Urban News Features

Lies and Coverups in Chicago By Marc H. Morial

Dec. 13, 2015

To Be Equal

Lies and Coverups in Chicago
By Marc H. Morial

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - “Because a body of men, holding themselves accountable to nobody, ought not to be trusted by anybody.” – Thomas Paine, Rights of Man (Part One), 1791

A day after the city of Chicago released the dash-cam video showing the cold-blooded murder of 17-year-old Laquan McDonald at the hands of a Chicago Police Department officer, the Chicago Urban League, supported by the National Urban League, formally requested that the Department of Justice initiate a “pattern and practice” investigation into the CPD.

Based upon the disturbingly stark difference between official police accounts of the October 2014 shooting of the Black teen and what is seen on the video, our nation’s second largest police department is now under a wide-ranging federal investigation that will examine whether the department engages in a pattern or practice of violations of the Constitution or federal law while policing.

Police claimed McDonald moved toward the officers just before the shooting. The video shows McDonald jogging away from the police. Police claimed McDonald continued moving toward the officers even after he fell. The video shows Van Dyke firing shots into McDonald’s motionless body. Police claimed the knife McDonald held was in the open position. State’s Attorney Anita Alvarez said the blade was closed.

In other words, the police lied.

This long sought-after probe will investigate the CPD’s use of force (including deadly force), racial and other disparities in its use of force, and scrutinize the department’s ability to handle allegations of misconduct and effectively discipline rogue officers. The video of Laquan being shot repeatedly as he walked away from the police officer, and the conspiracy to conceal the truth of what happened that night with a concocted account that painted the teenage victim as an aggressor, speaks to a long-standing grievance, particularly among the city’s African-American communities, that too many police officers believe they are above the communities and laws they are sworn to protect and serve.

Officer Jason Van Dyke, who shot 16 bullets into Laquan—many of them while he was already lying on the ground—had 18 citizen complaints filed against him, but he had never been disciplined. According to the New York Times, from 2011 to 2015, in 97 percent of citizen complaints filed, not one officer was punished. Laquan’s unnecessary and tragic death has pushed aside the dark veil of police department unaccountability. The investigation must usher in an era where the beams of transparency brings sweeping changes and reforms to the CPD.

Enough is enough. Lies and coverups can neither appear to be nor be the norm in any of our nation’s police departments. No one is served when the police and citizens look at each other with distrust, fear and hostility. To effectively fight crime, citizens and police officers must be partners in that effort, and that can’t happen if suspicion and anger stand in between that vital, life-saving partnership.

The Chicago Urban League was, and remains, at the forefront of those demanding broad and bold reform within the CPD. I applaud both the swift work of the Chicago Urban League on this pressing issue and the Justice Department’s decision to open the investigation.

We need to not only understand how the police handled this specific case of a 17-year-old boy shot dead by a police officer, but we also need to know if this points to a pattern of systemic abuse and lies. “The mixed-message of purported concern yet muted response – or even denial – we’ve seen from CPD’s top management highlights the lack of transparency and due process when it comes to officer-involved shootings. It is imperative that the Department of Justice step in and correct this conduct before there is any more loss of life,” said Shari Runner, interim president and CEO of the Chicago Urban League.

This week, the Chicago Urban League is sponsoring “Truth and Justice for All: Advancing Police and Community Accountability,” a community forum that will begin the conversation about strategies to heal the rift caused by decades of mistrust between the police and the city’s residents. Leading voices on social justice and legal issues will examine the need for improved policing practices and discuss how the CPD can be reformed. If fair policing and justice for all—not some—matters to you, add your ideas and your voice to this vital conversation. As long as organizations, community groups and the citizens of Chicago (and beyond) continue to demand that police departments respect and protect the civil rights of everyone it protects and serves, the days of unchallenged lies and shameful coverups in the CPD—or otherwise—are numbered.

Eloquence and Arrogance By Julianne Malveaux

Dec. 13, 205

Eloquence and Arrogance
By Julianne Malveaux

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - On the same day that President Barack Obama gave a stirring and historically grounded commemoration regarding the 150^th anniversary of the passage of the 13^th Amendment, the one that “abolished” slavery, Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia chose to disregard tenets of equality and opportunity from the bench during the hearing for Fisher V. University of Texas when he suggested that African American students would benefit more if they went to “lesser track” schools. His verbatim comments:

“There are those who contend that it does not benefit African-Americans to get them into the University of Texas, where they do slower-track school where they do well,” Scalia said. “One of the pointed out that most of the black scientists in this country don’t come from schools like the University of Texas. They come from lesser schools where they do not feel that they’re being pushed ahead in classes that are too fast for them.”

