Dylann Roof Does Not Deserve the Death Penalty by Julianne Malveaux

May 29, 2016

Dylann Roof Does Not Deserve the Death Penalty
By Julianne Malveaux

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - Dylann Roof, the unrepentant racist who killed nine people at Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina, is - no question - a monster. He prayed with people before reciting racist cants and annihilating people. After his heinous acts, it was discovered that he was a rabid racist who had wrapped himself in the Confederate flag. Does he deserve the death penalty? No.

The death penalty is the kindest thing that could happen to Dylann Roof, and he does not deserve our kindness. The death penalty provides some of us with immediate satisfaction, a sense of revenge. And it lets him off the hook. Imagine, instead, that this slug is sentenced to life in prison and forced to live with the consequences of his action. Imagine that he is incarcerated with people who look just like the folks he killed. Imagine that, daily, he has to negotiate the racial realties of our nation’s prison system, a system that disproportionately incarcerates African- American men. Imagine that he is vilified as a symbol of our nation’s ingrained racism. Imagine that he, perhaps, has a “come to Jesus” moment where he renounces the racism that caused him to act. Or, imagine that he simmers in his evil and reminds others how heinous he is.

The death penalty is inhumane no matter how it is applied. African Americans are more likely to be sentenced to death than others are, and that is part, but not all, of the point. The rest of the point is that “an eye for an eye” leaves us all blind. The good people of Mother Emanuel AME Church were overflowing in their forgiveness of Roof. Do these forgiving, God-fearing people now oppose the commandment that says, “thou shall not kill”?

According to the Death Penalty Information Center, nearly 3000 people sit on death row. While African Americans are just 13 percent of the population, we are 43 percent of the death row inmates. Most people don’t believe that the death penalty deters crime, and many believe that enforcing the death penalty is a waste of taxpayer money. Most prefer alternatives – life sentences without parole, and perhaps with restitution. Dylann Roof can turn into a Confederate martyr if he is killed. Instead, imagine him as a decrepit old man living his life out in prison, constantly faced with his crimes, constantly reminded of his heinous acts. His life, not his death, will constantly remind us of the hate that hate produced. Because, make no mistake, Dylann Roof is not an isolated phenomenon. He is the product of the Confederate flag, the product of the Ku Klux Klan, the product of the ugly, repugnant, vicious hate that produces a flawed and crippled white supremacy.

We don’t kill white supremacist hate by killing Dylann Roof. We don’t eliminate the ugly sentiments that propelled this extremely sick young man into a church with a gun by taking his life. Instead, it seems to me, the sole purpose of his life might be to serve as a symbol of hate, to remind us that there will be no peace without justice. Justice does not mean extracting a death penalty that is, inherently, unfair to African Americans. Justice means abolishing the death penalty that is still upheld in 31 states.

The friends and relatives of the Emanuel AME Church murdered were exceptional in their rapid expressions of forgiveness for Dylann Roof. They understood the brokenness that caused him to kill and, even as they mourned their loss, they offered their forgiveness as evidence of their faith. Can we do anything less?

I say that Dylann Roof ought to be put up under somebody’s jail, allowed only a Bible and minimal bland food. I say that he needs to be deprived of every pleasure his victims have been deprived of. I say he needs to be surrounded by black folks just like the ones he killed. I’m not wishing him violence or harassment, just reflection. Killing Roof won’t kill white supremacy. Keeping him miserably alive may, in fact, deter others from imitating him.

Julianne Malveaux is an author and economist. Her latest book “Are We Better Off? Race Obama and Public Policy is available for purchase at juliannemalveaux.com or amazon.com

Policy Makers Headed for Black Political Convention to Set ‘The People’s Agenda’ By Hazel Trice Edney

May 24, 2016

Policy Makers Headed for Black Political Convention to Set ‘The People’s Agenda’
By Hazel Trice Edney

Tuskegee Mayor Johnny Ford

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - As the U. S. presidential and congressional campaigns remain in full throttle, the National Policy Alliance, a coalition of 16,000 Black elected and appointed officials and more than a million Black policy makers has organized a National Black Political Convention to be held June 9-12 in Gary, Ind.

