Riley is caught off guard and George is caught speeding.

Most of you who come to the fields on a regular basis know that I live in Philly and I am a huge Eagles fan. Come football season I ride with Gang Green no matter what. So it is with a heavy heart that I have to report tonight that the Big R has struck Eagles Nation.

One of Tim Tebow's best buds -and his roommate from college- was caught dropping the N- word at a good ole boyz concert. Now Riley Cooper is no politician or person influencing public policy, so if he is a closet racist it doesn't really bother me that much. It's all par for the course as far as I am concerned.  What does bother me is the distraction that he has become to my team.

"Embarrassed Eagles receiver Riley Cooper stood fittingly with his back to a wall outside the team's training complex press room Wednesday night, apologizing for a racial epithet used after a confrontation with an African American security guard working a June 8 Kenny Chesney concert.

The six-minute, 45-second apology -- which followed a Twitter apology -- was only the beginning for Cooper, who was fined an undisclosed amount by the team and now awaits word on whether the NFL will tack on more discipline.
The receiver said he intended to apologize later to his teammates, many of whom are African American, following a 7 p.m. walk-through practice.
VIDEO: Cooper's outburst

"It's going to be very difficult for me. I'm going to tell them, 'I'm extremely sorry,' tell them exactly what I'm telling you guys. There was a confrontation and I handled it extremely, extremely poorly,'' Cooper said to 25 reporters and six local television cameras. "This is kind of the lowest of lows. This isn't the type of person I want to be portrayed as. This isn't the type of person that I am." [Source]

Actually, Riley, that is exactly the "type of person" that you are, and it's only the "lowest of lows" because you got caught on camera. Sadly, you are a pretty good receiver, and with one of our other top receivers out for the year with a torn ACL, you were going to be number two on the bird's depth chart. Now every time I see you going over the middle I am torn between wanting to see your head separated from your shoulders by some crazed linebacker or you catching the rock and taking it to the house.

Good luck with the apology tour with your teammates. I hope they make that extra block for you this year. I am sure you do as well. We wouldn't want one of those N*****s ending your career.

Finally, it looks like child killer, George Zimmerman, is in the news again.Unfortunately for George he was caught speeding with a gun in his car. Fortunately for George he was stopped in a place called Forney, Texas.

"Hey, ain't you the guy that killed that N****r boy down in Florida? Sir, you have a nice day, and let us know if you have any problems down the road. We will be glad to provide an escort for you."

Ok, so maybe it didn't quite go down that way, but I wouldn't be surprised to hear that it did.

"Zimmerman, who informed police that the weapon was in the car shortly after being pulled over, was asked where he was going, to which he responded, "nowhere in particular," according to the site.

CBS News reports that, during the traffic stop, which occurred at 12:54 p.m., Zimmerman also asked the officer if he recognized him from television.
This is the second time Zimmerman has been in the news since his trial ended on July 13.

Three days later, Zimmerman reportedly came to the aid of a family trapped under an overturned SUV on a Florida highway, pulling two children and their parents to safety".

Yes George, I am sure that he recognized you. This is why you were only given a warning for speeding with a firearm in your vehicle.

Oh, and about that "overturned SUV, story.......

His Home might need improvement, and five things for Don.

I was going to blog about Tim Allen and his confusing and convoluted diatribe about the use of the "N-word" but honestly, it's not even worth it. For the life of me I cannot understand why certain white folks feel so strongly about being able to say the word, Nigger.

 "I've had this argument on stage a million times. I do a movie with Martin Lawrence and pretty soon they’re referring to me, 'Hey, my n*****'s up.' So I'm the n***** if I'm around you guys but seven feet away, if I said n*****, it's not right. It's very confusing to the European mind how that works, especially if I've either grown up or evolved or whatever, it literally was growing up in Colorado, with Hispanics and Anglos, that's all I remember. So when Paula Deen (admits her language), they go after her, and now we've gone backwards in the world. She said n***** in '83 or something?"

Back in the day folks like Tim Allen and Paula Dean called us "Nigger" so much that I bet some blacks folks thought that their name was actually, Nigger. Not anymore, and I honestly think that this bothers some folks. This is why we have the constant cries of double standard because we are allowed to use it to each other (sorry Don Lemon, that will not be changing anytime soon) and they can't.  

Finally, I really wanted to feature an article by Lauren Victoria Burke, an editor over at Politic365. My only wish is that Mr. Lemon reads this news site, and that he will check out Lauren's post over coffee tomorrow morning.

"CNN let Roland go and kept this? –> see video On this whole Don Lemon thing, it is a shame to waste time on 24 hour cable’s many flim flam artists — but in this case it’s a must. You see, Don actually believes he’s right. Anyone left who is confused on the question of whether a person can be mis-educated yet have a national platform has found their answer.  With that, I want to bring something up that’s been on my mind for some time now. Which is: If journalists can’t confront complex issues in a smart way they should shut up.

Yeah, yeah, I get it: If you can get paid to run your mouth why not right? Ratings, attention, fame: Good for you Don Lemon — look at you go. Just “pull your pants up,” everyone.  I guess any flunky on TV could come up with “Don’s 5 points”, and wouldn’t you know it, one did.  Sadly, TV’s Billy O and Double Down Don have no solutions. Long after these guys are gone harder questions will remain.

The deeper questions: How did we get to the place where the N-word is used casually in music and 1 in 28 kids in the U.S. has a parent behind bars? How do we break the cycle? This is where TV flunkies Don and Billy O fail. We are the country that leads the world in putting humans in cages. Why is any so-called journalist acting shocked that American youth have adopted prison culture with 1.5 million kids with a parent in jail? It appears a network anchor knows nothing about the effects of the war on drugs. Scary.

It took Michelle Alexander 332 pages to detail those effects, particularly on Black communities, in The New Jim Crow. Perhaps Don and Billy should read more. Or how about a viewing of The House I Live In? It’s never surprising when a Fox anchor doesn’t care to learn these issues. But one of the only Black anchors on a major network?

So if Don wants to “really fix” problems I say we start with “fixing” Don. Here are 5 things to consider Don — I write directly to you and no one else. Because it’s time for “tough love.”

1.
News reporting around the story of a 17-year-old who was followed and then ended up being shot to death is not the time for “lessons to Black people.” Only if you are a brainless dupe who is too stupid to see you’re a dupe could you fall for the wingnutty spin that switches topics from Trayvon to “black on black” crime. Don, what’s with opening you’re 7 minute “discussion” as if it’s somehow related to the death of Trayvon Martin — then saying you know it isn’t — then launching into how correct Billy O’Reilly is then rolling a clip of him doing just that? Everyone knows the first rule in the Fox debate playbook is “change the subject.” The only reason Billy O is talking about problems in the black community is as a device to change the subject from Trayvon. Billy will only return to the subject when he needs a handy way of saying Blacks are f’d up. And what did you do: Dance like a reverse Jolson to his narrative.
2.
The N-word and pants sagging are the end result of pathology not the start of it. No one exits the womb doing these things. Sitting in pious judgement without considering a myriad of factors is a precarious adventure. But sure, it’s great for ratings and getting booked on The View? And do I have this right: You’re a gay black male and you don’t appear to understand what it is to be judged by others who don’t know you simply because you belong to a particular group? I hope I don’t have this right.

