UNIFIED GOVERNMENT MAYOR JOE REARDON TACKLES THE HOMELESS ISSUE, by Crystal Booker

KANSAS CITY, Kan – On Tuesday, July 27, Unified Government Mayor Joe Reardon announced his initiative to end homelessness in Kansas City, Kansas. He has entrusted this task to the Wyandotte Homeless Services Coalition. One of the fund raisers for this cause is the Mayor’s pajama Party which will be held November 19th from 5pm-8pm. All of Wyandotte County is encouraged to wear pajamas on this day to show their support for those less fortunate in the community; who are homeless and unable to wear pajamas at night. Afterwards, Mayor Reardon took time to discuss his initiative.

Crystal: Exactly what is the Mayor’s Initiative?

Reardon: The Mayor’s Initiative is really two fold. Number one, it’s more than one government and more than one entity that can start to address the needs of our homeless population. It’s all of us collectively. It’s raising the awareness of everyone in the community. To say as we look at the health of this community, we need to look at those that don’t have a place to call home. And then secondly, it’s to raise funds. It’s to say there are ongoing costs to operate emergency shelters and beds. And we need to all participate in helping to offset those funds; then to leverage every federal dollar we can to try to address long term solutions.

Crystal: Under your leadership, Kansas City, Kan. has come a very long way. Where is the future of the city going?

Reardon: Well I think it’s to address the need for emergency beds, which we are lacking here in our community specifically. But secondly, it’s to work with the federal government to focus on the continuum of care to identify those that need emergency shelter, but to take them into a permanent solution to homelessness. That’s very important and it speaks to the broader challenges of health in the community as well.

Crystal: I want to thank you for taking time to speak with me.

Crystal Booker, a distinguished member of the Kansas City Film Critic’s Circle, is the movie critic of Kansas City’s Magic 107.3 FM. She is also a contributing writer to I Love Black Movies.com. To view her movie reviews, click here. For the latest reports, check out “Crystal on the Scene.” She welcomes both your questions and comments at crystalb@crystalsbonusandreviews.com

FEDERAL JUDGE BLOCKS PARTS OF ARIZONA IMMIGRATION LAW, Wired from CNN.com

PHOENIX, Arizona (CNN) — A federal judge has blocked one of the most controversial sections of a tough Arizona immigration law, granting a preliminary injunction Wednesday that prevents police from questioning people about their immigration status. That provision requires police to “make a reasonable attempt to determine the immigration status of a person stopped, detained or arrested” if the officer has a reasonable suspicion that the person is in the United States illegally.

U.S. District Judge Susan Bolton’s ruling, in response to a motion filed by the federal government, came with scant hours to go before the law goes into effect. She also blocked provisions of the law making it a crime to fail to apply for or carry alien registration papers or “for an unauthorized alien to solicit, apply for, or perform work,” and a provision “authorizing the warrantless arrest of a person” if there is reason to believe that person might be subject to deportation.

Seven lawsuits are seeking to block implementation of the law, signed by Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer in April. The law, which also targets those who hire illegal immigrant laborers or knowingly transport them, is to go into effect Thursday. One option is to ask the judge to revisit the issue after more complete fact-finding, Toobin said. A second option, which is more likely, is taking the case to the court of appeals.

“I think this a case very much destined for the Supreme Court,” as other states pass similar laws, Toobin said. The Court of Appeals could take up the case in a matter of days, but the earliest the Supreme Court could look at it would be October because the high court is in summer recess. President Barack Obama, a critic of the Arizona law, was not expected to comment on the ruling Wednesday. The Justice Department issued a statement saying the court “ruled correctly.”

“While we understand the frustration of Arizonans with the broken immigration system, a patchwork of state and local policies would seriously disrupt federal immigration enforcement and would ultimately be counterproductive,” the statement said. “States can and do play a role in cooperating with the federal government in its enforcement of the immigration laws, but they must do so within our constitutional framework.” Opponents say the law will lead to racial profiling, which is illegal.

Supporters point out that the law prohibits racial profiling and people cannot be stopped and asked for proof of legal residence based solely on their looks. In addition to the U.S. Justice Department, the American Civil Liberties Union, the National Coalition of Latino Clergy, the Christian Leaders League of United Latin American Citizens and other individuals or groups have asked the judge to halt the law, commonly known as SB 1070. Bolton heard arguments in the case last week from the Justice Department and the ACLU.

