The Wilmington Journal - Part of the BlackPressUSA Network

[Staff]

Part of the BlackPressUSA Network
http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/news/default.asp

Wilmington Journal articles : Part 2
http://www.dumpcms.com/showthread.php?p=6726#post6726

[Staff]

CHAMBERS IS BACK IN SCHOOL DESEGREGATION, WEEK OF FEBRUARY 17-23, 2005
by CASH MICHAELS
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 2/18/2005
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The case will have statewide implications if Judge Manning rules in Chambers' favor.

In a legal maneuver that could challenge the racial resegregation of public school systems and the school choice movement across the state, Attorney Julius Chambers has filed a legal motion in Wake Superior Court charging that the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Public School System (CMS) denies Black students a “sound basic” education because the student assignment plan relegates them to high poverty inner city schools.

CMS employs school choice, which ultimately allows White parents to send their children to predominately White and resourceful suburban schools, while most Black and Hispanic parents are forced to send their children to older, crumbling, poorly staffed city schools.
Read more...
http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/article/article.asp?NewsID=53981&sID=4

[Staff]

JAMES HAS A PLAN TO SAVE URBAN BLACKS'', WEEK OF DECEMBER 16-22, 2004
by CASH MICHAELS
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 12/19/2004
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From the white conservative Republican who caused a virtual racial meltdown by calling African-Americans “illiterate” and charging that they live in a “moral sewer,” is an equally controversial follow-up.

The problem is, this time he has blacks backing him up.

Read More...
http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/article/article.asp?NewsID=51656&sID=4

[Staff]

STUDY: AFRICAN AMERICANS STILL HAVE A LONG WAY TO GO, WEEK OF FEBRUARY 19-FEBRUARY 25, 2004
by JOHANNA THATCH-BRIGGS
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 2/20/2004

The information documented in the “The State of the Dream 2004: Enduring Disparities in Black and White”, revealed eye-opening statistics about wealth, employment, education, health, and other factors that have a direct impact on the Black-white divide. The report goes a step further in providing information about the state of Black America in the 1960s and 1970s.
.......
Education part is excerpted. Full Article available with link below
.......
However, there is some good news for future African American leaders of the nation—-African American children. In 1968, 30% of Blacks age 25 and older were high school graduates, compared with 55% of whites. In 2002, 79 percent of Blacks age 25 and older had graduated from high school, compared with 89 percent.

Yet the report does disclose a dark side to the education of African American children. Obviously, the trend of neighborhood schools is not only happening on a local and state level, but it is also occurring across the nation.

The report affirms, “Dr. King would be outraged to learn that in the 50th anniversary of Brown v. Board of Education resegregation is rampant. As the Harvard University Civil Rights Project reports, ‘American public schools are now twelve years into the process of continuous resegregation.

The desegregation of Black students, which increased continuously from the 1950s to the late 1980s, has now receded to levels not seen in three decades.’ The bottom line is this: Black students are doing their part.

Government, school districts and employer must do theirs.”
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http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/article/article.asp?NewsID=39128&sID=12

[Staff]

OUR VOICE: ''THE TRAP THAT KEEPS ON TRAPPING'' AND ''BACK ON THE JOB'', WEEK OF FEBRUARY 24-MARCH 2, 2005
by EDITORIAL STAFF
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 2/25/2005
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Excerpt...

BACK ON THE JOB

There’s something to be said for “quiet fire.”

As everyone is looking the other way, distracted by the sometimes hopelessness of the day’s events, there’s a force working slowly, surely and diligently off to the side, growing in size and energy.

Before you know it, that force, that “quiet fire,” has consumed all around you, changing everything, sometimes for the better.

That’s how we describe civil rights attorney Julius Chambers.

Read More....
http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/Article/Article.asp?NewsID=54207&sID=34

[Staff]

NAACP REQUESTS STATES SUBMIT FIVE-YEAR PLANS TO REDUCE RACIAL DISPARITIES IN EDUCATION, WEEK OF FEBRUARY 24-MARCH 2, 2005
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 2/25/2005
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NAACP Call for Action goal is to reduce education disparities by 50% over a five-year period

The National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) Education Department is requesting states to submit Educational Equity Partnership Plans that outline the states’ efforts to reduce education-related racial disparities by 50% over the next five years (2005-2009). Each state is asked to submit its plan by June 24, 2005.

Dr. John Jackson, NAACP National Director of Education, said, “The NAACP Call for Action initiative is an effort to partner with states to reduce the racial disparities in education and assist states in meeting the benchmark in the federal No Child Left Behind Act. The federal government has to play more of an active role assisting states in resources and policy to address these disparities. However, until the federal government decides to do what is right, the NAACP has a moral obligation to fight to ensure that all students have access to a high quality education.”

Over the past three years, the Call for Action initiative has gained tremendous momentum. Between 2001 and 2004, forty-eight states agreed to participate ....

Read more...
http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/article/article.asp?NewsID=54238&sID=33

[Christine]

OUR VOICE, MESSAGES TO THE GOVERNOR AND THE GENERAL ASSEMBLY: ''LEAVE THE PARENTS ALONE'' AND ''REPARATIONS FOR A HIDEOUS ACT'', WEEK OF MARCH 3-9, 2005
by EDITORIAL STAFF
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 3/4/2005
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Leave the parents alone

In his recent State of the State address, Gov. Mike Easley, speaking on the need to improve education in North Carolina, talked about better teachers, smaller classroom sizes, and more funding—as court ordered—of poorer school districts.

So far so good.

But then Easley did something that politicians love to do when they’re feelin’ too much heat.

They pass the buck.

In this case, the governor starts whining about parents and how they have to do more for their kids.

Well, Gov. Easley, before you ever utter such vile nonsense again, maybe you should break your sorry record and bring yourself to the African-American community and see for yourself.

Read More...
http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/article/article.asp?NewsID=54507&sID=34

[Staff]

AFRICAN AMERICANS IN NC STILL FACE ''STARK'' DISPARITIES, WEEK OF JULY 1-JULY 7, 2004

In a report unprecedented in scope, the N.C. Center for Public Policy Research examines racial disparities across a broad range of indicators and finds North Carolina minorities trail whites in education, economic well-being, housing, voter participation, Internet access, health, and criminal justice.

....... Excerpt

Education Outcomes
The first area where the Center found disparities is education. On North Carolina’s end-of-grade tests, nearly nine out of 10 white students (89 percent) score at or above grade level in both reading and math for grades three through eight. That compares to 72 percent of Native Americans, 70 percent of Hispanic students, and 67 percent of African American students.

Asian students’ performance ranks second highest behind whites at 87 percent.

African-Americans are underrepresented in classes for gifted students and among students who take advanced placement classes. By contrast, African Americans are more likely to be identified as needing special education, particularly in the more subjective categories such as behaviorally or emotionally disabled or mentally disabled. Indeed, North Carolina labels a higher percentage of African-American students as mentally disabled than do any of its neighboring states.

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http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/article/article.asp?NewsID=45523&sID=4

[Staff]

OUR VOICE, WHERE DO THE FOUL MOUTH TEACHERS GO?, WEEK OF MARCH 10-16, 2005
by EDITORIAL STAFF
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 3/11/2005
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Talk about a double-cross. In truth, we should have seen it coming. After school board member Dorothy DeShields, the superintendent and the school system staff made it clear last month that setting up a bad boys warehouse called a “success school” was a stupid idea (because putting misbehaving elementary and secondary students under one roof does not straighten them out), the hardheads on the board, led by former chair Steve Bilzi, decided they weren’t going to let common sense back them down.

Read more...
http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/Article/Article.asp?NewsID=54793&sID=34

[Staff]

NC CHILDREN TO SUFFER UNDER BUSH, GROUP SAYS, WEEK OF MARCH 10-16, 2005
by CASH MICHAELS
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 3/13/2005
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If President Bush’s proposed budget cuts, being taken up this week by the House and Senate Budget committees, are adopted by Congress, the children of North Carolina will suffer, charges a statewide child advocacy group.

In an op-ed piece being circulated this week titled “We Promise Our Children More,” Barbara Bradley, executive director of the nonprofit/nonpartisan NC Child Advocacy Center in Raleigh, warns that proposed federal budget cuts over the next decade to social programs and services that specifically address the needs of children will hurt North Carolina.

“If the administration’s budget is adopted, children in North Carolina will grow up without the medical care they need, fewer children will be in childcare, and, fewer will receive early literacy help - all burdening we taxpayers more in lost revenues and increased expenses that it would ever have cost to provide the diagnoses, the treatments, and, most important of all, the preventive measures that they need right now,” Bradley writes.

Excerpt...

“ Unsupervised children are not safe. Eighty percent of incarcerated men never graduated from high school. Young people without vocational and technical skills may become adults who are unproductive or unemployable, wasting much more in lost earnings, unpaid taxes, and public assistance than it could ever have cost to provide them with skills when they were young.”
“Make your voice heard,” Bradley urges. “The investments in children being cut from the federal budget will hurt children, families and businesses in North Carolina. It is up to us to make certain our legislators know we want North Carolina to be the best state in which to be a child and in which to rear a child.”

Defenders of the Bush budget say it reduces or eliminates services that are duplicated or that the states could do a better job of. They also point to programs like Headstart, which the administration says it increased funding to.

http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/news/Article/Article.asp?NewsID=54836&sID=4

[Staff]

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http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/images/Blank.gifBlack Republicans Remain an Anomaly – Even in Own Families
by Hazel Trice Edney Originally posted 9/15/2004
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WASHINGTON (NNPA) – No one can ever accuse Clarence Sailor and his wife, Rev. Deanna M. Petit-Sailor, of fitting the typical stereotype.

A staunch Republican and former president of the Republican Women’s Forum of Detroit, Petit-Sailor is an avid supporter of affirmative action. Her husband, a retired union man of 30 years from the Ford Motor Co. and faithful Democrat, argues against affirmative action.

The Detroit couple is not a pairing one finds every day.

http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/article/article.asp?NewsID=3447&sID=3

[Staff]

WEALTH DOES NOT PROTECT YOUNG MILLIONAIRE FROM RACISM, WEEK OF MARCH 3-9, 2005
by HAZEL TRICE EDNEY
WASHINGTON CORRESPONDENT FOR NNPA
Originally posted 3/4/2005
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LAS VEGAS (NNPA) – When millionaire author and young businessman Farrah Gray sits in the first class section of an airplane, flight attendants sometimes question whether he should be in coach. And, like other Black males, police have stopped him for no justifiable reason.

Excerpt....

nothing could stop young Farrah’s perseverance.

At 7, he carried a lunch box for a brief case and a business card that read, “21st Century CEO.” At 8, he started UNEEC, Urban Neighborhood Economic Enterprise Club, a group of 8 to 12-year-old friends in the inner city who talked about how to get out of poverty by entrepreneurship and even inviting business professionals to talk to them.

