Racist Attacks Black Man And Children At Wake Forest Hospital

This one is unbelievable. Black man and his two small children walk into a hospital, and the receptionist starts calling them the “N-word”, and hitting and kicking the man, yelling at them to get out!

Looks to me the receptionist should have been walked out of there in cuffs. I guess Donald Trump’s appeal to racism is empowering these types of folks.

Watch this North Carolina hospital volunteer have a complete freakout over a visiting black family

A video uploaded to YouTube, a volunteer at a North Carolina hospital is seen going on a shrieking rampage and telling a black family to get out while kicking at them.

According to WNCN, Isaiah Baskins uploaded the video after he took his daughter to an appointment at Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center where he encountered the unidentified woman who worked as a volunteer there.

Baskins states that the woman called him a “n*gger” before telling him to leave as he took out his phone to record the encounter. As the video begins, the woman is seen on the phone asking some one to “get these people out of here.”

With Baskins asking her what her problem is — and whether she is “off her medicine” — the woman loses control and begins shrieking at the family, complaining about the man’s gray underwear coming out of the top of his pants.

She then grabs at the cellphone while hollering “get out of here!” as she kicks him him and calls him a “dirty old tramp.”

Another man steps in saying he’s trying to “defuse the situation” before ruefully stating, “Something is wrong with her.”

A spokesperson for the hospital apologized and said the woman is no longer a volunteer there.

 

Light-Up Device Lets You ‘Talk’ to Fireflies

 

What every kid is going to want for summer vacation, or visiting out in the country!

Prepare your wallets, parents!

A handheld device lets users communicate with fireflies by producing light pulses in patterns that mimic actual firefly signals.

Source: Light-Up Device Lets You ‘Talk’ to Fireflies

 

A System That Cares…

As a kid growing up in segregated Virginia…

My Mother was a primary School Teacher. Besides learning to write in perfect letters in both cursive and block letter, she insisted that every piece of paper I handed in look perfect.

She would often correct papers at home, after dinner, One day, when I was in about 3rd grade,  noticing that some of the papers had grease stains on them, I asked why. That question led to a sit down, which opened my eyes to realities beyond our black middle class home. She told me that some of the kids I went to school with lived in homes where the only place to do homework was at the kitchen table. They had no other place to go, and sometimes he food stains got on the papers as their mother was preparing dinner. I had honestly never considered that some of my friends lived in small, very old homes, where 5 or 6 kids tried to live in in 2-3 bedrooms. Scotty was my friend who played baseball after class….It never occurred to me that anything wasn’t as it should be, or that his home life would be any different than my own.

She organized a food and supplies drives through her Sorority and Church, and very quietly made sure these kids had enough food, clothing, and supplies – often delivering them herself, after sending a note home with the kids – who often didn’t have telephones in their homes. I went with her to deliver some of the supplies, and what I saw truly changed my worldview…I got strict orders never to discuss any of it, ever with my friends or school mates. It was our secret for many years.

The black community looked after the black community in those days…Because nobody else would. And did so in a way to try and preserve the dignity of those receiving aid. My Ebony and Jet reading dumb behind, never thought about it until then.

Now I grew up in what has consistently been ranked by those who keep track of such things as one of the 5 or 6 wealthiest counties in America. After desegregation, many of the white teachers were shocked to learn that abject poverty (both black and white) existed in the cracks and crevices of our otherwise wealthy and highly educated area.

It has taken damn near 50 years…But somebody else caught on to the things my parent’s generation knew.

School’s Private Pop-up Shop Lets Underserved Students Buy Basics With Dignity

Students require more than just books to succeed in school, and this innovative resource is helping teens in need build confidence both in and out of the classroom.

Administrators and the student government at Washington High School, in Washington, North Carolina, have created an anonymous, in-house shopping experience that provides underprivileged students with basic resources like food, hygienic products, school supplies and clothing. To eliminate stigma or judgment, students are able to discreetly approach a school administrator to privately take what they need from the shelves, where all items are targeted specifically to teenagers.

“If we want academics to improve, we have to make certain we’re meeting our students’ basic needs,” Misty Walker, the school principal, told The Huffington Post. “We want to strengthen our community, and schooling is just one aspect of that.”

