellectual setting.

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INTERNATIONAL
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High rates of crime and violence in the Caribbean are undermining growth, threatening human welfare, and impeding social development, according to a new report published by the World Bank and the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime

Crime impacts business and is a major obstacle to investment. In many countries, as crime increases, access to financing declines; spending on formal and informal security measures increases; and worker productivity declines. Estimates suggest that reducing the homicide rate in the Caribbean by one third from its current level could more than double the region’s rate of per capita economic growth.

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Nicolas Sarkozy’s election as French president stirred fears yesterday in Francophone Africa that his tough immigration policies could poison France’s traditionally strong ties with the world’s poorest continent.

“Immigration policy is going to harden and (repatriation) charters are going to resume. He is going to kick out a lot of Africans,” said Habibou Thiam, a 32-year-old carpenter in the Senegalese capital Dakar.
Sentiment in French-speaking Africa had broadly favoured Sarkozy’s Socialist rival Segolene Royal, who was born in Dakar and was perceived to have a more sympathetic view of the needs and aspirations of developing African countries.
Sarkozy’s insistence during his campaign that he would seek to curb and control illegal migration of Africans, many of whom dream of seeking a new life in Europe, had drawn sharp criticism from governments and ordinary people on the continent.
“With ‘Sarko’ as president, our compatriots, even those whose (migration) situation is in order, will be trembling. Is he going to renew expulsions all over the place and charters.

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News24: Foreign ministers from 53 African nations started gathering in Durban on Monday for a two-day meeting on political and economic integration on the continent.
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HEALTH
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Vibe: Dave Tolliver and Edgar "Gemini" Porter, aka Men at Large, are challenging African American men to lose a collective 2 million pounds by the end of the year as a way to improve their health.

Dave Tolliver and Edgar "Gemini" Porter, aka Men at Large, are challenging African American men to lose a collective 2 million pounds by the end of the year as a way to improve their health. The duo - who themselves weigh a collective 750 lbs. - decided to take the initiative after the passing of Gerald Levert, who helped nurture the group. "Gerald's death was a big loss to us," said Porter in a statement, "and when we began to look around at a lot of friends and family members who were also dying young it hit us that many of them were dying from either, being overweight, being diabetic, or having high blood pressure."

"We realized we aren't as young as we used to be but obviously being overweight was having a serious impact on us," Porter continued.

The singers' goal is to lose 100 lbs each, which Tolliver said they aim to do by "pushing back from the table and eating less," "walking a lot" and "rehearsing more vigorously to get in shape... Searching ways to lose weight on the internet let us know just how big the problem is among black men."

Over 69% of African American men are thought to be overweight, and 40% of all black men have high blood pressure. Additionally, eight percent of black men suffer from diabetes - twice that of white men - according to statistics from the Center for Disease Control.

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News-Medical: Researchers from Wake Forest University School of Medicine explored why blacks are less likely than other races to become living kidney donors, and the reasons are obesity and failure to complete the donor evaluation

Donor questionnaires and charts for 541 disqualified potential donors were reviewed. The disqualified donors were all identified by documented information, race, gender and cause of donor exclusion. In some cases, disqualified donors had more than one reason for exclusion.

About 30 percent of blacks were excluded because of obesity, compared to 16.6 percent of whites. Obesity was defined by body mass index (BMI) greater than or equal to 32 kg/m. Twelve percent of blacks were excluded because they didn't complete the evaluation process, compared to 1.8 percent of whites. For whites, the biggest reason for exclusion was kidney stones, at 7.3 percent, compared to 1.5 percent in blacks.

"Further study of these differences may improve our understanding of the causes of low rates of living kidney donation among African-Americans, particularly regarding the social reasons," said Reeves-Daniel. "Is it lack of trust in the medical community, financial inability to get to doctor's appointments for tests, concerns with work and child care, or perhaps some other issue?"

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POLITICS
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For African-Americans, folly of this war hits home

This war, launched under false pretenses, now has so little merit that the enrollment of African-Americans in the military may be at its lowest point since the creation of the all-volunteer military in 1973. In 2000, 23.5 percent of Army recruits were African-American. By 2005, the percentage dropped to 13.9 percent. National Public Radio this week quoted a Pentagon statistic that said that African-American propensity to join the military had dropped to 9 percent.

Technically, 13.9 percent is about the proportion of African-Americans in the general population. But the military's meritocracy has long been a disproportionate option for young African-Americans because of a disproportionate lack of career opportunities and decent public schools to prepare them for college.

The drop in African-American enrollment in the military may be as powerful a collective political statement about Iraq as when Muhammad Ali refused to be drafted during the Vietnam War. Before the 2003 invasion of Iraq, major polls showed that African-American support for the invasion was as low as 19 percent, according to the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies, while white support ran between 58 percent and 73 percent in major polls.

