One hundred and nine Bennett College students shook my hand and received their diplomas on Saturday, May 5. With big smiles and a little swagger, they went through the time-honored ceremonies of baccalaureate and commencement. And, we were blessed to have phenomenal friends join us. Rev. Al Sharpton was our baccalaureate speaker, and the Hon. Alexis Herman was our graduation speaker.
The defeat of French President Nicolas Sarkozy in Sunday’s French elections provides a clear lesson to America. So does the fall of the conservative Dutch government, the rebuke of the British conservative government in local elections, the defeat of the establishment parties in Greece and the turmoil in Spain.
A large audience packed the lower auditorium of the historic Mt. Carmel Baptist Church in downtown Washington, D.C. Thursday, May 3rd for a Town Hall Meeting to discuss the War on Drugs and other criminal justice policies a growing number of leaders feel have had destructive effects on Black families and communities. Rev. Jesse L. Jackson, President, Rainbow/PUSH Coalition, set the tone by lamenting the growth of the prison-jail industrial complex as a result of criminal justice policies which target Black communities.
If the possession and pursuit of money can change even the focus of faith from social justice to personal prosperity, we cannot wonder how concerns about funding and maintaining favor can contribute to redefining, not only the memories and meanings of the 1992 Los Angeles Revolt, but also those of our history and struggle, and even of our being Black.
Dr. Ron Daniels, President of the New York based Institute of the Black World 21st Century (IBW), announced today that the organization is intensifying its efforts to end what he describes as a “racially- biased” War on Drugs by holding Town Hall Meetings in Washington, D.C., Pittsburgh, PA and Baltimore, MD in the next few weeks. President Richard M. Nixon launched the War on Drugs 41 years ago to halt the trafficking of illegal drugs in the U.S.
The Institute of the Black World 21st Century Presents a Town Hall Meeting
Should Drugs Be Legalized to Stop the Violence and Killing in Black Communities?
Thursday, May 3, 2012 6:00PM (Doors open at 5:30PM)
Mount Carmel Baptist Church, 901 3rd Street, NW, Washington, D.C., Rev. Dr. Joseph Evans, Sr. Pastor
President Barack Obama hit a home run when he traveled to three colleges last week, including the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the University of Colorado at Boulder, and the University of Iowa.
New York City’s KISS-FM to leave airwaves Sunday night and merge with longtime rival.
When Democratic commentator Hilary Rosen said that Ann Romney had “never worked a day in her life”, Ann Romney behaved as if she had just hit the lottery. She smugly made the media rounds talking about how hard it was for her to raise her five sons. And she’s right. Stay at home moms work extremely hard to cook, clean, run a shuttle for their children and their various activities, participate in school activities like “Room Mom” and “Cookie Mom”.
As Earth Day approaches this year, it provides an important opportunity to focus on critical environmental issues in a post-Katrina era of devastating storms and flooding, increasingly disastrous climate change, continuing toxic contamination of land, water and air, the ravaging of rain forests, the racist sacrificing of the health and well-being of unfavored peoples…