By Hazel Trice Edney

Charles Ogletree, Harvard University

Jack Levin, Northeastern University

(TriceEdneyWire.com) – Just as Boston was beginning to hunker down for a 48-hour manhunt that ended in the death of one suspected bomber and the wounding and capture of the other, Harvard Law Professor Charles Ogletree was already envisioning the healing process that would be needed after the tragedy that took place only hours earlier.

“I’m getting emails from people already talking about what we need to do to move forward and how we need to openly express not only support for this great country and the leadership of our president and our governor and our local mayor and police authorities, but also our willingness to have the conversations with our children and grandchildren, and neighbors and friends and even some enemies about how we have to come together as communities to combat these senseless acts of violence like this one,” he said in a telephone interview. “So this will lead to further dialog and further activities rather than people simply being stunned and angry and disappointed. I think they want to do something that makes a difference.”

Ogletree, nationally known as a civil rights icon and thought leader, was among the founders of the Charles Hamilton Houston Center for Race and Justice, which he now directs at Harvard, located in Cambridge, Mass., a suburb of Boston. In the coming months, he envisions the Center, named after the iconic civil rights lawyer of the 1960s, growing as a hub for those conversations that could lead to healing among communities.

“It’s no question that the Charles Hamilton Houston Center will use this as another stepping point to have larger dialog. Rodney King urged us to think...more than two decades ago, when he said, ‘Why can’t we all get along,’” Ogletree recalled the poignant words of the now deceased former victim of police brutality.  “I think we could answer his question. We’re going to see to it that that happens and we’re going to make sure that whoever is responsible for this goes through the justice system in an appropriate way.”

Later, through video and eye witnesses, Police and FBI quickly narrowed down the Boston Marathon bombing suspects to Tamerlan and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, brothers of Chechnyan descent. During a massive manhunt that shut down the city of Boston and surrounding communities, Tamerlan was killed amidst a gun battle with police. Dzhokhar, 19, is now hospitalized with gunshot wounds and has been charged with use of a weapon of mass destruction and malicious destruction of property. Authorities say he is lucid and communicating and has reportedly written that the motive was to “defend Islam.” He reportedly cannot talk because of a gunshot wound to his throat.

The attacks included the explosion of two bombs near the finish line. It left three people dead, nearly 200 suffering physical wounds, but thousands more emotionally and psychologically traumatized.

Despite what appears to be an increasing number of terrorist attacks on American soil since Sept. 11, 2001, experts say they are minimal compared to those abroad.

“We have far less terrorism in this country than in many others. Countries in Asia, the Middle East, South America yearly have far larger numbers of terrorist acts,” says Jack Levin, co-director of the Brudnick Center on Violence and Conflict at Northeastern University in Boston.

He says international terrorism is actually rare in the U. S. “The terrorism in this country tends to come, not from politics, but from psychopathology. Most of the terrorist acts are not from other countries. They’re not international. The vast majority are domestic in origin committed by American citizens for personal reasons.”

His words harkened to the mass murders by gun fire that have taken place over the past several years, including the Virginia Tech University, the Aurora movie theater, and the Sandy Hook Elementary School shootings.

Despite the new vigilance and the relief expressed by Bostonians that the suspects were quickly apprehended, Levin predicts a long road to healing.

“We’re not going to heal as quickly as the residents of New York City for one reason alone - the city of New York is so much larger than Boston,” Levin said. “When tourists visit New York, they think of Broadway,” he said, explaining that the larger the city, the less people will actually identify the act of violence with the city because of its vast reputation.

Boston – like Newtown, Conn., the location of Sandy Hook Elementary – will probably take much longer to heal from the shock simply because of its size, he says.

Ogletree agrees the attack has left a city awakened to violence in way it never expected as well as dealing with principles of justice that must be respected.

“This is a tragic reminder of the terror that we all experienced on Sept. 11, 2001. It reminds us that we still can’t assume that where we live or what we do makes us safe from threats like this. It also is a reminder that when people use tactics like this, it’s no longer a global or national or even state event, it can be very local and can be very public and can lead to this tragedy that we saw here,” Ogletree says. “So I think it just requires all of us to be vigilant, to respect the need for more security, and yet not to engage in unwarranted and unnecessary profiling along racial, religious or ethnic lines. That can be very dangerous.”

By Marc Morial

(TriceEdneyWire.com) - "It is better to be prepared for an opportunity and not have one than to have an opportunity and not be prepared." - The late National Urban League and civil rights leader, Whitney M. Young, Jr.

This week, during the National Urban Leagues 10th annual Legislative Policy Conference in Washington, DC, we released the 37th edition of the State of Black America, Redeem the Dream: Jobs Rebuild America.  This years report commemorates the racial milestones that have occurred in the 50 years since the height of the civil rights movement and shines a sobering light on the unfinished business of achieving full equality and empowerment for every citizen.

One of the most encouraging signs in the report is the progress African Americans have made in fulfilling Whitney Youngs vision of preparing ourselves for real and hoped for opportunities through education.

Since 1963, the high school completion gap has closed by 57 percentage points. There are more than triple the number of Blacks enrolled in college.  And for every college graduate in 1963, there are now five.

Anti-poverty measures have also improved our living standard since 1963. The percentage of Blacks living in poverty has declined by 23 points.  And the percentage of Blacks who own their homes has grown by 14 points.

