Clipmarks | masbury's 'race' clips

Whaddya know? People ARE talking about race!

Wed, 08 Oct 2008 04:00:53 GMT

clipped by: masbury
clipper's remarks: Here are some honest folks putting it right there on the table where everyone can see it.

Clip Source: www.motherjones.com

But, boy, do we have a long way to go. Check out this article about Obama organizers doing their best in Buchanan County, Virginia. Here's an excerpt:

...Obama's supporters, as they push to win this dead-even battleground state, are talking directly about race

When Cecil E. Roberts, president of the coal miners union that shapes politics in much of this mountain region, talks to voters, he tells them that their choice is to have "a black friend in the White House or a white enemy." When Charlie Cox, an Obama supporter, hears friends fretting about Obama's race, he reminds them that they pull for the nearby University of Tennessee football team, "and they're black."

Union organizer Jerry Stallard asks fellow coal workers what's more important: improving their work conditions or holding onto their skepticism of Obama's race, culture or religion. "We're all black in the mines," he tells them.

Tags: race, election, politics

Divided on racial views

Mon, 22 Sep 2008 19:37:42 GMT

clipped by: masbury
clipper's remarks: Is it just coincidence that the more powerful group doesn't see discrimination as much of a problem? H/T bbking13, who clipped another part of this good story.

Clip Source: news.yahoo.com

Tags: race

St Paul the past; Denver the future of political demographics

Sat, 06 Sep 2008 03:20:11 GMT

clipped by: masbury
clipper's remarks: RNC relies on shrinking demographic groups - growing whiter and older. Dem support comes from fastest growing demographic groups.

Clip Source: tpmcafe.talkingpointsmemo.com

As I surveyed the crowd, I had an overriding thought: 'This place is really white.'

At Invesco, I was surrounded by blacks, Hispanics, Asian-Americans and whites; young and old; male and female; gays and straights

in St. Paul. The crowd consisted of middle-aged white men and middle-aged white women

Apparently my eyes don't lie. At the DNC, 34 percent of the delegates were black or Hispanic. At the RNC, 93% of delegates are white, 5% Hispanic and only 1.5% African-American - in fact, it is the lowest black delegate representation at a Republican convention in 40 years.

Obama is capturing

his support comes from the part of the population that is fastest growing

McCain's support comes largely from white voters and in particular older Americans

not to say that John McCain will necessarily lose

But having stood on the floor of both convention halls this past week, it seems quite clear that Denver represents the future of American politics - and St. Paul is the past.

Tags: politics, race

Execution scheduled despite recanted testimony

Sat, 06 Sep 2008 23:40:10 GMT

clipped by: masbury
clipper's remarks: [Send email at link if you want to express your support for review] Convicted of murder solely on basis of witness testimony - no physical evidence. All witnesses but two have since changed their position; one of the two is the prime alternate suspect. But Georgia will not allow factual review of case, and has set execution for the 23rd of this month.

Clip Source: www.amnestyusa.org

EXECUTION DATE SET: SEPTEMBER 23 AT 7 p.m.

The Georgia Board of Pardons and Paroles will hold a clemency hearing on Friday, September 12.

the Georgia Supreme Court decided 4-3 to deny a new trial for Troy Anthony Davis, despite significant concerns regarding his innocence

Georgia might soon execute a man who may well be innocent

Restrictions on Federal appeals have prevented Troy Anthony Davis from having a hearing in federal court on the reliability of the witness testimony used against him

The case against him consisted entirely of witness testimony

Since then, all but two of the state's non-police witnesses

have recanted or contradicted their testimony

Many

have stated in sworn affidavits that they were pressured or coerced by police into testifying or signing statements

One of the two witnesses who has not recanted his testimony is Sylvester "Red" Coles – the principle alternative suspect

against whom there is new evidence

Nine individuals have signed affidavits implicating Sylvester Coles.

Tags: troy davis, georgia, civil rights, race

Lawsuit against US Biz's that profited from Apartheid

Tue, 08 Jul 2008 22:34:54 GMT

clipped by: masbury
clipper's remarks: Despite int'l sanctions, some US corporations kept doing business in S Africa during apartheid years, benefiting from legal wage and labor suppression of black people there.

Clip Source: www.democracynow.org

Landmark Case Returns to NY Seeking Millions from Corporations that Profited from South African Apartheid

It seeks damages from the companies for doing business with the apartheid government despite international sanctions and boycotts. The companies include the oil giants BP and ExxonMobil, banks such as Citigroup and UBS, and the car giants General Motors and Ford Motor

The case was initially dismissed in November 2004 but reinstated last October. The Supreme Court was set to rule on the case in May but sent it back to district court after four justices disclosed they own shares in some of the companies named in the suit

I grew up in Port Elizabeth, for instance, which was the headquarters both of Ford and GM, and they were using black labor, but it was very cheap black labor, because there was a law in South Africa which said (a) blacks are not allowed to join trade unions, and (b) they’re not allowed to strike, so that they were forced to accept whatever wages they were given

Tags: race, business

Texas GOP convention vendor highlights Obama's race

Wed, 18 Jun 2008 19:32:37 GMT

clipped by: masbury
clipper's remarks: Wonder why they'd do that?

