Five women who had accused O’Reilly of sexual harassment or other inappropriate behavior received payouts to keep quiet.
Mercedes-Benz is pulling advertisements from Fox News’ top program, The O’Reilly Factor, as a history of sexual harassment allegations against its host, Bill O’Reilly, comes to light.
“We don’t feel this is a good environment in which to advertise our products,” a spokesperson for the luxury car maker told CNN on Monday.
A New York Times investigation published over the weekend found that five women who had accused O’Reilly of sexual harassment or other inappropriate behavior had received payouts from either O’Reilly or Fox News — totaling roughly $13 million — to keep quiet.
Bill O'Reilly and Fox News reportedly paid women $13 million to quiet sexual harassment allegations—and it's seemingly business as usual: pic.twitter.com/wFSXJ84Oac
— Fusion (@Fusion) April 3, 2017
All five of the women either worked for O’Reilly at Fox News or appeared on his show. “They have complained about a wide range of behavior, including verbal abuse, lewd comments, unwanted advances and phone calls in which it sounded as if Mr. O’Reilly was masturbating,” the Times reported.
For his part, O’Reilly denied the merit of the allegations and sought to portray himself as the victim in a statement to the Times. “Just like other prominent and controversial people, I’m vulnerable to lawsuits from individuals who want me to pay them to avoid negative publicity,” the statement read.
Lisa Bloom, an attorney representing Wendy Walsh, one of O’Reilly’s accusers, called for an independent investigation of sexual harassment at Fox News on Sunday, comparing the network to Bill Cosby, who faces sexual assault allegations from dozens of women.
The accusations against O’Reilly come in the wake of a high-profile sexual harassment lawsuit against former Fox Chairman and CEO Roger Ailes. Last summer, Ailes was sued by former Fox News host Gretchen Carlson, who alleged that he sexually harassed her and retaliated against her for complaining. Fox settled with Carlson for $20 million in September, half of what Ailes reportedly received in his exit package after being dismissed two months prior.
https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/4c/4e/a1/4c4ea1020ca69159101b64b45d5ce9f8.jpg
For what it’s worth…And for all the many times and all the many defenses and excuses folks are quick to offer up as they insist that this person is ‘shy’, ‘private’, ‘vulnerable’, ‘never thought of or wanted to be in this position’, ‘hasn’t had time to prepare’, ‘needs rescuing’….never-mind the hilarious bits about ‘classy’, ‘elegant’, ‘intelligent’, ‘accomplished’, ‘had her own money’ etc…
Here’s her actual quote to British GQ magazine – January 2000, (American mags clearly weren’t exactly interested in him or her); part of the handful of mainstream magazine spreads subsequently arranged for the portfolio-sparse ‘model’ by her wealthy, 2x divorced then ‘boyfriend’ later husband..
Please note that this British GQ spread is listed proudly on our (shudder) White House website as one of her greatest achievements…the (solitary) Vogue cover mentioned, was actually Anna Wintour doing her then New York ‘pal’ ‘The Donald’ a favor by covering his 2005 wedding to his 3rd wife, and placing said 3rd wife on the Vogue cover in the wedding gown Anna Wintour’s then close aide and former Vogue editor at large Andre Leon Talley, helped pick out…
When the British GQ spread was done in 2000, Trump was mulling yet another ‘presidential’ run, to which it was suggested that the subject of the photo shoot may actually one day be America’s ‘first lady’ to which she responded:
“I think every woman would like to be…Why not.”
This is one of the photos from that British GQ photo-shoot..
https://pbs-h2.twimg.com/media/C8gEwsAXUAI0VYE.jpg
You can read GQ’s take on it:
“…We were bombarded by requests to shoot Melania,” GQ editor Dylan Jones recalled, when asked by The Hollywood Reporter about our January 2000 nude shoot with Melania Trump, after we had dug through the archives and published the images online in March 2016.
“And so, given that she was obviously so keen to be featured in GQ, we came up with a rather kitsch and camp story for her to feature in.”
Donald Trump also requested that photographs be delivered to his office. “We framed the cover and a selection of prints and sent them as soon as we could.”
It appears the ‘*first lady*’ is rather proud of the images: the new White House website lists the cover shoot as one of her greatest achievements.
“…Enter high-spirited Donald Trump to show us how it’s done. The billionaire New York property magnate, Reform Party presidential candidate and proud owner of this custom-fitted 727 (even the seat buckles are 18-carat gold) is an expert in the art of in-flight entertainment. And his personal hostess, 26-year-old Slovenian supermodel Melania Knauss, might just end up as the next First Lady. Flight of fancy? Not if The Donald has his way…”
http://www.gq-magazine.co.uk/article/donald-trump-melania-trump-knauss-first-lady-erections
So forgive me if I scoff at attempts by folks trying to remake, recast, boost and elevate this person as somehow even marginally ‘respectable’…or ‘classy’…even as they laughably insist as much while having the gall to disrespect and malign my historic FLOTUS …and incredibly having the chutzpah to demand that folks stop ‘slut-shaming’ when folks rightly point out the massive pink elephant in the room that entirely comprises and sums up the entire career stretch and claim to fame of the supposedly ‘classy’ one…
It all speaks to indispensably important attributes like character, judgement…
By 26, my historic FLOTUS – whose parents were neither college-educated or well-off in a country and time that was still incredibly hostile and unkind to black folks generally, had already taken her 17 year old self from the SouthSide of Chicago to top Ivy League Princeton, graduated top Ivy League Harvard Law, and had already been practicing law for a couple of years at the top blue chip law firm back in her hometown of Chicago…where she met and started dating – not the partners or senior lawyers at the firm…but the young man who was still in Law school, and who together with, she would go on to build a life and family of their own…the man who would become her husband, life partner, father of their two kids and the historic President….at 26, she was also back home helping out her parents…helping care for her disabled father who would soon die just 2 months after the future First Lady’s 27th birthday…
And yet…
Wait just a bloody minute…
Just did the math..
She couldn’t have been 26 in 2000…when her official birth year is given as 1970.