But these numbers dont tell the full story. While Black America has achieved double-digit gains in educational attainment, employment, and wealth over the past 50 years, we still have made only single-digit gains against Whites. With an Equality Index of 71.7 percent, African Americans enjoy less than three-fourths of the well-being and economic status of White Americans. Similarly, Hispanic Americans, with an index of 75.4%, are experiencing only three-quarters of the full opportunity America has to offer.

For example, in the past 50 years, the Black-White income gap has only closed by 7 points (now at 60%). The unemployment rate gap has only closed by 6 points (now at 52 percent).  And with March unemployment figures showing African American joblessness now at 13.3% and Hispanic unemployment at 9.2 percent, compared to an overall rate of 7.6%, we still see a tale of two Americas that continues to break down along the color line.

But rather than bemoan these problems, the National Urban League is using these findings to sharpen our focus on meaningful solutions.  Earlier this year, we launched a ground-breaking endeavor  Jobs Rebuild America, a $70 million series of public/private investments to create pathways to jobs and put urban America back to work.

But Washington must also be part of the solution.  During our visit to Capitol Hill this week, we reiterated our support of the Urban Jobs Act and the Project Ready STEM Act, a bill sponsored by Congressional Black Caucus Chairwoman, Marcia Fudge.  We also support the stated goal in the Presidents 2014 budget released this week: to invest in the things needed to grow our economy and create jobs while reducing the deficit in a way that does not unfairly impact the most vulnerable communities.

Again, while much progress has been made over the past 50 years, The State of Black America remains a tale of two Americas.  The National Urban League has put some real solutions on the table.  Its time for Washington to put them to work.

Marc Morial is President/CEO of the National Urban League. To obtain a copy of the State of Black America visit www.nul.org.

By Hazel Trice Edney

Tamerlan Tsarnaev (left) was killed during a gun battle with police; his brother, Dzhokhar, 19, was captured, but remains hospitalized with a gunshot wound to the throught. Authorities have said he has been unable to speak.

(TriceEdneyWire.com) – CNN, which has prided itself as a world leader of news and information, has come under scorching criticism after reporter John King, a senior correspondent for the station, erroneously described the Boston Marathon bombing suspect as a “dark-skinned male”.

Both suspects, Tamerlan and Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, brothers of Chechnyan descent, turned out to be white-complexioned, a fact that has drawn scorching criticism from civil rights leaders and even fellow journalists who described King’s reporting as irresponsible and racially inflammatory. Dzhokhar is now hospitalized with gunshot wounds. Tamerlan died amidst a gun battle while running from police.

“The false reporting by the media in the Boston bombing case was offensive and inflammatory, including specific references by CNN’s John King who labeled the alleged suspect as a “dark-skinned male” perpetuating a stereotypical characterization devoid of relevant facts about the suspects identity,” said the Rev. Al Sharpton in a statement after criticizing King on his MSNBC show, PoliticsNation. “It was irresponsible and misleading to characterize the suspect by his race and it made every dark skinned male in Boston a suspect. If I reported that a “white skinned male” was being sought after, I would be publicly maligned as a “racial agitator.” The media must be responsible and put facts in proper context.”

The two bombing blasts that took four lives, wreaked havoc in Massachusetts, causing rippling affects across the nation. Memories of Sept. 11, 2001 were quick to return; especially with the uncertainties of the motive for the blast and who exactly had committed the attacks. Also similar was the tendency to falsely accuse people of color even before there is evidence or proof. 

The NAACP piled piled on the "inflammatory" reporting.

“The fact that this information was false is only part of the problem,” said NAACP President and CEO Benjamin Todd Jealous in a statement. “Our concern is that CNN used an overly-broad, unhelpful and potentially racially inflammatory categorization to describe the potential suspect. History teaches us that too often people of color are unfairly targeted in the aftermath of acts of terrorism.”

In the NAACP statement, which described the reporting as “irresponsible, reckless, and counterproductive”, Jealous concluded, “We ask that CNN and all media outlets exercise caution and weigh the potential implications of such categorizations in future reports.”

On Monday this week, CNN had issued no statement in response to the criticism. But King has vehemently defended himself, according to Twitter posts reported by Richard Prince’s Journal-isms. " 'Source of that description was a senior government official. And I asked, are you sure? But I'm responsible. What I am not is racist,' the anchor wrote Thursday," according to Prince’s report, quoting a story by Erick Hayden of the Hollywood Reporter.

Though King has been apologetic for the error, some of his own colleagues say that doesn’t goes far enough. Donna Brazile, a CNN contributor, said the network; not just King, should apologize for the report.

"I cringed when I heard it," Brazile was quoted in a Prince story covering her during a forum at George Washington University, where she was speaking on "Race and the Race for the Presidency." She continued, "Without a picture. . . . just putting that statement out. It brought me back to my childhood, when they would always describe the color of a person's skin …I believe an apology is owed, not just to dark-skinned people," she added.

Typically, when a reporter makes an extreme mistake, the station or news agency will take responsibility for issuing an apology. CNN has not said why it feels exempt from the professional protocol.

Among others, the National Association of Black Journalists also weighed in on the criticism, giving a bit of advice:

“NABJ in no way encourages censorship but does encourage news organizations to be responsible when reporting about race [and] to report on race only when relevant and a vital part of a story,” the organization said in a statement. “Ultimately this helps to avoid mischaracterizations which might encourage potential bias or discrimination against a person or a group of people based on race or ethnicity.”

By Rev. Jesse Jackson Sr.