Police Harass BLM Ahead of Republican Convention

Seems like Cointelpro is still active in Cleveland…

 

Are Police Targeting Black Lives Matter Activists Ahead of the GOP Convention?

Law enforcement says it’s community outreach. Activists say it’s a harassment campaign.

With the Republican National Convention fast approaching in Cleveland, tensions over security are mounting. Presumptive GOP nominee Donald Trump is expected to draw thousands of protesters and the scene outside the convention could turn volatile. At least two outside police departments have pulled out of the security effort, citing concerns that the city is ill-prepared. And the American Civil Liberties Union sued Cleveland over protest rules it views as draconian. (A settlement was reached last week.) Now, local and federal authorities have begun aggressively tracking activists—including members of the Black Lives Matter movement who have helped spotlight Cleveland’s brutal policing problems.

Last week, law enforcement agents began visiting the homes of known activists in Cleveland. Jocelyn Rosnick, an attorney with the Ohio chapter of the National Lawyers Guild, which is providing legal advice and holding civil rights trainings for activists ahead of the RNC, said her group had received about two dozen reports from activists who said they’d been visited by agents from the FBI, the Department of Homeland Security, and the Secret Service, or by Cleveland PD officers and Cuyahoga County sheriff’s deputies. Law enforcement agents, some of them said, also made phone calls to relatives, neighbors, and places of employment asking about the activists’ whereabouts. According to Rosnick, most of these reports have come from people involved with the local chapter of Black Lives Matter or the Occupy Wall Street movement.

The people receiving these visits and calls have found them intimidating. Local resident Dionne Hudson told Cleveland’s NewsChannel 5 that two law enforcement officials visited her home on June 21 looking for her 20-year-old daughter, who was among 71 people arrested at a protest following the acquittal of Cleveland PD officer Michael Brelo for a fatal shooting. Her daughter’s case was thrown out and she has not been involved in a protest since, Hudson said. “Where can we find her at? They asked things of that nature. What’s her phone number. It was like they were hunting her down,” Hudson said. “It’s intimidating.”

A prominent Cleveland activist, contacted byMother Jones via the National Lawyers Guild, said an agent with the FBI’s Cleveland field office left him a voicemail last Tuesday asking to speak with him. The activist, who asked to remain anonymous, said he had heard from others who received visits or phone calls from law enforcement. One said officers stopped him while he was jogging, and another said officers blocked his car with theirs as he attempted to pull out of his driveway. The activist, who has done organizing in Cleveland for nearly two decades, said he was not intimidated, but he worries about the impact on younger, less experienced activists.

“Clearly this is a harassment campaign,” he said. He pointed to the FBI’s history of targeting activists, including a local 2012 case in which five Occupy activists were arrested on terrorism charges after a federal agent infiltrated their group. The Cleveland PD, meanwhile has said it planned to use undercover officers in its security preparations. The activist said he thinks law enforcement is using the convention as a pretext to harass people who may end up on their radar for other reasons.

In a statement to the Cleveland Plain Dealer, a FBI spokeswoman said agents were conducting community outreach as a part of their security planning for the convention. “Law enforcement is reaching out to individuals known to the community who might have information that could help to ensure a safe and secure environment during the RNC,” the FBI spokeswoman said. Neither the FBI’s field office nor the Cleveland mayor’s office, which is handling media requests related to the RNC, responded to inquiries from Mother Jones.

Since 2014, Cleveland has seen a wave of protests in response to police shootings of black people. Activists affiliated with Black Lives Matter have also disrupted severalpolitical events since the beginning of the campaign season. One BLM leader saidin an interview last July that the group would take “any opportunity we have to shut down the GOP convention.” But Rosnick noted that many of the people who had been contacted by law enforcement recently said they had no plans to protest at the convention.

J. Edgar Hoover

Law enforcement also conducted these kinds of operations ahead of national political conventions in 2008 and 2012, Rosnick said, but “to me it seems like they have cast a wider net this time around.” She said members of an arts collective on the city’s west side—which hosted meetings related to protests of the Tamir Ricecase—have also been paid visits. And Maggie Rice, an organizer with Food Not Bombs, told Mother Jones that at least four of her group’s members were visited by FBI agents and plainclothes Cleveland police last week. “It made me feel uneasy,” one of those members told Mother Jones, “like no one I knew was necessarily safe.”

Randy Cunningham, a 66-year-old veteran environmental activist who’s coordinating an anti-poverty march for the GOP convention, described how two Cleveland PD detectives visited his home on June 20: One carried a manila folder with his name on it that contained a picture of his driver’s license and other documents, Cunningham said. He said they asked him questions about his plans for the march, how many people were expected to attend, and if he knew of people who might be coming from out of town to cause mayhem.

Meanwhile, Mother Jones also contacted four supporters of Trump in the Cleveland area who submitted applications for parade permits during the RNC. All replied they had not been contacted by law enforcement…. Read More Here…

 

Trump Bankrolled Racist Ads to Stop Mohawk Casino

Trump has no compunction in playing the race card – in business or politics…

Artist rendering of planned St. Regis Mohawk Casino

REVEALED: Trump bankrolled a racist ad campaign against Native Americans to protect his casino biz

Donald Trump has shown no reluctance to do bigoted things during his presidential campaign, whether it’s supporting a ban on Muslims entering the U.S. or attacking a “Mexican” judge as being unfit to rule on the Trump University case.

Because of this, it’s not surprising to learn that Trump once bankrolled a racist ad campaign against Native Americans who had just proposed building a casino in upstate New York.

