This week is the 50th Anniversary of the 1963 March on Washington for Justice and Jobs. Let’s look back at some of the heroes of the March.
Today’s Hero is Bayard Rustin.
Bayard Rustin (/ˈbaɪərd/; March 17, 1912 – August 24, 1987) was an American leader in social movements for civil rights, socialism, pacifism and non-violence, and gay rights.
In the pacifist Fellowship of Reconciliation (FOR), Rustin practiced nonviolence. He was a leading activist of the early 1947–1955 civil-rights movement, helping to initiate a 1947 Freedom Ride to challenge with civil disobedience racial segregation on interstate busing. He recognized Martin Luther King, Jr.’s leadership, and helped to organize the Southern Christian Leadership Conference to strengthen King’s leadership; Rustin promoted the philosophy of nonviolence and the practices of nonviolent resistance, which he had observed while working with Gandhi’s movement in India. Rustin became a leading strategist of the civil rights movement from 1955–1968. He was the chief organizer of the 1963 March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, which was headed by A. Philip Randolph, the leading African-American labor-union president and socialist.[1][2] Rustin also influenced young activists, such as Tom Kahn and Stokely Carmichael, in organizations like the Congress on Racial Equality (CORE) and the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC).
After the passage of the civil-rights legislation of 1964–1965, Rustin focused attention on the economic problems of working-class and unemployed African Americans, suggesting that the civil-rights movement had left its period of “protest” and had entered an era of “politics”, in which the Black community had to ally with the labor movement. Rustin became the head of the AFL–CIO’s A. Philip Randolph Institute, which promoted the integration of formerly all-white unions and promoted the unionization of African Americans. Rustin became an honorary chairperson of the Socialist Party of America in 1972, before it changed its name to Social Democrats, USA (SDUSA); Rustin acted as national chairman of SDUSA during the 1970s. During the 1970s and 1980s, Rustin served on many humanitarian missions, such as aiding refugees from Communist Vietnam and Cambodia. He was on a humanitarian mission in Haiti when he died in 1987.
Rustin was a gay man who had been arrested for a homosexual act in 1953. Homosexuality was criminalized in parts of the United States until 2003 and stigmatized through the 1990s. Rustin’s sexuality, or at least his embarrassingly public criminal charge, was criticized by some fellow pacifists and civil-rights leaders. Rustin was attacked as a “pervert” or “immoral influence” by political opponents from segregationists to Black power militants, and from the 1950s through the 1970s. In addition, his pre-1941 Communist Party affiliation was controversial. To avoid such attacks, Rustin served only rarely as a public spokesperson. He usually acted as an influential adviser to civil-rights leaders. In the 1970s, he became a public advocate on behalf of gay and lesbian causes.
In August 2013, President Barack Obama posthumously awarded Rustin the Presidential Medal of Freedom.
Influence on the Civil Rights Movement
Rustin and Houser organized the Journey of Reconciliation in 1947. This was the first of the Freedom Rides to test the ruling of the Supreme Court of the United States that banned racial discrimination in interstate travel (Irene Morgan v. Commonwealth of Virginia). Rustin and CORE executive secretary George Houser recruited a team of fourteen men, divided equally by race, to ride in pairs through Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee, and Kentucky.[10] The NAACP opposed CORE’s Gandhian tactics as too meek. Participants in the Journey of Reconciliation were arrested several times. Arrested with Jewish activist Igal Roodenko, Rustin served twenty-two days on a chain gang in North Carolina for violating Jim Crow laws regarding segregated seating on public transportation.[11]
In 1948, Rustin traveled to India to learn techniques of nonviolent civil resistance directly from the leaders of the Gandhian movement. The conference had been organized before Gandhi’s assassination earlier that year. Between 1947 and 1952, Rustin met with leaders of Ghana’s and Nigeria’s independence movements.
In 1951, he formed the Committee to Support South African Resistance, which later became the American Committee on Africa.
Rustin was arrested in Pasadena, California, in 1953 for homosexual activity with two other men in a parked car. Originally charged with vagrancy and lewd conduct, he pleaded guilty to a single, lesser charge of “sex perversion” (as consensual sodomy was officially referred to in California then) and served 60 days in jail. This was the first time that his homosexuality had come to public attention. He had been and remained candid about his sexuality, although homosexuality was still criminalized throughout the United States. After his conviction, he was fired from FOR. He became the executive secretary of the War Resisters League.
Rustin served as an unidentified member of the American Friends Service Committee’s task force to write “Speak Truth to Power: A Quaker Search for an Alternative to Violence,”[12] published in 1955. This was one of the most influential and widely commented upon pacifist essays in the United States. Rustin had wanted to keep his participation quiet, as he believed that his known sexual orientation would be used by critics as an excuse to compromise the 71-page pamphlet when it was published. It analyzed the Cold War and the American response to it, and recommended non-violent solutions.
Rustin took leave from the War Resisters League in 1956 to advise Martin Luther King Jr. on Gandhian tactics. King was organizing the public transportation boycott in Montgomery, Alabama, known as the Montgomery Bus Boycott. According to Rustin, “I think it’s fair to say that Dr. King’s view of non-violent tactics was almost non-existent when the boycott began. In other words, Dr. King was permitting himself and his children and his home to be protected by guns.” Rustin convinced King to abandon the armed protection, including a personal handgun.[13]
The following year, Rustin and King began organizing the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC). Many African-American leaders were concerned that Rustin’s sexual orientation and past Communist membership would undermine support for the civil rights movement. U.S. Representative Adam Clayton Powell, Jr., who was a member of the SCLC’s board, forced Rustin’s resignation from the SCLC in 1960 by threatening to discuss Rustin’s morals charge in Congress.[14] Although Rustin was open about his sexual orientation and his conviction was a matter of public record, the events had not been discussed widely outside the civil rights leadership.
