May 5, 2016

Larry Wilmore  - It’s Important to Understand Why
By Dr. Wilmer J. Leon, III

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - “Words alone do me no justice. So Mr. President, if I’m going to keep it a hundred; yo’ Barry, you did it my Nigga; you did it.”  Larry Wilmore - White House Correspondents’ Dinner

Comedian Larry Wilmore was the host of this years White House Correspondents’ Dinner.  He did a fantastic job.  He “killed” as they say in the comedy business.

His jokes were timely, thoughtful and spoke to many realities that too many in the room and within the larger viewing audience would have preferred he not address.  As he followed President Obama’s monologue he opened with, "Welcome to Negro Night…Or as Fox News will report, 'Two thugs disrupt elegant dinner in D.C…that’s how they do it,’ " He was spot on, that’s how FOX News does it.

He thanked President Obama, the First Lady and others for hiring him and Sen. McConnell (R-KY) for not blocking his nomination.  Again, spot on, timely and relevant. McConnell’s contrived and baseless logic for not holding hearings on President Obama’s nominees is BS and everyone knows it.

He introduced himself by saying, “…to say a little bit about me, I am a Black man who replaced a white man who pretended to be a TV newscaster so yeah, in that way Lester Holt and I have a lot in common.”  The audience did not like that reference to their beloved Brian Williams. Even though Williams “embellished the truth” during national newscasts for personal gain, in the minds of many in the room that was off limits.

Wilmore went on to comment about the President hanging out with NBA players like Steph Curry.  He said that it made sense “because both of you like raining down bombs on people from long distances.”  As the crowd moaned and groaned he quipped, “what, am I wrong?”  No, Larry, again you were spot on. It takes a smart, strong and courageous comedian to incorporate drone attacks and collateral damage into a comedy routine in front of the Commander in Chief.  He said what needed to be said.

He aptly noted that MSNBC “actually now stands for ‘missing a significant number of black correspondents” and then introduced CNN’s Don Lemon by saying, “alleged journalist Don Lemon is here ladies and gentleman.”  Calling out the fact that the Columbia Journalism Review blog named CNN’s Don Lemon one of the worst journalists of 2014, again, spot on.

Larry Wilmore closed his 23-minute “set” with some heart-felt real talk. “When I was a kid, I lived in a country where people couldn’t accept a black quarterback. Now think about that. A black man was thought by his mere color not good enough to lead a football team. And now to live in your time, Mr. President, when a black man can lead the entire free world.”  Wilmore then closed with what have now become the most famous three lines in recent memory, “Words alone do me no justice. So, Mr. President, if I’m going to keep it 100,” Wilmore said, before pounding his chest. “Yo, Barry, you did it, my nigga!”

Larry Wilmore has caught a lot of heat for how he closed his set.  Before I jumped on the  “bash Larry bandwagon” I decided to first try to understand the why.  He has since explained that he meant no disrespect.  There are those in the African American community who have tried to claim or defuse the racial epithet as denoted by the “er” and embrace it by replacing the “er” with the “a” to connote affection. Or, as Wilmore said, “conjugating the slur.”

Would I have done it? No. Was I surprised when he did it? Yes. Do I wish he had not done it? Yes.

At the end of the day, Larry Wilmore has admitted his error.  He has said it was bad judgment.  He used a personal “in house” reference that is not even totally accepted “in house” and used it with a general audience.  He did not run from his error like so many others by saying he was “taken out of context”.  I commend him for standing by and owning his error.

I thought Larry Wilmore did an incredible job.  He “crushed it”.  He really pushed the envelop and kept it 100

Before Larry Wilmore hosted the White House Correspondents’ Dinner I liked his humor, his style, his intellect and his approach to comedy as social criticism. Now, I still do and respect him as a man even more.

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

May 1, 2016

Miseries for the Homeless Don’t End in the Spring and Summer
By Kishana Flenory

In good weather, homeless people often rest in local parks in Washington, DC. But the needs of the homeless do not end with warm weather. PHOTO: Kishana Flenory/Howard University News Service

Special to the Trice Edney News Wire from Howard University News Service

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - Every winter, more than 3.5 billion people are homeless in the U. S., according to the National Law Center on Homelessness & Poverty.  When the season changes to spring and then summer, the socio-economic, mental health and other conditions afflicting the homeless remain steady. 