What does Justice Scalia mean by “lesser schools”? Does he suggest that the African Americans, most at the top 10 percent of their high school class (as required by Texas law) can’t compete with their peers, similarly situated students at the top of their classes? Abigail Fisher, who is bringing this lawsuit, was deficient, and judged as so. She was not in the top 10 percent at her Texas high school; according to the Top Ten Percent Plan any graduating senior in the top 10 percent of their graduating class receives admission to the University of Texas at Austin. More than three quarters of the slots at the University of Texas-Austin are reserved for that group of students – the best and the brightest of their high schools.

What about Fisher? She didn’t make the cut. A middling student, she had not enough redeeming social value to be considered among the 8 percent whose admission is a function of the Personal Achievement Index (PAI) and Academic Index (AI). These are the folks who based on their race, socioeconomic status, family background, extra curricular activities and other factors stand out. These folks are not all African American; in fact of the 841 that make up the 8 percent, only 47 of them scored lower than Fisher and only five of them were African American. They are folks whose portfolio deserved special consideration.

Abigail Fisher is an ordinary white girl who was so seeped in white skin privilege that she fully expected to have her way. She is a whiner who has been enabled by the anti-affirmative action crowd. She is pushing a point because she cannot own her own deficiencies. She is attacking affirmative action because that is her excuse for being deficient and mediocre.

Lots of students don’t get into their first choice school. Most recover – they go to their second or third choice, graduate, and manage their lives happily. From time to time, they may ruminate that they would have liked to have their first choice. They may show up at football games, cheering for the school they weren’t admitted to, or they may relish the success that comes to them, despite their early disappointment. But they are grown people, used to a setback (who isn’t), and prepared to move on with their lives. They know they weren’t in the top 10 percent, and they are happy if they made the second cut at UT, or content to go to another school and excel. Not Fisher. Buttressed by the dollars that come from affirmative action opponents, she is willing to be the poster girl for inadequacy.

From his remarks from the Supreme Court bench, Judge Antonin Scalia is willing to consider her point and exhibit his own racism. What does he mean by “lesser schools”? Is he familiar with the data on African American accomplishment? Does he share the same hubris that Abigail Fisher does, asserting that a deficient white student deserves an edge over a well-prepared black one? Scalia needs to look at the data before running his mouth. Both African American and white students go to schools that are less highly rated than the University of Texas (lesser schools, really). Most of them succeed. They would have succeeded at UT, too. Regardless of race, they accept the fact that, not in the top 10 percent of their class, they were not entitled to admission. After that, their admission was a roll of the dice.

While President Obama talked about freedom, invoking the history that made the 13^th Amendment important, reminding us of “the preachers, black and white, (who) railed against this moral outrage from the pulpit. Where are these preachers now? They know that there are racial economic gaps, but they are silent. They know that there is a structural racism that perpetuates unfairness, but they are unwilling to fight against it. They will offer preaching, perhaps tepid, perhaps rousing. But they won’t step up and attack the systems that produce disparate economic results. They won’t condemn attacks on affirmative action.

How could Justice Scalia’s response to President Obama’s eloquence with his white-privileged arrogance? If there is a poster girl for fairness, she isn’t Abigail Fisher. To lift her up is to embrace the arrogance of white skin privilege. To lift her up is a disgraceful rebuff to the Texas students who achieve against all odds. To denigrate the student who were admitted instead of Fisher is a laughable attempt by a so-called justice to justify his injustice, and it flies in the face that our President made when he spoke of the 13^th amendment.

Julianne Malveaux is an author and economist based in Washington, DC. Her latest book “Are We Better Off? Race, Obama and Public Policy” will be released in 2015 and is available for preorder at www.juliannemalveaux.com

Gun Bans Once Had Bipartisan Support By Rev. Jesse Jackson Sr.

Dec. 13, 2015

Gun Bans Once Had Bipartisan Support
By Rev. Jesse Jackson Sr.

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - In the horror in San Bernardino, Calif., a husband and wife walked into a social services center armed with two AR-15 style semiautomatic assault rifles and two 9 mm semiautomatic handguns, with 1,400 rounds of ammunition for the rifles. They opened fire, leaving 14 dead and 23 wounded. We now know that they had apparently committed themselves to the Islamic State. This was an act of terror.

