Civil Rights 2010: The struggle for quality education The Civil Rights Movement is alive and well in 2010.  There is no such thing as the "post-Civil Rights era," unless you are one of those rare individuals who assume that African Americans and others have already "overcome" racial discrimination and economic exploitation.    Read More ... Dr. Benjamin F. Chavis, Jr., NNPA Columnist

Ebonics a language? Thanks for confirming that In what resonates like a "Saturday Night Live" skit, the Drug Enforcement Administration recently sent memos to companies that provide translation services requesting help in finding nine translators who were fluent in ...  Ebonics.  Read More ... Tonyaa Weathersbee, Contributing Writer

Katrina, five years later This was the dream shared by the 2005-2006 kindergarten class at New Orleans West KIPP Academy in Houston, Texas-children who had just fled everything familiar in the wake of Hurricane Katrina. Five years later, for many of Katrina's children and families home is still not back to the way it was. New roadblocks keep appearing on the road to recovery. As the recent report The New Orleans Index at Five puts it, "It has been often said that New Orleanians are resilient.  Read More ... Marian Wright Edelman, NNPA Columnist

Nightmare, dream or in-between I was in a meeting on August 28 when a man referenced "two marches" and I nearly melted down.  I was appalled that anyone could manage to refer to equivalence between those who came to uphold Dr. Martin Luther King's dream 47 years later, and those who came to repudiate it.  Glen Beck, Sarah Palin and their colleagues need to be ashamed at their feeble attempt to "restore honor".  Restore.  Reclaim.  Give me a break.  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

No place to be somebody As I was preparing for an interview with R&B crooner Brian McKnight several years ago, I had a very interesting experience. On my way home from work I stopped to pick up some batteries and film for my camera and mentioned to the salesclerk that I was preparing to interview the singer later that evening. I had no idea that four young men were listening in on our conversation, but as I was leaving the store they approached me and bombarded me with questions about the interview.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

The 1963 March on Washington's rocky start The dueling events on the anniversary of the 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom have ended, but astoundingly little is known about the behind-the-scenes maneuvering that at several times threatened to derail the march where Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. delivered his famous "I Have a Dream" speech.  Read More ... George E. Curry, NNPA Columnist

Children need emergency help in this deep recession Children have only one childhood and it is right now. Millions of children in our nation require emergency attention in our recession ravaged economy as poverty, including extreme child poverty, hunger, and homelessness have increased, if irreparable harm is not to be inflicted on them and on our nation's future.  Read More ... Marian Wright Edelman, NNPA Columnist

Katrina revealed race and poverty Much as the Emmit Till murder did 55 years ago Hurricane Katrina pulled back the cultural curtains and revealed the intersecting roads of race and poverty in the United States of America. In both cases, America's egalitarian myth of civility to all her citizens was shattered by the photo of Till's open casket in Chicago (Jet Magazine) and news images (CNN) of African Americans treated as animals and "refugees" in New Orleans.  Read More ... Gary L. Flowers, NNPA Columnist

Prioritizing the education of our children first It is always interesting to note how the interests and issues concerning the education of African-American children throughout the United States are articulated and prioritized.  President Barack Obama's courage to advance the cause of educational reform in the interests of African-American and other children across the nation is noteworthy.  Read More ... Benjamin F. Chavis, NNPA Columnist

Was Speaker Pelosi's 'swamp' a black thing? It was a very proud moment in the career of Nancy Pelosi, a child of a Baltimore, Maryland mayor and the wife of a millionaire wheeler dealer.  Here she was bringing down the gavel on the U.S.  House of Representatives and calling it to order as the first female Speaker of the House.  In setting her platform she concentrated on corruption of all things.  How do you police corruption in a chamber of politicians?  It is very hard to do, in fact, impossible.    Read More ... Harry Alford, NNPA Columnist

Were you there? Sunday marked the fifth year since Hurricane Katrina devastated the city of New Orleans and other towns along the Gulf Coast.  Although five years have passed since everything we took for granted ceased to exist, it still feels like very little time has passed and not enough progress has been made since those dark days.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

America — The new Third World? I thought I had seen it all during the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina when thousands of people waited for days at the convention center for a drink of water, where some of them died in the hot sun and the rancid water, where thousands more were holed up in the Superdome in conditions that rivaled foreign prisons, and where many who were looking for food in order to survive were accused of looting and subsequently shot down like stray dogs.  Read More ... James Clingman, NNPA Columnist

Get out and vote As we approach the fifth anniversary of Hurricane Katrina and continue to grapple with the aftershocks of the Gulf oil spill, let us be ever mindful of the fact that we might have been able to bounce back better and quicker from both catastrophes if we had been more actively engaged in the political process.  Read More ...

It’s time for hanging the status quo in our schools In late July, both President Obama and Secretary of Education Arne Duncan spoke to the National Urban League’s Centennial Conference about what the President called “an issue that I believe will largely determine not only African-American success, but the success of our nation in the 21st century — and that is whether we are offering our children the very best education possible.” Right now, of course, the answer is no so President Obama and Secretary Duncan were there to speak about the Admini­stration’s plans for education reform.  Read More ... Marian Wright Edelman, NNPA Columnist

March for jobs and justice wherever you are We have to thank Rev. Al Sharpton and other Civil Rights leaders for turning our attention to the atrocity planned by Glenn Beck, Conservative Fox TV talk-show host, to have a rally on the Lincoln monument on the anniversary of the March on Washington. Rather than “restoring honor” as they say, this march, heavily supported by the Na­tional Rifle Association is a perversion of the progressive spirit of the original nonviolent march, which held out the hope of racial reconciliation and that America would finally cash a check of justice that would allow all of us to invest in the great project of Democracy.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Questions for Katrina and beyond As we approach the fifth anniversary of Hurricane Katrina and try to move beyond the recent Gulf oil spill, it is important that we continue to ask questions about the way we do things in Louisiana and what our decisions and priorities say about us. In that spirit, here are some of the questions on the minds of many who call this city and state home:  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Senate again denies justice to Black farmers For more than 10 years, tens of thousands of Black farmers have been denied justice and a share of a $1.25 billion government settlement as compensation for decades of discrimination in federal farm loan programs. Many have lost their farms waiting. Some have died waiting. And on August 5, before going on its summer recess, the Senate prolonged the wait by failing to once again appropriate the funds to right this egregious wrong.  Read More ... Marc H. Morial, President/ CEO, National Urban League

The New York mosque controversy I watched with outrage as a debate over the placement of a mosque near Ground Zero in New York took place. The proposed mosque had been suggested as a symbol of tolerance in a society that is becoming less tolerant. The response, particularly led by right-wing Republicans, was outrageous in the extreme.  Read More ... Bill Fletcher Jr., NNPA Columnist

Yeah, we ‘be’ geniuses It never ceases to amaze me when I witness firsthand just how beautiful, brilliant and creative we are as a people. Oh yeah, we be geniuses.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Putting it out in the open More than a week ago, the public learned that board of the newly proposed LSU teaching hospital (slated to be built on top of a 19th-century, predominantly African-American neighborhood in Mid-City) met in secret. Now, our editors have heard rumors of a possible second secret meeting under the guise of a “social event,’” despite the barrage of criticisms that hospital supporters and opponents alike levied last week — criticisms that such closed gatherings violate the state’s “sunshine laws.”  Read More ...

Five years after the levees broke On August 29, we will commemorate five years since Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans, and since subsequently levees broke, drowning the city in toxic floodwater. Five years ago our nation exhibited some of the most profound indifference to human beings as thousands of New Orleanians were stuck without food, water, or sanitation in the Superdome.  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

Institutional racism in Congress The sensational exposes about Rep. Maxine Waters have failed to relay an important fact to the public about why she arranged meetings between herself, a bank, and former Treasury Secretary Paulson. It had to do with trying to support the survival of the Black economic infrastructure which had been hit hard by the financial crisis the country faced. Rep. Waters has for a long time been an advocate for Black businesses in the Congress, essentially because they had been marginalized and excluded routinely. Here, she took over the role of Parren Mitchell of Baltimore who was their champion, but who left the Congress with an illness.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Let’s reclaim the Dream on August 28 Forty-seven years ago, our nation was in the midst of uncertainty, trepidation, fear, frustration, anger and unrest. Forty-seven years ago, we were simultaneously hopeful, dedicated, ambitious, determined and resilient.  Read More ... Rev. Al Sharpton, NNPA Columnist

Put on your marching shoes While many bankers, corporate executives, and Congressional members are preparing for summer vacation, Americans left behind are losing homes, hope for employment, and help for failing farms. When all else fails, people of conscience must take a public stand and petition for legislative relief.  Read More ... Gary L. Flowers, NNPA Columnist

Social Security: The 75-year-old lifeline for many African Americans Just like the years fly by as we age, it’s hard to believe it’s been 75 years since Social Security was first created. And for many Americans of all generations, and of all ethnic backgrounds, Social Security is a lifeline. To fully celebrate this historic anniversary, we need to recognize the program’s importance and its value for future generations.  Read More ... Catherine Georges, NNPA Special Commentary

Blacks split with Obama over education reform At the recent National Urban League convention, President Obama's speech took aim at criticisms that had been launched by the Black Civil Rights community over the educational reforms proposed by Secretary of Education Arne Duncan.    Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist - 1 opinion posted

High-level lucrative hustling It is always somewhat amusing to watch Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton hustle the Democratic Party. They appear like magic at any event even remotely connected to race and issue declarations, proclamations and platitudes denouncing whoever was responsible and predicting havoc if something isn't done about it. Usually, the something being done ended in goodies for Brother Jesse, and Brother Al and some of their posse.  Read More ... A. Peter Bailey, Contributing Columnist - 1 opinion posted

Lessons from the Shirley Sherrod case In life, there are lessons we all must learn. Making mistakes and evolving past them is, after all, the ultimate form of growing and developing oneself. Shirley Sherrod, the now infamous victim of a right-wing smear attack campaign, discussed her own personal evolution at an NAACP gathering several months back, when her comments on racial harmony were erroneously taken out of context.  Read More ... Rev. Al Sharpton, NNPA Columnist

Respect overdue It’s easy to see why Jerome Smith, volunteer director of the Tremé Community Center, was recently named a finalist for the Community Champion award sponsored by General Mills.  Read More ... 1 opinion posted

We can’t extend the Bush tax cuts It took three months and a stern presidential scolding for the United States Senate to pass legislation that would extend unemployment insurance for more than 2.5 million Americans who have been out of work for a long time.  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

Where’s the outrage? After viewing and reading about the two stories FOX8 News recently ran about what appears to be a blatant misuses of public funds by some employees of the New Orleans Sewerage & Water Board and the New Orleans Public Belt Railroad, I have one question: Where's the outrage?  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Education is the key As a brand-new school year approaches, the entire community needs to take time to reflect on the importance of education to the future of our children and our children's children. Since antebellum times, education has been seen as one of the pivotal keys to lifting Africans in America up from bondage and peonage to freedom and economic independence.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Full employment is needed fast While most of the media nation was transfixed by a diversionary-racist smear campaign against United States Agriculture employee Shirley Sherrod on the issue of perceived racial animus — an issue deserving full attention on another day — President signed legislation to extend unemployment benefits to the long-term unemployed. By the president’s signature, the jobless were given a little relief to their lack of financial resources in a critically depressing economic period many refer to as the Great Recession.  Read More ... Gary L. Flowers, NNPA Columnist

It takes a fool to learn… Three weeks ago, a two and a half minute video clip showing Shelley Sherrod, who as of three weeks ago was director of the state of Georgia’s Rural Development for the U.S. Department of Agriculture, allegedly making ‘reverse-racist’ comments at a March NAACP local banquet went viral. She told how 24 years ago she hesitated to give full service to a poor white farmer because of his racial attitude.  Read More ...

It takes leisure to write ‘What a Wonderful World’ So we’re lazy. That’s the result of new study printed by Businessweek.com. Cursorily examining data from the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, a new report found that Louisianans are active only two and a half hours a day, a pittance compared to the laborious instincts of other Americans.  Read More ...

NAACP’s appalling attack—and retraction After hearing Minister Louis Farrakhan roundly denounced by Black and Jewish leaders in 1984, purportedly for describing Judaism as a “gutter religion,” I called Farrakhan before writing a story for the Chicago Tribune. Farrakhan denied he had ever described Judaism as a gutter religion and offered up his life to anyone who could prove he had made such a comment.  Read More ... George E. Curry, NNPA Columnist - 1 opinion posted

Race, heat, economic light: Advancing economic justice Last week, President Obama signed legislation implementing financial reform and extending economic benefits.  He also endorsed legislation that would make it easier for women to get equal pay in the workplace. It was a week when the economic justice agenda was advanced in many ways.  And it was a week when race dominated the airwaves.  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

The real Sherrod injustice: Right-wing vs. Black farmers (New America Media) - Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack was direct, forceful and blunt when he declared this week that the USDA does not tolerate racial discrimination. This was Vilsack's widely circulated public explanation for firing Black civil servant Shirley Sherrod. There are two problems with this.  Read More ... Earl Ofari Hutchinson, Guest Columnist - 1 opinion posted

The sky is falling in Louisiana after the oil spill The "Rally for Economic Survival," organized and or­ches­trated by the oil industry drew thousands to the Cajun­dome in Lafayette, Louisiana last week. "No Moratorium" and "Drill baby Drill" were the T-shirt slogans of the day. State officials made no bones about their willingness to have an open slugfest with the federal government. As the Lt. Gov­ernor ranted: "We are not going down without a fight."  All well and good, and there are certainly logical arguments against a long-term moratorium in the Gulf.  Read More ... Jim Brown, Guest Columnist

Urban League celebrates 100 years The National Urban League was founded in crisis 100 years ago as an organization devoted to paving the way for African-American men and women migrating from southern farms to northern cities in search of jobs and a better life.  Together we have made great strides and have torn down many of America's ugly walls of discrimination and injustice - from the segregated water fountain to the separate and unequal classroom to the whites-only Oval Office.   So, there is much to celebrate.  But there is also much unfinished business.  Read More ... Marc H. Morial, President/ CEO, National Urban League

100-degree weather and all is not well You may remember the snow storms that hit the Mid-Atlantic and Northeastern USA in February 2010. The storms were nearly unprecedented and buried the region, particularly paralyzing cities that were not used to such levels of snow. The aftermath of these storms was nothing short of bizarre.  Read More ... Bill Fletcher Jr., NNPA Columnist

BP is déjà vu Yes, we have experienced such a cocky, greedy and arrogant bunch of business raiders before. Remember Enron and how about that old MCI? Business circles called them “cowboys” as they were wild and appeared to be racing to a particular end. They thought that end would be big pots of gold and treasures beyond belief.  Read More ... Harry Alford, Contributing Columnist

Has journalistic integrity become an oxymoron? What has happened to journalism when personal bias and political agendas have come to so dominate the coverage of particular news stories that the very concept of objectivity has almost become the enemy of daily reporting?   Two stories this past week, from the left and the right, both demonstrate a truly terrifying trend in the direction of journalism, a trend that stretches at best from obfuscation and out-right lies to at worst, believe it or not, laziness that has become so indicative of the hyperlink culture of the blogosphere that politically motivated columnist remain unwilling to do the most basic research if the falsehood damages their political opponent.  Read More ...

Right tries to block NAACP criticism of Tea Party racism It was another right-on-time moment that Ben Jealous exercised at the NAACP Convention in calling out the Tea Party for coddling elements of racism within their midst. The Convention went on to passed a resolution to this effect, calling on the leadership of the party to repudiate these elements, but it will not become official until approved by the Executive Committee in October.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist - 2 opinions posted

Watch your mouth That's a lesson I learned years ago. There's no denying the power that words have. That's why the elders used to tell members of my generation, "Watch your mouth, child."  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

What the Tea Party really stands for When we study the intense struggle for civil rights in this nation, we quickly — and rightfully so — find ourselves analyzing the life and legacy of the great Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.  Read More ... Rev. Al Sharpton, NNPA Columnist - 1 opinion posted

Jobs and Justice: Then and now On August 28, 1963, during the “Civil Rights Movement,” a rainbow of people—Red, Yellow, Brown, Black, and White—traveled to Washington, DC to protest the lack of Jobs and Justice for African Americans. Forty-seven years later not much has changed in some ways, but a lot has in other ways.  Read More ... Gary L. Flowers, NNPA Columnist - 1 opinion posted

Don’t sit on your hands this Fall “If the teachers sit on their hands this fall, it would be a disaster for Obama and the Democrats,” said a scholar who follows educational politics last week.  Read More ... Julian Bond, NNPA Guest Commentary

LeBron fever LeBron fever is over, at least for now.  Last week, unprecedented attention was paid to the decision of a 25-year-old athlete about where he will play pro basketball next year.  For the record, Miami won, Cleveland lost and New York, Chicago and dozens of other hopeful cities were left out in the cold.  But the LeBron James story is about more than a big-money salary and winning and losing on the basketball court.  For many of the athlete’s urban suitors, it was a desperation jump-shot designed to do what the Congress has so far failed to do — create private sector jobs bill that will put Americans back to work.  Read More ... Marc H. Morial, President/ CEO, National Urban League

Living like we’re bulletproof Indian-American Governor Bobby Jindal has agreed to allow concealed handguns inside Louisiana’s churches, mosques and synagogues, prompting anti-gun violence activists up in arms against the controversial move.  Read More ...

Not lily-white, just non Black— A correction and a comment Last week, I wrote that the Senate might be an all-white affair, given that the Illinois Senator, Roland Burris, is on his way out, and the most competitive candidate for the United States Senate, Congressman Kendrick Meek of Florida, is facing major challenges.  I wrote that the Senate might be all white.  I was wrong.  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist - 1 opinion posted

Reform equals progress I read an article on Sunday, July 11, 2010, in the Washington Post entitled "Reform" (with form spelled upside down) by Michael Lend with little concurrence. Not only was the word reform disjointed, but also yellow-colored arrows flowed from the word in haphazard directions akin to its misdirection of American public policy history.  Read More ... Gary L. Flowers, NNPA Columnist

Trying to satisfy our curiosity It's hot and humid with no sign of fall weather on the horizon. With the start of football season still weeks away and fewer opportunities to attend seafood boils, what else is there to do but sit on the porch with a pitcher of lemonade and ponder questions about life's many unanswered questions. Here's a little something to get you started:  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

An all-white Senate? There have only been six African-Americans in the United States Senate in history, and two — Hiram Revels and Blanche Bruce — served Mississippi during Reconstruction as appointed Senators.  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist - 1 opinion posted

Education: Still a civil rights issue President Johnson was on the frontlines in our battle for civil rights. And he understood - before so many others did - that education is a civil rights issue. He made elementary and secondary education the cornerstone of the War on Poverty. He understood that our entire society benefits when every child has a chance to succeed.  Read More ... Congresswoman Gwen Moore (D-Wis.), NNPA Special Commentary - 1 opinion posted

Obama’s speech on immigration reform, a high moment of vision In the wake of divisive and ill-conceived actions by states, President Obama delivered a much needed policy statement on immigration reform. It is my hope that it will bring light to dark places and place this important debate on a clear, objective footing, beyond the ideological rhetoric and partisan politics of the day.  Read More ... Rev. Jesse Jackson, NNPA Guest Columnist - 1 opinion posted

Republicans move against federal worker unions The one thing that I have to give the Republicans is their tenacity. They simply do not give up. They are like pit bulls. On Wednesday, June 30,  they demonstrated this again with an attempt to eliminate what is known as “official time” for federal union officials doing representation work to serve their members.  Read More ... Bill Fletcher, Jr., NNPA Columnist - 1 opinion posted

Say what you need to say Mel Gibson has to be one of the greatest actors on the planet. He actually had me - and probably hundreds of millions of others - believing that he was a decent human being.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor - 1 opinion posted

Supreme Court contributes to lethal violence There’s a war going on outside. Despite the public’s belief, this war isn’t confined to the battles waging in Iraq or Afghanistan. Nor is it occurring only in distant lands like Nigeria or Thailand. There is another conflict much closer to home taking place virtually every single day in cities and towns all across this nation.  Read More ... Rev. Al Sharpton, NNPA Columnist - 1 opinion posted

Trying to make sense of the senseless Must everything be rendered into the Halls of Congress or the Chambers of the State Capitol? Has common sense so left us as a society that we must legislate every activity, allowing or restricting activities that — by definition — defy common decency?  Read More ...

Let us reclaim the ‘dream’ on Aug. 28 It was 1963. The nation was at a virtual boiling point. Despite marked gains in the civil rights struggle from integrating lunch counters and universities to equalizing buses, the fight for justice was far from over.  Read More ... Rev. Al Sharpton, NNPA Columnist - 1 opinion posted

Republican radicals reject unemployment fund extension As part of the current unemployment crisis, at last look there were 453,000 claims for insurance, a number that is likely to surge when part-time government workers employed on the Census end their term this summer.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist - 3 opinions posted

The water’s edge There was a sense of unity, that transcended partisan differences, to rebuild lower Manhattan and bring those who instigated the tragedy to justice.  Read More ...

