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A Gray State for Obama?
John McCain has decided that if he is to have any chance of winning the election, he must win Pennsylvania. It is a shrewd, maybe desperate, calculation that speaks to today’s difficult political landscape. Pennsylvania has the second oldest population, and therefore is a natural demographic target for McCain. Not so fast. There has been…
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Home Court Disadvantage
When John McCain and Barack Obama face off this evening in the second of three presidential debates, it will be like nothing we’ve seen before in this campaign season. For 90 minutes, the television tit-for-tat, the rapid-response surrogate operations, and the e-mail alerts and reminders will take a back seat in what is sure to…
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No Backbone, No Bailout
John Boehner wept. Roy Blunt fiddled. Nancy Pelosi lamented. And on a day when the stakes could not have been higher, or the situation graver, nothing worked in Washington. On one of the most chaotic and stunning days on Capitol Hill in recent memory, the 110th Congress rejected the $700 billion proposed bailout of troubled…
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Test post
Test post: The quick brown fox jumped over the lazy dog. And then he jumped over it again. More after the (har) jump. Covers the White House and Washington for The Root. Follow her on Twitter.
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Dayo on Nutrition in New Orleans
Covers the White House and Washington for The Root. Follow her on Twitter.
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Talking Points
Barack Obama’s 2004 keynote speech at the Democratic National Convention contained sound-bite-worthy lines that would be replayed long after the ovation subsided. “There’s not a liberal America and a conservative America—there’s the United States of America,” he said. Despite his greenness—Obama had never before used a teleprompter—the reaction was titanic. Bill Clinton waited with throngs…
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How Can You Access Blocked Web Sites in China?
With the Olympics underway, Americans are devoting countless hours to Googling their favorite athletes and using the Web to find out all they can about China. But how free are people in China to interact online with fellow citizens and the world? How easy is it to surf the Web in China? The Chinese government…
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China's Long March Across Africa
By now, we’re used to seeing foreign fingers in the African pot. For the latest act of this timeless drama, one need look no further than the Chinatown in Lagos, Nigeria. For years, a small community of Chinese workers ran restaurants or sold textiles in the city; today, however, a walled-off square is brimming with…
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What Does a Taser Do to the Human Heart?
On January 17, 21-year-old Baron Pikes was stopped by the police. Nearly half a million volts of electricity later, he died on the street. Handcuffed, held down and stunned with a Taser-brand electro-weapon seven times before he died (and then twice more after that), Pikes’ heart, the coroner notes, simply gave out. Amnesty International estimates…
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Sketchy Imagery
Depending on whom you ask, the July 21 cover of The New Yorker has become cause for outrage, confusion and partisan glee. Given the flare-ups surrounding race and representation that have rocked the 2008 presidential race, it’s easy to treat the satirical cover—of a be-turbaned Barack and a be-afroed Michelle Obama—and other “racialist” images of…
Black News and Black Views with a Whole Lotta Attitude