And so you and Billy O want to talk about black males and the American criminal justice system? Well hot damn, let’s talk. The NYPD has stopped over 4 million innocent people in over 10 years and the majority of those stopped were innocent black and latino males. Police Commissioner Ray Kelly apparently wants to “save” black and latino males from being subjected to 4th and 5th amendment protections even though crime is at a record low in NYC. But there are no drugs and guns in Bensonhurst or Staten Island?  Perhaps you should consider who the disproportionate target of law enforcement is in the city you live in — even when that target is innocent and there is no probable cause.  Over 473,000 innocent people were stopped last year — 55% Black.  Find an interview.

Personal behavior is very important. And that behavior is often driven by the (read: limited) choices we have in front of us. Let’s ask ourselves: Is arresting kids better than suspending them? Are we making it easier or harder for people to get a criminal record? And when they do: Do we make it easier or harder for them to re-enter society? When stats show that black males are sentenced 20% longer what effect is that likely to have? Does our society make it easy for people to attend college? Does a poor kid have the same educational opportunities as a rich one in America? When a poor kid sees few opportunities what decisions is he or she likely to make? Last I checked there were 50 million Americans — 1 in 7 — in poverty. That’s a lot of people facing the above questions.

3. 
Your “respect where you live” advice was my favorite. “I’ve lived in several predominately white neighborhoods in my life, I’ve rarely witnessed people littering,” you say. Stopping litter will save us? 

Well how about you stop littering: On the group you are in. Ask yourself: Would anyone in any other religious or ethnic group in America do what you did on live TV to the group they are a member of? Think: Would Thomas Roberts or Capehart rag on gays on the air as you did on Blacks? Would you? Would any Latino anchor take to the air and “call out” Hispanics? Would Fareed Zakaria do a screed like yours on Muslims? Would anyone of the Jewish or Catholic faith be critical of others in their group in this way? And the Catholics had a sex scandal.  Every group has their issues.  Sit back, close your eyes and ask yourself why no other group in America but African Americans do public self flogging as celebration. 

4. 
Remember the last line from Adolph Ceasar’s character in A Soldier’s Story: “They still hate you…”  Well President Barack Obama finished high school. He got a B.A. from Columbia U. He then graduated Harvard Law School. He became the 44th President of the United States.  And people demanded to see his birth certificate. You think you can escape from blackness by winking to Bill O’Reilly who demands the President’s “hidden college records.”  You’re reminding me a bit of Sgt. Waters in A Soldier’s Story with this episode.  The line, “you know the damage one ignorant Negro can do…” has many interpretations. 

5. 
Finally you may want to take note that the same people who now suddenly want to talk out-of-wedlock babies are the same people who advocate against sex ed in schools and contraception. The same people who want to abolish the Department of Education and cut funding for public schools are the same people who request $30 million to throw more people in jail even after that policy has proven it does not work. Chicago’s mayor “finds” $300 million for a sports stadium but closes 46 schools to “save money.” Chicago’s Senator finds $170 million for a prison but no money for summer jobs? Black youth unemployment is 46%. How about 7 minutes on that?

If I’m wrong I apologize but I’m going to go ahead and bet you didn’t study sociology, criminology or psychology. I’ll bet you’ve spent an entire life in journalism — a life of watching and not doing. I can speak first hand on what a vacuous vocation that can be. It can be a brilliant profession. It can also reveal deep ignorance." [Source]

One correction for Lauren, there is nothing ignorant about what Don Lemon is doing. He knows exactly what to do to become known and to drive up his ratings.


 



 

Don's five point plan.

I need to holla at my boy Don Lemon real quick. The CNN host has been catching some heat from his my people after his recent rant about what is ailing the black community. (Memo to Don: Never start an editorial about black folks by invoking the name of Bill O'Reilly.) 

Don thinks that if we could just get the young bucks to start pulling up their pants and stop dropping the N-word, we would all of a sudden get black unemployment down to 7%, and get the government to start focusing on urban issues. He thinks that implementing his five point plan would get the GOP to start focusing on passing legislation that would address things such as education and fighting crime, instead of how to control a woman's body and defunding "Obamacare".

The thing is, I actually agree with some of the things that Don talked about, (most black folks do) but when he goes on CNN of all places and preaches down to us as if these aren't things we talk about all the time, it's a problem. I am guessing that if Don had made these statements on BET or TV One (sorry Oprah, not OWN; I still don't trust you to keep s*** among us) most black folks would not have a problem, but putting white folks in our business to the delight of clowns on the right and the FOX NEWS crowd is not cool. It's never cool to side with the "professional assassins" of black folks. Besides, I have news for Don: the people he should be trying to reach are not watching his show on CNN. Some of the people that he and the bloviator over at FOX like to bash are the ones that he is going to have to reach out to get the message across to a generation of lost souls. Some young buck in North Philly who dropped out of school in the 10th grade and is slinging dope on the corner is not going to listen to two talking heads who are paid to drive up their ratings on television. One is an egomaniacal racist and the other is a sheltered dude from Baton Rouge who sometimes means well but cares about his television career more than improving the lives of black folks.

"And number one, and probably the most important, just because you can have a baby, it doesn't mean you should. Especially without planning for one or getting married first. More than 72 percent of children in the African-American community are born out of wedlock. That means absent fathers. And the studies show that lack of a male role model is an express train right to prison and the cycle continues. So, please, black folks, as I said if this doesn't apply to you, I'm not talking to you. Pay attention to and think about what has been presented in recent history as acceptable behavior. Pay close attention to the hip-hop and rap culture that many of you embrace. A culture that glorifies everything I just mentioned, thug and reprehensible behavior, a culture that is making a lot of people rich, just not you."

The irony is, of course, that the people Don says that he is "not talking to" are  the only ones who are listening to him, and we all want to know why he chose this particular forum to have his conversation.

Passing laws to suppress votes, and a shaky rescue in Florida.

This post won't be long because I am on the road and not in my comfort zone if you will.

Anyway, I was browsing the web this morning, and I saw where Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg has declared that her prediction as it relates to the supremes striking down a key enforcement provision of the Voting Rights Act having dire consequences, is turning out to be spot on.

Take, for instance, what is happening in North Carolina. The state's republican lawmakers have lost their minds now that they have taken control, and they are now going to make sure that minorities and poor people have no access to the ballot box. No pesky federal government to watch over how they disenfranchise thousands and thousands of people. I suspect that it won't be long before we go back to the days of having to prove we can read and write or that we own property before we can have the privilege of voting in some states here in America.