The event is a follow up to a historic gathering convened in 1972 by then Gary Mayor Richard Hatcher.

“The Gary Convention was perhaps the single most important political event for Black America held during the last century,” Tuskegee, Alabama Mayor Johnny Ford said in an interview this week. “With that Gary Convention came the inspiration and motivation that led to the election of more Black elected officials than any time since reconstruction.”

As the first Black mayor of Tuskegee, Ford said, “I am a product of 1972.”

Although he is founding co-chair of the National Policy Alliance, Ford says there will be no top leader.

“We have no one leader. We don’t have a Martin Luther King. We don’t have a Malcolm. We have diversified if you will, whereby all of us have leadership roles,” he said.

Ford confirmed that both Democratic and Republican presidential candidates have been invited to attend and to speak at the event, set for June 9-12. He said President Obama and First Lady Michele Obama have also been invited as well as national civil rights leaders; including youth leaders such as Black Lives Matter. The Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies is also involved with the organizing, Ford says.

The main purpose of the gathering will be to establish a Black agenda that will result in equality and justice, Ford said.

“The challenges facing the African-American community today are even greater than they were 44 years ago,” Ford said. “This convention is being held now because, If not now, when? If not us, who?”

Ford listed issues including “high unemployment, crime in our communities, the need for better education, quality and affordable and accessible health care, the need to develop our infrastructures in the Black community” as being key to a Black agenda.

These are issues being dealt with every day by state and local officials. “So, that’s why we who are closest to the people are providing the leadership.”

Ford acknowledged that while the issues are similar to 1972, the modes of communication are different. For example, there was no Internet back then. This gathering will take full advantage of the new media, he said.

“While this convention is not as well known or will be as big as the one that took place 44 years ago where more than 10,000 delegates came together and adopted a call for action, the African-American community in this country and even internationally will be able to be a part of this convention by [live] streaming - thanks to the Internet.”

Regardless of who shows up, Ford says the significance of going back to Gary 44 years later is powerful because of the historic impact the convention made then.

“Gary precedes glory,” he said. “Gary is a significant and historic return to a place that is sacred in the sense that it was at Gary that we shaped a national agenda. It will be at Gary that we will return to shape a 2016 national agenda.”

Ford said he does not expect everyone to agree on everything. But where there is agreement will come the Black agenda, he said. “And that will be the agenda that we will present to the national Democratic Party, the national Republican Party and the nation and the world.”

With Voting Rights Restored, Former Richmond, Va. Councilman Moves to Run for Mayor

May 22, 2016

With Voting Rights Restored, Former Richmond, Va. Councilman Moves to Run for Mayor

A confessed drug addict, Richardson's announcement has national implications

By Hazel Trice Edney

Henry W. "Chuck" Richardson

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - Former Richmond, Va. City Councilman Henry W. "Chuck" Richardson, who resigned from office after a non-violent drug conviction in 1995, was among the more than 200,000 people with felony records whose voting rights were recently restored by Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe.

Richardson, who served for 18 years after his election as a member of the city's first majority Black City Council in 1977, says he is not only elated that his voting rights have been restored, but he is also circulating petitions to possibly run to become the city's next mayor.

"I have now secured my declaration of candidacy form, filled out the necessary papers and I am getting petitions signed in order to qualify my candidacy for the mayorship of Richmond," said Richardson in an interview this week.

Richardson is not unfamiliar with the mayoral candidacy. He was nominated for the position in 1982 by then Councilwoman Caroline C. Wake, who was then one of four White members of the Council. At that time, the mayor was elected by the nine-member city council. However Richardson voted against himself that year; thereby thwarting the nomination. Richardson explained that he declined then because the other four votes would have come from the White members who he said was attempting to divide the five-member Black regime.

Richardson said the position was offered to him again by the Black members of council in 1994, but "the time wasn't right." In the early 90s, Richmond changed its City Charter to create an at large, city-wide elected mayor.

Richardson would enter a crowded non-partisan field of at least 17 other candidates for the position. The filing deadline is June 14. His candidacy has national implications harkening to that of the late Washington, DC Mayor Marion Barry who after three terms as mayor, was arrested and served six months in federal prison on a crack cocaine-related charge. Barry rose back to popularity after his release and a stint in drug rehab and won re-election to Council in 1993 and re-election to mayor in 1994.