The idea for the pantry came about when Walker realized her students’ needs were constantly growing. Though Washington High offers free and reduced meals, some students would not eat their next meal until they were back at school the next day, Walker explained. Students even began coming up to her personally, asking for items like toothpaste and toothbrushes.

As more of these needs began to surface, Walker consulted with Washington High School partner Bright Futures — an organization focused on school and community development. With the group, school administrators and the student leaders first developed a hygiene closet, and when that was successful, local donors helped expand the service into a school supply closet, food pantry and clothing shop.

“It’s a slightly different concept because we focused really on trying to help our high schoolers, versus the experience of preparing a whole box of food for a family,” Walker said.

To gain access to these resources, students simply speak in confidence with a teacher, counselor or administrator about their needs. A member of the school staff will then take them to shop in the pantries, all of which are located inside the school. This system both provides teens in need with basic resources, and strengthens the school community…Read the rest here…

 

Epidemics in Black and White…The End of the War on Drugs

The “crack epidemic” of the late 80’s and early 90’s is over. One of the key racial hypocrisies of the response to the epidemic was to make sentences for possessing “crack”, used by black folks, about 5 times worse than cocaine, the same drug – used by whites.

Now we have a “heroin epidemic”, but the legal and legislative response is almost invisible. Indeed, you wouldn’t even know this was going on if you watched the evening news.

That’s because about 90% of the new addicts are white, don’t live in the city…And start using heroin as a cheaper substitute to the drugs they have been stealing out of Mommy and Daddy’s bathroom cabinet.

The move now is to “treat” addicts.

Having some experience in dealing with that with a friend – that is one long hard road. I went to some of those meetings in support, about 5 years ago, and was stunned by what I saw. I remember years ago the streets of downtown Baltimore being covered by heroin addicts – mostly black, mostly from the ghetto. Baltimore during the 8070′ through the 90’s had the largest population of addicted in any major city. These folks at the the new meeting were mostly white, mostly the addicts were kids under the age of 25, and we mostly from middle class families. And it is driving ancillary crime in rural and suburban areas to support their habits.

But heaven forbid we fill the jails with white addicts.

The end of the senseless “War on Drugs”, is indeed all about racial politics.

A photo of Courtney Griffin, who died of a heroin overdose in 2014, with her sister Shannon, left, and her mother, Pamela.

In Heroin Crisis, White Families Seek Gentler War on Drugs

When Courtney Griffin was using heroin, she lied, disappeared and stole constantly from her parents to support her $400-a-day habit. Her family paid her debts, never filed a police report and kept her addiction secret — until she was found dead last year of an overdose.

At Courtney’s funeral, they decided to acknowledge the reality that redefined their lives: Their bright, beautiful daughter, just 20, who played the French horn in high school and dreamed of living in Hawaii, had been kicked out of the Marines for drugs. Eventually, she overdosed at her boyfriend’s grandmother’s house, where she died alone.

“When I was a kid, junkies were the worst,” Doug Griffin, 63, Courtney’s father, recalled in their comfortable home here in southeastern New Hampshire. “I used to have an office in New York City. I saw them.”

Noting that “junkies” is a word he would never use now, he said that these days, “they’re working right next to you and you don’t even know it. They’re in my daughter’s bedroom — they are my daughter.”

When the nation’s long-running war against drugs was defined by the crack epidemic and based in poor, predominantly black urban areas, the public response was defined by zero tolerance and stiff prison sentences. But today’s heroin crisis is different. While heroin use has climbed among all demographic groups, it has skyrocketed among whites; nearly 90 percent of those who tried heroin for the first time in the last decade were white.

And the growing army of families of those lost to heroin — many of them in the suburbs and small towns — are now using their influence, anger and grief to cushion the country’s approach to drugs, from altering the language around addiction to prodding government to treat it not as a crime, but as a disease.

“Because the demographic of people affected are more white, more middle class, these are parents who are empowered,” said Michael Botticelli, director of the White House Office of National Drug Control Policy, better known as the nation’s drug czar. “They know how to call a legislator, they know how to get angry with their insurance company, they know how to advocate. They have been so instrumental in changing the conversation.”

Mr. Botticelli, a recovering alcoholic who has been sober for 26 years, speaks to some of these parents regularly.