The separate hearings were held in Phoenix, where Bolton sits on the U.S. District Court for the District of Arizona. Bolton’s courtroom was packed during the two July 22 hearings and protesters chanted outside throughout the afternoon. Seven protesters were arrested on civil disobedience charges, according to the National Day Laborer Organizing Network. The legal arguments revolved around a range of issues, including racial profiling, effective enforcement and possible harm to Arizona’s citizens.

Attorneys from the Obama administration presented their case at the second hearing. The administration’s challenge contends Arizona’s law would usurp federal supremacy on immigration. Brewer attended the hearing. Arizona has argued that the federal government has not done a good job of securing the border. “A law unenforced is no law at all,” said state attorney John Bouma. The American Civil Liberties Union and a coalition of civil rights groups argued earlier in the day that the controversial law amounts to racial profiling and will have a profound effect if it goes into effect.

“It treats people of color as suspects first, rather than citizens,” attorney Karen Tumlin said after the hearing. Bouma said the law would not treat people unfairly. “These are hypothetical arguments. Local police are enforcing immigration laws all over the country,” he told Bolton. Those in favor of the law say SB 1070 is consistent with federal law. They say the law explicitly prohibits racial profiling and they are challenging the legal standing of many of the groups opposed. They also contend opponents of the law have not been able to show there will be any harm from its implementation.

During the first hearing, Bolton said the law has a section allowing parts to still take effect even if other parts are struck down, according to CNN affiliate KNXV. Tumlin, managing attorney for the National Immigration Law Center, and other lawyers and foes of SB 1070 repeated assertions that Arizona’s law should be rejected.

“We are here to defend the rights of those who cannot stand up for themselves,” said Terri Leon, CEO of the Friendly House, which supports the legal challenge by the American Civil Liberties Union. Bolton heard a challenge to SB 1070 by an Arizona police officer the previous week.

JEAN GREGOIRE SAGBO IS THE 1ST BLACK POLITICIAN ELECTED IN RUSSIA, by Michael Stevens

NOVOZAVIDOVO, Russia – For the first time in Russia, a black politician will hold a political position in the country. He has been referred to as “Russia’s Obama.” In Novozavidovo, Jean Gregoire Sagbo was elected as a councilman. Sagbo was born in Benin Africa. However, he has lived and raised his children in Novozavidovo for the past 21 years. He is a Russian real estate agent and politician, his position is councilor of Novozavidovo.

He has been referred to as “Russia’s Obama”. Russia has had a history of extreme racial violence, which makes this election a significant milestone. Sagbo has already made many key promises for the impoverished town, saying he wants to curb drug addiction, put heating in homes, and clean up pollution.

“Sagbo is Russian inside and that he cares deeply for his hometown,” stated the mayor of Novozavidovo, Vyacheslav Arakelov. Sagbo will be one of ten councilmen for the city of Novozavidovo. The people of this town used to stare at Sagbo for the mere fact that they had never seen a black man. Now they say they see in him something equally rare, an honest politician.

For more on the Russian Obama, please click the play arrow.

OBAMA’S APPEARANCE ON “THE VIEW” WILL MAKE PRESIDENTIAL HISTORY, The Associated Press

NEW YORK – ABC’s “The View” has welcomed many notable guests, but none more prominent than President Barack Obama, who is scheduled to visit for Thursday’s edition. In making the announcement on Monday, executive producers Barbara Walters and Bill Geddie said this marks the first time a sitting U.S. president has visited a daytime talk show.

They said the majority of the hour will be devoted to Obama’s appearance, which will touch on topics including jobs, the economy, the Gulf oil spill and family life inside the White House. It is scheduled to tape on Wednesday. “We are so pleased and honored,” Walters said.

Walters will make a special return to the studio for the occasion, joining co-hosts Whoopi Goldberg, Joy Behar, Elisabeth Hasselbeck and Sherri Shepherd. Other than a brief segment broadcast from her home this month, Walters has been off the air since undergoing open-heart surgery in May and had not planned to be back until September.

Obama’s appearance is part of the show’s continuing “Red, White & View” campaign, which is committed to political guests and discussions. The show welcomed Vice President Joe Biden in April. Obama was last a guest on “The View” in March 2008 when he was a U.S. senator. The program airs weekdays on ABC at 11 a.m. Eastern time.

