Oct. 17, 2017

Civil Rights Leaders, Clergy Support Federal Crackdown on Payday Lending
By Charlene Crowell

Hilary O. Shelton

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - After five years of field hearings, town hall meetings, multiple research reports, and over one million comments, the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB) has announced a new rule to rein in predatory payday and car-title loans.

“These protections bring needed reform to a market where far too often lenders have succeeded in setting up borrowers to fail. . . Faced with unaffordable payments, consumers must choose between defaulting, re-borrowing, or failing to pay basic living expenses or other major financial obligations,” said Richard Cordray, CFPB Director.

Central to the CFPB's rule, established Oct. 5, is the establishment of an ability-to-repay principle. High-cost loans of 45 days or less, as well as longer term loans that end in a balloon payment, must first take into account whether the loan is affordable when both borrower income and expenses are considered. These loans allow lenders to seize funds from either a borrowers’ bank accounts (payday loans) or repossess vehicles that were used as collateral (car-title loans).

Although marketed by predatory lenders as an easy lifeline in a financial emergency, research by CFPB, and other consumer groups found otherwise: payday lending’s business model is the tool that drowns borrowers into a sea of debt. With triple-digit interest rates of 400 percent or higher, payday and car-title loans drain $8 billion in fees on loans averaging $300-$400. Borrowers stuck in more than 10 loans a year generated 75 percent of all payday loan fees. Similarly, 85 percent of car-title loan renewals occur 30 days after a previous one could not be fully repaid.

Across the country, these high-cost lenders are most-often found in communities of color where Blacks, Latinos, and low-wealth families reside. The data and consistency of business locations in these areas suggest that lenders target financially vulnerable consumers.

Upon learning of CFPB’s payday rule, clergy and civil rights leaders who have steadfastly opposed payday and car-title lenders’ triple-digit interest rates were swift to speak in support. Their desire to rein-in the debt trap of these unaffordable loans was both strong and consistent.

“With little accountability for their actions, payday lenders have long preyed upon communities of color and drained them of their hard-earned savings,” said Hilary O. Shelton, the NAACP’s Washington Bureau Director and Senior Vice President for Policy and Advocacy. “This CFPB rule establishes a much-needed set of transparent responsibilities for lenders and basic rights and protection for borrowers.”

“We will work to defend and strengthen this rule,” continued Shelton, “so Americans face fewer burdens in establishing financial security.”

For Reverend Willie Gable, Jr., Pastor of Progressive Baptist Church in New Orleans and Member of the National Baptist Convention, USA, Inc., the country’s largest predominantly African-American religious denomination, the payday rule was both personal and pastoral.

“In my home state of Louisiana, the average payday loan interest rate is 391 percent,” said Reverend Gable, Jr., “With rates this high – and even higher in other states, cash-strapped people who needed only a couple hundred dollars soon discover they are in financial quicksand, paying loan fees were after week, that only sink them deeper into debt.”

“As best I can, I comfort those caught in payday lending’s web of debt,” Gable added. “Yet I also know that it is time for change. These shackles of debt must be broken.”

“President Trump and Congress should get on the side of civil rights advocates, the religious community, consumer organizations, and the public at-large by supporting and strengthening the CFPB’s new rules on payday lending,” challenged Vanita Gupta, president and CEO of The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, a coalition of more than 200 national organizations to promote and protect the civil and human rights of all persons in the United States. “Payday lending is bad for many consumers; but like many predatory scams, it invariably ends up as a weapon against the disadvantaged communities that are least able to bear its terrible burden.”

Looking ahead, many consumer advocates remain hopeful that CFPB will go even further with its rules, to include similar actions against harmful and longer-term loans.

At both the state and federal levels, civil rights leaders and consumer advocates must remain watchful to preserve, expand, and enforce existing interest rate caps now in effect in 15 states and the District of Columbia. Advocates must also remain watchful for any congressional actions that may be taken to preempt or undermine consumer protections.

Oct. 16, 2017

America Being Forced to Face Conflict Between its Founding Principles and its Racist Reality
By Dr. Wilmer J. Leon, III

This Charlottesville statue of Confederate General Robert E. Lee remains covered in a black cloth since deadly violence by White supremacists last summer. After the defeat of the Confederacy, Lee actually called for unity.   

NEWS ANALYSIS

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - “Time catches up with kingdoms and crushes them, gets its teeth into doctrines and rends them; time reveals the foundations on which any kingdom rests, and eats at those foundations, and it destroys doctrines by proving them to be untrue.” - James Baldwin, The Fire Next Time

America, the international global hegemon, the empire - finds itself conflicted.  At the crux of this conflict is the fact that for as noble as its founding pretexts are, “…that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights…” the “grand experiment” of American or Jeffersonian democracy was actually founded on the myth of racism/White Supremacy.  Americans, both White and Black have been indoctrinated to believe in the false social construct of race and the false narratives that Whites – Europeans and European Americans are superior to all others in the world, Manifest Destiny and American Exceptionalism.

