Free Republic

A Poll Tax by Another Name By JOHN LEWIS August 26, 2011 AS we celebrate the Martin Luther King Jr. Memorial, we reflect on the life and legacy of this great man. But recent legislation on voting reminds us that there is still work to do. Since January, a majority of state legislatures have passed or considered election-law changes that, taken together, constitute the most concerted effort to restrict the right to vote since before the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Growing up as the son of an Alabama sharecropper, I experienced Jim Crow firsthand. It was enforced by the...

Al Sharpton to Join MSNBC As a Host; He's a Perfect Fit for Network By Ken Shepherd Created 07/21/2011 - 12:11pm When MSNBC shuffled Ed Schultz up to the 10 p.m. slot they placed left-wing blogger and radio host Cenk Uygur (pronounced jenk you-gur) in the 6 p.m. Eastern time slot that Ed vacated as an interim host. But Uygur has been curiously absent from his dinnertime perch since early July, with the Rev. Al Sharpton filling in but not explaining why Uygur was out. Yesterday MSNBC announced that Uygur had officially left the network and today the New York...

The media stood and applauded yesterday when President Obama and his family went to church for Easter. Yesterday’s visit to Shiloh Baptist Church in D.C. shows again that Obama really is a man of faith, the reports seem to suggest. But while the media rushed to report on the first family’s attendance of the predominately black congregation (and the family’s outfits), what it failed to mention was the views held by the church’s pastor. And while those views are not delivered in the same fiery manner as Obama’s former pastor, Jeremiah Wright, they sound eerily familiar. What views are those?...

I am tempted to say that President Obama rushing up to New York City to embrace Al Sharpton during the opening days of his campaign is evidence of a weakness in his re-election prospects. But it is much worse than that. Barack Obama is failing to demonstrate leadership on racial issues, and leadership in general, by paying such homage to Sharpton. I thought the whole point of electing a black president was to allow the nation to rise above everything that Sharpton represents. Sharpton has been fined hundreds of thousands of dollars for violating campaign laws as result of...

Indiana State Police are investigating the reported battery of a state worker Thursday during the large union rally outside the Statehouse. First Sgt. Dave Bursten says a 33-year-old employee of the Indiana Department of Child Services told Capitol Police she was taking a smoking break around 12:15 p.m. at the west end of the Indiana Government Center South building when she was approached by three white men. The men reportedly asked to use her electronic pass to enter the building, but she declined. When she pointed them toward a public entrance, they allegedly pushed her. The incident caused her to...

White America still owes us is the misguided mantra foisted on Blacks for decades that is upsetting to Lloyd Marcus, an un-hyphenated American of African descent, who decries what Black History month has become in our nation. He says it’s the special time of the year when race hustlers pitch many new guilt trip entitlement programs on us and our politicians, because Marcus says the hustlers still are stuck back in the 1950′s angst of systematic abuse. Not true today he says. “Throughout American history, white folks, mostly Christians, suffered, sacrificed and died to help set blacks free and move...

When a child named Curtis Bowen was slapped by his teacher at Martin Luther King Jr., Elementary School, no one really heard about it. Except for President Obama, Vice President Biden, their wives, three senators, and more than 20 other officials. They all were CC'ed on the whopping 40-page letter that Curtis' mother, Lisa Henry Bowen, sent to school district superintendent John Covington. In it, Bowen makes mind-boggling demands for reparations. One recipient called the letter "one of the craziest things I've ever seen" and leaked it to the Internet. And Lisa Henry Bowen even created her own web site...

(VIDEO AT LINK) Here is Naked Emperor News video of the Rev. Al Sharpton speaking at a rally in Alabama back in July in which he essentially said African-American candidate Johnny Ford should win his State Senate Primary runoff against a white candidate – Billy Beasley – because the district is “heir property” to African-Americans. Sharpton, for all his talk of wanting equality, actually uses “race” as a cottage industry for himself. It is impossible to square these comments with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.’s dream that people would someday be “judged by the content of their character” and not...