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Rep. Hank Johnson’s mild-mannered style will never be mistaken for that of his outspoken predecessor, Rep. Cynthia McKinney (D). But that doesn’t mean fellow Democrats are going to let him cruise to a second term. Freshman Rep. Hank Johnson conscious of potential primary.

Democrats in the Atlanta area say Johnson is keenly aware that McKinney’s departure has opened a door to any number of ambitious would-be members of Congress. Johnson, wary of pronouncing himself reelected, told the Atlanta Journal-Constitution last week that he’s hearing several names.

Anti-McKinney Democrats largely coalesced behind Johnson last year to knock off McKinney for the second time in the last three cycles. Now some of them — and possibly McKinney — apparently have turned their eyes on the quiet freshman as well.

“He’s certainly hearing rumors,” Johnson spokeswoman Deb McGhee Speights said. “But he wouldn’t be surprised, certainly, at this point if there is a challenger.”

Pervasive speculation has it that DeKalb County CEO Vernon Jones will drop his U.S. Senate bid to enter the race, and Democrats are not counting out repeat bids by McKinney or former Rep. Denise Majette (D-Ga.). Majette beat McKinney in 2002 but vacated the seat for a failed bid for Senate in 2004, at which point McKinney retook her old seat.
Jones’s campaign dismissed the rumors and spoke highly of Johnson. But many Democrats are dumbfounded by Jones’s flirtation with running for Senate.

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MONEY
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Auto loan rates higher for African Americans

Black auto buyers have been charged higher auto loan rates than others, federal research says. But the gap in loan rates could narrow - and possibly disappear - as the result of recently concluded lawsuits.

Blacks paid a typical auto loan rate of 7 percent for new cars, compared with a rate of 5 percent for whites in 2004, according to a consumer organization's analysis of the Federal Reserve Survey of Consumer Finances. That was the most recent survey available.

And blacks were more likely than auto buyers in general to have auto loan rates higher than 15 percent. For used car loans, 27 percent of blacks who buy cars were charged interest rates of 15 percent or more. Blacks were three times as likely as whites - 27 percent to 9 percent - to have auto loan rates at least that high, according to the report released Monday.

Hispanics were paying a typical rate of 5.5 percent for new car loans, while 19 percent of Hispanics had loans for used cars over 15 percent, the analysis found.

Lenders' suggested quote rates are based largely on the buyer's credit history, but auto dealers often raise the rate higher than that risk-related rate without discussing the rate with the customer, consumer advocates said. And they question the causes of those rate differences.

"It's hard to believe that any differences in creditworthiness explain all of these rate gaps," said Stephen Brobeck, executive director of the Consumer Federation of America. "They size you up, the car salesmen and finance and interest guys. They must think African Americans are more vulnerable to a markup."

But a series of legal actions against auto finance firms seeking fair treatment for minorities could help solve that problem.

"We had 11 lawsuits, the last of the cases settled last month," said Stuart Rossman of the National Consumer Law Center. "We reached a settlement with each of the finance firms. Our cases involved discrimination. We believe the terms of the settlements will eliminate discrimination."

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.Pepsi Ad Man Who Fought Stereotypes Dies In L.A.

(AP) LOS ANGELES A former Pepsi ad man who broke color barriers with one of the first corporate marketing campaigns to portray African Americans in a positive light has died. Edward Boyd was 92.

Boyd was hired as an assistant sales manager at Pepsi in 1947and led a group of educated African American salesmen.

He created a marketing campaign that showed African Americans as respectable, middle-class consumers.

One store display pictured a smiling mother holding a six-pack of Pepsi-Cola as her handsome, young son reached for a bottle.

The promotions differed sharply from the insulting images of many ads at the time.

Boyd died April 30 at Century City Doctors Hospital in Los Angeles. The cause was complications of a stroke he suffered in March.

BUSINESSWEEK ASKS, DO YOU WANT TO BUY THE BROOKLYN BRIDGE?

I don't think this article got much notice progressive blogosphere, but Business week did a story on the -selling off- privitization of public infrastructure currently the rage in financial markets. From the Chicago Skyway now in private hands to the

$3.8 billion deal for the Indiana Toll Road, struck in 2006, could break even in year 15 of the 75-year lease, on the way to reaping as much as $21 billion in profits, estimates Merrill Lynch & Co.

See Roads To Riches, Why investors are clamoring to take over America's highways, bridges, and airports—and why the public should be nervous for the full story.

In the past year, banks and private investment firms have fallen in love with public infrastructure. They're smitten by the rich cash flows that roads, bridges, airports, parking garages, and shipping ports generate—and the monopolistic advantages that keep those cash flows as steady as a beating heart. Firms are so enamored, in fact, that they're beginning to consider infrastructure a brand new asset class in itself.

With state and local leaders scrambling for cash to solve short-term fiscal problems, the conditions are ripe for an unprecedented burst of buying and selling. All told, some $100 billion worth of public property could change hands in the next two years, up from less than $7 billion over the past two years; a lease for the Pennsylvania Turnpike could go for more than $30 billion all by itself. "There's a lot of value trapped in these assets," says Mark Florian, head of North American infrastructure banking at Goldman, Sachs & Co (GS ).