That would make her a couple of months shy of her 30th birthday in January 2000 in this GQ photo shoot happened…
Yet, the GQ article claims she’s 26 years old…information which they could have only gotten from her and her man…
Hmmm..🤔🤔
Caught in yet another lie..
‘Blue Chip’ Activist Roger Wilkins Dies
Richard Prince
3/29/17 5:00pm
………………………………………….
. . . I Said, ‘They Don’t Know What to Make of You’
By Kenneth Walker
I was quite surprised at the speed with which Roger Wilkins and I became friends. He moved in black civil rights high society for most of his adult life. As a journalist, I covered much of that work: So Roger and I became acquainted.
Roger came late to white journalism, but instantly shot as close to the top of it as any black man had before him.
Apart from Pulitzer Prize-winning writing, Roger served a role in journalism similar to that he had in government – leveraging his access to power on behalf of black and poor people.
In the ‘60’s, Roger served as an assistant attorney general in Lyndon Johnson’s administration, at a tumultuous time in race relations in America. He shuttled from coast to coast as the government struggled to keep track of an African American rebellion that often threatened to get out of control.
At about the same time, America’s newsrooms were experiencing similar tensions. The urban rebellions led many white newspapers to hire African Americans when white reporters either would not or could not venture into combustible cities.
Those in this first generation of black reporters often found themselves in newspapers with decades or even centuries of segregated histories and racist managements. By the time Roger Wilkins got to the Washington Post, black reporters there were past the boiling point in their relations with white management. They filed a discrimination complaint in 1972 against the Post. Wilkins supported them.
By the time he arrived at the Washington Star in 1981 as an associate editor and columnist, black reporters there were in a similar state of unrest. Wilkins arrived at the paper as the highest ranking African American in the Star’s 128-year history.
Shortly after arriving at the Star, Roger confided that he found an atmosphere at the Star similar to that he experienced at the Post and later at the New York Times, where he served on the editorial board and as a columnist.
“A lot of the white folks around here seem a bit nervous around me,” Roger said to me one day. “I’m not sure what to make of it.”
“It’s pretty simple,” I responded. “They’ve never seen no blue chip niggers around here. They don’t know what to make of you.” Roger understood that what I meant was that the white journalists at the Star had never seen a black editor in a position senior to themselves.
Samuel L. Jackson, Spike Lee, Jeh Johnson Respond to The Root’s Morehouse Investigation
Michael Harriot
Today 4:00pm
As Morehouse College’s alumni, students and faculty discover the years of obfuscation by the board of trustees revealed in The Root’s investigative piece “The War at Morehouse,” three of the college’s most distinguished and successful alumni weighed in on the revelations exposed in our probe.
Academy Award-nominated actor Samuel. L Jackson (class of ’72), former Secretary of Homeland Security Jeh Johnson (Class of ’79) and Oscar-nominated writer-director Spike Lee (Class of ’79) penned a letter to Morehouse’s board of trustees, urging its members to “engage in the difficult and awkward task of self-assessment,” adding that “the health and survival of the institution we all love depends on it.”
We previously reported that during his undergraduate years at Morehouse, Jackson was suspended for leading a student protest against the trustee board. Jackson and other students held members of the board (including Martin Luther King Sr., the civil rights icon’s father) hostage, demanding a black studies program and more African-American trustees.
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Jeh Johnson, who served as secretary of Homeland Security under the Obama administration, was a classmate of the recently fired president, John Sylvanus Wilson, while at Morehouse. During Wilson’s tenure as executive director of the White House Initiative on Historically Black Colleges and Universities, and before he became Homeland Security secretary, Johnson was appointed by President Obama as the general counsel to the Department of Defense.
Shelton “Spike” Lee based one of his early films, School Daze, on his experiences at Morehouse. The noted filmmaker has been a vocal advocate for his alma mater, and even served on Morehouse’s board of trustees.
In their letter, the trio of some of the HBCU’s most-famous alumni explicitly expressed to the board where the blame for the controversy lies:
If only Ms Greenspan would sit down with #45 and grill him about taxes & Russia like this.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RpjN4iEz9Oo
Why in the HELL would Susan Rice even given this bitch the time of day.
Greetings, Dear Chics! It appears that the National Security Adviser is not supposed to view documents concerning national security. Unless, of course, said Adviser is white male reporting to white male President. But of course Andrea Snit-chell does not get paid for reporting basic “facts” or providing “context”..
This irritated and infuriated on so many levels…
This ‘interview’ with Andrea Mitchell on her studio set, was completely ill-advised…
First, there must have been a million and one news media looking to get Susan Rice for an interview… why oh why did she settle for this …
It should have been entirely on her own terms…and on her own turf…and she should have gotten to pick and set the scene…and the where..
This interview was in every regard, incredibly and almost irreversibly diminishing …
OPTICS is everything…we’ve all learned that, even if we’ve learnt nothing all these past several years paying attention…
If she was in a hurry to get out her side of this story, she should have had a spokesperson immediately release a well-done statement, and then instead of scrambling, taken her time picking someone to give an interview to…and even if she still settled on Andrea Mitchell, this should have been set up and done much differently…and so much better..
This interview should have been conducted on Susan Rice’s turf…in a well-appointed space – with her holding court…with proper lighting, make-up, angles etc…the works…
The visuals today were terrible…it was and looked scrambled, she sounded nervous and tentative at first, and defensive when she absolutely should not be…Andrea Mitchell easily threw her off her game…even quoting the freaking rag the Daily Caller for crying out loud…How is this even possible..?
It’s about projecting an image …of power, strength, calm, confidence, dignity, but most importantly, the unimpeachable patriotic truth…
How could she not know this…?
If bloody, shallow, hollow Ivanka can – and on her own terms and turf – summon and have Gayle King groveling and eager to normalize her, turn a blind eye, muddy up stuff and help provide cover for the Putin-installed White Supremacists…and only to churn out and disperse hardly distracting and terribly unimpressive and mind-bogglingly empty blah, blah, blahs and bullshit word salads that convey absolutely nothing….and all to applause …surely, the Stanford and Oxford-educated Phd and Diplomat….and former United Nations Ambassador and former National Security Advisor, could have after 8 years as one of the top folks, commanded and pulled off a much more dignified and respectable interview – on her own terms, and on her own turf…A pertinent interview, on a pertinent matter that will have long-term ramifications on our democracy and country…?
