"The Washington Post Mistakes Barack Obama For Malcolm X"

This is the headline of the Huffington Post's posting on a Washington Post story on President Obama with a picture of Malcolm X and not the president. Come on.

From The Daily Show

"Republicans Want Michael Steele to Fail" and "Law & Border."

Black Women Are Increasingly Dying When Giving Birth

Essence magazine discusses the issue.

A Harvard 3L's E-Mail

An e-mail written by a third-year student at the Harvard Law School contained the following observation: "I absolutely do not rule out the possibility that African Americans are, on average, genetically predisposed to be less intelligent." The e-mail was forwarded to the Harvard Black Law Student Association list-serv with the writer's name and then went viral.

Mayor Ray Nagin's 23 Most Memorable Quotes

To hear the quotes, click here.

"14CV88"

14CV88 was the license plate number of a personalized plate issued in Virginia to the owner of a Ford truck. The coded message contained therein: "The number 88 stands for the eighth letter of the alphabet, H, doubled to signify 'Heil Hitler' . . . 'CV' stands for 'Confederate veteran' . . . And 14 is code for imprisoned white supremacist David Lane's 14-word motto: 'We must secure the existence of our people and a future for white children.'" The Department of Motor Vehicles has canceled its approval of the plate number.

Discrimination At The Naples, Florida Ritz-Carlton?

From the Guardian: "A British family has been banned from staying at a chain of luxury hotels after allegedly requesting not to be served by 'people of colour' at a Florida resort."

Henry Louis Gates On President Obama And Reparations

In his recent New York Times op-ed Henry Louis Gates contends that "Barack Obama has a unique opportunity to reshape the debate over one of the most contentious issues of America's racial legacy: reparations, the idea that the descendants of American slaves should receive compensation for their ancestors' unpaid labor and bondage."

Stanley Crouch argues that Gates has struck a "blow to the 'victim's studies' hustle."

From The Colbert Report: The Word--No Problemo; Drive-Through Rapping

Watch this and this.

Patricia Williams' "Not-Black by Default"

Read her piece.

"Why Can't a Successful Black Woman Find a Man?"

Nightline asked the question; Melissa Harris-Lacewell shares her critique of the program.

Arizona

From the April 22 edition of the Christian Science Monitor: "In the past six days, the [Arizona] legislature has passed the nation's strictest anti-illegal immigration bill, a law permitting concealed weapons, and the House has approved a bill requiring a presidential candidate to show his or her birth certificate to appear on the state ballot."

Michael Steele On The GOP And Black Voters

Republican Party chair Michael Steele on why African Americans should vote Republican: "You really don't have a reason to, to be honest--we haven't done a very good job of really giving you one. True? True."

The Williams Syndrome Neurodevelopment Disorder

Check out this interesting story in nature.com: "Children with a neurodevelopment disorder called Willams Syndrome . . . do not develop negative attidues about other ethnic groups, even though they show patterns of gender stereotyping found in other children."

Racial Isolation In Mississippi Schools

Troubling developments in Mississippi public schools are noted in this Washington Post story.

Rest In Piece, Dorothy Height

Dorothy Height has died at the age of 98.

Send Obama Back To Kenya?

This from former Rep. Tom Tancredo about President Obama: "If his wife says Kenya is his homeland, why don't we just send him back?"

"The Women Of SNCC"

Check out Jack White's piece in The Root and his argument that "the civil rights movement could never have succeeded without the extraordinary creativity and courage of female organizers."

On The State Of The Black Church

Samuel Freedman discusses this topic here.

Racism In Online Video Games

This article discusses the ways in which players of the XBox Live version of Call of Duty "exchange hate speech over their headsets as they stalk each other across the virtual battlefields. Players trade racist, homophobic and anti-Semitic insults so frequently that game makers are taking steps to tone down the rhetoric."

The Obama Speech On Race

Always worth watching.

Killing For Rims

Read this Houston Chronicle story.

Joshua McMackie, Rest In Peace

Joshua McMackie, an 18-year-old student at Texas Southern University, was shot and killed at a street party early Saturday morning. Breaks my heart.

Frank Rich's "Welcome to Confederate History Month"

Definitely worth reading.

On Idris Elba

Nice story on actor Idris Elba, who played Stringer Bell on "The Wire," my favorite televisions series.

Police Shootings In New Orleans After Hurricane Katrina

The New Orleans Times-Picayune has published a series of excellent stories on this subject.

Crack News: 50 Cent Is Removing His Tattoos

People magazine has the story.

Recipe: Add "Freshly Ground Black People"

An Australian cookbook, the Pasta Bible, had a recipe for spelt tagliatelle with sardines and prosciutto. The recipe should have called for adding "salt and freshly ground black pepper"; instead, it called for the addition of "freshly ground black people."

Oops. The cookbook has been pulped and reprinted by the publisher.

Prison Sentence For White Supremacist Who Plotted To Kill Obama And Others

Paul Schlesselman, a 19-year-old white supremacist, has been convicted and sentenced to 10 years in prison for plotting to kill then-presidential candidate Barack Obama and 88 African Americans and the beheading of 14 black persons.