Rev. Jesse Jackson says Michigan needs to get over its anti-Detroit sentiment Published: Wednesday, August 25, 2010, 9:56 PM Ron Cammel | The Grand Rapids Press Ron Cammel | The Grand Rapids Press GRAND RAPIDS -- The Rev. Jesse Jackson had a word for West Michigan: There is an anti-Detroit sentiment in the state, but Detroit is "the largest organ in Michigan's body. ... If Detroit suffers, Michigan suffers." That was just one of the points Jackson made as he gave a pep talk in Grand Rapids Wednesday as part of Rainbow PUSH's campaign "Rebuild America: Jobs Justice Peace." During...

Former USDA official Shirley Sherrod, who claims she was falsely smeared as a racist while she herself falsely smears Republicans and Fox News as racists, said this morning that she would like to see BigGovernment.com, the website that made her famous, shut down for the good of the country.CNN's American Morning reported on Sherrod's demand:She said if Breitbart's site were shut down, "That would be a great thing, because I don't see how that advances us in this country ... at a time when we should be trying to look at how we can make space for all of us...

As soon as much of the available evidence suggested that Shirley Sherrod had become the victim of a rush to judgment by Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack, it became clear President Barack Obama had a mushrooming political problem on his hands. Sherrod went from being the villain of the piece to a figure drawing great empathy from millions, not the least of which was conservative talk show host Glen Beck. And among those who were most closely watching the president’s handling of affair were important members of the president’s base, people he could ill afford to alienate: African Americans and liberals....

Rainbow Coalition Also Wants Comcast/NBCU To Spend 25% Of Ad Budgets On Minority-Owned Firms The Rev. Jesse Jackson's Rainbow/PUSH Coalition wants Comcast to set aside 10% of its basic tier for networks "owned and controlled by people of color." The organization also wants both Comcast and NBC Universal to spend 25% of their ad and marketing budgets and the same percentage of "vendor dollars" on minority-owned firms. "We want to make sure that independently owned and controlled minority cable networks don't find it harder to gain carriage if this deal happens," said Jackson in written testimony for the July 8...

Nobody likes a racist… Nobody likes a race hustler either. On Saturday March 20th the leftist media reported what they described as a horrible story from their sources at the conservative-hating Huffington Post. The media claimed that members of the Congressional Black Caucus were called n*ggers and spat on by tea party protesters as they walked from the Longworth office building to the Rayburn office building. At least one report said that it was “a chorus” of racist hatred. Another report said the Congressional members heard the n-word at least 15 times. Reporters from ABC, CBS, CNN, FOX News, (including...

Created in 1926 by black historian, scholar, educator and publisher Carter G. Woodson, it began as "Negro History Week." By 1976, it morphed into Black History Month -- a celebration of the contributions of blacks to America and their struggles to overcome. From Africa to slavery. The Civil War. Jim Crow and lynchings. Sit-ins and marches. Brown vs. Board of Education and the Civil Rights Act. Assassinations. A historic presidency. With history yet to have its full say regarding President Obama, we interviewed a broad spectrum of his fellow Chicagoans and prominent visitors on what the month means to them...

Do you have a a Negro friend and are you having trouble finding just the right gift to get him dancing and singing on Christmas Day? Well, the New York Times has come up with one of the great ideas of the 1950s: a holiday gift guide for the colored folk. You’ve probably struggled with what to give your doorman, or valet, or housemaid as an appropriate present. You want something not too expensive but something they can really use. This colored folk gift guide takes the worry out of your holiday shopping for servants and others who are complexion-challenged....

You're a college dropout and OxyContin junkie who somehow managed to climb to the top of the media pile. You've made yourself one of the most popular and influential voices in the national dialogue and that, in turn, has made you rich beyond dreams of avarice. How satisfying must that be.Just because you said the NFL "all too often looks like a game between the Bloods and the Crips"? Just because you once told a black caller to "take that bone out of your nose and call me back"? For those trifles the sensitive pansies of the NFL don't want...

"You've never seen a Columbine done by a black child. Never. They always say, 'We can't believe it happened here. We can't believe it's these suburban white kids.' It's only them. Now, a black kid might shoot another black kid. He's not going to shoot up the whole school."

