Greene County Democrat

Author: greenecodemocratcom

  • President Obama and Hillary Clinton are making their first joint campaign appearance

     By: The Associated Press

     

    Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama

    Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama

    Eight years after Hillary Clinton helped unite Democrats behind Barack Obama’s presidential campaign, he’s returning the favor. Obama and Clinton will make their first joint appearance of the 2016 campaign Tuesday in North Carolina, a state Democrats are eager to pull back into their win column in November. Presumptive Republican nominee Donald Trump will hold his own event in the political battleground a few hours later. The Democratic duo’s rally in Charlotte cements a new phase in their storied political relationship. They were bitter rivals in the 2008 Democratic primary but became colleagues when Clinton joined Obama’s Cabinet as secretary of state. Now, they’re co-dependents as Clinton seeks the White House once again.
    Her chances of winning hinge on rallying Obama’s coalition to her cause. Obama’s legacy depends on her success. Aides to both say the foe-to-friend story will be at the center of the Obama-Clinton show Tuesday. In his remarks, the president will act as a character witness for his former adviser, who is struggling to convince voters of her trustworthiness and honesty. There is no better politician to testify on her behalf, many Democrats believe, than the man who once counted himself among the Clinton skeptics but came around to be one of her biggest boosters.
    “I think that he can be very helpful, particularly with Democratic voters and some independent voters who have doubts,” said David Axelrod, the chief architect of Obama’s 2008 race for the Democratic nomination against Clinton. “He can do that by sharing his own experience. They were rivals, they had their differences; that gives him some additional standing.”
    The Clinton campaign also is hoping that Obama’s presence at her side serves as a reminder of another, more popular chapter in Clinton’s career. For four years, Obama trusted her to circle the globe representing his foreign policy. She sat at his side in the Situation Room. She was the good soldier, putting aside her political ego to join the administration of the man who defeated her. During her tenure at the State Department she was viewed favorably by most Americans.
    “As someone who was a former rival and came to put a lot of faith in her, we believe the president’s support for her is particularly meaningful to voters,” said Clinton campaign adviser Jennifer Palmieri.
    The White House confirmed Monday that Clinton and Obama will travel to the event together on Air Force One. Clinton’s Republican presidential rival objected to the travel plan. “Why is President Obama allowed to use Air Force One on the campaign trail with Crooked Hillary?” Donald Trump tweeted. “Who pays?”
    Presidents make all their airplane flights on Air Force One, no matter the purpose of the trip. Political committees are required to contribute to the cost of a president’s campaign-related travel, though a portion of such costs is borne by taxpayers, too. “As is the standard practice, the campaign will cover its portion of the costs,” Clinton spokesman Nick Merrill said.
    Obama makes his first campaign appearance with Clinton during a wave of popularity unlike anything he’s experienced since his first term. Clinton aides say they’re confident they could deploy him in any battleground state, though they believe he’ll be particularly effective in rallying young people, as well as black and Hispanic voters, and will be instrumental in voter registration efforts.
    In a series of remarks in recent weeks, the president has proven himself to be one of the Democrats’ most effective critics of Trump. From his perch at the White House and on the world stage, Obama has regularly found ways to blast Trump’s message and mock his style. The mix of high-minded concern and sharp-elbowed sarcasm is widely viewed as an effective, tweetable model for other Democrats.
    Still, Obama won’t spend the next four months as the “Trump-troller in chief,” as one official put it. Obama plans to take a largely positive message on the road as his campaigning picks up later this summer. That’s in part because he’s campaigning for the continuation of his agenda — as well as Clinton’s. On health care, immigration, financial reform and the environment, Clinton is largely promising a continuation or acceleration of Obama’s policies.
    Obama and Clinton originally planned to make their first campaign appearance together in Wisconsin, a Democratic-leaning state where Clinton struggled in her primary fight with Bernie Sanders. Campaign aides viewed the rally as a way to forge Democratic unity after the bruising primary and consolidate the party’s voters in a state Clinton needs to carry in November.
    But the June 15 rally was postponed due to the mass shooting at an Orlando nightclub. By the time the campaign and White House got around to rescheduling, Clinton aides said the landscape had shifted — they are now far less worried about bringing along Bernie Sanders voters and more interested in using the president to rally voters in one of the most divided general election battlegrounds.

