Category: What’s Up!

One of the ugliest words in the English language is “racism,”  Not only is the application of this word inconsistent with the equal protection provisions of our Constitution, racism permeates racial, ethnic and gender lines.  Not all discrimination is racism, but all racism is discrimination. On Saturday, July 13, 2013, a woman of color and five white female jurors decided that it is okay for an armed white want-a-be cop to shoot an unarmed teenager to death and not be held accountable. 

 

Only Zimmerman knows what happened that rainy evening in 2012 when he profiled, followed and killed Trayvon Martin, a 17 year old African American boy visiting his father.  A scuffle ensued, a shot rang out and a teenager is dead.  This case consumed the country’s attention for more than a year, sparking heated racial debate.  While some criticized Zimmerman for racially profiling 17-year old Martin, others including at least one juror, said that Trayvon was, in fact, the aggressor.  Fox News analyst Ann Coulter praised the Zimmerman decision when she remarked “hallelujah.”  In her book, “If Democrats had Any Brains, They’d be Republicans,” Coulter wrote, “I’m a Christian first, and a mean-spirited, bigoted conservative second, and don’t you ever forget it.”  Over the past several years, Coulter has successfully demonstrated her bigoted nature.

 

Although both counsel were advised to leave race out of the discussion during the trial, at the press conference following the verdict, Zimmerman’s attorney, Mark O’Mara, remarked that if his client were black, “he never would’ve been charged with a crime.”  Either O’Mara is completely naive on the subject of racism or living on another planet.

 

“Racism” is indeed a sensitive topic for discussion and I had to consider if I really wanted to approach this subject here.  After careful consideration, however, I have concluded that a significant number of events occurring over the past few years have produced ample evidence for me that twenty-first century racism is alive, well and flourishing.  While some believed that racism and the “Jim Crow” era had passed over fifty (50) years ago, unfortunately for many minorities, it was only in “remission” like cancer, and it only took an African American President to bring out the worst of racist America.  At least when cancer is in remission, we know in advance that it can flare up at anytime.

 

According to Wikipedia, the exact definition of racism is controversial both because there is little scholarly agreement about the meaning of the concept of “race” and because there is also little agreement about what does and does not constitute discrimination.  I disagree with Wikipedia because I think the definition of racism is simple—racism occurs when a person or a group of persons prohibits another person or group from exercising their civil rights.  Racism is generally exhibited in one of two forms – subtle or blatant.  Subtle racism occurs when the affected person or persons are not aware that they have become victims of racism.  For example, when two equally qualified candidates are being considered for a position but one receives the position solely because of race, that’s subtle racism.  Blatant racism occurs publicly.  For example, a federal court recently found Arizona Sheriff Joe Arpaio guilty of engaging in blatant racism by racially profiling Latino drivers. 

 

Racism is nothing new to African Americans and other minorities.  In fact, I have personally been the victim of both subtle and blatant racism.  During the 1950s while accompanying my church choir to Danville Virginia for a musical concert, we stopped at a diner.  Upon entering that diner, it never occurred to us that we would not be served because of the color of our skin.  We were told by a waitress that they didn’t serve “coloreds” in the restaurant but we could go to the carry-out side and purchase a meal to go.  During this same period, my sister-in-law had to be escorted by police as the first African American student entering an all white school in Washington DC for the first time.  As other African American students started to attend, the National Guard replaced the police because African American students were being physically assaulted by white students.  These assaults continued through much of that school year.  A subtle incident of racism occurred to me when I started working for a Federal agency in 1961.  Although I was hired as a clerk-typist, instead of giving me the clerk-typist position, I was assigned to the Docket Room as a file clerk.  During my early years in the Federal workplace, I quickly realized that the standards for advancement as an African American were significantly higher than for my white counterparts.  Good was not good enough, my work had to be outstanding.  Even then, promotion was still very competitive.  If only one advancement opportunity was available, it would often go to the white employee.  After the Civil Rights Act was passed in 1964 Federal agencies were required to establish hiring goals that opened a number of opportunities for minorities.  Unfortunately, some minorities failed when they were assigned to positions they didn’t meet the qualifications.  Of course, those failures fed certain right-wing opponents of the Act with racist rhetoric about the competence of African Americans.  

