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    By Mark Lassiter
    New Orleans radio announcer, Bernard “Buddy D” Dilberto, fueled a grass roots, populist movement in 1980. He implored frustrated football fans to attend games with brown paper grocery bags on their heads to protest the performance of the 0-14 hometown Saints. Buddy also said, “When you go to Heaven after you die, tell St. Peter you’re a Saints fan. He’ll say c’mon in, I don’t care what else you done, you suffered enough.”

     
 
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Is This Racist?

Poll# 18

The Wrong Kind of Color-Blindness in Hollywood

How “new” can an all-white Hollywood be? Controversy is swirling around the latest cover of Vanity Fair magazine, which features nine young Hollywood actresses and muses—all very young, very thin and exclusively white. There are no Asian, Black, Middle Eastern or Latina actresses featured in “A New Hollywood 2010.”

Vote here!

Quote of the day

If you lose hope, somehow you lose the vitality that keeps life moving, you lose that courage to be, that quality that helps you to go on in spite of all. And so today I still have a dream. — Martin Luther King, Jr

Feature

The Missionary’s Position image

By Esther Armah
Ten white faces, bewildered and confused, emerge on the small screen. They are Americans from a Baptist missionary church in Idaho, arrested and accused of illegally taking 33 children out of Haiti, across the border to the Dominican Republic. Twenty of those children, it has been revealed, are not orphans. The SOS Children’s Villages, the group now caring for them, say they have parents.

 

Feature

Howard Zinn: The People’s Historian image

By Jelani Cobb
Among Professor Howard Zinn’s numerous accomplishments, none rank higher than his work to breathe life into history. Often when I mention to people that I’m a historian I hear mumbled comments about how the subject put students to sleep or seems like a dry collection of dates, wars and speeches. Not so with Howard Zinn.

 

Feature

Beyond Partisan Wars: Breaking Down Health Care Reform image

By Maggie Astor
Beyond the meaningless, catch-all accusation of “socialized medicine” and the blatantly ridiculous specter of “death panels,” how would these bills, if reconciled and signed into law, affect you?

 

Exoneree of the Week

Stephan Cowans image

Feb 2 – Six years ago this week, Stephan Cowans was exonerated in Massachusetts after serving more than five years in prison for a crime he didn’t commit. He was convicted based in part on a faulty fingerprint identification. Sadly, he died in 2007 after just three years free.

Feature provided by The Innocence Project.
image Obama, Race and Representation

By Manning Marable
Early on in their deliberation process, the Obama pre-campaign group recognized that most white Americans would never vote for a black Presidential candidate. However, they were convinced that most whites would embrace, and vote for, a remarkable, qualified Presidential candidate who happened to be black.

image New York City Sued Over Discriminatory Policing Policy in Public Housing

By The Editors
The lawsuit claims that the city’s policing practices in its public housing developments – most notably, its “vertical sweeps” of buildings — “routinely” subject residents and those who visit them to illegal stops and false arrests that serve no lawful purpose.

image Cartoon: February 4, 2010

By Kevin Eason
Kevin Eason is a freelance editorial cartoonist and Illustrator from NJ. His brand of satire covers news events in politics, entertainment, sports and much more. Kevin’s work features include: TVOne, NABJ, WBLS_107.5FM, EURweb and various newspapers & magazines throughout the country.

image Race to the Top? Banking on Charter Schools to Save the Failing Public School System

By C. Nicole Mason
Amid protest from parents and teachers, New York City’s Department of Education voted on January 27 to close 19 failing public schools. The closings come on the heels of a heated battle among state legislators to lift a ban limiting the number of charter schools in the state. The measure failed, but not without revealing a troubling trend around the country with regard to public education in states and cities—chasing dollars instead of what’s in the best interest of students.

image Sting Like a Bee: Obama vs. the GOP

By Mark Lassiter
The President’s luncheon meeting with the House Republican Conference in Baltimore last Friday offered proof that the art Ali demonstrated in the boxing ring at the pinnacle of his career can also shine brightly in a different kind of arena.

image A Black Immigrant’s Experience with Coming to Terms with Race Relations in America

By Nicole Y. Dennis
I’ve come to believe that many black immigrants coming to the United States don’t really factor the existence of racism into their plan of achieving the American Dream. I think many immigrants overlook it, often seeking success with a tunnel vision. I speak from experience. That’s what I did.

image My Top 10 African-American TV Shows of All Time

By Ralph Richardson
Hey ya’ll, I’m back, this time with the Top Ten African-American TV Shows of All Time.

image David Ruggles: Frederick Douglass’ First Professor of Abolitionism

By Graham Hodges
In early September, 1838, the man who would become Frederick Douglass, the foremost black abolitionist of the nineteenth century, arrived in New York City, well aware that he still faced danger from the “slave catchers” who roamed the streets seeking to kidnap unwary blacks. Through fortuitous circumstance, Frederick Bailey, as he was then called, soon met David Ruggles, the city’s leading black abolitionist—and Frederick Douglass’ first and perhaps most influential professor of radical abolitionism.

image RingShout Literary Salon: On Push, Precious and Erasure

By Eisa Nefertari Ulen
The controversial film Precious, released to great acclaim in November, is still making news. With Mo’Nique’s Golden Globe Awards win for Best Supporting Actress (with Oscar nods expected to follow), and eight NAACP Image Award nominations, the story of a teen abused every which way by both her mother and father provides fertile ground for introspection and discussion.