Their efforts also include lobbying statehouses, holding rallies and starting nonprofit organizations, making these mothers and fathers part of a growing backlash against the harsh tactics of traditional drug enforcement. These days, in rare bipartisan or even nonpartisan agreement, punishment is out and compassion is in.

The presidential candidates of both parties are now talking about the drug epidemic, with Hillary Rodham Clinton hosting forums on the issue as Jeb Bush and Carly Fiorina tell their own stories of loss while calling for more care and empathy.

Families meet at a Counseling Session and pray for their family members and friends who are addicted.

Last week, President Obama traveled to West Virginia, a mostly white state with high levels of overdoses, to discuss his $133 million proposal to expand access for drug treatment and prevention programs. The Justice Department is also preparing to release roughly 6,000 inmates from federal prisons as part of an effort to roll back the severe penalties issued to nonviolent drug dealers in decades past.

And in one of the most striking shifts in this new era, some local police departments have stopped punishing many heroin users. In Gloucester, Mass., those who walk into the police station and ask for help, even if they are carrying drugs or needles, are no longer arrested. Instead, they are diverted to treatment, despite questions about the police departments’ unilateral authority to do so. It is an approach being replicated by three dozen other police departments around the country.

“How these policies evolve in the first place, and the connection with race, seems very stark,” said Marc Mauer, executive director of the Sentencing Project, which examines racial issues in the criminal justice system.

Still, he and other experts said, a broad consensus seems to be emerging: The drug problem will not be solved by arrests alone, but rather by treatment.

Parents like the Griffins say that while they recognize the racial shift in heroin use, politicians and law enforcement are responding in this new way because “they realized what they were doing wasn’t working.”

“They’re paying more attention because people are screaming about it,” Mr. Griffin said. “I work with 100 people every day — parents, people in recovery, addicts — who are invading the statehouse, doing everything we can to make as much noise as we can to try to save these kids.”

An Epidemic’s New Terrain

Heroin’s spread into the suburbs and small towns grew out of an earlier wave of addiction to prescription painkillers; together the two trends are ravaging the country…

Deaths from heroin rose to 8,260 in 2013, quadrupling since 2000 and aggravating what some were already calling the worst drug overdose epidemic in United States history.

Over all, drug overdoses now cause more deaths than car crashes, with opioids like OxyContin and other pain medications killing 44 people a day….Read the Rest Here…

 

Self Proclaimed Conservative Black Kid Goes Anti-Ahmed

This one is just sad. A 13 year old black kid goes on the Internet to berate President Obama for inviting the Muslim kid who was arrested in Texas for building an electronic clock…

I have known kids who wanted to grow up to be great scientists, or doctors, or lawyers…This indeed is the first one I’ve ever seen planning to grow up to be a Lawn Jockey.

Ga. teen blasts White House invite of Ahmed Mohamed

A Georgia teen took to YouTube this week to criticize the White House for its invitation to a Texas teen who has been in the spotlight for an invention that got him suspended.

Ahmed Mohamed, the Muslim teen from Texas who was suspended earlier this week because a teacher thought his homemade clock was a bomb, will not be returning to the school that suspended him.

The case sparked claims of racial profiling and outrage across the country, with some influential people — including Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg and President Obama, who invited him to the White House — showing Ahmed, 14, support.

That invite is drawing sharp criticism from a 13-year-old boy in Georgia. CJ Pearson has never been a fan of the president. In this case, he sees a double standard.

CJ is from the Augusta area, and his name was trending on Facebook overnight for his latest YouTube video.

“When cops are gunned down, you don’t invite them to the White House. You never did. But when a Muslim builds a clock, come on by. What is this world you’re living in?” he said in the video.

CJ goes on to say the invitation to Ahmed fits the president’s agenda.

By Friday morning, the video, posted Wednesday, had been viewed more than 330,000 times.

It’s the latest in a series of videos from CJ, who labeled himself a conservative at the age of 8.  His website claims a Facebook base of more than 29,000 followers and a viewership of more than 2 million on his YouTube channel. His Facebook page shows more than 52,000 people like the page.

According to the Washington Post, CJ is the national chairman of Teens for Ted, a national group backing Texas Republican Sen. Ted Cruz for president.

