Now, this is helpful

Open Secrets displays the donor records for the people behind the ant-Kerry Swift Boat Veterans for Truth ad, along with those of other major players in this year's election. The website also has data on the financing of the Congressional race in Tennessee's eighth district, where eugenicist James Hart emerged as last week as the Republican standard-bearer against incumbent John Tanner.

Misreading Unity '04

There's a steady stream of articles in the mainstream press, dutifully blogged by Jim Romenesko and others, alleging that attendees at the Unity '04 convention for journalists of color were unprofessional and partisan in their responses to speeches by Pres. Bush and Sen. Kerry. There's also a steady stream of responses from journalists of color who were there that argue that the reporting on the event was incomplete.

This criticism by Seattle Times blogger J. Patrick Coolican, among many views cited by Jay Rosen at Pressthink is representative:

Just off the phone with Seattle Times reporter Florangela Davila, who's at the Unity convention in Washington D.C.
Unity is a conference of 7,000 journalists of color.

She reports that more than half the journalists gave Sen. John Kerry, who spoke to at least 2,000, a standing ovation. If you ever see us at campaign events or reporting on someone making a speech, you'll note we don't applaud or heckle, because it's unprofessional. Giving a presidential candidate a standing ovation during the height of the campaign is as unprofessional as it gets.

"It was so offensive and awful, and I hated it. It was clearly inappropriate. It was ridiculous," an exasperated Flor said.

Perhaps the most valuable perspective on the controversy comes from Roland Martin a noted columnist and editor whose question to Pres. Bush about legacy admissions generated what was arguably the most interesting news of the event. Martin posted this response to Poynter.org and to the TV.com Watercooler message boards and he has given me permission to post it here. I added a few links, but otherwise the text is unchanged.

I'm Roland S. Martin, syndicated columnist and editorial consultant for the Chicago Defender, and one of the panelists who questioned President Bush on Friday.

First, I'm pleased that as journalists we are raising the issue as it relates to the reaction from journalists.

But I think there are some critical points that are being overlooked.

First, the room was not full of journalists. As Maria Hinojosa pointed out in a story on CNN, there were advertising executives, P.R. company owners, advocacy groups (non-media groups had booths at the convention) partisan media organizations(sites like BlackCommentator.com, TheNorthStarNetwork.com, etc.), and sponsors. I believe that Freddie Mac was the sponsor and I saw its CEO clapping on several occasions.

But there were journalists who were either applauding or laughing. Yet it's important to point out that Bush also tried to use humor during his speech (Go to www.whitehouse.gov to see the official transcript). Had folks not laughed, I'm sure the story would have been that journalists didn't laugh at Bush's jokes.

What is also interesting is that when Bush and others speak at the White House Correspondents dinner, it is a laugh fest. Are we to question their integrity by participating in this event? Yes, the Bush speech wasn't a fun and games event, but there are events where someone could say a line was crossed.

Second, I've attended ASNE, RTNDA and NAB conventions, and have seen presidents and other newsmakers speak, and I've seen those organizations clap, applaud, and laugh. Most of these folks are non-minorities. As Heidi Phillips asked me on Friday night on CNN, "Two wrongs don't make a right," I agreed, but we should not leave the impression that what took place was somehow an isolated event.

Third, this was not a news conference. Everyone in that room was not there to write a story. Are all of you suggesting that if you are a member of an organization, and there is a newsmaker speaking, that you are not going to respond - clap, laugh or standup - when you agree with something in their speech? Yes, this is different because the organization in question is media-based, but the reality is a lot of people were operating and acting naturally to a speaker and not as if they were "on the clock" as a reporter. It's a fine distinction and one that needs to be made.

I personally would not have responded to some of the situations as others did. Would I have laughed at Bush's confused statement on sovereignty? Dunna know. But I can tell you I had a hard time holding it on on the stage! Would I have laughed at some of Bush's laugh lines? Yea. Why? Because they were funny.

Lastly, I'm surprised that no one has asked about the rope line. Since this was a speech by the president, should a rope line have been set up for pictures, autographs, etc?

If we are going to comment on this issue, fine. But put it in the right perspective with the other journalism organizations and how they respond. Maybe the difference is that the Bush and Kerry speeches were broadcast and not those at other media conferences.

One more point: since Time Warner is a media giant and an institution that we cover, are we not to react to things said by CEO Dick Parsons? Or is this the journalistic double standard: we don't react to those who are not our own, but do respond to those who are in our club?

Roland S. Martin
www.rolandsmartin.com
syndicated columinst, Creators Syndicate, www.creators.com
Editorial consultant, Chicago Defender

De Frantz: Support for Women Growing at Olympics

From an interview with Anita De Frantz, Olympic medalist and member of the International Olympic Committee, with Ms. Magazine

Ms.: There’s obviously been a much greater acceptance of women’s sports in the past couple of decades.

DeFrantz:I know a lot about discrimination, being an African American woman, so I have an awful lot of trouble with the word “acceptance.” The difference is the support and the opportunity. Once you see women competing at the highest levels, doing things you can barely imagine doing, you do support it. Interestingly enough, studies now show that while daily media coverage of women in sports is still dismal — 95 to 1 is the ratio of coverage of men to women on televised media, and it’s 20 to 1 in print media — at least in the Olympic Games, where we pursue excellence and mutual respect, the coverage has become far more even, qualitatively and quantitatively.

Keyes Is In, But Past Mistakes Add to Disadvantages

As expected, Alan Keyes declared himself a candidate for the U.S. Senate today, running against Barack Obama. Admitting that he knows little of Illinois or its issues, Keyes predicted that voters will be attracted to his strong conservative stands on such issues as abortion, gay rights and tax policy. Obama called the Republicans' selection of a black candidate, "a hopeful sign for the country."

However, Keyes' campaign faces not only political challenges, but financial hurdles as well, according to Yahoo! News:

Keyes still owes $524,169 from his two presidential bids, according to federal elections records. He also owes $7,481 in unpaid state income taxes in his home state of Maryland, according to court records.

The state filed a lien against Keyes in December 2001 for those unpaid taxes. Bill Pascoe, a Keyes adviser, said the tax bill was erroneous and Keyes only owed $152, which he paid on Friday.

Here are links to the Federal Election Commission's summary information on Keyes and other candidates' funds, disbursements and debts from the 1996 and 2000 Presidential campaigns.

Police: Xbox Theft Spurred Fla. Slayings

This story from ABC News is the kind of thing that leads my mother to say we're in the Biblical Last Days:

DAYTONA BEACH, Fla. Aug. 8, 2004 — An ex-convict who blamed a young woman for taking his video game system and clothes recruited three teenagers to stab and beat her and five others to death, investigators said Sunday.
The 22-year-old woman was singled out for an attack so vicious that even dental records were useless in trying to identify her. Some of the victims were attacked in their sleep, according to authorities....