The Los Angeles Times reports that when the St. Regis Mohawk tribe announced plans to build a casino near a racetrack in the Catskills, Trump decided to bankroll an ad campaign aimed at convincing local communities to kill the project.

Trump plunged $1 million into a purported “grassroots” anti-gambling organization called the New York Institute for Law and Society that warned the casino would bring “increased crime, broken families, bankruptcies and, in the case of the Mohawks, violence.”

But that’s not all: Documents obtained by The Los Angeles Times show that Trump personally signed off on a strategy devised by longtime ally Roger Stone to depict the Mohawks as a violent people who would bring ruin to everyone else in the area.

“Roger, do it!” Trump scrawled on a proposed flier that said the Mohawk tribe was well known for being a violent group that sold drugs and smuggled undocumented immigrants into the country.

Trump and his associates were ordered by the New York Temporary State Commission on Lobbying to pay $250,000 for deceptive advertising by not disclosing the fact that Trump almost single handedly funded the New York Institute for Law and Society, despite the fact that the organization falsely boasted it had raised funds from more than 12,000 donors.

 

Stacy Who?…Again

A man walks into a bar and spots a beautiful woman.

He walks up to her, and says “Would you go to bed with me for a million dollars?”

Somewhat abashed, she stutters, and then says “Yes”.

He responds, “WOuld you go to bed with me for $10?”

She angrily sputters back, “No. What sort of woman do you think I am?”

He responds…”We’ve already established that. Now all we are doing is haggling over the price.”

Conservative black dipwit Stacy “Who?” is at it again. I guess the only way the poor girl can make money now that her Sugar Daddy cut her loose is to appear on TV trying to be outrageous. Her newest rant? “poor women don’t work hard enough!”

Apparently the cost of Stacy is down to $10. Might want to change that moniker to Stacy Ho!

REVEALED: Stacey Dash complains poor women don’t work hard enough — and collects $6K from fiancé

Former actress and Fox News contributor, Stacey Dash is drawing fire after theDaily Mail uncovered her 2004 bankruptcy documents that show she was financially supported by her former fiance to the tune of $6,000 a month, Perez Hiltonreports.

Dash was apparently so broke and drowning in debt because she says she couldn’t find work and ultimately filed for Chapter 7 Bankruptcy.

Eleven years after that, Dash told Meredith Vieira in an interview that she thinks women need to work harder and stop complaining about the gender wage gap. Dash continued, claiming that women should stop trying to make excuses about the discrepancy in pay between men and women and, instead, take control of their own financial opportunities.

“It’s an excuse. Stop making excuses. If there are opportunities, seize them. And be prepared for them. And be the best, if that’s what it takes. If you have to be extraordinary, be extraordinary,” said Dash.

When Vieira told Dash that women make just 70 cents for every dollar a man made, Dash didn’t question the data but questioned women instead.

“I don’t know if that’s true,” she began. “I know that the numbers are true, but I feel like your daughter will be able to make as much money as she wants in her life. Just like you are. I mean, look at you.”

Vieira then responded with her own personal story about being paid less than her male counterparts.

“I guess I won’t put my fate into anything other than my own action and taking my destiny in my hands,” Dash responded. “I will not play victim to anything.”

Taking that advice back in 2004 would have put Dash in a difficult predicament while she tried unsuccessfully to score acting gigs. Instead of working part time as a server as many performers in New York and Los Angeles have done, Dash did exactly what she’s accusing others of doing: Playing the victim.

Dash lashed out at Hollywood in an interview with the conservative CNS News, claiming she was persecuted and blacklisted by the entertainment industry because she is vocal about her conservative values.

“My acting opportunities have ceased because of my political beliefs,” she said. “I’m being persecuted in Hollywood. I’ve been blacklisted. My agents have dropped me.”

For two years Dash couldn’t find work while her British former fiance James Maby bankrolled her lifestyle. When she ultimately filed for bankruptcy` she claimed $28,582 in assets, but $157,703.53 in liabilities owed to creditors.

 

Sudden Death Syndrome 5 Times Higher Among Minority Athletes – Cause

At least 50 times a year, a young male athlete in his prime will just keel over and die during or after participation in an event. Doctors now have a study which both identifies the leading cause and risk factors.

Heart Problem Behind Many Sudden Deaths Among Minority Athletes

…In the study, researchers investigated the causes of sudden death in competitive athletes by using data from the U.S. National Registry of Sudden Death in Athletes covering the years between 1980 and 2011.

Of the 2,400 deaths that occurred in young athletes between 13 and 25 years old who were engaged in 29 different sports, the researchers found that more than 840 had cardiovascular diagnoses, which were confirmed at autopsy.

Male athletes tend to die from sudden cardiac event with 6.5 times higher risk than women. Basketball players who were African-American or members of minority groups have a threefold risk of dying from sudden death.

The rate of cardiovascular death among African-Americans and those who belong to other minority groups were also found to be five times higher than those of whites.

For these individuals, the condition may go unnoticed for a long time and those that are most at risk are athletes as the physical effort that they are exposed to on a regular basis can weaken their heart, which can lead to sudden cardiac arrest.

The researchers likewise discovered that more than a third of the deaths were caused by hypertrophic cardiomyopathy, which was responsible for almost 40 percent of sudden deaths among male athletes.

Of hypertrophic cardiomyopathy cases, more than half occurred in minority males, albeit only 1 percent in minority females.