So, what we are seeing today play itself out with the Columbus myth, Trump, Charlottesville, DACA and the Dreamers, the Muslim ban and the NFL fiasco, etc. is America being forced to face up to the conflict between its founding principles and its racist reality. Time is catching up to these doctrines and proving them to be untrue.

The late great Dr. Francis Cress Welsing defined racism/White Supremacy as, “The local and global power system structured and maintained by persons who classify themselves as White, whether consciously or subconsciously determined. This system consists of patterns of perception, logic, symbol formation, thought, speech, action and emotional response, as conducted simultaneously in all areas of activity [economics, education, law, etc]).”

The following are two examples to support the position that the grand experiment of American or Jeffersonian democracy was founded on the myth of racism/White Supremacy.

1) The Virginia Slave Code Act I 1669, “Be it enacted…if any slave resist his master…and by the extremity of the correction should chance to die, that his death shall not be acompted felony, but the master…be acquit from molestation, since it cannot be presumed that prepense malice…should induce any man to destroy his own estate.” This is the first example that I found where we were relegated to property or what Amiri Baraka called “thingness”.

2) 13^th Amendment to the Constitution - Section 1. “Neither slavery nor involuntary servitude, except as a punishment for crime whereof the party shall have been duly convicted, shall exist within the United States, or any place subject to their jurisdiction.” This led to the implementation of the convict leasing system as a replacement for slavery.  This is brilliantly documented by Douglas Blackmon in his book Slavery By Another Name.

On October 9^th, Americans celebrated the traditional "Columbus Day".  According to Steve Kurtz, from Fox News.com, “Columbus Day… is a nationally recognized holiday...It is true that the conquest of the Americas by Europeans, which starts with Columbus, was very ugly, and involved a lot of violence. But that, for better or worse, is how history worked pretty much everywhere for thousands of years. (Though it should be noted a large portion of the deaths of Native Americans was due to disease, not violence--an inevitable consequence of Old World illness in New World soil…) …The point is not to excuse the worst that happened, but to understand it. And to see that it is not the essence of Columbus, but rather part of the times. With all that, there are reasons to celebrate Columbus Day.”

Now, if that’s not Eurocentric nonsense I don’t know what is.  According to the LA Times, “Columbus’ landfall ushered in one of the greatest injustices in human history: the wholesale transfer of wealth and lands from native peoples to Europeans; the unprecedented depopulation of vast swaths of the Americas as European diseases reduced native populations by 90%...” From the Eurocentric perspective violent history is celebrated, the death, destruction, rape, slavery and other atrocities committed by Columbus are ignored and he is deified because history is written from the perspective of the victor. That’s why it’s called “his-story”.

This racist logic, this White Supremacist narrative that is clearly articulated in Kurtz’s rationale for honoring Columbus is the same narrative used by Sons and Daughters of the Confederacy, neo-Confederates and neo-Nazi’s supporting the terrorist statutes from the Civil War as paragons of virtue. In this instance it is not that the South won the Civil War. Their racism compels them to protect their whiteness, history and heritage. Their narrative tells us that the statues are supposed to help us understand context and the dynamics of what was happening at the time from their perspective.  But, like the Columbus lie, the story is told from the perspective of the oppressor, not the oppressed.  They simply want to maintain some semblance of the myth of White Supremacy.

One very simple question, how could Columbus “discover” something when the Arawak people were already there?  They are some of the indigenous peoples of the West Indies that Columbus first encountered not “discovered”. That “discovery” lie is the blindness that attends arrogance.  That’s the ignorance born out of the false narrative of White-Eurocentric supremacy.  I discovered you!  Columbus was late, real late, centuries late to the party.

Now to support this ignorance, Kurtz writes, “While there is only limited knowledge of what pre-Columbus America was like...”  Really? Try telling Dr. Ivan Van Sertima, author of They Came Before Columbus that his lifetime of work on Olmec civilization in the Americas is limited knowledge. Try telling Dr. Ben, John Henrick Clark, Chancellor Williams and the host of other Black scholars on this history that their life’s work and research is limited knowledge. Kurtz is like Columbus – just because he refuses to recognize it, it must be “limited knowledge” and research.

Kurtz wrote, “While there is plenty to criticize about Columbus…I think this movement (Indigenous People’s Day) is missing the point…History, in fact, is the story of conquest. We may not like it, but it’s our shared heritage.” No sir, that’s the Eurocentric historical perspective…not all historical perspectives begin and end with, we came, we saw, we kicked your butt. That’s the basis of the same lie being told by those who want to fly the Stars and Bars and commemorate the Confederate generals. They continuously tell us “it’s our shared heritage… The point is not to excuse the worst that happened, but to understand it.” Here’s the reality, those neo-Confederates who want to “celebrate their heritage” and “commemorate their ancestors” are celebrating treason and commemorating racists and traitors.  Where’s the honor in that?

