March 19, 2017

March 14, 2017

Editor's Note: Editors and Publishers: The following is the first in a series of three articles discussing the modern day role of the Black Press in celebration of the 190th anniversary of the founding of Freedom's Journal, the first Black newspaper March 16, 1827. 

The Ammunition We Need Now More Than Ever - Black Newspapers
By Oscar H. Blayton

Special Commentary

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - In 1960, Blacks in Virginia watched as the state changed the laws against trespass to make it a more serious crime, and the penalty was raised from a $100.00 fine to $1,000.00.  This action was taken by the then all-White legislature in an attempt to combat the Civil Rights Movement and more severely punish the activists that were engaging in the sit-ins that were taking place in Richmond – the former capital of the Confederacy – and across the nation.

During that time, we read the unhinged rantings of segregationists, such as James J. Kilpatrick, who wrote lies, to stoke fear and hatred in the hearts of whites against their Black neighbors by exaggerating the civil disruption caused by demonstrators.

During the Civil Rights Movement, Virginia was not the only state where fierce battles for equal justice were fought – battles where so many people suffered, and many lost their lives.  But much of the truth of this struggle was hidden by the dominant news sources of the day; and battles had to be fought to even bring the truth to light.

That was a time when the only reliable news about the Civil Rights Movement could be found in Black newspapers.  Even the storied New York Times and the Washington Post wrote about the Civil Rights Movement from the perspective of spectators, a safe distance from the fray.  Having nothing to lose, the journalists at these newspapers, in an attempt at “objectivity,” often gave too much credence to the misrepresentations of their Southern counterparts.

Today, reading the current reporting and editorials of the large, White-dominated, corporate newspapers, I have a sense of déjà vu.  But now it is not just the newspapers of the Southern segregationists that are spewing lies.  The “alt right” haters have gained a prominent voice in the national discourse, and they are on their way toward gaining even greater influence, with Steve Bannon entrenched in the White House.

So now, as much as ever, the voices of the Black newspapers are needed to combat the evil we face.

We are witnessing the normalizing of the Donald Trump presidency, as the language of appeasement creeps, ever so slightly onto the front pages of the dominant newspapers.  Sports writers are chiding Black athletes for refusing to go to the White House and provide Trump with a photo-op, so that he can pretend not to be a bigot.  Journalists writing for many major outlets are reporting the terrorizing of undocumented aliens as “routine” law enforcement activity.  And stories about the law suits against Trump and the allegations of sexual assault, including rape, are evaporating from the pages of the corporate press like small puddles in a drought.

Too few Americans are alarmed by these recent developments because they are not in the crosshairs of the bigotry that drives the current administration.  There will be precious few allies to combat this plague of bigotry alongside people of color, progressive women, immigrants, the LGBTQ community and undocumented aliens.

But the one resource we have is the battle tested Black Press, founded March 16, 1827.  Black newspapers have always been the sword and shield against injustices aimed at people of color.  This tradition goes back to Fredrick Douglas and beyond, including the first Black newspaper, Freedom’s Journal, founded 190 years ago by John B. Russwurm and Rev. Samuel Cornish.

The ammunition that we will need most in the struggles to come will be the accurate reporting of the truth; and it is beginning to look like the major corporate news media is prepared to compromise on that.  So, we must continue to battle to bring accurate facts to light.  And we will be opposed by those powerful people who want to hide the truth in the shadows by controlling the outlets that feed lies to the public in order to keep us passive, and apathetic.

Maintaining Black newspapers as a loud and honest voice that will fight for the rights of people of color is our best and brightest hope in these terrible times to come.

Oscar H. Blayton is a former Marine Corps combat pilot and human rights activists who practices law in Virginia.