[H]ypertrophic cardiomyopathy is the leading cause of sudden cardiac death in male athletes and is an under-appreciated cause of sudden death in male African-American and minority athletes,” said study author Barry Maron of the Tufts Medical Center in Boston.

 

“Becomming a Man” – A Program Successful at Cutting Youth Crime in Chicago

Something is working to at least slow the violence in Chicago down. It also will never be covered by most of the MSM because it is.

Inside The Chicago Program That Is Slashing Youth Crime Rates

“They learn that the kid sitting across from them in the circle has those same fears, has those same anxieties and that it’s OK.”

The Chicago-based program Becoming A Man is the type that allows rival gang members to sit together, just days after one group killed a member of the other, and calmly talk about their issues, according to John Wolf, senior manager of the University of Chicago’s Crime Lab.

“The kids weren’t saying whether or not they specifically knew who did it. But you had these two groups of people — where they knew someone from their group of friends had just killed someone from the other group of friends — and they were able to sit down in this group and have a conversation back and forth about what had just transpired,” Wolf said. “They were talking through ways of finding peace and ways of making sure it didn’t escalate further.”

For the past few years, Wolf and his colleagues have been studying the impact of the Becoming A Man program, which targets at-risk male students in Chicago public schools. The program, run by the non-profit organization Youth Guidance, allows students to participate in weekly group sessions that teach them how to be more conscious of their decision-making processes. A recent two-year evaluation of the program showed that between 2013 and 2015, there was a 50 percent decline in violent crime arrests for the 2,000 participants as compared to a control group. The results of this evaluation are being shared Monday at the National Summit on Preventing Youth Violence in Baltimore.

By teaching these adolescent males how to slow down their decision-making processes and avoid knee-jerk reactions, the program aims to improve students’ abilities to make appropriate judgments in high-stakes situations.

Wolf spent many days observing the participants in the program. He watched as the boys became more willing to open up about their personal lives to other students in the group and speak about their emotional vulnerabilities.

Students in the program often face difficult life circumstances. Many of them live in poverty or in dangerous neighborhoods, surrounded by violence. Just getting to and from school can be a harrowing experience.

Counselors push participants to describe “what are you actually nervous about, what are you actually scared about, what are the things that you’re dealing with in your everyday existence, walking home, walking to and from school,” Wolf said. “You’re not allowed to say that you’re fearful or worried about things, but in the BAM circle they’re able to uncover those feelings.”

“I think a big part of it is, they learn that the kid sitting across from them in the circle has those same fears, has those same anxieties and that it’s OK,” he went on. “It’s a human condition to show those things and it’s a common experience.”

The program does not tell students how to behave, or instruct them as to the “right” thing to do, instead leaving it to the students to decide that. The program emphasizes only that the students carefully consider their decisions instead of rushing to act….Read the Rest Here...

 

Ronald Reagan and Religion Billboard

Seems some clever folks have found a way to push back against the right wing extremist “Religious Freedom” laws being passed by Republican dominated legislatures around the country…

Reminding them of what their Saint Raygun said. One would have hoped many other organizations could have found the money, or cleverness to do the same to battle right wing facsism as will be on full display in the Chumph convention.

This Ronald Reagan billboard outside the Republican convention is going to infuriate conservatives

Former President Ronald Reagan’s son and namesake Ron Reagan is literally the poster-person against religion. While the younger Reagan has been doing ads on news channels for the Freedom from Religion Foundation, it will be his father’s words that will hover over the Republican National Convention in Cleveland, Ohio in July.

“We establish no religion in this country… Church and state are, and must remain, separate,” the billboard will read.

The quote is part of a longer statement Reagan made in 1984 to Temple Hillel and Community Leaders in Valley Stream. “We in the United States, above all, must remember that lesson, for we were founded as a nation of openness to people of all beliefs,” Reagan said. “And so we must remain. Our very unity has been strengthened by our pluralism. We establish no religion in this country, we command no worship, we mandate no belief, nor will we ever. Church and state are, and must remain, separate. All are free to believe or not believe, all are free to practice a faith or not, and those who believe are free, and should be free, to speak of and act on their belief.”
Co-President of the Freedom from Religion Foundation, Annie Laurie Gaylor, said in a statement that this particular message was important at this point in history.

“The RNC needs to be reminded that our nation is predicated on a godless and entirely secular Constitution,” she said. “The fate of our Establishment Clause hangs in the balance of the election. We’re not voting for the next president — we’re voting for the next Supreme Court justice.”

The local chapter director, Marni Huebner-Tiborsky, agreed that the message is an important one for Republican leaders to remember. “This billboard couldn’t be any more timely, and is definitely needed to remind our political leaders and the public that political campaigns should stick to a secular platform, where real change can happen,” she says.

Republican Party presidential nominee Donald Trump met with religious leaders last week and unveiled his evangelical advisory committee with former Rep. Michele Bachmann (R-MN). Trump does not have an extensive track record with religion other than to attack others for their beliefs. Though this was enough for evangelical James Dobson to call Trump a “baby Christian.”

 

Ted Cruz Leads Racist Attack in Congress Against Ellison and Carson

Islamophobic and racist in charge Republican Ted Cruz entertained a bigot to speak before Congress, and attack the only two Muslim members. I think Cruz should be investigated for his ties to domestic terrorism.

Reps. Keith Ellison and Andre Carson, the two Muslim members of Congress, were accused by a witness at a Senate hearing of having ties to the Muslim Brotherhood.