Copyright 2010 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

AFGHAN SAYS IT’S SHOCKED BY LEAKED U.S. DOCUMENTS ON WEBSITE, by Atika Shubert (CNN)

WASHINGTON, D.C. – The Afghan government said Monday it was “shocked” as it sifted through tens of thousands of leaked U.S. military and diplomatic reports on the war in Afghanistan that a whistleblower website posted a day earlier. “The Afghan government is shocked with the report that has opened the reality of the Afghan war,” said Siamak Herawi, a government spokesman. WikiLeaks.org — a whistleblower website — published on Sunday what it says are more than 90,000 United States military and diplomatic reports about Afghanistan filed between 2004 and January of this year.

“It is the total history of the Afghan war from 2004 to 2010, with some important exceptions — U.S. Special Forces, CIA activity, and most of the activity of other non-U.S. groups,” Assange said. CNN has not independently confirmed the authenticity of the documents. The Department of Defense will not comment on them until the Pentagon has had a chance to look at them, a Defense official told CNN. “What you have here is you have a variety of reports of different types,” said New York Times reporter Chris Chivers. “Many of them are simple incident reports. The military describing … on the ground what happened. Incident by incident.”

The New York Times reported Sunday that military field documents included in the release suggest that Pakistan, an ally of the United States in the war against terror, has been running something of a “double game,” allowing “representatives of its spy service to meet directly with the Taliban in secret strategy sessions to organize networks of militant groups that fight against American soldiers in Afghanistan, and even hatch plots to assassinate Afghan leaders.” Herawi charged that Washington needed to deal with Pakistani intelligence, known as the ISI.

“There should be serious action taken against the ISI, who has a direct connection with the terrorists,” he said. “These reports show that the U.S. was already aware of the ISI connection with the al Qaeda terrorist network. The United States is overdue on the ISI issue and now the United States should answer.” But Gen. Hamid Gul, the former head of Pakistan’s intelligence service and who is mentioned numerous times in the Wikileaks reports, called the accusations lies.

“These reports are absolutely and utterly false,” Gul said Monday. “I think they [United States] are failing and they’re looking for scapegoats.” Husain Haqqani, Pakistan’s ambassador to the United States, issued a statement Sunday saying the reports “do not reflect the current onground realities.” Rather, they “reflect nothing more than single source comments and rumors, which abound on both sides of the Pakistan-Afghanistan border and are often proved wrong after deeper examination,” Haqqani’s statement said.

“Pakistan’s government under the democratically elected leadership of President [Asif Ali] Zardari and Prime Minister [Yousuf Raza] Gilani is following a clearly laid out strategy of fighting and marginalizing terrorists and our military and intelligence services are effectively executing that policy,” the statement said. National Security Adviser Gen. James Jones issued a statement Sunday calling the documents’ release “irresponsible.”

“The United States strongly condemns the disclosure of classified information by individuals and organizations which could put the lives of Americans and our partners at risk, and threaten our national security,” the statement said. “These irresponsible leaks will not impact our ongoing commitment to deepen our partnerships with Afghanistan and Pakistan; to defeat our common enemies; and to support the aspirations of the Afghan and Pakistani people,” the statement said.

Assange declined to tell CNN where he got the documents. Jones’ statement said the website made “no effort” to contact the Obama administration about the documents. “The United States government learned from news organizations that these documents would be posted,” Jones’ statement said. Assange claims the documents reveal the “squalor” of war, uncovering how many relatively small incidents have added up to huge numbers of dead civilians.

The significance lies in “all of these people being killed in the small events that we haven’t heard about that numerically eclipse the big casualty events. It’s the boy killed by a shell that missed a target,” he told CNN. “What we haven’t seen previously is all those individual deaths,” he said. “We’ve seen just the number and, like Stalin said, ‘One man’s death is a tragedy, a million dead is a statistic.’ So, we’ve seen the statistic.” WikiLeaks publishes anonymously submitted documents, video and other sensitive materials after vetting them, it says. It claims never to have fallen for a forgery.

Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman John Kerry, D-Massachusetts, said in a statement Sunday that the documents — regardless of how they came to light — “raise serious questions about the reality of America’s policy toward Pakistan and Afghanistan.” Wikileaks has previously made headlines for posting controversial videos of combat in Iraq. The site gained international attention in April when it posted a 2007 video said to show a U.S. helicopter attack in Iraq killing a dozen civilians, including two unarmed Reuters journalists.