For his part, Ahmed said he will accept the president’s invitation, which was posted on Twitter.  The president called his homemade clock “cool” and asked the teen to bring it to the White House.

Police in Irving, Texas, do not plan to pursue criminal charges against Ahmed.

 

 

Disparate Treatment of Black Children for Pain Management

One of my recurring nightmares from a disaster zone where I was working is the sight of a small child lying on the sidewalk dead while people and workers stepped around and over the child. Makes you sick when you think medical personnel could actually do this…

Just when you thought we had left all this behind us…

White Kids Get More Pain Meds Than Black Kids in the Emergency Room

A new study found that in emergency rooms, the odds of a black child being given appropriate pain medication were one-fifth those for a white child.

Appendicitis is painful. Having been lucky enough to experience it in my late twenties myself, I can personally verify this bit of common knowledge. It hurts.

However, despite the clear association between appendicitis and pain, which can be quite severe, the management of that pain is not always consistent. A new study in the journal JAMA Pediatrics finds that there are racial disparities in the medications used to treat it for children in American emergency departments, with black patients far less likely to get more potent pain medication than white ones.

The authors of the study sought to build on previous reports that had documented disparities between white and black patients regarding pain management. They chose appendicitis as their particular focus because it more clearly warrants stronger pain medications. There are many causes of broader categories like abdominal pain, and for some of these treating with opioid medications like morphine or Demerol would be inappropriate. By selecting appendicitis, investigating the proper pain control is less ambiguous.

Using a survey of hospitals conducted annually by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the study looked at how often any pain medication was prescribed for pediatric patients diagnosed with appendicitis, and beyond that, how often opioids specifically were given. While their results showed no racial difference in how often analgesics as a whole were delivered to control patients’ pain, there was a big difference when it came to opioids.

Black patients received the stronger medications in about 20 percent of overall cases, compared to about 43 percent of white patients. When controlling for additional factors such as ethnicity, age, sex, insurance status, triage level, and pain score, black children were likely to get opioids for their pain about 12 percent of the time, compared to 34 percent for white children.

This disparity remained even when patients rated their pain as moderate, with a 60 percent likelihood for white patients to receive any pain medication at all, compared to only about 16 percent for black patients. When the pain rating was severe, black patients were likely to receive the stronger opioid class of medication about 25 percent of the time, compared to 58 percent for white ones.

In other words, three quarters of the time black children presented to emergency departments complaining of severe abdominal pain from appendicitis, if they received any pain medication at all it was likely to be a comparatively weak choice such as Tylenol. Two thirds of white patients in similar levels of pain were likely to get something like Demerol or morphine.

The results when it comes to the appropriate management of appendicitis weren’t great across the board. Overall, a little less than 60 percent of all patients surveyed received pain medication of any kind. That means a sizeable minority weren’t given anything, which is distressing in itself. As the authors note, good pain control is a benchmark of quality care, and large numbers of kids during the study period weren’t getting it.

Much of this lack may be related to providers’ mistaken belief that appropriately controlling patients’ pain can delay proper diagnosis, which could then delay necessary surgery. Location and severity of pain are among the criteria for diagnosing appendicitis, after all. However, there are numerous studies thatdebunk that misapprehension, and patients who present in pain should have that pain alleviated.

However, the racial disparity in how appendicitis pain was treated is stark in this report. The authors found that the odds of a black child being given appropriate pain medication were one fifth those for a white child. That is egregious.

 

Better Punt Aussies – LA Inner CIty Kids Take up Rugby

Rugby isn’t very big in the US, but in the UK and Australia it is a big sport.

 

A Funny Takedown of the confederate Flag

Except for the language (by kids) – this one is a riot

 

Police Militarization – Cops Fire at Minivan Full of Kids

While I certainly agree the Mom in this case was way out of bounds…

Shooting at a minivan full of kids is something else entirely.

And as to the “Marijuana pipe”…If you believe that was in the van before they searched…. I got some oceanfront to sell you in Death Valley. She certainly IS guilty of evading the police, although I have to say fleeing from some “officer” shooting at a van full of kids isn’t exactly “criminal”.

Seems to me what you got in this case is criminals stopping a criminal.