Trashing an Icon? No big deal Seems that Republican lawmakers, egged on by their wingnut brethren, have begun to see civil rights and all things associated with it as a reminder of President Barack Obama's ascendency, and not as a triumph for a nation mired in racial injustice.  Read More ... Tonyaa Weathersbee, Contributing Writer - 1 opinion posted

Who should really be drug tested? Utah Senator Orrin Hatch has a proposal for the unemployed. He wants them drug tested before they can receive unemployment benefits. Hilarious!  With unemployment rates at 9.7 percent, with nearly six million Americans out of work for at least six months, with more than a million people without support since their unemployment benefits have run out, Hatch proposes drug testing for unemployed people.  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist - 1 opinion posted

Appreciating Rev. Jackson The Rev. Jesse Louis Jackson, Sr. has been an advocate since his high school freshman days when he, among the Greenville Eight, protested segregated library practices.  As a student at North Carolina A&T State University, he was part of the actions to integrate the city, involved with the phenomenal Bennett Belles who were the backbone of that movement.    Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist - 1 opinion posted

Does the private director ‘do it better’? The disaster in the Gulf of Mexico with the non-stop oil leak raises a question that few mainstream commentators are addressing:  what does this say about the private sector?  Read More ... Bill Fletcher, NNPA Columnist

Got love? Do you treat others with love, compassion and respect? Do you look out for your neighbors, classmates and colleagues and treat them the way you would like to be treated? When you are exhausted or busy, do you still summon the energy and compassion to show genuine concern for others? Do you listen with loving, patient ears to your friends and loved ones?  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

High school graduation days defy purveyors of gloom and doom I recently attended the 136th graduation ceremony of Armstrong High School in Richmond, Virginia. My granddaughter, Tiara, was one of 205 seniors receiving diplomas from the historic high school whose alumni include Samuel Gravely, Jr., the U.S. Navy’s first Black admiral, L. Douglas Wilder, the nation’s first Black state governor, Spotswood Robinson III, a Brown vs. Board of Education attorney and Max Robinson, a pioneering national television anchor.  Read More ... A. Peter Bailey, Contributing Columnist

Let’s take back our jobs I hear some folks saying they want to take back their country.  I want to take back our jobs.   I have just read a study produced by Vice President Joe Biden’s office about the performance of Stimulus funding which shows that it has taken many of the “shovel-ready” projects that were proposed 18 months ago that amount of time to be really ready now.  This has led the New York Times to note that there will be an “explosion” of Stimulus funded construction projects this summer.  In fact, the White House has dubbed the coming employment opportunity as “Stimulus Summer.”  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist - 1 opinion posted

We’ll soon wish we still had ACORN ACORN, the community organizing group that became an obsession of right-wingers appalled that scores of Black people dared to exercise their right to vote in 2008, was recently vindicated by the General Accountability Office.  Read More ... Tonyaa Weathersbee, Guest Columnist - 1 opinion posted

‘Pelicans over people?’ The damage to the Gulf's ecological system will be felt for at least the next generation. However, an article in the June 13 edition of the Washington Post  entitled, "One bird's odyssey through the oil" has ruffled my feathers. While I am eco-friendly and respectful of the plight and flight of birds the meticulous attention to the pelicans of the Gulf pales in comparison to that of people in need-both homeless and unemployed.  Read More ... Gary L. Flowers, NNPA Columnist

Don’t be fooled by a few glimmers of hope A few months back, Marc Morial of the Urban League, Benjamin Jealous of the NAACP  and I met with President Obama in the White House on a day that could best be described as troublesome and unpredictable.   Read More ... Rev. Al Sharpton, NNPA Columnist - 1 opinion posted

Obama’s oil spill leadership The charge that the oil spill in the Gulf is Obama’s Katrina is bogus because there was no comparison between the swift manner in which he deployed his administration to deal with the crisis and Bush’s approach to Katrina.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist - 1 opinion posted

Things fall apart: The BP oil spill I was twice introduced to the poem in college, first in a class that required the study of English poets, then in a class that examined African literature, including the powerful novel of Nigerian colonization by Chinua Achebe, ironically titled, Things Fall Apart.  The poem is so emblazoned on my brain that from time to time it comes to mind, most recently when I contemplate the BP oil spill, its damages, its consequences, and its handling.  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

When we were kings Almost every day we read or hear about something that attests to the historical greatness and significance of Africa. And almost every other day, someone comes along to try to refute that greatness as if Africa's role in the history of the world diminishes or cheapens the historical reputation and legacy of his or her reference group.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Artur Davis uses post-racial politics in Alabama and loses When Artur Davis, savvy member of the Congressional Black Caucus, filed to run for governor of the state of Alabama it provoked one of the biggest head-scratching discussions among Blacks in Washington, DC.  Was he smoking something, they mused,  was it a case of unmitigated arrogance for which politicians are too well  known, or was it just a case of taking the new ideology of post-racialism for a ride in one of the toughest arenas in the country?    Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist - 1 opinion posted

Civic education leads to empowerment Once upon a time in the United States of America school districts mandated that students be proficient in “government” or civics classes. In 1970 (the year I entered the first grade) government and civics classes were watered down and replaced “social studies.” The result was predictable: The average IQ of most Americans—particularly African Americans—decreased.  Read More ... Gary L. Flowers, NNPA Columnist - 1 opinion posted

Must be the music Remember the good ol' days when you could turn on the radio and hear something uplifting? You know, back in the day when you could hear Earth, Wind & Fire tellin' sistas to "Be Ever Wonderful" or local funksters Chocolate Milk tellin' folks that "all you got to do is let down your hair and be free"? I certainly remember.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Our jobless recovery Our economy generated about 431,000 jobs last month. Good news?  Only if you don’t count the fact that more than 400,000 of the jobs were temporary jobs connected to collecting data for the Census. Those jobs won’t last for long and when the dust clears the current 9.7 percent unemployment rate, down from 9.9 percent a month ago, is likely to rise again.  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist - 1 opinion posted

The power and force of Black Music Month Music has been an important piece of my life. As a political activist I have used music to motivate myself and inspire others. I have seen the power of the lyrics move people to great heights. Melodies backed by instruments have been a source of continuous encouragement and a vehicle which crystallizes ideas. Apart from humming to myself to a favorite tune or tapping on desk to a wonderful melody, music has also given me food for thought. This is why I join people all over the country in celebration of June as African American Music Appreciation Month a.k.a. Black Music Month.  Read More ... Nicole C. Lee, NNPA Columnist

Mobilize for jobs There are two bills in Congress now that could potentially put considerable new resources into communities with high unemployment around the country to create jobs.  The first is the $118 billion bill, H. R. 4231, that is essentially designed to extend unemployment insurance and provide tax incentives to companies to create jobs. That is being put on the fast track to pass before politicians leave for the recess in June to campaign for re-election.    Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist - 1 opinion posted

To the core America as a nation is racist at its core. Its core values are based in racism and its primary practices are portrayed through racial discrimination and segregation. Racism is a word that most intelligent African Americans rarely refer to without very careful study and consideration of the incidents they are describing. Incidents are documented daily and throughout each day in which African Americans being excluded, overlooked and denied deserved opportunities.  Read More ... Akwasi Evans, NNPA Guest Columnist - 1 opinion posted

When the problem is us As I left work Thursday, I learned of the murder of a 18-year-old man who was gunned down in the parking lot of the Walgreens drugstore at the corner of Robert E. Lee Blvd. and Elysian Fields Ave. by three unidentified men. The incident troubled me and left me with more questions than answers about the future of Black New Orleans.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor - 1 opinion posted

When will we stop burying our children? People often ask me to deliver words of comfort and strength during some of their most challenging moments in life. Through­out the decades, I have stood side by side with family members of those that have been wrongfully killed in acts of violence — whether those acts were committed by police or from within the community itself.  Read More ... Rev. Al Sharpton, NNPA Columnist - 1 opinion posted

Blame Obama all the time But at this stage of the crisis, the article felt decidedly like there was some culpability of Obama for not having had his Minerals Management Service regulate oil drilling more vigorously.  This doesn’t wash, because it’s like blaming the Obama administration for not being able to see into the future, but it is consistent with the way in which he has been viewed increasingly.    Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist - 1 opinion posted

If you are really angry about immigration In the aftermath of the extremely racist Arizona anti-immigrant legislation-SB 1070-and the fact that opinion polls seem to indicate that a majority of the public supports this obliteration of basic human rights, it is worth asking a few tough questions.  Let's start with these:  Read More ... Bill Fletcher Jr., NNPA Columnist - 3 opinions posted

People are ready for change—again It seems as if every time we turn on our television sets and tune in to the day’s news, we are almost immediately inundated with numbers and percentages from various polls.  Many often utilize these polls for their own political advantage, while others are accused of steering the public’s views with the use of polling data.  But if we are to take the stats at face value, we can easily see one undeniable theme:  the country is ready for change yet again.     Read More ... Rev. Al Sharpton, NNPA Columnist - 1 opinion posted

Questions? Try as I may to plug up the question well with every imaginable method known to modern man, I can’t seem to stop the seemingly endless, massive flow of questions about elected officials and current events. Here are the latest:  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Why Paul’s racism is so easily dismissed? The first ones appeared at Tea Party tax day rallies; gatherings where racists posing as patriots hoisted signs filled with racial slurs and incendiaries and caricatures of President Obama as a primitive chieftain with a bone in his nose.  Read More ... Tonyaa Weathersbee, Contributing Writer - 1 opinion posted

Worse than Katrina When the now infamous offshore BP oil rig first blew up, some called it another Katrina and many of us took that as an insult. The pain and suffering caused by Hurricane Katrina (August 2005) were biblical and were fanned by the slow response of our own federal government.    Read More ... Harry Alford, NNPA Columnist

The short run and the long haul I was among the many who were disappointed that President Barack Obama did not nominate an African-American woman to be an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court. After all, there are six white men, two women — one Latina and one white — and a nominal African-American man on the court. Why not an African-American woman?  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist - 2 opinions posted

Slips of the tongue? There were two incidents last week that underscored how important it is that people of color and those committed to justice, fairness and democracy remain vigilant.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Lena Horne did much more than an entertain When we reflect on the civil rights struggle within this nation, we often focus — and rightfully so — on the works of the great Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. In school, students learn of the boycotts and sit-ins that transformed the landscape of everyday American life. And those of us that lived it, remember signs that read “Whites only,” the segregated schools and the countless marches that eventually united and integrated society.  Read More ... Rev. Al Sharpton, NNPA Columnist

How about getting a Black person on the Supreme Court? It's been a long time since Thurgood Marshall served on the highest court in the land; I think it's time we get another Black person on the bench. We have a "Black" president who has now nominated two females, one white and Jewish, and one Hispanic and Catholic. Now we have six Catholics and three Jews on the Court, and no Blacks or so-called Protestants, the most prevalent religious segment in the United States. Hmmm.  Read More ... James Clingman, NNPA Columnist - 1 opinion posted

Dora the Explorer helps prepare children for school Is every child in your community ready to start school? This may seem like a strange question to families still finishing up their plans for summer vacation. But in reality, it's never too soon to start making sure children are prepared for their first day of school. That includes children for whom kindergarten is still a few years down the road.  Read More ... Marian Wright Edelman, NNPA Columnist

Beware of the value-added tax I’m reminded of Emperor Nero playing the violin as Rome burns to the ground. Our elected officials continue to write pork barrel projects and take our deficit into territory that threatens our very future. We are in debt by $13 trillion and virtually ignore that. By printing more paper dollars we increase our reliance on our number one debt holder — China. Greece has fallen with Argentina, Portugal, Ireland and Spain getting ready to drop in like fashion.  Read More ... Harry Alford, Contributing Columnist

Flawed education plan needs a safety net In order to gain admittance into all four-year Louisiana colleges and universities that are supported by state-assisted funding, prospective first-time students must meet certain admissions requirements, including a composite score of 20 on the ACT and passage of certain core curriculum courses.  Read More ... 1 opinion posted

Kent State and Jackson State: 40 years later A couple of weeks after the May 4, 1970 killings of four students at Kent State by National Guards troops during an anti-Vietnam War demonstration, word spread throughout my high school regarding the killings of two Black students at Jackson State College (now University).  Read More ... Bill Fletcher Jr., NNPA Columnist

Opposition to immigrants is nothing new in the U.S. After passing the most draconian immigration bill in U.S. history, Phoenix's government is not only serving its residents with legal racial profiling, harassment and an environment of hate-mongering, but it is in effect impacting the civil liberties of all Americans around the nation - and of course those who seek to come here.     Read More ... Rev. Al Sharpton, NNPA Columnist

Questions? Although the seasons change and temperatures rise and fall in Louisiana, there are always questions that beg to be answered. Below are some of the questions on the minds of many who call this city and state home:  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Take racism out of immigration reform For my money the debate over immigration reform is far too narrow.  Our civil rights leaders have followed the predictable dynamic created by Hispanics who have justly mobilized to normalize their status in America.  We should support them because the stakes of strengthening our coalition at this moment in history will bear substantial fruit as both groups become a larger part of American society, its political system and its economy.  So, it is a civil rights struggle to oppose the racist law passed by the Arizona legislature to profile Hispanics and relate any illegal acts to their immigration status.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Tea Party driven by fear, stale ideology and a dwindling white population I first advanced this thesis a few months ago. Now it appears others commentators are beginning to reach the same conclusion (see Frank Rich op-ed piece in the New York Times 5-5-'10). The thesis essentially goes as follows: The conservative Tea Party Movement and much of the right-wing opposition to President Obama are primarily driven by the fears of a white population which is rapidly declining as America's majority.  Read More ... Robert James Taylor, Guest Columnist - 2 opinions posted

Wake up, Louisiana Louisianans, particularly those of us in its coastal region, stand to endure the damage of a massive spill, destroying our remaining fisheries, decimating our few coastal wetland hurricane protections, and rendering much of our state toxic for years to come, and we endure all of the above knowing that everyone has benefited from our most precious natural resource but the people of the Pelican State.  Read More ...

Mexicans deserve less blame than Americans So, now some rightwing pundits are blasting critics of Arizona's racist immigration law of caring more about protecting undocumented lawbreakers than good, law-abiding citizens like Robert Krentz Read More ... Tonyaa Weathersbee, Guest Columnist

Mexicans deserve less blame than Americans His slaying, it seems, helped to ratchet up the xenophobia that led Arizona's governor, Jan Brewer, to sign a law that all but guarantees that police will be harassing Latinos for offenses as minor as jaywalking - just to force them to prove that they're supposed to be walking in the United States in the first place.  Read More ... Tonyaa Weathersbee, Guest Columnist

New immigration law in Arizona reminiscent of King Holiday repeal WASHINGTON (Special to the NNPA from the Arizona Informant) — In the late 80s Republican Governor Evan Mecham, set-off a bomb that cost the state of Arizona millions of dollars in tourist and convention business when he repealed the Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Holiday.  Read More ... Floyd Alvin Galloway, Contributing Writer

Professor Gates and the blame for slavery Like everyone else who read Professor Skip Gates’ piece in the New York Times asserting that Africans were just as responsible for slavery as Europeans, I was aghast because he is one of the most acclaimed scholars in the country and his position lends credibility to those who oppose an historical corrective for the oppression of African peoples. Admittedly, my concern also arises from the publication of my most recent book on Reparations, The Price of Racial Reconciliation in which I take a strong position favoring Reparations as a long time member of this movement.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist - 1 opinion posted

Bill O’Reilly’s obsession with ‘playing the race card’ So-called conservatives in this country spend much of their time accusing Black folks of “playing the race card” when practically any comment is made about expressions of white supremacy. The leader of the conservative mantra on this subject is Fox “fair and balanced” Cable News’ reigning propagandist, Bill O’Reilly.  Read More ... A. Peter Bailey, Contributing Columnist

Blacks with guns? When the so-called pro-gun demonstrators decided that April 19th would be their day to “march while packing” (weapons), the first thing that I said to my wife was this: “So, what would happen if hundreds of Black folks were to go to a national park fully armed and march?”  Read More ... Bill Fletcher, NNPA Columnist

Displacing the displaced: Results of current policy in Haiti Last week, I asked a young journalist why he decided several months ago to begin his career in Haiti. He told me that journalists must go where the silence is. For years I have been a student of Haiti, and I have observed the unbearable silence that threatens every Haitian, both in Haiti and abroad.  Read More ... Nicole Lee, NNPA Columnist

I love this place There’s the uniqueness and sassiness of the people. The sights and sounds of the city. The many culinary masterpieces. The way we celebrate life and honor the passing of loved ones. Our defiant refusal to allow Mother Nature to make us give up our way of life. The flavor and vibe of nights here, where the sacred and the profane are constantly intertwined.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Imagine: Protest, insurgency and the workings of white privilege Let's play a game, shall we? The name of the game is called "Imagine." The way it's played is simple: we'll envision recent happenings in the news, but then change them up a bit. Instead of envisioning white people as the main actors in the scenes we'll conjure-the ones who are driving the action-we'll envision Black folks or other people of color instead.  Read More ... Tim Wise, Contributing Columnist

The Black side I just finished watching The Blind Side, One reviewer described the film as “The remarkable true story of Michael Oher, a homeless African-American youngster from a broken home, taken in by the Touhy’s, a well-to-do white family who help him fulfill his potential.”  Read More ... Phill Wilson, NNPA Columnist

A call for education equity Title I was created "to ensure all children a fair and equal opportunity to obtain a high-quality education." However, the formula for distributing Title I funds is stacked against the very children it was most intended to help. The current formula (a complex combination of four formulas) favors large districts regardless of their child poverty rate while children trapped in areas of concentrated poverty in mid-sized cities and rural districts are seriously disadvantaged. The inequities between and within states are blatant and must be rectified in this reauthorization cycle.  Read More ... Marian Wright Edelman, NNPA Columnist - 1 opinion posted

Confederate history is supremacy history Last week, Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell proclaimed April Confederate History Month in his state.  In fact he proclaimed the date on April 7, which is the same day in 1865 that Confederate general Robert E. Lee began to negotiate the terms of surrender with United States General Ulysses S. Grant.  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

Dr. Benjamin L. Hooks— A true Civil Rights giant The National Urban League joins the nation in mourning the passing of civil rights pioneer, Benjamin Hooks.  A recipient of the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2007, Dr. Hooks was one of the nation’s most revered champions of racial reconciliation.  He served as executive director and CEO of the NAACP for 15 years, from 1977-1992.  Read More ... Marc H. Morial, President/ CEO, National Urban League

Happy people A recent study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that interviewed 1.3 million people found that when it comes to happiness, Louisiana residents are tops in the nation.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Obsession with skin color is still an American problem The April 4 observation of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s bloody death in Memphis produced another round of speech excerpts of him saying his dream was to see people judged on the basis of their character, not their skin color.  Read More ... Michael McMillan, NNPA Guest Commentary

This time they beat up white guys Police brutality in Prince George's County, Md. is legendary.  There have been scandals after scandals for at least the last 50 years.  Much of it has spread across the border into Washington, DC.  It is bad and wide scale and it is also tinged with Black and Hispanic inclusion.    Read More ... Harry Alford, Contributing Columnist

Black Union soldiers marched into Richmond on April 3, 1865 When speaking to Black students on predominately or overwhelmingly white college campuses where they have been disrespected by a demeaning skit or other presentation by some of their white peers,  I tell them to stop weeping and wailing about their feelings being hurt.  Read More ... A. Peter Bailey, Contributing Columnist

Don’t let the corporations steal our voice Whether it was David Walker’s Appeal for action against the horrors of slavery published in 1829, the cause of Cinque and the Amistad slave ship revolt in 1841, the words of abolitionist Frederick Douglass, the oratory of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., or the fiery rhetoric of Malcolm X—the power to speak, to challenge, to rally, to defend, and to define have been crucial for us as a people.  Read More ... James Rucker, NNPA Guest Commentary

HBO’s lilywhite World War Cable television's largest movie channel, HBO, has proudly shown two fictitious (they want you to believe it is a documentary) classics about World War II.  Band of Brothers dealt with the European Theater and now Pacific is portraying the battles of the Pacific from a very racist point of view.  Despite the fact that hundreds of thousands of African Americans gave their blood, sweat and tears to this noble challenge these shows are void of any Black participation.  Read More ... Harry Alford, Contributing Columnist

How health-care reform helps you Health care reform means accessibility. The new law expands coverage to 32 million more people. This helps guarantee that 94 percent of Americans will be covered. It prevents insurance companies from discriminating based on pre-existing conditions, health status, and gender. It ends recissions, which means health plans cannot drop you if you get sick. The law also prohibits plans from placing lifetime caps on coverage.  Read More ... U. S. Rep. Carolyn Cheeks Kilpatrick (D-Mich.), NNPA Special Commentary

Will Obama fight for a liberal on the Supreme Court? The coming resignation of Justice John Paul Stevens from the Supreme Court sets up a new fight for his successor and a question that I -and others - have is will President Obama appoint someone as liberal as Stevens has become.  An indication of where the President might be coming from is the comment that he made when the Citizens United case was decided last year.    Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

A grisly tale Nothing anyone could have seen or heard thus far about the Danziger Bridge shootings that claimed two lives and left four other New Orleans residents wounded could have prepared them for the barbarity and brutality described by former New Orleans police officer Michael Hunter last week.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

A time to break silence Some will notice that the title of this missive comes from Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s  speech, “Beyond Vietnam: A Time to Break Silence,” when he challenged the war then being waged in the name of global anti-Communism that conflicted with fighting the evils of racism, militarism and materialism at home.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

It always leads back to race In the end in the United States, as evidenced by the furor over passing of the Health Reform Bill, it always leads back to race. Those American Tea Party protesters who screamed racial epithets at Black members of Congress and who waved signs whining that “Obama Plans White Slavery,” once again illustrated that those who exult over a “post-racial” America are, to put it mildly, living in some kind of fantasyland.  Read More ... A. Peter Bailey, Contributing Columnist

The Black Press: A weapon in the Black freedom struggle I was privileged to attend the Annual Conference of the National Newspaper Publishers Association (NNPA), the trade association for more than 200 newspapers in Black America. I was also honored to receive NNPA's North Star Community Service Award, which is named after the militant newspaper founded by Frederick Douglass in 1847. It was a real treat to have the opportunity to meet and interact with Black writers and publishers from around the country.  Read More ... Dr. Ron Daniels, Guest Columnist - 1 opinion posted

The dangerous drift back toward segregated schools Two recent decisions by school boards in North Carolina are local signs of a troubling national trend towards resegregation in public schools. In New Hanover County, which includes Wilmington, parents and advocates spent much of last year debating a new middle-school redistricting plan that would focus on "neighborhood schools," essentially resegregating the schools by race and economic class because our neighborhoods look that way.     Read More ... Marian Wright Edelman, NNPA Columnist

Moving toward change Last week's bloody headlines about quadruple murders and multiple shootings across New Orleans brought to mind the 1990s when there seemed to be no end to the bloodshed and cops like Len Davis and Antoinette Frank were more interested in working as hired killers than protecting and serving the people of New Orleans.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Questions? Intellectual curiosity is a beautiful and empowering thing, for in asking questions and seeking answers we experience growth, enlightenment and understanding.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Your rights under siege in Baton Rouge Two bills proposed for this legislative session could deprive literally hundreds of thousands of individuals of critical information from the state-and eventually their parish sheriffs, councils, and school boards-the kind of information that robs a citizen of his or her home or property.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

U. S. lags in world technology The World Economic Forum released its Global Information Technology Report last week, providing an analysis of the network infrastructures of 133 countries.  While the United States likes to project itself as the most advanced in many things, including technology, this report ranks the United States as fifth, after Sweden, Singapore, Denmark and Switzerland.  That's right, the country that is often considered the "biggest and the baddest" ranks as only the fifth most networked country in the world.  When it comes to broadband adoption, we rank 22nd!  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

The hate spasm in American politics Speaking at the recent conference of the Veterans of the Civil Rights Movement in Jackson, Mississippi, I constantly ran into questions and comments drawing comparisons to the racial harassment faced by civil workers in the 1960s and what is occurring today.  Most said there was very little comparison to the intensity of the racism faced by those who attempted to vote or eat at a lunch counter, and we know that many sacrificed their lives.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Jobless tea partiers live in fear, denial Supporters hold flags and signs as the Tea Party Express makes a stop at the Utah State Capitol in Salt Lake City Tuesday.   A recent story in The New York Times verified much of what I had already suspected about the Tea Party movement.  Read More ... Tonyaa Weathersbee, Guest Columnist

Right-wing Republicans masquerade as tea baggers Despite efforts to depict the so-called tea bag protesters as part of an independent political movement, new polling data reveal that approximately three-quarters of them are Republicans or lean toward the GOP and 77 percent of them voted for John McCain in 2008.  Read More ... George E. Curry, NNPA Columnist

DOA promises improvements in civil rights, fair share in advertising WASHINGTON (NNPA) - Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack has promised Black newspaper publishers that the department, with its long history of documented race discrimination, will do better at civil rights and the fair dissemination of advertising dollars in coming months and years.  Read More ... Hazel Trice Edney, NNPA Editor-in-Chief

Beyond the rhetoric amidst the economic mess, new Black candidates arise Yes, and that is a very blessed thing.  The Old Guard seems to be moving slower than ever and the “Party Loyalists” are clamoring for fresh ideas — ideas that they are not receiving from their leadership.  The economy is in the tank and all they are concerned with on Capitol Hill is Healthcare.  Read More ...