Who is Jerome Corsi and Why is Anyone Listening to the Nasty Things He Says?

From Media Matters for America:

While much has been written about the identity and history of John E. O'Neill -- one of the authors of the forthcoming Regnery book Unfit for Command: Swift Boat Veterans Speak Out Against John Kerry (whose links in the GOP go back to his days as "protégé of Nixon-era dirty trickster Charles Colson") -- little has been said about his co-author, Jerome R. Corsi, PhD.

• Corsi on Islam: "a worthless, dangerous Satanic religion"

• Corsi on Catholicism: "Boy buggering in both Islam and Catholicism is okay with the Pope as long as it isn't reported by the liberal press"

• Corsi on Muslims: "RAGHEADS are Boy-Bumpers as clearly as they are Women-Haters -- it all goes together..."

XXBlog Asks: What Liberal Media?

In case you hadn’t noticed, between our daily doses of presidential attack ads and half-assed punditry, [former Clinton Administration National Security Advisor] Sandy Berger was exonerated. The media hasn’t noticed yet.

Read the full post.

Something neat for people following the same-sex marriage debate

Trey of Daddy, Poppa and Me has created a nice interactive map that tracks the status of laws, constitutional amendments and court rulings related to same-sex partnerships. It's a handy resource for anyone interested in the issue, regardless of one's convictions on the matter.

Eugenics May Be Discredited -- But It's Never Gone Away

Folks say they're shocked -- shocked! that James L. Hart, an "unabashed racist," has won a Republican primary in Tennesseee, according to news reports. Hart, 60, believes in eugenics, the pseudoscience of encouraging the breeding by members of "superior" population groups and discouraging breeding by members of "inferior" groups.

Hart handily defeated a write-in candidate and will run against incumbent Blue Dog Democrat John Tanner in November to represent the 8th district, in the northwest corner of the state. Tanner has been in Congress 15 years, and counts House Ways and Means Committee among his key assignments and affiliations. Neither Tanner nor the Tennessee Republican Party seemed to have anything to say about the new contender.

Eugenicists held considerable sway in the public policy discussions in the early 20th century, legitimizing tens of thousands of forced sterilizations and providing intellectual cover a host of draconian measures, including anti-miscegenation laws. Adolf Hitler admired American eugenics policies so much that he incorporated them into his own mass-murder machine, the Third Reich, with a ferocity that caused most American proponents to abandon the movement. However, eugenics advocates have never completely faded from public discourse, and some of its supporters have achieved considerable prominence and influence.

Charles Murray, for example, a senior fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, prominent author, and leading conservative thinker, aligns himself with advocates of "humanitarian eugenics." He substantially influenced the drafting of the 1996 welfare reform law.

Murray's work has received support from the infamous Pioneer Fund.According to Barry Mehler at the Institute for the Study of Academic Racism,

"The Pioneer Fund has been the key source of funding for the last 20 years of scientists who have produced the material that is the foundation for the claims that African American people on average are intellectually inferior to whites."

In addition to Murray, ISAR has documented the work and connections of a number of other individuals and organizations dedicated to a return to racist scientific practices.

Remembering Rick James: 1948-2004

Given the life of genius and excess that he led, perhaps the most astonishing aspect of the death of funkmaster Rick James is that he passed away quietly in his sleep, apparently of natural causes, at the age of 56. James had been at work on a new album and had been collaborating with popular contemporary artists such as Kanye West. He left behind three children and two grandchildren. A message board has been set up on his official site for those who want to share memories or condolences. The family for donations to the American Cancer Society in lieu of flowers.

There is a tendency to look for lessons in untimely passings, and a quick sampling of the stories currently online emphasize James' talent and moralize on its dissipation to varying degrees.

However, this writer came of (clubbing) age with "Give it to Me" and "Fire and Desire," so this moment prompts more visceral and personal reflection. James's moment in the musical spotlight came during the dying days of disco, at the dawn of the Reagan era, and there was much about his cartoonish persona that fit that "greed-is-good" ethos: the emphasis on individual gratification, the valorization of materialism, the machismo. It was the decade, as filmmaker Demetria Royals once remarked, that the Isley Brothers went from singing "Fight the Power" to "Betwen the Sheets." At the bridge of his signature song, "Superfreak," James orders, "Temptations, sing!" signalling the end of the era that had given us that group's most socially conscious music (think "Runaway Child," "Message from a Black Man," "Glass House").

It's clear that Rick James didn't mean to be a role model, but he was. More than James' unfortunate personal antics and escapades, the hedonism his work promoted may be his most troubling legacy -- one that lives on in the silly wanne-be pimps strutting around on BET and MTV. In this he was not alone -- he was more a reflection of his times than its Pied Piper, but we are still living with their community-destroying consequences.

Don't get me wrong, I shook my booty like everybody else did then, and I'll still sing along with the Mary Jane Girls in a New York minute. He brought Teena Marie to the world and "Square Biz" was my jam in grad school. I still think he was a master at getting the full emotional range out of her sharp, soaring voice. (You can listen to her latest hit, "Still in Love," by following the "Media" link on her site.) But James' death reminds me that too many of my generation were partying when we should have been building on the foundation laid by our Civil Rights-generation parents -- and too many of our children are still reaping our whirlwind.

UPDATE: Move The Crowd has an excellent radioblog tribute to Bro. James.

Property Tax Race Discrimination Probe Planned for New Jersey

The New Jersey office of the American Civil Liberties Union and the New Jersey Institute for Social Justice announced plans to investigate a pattern of disproportionately high property tax rates in communities with high percentages of black homeowners, according to a July 27 story in the Newark Star-Ledger. The probes are being launched in the wake of July 25 Star-Ledger story reporting that, "thousands of homeowners in diverse neighborhoods in Essex, Middlesex and Union counties are paying municipal property taxes at a higher rate than neighbors in predominantly white neighborhoods."

Thanks to Rosemarie for finding the Star-Ledger article for me.

ACLU Offers Free Legal Aid to Arabs and Muslims to Combat Racial Profiling

Press release from the ACLU website:

NEW YORK (Aug. 5) - The American Civil Liberties Union announced today that it is working with attorneys around the country to offer free legal representation to anyone who is approached by the FBI during its latest round of "dragnet" interviews of Arabs and Muslims.

"This dragnet technique used by the FBI is simply racial profiling and violates our most cherished fundamental freedoms," said Dalia Hashad, the ACLU’s Arab, Muslim and South Asian Advocate. "Casting blanket suspicion on an entire religious and ethnic community is not a productive means of protecting national security or civil liberties."