  • New opposition in Zimbabwe launches campaign

    Joice Mujuru and Robert Mugabe

     Joice Mujuru and Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe

    June 27, 2016 (GIN) – Zimbabwe‘s former vice president, Joice Mujuru, was the headliner at a rally this week in Matabeleland in one of the first public events of the new Zimbabwe People First opposition party.    The newly-launched campaign promptly took on the incumbent – President Robert Mugabe – in advance of elections in 2018.   Mujuru accused the government of being disinterested in the plight of the majority and promised to fight for the interests of ordinary citizens. “Zimbabwe People First is a new democratic, inclusive political party that accommodates every Zimbabwean… Please, get it from me, I am not going back to Zanu PF”.A year ago, Mujuru began stitching together a platform, publishing plans to relax security and media laws and review divisive black empowerment legislation. She pledged to push for a free press and repeal restrictive media and broadcasting laws that ban private television stations and bar foreign journalists from working permanently in Zimbabwe.

    Tough security laws that Mugabe has used against the opposition would also be removed, Mujuru said.

    A veteran of Zimbabwe’s independence war against white minority rule, Mujuru was once seen as one of Mugabe’s closest allies. However, she was dismissed from her government and ruling party posts in December on charges that she led a cabal that planned to topple Africa’s oldest leader.

    Meanwhile, a two-page Blueprint to Unlock Investment and Leverage for Development (BUILD) – has been circulated that reads like an election manifesto. “From the day we started, it was like we lit a matchstick at a gas station. Everyone was waiting for the formation of a party which is all inclusive even to those who were not interested in politics,” Mugabe’s former deputy said.

     

    “When people heard there was a political party called People First they were saying ‘Mai Mujuru we were blaming ourselves asking what we were doing [in Zanu PF] when madzana mbwanana achitambwa nemazidinga aya’ [fools were playing with people’s lives],” she said.      Political commentator, Khanyile Mlotshwa, said Mujuru had a good chance to make an impression through her rally in Bulawayo. “Her rally will be packed, as long as her political commissars appeal to the people on the basis of her stature… If they play the woman card, they are likely to draw a lot of women, some of whom have never been interested in politics, to her party… ”    The ruling ZANU-PF party has already chosen Mugabe as its candidate for the 2018 presidential poll, when he will be 94

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

     

  • A radical idea to compensate Black homeowners harmed by racial bias

    By Emily Badger , Washington Post

    Graphic for housing story

     

    Homes in Black middle-class neighborhoods, like the one where Natalie Y. Moore grew up on the South Side of Chicago, typically don’t gain value over time the same way homes in mostly white middle-class neighborhoods do.

    The people who live there are penalized for biases built into the housing market. White home buyers seldom consider neighborhoods with even a modest black population, and so housing demand is much lower in those communities. That drives down prices and muzzles appreciation. It means that homeownership simply isn’t as good of a deal in neighborhoods that are even slightly black.

    Moore, a public radio reporter writing in her new book, “The South Side: A Portrait of Chicago and American Segregation,” quotes an idea from Emory University law professor Dorothy Brown on how to partially remedy this: “Why don’t we say no one gets a mortgage interest deduction unless they live in an integrated neighborhood?” Brown told her. “We realize you’re taking a penalty in the market, and we want to compensate you by lowering your taxes.”

    And Brown’s radical proposal to implement the idea: Let’s extend the mortgage interest deduction only to homeowners who live in neighborhoods that are at least 10 percent black.

    I was intrigued by this as a thought experiment so I shared the book excerpt on Twitter, where it prompted some broad discussion. Could we use the tax code to foster integration? Would doing so just reward gentrifiers? Would Brown’s formula mean that most black homeowners would get the tax break?

    Decades of official government policy, lending practices and silent preferences have sorted blacks and whites into separate housing markets in America. They have enabled whites to build wealth through homeownership, across generations, in ways that compound the racial wealth gap in America. And in this divided housing market, black wealth was destroyed at a much higher rate during the housing bust.

    The home mortgage interest deduction, meanwhile, further distorts the housing market, piling benefits on the rich and encouraging people who were already well-off to buy even bigger homes. So why not restructure the deduction — which needs doing anyway — to recognize some of housing’s racial disparities?

    I called Brown to talk through her idea more. To my surprise, she is actually not interested in nudging people to live in more integrated neighborhoods. She’s not sure integration in itself is a worthy goal.

    “Every time I presented this paper, someone said, ‘Oh you’re encouraging integration,’ ” Brown says of the 2009 paper in which she first floated the idea. “I said, ‘No I’m not.’ I’m basically compensating people who live in more than 10 percent black neighborhoods. Some of those are racially integrated. Some of those are not.”

    She is more interested in making it up to people who are harmed by biases in the housing market than getting us to behave in ways that would overcome those biases. As a scholar, she primarily writes about the race and class implications of federal tax policy. The mortgage interest deduction disproportionately benefits whites because they’re much more likely to be homeowners. But she realized that white homeowners disproportionately benefit even relative to black homeowners because housing is worth so much more to whites.