Therefore, though the issue of homelessness in the warm weather may not seem as dire, those who deal with the needs of the homeless year round say their work continues with the same intensity. 

“The temperature outside - whether it’s hot or cold - is not healthy for a person who lives outdoors,” said Megan Hustings, director of the D.C. National Coalition for the Homeless. Hustings said that in either of the extremes, very hot or very cold, a person is subject to illness if they live outside.

The root causes of homelessness must also be dealt with year round, experts said. Whether mental illness, addiction disorders, unemployment, poverty or other situations, each person or family has his or her own story, said John Lozier, executive director of the National Alliance to End Homelessness. 

“Homelessness reflects that a lot has gone wrong in a person’s life,” Lozier said. “It could be their personal life or social economic systems.” 

Lozier also pointed out that homeless people have the same illnesses as people with homes. However, due to weather conditions, whether cold or poor air quality due to heat or just the stress of living outside, illnesses among the homeless can be three to six times worse than someone with a home, he said.

Despite the care that’s available to the homeless, some shelters are almost as bad as living on the street; regardless of the season, some said. 

“The conditions in some of the shelters I have been placed in were terrible,” said Uniqua Johnson, a 30-year-old New York resident.   However, I had nowhere else to go. So, I was forced to stay there.” 

Johnson said she was homeless because she was unemployed. With no money to pay rent for an apartment, she ended up on the streets, she said. Now employed, Johnson said she has made it her duty to never end up in a shelter again. 

Those who work with homelessness, said it requires the coordination of many levels of society. The Steward B. McKinney Assistance Act, established by Congress in 1986, aimed to coordinate the federal response to homelessness and to create partnerships between the federal, state, local and private agencies to address homelessness.

Due to local legislation, in some areas - like Washington. and New York - the homeless are required to be accepted into shelters when the temperature drops to 32 degrees or lower, when the wind chill drops below zero degrees, when snow is more than six inches or when ice storms and freezing rain occurs.  

There are many illnesses a homeless person can receive from being outdoors for long periods of time. 

During the winter, frostbite and hypothermia, the result of the body temperature being abnormally low, is among the major issues, said David Hornig, a receptionist at Hope Mission in Washington.  
“Frostbite affects a person’s body,” Hornig said.  “Their faces, ears, arms become affected by this illness.”

In the spring, severe issues continue and new issues arise, said the Rev. Joanne Holston, president of the Anchor of Hope for the Homeless ministry at Greater Mount Calvary Holy Church in D.C. 

“During the summer and spring they still need toiletries and they need places to take showers and places to bathe because it’s hot,” Holston said, noting that food and water are also needed year round.

Holston said there is great need for the public to continue to contribute to homeless shelters year round - beyond the drives of Thanksgiving and Christmas. 

Sometimes the city issues a “Code Red” meaning no one should be outside due to the heat and poor air quality, she said. 

“So even though the weather is nice and they can sleep outside, they still need a place to stay,” she said.   “That’s very crucial.”

Many homeless people are not mentally ill or on drugs, as is often the perception, she said.  Instead, many simply lost their jobs, she said. So, beyond tangible needs, they also need kindness and empathy, she said.

“They need to know that people care and that they’re not looked down upon because homelessness has a different face now,” she said. “They’re not just out there. They’ve had other positions and other lives. And that’s year round.”

May 3, 2016

Gov. McAuliffe Restores Voting Rights of 206,000 Virginians, Including Disenfranchised African-Americans 
By Jeremy Lazarus

 

Gov. Terry McAuliffe triumphantly holds up the historic order he signed last Friday outside the state Capitol.  PHOTO: Michaele White/Governor’s Office

Special to the Trice Edney News Wire from the Richmond Free Press

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - David Mosby no longer feels like a second-class citizen.
After years of being barred from the ballot box because of his criminal record, the 46-year-old home improvement contractor is finally able to vote and fully take part in the life of his community.