Clip Source: www.democracynow.org

In other campaign news, the Texas Republican Party is coming under criticism for allowing the sale of racist pins at last week’s convention. One vendor was selling a pin that read “If Obama is President…will we still call it the White House?”

Tags: race, racism, politics

White Supremacists Cheer Obama

Sat, 14 Jun 2008 02:12:31 GMT

clipped by: masbury
clipper's remarks: Convinced that all will see the inferiority of non-white people if Obama is elected. HAHAHAHAHAHA. Maybe Affirmative Action boosted him to the top of his Harvard Law class. Maybe it suppressed unfortunate McCain to the bottom of his US Naval Academy class.

Clip Source: www.splcenter.org

President Obama? Many White Supremacists are Celebrating

With the nomination of Barack Obama as the Democratic presidential candidate clinched, large sections of the white supremacist movement are adopting a surprising attitude: Electing America’s first black president would be a very good thing.

It’s not that the assortment of neo-Nazis, Klansmen, anti-Semites and others who make up this country’s radical right have suddenly discovered that a man should be judged based on the content of his character, not his skin. On the contrary. A growing number of white supremacists, and even some of those who pass for intellectual leaders of their movement, think that a black man in the Oval Office would shock white America, possibly drive millions to their cause, and perhaps even set off a race war that, they hope, would ultimately end in Aryan victory.

“He will make things so bad for white people that

they will finally realize how stupid they were for admiring these jigaboos

Tags: obama, race, racism

How US immigration changed in 1965

Wed, 04 Jun 2008 20:58:00 GMT

clipped by: masbury
clipper's remarks: changed from openly racist 1924 laws

Clip Source: www.juancole.com

1965 is significant in two ways, as the culmination of the Civil Rights Movement and as the year when Congress finally showed some shame about the 1924 racist immigration laws that allotted big annual quotas to northern European Protestant countries and limited everyone else. Instead, every country in the world was given an upward limit of 25,000 ordinary immigrants. And then the Africans, Latinos (many of them actually Mayans & etc.), Arabs, and Asians came. And they often intermarried, both with already-constituted ethnic groups in the US, and with each other. That's Obama's family.

Tags: race, immigration

KU KLUX KLAN WON'T ENDORSE OBAMA!

Wed, 28 May 2008 05:01:04 GMT

clipped by: masbury
clipper's remarks: Excellent satire - read the whole thing! Healthcare, it is assumed, is their point of disagreement. And "Noting her strength with the broad swaths of people who have no intention of actually voting for her, Senator Clinton also feels Obama's weakness with people who hate both of them with a passion should give unpledged superdelegates pause."

Clip Source: www.huffingtonpost.com

Dateline - Lynchburg, Virginia

In a surprising move, which some are calling a deathblow to his candidacy, the Ku Klux Klan today decided to not endorse Senator Barack Obama in his bid for the Presidency of the United States. Seeming to validate Hillary Clinton's assertion that Obama cannot win the all-important poor white racist vote which had became the cornerstone of her support, many are now speculating that rejection by the influential domestic terrorist organization could spell the end for the Illinois Democrat's race for the White House.

At his armed camp outside of Shepherdstown, West Virginia, Imperial Grand Wizard Gomer Bath explained the Klan's decision. "Our secret membership just did not feel that Senator Obama was addressing our core values." he said during press conference to a group of blindfolded reporters.

I don't know about the others," he continued, "but for myself it really came down to health care

we took a hood count, and voted unanimously against endorsement

Tags: satire, politics, obama, race, humor

It wasn't Affirmative Action that bumped your kid's college acceptance

Wed, 30 Apr 2008 18:34:22 GMT

clipped by: masbury
clipper's remarks: Yet another way the rich stick it to us while we blame the poor: Twice as many as assisted nonwhite admissions are rich white kids with connections. Only 40% of financial aid goes to students with financial need. ... many get into exclusive colleges [both private and state schools] the same way people get into trendy night clubs, by knowing the management or flashing cash at the person manning the velvet rope

Clip Source: www.boston.com

selective colleges are

boasting

they have increased their black and Hispanic enrollments,

National Merit scholars or

high school valedictorians.

What they almost never say is that many of the applicants who were rejected were far more qualified than those accepted. Moreover, contrary to popular belief, it was not the black and Hispanic beneficiaries of affirmative action, but the rich white kids with cash and connections who elbowed most of the worthier applicants aside.