At the time, Maj. Shawn Turner, a U.S. military spokesman, said that “all evidence available supported the conclusion by those forces that they were engaging armed insurgents and not civilians.” Pfc. Bradley Manning, 22, suspected of leaking a classified 2007 video, has been charged by the U.S. military with eight violations of the U.S. Criminal Code for transferring classified data, according to a charge sheet released by the military earlier this month.

Attempts to reach Manning’s military defense attorney, Capt. Paul Bouchard, were unsuccessful Sunday. However, U.S. Army spokesman Col. Tom Collins has said Bouchard would not speak to the media about the charges. Assange says WikiLeaks has attempted to put together a legal team to defend Manning, something it will do for any “alleged” whistleblower that runs into legal trouble because of WikiLeaks. Assange — a former teen hacker who launched the site in 2007 — denies that WikiLeaks has put troops in danger.

“There certainly have been people who have lost elections as a result of material being on WikiLeaks,” he said. “There have been prosecutions because of material being on WikiLeaks. There have been legislative reforms because of material being on WikiLeaks,” he said. “What has not happened is anyone being physically harmed as a result.” The website held back about 15,000 documents from Afghanistan to protect individuals who informed on the Taliban, he said. But he said he hoped his website would be “very dangerous” to “people who want to conduct wars in an abusive way.”

“This material doesn’t just reveal occasional abuse by the U.S. military,” he said. “Of course it has U.S. military reporting on all sort of abuses by the Taliban. … So it does describe the abuses by both sides in this war and that’s how people can understand what’s really going on and if they choose to support it or not.” Assange said the organization gets material from whistle-blowers in a variety of ways — including via postal mail — vets it, releases it to the public and then defends itself against “the regular political or legal attack.”

He said the organization rarely knows the identity of the source of the leak. “If we find out at some stage, we destroy that information as soon as possible,” he said.

CNN Pentagon Correspondent Barbara Starr contributed to this report.

HUGO CHAVEZ WARNS OF U.S. OIL CUTOFF IN COLUMBIA DISPUTE, the Associated Press

CARACAS, Venezuela – President Hugo Chavez threatened on Sunday to halt oil sales to the United States if Venezuela faces any military attack by its U.S.-allied neighbor Colombia. Chavez said in a speech to thousands of supporters that if there is an “armed aggression against Venezuela” from Colombia backed by the U.S., “we would suspend shipments of oil.” Chavez said that “we wouldn’t send one more drop” of oil to the United States, which is the top buyer of oil from the South American country.

If actually carried out, such a threat would be titanic economic blow for Chavez’s government, which depends heavily on oil sales. It’s likely Chavez made the warning in part to put the U.S. and Colombia on notice that he will not stand for a more aggressive international campaign to denounce allegations that leftist Colombian rebels are finding safe haven in Venezuela. The Venezuelan leader cut off diplomatic relations with Colombia on Thursday after outgoing President Alvaro Uribe’s government presented photos, videos and maps of what it said were Colombian rebel camps inside Venezuela.

Chavez called it an attempt to smear his government and said Uribe could be trying to lay the groundwork for an armed conflict. The Colombian government denies seeking a military conflict. It says it went to the Organization of American States with its evidence about the rebels’ alleged presence in Venezuela because Chavez’s government has not addressed the situation. Chavez also said Sunday that he had canceled a trip to Cuba due to the tensions with Colombia.

In 2008, Chavez warned of a possible war with Colombia after the Colombian military staged a cross-border raid on a rebel camp in Ecuador that killed a guerrilla leader, Raul Reyes. Chavez on Sunday appeared to be giving a new warning to Colombia – and the U.S. – that he won’t tolerate a repeat in Venezuelan territory. He said separately in a newspaper column, however, that he will wait to see if Colombian President-elect Juan Manuel Santos, who takes office next month, expresses what Chavez deems a genuine willingness to ease the diplomatic conflict.

“We have to receive clear and unequivocal signals that there is a real political will in the new Colombian government to take up the path of dialogue again, without tricks,” Chavez wrote. The conservative Uribe has frequently feuded with the socialist Chavez, and Colombian officials have long complained, mostly in private, that Chavez has harbored leaders of its two main leftist rebel groups. Santos, however, has stressed the importance of mending trade relations with Venezuela that overwhelmingly benefit Colombia’s food producers. And Chavez has raised the possibility that relations could be restored under Santos.