OPTICS…
Americans love their bullshit served them via contrived and well-choreographed false images, complete with well-manicured nails, expensive designer duds, diamonds and all manner of glaring affectation…
Even the ‘earnest’, ‘humble’ and ‘authentic’ versions they prefer and like and praise most, are those who dole it out in the most contrived and self-servingly humble-bragging ways…draped in gold, perched atop expensive furniture and from an exclusive space…
How are we still not clear after all these years, about basic stuff like this…
We have 80’s style glamor shot of 2-bit gold-digging, euro trash escort airbrushed and photoshopped to death, passing as an ‘official portrait’, and Betsy Devos’ crooked brother gaming the system to an inch of treason, and doing the grand optic dance around entanglements with Russia and their preferred muslims…wealthy UAE ones …even as he plots his next treasonous move with the assist of dubious, greedy, corrupt, unpatriotic republicans inside and outside our Capitol…and easily fooled Americans are buying and eating up their crap…while Susan Rice looks small and defensive, being grilled and explaining herself onset, to bloody Daily Caller quoting Andrea Mitchell…
Tell the TRUTH. You nailed exactly how I’m feeling about this nonsense.
What in the LIVING Fuck was Susan Rice thinking?
I just want cry out of frustration Ametia…this is nuts…
How is it that they keep getting outwitted by idiots…?
THIS Gayle King was ALLOWED into Ivanka’s D.C. home
The buffoon’s clan have mastered the art of the bullshit, just like their father…it’s about scene-setting…manipulating and distracting with borrowed images that
falsely convey a contrived image they’re
desperately trying to sell…even if in the end, what inevitably falls out from their mouth is just as expectedly and confirmedly shallow, hollow,
indiscernible and as viscerally vacuous and dodgy as they all really are..
Susan Rice did herself – and us, no favors today..
Besides the fact that she was a visibly high-profile part of a historic administration – and for all intents and purposes, anything she says and does, still reflects upon the historic
administration….I’m sure she’s also writing or plans to write a book and go on the speaker circuit…capitalize on her access to the historic President, as even some
lower-level aides are already doing…
This performance today wasn’t at all helpful if she expects to command the big bucks…and to be courted and respected…heck even bloody B-list actresses are being p.r -packaged better…rare exclusives and the like ..heck, even bloody Condoleeza Rice has succeeded in casting her self-loathing, dubious, bloodmoney oil-grifting, token negro woman on the exclusive whites-only golf course, Aunty Tomasina b*tt as some ‘credible’, always invoked but rarely ever seen as she slyly sneaks around, ‘stateswoman’…
After all these years…from their Clinton days to now, one would think some of these folks would know better…have this thing down pat…
P.S…
Scott Pelley has surprised and almost impressed me lately…
Looks to not seeming to be buying the bullshit…
And unlike others in the media, he sure as heck isn’t tripping all over himself trying to bestow the buffoon with the title…choosing instead to correctly address him as ‘Mr’…
Capitalism vs. Coal: How Barack Obama Made it Possible for the Market to Fight Climate Change
Spandan Chakrabarti
April 4, 2017
Last week, Donald Trump sought to undo pretty much all of President Obama’s actions to fight climate change, ceremoniously signing executive orders to make it easier for polluters, particularly coal plants, to pollute without mercy. After a humiliating loss in his 17-day saga to try to repeal Obamacare, Trump and his band of sadist conservatives had at least one Obama accomplishment that could be rolled back.
Not so fast.
Almost immediately following Trump’s petulant announcement, American and global industry giants rebuffed the White House and stressed their own plans – as private companies – to meet or exceed renewable and clean energy commitments they had made under President Obama.
Walmart, no friend to liberal treehuggers, said in a statement that their commitment to get half of its power from renewable sources was embedded in their business model, and that the march away from carbon-polluting energy is good for business. Anheuser-Busch, world’s largest beer company committed to get 100% of its energy from renewable means, and major tech firms flat out applauded Obama’s Clean Power Plan for making “renewable energy supplies more robust and address the serious threat of climate change while also supporting American competitiveness, innovation, and job growth.”
These companies are not responding to political pressure, they are responding to their bottom line. Part of the reason for this new reality of their bottom line is certainly the investments the United States made in clean energy under President Obama (the largest in the nation’s history), but half the story – perhaps the better half – happened outside our borders.
Perhaps the most significant victories for President Obama on the world stage came when he persuaded the Chinese and the Indians to become partners in, rather than adversaries to, investing in clean energy. President Obama was so successful that China not only came on board on bilateral cooperation but committed to the Paris Climate Agreement. With Obama’s relentless diplomacy, China saw the economic benefits of investing in a clean energy future.
And China is not stepping back. The same China that took years of persuasion by Obama to commit to climate change doubled down in response to Trump’s abdication of American leadership on this issue by… creating more economic incentives to produce and use renewable power. China is also poised to set up the world’s largest cap-and-trade program.
April Ryan, Maxine Waters and Now Susan Rice: Black Women Are Natural Enemies of Trump Administration
Jason Johnson
Today 9:55am
Nature shows us many examples of “natural enemies” in the wild. Mongooses will take on poisonous snakes without a thought, sea lions will mob up and attack killer whales, and a pack of hyenas will take on a lion three times their size. When you know who your enemy is; when you know you’re just prey pretending to be a predator, you attack without hesitation.
Which explains why Trump-era Republicans are lashing out at any black woman they can find, whether it’s White House reporter April Ryan, Democratic Rep. Maxine Waters of California or, now, former national security adviser Susan Rice. Trump-era Republicans hate and fear black women, and they’re convinced that their downfall will be at the hands of a black woman’s pen, policy or protest.
On Monday the Republican echo chamber went nuts after a Bloomberg news story reported that Rice, President Barack Obama’s former national security adviser, had “repeatedly” asked to “unmask” the names of Trump campaign and transition officials who were caught on tape talking to Russian spies under investigation. Rice, as part of the investigation into Russian hacking and meddling in U.S. affairs, had every right to ask who was on the other end of a phone call between a foreign agent and an American who might one day be part of the White House. However, Republicans have concluded that this is somehow validation of their Fox & Friends-induced belief that Obama was spying on Donald Trump.