The ACLU mobilization came in response to a recent announcement by Attorney General John Ashcroft and FBI Director Robert Mueller that the FBI would launch a new round of dragnet-like interviews in Arab and Muslim communities nationwide. This latest effort appears to be a resurrection of a similar program attempted in 2001 and 2002, in which the FBI questioned more than 8,000 Muslim and Arab men. The questioning did not yield a single arrest of a suspected terrorist.

"These types of FBI tactics are counterproductive. They produce fear and resentment, not results," Hashad said. "Treating innocent people like criminals is certain to drive a wedge between law enforcement and the communities that agencies should be reaching out to."

According to reports from ACLU attorneys who have accompanied members of the community to such interviews, the line of questioning includes inquiries about religious practices and family members, and agents can become coercive. In at least one instance, agents threatened to interfere with the marriage plans of a Muslim man if he did not agree to become an informant on his friends and neighbors. In his interview, FBI agents suggested that if he did not cooperate he could experience "a lot of difficulty" with his plans to marry.

Another example of the way in which the government continues to treat Arabs and Muslims as suspects came to light last week, when news reports revealed that the U.S. Census Bureau, at the request of the Department of Homeland Security, provided detailed statistical data about the distribution of Arab-Americans in the United States. DHS officials clamed that they needed this data for "identifying which language of signage, based upon U.S. ethnic population, would be best to post at the major international airports."

In a letter sent today to Charles Kincannon, the Director of the Census Bureau, the ACLU condemned the release of the data, noting that although it was not barred by law, the decision to release the information "violates the spirit of trust held by millions of Americans that the information they furnish on the Census will not be used against them by law enforcement agencies." The letter is online at http://www.aclu.org/SafeandFree/interviews/census_letter.pdf.

The ACLU has urged Congress to curb racial profiling through adoption of End Racial Profiling Act (ERPA), federal legislation that defines racial profiling, makes it illegal and would require data collection on all law enforcement encounters. This legislation is critical in preventing abuse of Muslims in particular, the ACLU said, because the Department of Justice’s guidelines on the use of racial profiling in law enforcement allows an exception for such questioning for "national security" reasons.

"Congress can't keep sitting on its hands with a racial profiling ban," said ACLU Legislative Counsel LaShawn Y. Warren. "It's not just a question of violating the Constitution, it's a question of what kind of law enforcement works best. If the government is questioning Arab-Americans just because they are Arab-Americans, that increases the chances that law enforcement officers are going to miss the real threats."

The ACLU has also updated its "Know Your Rights" pamphlets, which are now available in Hindi, Arabic, Urdu, Punjabi, Farsi, Somali, English and Spanish. The English-language version is online at http://www.aclu.org/kyr/kyr_english.pdf. Others will be available soon.

UPDATE: Keyes Will Run

The International Herald Tribune is reporting, via the Associated Press, that talk-show host and former diplomat Alan Keyes will accept the Illinois Republican Party's invitation to run for the US Senate against Democratic hopeful Barack Obama. Keyes is expected to make the formal announcement Sunday at a GOP-sponsored rally in Arlington Heights.

Meanwhile, Afro-netizen's Chris Rabb, who is from Illinois, has some pointed comments about the Republicans' strategy. A sample:

It's been . . . hours since the GOP has been so patently offensive to Blackfolk in its dim-witted selection strategy to oppose Democratic shoe-in Obama. Given the high probability of a Democratic victory in this Senate race, GOP state party leaders have decided to cynically embrace African-American dark horse candidates whose reputations and upward mobility they have little interest in genuinely promoting.

UNITY Conference Highlights: Pres. Bush, Sen. Kerry

This weekend, about 7000 journalists of color have converged upon Washington, DC for the quintennial Unity Journalists of Color Convention. The Unity Journalists are a coalition of journalists including the National Association of Black Journalists, the National Association of Hispanic Journalists, the Asian American Journalists Association and the Native American Journalists Association. (Although I'm involved in NABJ, I couldn't go to DC two weeks in a row.

Among the highlights so far:

• In remarks that columnist Richard Prince said some listeners found "disconnected," Pres. Bush defended his policies, declared his support for media diversity and the protection of voting rights, and surprised some listeners by criticizing legacy admissions at colleges and universities -- a policy which eased his own admission to Yale University back in the 1960s.
  
  "I'm for diversity, not quotas," Bush said several times. My only question was, why did Bush keep repeating his opposition to the use of quotas to achieve racial balance when they've been illegal since the 1978 Supreme Court decision in Bakke? It's hard to think of an explanation that doesn't involve an accusation of using racial code words.


• 
  On Thursday, Sen. John Kerry presented his alternative vision for the United States. Responding to a question from a panel representing the constituent organizations, Kerry said he agrees with some of the recent criticisms by comedian Bill Cosby, but added, “I think all of us are responsible, I know exactly where Bill is coming from.”
  

For more convention highlights and continuing coverage, visit C-SPAN and the @unity website. Also, the Poyner Institute is blogging UNITY.

In Today's Revealer

You can read my piece, Black Christians, the Homosexuality Debate and the American Creed. It's part of a summer-long series, The 'R' Word" Campaign Coverage Forum. I'm interested in your thoughts.

The Illinois GOP's Hail Mary Pass to Alan Keyes

The latest story on the Illinois Senate race is curiouser and curiouser. According to the Chicago Sun-Times, Illinois Republicans have asked former Ambassador and failed presidential candidate Alan Keyes to run against Democratic front-runner Barack Obama for the Senate this fall.


Obama has been running unopposed since former Republican nominee Jack Ryan was forced out of the race by a sex scandal . As a story on his website notes, Obama's campaign has not only generated excitement among Democrats, it has attracted interest from a number of rank-and-file Republicans. It's likely that state GOP leaders hope Keyes can at least hold the party together, if not win the election.

Keyes, a talk show host who lives in Maryland, has reportedly said he would give his answer by Sunday. A statement on Keyes' website makes him sound like a candidate:

Conservatives in Illinois, and nationwide, are very pleased that the Illinois Republican Central Committee has offered Alan Keyes the GOP nomination for US Senate.

Although wholly unsolicited and unlooked for by Ambassador Keyes, his candidacy would be without question a boon to Illinois, and America. Those of us who admire Alan Keyes and his defense of conservative principle believe this is a great opportunity to best represent the good people of Illinois -- and to best empower the Illinois Republican Party for victory.