Health care: Finally a semblance of justice It was the second annual convention of the Medical Committee for Human Rights in 1965.  And during this conference in Chicago, our great civil rights leader, the Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., delivered a speech that till this day resonates with those who see disparity in our healthcare system.  Read More ... Rev. Al Sharpton, NNPA Columnist

On speech and accountability The U.S. Constitution’s First Amendment states, “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.”  Read More ...

Racism is a pre-existing condition When the House of Representatives passed healthcare reform, they made history.  Never mind that the victory was a narrow 219–212, with 31 Democrats deserting their party on this vote.  Never mind that not a single Republican voted for healthcare reform.  It was about time that the myth of bipartisanship bit the dust, about time President Obama shrugged of the role of conciliator and healer, embracing his mandate as change agent instead.  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist - 1 opinion posted

Reckoning and retribution In 1984, John Thompson was railroaded by the New Orleans criminal justice system. Twenty-six years later, the same criminal justice system is trying to find a way to avoid making amends for a despicable act that landed Thompson on Louisiana's death row.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Responding to the jobs crisis The National Urban League has released the 34th edition of the State of Black America, our annual assessment of the economic and social progress, or lack thereof, within the African-American community.  The highlight of the 2010 report is our yearly Equality Index, measuring the status of African Americans, and for the first time, Hispanics, relative to whites in five key areas:  Read More ... Marc H. Morial, President/ CEO, National Urban League

The Black Agenda There never has been a time when Black folks in America did not have an agenda, from when we tried to avoid captivity in Africa to be sent here, to when we were in the holds of slave ships, or on plantations planning ways to survive and to escape, or those of us today still trying to obtain the promised vestiges of freedom and equality.  The Black Agenda is our Black survival grocery list and Travis Smiley is right, to a great extent it is also an "American" Agenda.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Attach education program to the budget package We often teach our children that a solid education is the key foundation for their future, no matter what their personal ambitions may be.  Education brings a world of opportunities, opens the door for intellectual development and advancement in society, expands a student’s horizons,  and, at the very least, provides a support mechanism for improved quality of life.  Collegiate education is, after all, often the difference between a minimum wage job and the pursuit of the American dream.  Read More ... Rev. Al Sharpton, NNPA Columnist

Black political power impossible without Black economic power Unfortunately, most Black folks consistently ignore the fact that an individual or group of people can never achieve political power without having economic power. The best one can do in that situation is to have varying degrees of political influence. However, if you have economic power, political power automatically follows.  Read More ... A. Peter Bailey, Contributing Columnist

Ethics and Black politics I am writing a piece that may unsettle a number of readers. Over the last several weeks there have been a number  of allegations against Black politicians for inappropriate conduct of various sorts.  I do not want to get into the details of each case.  When we do that we often lose the forest for the trees.  There is, however, a problem and I am writing to flag it.  Read More ... Bill Fletcher Jr., NNPA Columnist

Tea Party, Coffee Party: Why not a Black Party? Now we have the Coffee Party, which I suppose is a liberal counterpart to the Tea Party that emerged in the Washington, DC area by folks led by Annabel Park, a documentary film maker who was horrified by the ugly, menacing and anti-government spirit of the Tea Party crowd that emerged to disrupt the flow of civil discussion about important issues.  I’ve been asking, where are the folks who voted for Barack Obama, believing in Hope and Change and pining for a new post-Bush, post-Conservative America?  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

The agenda after health care Is the passage of healthcare reform a foregone conclusion?  At this writing, Democrats lack enough votes in the House of Representatives to pass even a watered-down version of the initial legislation because, on the left, there is opposition to the absence of a public option and because, on the right, there are objections to market manipulations.    Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

American workers owe the Labor Movement Americans today are indebted to the labor movement of the United States of America. The American labor movement has transformed work life for all people—whether union members or not. How much money workers make; how many hours are worked; under what conditions; and whether collective bargaining is a part of the process is directly attributable to the struggle for workers’ rights.  Read More ... Gary L. Flowers, NNPA Columnist

Jim Crow in Silicon Valley is exposed This is the age of high technology. IT companies are leading the way in job growth and high-paying jobs as the word does business at the speed of thought. No place else in the world concentrates in this industry better than the Silicon Valley of California (Palo Alto — San Jose area). So with California having a minority population of 52 percent logic would dictate that this is a place of much diversity and opportunity for Blacks and Hispanics.  Read More ... Harry Alford, NNPA Columnist

Mo'nique's Oscar- victory and setback The comedienne, talk show host and actress Mo'nique has become only the fifth African- American woman to win an Oscar. Her portrayal of Mary Jones, the revolting and depraved mother of Precious, was arguably masterful, and she now joins Hattie McDaniel (who played a maid), Halle Berry (who played a sex-starved fool), Whoopi Goldberg (who played a medium in Ghost), and Jennifer Hudson (who played a singer).  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

Obama targets HBCUs for increased spending As the proud graduate of an histor­i­c­ally Black university and having worked in one for most of my academic career, I approve of President Barack Obama having broken his pledge not to govern by race or ethnicity just in time to increase spending for HBCUs. These institutions are still vitally relevant to the production of a Black middle class because, while they only constitute three percent of all institutions of higher education, they graduate 20 percent of all Black undergrads.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

The Danziger plot thickens With the second guilty plea in the Danziger Bridge shooting case in less than a month, the plot begins to thicken as New Orleans residents and others wonder how far-reaching the conspiracy to conceal what took place on the eastern New Orleans bridge on September 4, 2005 might go and how far federal prosecutors might have to go to root out all the bad apples in the New Orleans Police Department.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Drum roll in the White House When is the last time you have heard a rousing HBCU drum roll in the White House?  According to President Barack Obama and some of his handlers, Friday, February 26, was actually the first time, The Virginia State University Trojans were “in the house,” accompanied by their Congressman Bobby Scott (D-VA), and preceding a ceremony during which President Obama signed a new Executive Order affirming the White House Initiative on Historically Black Colleges and Universities.  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

Black pro-lifers should stop the scare tactics According to the Centers for Disease Control, Black women have 37 percent of all abortions. Davis told the Times that if 18,870,000 Black babies hadn't been aborted since Roe v. Wade, Black people "would be 59 million strong - more than 19 percent of the population."  Read More ... Tonyaa Weathersbee, Contributing Writer

I am empowered — are you? “I pledge to responsibly commit my time and talent to ensure that the nation is empowered to eliminate racial gaps and disparities in housing, education, employment and healthcare by 2025…”    Read More ... Marc H. Morial, President/ CEO, National Urban League

Que pasa? It's spring in New Orleans and the minds of residents are stirring with questions about the way the city is being run and many of the things they see on the evening news. Here are some of the questions on the minds of many of the folks I've talked to recently:  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

The Obama record There is a lot of misinformation circulating on talk radio, at town hall meetings, in the blogosphere, and around office water coolers about President Obama. It is time to set the record straight with a list of Obama's initiatives (through February 5, 2010).  Read More ... Robert P. Watson, Ph.D., Guest Columnist

Black and blue justice Just weeks after winning the Super Bowl and electing a new mayor, New Orleans appears to be on the verge of purging a police department that some have described as vile, brutal and vindictive. Because of the nature of the racially explosive case at the center of the federal investigation that led to a conviction of a former New Orleans police officer last week, this presents a major post-jubilation examination for the Who Dat Nation.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

How the CBC can create jobs Recently, the Congressional Black Caucus held a press conference and stated they wanted more attention given to the dismal unemployment rates in our communities.  This was a noble and very responsible move on their part.  There is something else they can do that will directly address the problem.  It is right before our eyes and the time to act is now.    Read More ... Harry Alford, NNPA Columnist

In the Republican Party, who’s playing who? Just last week, Politico reported that Steele is making his duties as GOP national chairman too cushy for the party's major donors. Says he's spending twice as much as his predecessors on private planes, private cars, flowers and meal expenses that jumped from $306,000 in 2005 to $599,000.  Read More ... Tonyaa Weathersbee, Contributing Writer

Stimulus plan averted a second great Depression Although President Obama’s $787 billion economic stimulus plan created or saved enough jobs over the past year to prevent the United States from plunging into the second Great Depression, most Americans grossly underestimate what the package has accomplished.  Read More ... George E. Curry, NNPA Columnist

The 1958 Wichita Sit-in My friend George Curry reminded me of something in his article on "Being True to Black Historymakers" when he said that in this year when we celebrate the 50th anniversary of the Greensboro Sit-in that we must remember "they were not alone."  It is true that these students were not alone, because in August of 1958, those of us in the NAACP Youth Council of Wichita, Kansas targeted the lunch counter at the Dockum Drug Store in the heart of town for a Sit-in demonstration because they, like so many other establishments, did not let Blacks eat there.  After about six weeks of Sit-ins that drew 20-40 young participants, we successfully desegregated, not just Dockum Drugs, but the Rexall chain of drug stores in that state.   Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Avatar and Tarzan Most Americans over 45 years old remember the movie Tarzan, King of the Apes. For those younger, Tarzan, the movie, was set in the jungles of Africa and falsely depicted natives as primitive and backward. That is, until baby Tarzan is raised by the natives and taught their social mores and cultural rituals.  Read More ... Gary L. Flowers, NNPA Columnist

Black leaders in the White House: What happened, what next? Recently, Dorothy Height of the National Congress of Negro Women, Rev. Al Sharpton of the National Action Network, Ben Jealous of the NAACP, and Marc Morial of the National Urban League, wrote President Barack Obama asking for a meeting about the state of Black employment and with the ensuing invitation, all but Height went to the White House in a snow storm for a one hour meeting.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Celebrating our history As we move beyond the New Orleans Saints' first Super Bowl victory and the 2010 Carnival season, it is time to pause to acknowledge and celebrate the contributions of people of African descent to the United States and the rest of the world.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Children who go to bed hungry in the U.S. Picture a small child, no more than 10 years old, who is forced to leave school, say goodbye to his/her friends and abandon the only home they ever knew.  Imagine this young boy or girl milling through piles of garbage for scraps of our leftovers, and then illegally working an odd job to bring in a few dollars for the family.    Read More ... Rev. Al Sharpton, NNPA Columnist

The meaning of the jobs meeting It was good to see the photo of NAACP President Ben Jealous and National Urban League President Marc Morial leave the White House, snow hip deep, after they met with President Barack Obama to talk about the ways the unemployment crisis is affecting African Americans.    Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

The New Orleans Saints and Obama Time has passed since the Super Bowl and the glorious victory of the New Orleans Saints, but I find that I keep coming back to that game, and not for the reasons that you might think.  The Indianapolis Colts were supposed to win that game.  They are an outstanding team with an outstanding quarterback and head coach. Everyone knew that it would be uphill for the Saints.  Read More ... Bill Fletcher Jr., NNPA Columnist

It’s Tea Party racism Following the Tea Party phenomenon and watching its recent convention, it was interesting to see media folks and Tea Party representatives struggle with the question of why so few Blacks were there.  This is not a new thing, since the philosophical base of the Republican Party has been the Conservative movement for some time and their conventions have also been lily white.  But the emergence of the Tea Party phenomenon should cause us to ask how far it is from bonafide anti-Black White nationalist politics striving to enhance its role in the political system.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

‘Now, who are your people?’ As we celebrate Black History Month, we must be reminded of the great civil rights organizer, intellectual and teacher Ella Baker's question, "Now, who are your people?"  Ella Baker was keenly aware that we are a product of many people who sacrificed for us-both in political and personal terms. Baker herself represented "our people"-she worked tirelessly from Harlem to Montgomery to organize for people's rights the United States. Some have called her the most influential woman in the civil rights movement.  Read More ... Nicole C. Lee, NNPA Columnist

Obama’s undying faith in the GOP You would think that after Republican leaders in the House and Senate united to oppose every major initiative that President Obama has proposed - ignoring how Americans would benefit from such programs - that he would finally get the message. Unfortunately, he hasn't.  Read More ... George E. Curry, NNPA Columnist

Remember Malcolm Sunday, February 21, marks the 45th anniversary of the assassination of Malcolm X, one of the world's most brilliant, courageous and visionary freedom fighters  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

The audacity to adopt The recent tragedy in Haiti has no doubt seized our attention while simultaneously tugging at our heart and purse strings. And rightfully so. As I watched the news reports and looked at the devastation I began to wonder … what will happen to the Black children who have lost all they have ever known … including their parents?    Read More ... Wendell F. Phillips, NNPA Guest Commentary

Being true to Black history makers The news media is fascinated with anniversaries, especially those ending in round numbers. Therefore, it came as no surprise that the 50th anniversary of the Greensboro lunch counter sit-ins was celebrated this week. On February 1, 1960, four students from North Carolina A&T University — Ezell A. Blair, Jr., David L. Richmond, Joseph A. McNeil and Franklin E. McCain — initiated a successful effort to desegregate the lunch counter at the downtown Woolworth’s  store.  Read More ... George E. Curry, NNPA Columnist

Black History Month marks launch of NUL centennial This year, Black History Month coincides with a historic milestone of the National Urban League:  our 100th anniversary.  Fittingly, this year’s theme, “The History of Black Economic Empowerment,” tracks the organization’s century-long mission.         Read More ... Marc H. Morial, President/ CEO, National Urban League

Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), 50 years later Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s birthday every January becomes an occasion for looking back at the legacy of the Civil Rights Movement. As the celebration of the King Holiday leads into February and Black History Month, it’s a time to consider not only how far we’ve come but how far we still have to go, and to reflect on some of the milestones in movement history. This year, one of those national and personal milestones is the 50th anniversary of the founding of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC).  Read More ... Marian Wright Edelman, NNPA Columnist

United States Senate has false fear of filibuster Last week, many of us watched with anxious anticipation the State of the Union Address by President Obama. The President opened with light-hearted recognition of recent Democratic political losses in Massachusetts, New Jersey, The Commonwealth of Virginia, and the The Commonwealth of Massachusetts.  Read More ... Gary L. Flowers, NNPA Columnist

We cannot be silent President Barack Obama’s State of the Union Address is a testimony to the power of we:  we, who dared to dream breaking the centuries-old color barrier at the White House was possible; we, who continue to fight for expanding voting rights; we, who battle tirelessly every election to maximize voter participation and minimize voter intimidation.  His first State of the Union address is a paean to those who have joined together throughout history to change our country for the better.  Read More ... Benjamin Todd Jealous, NNPA Guest Commentary

What would you sit in for? It has been 50 years since four young North Carolina A&T State University students sat in at a segregated Woolworth's lunch counter for a cup of coffee, 50 years since their action triggered a movement that challenged, and ultimately changed a nation.  While a gala and concert were snowed out, thousands will line the streets of Greensboro to celebrate the museum's opening.  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

Who dat questions   •  Regardless of the outcome of the Super Bowl, how many grown folks are going to be in any kind of shape Monday morning to drive their kids to school?    • Who really believes that there are "JUST" going to be 200,000 fans gathered for Tuesday's Super Saints Parade?  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

A good start for Obama, but much more to do After one year in office, America’s first Blackberry President has found that in the age of tweeting, texting and daily polling, there is no shortage of those eager to judge his performance based on fragments of information that may not always be accurate.  We will resist the urge to join the fray.  No grades from me for Mr. Obama.  But that does not mean we have no opinion on his first year as President.  Read More ... Marc H. Morial, President/ CEO, National Urban League

Court decision complicates Black Power The Supreme Court, in its recent decision in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission, may have complicated the growth of Black elected officials by their 5-4 conservative majority giving corporations carte blanche authority to directly spend money in elections  Read More ...

Haiti is crying out for help In 1964, the world honored the greatest civil rights leader, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., with the Nobel Peace Prize for having contributed the most to the furtherance of peace among men.  He was — and is — upheld to the highest standards of dignity, humanity, strength and philanthropy.  Always on the side of the down trodden, and diligently working to empower the disenfranchised, MLK dedicated his life to assisting those who were the most fragile among us.  Read More ... Rev. Al Sharpton, NNPA Columnist

Massachusetts’ Coakley in context: She ran a lousy campaign Massachusetts Attorney General Martha Coakley was a lousy candidate who ran a lousy campaign and lost her bid for Ted Kennedy's Senate seat as a result.  Instead of preserving 60 filibuster-proof votes for Democrats, she handed the Massachusetts senatorial seat to Republican Scott Brown on a silver platter.  And, as they are entitled to, Republicans are celebrating, dubbing the extremely conservative Mr. Brown as "41" and suggesting that his election signals a Republican resurgence.  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

Pundits are not policy makers on Haiti Twenty-four hours a day since Tuesday, January 12, we have watched tens of thousands of Haitians in a slow death after having  their homes, schools and workplaces fall on top of them. Many more will die of thirst, hunger and disease as they wait for relief operations. But the real horror of the Haitian tragedy will come if we allow U.S. and world response policy to be crafted by the ignorant and misinformed who have microphones and access to the editorial pages of major newspapers.  Read More ... Nicole C. Lee, NNPA Columnist

Who Dat trippin’ on the Big Easy? As if the people of New Orleans didn't have enough on their plates with local elections, Mardi Gras and the Super Bowl on the horizon, they are now forced to deal with the NFL's attempts to dictate to the city how it watches and commemorates this year's unprecedented success.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

African-Americans divided into two basic groups Most African Americans are very reluctant to admit that there are basically two groups of Black people in this country. As we enter into a new year, it is time to confront this obvious reality so we can better plan a more productive present and future for our people.  Read More ... A. Peter Bailey, NNPA Columnist

Haiti: Crisis and opportunity Much of what I feel about the monumental crisis in Haiti is similar to the Katrina hurricane in that it was a man-made event waiting to happen. Haiti has existed in the backwater of the most powerful country in the world for 200 years as the poorest example of human hospitality.    Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Limbaugh, Robertson remarks show what crazy looks like As President Barack Obama directs aircraft carriers and transport planes jammed with food, medicine and as physicians, relief workers and journalists risk their lives to help beleaguered Haitians, the callous, venomous statements of Rush Limbaugh and Rev. Pat Robertson show just how irrelevant the GOP has become.  Read More ... Rev. Dr. Barbara Reynolds, NNPA Religion Writer

Make your vote count With early voting already underway, the city of New Orleans is moving closer to electing a new mayor, City Council members, an assessor and judges.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

The enormity of what happened in Haiti cannot be fully realized Nicole C. Lee NNPA ColumnistI write this column with a broken heart.  The evening of January 12, I received a message from a friend that read, “Earthquake. Very bad. Many deaths.”  That statement remains true and will remain true for weeks and months to come.  Read More ... Nicole C. Lee, NNPA Columnist

We’ve made great strides, but we have yet to recover Two thousand and nine was an historic year.  We began on a triumphant note with the inauguration of Barack Obama, our country’s first African-American president.  Yet there was no time for celebration—there was other history in the making.  Read More ... House Majority Whip James E. Clyburn (D-S.C.), NNPA Special Commentary

After Reid, will Blacks finally question Democratic leaders? Democratic Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid's characterization of then-candidate Barack Obama's chances to win the presidency because he is a "light-skinned" African American "with no Negro dialect"- well, was right. All Reid left out was the fact that Obama was "male," because let's face it, that helped too - that and the fact that he spoke English better than any other Black man who had ever run for President and didn't sport a perm or an Afro.  Read More ... Jasmyne A. Cannick, Guest Columnist

Criticism, criticism, criticism I think that the pundits and the public should face up to one fact.  The mess that President Barack Obama inherited will not be fixed in one year, or two or possibly even during his entire term.      Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Haiti's sin On Wednesday, televangelist Pat Robertson made a tragic situation worse by suggesting that Tuesday's devastating earthquake in Haiti is evidence that the small Black nation has been "cursed" for making what the minister calls "a pact with the devil."  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor - 2 opinions posted

On MLK Day, Inaugural Anniv.: Has Obama kept his promises to Blacks? WASHINGTON (NNPA) - On Nov. 3, 2008, an important telephone conference was held in Black America. That was the day that then candidate Barack Obama, on the eve of his historic election to the presidency, promised African-American leaders and representatives across the nation that if elected, he would never forget that Black people are specifically and disparately hurting from social ills.      Read More ... Hazel Trice Edney, NNPA Editor-in-Chief

Reid spoke the awful truth about Obama's racial exceptionalism Senate Majority leader Harry Reid apologized profusely for his unguarded quip that Obama's light skin and non-Negro dialect put him in good standing with him and by implication with other whites.  Read More ... Earl Ofari Hutchinson, Guest Columnist

U.S. Census Bureau says many Blacks still identify themselves as 'negro' WASHINGTON (NNPA) - In March, many of the estimated 145 million households who receive the Census Bureau's shortened questionnaire for the nation's decennial headcount may be full of raised eyebrows when they get to question 9, which asks about a person's race.  Read More ... Pharoh Martin, NNPA National Correspondent

W.E.B. DuBois was right The problem of the twentieth century, wrote scholar-activist WEB DuBois in 1903, is the problem of the color line, the relation of the darker to the lighter races in Asia and Africa, in America and the islands of the sea."   Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

AG Holder picks up Black male theme Attorney General Eric Holder in a few recent speeches at the Roosevelt, NY Memorial Presbyterian Church, at a church in Queens, NY, and at a Townhall meeting at Morehouse College in Atlanta has rehashed the theme of the irresponsible Black male.  It seems like something of a campaign by President Barack Obama and his Attorney General that sounds so much like the conservative playbook on race we have witnessed for the past 30 years.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Cheney’s sorrow about the failure of Christmas Day bombing attempt When reading, hearing or watching the reactions of former Vice-President Dick Cheney and his ideological comrades to the failed attempt to bomb the Northwest-Delta airplane on Christmas Day, 2009, one could almost believe that they are truly sorry that the attempt was unsuccessful.  Apparently their distaste of President Obama being in the White House is so intense and so pervasive that they will do, say or support anything that they believe will destroy him politically.  Read More ... A. Peter Bailey, NNPA Columnist