March on Washington
Despite shunning from some civil rights leaders,
[w]hen the moment came for an unprecedented mass gathering in Washington, Randolph pushed Rustin forward as the logical choice to organize it.[15]
A few weeks before the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom in August 1963, Senator Strom Thurmond railed against Rustin as a “Communist, draft-dodger, and homosexual,” and had the entire Pasadena arrest file entered in the record.[15] Thurmond also produced an FBI photograph of Rustin talking to King while King was bathing, to imply that there was a same-sex relationship between the two. Both men denied the allegation of an affair.
Rustin was instrumental in organizing the march. He drilled off-duty police officers as marshals, bus captains to direct traffic, and scheduled the podium speakers. Eleanor Holmes Norton and Rachelle Horowitz were aides.[15]
Despite King’s support, NAACP chairman Roy Wilkins did not want Rustin to receive any public credit for his role in planning the march. Nevertheless, he did become well known. On September 6, 1963, Rustin and Randolph appeared on the cover of Life magazine as “the leaders” of the March.[16]
After the March on Washington, Rustin organized the New York City School Boycott. When Rustin was invited to speak at the University of Virginia in 1964, school administrators tried to ban him, out of fear that he would organize another school boycott there.
Bayard Rustin’s May 10, 1957 letter to Martin Luther King suggesting themes for King’s Speech at the Prayer Pilgrimage to Washington, D.C. in 1957:
Program for the 1963 March on Washington:
http://media.npr.org/assets/img/2013/08/15/ap630824099_custom-9bf942d77b3591a797f1676f5279c69cd12f7e27-s40-c85.jpg
Photo of Bayard Rustin, holding a map, at planning session for March on Washington:
http://media.npr.org/assets/img/2013/08/15/ap630824099_custom-9bf942d77b3591a797f1676f5279c69cd12f7e27-s40-c85.jpg
“Collection reveals the culture and identity of African Americans through art”
http://www.artdaily.org/index.asp?int_sec=11&int_new=64486#.UhLg2eDFVok
Great video accompanies this article.
http://www.charlotteobserver.com/2013/08/19/4248440/moral-monday-protesters-gather.html
“Moral Monday rails against ‘Mecklenburg trio’”
By David Perlmuttand Jim Morrill
Posted: Monday, Aug. 19, 2013
Nine Term North Carolina Senator Resigns To Fight New Voter Suppression Law
http://n360.to/14WGIBo
Great to hear that an experienced state senator is going to join the fight against voter suppression.
A paragraph from her letter:
Joe Biden’s son evaluated at hospital for ‘episode of disorientation and weakness’
http://wp.me/p4HKM-1co3
Prayers for him
Praying that all will be well for him.
AMEN!
It was Jim Lawson who trained the original members of SNCC (including John Lewis) in Ghandi’s way of non-violent protest:
“Dropping the Leadership Baton”
by JULIANNE MALVEAUX NNPA COLUMNIST
Monday, August 19, 2013
excerpt from article:
http://www.insightnews.com/commentary/11203-dropping-the-leadership-baton
Steve Dowdy @Steverocks35 7m
@kjkeenan1950 @JeffersonObama Fun fact: Ted Cruz’s father fought for Fidel Castro in the Cuban Revolution.
Published on Sep 13, 2012
“SCLC AND CIVIL RIGHTS COMMUNITY JOIN FORCES FOR 50TH ANNIVERSARY OF THE MARCH ON WASHINGTON, D.C.”
“Hundreds prepare for 50th anniversary of March on Washington”
Posted: Aug 17, 2013
By Veronica Griffin
http://www.cbsatlanta.com/story/23164454/hundreds-prepare-for-50th-anniversary-march-on-washington
Can a Dusty Legislative Gambit Revive Immigration Reform?
Progressive activists want to use a so-called discharge petition to force a vote
By Alex Altman @aaltman82Aug. 19, 20130
Immigration reform is dying. The majority of voters want it. A broad bipartisan coalition pushed hard to enact it. The timing seemed propitious after the 2012 election. But all the economic arguments, policy papers and polling data marshaled by supporters cannot convince the Republicans who control the House. The best shot in a generation at rewriting U.S. immigration law looks destined to die with a whimper.
And yet there may still be a way to resuscitate reform efforts and force a vote on a path to citizenship. It involves a rarely used parliamentary tactic known as a discharge petition.
The legislative practice enables a simple majority of the House to force a vote on a bill, discharging the relevant committee from its responsibility to report it and circumventing the power of leadership, which controls the floor. Discharge petitions are rare. The tactic was successfully employed just 26 times between 1931 and 2002, when it was most recently leveraged to win a vote on the McCain-Feingold campaign-finance-reform bill. But a cadre of progressive activists, including powerful labor groups like the AFL-CIO and the pro-reform organization America’s Voice, have zeroed in on it as perhaps the best way to sidestep Speaker John Boehner‘s insistence that any immigration bill brought to the floor have the support of a majority of the GOP conference.
http://swampland.time.com/2013/08/19/can-a-dusty-legislative-gambit-revive-immigration-reform/?iid=sl-main-lead#ixzz2cPrILwZf
Sunny is cute!
https://twitter.com/FLOTUS/status/369606071599374336/photo/1
It isn’t 2009 anymore
By Greg Sargent, Published: August 19 at 4:41 pm
This is some very interesting video, passed along by the Dem-allied American Bridge, of GOP Rep. Joe Heck of Nevada, getting grilled by a constituent who knows the Affordable Care Act very well and wants to know why Heck would take its benefits away from people:
http://youtu.be/En6Y4oBqH6o
American Bridge says the constituent isn’t a plant, and Heck’s office tells me they don’t think it’s a plant, either.