It is an extraordinary situation which confronts the Illinois GOP, and a Keyes candidacy would provide a champion who could meet the challenge

If Keyes accepts, the Illinois GOP will defend his decision by arguing this is no worse than what their native daughter, Hilary Clinton, did when she moved to New York to run for the Senate there. However, in past runs, Keyes has failed to demonstrate serious political currency, even among Republicans. so it will be interesting to see what unfolds. At the very least, an Obama-Keyes contest make history -- not only will it be the first Senate election in which both major parties are of African descent; both men are graduates of Ivy League universities.

Democrats: "The Party of Ideological Whiplash

Rick Perlstein finds the professed populism of some of the speeches at last week's Democratic National Convention just a tad disingenuous:

...A visionary party of opposition—you might even say a competent party of opposition—would place fixing inequality and stagnating incomes at the center of its political appeal. For all the talk of swing voters, of NASCAR dads and soccer moms, this is the way to beat George Bush—and to recover the Democrats' former status as the ruling party in American politics. Instead, the party invites within its folds securities lobbyists who want to repeal the corporate tax. How do the decisions get made that produce this state of affairs? How, in this party of the people, do the corporations become the mainstream and the liberals become the insurgents?...

If They Come for the Arabs and Muslims in the Morning, Who Will They Come For At Night?

An article by Chisun Lee in thhe Village Voice says that post-9-11 hysteria is leading us to ignore rampant racial profiling of Arabs and Muslims:

Trawling for terrorists and pulling over motorists in search of drugs are in fact the same thing. While it may be acceptable to target people based on a racial or ethnic description if—and only if—there is some specific indication that those particular people are actually criminals, broad sweeps based on general traits are never OK. Not only are they unlikely to yield "hits" and certain to humiliate innocent parties, but such dragnets also violate this nation's fundamental principle that people will be treated as individuals and not according to stereotypes.

"You either have racial profiling, or you don't have racial profiling. You can't have it both ways," says LaShawn Warren, a leader in pushing for passage of the End Racial Profiling Act of 2004, currently a bill with support from 124 members of the House and 16 of the Senate. As a national legislative counsel for the American Civil Liberties Union, she has been struggling to show Congress members that FBI questioning and immigration roundups of people who appear to be Arab or Muslim—whatever that looks like—are "no different than the old kind of racial profiling that we said was wrong."

There is little wonder that some people refuse to believe her. The Bush administration has led the way. In his long-promised racial profiling ban, announced with great fanfare in June 2003, Bush told federal law-enforcement agencies that "racial profiling is wrong and will not be tolerated" and that "stereotyping certain races as having a greater propensity to commit crimes is absolutely prohibited." (The directive, which is not a law, lacks any enforcement mechanism, so the prohibition is absolute only in theory.) But he created a crippling exception: "The above standards do not affect current federal policy with respect to law enforcement activities and other efforts to defend and safeguard against threats to national security."

In effect, that "national security" loophole has become the exception that would erase the rule. Like a political ray gun, it neutralizes any critic who would cry racism or xenophobia when it comes to 9-11–related profiling. ...

Finally, the Democrats are Ready to Rumble

From Lester Kenyatta Spence's latest Africana.com column:

For the longest time the Republican Party has been able to effectively divide two groups, the rural and urban poor, that have a lot in common by a combination of race-baiting, cultural conservatism, and knee-jerk patriotism. Think about Willie Horton and the 1988 Presidential Campaign. George Bush was actually behind in the polls to Michael Dukakis until Lee Atwater launched an ad that will go down in infamy. While representatives of various civil rights organizations (as well as Reverend Jesse Jackson) spoke out forcefully against the ad, Dukakis remained silent. By not countering with a trenchant critique of racism (Atwater later acknowledged that the ad was in fact racist, even though he and other GOP members denied the charge in 1988) the Democrats ceded valuable ground to the Republicans. Think about how a Constitutional Amendment against flag-burning was the pre-eminent issue in 1988, made far more important than the Iran-Contra scandal which revealed corruption and deceit in the highest levels of the White House. While perhaps it is not totally accurate to say that the Democratic Party laid down while the GOP used tactics to divide and obscure, it may not be far off the mark to say that the Democrats reclined. It is definitely not far off to say that the DNC was punk'd.

From what I heard last week, it seems that the Democratic Party is finally interested in getting up. They are finally interested in articulating a clear and distinct vision with some vigor, and some passion. They are finally interested in fighting for a set of issues that bring urban, suburban, and rural people together. They are finally interested in calling GOP baiting tactics for what they are. And they are tying the fight to a progressive vision of what America is supposed to be. Whether it was Reverend Sharpton (as an aside, I don’t like Sharpton’s politics much, but whoever made the decision to only give Sharpton six minutes of air time should be fired) quoting the late great (and Republican) Ray Charles, talking about the purple mountains that Charles could never see, or Obama talking about the myth of Blue and Red states, or Bill Clinton rattling off the names of various working class folks of various races who got the shaft as a result of the Bush tax cuts, it is hard for me to imagine that just four years ago the DNC actually had a game plan that relied on erasing differences between Gore and Bush.

Once Again, Roy Veal's Death Ruled a Suicide: Investigators Call for End to Talk of Lynching

Federal, state and local investigators, as well as a grand jury, have confirmed that the April 21 death of Roy Malcolm Veal was probably a suicide, according to a story in today's Natchez-Democrat. According to another story, civil rights groups such as the Southern Poverty Law Center and the Mississippi chapter of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference also endorse the investigators' judgment that the evidence found at the site where Veal was discovered on April 23, along with other evidence, suggests that Veal killed himself because he was depressed.

According to a statement on the Internet from Wilkinson County Sheriff Reginald Jackson, who is, himself, African American:

...Wilkinson County and the State of Mississippi have struggled hundreds of years with race relations. We have endured many lynchings, beatings, and much discrimination. Although things are not what they should be, we are indeed better than we use to be…The citizens of Wilkinson County are very relieved that the years of an ugly past, did not come back to haunt us again. Most blacks and whites here share different views and ideas but we all have one common denominator, which is making Wilkinson County a better place to live.

The Veal family loss did not go without merit because many citizens here were very concerned about his death. They were assured in knowing that I had contacted the Federal Bureau of Investigations (FBI); the Mississippi Highway Patrol Investigations Department; and the State of Mississippi Crime Lab Forensic Team to assist my department. The Veal family found comfort in knowing that the scene where Mr. Veal’s body had been found was safely secured until all the experts had arrived. All evidence was carefully gathered and handled with the utmost care. As the first black Sheriff of Wilkinson County, I am deeply appalled that some of you would think that my department and I are covering up evidence that suggests Mr. Veal’s death was a lynching. My struggles here have been many, that is why Mr. Veal’s death was handled on both a professional and personal basis.