Why 88 and 14? According to the Urban Dictionary, 88 refers to H, the eighth letter of the alphabet, and represents "Heil Hitler," and 14 to the following words: "We must secure the existence of our people and a future for white children."

"Black by Choice"

Melissa Harris-Lacewell's The Nation article discusses President Obama's choice to identify himself solely as black when he completed his United States Census form, a choice that "disappointed some who have fought to ensure that multiracial peopele have the right to indicate their complex racial heritage" and "confused some who were surprised by his choice not to officially recognize his white heritage."

"All blacks leave the store."

Remember the recent incident in which a 16-year-old boy in a Wal-Mart store in Turnersville, New Jersey told all blacks to leave the store? It happened again, this time in a Whole Foods store in Edgewater, New Jersey, when a 14-year-old girl grabbed a store microphone and said, "All blacks leave the store." She has been charged with bias intimidation and harassment.

Benjamin Hooks, Rest In Peace

Benjamin Hooks, leader of the NAACP from 1977 to 1992, has died.

Dear Governor: Could You Restore My Right To Vote?

An individual convicted of a non-violent crime who seeks the restoration of her voting rights in Virginia must submit a personal letter addressed to the governor explaining "the reasons why you believe the restoration of your civil rights is justified." Erika Wood's The Grio article argues that this requirement "introduces an entirely arbitrary and subjective standard that allows the most powerful elected official in the state to play fast and loose with one of America's most fundamental rights."

Photos Of Post-Earthquake Makeshift Homes In Haiti

Click here.

"In Living Color"

For some of the best moments from this television show, click here.

Belated Happy Jackie Robinson Day

On April 15, 1947 Jack Roosevelt Robinson became the first African-American player to play major league baseball in the 20th century.

It's 2010, Right?

From the Washington Post: "A federal judge Tuesday ordered a rural county in southwestern Mississippi to stop segregating its schools by grouping African American students into all-black classrooms and allowing white students to transfer to the county's only majority-white school, the U.S. Justice Department announced."

Is This Guy A Racist?

Watch this story on Carl Paladino, Tea Party candidate for the position of governor in New York. It has been reported that Paladino has forwarded racist and offensive e-mails to friends and coworkers.

Stanley Crouch On Michael Steele

Crouch comments on GOP chair Michael (What Up?) Steele's use of the civil rights credit card.

More From Pat Buchanan

Pat Buchanan (still an MSNBC commentator!) defends Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell's declaration of Confederate History Month sans any mention of slavery. Buchanan argues that slavery was not the cause of the Civil War. "Secession was--that and Lincoln's determination to drown the nation in blood if necessary to make the Union whole again."

Glad he cleared that up.

"Silence kills even the best in our city"

From the Chicago Sun-Times:

Somebody knows who killed Percy Day and Tyrone Williams.

But nobody has tipped the police because too many people in Chicago confuse doing right with snitching.

And so the killer of two good young men walks our streets even now, free to kill again.

Notre Dame's First Black Valedictorian

Katie Washington, a biology major with a minor in Catholic social teaching, will be the first black valedictorian at the University of Notre Dame.

The World War II Internment Of Japanese-Americans At The Santa Anita Racing Park

Watch this interesting account from ESPN's Outside the Lines show.

"Southern Discomfort"

In his recent New York Times op-ed Jon Meacham comments that "it is revealing that Virginia's neo-Confederates are refighting the Civil War in 2010."

Racial Attitudes In The Tea Party Movement

This subject is examined in this University of Washington survey.

Recommended

David Remnick, The Bridge: The Life and Rise of Barack Obama (Knopf 2010).

"How the mass incarceration of black men hurts black women"

This Economist article addresses the negative impact of this nation's mass incarceration of black men on black women. From the article: "Between the ages of 20 and 29, one black man in nine is behind bars. For black women of the same age, the figure is about one in 150."

The Urban Prep Charter School

The graduation rate for African-American boys in Chicago is 40 percent. That city's Urban Prep charter school (previously noted in a March 20 posting) has announced that all 107 young black men in its first graduating class have been accepted by a four-year college.

From The Louisiana Gun

I don't know how to accurately describe this, so just click here and watch.

John Judis: Why Obama Isn't Black

In this New Republic article, Judis argues that President Obama "confirmed an enduring legacy of American racism" when he checked the "black, African American or Negro" box on the United States Census form.

Jack Balkin's Commemoration On Confederate History Month

This is definitely worth reading.

The Tiger Woods Ad

If you haven't seen it watch it here. After my first viewing the word "creepy" stuck with me for quite awhile.

Bullicide

On the rise of the bullying of young people and the disastrous consequences, check out this article.

Glenn Beck Compares Himself To Rosa Parks

For real. Seriously. This is not a joke.

35 Percent

That is the number of black males who enter college and graduate in six years (compared to 59 percent of white males, 46 percent of Latino men, and 45 percent of black females).