After his family moved to Las Vegas from Chicago, he reached millions of people as a 10-year-old co-host of a radio show, “Backstage Live,” that featured interviews with visiting celebrities. At 13, he founded NE2W U.S.A. (New Early Entrepreneur Wonders University Student & Alumni) Capital Search Fund. Headquartered on Wall Street, he raised a million dollars for the fund and opened up his Wall Street office, from which he has helped to finance the business futures for at least 800 young entrepreneurs.

He became a millionaire at 14 after his business, Farr-Out Foods, a specialty foods company targeting youth, hit sales of $1 million. At 15, he sold the business for approximately $1.5 million dollars in order to pursue other endeavors such as real estate investments and the purchase of “innercity,” a youth-oriented magazine with a circulation of 300,000.

At 20, he is a real estate investor and the youngest member on the board of directors of the National Association of Real Estate Brokers, Inc.

http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/article/article.asp?NewsID=54508&sID=33

[Staff]

EDITORIALS http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/images/Blank.gif
THE AFRICAN AMERICAN COMMUNITY TOLD THE SCHOOL BOARD LAST YEAR THAT TWO-WAY BUSING IS A MUST IN NEW HANOVER COUNTY.

OUR VOICE, NO SCHOOLS, NO VOTES, WEEK OF JANUARY 13-19, 2005
by EDITORIAL STAFF
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 1/14/2005
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It’s a funny thing when you know that you’re being ignored by people you’re speaking to.

You don’t like it one bit, and you absolutely want them to know about it.

Take for instance what happened exactly a year ago. Wilmington’s Black community jammed a public forum at Town Hall to tell members of the New Hanover County Board of Education that the four redistricting plans they were contemplating were completely unacceptable, not to mention unfair.

Each of those plans, if implemented, would have made five or more “neighborhood” elementary schools majority Black.

As our January 22 editorial titled “For Our Kids, Not Good Enough”, stated, “That’s a sure recipe for the racial resegregation of the entire NHC Public School System, with White children enjoying the newer suburban schools out in the boondocks, while our children toil away in substandard, crumbling inner-city schools with some second-rate teachers and administrators.”

That editorial noted that our African-American parents, beyond all else, wanted the very best education for their children, and expected the school system to provide every inch of it in the fairest way possible.

According to that Journal editorial, those Black parents made clear what they wanted.

“Build new schools in the inner city; recruit and hire quality teachers, especially African-American and Hispanic; establish two-way busing so that White students can be brought in greater numbers into the inner city, while Black students are being shipped out; addressing situations like Carolina and Wrightsville Beach schools which remain mostly White; increase school busing so that the entire county carries the burden regardless of the costs; make no changes at Lakeside School; renovate and reactivate the old Williston School; keep Johnson Elementary School year-round and expand year-round schools to the middle grades; establish more diversity in the teaching and administrative ranks; and teach more reading and comprehension.

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http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/article/article.asp?NewsID=52539&sID=34

[Staff]

OUR VOICE, BEYOND THE OUTRAGEOUS GANG, WEEK OF MARCH 31-APRIL 6, 2005
by EDITORIAL STAFF
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 4/2/2005
Let’s be blunt.

Our state lawmakers aren’t just drunk with power.

They’re drunk…period! They’d have to be drinking to try and get away with some of the dumbest, most stupid stuff that’s been reported in the press about their la-de-da antics.

Stupid stuff involving tens of millions of dollars.

To be more specific, taxpayers’ dollars.

To be even MORE specific, YOUR money!

Let’s see, where do we begin?

House Speaker Jim Black, former GOP House Co-Speaker Richard Morgan, and Senate President pro-tem Marc Basnight—all controlling around $30 million of a secret so-called political slush fund to throw money…make that YOUR money… around to various special interests in their districts, to places and projects that the General Assembly as a whole knew little or nothing about.

Read more...
http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/Article/Article.asp?NewsID=55591&sID=34

[Staff]

by BERNICE POWELL JACKSON
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 4/2/2005
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Because education was denied to slaves, African Americans for generations treasured education. Indeed, during slavery just teaching blacks to read was illegal in many Southern states.

Thus, soon after the end of the Civil War, not only were schools established for African Americans, but churches and any other available spaces were used for literacy programs. Black colleges were founded and many families sacrificed greatly so that their children might attend because they realized that education or sports were the only tickets out of poverty and oppression for their children.

So it is very disturbing that today, in the 21st century, in this information age, many African American, Latino and Native American students are dropping out of high school at alarming rates.

Indeed, according to a recent study done by The Civil Rights Project of Harvard University, many urban high schools have become “dropout factories” that send “hundreds of students off a figurative cliff” each year.

Read more...
http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/article/article.asp?NewsID=55588&sID=16

[Staff]

STATE BRIEFS, WEEK OF MARCH 31-APRIL 6, 2005
by COMPILED BY CASH MICHAELS
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 4/2/2005
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GREENSBORO] First the U.S. Census shocked everyone when it was reported that Black women earn more money than their White counterparts. Now the Census shows that Black women in North Carolina are having fewer babies than White women. According to Census figures the birthrate for Black women was 22 percent less between 1990 and 2000. The drop was especially sharp in Black teens, many of whom have decided not to become pregnant in order to have good careers.

Human Relations Commission to hear school gripes

DURHAM] The trust between the African-American community and the Durham School Board has fallen so low that Black parents now want the Durham Human Relations Commission to hear their grievances regarding school suspensions. Larry Holt, commission chair, says there needs to be an independent body in this situation that can work towards some solutions. The commission would approach the Durham School Board with a problem only if there is evidence of a pattern.

Read more...
http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/article/article.asp?NewsID=55577&sID=14

[Staff]

by CASH MICHAELS
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 4/8/2005
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In an effort to either slow down or stop altogether the New Hanover County Board of Education’s drive to establish so-called “success school” centers for behaviorally challenged children, state Rep. Thomas Wright [D-New Hanover] has introduced a bill requiring the school board to study what success schools actually are before implementing its plan.

No success schools can begin until the school board completes its study, the bill mandates.

Wright’s bill is the latest salvo in what is shaping up to be a full-scale war between the African-American community and the school board over the alternative schools issue.

A majority of the board believes that success school centers are necessary for teachers to be allowed to transfer students to who are deemed disruptive. They say the move is better than suspension, and the students can get the counseling and focus they need in an atmosphere developed for them.

Read more...
http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/article/article.asp?NewsID=55825&sID=4

[Staff]

Urban League: Progress Slows
by Hazel Trice Edney
NNPA, Washington Correspondent
Originally posted 4/4/2005
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WASHINGTON (NNPA) – Despite civil rights gains since the 1960s, socio-economic progress in Black America appears to be on a “blackslide,” National Urban League President and CEO Marc Morial said in remarks delivered Thursday to coincide with the annual release of the organization’s annual State of Black America report this week.

“We see that when it comes to the unemployment rate between Black America and White America, the gap grows wider. When it comes to the number of long-term unemployed African-Americans, the gap grows wider. And when it comes to African-American families building wealth and savings, the gap grows wider still. And as this gap grows wider and the road grows longer, we see that 40 years later we are in danger of erasing all the gains we have made thus far,” says Morial. “I’ve come to think of this danger as the Great Blackslide.”
The annual Black progress report, first issued in 1976 under then Executive Secretary Vernon Jordan, paints a grim picture:

Read more...
http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/article/article.asp?NewsID=3979&sID=3

[Staff]

MARCH JOBLESS RATE FOR AFRICAN AMERICANS HITS AN ASTONISHING 10.3 PERCENT, WEEK OF APRIL 7-13, 2005
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 4/8/2005
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WASHINGTON, D.C. - U.S. Representative Melvin Watt (D-NC), chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus (CBC), this week released the following statement regarding the March unemployment figures announced this morning by the U.S. Department of Labor:

“African American unemployment is an astonishing 10.3 percent, compared to 4.4 percent for White Americans, according to unemployment numbers released this week by the U.S. Department of Labor. Such a huge gap once again shows that African Americans lag woefully behind White Americans in jobs and employment opportunity. This, unfortunately, impacts on all aspects of life and widens the disparities gap for African Americans in health care, retirement security, education, employment security and wealth building.

Read more...
http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/article/article.asp?NewsID=55814&sID=33

[Staff]

A Tale of Two Cities
By: Ralph Matthews
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Endangered Species
By: Clint Wilson, Sr.
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More History Comics
http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/history/historycomics.asp?sid=95

[Staff]

This is a really cool feature of this online site. Historical archives with a drop down box for different eras. -Christine


http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/images/History/Timeline_LeftHeader.gif http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/images/History/Timeline_RightHeader.gif http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/images/Blank.gif
WWII Era http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/images/Blank.gif
THE DOUBLE V (PT. II) George Schuyler's Commentary
Originally posted 2/21/2001
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Editor’s Note: The following are excerpts from a commentary by Pittsburgh Courier columnist George Schuyler. The iconoclast was the foremost Black columnist of the 1930s and 1940s and one of the paper's editorial writers. Author Frederick S. Voss described Schuyler's style as "a blend of colorful terminology, unmincing frankness, and a sometimes-withering wit." These attributes are on display in the following column, with some spelling changes and editing. It printed in The Courier on January 10, 1942.


With sadness and resignation I note that many supposedly intelligent Negroes are swallowing hook, line and sinker the same bush-wah at which their fathers snapped during World War I. To wit: that once victory is achieved, the Colored brethren as a reward for their patriotic efforts and sacrifices will be promptly invested with all the rights and privileges of citizenship now denied them wherever Homo Nordicus rules.....

It is not surprising that so many so-called educated Negroes of the thousandaire... http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/images/PageElements/MoreButton.gif (http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/History/TimelineArticle.asp?NewsID=102&sID=96)

Use the drop down box to choose an era fromthe history of Black Press.

http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/history/TimeLineMain.asp?sID=96&Era=227
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Abolitionist Era (1829 - 1865)Post-Civil War Era (1866 - 1891)Turn of the Century (1892 - 1918)Harlem renaissance (1919 - 1928)Depression Era (1929 - 1939)World War II (1939 - 1945)Civil Rights Era (1946 - 1973)Modern Era (1974 - Present)

[Staff]

The Next Pope Could be Black or Hispanic
by George E. Curry
NNPA, Editor-in-Chief
Originally posted 4/4/2005
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NEWS ANALYSIS


WASHINGTON (NNPA) – Profound demographic changes in the Catholic church could open the door for a Black or Hispanic to succeed Pope John Paul II, church authorities say.

The clear front-runner among Blacks is Cardinal Francis Arinze of Nigeria. Until his recent appointment as prefect of the Vatican’s Congregation for Divine Worship, Cardinal Arinze had served as president of the Pontifical Council for Inter-religious Dialogue. He was consecrated as bishop in 1965 at the age of 32.

Morley Safer, in an interview Sunday on “60 Minutes,” raised the possibility of mass defections among White Americans and Europeans if a Black were elected pope.