    “There’s a market penalty –– I call it an appreciation gap – in any home in a neighborhood with more than 10 percent black [population],” she says. “It doesn’t matter if you’re a white homeowner or a black homeowner. If you’re in a neighborhood that’s 10 percent black, that home isn’t going to appreciate the same way it would if you picked it up and moved it to an all-white neighborhood. I found that fascinating.”

    Tax policy, she figured, should disrupt that pattern, not exacerbate it. As a practical matter, that would mean that black homeowners in all-black neighborhoods would get the deduction. It would mean that white, Hispanic, Asian and black homeowners in neighborhoods that are 10 percent black would get it, too (a similar penalty doesn’t appear to be associated with Asian and Hispanic residents). Whites with few blacks in their neighborhood would not.

    Does that sound like social engineering, like government picking winners and losers unfairly? “Right now, a subsidy only for homeownership – there’s no rent deduction – benefits whites, period, full-stop. Because most whites are homeowners,” Brown says. “We’ve got social engineering right now in the code, and people are fine with it because they’re winning. And all I’m saying is you’re already winning in the market. You don’t need to also win in the tax subsidy.”

    She’s also skeptical her idea would prompt gentrification into black neighborhoods by wealthier whites. The mortgage interest deduction just isn’t that generous.

    “I just don’t see this proposal, if it became law tomorrow, causing lots of white people to run out to buy houses in majority-minority neighborhoods,” she says. “That flies in the face of all the research out there showing that whites don’t want to live in diverse neighborhoods.”

    Of course, there is roughly zero chance of her proposal becoming law tomorrow. But the mere idea — and sometimes it’s just worth throwing them out there — raises real questions about why homeownership hasn’t equally benefited blacks, and how government policy has helped make that so.

  • US Supreme Court in 4-3 vote upholds affirmative action at University of Texas

    By: David Smith in Washington and Alan Yuhas in New York, The Guardian

    The principle of affirmative action for African American and Hispanic people seeking access to higher education received a boost on Thursday when the supreme court upheld a controversial program run by the University of Texas.

    In a 4-3 ruling, the court decided that the university’s scheme, which considers race as part of its admissions process, is constitutional. Justice Elena Kagan recused herself from the case because she worked on it while serving in the justice department.

    Most students are admitted to the University of Texas through a scheme that guarantees slots to Texans who graduate in the top 10% of their high school classes. But for a quarter of its intake, it considers race as one factor among many, a formula supported by the Obama administration.

    Justice Anthony Kennedy warned that though the Texas program is constitutional it may still be the subject of future scrutiny by the courts.

    “The Court’s affirmance of the University’s admissions policy today does not necessarily mean the University may rely on that same policy without refinement,” he wrote. “It is the University’s ongoing obligation to engage in constant deliberation and continued reflection regarding its admission policies.”

    The ruling strengthens affirmative action programs around the country, making them more likely to survive discrimination suits.

    Kennedy wrote that universities deserve “considerable deference” in how they run themselves, “but still, it remains an enduring challenge to our nation’s education system to reconcile the pursuit of diversity with the constitutional promise of equal treatment and dignity”.

    Universities and states can be “laboratories for experimentation”, he said, citing UT Austin as a school that could serve as an example to others. But his commendation came with an order to continuously re-evaluate whether “changing demographics have undermined the need for a race-conscious policy”.

    Justice Samuel Alito took the remarkable step of reading his dissent from the bench – an act reserved only for when justices, usually decorous even in defeat, passionately disagree with a ruling. After Kennedy read the conclusions of his 20-page ruling, Alito read his 50-page dissent in its entirety.

    “UT’s crude classification system is ill suited for the more integrated country that we are rapidly becoming,” Alito said. “If an applicant has one grandparent, great-grandparent, or great-great-grandparent who was a member of a favored group,” he asked, “is that enough to permit UT to infer that this student’s classroom contribution will reflect a distinctive perspective?”

    This system of self-identification, Alito argued, “is an invitation for applicants to game the system”.

    In a separate dissent, Justice Clarence Thomas repeated his view that the constitution outlaws any use of race in higher education admissions.

    Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton welcomed the ruling, calling it a “win for all Americans”.

    “Having a student body with diverse experiences and perspectives breaks down barriers, enriches academia, and prepares our young people to be leaders and citizens in our increasingly diverse country,” she said.

    Arguments at last December’s hearing focused on whether the university can be justified in using race as a factor and showed a clear split between conservatives and liberals.

    Abigail Fisher, a white woman from Texas, claims she was deprived of a place at the university because of her race. Bert Rein, representing Fisher, argued that the “top 10%” program was sufficient to bring in Hispanic and African American students and said the university could adopt other measures to diversify its student body without explicit reference to race.