Since everyone has already told the administration that the wiretapping story was a lie (even Fox News suspended the guy who said it), let’s focus instead on Rice. Why, out of the dozens of former White House officials involved in the Russia investigation, are Republicans focusing on her absolutely legal requests? For the same reason that White House press secretary Sean Spicer got snippy with Ryan, and Bill O’Reilly came after Waters. Republicans smell their natural enemy.
This is not some essentialist “black queen as savior of our men” polemic masquerading as commentary. It’s a stone-cold fact that while many Americans are waking up to the havoc wreaked by less than 100 days of a Trump administration, African-American women, a full 94 percent of them, saw Trump for what he was last fall. That group includes African-American Republican women like Condoleezza Rice.
While, at various points in the last 40 years, Republicans have been able to lure black men, white men, Hispanics and white women into the fold with various policy promises, black women haven’t been buying it. They are kryptonite to the Republican Party, especially under Trump. African-American female politicians, journalists and activists are the greatest consistent threat to the hegemony of Trump, and his supporters are triggered whenever a black woman speaks her mind with authority.
53% of white women voted for #45.
As a Black woman I’m well aware of the power I AM. By not voting for hate, racism, bigotry, misogyny, xenophobia, greed, etc. There’s power in CHOICE.
Uh huh
Uh huh
Did Russia Attempt to Influence Sanders’ Supporters?
by Nancy LeTourneau April 4, 2017 11:50 AM
During the House Intelligence Committee hearing with FBI Director Comey and NSA Director Rogers, Republican legislators went to great lengths to distract from the central question Comey said was at the heart of the investigation: that it was directed at Russia’s attempt to influence the 2016 election and the question of whether or not members of the Trump campaign cooperated with them.
Along with Republicans, there are some liberals who are skeptical about how this investigation is unfolding. One of them is Matt Taibbi, as Martin just noted. In response to some of the inquiries that came up during the Senate Intelligence Committee hearing, he provides a distraction from that central question.
Under questioning by Sen. Mark Warner, Retired Gen. Keith Alexander — former director of the National Security Agency — said, “Senator, I think what they were trying to do was drive a wedge within the Democratic Party between the Clinton group and the Sanders group. And then in our nation between Republicans and Democrats.” Taibbi responded with this:
Did you catch the distraction? The questions on the table are not whether Russia’s attempts to influence the election were successful. They are: what did the Russians do to influence the election? And was the Trump campaign involved?
Matt Taibbi’s Skepticism of the Russian Hacking Coverage Is all Wrong
by Martin Longman April 4, 2017 10:48 AM
I have news for Matt Taibbi. When Russian mobsters crash your daughter’s wedding party and spike the punch with LSD-25, it’s not McCarthyism to be pissed off that Cousin Jethro is up on the roof with Sergei in their underwear jabbering about the Dixie Chicks and InfoWars. And it won’t do to pretend none of it matters if we can’t prove that the father of the groom was in on the whole thing.
…………………………………………………
One clue here is Taibbi’s sarcastic reference to the obvious benefits of an armed proxy war with Russia in Ukraine. But snideness isn’t an argument. You don’t have to agree with the bipartisan consensus view of the American Establishment that Ukraine would be better off in the E.U. than having itself carved up by a man like Vladimir Putin. You can agree with Donald Trump that Russia hasn’t gone into Ukraine and that Crimeans are happier being part of Russia. You don’t even have to want to give Ukraine “lethal defensive weapons.” After all, Obama refused to do just that.
What you can’t do is say with any credibility that Trump having the GOP change the party platform to weaken its position on Ukraine isn’t any evidence of some kind of quid pro quo.
But, look, when E. Howard Hunt graduated from fucking up democracy in Guatemala and invasions of Cuba to orchestrating half-ass break-ins of the Democrats’ party headquarters, people didn’t think it was Hunt taking it down a notch. People didn’t say it was politics as usual. What they said (for quite a while) is that “we haven’t seen any real evidence of” Nixon’s involvement and that all those pesky Washington Post reporters have proved is that Nixon Derangement Syndrome has arrived.
Or, the useful idiots said that. The folks with an olfactory sense for smoke and trouble knew that decorated CIA officers don’t run domestic operations using Cuban exiles against the national headquarters of a major party in an election year without there being something truly goddamned sinister underlying it.
But, hey if the break-in is only digital who cares if it is vastly more successful in pilfering information? Who cares if the theft is carried out by an actual foreign government. Right?
How Journalists Are Still Getting Punked By Trump
by Nancy LeTourneau April 4, 2017 8:00 AM
It has officially been a month since Trump tweeted what everyone knows was nonsense.
Terrible! Just found out that Obama had my “wires tapped” in Trump Tower just before the victory. Nothing found. This is McCarthyism!
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 4, 2017
Yet we are still getting stories attempting to “investigate” whether there was any truth to his claim. The latest one explores the idea that the same Ezra Cohen-Watnick who called Rep. Devin Nunes to a clandestine meeting at the White House has now suggested that Obama’s national security advisor, Susan Rice, requested the “unmasking” of people associated with Donald Trump whose communications with foreign targets had been collected incidentally.
Kevin Drum noted how far down the rabbit hole we’ve traveled from the original claims in Trump’s tweet.
Even though we’re now in territory that has zero resemblance to Trump’s claims, the president and his supporters take these stories as validation that he has been right all along.
This will kill the tourism industry
https://mobile.twitter.com/JoyAnnReid/status/849221847862431744?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fdisqus.com%2Fembed%2Fcomments%2F%3Fbase%3Ddefault%26version%3D4aa09c5f8e7ed94c5680db6d0895ecf5%26f%3Dpragmaticobots%26t_i%3D58249%2520http%253A%252F%252Fpragmaticobotsunite.com%252F%253Fp%253D58249%26t_u%3Dhttp%253A%252F%252Fpragmaticobotsunite.com%252Ftuesday-open-thread-black-conductors%252F%26t_e%3DTuesday%2520Open%2520Thread%253A%2520Black%2520Conductors%26t_d%3DTuesday%2520Open%2520Thread%253A%2520Black%2520Conductors%26t_t%3DTuesday%2520Open%2520Thread%253A%2520Black%2520Conductors%26s_o%3Ddefault%26l%3D
The looming strategic disaster at Mar-a-Lago this week
China will try to buy off the Trump administration. It may very well succeed.