Happy Confederate History Month

Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell has issued a proclamation recognizing April 2010 as Confederate History Month. The proclamation does not use the word, and says nothing about, slavery as it declares that "this defining chapter in Virginia's history should not be forgotten, but instead should be studied, understood and remembered by all Virginians . . ."

McDonnell's action has been duly criticized as "bringing back ideas and symbols that many Americans--including many Southerners--find offensive and divisive. It could derail efforts to win favor among Democrats, not to mention Southern blacks, and it could drive a cultural wedge into the Republican Party as it looks for ways to win in November."

Update: Governor McDonnell has apologized for not mentioning slavery in the Confederate History Month proclamation. "The failure to include any reference to slavery was a mistake, and for that I apologize to any fellow Virginian who has ben offended or disappointed."

Black Barbie $3; White Barbie $5.93

These pricing choices were made by a Louisiana Wal-Mart store.

Is White The New Black?

Kelefa Sanneh discusses this question.

The End Of Income-Based School Integration Policy In North Carolina

On March 23 the Wake County, North Carolina board of education decided, by a 5-4 vote, to end its program of assigning students to schools on the basis of family income. The Economist discusses this development.

More Michael Steele

This ABC News report states that Republican National Committee Chair Michael (What Up?) Steele played the race card when asked "if he has a slimmer margin of error because he is African American." Steele stated that he tends to "come at it a little bit stronger, a little bit more street-wise, if you will. That's rubbed some feathers the wrong way."

Divorce Court

A recent Nightline program looks at the syndicated television show Divorce Court and Judge Lynn Toler, my law school classmate and moot court partner.

"The invisible underclass"

Gene Washington's Washington Post column on a horrific event "in the poorest, blackest, most crime-ridden quadrant" of Washington, D.C.

The All-White Basketball League

Another The Daily Show segment, this one on a poor soul who wants an all-white basketball league. I previously posted about this in February.

Fear Of A Black C-SPAN

Check out Jon Stewart on a racist caller to a C-SPAN program.

Receiving A High School Diploma--60 Years Later

Eight persons have been given honorary high school diplomas from a DeKalb County, Georgia school system that did not give such diplomas to African Americans more than six decades ago.

April 4

The date of the assassination of the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

President Obama Checks "African-American" On The Census Questionnaire

As reported by the New York Times.

A Belated Recognition Of The Birthday Of Cesar Chavez

March 28.

President Obama And His Black Critics

For those who contend that President Obama should have an explicitly black agenda and that he has not done enough for black communities, Angela Glover Blackwell presents this rebuttal.

Slow Jamming The Health Care Bill

This from Jimmy Fallon and Brian Williams.

"Why Are So Many Black Women In Poverty?"

Latoya Peterson takes up this question in her Salon article. From the first paragraph: "Black women have a median net worth of $5."

Did A Tea Partier Spit On A Black Congressman?

Some doubt that this actually happened. Here's a video--what do you think?

From Frank Rich

In his March 28, 2010 New York Times column Rich, discussing the anger over health care legislation, argued that the "conjunction of a black president and a female speaker of the House--topped off by a wise Latina on the Supreme Court and a powerful gay Congressional committee chairman--would sow fears of disenfranchisement among a dwindling and threatened minority in the country no matter what policies were in play."

And in his most recent column Rich writes that one of his friends, "a prominent liberal Obama supporter," "wondered if white liberals who voted for Obama expected a 'sweeping Republicans-be-damned kind of agenda' in part--and he emphasized 'in part!'--because 'they expect a black guy to be intemperate, impetuous, impatient' rather than 'measured, deliberate, patient.'"

Trying To Resuscitate A Possum

Donald Wolfe was arrested by authorities in Pennsylvania after he tried to resuscitate a dead possum on a highway. Can't (wouldn't want to) make it up.

In April 2006 Mitt Romney Said . . .

This about an individual health care mandate (as E.J. Dionne reminds us):

"By law, emergency care cannot be withheld. Why pay for something you can get free? Of course, while it may be free for them, everyone else ends up paying the bill, either in higher insurance premiums or taxes."

"Some of my libertarian friends balk at what looks like an individual mandate. But remember, someone has to pay for the health care that must, by law, be provided: Either the individual pays or the taxpayers pay. A free ride on government is not libertarian."

Calling President Obama "Buckwheat"

That's what Corey Poitier, a candidate for Congress in Florida, said. Check out this story.

Harris-Lacewell On "A Right to Life for the Living"

Melissa Harris-Lacewell shares her views on Georgia Right to Life's posting of billboards and efforts to encourage black women not to exercise their legal right to an abortion. The author notes that this effort "taps into the troubling legacy of eugenics-inspired efforts to broaden birth control access and legalize abortion" and that "[f]amily planning pioneer Margaret Sanger was a eugenics proponent who sought to reduce birthrates among the poor, the disabled and racial and ethnic minorities." Harris-Lacewell proposes additional billboards: "Poverty Is Genocide." "Inadequate Education Is Genocide." "Racism Is Genocide."

Segregated Schools In New York City

Nat Hentoff discusses the racial segregation of public schools in New York under the Bloomberg administration.