“I never thought I’d have this opportunity,” said the teary-eyed Varina resident, one of more than 200,000 Virginians whose lives have been changed with a stroke of Gov. Terry McAuliffe’s pen. 

 Gov. McAuliffe has gone further than any state chief executive to eliminate the last big barrier to voting in Virginia — a felony conviction.

He signed an order restoring the right to vote to anyone who had completed a prison term as well as any probation or parole requirements as of April 22. 
The change also allows the former felons to serve on a jury or to run for political office.

Even more stunning, the governor made no distinction between those with records for violent crimes such as robbery and rape and those who committed nonviolent offenses such as fraud and illegal drug use. 

The policy change represents a victory for the Virginia State Conference of the NAACP and the American Civil Liberties Union of Virginia, which have been urging such action from the past three governors. 

Immediately, state Republican leaders charged that Gov. McAuliffe had overstepped his authority and urged him to call a special session of the General Assembly to review his action, a call he rejected.

Yet despite the GOP backlash, the Democratic governor has promised to update the order monthly to include other Virginians who fully complete felony sentences after April 22. 

Essentially, Gov. McAuliffe has transformed Virginia from one of the most restrictive states in restoring citizenship rights. A majority of states allow for automatic restoration of rights once a felon completes his or her sentence. Only Florida, Kentucky and Iowa were like Virginia in barring felon voting unless a governor restored rights. 

In a state where 307,000 people with felonies are believed to be disenfranchised, according to the Washington-based Sentencing Project, Gov. McAuliffe stated that his order would impact 206,000 people immediately, possibly half being African-American.

He has rebuffed a request from the General Assembly to release the names and backgrounds of those whose rights are restored. However, newly appointed Secretary of the Commonwealth Kelly Thomasson has put up a searchable database on her office’s website giving individuals the ability to check to see if their rights have been restored.

Should the next Virginia governor rescind the order when he or she takes office in January 2018, state Sen. A. Donald McEachin, D-Henrico, said that Gov. McAuliffe’s action could not be reversed for those whose rights he has restored and who now can register and vote for the next president and for others seeking local and state office.

Before signing the order, the governor said his action would help undo the state’s long history of trying to prevent African-Americans from full participation.

As he and others noted in remarks made on the South Portico of the Virginia Capitol, African-Americans did not gain full voting rights until 1965, when Congress passed the federal Voting Rights Act.

Virginia’s Constitution has prohibited felons from voting since the Civil War, helping to reduce African-American influence at the polls. Those restrictions were expanded in 1902 as part of an updated state Constitution that included poll taxes and literacy tests that were not eliminated until the passage of the Voting Rights Act. 

In researching the provisions, aides to the governor turned up a 1901 quote from a principal author of that Constitution, Lynchburg state Sen. Carter Glass, noting that its voting provision would “eliminate the darkey as a political factor in this State in less than five years, so that in no single county of the Commonwealth will there be the least concern felt for the complete supremacy of the white race in the affairs of government.” 

As Gov. McAuliffe noted, “Too often in both our distant and recent history, politicians have used their authority to restrict people’s ability to participate in our democracy,” he said.
“Today we are reversing that disturbing trend and restoring the rights of our fellow Virginians who work, raise families and pay taxes in every corner of our Commonwealth.”

The right to vote “is the essence of our democracy and any effort to dilute that fundamental principle diminishes it for all of us,” he said, in addressing the crowd of more than 100 people, including ex-convicts like Mr. Mosby, as well as supporters of his executive action like Congressman Robert C. “Bobby” Scott and seven Democratic members of the General Assembly. 

“This makes me feel so good,” said Darlene Jewell, 61, of Richmond, who, for the first time, signed a voter registration application. Her checkered past had ensured she could not vote until now. 

Other speakers added their words of support, including former Secretary of the Commonwealth Levar Stoney, who helped the governor reach this step before stepping down from his post to run for mayor of Richmond; his successor, Secretary Thomasson; and the Rev. Benjamin Campbell, former director of the ecumenical Richmond Hill retreat center in Church Hill; and Raja Johnson, a 40-year-old Richmond mother who spent two years in prison. Her rights were restored in 2014, more than 15 years after being convicted of grand larceny. She now is completing her associate degree in medical technology.