Trade between Venezuela and Colombia has fallen about 70 percent since Chavez froze relations a year ago in response to Colombia’s decision to grant the U.S. military expanded access to its military bases.

RIGHT WING IS USING RACE TO SMEAR PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA, by Eugene Robinson

WASHINGTON, D.C. – After the Shirley Sherrod episode, there’s no longer any need to mince words: A cynical right-wing propaganda machine is peddling the poisonous fiction that when African-Americans or other minorities reach positions of power, they seek some kind of revenge against whites. A few of the purveyors of this bigoted nonsense might actually believe it. Most of them, however, are merely seeking political gain by inviting white voters to question the motives and good faith of the nation’s first African-American president. This is really about tearing Barack Obama down.

Sherrod, until Monday an official with the Department of Agriculture, was supposed to be mere collateral damage. Andrew Breitbart, a smarmy provocateur who often speaks at Tea Party rallies, posted on his Web site a video snippet of a speech that Sherrod, who is African-American, gave to a NAACP meeting earlier this year. In it, Sherrod seemed to boast of having withheld from a white farmer some measure of aid that she would have given to a black farmer.

It looked like a clear case of black racism in action. Within hours, Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack had forced her to resign. The NAACP, under attack from the right for having denounced racism in the tea party movement, issued a statement blasting Sherrod and condemning her attitude as unacceptable. But Breitbart had overstepped. The full video of Sherrod’s speech showed she wasn’t bragging about being a racist, she was telling what amounted to a parable about prejudice and reconciliation.

For one thing, the incident happened in 1986 when she was working for a nonprofit, long before she joined the Obama administration. For another, she helped that white man and his family save their farm, and they became friends. Through him, she said, she learned to look past race toward our common humanity. In effect, she was telling the story of America’s struggle with race, but with the roles reversed. For hundreds of years, black people were enslaved, oppressed and discriminated against by whites — until the civil rights movement gave us all a path toward redemption.

With the Obama presidency, though, has come a flurry of charges — from the likes of Breitbart but also from more substantial conservative figures — about alleged incidences of racial discrimination against whites by blacks and other minorities. Recall, for example, the way Obama’s critics had a fit when he offered an opinion about the confrontation between Harvard professor Henry Louis Gates Jr. and a white police officer. Remember the over-the-top reaction when it was learned that Justice Sonia Sotomayor had once talked about how being a “wise Latina” might affect her thinking.

Newt Gingrich called Sotomayor a racist. He was lightning-quick to call Sherrod a racist, too. I’d suggest that the former House speaker consider switching to decaf, but I think he knows exactly what he’s doing. These allegations of anti-white racism are being deliberately hyped and exaggerated because they are designed to make whites fearful. It won’t work with most people, of course, but it works with some — enough, perhaps, to help erode Obama’s political standing and damage his party’s prospects at the polls.

Before Sherrod, the cause celebre of the “You Must Fear Obama” campaign involved something called the New Black Panther Party. Never heard of it? That’s because it’s a tiny group that exists mainly in the fevered imaginations of its few members. Also in the alternate reality of Fox News: One of the network’s hosts has devoted more than three hours of air time in recent weeks to the grave threat posed by the NBPP. Actually, I suspect that this excess is at least partly an attempt by a relatively obscure anchor to boost her own notoriety.

The Sherrod case has fully exposed the right-wing campaign to use racial fear to destroy Obama’s presidency, and I hope the effect is to finally stiffen some spines in the administration. The way to deal with bullies is to confront them, not run away. Yet Sherrod was fired before even being allowed to tell her side of the story. She said the official who carried out the execution explained that she had to resign immediately because the story was going to be on Glenn Beck’s show that evening.

Ironically, Beck was the only Fox host who, upon hearing the rest of Sherrod’s speech, promptly called for her to be reinstated. On Wednesday, Vilsack offered to rehire her. Shirley Sherrod stuck to her principles and stood her ground. I hope the White House learns a lesson.

Eugene Robinson is a writer for Investors.com.

JUDGE HEARS ARGUMENTS ON ARIZONA IMMIGRATION LAWSUIT, Associated Press

PHOENIX — A judge heard arguments in a packed courtroom Thursday on whether Arizona’s new immigration law should take effect next week amid a flurry of legal challenges against the crackdown. The hearing focused on one of seven lawsuits filed against Arizona over a law that has reignited the national immigration debate. The American Civil Liberties Union, federal government and other opponents of the law want U.S. District Judge Susan Bolton to grant an injunction to block implementation of the law before it takes effect next Thursday. The judge has not said when she might issue a ruling.