Father Thomas J. Reese, author of “Inside the Vatican,” scoffed at that notion.

“If someone is going to leave the church because we have a Black pope, in my opinion, they should have left the church years ago,” Reese stated on “60 Minutes.

Read more...
http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/article/article.asp?NewsID=3980&sID=3

[Staff]

FIGHTING TO SAVE BLACK YOUTH: TRIANGLE COMMUNITY UNITES TO SOLVE GROWING PROBLEM, WEEK OF APRIL 14-20, 2005
by CASH MICHAELS
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 4/15/2005
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“Clearly there is a problem, and clearly, our current policies and our family and community support systems need open and honest dialogue. Together, hopefully, the development of a sound, proactive and strategically significant plan of action can be developed.”—Statement from the Lost Generation Community Task Force

On one end there is family dysfunction amid neighborhoods fraught with rampant poverty, drugs and crime.

On the other end, a criminal justice system that sees “justice” through the biased lens of race.

And in the middle -– troubled Black youth.

Most African American youth are working hard at their studies and their futures. Indeed a recent U.S. Census study showed Black teenage pregnancy taking a steep 25% drop between 1990 and 2000, primarily because more Black female students say they want good careers, and having children before they’re ready would only hinder that.

But statistics show that far too many Black young people are struggling to survive, and many are turning to the streets, gangs and ultimately crime to make up for what they can’t find elsewhere.

Read more...
http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/Article/Article.asp?NewsID=56124&sID=4

[Staff]

OUR VOICE, GUEST EDITORIAL, ''TWO WRONGS DO NOT MAKE IT RIGHT'', WEEK OF APRIL 28-MAY 4, 2005
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 4/30/2005
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BY ATTY. JERMAINE A. WYRICK

A whirlwind of controversy began when a videotape was released depicting the handcuffing of a five-year old African-American girl at her school by law enforcement officials after she was engaged in disobedient and mischievous behavior. The public outcry led to an investigation as to whether the law enforcement officials exercised bad judgment or conversely acted appropriately.

Was she treated fairly? As with any five-year old, she was small, dwarfed in size, outnumbered and outgunned by three law enforcement officials.

Factually, she was sitting in a chair and calmed down when the three sheriffs arrived. The sheriffs forcibly stood her up, pinned her hands behind her back, put handcuffs on her as she screamed, No, and cried. The scene was videotaped as part of a classroom self-improvement exercise. Before the sheriffs arrived she tore papers off a bulletin board and punched an assistant principal.

Her temper tantrum was caused by her jelly beans being taken from her. What is appalling is the actions demonstrate perhaps one of society’s most pernicious evils - racism. A salient issue is whether a five-year old Caucasian girl would have been treated the same way. Further, her behavior has been characterized as disruptive, reckless, and violent. How can a five-year old child who does not even have a weapon be violent? When she tried to hit her principal, her arms were too short to reach her which precluded her from causing any harm. Moreover, five-year olds do not even know what the word reckless means.

Read more...
http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/Article/Article.asp?NewsID=56645&sID=34

[Staff]

YOUR VOICE, ''ALL AFRICAN-AMERICAN STUDENTS AND PARENTS LISTEN UP, PLEASE, WEEK OF APRIL 28-MAY 4, 2005
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 4/30/2005
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It is very important that students do not get discouraged. It is imperative that students do not listen to negative advice, which tells them they are not college material or they do not have the ability to go to college.

It is also necessary to finish high school and get a diploma. Do not let anyone tell you otherwise. If you do not have a diploma, please get a GED. Education is vital in your career choices and your life.

Be prepared also for cultural changes.

One must learn Spanish as a second language. Do not let this slip by you as a Black person. The Hispanic population is demanding that you do so. If you cannot speak the language, be able to write and read it. It will make a difference for you in general.

Parents, you must be involved. You are the parents. Guide them before others give them advice in the wrong direction or advise them on the wrong career goals. Some people do not care what goals your child has. Do not fool yourselves - color still is an issue.

Build up our Black universities and colleges. Stop adding to criticism. We have excellent facilities and fine instructors. Support Shaw, Johnson C. Smith, Fayetteville State and other Black universities. Encourage scholarships, fundraising etc. Direct the path of our children and stop letting “boards” determine the fate of our “intelligent young people”.

Teach them to become whatever they desire: doctors, pharmacists, chemists, judges, nurses, directors, business owners, publishers, etc. They are, and can be, the best.

Lola James
Wilmington

http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/article/article.asp?NewsID=56646&sID=35

[Staff]

THOUGHTS FOR SUCCESS, ''THE TRUTH ABOUT SUCCESS'', WEEK OF APRIL 21-27, 2005
by HERBERT HARRIS
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 4/25/2005
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Success is generally defined as a favorable or satisfactory outcome or result. Whatever you do in your life, you get results. Whether or not those results are the ones you desired, is basically whether you succeeded or failed in your endeavors. Success is often defined as the gaining of wealth, fame, rank and so on. However, in the most general terms, success is the the continuous realization of the outcomes or results you desire.

On the physical level, success is often seen as specific material accomplishments—a particular type of car, home, status, or income level.

However, once the car, home or other material possessions are obtained, there is no further growth in understanding, wisdom, or consciousness. Those who operate on this material level of success generally become consumed with maintaining those possessions that represent their success.

When success is understood on a spiritual level, it is seen as a progressive realization of a worthwhile purpose. You continue to grow and develop in all aspects. On a spiritual level, success is the continuous unfolding of your purpose and destiny.

True success is the progressive, continuous effort of attaining your goals and realizing your vision. This guides you to your worthwhile purpose in life.

Success Must Be In Your Mind First

Success starts in your own mind. Constantly have a concept and vision in your mind of what success means to you.

“You become what you think about most of the time.” —Earl Nightingale

Be Constant In Your Efforts

Never take a break from your success journey. Do not stop for rest and reward too soon. When you stop at the first sign of success, you become stagnant, lazy, and begin to decline.

As your efforts begin to produce rewards and results, work even harder.

Success and achievement come only through continuous work. The only place that success comes before work is in the dictionary.

Get Away From The Crowd At The Bottom

One of the most difficult steps you will face on your success journey is getting away from the crowd at the bottom. There are many unsuccessful, mediocre people who have failed to recognize, or act on their true potential. If you constantly associate with them, your success journey will be short-lived. You must clear the deck to make room for new associations which will complement and enhance your success efforts.

Once you break away from the mediocre crowd, accept the temporary state of loneliness and prepare for your success.

http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/article/article.asp?NewsID=56466&sID=20

[Staff]

THE SCOURGE OF BLACK POVERTY, WEEK OF APRIL 28-MAY 4, 2005
by RON WALTERS
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 4/30/2005
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Until recently, I had never heard of the latest disease now ravaging Angola in West Africa, called ‘’Marburg.’’

Something like the dreaded Ebola virus or HIV/AIDS, it spreads through the transmission of body fluids and has killed 235 people in that country. That his why international health officials have raced into Angola to attempt to cut it off from spreading, since the virus builds and builds in the body even after killing the person. It has been called a virtual ‘’time-bomb.’’

The more you hear about these diseases that appear to have the capacity to wipe out large sectors of the African population, it seems that they all have one basic root - they breed in areas where there is little modern education and where gut-wrenching poverty is the way of life. Yet, it does not appear that reducing global poverty has the same urgency in this country as making war.

For example, it was recently reported that the world’s riches nations, the G-8, failed to reach an agreement on how to erase $40 billion of so-called ‘’debt’’ from the world’s poorest nations. I say so-called because the very idea of there being an African debt to the United States or Europe is a laughable proposition: Black people sitting in America have not been paid for the hundreds of year of slavery they endured, and African countries have not been reimbursed for the theft of natural and human resources that European took from that Continent.

In any case, while Britain has proposed doubling economic assistance to Africa and has begun to pay off 10 percent of the debt of 22 of the poorest countries, the United States has put forth a very different plan opposed by the European countries and the World Bank. The U.S. proposed reducing the debt, while at the same time reducing the money available for low interest loans to poor countries. In other words, it doesn’t want to come out a net loser in the deal, so it pays for reducing the debt of poor countries with the money it contributes for the development.

The Bush administration just doesn’t get it. It is difficult to make real progress with respect to a number of social problems unless you are able to deal effectively with poverty. In this country, for example, we expect excellent educational performance in areas that are racked by poverty, really expecting the school - a community institution - to perform in ways different from the environment in which it exists. While some schools do, they are the exception. The same thought exists with respect to HIV/AIDS, originally a problem of homosexual males that has become heterosexually transmitted in the context of poor, drug infested communities.
Read more...
http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/article/article.asp?NewsID=56648&sID=16

[Staff]

WRIGHT'S ''SUCCESS CENTER'' BILL TOUGHENED, WEEK OF MAY 5-11, 2005
by CASH MICHAELS
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 5/8/2005
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REP. THOMAS WRIGHT
http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/images/Blank.gif A tough House bill designed to make it difficult for the New Hanover County School Board to establish alternative “success” schools for behaviorally challenged students, has just gotten tougher.

Filed this week, the Alternative Learning Pro-gram/School Proposals (House Bill 1076) measure, formerly known as Study Success Centers/New Han-over Schools, is a proposed House Education Committee substitute for two previously filed measures addressing the issue by Rep. Thomas Wright [D-New Hanover].

Wright’s original two bills – HB1034 and 1076 –required the New Hanover County Board of Education to only “study” success centers “before implementing them in New Hanover County schools.”

But the third version broadens the issue beyond New Hanover County, and instead of the NHC School Board, “directs the State Board of Education to adopt standards for alternative learning programs, and to require local boards of education to develop proposals that are submitted to the State Board of Education before establishing any alternative learning program or alternative school.”

The bill then makes making “developing standards for Alternative Learning Pro-grams “statutorily part of an amended “Powers and duties of the [State] Board [of Education] generally.”

Excerpt...
With Rep. Wright one of Speaker Jim Black most loyal lieutenants, there is also little doubt that the speaker can now get behind this new bill with full authority to push for passage.

That could happen as early as next week if it is indeed voted out of the House Education Committee favorably.

If ultimately passed and made law by the General Assembly, the NHC School Board would have to do much more than it originally intended to ensure that success school centers did not become warehouses for unruly children, as many parents fear.

With Rep. Wright one of Speaker Jim Black most loyal lieutenants, there is also little doubt that the speaker can now get behind this new bill with full authority to push for passage.

That could happen as early as next week if it is indeed voted out of the House Education Committee favorably.

If ultimately passed and made law by the General Assembly, the NHC School Board would have to do much more than it originally intended to ensure that success school centers did not become warehouses for unruly children, as many parents fear.