Down in Texas (I wish they would just go ahead and secede) they are  doing their  best to suppress votes as well, and the only thing in Texas in more danger than poor people and minorities is a woman's womb.

I was glad to see Eric Holder address this issue at the Urban League get together in Philly. He has vowed that his justice department will be watching these states and will be proactive in coming months. (*Breaking! The Justice Department is asking to reinstate The Voting Rights Act in Texas.)

We will see. I like Holder, the fact that wingnuts hate him so much is reason enough for me to like the guy. All that hateration from the right wing; he must be doing something right.

Finally, this Zimmerman rescue story. I am not big on conspiracy theories, but....

"This was a suspicious story from the beginning.

 

We have seen news reports of protesters doing thousands of dollars of damage to be wrong. The claims of separate attacks by protesters over the Zimmerman verdict turned out to be false. Now added to the list of  false news reports appears to be the story of George Zimmerman heroically rescuing a family of four from a burning SUV.

The initial report was that George Zimmerman was ‘just coincidentally’ driving by after a car accident occurred, that he leaped out of his vehicle, fire extinguisher in hand, to come to the rescue of the family of four trapped inside as the vehicle caught fire, pulling them to safety. That was followed by the claim that the family he rescued had planned a press event to thank George Zimmerman, but that they canceled due to threats from Trayvon Martin supporters.

It appears they may have canceled the event because they did not want to be part of the fraud of making Zimmerman out to be a hero, when that story was not precisely true.

What did occur was that an accident occurred where a car slid on its side into a median. People at the scene called 911, which went to the Sanford office of the Seminole County Sheriff’s Office. BEFORE responding to the 911 call, News Ball.com reports that Seminole Sheriff’s Dept. Officer Patrick Rehder, a self-styled friend and supporter of Zimmerman, contacted Zimmerman by cell phone directing him to go to the accident so as to appear to be a hero.   News Ball.com also provides a social media screen capture of a curious statement about Rehder taking pleasure when someone gets credit for something they did not do.

Rehder’s name appears on the accident report as the responding officer; social media shows his connection to Zimmerman." [Source]

Wingnut sites, of course, have a different take on things.

I am not sure where this is all going, but it should be interesting to see it all develop.

      

 

The real race hustlers.

Bill O'Reilly is trying to represent our white brothers and sisters in this conversation on race. Billo has been talking tough about race all week and he has been attacking the "black civil rights establishment" for profiting off of racial divisions. (Pot meet kettle) Of course Bill O'Reilly is not alone. His ideological soul mate, Rush Limbaugh, has been throwing in his two cents as well. Still, it's Bill O'Reilly who has been the most passionate about this subject.

"An unusually crazed, agitated O’Reilly declared that the plight of black America “has nothing to do with slavery. It has everything to do with you Hollywood people and you derelict parents… Race hustlers and the grievance industry,” he went on, “have intimidated the so-called ‘conversation,’ turning any valid criticism of African-American culture into charges of racial bias,” leaving African-Americans to “fend for themselves in violent neighborhoods.” I can’t wait to hear the ignorant O’Reilly generalize more about “African American culture.”
But I agree with O’Reilly about “race hustlers and the grievance industry” being the problem here – only we define them differently. Bill-O himself is a consummate race hustler and grievance peddler, pushing the drug of racial grievance to white people, making himself rich by worsening racial tension. He’s second only to Rush Limbaugh in terms of spewing ignorance to a vast, frightened audience.

Yep, that about sums it up.

Anyway Bill, we would love to have this open and honest dialogue on race with you and your peeps, but you have got to stop preaching to us and acting as if you and your ilk have clean hands in this racial conundrum we find ourselves in.
I am starting to think...I take that back' I know that Rush and O'Reilly are the real race hustlers. They have profited and built an entire industry around scaring white folks and playing us against them.

Oh, and Bill, you will have to tell your people to stop killing (and trying to kill) our children.

With the Trayvon Martin verdict fresh in our minds, we have yet another case of "color arousal" causing someone in the majority population to take the life of a young African American male.

"Merritt Landry shot a 14-year-old boy who was standing near his car. He shot the young teen in the head. Merritt Landry has been booked with attempted second degree murder.
 
This comes less than two weeks after the Trayvon Martin verdict.

“A Marigny homeowner has been booked with attempted second-degree murder after he shot a 14-year-old boy in the head early Friday, police said. The homeowner’s friends and neighbors said the owner believed the teen was an intruder. The teenager remains hospitalized in critical condition, police said.
New Orleans police arrested Merritt Landry, 33, a building inspector for the Historic District Landmarks Commission, after conducting multiple interviews and reviewing crime scene evidence, including a single spent casing at the scene, NOPD spokeswoman Remi Braden said.

Police said the teen was near Landry’s vehicle when he was shot. Landry’s friends said the vehicle was in the driveway behind a gate just a few feet from the house’s backdoor." [Source]

People like Merrit Landry sure make it hard for us to have our kumbaya moment.















  

"Maddy" has regrets and a big lie down in Georgia.

So this Juror-B29 lady felt that George Zimmerman was guilty but the law just wasn't there to convict him. She also had some very strong words for Mr. Zimmerman:

  “George Zimmerman got away with murder,” Maddy, who declined to give her last name, said in an interview with ABC’s Robin Roberts on "Good Morning America," “but you can't get away from God. And at the end of the day, he's going to have a lot of questions and answers he has to deal with."

Yes, he did, but you helped to set him free. If you felt that strongly about his guilt you should have stood your ground. (Pun intended) A hung jury would have given the state an opportunity to try Mr. Zimmerman again.

"It's hard for me to sleep, it's hard for me to eat because I feel I was forcefully included in Trayvon Martin's death. And as I carry him on my back, I'm hurting as much Trayvon's Martin's mother because there's no way that any mother should feel that pain..."

Boricua, we are all hurting because of you.

Finally, remember the story in Georgia where two "violent and malevolent" black males shot a 13 month old infant in the face while he was in his stroller? Well, as it turns out, this story might not be going according to the racist right wing script.

"During the height of the George Zimmerman trial, when media attention was focused heavily on Stand Your Ground Laws and the question of whether or not a white man would be found not guilty of killing an unarmed African-American teenager, the shooting death of 13 month old Georgia infant Antonio Santigio, also made national media headlines. After the mother, Sherry West, told police that her baby was killed by two black teenagers, the right-wing went crazy with this story. Meme’s about the killing could be found on every social media web-site, public page and in every group where the Trayvon Martin story was discussed. Most of these meme’s showed photos of the infant side by side with one of two accused African-American teenagers.