Most of the post-Civil War statues that were erected in Virginia and Louisiana and other Southern States were not erected to commemorate Confederate Generals.  Most of the statues in question were erected as acts of intimidation to terrorize African-Americans and show unified opposition to the movement towards civil rights; not to honor dead “heroes”. In fact, Robert E. Lee opposed Confederate memorials. He wrote in 1869, “I think it wiser…not to keep open the sores of war but to follow the examples of those nations who endeavored to obliterate the marks of civil strife, to commit to oblivion the feelings engendered.” Lee eventually swore allegiance to the Union and publicly decried southern separatism, whether militant or symbolic. These neo-confederates want to honor a man who did not want to be honored.

So, what we see with the narrative of the Charlottesville race riot and Trump saying that there were good people on both sides is as Dr. Welsing clearly articulated. It is a narrative developed through and supported by patterns of perception, logic (The Lost Cause for example), symbol formation (The flying of the Stars and Bars and these statutes), thought, speech, action (glorifying Columbus w/ a holiday) and emotional response (the Charlottesville riot). It is a White Supremacist narrative that goes all the way back to the Columbus myth and a last-ditch effort by those in 2017 like Steve Kurtz who desperately try to defend the indefensible.

Dr. Wilmer Leon is the Producer/ Host of the nationally broadcast call-in talk radio program “Inside the Issues with Leon,” on SiriusXM Satellite radio channel 126. Go to www.wilmerleon.com or email: This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.. www.twitter.com/drwleon and Dr. Leon’s Prescription at Facebook.com        © 2017 InfoWave Communications, LLC

 

 

Oct. 16, 2017

As U. S. Starts New Relations With Sudan, Human Rights Watch Calls the Lifting of Sanctions a 'Serious Mistake'

I. Ghandour and U.S. Deputy Secretary of State John Sullivan

(TriceEdneyWire.com/GIN) – Sudan’s strained relations with the U.S., decades long, have suddenly taken a turn for the better.

In a move that caught some diplomats and human rights defenders by surprise, the U.S. State Department announced the lifting of some of its toughest economic and trade sanctions against Sudan. The initiative was reportedly hammered out in the last days of the Obama administration and is a major step towards normalizing relations with this Eastern African nation whose leader has faced war crimes charges.

Despite the policy change, Sudan remains on a black list of state sponsors of terrorism such as Syria and Iran.

“This is a paradox,” said a perplexed Foreign Minister Ibrahim Ghandour. “We are the best country cooperating on countering terrorism and at the same time we are on the list of state sponsors of terrorism!”

Rocky relations with the U.S. date back to 1967 when Sudan threatened Israel during the Arab-Israeli six day war. Antagonism towards Israel has since cooled and diplomatic channels between the two former enemies have reportedly opened.

Military relations between the U.S. and Sudan were resumed this year along with a pledge by Sudan not to pursue an arms deal with North Korea. President Omar al-Bashir has also lent support to the U.S.-backed war in Yemen with hundreds of troops on the ground, incurring heavy losses.

The development comes as shocking news to rights groups who say that lifting sanctions would reward a government still accused of abuses.

“It’s a serious mistake for these sanctions to be lifted permanently when Sudan has made no progress on human rights,” said Andrea Prasow of Human Rights Watch.

In its objection, Amnesty International cited the use of chemical weapons by Sudanese forces against civilians, including babies and young children, in the restive Darfur region as recently as September.

Supporters of the American decision say that sanctions have done little to encourage reforms or fully resolve a conflict in the Darfur region.  “Sudan is moving towards being reintegrated into the community of acceptable nations,” said Magnus Taylor of the International Crisis Group. “They’re on this ladder, albeit a low rung, but they’re climbing.”

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Oct. 11, 2017

Study Reveals: Racial Microaggressions May Reveal Deeper Beliefs  
By Kim Eckart

Special to the Trice Edney News Wire from NorthStarNewsToday.com

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - Whites who are more likely to make microaggressions against Black people are also more likely to hold some degree of negative feelings towards Black people as a whole, whether they know it or not, a new study suggests. “Our study results offer validation to people of color when they experience microaggressions.”

While blatant racism may seem easy to identify—a shouted racial slur, a White supremacist rally, or the open discrimination, segregation, and violence of the pre-civil rights era—more subtle forms of bias, called microaggressions, emerge in the everyday exchanges among friends and strangers alike and can offend racial and ethnic minorities.