No matter how much is said nor how much is done; some of you will never accept the fact that this was anything other than a lynching. It appeases me to know that the majority of you have confidence in my leadership to know that I will continue to go that “extra mile” to make sure that no laws were broken. I ask that the medium respect the fact that no lynching occurred in Wilkinson County, Mississippi on April 23, 2004. It is not fair that the Veal family, the citizens of Wilkinson County and the great State of Mississippi will have to once again endure the negative attacks that are placed upon us by media outlets looking for a story. Lastly, I appreciate the outpouring support that I have received from everyone far and near.

Gotta Mention -- if you're on the Vineyard

My buddy Miche Braden is musical director and a featured performer for "Mahalia: A Gospel Musical" at the The Vineyard Playhouse. The show runs until August 14.

Now this is worth paying attention to

Everybody's fascinated with Barack Obama right now, and there's no denying that there is a lot of cause for fascination. But of all the huzzahs I've read in the wake of the likely Illinois Senator-elect's speech at the Democratic National Convention (which you can hear here), none has struck me as more perspicacious than this commentary from Michael Paul Williams. (I had to look the word up to make sure it was what I meant -- I hadn't read or heard that word in a while.)

Anyway, Williams suggested that Obama might do well to remember the experience of Julian Bond another civil rights activist turned state legislator who whose star shone so brightly after the 1968 Democratic convention that many of us were sure we had seen the First Black President. His career since then has been distinguished, but not epoch-making. While noting important differences between the two men and their times, Williams cautionary note can serve to keep us all grounded:

It's certainly tempting to hop on the Obama bandwagon. He's fresh, politically dexterous and charismatic.

But in politics, past is often prologue. Before writing the next draft of history, it's always a good idea to leaf back a few chapters

via NegroPhile

More on Voting Rights and Their Denial

Hungry Blues continues to do an excellent job of documenting the racial implications of the discarding and despoiling of ballots in the 2000 election. Meanwhile, Contrapositive reports on research finding that while black voters were disproportionately purged from Florida's rolls, Hispanics were under-represented among the ranks of purged potential voters. While not going so far as to say that the the discrepancy was deliberate, the author notes that Florida's Hispanics tend to vote solidly Republican.

And the reason for prohibiting international observers is what, exactly?

From the Institute for Public Accuracy:

The St. Petersburg Times reported July 29 that the Republican Party of Florida has urged its supporters to use absentee ballots because "new electronic voting machines do not have a paper ballot to verify your vote." The glossy GOP mailing read: "Make sure your vote counts. Order your absentee ballot today." The mailing included a tear-off absentee ballot request form with a picture of George W. Bush.

Meanwhile, officials from the Election Assistance Commission say that unreliable voting system technology will make it difficult to ensure that everyone's vote will be count this year.

Cause for Celebration

My friend Chuck is the Screaming Writer. Check him out.

And a little child shall lead them...

Rittenhouse Review pays tribute to the short, significant life of Miss Alexandra Scott, 1996-2004

The New Slavery

Past Imperfect: Doing Time

“The fact is that prosecutors are more likely to bring charges against black males than they are against whites suspected of similar crimes,” the prosecutor told me. “The result is that we’re throwing away black boys who are as young as 13 or 14 years old.” We are not speaking of a predatory drug dealers, murderers or rapists who terrorize our communities, but often first-time offenders and non-violent drug users who are swelling the ranks of black men in prison to disastrous proportions....

Ooooh, Snap!

"He's done more to destroy the myth of white supremacy than anyone I know."

Charles Rangel's (D-NY) response on being asked to say something nice about Pres. G.W. Bush, as reported in "Journal-isms"

Now This a Level of Ignorance I'm Not Prepared to Fathom

Bush camp solicits race of Star staffer

President Bush's re-election campaign insisted on knowing the race of an Arizona Daily Star journalist assigned to photograph Vice President Dick Cheney.

The Star refused to provide the information.

Cheney is scheduled to appear at a rally this afternoon at the Pima County Fairgrounds.

A rally organizer for the Bush-Cheney re-election campaign asked Teri Hayt, the Star's managing editor, to disclose the journalist's race on Friday. After Hayt refused, the organizer called back and said the journalist probably would be allowed to photograph the vice president.

"It was such an outrageous request, I was personally insulted," Hayt said later.

Danny Diaz, a spokesman for the president's re-election campaign, said the information was needed for security purposes.

"All the information requested of staff, volunteers and participants for the event has been done so to ensure the safety of all those involved, including the vice president of the United States," he said.

Diaz repeated that answer when asked if it is the practice of the White House to ask for racial information or if the photographer, Mamta Popat, was singled out because of her name. He referred those questions to the U.S. Secret Service, which did not respond to a call from the Star Friday afternoon....

via Richard Prince's "Journal-isms"

Todd Steven Burroughs on Mumia: Serious, Pointed Angry Black Advocacy

Todd Steven Burroughs, Ph.D., former newspaper reporter and journalism scholar, says that the works of radical journalist and death row inmate Mumia Abu Jamal have inspired his work in the way that The Autobiography of Malcolm X inspired baby-boomers:

During the years of Ronald Reagan and George Bush The First, many young Blacks unfortunately found current truths in Malcolm's long-uttered words. I was one of them. But although The Autobiography seemed to be about today, it was, in reality, more a defining part of yesterday. In my case, it was literally more high school book report topic than contemporary manifesto.

Then along came "Live From Death Row" and two tapes of Mumia's radio commentaries, all between the beginning of 1994 and the end of 1996...

I was affirmed, if not transformed. I began to understand what the "Black Power" Baby Boomers were talking about, a la The Autobiography.

I had found a book that, as a Black journalist in the mid-1990s, spoke directly to me-in content, in execution and in purpose.

Here was a talented Black journalist not practicing Black "objectivity"-defined, in my eyes, as the art of presenting (and negotiating) Black perspectives in ways that allow Black mainstream journalists to make rent and car payments. Here was someone who apparently did not worry about receiving acceptance from, and credibility with, America's powerful. Here was a Black writer who was clear, and not afraid to raise his voice in an undiluted way....

Burroughs' perspective implicitly endorses W.E.B. Du Bois' argument that, "Agitation is a necessary evil to tell of the ills of the suffering" inflicted by white supremacy. From this perspective, journalism is propagandistic in the sense that it is a form of transactional rhetoric, as opposed to the traditional view of journalism as objective.

The Revelation that is Rhinold Ponder

Rhinold Ponder is an attorney, community leader, editor, and the oldest son of an extraordinary woman named Carrie Ponder. He is also, I'm privileged to say, a friend of mine of long standing. This is one his paintings, "Revelations," which will be on exhibit at Orphas Coffee Shop in Skillman, New Jersey on August 5. Check out his show, buy a book, be inspired.