Read more...
http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/Article/Article.asp?NewsID=56910&sID=4

[Staff]

OUR VOICE, VOTE ''NO'' ON THE $123 MILLION NHC PUBLIC SCHOOL BONDS''; VOTE ''YES'' ON THE $27 MILLION CAPE FEAR COMMUNITY COLLEGE BONDS''; HAPPY MOTHER'S DAY, WEEK OF MAY 5-11, 2005
by EDITORIAL STAFF
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 5/8/2005
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VOTE ''NO''

As badly as we need new schools in the African-American community, we must recommend an emphatic “no” when it comes to voting on this $123 million boondoggle on the May 10th ballot, and we’ll tell you why.

Because the black community isn’t getting any new schools from the New Hanover County School Board through this high-priced bond referendum.

You read right – if you vote “yes” for this insult, you might as well drive out to the suburbs with a hammer and nails, and start building the schools yourself, because Lord knows you’ll be paying for them.

Oh, you didn’t see the part on the sample ballot which says, “…and a tax to be levied for the payment thereof…”
The fact of the matter is new elementary and middle schools slated for construction, will be constructed for someone other than our children.
That means black children will be the ones carrying the burden of bringing some much needed color to these lily white enclaves that you are going to be paying for, when they are bused from their inner city communities daily.

Read more...
http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/Article/Article.asp?NewsID=56900&sID=34

[Staff]

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by Christopher Wall
NNPA Special Contributor
Originally posted 4/25/2005
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WASHINGTON (NNPA) --The Howard University School of Law Moot Court Trial Team participated in the American Bar Association Criminal Justice and John Marshall Law School competition and placed first in the event, the first Black college to do so.

“The confidence that we had in ourselves created a command in the courtroom like no other,” Errick Simmons said, team captain and third year law student.

“We submitted a declaration of interest last summer,” Simmons said. “The national committee selects teams based on prior success records.”

Eight weeks prior to the competition, each team is given a fact pattern written by a problem drafter who is also one of the judges in the final round. The fact patterns are based on real life cases with the parties and witnesses changed.

Excerpt...
“There is a true sign that after the passing of Johnny L. Cochran, Jr. on the same week of the national win of Black law students, that it was revealed and assured that there’s hope in the African-American Black lawyer for years to come,” Simmons said. “The torch has been passed from the old to the new underrepresented.”

http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/Article/Article.asp?NewsID=4073&sID=3

[Staff]

RACE AND THE RUNAWAY BRIDE, WEEK OF MAY 5-11, 2005
by GEORGE CURRY
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 5/8/2005
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A hoax by a runway bride is not a topic I would normally address.

Excerpt...
As these end-of-the-world issues were being debated over the past two weeks, there was one aspect of the saga that grabbed my attention. Before acknowledging that she had made up the tale, Wilbanks claimed that she had been abducted and forced into a blue van by a Hispanic man and White woman.

When I heard the Hispanic angle my mind flashed back to numerous hoaxes in which to gain public sympathy, a White woman said to have been abused or raped by a Black male. At least, Wilbanks took a different route by claiming this mystery man was Hispanic. In either case, the point is the same: introduce race or ethnicity into any case with sexual overtones, and the story will get around-the-clock coverage in the national media.

In 1989, Boston businessman Charles Stuart murdered his wife for life insurance and tried to cover it up by alleging that a Black man had killed his pregnant wife. Hundreds of Black men were questioned by police. Stuart committed suicide the following year and it was only then that the truth came out.

Susan Smith also knew the power of introducing the element of race into a case. She claimed a Black man wearing a skullcap had carjacked her car in South Carolina, driving off with her two infant sons. She tearfully pleaded for their return on national TV. She later tearfully admitted that she had strapped her two sons into the car and plunged it into a nearby lake.

There have been many lesser-known cases in which the race card was played to establish credibility.

Read more...
http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/article/article.asp?NewsID=56906&sID=16

[Staff]

YOUR VOICE, AN OPEN LETTER TO THE CITIZENS OF THE INNER CITY'', WEEK OF MAY 5-11, 2005
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 5/8/2005
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Recent events in and around Wilmington have become an alarming wake-up call to the Black community. At some point the Wilmington Police Department decided to no longer provide police escorts for funeral services. The Sheriff of New Hanover County, Sid Causey, responded to this need and has allowed his department to fill this void.

This arrangement, in the beginning, benefited the entire Wilmington community. Somehow, as things always seem to happen in Wilmington lately, the African-American community has largely, if not altogether, been ignored. As one bereaved family noted, “every time there is a funeral at that large church at Third and Market streets, there’s always a bunch of police cars there.”

Quietly, but just as effectively, the Register of Deeds office has been eliminating African-Americans from positions. Rebecca Tucker has all but purged her office of anyone that remotely looks like or has the same interests as you and I. This department is responsible for safeguarding the most precious documents to the Black community living the American dream, the deeds to home ownership.

Fortunately, at the appropriate time, we as a community can send a very loud message to both of these individuals at the polls since an elected office is a privilege that can be revoked.

Read more...
http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/article/article.asp?NewsID=56902&sID=35

[Staff]

ANTI-SUCCESS CENTER BILL CLEARS COMMITTEE, WEEK OF MAY 12-18, 2005
by CASH MICHAELS
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 5/14/2005
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EXCLUSIVE

After a hearing and some debate, the House Education Committee Tuesday voted out House Bill 1076, The Alternative Learning Program/School Proposals measure that establishes statewide mandatory standards for local school systems to follow before they implement alternative, or so-called “success” schools, for behaviorally challenged students in their districts.

That means the bill, which started out as a local measure sponsored by New Hanover House Rep. Thomas Wright to impede the NHC School Board’s efforts to recklessly develop what some critics call “warehouses for black children,” is ready for a floor vote as early as next week.

In an exclusive interview with The Wilmington Journal, Dorothy DeShields, the New Hanover School Board’s only African-American and the only member to vote “no” when the board hastily approved a success school plan weeks ago, told why she testified before the House Education Committee, at Rep. Wright’s request, as an “expert” in support of the bill.

“Our school administrators and superintendent say they have at least 20 strategies to address the needs of these students in their schools,” DeShields said.

Read more...
http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/Article/Article.asp?NewsID=57172&sID=4

[Staff]

OUR VOICE, NO REASON TO QUIT, WEEK OF MAY 12-18, 2005
by EDITORIAL STAFF
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 5/14/2005
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Last week this newspaper recommended that voters oppose the $123 million school construction bond the New Hanover County Public School Board was pushing, because of its inequitable treatment of the African-American community and our children.

That bond measure passed.

This editorial page also urged voters last week to fully support the $27 million capital improvement bonds for Cape Fear Community College. Given how CFCC has proven to be a vital resource in the ongoing education and skills development for so many in our community, we felt the referendum was a worthy investment in the future of our county and its citizenry.

Unfortunately, that bond measure failed.

We had hoped for two different outcomes.
But let’s be clear - in no way are the people defeated. True, the developers, thanks to the School Board, will now have free rein to build as many suburban schools in lily white neighborhoods as they want, meaning that our inner city children will probably never see another new school in their community again, but will now have to travel longer distances just to give somebody else’s campus a little more color.

Read more...
http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/Article/Article.asp?NewsID=57173&sID=34

[Staff]

REDUCING HEALTH DISPARITIES IN CHILDREN, WEEK OF MAY 12-18, 2005
by MARIAN WRIGHT EDELMAN
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 5/14/2005
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Seven years after the government set national goals to eliminate health disparities by 2010 in its Healthy People 2010 campaign, the continuing disproportionately high rates of illness and death experienced by minorities and the poor, including children, are still a major obstacle to improving the nation’s health.

Many of the conditions that are more likely to affect minority and poor children, such as lead poisoning, can hurt their cognitive and physical development and affect them throughout their lives. Because of the long-lasting impact of childhood environmental conditions, reducing health disparities among children is key to improving not only the well-being of all children but the nation as a whole.

Read more...
http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/article/article.asp?NewsID=57187&sID=16

[Staff]

DOT ''NOOSE'' TRIAL: SEEING THROUGH THE STATE'S DEFENSE, WEEK OF MAY 12-18, 2005
by CASH MICHAELS
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 5/14/2005
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For lawyers defending the NC Department of Transportation against a civil rights lawsuit in federal court this week, the question boiled down to “What noose, and what complaint?”

The looped rope a white NCDOT maintenance worker put up over his work station – of which pictures and even a videotape was taken of - was actually a “tool” used to snake hydraulic lines in vehicles, the defense maintained, not a “noose” as two of the black plaintiffs testified to on Tuesday.

Besides, none of the seven black NCDOT maintenance employees at the Beryl Road depot in Raleigh who filed suit against the state agency ever complained to DOT management about it, despite four NCDOT investigations, the defense told jurors in the civil rights trial which began in Raleigh this week.

But Alan McSurely, the attorney for the seven black plaintiffs in the DOT-7 “Hangman’s Noose” case, countered that Norman Powell, the white employee who allegedly hung up the noose for the whole month of February, and part of March 2002, did so because he despised Black History Month, and wanted to send a message of racial intimidation to his black coworkers.

In fact, black plaintiffs allege that Powell, in a meeting with white and black coworkers after the noose was hung, uttered that “We need to go back to the way things used to be and tie them up and hang them like my father did.”

It was a hangman’s noose that several NCDOT managers and supervisors saw but did nothing about, McSurely maintained to jurors this week, and officials at NCDOT engaged in a coverup the moment the plaintiffs complained to an outside investigative agency.

So who’s right?

Read more...

http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/Article/Article.asp?NewsID=57171&sID=4

[Staff]

ANTI-SUCCESS CENTER BILL CLEARS COMMITTEE, WEEK OF MAY 12-18, 2005
by CASH MICHAELS
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 5/14/2005
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EXCLUSIVE

After a hearing and some debate, the House Education Committee Tuesday voted out House Bill 1076, The Alternative Learning Program/School Proposals measure that establishes statewide mandatory standards for local school systems to follow before they implement alternative, or so-called “success” schools, for behaviorally challenged students in their districts.

That means the bill, which started out as a local measure sponsored by New Hanover House Rep. Thomas Wright to impede the NHC School Board’s efforts to recklessly develop what some critics call “warehouses for black children,” is ready for a floor vote as early as next week.

In an exclusive interview with The Wilmington Journal, Dorothy DeShields, the New Hanover School Board’s only African-American and the only member to vote “no” when the board hastily approved a success school plan weeks ago, told why she testified before the House Education Committee, at Rep. Wright’s request, as an “expert” in support of the bill.

“Our school administrators and superintendent say they have at least 20 strategies to address the needs of these students in their schools,” DeShields said.

As a veteran educator with over 30 years experience – 17 as principal of the Gregory School of Science and Math where she directly dealt with the issue – DeShields says her experience has convinced her that addressing abhorrent student behavior in their school, and not somewhere else, has definitively proven to be more effective.

DeShields says she shared that with her colleagues on the School Board, hoping to slow them down so that they would realize that there was more to alternative schooling that just establishing a building and shipping kids off there.

