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Why a Supreme Court Challenge of Obamacare Matters
Despite the seemingly endless bad press that the rollout of the Affordable Care Act has received in recent weeks, supporters of the Obama administration and “Obamacare” could take comfort in one thing: Aside from Sen. Ted Cruz et al’s blustering, overturning Obamacare was virtually impossible. That is, virtually impossible at the legislative level, something critics…
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Why It Matters That Angelina Jolie’s White Child Plays With Black Dolls
Angelina Jolie is known for her unconventional family, which includes three biological children with longtime partner Brad Pitt and adopted children from Cambodia, Ethiopia and Vietnam. Her multiracial and multicultural family has generated headlines, most notably when critics have felt the need to weigh in on her Ethiopian daughter Zahara’s hair. Some challenged Jolie’s ability…
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Obama May Not Worry About His Safety. We Do
The 50th anniversary of President John F. Kennedy’s assassination generated extensive media coverage of what happened that fateful day in Dallas, fresh discussion of conspiracy theories about who was really responsible and nostalgia for the glamour of “Camelot,” in particular the 35th president and his iconic wife, Jackie. But one less-covered angle was the impact…
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Giving Black Boys a Chance to Run the Tech Industry
Last month Twitter found itself the latest major tech company to face criticism for a lack of diversity—a jarring lack of diversity, to be more precise. It was revealed that the company’s entire board of directors consists of white males. The revelation generated plenty of hand-wringing about a well-covered topic, namely the underrepresentation of women…
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A Get-Tough Obama Finally Emerges
Democratic Senate leader Harry Reid has generated most of the headlines for his willingness to “go nuclear,” specifically his willingness to, as the publication Politico put it, take the “unprecedented step of gutting Senate filibuster rules for presidential nominees on a straight party-line vote.” The move, which alters how the Senate has operated for more…
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How a Racist Serial Killer Restored My Faith in the Death Penalty
Last month, headlines blared, “U.S. Death Penalty Support Lowest in More Than 40 Years.” Based on that pronouncement, one might assume that an overwhelming number of Americans oppose the capital punishment. That assumption would be wrong. If anyone actually read past the provocative headlines and read the actual data, 60 percent of Americans still support…
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Funding Crisis Threatens Black Theater
With the success of films like Lee Daniels’ The Butler, 12 Years a Slave and now The Best Man Holiday, which surpassed box office expectations this weekend, 2013 is being billed as a banner year for African-American films. But while films with predominantly black casts are thriving, live theater featuring predominantly black casts is not.…
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Best Man Holiday: The Most Important Film of the Year?
Thanks to the critical and commercial success of Lee Daniels’ The Butler and 12 Years a Slave, 2013 is already being hailed as a banner year for black cinema. It is looking extremely likely that between the two films, African-American directors, writers and performers could dominate the next Academy Awards. But another “black” film was…
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Stop Apologizing: Start Firing
Yesterday the president said what every American not living under a rock already knew: “I mean, we fumbled the rollout on this health care law.” He also stated, “I think it’s legitimate for them to expect me to have to win back some credibility on this health care law in particular, and on a whole…
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Singer Attacks Sexism With Racist and Sexist Video
As the saying goes, the road to hell is paved with good intentions. Apparently so is the road to terrible music videos. English singer-songwriter Lily Allen seems to have decided to make a statement on the Miley Cyrus-ification of pop culture by making her latest video an in-your-face attack on the sexual exploitation of women…
Black News and Black Views with a Whole Lotta Attitude