    Texas said the “top 10” program alone was not enough and it needed the freedom to fill out incoming classes as it saw fit. Gregory Garre said on behalf of the university that minority enrolment dropped at top public universities in California and Michigan after they ended consideration of race.

    “If this court rules that the University of Texas can’t consider race, we know exactly what will happen: diversity will plummet, especially among African Americans,” Garre said. “Now is not the time and this is not the case to roll back student-body diversity in America.”

    But during oral argument, Alito said the university was engaging in “terrible stereotyping” by suggesting there was something “deficient about the African American students and the Hispanic students who are admitted under the top 10% plan”.

    It is unclear what impact the death of conservative Justice Antonin Scalia in February ultimately had on the opinion.

    Scalia might have swayed the moderate Kennedy away from such a strong affirmation of race-conscious admissions. In at least three past cases on related issues, Kennedy had sided against affirmative action programs. Scalia at the very least could have deadlocked the decision 4-4. The conservative justice had made his opinion on the case known in December, when he suggested that black students might benefit from the end of affirmative action.

    “There are those who contend that it does not benefit African Americans to get them into the University of Texas where they do not do well, as opposed to having them go to a less-advanced school, a slower-track school, where they do well,” he said during oral arguments in December.

    The court first heard Fisher’s case in 2012 but the case ended inconclusively and was sent to a lower court for review. The federal appeals court in New Orleans twice upheld the Texas admissions program and rejected Fisher’s appeal.

    Fisher’s case was conceived by Edward Blum, an opponent of racial preferences. Blum also is behind lawsuits against Harvard University and the University of North Carolina that aim to eliminate any consideration of race in college admissions.

    The Supreme Court has previously allowed affirmative action in limited cases though it has said it wanted to phase it out because it was a form of racial discrimination.

    Such programs date to the 1960s, when they were first used to try to reduce racial segregation, but strict quotas were ruled unconstitutional by the court in 1978. Since another test case in 2003, race may now only be used as a factor if it can be shown to be essential in creating educational diversity in class.

    Eight states ban the use of race in public college admissions: Arizona, California, Florida, Michigan, Nebraska, New Hampshire, Oklahoma and Washington.

    The Associated Press contributed to this report

  • Obama: Court ruling won’t end immigration debate

    By: Gregory Korte, USA TODAY

    President Obama

     

    WASHINGTON — President Obama all but conceded defeat on immigration Thursday following a Supreme Court decision that kept his executive actions on hold, saying it’s unlikely he’ll be able to accomplish his goal of giving millions of immigrants semi-legal status by the end of his presidency.

    Obama called the Supreme Court’s deadlock a setback that “takes us further from the country we aspire to be.” But he also predicted that an overhaul the immigration system would come eventually.”Congress isn’t able to ignore America forever,” he said.

    Obama spoke following the Supreme Court’s 4-4 deadlock in a closely watched case that considered whether the president has the power to delay deportations of millions of immigrants who don’t have the legal authority to be in the United States.

    The unusual Supreme Court tie vote — caused by the vacancy created by Senate Republicans’ refusal to confirm a replacement for the late Justice Antonin Scalia — means that a lower court ruling stands. That decision held that states have standing to sue the federal government over the executive actions, and put important parts of Obama’s immigration plan on hold.

    The Obama administration has deployed more border agents to the southern border, and Obama said he’s cut illegal border crossings to their lowest levels since 1970s. But he lamented that success on that front did not break the logjam in Congress over an immigration reform package.

    “It is heartbreaking for millions of immigrants who made their lives here, who raised families here,” Obama said.

    Obama promised that little would change for most immigrants, saying his administration would continue to consider long-term unauthorized immigrants a low priority for deportation. “What is unaffected by today’s ruling, or lack of a ruling, are the enforcement priorities we put in place,” he said. “As long as you have not committed a crime, our limited law enforcement resources are not focused on you.”

    But the decision means that immigrant families will not be eligible for get work authorizations and government benefits. Obama said he’s not considering any more executive actions on the issue before the end of his presidency.

    Obama also used the occasion to once again call on the Republican- controlled Senate to confirm his nominee for a vacancy to the Supreme Court, which would provide for a more definitive — and likely Obama-friendly — decision.

    “The court’s inability to reach a decision in this case is a very clear reminder of why it’s so important for the Supreme Court to have a full bench.”

    Obama did praise a separate decision upholding affirmative action in college admissions. “We are not a country that guarantees equal outcomes, but we do strive to provide an equal shot to everyone, and that;s what the Supreme Court upheld today,” Obama said.