Resurrecting families Monday, January 18, marks the day set aside this year for the nation to pay tribute to one of America's most compassionate drum majors for justice.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

The Agent Orange horror and the U.S. You may not notice a victim of Agent Orange. They may look healthy on the outside, full of life and vigor.  Yet inside them there is a time-bomb, a time-bomb set during the U.S. war against Vietnam more than 35 years ago.  In over three million people, including U.S. troops who were involved in that war, this bomb has been going off over the years creating an on-going catastrophe.  Read More ... Bill Fletcher, NNPA Columnist

What we learned from Copenhagen Another world conference on Global Climate Change has come and gone. This time there appears to be no real progress made or resolutions obtained.  It was all a bunch of rhetoric, accusations and disagreements.  Unlike the last big conference, Kyoto in 1992, there were no plans or direction decided on. The controversies or debates have not ended or been resolved. In essence, there is no leadership and all of the sub-groups appear to be moving in circles void of progress.  Read More ... Harry Alford, Contributing Columnist

Wish list for 2010 and beyond President Obama stops gutting his domestic programs in an effort to appease Republicans who have no intention of supporting him on anything. GOP leaders are lower than a snake's belly and it is useless to try to satisfy them or their No.1 ally, Joe-the-Traitor Lieberman.  Read More ... George E Curry, NNPA Columnist

Are Black issues getting a fair hearing? But when the gaping disparities between whites and non-whites continue – even at this late date in our history, even with a Black man in the Oval Office, even as the populace grows Blacker and browner by the day — declaring this a “post-racial” era seems post traumatic.  Read More ... Deborah Mathis, Guest Columnist

Devastating, yet distinguished decade As we approach the end of the first 10 years of the 21st century, it is useful to remember the legal lows and the historic highs of the past decade for the policy interests of Black people in America. My father’s advice to me is still applicable: “Do not forget your Egypt.”  Read More ... Gary L. Flowers, NNPA Columnist

Precious and a princess There is a scene 10 minutes into the new Disney animated film The Princess and the Frog when young Tiana's mom and dad come into her bedroom to tuck her in for the night. The little girl's father asks what she wants to be when she grows up, and she replies, eyes sparkling, that she wants to own a restaurant with him where they can make his delicious gumbo. Dad beams with pride, and then leans down to kiss his daughter goodnight. His loving, departing message is you can be anything you want, Tiana, if only you believe.  Read More ... Phill Wilson, NNPA Columnist

Renewing our commitment to ourselves The new year is upon us and with it an opportunity to renew our commitment to making life better in New Orleans. Before we can do that, however, we need to be aware of the challenges that confront us and what will be required to overcome those obstacles.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

The ‘colorline’ problem still America’s major flaw in 2010 WASHINGTON (NNPA) - It was in 1903, the birth of the 20th Century, when W.E.B. Du Bois wrote in his book, The Souls of Black Folk the statement that has become prophetic: "…for the problem of the Twentieth Century is the problem of the color-line."  Read More ... Hazel Trice Edney, NNPA Editor-in-Chief

Stereotypes, the media and Black athletes who get into trouble (Special to New America Media from FinalCall.com) – Quick, name a professional athlete who received extensive national media coverage because of a sex scandal. Name two. OK, name a baseball player involved in a steroid use scandal.  Read More ... James G. Muhammad, Contributing Writer

Happy people A recent study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention that interviewed 1.3 million people found that when it comes to happiness, Louisiana residents are tops in the nation.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

It is literally time to stand and be counted The greatest civil rights leader in history taught each and every one of us invaluable lessons throughout his short time on earth.  Absorbing his teachings, readings and speeches, we have been able to peacefully highlight injustice whenever and wherever we see it, and demand equality in a forthright and sustainable way.  Read More ... Rev. Al Sharpton, NNPA Columnist

Powerful special interests should not trump children’s health needs A theologian friend shared the story of taking her car to a Jiffy Lube for servicing. Not having anything to read, she picked up a manual on the coffee table about boating. A chapter on the rules for what happens when boats encounter one another on the open sea described two kinds of craft: burdened and privileged. The craft with power that can accelerate and push its way through the waves, change direction, and stop on demand is the burdened one. The craft dependent on the forces of nature, wind, tide, and human effort to keep going is the privileged craft.  Read More ... Marian Wright Edelman, NNPA Columnist

The conspiracy to kill Black Media It is just that sinister. The powers that be want to corral and exploit 38 million African Americans.  They want our $1 trillion per year of disposable income.  They want us to get none of the trillions of dollars in contractual opportunities afforded by various levels of government and private enterprise.  They don't want us to develop our own businesses for fear of us being free from their oppression and manipulation.  Read More ... Harry Alford, Contributing Columnist

The curse of high expectations I went to Copenhagen as part of the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies Commission to Engage African-Americans in Climate Control.  The Commission - led by Carolyn Green, formerly of Sonoco - included environmental justice guru Robert Bullard, Dillard University professor and environmental justice leader Beverly Wright, Frank Steward of the Association of Black in Energy, Leslie Fields of the Sierra Club, and me.  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

The politics of credit for health care reform A few weeks from now, lots of people will be trying to assess the one-year anniversary of the performance of President Barack Obama and I wonder in that picture where will be his victory in getting a healthcare bill passed.  I say “his victory” because whether or not others – even in his own party—consider it a victory, it will give his administration a concrete accomplishment to stand on that Republicans have been trying to prevent.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Is there still no room in our inn for the most famous poor baby In this holy season of Advent, tens of millions of Christians are waiting for and preparing to celebrate the birthday of the most famous poor baby in history on Christmas Day. Yet that baby — born in a stable after being denied a room in the inn for his birth more than 2,000 years ago — might still find “no room” signs in the healthcare inn in the richest nation on earth in 2009.  Read More ... Marian Wright Edelman, NNPA Columnist

Questions abound It’s hard to believe we’ve reached the end of the year, but we’re finally inching toward a shiny new year. Before we ring in the New Year with parties, family gatherings and prayers, however, I’d like to pose a few questions to Louisiana Weekly readers. Here goes:  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Obama’s Nobel Peace Prize speech As one of the first to defend President Obama’s selection for the Nobel Peace Prize, I also believe that his speech was much more than an adequate expression of the contradictions in which he found himself by being selected.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

What if the CBC used its power? I must admit.  I have never been prouder of our Congressional Black Caucus than this past week.  They stood up for their constituents and didn’t care who they offended.  The point was their people are suffering and it must stop. They took on real issues such as our outrageous unemployment levels, lack of Black-owned advertisers being utilized by the federal government, the Stimulus Bill and TARP (bank bailout monies) skipping over our communities and not utilizing our businesses.  Read More ... Harry Alford, NNPA Columnist

Where do we go from here? It’s been a big month.  A jobs summit, the beginning of another escalation in Afghanistan a Nobel Peace Prize speech in Oslo, a climate change conference in Copenhagen, a possible end game for the Senate on health care, and a jobs summit and what I hope will be the start of an effective national jobs program that puts America back to work.  Read More ... Rev. Jesse Jackson, NNPA Columnist

Black Press of America stands with Black Caucus’‘Ben 10’ In one of the most honest self-assessments in recent American political history, 10 Congressional Black Caucus members ruefully admitted that they fell asleep at their posts as the traditional political guardians of Black America.  Read More ... Charles W. Cherry II, NNPA Special Commentary

Black Press of America stands with Black Caucus’‘Ben 10’ In one of the most honest self-assessments in recent American political history, 10 Congressional Black Caucus members ruefully admitted that they fell asleep at their posts as the traditional political guardians of Black America.  Read More ... Charles W. Cherry II, NNPA Special Commentary

Chicken hawks: All talk and no action The shrillest chicken hawk supporters of United States military adventures in Iraq and Afghanistan repeatedly insist that the country’s national security is at stake, that anyone who opposes these military adventures is literally putting everyone in the country in danger. Which, in my opinion, raises a very obvious question.  Read More ... A. Peter Bailey, Contributing Columnist

Havethings on theground reallychanged that much? It was regarded as one of the most historic days in our nation’s history.  Unprecedented numbers of young people and minorities hit polling stations and cast their ballots in a national election.  After an intense, seemingly endless campaign cycle, the populous was engaged and actively participated in our political process in ways previously unheard of.  Read More ... Rev. Al Sharpton, NNPA Columnist

Obama’s ‘trickle-down’ economic program Barack Obama sent a disturbing message to Black America last week: If you’re looking for the president to address the special needs of African Americans, you should start looking elsewhere.  Read More ... George E. Curry, NNPA Columnist

This is a Black tax Leonard Harris started Chatham Food Center in Chicago's South Side in 1983.  He wants to leave the business to his sons but can't because his family will face an estate tax so huge it will force them to sell off the business just to pay Uncle Sam.  He should know.  He started his career as a CPA.  Read More ... Harry Alford, NNPA Columnist

Touched by an angel Every time December rolls around, my mind wanders to a cold, overcast day two decades ago when my faith in humanity was restored by a perfect stranger. It was about a week and a half before Christmas when I decided to take one of my nieces and a nephew on a holiday shopping expedition in the Central Business District.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Congress should check convenience stores As we prepare to advocate for universal health care in the United States Senate, one issue that impacts people's health is the quality of food available to them. Wealthy people tend to have better health in part due to their diet of quality foods. Conversely, poor peoples' poor health is usually predicated on their choices in food.  Read More ... Gary L. Flowers, NNPA Columnist

Evolution of Black American business Construction and farming were the major income providers until the turn of the century. The Industrial Revolution created a big demand for entrepreneurship and employment. What became known as the First Migration caused millions of Blacks to leave the South and populate northern urban centers with the prospect of working in plants. The National Urban League was formed by well-meaning whites to encourage Blacks to leave the South and provided assistance in assimilating them in these northern urban centers.  Read More ... Harry Alford, Contributing Columnist

Sammy Sosa’s new look ...There is something really wrong with this Today. I would like to say I have never wondered what it would be like to be lighter. But that would be a lie. I have lived the contradictions that many of us African Americans deal with about skin color but often chose not to think about. Still it's hard to forget the indignities.  Read More ... David Bernett, NNPA Guest Commentary

There is nothing good about ‘Good Hair’ While new movies such as Precious and The Princess and the Frog are stirring intense debate among African Americans, no recent movie or documentary has hair stylist Bo Bogard more riled than Good Hair. To Bogard, the owner of Bo26, an upscale salon in northwest Washington, D.C., there is nothing good about Good Hair.  Read More ... George E. Curry, NNPA Columnist

We need pathways out of poverty The economic crisis is having a devastating effect on millions of Americans and has resulted in record levels of unemployment. For the first time since 1983, that national unemployment rate has reached 10.2 percent. In my home state of California the unemployment rate has topped 12.2 percent.  Read More ... Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Calif), NNPA Special Commentary

Whose house? Did you notice the helpless, befuddled looks on the faces of Brady and other Patriots throughout the game and the way their frustration grew every time the Saints responded to a New England score with a score of their own? Did you notice how rabid Saints fans were throughout the contest and how much love the Saints and their fans received from ESPN, the NFL network and a host of other sports channels for the greater part of last week?  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

A Thanksgiving prayer to end poverty in our time Thanksgiving is a time when many Americans pause to be grateful for all we have. In the current economic downturn when the gap between rich and poor is at the highest level since the Great Depression and the unemployment rate is 10.2 percent, millions of our neighbors, including many families with children, are struggling hard to count their blessings.  Read More ... Marian Wright Edelman, NNPA Columnist

It’s time for Eric Holder to clean house The conservatives were anxious to find a repellent or, at least, a mechanism to stop the progress and eventually turn the tide back to the bad old days. Meese developed a two prong approach. One was to disburse the concentration on Black empowerment and spread it to all ethnicities, plus both genders, sexual persuasion and most of all people with disabilities.  Read More ... Harry Alford, NNPA Columnist

Simply thankful The Northeastern University study, funded by the National Science Foundation, required participants to perform a difficult data entry task only to have it lost by a computer glitch. Then a lab assistant participants believe is not part of the study, who claims to be in a hurry himself, comes to their assistance and recovers their lost work.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Urgent action for jobs needed now As Congress and the nation focus on the passage of comprehensive health care reform, the latest jobs numbers show that our economy also remains in bad health. And while overall unemployment is now at 10.2 percent, African American joblessness has reached a 28-year high of 15.7 percent, compared with 13.1 percent for Latinos and 9.5 percent for whites.  Read More ... Marc H. Morial, President/ CEO, National Urban League

We must reclaim the value of life? For decades now, I have traveled across this nation to listen, learn and absorb the concerns and frustrations of the community. I’ve marched with victims of police brutality, consoled families who have viciously lost loved ones and called for transparency and proper judicial proceedings for those that have been wrongfully victimized by our system.  Read More ... Rev. Al Sharpton, NNPA Columnist

Why just CBC members charged with ethics violations? I wasn't too surprised when I read a report on Politico that in more than 30 of the probes the new Office of Congressional Ethics was considering, the only active investigations were on Black Congresspersons. That is the way institutional racism is supposed to work.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Winding down The last five weeks of the year, the days beginning with Thanksgiving and moving through the New Year, are days when we all wind down. Some of us don't want to admit it, citing business as usual. But the fact is that from the first Thanksgiving party to the last holiday gift exchange, we have collectively decided that the year is over and we can't do much about it.  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

How bigotry caused the second Iraq war Bigotry and violence are a part of our nation's legacy. Still, we have our moments and sometimes it is to our detriment how we handle it or don't handle it.  Right now our Department of Defense procurement apparatus, the Defense Logistics Agency (DLA) is having a major "hissy fit" trying to keep a major example of governmental bigotry from being exposed.  Please sit down as you read the following.  Read More ... Harry Alford, NNPA Columnist

Obama in China, China in Africa President Obama has taken his populist style to China with a town hall meeting with students in Shanghai that was also streamed on the Internet.  Meanwhile, journalists and others in China chafe against restrictions that prevent their free speech and unfettered use of the Internet.    Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

Targeting Black lawmakers Although a House of Representatives ethics committee is known to be looking into the activities of at least 19 members of Congress, the only full-scale investigations underway are against seven Black lawmakers.  Read More ... George E. Curry, NNPA Columnist

The White House jobs summit It's a good thing President Obama will be having a jobs summit because the recovery of the African-American community from a recession, as part of the general recovery of the national employment picture, is not assured.  My view is that this will be a grand opportunity to figure out how to boost job growth for everyone, but also to do some targeted work with those communities that are especially hurt by the downturn in the economy as well.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Another round of questions Once again, it’s question time. Time to ask some of the questions on the minds of many New Orleans residents and pose questions that make some of us go “hmmmm…” In no particular order, here goes:  Read More ...

Wake up, it's not over! The euphoria and excitement over our first Black President was tremendous and it shook the world for the better. Now that one year has gone by after the election it is time to get back to business. The business of empowering Black America and the rest of the Diaspora should be our paramount priority.  Read More ... Harry Alford, NNPA Columnist

'Worrying' about interracial children After creating an imbroglio because he refused to perform a marriage ceremony for a White woman and a Black man, Louisiana Justice of the Peace Keith Bardwell resigned under pressure. However, his stated reason for denying the couple a marriage license is still perplexing: "There is a problem with both groups accepting a child from such a marriage," he told the Associated Press. "I think those children suffer, and I won't help put them through it."  Read More ... George E Curry, NNPA Columnist

'Change': A Year Later What a difference a year makes. This time last year, I was sitting around my living room with a bunch of 30-something Black professionals eating Buffalo wings and checking off red states and blue states.  Honestly, we were all a little shell shocked. Some of us had campaigned all over the country for Obama. Others had just sat and watched in awe as history unfolded.   Read More ... Nicole Lee, NNPA Columnist

Hate Crimes prevention act signed into law The late Bayard Rustin was one of the few openly gay African-American leaders of the civil rights movement of the 1960s. He counseled Martin Luther King, Jr. on the philosophy of non-violence and was one of the main organizers of Dr. King's famous1963 March on Washington.  Read More ... Marc H. Morial, President/ CEO, National Urban League

The economic crisis elections There.  I made up a title for the fact that the recent November elections were essentially about the socioeconomic status of voters as the primary factor in their decisions.  We know already that in by-year and mid-term elections after a major presidential election, the winner's party most often loses seats.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

The Talented Mr. Blakely Former New Orleans recovery czar Dr. Edward Blakely thinks the Crescent City is the worst place in the world to live and work. I can live with that. Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

A decision on Afghanistan should not be made in haste Most Americans forget that there’s a war going on outside — or rather more than one.  In the midst of chasing after celebrities and keeping up on the latest gadgets, we’re often pushed into some sort of forced seclusion that bars us from the ongoing reality of two active wars. Read More ... Rev. Al Sharpton, NNPA Columnist

Obama's Leadership Style I do not understand those people who criticize the President for taking his time to get public policy right, when much of the misery that has come to visit their lives is a result of public policy, in both the domestic and international arenas, formulated by the previous administration, that was founded on distorted information, tunnel vision and hasty judgment that produced ill-conceived decisions. Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Better off than a year ago? President Ronald Reagan had his flaws, but he certainly could turn a phrase.  In the 1980 Presidential campaign he asked a question that has resonated in campaigns ever since.  “Are you better off than you were four years ago,” the former California governor asked in his race against Democratic President Jimmy Carter.  The people answered with a resounding “no,” and Ronald Reagan was elected. Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

What are America’s real values? At the Children’s Defense Fund, I hear far too much about indefensible child tragedies and suffering. It is way past time for parents, faith, national, and community leaders to tell our political leaders in no uncertain terms that child lives and health are not political or budget footballs and are not negotiable. Ensuring our children’s health and well-being is our deepest moral responsibility as adults and as a nation — a test not only of our morality but of our common and economic sense. Read More ... Marian Wright Edelman, NNPA Columnist

A teachable moment Last week’s news about Brother Martin students engaging in a racially offensive skit brought me all the way back to my high school years when I was playing in the McDonogh 35 marching band. We were the visiting team playing East Jefferson in Metairie when the lights were suddenly turned off in the stadium. Before anyone could say anything, there was a flash of fire as someone lit up an EJ logo with flames. I remember the chill that experience sent down my back and the backs of everyone who made that trip into the town of “Jeffersonia” like it was yesterday.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Can children get Congress to protect their health? (NNPA) - In 1931, Grace Abbott, the Chief of the U.S. Children's Bureau, gave a speech about her long and frustrating workdays in our nation's capital trying to advocate  for children's needs. She said she felt all alone standing with her baby carriage on the sidewalk watching a great traffic jam moving toward the Capitol where Congress sits.  Read More ... Marian Wright Edelman, NNPA Columnist

It’s time to end the wars The beautiful diva Freda Payne also chimed into this anti-Vietnam War movement with her song "Bring the Boys Home". Songs, poems, public protests and 500 body bags a week coming home made this ugly conflict intolerable. Today, Vietnam is a prime business partner of the United States with its "favorite nation" status. Somehow the ugly communist nation has become one of our best friends. I guess this shows how ridiculous that war was.  Read More ... Harry Alford, NNPA Columnist

Time for a shift in priorities (NNPA) - Twenty-five years ago, the world was sickened when pictures of starving children flashed across their television screens each night. Extreme famine, drought, and war hit Ethiopia like a ton of bricks and the victims were the nation's most vulnerable. Ethiopia was riddled by a deadly combination of war and apathy. And while many will never forget the images from 1984, this scene has continued to replay itself over the years.  Read More ... Nicole C. Lee, Contributing Columnist

Will these people and corporations stop at nothing? (NNPA) - Freedom of the press unequivocally stands at the core of fundamentals in the United States of America. It is a form of checks and balances towards the government, business and other entities in our society. But when producers, editors, journalists, executives and media conglomerates themselves begin fabricating news and openly spreading half-truths and lies, it's time for someone else to start checking them.  Read More ... Rev. Al Sharpton, NNPA Columnist

DNA testing: Today’s get-out-of-jail card (NNPA) — Two weeks ago, U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder directed the United States Department of Justice to review a Bush Administration policy virtually excluding DNA testing from defendants in federal cases.  Read More ... Gary L. Flowers, NNPA Columnist

Harper’s Ferry and allegations of terrorism (NNPA) - October 16 represented the 150th anniversary of the famous raid on Harper's Ferry, West Virginia by white abolitionist John Brown and his supporters who were hoping to provoke a slave rebellion.  The raid failed, a series of mistakes were made by Brown and his team, and they were captured and/or killed.  Brown was hanged as a result of the raid.  Read More ... Bill Fletcher Jr., NNPA Columnist

Limbaugh owning a football team? A resounding ‘no’ In 1902, a man by the name of Charles Follis, became the first documented African-American pro football player as a member of the Shelby Athletic Club.  Despite a few sprinklings of color here and there, the NFL banned Black athletes from the popular sport during the ‘30s.  Read More ... Rev. Al Sharpton, NNPA Columnist

Our time Now that the New Orleans Saints have come out of the gate swinging bolos and beating Eli Manning and the New York Giants like they stole something, I'm ready to believe...again.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

The Democrats’ big conundrum (NNPA) — To say that the Democratic Party is a strong partner with the labor unions would be quite an understatement.  It is more like the labor unions “own” the Democratic Party.    Read More ... Harry Alford, NNPA Columnist

America finally discovers Christopher Columbus After institutionalizing the lie that in 1492 Christopher Columbus discovered what we now call America, some educators are finally beginning to tell students the truth: it was impossible for Columbus to discover a place where people were already living.  Read More ... George E Curry, NNPA Special Contributor

Enforcing Section 3 of the HUD Act It has been 41 years since the implementation of Section 3 of the HUD Act.  For the next 15 months (through the end of 2010) we are going to make enforcement of this job and business creator a reality. We, the National Black Chamber of Commerce, are going to do all the heavy lifting necessary to make it happen.  Read More ... Harry Alford, NNPA Columnist