In Colorado Springs, Colo., Robert Dear walked into a Planned Parenthood clinic armed with a “long gun” and started shooting, leaving three dead and nine injured. This, too, was an act of terror.

Mass shootings — with more than four victims — occur in this country at the rate of more than one a day. There are more guns now in private hands in America than there are people. Our weak gun laws make it “just too easy,” as President Obama put it, for terrorists or the mentally unbalanced or the irate to walk in and buy an assault weapon, designed explicitly to kill lots of people in battle.

The San Bernardino killings have triggered a fierce political debate. Republican presidential candidates are using the occasion to indict President Obama for being too passive or too weak. Jeb Bush and Marco Rubio condemn the modest reforms to limit NSA access to private telephone records, suggesting that the right to privacy and the Fourth Amendment must be sacrificed in order to counter terrorism. They call for a war on all fronts against terror — except on guns.

Rubio joined with his Republican senators to kill a modest bill seeking to close the loophole that allows people on the terrorist watch lists to buy guns in America. While the fight against terror requires sacrifice and war, he argues, it should not restrict the right of those on terrorist watch lists to buy and hold arsenals.

The ban on the sale of assault weapons used to enjoy bipartisan support. Closing of all loopholes for background checks seems just common sense. In fact, four in five Americans support background checks. Similarly numbers would prevent the mentally ill from owning guns. Seven of 10 support creating a federal database on gun ownership. Majorities would ban the sale of assault weapons.

Despite this, common sense gun control has become a bitter partisan issue. The Washington Post reports that from 1993 to 2007 Republicans were split about 50-50 on gun control, with Democrats 2 to 1 in favor. Then after the election of Barack Obama, Democrats didn’t change their views, but now 75 percent of Republicans line up against more gun control. Gun ownership — even of assault weapons — is increasingly defended as a “check against government tyranny.” After Colorado Springs or San Bernardino, or Connecticut or Oregon or Virginia or South Carolina, the gun lobby and their allies argue that more guns are the answer, not part of the problem.

Common sense gun control won’t happen until this partisan divide is broken. It can advance in blue states, perhaps, and in blue municipalities where the state hasn’t banned local action. National reforms won’t happen until people break the partisan stalemate. This is a time for people of faith — of all denominations — to come together and demand common sense reforms to limit the gun epidemic that continues to spread.

Trump is Not the Only One By Dr. E. Faye Williams, Esq.

Dec. 13, 2015

Trump is Not the Only One
By Dr. E. Faye Williams, Esq.

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - The last name I wanted to mention in my column this week or during this "Season of Peace" was Donald Trump! I consider it a travesty, especially at this time of the year, to give platform to a xenophobic, misogynistic racist! The time taken to refute the bile of hatred and intolerance he regularly spews forth only lengthens his time in the public limelight and engenders unnecessary debate and discussion of his positions. Unfortunately, I could not allow Trump's "Ban the Muslim" comment to go unanswered and felt compelled to add my thoughts to the sentiment of the many who, rightly, condemn him.

Lest anyone forget, since his campaign began, as well as Muslims, Trump has disparaged Hispanics, women, African Americans, the physically disabled, Fox News commentators, and anyone else he assumed critiqued him harshly or asked him a question that displeased him. Unlike those who have excused him and his ardent fans, I cannot overlook his "Muslim" comments or minimize their negative impact.

From personal experiences in that cultural/religious environment, I can assure you that few who share or understand the Muslim world-view will forget his comments. His comments have jeopardized all who represent US interests in the Muslim world. Our diplomats, soldiers and citizens will now embody the hostile ravings of Trump and, in a region torn with violent acts, become targets of retribution. It is understandable that so many have identified the Republican position on Muslims as a "War on Islam."

Sadly, although condemned from many circles, Trump's comments are indicative of a larger problem facing this nation. As reprehensible as his comments were, they are only made more objectionable by the 68% of Republican sympathizers/self-identified voters who continue to support Trump and the policies of exclusion he proposes. The lukewarm criticism he has received from his fellow presidential candidates is reflective of many of the veiled anti-Muslim comments they have already made during this campaign season.

What has been made customary in this campaign, by all of the Republican candidates, is their appeal to hatred, intolerance and fear. They are using the oldest tricks in the book to psychologically manipulate the masses. Through historical analysis, we should have learned how destructive this course of action can be.

An example of Trump's folly is the Chinese Exclusion Act of 1882. This was another "temporary" law with a ten-year life signed by President Chester A. Arthur. Instead of expiring, it was renewed in 1892 and made permanent in 1902. This was the first law established in the US to restrict the immigration of a specific ethnic group. This temporary law was finally repealed in 1943 after 61 years.