Witness At Ted Cruz Hearing Accuses Congress’ Two Muslim Members Of Muslim Brotherhood Ties

In explosive testimony Tuesday, a witness before a Senate panel about Islamic terrorism accused the two Muslim members of Congress of having attended an event organized by the Muslim Brotherhood.

The charge was leveled by Chris Gaubatz, a “national security consultant” who has moonlighted as an undercover agitator of Muslim groups that he accuses of being terrorist outfits, and it was directed at Reps. Keith Ellison (D-Minn.) and André Carson (D-Ind.). At the heart of his accusation is the attendance by those two members at a 2008 convention hosted by the Islamic Society of North America — a Muslim umbrella group, which Gaubatz claims is a front for the Muslim Brotherhood.

“I attended a convention in Columbus, Ohio, in 2008, organized by Muslim Brotherhood group, ISNA, and both the Department of Homeland Security, and the Department of Justice Federal Bureau of Prisons had recruitment and outreach booths,” Gaubatz said in his testimony. “Both Congressman Keith Ellison, MN, and Andre Carson, IN, spoke at the Muslim Brotherhood event.”

Allegations that Ellison and Carson are secret Muslim agents with extremist leanings are usually found among fringe groups online, often discussed in dire tones on poorly designed websites. Rarely, if ever, do such sentiments get read into congressional testimony, with the imprimatur that offers.

Responsibility for this rare instance lies with Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas), who oversaw the hearing as chairman of the Judiciary Subcommittee on Oversight, Agency Action, Federal Rights and Federal Courts and whose staff likely saw the testimonies of the witnesses.

Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-Minn.) later addressed Tuesday’s hearing and defended Ellison.

“He is my congressman. He is a man of great patriotism,” she said, adding that he has advocated for additional funding for efforts to detect what attracts young people to join terrorist groups.

An aide to Ellison confirmed that he did attend the 2008 ISNA convention. He’s gone to a few of the group’s conventions, in fact. Carson’s office didn’t return a request for comment. But news reports show that both he and Carson led a discussion at the 2008 convention on how to mobilize Muslims politically. President Barack Obama has addressed the group as well, though only via a video recording.

Critics of ISNA have insisted that these politicians have either turned a blind eye to — or explicitly embraced — the group’s affiliation with the Muslim Brotherhood, an affiliation that is based on ties some of the founding ISNA members have allegedly had to the hard-line religious organization. ISNA has long insisted that no such connection has ever existed.

“I can definitely tell you we are not Muslim Brotherhood. We are not affiliated with them at all and never were,” said Faryal Khatri, an official with ISNA. “That much I can reassure you.”

ISNA is not the only group targeted by Gaubatz. In 2009, he told Talking Points Memo that he obtained an internship with the Council on American-Islamic Relations as part of an effort to secretly collect evidence against the group to be used in a book written by his father. The book, “Muslim Mafia,” alleged that CAIR, a Muslim advocacy group that works to combat Islamophobia, was a front for the Muslim Brotherhood.

Cruz’s office did not respond to a request for comment on Gaubatz’s allegations against Ellison and Carson or whether it had given either member a chance to respond. But the senator has displayed a tolerance for these kinds of conspiracy theories in the past.

Before he suspended his presidential campaign, Cruz appointed known Islamophobe Frank Gaffney to his team of national security advisers. Gaffney, now head of the Center for Security Policy, has objected to Ellison and Carson serving on the House Intelligence Committee because he believes their Muslim faith could compel them to leak information to the Muslim Brotherhood. He has also accused Hillary Clinton aide Huma Abedin, and conservative heavyweights Grover Norquist and Suhail Khan of being closeted Muslim Brotherhood members.

When asked about his controversial selection, Cruz defended Gaffney as a “serious thinker” focused on “fighting jihadism across the globe.”

 

Dealing With Segregation in NYC

In actuality, the most segregated school systems in America are in the Northern Big Cities. Hyper-segregation at the neighborhood level leads to segregated schools. This enforces, and supports different outcomes for black and white children. While black kids certainly don’t need white kids around to learn…It seems far too many school administrators and teachers need white kids around to teach.

Why Liberal New York City’s Schools Are Among the Nation’s Most Segregated

 

New York City’s public schools are among the most segregated in the country – a fact that flies in the face of the city’s history as a bastion of progressivism. For this podcast, I spoke with former ProPublica reporter Nikole Hannah-Jones, now a New York Times Magazine staff writer, about her decision to delve deeply and personally into that paradox.

Hannah-Jones wrote about the public school her daughter attends in New York City, PS 307. The school is populated by poor children of color from nearby housing projects. It also became the site of community tension when predominantly white and well-off parents living nearby were pushed into its school zone to ease crowding at another school.

Hannah-Jones has spent much of the past four years chronicling how official actions and policies perpetuate racial and economic segregation in our nation’s housing and schools. For this story, she focused on the painful choices she and other parents have to make in the absence of official efforts to right past wrongs.

On why she decided to write a personal story about her family’s experience in a school already in the headlines:

Hannah-Jones: I just felt that there was a story that wasn’t being told. That a lot of the history and, understandably, because newspaper reporters, as in TV reporters, have very short time to turn around something, they don’t have a lot of space. They have to move on to other things. I felt like we were writing about all of these tensions and this difficulty without giving any context about why we were here, and what was making this so hard, and why, in this very liberal city, we were grappling race no better than anywhere else.

