Politics
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Ben Carson Probably Isn’t the Key to Republicans’ Winning the White House
Give this much, at least, to the National Draft Ben Carson for President Committee: At the Conservative Political Action Conference this year, they went all out for their “candidate.” Carson addressed the crowd on the final day of this year’s CPAC—before Sarah Palin’s late-Saturday keynote—and autographed copies of his new book at a preferred-access signing…
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Memo to Rutgers: Don’t Boycott Condi Now If You Won’t Boycott Hillary Later
Put me down as a skeptic when it comes to Condoleezza Rice. Although she’s generally applauded for her barrier-breaking career in public service, as the first African-American woman to serve as secretary of state and national security adviser, “her signature ‘achievement’ in public life,” as I wrote a couple of years ago, “was co-signing Bush’s…
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‘Gladiator School’: FBI Investigates Idaho Private Prison for Abuse
The FBI has opened an investigation into one of the largest private-prison operators over its management of an Idaho prison with a reputation for violence, which inmates call “gladiator school,” according the Associated Press. Corrections Corporation of America, based in Nashville, Tenn., which has operated Idaho’s largest private prison for more than a decade, has…
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Condoleezza Rice Unwelcome at Rutgers’ Commencement
There’s little love for former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice at New Jersey’s Rutgers University, where faculty and staff are lashing out at the decision to invite Rice to be this year’s commencement speaker, Fox News reports. According to the news site, the New Brunswick Faculty Council officially called on the university’s board of governors…
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The History of Attacks by the Right on Civil Rights Defenders
It’s true that some U.S senators voted to kill the confirmation of Debo Adegbile as assistant attorney general for civil rights because they were concerned about the representation provided by Adegbile as a lawyer with the NAACP Legal Defense & Educational Fund to a man convicted of killing a Philadelphia police officer. Even though LDF’s…
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How the Kapor Center Serves as Our Brothers’ and Sisters’ Keeper
Cedric Brown sat three chairs down from President Barack Obama as he announced his My Brother’s Keeper initiative last week. But more importantly, moving forward, is that Brown has a seat at the table as the White House tackles the persistent crisis of young men of color in America. Brown and his colleague Nicole Sanchez…
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Senate Rejects Debo Adegbile to Lead Civil Rights Division
Republicans of the Senate, joined by a few defecting Democrats, successfully blocked President Barack Obama’s pick to lead the Civil Rights Division of the Justice Department on Wednesday, sparking the ire of the administration, the Associated Press reports. The final vote tally was a narrow 47-52 against moving longtime NAACP Legal Defense and Educational Fund…
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Hillary Clinton Stands by Her Comparison of Russia’s Putin to Hitler
At a Wednesday question-and-answer at UCLA, former U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton mostly stood by her earlier comparison of Russia’s Vladimir Putin to Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler, the Washington Post reports. “I just want people to have a little historic perspective,” Clinton said during the session, adding that she was merely pointing out similarity…
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Latino Leader Calls Obama ‘Deporter in Chief’
A Latino activist called President Barack Obama the “deporter in chief,” denouncing the administration’s deportation of nearly 2 million immigrants, the Associated Press reports. Janet Murguia, who heads the National Council of La Raza, didn’t just direct her anger over the deportations at the president. She also voiced her displeasure with House Republicans for stalling…
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Why Is Tim Scott Suddenly on a Black-Revival Tour?
If you’re looking into clues explaining Sen. Tim Scott’s (R-S.C.) recent revival of blackness, look no further than a recent Winthrop University poll of South Carolina GOP voters. It’s odd that pollsters would even ask largely white Republican voters in a hard red Southern state how they feel about their black Republican senator’s relationship with…