March 13, 2017

We Played Donald Trump Cheap; Now the Joke’s On Us
By Dr. Wilmer J. Leon, III

NEWS ANALYSIS

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - “In several Southern states men long regarded as political clowns had become governors or only narrowly missed election, their magic achieved with a ‘witches’ brew of bigotry, prejudice, half-truths and whole lies.” - Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. 1967

On Friday, January 20, America inaugurated a narcissistic misogynist millionaire who marketed to what Dr. King called the “White backlash” by playing to racist sentiments, bigotry and hatred. Just as he stole the line “Make America Great Again” from Reagan’s campaign, Trump also stole the racist page from Reagan’s play book.

As Reagan, then Governor of California, sought to reassure social conservatives (aka racists) by launching his presidential bid in Philadelphia, Mississippi, Trump has fanned the flames of xenophobia and ill-founded fears of terrorism.

His tweets and illogical rants were and continue to be a “witches’” brew of bigotry, ignorance, prejudice, half-truths and whole lies.  We played him cheap and now the jokes on us.

Early on in the 2016 presidential campaign businessman Donald Trump was the media darling. CBS Chairman Les Moonves said at a Morgan Stanley conference, "It may not be good for America, but it's damn good for CBS…It's a terrible thing to say. But, bring it on, Donald. Keep going.”

America could not get enough of Trump’s bombast, buffoonery and total disregard for truth and fact.  Mainstream media was so entertained by the novelty of Trump that it ignored his inability to articulate substantive policy and lack of experience.  According to a report from Harvard’s Kennedy School’s Shorenstein Center on Media Politics and Public Policy, “Only 11 percent of coverage focused on candidates’ policy positions, leadership abilities or personal and professional histories.”

It’s imperative that we clearly understand that this White backlash as Dr. King called it, or politics of resentment as Dr. Ronald Walters called it, is not new. What is the backlash in response to? What is this resentment directed toward?

The answer to the question is the election of Barack Obama as the first African-American President of the United States. As Dr. Walters wrote in White Nationalism Black Interests – Conservative Public Policy and the Black Community, “Within American society, which includes contending social groups, there exists a balance of power that conforms to that society’s racial composition”.  This balance must conform to the normal distribution of power if society is to remain in equilibrium.  President Obama, in the minds of a many people became an indicator that the normal distribution of power was askew and in jeopardy.

Now this normal distribution of power has shifted so far to the right that it has placed America in jeopardy. President Trump recently tweeted, “Terrible! Just found out that Obama had my "wires tapped" in Trump Tower just before the victory. Nothing found. This is McCarthyism!”

To date Trump has provided no evidence to substantiate this outlandish claim.  But the man who ran on eliminating “waste, fraud and abuse” is now asking Congress to open an investigation.

The investigation should begin with Congress asking Trump to present to the public the information he used to make his claim. If not, how much tax payer money will be wasted researching another unsubstantiated claim by Trump?

The larger problem is it’s not just Trump, it’s also those around him.  Here’s what Trump’s HUD Secretary, Dr. Ben Carson, said about enslaved Africans: “That’s what America is about, a land of dreams and opportunity…There were other immigrants who came here in the bottom of slave ships, worked even longer, even harder for less.”  Carson tried to “clarify” his statement by saying that anybody who’s come from a foreign place is an immigrant. Ignoring the fact that Webster defines “immigrant” as “a person who comes to a country to take up permanent residence”. A person “comes” to a country based upon their free will. Enslaved Africans did not come to America to take up permanent residence in pursuit of opportunity; they were brought to America against their will and worked to death.

Trump’s Secretary of Education Betsy DeVos recently praised HBCUs as “pioneers” of the school choice movement. DeVos ignores the historical reality that in Mississippi, South Carolina, Louisiana and other states it was illegal to teach and/or allow Africans in America - slave or free - to read.  In Virginia, any slave or free person of color found at any school for teaching, reading or writing by day or night could be whipped, at the discretion of a judge, "no more than twenty lashes".  Mississippi state law required a White person to serve up to a year in prison as "penalty for teaching a slave to read".  The creation of HBCUs had nothing to do with choice and everything to do with the response to slave codes, Jim Crow laws and state sanctioned segregation.