Mirriam Webster Dictionary defines a micro aggression as “a comment or action that subtly and often unconsciously or unintentionally expresses a prejudiced attitude toward a member of a marginalized group (such as a racial minority).”

Such statements, uttered intentionally or inadvertently, draw upon stereotypes and are linked with racism and prejudice, according to the new study.

The concept of microaggressions has garnered greater attention in today’s political environment, explains lead author Jonathan Kanter, a research associate professor of psychology at the University of Washington.

“Our study results offer validation to people of color when they experience microaggressions. Their reactions can’t simply be dismissed as crazy, unreasonable, or too sensitive,” Kanter says.

“According to our data, the reaction of a person of color—being confused, upset, or offended in some way—makes sense, because they have experienced what our data show: that people who are more likely to make these comments also are more racist in other ways,” Kanter explains.

Three examples

For this study, the team, with the help of focus groups of students of color from three universities, devised the Cultural Cognitions and Actions Survey (CCAS) and administered it to a small group of students—33 Black, 118 White—at a large public university in the Midwest. More than half of White respondents said they would think or say, “All lives matter, not just Black lives.”

The 56-item questionnaire asks the White respondent to imagine him- or herself in five different everyday scenarios involving interactions with Black people, such as talking about current events, attending a diversity workshop, or listening to music. The respondent then considers how likely he or she is to think or say specific statements.

For Black respondents, the wording of the scenarios and questions was revised slightly to assess whether they would experience racism. Each of the statements included in the survey was deemed at least somewhat, if not significantly, offensive by Black students.

In the “current events” scenario—the one that yielded the highest percentage of “likely” responses from Whites—respondents were to imagine talking about topics in the news, such as police brutality and unemployment. More than half of White respondents said they would think or say, “All lives matter, not just Black lives,” while 30 percent said they might say, “I don’t think of Black people as Black,” and 26 percent said they were likely to think or say, “The police have a tough job. It is not their fault if they occasionally make a mistake.” More than half of Black respondents identified each of those statements as racist.

Responses on the CCAS were then related to several validated measures of racism and prejudice, to determine if one’s likelihood of making microaggressive statements was related to these other measures. An additional scale controlled for social desirability—the idea that respondents might answer in ways that put themselves in the best possible light.

White privilege

Results indicated that White students who said they were more likely to make microaggressive statements were also significantly more likely to score higher on all the other measures of racism and prejudice, and results were not affected by social desirability. “It can come as a bit of a shock to a lot of White people that their behavior and attitudes are under scrutiny.”

The statement that yielded the highest statistical relation to other measures of racism among White respondents came from the “diversity workshop” scenario, in which a class discusses White privilege. Though only about 14 percent of White respondents said they were likely to think or say, “A lot of minorities are too sensitive,” the statement had the highest correlation with negative feelings toward Blacks. Nearly 94 percent of Black respondents said the statement was racist.

The correlations between statements and attitudes are averages from the study sample, Kanter says, and so the results do not address the intentions or feelings of any one person.

“It doesn’t mean that on a case-by-case basis, if you or I engaged in microaggressions, that we have cold or racist feelings toward Blacks,” he says. “But the study says that regardless of the intention behind a microaggression or the feelings of the specific person who uttered it, it’s reasonable for a Black person to be offended.

“On average, if you engage in a microaggression, it’s more likely that you have cooler feelings toward Black people, and that whether you intended it or not, you’ve participated in an experience of racism for a Black person.”

In many ways, overt racism has declined gradually since the civil rights movement, Kanter says, and White people often assume that because they do not utter racial slurs, or perhaps are well-versed in and value social justice, that they do not have to worry about engaging in racist behavior themselves“It can come as a bit of a shock to a lot of White people that their behavior and attitudes are under scrutiny,” says Kanter, who pointed out that as a White male, he has had to confront realizations about his own behavior over time. “The nature of how we’re looking at racism is changing. We’re now able to look at and root out more subtle forms of bias that weren’t focused on before because explicit racism was taking a lot of the attention.”

Why this focus?

Taken in isolation, the size and location of the study sample limit the generalizations that can be made, Kanter says. But the idea behind the CCAS is to use it elsewhere and adapt it to focus on other racial and ethnic minorities so as to better understand racism and develop educational tools to combat it. The survey has since been used at the University of Washington, he adds, where early results are very similar to those reported in the published article.

Kanter says he’s heard from critics who say the study has a liberal bias, or that the research should examine offenses against White people. But he says the point is to address racism targeted at oppressed and stigmatized groups.

He says, “We’re interested in developing interventions to help people interact with each other better, to develop trusting, nonoffensive, interracial relationships among people. If we want to decrease racism, then we need to try to decrease microaggressions.”

The study appears online in the journal Race and Social Problems.

Kim Eckhart is a public information officer for University of Washington.