Read more...
http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/Article/Article.asp?NewsID=57172&sID=4

[Staff]

WHERE ARE THE LEADERS?, WEEK OF AUGUST 11-17, 2005
by MARIAN WRIGHT EDELMAN
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 8/12/2005
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A lot of people spend a lot of time slamming young people. Many ask: Where are the new young leaders? When are young people going to think about and do something for somebody other than themselves?

Well, I want to turn that question about young people back to the adults.

Where are the adults who are mentoring and providing visible and sustained examples of doing something for somebody other than themselves? What lessons are we teaching the next generation about what is important through our lifestyles? Are we showing them by our lives that it is important to get as much as we can for ourselves�the biggest car, house and flashiest clothes�or to share as much as we can with those left behind? Are we standing up for children and young people when those in power assault their health and education and after-school funding, or are we mute when those who are supposed to educate them, provide them care, or rescue them from neglectful and abusive families also neglect, abuse and mis-educate them?

Are we protesting against the younger and younger criminalization of children when our school officials call in police to arrest 5-, 8-, and 10-year-old children for behavior that used to be handled in the principal�s office?

Too many of our young people are going off to juvenile detention and prison because too many adults in our homes, schools, congregations, communities, and political life do not provide them enough love, attention, positive examples, and alternatives to withstand the lures of drugs and gangs and fail to provide them the emotional supports they are desperately seeking.

Despite so much adult abandonment, many children and youths are still struggling to beat the odds and are succeeding. The Children�s Defense Fund (CDF) and local groups celebrate a small percentage of them in 10 cities each year. Many of these youths have gone on to become teachers, lawyers, doctors, and good parents despite prior homelessness, abuse, incarcerated parents, substance abuse, and low expectations by many responsible for guiding them. A lot of former Beat the Odds� scholarship winners are in college and are getting supplemental training through various CDF youth development networks which empower them to reach back, teach, and mentor younger children and show them by example that they can make a difference despite the challenges they face daily.

Read more...
http://www.wilmingtonjournal.com/News/article/article.asp?NewsID=60470&sID=16

[Staff]

OUR VOICE, ''REPARATIONS NEED DUAL APPROACH'', WEEK OF JULY 21-27, 2005
by EDITORIAL STAFF
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 7/25/2005
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Remember the civil rights movement?

That golden, remarkable yet crucial period in our country�s past was not only the landmark event that forever changed the course of American history, but highlighted African-American unity at its best.

That doesn�t mean all was perfect without a hitch. Indeed, there were numerous setbacks and disappointments, and certainly civil rights figures like Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Medgar Evers and Schwerner, Goodman and Chaney, among others, were always targets for death.

But after many years, and much struggle, the movement achieved many, if not most of its goals, and serves as the foundation for the freedoms that African-Americans have today.

And the key to that undeniable success is that as a people, we didn�t put all of our eggs in one basket. The fight for civil rights was a multi-track struggle.

Leaders and organizers knew that marching and protesting wasn�t enough.

They also had to peaceably fill the jails, so that attorneys with the NAACP could then bail them out.

While Dr. King and others were rallying outside, NAACP negotiators were telling white leaders inside, �They will be here as long as you refuse to talk.

And if you have them arrested, they�ll just go to jail, we�ll get them out, and they�ll be back here picketing again tomorrow. Your choice.�

Call it �good cop-bad cop�, but the strategy of marches-demonstrations-arrests-and behind-the-scenes negotiations, did the trick.

We may need that same approach today with the issue of slavery reparations.
So far the courts have been our primary mode of seeking just compensation for the unjust institution of the African slave trade that brought the majority of our ancestors to these shores.

Read more of this article..
http://www.wilmingtonjournal.com/News/article/article.asp?NewsID=59682&sID=34

[Staff]

OUR VOICE, ''BLACK MALES, BAD BREAKS'', WEEK OF JUNE 23-29, 2005
by EDITORIAL STAFF
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 7/1/2005
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Now ain�t this a blip. According to a new study, released by the New York City Commission on Human Rights and conducted by sociology professors at Princeton University, a young Black male is so feared in this racist society, that even a young, clean cut brotha-man without a criminal record barely has a chance to beat out a convicted White male felon when it comes to getting a job.

To put it a better way, a young White drug dealer just out of prison has just as much chance of getting a job as a deli clerk, cashier or telemarketer as a young, high school educated Black man with no criminal history at all.

Both would be called back by an employer 16 percent of the time, but you know in the end who has the advantage.

What about a Black male�s chances with a felony conviction � 6 percent.

A White male without a felony conviction � 21 percent.

The head of the study told The NY Daily News �employers are hesitant to trust young Black men.�

Those findings should not only make you sick to your stomach, but shake your head and ask, �What else is new?�

Now don�t get us wrong, we�re the first to trumpet the cause of good upbringing and taking responsibility for one�s actions. Those have been hallmarks of the Black family, qualities that have seen us through rough days past, and will continue to do so in even rougher days ahead.

But the Black family has endured the kinds of forces and pressures that virtually no other community, except for Native Americans, has had to face.

And it has had to face those pressures and forces in a society that feigns lawfulness, but actually promotes lawlessness.

Read more...
http://www.wilmingtonjournal.com/News/article/article.asp?NewsID=58889&sID=34

[Staff]

OUR VOICE, ''SUSPENDED THINKING'', WEEK OF JULY 28-AUGUST 2, 2005
by EDITORIAL STAFF
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 8/1/2005
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There is no question the North Carolina Association of Educators means well, we hope, but sometimes you have to wonder just who does the thinking over there? Some kid with a propeller beanie cap?
In shorts?

The considerable source of our consternation about the NCAE � the group that represents teachers in our state � is the free community forum it�s hosting called �Solutions to School Suspensions� this Tuesday, August 2, from 6 p.m. to 7:30 p.m., at the UNCW Executive Development Center, 1242 Military Cutoff over there in the Wrightsville Beach area.

First of all, why did NCAE decide to announce such an important community meeting just a week in advance instead of two? Doesn�t give parents, school officials and other interested persons enough time to prepare to be there.

Secondly, what�s a meeting so important to the African-American community � since black students make up a lion�s share of school suspensions � doing being held outside of the community? In the Wrightsville Beach area, no less, where few blacks want to go in the first place.

Since this regional community forum (this is the third of eight NCAE is holding across the state) touts itself as seeking �solutions� as opposed to laying �blame,� a better location could have been at one of our area black churches, which would have been more than happy to open its doors.

OK, so far we�ve caught NCAE getting off on the wrong foot in bringing its forum to Wilmington. One would have thought the group would have worked closer with the African-American community to strike the right tone and not come off as being so insensitive, but that�s water under the bridge.

What about the issue of school suspensions and how they disproportionately impact African-American students? Our community needs to be a part of this forum, and we need to have input, but also we need to listen to what�s being offered as solutions to see if they can work.

Read more...
http://www.wilmingtonjournal.com/News/article/article.asp?NewsID=59974&sID=34

[Staff]

TV TALK SHOWS'' ''SUNDAY MORNING APARTHEID'', WEEK OF AUGUST 4-10, 2005
by GEORGE E. CURRY
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 8/12/2005
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WASHINGTON (NNPA) � More than 68 percent of Sunday morning network and cable talk shows have no Black guests and those that do, use only three people � Condoleezza Rice, Colin Powell and Juan Williams � more than two-thirds of the time, a study by the National Urban League Policy Institute has disclosed.

The report, titled �Sunday Morning Apartheid� was made public by the National Urban League this week.

�In 1958, Martin Luther King wrote: �It is appalling that the most segregated hour of Christian America is eleven o�clock on Sunday morning.� Today, nearly 50 years after Dr. King�s incisive observation about America�s churches, we are facing another form of Sunday Morning Apartheid: the Sunday morning talk shows,� the report states.

The Urban League monitored the talk shows for an 18-month period, from January 1, 2004 through June 30, 2005. During that period, it studied the five Sunday morning political talk shows: This Week with George Stephanopoulos (ABC), Face the Nation (CBS), Late Edition (CNN), Fox News Sunday (FOX) and Meet the Press (NBC).

Among its findings:

http://www.wilmingtonjournal.com/News/article/article.asp?NewsID=60476&sID=12

[Staff]

by COMPILED BY CASH MICHAELS
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 8/9/2005

White Durham school board members feel unsafe

[DURHAM] Last week after the 4-3 white majority Durham School Board re-elected its white chairwoman over the black female vice chair who vied for the position, then elected a white male vice chair to replace her, the angry predominantly black audience erupted.

Many charged racism, especially since the racially divided board usually votes down racial lines, and the white majority has never agreed to elect a black chairman. One audience member told Chairwoman Gail Heath to 'go to Hell' and called her a 'racist dog.'

Donald Hughes, the son of black board member Jackie Wagstaff, had to be escorted out after telling the board's four white members, 'I hope there's a place in Hell for each of the four of you.' Though agreeing that raucous outbursts at Durham School Board meetings are no way to conduct public policy gatherings, black parents and protesters say the white majority on the board have always disrespected the black community since the merger of Durham city and county schools in 1992. They say there will be no peace until there is justice and equity.

Meanwhile white board members are meeting with law enforcement officials because they're concerned about the threatening nature of the outbursts.

Article
http://www.wilmingtonjournal.com/News/article/article.asp?NewsID=60265&sID=14

[Staff]

ASSATA: ''MY SIDE OF THE STORY'', WEEK OF JUNE 23-29, 2005
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 7/22/2005
http://www.wilmingtonjournal.com/News/images/Blank.gifSPECIAL TO THE NNPA
FROM SAN FRANCISCO BAY VIEW

[Last month, New Jersey and federal law enforcement officials announced a $1 million reward for former Black Panther Party Member Assata Shakur, formerly known as Joanne Chesimard. Assata is the granddaughter of the late Mr. Frank and Mrs. Lula Freeman Hill. The Hills were the owners of Freeman�s Beach. Assata spent many summers here in Wilmington with her grandparents who lived on South Seventh Street. The article �Assata: The stakes are raised� appeared in the May 26, 2005 edition of The Wilmington Journal after which Assata�s cousin, Lincoln Hill e-mailed the following story to us. This story was also shared with us by the San Francisco Bay View...]

Open letter written in 1998 from Havana,Cuba-----By Assata Shakur

My name is Assata Shakur, and I am a 20th century escaped slave. Because of government persecution, I was left with no other choice than to flee from the political repression, racism and violence that dominate the U.S. government�s policy towards people of color. I am an ex-political prisoner, and I have been living in exile in Cuba since 1984.

I have been a political activist most of my life, and although the U.S. government has done everything in its power to criminalize me, I am not a criminal, nor have I ever been one. In the 1960s, I participated in various struggles: the Black liberation movement, the student rights movement and the movement to end the war in Vietnam.