     

  • Democrats end House sit-in protest over gun control

     

    By Deirdre Walsh, Manu Raju, Eric Bradner and Steven Sloan, CNN

    John Lewis with Terri Sewell

    Congressman John Lewis and colleagues including Congresswoman Terri Sewell (AL-7) as part of sit-in on House floor;

     John Lewis crossing bridge 1965

     John Lewis crossing Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma 1965   Washington (CNN)

    Democrats decided to end their day-long sit-in protest on the House floor over gun control Thursday, June 23, 2016.

    Rep. John Lewis, who launched the sit-in Wednesday morning that eventually drew 170 lawmakers, lit up social media, and infuriated House Republicans — but spurred no legislative action — said the fight was not over.

    “We must come back here on July 5th [when Congress returns to session] more determined than ever before,” Lewis said.

    “We are going to win,” he told supporters on the Capitol steps after the sit-in was halted. “The fight is not over. This is just one step of when we come back here on July the 5th we’re going to continue to push, to pull, to stand up, and if necessary, to sit down. So don’t give up, don’t give in. Keep the faith, and keep your eyes on the prize.”  He also tweeted, “We got in trouble. We got in the way. Good trouble. Necessary Trouble. By sitting-in, we were really standing up.”

    Lawmakers said that during the July 4th break, they would take the issue to their districts.”We are going back to our congressional districts — we are going to engage our constituents on this subject, and we will not allow this body feel as comfortable as in the past,” Rep. Jim Clyburn said. “On July 5, we will return, and at that time we will be operating on a new sense of a purpose.”

    Republicans had earlier tried to shut down the sit-in, but the Democrats’ protest over the lack of action on gun control lasted for more than 24 hours. House Democrats were looking for votes to expand background checks and ban gun sales to those on the no-fly watch list.

    In the middle of the night, the House GOP had sought to end the extraordinary day of drama by swiftly adjourning for a recess that will last through July 5.

    The Republican move was an effort to terminate a protest that began Wednesday morning in reaction to the massacre in Orlando when Democrats took over the House floor and tried to force votes on gun control. But throughout the morning Thursday, 10-20 Democrats, including House Minority leader Nancy Pelosi for much of the time, remained on the floor.

    At one point, a police officer told the Democrats that they would be conducting a daily security sweep. “I’d ask that you clear the floor while that happens,” the officer said.

    Pelosi responded: “That’s not going to happen” and the security check then took place involving five agents and a dog as the House Democratic leader continued speaking, undeterred. Pelosi said the sit-in would continue “until hell freezes over.”

    House Speaker Paul Ryan on Thursday accused the Democrats of throwing the House into “chaos” and threatening democracy. He said Republicans were looking at all options to stop the sit-in, if the Democrats continued it.

    Sen. Susan Collins, a Maine Republican, also criticized the protest and said it was a setback to her efforts to build bipartisan support for her legislation that would ban gun sales to people on a list of possible terrorists.

    “It is not helpful to have had the sit-in on the House side because that made it partisan, and I’ve worked very hard to keep this bipartisan, so that setback our efforts somewhat,” she said of her bill, which won support from a majority of senators Thursday but fell short of the 60 votes needed to advance.

    Although Republicans leaders had shut off House cameras, Democrats continued Thursday morning to livestream their activities on the floor. Rep. Mark Takano plugged his phone into an external power source, set it on top of a chair facing the podium, and was streaming on his Facebook page even though he’d left the chamber to appear on CNN’s “New Day.”

    The sit-in became a social media happening. Tweets sent by Reps. Scott Peters and Eric Swalwell with Periscopes were viewed over 1 million times and the hashtags #NoBillNoBreak and #HoldTheFloor were tweeted over 1.4 million times, according to Twitter.

    Shortly after 8:00 a.m. Florida Rep. Ted Deutch gave an impassioned speech on the floor.”I am tired, I am cold, and I am hungry. Let me remind everyone watching how privileged I am to be tired, cold, and hungry,” he said. “These are feelings that I am privileged to have because so many will never feel that again,” referring to victims of gun violence.

    Overall, more than 170 Democrats took part in the sit in over the 24 hours, lawmakers said.

     

     

  • SCLC Names International Headquarters after President Charles Steele, Jr.

    By George E. Curry
    Editor-in-Chief
    EmergeNewsOnline.com
    Charles Steele Jr.

