 There is an undercurrent of discontent coming from the African American community regarding President Obama's commitment and policies towards addressing the concerns of African Americans. During an interview on Meet the Press NAACP President and CEO Benjamin Jealous commented “The country’s back to pretty much where it was when this president started.....White people in this country are doing a bit better. Black people are doing a full point worse." In a blog post from the Shreveport Times the writer states: "Mr. Obama’s disparate treatment of the African American voting bloc, to be frank, disgusts me. To hear him take the positions he’s had on issues important to the gay and Latino communities, yet in the same breath, all but chastises African Americans for wanting their issues prioritized, as well, irks me to no end." There are also those that have issues with Obama's policies on drone attacks and the military actions in Africa.
 I made a conscious decision not to write about gun control and the lunacy that has been playing out in the media. It seem quite obvious to me that there is a need to revisit and revamp the existing laws. I didn't feel that there was anything new that I could contribute that hasn't been said already. That was until the race card was played to rally support against gun control. First Larry Ward, chairman of the national Gun Appreciation Day told CNN Friday that there never would have been slaves in America if black people had guns. "I think Martin Luther King, Jr. would agree with me if he were alive today that if African Americans had been given the right to keep and bear arms from day one of the country's founding, perhaps slavery might not have been a chapter in our history," Then Rush Limbaugh during his Friday’s radio show questioned how civil rights leaders would have had to march for rights if they had greater access to firearms at the time. “If a lot of African-Americans back in the ’60s had guns and the legal right to use them for self-defense, you think they would have needed Selma? I don’t know, I’m just asking.” We're sharing this very informative video created by the Center for Constitutional Rights as part of their Stop and Frisk project. New York City is not the only place to have such programs, it happens to be the one that gets the most attention. Brown, Black, and Blue: "The Stop & Frisk Policy of the NYPD" examines the NYPD's stop and frisk policy in depth, highlighting issues of discrimination, constitutional concerns and the policy's impact on individuals' lives.
 Here's one of the arguments opposing Affirmative Action: as long as we continue to discuss race and make race an issue we'll never be able to put race behind us. Some opponents of Affirmative Action feel that we need to move beyond it. The battle is over. This goes for gender equality also. The issue at hand is not if there is a need for Affirmative Action but if it's still constitutionally relevant, after all we do have an African American president. Taking this one step further, if AA is constitutionally relevant, does a State have the right to ban it? There's a push for these decisions to be made at the state level. California, Oklahoma, and Michigan passed legislation to ban AA, Michigan's law was overturned. In a Los Angeles Times editorial entitled "Affirmative action and the law" the writer states: "Instead of asking courts to roll back unfavorable referendums, advocates of affirmative action in Michigan, California and elsewhere need to make their case to the public the way Ward Connerly and his allies made theirs."  Click to enlarge image I saw The Central Park Five on Monday.
To say that the story of these boys (now men) was a travesty of justice is a gross understatement. This was an utter miscarriage of justice, a totally orchestrated train wreck. What happened is a case study of how the system can fail on all levels. This was not just a failure of the criminal justice system. The media was equally culpable. The public was complicit as well. What galls me the most is New York City, my city, has not owned up to the mistakes that were made and has never apologized to these men for the injustices they faced. Make no mistake about it this can happen again. A confession may not necessarily be a confession, especially if it’s not in line with the evidence. Sometimes a confession is really coercion. |
EditorErnest R. Heyward is the Founder and President of the Marketplace for Social Awareness and Social Responsibility Inc. 
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