The constituent, a self-described “business person,” says the law has already saved him money and will save him more in the future, adding that it has already bent the cost curve. “Why would you oppose the ACA at every turn?” the man asks. “Why would you oppose something that’s helping me now?”
What this sort of encounter confirms, as another similar moment with GOP Rep. Patrick McHenry of North Carolina did recently, is that we may now be heading into new political territory when it comes to Obamacare. Polls continue to show the law remains unpopular and that public confusion about it remains rampant. But now that the law’s concrete benefits are kicking in, it may be harder for Republicans to explain their continuing drive to repeal it, particularly to constituents who understand what repeal would take away from them. We’re a long way from the anti-Obamacare town halls of the magical Summer of ’09.
Indeed, note that Heck explained his support for repeal by at first resorting to a number of well worn arguments — Dems rammed the law through in the dead of night; the bill is 2,700 pages long — that now sound politically dated and irrelevant. But then he went on to allow that “there are good things in the bill that we’ve gotta keep.”
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2013/08/19/it-isnt-2009-anymore/
The Morning Plum: For Obamacare opponents, time is running out
By Greg Sargent, Published: August 19 at 8:59 am
Here’s something to keep an eye on as we enter the second half of the August recess: Will there be any grassroots outcry to speak of on behalf of the right’s push for a government shutdown to defund Obamacare, or will the whole thing be a big fizzle?
Today Heritage Action for America is launching a nine-city tour designed to drum up support for the push for defunding. The White House-allied Americans United for Change is vowing to match Heritage’s events with its own, in an effort to demonstrate at least as much or more energy on the pro-Obamacare side. We’re already seeing little evidence to suggest that the great and fearsome conservative backlash to immigration reform is materializing. Will the same happen on the great defund-Obamacare crusade?
Those who want a shutdown confrontation are themselves framing the battle in these terms, arguing that the recess is the time for the grassroots to speak up and demand that the squishy GOP establishment stiffen its spine and do what it takes to halt Obamacare before it’s too late. Indeed, National Journal reports that the movement to defund Obamacare is falling “on hard times,” and even defund-Obamacare ringleader Ted Cruz seems uneasy:
With momentum stalled in Washington, proponents of “defund or shutdown” know they must rally the base during the current August recess and are ramping up pressure. “We need to activate another grassroots army,” Cruz said in a taped message he released earlier this month. Heritage Action, the activist arm of the Heritage Foundation, has organized a nine-city “Defund Obamacare” town-hall tour, beginning Monday in Fayetteville, Ark.
“This has always been a strategy relying on people going home in August and listening to constituents,” said Michael Needham, CEO of Heritage Action.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2013/08/19/the-morning-plum-for-obamacare-opponents-time-is-running-out/
“Black Women’s Roundtable Kicks-Off 50th Anniversary March on Washington Week of Activities Bringing Diverse Women Together to Celebrate Women’s Accomplishments and Craft a Unified Agenda”
http://www.wsav.com/story/23173599/black-womens-roundtable-kicks-off-50th-anniversary-march-on-washington-week-of-activities-bringing-diverse-women-together-to-celebrate-womens
I hope they videotape this. I would love to see it.
From bad to worse in Virginia
By Steve Benen
–
Mon Aug 19, 2013 3:31 PM EDT
Virginia Gov. Bob McDonnell (R) adopted a new posture and defense strategy a few weeks ago, bringing new lawyers and damage-control experts to help him avoid resigning in disgrace. The strategy included some obvious elements, including returning the ill-gotten gifts, launching a statewide “opportunity” tour, etc.
The subtext wasn’t subtle: McDonnell, we were supposed to believe, was transitioning from the “humiliating revelation” phase to the “please let me stay in office for a few more months” phase.
And that’s arguably not a horrible gambit — or at least, it wouldn’t be if the scandal-plagued governor really had moved past the “humiliating revelation” phase, which he hadn’t.
We learned over the weekend, for example, that while the governor was helping Star Scientific and receiving luxury gifts from the company’s CEO, the governor’s wife, Maureen McDonnell, quietly purchased thousands of shares of stock in the company. Why didn’t the governor think to mention this before? According to his spokesperson, it’s because McDonnell had no idea what his wife was up to — she made the investment without the governor’s knowledge.
Oh good, we’ve apparently reached the “throw the wife under the bus” phase.
Making matters considerably worse, the Washington Post reports that the governor and wife will spend the day meeting with prosecutors — but not together.
http://maddowblog.msnbc.com/_news/2013/08/19/20093094-from-bad-to-worse-in-virginia?lite
August 19, 2013
“Detroit officers learning controversial tactics
City’s version differs from stop-and-frisk used in NYC, police say”
From The Detroit News: http://www.detroitnews.com/article/20130819/METRO01/308190024#ixzz2cSbYw0sO
Business groups aren’t too happy about Tea Party mania they helped unleash
By Greg Sargent, Published: August 19 at 2:41 pm
GOP-aligned business groups such as the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National Federation of Independent Business, and others played a key role in helping elect dozens of conservatives to the House and Senate. Now that these conservatives are trying to drag Congress into multiple confrontations that could do untold economic damage, however, the groups that played such a big role in shaping this Congress are none too happy with the forces they helped unleash.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/plum-line/wp/2013/08/19/business-groups-arent-too-happy-about-tea-party-mania-they-helped-unleash/
“Get Money: Site Helps Black Entrepreneurs Fund Their Dreams
Black Startup’s CEO talks about why his crowd funding platform stands apart from Kickstarter.”