How many of the people whose rights have been restored will register to vote is unknown. An early estimate from the Center for Politics at the University of Virginia suggested about 35 percent, or about 72,000 people of those whose rights were restored by the governor. That represents 1.3 percent of the 5.3 million Virginians currently on the state’s voter rolls.
In Richmond, as well as most communities, there is no data on the number of people with felony records or the number affected by the governor’s order.

However, Census data and other information can provide a guess. Currently, 134,500 people are registered to vote in Richmond, state figures show. The city has about 179,000 people of voting age, 18 and over, according to the U.S. Census, a difference of about 44,500.

According to the Sentencing Project, 20 percent of African-Americans in Virginia cannot vote because of felony records. Applying that percentage to Richmond’s population, which includes about 107,000 African-Americans, at least 15,000 and possibly more of those 44,600 unregistered people would have felony records. Non-citizens and college students who maintain residences in other states would be among the rest.

Advocates such as Richard Walker, founder and chief executive of Bridging the Gap in Virginia, a felon support and advocacy group, are planning to step up efforts to find people who now qualify to vote. 

However, he noted that the governor can only go so far and that his action would not expunge felony convictions, leaving most of the beneficiaries still struggling to find housing or an employer willing to give them a second chance. 

Ms. Jewell agreed, saying that the action is unlikely to make employers hire her after seeing her criminal record. 
“I wish it would,” she said, “but I’ll take what I can get.” 

The question of the governor’s authority to undertake such a sweeping action is sending people to read Article 5, Section 12 of the state Constitution which spells out the governor’s clemency power. 

A strict reading of that section indicates that the governor’s power to “remove political disabilities,” as restoration of rights is called, is unfettered, according to Secretary Thomasson.

Removal of political disabilities is not on the list of items the governor must report on a case-by-case basis to the General Assembly. The Constitution states the governor must report to the General Assembly the particulars of each case in which he uses his authority to grant pardons, issue reprieves, commute sentences or reduce or eliminate fines and penalties. 

Secretary Thomasson said the governor sidestepped the reporting requirement by keeping intact the obligation of those with restored rights to pay court fines, fees and penalties. That obligation is unchanged, she said.

Instead, the governor decoupled the obligation to repay, said Congressman Scott said. The governor said such debts would constitute “a poll tax” if they were used to block the right to vote, the congressman said. 

Away this week on a trade mission, Gov. McAuliffe said he was assured by state Attorney General Mark Herring and the author of the current state Constitution, University of Virginia law professor A.E. “Dick” Howard, that he had authority to take executive action.

Through a spokesman, Mr. Herring confirmed his support: “We believe that the Constitution provides sufficient authority for the governor’s restoration order and are prepared to defend it in court if necessary.” 

Republican Delegate Bob Marshall of Prince William County, however, has asked Mr. Herring to issue a formal, written opinion to spell out that view. 

Howard did not respond to a request for comment, but has previously written in his commentaries on the state Constitution that governors have considered the restoration of rights “on an individual basis.”

Others who have reviewed that section of the Constitution agreed. Paul Goldman, a former state Democratic Party chairman who served on a panel that then-Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli created in 2013 to find ways to expand restoration of rights, said that was the conclusion the panel reached. Everyone on the panel “who looked at it agreed the governor could not” issue a blanket restoration.

Among those gasping at the governor’s action is Republican House Speaker William J. Howell.

“I am stunned at (the governor’s) broad and unprecedented view of executive power, which directly contradicts how past governors have interpreted their clemency powers. And I am stunned at his willingness to restore the rights of the most heinous criminals without batting an eye.”

Speaker Howell went further to claim the governor was simply trying to make it easier for his friend, Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton, to win Virginia. The governor denied that charge, saying that “there are elections every year in Virginia,” and that his action was based on principle, not partisanship.