There are some advantages to private control of roads, utilities, lotteries, parking garages, water systems, airports, and other properties. To pay for upkeep, private firms can raise rates at the tollbooth without fear of being penalized in the voting booth. Privateers are also freer to experiment with ideas like peak pricing, a market-based approach to relieving traffic jams. And governments are making use of the cash they're pulling in—balancing budgets, retiring debt, investing in social programs, and on and on.

But are investors getting an even better deal? It's a question with major policy implications as governments relinquish control of major public assets for years to come. The aggressive toll hikes embedded in deals all but guarantee pain for lower-income citizens—and enormous profits for the buyers.

We have seen what the privitization ethos has done to the Iraq war. Where war profiteering mercenaries such as Black Water group, and Halliburton have performed functions that used to be done quite well by the US military. I think we as a group (progressives) need to come to grips with this movement. Other wise a few years from now we could be facing a movement as powerfull as "Free Trade" (something in my opinion that progressives were late in coming to grips with).

On the other side of the bargaining table from the investment firms sit struggling governments suddenly amenable to the idea of selling control of assets to solve short-term problems. The burden of maintaining roads, bridges, and other facilities, many built during the 1950s, is becoming difficult to bear.

Federal, state, and local governments need to spend an estimated $155.5 billion improving highways and bridges in 2007, according to transportation officials, up 50% over the past 10 years. And that's hardly the only obstacle they face. In 2006 alone, states increased their Medicaid spending by an estimated 7.7%, to $132 billion. And state and local governments could be on the hook for up to $1.5 trillion in retiree liabilities, estimates Credit Suisse. At the same time, politicians find it difficult to raise taxes. Chicago's former chief financial officer, Dana R. Levenson, sums up the situation: "There is money to be had, and cities need money." U.S. Representative Chaka Fattah, a Pennsylvania Democrat who is running for mayor of Philadelphia, proposes to privatize the Philadelphia International Airport and use the proceeds to fund poverty programs—a much easier sell than a tax increase.

But there's a downside to the quick cash: planned toll hikes that are usually quite aggressive.

Chicago's Skyway could see car tolls rise from $2 in 2005 to $5 by 2017. For some perspective, if a similar scheme were applied to the Pennsylvania Turnpike during its 67 years of existence, the toll for traveling from the Delaware River to the Ohio border would be as much as $553 now instead of $22.75. Macquarie, which teamed up with Spain's Cintra to purchase the Chicago Skyway and the Indiana Toll Road, underscored the governmental trade-off during a presentation at the recent White House Surface Transportation Legislative Leadership Summit: "More Money or Lower Tolls." In an extreme scenario, governments could begin to sell properties that aren't tolled to private owners who will impose fees.

I'm not reflexively anti-privization. But I do think we need to talk about this early. When if ever is it a good idea? Is some infrastructure to critical to sell? Should limits be placed on deals? Can tax payers fund infrastructure, then have it sold off at a profit? These are all questions we need to ask ourselves.

Some facts:

1) All told, some $100 billion worth of public property could change hands in the next two years, up from less than $7 billion over the past two years; a lease for the Pennsylvania Turnpike could go for more than $30 billion all by itself.

2) Investors in the $3.8 billion deal for the Indiana Toll Road, struck in 2006, could break even in year 15 of the 75-year lease, on the way to reaping as much as $21 billion in profits

3) Rob Collins, head of infrastructure mergers and acquisitions at Morgan Stanley, estimates that 30 funds are being raised around the world that could wield as much as $500 billion in buying power for U.S. assets

4) Investors can't get in fast enough. They recently deluged Goldman Sachs with $6.5 billion for its new infrastructure fund, more than twice the $3 billion it was seeking.

5) Federal, state, and local governments need to spend an estimated $155.5 billion improving highways and bridges in 2007, according to transportation officials, up 50% over the past 10 years.

6) The 99-year lease of the Chicago Skyway that went for $1.8 billion in 2005 was the first major transaction.

7) Based on the going rate of about 40 times toll revenues, the iconic Golden Gate Bridge could probably fetch $3.4 billion were California interested in selling. The Brooklyn Bridge? If permission were granted by New York City to charge the same tolls as the George Washington Bridge, a private owner might shell out as much as $3.5 billion for it.

8) Chicago's Skyway could see car tolls rise from $2 in 2005 to $5 by 2017.

9) Bankers say New York could reap a combined $70 billion for long-term leases on a bunch of assets, including the state's lottery, the Tappan Zee Bridge, and the New York State Thruway. New York state officials have looked into the option of leasing the lottery, which itself might command $35 billion—a sum that could substantially upgrade, say, New York's higher education system. The downside? The state would probably have to remove constraints on the lottery's marketing designed to discourage people from gambling more than they can afford. If the state insists on keeping the constraints in place, it could reduce the value of selling it.