     

    ATLANTA – The Southern Christian Leadership Conference, the Atlanta-based civil rights organization co-founded by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., has named its international headquarters at 320 Auburn Avenue, N.E. in honor of Charles Steele, Jr., its current president and CEO.
    Steele, a former Alabama state senator from Tuscaloosa, AL served from 2004-2009 as its sixth president since the founding of SCLC in 1957. When he assumed office, the organization could not pay its utility bills and was nearly $2 million in debt.
    Fred Shuttlesworth, the leader of the Birmingham, Ala. civil rights struggle and a former SCLC president, had written off his organization as dead, saying: “Only God can give life to the dead.”
    When he took over, a confident Charles Steele answered that criticism directly, saying, “Well, I talked with God as well and he said he was not coming, but he sent me.”
    And the record appears to support his godly assertion.
    Steele said within three years, he had raised approximately $20 million – half in cash and the other half through in-kind contributions.
    Having accomplished his primary mission, Steele decided to return to his life as a businessman in 2009. But his “retirement” would be short-lived.
    In 2014, Steele was asked by the board of directors to give up his full-time private consulting business to return as president to an organization again on the verge of financial collapse.”Dr. Steele has returned as president because of a very important need at this point which is fundraising and fund development. That’s a primary responsibility of the president, and he has excellent skills and contacts in that arena to help us maintain our financial stability,” Board Chairman Bernard LaFayette, Jr. said at the time.
    After Steele’s 5-year stint, SCLC went through a series of leadership changes. The charismatic president and fundraiser was succeeded by Rev. Howard W. Creecy, Jr., who served from 2009-2011, when he died accidently while still in office. Issac Farris Jr., a nephew of Dr. King, was dismissed in 2012 after serving less than a year as president. He was followed by civil rights icon Rev. C.T. Vivian, who agreed to serve on an interim basis until SCLC could select a new president.
    For stability, SCLC turned again to a reliable face.
    Steele, the only person who has ever served twice as president of the storied civil rights group, has been widely recognized for raising most of the $3.5 million to erect the 2-story building on Auburn Avenue and providing the leadership to resurrect the troubled organization.
    The building, which opened in 2007, carries the official name: “SCLC International H.Q. – Charles Steele, Jr. Bldg.” A marker is prominently displayed above the front entrance of the building.
    “Here is a president who, for the first time, made it possible for SCLC to own its own headquarters,” said LaFayette, the SCLC board chairman. “This is not just a building, it’s an international headquarters named to emphasize our international thrust.”
    Steele said he was deeply touched by the decision to name the building in his honor.
    “I could go on forever without the personal recognition,” he said in an interview. “But to put my name on the building gives respect to all of the people who supported me, especially my family. It’s a blessing from God and the expression of gratitude says that my work has not been in vain.”

  • Judge orders return of 825 bingo machines to Greenetrack; Decision based on ‘electronic bingo’ defined in Constitutional Amendment 743

    By: John Zippert,
    Co-Publisher

    Bingo

     

    On June 22, 2016, Special Circuit Judge Houston L. Brown ruled in favor of returning 825 electronic bingo machines and other records to Greenetrack. The machines were seized on July 1, 2010, in the first State of Alabama raid on bingo in Greene County.
    Perhaps anticipating an appeal by the State of Alabama, Judge Brown goes to great lengths in his decision to say that the electronic bingo machines used and seized were legally permissible machines under the definitions in Alabama Constitutional Amendment 743, governing the operation of bingo in Greene County.
    The voters in Greene County adopted amendment 743 in 2003 by an overwhelming vote of 82%. Since the majority of voters in Greene County are African-American, many view the concerns surrounding the legality of Amendment 743, as issues of voting rights and self-determination by the majority of the county’s voters.

    Greenetrack CEO Luther ‘Nat’ Winn said, “ This is a victory for Greenetrack and the people of Greene County. We have been battling to protect the voting rights and decisions of Greene County residents for a long time. We feel this decision by Judge Brown supports our argument that electronic bingo is legal, protected by Constitutional Amendment 743 and needed in Greene County for employment and economic development reasons.”
    In his decision, Judge Brown states, “The core of the State’s position is that the bingo games at issue are slot machines and do not satisfy the “Cornerstone” test announced by the Supreme Court. The State contends that the games at issue fail the Cornerstone test because they do not require the player to hear bingo numbers called, to pay attention and then take physical action to mark a bingo card, and to recognize and verbally announce a ‘bingo’ in order to win.”