By Erin E. Evans
Posted: 08/19/2013
http://www.bet.com/news/national/2013/08/19/get-money-site-helps-black-entrepreneurs-fund-their-dreams.html
Let’s have some fun! Excuse me while I whip this out.
***dead***
*sipscooldrink-o-icedtea* Tee hee hee
https://www.facebook.com/indigenouspeoplesissues
On This Day: In 1854 Brulé Lakota Chief Mathó Wayúhi (“Conquering Bear”) was shot in the back and killed by US troops. Earlier a Miniconjou Lakota named High Forehead had killed a sickly cow near Fort Laramie. The cow’s owner reported the incident to the Fort’s commander, who immediately went to capture High Forehead. Upon arriving at the Lakota encampment, the troops demanded High Forehead be turned over. A discussion ensued, during which Mathó Wayúhi was shot in the back. The Lakota immediately retaliated, and killed all but one trooper, who escaped back to the Fort. Out of respect, the Brulé took the dying Conquering Bear out into the vast prairie, far away from White people, to die with dignity. It was there on his prairie that they buried him, laying to rest a leader, warrior, and peacemaker. The incident would spark a response from the US Army, who ignored the fact that Lt. Grattan had instigated the affair. This event would greatly influence the First Sioux War.
Now, who are the REAL SAVAGES?
Evil heartless beasts!
BWA HAHA HA
Those eyes! Those eyes!
LOL!
LMBAO These pics are spot on and hilarious!
I’ll always love Gene Wilder!
Me too!
How the GOP Can Lose the Midterms
by BooMan
Mon Aug 19th, 2013 at 02:43:10 PM EST
When it comes to midterm elections prognostication, it’s helpful to look at demographic trends and polling data, but, at least when it comes to the House of Representatives, you need to focus on the make-up of the districts. Growth of the minority population, higher minority turnout, and less support from minorities for Republican candidates would be unwelcome developments for the GOP, but those factors would also be unlikely to change the outcome in more than a small handful of House elections. That’s because most Republican-held districts have relatively few minorities and the whites are reliably Republican. If the Republicans are really in jeopardy of losing control of the House, it’s because they’re losing the support of people who they used to be able to depend upon for support.
That’s where their handling of the budget, economy, retirement programs, health care, farming, and even transportation, could become a problem. Historically, no organization has been more closely aligned with the Republican Party than the national Chamber of Commerce, but that has to be about to change considering that the modern GOP simply refuses to do its bidding anymore. The Chamber wants immigration reform, but it also wants more transportation spending and opposes a government shutdown or imposition of the debt limit.
The agricultural industry is another source of strength of the GOP, especially considering that the Republicans dominate in rural areas. But failing to produce a Farm Bill is enraging farmers.
I’ve already discussed recent Democracy Corps polling that showed severe erosion of the Republican advantage with elderly voters. This is probably primarily a result of lasting damage done by the voucher plan for Medicare that Paul Ryan pushed over the last several years. But the GOP’s general attitude about entitlements (that we’re not entitled to the benefits we paid for during our working lives) is always going to be a drag on their performance with the elderly. If it’s getting worse, some safe districts are going to become competitive.
There are other factors that could be turning off long-time Republicans. One is the way Republican governors have behaved. Most of them are very unpopular. Pushing voter suppression schemes and blocking a decent fix for college loans turns off young voters. Extreme anti-abortion legislation is alienating many right-leaning women. Attacks on school budgets are worrying countless parents. And there are plenty of people who mildly disagree with the president on most things but acknowledge that he was reelected and think he deserves an opposition that will compromise.
Beyond that, as the culture changes to be more tolerant about things like gay marriage and a pathway to citizenship, and climate change become more of an undeniable reality, the culture wars become a less effective wedge.
Finally, one of the Republicans’ traditional areas of strength has been their message discipline: lower taxes, less regulation, a strong military, etc. But the GOP is no longer united on national defense, taxes and budgetary issues, or even on immigration reform and gay rights. As a result, they will not be able to convey a clear concise message effectively, as they have in the past.
All of these things are factors that could combine to do enough damage in districts that Romney carried easily that a Democrat might be able to sneak out a win in November 2014.
We saw something similar happen in 2006. President Bush was such an epic fuck-up, that a lot of Republicans just left the party, many for good. It could happen again.
http://www.boomantribune.com/story/2013/8/19/144310/866
Leroy Bloomberg @bloombergs_son
If I got #StopAndFrisk’ed My dad @MikeBloomberg would be mad. Just like a lot of NYers when he re-wrote the rules & gave himself a 3rd term.
10:43 AM – 19 Aug 2013
………………………………..
Leroy Bloomberg @bloombergs_son
I got stopped by a cop once. It was the scariest 40 secs of my life until the cop realized my dad was @MikeBloomberg. Then I got ice cream.
10:50 AM – 19 Aug 2013
More than 57,000 kids cut from Head Start because of sequester
More than 57,000 children this fall will be cut from Head Start, the program for pre-school age children from low-income families, because of the ongoing “sequestration” budget cuts, the Obama administration announced Monday.
Head Start and Early Head Start saw a 5.27 percent reduction in its $8 billion budget after Congress this March enacted the sequester — $1.2 trillion in across-the-board cuts to federal spending over 10 years.
Administered by the Health and Human Services Department, Head Start awards grants to public and private institutions on a competitive basis to provide pre-school services in their communities. The program serves more than one million children every year in every U.S. state and territory.
So far, the impact of sequestration is not as drastic as anticipated — the Obama administration originally estimated it would mean having to cut 70,000 students from the program.
Nevertheless, 51,299 fewer children will be enrolled in Head Start, while 5,966 fewer children will be enrolled in Early Head Start. The Office of Head Start reported the data after collecting reduction plans from individual Head Start grantees. California will see the largest number of students affected, with 5,611 children cut, while Texas will have to cut 4,410.