15 percent

are white teens who failed

minimum admissions standards

White students who failed to make the grade

were nearly twice as prevalent on such campuses as black and Hispanic students who received an admissions break based on their ethnicity

A sizable number are recruited athletes

A larger share, however, are students who gained admission through their ties to people the institution wanted to keep happy

colleges routinely favor those who have connections over those who don't

Clip Source: www.boston.com

enrollments of Pell Grant recipients

shrinking

Tags: affirmative action, race, education, politics, news

AP: Sewage spread as test in poor black neighborhood in 2000

Wed, 23 Apr 2008 21:52:05 GMT

clipped by: masbury
clipper's remarks: Feds funded experiment on whether sludge might reduce lead poisoning.

Clip Source: www.democracynow.org

Sludge Tested as Lead Poisoning Fix in Poor Black Neighborhoods

Lawmakers and the NAACP are calling for an investigation into reports that federally funded scientific experiments in 2000 spread sewage sludge on yards in poor black neighborhoods to test if it could fight lead poisoning in children. The Associated Press reported Sunday that researchers spread a mix of human and industrial wastes from sewage treatment plants on the lawns of nine low-income families in Baltimore and a vacant lot next to an elementary school in East St. Louis, Illinois. We speak with John Heilprin, the AP reporter who broke the story. [includes rush transcript]

Tags: race, poverty, science

Republican Rep: "That boy ... " (Obama)

Tue, 15 Apr 2008 00:22:16 GMT

clipped by: masbury
clipper's remarks: Rep. Geoff Davis: "was not trying to be racist." LOL! He doesn't even have to try!

Clip Source: rawstory.com

Rep. Geoff Davis was speaking to about 400 donors at a fundraiser in Kentucky, when he said of Obama, "That boy's finger does not need to be on the button."

A Davis spokesperson said the two-term Republican "misspoke" and was not trying to be racist.

Later, Davis issued a written apology to the Democratic frontrunner.

Tags: politics, race

Florida apologizes for slavery

Fri, 28 Mar 2008 00:42:09 GMT

clipped by: masbury
clipper's remarks: Bravo.

Clip Source: www.commondreams.org

Described as a bid for “reconciliation and healing,” the House this afternoon passed a resolution apologizing for state slavery laws dating back to 1822 - decades became Florida even became a state - that “perpetuated African slavery in one of its most brutal and dehumanizing forms.”

Earlier, the Senate passed the same resolution with Gov. Charlie Crist looking on.

Legislators in both chambers sat in silence as historian John Phelps, a former House clerk, read a summary of state laws from the 19th Century that denied even basic freedoms to slaves.

From the House and Senate floors, Phelps read an 1861 letter from Florida Gov. Richard Keith Call describing a black man as “an animal in the form of a man, possessing the greatest physical power, and the greatest capacity for labor and endurance … a wild barbarian, to be tamed and civilized by the discipline of slavery.”

The resolution pointed out that although slave-era laws are gone, they shouldn’t be forgotten.

Tags: race, politics, slavery, florida

NYTimes lauds Obama race speech: "a higher plane"

Thu, 20 Mar 2008 17:47:02 GMT

clipped by: masbury
clipper's remarks: "an honesty seldom heard in public life"

Clip Source: www.nytimes.com

There are moments — increasingly rare in risk-abhorrent modern campaigns — when politicians are called upon to bare their fundamental beliefs.

Inaugural addresses by Abraham Lincoln and Franklin D. Roosevelt come to mind, as does John F. Kennedy’s 1960 speech on religion, with its enduring vision of the separation between church and state. Senator Barack Obama, who has not faced such tests of character this year, faced one on Tuesday. It is hard to imagine how he could have handled it better.

Mr. Obama had to address race and religion, the two most toxic subjects in politics. He was as powerful and frank as Mitt Romney was weak and calculating earlier this year

He put Mr. Wright, his beliefs and the reaction to them into the larger context of race relations with an honesty seldom heard in public life.

There have been times when we wondered what Mr. Obama meant when he talked about rising above traditional divides. This was not such a moment.

he raised the discussion to a higher plane

Tags: opinion, politics, obama, race

"Obama's race speech heralded as historic"

Wed, 19 Mar 2008 01:34:42 GMT

clipped by: masbury
clipper's remarks: "a turning point in the campaign" Read speech at A more perfect union

Clip Source: www.usnews.com

Kelley, a professor at the University of Southern California and, at 46, a contemporary of Obama's, said the speech was "truly historic."

"I was inspired," Kelley said, "and I'm a skeptic. But this is a turning point in this campaign." Obama's message, he says, is not just about transformation in the black American but about "real change in the heart and culture of America."

Pollard said. "Just as with Lincoln and Dr. King, you have in Obama a person who is able to stand in that gap at a moment when the nation is at one of its most difficult junctures."

In Fluker's estimation, win or lose the Democratic nomination, Obama today did something special for the nation: "Like King in the past, and Franklin Delano Roosevelt during the Great Depression, he spoke directly to the complexity of the issue at hand, and translated it so it's part of our nation's story."

Tags: politics, obama, race