Must be the music Remember the good ol’ days when you could turn on the radio and hear something uplifting? You know, back in the day when you could hear Earth, Wind & Fire tellin’ sistas to “Be Ever Wonderful” or local funsters Chocolate Milk tellin’ folks that “all you got to do is let down your hair and be free”? I certainly remember.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Nobel Prize for Obama deserved? Yes!  But surprise should not have been a cause for derision.  Instead, it should have been a cause for national pride, but right away, many in the media raised questions about whether it was deserved since he had been in office so few months that he had accomplished nothing and Republicans like Michael Steele dismissed it “meaningless.”  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Only a few generations separate Mrs. Obama from the shackles They say you won't get anywhere in life until you know where you've come from.  But for the countless number of African Americans in this country, the simple act of knowing one's history is a  complicated and painful notion.  Painful in the sheer sense that through the bondages of slavery, we have been literally stripped of our roots, and can only trace back to an era of America's past that most of us would prefer to believe never existed.  But it did exist, and it was ugly, and it's about time we start facing that reality.  Read More ... Rev. Al Sharpton, NNPA Columnist

What Obama’s Nobel Peace Prize means for America It was announced last Friday that President Barack Obama was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize. Within hours the Republican Party issued a statement declaring he was not worthy of such recognition. Others said the award was based on his potential rather than his accomplishments so far.  Read More ... Brian Townsend, NNPA Guest Contributor

Questions? • What’s sadder, watching supposedly patriotic, God-loving elected officials and others cheer wildly about Chicago losing its Olympic bid or understanding the lengths to which some people in America are willing to go to seize or maintain political power?  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

School violence and the urban crisis It was with some concern that when the 16-year-old student Derrion Albert was killed recently by other youth wielding wooden clubs in Chicago, the White House responded by deciding to send Attorney General Eric Holder and Schools Chief Arne Duncan into the fray.  First of all, we should be pleased that this incident attracted action by the White House at all, but my concern is that, at base, it is really not an issue of policing or one of school administration, since 400 youths have been killed in Chicago in the past year.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Shooting deaths of children have risen I’m deeply disturbed that after a decade of decline, the number of firearm deaths among children and youth has increased for the second year in a row. Our 2009 Protect Children, Not Guns report released in September reveals that almost nine children and teens die from gunfire every day—one child death every two hours and 45 minutes.  Read More ... Marian Wright Edelman, NNPA Columnist

The brutal truth about the ACORN debacle It was the 1960s, and after decades following the abolishment of slavery, African Americans were still vying for simple fundamental human rights, including the most basic form of involvement in society – voting.  Read More ... Rev. Al Sharpton, NNPA Columnist

The Foreclosure Victims: Saddest Story Ever Told, Part II Yes, it is the foreclosure victims that have been left to fend for themselves.  They were the ones marked by the mortgage brokers participating with the Hedge Funds.    The Hedge Fund operators have disappeared with their take and the banks/mortgage brokers have been bailed out with about $1 trillion in tax funds. Read More ... Harry C. Alford, NNPA Columnist

Genocide, plain and simple Residents  of Chicago’s South Side gathered last week to pause and remember the life of Derrion Albert, a 16-year-old honor-roll student at Christian Fenger Academy High School slain by a group of teenagers on his way home from school on Thursday, Sept. 24.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Partial to Public or Private? Today’s debate over legislative issues such as health care, education, and energy boil down to whether public interests or private interests will benefit. I am partial to public.  Read More ... Gary L Flowers, NNPA Columnist

The Foreclosure Victims: Saddest Story Ever Told, Part I The root of the American Dream is home ownership. That concept came after World War II when we rewarded our courageous veterans with the Veteran Administration home mortgage program and the rest of the GI Bill of Rights (education, healthcare, etc.).   Read More ... Harry Alford, NNPA Columnist

The other Pittsburgh at the G-20 meeting Just before the G-20 nations met in Pittsburgh September 24-25, I was the keynote speaker at an Urban Summit hosted by a community group, the Community Empowerment Association.  This African- American city-wide organization felt it important enough to sponsor a meeting that would draw people from other cities to highlight issues of importance to those who were hurt the most by policies of the G-20 nations and previously the G-7.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

They have betrayed Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. so despicably The things people and groups will do for a little money, campaign contributions, and camaraderie.  Dr. Martin Luther King and many other great Americans dedicated, and many gave, their lives for the Civil Rights Act and all laws that support it.  Read More ... Harry Alford, NNPA Columnist - 1 opinion posted

Carter was right to denounce racists One of the major criticisms of civil rights leaders for years has been that too many decent whites choose to remain silent on the issue of race, ceding the spotlight to mean-spirited Caucasians who are insensitive to the suffering of African Americans.  Read More ... George E. Curry, NNPA Columnist

Race: On civil discourse and decorum A review of world history reminds us that civilization is barbarianism all grown up. From the earliest civilizations of humans began on the Continent of Africa to more recent nations, have respected differing opinions by codification of social mores and rules of decorum. With centuries of civility behind us, the un-civility of Representative Joe Wilson is averse to the American way of amicability, and not a good look for our nation as the “civil police” of the planet.  Read More ... Gary L Flowers, NNPA Columnist

Remember the race lessons from the past It's hard to imagine that less than a century ago, police sergeants and sheriffs were overseeing the burning of crosses and ensuring the safety of Ku Klux Klansmen in places like Queens, N.Y.  Read More ... Rev. Al Sharpton, NNPA Columnist

When the circle broke A week after hearing of the murder of a 17-year-old college freshman by two 19-year-olds who killed him because they were allegedly jealous of the car he drove, I’m still trying to wrap my mind around it.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

A good energy policy versus environmental extremism The United States is the only modern nation to not have a formal energy policy.  We, unlike a leader of the world, have been going willy-nilly on issues related to our energy needs which also affect our environmental conditions.  Since the uplifting of the Environmental Protection Agency by the Nixon Administration we have been debating, accusing and falsely predicting what should be done and what has happened.  Read More ... Harry Alford, Contributing Columnist

Obama fighting back, at last! President Barack Obama took off the gloves in his speech to the Congress on health care, seeming to hear those who said that he was not leading, that he had not been specific enough; they did not know where he stood on some of the critical issues. Of course, many of these charges are a mystery to me, perhaps because I paid attention to the speeches that previewed the aims of his initial White House Summit on health care, the bi-partisan meetings in the White House on health care, the many speeches he has given on town halls all over the country, the Saturday messages on health care, and the many other places where he has given his views on this subject.  Read More ... Ron Walters, Contributing Columnist

Obama has once again silenced his doubters For the past several weeks, all we have been inundated with is negativity; a decline in President Obama’s approval ratings, scare tactics, weakening support for health reform and an overall sense of pessimism and frustration with regards to change.    Read More ... Rev. Al Sharpton, NNPA Columnist

Serena Williams — Beautifully human Days after Serena Williams melted down during her U.S. Open match with her long-time friend and fellow tennis champion Kim Clijsters, the controversy continues to swirl.  As of this writing there is talk of a possible suspension, further fines, and other action against the phenomenal tennis diva who let her intensity and passion run away with her when she reacted inappropriately to what may have been a faulty foot fault call on the part of an overzealous line judge.  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

Some companies continue to support Glenn Beck Evidently JosBanks doesn't want African Americans and other progressives to purchase clothes from their stores. TD Ameritrade apparently wants Blacks to buy and sell stocks, but from someone else. And those sun-drenched ads urging you to visit Sandals resorts in the Caribbean inexplicably don't want Blacks to go to those hotels and spas on the largely Black islands. The Video Professor objects to African Americans ordering his products.  Even the people at The Scooter Store don't want African-American seniors scooting around on their brand of scooters.  Read More ... George E. Curry, NNPA Columnist

The other America If anyone thought that the droves of Americans who have clamored for President Barack Obama’s head on a platter since right-wingers began circulating misinformation about the president’s healthcare agenda might fizzle out, they better think again.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Barack can’t speak to school children? Why? President Barack Obama wanted to do what he and his staff probably thought was an innocuous and very positive gesture - send a message to school kids at their institutions that it was a good thing for them to study hard and stay in school because their future and the future of the nation depended on it.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Fighting against the big sellout It is an established fact that construction union shops discriminate against minorities, especially Blacks, and females in their hiring practices.  If you want to see Jim-Crow style discrimination just investigate a project using union labor.  Read More ... Harry Alford, NNPA Columnist

Medicare: Hope, not fear, in healthcare The Congressional Black Caucus has always been the conscience of the Congress and we judge health care reform and every other piece of legislation - large or small - on whether it is good for our community or not. We have also been some of the fiercest defenders of Medicare.  Read More ... Congresswoman Donna Christensen (D-V.I.), NNPA Special Commentary

Nasty anti-healthcare reformtactics deserve a nasty response Supporters of healthcare reform should immediately cease their weeping, wailing and whining about opponents of reform who disrupt town hall meetings and/or show up at pro-health reform rallies with loaded weapons.  Read More ... A. Peter Bailey, NNPA Columnist

No excuse for gun violence Jasmine Lynn, a Spelman sophomore, was killed by a stray bullet as she walked on the campus of Clark Atlanta University on September 2 just after midnight. She was chatting with friends not far from the place where six shots were fired during a fight at Clark Atlanta.  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

The wrong side of right There's a scene from I Am Legend during which Will Smith's character, Robert Neville, has found a cure for the virus that has plagued most of the human race but he finds himself struggling to convince those attacking him that he has their best interests at heart. As he stands behind a thick glass wall, infected New Yorkers slam their bodies against it in the hope of breaking through to take his life. He can do nothing but plead with them for compassion and patience, two things the infected humans are sorely lacking. "Let me save you! Let me save you!" he pleads. "I can save all of you!"  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Katrina's children - still struggling "Dear President Obama: My name is Jade Windon, 7th-grade student at McDonogh 42 Charter School in New Orleans, Louisiana. Mr. President, I write to you expressing how many of our lives continue to be affected today by the storm that happened almost four years ago. Hurricane Katrina devastated the lives of everyone here and in the Gulf Coast region.  Read More ... Marian Wright Edelman, NNPA Columnist

Questions As members of a free republic, one of the most important things we can do is ask questions. With the posing of questions, we gain not only answers but wisdom. In the pursuit of clarity and a better understanding of the forces that determine the fate of this community, I pose the following questions:  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

That four-letter word There exists a word in the American English language that on its own incites such a reaction that it may as well be taboo.  It isn’t a cuss word or a derogatory term, but rather a simple four-letter concept that by and large encapsulates the crux of many of our problems as a nation.  Read More ... Rev. Al Sharpton, NNPA Columnist

They say Obama lies and grandma dies Picture it. Los Angeles. 2009. You're talking to your 87-year-old widowed diabetic grandmother on the phone. She has just told you that she hasn't been feeling too well lately.  Read More ... Jasmyne A. Cannick, New American Media Columnist

Who will give voice to the voiceless? Senator Edward M. Kennedy was a voice for the voiceless.  He was passionate about health care, about children, about education.  He understood poverty and often spoke of it.  The fact that he touched so many lives was evidenced by the thousands that lined the streets of Boston simply to watch his casket drive by, or the lines that snaked toward his gravesite at Arlington Cemetery just a day after he was buried.  It begs a cliché to say that he will be missed.  More importantly, who in the senate will give voice to the voiceless?  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

An opportunity: Get out of Afghanistan During the campaign of President Obama, I was leery about his fierce intention to pursue Osama bin Ladin in Afghanistan to the point that he would engage in a war against the Taliban. Yet, I felt, like most people, that it was a righteous objective, since it was aimed at atonement for the 3,000 people ruthlessly killed by al-Qaida operatives at the New York World Trade Center bombing in 2001.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Boycotting Glenn Beck's sponsors is not enough Some of the nation's blue-chip companies-many that rely on African-American consumers for a significant portion of their profits - advertised on right-winger Glenn Beck's incendiary program on Fox TV. They include:  Procter & Gamble, Kraft Food, ConAgra (maker of Healthy Choice foods), Clorox, UPS, the U.S. Postal Service, Honda, General Electric, Travelocity, State Farm Insurance, Geico, Farmer's Insurance, Pfizer, Wal-Mart, Best Buy, Office Depot, RadioShack, Sprint, CVS, Red Lobster, Nestle, Progressive Insurance and pharmaceutical companies Roche and Sanofi-Aventis (maker of Plavix).  Read More ... George E. Curry, NNPA Columnist - 1 opinion posted

Health care is a fundamental human rights issue In April of 1963, Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. intellectually and emphatically asserted that ‘freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed’ as he diligently wrote from a rotting prison cell.  His now infamous Letter from a Birmingham Jail called for a restoration of human rights, liberty and justice for all of humanity.  Speaking over 2,500 times, arrested upwards of 20 and assaulted at least four times, MLK would likely do it all one more time were he alive today in the cause of another impeding civil right’s issue: Lack of adequate health care for our citizenry.  Read More ... Rev. Al Sharpton, NNPA Columnist

The power of mentoring, Part II When I was growing up I was hungry to learn everything I could about just about anything. And hanging out with some of my older siblings taught me that some people who are older actually sometimes know more than you. (That’s a hint for all the teenagers who think their parents don’t know anything but discover by the age of 21 that their parents learned everything in the brief period between their teen years and the age of 21...)  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

This is not a time for silence During the fierce battle with the Amalekites, when Moses raised his hands the Israelites won, but when he tired and dropped them, his enemies won. So Moses' brother Aaron and Hur, a friend, stood with Moses and kept his hands raised until their side had the victory. Read More ... Dr. Barbara A. Reynolds, NNPA Columnist

Why are they becoming hysterical? I have been on this earth for more than six decades and I have never seen such a repetitious amount of temper tantrums, paranoia, propaganda and verbal eruptions directed towards political leaders.  All of a sudden our structured and proven leadership models are becoming inefficient.   Read More ... Harry Alford, NNPA Columnist

Obama and the extreme right I am hoping that you have been reading and watching the news.  You may have come across stories about these right-wing mobs that have attempted to disrupt town hall meetings that congress people have organized to discuss health care.  There are some interesting things about these disruptions:  they are virtually all-white; they have completely mischaracterized the issue of healthcare and the proposals that President Obama is suggesting; they are openly and subtly racist; and they are angry and threatening to the point of being lunatic.  Read More ... Bill Fletcher, NNPA Columnist - 1 opinion posted

President Obama is Bringing Back Title VI of the Civil Rights Act Oh, it has been a long drought in Washington, DC.  One of the most precious components of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 has been diminishing at a constant rate at the federal level.  It didn’t matter who was President or Attorney General.  This law was being ignored, diverted and misrepresented.  Read More ... Harry Alford, NNPA Columnist

Testing Obama’s Fortitude It is time for testing on several fronts as the healthcare debate becomes the platform for a general uprising over President Barack Obama’s governing program.   Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

The power of mentoring, Part I The funny thing is, it’s not like I ever went out and tried to broaden anybody’s horizon or even set a good example. Back in the gap, when I was a college student, I was too busy trying to live my own life and make my way through the world. But because of my activities in several student organizations and my dealings with some of the most conscious women and men at Southern and LSU, I was able to grow exponentially as a student activist and a teacher during those impressionable years and could never really resist the urge to share what I had learned with others.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

They Don’t Dislike Health Care, They Dislike Barack Obama I am fascinated by the town hall meetings that are happening around the country and the ire, real or imagined, that is being heaped on members of Congress who are simply attempting to share information with their constituencies about ways our government hopes to help 50 million uninsured Americans get health insurance.  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

Education is the key As a brand-new school year begins, the entire community needs to take time to reflect on the importance of education to the future of our children and our children’s children. Since antebellum times, education has been seen as one of the pivotal keys to lifting Africans in America up from bondage and peonage to freedom and economic independence.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Republican race rage not tied to health care Several people have contacted me about the similarities between Paul Krugman’s recent New York Times article and my own idea that the Republican base in motivated by a rage that is, in part, racial.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Stuck in the "60s or race relations realists Numerous times since the emergence of President Barack Obama and “Transracialism” on the national scene, my skepticism about the whole process has led people to label me as “stuck in the ’60s” in regards to race relations in this country.  Read More ... A. Peter Bailey, NNPA Columnist

Take your time and get it right It was rushed by Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D, CA) and she popped the “whip” on her minions. All but one of the Congressional Black Caucus followed her orders.  Read More ... Harry C. Alford, NNPA Columnist

Let this be a lesson While we respect the jury’s decision, we also know that the courts are not infallible  and have convicted people in the past based on partial or faulty evidence. The congressman has the right to appeal the conviction and is guaranteed equal protection under the law by the United States Constitution.  Read More ...

Nothing learned during "teachable moment" When it was announced that President Obama, Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates, Jr.. and Police Sgt. James Crowley would hold a beer summit in the White House, the suds tag lines began flowing. They included “The Audacity of Hops,” “A Thousand Points of Bud Light” and my favorite, “Yes, Three Cans.”  Read More ... George E Curry, NNPA Columnist

Progressives and Blue Dogs: Battle health reform In case you have missed it, there has been a battle royal over healthcare reform in the House of Representatives, but the main one has taken place within the Democratic Party between the 80-member Progressive Caucus and the 50-member Blue Dog conservative Democratic caucus.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

What Black leader? Instead of irate demands to correct disparities of America’s discriminatory past, Blacks who have been designated by the mainstream as our “leaders” are caught up in the drama of whether such disparities even exist.  Read More ... William Reed, Guest Columnist

Profiling of a professor's pigment Dr. Gates’ recent arrest  by the Cambridge, Mass. Police Department has generated a renewed national discussion relative to the issue of racial profiling of people of color. Although Dr. Gates and the arresting officer, Sgt. James Crowley, have conflicting accounts of what was said by whom, the essential facts are not in dispute. Officer Crowley responded to a call from one of Dr. Gates’ neighbors who reported a possible break-in occurring by two Black men at Dr. Gates’ home.  Read More ... Gary L. Flowers, NNPA Columnist

‘Massa-sippi’ burning How far is Massachusetts from Mississippi? Many folks are asking that question after the July 16 incident during which Harvard professor Dr. Henry Louis Gates was arrested for Entering His Home While Black.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Invite Pookie for beer Dr. Skip Gates was arrested in his own front yard for disorderly conduct by police officer James Crowley, who apparently didn’t like being called a racist by Gates. President Obama correctly said the arrest was stupid (if you can’t be disorderly anyplace else, you ought to get a pass in your own front yard), and then he backpedaled a bit and invited Gates and Crowley to the White House for a beer.  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

Healthcare reforms: Don't forget women Recently I saw a pregnant woman I will call Lillian, a 22-year-old who brought her two children with her to the ER. Lillian has a fulltime job whose health insurance doesn’t cover pregnancy. She can’t afford to cover herself and her family on the individual market, and she makes too much money to qualify for Medicaid. Lillian came to the ER because she wants to make sure her baby is okay. A friend with better insurance advised her that she should have an ultrasound.  Read More ... Ralph Riviello, MD, MS, Guest Columnist

It's time for a big political flushing When headquarters would call in the managers and state it is time to upgrade our field staff we had no alternative but to agree and begin the “slashing.” Through upfront terminations, attrition and warnings, a new workforce would begin forming, replacing the stale and nonproductive workers.  Read More ... Harry C. Alford, NNPA Columnist

Post-racial paradise? Gates had just got back into the country after a trip to China and forced his way into his home near the Ivy League school after discovering that his front door was jammed shut. Shortly thereafter, he ended up in handcuffs, much like the millions of underprivileged Black youth he seeks to inspire to rise above poverty, violence and hopelessness.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Obama at the NAACP Well, despite what we hear to be something of a struggle within his administration about how close President Barack Obama should be to the African-American community, he showed up at the 100th Anniversary of the NAACP and showed out.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

King Family Puts Price on Legacy (Special to the NNPA from the Philadelphia Tribune) - In November of 2006, America took a bold step, roughly a half-mile from Lincoln’s iconic statue. For the first time in history, an African-American, Martin Luther King Jr., would be memorialized on the National Mall in Washington, D.C.  Read More ... Zack Burgess, Contributing Writer

Everybody loves Raymond Mr. Raymond and his wife, Miss Flo (Flora Dix Rousseau), were a part of my family for as long as I can remember. They, my parents — Anita and Dr. Lancelot Lewis Sr. — and Gerson and Norris Ferrier made up a trio that loved spending time together whether they were spending a day at the race track, going “crabbing” on Lake Pontchartrain or shooting a game of pool in our family den. They were inseparable.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Demand Real Child Health Reform Legislation in Congress for All Children As legislators on Capitol Hill make crucial decisions right now to reform America’s broken health care system, thousands of children across the country raised their voices demanding health coverage for all children during the Children’s Defense Fund (CDF) Freedom Schools® annual National Day of Social Action.  Read More ... Marian Wright Edelman, NNPA Columnist

Are all men really “created equal”? July 2nd, 2009 marked 45 years since President Lyndon Johnson signed the Civil Rights Act to initiate racial equality.  This anniversary coincides with the recent Senate Resolution “Apologizing for the Enslavement and Racial Segregation of African-Americans,” which expressed America’s “recommitment to the principle that all people are created equal.”  While these gestures appear impressive as political theory, in actuality, “Created Equal” on paper differs from “Created Equal” in practice.  Read More ... Ezrah Aharone, Guest Columnist

Bond says eliminating the NAACP would be like eliminating the military (NNPA) — NAACP Chairman Julian Bond, speaking before thousands at the NAACP Centennial meeting in New York City this week, issued a stern rebuke of those who advocate the elimination of historic civil rights laws and groups just because America has its first Black president.  Read More ... Hazel Trice Edney, NNPA Editor-in-Chief

City should lose its Head The emails of District B Councilwoman Stacy Head unfortunately seem to have all the political sophistication of a high school sophomore passing notes in class.  Read More ...