About her struggle with deciding to allow her daughter’s photograph to be on the cover of The New York Times Magazine:

Hannah-Jones: In the end, I thought, if they can see this little girl, a girl that they can relate to more for class reasons, or for whatever reasons, will they then be able to finally relate to all these children who are suffering for our decisions? Who adults are making decisions for and about, and putting them in situations they don’t deserve. Ultimately, that was the reason why I finally said, “Okay.” I felt the small sacrifice of her anonymity as worth it if people could make a connection to all of these other children through her.

On why she chose the chilling end to her piece that she did:

Hannah-Jones: I needed to end with a gut punch, really. I needed to end with something that would stick with you, and you wouldn’t walk away from this story feeling like, ‘Yeah. This was really sad, but whatever.’ It was really important for me to end with that – in the end bring it back to the reality that all these 10,000 words are about these children.

Listen to this podcast on iTunes, SoundCloud or Stitcher. For more, read Hannah-Jones’ piece Choosing a School for My Daughter in a Segregated City.

 

 

Diversity in the Outdoors

One place you can pretty reliably not find black folks is in the great outdoors. Some folks are trying to change that…

BTW – BTx3’s Outdoor adventures this year are kayaking fishing, and at least one night camping on an ocean beach.

Diversity in the outdoors, one hashtag at a time

A conversation with Teresa Baker, founder of Hike Like a Girl.

TrailPosse is a series produced in partnership with The Trail Posse focused on the relationship between people of color and Western public lands.

During the past three years, Teresa Baker of Martinez, Calif., has organized some of the most significant events in the movement to diversify and improve inclusion in the outdoors: The African American National Parks Event, the Buffalo Soldiers Trail Retracing, the Muir Campfire Discussion on Relevancy and Inclusion in Outdoor Organizations, and the convening on Relevancy and Inclusion in Outdoor Organizations.

Her latest brainchild, Hike Like a Girl, a campaign to encourage females to take to the trails, solo or in groups, took place on May 14. The event followed a familiar formula: Working with partner organizations, Baker encourages people to engage in outdoor activities on a certain day (or days), then record, post and hashtag on social media to raise further awareness.

Recently featured as one of Patagonia’s Women Active Activists, Baker is a former high-school point guard and former trip leader for Outdoor Afro, a national network that uses meetups and education to encourage African Americans to get outside. She’s evolved into a one-woman force of nature. She says her mother didn’t like her “being defiant and going against the grain as a girl,” but adds, “My dad told me daily, that I could not back down to anyone or I would do it for the rest of my life. So he encouraged me to speak up and not be afraid to live my true life.” HCNcontributing editor Glenn Nelson recently caught up with Baker.

High Country News Most people of color don’t have a background in the outdoors growing up, but that wasn’t the case with you, was it?

Teresa Baker I was the only girl in a family of eight boys and was determined not to be outdone by anything my brothers did. So when they went hiking, I went hiking; when they played basketball, I played basketball. When they and the other guys in the neighborhood would talk trash about how girls weren’t capable of keeping up with guys, I’d prove them wrong. That’s where my love of the outdoors began. We lived directly across from a city park, so every day we were outdoors with other neighborhood kids, playing every sport imaginable, but my favorite by far was hiking.

I was part of an after-school program where we would go hiking in Tilden Park almost every week. We would also visit a ranch that belonged to the owners of the program. There we learned how to care for animals and the land. We would ride horses and hike the surrounding area. I absolutely loved it and to this day reminisce on how at peace I felt out on this ranch.

In 1978 my mother made me join the Girl’s Club, which I fought tooth and nail. I didn’t want to be around a bunch of girls who would probably not embrace my love of the outdoors. I was only partially right. In the summer of 1979, we went to Yosemite National Park for my first official camping trip. That was it for me; I fell in love with Yosemite and have remained so to this very day.

HCN What inspired you to start the African American National Park Event?

Baker I take off for Yosemite at the drop of a dime, no long-term planning needed. On one of my Yosemite visits in 2012, I started to take notice of how many African Americans I encountered. At the end of my second day in the park, I had not seen one other African American. I started to research people of color in our national parks – not just in visitation, but in the makeup of the National Park Service. The lack of diversity was surprising because I had never really paid much attention to it. The next year, I created an event to encourage African American communities across the country to get outdoors in a national park site during the month of June. The larger concern is that if we don’t start creating welcoming environments in the outdoors for people of color, in 20 years when the majority demographic in this country is black and brown faces, no one will be around to care about these open spaces. That’s the urgency of this issue.

The involvement I have now with the outdoors wasn’t planned. I simply wanted to create an event to get people of color outdoors. That turned in to talking engagements and written article after article about the lack of diversity in our national parks. That’s how I ended up doing this work, I feel it is my calling. It’s certainly my passion. And connecting with others who are just as passionate about this work has been an honor. I’m committed to the challenges that are ahead of me and will work diligently to bring about a change that will last beyond my lifetime.

HCN The Buffalo Soldiers are important to the history of both African Americans and the National Park Service because, as all-black troops in the 9^th Cavalry Regiment and 24^th Infantry, they were among the nation’s first park rangers, patrolling Yosemite, Sequoia and Kings Canyon National Parks in 1899, 1903 and 1904. Their commanding officer, Capt. Charles Young, was the first African American park superintendent, at Sequoia in 1903. What led you to retracing the Buffalo Soldiers’ route from the Presidio, where they once were garrisoned, to Yosemite?