While We're on the Sexual Healing Tip

I don't know why I'm feeling led down this particular path of information sharing today, but this is from the website of author Lori S. Robinson:

I Will Survive: The African-American Guide to Healing from Sexual Assault and Abuse is a celebration of healing and empowerment. This book grew from Robinson’s own experience as a survivor of sexual violence. She was on staff at Emerge magazine when she was raped in 1995. An article she wrote about her assault and the alleged assault of a college student—for which she won a first place award at the 1998 National Association of Black Journalists annual convention — generated an outpouring of letters from readers affected by sexual violence. Those letters inspired Robinson to write I Will Survive.

Much needed! The Dinah Project

From the website of Rev. Monica A. Coleman:

Sexual violence is rarely discussed in church, despite the rising incidents of rape, sexual assault, molestation and incest. The Dinah Project, which gets its name from Genesis 34 – the rape of Dinah, Jacob’s daughter – was borne out of the author’s decision to start healing through the church after being raped. What resulted is this book and an entire ministry program to assist churches in responding to sexual violence.

The Dinah Project describes programmatic ways in which a local church can respond to the crisis of sexual violence in the community. By sharing the lessons of one church, this book proposes detailed methods for instituting a church program. The Dinah Project provides church activities ranging from providing resources for members to ways to organize a full-time church ministry, and many stages in between. Topics include planning worship services, conducting community education workshops, working with local agencies, establishing a board of directors and holding therapy groups at the church. With checklists, forms and detailed explanations, this user-friendly book guides any interested individual from basic information about sexual violence to tips on budgeting for programs.

DNC Bloggers to Watch

I didn't apply for press credentials to blog the Democratic National Convention because I'll be in Washington for the summer institute of the Visible Knowledge Project. I do plan to blog a bit from there, though.

In the meantime, here are the bloggers I'll be reading:

• Chris Gruber and Ken Quinell from Open Source Politics


• Chris Rabb, publisher of Afro-Netizen


• Jay Rosen, chair of NYU's journalism department, who shares personal insights on his blog, PressThink, but who is also a guiding light for the Blogging of the President and The Revealer.


• 
  The ever-insightul Travis from Rain Storm.


• 
  Jenny Greenleaf's dispatches for American Street on being a delegate.

Cyberjournalist.net has the running list of credentialed bloggers. By the way, Dave Winer has a site that is intended to provide live feeds from the bloggers that have been credentialed.
Not all of the bloggers that I intend to follow are listed there, probably because they don't all have RSS or Atom feed links on their sites.

Utne Reader picked up a story from Progressive Magazine about a troubling phenomenom: homeless college students. The article explains why it's so difficult to document the extent of the problem, and highlights the work of one charity that's trying to help.

New Poll: Blacks Hate Bush, But Aren't Exactly in Love With Kerry

From a new poll sponsored by Viacom siblings BET and CBS News:

Black voters overwhelmingly support Kerry for president, but issued a warning to Democrats: Don't take us for granted. A new BET/CBS News Poll suggests both candidates have work to do before November. Click for the full story and poll results.

Hungry Blues: The Press Ignores Civil Rights Commissioners' Call for Investigation of 2000, 2004 Balloting

I don't have time to explain why now, but check out Ben Greenberg's post on this.

US House Won't Fund "Teaching American History" Program, But Grants Unprecedented Gift to Nixon Library

From the newsletter of the National Coalition for History:

Over the last week or so, House appropriation recommendations were announced for the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA), including the National Historical Publications and Records Commission (NHPRC), and the Department of Education, including the "Teaching American History" grant program. With a recommended 70 percent cut to the NHPRC and zero funds for the "Teaching American History" initiative, this year the House appears little disposed to support programs that advance history and archives.

On 15 July 2004, the House Appropriations subcommittee on Transportation, Treasury, and Independent Agencies advanced to the full Appropriations Committee its recommendations for NARA. Though exact numbers are embargoed until the full committee meets next Thursday, Hill insiders report that overall funding for NARA is not bad except for the NHPRC. Reportedly, the subcommittee has endorsed the Bush administration's recommendation of only $3 million for the NHPRC. This represents a 70% cut over last fiscal years allocation, which for the first time reached its fully authorized limit of $10 million.

While the subcommittee could not find the funds to enable the NHPRC to operate even at minimum levels, the NCH has learned that House appropriators are prepared to respond favorably to a request for $750,000 by lobbyists representing the Richard Nixon Presidential Library and Birthplace to provide governmental funding for planning and design of a new 25,000 square foot archive facility to house the Nixon papers in Yorba Linda, California. Such an earmark for a presidential library is without precedent. It violates the spirit if not the letter of the law that
requires presidential libraries to be entirely planned and constructed with
private funds prior to being donated to NARA. History and archive advocates
vowed to defeat the earmark and work for higher numbers for the NHPRC....

Sakia Gunn Developments: Murder Trial Set for November; New Scholarship Announced

According to the website for the Essex County, New Jersey Prosecutor's Office, Richard Mc Cullough will stand trial on November 8, 2004 for the murder of Sakia Gunn, 15, on a downtown Newark street corner in the early hours of Mother's Day, 2003. The killing is being prosecuted as a bias crime and might lead to a sentence of 118 years. According to news reports, the prosecution is unusual under New Jersey bias crime laws.

In another development, Michigan State University student LaJoya Johnson has initiated a new scholarship at her school in Sakia Gunn's honor, and is seeking donations. According to an article in the State News, the new scholarship will benefit student activists of color who lesbian, gay, bisexual or transgendered. The university expects to begin awarding the scholarship in the spring of 2005.

Johnson has been active in efforts to keep Gunn's memory alive through two online petition drives. The first urged Newark school official to allow a memorial for Sakia; the second urged the death penalty for her accused killer. The Newark public schools held a moment of silence for Gunn and other student murder victims on May 11, 2004, the first anniversary of Sakia's death.

NAACP calls for new trial for Mumia

The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People issued a resolution calling for a new trial for journalist-turned-death row inmate Mumia Abu Jamal at the close of last week's 95th national convention in Philadelphia, PA. According to news reports, the resolution comes at a critical time in Abu Jamal's 23-year fight to overturn his murder conviction and death sentence in the Dec. 9, 1981 slaying of Officer Daniel Faulkner, because Jamal's case is about to enter yet another round of appeals through the Third Circuit Court.

Noting disturbing racial patterns in the application of the death penalty in Pennsylvania, the NAACP urged it chapters "throughout the United States and the world to support the international call for Mumia Abu-Jamal to be released from death row," according to an article on Jamal's website. The article also noted that NAACP leaders seemed skittish about bringing the resolution to a vote, and cancelled a panel on the death penalty that was to have included a discussion of Jamal's case. According to this and other news reports, the vote on the resolution went ahead when Pam Africa, a leader of MOVE, the radical back-to-nature religious and political organization, threatened to stage a disruptive demonstration on the day that Sen. John Kerry was to address the convention. Jamal is a member of MOVE, which has had several tragic clashes with police over the last three decades.