For months, right wingers have levelled accusations of reverse racism against the President, the DOJ and even the media. There have been outcries of disparity against white people because no prominent politicians spoke out about the case, no protests were held, it was not declared a hate crime, the teens weren’t sent to Gitmo to face terrorism charges and especially because the two were not immediately sentenced to execution. To Republicans and racists, the case appeared to be anecdotal proof of everything they believe about black people; that they are scary, they are dangerous -they are baby murdering monsters. The case was repeatedly cited to “prove” that people like George Zimmerman have every right to gun them down black kids, like Trayvon Martin, at will.

In spite of the social media “outrage” and the right-wing media narrative, however, the Baby Santiago case only illustrates just how prevalent racism really is in the United States. Just days after Sherry West told police her 13 month old was shot and killed by two black teens, West’s 21 year old daughter went to police to tell them that she suspected her mother may have killed her infant brother. Ashley Glassey told CBS News in March, that her mother has serious mental health issues. These include a diagnosis of bi-polar with accompanying schizophrenic tendencies. West also talked with the media about how she was removed from her mother’s care at the age of 8, because of abuse and neglect in the home. Immediately after the shooting, Glassey said West began asking questions about how long it would take her to collect the insurance money. West’s daughter also told both media and police that her mother made conflicting statements to her, regarding the child’s death - including different stories about who was shot first. West’s inconsistencies and suspicious behavior caused her own daughter to tell police and reporters that she suspected her mother was not telling the truth about how the infant was killed. CBS News reported several days later that police had not followed up with Glassey, nor had they taken her statement. A follow-up call by the press to the police, was never returned.

On July 16^th further evidence was released to the public that implicates the parents involvement in the child’s death. Police tests immediately following the shooting revealed gun powder on the hands of both Sherry West and the baby’s father, Louis Santiago. Santiago claimed that he was nowhere near the scene of the shooting. This evidence too, was withheld for months, until the defense attorney in the case demanded that it be released in mid July.

When we look at the Zimmerman case and the Baby Santiago case side by side, what we see is how racism plays out in the United States. When a white man openly admitted to shooting and killing an unarmed black teenager, the public immediately jumped to his defense. On the other hand, when two black teenagers were accused of shooting and killing a white child, the public immediately cried out for their executions. Zimmerman was guilty, the two teens may very well be innocent, but public perceptions about these two cases shows that what matters most is the skin color of the accused killers." [Source]

Sherry West, meet Susan Smith.















 

Ready to start the conversation?

There was a hearing on Capitol Hill Wednesday to talk about the crisis facing young black males in America. The man whose son had to die to start America's conversation about race was there to testify:

 "I think 50 years from now, when I'm dead and gone, I would like to see Trayvon Martin's name attached to some type of statute, amendment, that says you can't simply profile our children, shoot them in the heart, kill them and say you were defending yourself.."

Well said Mr. Martin, but unfortunately these laws will not be changing anytime soon because there is no legislative will to change them.

As black folks we can't depend on politricksters to save our children and bring about a better community; that is on us. And I don't want to hear bigots on Fox News lecturing us about community responsibility while they profit from racial division as much as the "civil rights industry" they are always pointing their fingers at. 

So anyway, with all this in mind, I would like to share an excellent article I read yesterday by Helen Ubinas. Ms. Ubinas called out the sisters in our community.

"YESTERDAY, I wrote about young black males being killed in the city. Now let's get real and talk about where that starts and hopefully where it will end - and that's with you, my sisters.

We can have a national discussion about race and urban violence. We can push for a long- overdue national movement to combat black-male genocide. We can beg, cajole, even guilt, society to care and act - or at least pretend to.
But really, it's on you - mothers of boys.
 

You are the ones with the best shot at changing the bleak reality out there.
You have the most to lose, and the most to gain. Because, overall, those are your children dying out there. And it starts with one simple word: No.

No: You will not sell yourself short and become a cog in the cycle of poverty by becoming teen mothers.

No: You will not let some sperm donor, however good-looking or smooth, subject you, or your future children, to the inevitable hardship that comes with raising children on your own, and in poverty.

And you know - you know better than anyone - what that hardship looks and feels and tastes like, because chances are you are a product of it.

No: You will not become a statistic or a stereotype because yes, you are worth more than that and yes, your future children deserve more than a life struggling to claw themselves out of a black hole. And yes, you finally realize how much power you hold in your hands, and in your decision to say "No" - no more.
That is not to say that children who are born to single mothers can't or don't make it. President Obama was raised by a single mother. I have spent my nearly two-decade long career writing about young men and women who were teen mothers, or raised by one, and who beat the odds. But that's just it: They have to beat the odds, of high poverty, of low graduation rates, of violence and incarceration and death. It's right there, in all the depressing stats.

An estimated 10,000 to 12,000 Philadelphia teens are mothers, according to a story by thenotebook.org, a local education-news service. Project U-Turn, a city campaign to focus on the city's dropout rate, estimates that more than 70 percent of those teens will drop out of high school.
The number of children living in single-parent homes has nearly doubled since 1960, according to data from the 2010 Census. More than 40 percent of teenage moms report living in poverty by age 27. The rates are especially high among black and Hispanic teen moms, more than half of whom end up in poverty.
I'm not just holding you accountable here. One-third of American children - 15 million - are being raised without a father, according to studies.

I cannot and will not downplay the importance of a father in a child's life. I don't know if I so much made the decision not to get pregnant out of wedlock or my father scared the resolution into me. Either way, I saw the difference between my household and those of my friends and family that were headed by single mothers struggling to make ends meet, to balance the difficult - often impossible - task of raising their children and feeding them.

Let me be really clear here: None of this absolves society for its part in the history and circumstances that led to embedded, multigenerational poverty. As I've written, we all own a piece of this crisis. And while it's tempting, easier, to wipe our hands of our responsibility by blaming "kids having kids," it's more complicated than that.

But here's the reality: No one and nothing, not the most well-intentioned do-gooder, not the most well-funded program, will ever be able to do more to break the cycle of poverty and violence than the people who are most affected, and that starts with young women of color.

And that starts with more of them saying "No."

If I'm wrong, I'm ready to hear it. If I'm not, let's start having this conversation . . . Ladies?" [Source]

Helen, what you didn't say is that some politicians will fight like hell to take away the woman's choice to have that child (I see you Rick Perry), and when the child gets here they are pretty much f****d. That same politician will pass the most draconian and pitiless laws possible to make sure that the child he tried to save before it was a viable fetus catches hell when he is a fully grown man.

   

Fearing black.

There are a lot of lies and misinformation being thrown around out there, so you Negroes in America who get down in the fields need to be very careful. You just never know who to trust anymore. Folks will spin things to fit their narrative and the so called main stream media outlets are now getting their talking points from the fringes.