By Daniel W. Drezner April 3 at 8:15 AM Follow @dandrezner
Daniel W. Drezner is a professor of international politics at the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy at Tufts University and a regular contributor to PostEverything.
But no, after reading about the preparations for Trump’s scheduled summit with Chinese premier Xi Jinping at Mar-a-Lago later this week, I have to write about this. I blame man-in-charge-of-Mexico-and-Canada-and-the-Middle-East-and-China-and-government-reform-and-criminal-justice-reform Jared Kushner.
Three stories dropped over the weekend about Kushner’s role in planning this summit. The Financial Times’ Edward Luce was first:
The New York Times’ Mark Landler offers up some additional details that help to explain why China is working through Kushner rather than, say, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson:
It’s so great that the American political system resembles China’s political system enough for the Trump administration for have its very own princeling.
.@SpeakerRyan The AHCA was a not-very-cleverly disguised attempt to grab $1 trillion in tax cuts up front, ahead of more to come: https://t.co/GaEOB3jTiX
— Joy Reid (@JoyAnnReid) April 4, 2017
The War at Morehouse
Michael Harriot
Thursday 8:00am
The phrase “black America” may often be overlooked as a trite colloquialism, but it gives voice to the collective experiences of a community forged in fire.
Black America is not enveloped inside or beneath the United States of America that we love to hate and hate to love. No, black America exists alongside a nation that genuflects to its Founding Fathers as sacred modern-day apostles, conquering gods who made freedom and liberty from scratch with nothing but a stolen land and the blood of people in chains.
Black America is neither African nor European. Created out of a strange combination of necessity, inequality and ingenuity, it has its own distinct identity and origin story. Point Comfort is black America’s Plymouth Rock, and it landed on us a full year before the Pilgrims landed on the Wampanoag Nation. Sullivan Island is black America’s Ellis Island, where shackled human chattel was dragged from Africa into a new world. Martin and Malcolm are this parallel nation’s Jefferson and Adams.
And most people agree that the capital is Atlanta, home to the Atlanta University Center, which is made up of three of the most revered institutions in black America.
In black America, the Ivy League—Harvard, Yale, Princeton, et al.—pales in comparison with the Ebony League. Which HBCUs can stake claim to this rarefied status may be debatable, but there is no dispute that Howard University, Tuskegee University, Hampton University, Dillard University, Clark Atlanta University, Fisk University and Spelman College are all among them.
And then there is Morehouse.
Founded in 1867, two years after the end of the Civil War, Morehouse College is one of black America’s crown jewels. It is one of only four colleges in America that exclusively provide men with a liberal arts education. Located in Atlanta, the men-only college has educated black men for more than 150 years.
If you speak with anyone at Morehouse—students, faculty members, staff, even someone passing by—you are sure to be immediately impressed. Morehouse’s reputation does not merely come from its rigorous academic standards; it is built on a century-and-a-half of sustained superiority. It not only creates scholars, but for more decades than you can count on your fingers, Morehouse has been a factory of black excellence, rolling out men like Spike Lee, Samuel L. Jackson, Julian Bond, Saul Williams, David Satcher, Edwin Moses and Bill Nunn.
………………………….
Yet Morehouse has long served as the voice, soul, heart and conscience of not just the dark part of this country, but of America itself. As director of Homeland Security, Jeh Johnson (Class of 1979) kept this nation safe. Lerone Bennett Jr.’s (Class of 1949) book Before the Mayflower: A History of Black America is the definitive history of black America. Martin Luther King Jr. (Class of 1948) unquestionably showed the world that “love is stronger hate” was more than just an overused aphorism. Black America needs Morehouse. America needs Morehouse.
But Morehouse is falling down.
At the center of any institution of higher learning are two separate but important entities: the students and its faculty. A college exists to educate its students, and without the educators, it fails. They are the people in the trenches, on the ground, learning and teaching, leading and being led. They are the heartbeat of every university—black or white. Without them, schools are nothing but collections of buildings, chalkboards and desks.
In January 2017 (pdf), student leaders from Morehouse, frustrated with the leadership at the college, went to court and filed a restraining order against Morehouse’s board of trustees.
On March 22, the faculty of Morehouse held a meeting to address a litany of concerns, rumors and problems facing the institution. The meeting concluded with a simple statement from the faculty (pdf):
The faculty of Morehouse College expresses a vote of no confidence in the current chairman of the board of trustees of Morehouse College.
This lack of confidence did not explode from a single situation. It is the result of an infected, festering boil that eventually turned into a tumor. For years, Morehouse College has been the battlefield for a silent struggle of power that vacillates somewhere between a civil war and a Baptist church deacon board dispute.
It is a yearslong slap fight for the steering wheel of one of black America’s most valuable institutions between a board of trustees strongman, a lone, fearless savior, a gaggle of passionate fire-blooded warriors and a quiet, dedicated group of steel-willed educators. The thing that separates them is also the thing that binds them together. Every single one of them loves Morehouse as much as life itself, and each of them believes the other might ruin the beloved institution.
The Danger of Forcing the ‘Runaway’ Label on the Missing DC Girls
Preston Mitchum
Thursday 2:00pm
Double-digit numbers of young black and Latinx girls in the nation’s capital are missing and, as expected, there has yet to be a national outcry. Instead, within the past week, Washington, D.C.’s Metropolitan Police Department and other social media outlets are now focused on emphatically underscoring the message that social media distorted the stories and numbers of those missing.
The effort to find a handful of missing teenagers is being used to illustrate how a community is supposedly lying. But what’s still abundantly clear is that young black girls are missing, and many don’t care. The lack of rage over these young girls reveals a troubling truth: Missing girls are oftentimes immediately thought of as “runaways” who are not being harmed by systems of exploitation and victimization.