Barry died suddenly in 2014 at the age of 78. Like Barry, Richardson was tremendously popular among the elderly, the poor, the homeless and Richmond's Black population. Richardson was mentored by his brother-in-law, the late Maynard Jackson, mayor of Atlanta. He was the author of Richmond's 30 percent minority set-aside plan, which was a model for Black economic participation around the country when it was struck down by the U. S. Supreme Court in Croson v. Richmond in 1989.

"I had no intentions of running for the mayorship. But it seems to me that providence has come to bear on my life," Richardson said this week. "In the moment of the mayorship's ripeness, the governor has given me my rights back and, to me, it's a message to say run Chuck run. The events are in the saddle and they ride mankind."

Richardson, 68, said among his most prevalent issues will be running "an open government" with transparency so that citizens will always know what's going on; a citizen-friendly City Hall; creating a city jobs bank and strengthening the city school budget process. He said he will also dispense of "wasteful spending" such as the heavy security detail employed by current Mayor Dwight Jones.

As the historically longest serving member of the Richmond City Council, Richardson said his legacy was always one "to get the job done. I worked hard and I was known to get the job done."

Richardson is aware of an obscure Virginia law that prohibits anyone convicted of a drug offense from running for public office. However, the governor's letter appears to give him explicit rights to run.

The May 12 letter to Richardson from McAuliffe says the governor has "restored his rights to vote, hold public office, serve on a jury and to be a notary public". The restoration was effective April 22, 2016, according to the letter.

Richmond lawyer Vinceretta Taylor Chiles, who assisted Richardson and others in the voting rights restoration process, said while she has not researched the state law as it pertains to Richardson, the law appears to be problematic given the governor's sweeping restorations.

She described the law as "arbitrary and capricious because why single drug offenders out opposed to people who are involved in other morally corrupt activity?" she asked. "You mean you can molest a child or sexually offend a child or get convicted of contributing to the delinquency of a minor and that does not disqualify you from running for public office? My goodness."

Richardson credits his history as a decorated Marine machine gunner for his ability to work hard and remain focused on the tasks required by public service. However, it was also during his tour of Vietnam that he became addicted to heroin; an addiction that followed him on to City Council. Nevertheless, he continued to be re-elected even four times after he was convicted of possession of dangerous drugs - cocaine and heroin - in 1988.

He ultimately resigned in 1995 after delivering a small amount of cocaine to a personal friend, who turned out to be a police informant. When the informant gave him what Richardson said was a simple reimbursement, he was arrested and charged with cocaine dealing.

Twenty-one years later, Richardson says he is completely free of drugs and - with rights restored - is looking forward to the mayoral campaign. He says he doesn't see his past as a stumbling block for a successful race and that he could even be an inspiration to young people.

"Young people should be inspired by my message about never giving up," he said. "You can do a lot of things in life. You can have your falls, your ups and your downs. But, I am a testament to the fact that if you keep the faith and never give up, there is no telling what God has in store for you."

Richardson stressed that despite his past troubles, he was always an extraordinary public servant as indicated by his repeated re-elections. He concludes, "Today, more than any other time in Richmond's history, it needs a Marine. Once a Marine, always a Marine. It needs Chuck Richardson because I get the job done."

Donald Trump and the Company He Keeps By Dr. Wilmer J. Leon, III

May 23, 2016

Donald Trump and the Company He Keeps
By Dr. Wilmer J. Leon, III

NEWS ANALYSIS

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - "…I don't know why you like this guy (Trump)…He's a race-baiting, xenophobic religious bigot. He doesn't represent my party. He doesn't represent the values that the men and women who wear the uniform are fighting for... He's the ISIL man of the year." - Senator Lindsey Graham (R-SC)

According to Proverbs 13:20, “He that walketh with wise men shall be wise; but a companion of fools shall be destroyed.”

In common parlance this has come to mean you are judged by the company you keep. And so it should be with the presumptive Republican presidential nominee Donald Trump.

