Politics
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Why Sen. Graham Got It Wrong
Sen. Lindsey Graham’s brief on behalf of beleaguered white men was delivered with a honeyed tongue and a swift blow from the first day of the confirmation hearings of Judge Sonia Sotomayor. His argument is instilled in his central thesis: If a white man had made the same statements as those made by Judge Sotomayor…
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No Empathy Debate for Regina Benjamin
When Hurricane Katrina flooded much of the Gulf Coast in 2005, Dr. Regina Benjamin’s rural health clinic in a south Alabama shrimping village was just one of the casualties, but despite all the chaos, the doctor’s patients didn’t suffer without medical care. Benjamin set up shop on the stage at the Bayou La Batre Community…
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Hearings Through the Looking Glass
“I am a Brooklynite, born and bred—a first-generation American on my father’s side, barely second-generation on my mother’s.” —Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg I am who I am in the first place because of my parents . . . My father was brought to this country as an infant. . . He grew up in poverty.…
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Obama Slated to Toss Out First Pitch at All-Star Game
According to NewsOne (via the AP): “President Barack Obama will be in the Fox broadcast booth for Tuesday night’s All-Star game. Fox spokesman Lou D’Ermilio said Monday that Obama will join Joe Buck and Tim McCarver for the telecast from Busch Stadium but that the inning had not yet been determined. Obama is scheduled to…
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Regina Benjamin Tapped as Surgeon General
From CNN: “President Obama announced Monday he has chosen Dr. Regina Benjamin, a family practice doctor from the Gulf Coast, to serve as surgeon general. The rural family physician has long provided medical care on the Gulf Coast. In 1990, she founded Bayou La Batre Rural Health Clinic in the fishing village of Bayou La…
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Emotion Denied
It’s after midnight. You’re a summer intern at the right-wing American Solutions foundation drinking your fourth room-temperature Honest Tea agave maté of the day out of an old Mountain Dew bottle so that your colleagues don’t mistake you for some kind of new-age Republican peacenik. You’re trying to figure out how to turn Judge Sonia…
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Philly Swim Club: 'Sorry for the Racis..er..Mix Up. Still Wanna Swim?'
From CNN: “A suburban Philadelphia swim club has invited children from a largely minority day-care center to come back after a June reversal that fueled allegations of racism against the club, a spokeswoman said Sunday. The development came during a hastily called Sunday afternoon meeting of the Valley Club in Huntingdon Valley, Pennsylvania. Club members…
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Digging Up Grave Sites and Reselling the Plot = Not Tight
From Reuters: Four Chicago-area cemetery workers were accused on Thursday of digging up hundreds of graves and dumping the remains so the burial plots could be resold, prosecutors said on Thursday. The office manager and three grave diggers at the Burr Oak Cemetery in South suburban Alsip were charged with dismembering a human body, a…
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Burris Says "No Mas"; Shan't Run in 2010
From the Chicago Sun-Times: ” Sen. Roland Burris (D-Illl.) will not run for election in 2010—a not surprising decision given that Burris, appointed by ousted Gov. Blagojevich to fill the seat vacated by Barack Obama had never created a political organization, raised virtually no campaign cash, and faced controversy from the start. Burris’ decision, reported…
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Eyes Off the Prize
Like millions of others, I’m still deeply moved by the wonderfully rich memorial service for Michael Jackson. But I can’t help but wonder whether Sheila Jackson Lee, D-Texas, is doing Michael Jackson, her constituents or black folks a favor when she promises to bring to the floor what will be a controversial resolution deeming Jackson…