This mindset allows black girls to experience harm and trauma, while the assumption that girls are runaways puts the blame on caregivers, removes the government’s role and implies that these girls got what they deserved for being “fast”—stereotypes of oftentimes physically, emotionally and psychologically abused girls.
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This nonuptick in numbers is being used to diminish the feelings among black people in the District—feelings that are beginning to develop nationwide—that law enforcement and many elected leaders don’t care about these black girls. These numbers are also being used to assure the public that there isn’t a real sense of urgency and that this “black outcry” is opportunistic and nonfactual. We know better.
As of March 28, 14 cases of missing young black girls and Latinx remain open in D.C., including 14-year-old Shaniah Boyd, who went missing March 18, and 17-year-old Demetria Carthens, who was last seen Feb. 7. For many black people, it isn’t surprising that only we are discussing the trauma associated with what could be happening to the missing girls.
This lack of compassion for the black experience is part of a long line in history: Multiple missing black girls, in the eyes of white America and, by extension, white media, will never equal one Natalie Holloway. Many of us recognize this at a young age, so we don’t have to curb our enthusiasm when we find out later in life that law enforcement doesn’t value us.
This is disturbing on so many levels. One of these levels is snuffing out the full potential of our girls to grow fully experience a loving childhood, grow into adulthood, and realize their life’s mission. Not to mention the fact that they can become mothers of MORE BLACK CHILDREN.
This Is All James Comey’s Fault
Michael Harriot
Thursday 3:55pm
On Thursday morning, news surfaced that the experimental humanoid who somehow got a job as director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation (you’re not fooling us, James Comey; we know a Frankenstein monster when we see one) wanted to tell the public about Russia’s interference in the 2016 election as early as last summer. He didn’t want to hold a congressional hearing, convene an investigative committee or appoint a special prosecutor. No, when Ol’ Jughead James discovered that America’s mortal enemy was trying to undermine the foundation of American democracy, he wanted to write an article about it.
According to Newsweek, Comey gathered Attorney General Loretta Lynch, Secretary of State John Kerry, Department of Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson, national security adviser Susan Rice and others to inform them that Russia was trying to hack the election. Instead of advocating for sanctions, a diplomatic solution or even counterintelligence, the FBI director held up a piece of paper with an outline and offered to fight what amounts to an act of war by writing a public opinion piece. “He had a draft of it or an outline. He held up a piece of paper in a meeting and said, ‘I want to go forward. What do people think of this?’”a source familiar with the meeting told Newsweek.
President Barack Obama’s White House balked at the idea because it believed a public revelation that serious should be backed by intelligence sources, the president and multiple agents. In other words, when they were confronted with the proposition of fighting an enemy state’s attempt to sabotage the nation with cyberwarfare with a few sternly worded paragraphs, the collective response was, “For real, bruh?”
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And that is how Donald Trump became president.
In case you forgot, Comey is a huge fan of letter writing. After he investigated the Hillary Clinton email scandal and declared that the Justice Department would not indict her, the FBI chief sent a letter to Congress informing its members that he was reopening the investigation. Then, three days before the election, the Lurch look-alike penned another letter that basically said, “My bad. I didn’t find out anything new,” and closed the Clinton case again. Many polls and political experts cite the negative publicity from that action as one of the contributing factors in why Clinton lost a close race to Trump.
“Many polls and political experts cite the negative publicity from that action as one of the contributing factors in why Clinton lost a close race to Trump.”
Can’t say how tired I am of hearing that Comey, Russia, etc…stole the election from Hillary. She won the popular vote but lost three blue states, Wisconsin, Michigan, and Pennsylvania by 106,000 votes spread across those states. I guess it’s fine if “political experts” want to blame this on James Comey but people who are running campaigns better do a different kind of analysis.
To be fair, it was a combination of things…
Her campaign fell short in more ways than one…but Russian interference and the shenanigans of Comey and others, did impact the elections..
It’s disconcerting to hear Democrats – and even Hilary’s campaign folks so quickly go along with, and even parrot the head-scratching disclaimer that Russian interference/collusion did not in fact affect or change the final outcome/results…even as they go on to insist that an investigation is still needed…
Insanity…
You never accept or concede that pertinent notion…or what’s the point of going on to demand an investigation that in the end – even if compelling evidence is found, not much is to be done …since everyone has decided that it had no effect on the final results to begin with…
Makes no sense…
I can’t wait for this episode.
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Upcoming Episode of Underground Will Be Solo Performance by Aisha Hinds, Focused on Harriet Tubman
Monique Judge
Saturday 1:38am
The sixth installment of the second season of Underground will be a solo performance by actress Aisha Hinds, focused on her portrayal of Harriet Tubman, the most famous conductor of the Underground Railroad, who led many enslaved black people to freedom.
WGN America announced Friday that the April 12 episode will air at a special time, 8 p.m. ET, Yahoo! Finance reports.
Underground creators, writers and Executive Producers Misha Green and Joe Pokaski said: “When introducing someone as iconic as Harriet Tubman, we felt compelled to attempt an episode as revolutionary as her spirit. When we learned through research in 1858 she began to give talks about her life to like-minded abolitionists to raise money for the cause, we knew we had our in: A ‘TED Talk’ with Harriet Tubman.”
“This episode is truly one of a kind. It alone, masterfully revolutionizes TV storytelling,” Anthony Hemingway, Underground director and executive producer, said. “Aisha surrenders herself to the spirit of Harriet Tubman and gracefully reintroduces us to Harriet’s humanity by sharing her story, in a chillingly exceptional performance. I am extremely proud of the amazing artistry that every cast and crew member poured into making Underground. It’s the most exhilarating experience I’ve had as a filmmaker.”
MUST SEE TV!
Where Are All the Black Bone Marrow Donors?
Kellee Terrell
Saturday 9:00am
“You don’t want to see him on a good day, to be honest; it’s still pretty bad,” Charline Bullock said in an exclusive interview with The Root.