Obama on African responsibility I was happy to see President Barack Obama travel to Africa in the first year of his Administration and his praise for the progress of Ghana seemed to be a vehicle to elevate the position of Africa in his foreign policy.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Obama on I was happy to see President Barack Obama travel to Africa in the first year of his Administration and his praise for the progress of Ghana seemed to be a vehicle to elevate the position of Africa in his foreign policy.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Stimulus spending proceeding as planned What Republican House Leader John Boehner is doing is a doggone shame. The Ohio congressman has released a video starring a job-sniffing bloodhound named Ellie Mae hot on the trail of stimulus money. Narrated in the down home voice of Rep. Lynn Westmoreland of Georgia, it begins: “Where are the jobs? We put the dogs on the money trail to find out.”  Read More ... George E Curry, NNPA Columnist

Failed stimulus — too soon to tell? The most recent Employment Situation report from the Bureau of Labor Statistics brought unwelcome news. Job loss last month grew to 467,000 jobs, up nearly 150,000 jobs from May’s loss.  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

I love this place, Part II A businesswoman from New York City found this out when she called this writer one busy Friday afternoon as we were trying to put the finishing touches on that week’s issue of The Louisiana Weekly. As she sought to gather information about what software the publication was using and other pertinent data, she made the mistake of asking a very tired employee what we printed the newspaper on. “Stone tablets,” I told her without a hint of humor.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Michael Jackson and white fever One of the major ways in which Malcolm X differed from other Black leaders in the late 1950s and early 1960s was his persistent focus on the psychological as well as the physical assaults on Black people by the proponents of white supremacy/racism.  Read More ... A. Peter Bailey, NNPA Columnist

NAACP needed now more than ever I admit that, like most of us, I am an NAACP baby, born in the struggle to desegregate the Dockum Drug Store in Wichita, Kansas in 1958 two years before the Greensboro sit-in, as a leader of the NAACP Youth Council. Over the years, as a political analyst, I have been asked whether the organization is “still relevant.”  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Health coverage: Making too little, making too much? The James family in Fort Worth, Texas, should be celebrating right now. After losing his last job due to the difficult economy, Jason James, who worked as a supervisor at a warehouse company, had been searching for new employment for months. When he finally found a new position, his job offer coincided with wife Misty receiving a raise at her job.  Read More ... Marian Wright Edelman, NNPA Columnist

Black business success can hurt The modesty comes from many examples of attacks, conspiracies and mountains of adversity put before them and others simply because they are Black. Most successful Black entrepreneurs that I know would never publish themselves in the so called Black Enterprise Top 100 Black Businesses. To many it is perceived as a "target list" for the IRS, large competitors and others with bad intentions. Allow me to discuss a few of the horror stories that successful Black entrepreneurs have experienced.  Read More ... Harry C. Alford, NNPA Columnist

Hold the apology: Give us our 40 acres Are Black folks special or what? The U.S. Senate, and maybe soon to be followed by the U.S. House of Representatives, issued an apology for the enslavement of Black people in this country.  Read More ... James Clingman, NNPA Columnist

I love this place, Pt. I There's the uniqueness and sassiness of the people. The sights and sounds of the city. The many culinary masterpieces. The way we celebrate life and honor the passing of loved ones. Our defiant refusal to allow Mother Nature to make us give up our way of life. The flavor and vibe of nights here, where the sacred and the profane are constantly intertwined.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Jindal is wrong to veto the funding of NOAH Pure political revenge key Democrats in the city called the move that would transfer the Southshore's only facility for in-patient psychiatric care to Mandeville. Literally hundreds of local young people, many suicidal teenagers still recovering from the mental mind-twisting that was Hurricane Katrina and its subsequent scattering, will have to find their way across the Causeway for any form of treatment  Read More ...

Testing is key to curbing AIDS among Blacks Blacks are more likely than other racial and ethnic groups to have been tested for HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, but will need to be examined at much higher rates in order to curb the devastation the epidemic is having on African Americans. Read More ... George E Curry, NNPA Columnist

After the apology — pass the Rep. John Conyers bill The resolution “acknowledged the fundamental injustice, cruelty, brutality and inhumanity of slavery” and “apologizes to African Americans on behalf of the people of the United States for the wrongs committed against them and their ancestors who suffered under slavery and Jim Crow laws.” Unanimously passed!  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

Buy Hummer Despite repeated assurances to the contrary, on Wednesday, June 24, General Motors Corp. announced plans to close its assembly and stamping plants in Shreveport no later than 2012.  Read More ...

Congress cowards on healthcare reform Healthcare reform, especially with the rising number of Americans losing their jobs and health benefits, is one of the more pressing public policy issues of the day. Yet, to borrow a phrase from Attorney General Eric Holder, too many Democrats and Republicans are cowards when it comes to taking on the powerful insurance and healthcare lobby.  Read More ... George E Curry, NNPA Columnist

Irreplaceable Those are but a few of the words to describe Michael Jackson, the multiplatinum-selling entertainer who died Thursday after suffering cardiac arrest.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Obama: ‘tear down that wall’ In the heat of all the evaluations of the administration of President Barack Obama, we should not let this moment pass that connects his speech in Cairo to the progressive movement in Iran. I don’t agree with Benjamin Netanyahu, the Prime Minister of Israel, very often, but on “Meet the Press,” Sunday, June 21, he answered the question of whether Obama should give more credibility to the freedom movement in Iran by saying that Obama began the process with his Cairo speech.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

When racists call us racist It is pretty much what the maniacal propaganda minister for Adolph Hitler, Joseph Goebbels, would say: “If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, then people will begin to believe it.”  Read More ... Harry C. Alford, NNPA Columnist

Healthcare reform important to Blacks Health inequities are deep, persistent, and not new. From the cradle to the grave, racial and ethnic minorities suffer from shorter life spans, higher rates of disease and disability, and higher mortality relative to national averages.  Read More ... Brian D. Smedley, NNPA Guest Commentary

Fixing a sick healthcare system The debate over universal healthcare heated up last week amid false charges that President Obama wants to institute "socialized medicine" and healthcare reform hurts those already covered by private insurers. One of the most important facts to keep in mind is that although the United States spends twice as much as other industrialized nations on healthcare ($7,129 per capita), it is at or near the bottom when it comes to such indicators as infant mortality and life expectancy.  Read More ... George E Curry, NNPA Columnist

Choose freedom On Thursday, June 18, the U.S. Senate unanimously passed a resolution apologizing for slavery and racial segregation in the U.S. and sent the measure to the House.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

On Father’s Day: The Black man — an American hero He built America from the ground up with a few tools, his bare hands and by the sweat of his brow. While doing so, he was repeatedly whipped, lynched, falsely accused and castrated.  Read More ... Hazel Trice Edney, NNPA Editor-in-Chief

The loss of leadership The newly elected legislators entered office 2008 with so much promise—a wellspring of hope that this crop of newcomers, born of term limits, might not succumb so quickly to the political falsehoods that have historically dominated the discourses of Louisiana’s annual legislative sessions.  Read More ...

Let's fight for the stimulus money On behalf of the National Black Chamber of Commerce, Inc. (100,000+ Black-owned businesses) and with the encouragement of Johnny Ford, General Secretary of the World Conference of Mayors (700+ Black mayors) and Calvin Smyre, president of the National Black Caucus of State Legislators (624 Black state legislators), I write this letter to protest the festering and damaging state of affairs at the Federal Highway Administration in regards to Executive Order 11246 and Title VI and Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.  Read More ... Harry C. Alford, NNPA Columnist

Are racist ‘lone wolves’ really alone? On Wednesday evening June 10, I was supposed to have attended the preview of a play by Janet Cohen, an African- American writer and wife of Jewish former Secretary of the Army, Steve Cohen at the Holocaust Museum.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Questions about Sonia Sotomayor For President Dwight D. Eisenhower, it was Earl Warren. In Richard M. Nixon's case, it was Harry Blackmun and Lewis Powell. And for George H.W. Bush, it was David Souter. In those instances, justices appointed to the Supreme Court voted contrary to the way those appointing them had expected.  Read More ... George E Curry, NNPA Columnist

How to Structure a Good Minority Business Program Recently, I was asked by the Pennsylvania Black Caucus of State Legislators to come and testify about good minority business programs.  Read More ... Harry C. Alford, NNPA Columnist

Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act Must Stand for Another 25 Years By the end of June, the Supreme Court will decide one of the most important voting rights cases in a generation. Argued April 29, the case, Northwest Austin Municipal Utility District Number One v. Holder, threatens to strike down Section 5, known as the heart of the Voting Rights Act, the single most effective provision of any civil rights law in our Nation's history.  Read More ... John Payton, NNPA Guest Commentary

The values divide Some take great pride in the way they present themselves and the fact that their interaction with others determines how they are perceived and treated. These kids seem to understand that it is important that they work hard at becoming the kind of person who is respected, trusted and relied upon.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

President Obama changing Islam's opinion of the U.S. Pres. Barack Obama's recent trip to the Middle East where he gave a speech in Cairo, Egypt was a triumph in his attempt to change the opinions of over 1.2 billion Muslims about the character of the United States.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

The usual suspects That was my gut reaction to the story about Bonnie Sweeten, a white Philadelphian who told authorities that two Black men in a Cadillac kidnapped her and her nine-year-old daughter and threw them in the trunk of their car to cover up her own criminal mischief.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

The Hidden Costs of This Recession Have we seen the worst of this recession? Some financial analysts are saying things have "bottomed out" and point to upticks in the stock market as proof positive that things are getting better.  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

The death of the newspaper We look to newspapers for information, analysis and critiques of issues facing our cities, country and world. In today's global economic downturn, millions of people will lose their jobs and many industries will never again be the same. The death of major automobile manufacturers has led the news coverage for months. However, the demise of the news industry itself has gotten very little coverage.  Read More ... Nicole Lee, NNPA Columnist

Sotomajor epitomizes American dream The American dream. Throughout the decades, people have parted ways with family and friends to reach the shores of the United States with the hopes and aspirations of attaining better jobs, improved living conditions, a stronger future for their children and possibly, just possibly, a shot at that American dream.  Read More ... Rev. Al Sharpton, NNPA Columnist

Conservative justice and the Ricci firefighter's case In the developing fight over the nomination of Judge Sonia Sotomayor, some conservative Republicans such as Newt Gingrich, Rush Limbaugh and Tom Delay are raising the charge that she is "racist" and would be an "activist" judge because of her ruling in the Ricci v. DeStephano case.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Another 'blame a black man' hoax Move over Charles Stuart and Susan Smith. Bonnie Sweeten of suburban Philadelphia has now qualified to be inducted into the Hall of Shame that bestows special recognition upon whites who have committed crimes and then falsely blamed a Black man.  Read More ... George E Curry, NNPA Columnist

Black selling power For Black consumers especially, but also for other so-called "minority" groups in this country, the respective aggregate amounts of money earned each year, and then spent, are staggering. In addition, and again especially for Black consumers, our aggregate "buying power" can be described as a perpetual cash register, ringing, buzzing, and chiming 24/7/365. Why do we and others always pontificate about our "buying power" and seldom, if ever, discuss our "selling power"?  Read More ... James Clingman, NNPA Columnist

Colin Powell fights back That's because former Secretary of State Colin Powell defended his place in the Republican Party from charges by Rush Limbaugh and former Vice President Dick Cheney. On the same show a week earlier, Cheney said that he preferred Limbaugh to Powell who had left the Republican Party because he voted for Barack Obama. Limbaugh said that Powell did it only because Obama was Black.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

From murder to miracle in Philadelphia, Ms. To many Blacks who grew up in the Deep South before the passage of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, last week's election of James Young as the first African-American mayor of Philade_lphia, Miss. was as monumental as the election of President Barack Obama.  Read More ... George E Curry, NNPA Columnist

The games they play on Blacks Oh, the games they play. A little media exposure, sound bites and a formal public relations campaign can have the masses of African Americans believing just about anything.  Read More ... Harry C. Alford, NNPA Columnist

The Poor Pay More, Too Throughout United States history economic exploitation of the poor has been a constant. Whether it was the exploitation of Native Americans for food cultivation and military intelligence, or Africans in cotton fields, or Latinos in fruit fields, or Asians on the railroad, the poor have paid an extraordinary price of patriotism.  Read More ... Gary L. Flowers, NNPA Columnist

Thinking out loud These days, there's a lot on the minds of New Orleans residents as we grapple with recovery challenges, the recession and a host of other issues that threaten to move us closer to the brink of insanity. In the spirit of freeing one's soul by speaking one's mind, I pose the following questions to our readers:  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Excuse me, Miss Very few people who have observed New Orleans City Councilwoman Stacy Head in interviews  and media coverage of council meetings should have been caught off guard by the contents of her emails released last week.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Is there common ground on faith? President Barack Obama is a more tolerant human being than I am. He braved critics at Notre Dame and disarmed many with a sanguine, balanced speech that did not sidestep the issue of abortion, but took on aspects of it. He called for mutual respect among folk who don't see things the same way, and asked for middle ground instead of the hard lines that we now find around the choice debate. Above all, he asked what we have to do to get along as one human family.  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

Maybe the US Auto Industry Can Get it Now It is so easy to excel when you are the only player on the field. Such was the case for the U.S. Automobile Industry for decades.  Read More ... Harry C. Alford, NNPA Columnist

Challenging world for new graduates Ninety-nine young women walked across Bennett College for Women’s graduation stage on May 9, 99 exuberant achievers who have cleared one life hurdle and now have to gear up for another. There are scientists going to study microbiology, aspiring lawyers heading to Indiana University and the University of Iowa, social workers headed to the University of Pittsburgh and Simmons College, an urban planner going to the University of Illinois, a budding journalist headed to Columbia University.  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

Demonization of Mexicans in the midst of flu outbreak The emergence of the swine flu has become a moment for our domestic swine to surface with anti-immigrant bashing. What has been amazing has been the intensity of it.  Read More ... Bill Fletcher Jr., NNPA Columnist

Insurance CEOs get rich while denying health coverage to children She is deaf in one ear, has a feeding disorder and requires daily medication for asthma. In her short life, she has been rushed to the emergency room six times and hospitalized twice. Her health was put at even greater risk when she lost her health coverage —which meant no more regular doctor’s visits, weekly therapy or attention from specialists.  Read More ... Marian Wright Edelman, NNPA Columnist

The Big ‘Disease-y’ More than two years ago, more than a thousand New Orleans residents marched on City Hall to demonstrate their anger and frustration with the city’s lackluster crime-fighting effort.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Vitter's real opposition to Obama FEMA director  Read More ...

Honoring mothers Sunday, May 10, marked Mother's Day, a day set aside to celebrate the women who gave us life. While it is important to pause on this day to pay tribute to the women in our lives, it is even more important to live our lives in a way that honors them daily.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis

People need help now, not six months from now President Barack Obama has led the nation with strength and dignity and has shown the world that we can embrace our international brothers and sisters by allowing room for dialogue that was not present in previous administrations.  Read More ... Rev. Al Sharpton, NNPA Columnist

Post-bigotry, not post blackness While on recent travel to the a conference organized by National Organization of Black County Officials I read a review in the New York Times Book Review entitled, "Visible Young Man" by Touré on the novel Sag Harbor, authored by Colson Whitehead. The novel is set in the affluent Long Island Hamptons of New York and explores the idea of "post-Blackness" through the eyes of a Benji, a "Smiths-loving, Brooks Brothers-wearing son of moneyed Blacks who summer in Long Island and recognize the characters of the television series "The Cosby Show," in 1985.  Read More ... Gary L. Flowers, NNPA Columnist

President Obama's First 100 Days Restore confidence - check. Pass a stimulus bill - check. Reset American leadership abroad - check. Take action to shore up the faltering banking and auto industries - check. Get a new puppy - check. Ever since Franklin Roosevelt passed a dizzying number of bills during the first 100 days of his presidency in 1933, commentators and others have used that time frame to grade a new president's early performance.  Read More ... Marc H. Morial, President/ CEO, National Urban League

A stimulus plan for black colleges We need a stimulus plan to preserve and expand historically Black colleges. If the federal government can come up with rationalizations for bailing out Wall Street, making sure there is No Bank Left Behind and pumping millions into what comedian Bill Maher calls Notorious A.I.G., it can produce a stimulus plan for Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs).  Read More ... George E Curry, NNPA Columnist

Things that make you go hmmm Why would any elected official think he or she has the right to ask the president to pardon another elected official because they grew up together, played basketball together or because the incarcerated official in question was “only” making $42,000 for a public office job he made a conscious decision to pursue?  Read More ...

Democracy hangs in the balance On the 100th day of President Barack Obama’s administration, the Supreme Court heard arguments brought by conservative lawyers to try to derail the Voting Rights Act.  Read More ... Benjamin Todd Jealous, NNPA Guest Columnist

Shutting down the last plantation This massive 100,000 employee agency has a strong history of outright racism. Its views have been very southern and conservative in nature. At times the activities over there have resembled another nation far and away from the U.S. constitution and the land of the free. President Obama has promised change and to change this giant is going to take a massive undertaking.  Read More ... Harry C. Alford, NNPA Columnist

Obama and the Right Wing The political Right has dismissed any notion of so-called bi-partisanship in favor of an all-out war against President Obama.  Read More ... Bill Fletcher Jr., NNPA Columnist

Too many white males can’t cope When reading and hearing about so many White males, from teenagers on up, going off the deep end during the past 15 years, one is compelled to wonder what is their problem?  Read More ... A. Peter Bailey, NNPA Columnist

Give an A for 100 Days In an era of instant spin, there is no wonder that people are grading President Obama on his performance in his first 100 days.  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

Had they known they were slaves Harriet Tubman was truly an American hero. She provided freedom for enslaved Africans via the operation of the Underground Railroad. Daily, she risked her life so that others could escape the savagery of human bondage.  Read More ... Harry C. Alford, NNPA Columnist

Taxes, tea parties, and temper tantrums Recently, several "Tea Parties" were held across the nation to demonstrate discontent over the Obama Administration's tax plan for most Americans.  Read More ... Gary L. Flowers, NNPA Columnist

Fifty-five Years Later: American Education Separate and Unequal In the case of Brown v. the Board of Education on May 17th 1954, the Supreme Court decided that the Constitution of the United States must guarantee equal education for all American citizens.  Read More ... Rev. Al Sharpton, NNPA Columnist

Cheeky people I have noticed, however, that different places have different meanings for the word. In Baton Rouge, for example, it means something that is shabby or raggedy. But in New Orleans, "cheeky" is basically somebody who is out for self and doesn't give a damn about anybody else.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Obama Should Have Attended UN Racism Conference I am missing something here. President Barack Obama just went to Europe and Iraq and made speeches saying that he would be deferential to Communist China, that he would meet without conditions with the leadership of Iran and that he wanted to open up a new relationship with the Islamic world.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

World Conference Against Racism: History is Important A number of U.N. Resolutions, conventions and declarations show how the world has struggled with issues of racism and discrimination over the years. We have seen the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights, and the adoption of the First Decade to Combat Racism and Racial Discrimination in 1973, but neither seemed to address the underlying causes of discrimination.  Read More ... Nicole Lee, NNPA Columnist

The Employee Free Choice Act One of the apparent mysteries many people ponder is how it was that union membership was responsible for virtually building the American middle class after World War II and now so many people appear to blame unions for the loss of jobs rather than the push for more profits by company bosses. The answer is fear.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Take a stand against violence Over the past few weeks, there have been several events and gatherings organized to draw attention to the ongoing slaughter of Black people by other Black people in New Orleans. These events have included heart-wrenching pleas for New Orleanians to stop killing one another by those who have lost loved ones, neighbors and friends to this scourge of violence. While those who attended have strengthened their resolve to do whatever they can to address the problem, there are still too many New Orleans residents who either don't care or simply just don't get it.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Black and Green Earth Day is April 23, but environmentalists, taking a page from Black folks' book, have decided to make a month of it and declare April "Earth Month."  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

Like we just don't care? Pt. II One of the reasons people in other parts of the country are amazed by what they hear and read about New Orleans and the rest of the state is our infamous willingness to accept lackluster performances and questionable behavior from the men and women we elect to represent our interests in government.  Read More ... Edmund Lewis, Editor

No slam dunk in the classroom If the basketball championship games had been based on how athletes performed in the classroom instead of on the basketball court, Monday night's championship game in Detroit would have been between Duke and Villanova instead of North Carolina and Michigan State in the men's division and top-ranked Connecticut would have faced either Ohio State, Stanford or Vanderbilt instead of Louisville in the women's championship game Tuesday night in St. Louis.  Read More ... George E Curry, NNPA Columnist

Giving to GM is a good move For nearly a century, General Motors has been part of the American dream. A middle class was built upon it, entire communities grew around it, and its pioneering products changed the way Americans lived and worked.  Read More ... Gary L. Flowers, NNPA Columnist

Black Talent Rots in U.S. Prisons America became the leading nation in the world through its victories and leadership during World War II. Our 65-year reign is the shortest in history and we are a far way from having any kind of seniority in this position. We have made many mistakes along the way such as slavery, land theft and apartheid.  Read More ... Harry C. Alford, NNPA Columnist

Like we just don't care? There's a commonly used hip-hop song hook that gets crowds hyped by imploring them to: "Throw your hands in the air, and wave 'em like you just don't care."  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

The truth of trickle-down economics Last week, the G-20, the 20 countries with the largest Gross Domestic Product, met to discuss the implications of the economic crisis. Both in the suites and on the streets, uncertainty and downright skepticism loom over the talks. President Lula of Brazil has already stated that the financial crisis has been caused by greedy profiteers from the U.S. and Europe.  Read More ... Nicole C. Lee, NNPA Columnist

Black Women and the Green Economy The term "grassroots" connotes organizing at the local level to improve the spaces and places where ordinary folk live their lives. Throughout time Black women have provided leadership at this level; we now have an opportunity to provide global leadership by resurrecting traditional Black family values to usher in a new era of conservation. Waste, excess, and conspicuous consumption must be replaced with a return to responsible stewardship. We helped to plant physical, intellectual, and spiritual seeds that are now sprouting in an international movement for environmental justice and equity...what is now referred to as sustainability. We create change from the bottom up.  Read More ... Felicia M. Davis, NNPA Special Commentary

The hope of John Hope Franklin When I first heard that historian John Hope Franklin had died, I reached for a copy of And Still We Rise, a collection of 50 interviews with Black role models by Barbara Reynolds. There are two stories Franklin recounted that I have never forgotten - and probably never will.  Read More ... George E Curry, NNPA Columnist

Stopping the house invasions Mrs. Amara Weaver is a dedicated mother and grandmother living in Milwaukee, Wis. She worked hard all her life and bought a home for her family.  Read More ... Ben Jealous, NNPA Guest Columnist

The Stimulus Bill and Section 3 of the HUD Act “That was our job and now you (businesses and advocates) must approach your governors and mayors and make it happen for your particular community or interest.”  Read More ... Harry C. Alford, NNPA Columnist

A.I.G. bonuses: Don’t hate the player, hate the game I watched last week as the nation’s furor turned towards employees of insurance giant American International Group (A.I.G.) and the $165 million in retention bonus payments recently doled out to executives. Executives, who, as we already know are largely to blame for their role in A.I.G.’s financial crisis that led to the country’s economic meltdown in the first place because of its dealings in bad mortgage-backed securities.  Read More ... Jasmyne A. Cannick, Guest Columnist

A stimulus guide for dummies With dueling economists and back and forth between Democrats and Republicans over President Obama’s economic recovery package, the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities has provided us with a Stimulus Guide for Dummies. Actually, it’s a report by Chad Stone, the center’s chief economist, titled, “Attacks on Congressional Package Don’t Withstand Scrutiny.”  Read More ... George E Curry, NNPA Columnist

We’ve got t o do better For the governor of a state threatened annually with floods, fires, tornadoes and hurricanes to suggest that funds set aside to monitor volcanic activity should be axed is incredible.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