 

It should be noted that a racist nucleus of mad white Americans has never supported racial equality.  In fact, their political representatives voted against both the Civil Rights and Voting Rights Acts of 1964 and 1965. The loudest voices of right-wing talk radio and cable television such as Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Glenn Beck, and Fox News commentators, appeal directly to that core with racially tinted messages as the right-wing of the Republican Party continues to do.  You may recall that there were blatant signs of racism at the most heated town hall meetings during the summers of 2008 and 2009 including many Tea Party signs that carried overtly racial messages and pictures. Even during the 2012 presidential elections, there were elements of racist behavior.

 

It appeared that much progress had been made in attempting to eliminate racism; however, there was a significant set-back when President Obama was inaugurated as the first African American President and re-elected to a second term.  Racist attacks have become even more blatant especially when you hear congressional Republican verbal assaults on this President as well as its extreme right-wing radical element.  The rage during the campaign and over the past 4-1/2 years have been unprecedented especially when you hear emotionally charged members of the white community say that they want to “take their country back” as though it has disappeared because there is an African American President in the White House. 

 

Many people especially African-Americans continue to believe that President Obama is being disrespected by a racist White America.  The consistent involvement of the “birther” movement during the 2012 presidential campaign that raised doubts about Obama’s citizenship is one example.  Other examples of blatant racism include Newt Gingrich’s attack on President Obama as a “food stamp president” and his claim that African Americans are content to collect welfare benefits rather than pursue employment.  We all remember the disrespect shown the President when Republican Congressman Joe Miller called the President a liar during the President’s September 2009 message to Congress about the health care legislation or when Arizona Governor Jan Brewer, who was on the tarmac to greet Obama, hand-delivered a letter before engaging the president “intensely” for several minutes, including pointing her finger directly at him.  And none of us can forget the racist monologue delivered by Clint Eastwood at the RNC Convention in August 2012.  This kind of deliberate contempt for the first African American President is unprecedented and continues to thrive. 

 

 

CONTINUED IN PART II

 

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When it comes to diamonds, there are numerous scams to avoid. Most scams are minor, but there are some major ones that come up from time to time concerning the buying and selling of diamonds. Scams occur simply because most people who buy diamonds – for whatever reasons – don’t know that much about diamonds. Therefore, they are easily fooled.

Jewelry stores like to show their diamonds in bright lights. Lights make diamonds shine. Ask to see the diamond in a different, darker type of lighting as well. Jewelry also stores often run ‘fluorescence’ scams to varying degrees. Referring to a diamond as a blue-white diamond is such a scam. A blue-white diamond sounds very unique and special, but in fact, this type of diamond is of lesser quality – even though the jeweler will try to make you think you are getting something special.

A common scam that most jewelry stores participate in is the Carat Total Weight scam. The tag on the piece of jewelry, usually a ring, only states the total carat weight of all diamonds in the piece, instead of listing the total weights separately for each diamond. This leads consumers to believe that the main diamond in the piece is actually bigger than it is. Ask what the total carat weight of the center stone is. Also beware of fractions. Jewelry stores are allowed to round off diamond weights. This means that if the jeweler tells you that it is a ¾ carat diamond, it is probably between ½ and ¾ carat – but closer to ¾.

Some truly unscrupulous jewelers target those who want appraisals on diamonds that were given to them as gifts or that were purchased elsewhere. They will try to tell you that the diamond is worthless, or worth less than it actually is worth – and offer to take it off your hands or trade it for a much better diamond, along with the cash to make up the difference. This is called low balling. Get a second, third, and even a forth opinion before taking any action.

Jewelry stores often run ‘fluorescence’ scams to varying degrees. Referring to a diamond as a blue-white diamond is such a scam. A blue-white diamond sounds very unique and special, but in fact, this type of diamond is of lesser quality – even though the jeweler will try to make you think you are getting something special. Jewelry stores also like to show their diamonds in bright lights. Lights make diamonds shine. Ask to see the diamond in a different, darker type of lighting as well.