During his first address to the joint session of Congress, Trump acknowledged the sacrifice of Navy Special Operator Senior Chief William ‘Ryan’ Owens, but failed to take responsibility for authorizing the raid in Yemen where he died.  In fact, he tried to blame the Obama administration for authorizing the raid and leaving it for him to clean up.  According to the Washington Post, In an interview with Fox News that aired Tuesday morning, Trump said the mission “was started before I got here.”  He went on to say, “This was something that was, you know, just — they wanted to do… ‘And they lost Ryan,’ Trump continued.”

According to PBS, President Obama did not authorize the raid. It was suggested in early January that the decision be “deferred to the Trump administration, so they could run their own careful process. And President Obama agreed on that, that he would make no decision whether to do things like this, and instead that Trump should run his own process.”

Donald Trump is a man long regarded as a political clown. We mocked him, scoffed at him and dismissed him as we dismissed Sarah Palin; the lightest of lightweights. He worked his magic (and Republican thievery) and was elected by employing a “witches’” brew of bigotry, prejudice, half-truths and whole lies.  A tactic he continues to employ.

You get what you vote for in America (or don’t show up to vote for). We played him cheap; now the jokes on us.

, Producer/ Host of the nationally broadcast call-in talk radio program “Inside the Issues with Wilmer 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

March 7, 2016

Revised Ban on Immigrants is 'Catastrophic', Critics Charge

(TriceEdneyWire.com/Global Information Network) – A revised travel ban by the Trump administration is already in trouble with a leading aid agency, with the travel industry, and with the Nigerian government which has urged its citizens to postpone making trips to the U.S. without “compelling or essential reasons.”

The new travel ban, which still targets majority-Muslim countries, slightly modifies an earlier order that sparked chaos at airports across the country as travelers – even those with green cards – were denied entry by local officers.

One of the harsher critics of the new ban, the head of the NY-based International Rescue Committee, labeled it an "historic assault on refugee resettlement to the United States, and a really catastrophic cut at a time there are more refugees around the world than ever before."

“There is there is no national security justification for this ‘catastrophic’ cut in refugee admissions,” declared David Miliband, adding that the ban singles out "the most vulnerable, most vetted population that is entering the United States."

The IRC provides humanitarian aid in five African countries, six Middle Eastern countries, six Asian countries, three European countries, and 22 cities in the U.S.

Trump's latest order suspends the U.S. refugee program for 120 days, though refugees already formally scheduled for travel by the State Department will be allowed entry. When the suspension is lifted, the number of refugees allowed into the U.S. will be capped at 50,000 for fiscal year 2017.

But the new and higher bars to entry to the U.S. have the tourism industry biting its nails. Travel analytics firm ForwardKeys tallied the fall-off in major tourism-dependent U.S. cities as 6.5 percent in the eight days after President Donald Trump's initial travel ban was announced on Jan. 27th.

In New York City, analysts foresee some 300,000 fewer visitors from abroad this year than in 2016, a 2.1 percent dip. It's the first time for such a fall-off since 2008, says NYC & Company, New York's tourism arm.

Even some African countries are sounding the alarm. In Nigeria, for example, special presidential adviser Abike Dabiri-Erewa, urged Nigerians to consider postponing visits to the U.S.

“In the last few weeks, the office has received a few cases of Nigerians with valid multiple-entry US visas being denied entry and sent back to Nigeria,” she said. “In such cases, affected persons were sent back immediately on the next available flight and their visas were cancelled.”

Planned trips should be delayed, she advised, barring compelling or essential reasons, until there is clarity on the new immigration policy from Washington.

The latest action by the Trump administration could spell trouble for the 2.1 million African immigrants living in the U.S., 327,000 of whom were born in Nigeria, according to the Pew Research Center, published in February.

GLOBAL INFORMATION NETWORK creates and distributes news and feature articles on current affairs in Africa to media outlets, scholars, students and activists in the U.S. and Canada. Our goal is to introduce important new voices on topics relevant to Americans, to increase the perspectives available to readers in North America and to bring into their view information about global issues that are overlooked or under-reported by mainstream media.