The ‘best and worse of times’ for Blacks National Urban League releases 2009 State of Black America report Echoing the words of author Charles Dickens as he talked about the State of Black America 2009 report last week, National Urban League president Marc H. Morial told members of the Black Press Tuesday morning, “These are the best of times and the worst of times for Black America.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Taking pride in service This is an exciting time to serve in the U.S. House of Representatives. As members elected to represent the interest of our constituents, we are privileged to serve with a new President who has already begun to make good on his campaign commitments to the education, health and energy independence of our country.  Read More ... U.S. Rep. Chaka Fattah (D-Pa.), NNPA Special Commentary

Take a look One of my favorite pastimes is surfing the Internet to view images of people of African descent. I have noticed that it is both relaxing and empowering to look into the eyes of Black people whose images tell fascinating stories of days gone by but somehow still have relevance for the things people of color face today.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Post-racial Since the Obama phenomenon began, some commentators have clamored to declare the U.S.'s racial problems a thing of the past. Mimicking Francis Fukuyama's notion of the "end of history," these pundits claim that now that the U.S. has a Black president, the verdict is in: people of color can stop worrying. Racism is finished. The glorious post-racial era has begun. Huh?  Read More ... U.S. Nicole C. Lee, NNPA Columnist

Getting our economy back on track Many African-American families are bearing the brunt of our nation's current economic challenges as seen by high rates of foreclosure and unemployment within the African American community.  Read More ... U. S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), NNPA Guest Commentary

True change is never easy He has made a whole stroke toward women's equality in the workplace through signing the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act. He has begun the march toward expanding health care coverage to all in need by extending the State Children's Health Improvement Program (SCHIP) to millions of children who would have otherwise gone without.  Read More ... Dr. Dorothy Height, NNPA Special Commentary

Why we need the employee free choice act? The proposed Employee Free Choice Act (EFCA) represents legislation that would make it easier for workers to join or form unions. The political Right, including some major corporations, has assembled significant resources to fight this. Their central argument is that the EFCA will deny workers the right to a secret ballot election to choose a union.  Read More ... Bill Fletcher Jr., NNPA Columnist

Just wondering As many of our readers and certainly my friends know, occasionally I experience "wonderment" moments that I've put a pen to. Another one of those moments happened recently...  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

An African-American depression I was watching him just a few minutes after I had a conversation with a sister who lost her job the same week her husband did. They were confident that they could make it through three months, thanks to savings, but didn't know what would happen to them after that. Stein wants happy talk, sister wants a job.  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

Let's fight for our share of the stimulus The Stimulus Bill has just been passed and I have already heard people state "Let's hold them accountable" or "Let's see what they do this time."  Read More ... Harry C. Alford, NNPA Columnist

Students, Not Sharecroppers Prior to the American Civil War African Americans were enslaved and opportunity for education was limited to wealthy White Americans. Following the Civil War, the 13th Amendment to the United States Constitution was enacted, granting legal freedom to Black people.  Read More ... Gary L. Flowers, NNPA Columnist

A look at race, incarceration, and American values Glenn Loury, a professor in the Department of Economics at Brown University, has long been one of the nation's most outspoken Black intellectuals.  Read More ... Marian Wright Edelman, NNPA Columnist

Limbaugh, Hannity, O'Reilly: Paper Tigers One of the more fascinating revelations from the 2008 presidential campaign is that "reformed" druggie, Rush Limbaugh, quintessential chicken hawk, Sean Hannity and bombastic egotist, Bill O'Reilly proved to be paper tigers, at least as far as that historic election is concerned.  Read More ... A. Peter Bailey, NNPA Columnist

Damaged Roots in the Fight for Public Housing? The fight for housing affordable to low-income families in the United States is a vortex; even unlike the work I did representing immigrants in the post-9/11 world. In my experience, fighting for public housing is more unpopular than fighting for non-citizen's rights. I have tried to discern why, and have a few thoughts: (1) the housing fight involves money - a land grab - and so the interests vested are greater; (2) if housing is seen as a commodity instead of a right, then public housing represents an inherent failure, diametrically opposed to the American dream of home ownership; (3) the affordable housing policy advocacy debate has been hijacked by people who do not represent the interests of low-income families.  Read More ... Anita Sinha, Guest Columnist

Not out of the woods with the chimp controversy The crude New York Post cartoon starring President Barack Obama as a dead stimulus bill-writing chimpanzee has been roundly and justifiably criticized as racist. And the half-hearted apologies by the editor and, later, the owner of the New York Post have been exposed for what they are - half-hearted. While much has been written about longtime efforts to equate African Americans with apes, not enough has been said about the broader motivation behind portraying Blacks as less than human.  Read More ... George E Curry, NNPA Columnist

GOP refuse stimulus for citizens deep in poverty I understand that several Republican governors, such as Haley Barbour of Mississippi, are considering refusing money from the Stimulus package. Well, at this writing I am in the Mississippi Delta on a poverty tour arranged by Antionette Harrell, a courageous African-American woman from New Orleans, and what we are seeing definitely marks such actions as cruel at most and unaccountable at least to the needs of most people living in the most vicious form of abject poverty.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Let's talk about R.A.C.E. So I'm reading a story on nola.com about the Zulu Social Aid & Pleasure Club presenting a commemorative coconut to President Barack Obama in the White House last week when I notice that there are more than a few readers who are apparently not at all happy to read anything positive about Black people.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Siding with Eric Holder Recent comments by Attorney General Eric Holder to the effect that when it comes to race, the USA is a "nation of cowards," brought forth immediate condemnation by right-wing talk radio. This was to be expected.  Read More ... Bill Fletcher Jr., NNPA Columnist

Let them eat principles No one who knows anything about Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal should have been caught completely off guard by his underwhelming response to President Barack Obama’s speech about the U.S. economy and the recently passed stimulus plan. Still, some Louisiana residents and others across the U.S. who are familiar with the dire straits that New Orleans and other parts of the state are in were understandably taken aback by the governor’s dogged determination to take a jab at the president, even if it means turning down much-needed funds earmarked to soften the blow of the recession and spur post-Katrina recovery.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Economic crisis puts children at risk Four days after Christmas, the Washington Post ran this article: “Child Neglect Cases Multiply As Economic Woes Spread.” In the article, area child welfare workers talked about the noticeable rise in the number of child abuse and neglect investigations. Many of the new neglect cases were connected to families trying to make do without heat, electricity or necessary medical care, like asthma medications and other basic needs.  Read More ... Marian Wright Edelman, NNPA Columnist

At last, an energy Policy is forming At least the last five congressional sessions have started with talk of developing an Energy Policy. At the end of each session we would be no further down the road than at the beginning.  Read More ... Harry C. Alford, NNPA Columnist

Majesty and Misery: The richness of Lift Every Voice When I learned that Senator Dianne Feinstein would be charged with the inaugural arrangements, I prayed. I prayed that our San Francisco sister would be as sensitive, as I was, to the moment and the meaning of the Negro National Anthem and to the possibility that the San Francisco Boys and Girls Choir might sing that song.  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

The Haitian Coup: An Unresolved Injustice After Five Years On the morning of 29 February 2004 I was asleep in Oakland, Calif., having gone to that city to deliver a speech. My cell phone went off around 6am and a voice announced herself as a journalist from a major media outlet. She asked me, in my then capacity as President of TransAfrica Forum, whether I could confirm that Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide had stepped down from office. Needless to say I was stunned and, having no new information, could neither confirm nor deny the rumor.  Read More ... Bill Fletcher Jr., NNPA Columnist

The call from the White House It was around noon on Tuesday, February 10, that I checked my cell phone messages after participating in an intense executive seminar all morning. One of the messages was from Corey Ealons, director of African-American media during President Obama's transition, who still works in a similar role at the White House.  Read More ... Hazel Trice Edney, NNPA Editor-in-Chief

From stimulus to Recovery: Follow the money Now that the "American Recovery and Reinvestment Act" has been signed into law by President Obama, what has happened through much trial and tribulation is tantamount to what Cuba Gooding said in one of his movies - "show me the money."  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Preserving Black History Month-Part 2, Part II The clamor to get rid of Black History Month ignores a crucial yet often overlooked fact: Congress has authorized and every president - Democrat and Republican - signs an executive order each year honoring the contributions of not only African-Americans, but Latinos, Asians, Native Americans and women.  Read More ... George E Curry, NNPA Columnist

Black Leaders Silent as Black Rappers Create Environ of Death and Abuse Singer Chris Brown's arrest for allegedly beating and biting his girlfriend, pop princess Rihanna the same night vulgar rapper Lil Wayne was being lauded with four Grammy awards is a reminder of how thuggish rap culture creates a climate for not only male-on-male violence but abuse of Black women as well.  Read More ... Dr. Barbara Reynolds, NNPA Columnist

Bringing Black history to life A Louisiana Weekly reader recently called me and asked for suggestions about how she might engage her peers and younger members of her family in positive activities during Black History Month and beyond. After gathering my thoughts and reflecting on the needs of communities of color,  I shared the following list of suggestions and activities with her.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

National African-American History Month, 2009 The history of African-Americans is unique and rich, and one that has helped to define what it means to be an American. Arriving on ships on the shores of North America more than 300 years ago, recognized more as possessions than people, African- Americans have come to know the freedoms fought for in establishing the United States and gained through the use of our founding principles of freedom of speech, freedom of the press, the right to assembly, and due process of law.  Read More ... Barack Obama, President of the United States NNPA Special Commentary

The Bailout was for fat cats; the stimulus is for the people The first phase of the Wall St. Bailout was a pure hustle. The National Black Chamber of Commerce opposed it because the writing was on the wall.  Read More ... Harry C. Alford, NNPA Columnist

Prioritize change for Haitian immigrants The Bush Administration left several messes to clean up. Each and every cabinet member has his or her work cut out for them and former Arizona Governor Janet Napolitano, our new Secretary of Homeland Security has her hands full.  Read More ... Nicole C. Lee, NNPA Columnist

Continuing the celebration, Part II There's been a great deal of conversation in the community in recent years about the power relationship between Blacks and whites and how that relationship is manifested in the criminal justice system, economy and local public schools. It's a dialogue that is long overdue and one we need to keep going until we find solutions to problems like the inequitable distribution of wealth and opportunities in this city.  Read More ... By Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Black is back, but check facts On Sunday, February 1, the Pittsburgh Steelers won the National Football League's Super Bowl by defeating the Arizona Cardinals. The Steelers wore black and yellow and the Cardinals adorned red and white.  Read More ... Gary L. Flowers, NNPA Columnist

Obama coattails: Black Republican chair Republicans have just named an African-American, former Maryland Lt. Governor Michael Steele, as party Chair.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Beware of gentrification with big government programs Whenever there is big money that comes down the "pike," there will be lobbyists and hustlers swarming around like lions during a wildebeest migration on the plains of Africa. The opportunity becomes immense and the "wildebeest" are the downtrodden and economically challenged who have no strong voice politically no matter how many Black legislators we send to the state house or capitol buildings. They will pounce and we become the prey over and over again. They have made big, long-term money off Black folks since the days of reconstruction.  Read More ... Harry C. Alford, NNPA Columnist

Black History, American History A century ago, a two-day race riot in Springfield, Illinois, where white mobs lynched two Blacks, turned out to be the final straw for a small interracial group of Americans committed to social justice. Lynchings and other acts of terror against Blacks at the height of the Post-Reconstruction Jim Crow era had become all too common.  Read More ... Marian Wright Edelman, NNPA Columnist

What about poor people? One of Vice President Joe Biden's first assignments in the Obama Administration is to lead a task force on the middle class.  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

Celebrate yourself Every February, schools, churches and community organizations across the U.S. gather to celebrate the history and achievements of African America. It's a tradition that dates back to 1926 when historian Dr. Carter Godwin Woodson established the first Negro History Week  Read More ... Edmund Lewis, Editor

Cao's accountability is to whom? Until the stimulus vote, newly elected Congressman Anh "Joseph" Cao had charted a very moderate course in his first few weeks in office. He voted in favor of expansion of the Children's Health Insurance Program (S-Chip)-critical for his impoverished district-and the Lily Ledbetter Fair Pay Act-guaranteeing legal recourse for women who are paid less than men in the workplace.  Read More ...

Republican Obstructionist Defeat Bi-Partisanship President Barack Obama's pledge to bring America together and specifically attempt to work across party lines with Republicans in the governing process was laudable, but I always wondered if it would work.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Why they fear, and we need Eric Holder The Rule of Law and the U.S. Constitution are sacred codes for our society. We must protect them to ensure our democracy and guarantee equal protection under the law for all of us. Anything less is chaos and tyranny.  Read More ... Harry C. Alford, NNPA Columnist

A bailout for our students Why do banks and businesses get breaks when college students do not? While some are getting multi-billion dollar bailouts, the students who so enthusiastically supported Barack Obama are being offered scant relief from the effects of our broken economy.  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

It is time to bail out our poor children and families As the current recession has turned into what may be the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression of the 1930s, we all witnessed televised coverage of the CEOs of big banks, investment houses, mortgage companies and auto makers testify before Congress and plead for financial bailouts.  Read More ... Marian Wright Edelman, NNPA Columnist

Louisianian savors role she played in Obama's historic election Growing up in a small, segregated Louisiana town during the height of the civil rights movement, Patrice Jacques perhaps could not fathom one day witnessing the election of a Black U.S. president. Even more improbable was the idea of a woman of such humble roots playing a pivotal role in bringing that dream to fruition.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Dawn's early light It is difficult to find words to convey the thoughts and emotions that swirled in me as President Barack Obama was sworn in as America’s 44th president.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis

We still have a long way to go Slightly more than 45 years after the historic March on Washington, the inauguration of President Barack Obama is a major down payment on the fulfillment of the dream King spoke about that day. It is as though God is saying, you may kill a few men, you may kill a few women and children, but the dream they dreamt, the truth that they stood for was too real, too right, too necessary, too noble to ever die.  Read More ... U. S. Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.), NNPA Special Commentary

Manifestation of a dream? Dr. King said he had a dream that people would be judged by the content of their character, not the color of their skin. On November 4, 2008, that date arrived. And from every corner of the country people are thronging to Washington, and coming together, to celebrate the triumph.  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

100 years later, still an unfinished journey The election of President Barack Obama reflects a seminal transformation within the American psyche. Overcoming the limitations of our history fraught with the wrenching divisions of race, a majority of voters embraced our country’s promise crossing racial, cultural and generational boundaries to set a remarkable example for the world.  Read More ... Ben Jealous, NNPA Special Commentary

How Wall St. punked the 110th Congress The 110th Congressional Session ended last November. As the 111th Congress begins its session with challenges like never before, we must reflect on what happened at the end of the last session.  Read More ... Harry C. Alford, NNPA Columnist

My recollection: Experincing his-story in the making Barack Obama’s historic journey from an unlikely candidate for president of the United States to becoming the eventual elected leader of the free world embodies the significant progress that our country has made over the centuries in respect to race and cultural relations. His insurmountable accomplishment not only represents a renewal of the American promise, but also creates a whole new set of possibilities for future generations of underrepresented populations whose predecessors endured decades upon decades of injustice and inequality. As an African-American male in his mid-twenties the opportunity to cover such a historic event and to be a living part of history was especially significant and rewarding. The ultimate color barrier had finally been shattered, and I would be witness to it.  Read More ... Brandon D. Hall, Contributing Writer

Whatever we imagine More than four decades ago, the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr. delivered his seminal “I Have A Dream” speech in Washington, DC. This Monday, as we celebrate the King National Holiday and prepare for the inauguration of the nation’s first Black president, we do so with honor and in remembrance of all those upon whose shoulders President-elect Barack Obama stands.  Read More ...

Just another boogeyman, Part II If you watch the media closely, you will notice that the lion’s share of mainstream media coverage of Black men is doled out to two groups: Black criminals and Black athletes. Both groups are  comprised of members who are strong, physically gifted and fleet-footed, we are reminded on a regular basis. Both groups are represented by men who are more physically intimidating than the average white male, we are also told. And, of course, these groups sometimes overlap. Look at Michael Irvin, Mike Tyson and O.J. Simpson. All three of these men captured the hearts and minds of Americans before their falls from grace.  Read More ... By Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Hard to say you're sorry? Perhaps the greatest accomplishment of the Prospect 1 art exhibition was to bring countless tourists and locals past the Memorial to the thousands of victims who died in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.  Read More ...

The inauguration of President-elect Barack Obama Even after a long campaign in which we have analyzed every twist and turn of the road together, what I have just written as the title to this piece has the clear and unmitigated ring of unreality, if one has been Black in America as long as I have.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Obama presidency brings new dawn, new day for America “Birds flying high, you know how I feel. Sun up in the sky, you know how I feel. Breeze driftin’ on by, you know how I feel. It’s a new dawn, it’s a new day, it’s a new life for me…and I’m feelin’ good.”  Read More ... U. S. Rep. Barbara Lee (D-Calif.), NNPA Guest Commentary

Labor leader to Obama: "We have your back; we will not let you back up!" The president of the Maryland and D.C.  AFL-CIO, Fred Mason, had an idea. Following the electoral victory of Barack Obama he found himself perplexed by the enthusiastic, yet very unfocused, response of organized labor as to what should happen next. While there was optimism in the air, what was missing was real content. But what was especially missing was any sort of public display of both support AND concern by U.S. workers for an incoming Administration at a point of significant economic and political crisis.  Read More ... Bill Fletcher Jr., NNPA Columnist

Jackie Robinson syndrome hits U.S. Senate Last week seemed like a major setback for the United States. Maybe it was a virtual flashback. The United States Senate (lily white) was up in arms over a Black man being appointed as Senator.  Read More ... Harry C. Alford, NNPA Columnist

Black assistant coach says white wife hampers promotion The University of Florida’s football team made a statement when it defeated the University of Oklahoma 24–14 and was declared national champion for the second time in three years. Charlie Strong, the African-American defensive coordinator who kept the Sooners far below their 54 points a game average, made an even louder statement when he declared that despite all of his success at Florida, he has been passed over for head coaching positions because of his interracial marriage.  Read More ... George E Curry, NNPA Columnist

Just another boogeyman, Part I Look! Up in the sky! It’s a bird, it’s a plane. It’s another Black boogeyman! More powerful than 40 ounces of St. Ides Malt Liquor or a bottle of Hypnotiq, faster than Paris Hilton on a Saturday night, able to snatch 10 purses in a single swipe. Actually, it’s every Black man in America.  Read More ... Edmund lewis, Editor

The road to economic recovery U.S. The news is somber. One in 10 homeowners have been late for at least one mortgage payment and an estimated two million foreclosures will occur by the end of 2009.  Read More ... Rep. Donna Edwards (D-Md.), NNPA Guest Columnist

Obama’s appointments and Blacks I’m not sure we are covered by the current appointments. It depends on how President Barack Obama intends to govern.    Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Dynasty or democracy:Kennedy, Clinton, and Bush Is our nation a democracy or a creator of political dynasties? Or are we a combination of both.  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

Mr. Burris, and racial politics, goes to Washington The mess surrounding Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich has gotten messier now that he has outfoxed his political opponents, at least for now, by appointing Roland Burris, the first African American to win statewide office in Illinois, to fill the vacated Senate seat of President-elect Barack Obama.  Read More ... George E Curry, NNPA Columnist

My new year hopes for Palestine and Obama As I write this column, Israel is carrying out a devastating attack on the Gaza Strip, attempting to complete the final destruction of Hamas, the Palestinian Islamist movement that controls that territory. By the time you read this commentary it is impossible to predict how the situation will have devolved or evolved.  Read More ... Bill Fletcher Jr., NNPA Columnist

Obama's miraculous win leads 2008 Black Press stories; stories of injustices close behind At this time last year, then U.S. Sen. Barack Obama was not the Black community’s favored candidate to win the Democratic nomination for the presidency of the United States. Indeed, because of America’s past history of racism, most Blacks did not initially favor Obama as the Democratic nominee because they simply did not believe he could win the general election. Read More ... Hazel Trice Edney, NNPA Editor-in-Chief

The greatest gift in the new year The greatest gift of all this Christmas was the emancipation of the human spirit, a present everyone can receive, but virtually no one can buy. With plant closings, homeowner evictions and unemployment on a frightening rise, this Christmas was not just another celebration of the acquisition of more stuff. Read More ... Rev. Barbara Reynolds, NNPA Columnist

Looking back, looking forward As we all look to a new year and pause to remember the highlights of the last one, the Children's Defense Fund (CDF) is reflecting on a major milestone: 2008 marked our 35th anniversary. In October, we celebrated with a special event at the Kennedy Center in Washington, D.C. Read More ... Marian Wright Edelman, NNPA Columnist

Will America Lose Another Generation of Black Males? The previous generation of young Black males was destroyed between 1985 and 2005.  No amount of crying, cursing or hand-wringing can change this because that generation is gone! We need only walk down any city street in almost any predominantly African American community to see residue of the broken lives—millions of young Black men nationwide. Read More ... Phillip Jackso, Guest Columnist

It is always darkest before dawn As the sun sets on the Bush Administration, the past eight years may be recorded as the “unenlightened years” of American history. After all, just before the elections of 2000, the national budget surplus was $230 million; the nation was in peacetime; citizens enjoyed the privacy of home; personal income paid the bills for most; American jobs were in America; school children had classes such as art, band, and drama as educational options; and the world community actually liked the president of the United States. Read More ... Gary L. Flowers, NNPA Columnist

Reclaiming our history As a child, I had no idea that Alexandre Dumas, author of The Three Musketeers and The Count of Monte Cristo, was a Black man or that Alexander Pushkin, “the father of Russian literature,” was a Black man. Africans and people of African descent have a long history of usurped glory. For centuries, “playa-haters” and naysayers have been trying to steal our intellectual and creative thunder. Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Too many bowls, too few black coaches An oversaturation of bowl games is not my number one complaint against college football. Rather, it’s the fact that approximately half of the players are African-Americans yet only 3.4 percent of the college football coaches are Black. That’s four among the 119 major division coaches.  Read More ... George E. Curry, NNPA Columnist

In search of our minds The signs are everywhere. Dennis Rodman. Michael Jackson. O.J. Simpson. Flava Flav. Snoop. I Love New York. Bobby Brown. Lil' Weezy. Diamond-encrusted fangs. Saggin' pants. Lip gloss. Just about any 'hood in the United States where we live. It ain't hard to tell. We have obviously lost our ever-loving minds. No diggety.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor - 1 opinion posted

Obama has a big challenge with the SBA On January 20, 2009, President Obama will receive management of a federal agency that is in complete shambles. The Small Business Administration has been on a downgrade since the mid 1990's. It is at a state of life support and our new administration must address it immediately because the status of small and minority business has been greatly suffering.  Read More ... Harry C. Alford, NNPA Columnist