In 1990 I served the federal court here in South Florida as amicus curiae (friend of the court) in the obscenity trial that determined Miami rap group 2 Live Crew’s album As Nasty As They Wanna Be was obscene and thus not protected by the First Amendment. The verdict -- the first in world history that a sound recording was obscene -- was handed down by Jose A. Gonzalez, Jr., a liberal judge appointed by President Carter and who was hailed for his civil rights record by the ACLU and the rap group’s lawyer when the case was assigned to...

In spite of RNC Chairman Robert M. "Mike" Duncan's sharply negative reaction, former Tennessee GOP leader Chip Saltsman said that party leaders should stand up to criticism over distributing a CD with the song. He earlier defended the tune as one of several "lighthearted political parodies" that have aired on Rush Limbaugh's radio show. ...... "The 2008 election was a wake-up call for Republicans to reach out and bring more people into our party," Duncan said in a statement. "I am shocked and appalled that anyone would think this is appropriate as it clearly does not move us in the...

How the advocate for the poor became the champion of the middle class. Step back in time to April, 1990. Obama is the first “black” President of the Harvard Law Review, and he begins to attack Middle America. This is the Obama thousands of Americans don’t know . . . yet. “I’m not interested in the suburbs,” he authoritatively tells a liberal reporter. “The suburbs bore me. And I’m not interested in isolating myself.”1 You see, in Obama’s worldview, the suburbs are full of middleclass types, who lead bo-ring middleclass existences, apparently. They’re the “isolating” folks, like, say, Joe, the...

I just caught Jesse Jackson junior on CNN; he was commenting on how unfair it is that McCain's campaign is bringing up Ayers, when after all Obama was only eight during his bombing days. He equates Sen. McCain's senatorial relationship with Trent Lott and Strom Thurmond with Obama's relationship with Ayer's et. al. This line of reasoning is poor on so many levels. Neither Thurmond nor Lott ever blew up any buildings. Neither Thurmond nor Lott are or ever were communists. McCain was never a "community organizer" alongside either of these people. Ayers was never elected to office. The most...

Do not say black and white Americans live in the same world or you will feel the wrath of Whoopi Goldberg. That is what Elisabeth Hasselbeck discovered on the July 17 edition of "The View." Upon suggesting that, Whoopi reduced Elisabeth to tears. On the news of Jesse Jackson’s use of the "n" word, the conversation quickly developed into the double standard involved between a white and black person’s use of the word. Sherri Shepherd and Whoopi Goldberg admitted there is a double standard, but added there should be. Sherri Shepherd said she uses the word "as a term of...

None other than the Rev. Al Sharpton has come to Milwaukee. Well, at least his voice is here. Sharpton’s syndicated radio show recently began broadcasting from noon to 3 p.m. weekdays on WMCS-AM (1290). That’s probably welcome news for some in town; for others, not so much. For some Milwaukeeans, Sharpton is part of the unholy trinity — along with Louis Farrakhan and Jesse Jackson — of outspoken black men who never let white America forget its sad racial past. To others, it’s a welcome relief to have a nationally syndicated African-American radio program with a political focus during daytime...

WASHINGTON - In a vulgar tirade caught on tape by Fox News, the Rev. Jesse Jackson said he wanted to "cut his [Barack Obama's] nuts out" and he accused the fellow Chicagoan of "talking down to black folks" by giving moral lectures to African-Americans, source said Jackson's shocking quotes were picked up by a hot mic before an interview on health care in Fox's Chicago studio last Sunday Fox planned to air the recording on Bill O'Reilly's "The Factor" show.

VIDEO Before a TV interview began with Reid Tuckson from the United Healthcare Group, Rev. Jesse Jackson's microphone was live and caught Jackson commenting that Obama "talks down to black people". Jackson also said he wanted to cut out a particular part of Obama's anatomy.