The office also reported that there will be 1,342,015 fewer days of service nationwide, and at least 18,000 staff members will be affected, either through pay cuts or job losses.
http://www.cbsnews.com/8301-250_162-57599142/more-than-57000-kids-cut-from-head-start-because-of-sequester/
Oakland classes offer black males hope
Stationed at the doorway to his classroom at Oakland High School, Tiago Robinson greeted each student with a handshake.
Every student was black and each one was male.
A few wore pictures of friends on their shirts or on laminated cards strung on lanyards they wore around their necks – memorial images of siblings, classmates or cousins who’d been killed.
As they grabbed their binders from a closet, some joked around or dissected the previous night’s Warriors game. Others walked slowly and silently to their seats, their shoulders hunched, their eyes tired.
Robinson, an African American man with spotless tennis shoes, a shaved head and heavily tattooed arms, shut the door.
“Brothers, let’s bring it in,” he began.
The class quieted down and Robinson started to teach. His goal this day – as it was every day – was to help these teens learn how to navigate the world in and out of school. To try and create strong, successful black males by demonstrating the man he’d become.
http://www.sfchronicle.com/local/bayarea/item/Even-Odds-Day-2-23198.php
Interracial Couple Attacked in Long Island City Hate Crime
By Caroline Bankoff
New York’s depressing new hate-crime trend continued early Saturday morning as an interracial couple was attacked outside a Long Island City bar. NBC New York reports that Billie (who is black) and Jacob (who is white) James-Vogel and a gay friend were leaving Billie’s 40th-birthday celebration at a place called Shi around 1:30 a.m. when three men in a nearby car started shouting racist and homophobic slurs at them. Jacob told NBC that when he asked the men why they were yelling, they pushed him to the ground and punched him repeatedly. “And while I was laying on the ground covering my face, I got to watch them shove my wife to the ground without being able to help her,” said Jacob, who ended up with a black eye and an injured head. Billie was left with bruises and broken toes. “When I think about the slurs, the N-word and the F-word, it hurts … It breaks my heart,” she said.
The incident became even more awful after the attack, when the James-Vogels returned to the restaurant they’d just left to ask for help. “My husband — his face was pouring with blood — went to that very same doorman and said, ‘Please help us,’ and he closed the door in my husband’s face,” Billie said. (The restaurant’s owner claims that he thought the police had already been called and that he didn’t want to let anyone in “out of fear for his customers.”)
The couple told NY1 that after the cops left the scene, one of their assailants bizarrely and terrifyingly returned and pretended to be a police officer while they waited in an ambulance. “The EMT drivers didn’t let him into the ambulance,” Jacob said. “They then followed him and called the police.” Twenty-eight-year-old Nikolaos Katsos was arrested and charged with assault and harassment, though those charges “could be upgraded.” The other guys are still out there.
http://nymag.com/daily/intelligencer/2013/08/interracial-couple-attacked-in-lic.html?mid=twitter_dailyintelligencer
If only Nikolaos Katsos had been STOPPED & FRISKED by the Po Po, this wouldn’t have happened. Just saying…
this is so sad. he’s too damn young.
………………
Lee Thompson Young
Ex-Disney Superstar
DEAD, Possible Suicide
Lee Thompson Young — who played the main character on Disney’s “The Famous Jett Jackson” — has died after what officials believe is a suicide … TMZ has learned. He was 29.
Sources tell us Young’s body was discovered with a gunshot wound that appears to be self-inflicted.
Young currently appears in the TNT show “Rizzoli & Isles” — and we’re told when he didn’t show up to work this morning, staffers called the landlord of Young’s L.A. home to check up on the actor.
We’re told … when the landlord opened the door, he discovered Young’s body
Read more: http://www.tmz.com/2013/08/19/lee-thompson-young-dead-disney-dies-friday-night-lights-the-famous-jett-jackson-rizzoli-and-isles/#ixzz2cRS6azCH
Visit Fishwrapper: http://www.fishwrapper.com
– – -☺@keithboykin
“The important thing is this: To be able at any moment to sacrifice what we are for what we can be.” – Charles Dubois http://youtu.be/WTFnmsCnr6g
View media — – [He is MOTIVATIONAL] :>)
— -☺@keithboykin
For Floridians with pre-existing conditions or high insurance deductibles, rates will come down under Obamacare. http://www.tampabay.com/news/h… …
—☺ @keithboykin
Violent crime has dropped dramatically in recent decades. http://www.washingtonpost.com/… …
View summary – — —[***waves @ MR. PRESIDENT*** :>)]
– –☺@keithboykin
In 1994, 52% of Americans said crime was the nation’s most pressing problem. Last month, that number was 2%. http://www.washingtonpost.com/… …
The only crimes being committed in America are those by teh GOP
After 45 Years, They’ve Proved the Doubters Wrong
Booming’s “Making It Last” column profiles baby boomer couples who have been together 25 years or more.
By ERIKA ALLEN
Published: August 16, 2013
Jerome and Rebecca Walker met as students, married less than a year later and on May 19 celebrated their 45th anniversary. They are both retired; Jerome from his work as a business manager and director for the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, a professional assocation, and Rebecca from her job as an elementary school counselor. They live in Piscataway, N.J., have 4 adult children and 12 grandchildren. An edited and condensed version of our conversation follows:
Was it hard being black at Harvard in those days?
Jerome: Challenging. I felt pressure to perform but that was more about being the first in my family to attend college. It was a little difficult not to have a prep school background that others did — they moved in with truckloads of stuff; I had a footlocker. But it was fine. I did well my first semester, and got overconfident, so my grades suffered.