Post racial racism As we come closer to the "post-racial age" of a Barack Obama presidency, I am intrigued to find that post-racial racism is already being propagated in the pages of the Washington Post. In "An Enduring Crisis for the Black Family," Kay Hymowitz blames the economic disfranchisement of African Americans upon the personal behavior of Black people and the silence of Black leaders concerning this behavior. Ms. Hymowitz portrays the massive national growth of single parent homes as a Black pathology. She uses the real challenge of the breakdown in the traditional family to further stereotype and lay blame on African Americans for racial inequality in this country.  Read More ... Dedrick Muhammad, Guest Columnist

Who will get the 2,500M new jobs? President Election Barack Obama has been formulating plans for the Stimulus Package that will be enacted shortly after he takes office.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Time to make peace with Cuba January 1, 2009, marks the 50th anniversary of the Cuban Revolution. Over the past 50 years Cuba has been a focal point of U.S. disdain.  Read More ... Nicole C. Lee, NNPA Columnist

Why won't they Shut up already? At a time when gay leaders should be apologizing to and trying to build bridges with African-Americans after exposing their closeted racism towards Blacks over the passage of California's Proposition 8, the gays are at it again.  Read More ... Jasmyne A. Cannick, Guest Columnist

Protests against Warren: Another case of silencing of the lambs President-elect Barack Obama has shown the courage to invite best-selling Purpose-Driven Life author and mega-pastor Rick Warren to give the Invocation at his Inauguration. And that is Good News.  Read More ... Rev. Barbara Reynolds, NNPA Religion Columnist

BPMS Blues I stumbled across some photos, cards and letters last week from about five years ago when a dozen or so students from Bishop Perry Middle School dropped by The Louisiana Weekly for a visit. The students, all aspiring journalists and members of the school's newspaper staff, were bursting with curiosity and energy that I still feel when I remember that day.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Activism and the perfect storm There was a perfect storm of factors that led to the Obama election. There was the extraordinary, and paradigm shifting assertion that we can believe in change, the audacity of the chant that "yes we can" organize and fight for the world we have envisioned. There was the profound discipline of the Obama campaign, a group of folk who shrugged off detractors, kept raising money, raising energy, making pragmatic decisions, and steamrolling forward.  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

The radical right rides again Think about it. A group of southern, right wing, Republican senators have stopped the U.S. Senate from approving a package of financial assistance to the big three auto companies who employ directly over 150,000 workers, but affects 3 million including the suppliers, dealers and etc.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA ColumnistThink about it. A group of southern, right wing, Repu

America's sixth child On the day he died, Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. called his mother to give her his next Sunday's sermon title: "Why America May Go to Hell." In his 1968 call for a Poor People's Campaign, he warned that "America is going to hell if we don't use her vast resources to end poverty and make it possible for all of God's children to have the basic necessities of life."  Read More ... Marian Wright Edelman, NNPA Columnist

'Secretary of State' Hillary Clinton to face high challenges at State Department The U.S. State Department is perhaps the eminent instrument of Global influence in U.S. foreign policy formulation. In the midst of questionable perceptions of American foreign policy standings in the community of nations, the State Department under the incoming Obama administration is poised to potentially change policy directives and redefine the U.S. role as a global manager in international affairs.  Read More ... Gloria Sawyer, NNPA Guest Commentary

Touched by an angel Edmund W. Lewis, Editor Every time December rolls around, my mind wanders to a cold, overcast day 20 years ago when my faith in humanity was restored by a perfect stranger. It was only a few days before Christmas and not that long after a tragic family accident when a teenage cousin had died after falling into the Mississippi River, when I decided to take one of my nieces and a nephew on a holiday shopping expedition in the Central Business District.  Read More ...

Equal opportunity in economic recovery With news that the economy is hemorrhaging jobs, President-elect Obama has stepped up to do the right thing. On the heels of the worst unemployment report that we've seen in more than a decade, a report that indicated that unemployment is 6.7 percent, African-American unemployment is 11.2 percent, and more than half a million jobs were lost in the past month, the President-elect has announced that he will implement a massive road-building plan, with more than five thousand projects being implemented among the 50 states, to the tune of more than $64 billion. Such a plan was expected, as infrastructure repair was part of the Obama campaign platform.  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

The time for a revolution It struck me while analyzing the current victory of Barack Obama that the last time there had been such a formidable Democratic landslide was in 1964 and the election of Lyndon Johnson made possible the mandate he used to create the Great Society.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

When does Iraq get an apology? A U.S.-Iraq pact has been announced that is supposed to lead to a U.S. withdrawal from Iraq by 2011. With this agreement there will be an increasing assumption that the war is over and the Occupation nearly at end. I actually think that neither is true, but for the purposes of this commentary I want to focus on a specific action that in coming President Obama needs to take regardless: apologize to the people of Iraq for the U.S. invasion.  Read More ... Bill Fletcher Jr., NNPA Columnist

The biggest inauguration of all time We have an Inauguration every four years. This one (January 20, 2009), like no other, promises to be the most magnificent and well attended event in history. It's the first African-American president for the United States and he obviously will be one of the most intelligent and well organized executive this nation has come to know.  Read More ... Harry C. Alford, NNPA Columnist

Angela's song I never met Angela.  But I feel as though I know her because my sister Anne spoke so glowingly of her physical and inner beauty. She talked at length about Angela's kindness, courage and strength in dealing with the many obstacles life placed in her path. She also heaped praised on Angela for the selflessness and love she displayed in raising her children.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor - 1 opinion posted

Has Barack Obama brought about a post-racial America? "Barack Obama's campaign and election has spawned a new racial narrative in America. Take note that the new storyline is trickery designed to distort realities of the nation's racial landscape. Through Obama, Blacks have a sense of inclusion in America. But, beyond the euphoria of the moment we need to access the realities and understand that Obama is just another black face on the same old white system.  Read More ... William Reed, Guest Columnist

An opportunity to build a new workforce Our economy is in dire straits. The employment levels are hitting new lows and no end is in sight.  Read More ... Harry C. Alford, NNPA Columnist

Dr. Julius Richmond-Creator of Head Start In July 2008, Dr. Julius B. Richmond passed away at age 91 at his home outside Boston. Dr. Richmond served as U.S. Surgeon General under President Jimmy Carter.  Read More ... Marian Wright Edelman, NNPA Columnist

Possibly two black U. S. Senators? Before Barack Obama's victory, thinking about the possibility of having two Black U. S. Senators would have been more unlikely than having a Black president of the United States. But right now there is at least the possibility, given the expected ascendancy of both Obama and Hillary Clinton to the ranks of the Presidency and Secretary of State respectively.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

World AIDS Day and President-elect Barack Obama December 1 was World AIDS day and I'm thinking about President-elect Barack Obama.  Read More ... Phill Wilson, NNPA Columnist

A time for Thanksgiving The past year has been a tumultuous and uncertain one for many Americans. Each day's headlines brought worrisome news: the collapse of Wall Street; massive home and job losses; and a spreading global economic crisis.  Read More ... Marian Wright Edelman, NNPA Columnist

Looking back and ahead As we approach the end of the year, many people began to reflect on the highs and lows of the previous 12 months as well as the events, moments and people who impacted our lives most. In the spirit of reflection and resolution, I've looked both back at this past year's high notes and ahead to some of the things that I'd like to see happen.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

An olive branch for Jesse Jackson When the 2008 contest for the Democratic nomination for President got heated, New York Sen. Hilary Rodham Clinton threw all kinds of wild accusations at President-elect Barack Obama.  Read More ... Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

Bush's fig leaf Dwelling on the past seems to be going out of fashion. I get it. It is a new day and for people who are seeking changing now is the time to seize our moment.  Read More ... Nicole C. Lee, NNPA Columnist

Malcolm X, Obama, Powell, Rice and "House Negroes" The uproar caused by the statements attributed to al-Qaida's deputy leader, Ayman al-Zawahiri, in which he labeled President-elect Barack Obama and former and current secretaries of states Colin Powell and Condoleezza, "house Negroes" is fascinating to those of us who consider ourselves Malcolmites.  Read More ... A. Peter Bailey, NNPA Columnist

U.S. Treasury betrays America It has happened sooner than I thought and it is worse than I thought. The big hustle known as the Wall St. Bailout perpetrated by Secretary of Treasury Henry Paulson went south on us like I-75.  Read More ... Harry C. Alford, NNPA Columnist

Reconceptualizing Civil Rights for the 21st Century As the new opportunities for social change are opened by the election of Barack Obama to the presidency, along with a Democratic House and Senate, we continue to need a concept that defines the struggle that it will take for us to achieve equality.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Just be thankful Have you ever met someone who seems to have no joy in his or her heart, no hope to hold onto and no love to give? This is truly one of the saddest sights you will ever see. Most of us have known people whose bad habits and harsh words cut us like knives at one time or another, but when we come face to face with someone who has no light in his or her eyes, no bounce in his step and no apparent reason to wake up every morning, it kind of takes the wind out of our sails.  Read More ... Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Is the U.S. living its creed and preparing for the future? How does America rank in investing in its children? At this transformative moment in American life with the election of Sen. Barack Obama as our first African-American and 44th President of the United States of America, we citizens must now roll up our sleeves and help translate this new presidency into a transformation of America's investment priorities and values-real change.  Read More ... Marian Wright Edelman, NNPA Columnist

Do we save the auto industry? We have just witnessed one of the most daring schemes and hustles in modern history. The secretary of treasury forces Congress and the President to fork over nearly $1 trillion dollars that we really didn't have under the perception that it was going to save millions from losing their homes.  Read More ... Harry C. Alford, NNPA Columnist

President Barack Obama The National Urban League and its affiliates congratulate President-elect Obama, Vice-President-elect Joe Biden, and their families for turning what began as an improbable journey into an historic victory for their party and our country.  Read More ... Marc H. Morial, NNPA Columnist

Mayor Nagin speaks to the issues..... The 2009 Budget process is one of the most critical budget cycles for our city. Although Business Week has named New Orleans as one of the "best places to ride out a recession," the crisis on Wall Street has hampered our ability to sell bonds for use in our recovery. The impact could be felt far beyond that.  Read More ...

Anger and Hope: Haitian families furious over school collapse (NNPA) - "No one cares about the children, living or dead," one furious father of children in the collapsed school outside of Port au Prince Haiti swore Sunday, November 9, in an interview.  Read More ... Bill Quigley, NNPA Special Correspondent

The Black Vote in 2008 Pardon me if I begin this with a little crowing, since I attracted considerable heat, months ago, by declaring that Barack Obama would win this election in a landslide and that the Black vote would reach unprecedented levels.  Read More ... Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Something's gotta give Last week's report by WWL-TV about recovery director Edward Blakely's schedule and how it may impede his ability to get the job done in New Orleans should have come as a surprise to no one who has watched in frustration as the city continues to struggle to meet the basic needs of residents.  Read More ... Edmund Lewis, Editor

From the diary of a 'down low' brother  Read More ...

McCain owes America an apology: John Lewis was right On election night he made a fine concession speech and walked away - but the fires are still burning for John McCain. He apparently thought it was OK to turn fears on high for as long as possible to help his quest for the presidency. Read More ... Bill Quigley, Guest Columnist

An American, Finally For all of my life I've been an American, reluctantly. Came here in chains. Advanced by my brains and by the legacy of struggle and dignity. I sing, "Lift Every Voice" as if it is rap because it is history, poetry, poignancy, and a capturing of every step African Americans have taken. How can you sing, "stony the road we trod" and feel fully American? How can you put your mouth around the phrase, "treading our way through the blood of the slaughtered" without wondering about the democratic integrity of our nation?  Read More ... By Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

Ain't that good news? It's not that I didn't try. It's just that with all of the sheer electricity of last week's milestone presidential election and the intoxicating moment, pregnant with possibilities, it represented, my mind was racing and my spirit was doing backflips.  Read More ... By Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

The hard work now begins for all of us A cartoon published in the early 1960s depicted a Black boy saying to a white boy: "I'll sell you my chance to be President of the United States for a nickel." At the time the cartoon appeared, Barack Obama was a toddler. There were only five Black Members of Congress and about 300 Black elected officials nationwide. The Voting Rights Act hadn't been passed and the overwhelming majority of Black Southerners were disenfranchised.  Read More ... By Marian Wright Edelman, Contributing Columnist

A leader for the entire world I had a confession to make to my dear wife, Kay. We are quite open and transparent with our expenses and revenue. But I had been keeping something from her for a couple of days.  Read More ... By Harry C. Alford, NNPA Columnist

A place for which our fathers (and mothers) sighed When James Weldon Johnson and his brother, John Rosamond Johnson penned the words in 1900 which would become the "Black National Anthem," they effectively truncated the history of Africans in America into three stimulating stanzas.  Read More ... By Gary L. Flowers, NNPA Columnist

After historic victory, Obama will face limitations Now that Barack Obama has defeated John McCain, Joe the Plumber and a barrage of negative television commercials, he will now strive to balance the high expectations of African Americans and other progressives with the reality of an anemic economy and supersized budget deficits.  Read More ... By George E Curry, NNPA Columnist

Organizing change outside of government Barack Obama will find out something, if he doesn't already know it. The size and number of the challenges he will confront cannot be managed entirely from within the government. John McCain has used the statement by Joe Biden that Barack Obama will be tested within six months by some foreign enemy because he will be perceived as young and inexperienced in foreign affairs.  Read More ... By Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Questions In the few short days prior to the most historic election in my lifetime, my anxieties with respect to the outcome of that race, has my mind racing with a myriad of questions. Questions that I wonder whether or not I am alone in thinking…  Read More ... By Edmund Lewis, Editor

In this election the Supreme Court matters On the way to the voting booth on November 4, in addition to thinking about who should occupy the White House, we should also be concerned about who he will appoint to federal courts.  Read More ... By Marian Wright Edelman, NNPA Columnist

Vote to make your ancestors proud I am voting for someone else on Tuesday. No, not John McCain. I am voting for my beloved Big Mama, Sylvia Harris. I am voting for my stepfather, William H. Polk. I am voting for my Uncle Frank Harris, who could not read or write. I am writing for Aunt Katherine Foster, who could write, but barely. I am voting for all of my deceased relatives and so many non-relatives who did not live to see the day when a Black man could become president of the United States.  Read More ... By George E Curry, NNPA Columnist

A Black voter’s guide to the tax debate Campaigning in Florida, Sen. McCain described Sen. Obama’s plan to cut taxes for 95 percent of American families by saying, “His plan gives away your tax dollars to those who don’t pay taxes. That’s not a tax cut; that’s welfare.”  Read More ... By William E. Spriggs, NNPA Guest Columnist

Why the attack on ACORN? The attack on ACORN (Associated Community Organizations for Reform Now) by the political Right has two clear objectives. The first is a preemptive assault against advocates for voting rights who have been raising concerns since November 2000 regarding electoral theft being carried out by the political Right. The second objective is to obscure who or what is behind the current economic crisis, a crisis that began in the mortgage industry.  Read More ... By Bill Fletcher Jr., NNPA Columnist

Don’t forget, there’s work to do The election that has consumed us for nearly two years is about to be over. Assuming that everyone goes to the polls and pulls the right lever, we will have the President we deserve on November 5.  Read More ... By Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

Changing times In his latest HBO comedy special, "Kill The  Messenger," Chris Rock spends a great deal of time talking about the upcoming presidential election and how it has revealed some very disturbing things about U.S. race relations.  Read More ... By Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Don't be Fooled by Weapons of Mass Deception-Vote In this time of unprecedented economic peril and historic change, we need to arm ourselves with clarity and unity as weapons of mass empowerment.  Instead, there is a concerted effort on the part of some to deploy weapons of mass deception to confuse and cloud the economic and political landscape before us. Let me give you just two examples.  Read More ... By Marc Morial President/CEO, National Urban League

Our fight for voting rights Not long ago, widespread rumors reverberated in the Black community that somehow African Americans could lose their right to vote in America. Not true. American citizens who are Black cannot lose their right to vote based on race.  Read More ... By Gary L. Flowers NNPA Columnist

America needs Barack Obama now This is not an endorsement, it is an analysis. At the end of the three presidential debates featuring Barack Obama and John McCain, the judgment of the American people was that Obama had won all three.  Read More ... By Ron Walters NNPA Columnist

Republicans can't see the forest for the ACORN So far, lacking an "October Surprise" that will dramatically turn the election in their favor, Republicans are gradually shifting their attention from William Ayers, "an old washed-up terrorist " in the 1960s, to the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now, better known as ACORN.  Read More ... By George E Curry NNPA Columnist

Dealing with minority front companies One of the sleaziest operations going on today is that of a Front Company. This is a company that claims to be of minority ownership when actually it is a white company or a minority person falsely claiming ownership to an activity that is for minority business credit.  Read More ... By Harry C. Alford NNPA Columnist

The audacity of hate By now, many of you may have seen a photo that’s been circulating in emails for at least a week or two that shows how one white gentleman feels about Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama. The man is on a motorbike at an intersection, waiting for the traffic signal to change from red to green. He has on a white T-shirt with the following message on the back: “NIGGER PLEASE!!! It’s a WHITE house.”  Read More ... By Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

The importance of sports In these waning weeks of the 2008 Hurricane Season, I read a letter from a female resident who explained in a very personal way, how the return of the New Orleans Saints allowed her to get through a rough time in her life, including hurricane evacuation, the passing of her mother and destruction of her family home.  The sentiments expressed are undoubtedly shared by legions of others in our metro area who, in the past five years, have experienced three evacuations, a loss of life and property in Katrina, and the economic distress caused by Gustav and Ike.  Read More ... By New Orleans Councilman Arnie Fielkow, Guest Columnist

For progress, we must fight The Great abolitionist and orator Frederick Douglas made it clear to us, “Power concedes nothing without a demand… There must be a struggle.” Such is the way of the world. Even the Biblical hero David understood this when he was confronted by the giant Goliath. The 12-year-old Black child didn’t flinch and plead for mercy. He popped a rock upside the giant’s head and the rest was history.  Read More ... By Harry C. Alford, NNPA Columnist

My take on the Bradley effect As the election has drawn nearer, there has been an inevitable debate about the way in which race will play out, even spoil the result, and in that respect the so-called “Bradley Effect” – Whites saying they will vote for a black candidate to pollsters, but not doing so when they go to vote — may play a role. Read More ... By Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Obama does great in polls - but don't believe them According to the polls, Barack Obama is steadily widening his lead over Republican rival John McCain to become the next president of the United States. A Washington Post-ABC News poll released Monday shows Obama with a 53 percent to 43 percent lead among likely voters.  Read More ... By George E Curry, NNPA Columnist

Welfare kings So I’m pinching pennies and coming up with a plan to get away clean with robbin’ Peter to pay Paul to pay all of my bills in a timely fashion when I run across a news story about a lavish getaway for executives at American International Group Inc., which shelled out almost a half million dollars literally just weeks after the company was bailed out by an $85 billion loan from the Federal Reserve.  Read More ... By Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

2008 Election: Historic, Whether Obama Wins or Looses We may be about to witness what political scientists call a “critical election” which promotes a realignment of American politics – in this case, from Republican to Democrat.  Read More ... By Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Why not bail out the unemployed? The United States economy is shedding jobs faster than a grooming dog sheds fleas. Payroll employment has been dropping for nine months in a row with 159,000 fewer jobs on the books in September than in the month before. Read More ... By Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

Judging the candidates on their records During nearly two years of presidential campaigning, the candidates have made claims and promises on how they would perform if they are elected to the White House. Some of the criteria we might use to judge a candidate’s fitness and temperament for leadership are difficult to quantify. But one concrete and objective way to assess how candidates measure up on crucial issues is by examining their voting records.  Read More ... By Marian Wright Edelman, NNPA Columnist

Conservative hate-mongering blaming Blacks for nation's financial crisis Somehow and in some way there are those in America, usually right-wing conservatives, who can manage to blame Blacks and poor people for just about everything that goes wrong in this country. The latest example is the sometimes subtle and the sometimes overt faulting of African Americans and other low-income minorities for the nation’s current financial crisis.  Read More ... By Robert N. Taylor, Guest Columnist

This is your nation on white privilege For those who still can’t grasp the concept of white privilege, or who are looking for some easy-to-understand examples of it, perhaps this list will help.    Read More ... By Tim Wise, Guest Columnist

Taxpayers subsidize America's corporate welfare queens There is growing evidence that the Wall Street bailout will definitely help Wall Street, provide some token assistance to Main Street, and totally bypass Dr. Martin Luther King Drive.  Read More ... By George E Curry, NNPA Columnist

Obama hits a triple at the debate, a home run at the CBC By all accounts Barack Obama won the first of the presidential debates on September 26 over John McCain, who was widely considered to have more experience in foreign affairs.  Read More ... By Ron Walters, NNPA Columnist

Take it personally I keep wanting to write something totally erudite about the economic crisis that will cause our country to bail out banks to the tune of a trillion dollars, but I cannot.  Read More ... By Julianne Malveaux, NNPA Columnist

When big capitalists plead for welfare It was an extremely sad day for those who believe in free enterprise and the fundamentals of capitalism. Adam Smith, the author of "Wealth of Nations", who is considered the Father of Capitalism, must have been turning in his grave.  Read More ... By Harry C. Alford, NNPA Columnist

In my solitude People sometimes ask me how I maintain a sense of balance and peace of mind in an ever-changing world that knows neither mercy nor compassion. After laughing to myself and tell them that still waters run very deep, I usually tell them that where there's a will, there's a way. I share with them my (italics) way, which inevitably leads to puzzled looks because there really is no magical formula to feeling at ease and relaxed. It's just something you have to work at daily, I tell them. I also tell them, as friends have told me over the years, that it's all about your attitude.  Read More ... By Edmund W. Lewis, Editor

Ignoring history and the truth Gov. Sarah Palin and the GOP want to lead Americans down a slippery and perilous path.  Read More ...

A choice of colors This just in...A new poll conducted by The Associated Press/Yahoo News in association with Stanford University discovered that there is still a wide racial gulf between Black and white Americans.  Alert the media!!!  Read More ... By Edmund W. Lewis, Editor - 1 opinion posted

Haiti, a country in crisis - Time for Action It is with all respect and humility that I express the sympathies of myself and the members of the Congressional Black Caucus, our condolences and support for the people of Texas and the Gulf Region, who have been toiling under storm after storm after storm and dealing with the destruction that comes from nature's wrath.  Read More ... By U. S. Rep. Yvette D. Clarke (D-N.Y.), NNPA Special Commentary

McCain will keep bushwhacking everyone but the very wealthy For eight horrible years under President George Bush, an oil war, corporate greed and tax cuts for the rich have drained billions out of the U.S. economy. Another eight years of the same under John McCain promises economic pain, punishment and misery for families, students, workers -all but the very rich.  Read More ... By Rev. Barbara Reynolds, NNPA Columnist