The courtroom was packed with about 150 spectators and 30 lawyers, while dozens of protesters gathered outside. The group outside included opponents who believe the law is inhumane and supporters who believe it is a necessary response to secure the border. The first part of the hearing was largely procedural as the judge and a lawyer for the American Civil Liberties Union broke down the law section-by-section to discuss the parts of the law that challengers want blocked.

Bolton said the law has a section allowing parts to still take effect even if other parts are struck down. ACLU attorney Omar Jadwat said the law’s provisions are supposed to work together to achieve a goal of prodding illegal immigrants to leave the state. He called it unconstitutional and dangerous.
Most of the controversy about the law centers on provisions related to stops and arrests of people, new crimes related to illegal immigrants, and a requirement that immigrants carry and produce their immigration papers.

Other parts of the law getting little attention deal with impoundment of vehicles and sanctions against employment of illegal immigrants. Attorney John Bouma, who represents Arizona Gov. Jan Brewer, told Bolton that those challenging the law haven’t demonstrated that anyone would suffer actual harm if it takes effect, and that facts — not conjecture — must be shown. “People talk about what they fear will happen and what they believe will happen,” he said.

Defendants include various county officials from throughout the state, most of whom sent lawyers to the hearing. Cochise County Sheriff Larry Dever was there in person, sitting at the front of the courtroom. Dever’s county is on the Arizona-Mexico border and he knew a rancher who was killed in March on his sprawling border property by a suspected illegal immigrant, possibly a scout for drug smugglers. The killing of Robert Krentz in many ways set the stage for the new Arizona law to pass, with politicians calling for action amid border violence.

Outside the courthouse, opponents gathered in prayer before the hearing started and carrying paper doves attached to plants representing olive branches, a symbol of peace. Sarah Fox, a 64-year-old Phoenix nurse, said the new law takes the country’s economic problems out on immigrants, who she believes are being used as a scapegoat. “It’s morally wrong,” she said. “I’m getting old and I don’t have many years left to speak out against what is wrong.”

Supporters of the law waved signs, some reading “Illegal is illegal,” and clutched American flags. Debbi MacNicol, a 55-year-old Phoenix psychiatric nurse who carried a gun on her hip and wore a T-shirt that read “Don’t Tread on Me,” said she supports the law because she fears Mexico’s drug war will spill over into Arizona.

This story was written by JACQUES BILLEAUD and PAUL DAVENPORT of the Associated Press.

SHERROD’S STORY OF RACISM PRESENTS WONDERFUL LESSON, by Wayne Hodges

ATLANTA, Georgia – Community backlash in the aftermath of Shirley Sherrod’s abrupt resignation and subsequent vindication has been vicious thus far. So, whose more at fault? Depends on who you ask? Many people are upset at Ben Jealous and the NAACP for publicly disowning Sherrod based solely on excerpts reported by Fox News.  Others question the integrity of the Obama Administration for reacting pretty much the same way.  Apologies have been given and accepted. But the pain, unfortunately, still lingers.

Sherrod, whose 62 years old, has certainly endured and overcome tragic episodes of racism. Her father, following a nasty dispute over a few cows, was brutally murdered by a white farmer in 1965. Folks, we’ve had great conversation on racism the past couple weeks. And I thought it would be wise to post comments from a couple people who actually lived the “civil rights” experience: Community activist Ms. E “The Power Broker” and prominent Kansas Citian Mrs. Jones. Please see their remarks below. Also, post your thoughts.

So, what’s my take? A few days ago, I presented a comparison/contrast on issues associated with racism versus “blatant” racism. The debacle stemming from Sherrod’s abrupt resignation is, in my humble opinion, a perfect illustration of this. My generation, and today’s youthful populace, can’t identify (generally speaking) with the intense level of racism Sherrod, and others from her era, has experienced. Reading books, newspapers and blogs about malicious acts of discrimination and hate doesn’t compare to actually “living it.” These points were profoundly expressed in Sherrod’s speech during an NAACP function.