Since taking office in 2014, Gov. McAuliffe, with the help of Mr. Stoney, already had gone further than any previous governor in restoring rights. As of this year, he had restored the rights of 18,000 people, particularly after eliminating in 2015 a requirement that felons had to repay court debts before their rights could be restored and after changing drug crimes to nonviolent offenses.

May 1, 2016

Blackonomics

Stop Whining—Start Grinding  
By James Clingman      

                                             

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - It’s interesting how the young folks have started using a term that describes what the older folks should be doing.  I hear young people saying, “I’m grinding,” and I hear older folks whining.  Young people know they have to “just do it,” as the saying goes, in order to achieve their dreams.  In many cases they are willing to take risks and forego the creature comforts that could accrue to them via high level corporate salaries.  They are willing to sacrifice in order to pursue their own path in life, unconstrained by the “rules” someone else sets for them.

We older folks are not as willing to do the work appertaining to progress; instead we are still relying on politicians to make things better for us.  We do a lot more whining than grinding when it comes to our collective—and sometimes even our individual economic freedom.

I hear it on the radio and on news shows all the time from so-called leaders and from so-called liberated Black folks.  They whine about what the “Man” is doing to us, how our collective fate is not in our own hands but someone else’s, what “we need to do,” how “unequal” we are in income, wealth, and social opportunities, and how many of us are in prison.  They can recite all the stats and all the history surrounding our current demise. They reminisce about Kemet and other ancient African contributions to the world.  They talk about “Black Wall Street” and invoke the names of our great icons; and they continue to lament and chronicle, as Maulana Karenga says, “Litanies of lost battles.”

While many of us are very adept at talking about our problems, far fewer of us are willing to get into the fray and do the work to ameliorate our problems—even though the solutions to our problems are relatively simple to implement.

Co-convener of the One million Conscious Black Voters and Contributors, Amefika Geuka, wrote a “Black Paper” in 2007 in which he stated, “[Our] vision is of a transformed Black community where our people radically improve the quality of their lives and surroundings. We will accomplish this by implementing programs and ventures designed specifically for the unique needs of people of African descent – without apology! This will result in the complete elimination of the ‘slave mentality’ and dependence on the gratuity of others that it promotes. We will cease to be the ‘weakest link in the chain,’ or weakest ‘patch’ in the ‘quilt-like’ fabric of American society and that of the world.”

Rhetoric not followed by action is meaningless; and whining not supplanted by grinding only displays weakness and apathy.  Booker T. Washington said, “The world might pity a whining nation, but it will never respect it [until it respects itself enough to do for itself].”

If we would turn our whining into grinding, not worrying as much about the external factors but concentrating on our internal resources with which to “accomplish what we will,” Black people would be much better off.

Politically speaking, Black folks are now so engulfed in Presidential candidates, thinking once again that our salvation somehow lies within them.  Some of our Black political hacks are whining about which candidate will do the most for us, which is kinda like two enslaved people arguing over which plantation and “master” are better.  If we continue to seek the largess of a political candidate without having a reasonable assurance that he or she will do more than talk about our situation, we will continue to get the same thing we have always gotten from them: more rhetoric.  Stop waiting to hear their patronizing words regarding Black issues; start demanding what we want, and then be prepared to respond with our votes and our dollars.  We must negotiate from a position of strength not with idle threats and saber-rattling, but by withholding our votes and our dollars if they do not support our demands.  What do we have to lose?

The State of North Carolina is currently being economically punished because of its stand on which bathrooms transgender persons can use.  Corporations are withdrawing their dollars and other threats abound by athletic groups and such.  Question:  Why isn’t the same thing happening on behalf of Black folks when it comes to voter suppression in that state?  Have you heard any corporation threaten to leave or boycott Carolina on behalf of Black people?  The POTUS even spoke up for the transgender people.  Similar to the Indianapolis, Indiana case and the purported discrimination against gay people by businesses, corporations said they would move and the NCAA said it would cancel its events in that city if the law was not reversed.  Guess what.  The law was changed.

We are too busy counting votes to realize that our dollars count for more.  Stop Whining and Start Grinding.