Monday, July 27, 2009

The Cambridge Police Report On The Gates Arrest

If you'd like to see what's in the report, click here.

History And The Texas Board of Education

The Texas Board of Education is considering revisions to the state's social studies curriculum. An op-ed by John Fea notes, among other things, that a report by Peter Marshall, an outside reviewer selected by certain members of the Board, states that Cesar Chavez "is hardly the kind of role model that ought to be held up to our children as someone worthy of emulation." Fea: "Perhaps the study of Cesar Chavez might help an 11th grade white student from a conservative Southern Baptist home learn something about the plight of her Mexican-American neighbors or the suffering of poor migrant workers."

When David Duke Posts Your Column On His Website . . .

David Duke posted (MSNBC commentator!!) Pat Buchanan's column about Judge Sonia Sotomayor on Duke's website. I'm just saying . . .

Ann Coulter On The "Obama Birthers"

When Ann Coulter says that those who think that President Obama is not a citizen are cranks you know that those pushing and covering this absurd "story" need to stop this silliness.

President Obama The "Witch Doctor"

Thinking that it was "Funny stuff," a Florida neurosurgeon and American Medical Association delegate forwarded this image of President Obama as what was supposed to represent an African witch doctor. The doctor has apologized.

A colorblind nation indeed.

Glenn Loury On The Gates Arrest

Loury, a professor at Brown University, finds "laughable, and sad, Professor Gates's declaration that he now plans to make a documentary film about racial profiling. Is this as far as his scholarship on the intersection of race and policing in America extends? Where has this eminent scholar of African-American affairs been these last 30 years, during which a historically unprecedented, politically popular, extraordinarily punitive and hugely racially disparate mobilization of resources for the policing, imprisonment and post-release supervision of those caught up in the criminal justice system has unfolded?"

Arguing that the nation has chosen to employ the police, courts and prisons to deal with "the antisocial behaviors of our fellow citizens," Loury posits that "such behavioral problems reflect failures elsewhere in our society--racial and class segregation in our cities; inadequate ducation for the poor; and the collapse of the family as an institution in some communities. Because of these failures, we have large numbers of under-socialized, undereducated and virtually unemployable young men in our cities and towns. (They are not all black, to be sure, but they are disproprotionately so.)"

"Meet the New Elite, Not Like The Old"

Check out Helene Cooper's piece in the New York Times on what she calls "the children of 1969--the year that America's most prestigious universities began aggressively recruiting blacks and Latinos to their nearly all-white campuses,"and her argument that today "America is being led, to a striking extent, by a new elite, a cohort of the best and the brightest whose advancement was formed, at least in part, by affirmative action policies." (Every time I see the phrase "the best and brightest" I think about what David Halberstam really meant when he placed that label on those in the Kennedy-Johnson administrations who formulated and implemented the policies resulting in the nation's involvement in the Vietnam War.)

A Critique Of CNN's "Black in America"

Sam Fulwood, writing in The Root: "CNN turned being black in America into a form of pathology, something to be cured. If black folks work hard, show respect to teachers and other authority and express gratitude for this nation's bounty, only then success may come their way."

Sunday, July 26, 2009

Sherrilyn Ifill And Richard Thompson Ford On The Arrest Of Henry Louis Gates

Ifill writes: ""We shouldn't need celebrities to bring home the seriousness of racial profiling. The pain, humiliation and injustice experienced by average, poor, black men and women should be a compelling enough story to hold our attention."

And Ford comments: "The president got it right: There's no plausible justification for the arrest. It was worse than stupid--it was abusive."

"And even racial profiling in the sense of using race as a part of a generic composite of a typical crimnal isn't necessarily racist. It's a tragic fact that blacks as a group commit a disproportionate number of certain types of crime. The trouble is that racial profiling--even if it's based on accurate generalizations--imposes a disproportionate share of the costs of law enforcement on innocent blacks, like professor Gates. Let's face it: It's hard to imagine that police would have presumed that a middle-aged white man who walks with a cane was a burglar."

Wednesday, July 22, 2009

Pat Buchanan's Supremacist Worldview

If you missed it, watch MSNBC commentator(!!) Pat Buchanan's recent appearance on Rachel Maddow's MSNBC show in which he sets forth his views on race. Maddow's comments on Buchanan's statements are worth viewing, as is this take by the Young Turks.

CBS News Report On Arrest Of Henry Louis Gates

Watch it here.

Tuesday, July 21, 2009

More Pat Buchanan

On his website: "The Supreme Court, far from being the last redoubt of the White Anglo-Saxon Protestant in America, reflects the collapse of that WASP establishment, and a rising racial, ethnic and gender consciousness and solidarity."

The Arrest Of Henry Louis Gates, Jr.

Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr. was arrested in his home near Harvard University after a neighbor called police and reported that two black men were breaking into the home. According to newspaper accounts, after returning to his home from a trip to China at about 12:40 p.m. last Thursday, Gates placed his key in and tried to turn the lock on his front door but the door would not open. Gates, wearing a blue blazer and leather shoes, and the car service driver who delivered him to his home pushed the front door until it finally opened. Gates entered his home and the driver left. Police officers appeared at Gates' home and, according to the Cambridge police department, Gates was arrested for disorderly conduct after he yelled at a police officer. That charge has been dropped and the police department issued a statement calling the incident "regrettable and unfortunate."

For stories on the arrest, see here and here. For an interview with Gates, go here.

Colored Demos' "Empthy, Racism and Our Highest Court"

Luis Fuentes-Rohwer writes: ""The Sotomayor nomination has taught me two things. The first is that the American public might in fact be dumb and dumber. The second is that Chief Justice Roberts might well be a racist."

On the first point: "Is there anybody out there stupid enough to believe that" Judge Sotomayor is a racist?

On the second point: Roberts has "demonstrated deep antipathy towards the interests of persons of color, on issues as far ranging as voluntary racial integration plans, voting rights, or hiring and promotion."

Frank Rich On The "Sotomayor Show"

From Rich's column:
On the Judiciary Committee's hearings: "Southern senators who relate every question to race, ethnicity and gender just assumed that their unreconstructed obsessions are America's and that the country would find them riveting. Instead the country yawned. The Sotomayor questioners also assumed a Hispanic woman, simply for being a Hispanic woman, could be portrayed as The Other and patronized like a greenhorn unfamiliar with How We Do Things Around Here. The senators seemed to have no idea they were describing themselves when they tried to caricature Sotomayor as an overemotional, biased ideologue."

On Senator Tom Coburn's "You'll have lots of 'splaining to do" statement: "[I]t clearly didn't occur to him that such mindless condescension helps explain why the fastest-growing demographic group in the nation is bolting his party."

Check out the full column.

President Obama On His NAACP Speech

From the President: "I've noticed that when I talk about personal responsibility in the African American community, that gets highlighted. But then the whole other half of the speech, where I talked about government's responsibility . . . that somehow doesn't make news."

Colbert's "Neutral Man's Burden"

Watch it here. Funny and insightful.

Sunday, July 19, 2009

Looking For A Confederate Flag Comforter?

Professor Guy-Uriel Charles tells you where to find one.

RNC Chair Michael Steele On Black Folks, Fried Chicken And Potato Salad

At the Young Republicans national convention Republican National Committee chair Michael Steele stated that he would welcome black persons to the Republican Party with "fried chicken and potato salad." Earl Ofari Hutchinson notes, "The shoot from the lip Steele with a wry smile and a chuckle told a questioner that he'll get more black folk into the GOP by ladling out scoops of potato salad and every black's favorite, fried chicken to them." Hutchinson also asks whether the GOP bribed Steele with a bucket of fried chicken, and "did Steele polish off his fried chicken gorge by slurping away at a big slice of warermelon?"

Thursday, July 16, 2009

Zell Miller: "Gorilla Glue" And Obama

Said by Zell Miller, former governor and United States senator from Georgia: "our globe-trotting president needs to stop and take a break and quit gallivanting all around. I think Rahm Emanuel ought to get some Gorilla Glue and put it in that chair in the Oval Office and say 'Sit here awhile."

Every time I think it can't get worse . . .

Wednesday, July 15, 2009

Cornyn On Cabranes

During a break in today's Sotomayor hearings, Senator Cornyn of Texas told C-Span viewers that Second Circuit Judge Cabranes is "of Puerto Rican extraction." Extraction? What does that mean?

Pat Buchanan On Judge Sonia Sotomayor

On his website Patrick J. Buchanan (who, among other things, is (still) a commentator on MSNBC) has this to say about Judge Sonia Sotomayor:

"Sonia is, first and foremost, a Latina. She has not hesitated to demand, even in college and law school, ethnic and gender preferences for her own. Her concept of justice is race-based." (Note his reference to "Sonia" and the lack of any facts supporting his declaration of who and what she is.)

Republicans must "expose Sotomayor . . . as a political activist whose career bespeaks a lifelong resolve to discriminate against white males to the degree necessary to bring about an equality of rewards in society." (Really? When anxiety crosses over into hysteria this is what happens.)

Was Martin Luther King, Jr. A Republican?

A billboard in Houston said that he was.

Vote Like A Puerto Rican?

In Tuesday's confirmation hearings on the nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor to the Supreme Court Senator Jeff Sessions, discussing Sotomayor's vote not to rehear en banc the appeal in Ricci v. DeStefano, made the following statement to the judge:

"You voted not to reconsider the prior case. You voted to stay with the decision of the circuit. And in fact your vote was the key vote. Had you voted with Judge Cabranes, himself of Puerto Rican ancestry, had you voted with him, you could've changed that case."

