Unlike one hundred years ago, we know what’s coming and what we can do to stop such actions. We know that from the increase in hate crimes and racism, much of it fueled by the actions of our former President, that racism on the part of conservative and right-wing whites is fear of the “browning” of America.
“The weaponization of rules once meant to short-circuit obstruction have been hijacked to guarantee obstruction. We must ask ourselves: if the right to vote is the cornerstone of our democracy, then how can we in good conscience allow for a situation in which the Republican Party can debate and pass voter suppression laws at the State level with only a simple majority vote, but not allow the United States Senate to do the same? We must adapt,” said Sen. Schumer.
“The right to vote is the foundation of American democracy. Free and fair elections that reflect the will of the American people must be protected and defended,” President Biden remarked during the Martin & Coretta Scott King Unity Breakfast. “But many Americans, especially people of color, confront significant obstacles to exercising that fundamental right. These obstacles include difficulties with voter registration, lack of election information, and barriers to access at polling places.”
August 6 was the 55th anniversary of the Voting Rights Act. If the constitutional amendments passed after the Civil War — the 13, 14 and 15th Amendments — were the “second founding” of democracy in America, the Voting Rights Act, which after nearly a century of segregation gave legal effect to the 15th Amendment that outlawed discrimination in the right to vote, should be considered the “third founding.”
There are half a million people, mostly men, mostly white, but way too many African Americans. African Americans are 13 percent of the population and 40 percent of the homeless. The homeless are primarily concentrated in California, New York, Florida, and Texas, but you can find them in almost any community. Two-thirds of the homeless are sheltered on a given night, but a third are sleeping on the streets, on park benches, in alleys, under awnings. To quote the late great Congressman Elijah Cummings, “we are better than this.”
If we women were honest, we would say that we have all cosigned patriarchy in the interest of keeping it moving. We have deflected the sexist comments that come our way, even as we cringe from them. We smile at men that we abhor because they may have decision making power in their hands. We dress up or dress down depending on the occasion and the way we have to play the game. We know the system is slanted against us, we know we still have to play, and we decide when we choose to blow the whistle, a whistle we could blow every single day.
U.S. Senator Kamala D. Harris (D-CA) on Wednesday delivered a speech on the floor of the United States Senate announcing that she will vote to convict President Donald Trump on two articles of impeachment for abuse of power and obstruction of Congress.
On Thursday, December 19, NNPA Newswire interviewed Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY). The discussion covered a wide range of topics, focusing primarily on the impeachment of the president. The Senator also shared some insight on his conversations with Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.), and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.).
While Republicans are throwing mud at Hunter Biden, no one has asked for any investigation of the Trump family. Ivanka has used her father’s influence to gain coveted trademarks in China. Her brothers have used government resources and their father’s influence to feather their nest in establishing new Trump properties all over the world. While I’m not condoning Hunter Biden’s possible pecuniary use of his father’s status, none of us should be happy about the way our government has subsidized the Trump Empire.
Individuals from Bowie State, Coppin, Morgan State, and the University of Maryland Eastern Shore arrived early and filled the streets chanting and demanding that lawmakers and Gov. Larry Hogan settle the longstanding dispute.
“An impeachment process is a viable option for the current House of Representatives given that the hearings will force several people in or close to the Trump Administration to testify before Congress under oath,” said D. Gilson, a writer who has taught popular cultural studies.
This year, as that date approached, I was listening to one of my all-time favorites, Luther Vandross’s “A House Is Not A Home,” when the question popped into my head: Do I consider America to be my home, or just my house?
Indeed, “the slave trade began in the 15th century,” said Boniface Chidyausiku of Zimbabwe in 2007, when he was the acting president of the United Nations General Assembly. Chidyausiku made the remarks during the UN’s observance of the 200th anniversary of the end of the transatlantic slave trade. “It was driven by colonial expansion, emerging capitalist economies and the insatiable demand for commodities – with racism and discrimination serving to legitimize the trade,” said Chidyausiku.
$174,000.00 – That’s what every member of the House of Representatives receives in salary each year. Every member, that is, except Nancy Pelosi, who as the Speaker of the House, gets to take home $223,500.00.