Read more...
http://www.wilmingtonjournal.com/News/article/article.asp?NewsID=59615&sID=33

[Staff]

MINORITY BUSINESSES COULD CASH IN WITH NC LOTTERY, WEEK OF JUNE 9-15, 2005
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 6/21/2005
http://www.wilmingtonjournal.com/News/images/Blank.gif
FairShareNow encourages
lawmakers to keep lottery contracts fair

DURHAM] �A Durham-based non-profit group called FairShareNow sent state lawmakers recommendations to strengthen the minority participation provisions in the North Carolina Lottery legislation.

FairShareNow believes that it is critical that the Lottery�s benefits are distributed in a fair and equitable way. This processing of dollars through the state lottery has impact beyond just the tickets bought and sold.

Minority business can be a real winner in the lottery. There will be opportunity to help minority businesses thrive. For example: there will be contracting opportunities with lottery machine manufacturers for the installation, delivery and maintenance of the terminals; instant ticket or scratch-off ticket printing, packaging and distribution; professional services, such as legal and accounting services; marketing and public relations contracts; and advertising contracts with minority-owned newspapers and radio stations.

The business results could be a life changing opportunity for the people of North Carolina and specifically for people whom opportunities have historically been limited or denied.

Read more...
http://www.wilmingtonjournal.com/News/article/article.asp?NewsID=58471&sID=33

[Staff]

''WE'LL TAKE OUR PEOPLE,'' SAYS FARRAKHAN, WEEK OF SEPTEMBER 15-21, 2005
by CASH MICHAELS
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 9/19/2005
http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/images/Blank.gif
The controversial leader of the Nation of Islam has issued a warning to government officials and relief agencies that have blocked the NOI from lending assistance to those being sheltered in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina.

“There is red tape, but I’m going to serve notice on these places that you’re not going to tell us that you’re going to keep our people,” Min. Louis Farrakhan defiantly told reporters Sept. 9 at Union Baptist Church in Durham.

“We’re coming to get our people, whether you want to give them to us or not. We’ll take them.”

The Chicago-based Muslim leader was reacting to how the NOI’s assistance was rebuffed in Phoenix, Arizona, where 2,000 Katrina evacuees were sent after being airlifted from a devastated New Orleans.

“We’re tired of this kind of behavior,” Farrakhan, his voice rising, went on. “We’re not slaves, this is not a plantation. You’re holding them, we appreciate you’re feeding them, clothing them, but don’t tell us that we can’t take them into decent, clean homes, and give them a start.”

“We will not hear that,” he said.

Farrakhan added that ‘I won’t condemn” the relief effort from various governmental and charitable agencies “because God knows our people need everything that they can get.”

But he cautioned that just as racism is clearly evident at all levels of society and in every institution, it is also in the American Red Cross, the Federal Emergency Management Agency, and many of the charities that are assisting Katrina survivors.

Farrakhan said that with the American people generously contributing almost $800 million to help the hurricane relief effort, an oversight committee must be established in order to make sure that that is indeed where the money is going.
....
It was right after Katrina hit the Gulf Coast states of Mississippi, Alabama and Louisiana over two weeks ago that Farrakhan directed all Muhammad’s Mosques in the country to open their doors to hurricane survivors without qualification.

NOI mosques in Atlanta, Detroit and New York are among the many that have already welcomed the Katrina homeless.

“All of us have committed ourselves to open our mosques, and get our brothers and sisters from wherever they come from. We’re not asking anybody what your status is; what your education is; have you ever been in jail – that’s irrelevant. If they’re hungry, if they’re naked, if they’re out-of-doors, that’s what we intend to serve,” he said.

Any children of Katrina evacuees will be placed in NOI schools where there are any, Min. Farrakhan added. “What we now have to do is get our people passed the red tape and out from where they are, and bring them to the cities where we are.”

....
He also had praise for the immediate and tremendous outpouring of aid from across the country, saying, “The people are better than their government.”

Farrakhan said, however, that African-Americans were justified in seeing the federal government as no friend of poor people or communities of colors, especially after Hurricane Katrina debacle.

“There is ample evidence of government complicity in the destruction of a people who are now useless,” he said, noting how the black male is endangered, and black women are devaluing themselves in dress and manner.

“The American people have no idea about the wickedness of things going on in high places,” said Farrakhan, adding that “there is a conspiracy against the poor of this nation, no matter what their color is.”

The religious figure also called the devastation of Hurricane Katrina “divine vengeance” by God to punish America for what many have called its “oppressive” policies, and starting wars on false information. He warned that “more is on the way” unless the government, and the people who follow it, repent.

“You haven’t seen the wrath of God yet,” Farrakhan admonished, noting that Hurricane Ophelia was just of the southeastern coast.
...
“Reparations are real, and the need for it is real. But whether you’re going to get it, is a big question,” Farrakhan said bluntly. Government will never recognize its responsibility to “pay the bill” until the African-American community strengthens itself to the point that when it makes the demand, the minister said, it cannot be refused.

Farrakhan, 72, made those remarks at a press conference before delivering an address to a packed McDougald-McClendon Gymnasium on North Carolina Central University’s campus later Friday night. During that address, the Winston-Salem State University alumnus talked about the need for the black community to return to righteousness in its everyday living.
...
Farrakhan said unlike 1995, the Millions More Movement is being endorsed by a cross section of African-American organizations and leadership, including the Congressional Black Caucus. He hopes that black scholars and religious leaders will sit down and hash out a plan that will lead to the masses of African-Americans using their resources to save themselves from the disparities of poverty, poor health, homelessness, crime and broken families.

“We are creating a movement for change,” Min. Farrakhan said.

http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/News/Article/Article.asp?NewsID=61645&sID=4

[Staff]

Part of the BlackPressUSA Network
http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpress...ews/default.asp (http://wilmingtonjournal.blackpressusa.com/news/default.asp)


(http://www.dumpcms.com/showthread.php?t=230&highlight=wilmington+journal)

[Staff]

EXCLUSIVE: RESPONDING TO CRITICS, THE TRUTH BEHIND DR. KAMBON'S ''EXTERMINATE'' REMARKS, WEEK OF NOVEMBER 10-16, 2005
by CASH MICHAELS
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 11/10/2005
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It was a month ago, Oct. 14, during a pre-Millions More Movement conference in Washington, D.C. about improving black media and activist communications in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, that Dr. Kamau Kambon’s world was turned upside down.

Activist after activist at the televised “Pro-Black Media Forum” held at Howard University hammered home the same message – after the horrendous events surrounding Hurricane Katrina, African-Americans dare not trust the government again, and had better regain control over their communities and destinies.

But Dr. Kambon, one of the invited speakers, angered by what he believed was a continuation of hundreds of years of white oppression of black people without redress, and sickened by the self-genocide of the community he loves so much, stunned those gathered, and thousands more watching live on C-SPAN, with the following:

“…[T] hey’re monitoring our people to try to prevent the one person from coming up with the one idea. And the one idea is, how we are going to exterminate white people, because that in my estimation is the only conclusion I have come to. We have to exterminate white people off the face of the planet to solve this problem.”

After a scattering of applause, the college professor and black Raleigh bookstore owner continued, “I don’t care whether you clap or not, but I’m saying to you that we need to solve this problem because they are going to kill us.”

He reiterated the point by declaring, “White people want to kill us.”

In contrast to nonviolent leaders of the 60’s like the NAACP and Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., black nationalists throughout history, like Malcolm X (“By any means necessary”), H. Rap Brown (“Burn, baby burn”) and the late, fiery Min. Khallid Abdul Muhammad (“Lift every voice and sing, yes, but also, lift every fist and swing”) always warned that the day of the “final comedown” was approaching, where blacks would have to take up arms against the white majority to stop police brutality, drug trafficking and racial discrimination.

But none had ever used the powerful word “extermination” before.

When Kambon, a quiet, well-studied apolitical man who is unaffiliated with any group, religion or cause, used that term on television, intended or otherwise, it ignited a firestorm of national controversy that he neither expected, or intended.

By the middle of the following week, outraged whites were abuzz on the Internet not only about Kambon’s remarks, but that he was a visiting professor at North Carolina State University.

They wanted him immediately fired. The school issued a statement distancing itself from the educator. He is no longer there.

“Why hasn’t this professor been arrested and charged with inciting violence, solicitation of mass murder, and promotion of genocide, which is an international crime against humanity?” wrote someone called “Umnumzana: at The Political Teen, a conservative website.

One wrote, “This man is a true racist,” while another stated, “This man is a human savage.”

Still another identified himself as “Angry Whitey.”

On other websites, bloggers who identified themselves as white, said they were arming themselves, using racially derogatory language in the process.

Radio talk shows across the nation picked up on the controversy, and phone banks were jammed with angry white listeners. Conservative bloggers, still smarting from defending former US Education Secretary Bill; Bennett’s abort “every black baby” remarks, spun the story to portray Kambon as “Black racist number one.”

Even black leaders were called to task to publicly denounce Dr. Kambon’s remarks.

Problem was while the controversy was boiling over in the white community, few in the African-American community were aware it, even days after the fact.
Conservatives at the John Locke Foundation tried to get North Carolina black congressmen Mel Watt and G.K. Butterfield to sponsor a resolution in Congress to denounce Kambon, just like they did Bill Bennett. But neither was aware of the Kambon controversy.

When Dr. William J. Barber, State NAACP President, was asked to denounce Kambon on NBC-17 News “At Issue” two weeks ago, he hadn’t heard anything about it.
Still, he made clear that “exterminating white people” was not something the NAACP believed in.

“We don’t believe in exterminating people,” Barber said. “ We believe in exterminating bad social policy.”
...
Those whites who, in Kambon’s view, “just don’t give a damn about the great, great, great grandchildren whose ancestors’ blood is soaked in the very ground on which we stand,” are the enemy, he says, though he’s quick to note that liberal whites are not standing for justice as they said they would.

But those who see him as a “hater” have stopped at nothing to vilify him.
Kambon’s critics are so incensed, they’ve even created fake interviews online with “Kambon,” even though he’s never said a word publicly about the controversy after Oct. 14, and certainly wouldn’t have interviewed with them.

While all of the mania was going on,
Dr. Kambon indeed went silent, and for good reason.

Threats were being called in to both the store and his home, worrying his family and friends. There weren’t a lot, but enough to give pause.

There were also calls of support from around the country, however, particularly from young people. They encouraged Kambon to respond, to say something before his remarks were further distorted.

Saying anything immediately would only ramp up the fire. Kambon felt it best to let things cool down for a while, and speak only when he was prepared to do so.

That time came last Sunday at the Bennu’ Cultural Center.

In a seven-page statement that was videotaped for later distribution and put up on the web, Dr. Kambon set out to not only respond not only to critics, but even to those who didn’t understand what he says he was saying.
He felt the media ran wild with the “exterminate” line, but did not report the rest of what he said, the context for such a dire and dramatic assessment.
...
“My official statement today is that I speak for no one.”