Baker After several visits to the Presidio of San Francisco, I started to learn about the legacy of the Buffalo Soldiers. I read about their participation in the military and how they were actually stationed right here in the Bay Area. Then I saw a documentary about Yosemite ranger Shelton Johnson and how he portrayed Buffalo Soldiers in the High Sierras. This was life-changing for me. Here I am, in love with Yosemite and concerned with the lack of African Americans in our national parks, then one day I find out the very first rangers in our national parks were African Americans. I was beside myself with pride and curiosity. In 2013, as an Outdoor Afro leader, I went to the Presidio and asked the park service if they would work with me on putting together a program to honor the Buffalo Soldiers at the Presidio. They agreed and my commitment to telling their story began….Read the Rest Here…

 

Jesse Williams Lights it Up

Wow! Viacom has blocked the whole video – so it is no longer available. Williams really laid it bare…

This is the entire speech, sans video –

 

The End of College Admissions Racism

The Supreme Court, with it’s chief bigot thankfully dead, just drove a spike right through the racist vampire hearts of conservative segregationists with upholding race as a potential factor in determining college admissions. With scumsucker Scalia dead, the wheels just came off their re-segregation campaign.

Turns out the case in question, and the woman for whom it was started were a lie, and a liar from the start.

The claim by Abigail Fisher –

“There were people in my class with lower grades who weren’t in all the activities I was in, who were being accepted into UT, and the only other difference between us was the color of our skin,” she says. “I was taught from the time I was a little girl that any kind of discrimination was wrong. And for an institution of higher learning to act this way makes no sense to me. What kind of example does it set for others?”

The Truth –

Race probably had nothing to do with the University of Texas’s decision to deny admission to Abigail Fisher.

In 2008, the year Fisher sent in her application, competition to get into the crown jewel of the Texas university system was stiff. Students entering through the university’s Top 10 program — a mechanism that granted automatic admission to any teen who graduated in the upper 10 percent of his or her high school class — claimed92 percent of the in-state spots.

Fisher said in news reports that she hoped for the day universities selected students “solely based on their merit and if they work hard for it.” But Fisher failed to graduate in the top 10 percent of her class, meaning she had to compete for the limited number of spaces up for grabs.

She and other applicants who did not make the cut were evaluated based on two scores. One allotted points for grades and test scores. The other, called a personal achievement index, awarded points for two required essays, leadership, activities, service and “special circumstances.” Those included socioeconomic status of the student or the student’s school, coming from a home with a single parent or one where English wasn’t spoken. And race.

Those two scores, combined, determine admission.

Even among those students, Fisher did not particularly stand out. Court records showher grade point average (3.59) and SAT scores (1180 out of 1600) were good but not great for the highly selective flagship university. The school’s rejection rate that year for the remaining 841 openings was higher than the turn-down rate for students trying to get into Harvard.

As a result, university officials claim in court filings that even if Fisher received points for her race and every other personal achievement factor, the letter she received in the mail still would have said no.

It’s true that the university, for whatever reason, offered provisional admission to some students with lower test scores and grades than Fisher. Five of those students were black or Latino.Forty-two were white.

Neither Fisher nor Blum mentioned those 42 applicants in interviews. Nor did they acknowledge the 168 black and Latino students with grades as good as or better than Fisher’s who were also denied entry into the university that year. Also left unsaid is the fact that Fisher turned down a standard UT offer under which she could have gone to the university her sophomore year if she earned a 3.2 GPA at another Texas university school in her freshman year.

So it really was all about racism. Racism which scumbag Sclaia and Uncle Tommie Clarence were willing to stand behind.

Supreme Court upholds college affirmative action program

 

Race-based admissions policies in higher education dodged another bullet Thursday, with the Supreme Court ruling narrowly to uphold a program that helps minority students get into the University of Texas.

In a 4-3 decision, the court held that Texas’ program admitting some students based on consideration of their race is constitutional while cautioning that the university must continue to show that other means of addressing diversity have failed.

“The record here reveals that the university articulated concrete and precise goals (for example) ending stereotypes, promoting ‘cross-racial understanding,’ preparing students for ‘an increasingly diverse workforce and society,’ and cultivating leaders with ‘legitimacy in the eyes of the citizenry’ — that mirror the compelling interest this Court has approved in prior cases,” wrote Justice Anthony Kennedy in an opinion joined by Justices Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer and Sonia Sotomayor.

But the decision also suggests potential limits, warning the university cannot rely on the policy “without refinement” and that “it is the University’s ongoing obligation to engage in constant deliberation and continued reflection regarding its admission policies.”

Only seven justices participated in the decision. Justice Elena Kagan had recused herself for prior work on the case as United States solicitor general and the late Justice Antonin Scalia’s seat remains vacant.

The University of Texas enrolls 75 percent of its class by offering admission to students with top class ranks. It fills the remaining quarter of the class through a “holistic” review in which race is a factor.

The ruling directly affects all public colleges and universities. While private colleges have had more leeway to consider race in admissions, all institutions that accept federal financial aid are subject to Title VI of the federal Civil Rights Act prohibiting racial discrimination, experts said.

Justice Samuel Alito read a withering dissent from the bench, saying the university had not done what the justices had asked when they sent the case back to a lower court in 2013. “The University has still not identified with any degree of specificity the interests that its use of race and ethnicity is supposed to serve,” he wrote in a minority opinion joined by Chief Justice John Roberts Jr. and Justice Clarence Thomas.

Alito said the university “presents no evidence that its admissions officers, in administering the ‘holistic’ component of its plan, make any effort to determine whether an African-American, Hispanic or Asian-American student is likely to enroll in classes in which minority students are underrepresented.”

It would be unfortunate, he said, if other colleges and universities interpreted the court’s ruling as a green light to use race more in their admissions decisions.