"The conservative smear that President Obama, as State Senator Barack Obama (D-Illinois), supported a Stand Your Ground law has made the species jump into the mainstream media with an assist from MSNBC’s Mika Brzezinski, the ostensible counterweight to conservative Morning Joe host Joe

Scarborough. On Tuesday morning, Brzezinski credulously read a Wall Street Journal piece that tried to paint the President’s Friday remarks about Stand Your Ground as a reversal, and as usual, there was no one around to call bullsh*t.
Noting that this is “pretty important, given the grand scheme of the conversation,” Brzezinski dutifully read from the WSJ piece, which uses weasel words and sleight of hand to conclude that then-State Senator Obama “participated” in an “examination” of Illinois’ self-defense law. and “emerged as a Stand Your Ground proponent.”

Brzezinski also parroted another sick conservative talking point, that “minorities, in some ways, have been on the benefiting side of Stand Your Ground” in Florida..

Anyway, you would think that after a black teenager was shot to death in Florida for just....well, being a young black teenager; it would be black folks worrying about their safety and warning their children to be careful of white folks. Not so much. Apparently this is a good time in America for white folks to warn each other of the dangers of living with black people. I guess this is why the prison industrial complex continues to grow and black men are being locked away in record numbers.

"In The National Review on Tuesday, Hanson notes that Attorney General Eric Holder told the NAACP that George Zimmerman's acquittal meant he had to give his son "The Talk," about how black people are assumed to be violent by some white people and thus at great risk for harm. Hanson says, "Yet I fear that for every lecture of the sort that Holder is forced to give his son, millions of non-African-Americans are offering their own versions of ensuring safety to their progeny." Hanson does not try to be funny, the way Derbyshire did, and he doesn't make the same kind of vague warnings about a simmering race war. (Derbyshire said about 5 percent of blacks were "ferociously hostile to whites," and another 50 percent or so of them would go along out of solidarity and becaue they think white people have it coming.) But his basic idea is the same: watch out for black kids.

Hanson says his father — a Democrat! — told him once, "When you go to San Francisco, be careful if a group of black youths approaches you." Hanson continues:

Note what he did not say to me. He did not employ language like “typical black person.” He did not advise extra caution about black women, the elderly, or the very young — or about young Asian Punjabi, or Native American males.  In other words, the advice was not about race per se, but instead about the tendency of males of one particular age and race to commit an inordinate amount of violent crime.

It was after some first-hand episodes with young African-American males that I offered a similar lecture to my own son.

When he was a grad student, Hanson says, two black guys tried to break into his apartment while he was in it. Another time, four black guys tried to steal his bike while he was on it.  "Regrettably, I expect that my son already has his own warnings prepared to pass on to his own future children," he says.

This is dumb and not very polite, The Atlantic's Ta-Nehisi Coates writes, but also does not actually make Hanson's kids safe. 

If I were to tell you that I only employ Asian-Americans to do my taxes because "Asian-Americans do better on the Math SAT," you would not simply question my sensitivity, but my mental faculties. That is because you would understand that in making an individual decision, employing an ancestral class of millions is not very intelligent. Moreover, were I to tell you I wanted my son to marry a Jewish woman because "Jews are really successful," you would understand that statement for the stupidity which it is.

But racism makes people do dumb things, Coates writes.." [Source]  

Indeed it does.


  


  

Shelby's turn.

I was waiting to hear from Shelby Steele on the George Zimmerman verdict. (Shout out to my twitter fam James for sending me the link to the article.) Shelby is a right wing thinker and House Negro who does not believe that racism exists in America. To Shelby, Negroes have arrived and we should stop fighting for social justice and true equality here in the land of the [only some are] free.

"The verdict that declared George Zimmerman not guilty of murdering Trayvon Martin was a traumatic event for America's civil-rights establishment, and for many black elites across the media, government and academia. When you have grown used to American institutions being so intimidated by the prospect of black wrath that they invent mushy ideas like "diversity" and "inclusiveness" simply to escape that wrath, then the crisp reading of the law that the Zimmerman jury displayed comes as a shock.

On television in recent weeks you could see black leaders from every background congealing into a chorus of umbrage and complaint. But they weren't so much outraged at a horrible injustice as they were affronted by the disregard of their own authority. The jury effectively said to them, "You won't call the tune here. We will work within the law."

Today's black leadership pretty much lives off the fumes of moral authority that linger from its glory days in the 1950s and '60s. The Zimmerman verdict lets us see this and feel a little embarrassed for them. Consider the pathos of a leadership that once transformed the nation now lusting for the conviction of the contrite and mortified George Zimmerman, as if a stint in prison for him would somehow assure more peace and security for black teenagers everywhere. This, despite the fact that nearly one black teenager a day is shot dead on the South Side of Chicago—to name only one city—by another black teenager." 

Shelby Steele thinks that diversity and inclusion is a "mushy" idea.--- How quaint and ironic, since his own immediate family is a model of diversity.--- As usual he misses the point entirely. Had one of those black teenagers murdered another one and was on the scene when police arrived with literally a smoking gun in his hand, he would have been cuffed and arrested on the spot. He then would have been charged with the death of Trayvon Martin, and rightfully so.

George Zimmerman was not even charged, and it took outrage and pressure from the civil rights leadership Shelby pontificates about to even get an arrest in the case.  

Sadly, Shelby Steele is celebrating Zimmerman's acquittal as if he somehow benefits from a killer who profiled and took the life of a young man walking free. (Maybe he does. The House Negro business is good.) Steele is just as guilty of doing what he accuses those on the "civil rights establishment" of doing. The difference is, of course, that Shelby Steele advocates for the status quo and a return to a time in this country (what he calls the "glory days") when questioning the actions of a sheriff's department in a small Southern town was unheard of. For him to write that the "civil-rights establishment" could "intimidate" what he calls "American institutions" just goes to show you how delusional he is.

I suppose that it has never occurred to Mr. Steele that one of the reasons there are so many killings in places like Chicago in the first place is because black life has been so devalued. The scary thing about Steele is that unlike Thomas Sowell and other conservative black thinkers, he has actually made some interesting and provocative points about race relations in the past. "The Content of Our Character" is still one of the best books ever written on race relations in America. But sadly, as he continues to live in his ivory tower and conservative cocoon in Northern California, Shelby Steele has become increasingly detached and isolated from what is going on in the rest of America. Like other right wing republicans, he continues to hold up a few civil rights leaders like Rev Al. Sharpton and Jessie Jackson as being the driving force behind any social movement for justice in this country. This, of course, is no longer the case. The thousands of people who marched this weekend did not do it because they wanted to get a better look at Rev. Al's suit. They did it because they felt moved to get up and march because they know that "American institutions" cannot be easily intimidated.

"Why did the civil-rights leadership use its greatly depleted moral authority to support Trayvon Martin? This young man was, after all, no Rosa Parks—a figure of indisputable human dignity set upon by the rank evil of white supremacy. Trayvon threw the first punch and then continued pummeling the much smaller Zimmerman. Yes, Trayvon was a kid, but he was also something of a menace. The larger tragedy is that his death will come to very little. There was no important principle or coherent protest implied in that first nose-breaking punch. It was just dumb bravado, a tough-guy punch.

