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GOP's Midterm-Election Nightmare Scenario
(The Root) — The conventional wisdom among the Washington, D.C., chattering class had been that the GOP — despite its dangerous display of extremism — was at little risk of losing a majority in the House of Representatives at the 2014 midterm elections. But a host of surveys and polling data suggests that the government…
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Top Black Techies: The Gadgets They Love
Teresa Wiltz is senior staff writer at Stateline, the journalism outlet of the Pew Charitable Trusts. Yes, we should all probably spend a little more time unplugging from the matrix. But who doesn’t love a good gadget? For starters, they make life easier. For those who care about that sort of thing, there’s cachet in…
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Quote of the Day: Eleanor Holmes Norton on Subjugated Groups
Read The Root’s coverage of Eleanor Holmes Norton here. Henry Louis Gates Jr. is the Alphonse Fletcher University Professor and founding director of the Hutchins Center for African and African-American Research at Harvard University. He is also the editor-in-chief of The Root. Follow him on Twitter and Facebook.
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Can Social Media Be Deadly?
The Miami Herald‘s Leonard Pitts Jr. checks in our growing tendency to focus on our screens instead of at what’s in front of us. The observation comes after the recent incident when San Francisco commuters were so engrossed in technology that they missed a man brandishing a handgun then shooting a passenger in the head.…
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Anti-Poverty Programs: Not Just for Mothers and Children
The federal government’s anti-poverty programs have largely ignored a vast number of childless adults living in poverty, the New York Times editorial board writes in a piece that disassembles the Republican Party’s relentless assault on the programs. For impoverished Americans, the biggest obstacle to health insurance remains the refusal of 26 mostly Republican-led states to expand their…
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Is Jesse Jackson Wrong About 'Obamacare'?
Writing at BET, Keith Boykin dissects the Rev. Jesse Jackson Sr.’s recent tweet that Obamacare is a derogatory term coined by failed Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney that should be retired. No matter what it’s called, Boykin argues, it’s time to put the beleaguered law to work. Rev. Jesse Jackson made an unusual announcement this week. On…
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Why the Senate Is Taking the Lead in Shutdown Talks
As the federal government shutdown heads into its second week, Senate leaders are poised to take over talks in an effort to reopen offices and avert a potential debt default. President Barack Obama met Saturday at the Oval Office with Democratic Senate leaders, including Majority Leader Harry Reid of Nevada and Dick Durban of Illinois,…
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Watch This: Malala Yousafzai Stuns Jon Stewart With Bravery
Comedy Central’s The Daily Show host Jon Stewart was left nearly speechless after 16-year-old Nobel Prize-nominee Malala Yousafzai, who survived a brutal attack by the Taliban last year because of her support for education, told him what she would do in the face of another assault. “I would tell him how important education is, and…
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Obamacare Critic Ben Carson Insults Slaves
(The Root) — If William F. Buckley Jr.’s definition of a conservative was someone who “stands athwart history yelling, ‘Stop’,” maybe Dr. Ben Carson’s idea of conservatism is standing athwart the present saying “slavery” as many times as he can. And if so, it’s a good way to grab headlines for himself. But it’s also…
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Quote of the Day: Gwendolyn Bennett on Black Beauty
Read the full poem here. Henry Louis Gates Jr. is the Alphonse Fletcher University Professor and the director of the W.E.B. Du Bois Institute for African and African-American Research at Harvard University. He is also the editor-in-chief of The Root. Follow him on Twitter and Facebook.
Black News and Black Views with a Whole Lotta Attitude
