If you want to have an effective racial discussion, you need to listen closely to what others are saying. If what you hear makes you squirm, that’s okay. When it’s your turn to speak you can explain your discomfort or ask more questions for further clarification. So I am here to listen on this one because frankly, I’m skeptical. I keep hearing conservatives saying, “If you criticize Obama you’re called a racist!” I am not seeing that at all. In fact, after former “Law and Order” actress Angie Harmon …

Note to the international community: cut it out! Stop using President Obama to sell snacks and services.
First there were "Obama Chicken Fingers" from Germany, now there’s "Duet" ice cream out of Russia to add to the subtly racist Obama food pyramid:
MOSCOW (Reuters) – A Russian advertising agency has used an image resembling U.S. President Barack Obama to promote a new vanilla-and-chocolate ice cream, drawing the ire of human rights groups who said the ad was vulgar.
Ice Cream Plant No. 3 in the Urals city of Yekaterinburg launched last week …

I wanted to give the readers an update on my foray into the political arena. I am currently in a knock down drag out with a field of 10 other candidates slugging it out in a special election for the District 4 seat on Montgomery County Maryland’s County Council. In case you think that this is rinky dink office, please allow me to inform you that they control a $4 billion dollar budget.
District 4 is the most racially diverse district in the county and has the …

Poor Gordon Brown, he’s having a helluva week. First he’s taken on by the Governor of the Bank of England for overspending, and then he gets to sit uncomfortably as his guest, Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula de Silva, goes off on a racially charged, wince inducing tirade about the reason for the global financial mess:
‘This was a crisis that was fostered and boosted by irrational behaviour of people that are white, blue-eyed, that before the crisis looked like they knew everything about economics,’ he declared.
‘Now they have demonstrated that …

In the latest installment of its ‘What would you do?’ series, ABC News turns on its hidden cameras to show the world what racism, indifference, compassion and solidarity look like up close in the real world.
The setting for ‘Would you stop racism?’ is an upscale New York boutique. Actors portrayed a black woman verbally insulted and falsely accused of stealing by a white actress who plays a racist sales girl. The black actress is then patted down in rough style, and further insulted, by a white male portraying the security …

So my very wise blogamigo Eddie Griffin suggested that I take TWO mental health days. He’s right of course, I am almost feeling clear and inspired again. I pay close attention when my higher energies, like optimism, dip and lower level energies, like frustration, surge. Sometimes the best way for me to re-balance is to take a break from writing for a day or two, breathe deeply, workout and read.
Big post for tomorrow, but in the meantime I am reading all over the interwebs and ask that you do the …

Pioneering historian John Hope Franklin dies at 94

RALEIGH, N.C. (AP) — John Hope Franklin, a towering scholar and pioneer of African-American studies who wrote the seminal text on the black experience in the U.S. and worked on the landmark Supreme Court case that outlawed public school segregation, died Wednesday. He was 94.
…He often regarded his country like an exasperated relative, frustrated by racism’s stubborn power, yet refusing to give up. “I want to be out there on the firing line, helping, directing or doing something to try to make this …

President Obama’s presser was pretty low key. It was solid on information if light on the inspirational charisma thing. One exchange in particular caught my ear. I too was surprised and pleased that the President called on Ann Compton. I was also surprised by her question:

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Visit msnbc.com for Breaking …

Top radio trash talker Tammy Bruce took her vocal derision of the First family to a new low today. Bruce hurled criticism after criticism at the First Lady in a rant that sounded like Bruce was unraveling on air. What triggered Bruce’s tirade? Oh, that would be the First Lady’s recent conversation with school children in which she shared that other kids had accused her of "talking white" :
"I wanted the A for myself, and I wanted to do it, and ooh, they said you sounded like a …

Once again race and blood stained tragedy has visited Oakland, California. This time 4 white police officers were shot down by a convicted black man attempting to evade an arrest warrant issued for parole violation. Three of the police officers Mark Dunakin, 40; Ervin Romans, 43; Dan Saki, 35, are dead. Motorcycle officer John Hege, 41, was declared brain dead Sunday morning and remained on life support to preserve his organs for donation. Lovell Mixon, the killer, was killed in an exchange with SWAT team officers.
When police officers are …

President Barack Obama made history last night as the first sitting President to appear on a television talk show. I was concerned that the venue would be too casual to support the gravitas of Commander-in-Chief. But as a guest on ‘The Late Show with Jay Leno,’ the President emerged mostly unscathed, except for one major gaffe relating his low bowling score to one more appropriate for the Special Olympics- UGH. President Obama appeared smart and well versed on the pressing issues facing our nation. The exchange with Leno was much …

Its Tis grew up in rural upstate New York, and with her sister, integrated the Head Start program and later the public school they attended. This was the late sixties. It was really, really hard. At 13 she went to a racially mixed boarding school where she was teased for “acting white.” This was the late seventies. It was really, really hard. Because of these experiences, she has learned to dance with understanding between different races and cultures; learning, periodically stepping in it, and …

Top o’ the mornin’ to ya!
Did you know that March is Irish Heritage Month?
Do you know why we wear green on St. Patrick’s Day? Check out St. Patrick’s Day: Facts and Legends
I really miss New York City’s St. Patty’s Day parade. Maybe there’s one here in Hellay too, but I haven’t found it. Some of my most laugh out loud inducing memories are anchored around St. Padraic’s Days past. Whew. Those obligatory pub crawls and parties were indeed the stuff memories are made of. Glad I have them.
I considered …

To be blunt, because there is no time for niceties, I am sick and tired of black leaders, secular and religious, not talking about sexual practices in the black community and not talking about how HIV/AIDS and other sexually transmitted diseases are ravaging the black community.
Now those ’speak no evil’ types will have little choice but to break their silence because it’s official. It is confirmed that, at least in Washington DC, HIV/AIDS is epidemic:

On Friday, in Los Angeles, the NAACP will file suit against two major banks alleging that they intentionally assigned black customers subprime mortgages while giving whites better rates. According to the Associated Press:
The NAACP is accusing Wells Fargo and HSBC of forcing blacks into subprime mortgages while whites with identical qualifications got lower rates.
Austin Tighe, co-lead counsel for the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, tells The Associated Press that class-action lawsuits will be filed Friday in federal court in Los Angeles.
Tighe says black homebuyers have been 3 …