The civil-rights leadership rallied to Trayvon's cause (and not to the cause of those hundreds of black kids slain in America's inner cities this very year) to keep alive a certain cultural "truth" that is the sole source of the leadership's dwindling power. Put bluntly, this leadership rather easily tolerates black kids killing other black kids. But it cannot abide a white person (and Mr. Zimmerman, with his Hispanic background, was pushed into a white identity by the media over his objections) getting away with killing a black person without undermining the leadership's very reason for being.

"The purpose of today's civil-rights establishment is not to seek justice, but to seek power for blacks in American life based on the presumption that they are still, in a thousand subtle ways, victimized by white racism. This idea of victimization is an example of what I call a "poetic truth." Like poetic license, it bends the actual truth in order to put forward a larger and more essential truth—one that, of course, serves one's cause.

In the Zimmerman/Martin case the civil-rights establishment is fighting for the poetic truth that white animus toward blacks is still such that a black teenager—Skittles and ice tea in hand—can be shot dead simply for walking home. But actually this establishment is fighting to maintain its authority to wield poetic truth—the authority to tell the larger society how it must think about blacks, how it must respond to them, what it owes them and, then, to brook no argument."

"Poetic truths succeed by casting themselves as perfectly obvious: "America is a racist nation"; "the immigration debate is driven by racism"; "Zimmerman racially stereotyped Trayvon." And we say, "Yes, of course," lest we seem to be racist. Poetic truths work by moral intimidation, not reason." [Source]

Mr. Steele, with all due respect, without "moral intimidation" you would be driving Stanford University students to school and not lecturing them.

Black on black slime.

Wal Mart's pimp, Tavis Smiley, was on national television today ripping the president for ----of all things--his comments on race. There are a lot of things we could get on this president about, and some black folks actually do a credible job of calling him out on things, but his WH presser about the Trayvon Martin verdict was not one of them.

Anyway, I love this post over at "The People's View" by Spandan:

"While Prof. Ogletree correctly called out the smug Smiley for pretending that all responsibility to have a conversation and take action on race falls on the president simply because he's black, for the lack of time, he didn't get to respond to the smug Smiley's demand to list what the president had done. I will. 
Let's start at the beginning - let's start with candidate Obama. Barack Obama's 2008 speech on race and race relations in America is one of the best inspiring speeches that captured America's emotions - in history. His 2008 speech falls in a group of select speeches by presidents in this country: Lincoln's Gettysburg Address, JFK's historic civil rights speech, and President Johnson's address to Congress on voting rights. The contemporary import and significance of Barack Obama's 2008 speech is exceeded perhaps only by Rev. Martin Luther King, Jr's I-have-a-dream speech.

But as much as Tavis Smiley would like for the president to speechify until he's blue in the mouth - much like Smiley himself does without making any real difference - President Obama, despite his impressive oratory, is more of a doer than a talker. So let's have a look at the policies that the president has codified or pushed, and what difference they make in the American promise to equal opportunity and equal justice for all.

Health Care Reform: Obamacare isn't just good health care policy, it is a key policy to bridge the health insurance disparity between whites and people of color. 21% of African Americans and 32% of Hispanics have no health insurance, compared to just 13% of whites. Health reform levels the playing field, institutes community rating and guaranteed issue, and ensures affordable coverage, along with the largest subsidies for health insurance in history. Because people of color bear the disproportionate brunt of lack of health insurance, we also stand to gain the most from health care reform.

Wall Street Reform: The president's Wall Street reform not only set up the country's first independent federal agency dedicated to consumer protection, but also imposed restrictions on banks and financial institutions from fooling and issuing liar loans to unsuspecting minorities and pushing subprime loans. Bankers even admit that they did so. Poor people and minorities are targets of rip-off style financial products, and both overall financial reform as well as the CFPB are a godsend. The CFPB is looking into regulating payday lenders I write. Once again, because people of color are disproportionately the target of financial vultures, the president's reform also disproportionately benefits them.

Pell Grants and Student Loan Reform: We continue to hearken back to economic factors limiting the scope of opportunity for minorities - who are disproportionately dependent on student loans and Pell Grants - but that's normal given that it is the economic hurdle that is the most pernicious in trapping minorities. One of the first bills President Obama signed into law protected students from loan sharks. The president's student loan reform was done in two parts: the first part in the student loan reform bill itself - a bill that made it far easier for students to pay off their debt. In the second part, through the reconciliation bill that completed health reform, he cut the banks out of the process of federal loans, investing the banks' cut in students instead.

The president also doubled the funding for Pell Grants. Why is that important? Because of the greater economic need, Pell Grant recipients of color dramatically increase their college graduation rates. It also eases the debt burden.

Credit Card Reform: Credit card reform outlawed a whole host of loan-sharking practices, including the minimum payment scam (now you have the right to know how much interest you will pay and how long you will pay if you just made the minimum payment), universal default for existing loans, deceptive due date practices, and giving credit cards to students without requiring proof of ability to pay (or a co-signer). Once again, because the abuses fall on those who have the toughest time paying - read disproportionately racial minorities - the benefits of the reform also befall the same people.

These broad policy achievements, of course, come in addition to specific, targeted policy achievements of the president, including the Fair Sentencing Act that reduces the drug sentencing disparities between crack cocaine and powdered cocaine, and yes, the Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Act - both because women of color are the most victimized by pay discrimination and because the Act itself deals with pay discrimination on the basis of any of the categories under the Civil Rights Act of 1964, including race. The president nearly single-handedly restored the American auto industry, and thus American manufacturing - also an economic underpinning of many minority communities.

This is to say nothing of the stimulus package that turned the whole economy around from the worst disaster since the Great Depression - a disaster that also disproportionately affected minorities.

The president has advocated for and tried to advance more policies that would address economic conditions - including his Jobs Act (as Professor Ogletree correctly pointed out) - without success as Republicans in Congress have made it their mission to block this president in any way they can.

But hey, why would you expect someone like Tavis Smiley - who economically is closer to the 1% and entirely focused on increasing his personal wealth through "poverty tours" to sell his book - to even recognize ways to address economic racial disparities as achievements or advancing the frontier on race relations? My mistake.

For those who want to focus on what the president says vs. what he does, there is no shortage of the president's public engagement, either. Not only has he stirred the nation's emotions from the death of an unarmed black teenager at the hands of an armed killer who racially profiled him, the president has lead with depth with the Gates controversy in 2009, after a Harvard professor was arrested for entering his house. Michelle Obama identified with Hadiya Pendleton as a southside girl from Chicago. Nearly every speech the president has given either on the campaign trail or on a college campus, addressing our future, his calls for people of all races and backgrounds to come together have given us hope. The president is, however, the president - and his role is not to lead a race, but to lead a nation.