Another common dirty trick is to switch the diamond you have chosen and paid for with one of lesser quality and value when you leave it to be set in a piece of jewelry, or leave a diamond ring to be sized. The only way to avoid this is to do business with one trustworthy jeweler. Avoid jewelers that you have not done business with in the past.

There are many more scams that jewelry stores commonly pull on unsuspecting consumers. Just use your best judgment, and purchase your diamonds with the utmost care and consideration.

The so-called third “scandal” occurred when we learned that the Justice Department had secretly obtained two months of telephone records of reporters and editors for The Associated Press in what the news cooperative’s top executive called a “massive and unprecedented intrusion.”  In a letter of protest to Attorney General Eric Holder, AP President and Chief Executive Officer Gary Pruitt said the government sought and obtained information far beyond anything that could be justified by any specific investigation. He demanded the return of the phone records and destruction of all copies.  “There can be no possible justification for such an over broad collection of the telephone communications of The Associated Press and its reporters. These records potentially reveal communications with confidential sources across all of the news gathering activities undertaken by the AP during a two-month period, provide a road map to AP’s news gathering operations and disclose information about AP’s activities and operations that the government has no conceivable right to know,” Pruitt said.

Although the Justice Department has not said why it sought the records but officials had previously said in public testimony that the U.S. attorney in Washington was conducting a criminal investigation into who may have provided information contained in a May 7, 2012, AP story about a foiled terror plot. The story disclosed details of a CIA operation in Yemen that stopped an al-Qaida plot in the spring of 2012 to detonate a bomb on an airplane bound for the United States.

In testimony this past February 2013, CIA Director John Brennan noted that the FBI had questioned him about whether he was AP’s source, which he denied. He called the release of the information to the media about the terror plot an “unauthorized and dangerous disclosure of classified information.”

The Obama administration has aggressively investigated disclosures of classified information to the media and has brought six cases against people suspected of providing classified information, more than under all previous presidents combined.  The White House said that other than press reports it had no knowledge of Justice Department attempts to seek AP phone records.  “We are not involved in decisions made in connection with criminal investigations, as those matters are handled independently by the Justice Department,” spokesman Jay Carney said.

Republican Darrell Issa, Chairman of the investigative House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, said on CNN, “They had an obligation to look for every other way to get it before they intruded on the freedom of the press.”  Sen. Patrick Leahy, Chairman of the Senate Judiciary Committee, said in an emailed statement: “The burden is always on the government when they go after private information, especially information regarding the press or its confidential sources. On the face of it, I am concerned that the government may not have met that burden. I am very troubled by these allegations and want to hear the government’s explanation.”

The American Civil Liberties Union said the use of subpoenas for a broad swath of records has a chilling effect both on journalists and whistleblowers who want to reveal government wrongdoing. “The attorney general must explain the Justice Department’s actions to the public so that we can make sure this kind of press intimidation does not happen again,” said Laura Murphy, the director of ACLU’s Washington legislative office.

Rules published by the Justice Department require that subpoenas of records of news organizations must be personally approved by the attorney general, but it was not known if that happened in this case. The letter notifying AP that its phone records had been obtained through subpoenas was sent Friday by Ronald Machen, the U.S. attorney in Washington.

William Miller, a spokesman for Machen, said Monday that in general the U.S. attorney follows “all applicable laws, federal regulations and Department of Justice policies when issuing subpoenas for phone records of media organizations.” But he would not address questions about the specifics of the AP records. “We do not comment on ongoing criminal investigations,” Miller said in an email.

The Justice Department lays out strict rules for efforts to get phone records from news organizations. A subpoena can be considered only after “all reasonable attempts” have been made to get the same information from other sources, the rules say. It was unclear what other steps, in total, the Justice Department might have taken to get information in the case.  A subpoena to the media must be “as narrowly drawn as possible” and “should be directed at relevant information regarding a limited subject matter and should cover a reasonably limited time period,” according to the rules.