This comment by Sessions can be viewed here, in a posting that also notes that Judge Cabranes also served on the board of the Puerto Rican Legal Defense and Education Fund. Why is that relevant? Sessions has ciritcized Sotomayor for serving on that very same board.

On Senator Jeff Sessions

A recent POLITICO story on Senator Jeff Sessions notes the Senate's rejection of his nomination to the federal bench in 1986:

"During the 1986 confirmation process, Sessions was accused of unfairly targeting black civil rights workers for election fraud charges as a federal prosecutor. A black lawyer under Sessions in the U.S. attorney's office accused him of saying he thought the Ku Klux Klan was 'OK' until he found out some of its members were 'pot smokers.'

"But the confirmation process also revealed that Sessions had once called the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People and the American Civil Liberties Union 'un-American' and 'communist-inspired.'

"Sessions . . . told POLITICO that those comments were made in a private conversation he had with an African-American on his staff in the U.S. attorney's office--and that they were taken out of context."

"Whose Identity Politics?"

From Eugene Robinson's column in the Washington Post:

"Republicans' outrage, both real and feigned, at [Supreme Court nominee Sonia] Sotomayor's musings about her identity as a 'wise Latina' might affect her judicial decisions is based on a flawed assumption: that whiteness and maleness are not themselves facets of a distinct identity. Being male and white is seen instead as a neutral condition, the natural order of things. Any 'identity'--black, brown, female, gay, whatever--has to be judged against this supposedly 'objective' standard. . . . Thus it is irrelevant if Justice Samuel A. Alito Jr. talks abut the impact of his background as the son of Italian immigrants on his rulings--as he did at his confirmation hearings--but unforgivable for Sotomayor to mention that her Puerto Rican family history might be relevant to her work."

Sunday, July 12, 2009

Audra Shay's Facebook Postings

Audra Shay is now the incoming chair of the Young Republicans. For where she stands on the electon of President Obama (e.g., "Obama Bin Lauden [sic] is the new terrorist" and her reference to "Obama in a noose") check out this Daily Beast story.

Attacking The Obama Children

Racism Review has an interesting post that begins: "Just when you think the racist right has reached its low point, some hyper-racist folks there show they can go yet lower." A photo in the New York Post showed Malia Obama wearing a shirt with a peace sign. Check out the post for the rabid, racist, and reactionary comments made by some of the "brave" anonymous fools out there in cyberspace. And check out some other comments noted in the post, including: "We're being represented by a family of ghetto trash." "Looks like a typical street whore." "Wonder when she will have her first abortion."

Thursday, July 9, 2009

Richard Nixon On Neccesary Abortions

President Richard Nixon, speaking to an aide in 1973 on the day following the Supreme Court's decision in Roe v. Wade: "There are times when an abortion is necessary. I know that. When you have a black and a white. . . . Or a rape."

The Bombing Of A Diversity Office

From That Minority Thing: "Twin brothers from Illinois who authorities say are white supremacists have been charged in a 2004 bombing that injured the black diversity director in the Phoenix suburb of Scottsdale."

"What Are Those Black Kids Doing Here?"

The Pennsylvania Human Rights Commission has indicated that it will investigate allegations that the Valley Club in Huntingdon Valley, Pennsylvania discriminated against a group of minority children who were swimming at the club's pool. According to Alethea Wright, the director of a Creative Steps, a summer camp for minority children, her organization paid for weekly swim time at the pool. While at the pool on June 29, "A couple of the children ran down saying, 'Miss Wright, Miss Wright, they're up they're saying, 'What are those black kinds doing here?'" Wright said that club members pulled their children out of the pool. The club later refunded the camp's payment. Wright has stated that some of the children have asked if they are "too dark" to swim in the pool. The club president has denied any wrongdoing.

Are The Indiana Pacers Too White?

That question was posed by Bob Kravitz in a column in the Indianapolis Star. "In a league where little more than 10 percent of the players are white Americans, the Pacers roster is racially split down the middle, making them one of the whitest teams in the league." Larry Bird, Pacers president and former NBA star, said, "I don't see race at all."

In 2004 the colorblind Bird, responding to the question whether the National Basketball Associaton could benefit from having more white players, said: "Well, I think so. . . . I think it's good for a fan base becase, as we all know, the majority of the fans are white America. And if you had just a couple of white guys in there, you might get them a little excited." He also said, during his playing days, that he was insulted when he was guarded by a white player.

"I don't see race at all."

The Horrible Burr Oak Cemetery Story

From the Chicago Tribune:
"Authorities today sharply increased the estimate of the number of bodeis disinterred at Burr Oak Cemetery in southwest suburban Alsip in a scheme to illegaly resell grave sites.
"Two to 300 bodies were dug up and dumped into an isolted, weedy area of the cemetery, where many prominent African-Americans are buried, including Emmett Till."