What the likes of Smiley don't understand when they accuse this president of taking a backseat on conversations of race is that this president has had to suffer through something no other president in history has because of his race: the palpable institutional and media racial bias. He has had to contend with claims from the likes of Glenn Beck that he hates white people, and he has had to put up with claims from the likes of Tavis Smiley that he's not militant enough"...[More]

Finally, as I posted earlier on twitter, to see why I will never be caught dead under the right wing tent (wait, I take that back; you could find me dead under there), please read here.

Have a wonderful Sunday evening, folks. And if you went to church today I hope that you prayed for peace.

 



  

A flawed victim?

As a trial lawyer who wanted george zimmerman to be found culpable for his actions, I was disappointed with the state's performance in the case. There are quite a few things that they did during the trial which left me wondering, and there are things that they allowed the defense to get away with that seemed way too easy.

The way, for instance, the defense portrayed Martin as sinister, minatory, and scary throughout the trial, and the testimony about young black males committing break-ins in the apartment complex where the incident took place.

This all helped to make zimmerman's actions justified because he feared for his life. The post trial statements by juror B-37 proves that it worked.

I am not mad at the defense lawyers; they were doing their job for their client. But I am still upset that the jury didn't find the Mall Cop wannabe guilty of something.

So george zimmerman is free and most black people, like me, are disappointed. Some blacks are angry, and still others are not as angry or even disappointed. Some of you wish that there was a more angelic victim than the young Trayvon Martin for you to rally around. While most will not go as far as the slave catcher, Jesse Lee Peterson (when he called Martin a "pot smoking thug" who deserved what he got), some will say, like an African American friend of mine (a man I respect who owns a business where he hires more than a few young black men), "With all due respect, this young buck ain't Rosa Parks."

No, he is not, but we can't always wait around to pick the perfect victim of injustice. Injustice is blind. Trayvon Martin was still a young man who lost his life because he was profiled by someone who believed that he had no right to be where he was that evening. That is an American tragedy, and just like the tragedy of hundreds of young African American men being killed by other young African American men every year; it is a tragedy that should be acknowledged. I don't care how much pot he smoked, or how much he liked to take pictures on Facebook with a braggadocios posture. His life, and the way he lost it, should not be diminished by these particular actions when he was alive.

Finally, I would like to address this Rich Benjamin controversy a little bit. Mr. Benjamin is a smart dude, and he is someone I respect. (At least I used to.) But some of the things he wrote in his article for Salon Magazine left me scratching my head.

I have to agree with some of my twitter fam who wrote things like the following:

"JamilahLemieux 18h

And I actually understand the colloquial use of "inner nigger." But it has NO PLACE IN THIS ARTICLE. Salon is not 125th Street.

 

blackgirlinmain 18h

@fieldnegro @JamilahLemieux Yes! Things we say in private amongst ourselves are not meant for the larger world, that includes inner niggers."

 

Rich, the next time you are inspired to share your inner most black thoughts, try to think about the platform that you are sharing it from. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The "post racial" president speaks about a racial tragedy.

I am glad that the president finally spoke directly about the george zimmerman (no caps for your name, george) verdict. I know that he did more dancing than Fred Astaire about some of the more serious issues concerning race relations, but we get it, he can't leave out white folks; he is their president, too.

Still, today, I finally felt like he was letting his black side out a little bit and speaking about racism on a more personal level. Some white folks won't like it, but there is nothing they can do about it now. He will be the HNIC for the next three years.

"'Trayvon Martin could have been me 35 years ago,' Obama told White House reporters in a surprise appearance at the daily briefing."

Anyway, If you happen to believe that the police in Sanford, Florida cared about just another another young black man being shot to death, and that the reason they were going to let george zimmerman walk---- without even so much of a trial--- was because of a lack of evidence, consider what is going on down in Baton Rouge, Louisiana.

"A veteran Baton Rouge police detective who used a racial slur to describe a homicide victim was suspended from duty recently after an internal affairs investigation determined he violated department policy.

The detective, John L. Colter, [*pic] complained at the scene of a fatal shooting in January that, “It’s my wife’s birthday and I am standing here over a dead nigger,” according to records released Tuesday by the Baton Rouge Police Department.

Colter, who is white, made the remarks among a group of officers that included a black detective.

Provisional Police Chief Carl Dabadie, in May, suspended Colter without pay for 20 days as a result of the incident and ordered that he attend a diversity training course.

*“Your actions could have potentially devastating consequences for this department in our bid to win the hearts and minds of those we have solemnly sworn to protect and serve,” Dabadie wrote in Colter’s letter of suspension.

He added, “This type of unacceptable behavior relegates anyone from the ranks of quintessential professional to that of an insensitive, arrogant and callous egotist that has neither empathy nor feeling towards others.”

Dabadie declined through a spokesman to discuss the case after the records were released Tuesday in response to a Public Records Act request because Colter remained hospitalized with serious injuries sustained in a motorcycle crash last week in Livingston Parish.

The spokesman, Cpl. L’Jean McKneely, said Colter sustained “significant brain injury” but is expected to survive.

Colter’s use of a racial slur came to light in February during former Police Chief Dewayne White’s pre-termination hearing. Without naming Colter, White said he had sought unsuccessfully to transfer the detective shortly after the incident, claiming the case highlighted Mayor-President Kip Holden’s tendency to micromanage him.

“Not only were the officer’s comments and conduct deplorable,” White said during the packed hearing in the Metro Council chambers, “but they could potentially cause to be called into question all of his prior investigations involving African-American victims....”


The spokesman, Cpl. L’Jean McKneely, said Colter sustained “significant brain injury” but is expected to survive.

The incident that led to Colter’s suspension occurred on the morning of Jan. 5, when Colter was called out to investigate the killing of 43-year-old Keith Matthews, a West Feliciana Parish man found fatally shot in a vehicle parked in front of a vacant home on Erie Street.

Officers at the scene recalled Colter taking out his smartphone at some point and appearing to photograph the corpse, suggesting he should send a picture to his wife to account for his middle-of-the-night absence on her birthday.
Colter denied snapping any photographs, telling internal affairs officers later that he had been using the flashlight application on his cellphone to see inside the vehicle where the victim was seated.

But Colter readily admitted using the racial slur, adding he quickly apologized to his fellow officers, who had been huddling in strategy over how to approach the “whodunit, head-scratcher” of a slaying.
Colter told internal affairs officers that the racial epithet was a “slip of the tongue” and that he shouldn’t have said it.

“I meant to say dead Negro,” he explained.

In his interview with internal affairs, Colter apologized if his remarks “came off as racist,” but noted he and other homicide detectives often make “very dark, inappropriate jokes” in coping with the gory scenes they encounter in their work.