The reason for these constraints, the department says, is to avoid actions that “might impair the news gathering function” because the government recognizes that “freedom of the press can be no broader than the freedom of reporters to investigate and report the news.”

News organizations normally are notified in advance that the government wants phone records and then they enter into negotiations over the desired information. In this case, however, the government, in its letter to the AP, cited an exemption to those rules that holds that prior notification can be waived if such notice, in the exemption’s wording, might “pose a substantial threat to the integrity of the investigation.”  It is unknown whether a judge or a grand jury signed off on the subpoenas.

Republican Senator Rand Paul had to add his assessment of the scandal by saying: “The Fourth Amendment is not just a protection against unreasonable searches and seizures; it is a fundamental protection for the First Amendment and all other Constitutional rights. It sets a high bar — a warrant — for the government to take actions that could chill exercise of any of those rights. We must guard it with all the vigor that we guard other constitutional protections.”

The May 7, 2012, AP story that disclosed details of the CIA operation in Yemen to stop an airliner bomb plot occurred around the one-year anniversary of the May 2, 2011, killing of Osama bin Laden. The plot was significant both because of its seriousness and also because the White House previously had told the public it had “no credible information that terrorist organizations, including al-Qaida, are plotting attacks in the U.S. to coincide with the (May 2) anniversary of bin Laden’s death.”

The AP delayed reporting the story at the request of government officials who said it would jeopardize national security. Once officials said those concerns were allayed, the AP disclosed the plot, though the Obama administration continued to request that the story be held until the administration could make an official announcement.

Conservative news outlets immediately started calling the IRS investigation an unholy crusade waged by the anti-Christ himself, lobbing accusations of “Chicago politics” and the creation of “an enemy’s list” by the White House. The breaking of the DOJ scandal caused right-wing pundits to take to the airwaves and Twitter to spin a story of “wiretapping” and vindictive, personal politics by an Obama administration out to get America’s real patriots.

The Justice Department’s investigation of the Associated Press certainly shocked the world of journalism and it received exhaustive news coverage.  The Pew Research Center recently released a poll that shows that the public was following the AP story less than the controversies over the IRS or Benghazi. While 26 percent said they were tracking the IRS closely, and 25 percent said the same for Benghazi, just 16 percent said the same of the AP.  Basically, Pew said, “public interest in a trio of controversies connected to the Obama administration has been limited.”

In my view, most Americans are not interested in any “made up” scandal initiated by conservative Republicans but are more interested in jobs, the economy and a safe homeland. While there should be a debate as to balancing first amendment rights with protecting the National security, it shouldn’t be initiated as a partisan effort to assess blame.  Remember, this whole process was originally initiated by the Bush Administration.  Unfortunately, since the economy is making a recovery and more than 6.8 million jobs have been created under the Obama administration with no help from Republicans, the only recourse they have to gain some leverage in preparation for the 2014 and 2016 elections is by making up a scandal.

Speaker Boehner continues to claim that jobs are the number one House priority, but since he has been Speaker, the House has voted a total of 213 times and only one vote related to jobs.  Yet, the Boehner House voted 39 times to repeal Obamacare even though the Supreme Court declared that Obamacare is constitutional.  Primarily because of Tea Party influence, the Republican congress has recorded the lowest approval in recent history-only 10%.  House Republicans continue to demonstrate that their real priority is to limit economic growth during the Obama presidency. The numbers confirm that Boehner’s tough talk on jobs is nothing more than empty rhetoric that Republicans expect the American people to believe.  However, there is a solution.

To eliminate any future made-up scandal, bring sanity and work ethics back to the House, the Democratic Party will make a all-out effort to recapture the House in 2014.  Will it be tough?  Yes, because of the rigged legislative districts in Republican legislative controlled states.  But I believe that a majority of the American people are so fed-up with Republican obstructionism and will return House leadership to Nancy Pelosi in 2014 and legislation and governing will commence again, but that’s just my take. 

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