    Brown says, “The defense (Greenetrack) contends that the Court must interpret Amendment 743 based on the plain language of the Amendment, and that the Court consider the history of the times, the state of the law, and the conditions necessitating its adoption in 2003. The defense further contends that the games are lawful under Amendment 743.
    “The Court finds that the seized items are not due to be forfeited but returned to Greenetrack. Amendment 743 applicable to Greene County is the only constitutional amendment authorizing bingo in Alabama that defines both bingo and bingo equipment on its face and includes the term “electronic marking devices” within the definition of bingo.”
    In its defense of bingo, Greenetrack put on witnesses and submitted newspaper clippings from the Greene County Democrat in 2003 when the amendment was being debated by the community to show that the people of Greene County knew that the Amendment authorized electronic as well as traditional forms of bingo, before they voted in the referendum on the Amendment.
    In his opinion, Judge Brown refers to “nostalgic forms of bingo” to describe some of the conditions set forth by the Alabama Supreme Court in its Cornerstone decision which was used to shut down bingo in Macon, Lowndes and other counties. He specifically indicates that the Cornerstone definitions of bingo as a paper game do not apply to Greene County because of the definition of bingo in its electronic forms in Constitutional Amendment 743.
    Judge Brown is also clear that his decision in this case was based on a plain reading and review of the wording in Constitutional Amendment 743 providing for and legally allowing electronic forms of bingo.
    “The Court is presented with a record where the language of the constitution before it is plain, unambiguous and cannot be disputed. The definitions of bingo and bingo contain, among others, the phrases “electronic marking device” and “electronic card marking device.” Under the rules of construction long established by the Supreme Court, the Court’s task here is circumscribed and mandatory,” says Brown’s decision.
    In a previous ruling, Judge Brown had returned over $75,000 in cash seized in the same July 2010 raid because the State could not prove the funds taken from the vault were from illegal gambling activities.
    Judge Brown’s June 22nd. order requires return of the machines and records to Greenetrack within thirty days. We will see if the State of Alabama appeals this decision or allows it to go into effect and set a precedent for the legal protection of electronic bingo, under Amendment 743, in Greene County.

  • Have we forgotten the kidnapped school girls in Nigeria

    By D. Kevin McNeir (From The Washington
    Informer, NNPA Member)

     

    Nigerian girls
    Congresswoman Frederica Wilson (D-FL) speaks out on Nigerian girls

    It’s been two years, April 14th to be exact, since the world witnessed the abduction of 276 Nigerian schoolgirls from their dormitory rooms at the hands of Boko Haram – a West African terrorist group that has lodged atrocities against its own people including the burning of children alive and sending teenaged girls on suicide bomb missions. But one member of Congress, a former principal and mother now in her third term in office, said she refuses to rest until the remaining 219 girls still missing have been safely returned to their families.
    On Thursday, April 14, Congresswoman Frederica Wilson (D-Fla.) sponsored a press conference and panel discussion in the Cannon House Office Building in Southeast that included experts and advocates who offered their perspectives and solutions for addressing the ongoing crisis in the region. Several girls who escaped their abductors and now live in the U.S. also shared comments and expressed their thanks.
    Wilson has visited Nigeria several times along with other members of Congress where they’ve met with some of the victims and their parents. She remains a staunch supporter of the Bring Back Our Girls movement.“I was shocked and deeply saddened when I first learned that Boko Haram had abducted the Chibok girls to punish them for seeking to learn and better their lives,” she said. “My concern began with the girls but has since expanded because of the near-daily atrocities that Boko Haram commits, which has escalated since the girls were kidnapped. They’re trafficking girls and women as sex slaves and slaughtering boys.”
    “They have no conscience and they must be stopped. Even though Boko Haram has been ranked as the world’s deadliest terrorist group, it’s actually a group of cowards, which is why they send girls out, some as young as seven, to do their dirty work.”
    Panelist participants included: John Yearwood, moderator and executive board chairman, International Press Institute; Malcolm Nance, executive director, The Terror Asymmetrics Project on Strategy, Tactics and Radical Ideology; Jana Mason, senior advisor for government relations, United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees; Tunde Odunlade, a Nigerian artist and activist; Daveed Gartenstein-Ross, senior fellow, Foundation for Defense of Democracies; Emmanuel Ogebe, international director, Education Must Continue Initiative; and Ernst Jan Hogendoorn, Africa deputy program director, International Crisis Group. Ambassador Linda Thomas-Greenfield, assistant secretary of state for African affairs, also gave an update on actions initiated by the U.S. government.
    Wilson said building support among her colleagues has sometimes been a challenge. “Several congressional lawmakers on both sides of the aisle and in both chambers have introduced legislation and support my efforts like Wear Something Red Wednesday, the daily Twitter campaign and events like the forum and press conference that I recently hosted. But we’ve got to hold Nigeria’s government more accountable, keep the pressure on those lawmakers and let them know that if they don’t increase their efforts to find the girls and defeat Boko Haram, that they can be voted out of office.”
    Ogebe said U.S. officials and leaders from other countries initially failed to take Boko Haram seriously. “World leaders allowed Boko Haram to spread like a cancer. What’s needed is greater intelligence on the ground and the assistance of the U.S. with technology that can pinpoint where the terrorists are hiding. What’s happening in Nigeria should be deemed as an act of genocide,” he said.
    Hogendoorn believes the U.S. could do more but that Nigerian officials must take the lead. “Ultimately it’s a Nigerian problem — they’re a country that remains in crisis,” he said. “Their military, police and elected officials are all going through major reform and that process cannot be forced.”
    Odunlade said he won’t give up, even though Boko Haram continues to grow more powerful and dangerous. “These terrorists have to be fought on all fronts,” he said. “I just hope that Nigeria’s neighboring countries will provide more assistance. And the country’s youth must be supported. They’re talented and many are hungry for more education. They could be the real answer to the problem of terrorism.”
    Thomas-Greenfield said she remains optimistic but noted that defeating groups like Boko Haram requires long term determination. “The truth is Boko Haram only represents a minority of people among Muslims and Africans,” she said. “Many of the foot soldiers in their organization are young boys and girls who have been forced to participate. Those who want to leave must be supported and not ostracized. Nigeria also has to be willing to use more of its assets. They have had recent success fighting Boko Haram with the help of countries like Cameroon and that’s encouraging. Ultimately, the U.S. needs Congress to vote to give more financial assistance and America needs other countries to commit themselves to this fight.”
    “The bottom line – if I weren’t optimistic I would have given up long ago. We’re making progress but it’s going to be a long process. The question is whether world leaders, along with Nigeria, are willing to take on this fight for the long haul. That’s what it’s going to take,” she added.
    On Wednesday, April 20, Wilson led a candlelight vigil in front of the U.S. State Department in an effort to keep the world focused on the plight of the still missing girls. Last week, CNN released a “proof of life” video, obtained from a source “close to the negotiations,” in which several of the missing girls appeared to be in good health but anxious to return home. “We’re fighting to keep this in the news and keep it in the hearts and minds of people so it won’t fade away because we’ve got to bring those girls back,” Wilson said.
    Since the distribution of this article, the Nigerian government has found two of the kidnapped girls from Chibok in the Cameroons and returned them to their families.