Her 5-year-old son, Asaya, suffers from immune dysregulation, polyendocrinopathy, enteropathy, X-linked (or IPEX) syndrome, a rare genetic blood disorder that causes multiple autoimmune disorders.
“He is a such sweetheart, but he gets so angry because he is sick. He suffers from serious memory loss, body aches, stomach issues, has serious joint pain, and it basically hurts everywhere,” she added.
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“He loves to learn, too, but can’t even go to school for a full week,” Bullock continued. “As a mother, it’s devastating to watch your child suffer, and there is nothing that you can do to fix it.”
Despite the severity of his disorder, Asaya has lived longer than expected.
When he was diagnosed at 8 months old, Charline and her husband, Vincent Bullock, were told that he probably wouldn’t make it past the age of 2. And while treatment has helped keep him alive, doctors were clear from the beginning that a bone marrow transplant was the only cure. Soon after, Bullock got pregnant, hoping that because siblings have a 25-30 percent chance of matching another sibling, her baby girl would be the answer to her family’s prayers.
Sadly, that was not the case. After receiving his sister’s cord blood, Asaya rejected her cells despite being a 7-point match out of 10.
“I just remember my husband breaking down when they gave us the news that it didn’t work,” Charline recalled.
Asaya is currently waiting to find a donor from the Be the Match Registry, run by the National Marrow Donor Program. But as it is for many other black people who are suffering from blood disorders and cancers such as sickle cell, leukemia and lymphoma, finding that perfect match isn’t easy.
There just aren’t enough potential donors of African descent on the registry.
Of the 12 million-plus donors registered, only 8 percent (800,000) are black, while 75 percent are white. Most important, given how much blood cell and marrow compatibility is based on similar DNA, race definitely matters in situations like Asaya’s.
“African Americans are more likely to match with other African Americans than with other races. But because we are one of the most diverse people genetically, finding a match is even more difficult for us,” said Addie Sanders, a senior community engagement representative for the National Marrow Donor Program.
“We have a 34 percent of not finding a donor, while white patients have a mere 3 percent chance. That’s a steep disparity. This is why it’s crucial for more of us, especially healthy people between the ages of 18 to 44, to sign up. Black lives are depending on it,” she stressed.
Muslim Teen Writes #BlackLivesMatter 100 Times for His Stanford Application Statement, Gets Accepted
Monique Judge
Yesterday 8:10pm
Is your activism performative or substantive? One New Jersey teen knew exactly how to show his answer to that question when filling out his application to Stanford University. Asked “What matters to you, and why?” the teen could think of only one thing: #BlackLivesMatter.
Ziad Ahmed wrote the hashtag #BlackLivesMatter 100 times, and that one act of activism paid off. According to a Mic profile of Ahmed, he received his letter of acceptance from Stanford on Friday.
Ahmed, who is a senior at Princeton (N.J.) Day School, said in an email to Mic: “I was actually stunned when I opened the update and saw that I was admitted. I didn’t think I would get admitted to Stanford at all, but it’s quite refreshing to see that they view my unapologetic activism as an asset rather than a liability.”
Elections have consequences Dear
https://mobile.twitter.com/rawstory/status/849123126520811521
According to Republicans, Black People Are Stupid and Lazy
Michael Harriot
Yesterday 5:45pm
In the latest round of “studies confirming stuff we already knew,” newly released opinion-poll data from the University of Chicago’s National Opinion Research Center shows that people who identify as Republican are more likely to believe that blacks are less motivated and less intelligent than whites. The survey results also reveal that more Republicans believe that African Americans get preferential employment treatment over more-qualified whites.
For more than four decades, the General Social Survey has studied the complex questions of American society; it is the “only full-probability, personal-interview survey designed to monitor changes in both social characteristics and attitudes currently being conducted in the United States.”
The Washington Post reviewed the survey’s 2016 data and learned some not-so-surprising facts about the differences in how the different parties view race in America. The poll asked, “On average, blacks have worse jobs, income and housing than white people. Do you think those differences are because most just don’t have the motivation or willpower to pull themselves up out of poverty?”
Fifty-five percent of white Republicans agreed with this statement, while 26 percent of white Democrats believed it to be true. While the difference in opinion was striking, the results were almost the same when researchers asked the question in 2010, when 60 percent of white GOPers agreed, compared with 32 percent of white Dems.
The Real Housewives of Potomac Returns: Still High Siddity and Super Shady
Michael Arceneaux
Yesterday 11:10am
Whenever I watch The Real Housewives of Jack and Jill Potomac, I have to ask myself if I really like this show or if I merely hate myself. Between their racial politics, color complexes and obsession with pretending that Potomac is the Washington, D.C., metropolitan area’s equivalent of St. Barts (select dictators certainly think so), even hate-watching can feel draining. Yes, Potomac is a very affluent area and, of course, the Real Housewives franchise is all about hamming up one’s wealth, but bougie black people are some of the most exhausting people on this increasingly less-green earth.
RHOP is like watching the after-hours of an HBCU (think Howard, Hampton or SpelHouse) alumni gala in real time. Like, you’re watching stuck-up black folks feign the kind of pedigree typically flexed by white people only. Why subject yourself to that torture? Well, you wait around ’cause you know brown liquor and “Blow the Whistle” will eventually loosen their tight asses the hell up already, and they’ll entertain you.
That’s basically how I feel about this show: Get them drunk already so they can stop faking like they belong on The Royals. That critique aside, I’m sitting here reviewing the season premiere, so congratulations, ladies. Y’all got me watching no matter how much shit I talk.
I do enjoy the show. Glad that confused Katie is gone. Seems like more truth will be coming out this season.
Police Told Fla. Woman to Stop Calling 911 Hours Before Boyfriend Killed Her: Report
Yesha Callahan
Yesterday 10:56am
A Florida woman’s calls to 911 failed to keep her and her young son alive after Sanford, Fla.’s Police Department told her to stop calling them.
In body-camera footage released by the SPD, officers responded to a call that Latina Herring made about her boyfriend, Allen Cashe, 31, according to WCMH-TV.
Three hours before Herring was killed, she could be seen on police bodycam video arguing with Cashe.