As Trump realized that the delegate counting process involves more strategy than simple math, he hired veteran Republican strategist Paul Manafort to assist him in this process. They say that you can tell a lot about a person by who they turn to for advice. In this case, Trump’s turning to Manafort speaks volumes.

During the 1980 Presidential campaign, Manafort was an integral part of the Reagan brain trust that developed the “Southern Strategy”. Never forget Reagan’s “states’ rights” speech at the Neshoba County Fair and the signal he sent to racists and bigots alike.

The symbolism is not lost on African-Americans and others who understand history. The fairgrounds is just a few miles away from Philadelphia, Mississippi and the hallowed ground where in 1964 Civil Rights workers, Andrew Goodman, Michael Schwerner and James Chaney were brutally murdered. Paul Krugman wrote in the New York Times that Reagan’s speech was, “…a coded declaration of support for segregationist sentiments.”

This messaging fits right in with Trump whose language - unlike Reagan, Trent Lott, Tom Tancredo and so many others before him - is not so coded or subtle.

Manafort seems to have never met a despot or dictator he could not help. According to Time Magazine Manafort’s firm (Black, Manafort) helped to polish the image of Angolan guerrilla leader and head of UNITA Jonas Zavimbi. The firm was charged with the responsibility of assisting UNITA in obtaining financial support from the US:

“Dole (Senator Robert Dole) had shown only general interest in Savimbi's cause until Black, the Senate majority leader's former aide, approached him on his client's behalf. Dole promptly introduced a congressional resolution backing UNITA's insurgency and sent a letter to the State Department urging that the U.S. supply it with heavy arms. The firm's fee for such services was reportedly $600,000.”

Manafort’s firm worked to rehabilitate the image of the dictator of Zaire, Mobutu Sese Seko. Remember, Mobutu working with the CIA overthrew the government of Patrice Lumumba in 1965. According to The Guardian, “…he plundered and looted his way to an estimated $5bn (£3.1bn), with homes in Switzerland and France. During the cold war, he enjoyed financial support from the US, whose then president, Ronald Reagan, called him "a voice of good sense and goodwill…"

The New York Times wrote, “The struggle in that Central African country (Zaire) is between freedom and oppression. Mr. Mobutu is a Machiavellian murderer who wants to stamp out the flickering flames of democratization in Zaire.” Somehow, Manafort and his minions found Mobutu to be worthy of support and his reputation worth reclaiming.

In 1985 Manafort worked with Philippine dictator Ferdinand Marcos. After being put on trial in the Philippines in 1986, Marcos was found guilty of violating the human rights of some 10,000 Filipinos and ordered to pay a total of two billion dollars in compensation to the victims.

According to The Daily Beast, “In 2004, Transparency International listed him as one of the world’s 10 most notorious leaders of the previous two decades (along with Mobutu Sese Seko, another Manafort client). They estimate Marcos embezzled between $5 million and $10 million from his people. Almost 50,000 Filipinos have filed claims for reparations for crimes against them during Marcos’s era of martial law, according to the Philippine news site Rappler.com.”

In American primary campaigns candidates tact to the more extreme sides of their respective parties in order to win the nomination of their parties. They then try to move toward the center of the political spectrum in order to win the general election since the country in neither as liberal nor conservative as the parties wish they were.

There’s a real problem with Donald Trump and his extreme hate-filled rhetoric. Anyone who says, “When Mexico sends its people, they’re not sending their best. They’re not sending you…They’re sending people that have lots of problems…They’re bringing drugs. They’re bringing crime. They’re rapists. And some, I assume, are good people” has no place on the mainstream American political stage. This is not the articulation of a mentality that will keep America safe. It will only be used to turn more people against us.

Trump has called for surveillance against mosques and said he was open to establishing a database for all Muslims living in the U.S. This sounds more like a throwback to the racist mentality articulated by Chief Justice Taney in the Dred Scott decision, “...can negro whose ancestors were imported into this country and sold as slaves…become entitled to all the rights, and privileges, and immunities, guarantied by that instrument (the Constitution) to the citizen…”

Simply put, do the protections of the Constitution apply to everyone in this Country? Taney said no! “they were at that time considered as a subordinate and inferior class of beings who had been subjugated by the dominant race, and, whether emancipated or not, yet remained subject to their authority, and had no rights or privileges but such as those who held the power and the Government might choose to grant them.”