Rebecca: By then we were committed; It was a turbulent time: Vietnam, King was shot. Then I found out I was pregnant, and Jerry was drafted.
That’s a lot for such a young couple.
Rebecca: He was supposed to go into the Army, but signed up for the Navy instead; we thought it would be better for him.
Jerome: We married in May before I left for basic training. We decided to keep our baby and have the ceremony in Pittsburgh.
Rebecca: He had given me his fraternity pin so we knew we were going to get married, just sooner.
How did your parents react?
Jerome: Not too mad, but her parents were very upset. Her mother really didn’t want to have anything to do with me.
Because of the pregnancy?
Rebecca: They were just completely shocked. They’d met Jerry just twice, and knew he wasn’t at Harvard any more. They couldn’t figure out how we’d make it. But he came to our home in Greenburgh, N.Y., and asked them if he could marry me. They tried to talk us out of it but gave their permission even though they didn’t plan on going to the wedding.
Jerome: We convinced them to come and that was a start down the right road. I won them over gradually.
Rebecca: I’d been a model kid. I wasn’t rebellious in high school, but this was the first time I said: “Here is what I want to do. This is who I’m going to marry.”
The wedding?
Rebecca: In his parents’ living room. We had a local minister, a small reception and stayed at a hotel for a few nights afterward.
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/16/booming/after-45-years-theyve-proved-the-doubters-wrong.html?src=recg
Chubby Checker can sue HP over genital-measuring app, judge says
http://www.themalaymailonline.com/showbiz/article/chubby-checker-can-sue-hp-over-genital-measuring-app-judge-says#sthash.XgpEGK0Q.dpuf
SAN FRANCISCO, Aug 18 — The musician famous for the Twist dance style can sue Hewlett Packard Co over allegations that the tech company used his trademarked name “Chubby Checker” on a software app that purports to measure a man’s genitals.
In a ruling on Thursday, US District Judge William Alsup in San Francisco ruled that Ernest Evans — known professionally as Chubby Checker — can move forward with trademark infringement claims against HP and its Palm unit.
HP spokesman Michael Thacker on Friday said the app was not created by HP or Palm. “It was removed in September 2012 and is no longer on any Palm or HP hosted website,” Thacker said.
Chubby Checker first gained fame in 1960 when his recording “The Twist” rose to No. 1 on Billboard Magazine’s hot singles chart, where it remained for 18 straight weeks, according to the lawsuit. It inspired an international dance craze in the early 1960s and has been a mainstay at dance parties ever since.
HP began offering “The Chubby Checker” app for sale in 2006, which purports to estimate the size of a man’s genitals based on his shoe size, according to the ruling. “The name ‘Chubby Checker’ is thus used as a vulgar pun,” Alsup wrote.
The musician informed HP that the app violated his trademark, and he sued earlier this year.
A Comic Quits Quitting
Dave Chappelle Returns to Stand-Up, With Stories to Tell
In 2005, Dave Chappelle was merely the hottest comedian in America. Then he left his job and became a far more singular cultural figure: A renegade to some, a lunatic to others, but most of all, an enigma.
Now he is making a kind of comeback — Mr. Chappelle headlines the Oddball Comedy and Curiosity Festival, a new 15-city tour presented by the Funny or Die Web site that begins Friday in Austin, Tex. — and what makes it particularly exciting is how he’s using his hard-earned mystique to make more daring and personal art.
Mr. Chappelle didn’t just walk away from a $50 million contract and the acclaimed “Chappelle’s Show,” whose second season on Comedy Central stacks up well against the finest years of “SCTV,” “Saturday Night Live” and Monty Python. He did so dramatically, fleeing to Africa and explaining his exit in moral terms: “I want to make sure I’m dancing and not shuffling,” he told Time magazine. Since then, he has been a remote star in an era when comedians have never been more accessible.
Mr. Chappelle hasn’t done any interviews (aside from a radio appearance in 2011) or appeared on podcasts or talk shows. He doesn’t even have a Web site. He joined Twitter last year, then quit after 11 tweets.
But Mr. Chappelle has tiptoed back into the public eye over the last year. While he has stayed away from movies and television, he still drops in pretty often on comedy clubs and occasionally theaters, usually in surprise appearances that generate more rumors of a comeback. Beyond the Oddball Festival, Chris Rock has said Mr. Chappelle may join him on his stand-up tour next year. Since seeing him perform at the start of the year, I have noticed an increased urgency in his comedy by the summer. A show I saw in San Francisco in March was charismatic if chaotic: freewheeling, improvisational and full of crowd work. But when I caught three of his shows in June down South, his act was very different: polished, thematically unified, less work in progress than test run.
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/18/arts/dave-chappelle-returns-to-stand-up-with-stories-to-tell.html?_r=0
Susan Rice ‘grateful’ for Obama’s support during Benghazi uproar
By Julian Pecquet 08/19/13 01:24 PM ET
National Security Adviser Susan Rice thanked President Obama for
standing up to Republicans critical of her explanation for the Benghazi
terror attack and hinted at a future Senate run in an interview in
September’s edition of Vogue.
Rice told the fashion magazine that she “wouldn’t rule it out” when asked about her childhood dream of becoming a senator. The former ambassador to the United Nations also declared herself “very grateful” that the president publicly defended her when she came under attack on Benghazi.
“My first reaction was that it’s a damn shame that the president of the United States has to spend time at a press conference right after he’s been reelected talking about this. And me!” Rice said in the interview, which was conducted in June, before she took over as the president’s national security adviser.