Police were called to a Wawa store at 3:20 a.m. March 27 and then, 20 minutes later, to a nearby home. In the video, Cashe and Herring are arguing over keys, but the officers’ conversations are quite telling:
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“She’s making false accusations; it’s the second time she’s done it.”
“She’s been calling all night. She first said he had a gun when he didn’t.”
“We’re going to handle it; just stop calling 911 and making accusations that you don’t know about.”
Three hours later, Herring and her 8-year-old son were dead, and her 7-year-old son, her father and two bystanders were injured. Cashe is accused of killing them with an AK-47.
Black and Proud. Even if Strangers Can’t Tell.
By REBECCA CARROLL
APRIL 1, 2017
My 11-year-old is understated, but not shy. He likes to bake, loves video games, is loyal to his friends and, biased as I may be, is a pretty good-looking kid. He gets mad sometimes, though, that people don’t immediately register him as black. “You’re so lucky,” he said to me a few months ago. “People look at you and know that you are black.”
Being black in America has historically been determined by whether or not you look black to nonblack people. This keeps racism operational. Brown and black skin in this country can invite a broad and freewheeling range of bad behavior — from job discrimination to a child being shot dead in the street. For my son, though, being black in America is about more than his skin color. It’s about power, confidence, culture and belonging.
You inherit race, though. You don’t steal it. We’re reminded of this once again by Rachel Dolezal, the white woman who made national headlines in 2015 for claiming a black identity because she felt like it. She released a memoir last week.
For the record, Ms. Dolezal, who has legally changed her name to Nkechi Amare Diallo, is white. She is the biological child of white parents who have stated publicly that their daughter is a white woman falsely identifying as black.
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Ms. Dolezal’s story demonstrates our unnerving trajectory from 2015, when white privilege was a zeitgeisty phrase people might apply to certain egregious behavior — like using your white privilege to decide you are black because you feel an affinity for corn rows and weaves — to the white supremacy of the Trump administration.
I was adopted into a white family, and the only black birth-family members I am aware of are no longer living. Every day I am saddened by the fact that I don’t have any black relatives for my son to know and spend time with. But my son has me, and I have him. And we are black. He also has his father, my husband, a white man of Italian descent, which accounts for our son’s light-skinned appearance.
My son is not the only light-skinned, mixed or biracial person I know who identifies primarily as black. Increasingly, I have observed my adult peers and colleagues who fall into this category not merely identifying as black, but routinely pulling out the receipts to prove their blackness.
This Twitter thread is the truth
https://mobile.twitter.com/AndyRichter/status/848892082207023107
I gots NOTHING for these folks.
NOTHING!
When McConnell deprived President Obama of a vote on Garland, it was a nuclear option. The rest is fallout.— Adam Schiff (@RepAdamSchiff) April 4, 2017
Part 3 from the LA Times
Trump’s Authoritarian Vision
http://www.latimes.com/projects/la-ed-trumps-authoritarian-vision/
9. Koch pawn Nunes, now tampering Trump-Russia investigation, backed a Koch bill that allowed foreign donors covertly entering US elections pic.twitter.com/ml4p1fxNU3
— Adam Khan (@Khanoisseur) April 3, 2017
Cashier: Wouldn’t you rather have a doll that looks like you?
Girl: “She is a pretty girl, I am a pretty girl” https://t.co/m0NQhISbcd pic.twitter.com/KHPN05r1Kt
— CNN (@CNN) April 4, 2017
Children LIVE what they LEARN.
Jared was never ELECTED by anyone. Why is he in charge of anything, let alone doing Rex Tillerson’s job? https://t.co/ylQYgIqg2Z
— bardgal (@bardgal) April 4, 2017
Same goes for Ivanka. The niost likely reason is that Trump is in way, way over his head and he’s drowning. It appears the only person he really trusts is Ivanka, and Ivanka trusts Jared.
** The most likely reason **
THIS
And those two are way over their heads too. When the GIG is up, these folks will have LINED their pockets to over-flowing.
Yep. I read their net worth is around 800 million.
And we thought Sarah Palin was a world class grifter…
There’s a reflexive default among the party to try to appeal to conservative white swing voters,” Steve Phillips, the San Francisco civil rights attorney, best-selling author of “Brown Is the New White” and founder of Democracy in Color, said Monday. “Absent any evidence that we can make headway with those voters, we should try to focus on those who we can.”
Democrats new strategy: Reach out to more people of color https://t.co/PNpab0VbI6 via @sfchronicle
— Pretty Foot (@PrettyFootWoman) April 4, 2017
NEW VIDEO: Intel reportedly nails Russia’s Election-Fixer in Washington – taped him. No wonder Trump is panicking: pic.twitter.com/uOWlUQyDsb
— Keith Olbermann (@KeithOlbermann) April 3, 2017
Putin killed a guy in London with radioactive poison & carpet-bombed a Russian city the size of Minneapolis, but an IED on a train, never!
— Mig Greengard (@chessninja) April 3, 2017
79 nominees blocked by GOP between 2009-2013, compared to 68 TOTAL between ’49-’08. Don’t buy bullshit spin that GOP hasn’t been partisan.
— The Resisterhood (@resisterhood) April 3, 2017
Izombie returns tonight.
Yeah:)
Attorney General White Citizens Council at work:
The decimation of the DOJ Civil Rights Division is underway, again.
THE RACHEL MADDOW SHOW 4/3/17
Trump politics diverts national security team
Michael Leiter, former DNI deputy chief of staff, talks with Rachel Maddow about some of the dysfunction within Donald Trump’s National Security Council and the potential consequences of that dysfunction.
THE RACHEL MADDOW SHOW 4/3/17
Trump puts NSC to personal political use
Rachel Maddow looks at some of the internal struggles of Donald Trump’s National Security Council and reports on new evidence that the NSC is being used as a political tool to bolster a counter-narrative to the Trump Russia scandal.
Good Morning, Everyone 😄😄😄
Good Morning, Everyone
Hopefully more advertisers will follow. It’s very unethical that FOX pays for people to be quiet. He must be worth so much to them. But, who watches FOX anyway? Only one person comes to mind, and he seems to have the same problem.