  • GAO report: Segregation increasing at some U. S. schools

    By Lauren Victoria Burke (NNPA News Wire
    Contributor)

    A recent report by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) found that the segregation of African American and Hispanic students nationwide is getting worse.
    In particular, a notable increase in segregation among K-12 public schools was pointed out in the study. The study also found that charter schools may often take students from public schools and enroll them into less diverse schools. The study also found that Hispanic students were “triple segregated” by economics, race and language barriers. The report was released on the 62nd anniversary of the landmark decision in the 1954 U.S. Supreme Court case Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka, which declared that segregated schools were unconstitutional.
    On May 16, a judge in Cleveland, Miss., found that schools in the town were just as segregated as they were a half-century ago. “The delay in desegregation has deprived generations of students of the constitutionally guaranteed right of an integrated education,” U.S. District Judge Debra Brown wrote.
    At a press conference on Capitol Hill, Congressional Black Caucus Chairman G.K. Butterfield (D-N.C.), House Education and Workforce ranking Democrat Rep. Bobby Scott (D-Va.), and House Judiciary ranking member Rep. John Conyers (D-Mich.) along with Reps. Xavier Becerra (D-Calif.), Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Texas) spoke on the issue.
    Reps. Conyers, Butterfield and Scott will author a bill that would require schools to “designate at least one employee” to work on complying with diversity requirements. “The percentage of schools where 75 percent of students are both low-income and Hispanic or African-American has increased from 9 percent in 2001 to 16 percent in 2014,” Rep. Conyers said.
    The report also found that schools that were segregated offered fewer courses in science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) related fields and college preparatory classes. “Segregation in public K-12 schools isn’t getting better. It’s getting worse, and getting worse quickly,” Rep. Bobby Scott of Virginia said.
    Senator Bernie Sanders tweeted that, “There are 6,727 highly-segregated schools in our nation, where one percent or less of the school population is white. #BrownVBoard.”
    In a statement about the report, National Urban League President Marc Morial said that the findings in GAO report confirm “that the promise of Brown remains a promise that has gone largely unfulfilled.” Morial continued: “In too many communities, students of color are now more segregated with less access to equitable educational opportunities than in decades prior.”
    NAACP Legal Defense Fund Director Sherrilyn Ifill said that the report shines a light on worsening education inequities that that cannot be divorced from our nation’s legacy of racial discrimination that has perpetuated racial and socioeconomic isolation. Ifill said: “It is our imperative on the 62nd anniversary of the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in Brown v. Board of Education to ask, ‘How will we act to address current disparities like resource inequities and discriminatory discipline practices?’”
    Lauren Victoria Burke is a political analyst who speaks on politics and African American leadership. She can be contacted at LBurke007@gmail.com and on twitter at @LVBurke.