Trump’s call for suspending the Constitutional protections for American Muslims is not the world view of a person who is campaigning to become the “leader of the free world”. This is the world view of a bigot who either does not understand the protections guaranteed to all citizens or chooses to ignore them. Not to mention, according to Trump, "The other thing with the terrorists is you have to take out their families...”

Senator Graham said that Trump is a “…race-baiting, xenophobic religious bigot.” Graham must be on to something. Trump should not only be judged by what he says but also by the company he keeps. It’s not only what you say; it’s what you do. “Who will render to every man according to his deeds…” - Romans 2:6

Will Trump become like Zavimbi, Mobutu and Marcos before him; the next despot client that Manafort can place in his “winners’ category?

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 © 2016 InfoWave Communications, LLC

New Federal Report Finds Increasing Segregation in U.S. Public Schools By Zenitha Prince

May 23, 2016

New Federal Report Finds Increasing Segregation in U.S. Public Schools

By Zenitha Prince

brown smith linda

This Library of Congress photo shows four of the five plaintiffs in the landmark schools desegregation case, Brown v. Board of Education. Taken upon the tenth anniversary of the Supreme Court decision, it includes Harry Briggs, Jr. (Briggs v. Elliot), Linda Brown Smith (Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka), Spottswood Bolling, Jr. (Bolling v. Sharpe), and Ethel Louise Belton Brown (Gebhart v. Belton [Bulah]). Dorothy E. Davis v. County School Board of Prince Edward County, Virginia, is not pictured. The 1964 photo was taken during a tenth anniversary press conference at the Hotel Americana.

Special to the Trice Edney News Wire from the Afro American Newspaper

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - A new analysis by the Government Accounting Office (GAO) reveals that more than 60 years after the United States Supreme Court struck down segregation in Brown v. Board, public schools in the nation remain separate and unequal.

“This GAO report confirms what has long been feared and proves that current barriers against educational equality are eerily similar to those fought during the civil rights movement,” said Rep. John Conyers, ranking member of the U.S. House’s Committee on the Judiciary, in a statement. “There simply can be no excuse for allowing educational apartheid in the 21st century.”

The GAO analysed Department of Education data from school years 2000-01 to 2013-14. It found that the percentage of all K-12 public schools that had high percentages of poor and Black or Hispanic students grew from 9 to 16 percent.

The schools in this 16 percent were not only the most racially-concentrated, the findings show, but also the ones with the highest percentage of low-income students: 75 to 100 percent of the students were Black or Hispanic and also eligible for free or reduced-price lunch—a commonly used indicator of poverty.

The report further showed that schools segregated by race and socioeconomic factors suffered from educational inequities. For example, these schools offered disproportionately fewer math, science, and college preparatory courses and had disproportionately higher rates of students who were held back in ninth grade, suspended, or expelled.

The analysis was the result of a request made in May 2014 by Conyers (D-Mich.), Committee on Education and the Workforce Ranking Member Bobby Scott (D-Va.) and former Congressman George Miller.

“Sixty-two years later, here we are in 2016 facing an overwhelming failure to fulfil the promise of Brown in realizing equality in educational opportunity for all students,” said Scott. “The GAO report confirms that our nation’s schools are, in fact, largely segregated by race and class. What’s more troubling, is that segregation in public K-12 schools isn’t getting better; it’s getting worse, and getting worse quickly, with more than 20 million students of color now attending racially and socioeconomically isolated public schools. This report is a national call to action, and I intend to ensure Congress is part of the solution.”

In addition to the demographic data, the GAO also examined why and how selected school districts have implemented actions to increase student diversity, and the extent to which the justice and education departments have taken actions to identify and address issues related to racial discrimination in schools.

Among other things the GAO recommended that the Education Department should “more routinely analyze its civil rights data to identify disparities among types and groups of schools” and that the DOJ should “systematically track key information on open federal school desegregation cases to which it is a party to better inform its monitoring.”