“On one level I was embarrassed and chagrined. But on another level, I was very moved and grateful that he said what he said and said it with obvious feeling.”
http://thehill.com/blogs/global-affairs/congressional-delegations/317661-susan-rice-thanks-obama-for-post-benghazi-support-hints-at-senate-run#ixzz2cRIC9X82
twitter is hilarious
……………………
Leroy Bloomberg @bloombergs_son
Wait theres a #Blacktwitter? Does my Dad #StopAndFrisk y’all too? RT @PragObots: Why Black Twitter? WHY? => Leroy Bloomberg @bloombergs_son
Confident Biden Team Sows Seeds For 2016
Backers Consider Steps for White House—Even If Hillary Clinton Enters Race
By PETER NICHOLAS
, CAROL E. LEE
and COLLEEN MCCAIN NELSON
Political allies of Vice President Joe Biden have concluded that he can win the 2016 Democratic presidential nomination—even if Hillary Clinton enters the contest—and are considering steps he could take to prepare for a potential candidacy.
While Mr. Biden has made no decision about his future, people familiar with his thinking say, he hasn’t ruled out a bid for the White House. If he runs, that could set up a titanic battle between two of the party’s most prominent figures.
One step under discussion by Biden backers is to form a political action committee he would use to funnel money to other Democratic candidates, which could build goodwill for a possible White House bid, people familiar with the talks said. Meanwhile, Mr. Biden is preparing to attend a Democratic event in Iowa, which traditionally holds the first nominating contest, and to raise money this week for the Democratic governor of New Hampshire, the state that holds the first primary.
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323423804579020781151204004.html?mod=wsj_share_tweet
GO JOE!
After Bloomberg
by Ken Auletta
…………….
Early on, the Mayor contemplated endorsing Quinn, calling her “a person of enormous integrity.” He has invited her to join him at press conferences and, at times, to fill in for him at public functions. Some of the Mayor’s friends are convinced that he made a back-room deal with Quinn in 2009, saying that he would endorse her in exchange for her support in amending the City Charter so that he could run a third time. (Both Bloomberg and Quinn have denied any quid pro quo.)
But the relationship between Bloomberg and Quinn is clearly uneasy. Late last year, Bloomberg encouraged several public figures, including Hillary Clinton and the real-estate developer and publisher Mortimer Zuckerman, to run for mayor; they declined. In early June, the Mayor, according to two Bloomberg advisers, was sympathetic to an effort by some of his supporters to draw Ray Kelly into the race. Bloomberg secretly financed a poll by his own longtime pollster, Douglas Schoen, to help convince Kelly that he could win, but Kelly declined.
http://www.newyorker.com/reporting/2013/08/26/130826fa_fact_auletta?currentPage=5
She needs help
………………
Stacey Dash lashes out at Oprah for comparing Emmett Till to Trayvon Martin
by Lilly Workneh | August 19, 2013 at 10:54 AM
Stacey Dash has become known for voicing her political opinions on Twitter — and when it comes to Oprah, the actress isn’t biting her tongue.
In a recent tweet, Dash posted a link to a Fox News article slamming Oprah for her comments comparing Emmett Till to the late Trayvon Martin and her statement that President Obama “shouldn’t be on Fox News every day.”
At the end of her tweet, Dash wrote, “Shame on you @Oprah.”
In the same tweet, the ex-Singles Ladies star published a quote from Malcolm X, which read: “If you aren’t careful, the newspapers will have you hating the people who are being oppressed and loving the people who are doing the oppressing.”
This isn’t the first time the conservative actress has ruffled feathers through her controversial comments on Twitter.
http://thegrio.com/2013/08/19/stacey-dash-lashes-out-at-oprah-for-comparing-emmett-till-to-trayvon-martin/
Stacey is trying for another 15 minutes of fame by slamming Oprah publicly after she got some attention for publicly supporting Romney last year.
Advice to Stacy: Sit down in a corner somewhere and shut your ignorant not knowing your own talking points behind.
But we still want to know if you let Paul Ryan hit it and quit it.
Hillary hype poses risks for a potential 2016 candidacy
Hillary Clinton’s lofty status as the apparent 2016 Democratic nominee-in-waiting has some allies concerned that the hype might be too much, too soon.
This seeming inevitability makes her more sensitive to attacks and risks amplifying any stumble, no matter how minor. And voters may react poorly to a candidate who appears to be waltzing to the nomination with minimal effort.
I think people close to her are more acutely aware than anybody else in the country that there’s no such thing as inevitability,” said a Democrat with ties to Clinton, who requested anonymity to speak more freely about her political calculus.
“The expectations are just so out of whack,” the Democrat added, noting the results of her 2008 candidacy. “If her opponent gets 30 to 40 percent in Iowa – the first time she has to break a sweat, the media will write, ‘Is this The Collapse, Part II?’”
Stephanie Schriock, the president of EMILY’s List, a Democratic women’s group that was recently in Iowa to promote female candidates for president – not just Clinton – said the former New York senator should be ready for a fight.
http://nbcpolitics.nbcnews.com/_news/2013/08/19/20077324-hillary-hype-poses-risks-for-a-potential-2016-candidacy?lite&ocid=msnhp&pos=3
Major Shakeup At MSNBC. Ed Schultz Moves Back To Weekdays, Takes Chris Matthews’ 5 PM Slot.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/08/19/ed-
Ed Schultz is moving back to weekdays, and taking one of Chris Matthews’ time slots, MSNBC said Monday.
Schultz will take over the 5 PM slot Mondays through Fridays, starting August 26th. Matthews, whose “Hardball” aired at both 5 and 7 PM, will now air solely at 7.
Thank goodness! Matthews didn’t need to be aired twice. We get enough spit & spittle on the first go round.
And it’ll be great to have Mr. Meats & Potatoes, Nuts & Bolts ED back!