Customers ask Wal-Mart stores to remove book Beloved by Mexicans for his dim wits, street smarts and playful disposition, long-running comic book character Memín Pinguín — a little black boy whose face resembles a monkey — is at it again. His zany adventures chronicled in a hugely popular book series for decades are up for sale at your neighborhood Wal-Mart store in the Libros en Español section, right next to the store's cadre of African-American books. The latest issue: Memín para presidente. By Shawnedria McGinty's American standards, the image was shocking. The African-American woman who was shopping at the store...

Rev. Al Sharpton plans Bell protest at Yankee Stadium for All-Star Game BY JOTHAM SEDERSTROM DAILY NEWS STAFF WRITER Monday, June 9th 2008, 4:00 AM The Rev. Al Sharpton threatened Sunday to disrupt baseball's historic All-Star Game at Yankee Stadium next month unless the state passes new laws to curb police misconduct.A month after protesters blocked bridges and tunnels during rush hour, Sharpton said he wants to bring the outrage over the Sean Bell shooting to the national stage July 15 by targeting the midsummer classic. "We have plans to do the same at the All-Star Game," Sharpton said. "We...

Senator Barack Obama is now the Democratic nominee for President of the United States of America. This seems like a good time to consider who this man is. Here are some quotes from his autobiographies Dreams of My Father and The Audacity of Hope that might help Americans and the rest of the world get a sense of this man who is one general election away from the Oval Office. Before you read them consider that Henry Kissinger once remarked that presidents come into office and leave office the the same men. The job is too demanding to permit opportunities...

  Senator Obama is one of key leaders in a campaign to make Juneteeth Day a National Holiday in the United States. Juneteeth Day occurs on every June 19th, the anniversary of General Granger announcing the emancipation of slaves in the South West. The Holiday would be celebrated on the third Friday in June. Here's what the NYT wrote about it on 2004: "Most gatherings are decidedly upbeat, but the sobering reason for the holiday has also been part of Juneteenth's growth. Dr. Ronald Myers, the leader of a movement to make Juneteenth a national holiday, says June 19 should...

The subject of race is all over the media headlines. Reverend Jeremiah Wright told it like it is and conservative America could not take the strong medicine. Sen. Barack Obama had to prepare his greatest speech to address the frenzy that was and is taking place about it. Imagine, Black people having to explain to White America that there is a racial problem in this nation. That alone signifies the degree of importance this issue has. Denial can be the worst enemy and biggest problem. Most recently, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice had to weigh in on the issue. She...

Hillary Clinton and John McCain both ripped into Barack Obama Friday for reportedly saying residents of small-town America “cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren’t like them” out of bitterness over lost jobs, a remark his opponents interpreted as arrogant...

An invitation to a "diversity workshop" sent to Sandia Labs employees last week by labs management has drawn complaints because of its suggestion that white people are inherently racist. "Recent studies suggest whites' lack of awareness about other cultures has to do with whites' commitment to maintaining higher social status, or 'white privilege,' '' the invitation said. It also said whites "are likely to persist in racist behaviors unless persuaded to abolish the privileges they receive as members of the white race." Sandia staff received a dozen calls from employees upset about the wording, labs spokesman Michael Padilla said. He...

While the crowd was indeed diverse, some students at the event questioned the practices of Mrs. Obama’s event coordinators, who handpicked the crowd sitting behind Mrs. Obama. The Tartan’s correspondents observed one event coordinator say to another, “Get me more white people, we need more white people.” To an Asian girl sitting in the back row, one coordinator said, “We’re moving you, sorry. It’s going to look so pretty, though.” “I didn’t know they would say, ‘We need a white person here,’ ” said attende....

I thought Barack Obama's speech was strong, thoughtful and important. Rather beautifully, it was a speech to think to, not clap to. It was clear that's what he wanted, and this is rare. It seemed to me as honest a speech as one in his position could give within the limits imposed by politics. As such it was a contribution. We'll see if it was a success. The blowhard guild, proud member since 2000, praised it, and, in the biggest compliment, cable news shows came out of the speech not with jokes or jaded insiderism, but with thought. They started...

Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama said Tuesday that the Bush administration has done nothing to defuse a "quiet riot" among blacks that threatens to erupt just as riots in Los Angeles did 15 years ago. The first-term Illinois senator said that with black people from New Orleans and the Gulf Coast still displaced 20 months after Hurricane Katrina, frustration and resentments are building explosively as they did before the 1992 riots. "This administration was colorblind in its incompetence," Obama said at a conference of black clergy, "but the poverty and the hopelessness was there long before the hurricane. "All the...

AFRICAN AMERICANS, INDEPENDENTS, DEMOCRATS, REPUBLICANS COMPLETELY AGREE, COMPLETELY DISAGREE... Looking at the reaction of a MediaCurves focus group of 709 viewers to Sen. Barack Obama's race speech in which he took on the issue of his controversial pastor, Rev. Jeremiah C. Wright, it's once again interesting to see the racial divide in how the speech was received. It's the same racial split Obama so deftly described in his speech. Blacks who took part of the survey had higher levels of agreement with Obama than non-blacks. And Democrats had more favorable impressions of the snippets of the speech they were shown...

If you missed it, here is the video.

Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama, in Philadelphia, Tuesday delivered a speech on race relations in the United States. Here is the transcript: We the people, in order to form a more perfect union. Two hundred and twenty one years ago, in a hall that still stands across the street, a group of men gathered and, with these simple words, launched America's improbable experiment in democracy. Farmers and scholars; statesmen and patriots who had traveled across an ocean to escape tyranny and persecution finally made real their declaration of independence at a Philadelphia convention that lasted through the spring of 1787....

Barack Obama took the stage this morning to give what was billed as a "major speech on race." It was, of course, an attempt to rescue his campaign from the revelation that his so-called spiritual mentor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, espouses a virulently anti-American and antiwhite worldview called "black liberation theology." <--snip--> What Obama is evading is that this "profoundly distorted view" is not just some passing emotion. It is what Wright himself, in the "talking points" page of his congregation's Web site, describes as "systematized black liberation theology." As we noted yesterday, Wright credits James Cone of New York's...

"A More Perfect Union" Remarks of Senator Barack Obama Tuesday, March 18th, 2008 Philadelphia, Pennsylvania 10:17:53 ET “We the people, in order to form a more perfect union.” Two hundred and twenty one years ago, in a hall that still stands across the street, a group of men gathered and, with these simple words, launched America’s improbable experiment in democracy. Farmers and scholars; statesmen and patriots who had traveled across an ocean to escape tyranny and persecution finally made real their declaration of independence at a Philadelphia convention that lasted through the spring of 1787. The document they produced was...

Hillary Clinton Blasts 'Bigot' Imus newsmax.com April 11, 2007 On Wednesday Sen. Hillary Clinton joined the attack on Don Imus, saying the talk-show host’s comments about the Rutgers University women’s basketball team showed "small-minded bigotry and coarse sexism.” In a mass e-mail sent to her closest supporters, the Democratic presidential hopeful wrote: "This year the Rutgers women’s basketball team defied the odds and lived up to their dreams, providing inspiration to every little boy and girl beginning to pick up a ball or open a book . . . "Don Imus’ comments about them were nothing more than small-minded bigotry...

New York (AP) -- A judge sentenced a man to 240 years in prison Wednesday for taking hostages in a bar and telling patrons that "white people are going to burn tonight." State Supreme Court Justice Maxwell Wiley told Steven Johnson, 39, who is black, that he had forfeited his "right to live in society." Johnson, 39, was convicted March 1 of attempted murder, assault and other charges, including some designated as hate crimes. Johnson invaded Bar Veloce, in Manhattan's East Village neighborhood, while nine men and six women were inside it June 16, 2002. He was carrying three pistols,...

Chicago's highest-paid television news personality claims a contractor who designed and helped build her $3 million Lincoln Park mansion skimped on luxuries and did shoddy work because she is black. Diann Burns, top news anchor at WBBM-Channel 2, recently filed suit against Chicago-based Metzler/Hull Development Corp., demanding at least $600,000 on claims of fraud and discrimination. She and her husband, talent agent Marc Watts, list 84 complaints about their 5,752-square-foot home on North Burling Street -- from the angle of the garage floor not being right to chipped mahogany doors being installed.In the lawsuit filed in Cook County Circuit Court,...