However, Counterpunch's Dave Lindorff, author of an investigative book that concluded that Jamal's prosecution was racially biased, argues that the NAACP's timidity also reflects the weakening of Jamal's support organization after years of infighting and legal mismanagement. Lindorff concludes:

"Until Abu-Jamal himself insists on seeking to rebuild a broader coalition, and openly condemns the sniping and character assassination that has been going on in his name outside the prison, he will pretty much be fighting his legal battles alone, with his attorneys and a few highly energetic supporters, but without any mass base.

"Which is pretty unfortunate for him, and also for the many thousands of others on death row and in prison, for whom his case could be a clarion call for reform of a criminally corrupted justice system."

I hate to say this, but, if this was happening in Europe...

The news from Darfur is worse than ever: Reuters reports that black Sudanese women and girls are being wantonly raped and used as sex slaves by the marauding Janjaweed militias. Read the Amnesty International report, "Rape as a Weapon of War." Then do something.

Check out The Revealer campaign forum on religion and politics

Jay Rosen, publisher of the The Revealer, a daily webzine on religion and politics, has an interesting preview and commentary on the Revealer's campaign forum, "In Search of Religion on the Campaign Trail," in his weblog, PressThink. Among the writers whose forthcoming entries to the forum Jay touts is yours truly. My essay is about the likely impact of the current political debate over homosexuality on the black church and black liberation theology. I suggest that the political stakes in the debate reflect a larger and far-reaching contest for the spirutual loyalties of black Christians.

What Progressive Journalists Should Do Now: Focus on Real Problems and Solutions, Not Cosby

W.E.B. Du Bois argued that journalists had a duty to tell of the evils of white supremacy -- not just the overt racism and violence that it fomented, but the internalized racism that caused non-whites to participate in their own destruction. Late in his career, he added to that charge the following prophetic worry about the changing nature of the media:

“Mass capitalistic control of books and periodicals, news gathering and distribution, radio, cinema, and television has made the throttling of democracy possible and the distortion of education and failure of justice widespread."

The failure of justice is increasingly evident in the torrent of recent reporting and analysis of Bill Cosby's charge that too many black parents are failing to do right by their children, and too many black men are failing themselves and their loved ones. While a few news outlets have done a commendable job of trying to initiate constructive conversations that discern truth from hyperbole, they haven't gone for enough.

The major problem that black writers, artists, intellectuals, activists, parents, preachers and teachers face in trying to get control of their families and communities is that the institutions that transmit ideas and values to black youth and adults are perverted by the corporate commodification of blackness. Rather than having their self image and goals shaped by the authority figures in their own homes, neighborhoods, schools and religious institutions, they are being molded by an amoral popular culture that will use anything to sell products.

Right now, that popular culture, which has been driven by an appropriation and caricaturing of African American culture since the days of Stephen Foster, teaches that authentic blackness includes a disdain for formal education, hypersexuality, and mindless,amoral acqusitiveness. This picture of who black people are and what we value is a cynical lie that a few blacks participate in perpetuating, because the corporate marketers figured out that the suburban kids whose dollars fuel hiphop don't want to hear from people with a mentality like Chuck D's:

I didn’t want to rap about ‘I’m this or I’m that’ all the time . . . . My focus was not on boasting about myself or battling brothers on the microphone. I wanted to rap about battling institutions, and bringing the condition of Black people worldwide to a respectable level."

To turn the tide, here are some of the questions I want to see journalists asking:

1. 
   While Kanye West makes fun of people who try to educate themselves, how many college dropouts is he employing? Are the people who handle his legal and business affairs college dropouts?
   


2. 
   What does Lil Kim wear when she meets with her attorneys? Why are she and other artists promoting styles of dress and behavior that lead young people to waste their money on things that will not help them in the job market, or in life?
   


3. 
   We need press coverage of some of the initiatives that have worked and are working! For example, while there is a dearth of black scientists, there are also programs such as the Cooperative Research Fellowship Program and the National Action Council for Minorities in Engineering, which have helped dozens of blacks get Ph.Ds. in mathematics, physics and other scientific and technical disciplines.
   


4. 
   While we're at it, let's make some of those black achievers more visible, and involve them in conversations about the problems in our community. Scientists such as James West have been running successful community-based science education programs for 30 years, but they are never called upon during these discussions.
   
   If Jim West is too "civil rights generation" to be listened to, then how about mathematician William Massey a co-founder of the Conference of African-American Researchers in the Mathematical Sciences.
   
   Still too old? How about young leaders such as Rahsaan Harris?


5. 
   Let's have some reporting on the state of the institutions that some successful blacks have created to reach back into their communities. Where is the Coalition of 100 Black Men these days? Where's BEEP? What about the the various ethnic affinity groups in the nations top corporations? What are they doing to address these problems? What do their successess and failures tell us?


6. 
   Conservatives seem to think they have the answers to the problems Cosby outlined. Between faith-based initiatives, school voucher programs, and the No Child Left Behind Law, conservative approaches have received substantial support over the last several years. If Cosby's charges signify the need for a close examination of what parents are doing, don't they also suggest the need to scrutinize these programs as well? Yet I'm not aware of any comprehensive examination of this type?
   

The next frontier for black people in this country is, indeed, to learn to intelligently and strategically use the substantial resources and opportunities that we have. To do this, however, we have to be able to put everything that we are doing on the table for examination and discussion -- the good, the bad and the ugly. What's more important, we have to be able to have a conversation about how to use our resources to serve our interests. That's what progressive journalists need to be talking about.

Congresswoman: International Monitors Needed for US Elections

Rep. Corrine Brown (D-Fl) told a Florida television station that monitors from the Warsaw, Poland-based Office for Democratic Institutions for Human Rights will come to Florida in September to ensure the fairness of the 2004 presidential election. Brown was censured by her Congressional colleagues Thursday night after she called for international monitors by declaring:

"I come from Florida, where you and others participated in what I call the United States coup d'etat. We need to make sure that it doesn't happen again. Over and over again after the election when you stole the election, you came back here and said get over it. No we're not going to get over it and we want verification from the world."

A statement on Rep. Brown's website about the censure vote further argued:

Striking my words from the House floor is just one more example of the Republican Party's attempt to try and cover up what happened during the 2000 election and of their activities this year in the state of Florida in preparation for stealing this year’s election as well. What is the Republican Party so afraid of? Let me tell you what I'm afraid of: another stolen election and four more years of the Bush administration. When the words of Corrine Brown are stricken from the floor, so is the voice of her 600,000 constituents in Florida's third congressional district.