Where do we go from here? Most of us are sick of racism. We’re tired of it. Those of us with good sense crave both a resolution and closure. However, we must remain cognizant of the simple fact racism is big, big business. That’s why it’s not going anywhere. Think about it. Because we, the people, don’t get along, greedy politicians and corporate “big-wigs” are able to get away with bloody murder. The distraction created by that dark cloud known as “racism” has crippled our efforts to hold “the powers that be” fully accountable. I’ll go to my grave believing to make progress, we must first pursue it.

Sherrod’s story, though disturbing, trails in comparison to job outsourcing, Walmart’s monopoly, death of small business, high unemployment rates, sweat shops, immigration, lack of health care, economic obsolescence, education budget cuts, and the elimination of social service programs for the frail, elderly and disabled. The real enemies are proponents of economic oppression. We can blame President Barack Obama, George Bush, and the federal government for the socioeconomic ills of America until our hearts content.

But the buck, in my view, stops with you and me. Our negligence, hate, and ascending ignorance has impeded the progress of this wonderful nation. And it’s really a crying shame. We could accomplish so much by working together. Read on…

Ms. E, Kansas City: “There are way to many folks,issues to be conceded with! And what has theNACCP done in the last the 60’s anyway? They do not speak for 99.9 %off “colored” folks anyway,let’s talk about real issues like folks unemployed,homeless,no medical, murder,drugs, no education,seniors, the oil spill that’s affecting lives, issues that we need to bringing up and take a stand on! Ms.E The Power Broker”

Mrs. Jones, Kansas City: “Hello Wayne, if you see the full context of the video, that was taped from a presentation she gave 20 years ago, it clearly shows she was using a parable to show why no one in a position of authority should use their position to withhold assistance from anyone regardless of their color. This is a lesson she herself learned when she attempted to further assist the white farmer. She found out the problems in the system did not stem so much from color, but from the stand point of the haves versus the have not’s.

The farmer that she assisted and his wife were on CNN last night, and stated that this women helped them save their farm. And she treated them well and they never felt mistreated. Fox news ran the story trying to put a blight on the NAACP, and its racism within its own ranks. The video was taken out of context and there was no discrimination involved. The NAACP, as well the white house got bamboozled by Fox, and in this climate of racial ping pong, made a rash decision to fire her, without speaking to her, or looking at the context of the whole video.

She should never have been fired. If she used her position  20 years ago to withhold assistance from a poor white farmer, then even now she should be fired. But that is not what happened in this case. The Blogger was attempting to make the case that the NAACP tolerated racism and  they purposely did not show the entirety of what  Ms. Sherrod actually said.  Ms. Sherrod was attempting to make the case against racism, that even she as a black woman had to learn overcome. Thanks. Mrs. Jones.”

*** View this article on the Examiner by clicking here ***

Wayne Hodges, an MBA from St. Mary University, is the Editor-in-Chief of “Mass Appeal News.” He is also a candidate for Kansas Senate District #7, an adjunct professor, and legislative intern with the Kansas Senate. Wayne welcomes your comments at whodges@massappealnews.com

SHIRLEY SHERROD’S STEADFAST MOTTO: “LET’S WORK TOGETHER.” Wired from CNN.com

ATLANTA, Georgia – Shirley Miller Sherrod has spent most of her life fighting injustice. On the Baker County, Georgia, farm where the Miller family grew corn, peanuts, cotton and cucumbers and raised hogs, cows and goats, oldest daughter Shirley despised the work. “I swore I would never have anything to do with a farm past high school,” she said Wednesday with an easy chuckle. “I would talk to the sun as I picked cotton and picked cucumbers and worked out there in that hot field, and [say], ‘This is not the life for me.’ I didn’t want to have anything to do with agriculture ever again.”

On the night in 1965 when her father, Hosie Miller, a black man and a deacon at Thankful Baptist Church, was shot to death by a white farmer in what ostensibly was a dispute over a few cows, Sherrod — then 17 years old — changed her mind. “I decided to stay in the South and work for change,” said Sherrod, now 62, who believes her father’s killing was more about a Southern black man speaking up to a white man than about who owned which animals. The all-white grand jury didn’t bring charges against the shooter.

That summer, when she and several other blacks went to the county courthouse to register to vote, the county sheriff blocked the door and even pushed her husband-to-be, Lester Sherrod, down the stairs, she said. Activists used that incident to get a restraining order against the sheriff so blacks could register to vote, she said. Sherrod worked for civil rights with the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee while studying sociology at Albany State University in Georgia. She later earned her master’s degree in community development from Antioch University in Yellow Springs, Ohio.