We need him to drive home ACA and other issues that Americans REALLY care about.
hee hee hee
still won’t admit that Hayes has been a disaster, but it’s a start
LMBAO Good riddance!
One more way to fight voter suppression. . .
https://twitter.com/carolmaewy/status/369484107069149184
@elonjames
“If I had a son who was stopped, I might feel differently about it, but nevertheless,” – Mayor Bloomberg on #StopAndFrisk
What?
He’s Jewish, why shouldn’t he understand? His daughters could be stopped too. What a ^_____^ ?
– –☺@JeffersonObama
Voting rights are being pushed
back with new GOP Jim Crow style laws but our media worried about
Greenwald’s safety selling NSA data to FSB
—☺@JeffersonObama
The courage of humanitarian workers in #Syria is simply astonishing. Meanwhile our media worried about Greenwald & his Russian spy ring
— -☺@JeffersonObama
Glenn Greenwald providing
Snowden’s US Intel data to his FSB handler in Berlin through his
companion is outrageous. What a coward.
Makes me furious. I didn’t know who ggreenwald was until Snowden showed up on the scene. I hate having him shoved in my face. It’s always poor me. He could care less about US national security. Or the lady in Germany. Spare me your priveledge pain. You have a big mouthpiece. Those loosing their right to vote do not. Hopefully with some fine bloggers on this blog and others they’ll be heard from the roof tops.
Hope you know I started scolding Gigi directly and not 3chicks. My words don’t always make sense to others. :(
SO…
Blooomberg took his bitchassness about Stop and Frisk to the WSJ Editorial Page?
G-T-F-O-H
Michael Bloomberg whining to every media outlet he can find b/c he can no longer profile black and brown people. Go pound sand!
Fuck Bloomberg and good RIDDANCE!
‘Who Designed the March on Washington?”
By: Henry Louis Gates Jr. | Posted: August 19, 2013 at 12:51 AM
http://www.theroot.com/views/who-designed-march-washington
Far-right ‘ready to erupt’ over health care?
By Steve Benen
Mon Aug 19, 2013 8:45 AM EDT.
President Obama’s weekly addresses tend to be pretty tame, at least as far as political rhetoric goes, but over the weekend his latest weekly message included some fairly pointed language about Republican efforts to sabotage the federal health care system.
Some congressional Republicans, Obama said, are “working hard to confuse people, and making empty promises that they’ll either shut down the health care law, or, if they don’t get their way, they’ll shut down the government…. A lot of Republicans seem to believe that if they can gum up the works and make this law fail, they’ll somehow be sticking it to me. But they’d just be sticking it to you.”
And while the White House pushes against the GOP shutdown threats, far-right activists continue to push in the opposite direction.
Two right-wing organizations, Tea Party Patriots and a group called For America, are launching online ads this week, and while the above clip goes after Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), the first wave of far-right lobbying will target 12 Republican senators who have not endorsed the shutdown-the-government-over-Obamacare scheme. The second wave will focus on six more GOP senators and House Speaker John A. Boehner (R-Ohio).
The groups are also kicking off a five-day, six-state tour in key senators’ home states.
It’s not yet clear whether shutdown skeptics within the Republican Party really have anything to worry about from this kind of activism. After all, Tea Party Patriots and For America are not exactly political powerhouses that strike fear into the hearts of their rivals, and the groups are relying on online advertising because they can’t afford more widely seen television spots.
http://maddowblog.msnbc.com/_news/2013/08/19/20089553-far-right-ready-to-erupt-over-health-care?lite
more from gn:
gn >
I honestly believe that this entire NSA “expose” Guardian/wikileaks crew are completely, utterly, batshit crazy who are living out some sort of spy fantasy and whose lunacy involves copious amounts of Obama Derangement Syndrome:
They’re nuts. And if ANY of them were black, their ass would be in jail already. This is some bullshit. These people are quite literally dealing in stolen intel and transporting it back and forth to foreign countries but we quite literally have a race-based regime of collective punishment in NY and no one in the beltway media could give that true hero and stop and frisk whistleblower the time of day. This is really some bullshit.
– – -☺@sherifffruitfly
get detained at the airport i feel bad for you son – but i got 99 problems and using my spouse as a document mule ain’t one. LOL —
— – -☺Charles Johnson
@Green_Footballs
Has anyone noticed
that Julian Assange is supporting the Australia First Party, an openly
fascist group allied with Greece’s Golden Dawn?
— -☺@Smartypants32
@sherifffruitfly @NerdyWonka @BobCesca_Go Pretty soon we’ll be down to “I can bust that story in 3..2..1 minutes” LOL
View conversation
– — -☺@Smartypants32
@JamesFallows @ioerror So now its overreach to detain & question someone who is traveling internationally with stolen classified documents?
@soonergrunt1m
@psddluva4evah @AngryBlackLady It’s all about generating outrage. This was INTENTIONAL by GG and partner. If GG wanted to xfer dox…
@soonergrunt
@psddluva4evah @AngryBlackLady He would have used Secure FTP/TOR or any number of other highly secure technologies.
@psddluva4evah
@soonergrunt @AngryBlackLady I’m not nearly as computer saavy as some, but even I know there are “stelthier” ways to exchange docs nowadays
Good Morning, Everyone :)
Morning, everyone!
Good Morning, Everyone! :-) I’m thrilled about the series this week, Rikyrah. Thank you.
Thank you, rikyrah, for focusing our attention on the heroes of the 1963 March on Washington!!
I appreciated reading the article you quoted from Wikipedia and the videos you posted on all of Baynard Rustin’s contributions to the Civil Rights Movement.
I found this video on Youtube with this label:
This is a video of a debate between two great leaders:
“Bayard Rustin debates Malcolm X”
Thank you, Yahtc!