Head Negro in Charge

Check out this WBAI interview with author Norman Kelley about his new book: The Head Negro In Charge Syndrome: The Dead End of Black Politics. Kelley argues that since the death of Dr. Martin Luther King, we have not had an effective activist black leader in the United States, and that black folk now lack the social, economic and political organization that's needed to be taken seriously by the powers that be.

via Jonn+Nubian.com

By the way...

More reports and videos from their 2004 members Conference are available, including speeches by Richard Clarke and Daniel Ellsberg.

Hersh Speaks: War Crimes at Abu Ghraib?

Ed Cone has a link to muckraker Seymour Hersh's speech at a recent American Civil Liberties Union Convention in which he went into more detail about the horrific images from the US-run Abu Ghraib prison that have not been made public. Last month, writer Rick Perstein emailed notes from a Hersh speech at the University of Chicago about those images. It's a two-our clip; Hersh begins speaking at 1:12:30. 
 
Before Hersh, there are remarks from Sandra Tsing Loh and director John Sayles.  Loh talked about her controversial firing from National Public Radio because of the failure to edit an obscenity from a taped commentary she made. Sayles showed a clip from a film he made about press self-censorship in the Bush era.
 
Hersh described the Bush administration as similar to a cult with a neo-conservative Utopian vision that has managed not just to induce press self-censorship, but to muzzle the bureaucracy and Congress. 
 
"I don't know what any of us can do to stop it.
 
"This is a sad fact. There is no sovereignty. Potemkin Village, maybe. We're making the pictures and we're believing them now...it's not going to stop the insurgency. ... A year ago, the insurgency was operating in one, two and three man cells and we knew nothing about them. Now they're operating in 10 and 15-man cells and we still know nothing about them...I think the policy is going to be, 'We've got this guy, Allawi, and his government, let's stand him up and see whether we can get through the election.'
 

"Debating about it, ummm ... Some of the worst things that happened you don't know about, okay? Videos, um, there are women there. Some of you may have read that they were passing letters out, communications out to their men. This is at Abu Ghraib ... The women were passing messages out saying 'Please come and kill me, because of what's happened' and basically what happened is that those women who were arrested with young boys, children in cases that have been recorded. The boys were sodomized with the cameras rolling. And the worst above all of that is the soundtrack of the boys shrieking that your government has. They are in total terror. It's going to come out."

"It's impossible to say to yourself how did we get there? Who are we? Who are these people that sent us there? When I did My Lai I was very troubled like anybody in his right mind would be about what happened. I ended up in something I wrote saying in the end I said that the people who did the killing were as much victims as the people they killed because of the scars they had, I can tell you some of the personal stories by some of the people who were in these units witnessed this. I can also tell you written complaints were made to the highest officers and so we're dealing with a enormous massive amount of criminal wrongdoing that was covered up at the highest command out there and higher, and we have to get to it and we will. We will. You know there's enough out there, they can't (Applause). .... So it's going to be an interesting election year."

Hersh rapped the press corps for not covering the Justice Department more intensely: "The degradation of the Justice Department has been so total... there are people there that really care about human rights... but if we have the kind of leadership we have, I don't know where we go. ..."
 

"Be terribly aware that we are so disconnected from this leadership that it's not necessarily clear that what you do is going to impact on them, because these are people are really out there. ...It's not the Manson clan, but we really have been taken over, and we have to do something to stop it. Let's hope that we can do it electorally.

 

Neighbors meet to stem violence

A string of attacks in the normally quiet, integrated town in which I live has neighbors worried that bias crimes may be on the rise:

EWING - The recent beating of a white township resident by a group of six black teenagers is considered a bias crime, police told a group of more than 200 residents who gathered at a local church last night to express their support for the victim and their concern about violent acts in the area in the past three weeks.

Police Chief Robert Coulton told those at St. John's Baptist Church that five more suspects have been identified in the July 3 beating of a Somerset Street man.

According to two witnesses, four of them, along with the first suspect arrested Tuesday night, took part in the beating, Coulton said.

The meeting was sponsored by the neighborhood civic group, the Ewing Park-BraeBurn Association. Officials of the group said they called the meeting to discuss their concerns with the police and to send a message to the attackers that people in the neighborhood will not tolerate violence against any of its members, black or white.

Several members of the victim's family, including his wife, mother-in-law and a son, were on hand.

The pews were filled with supporters, black and white, who voiced outrage at the attack and tried to comfort the family with words and hugs.

Rep. Charles Rangel Arrested in Protest Outside Sudan Embassy

Will this be like Haiti and South Africa in the 1980s, which required years of these kinds of protests before policy changes resulted? From Black Enterprise via AP:

2004-07-13
Associated Press



WASHINGTON--U.S. Congressman Charles Rangel was arrested Tuesday outside the Sudanese embassy in a protest over the plight of refugees in that African nation awaiting humanitarian relief.

"When human lives are in jeopardy, there should be outrage," Rangel said at the steps of Sudan's embassy, where he was arrested after standing in front of the door for five minutes.

"This is a small price to pay for the blessings I've received," he said.

Protest organizers said Rangel, a Democrat, will be one of a series of prominent black figures to be arrested in coming days in front of the embassy to bring attention to the suffering of starving Sudanese targeted by roving bands of murderous, mostly Arab horsemen.

Tens of thousands of civilians have been slaughtered in Sudan's Darfur region in the past year and a half, and an estimated 1 million driven from their homes...

U.S. Senate Votes Against Constitutional Ban on Gay Marriage

From Bloomberg News:

July 14 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. Senate blocked an attempt to amend the Constitution to ban same-sex marriage, dealing a defeat to President George W. Bush, who made his support for the measure part of his re-election campaign.

Senators voted 50-48 on a preliminary motion to cut off debate and permit a final roll call on the amendment, which defines marriage as between a man and a woman. The Republican-led effort needed 60 votes to shut off debate.

``I'm not of the view that we're wasting words here,'' said Senator Gordon Smith, an Oregon Republican who supports a constitutional amendment. He said today's vote is ``chapter one'' in a longer debate that could last years.

Sweeping stun guns to target crowds

From New Scientist:

Weapons that can incapacitate crowds of people by sweeping a lightning-like beam of electricity across them are being readied for sale to military and police forces in the US and Europe.

At present, commercial stun guns target one person at a time, and work only at close quarters. The new breed of non-lethal weapons can be used on many people at once and operate over far greater distances.

But human rights groups are appalled by the fact that no independent safety tests have been carried out, and by their potential for indiscriminate use.