US celebrities and rights activists have lamented the execution of Stanley Tookie Williams at his funeral. Hundreds of mourners came to the violence-wracked area of Los Angeles where Williams founded the murderous Crips gang three decades ago. Under heavy police presence, a long line of people entered the 1,500-seat Bethel AME Church. Vendors sold T-shirts with Williams' picture, and a large TV set up in the parking lot allowed the overflow crowd to watch the service. Williams was executed on December 13 despite clemency pleas from celebrities and others who said he had rededicated his life to peace. "It's nine-fifteen...

Court Rules Jesse Jackson Must Face Civil Trial for Assault and Civil Rights Violations Judicial Watch represents Rev. Jesse Lee Peterson in claims against Jackson (Washington, DC) Judicial Watch, the public interest group that investigates and prosecutes corruption, today announced that on January 17, 2006, Jesse Lee Peterson, et al., v. Jesse Jackson, et al. (BC 266505) will go to trial in Los Angeles County Superior Court after a ruling last week by Judge George H. Wu. Judicial Watch filed the lawsuit against Jackson, his son Jonathan, and others on behalf of Rev. Jesse Lee Peterson, who was the victim...

Back when NPR and other news outlets were reporting that New Orleans had “dodged the bullet” on hurricane Katrina I made an ill-conceived joke in The Corner about how the Superdome was going to hell-in-a-hand basket. I wrote: ATTN: SUPERDOME RESIDENTS [Jonah Goldberg] I think it's time to face facts. That place is going to be a Mad Max/thunderdome Waterworld/Lord of the Flies horror show within the next few hours. My advice is to prepare yourself now. Hoard weapons, grow gills and learn to communicate with serpents. While you're working on that, find the biggest guy you can and when...

President Bush has implemented economic policies that resemble those of the Roman Empire, which forced the baby Jesus into homelessness on the night of his birth, former civil rights leader Rev. Jesse Jackson said in a pre-Christmas rant late Thursday. "In the last [Bush] budget, we cut housing again, and that was Jesus' dilemma. In Bethlehem, his family ended up homeless," Jackson told MSNBC's Campbell Brown. "Rome was a wealthy country that left Jesus and Mary and Joseph, in a sense, homeless," he complained. "He was born an at-risk baby." The GOP bashing Democrat said that while Bush's reelection campaign...

Soon-to-be Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., said Sunday that he could support Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia if President Bush nominates him to head the high court, but he bristled at the prospect that Bush could tap Scalia's colleague Clarence Thomas, calling him "an embarrassment." Asked by Tim Russert about Scalia as a possible chief justice, Sen. Reid told NBC's "Meet the Press," "I cannot dispute the fact, as I have said, that this is one smart guy." Reid added that while he usually disagrees with Scalia's opinions, "his reason for arriving at those results are very hard to...

A House Judiciary subcommittee is investigating the finances of the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, whose chairman, Mary Frances Berry, is in a dispute over whether her term ends this week or next month.     "We are looking into management, financials, contracting ...," confirmed Mindy Barry, oversight counsel for the Constitution, civil rights and property rights subcommittee, which has authorized but not yet used a subpoena to obtain the needed information.     The subpoena seeks "all documents referring to all contracts, specifically dealings with [public relations firms] McKinney and Associates and McKinney and McDowell; all documents regarding any fees paid to...

NEW YORK A syndicated newspaper column by the Rev. Jesse Jackson, which slammed Ohio's handling of the recent presidential election, is being accused of "blatant inaccuracies" by the Ohio Secretary of State's office. Carlo Lo Paro, press secretary for Republican Secretary of State Ken Blackwell, claims that Jackson's column, distributed earlier this week through Tribune Media Services, contains numerous inaccuracies that hint at improper behavior by Blackwell's office. "We expect someone writing an op-ed and a syndicate distributing that op-ed would fact-check information and have a responsibility to the facts," Lo Paro told E&P Wednesday. "We believe someone can have...