Using that as his recurring theme, Kambon said he “spoke for no one” except “the ancient Afrikans of Kemet – the original name that was changed by the Greeks to Egypt – who were invaded and murdered in mass numbers over the course of centuries by” several peoples, including the Arabs, French, British and Romans.

Kambon took listeners through a history lesson he was well versed in, recounting the enslavement and “murder” of “Afrikans” by the Arabs over several centuries; the enslavement and imprisonment of millions of West Africans by the Europeans.

“I speak for no one, EXCEPT for the millions of Afrikan men in those dungeons who refused to submit and were put three to four in a cell and were left there for all of the other enslaved Afrikans to see them die a slow and painful death,” Kambon wrote.” “The millions of Afrikan women who were selected by the white commander of the dungeon to be raped repeatedly and sometimes left to die in their own blood.”

As Dr. Kambon, the author of several books on black history, black genocide and other topics about how black people struggle to overcome the horror of their history, sees it, there has been no historic redress for the millions of “enslaved” Africans, brought from their motherland of Africa, chained in great number in cramped, dark and inhuman conditions in the belly of slave ships.

The Middle Passage; the Black Holocaust.
Many of them ripped off their chained limbs, he says, to jump over the ships into shark-infested waters, preferring to face certain death than enslavement in the “New World.”

“I speak for no one EXCEPT for all of the Afrikans who arrived in North America bewildered, brutalized, weak, robbed of their culture, language, religions, families, cosmologies and longing for their own homeland,” Kambon said.”
...
“I speak for no one, EXCEPT for the many men, women and children who were murdered in Wilmington, NC and Tulsa, Oklahoma – both considered Black Wall Streets” – and their land stolen from them with the sanction of the american government. The 7600 Black and poor women in North Carolina, and [31] other states, who were sterilized without their knowledge or permission in clinics as part of the population control program. These sterilizations went on from 1929 to 1974. 65,000 Black and poor women, in this country, were sterilized during this period.
Kambon also noted the infamous Tuskegee experiments conducted by the federal government, where black men with syphilis were allowed to die over a forty-year period.

Dr. Kambon noted many other atrocities put upon black people and their leaders throughout history that have never been redressed, though many had asked.

He talked further about black babies dying because of poor nutrition; the millions of black men and women behind bars; elderly black people not able to make ends meet and forced to give up their properties; the generations of black people in Africa dying of AIDS.
The “Black Holocaust” is still going on, Dr. Kambon says.

“Some have asked white people, referring to the government and corporations, to just consider talking about reparations, and those requests have fallen on deaf ears,” he writes. “Why are white people not listening to, and implementing the suggestions of all the civic groups trying to advance the social, economic, educational, health and cultural concerns of Black people?

“I speak for no one, EXCEPT for my ancestors, our dead, and for myself, and I am saying that I don’t even know half of the true history of Black people. but I have seen and know enough to be able to say, “The war and genocide against Black people, in all of the areas of life activity, worldwide, must stop.”

In further remarks to his audience, Kambon admitted that black people are in no position to do what he said on Oct. 14, and that his remarks were more a reference to if something isn’t done to stop the genocide of blacks at the hands of whites, “we’ll be wiped off the face of the Earth.”

Realizing that his “solution” is not popularly shared in the African-American community, Dr. Kambon closed by asking, “Do you have a better solution to offer to solve this problem.?”

His full seven-page statement can be read www.blacknificent.com (http://www.blacknificent.com)

http://wilmingtonjournal.com/news/Article/Article.asp?NewsID=63426&sID=4

[Staff]

OUR VOICE, ''LICKING THEIR WOUNDS'', WEEK OF NOVEMBER 10-16, 2005
by EDITORIAL STAFF
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 11/10/2005
http://wilmingtonjournal.com/News/images/Blank.gif
Question.

Do you think there is any coincidence between the Bush White House implementing “ethics” classes for its top staffers, and Election Day?

Think maybe they were trying to send a not so subtle message to their base of crackpot right-wingers and holy roller race baiters (or is it right-wing race-baiters and crackpot holy rollers?)?
Well whatever the Republicans were hoping for, they didn’t get it.
Both here in North Carolina, and all across the nation, Republican candidates were falling faster than rodents crawling up Mount Black Flag. Apparently they never figured out when you take over everything, people have a tendency to blame you for virtually everything, even ingrown toenails.

And where voters did have right-wingers in full command, they sent a very clear message Tuesday that they didn’t want any.

Take the Wake County School Board races, for example.

Nine-member board has a normal majority – we use the term “normal” because the world isn’t just conservative and liberal – and supports economic student diversity in its controversial student reassignments in order to both keep up with growth, and maintain a racial…excuse us…we mean economic student diversity throughout the system.

Just in case the feds are reading this.

Needless to say, there are some White parents who don’t want little Polly, Holly, Bill or Bob to be bused out of their little upper middle-class cul-de-sac to a school in predominately Black Southeast Raleigh, where there may be a top flight magnet program, but there’s also Jamal and Malika.

And these folks don’t want Jamal and Malika running for classes anywhere near their neighborhood, either.

So in coalition with a right-wing taxpayer group and Christian organization, these parents elected one conservative to the board last month, and stood to put two more on this week to grab a five-member majority.

What happened?

Read more...
http://wilmingtonjournal.com/News/article/article.asp?NewsID=63430&sID=34

[Staff]

http://www.blacknificent.com/

http://www.blacknificent.com/Bookpicture.jpg

[Staff]

Posted on Fri, Nov. 11, 2005 [/url][url="http://ad.doubleclick.net/ad/inquirer.living/education;kw=center6;c2=education;c3=education_hom epage;pos=center6;group=rectangle;ord=113271176657 0?"] (http://%5Bimg%5Dhttp://ad.doubleclick.net/ad/inquirer.living/education;kw=center6;c2=education;c3=education_hom epage;pos=center6;group=rectangle;ord=113271176657 0?%5B/img%5D)
http://www.philly.com/images/common/spacer.gif
School firm still haunted by comments

http://www.philly.com/images/common/spacer.gif
By Susan Snyder
http://www.philly.com/images/common/spacer.gif
Inquirer Staff Writer
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Ron Packard, cofounder of the K12 curriculum company, sat quietly in the audience as chaos erupted over the School Reform Commission's decision Wednesday to keep the Virginia-based firm.

He understands "the emotional response" that members of the African American community had to the racial comments made by William Bennett - who cofounded K12 with Packard.

But Packard said yesterday that he was disappointed that people still blamed the company, which acted within a few days of the comments to cut Bennett's part-time employment and get his resignation as board chairman.

"We've shown our colors and what K12 stands for," Packard said in a telephone interview. "K12 has taken every legal possible way to sever ties with Mr. Bennett."

The controversy, however, continues. Yesterday, State Rep. Thaddeus Kirkland (D., Delaware), head of the black caucus in the Pennsylvania legislature, urged the school district to dump the company.

"These types of mindless racial comments can not go unpunished," Kirkland wrote in a letter dated yesterday to Paul Vallas, the district's chief executive.

Others, however, supported the commission's decision.

Barry Morrison, regional director of the Anti-Defamation League in Philadelphia, said school officials were correct that "the sins of Bennett should not taint K12" or have a negative effect on the company's curriculum.

The controversy started in September when Bennett suggested on his radio show that the crime rate could be cut by aborting black babies, although he immediately said such an action would be "morally reprehensible."

Bennett's comments and the company's decision to part ways with Bennett, which riled some of his supporters, have resulted in lost business for K12, Packard said.

"This was not a good thing for us," Packard said.

He said the company intends to stay in Philadelphia as long as the School Reform Commission will have it, and he noted test-score gains at the William H. Hunter School, an elementary school where the company has provided math, science and history curriculum materials for about a year and a half. In fifth-grade math, the percentage of students scoring at or above proficient levels rose from 23 percent in 2004 to 45 percent in 2005.

Olivia Dreibelbis, principal of Hunter School, said she likes the computer-based aspects of the materials and the way they are regularly updated.

"We're pleased with it," she said.

K12 also has a $3 million contract this year to provide science curriculum materials district-wide in kindergarten through third grade.

Packard said he had attended the meeting in case commission members had questions for him. They didn't call on him to speak at the session, which abruptly recessed when members of the audience rushed toward the commission table in anger after the vote.

A. Bruce Crawley, chairman of the African-American Chamber of Commerce, said yesterday that he had met with State Rep. Dwight Evans (D., Phila.) on the matter. Crawley wants the legislature to withhold $3 million in funding from the district until the contract is ended.

Gov. Rendell declined to comment; his spokeswoman, Kate Philips, called it a "local issue." House Speaker John Perzel (R., Phila.) also did not comment.

Mayor Street's education secretary, Jacqueline Barnett, said Street agreed that the contract should be severed, but said there was little he could do. His two appointees on the commission, Sandra Dungee Glenn and Martin Bednarek, already voted to dump the contract, but the three gubernatorial appointees opted to keep it.

Barnett said Street would be willing to meet with Dungee Glenn and others.

But she said she did not support the personal attacks that were made by some members of the audience toward Vallas and James Nevels, the commission chairman, who is black and voted to keep the contract.

"It is disturbing to take it to personal levels," she said.


Read the transcript of the Bennet show ...
http://www.philly.com/mld/inquirer/living/education/13137342.htm

[Staff]

Renewed Attacks on Affirmative Action
by George E. Curry
NNPA Columnist
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Despite a landmark Supreme Court ruling upholding the legality of the University of Michigan’s law school affirmative action program, affirmative action programs are coming under increasing attacks, sometimes with the complicity of the Justice Department.

A recent example involves a letter the Justice Department sent to officials at Southern Illinois University-Carbondale charging that three graduate fellowship programs designed to increase underrepresented women and people of color are unfair to Whites and males. The Justice Department said if the SIU programs are not terminated by Friday, it will sue the institution. University officials have requested a meeting and an extension to avert a legal showdown.

The three fellowships under attack are the Proactive Recruitment and Multicultural Professionals for Tomorrow, the Graduate Dean’s Program and the Bridge to Doctorate. University officials told the Daily Egyptian, the campus newspaper, that 129 such fellowships have been awarded since 2000, with 12 percent going to Whites. Most university fellowships are open to all students and make no effort to increase the presence of people of color on campus.

Less than 8 percent of Southern Illinois University’s 5,500 graduate students are Black or Latino.

The attacks on affirmative action are being led by Right-wing think tanks, notably the Center for Equal Opportunity, headed by Linda Chavez and based in Sterling, Va. It has filed complaints with the Justice Department against SIU and North Carolina State University.

Even more troubling than attacks on programs designed to end the under representation of people of color and women is the way that many universities have caved in without putting up a fight.
Roger Clegg, vice president and general counsel for the Center for Equal Opportunity, told the Daily Egyptian newspaper:

“We have contacted hundreds of schools over the past few years about programs like this. The overwhelming majority have changed the programs after we contacted them.”

