Politics

In 1992, President George H.W. Bush held a closed-door meeting at the White House to discuss law and order after the race riots in Los Angeles. Bush and the other lawmakers in attendance received an unexpected visitor in Rep. Maxine Waters, then a freshman representative from South Central Los Angeles, who had invited herself into…

We just saw a big man take a big stance in Congress on the issue of spending—so big that for days he was willing to single-handedly delay a vote to extend health and unemployment benefits for thousands of jobless Americans. Republican Sen. Jim Bunning’s position that Congress should find other ways to pay for extending…

What is wrong with these black politicians? The headlines in the papers are dominated by black elected officials in trouble. There’s Rep. Charles Rangel, D-N.Y., stepping aside (temporarily) as chairman of the powerful House Ways and Means Committee. Then there’s Marion Barry, the former Washington, D.C., mayor, stripped of his chairmanship of a city council…

When President Barack Obama and former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney square off at the debate podium in the fall of 2012, it might be harder than you think to tell the two of them apart. They’re both Harvard lawyers. They’re both millionaires and devoted family men. As a college student, Romney completed a requisite Mormon…

Marriage Nearly half of black Americans have never married—the highest percentage for all racial groups. Only 30 percent of blacks are now married. Married couples make up nearly three-quarters of all U.S. families. Among black families that number falls to 44 percent. The Children Black kids in the United States are in deep trouble. Nearly…

by Lynette Holloway When Desiree Rogers quietly stepped down as White House social secretary last week, it came as no surprise to Chicago’s political movers and shakers, such as U.S. Rep. Danny K. Davis, D-Ill., a longtime African-American leader. “I never expected Desiree Rogers to make a career out of being a social secretary,’’ Davis…

Did the authors of the infamous “torture memos” get off scot-free? Recent news stories seem to suggest that attorneys John Yoo and Jay Bybee were exonerated when the Justice Department’s Office of Professional Responsibility decided not to issue a finding of professional misconduct against them. But a close examination of the 69-page memo makes it…

It would be difficult to overstate the significance and revelatory import of the Supreme Court’s long-awaited decision in North Austin Municipal Utility District(NAMUD) v. Holder – the case that challenged the constitutionality of section 5 of the Voting Rights Act.  We learn that the conservative plurality on the Court (minus Justice Thomas) has a pretty…