 

Educational Fraud..Voucher Programs Fail

The whole voucher thing in Louisiana reminds me of the new Mercedes commercial with Willem Dafoe…

Dafoe, playing the Devil in this case selling Gov Bobby Jindal on a shiny new Voucher program for his state instead of the cute entry level Mercedes.

But what’s confusing you
Is just the nature of my game
Just as every cop is a criminal
And all the sinners saints
As heads is tails…

Indeed.

According to conservative hucksters, voucher programs are all about helping poor black kids in “failing” public school systems…

Having watched this movie one to many times, when conservatives tell me they are “doing good for black folks”, whether such is presented by an actor I think is one of the 10 best male character leads active in hollywood right now or not…

I tend to cinch my belt, put a hand on my wallet to assure it’s still there, make sure Momma and the kiddies are in a safe place…

And flip off the safety on my Colt.

Vouchers have been a failure nationwide. And what the DOJ should be doing is looking at the folks who are setting this crap up as organized crime.

Vouchers don’t do much for students

Ever since the administration filed suit to freeze Louisiana’s school voucher program, high-ranking Republicans have pummeled President Barack Obama for trapping poor kids in failing public schools.

The entire House leadership sent a letter of protest. Majority Leader Eric Cantor blistered the president for denying poor kids “a way into a brighter future.” And Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal accused him of “ripping low-income minority students out of good schools” that could “help them achieve their dreams.”

But behind the outrage is an inconvenient truth: Taxpayers across the U.S. will soon be spending $1 billion a year to help families pay private school tuition — and there’s little evidence that the investment yields academic gains.

In Milwaukee, just 13 percent of voucher students scored proficient in math and 11 percent made the bar in reading this spring. That’s worse on both counts than students in the city’s public schools. In Cleveland, voucher students in most grades performed worse than their peers in public schools in math, though they did better in reading.

In New Orleans, voucher students who struggle academically haven’t advanced to grade-level work any faster over the past two years than students in public schools, many of which are rated D or F, state data show.

And across Louisiana, many of the most popular private schools for voucher students posted miserable scores in math, reading, science and social studies this spring, with fewer than half their voucher students achieving even basic proficiency and fewer than 2 percent demonstrating mastery. Seven schools did so badly, state Superintendent John White barred them from accepting new voucher students — though the state agreed to keep paying tuition for the more than 200 voucher students already enrolled, if they chose to stay.

Nationwide, many schools participating in voucher programs infuse religion through their curriculum. Zack Kopplin, a student activist who favors rigorous science education, has found more than 300 voucher schools across the U.S. that teach the biblical story of creation as science; some also instruct children that the world is just several thousand years old and use textbooks describing the Loch Ness Monster as a living dinosaur. Parents at one such school in Louisiana received a newsletter calling secular scientists “sinful men.”

Asked whether he was confident that the private schools funded by vouchers are better than the public schools students would otherwise attend, Jindal told POLITICO that parents, not government officials, should make that decision. “We make no apologies for giving parents the option to determine the best educational path for their children,” he said. “President Obama has the means to send his children to the school of his choice. Parents in Louisiana should have the same opportunity.”

His rationale resonates widely these days.

Vouchers are booming in popularity; a record 245,000 students in 16 states plus D.C. are paying for private school with public subsidies, according to the Alliance for School Choice. Nine states added or broadened voucher programs this year and new initiatives are on the table in states including New Jersey and Tennessee.

By 2014, states will be spending $1 billion a year to send children to private schools through vouchers, tax credits and similar programs, according to Robert Enlow, president of the Friedman Foundation, an advocacy group for school choice.

“These programs are expanding, and they’re not going away,” said Kevin Chavous, executive counsel for the American Federation for Children, a school choice advocacy group that just released an emotional campaign-style video promoting vouchers.

The expansions are stretching voucher programs far beyond the stated intent of rescuing poor families from failing public schools.

 

She’s Really Not Into You!

First date mistakes…literally.

This little guy probably still in diapers is in for a healthy dose of rejection. But our intrepid Casanova doesn’t give up easily.