In other words, the think tank has been able to accomplish through threats what it could not achieve in the U.S. Supreme Court.
The attack on affirmative action extends beyond graduate fellowship programs.

Last year, Clegg testified before the Texas Senate Subcommittee on Higher Education to oppose even the 10 percent plan favored by President Bush. Under the program, the top 10 percent of each graduating class is guaranteed admission to the University of Texas.

The cruelest hoax is that the likes of Clegg are citing laws specifically designed to help African-Americans – the equal protection clause of the 14th Amendment and Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act that prohibits discrimination based on race, color or national origin – to dismantle programs that, if successful, would close the gap between people of color and Whites.

Read more...
http://www.blackpressusa.com/Op-Ed/speaker.asp?SID=16&NewsID=5414

[Staff]

New BET CEO
by Norman Robinson
njrob38@comcast.net

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Last week everyone cheered the new CEO of BET even I became caught up in the emotion of such a classy award show ran by black people rewarding black achievement. But I began to think mid-clap why should I applaud. Is Mrs. Lee the answer to the decline in black social morality that is represented 6 days a week on BET? Is she bringing back an Ed Gordon or will black America continue to be represented by the likes of Vida the “Toon Hood Rat”. How can we as a people celebrate the progression of wealth and success (not meaning that one justifies another) of African Americans in entertainment industry and at the same event applaud a continuum of social degradation at the hands of people that resemble you and I. When are we going to push for a more positive image to be portrayed in media? Such a request should not be even thought of but it seems that in this “Bling-Bling” Era our Corporate Executive brothers and sisters have been blinded choosing money over morality.

Norman Robinson
“Black Nationalism is self-improvement”

http://www.blackpressusa.com/op-ed/response.asp?NewsID=4425

[Staff]

PaulRevere
WTF????? The double standard has to end, and end soon. People like this are promoting violence. If a white guy said these things he would probably be tarred and feathered by the same liberal jackasses that coddle fools like Kambon. So add the "Dr." to your list of jackass race based hate mongers.

Guest
As a black person, I'll be the first to say what Dr. Kamau Kambon is an outrage. Simply an outrage. These are the words of a black supremist, and their veiws are just as twisted as those of a white supremist.



PaulRevere
Anonymous wrote: As a black person, I'll be the first to say what Dr. Kamau Kambon is an outrage. Simply an outrage. These are the words of a black supremist, and their veiws are just as twisted as those of a white supremist.
As the others have said, well put. I would however like to hear that from special interest groups like the NAACP, or from an Al Sharpton or Jesse Jackson.

http://www.wcnc.com/forums/viewtopic.php?t=217

[Staff]

''REPARATIONS DENIED!'', WEEK OF JANUARY 12 - 18, 2006
by PASTOR TONY MCGHEE
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 1/13/2006
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Several years ago I was invited to a meeting with a group of white Christian business men to address solutions to the economic problems in the Black community. This was meeting being held within the context of the consequences of the race riots of 1898. An associate of mine was with me. As the meeting got under way and different ideas were being put forth my associate made a statement that changed the entire atmosphere of the meeting.

He said, ‘until we talk about reparations we are not going to get anywhere’. Now I may not have quoted his statement exactly, however, that was the sentiment. I was furious, I could not believe that he would do such a thing. From my perspective, he had blind-sided me. He had come into the meeting with me and I assumed that we were on the same page as pertaining to the problem at hand. His statement and the way in which he gave his statement so impacted the atmosphere that the meeting, as far as I could tell, went downhill from there.

This word reparation refers to the making of amends, the paying of compensation for some wrong or injury. In other words, for those of us in the Black community, reparations means being compensated for the years of slave labor provided to this nation by our forebears. Looking back, I’m sure my perspective and response to him and his words might have been different had I had known what he was up to. Of course to be fair to my friend, it may not have made any difference at all. Because I did have on blinders.

Recently, I have taken a fresh look at the issue of reparations. It seems that the call for reparations stem from the idea of ‘40 acres and a mule’.
This idea of ‘40 acres and a mule’ as legend would have it, stated that each newly freed slave family would receive 40 acres and a mule to start their new life of freedom after the institution of slavery was dismantled. There has been much debate as to the validity of this idea. It does not appear that our forebears were promised 40 acres and a mule. However, General Sherman, based on his understanding of an edict from the War Department, issued Special Field Order No. 15. which made certain lands available for the settlement of our newly freed people. This land was divided up into 40 acre lots and distributed. After the war, there were a lot of extra mules that no longer had a purpose in the war department. These mules were then given to those that had received the land.

However, once Lincoln was assassinated, and Andrew Jackson became President, he rescinded Special Field Order No. 15 and returned the land to its previous owners. So the reparations were in fact taken back. Many tried to resolve this injustice, however, it was met with deaf ears.

In 1964, with the passage of the Civil Rights Bill, it is interesting to note that this legislation was to address the problems of Black people that had endured and survived the peculiar institution of slavery and Jim Crowism. However, before this act could be passed, some politicians, as a means to derail the legislation, added women to the bill. This was initiated not out of interest for women, but as an attempt to deny the Black race the long denied correction of injustices inflicted upon us.

Even today, when civil rights or affirmative action programs are spoken of, the term, ‘people of color’ is used. If I am correct that means everybody that is not white. When we say ‘people of color’, it puts all people of color on the same field of play, which gives other people of color (non black) the advantage over us (black). If the legislation and programs that were initiated were created to help compensate for the injustices committed specifically against the African-America race, why have all minorities been given access to them. No other race has served as slaves providing hundreds of years of free labor. Other minorities come hear without the debilitating residue of slavery and subsequent racial oppression that was visited upon us.

Yet they have access to a type of reparations that was or at least should have been intended for us. This has caused many to be able to step in and get ahead of us. Even though these program’s original intent was to help us catch up, they have been used to help others pass us by.

Is it possible that this has contributed to the renewed call for reparations. Perhaps this would not be such a hot issue if previous attempts at reparations for Black folk had not been denied or weakened.

Somebody’s gotta say something

Pastor R. Tony McGhee is married to Mrs. Tempy L. McGhee and they have six children. Pastor McGhee is the Pastor and Founder of Wilmington Christian Center. Among other interests as an entrepreneur, Pastor McGhee is an Independent Associate with Pre-Paid Legal Services.

http://wilmingtonjournal.com/News/article/article.asp?NewsID=65335&sID=16

[Staff]

OUR VOICE, AN ATTITUDE PROBLEM, WEEK OF MARCH 2-8, 2006
by EDITORIAL STAFF
The Wilmington Journal
Originally posted 3/2/2006
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A special report from our newsroom….

BLACK KIDS ACT UP!

Wait a minute, this just in as well…

BLACK KIDS ACT UP IN SCHOOL!

Hold on, still more breaking news…

BLACK KIDS GET SUSPENDED FROM SCHOOL FOR ACTING UP MORE THAN ANYBODY ELSE!

Stay tuned.

Fact of the matter is these headlines are not news to the African-American community, which cares deeply about the education of its children, and clearly wants the best for them. The high suspension rates of Black students here in New Hanover County (40 percent of middle-schoolers) and across the state (60 percent of all public schoolers) are certainly disturbing, and there’s no question that bold action has to be taken if our youth are to have a fighting chance for a future.

A future they can’t possibly have without a good education.

But when we read the comments of some of our NHC Public School principals and administrators regarding what they think should be done to address the problem, we get chills. As far as they’re concerned, when it comes to our children, Black children, they feel as if they’re dealing with a bunch of psychotics and psychopaths. They act as if our children are unteachable; indeed unreachable.

These administrators see our Black kids as threats, and have decided that because they can’t teach Black children, they’ll do the next best thing.

They’ll destroy them by getting rid of them.

We know, we know, what about the home, the parents…or in many cases, the parent? Good discipline and learning practices should start at home, and carry over to the classroom. After all, Mom and Dad are our children’s first, and presumably best teachers.

But when Black children step into a classroom, clearly in many cases, they are in no man’s land. Except for the few friends they have, they are at the mercy of a White middle-class teacher who not only doesn’t understand, but may very well be also afraid of them.

Children, no matter what the color, are like any other living beings in life. They smell fear, and they react to it.

They also react to unjust treatment – teachers who single them out or belittle them in front of their classmates. Teachers who don’t show concern, or don’t try to help a child who is willing to work if only someone would go the extra mile.

Children also see and know what’s going on long before adults do, so they have little tolerance for a teacher who displays favoritism toward others.

Indeed, it doesn’t take much more than one time for a child to get the message, “I don’t like you. You know you really don’t belong here.”

And when a White child gets a slap on the wrist for an infraction that administrators call the SWAT team for when a Black child commits the same offense, that relationship has been badly breached irreparably for good.

As noted in a published report this week, Black middle schoolers in NHC Public Schools are disproportionately being suspended at alarming rates. But what is even more alarming is that the principals and the school board vice chair seemed to resign themselves that this is a fact of life, so let’s feed the failure.

Even though the failure is theirs.

The fact of the matter is everything they’ve tried to do over the past six years (assuming they really tried to do anything), hasn’t worked because they just don’t understand Black children. And while we certainly agree that our schools must establish a standard of discipline so that all children can learn, that doesn’t mean that we run the place like Dick Cheney’s School of Good Shooting, assuming such a place can indeed stay in business.

Taking Black children out of their schools and putting them in special behavior treatment centers confirms two things if not more – that many White educators don’t know how to educate Black children, and that they want Black children to know that they think that something is wrong with them.

The result – our kids begin acting up because they believe that’s what’s expected of them. People responsible for their education have given up on them, so they have given up on themselves.

We know exactly what goes into creating this debacle. Teachers and guidance counselors trying to steer Black students clear of college early on, tracking them solely to trade classes.

Nothing wrong with trade classes , but every Black child doesn’t want to be a mechanic or a plasterer.

There simply aren’t enough Black teachers and administrators to help guide our students and help them navigate their school careers. Such people, if they care, serve as extensions of the home, reinforcing the values of family and church.

In short, they understand, and want to be there for the child.

And what about all of this from the Black child’s perspective?
Here he/she is in a White dominated setting that at best undermines his/her self-esteem by belittling his/her very existence. The only power this child has is to be disruptive.

Something is going very wrong in our public school classrooms, and it’s clear that White administrators would prefer to destroy young lives than truly and sincerely taking the time, and making the effort, to reach Black children. By doing so, we solve the racial achievement gap and the suspension and expulsion gap. Grades go up, and so do graduation rates.

Our children have proven that when they are respected and being truly included, they’re ready, willing and able to learn. They know what’s expected of them, and they want to deliver, and will. But, besides the home, the people responsible for giving them the vital instruction that they need have to change their thinking, their attitude, and their image about our children.

Until that happens, Black children will continue to be suspended from school at high levels, if for no other reason, than to get away from where they know they’re not wanted.

http://wilmingtonjournal.com/news/Article/Article.asp?NewsID=66937&sID=34