Our excursion into national folly was repeated by the Immigration Act of 1924 (Johnson-Reed Act). It limited the annual number of immigrants who could be admitted from ANY country, severely restricted the immigration of Africans, and imposed an outright ban on Asian and Arab immigrants. The State Department Office of the Historian purposes this act as a means "to preserve the ideal of American homogeneity." Other historians credit this act as being a significant contributor to hostilities leading to the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor and our involvement in WWII.

Most Americans will smugly condemn 1930's era Germany and its leader for psychotic enmity toward a specific ethnic group. Those with a little knowledge will point to the devolution of the values of that nation and its people. They will speak to the on-going impact of the barbarity of WWII era Germany and the stain it has left on the German character. Some Americans will do that without the slightest concern for our own current national temperament.

Trump is misguided, but he is not alone. Where do you stand?

(Dr. E. Faye Williams is President/CEO of the National Congress of Black Women, Inc. www.nationalcongressbw.org. 202/678-6788)

Is Trump Destroying the Republican Party? by Dr. R. B. Holmes

Dec. 10, 2015

Is Trump Destroying the Republican Party?
Donald Trump Appeals to the Worse Side of Us

Dr. R.B. Holmes

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - If the Republican Party nominates Donald Trump as their nominee for the president of these United States of America, in my humble opinion, he will not become the 45^th president of these United States of America. He does not have the experience, the temperament, the respect for all people, the knowledge of domestic and foreign policies, the power of truth-telling, the fairness, nor does he even have the vision to "make America great again.” This man will further divide America; this man will fight everybody who disagrees with him; and this man will bully this country into Armageddon.

It is a sad commentary to know that in this 21st century, that Mr. Trump can actually become the nominee for the Republican Party. To elect a man who clearly and purposefully tells "Big Lies" that he saw "thousands of Muslims cheering when the Twin Towers buildings were falling and on fire" after the horrific 9-11 attack, would be a travesty. He tells these lies with no proof, after reputable news outlets and reporters have said this is not true. How can the Republican Party nominate a man who consistently insults women; he calls them fat, ugly, stupid and distastefully mimics normal /functions unique to the female physiology? How can the republican electorate nominate a man to lead this country who lambasts Hispanics, Latinos, African Americans, refugees, a P.O.W. Hero, and led the “birther movement” against President Obama?

Donald Trump’s personality, his appeal and his divisive policies have reincarnated the likes of George Wallace, Bull Conner, Joe McCarthy, David Duke, etc! “The Donald” appeals to the worse side of us! Unfortunately, there is perhaps, twenty-five to thirty percent of the republican electorate, who can and will stay with Trump, no matter what he says or does! He probably can call folks "niggers” and continues to rise in the polls.

All of this is bad stuff, and any other person who has made these outrageous, atrocious, and disgraceful comments would have been long gone from the political process. But not Mr. Trump! The more shameful, pitiful, notorious and inglorious his comments are, he advances higher in the polls. Mr. Trump’s candidacy really is a dark, sad and grave indication of where this country is headed in race relations and how low our civility has fallen.

December 1, 2015, was the 60th anniversary of the courageous act of Rosa Parks’ refusal to give up her bus seat to a white man. Sunday, December 6, 2015, was the 150th anniversary of the 13th amendment that abolished black slavery. Now, we have a candidate by the name of Donald Trump as the leader in the Republican Presidential Primary aspiring to become the leader of this country and the world. America, it is praying time!

Fellow Americans, this is a terrible day in our country. My friends, it is true: free speech is a part of our freedom, but “Trump speech” should be a part of our past. It is a catastrophe that many of my friends in the Republican Party perhaps, have laryngitis, and will allow Donald Trump to destroy the party. Let me be very clear: Donald Trump will not become the next president of this country! You cannot make fun of the disabled and handicapped; you cannot demean women, immigrants, minorities, the frail, the weak and play on people’s fears; and thank God, you cannot bully your way to the White House! He may win the republican nomination in the primary, but he will not get enough votes to win in the general election; and to the Donald 's surprise, most people in this great America are not "dumb, ignorant nor stupid.” If Mr. Trump should manage to win the republican nomination, then let me be the first to say, “Congratulations! President Hillary Clinton!”

Dr. R. B. Holmes is publisher of the Capital Outlook Newspaper in Tallahassee, Florida.