“We were kind of making fun of the fact that the guy got shot with his pants down around his ankles basically,” Colter told investigators. “There had been other jokes about that prior to my comment.”

Police have said they believe Matthews was in the company of a prostitute at the time of his death.

Police records revealed conflicting accounts of the immediate reaction to Colter’s use of the racial slur. Dabadie, in the letter of suspension, mentioned that a lieutenant who overheard the remarks admonished Colter and told him he “did not want to hear that again.”

But another detective — whose name, like other police officials other than Colter, was blacked out of the records that were released — told investigators the officers “kind of brushed it off” after Colter apologized “and that was the end of it.”

Colter told officials that he prided himself on professionalism and said that his use of the racial epithet marked “the first time it has come out of my mouth in relation to my police duties” of 25 years.

“Truth be told, I probably shouldn’t have been making that comment to begin with,” he said. “We had been out there for about two hours and it was a bad scene.” [Source]

This story is sad, but what made it even sadder were the actions of the black house Negro detective who was on the scene. We would expect this type of behavior from Mr. Colter, not his fellow officer who happens to be black, himself. This was a sick display of ignorance: An officer sworn to protect and serve calling a dead victim a "Nigger". Even for a white police officer in the deep South, his actions went beyond the pale.

"..African-Americans feel the context of the Martin killing is little known or denied, "and that all contributes, I think, to a sense that if a white male teen was involved in the same kind of scenario that, from top to bottom, both the outcome and the aftermath might have been different..."

Mr. President, that "white male teen" would not have been called a "white ass cracka" by the detective investigating his death. I think we can all agree with that statement.

Some thoughts in the heat.

This heat wave is still all over us here on the East Coast. But I am cooling my heels in front of my computer and thinking about some things:

Like this O'Mara fellow. He says that he fears for his life, but...

"On Wednesday, George Zimmerman legal team leaders Mark O’Mara (pictured left) and Don West (pictured middle) were videotaped at Nello, one of New York City’s most-expensive restaurants, looking quite jubilant, even though O’Mara was interviewed just days before saying both he and his family were afraid for their lives.

 Nello is an organic Italian restaurant with pasta dishes that top off at $275 a plate. Its patrons reportedly include rapper and businessman Jay-Z and baseball player Alex Rodriguez. And apparently, its newest patrons also include O’Mara and West, with O’Mara telling TMZ casually, “It [the food] was good. It was great. This [restaurant] is one of the best. I am coming back.”
And of course, when O’Mara was asked about the outcome of the Zimmerman case, he responded, “He [George Zimmerman] was innocent from Day 1. I’m just glad the jury saw that.” [Source]

I am thinking that the "Drop Squad" folks must have been working overtime for the past few days. They can thank people like Charles Barkley and Larry Elder for that.

As the saying goes, "All my skin folk ain't  my kin folk".

I am thinking about poor Terry Ragland who was diagnosed by her doctor as having a "ghetto booty".

Not funny, doc. As someone commented on another site, would he tell a white man that he has a small Midwestern penis? Of course not! And he would be just as ignorant if he did. You are a doctor, not a comedian. Treat your patient with some dignity and respect. [Source]

I am thinking that something is seriously wrong with the American justice system if Marissa Alexander can be serving a 20 year sentence for standing her ground in Florida--- by shooting a gun in the air to protect herself from her "abusive husband"--- and George Zimmerman can walk free.

Finally, I am thinking that if the republican candidate has his way, Virginia will no longer be for lovers:

"The conservative Republican candidate for Virginia governor has begun advertising his efforts to reinstate an archaic and unconstitutional state law that make consensual oral or anal sex acts illegal.

Ken Cuccinelli, locked in a tight race for Virginia's top office, launched a new campaign website Wednesday that showcases his attempts to bring back the state's "Crimes Against Nature" law, which was struck down by federal courts earlier this year.

The law makes consensual oral or anal sex acts felonies, even for married couples who commit the acts in the privacy of their own homes." [Source]

Oh lawd! Mrs. Cuccinelli, my heart goes out to you.

Stay cool, people.

This is not how we start an honest conversation about race.

I know that AG Holder wants us to have an honest conversation about race in this country, but someone should explain to our white friends that certain words are a non- starter.

"An unidentified White man was rushed to the hospital Friday with a massive head injury after allegedly calling a Black man a racial slur at a Manhattan restaurant, the New York Daily News reports.

The altercation took place at Benny’s Burritos in the West Village neighborhood around 5:30 p.m. when a White man approached a Black patron in the outdoor seating area. Douglas Reddish, 25, was eating with his girlfriend when the man, who was reportedly drunk, stumbled to his table, according to the New York Post.

Reddish reportedly tried to help the man regain his balance before he allegedly said, “This ni*ger wants to fight me!” Reddish did not take the insult well, knocking the man out cold with a blow to the face. The man fell backwards onto the concrete.

“He was out cold. I thought he was dead,” said Benny’s worker Robert Garcia.
Reddish tried to attack the man again, but restaurant employees restrained him. Once Reddish realized the man was seriously injured, cops say he fled the scene; he was eventually tracked down, arrested and charged with assault.
A woman who spoke with the man before he was KO’d says he was upset over his wife leaving him and losing his job at Goldman Sachs.

Witnesses heard the man say, “You n—–s are why I lost my job.”
“I couldn’t believe it,” one witness said. “He mentioned the N-word, this guy hits him one time and he hits his head on the curb.”

The man was taken to Beth Israel Hospital. His status is not known at this time.

See what you started, Rush? I hope you at least offer to pay that poor man's hospital bill.

Rush drops the N word and a juror seaks out.

So this Rush Limbaugh dude thinks that he can say "Nigg-a" now because of what he heard one young lady say in a television interview?

Well Rush, I am not sure how many black friends you have, but if you do have some, may I suggest that you leave that word (regardless of how it's pronounced or how you spell it) out of your vocabulary. Although, to be honest, if they are your friends; maybe they don't mind being called a "Nigga" by you. (I see you, Jason.)

"So, ‘nigga’ with an ‘a’ on the end,” Limbaugh said, “I think can [say it] now, isn’t that the point? Because it’s not racist.” He explained that by Jeantel’s logic, he “could be talking about a male–a Chinese male, guy at the laundromat. I could be talking about a man, that’s what she said it means.”

Still, you have to give it to Rush; at least he has the guts to say out loud what other conservatives are thinking and want to say.

Finally, listening to this Juror B-37 just confirms that Trayvon Martin had no shot at justice with these six women from the start. She kept referring to George Zimmerman as "George" in the Anderson Cooper, interview, and she referred to Trayvon as a "boy".-- At least that's what I heard her say-- And she apparently referred to Trayvon as a "boy of color" during the voir dire process as well. Nice.

I guess she just couldn't stand to let poor "George" go to jail after he was violently confronted by that angry boy teenager that night.

I can't wait to hear what the other jurors have to say.