Only eight states ban race-based admissions for public institutions, and affirmative action policies remain in wide use. Roughly 60 percent of the most selective four-year schools consider race in admissions, an American Council on Education survey found last year.

Two other admissions-related cases filed against Harvard University and the University of North Carolina, both alleging they put Asian-Americans at a disadvantage, were on hold awaiting the Fisher v. University of Texas decision.

Peter McDonough, vice president and general counsel of the American Council on Education, which represents college and university presidents, said the ruling doesn’t appear to change the expectations for colleges and universities.

“The good news about today is that schools that may visit or re-visit what they do and how they do it, in composing a diverse class, have the comfort of knowing that it’s acceptable to continue doing it,” McDonough said. “It’s appropriate for an institution to value the diversity of the campus environment and the student body.”

This was the second go-around for the Fisher case before the nation’s highest court. In 2013, Kennedy wrote the 7-1 opinion that sent jilted University of Texas applicant Abigail Fisher back to an appeals court, which upheld Texas’ admissions policy for a second time. Fisher, a white woman, argued the university’s rejection of her 2008 application violated the Constitution’s equal protection clause….

 

 

Bundy Militia Type Tries to Bomb Federal Building

As if there was any question these guys are rats and domestic terrorists…

Bundy militia bro charged with trying to detonate a bomb at a government facility in Arizona

Yet another member of the Bundy militia is in trouble with the law again.

The Salt Lake Tribune reports that 57-year-old William Keebler was arrested this week and charged with attempting to detonate a bomb at a Bureau of Land Management facility in Arizona.

Keebler, who took part in the 2014 standoff with federal land administrators near Cliven Bundy’s ranch, told undercover FBI agents that he planned to target a BLM building in Mount Trumbull, Ariz. The FBI agents, in turn, created a non-working explosive device for Keebler to use at the facility, which Keebler first started scouting as a target in October 2015.

Keebler planted the device at the BLM building on Tuesday and tried to detonate it, without luck. He was arrested the next day.

If convicted, Keebler could face between five to 20 years in federal prison.

 

Understanding the War Against NAFTA

And you have to wonder why people are pissed?

Souring Chicago’s sweet treat: Corporate greed, American unions, and moving the Oreo to Mexico

Corporate executives saved $47 million by moving Oreo production to Mexico, but cost 600 in Chicago their jobs

For generations, kids from age 3 to 100 have loved munching on chocolaty Oreo cookies dipped in a glass of milk. But just over a year, ago, the tasty treat suddenly went sour.

In May 2015, bakery workers in Nabisco’s monumental 10-story plant in Chicago’s Marquette Park neighborhood had been expecting some sweet news from their corporate headquarters. Rumor had it that their renowned facility — after more than half a century and millions of Oreos — was about to receive a $130-million modernization investment to upgrade equipment and to add new production lines. So, the future looked bright and spirits were high on May 15 of last year when management convened members of Local 300 of the Bakery Workers Union to announce that the investment was indeed going to be made.

In Salinas, Mexico.

For decades, the Marquette Park community has been proud that the delectable smell of “milk’s favorite cookie” wafts through their neighborhood. But the noses of Nabisco’s corporate brass are clogged with greed, incapable of sniffing out anything but ever-fatter profits for themselves and other rich shareholders. Taking the NAFTA low road, they intend to move the iconic Oreo brand — and the jobs of 600 top-quality bakery workers — from Chicago to Mexico, where the minimum wage is a bit more than $4. Not per hour, but per day.

This is the tyranny of corporate globalization in action. In 2012 Kraft Foods split off its grocery business, which retained the Kraft name, and rebranded its remaining snack-food empire as Mondelez International, which includes Nabisco and its many brands including Triscuit, Planters nuts, Ritz crackers, Chips Ahoy and Oreos.

Such corporate empires now reign over millions of working families, arrogantly and even lawlessly making self-serving decisions from within the shrouded confines of faraway executive suites — wreaking havoc on workers, local economies, democratic values, and our sense of community. People affected are given no input or warning (much less any real say-so) in the profiteering that now routinely strikes us, like a lightning bolt from hell.

Worse, the so-called humans who’ve enthroned themselves with this autocratic power find it amusing to toy with those they rule over. Mondelez executives did exactly that after their sneak attack on Chicago’s bakery workers. In a crude ploy to shift blame for the loss of jobs to the union, the plutocratic powerhouse claimed it had made an offer to Local 300 to keep producing Oreos in Chicago, but that recalcitrant union officials refused.

Of course they did, for Mondelez essentially proposed that the workers commit mass financial suicide. Here’s the “offer”: Since the move to Mexico is expected to save $46 million a year, the conglomerate would graciously let the 600 ransom their jobs by paying that $46 million themselves. Just slash your annual pay and benefits (as well as your throats) by that amount, the executives told the union, and you can keep making Oreos for us.

This act was an astonishing, unprecedented insulting slap in the face of every middle-class worker in the U.S. Mondelez sapsuckers were effectively demanding that longtime, dedicated, productive employees subsidize the conglomerate and ransom their livelihoods by reducing their income to poverty. Note that Mondelez banked $7 billion in profit last year.

If its executives are so inept that they can’t find an honest way to fill a $46-million hole, they should dock the pay of their top three executives by that amount. They can damn sure afford it, for they totaled $37 million in compensation last year. CEO Irene Rosenfeld alone took a $20 million paycheck in 2015, bringing her eight-year total pay and benefits to almost $200 million.