Sorry for the horrendous soundtrack on this one – apparently he clip author was addicted to 60’s Bossa Nova screeching…

 

Great Teachers – Presidio, Tx Rocket Club

Been through this little town once – on my way to somewhere else…probably Chihuahua, Mexico or Big Bend Park. It’s about the only settlement bigger than a gas station between El Paso, Texas and Nueveo Laredo about 600 miles away (Texas is BIG, Y’all!). The only reason it sticks in my mind at all is the name similarity to the Presidio in San Francisco.

People are scarce out there!

This one also caught my eye because I, as a kid was also into building rockets…

And what, at least to my viewpoint is one cool teacher!

File this one under – “Save America – Deport a Republican!”

For Texas rocketry club and their inspirational teacher, the sky is just the beginning

Where the Rio Grande and the Rio Conchos meet in west Texas is believed to be the oldest continuously-cultivated land in America. But the most precious crop you’ll find there today is dreams.

CBS News correspondent Steve Hartman went “On the Road” — and met a woman who cultivates them.

In the middle of the Texas desert, on the border with Mexico, there’s a brief break in the cactus called Presidio.

If you’re a kid looking to escape the poverty and isolation of Presidio, there’s really no greater vehicle than the Presidio Rocket Club. In fact, even though it is in one of the poorest school districts in Texas, Presidio probably has more aspiring aeronautical engineers than any other town in America.

And what’s even more amazing than their location is their inspiration — a little firecracker of a science teacher named Shella Condino.

“I wanted to teach the kids: You want something so bad, you put your heart into it,” she said.

Shella started the club five years ago. Never mind that she didn’t speak Spanish and the kids barely spoke English. Never mind that rocket science is rocket science. The fact that it’s hard is part of the reason she thought these kids absolutely had to learn it.

 

Michelle Obama to Lead Socialist Jumping Jacks World Record

The First Lady is continuing her healthy living campaign to encourage kids to be more healthy by doing more physical activity, eating right,  and exercise.

As with her sneak visit to Target last week, which was posited as a socialist plot by conservative bigots –  undoubtedly she will accused by conservative haters for picking “Socialist Jumping Jacks” for the kids to break the world record.

I mean 25,000 people actually working, at anything… Is anti conservative capitalism!

First Lady Aims for Jumping Jack Record

Michelle Obama is looking for at least 20,425 people to help her break a Guinness World Record next week. The first lady will lead hundreds of children doing a minute of jumping jacks on the White House’s South Lawn on Tuesday, kicking off a 24-hour challenge, AP reports. Groups around the country will join the effort to beat the record for the most people doing jumping jacks in a 24-hour period. Event organizer National Geographic has more details.

 

 

First Lady Cuts a Dance Move, and Does the “Dougie”!

Our First Lady continues her campaign to help children become healthier through exercise and proper eating…

Along the way she shows off a few dance moves!

Go Michelle!

 

Michelle Obama As NORAD Operator, Tracking Santa

Michelle Obama payed a surprise visit to NORAD last night, to help out with the little ones calling in to find out where Santa was…

Where’s Santa? Ask Michelle Obama

While President Barack Obama took his daughters to the beach, the first lady played the role of Christmas elf, surprising little girls and boys inquiring about the whereabouts of Santa.

“Hello, this is the first lady, Michelle Obama, with NORAD, tracking Santa. How can I help you?” she said, taking a call from an 8-year-old boy named Max from Los Angeles.

It was a decidedly different greeting than other families across the country got after some confusion about which was the proper number for NORAD in Colorado Springs, Colo.

“Sorry, they gave out the wrong number,” the man informed one caller before giving out the correct number.

The first lady took a dozen calls over 40 minutes from inside the family’s vacation rental in Kailua. She reminded the kids to put out cookies — and vegetables — for Santa and his reindeer and warned the kids to get to sleep or their houses might be skipped.

She also answered a few questions about what it’s like to be first lady — and to be married to the president — from an inquisitive little boy named Austin.

“Is it a hard job?” Austin asked.

The first lady said it’s not as hard as being president and can be fun because she gets to work with kids.

“Is it hard to have all that security around you?” Austin wondered.

It’s not, the first lady said. The Secret Service are very nice and professional, she added.

“They’re good with the girls,” she said, referring to her daughters, Sasha and Malia. “It’s almost like they’re family after a while. So it’s not that hard having them around. And they’re there to keep us safe, right? You can’t be mad at that, right?”