Sherrod returned to rural Georgia to help minority farmers keep their land in a place where history is against them. She has often gone toe to toe with the local offices of government agencies, including the U.S. Department of Agriculture before she worked there, she said. Sherrod was forced out of her job with the USDA this week after a video emerged in which she seemingly admitted to failing to try to help a white farmer save his land from foreclosure in 1986. She has since said her words, recorded in March at a Douglas County, Georgia, NAACP meeting, were deliberately taken out of context.

The story, she said, was part of a broader message she has given many times about the need to move beyond race. White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said Wednesday afternoon that Sherrod is “owed an apology. I would do that on behalf of this administration.” Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said Wednesday that he offered his “personal and profound apology for the pain and discomfort” caused to Sherrod and her family. “It makes me feel better,” she said in response on CNN. “It took too long, but it makes me feel better that the apology’s coming.”

“… Why did they hire me in the first place if they didn’t believe in what I had done up to this point?” What she had done is work tirelessly for minority farmers for four decades. Because of discriminatory lending practices, black farmers were losing their farms in the late 1960s and ’70s. After college, Sherrod co-founded New Communities Inc., a black communal farm project in Lee County, Georgia, that was modeled on kibbutzim in Israel. Local white farmers viciously opposed the 6,000-acre operation, accusing participants of being communists and occasionally firing shots at their buildings, Sherrod said.

“They did everything they could to fight us,” she said. When drought struck the South in the 1970s, the federal government promised to help New Communities through the Office of Economic Opportunity. But the money was routed through the state, led by segregationist Gov. Lester Maddox, and the local office of the Farmers Home Administration, whose white agent was in no hurry to write the checks, she said. It took three years for New Communities to get an “emergency” loan, she said.

“By the time we got it, it was much too late,” Sherrod said. The operation hobbled along for a few years with other financing, but creditors ultimately foreclosed on the property in 1985, she said. Getting money for any minority farmer out of that FmHA office “was always a fight,” Sherrod said. But she made a point of learning the regulations so thoroughly that she understood them better than the bureau agent, she said. “I was such a thorn in his side,” she said, that the agent eventually left the bureau for good.

Using that experience, Sherrod worked with the Federation of Southern Cooperatives to help black farmers keep their land. The group worked with U.S. Rep. Mike Espy, D-Mississippi (who later became agriculture secretary), and Sen. Wyche Fowler, D-Georgia, to pass the Minority Farmers Rights Act in 1990. The measure, known as Section 2501, authorized $10 million a year in technical assistance to black farmers, but only $2 million to $3 million a year has been distributed.

With black-owned farms heading toward extinction, Sherrod and other activists sued the USDA. In a consent decree, the USDA agreed to compensate black farmers who were victims of discrimination between January 1, 1981, and December 31, 1999. It was the largest civil rights settlement in history, with nearly $1 billion being paid to more than 16,000 victims. Legislation passed in 2008 will allow nearly 70,000 more potential claimants to qualify.

“I was deeply involved in all of that work and in the settlement, and in helping farmers to file their claims,” she said. “So I was having to fight USDA just for the services, for the loans for farmers, for some of the programs that should have been automatic, that others were getting.” USDA hired Sherrod as its Georgia director of rural development in August 2009. She was the first black person in that position; of 129 USDA employees in Georgia, only 20 are black, she said.

Her family still owns the farm in Baker County, plus an additional 30 acres she bought from a cousin. She hasn’t had time to work the land yet. “I’d like to try some of the things I’ve taught others,” she said, again laughing. Sherrod emphasizes that the speech that caused all the controversy was about embracing diversity and using the strengths of every culture. “We’ve got to get beyond this [racial division],” she said. “… My message has been, ‘Let’s work together.’ That’s what my message has always been.”

Despite her father’s killing and the injustices that followed, the racial hatred she has fought all her life, and now her quick exit from the USDA, Sherrod refuses to become bitter. “I can’t hold a grudge. I can’t even stay mad for long,” she said. “I just try to work to make things different. If I stayed mad, if I tried to hate all the time, I wouldn’t be able to see clearly in order to do some of the things that I’ve been able to do. “Even with this, I’m not angry. I’m not angry. I’m out of a job today, but I’m not angry. I will survive. I have. I can’t dwell on that. I just feel there’s a need to go forward.”