 

Right Wing Harassment of Welfare Recipients a Total Failure

Bad news for the white right. Unlike their racist stereotypes, most folks on welfare (SNAP) aren’t on drugs. Yet another state fails miserably making a racist assumption and passing it into law… This one by the man responsible to murdering and maiming children in Flint with tainted water.

Guess how many welfare recipients tested positive in Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder’s drug test?

Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder (R), who faced criticism earlier this year for his handling of the water crisis in Flint, could face more pushback after the apparent failure of his program requiring drug tests for welfare users.

The Guardian reported that none of the 303 people tested under the auspices of the Family Independence Program have tested positive for drugs as of the end of May.

The pilot program ends on Sept. 30 and received $300,000 in state funding, although a spokesperson for the state health department said only $300 had been spent thus far.

“The governor will wait until the pilot program has concluded and the report is delivered, as required by the legislation, to reach any conclusions,” said Anna Heaton, a spokesperson for Snyder’s office.

The program allows health department officials to require applicants to go through a drug test based on the results of the 50-question screening process. Refusal to do so disqualifies them from receiving financial assistance for six months. However, none of the applicants reportedly refused to go through the test.

As Think Progress reported last year, several other states with similar programs also found little evidence of high drug use among social program recipients. For instance, only 11 out of 2,783 applicants in Kansas’ program tested positive.

“As we’ve seen time and time again, these misguided policies are devoid of any scientific credibility and have proven to be a colossal waste of our time and money,” said Eric Harris, a spokesperson for Rep. Gwen Moore (D-WI), who recently proposed a measure that would make drug tests mandatory for people reporting deductions of more than $150,000 on their tax returns.

 

 

Democrats In House Finally Grow Some Cajones

If the Institution refuses to do the peoples work, then it is time to bring the Institution to its knees. Democrats should have been doing this all along. By any means necessary…

Democrats Stage Sit-In On House Floor Over Gun Bills

Civil rights icon Rep. John Lewis led the charge. “We will be silent no more.”

Democrats literally sat down on the floor of the House chamber on Wednesday — and forced the House into a temporary recess — as part of an effort to compel Republican leadership to vote on gun control legislation.

Rep. John Lewis (D-Ga.), the civil rights icon who led sit-ins all through the 1960s, spearheaded the effort with a fiery, sermon-like denunciation of Congress for its failure to act in the wake of mass shootings.

“For months, even for years, through seven sessions of Congress, I wondered, what would bring this body to take action?” Lewis said while Democrats slowly surrounded him at the microphone. “We have lost hundreds and thousands of innocent people to gun violence. Tiny little children. Babies. Students. And teachers. Mother and fathers. Sisters and brothers. Daughters and sons. Friends and neighbors. And what has this body done? Mr. Speaker, not one thing.”

After about 10 minutes of escalating questions — and shouting, “Where is our soul? Where is our courage?” — Lewis said it was time for Speaker Paul Ryan (R-Wis.) to bring up some of the pending gun control bills. In the meantime, he said, he’d just take a seat. Moments later, he sat down on the floor. And so did all the other Democrats with him.

“Sometimes you have to do something out of the ordinary. Sometimes you have to make a way out of no way. We’ve been quiet for too long,” Lewis said. “Now is the time to get in the way. We will be silent no more. The time for silence is over.”

As another Democrat began to speak, the Republican lawmaker sitting in the chair gaveled the House into a temporary recess until noon. The House cut off the C-SPAN cameras that normally broadcast the floor. Later, when lawmakers reconvened, Democratic members still refused to budge, forming a circle in the well of the floor while chanting. Republicans were forced to gavel into recess once more.

It’s not clear what GOP leaders plan to do now.

“The House cannot operate without members following the rules of the institution, so the House has recessed subject to the call of the chair,” said Ryan spokeswoman AshLee Strong.

In the absence of cameras, Rep. Scott Peters (D-Calif.) broadcast clips on Twitter of members speaking. C-SPAN then broadcast Periscope and Facebook Live streams of the action.

Democratic senators also showed up to stand or sit with their colleagues. Among them were: Sens. Elizabeth Warren (Mass.), Chris Coons (Del.), Chuck Schumer (N.Y.), Amy Klobuchar (Minn.), Al Franken (Minn.), Tim Kaine (Va.), Bill Nelson (Fla.), Cory Booker (N.J.), Claire McCaskill (Mo.), Debbie Stabenow (Mich.), Dick Durbin (Ill.), Chris Murphy (Conn.), Richard Blumenthal (Conn.), Jeff Merkley (Ore.) and Mazie Hirono (Hawaii). Presidential candidate and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.)joined late in the afternoon.

Lewis’ effort was a dramatic attempt to force the hand of Republicans before the chamber adjourns later this week for a weeklong recess. But it’s not the only disruption House Democrats are planning. According to multiple aides and lawmakers, Democrats will try to essentially hijack the House floor both Wednesday and Thursday in an effort to get gun control measures a hearing.

The “No Bill, No Break” campaign centers on clever and repeated use of procedural rules. Assistant Democratic Leader James Clyburn (D-S.C.) has already tried and failed, twice, to bring up legislation to deny people on the no-fly list the right to purchase a firearm.

But the extent of the party’s plans has been kept largely under wraps out of concern that Republicans would move to undermine the strategy. Several aides have described it as a “disruption” campaign. One Democratic lawmaker said the party was “devising a variety of parliamentary tactics to pressure the GOP in D.C. this week, then in individual districts next week during recess.”

“Watch the floor carefully this week,” the lawmaker added.

The old Lion finally roars.