Jena 6 Teen Shoots Himself

After news broke of his arrest on a shoplifting charge, Mychal Bell shot himself in the chest Monday with a .22-caliber handgun. He remained hospitalized Tuesday but police said his chest wound was not life-threatening.

Two More Black Head Football Coaches Hired

Two African-American head football coaches were hired this week. Ron English takes over at Eastern Michigan. Mike Haywood is the new coach at Miami University.

MERRY CHRISTMAS

In Picking Rick Warren, Obama May Have Outsmarted Himself

By: Deborah Mathis

In staffing the top posts of his imminent administration, Barack Obama has stolen the mantle of “maverick” and proved himself to be not only smart, but clever.

His foreign policy and economic teams may be packed with veterans – even Old Schoolers – but his choices to lead the labor, energy, housing and education departments are brilliantly inspired.

This bodes well for the offer of change and for hopes that the promised “new day” means a new way of approaching resistant problems that are hardest on the poor and working class.

Maybe now American workers really have a chance at reclaiming their dignity, job security, wage fairness and opportunities for advancement.

Maybe now the U.S. will actually take some responsibility for and control of global warming, and we’ll see some real strides toward breaking the confiscatory addiction to foreign oil.

Maybe now affordable housing will bloom across the landscape, and subsidized housing will no longer be synonymous with “rat hole.”

COMMENTARY....

NCAA's Brand: Colleges Must Hire Black Coaches

NCAA President Myles Brand, upset by major college football's lack of progress in the hiring of African-American head coaches, tells the Associated Press that a civil rights lawsuit may be the only way universities will address this issue.

Katrina's Hidden Race War

In this Nation Institute exclusive, reporter A.C. Thompson talks with innocent victims and ruthless vigilantes about his expose on shootings of black New Orleans residents fleeing the city in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, and police misconduct after the storm.

After Katrina, it was literally open season on Black folks

A new report in The Nation documents what many have claimed for years -- for some Black New Orleanians the threat of being killed by White vigilantes in Katrina's aftermath became a bigger threat than the storm itself.

After the storm, White vigilantes roamed Algiers Point shooting and, according to their own accounts, killing Black men at will-- with no threat of a police response. For the last three years, the shootings and the police force's role in them have been an open secret to many New Orleanians. To date, no one has been charged with a crime and law enforcement officials have refused to investigate.

The facts are finally seeing the light of day. Now we must demand action. Given Louisiana's horrible record when it comes to criminal justice and Black folks, it's the only path to justice.

You can help. Join us in calling on Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal, Louisiana's Attorney General Buddy Caldwell, and the U.S. Department of Justice to conduct a full investigation of these crimes and any police cover-up. It takes only a moment to add your voice and to invite your friends and family to do the same:

http://www.colorofchange.org/nation/

In the two weeks after Hurricane Katrina made landfall, the media created a climate of fear with trumped-up stories of Black lawlessness. Meanwhile, an armed group of White vigilantes took over the Algiers Point neighborhood in New Orleans and mercilessly hunted down Black people. "It was great!" said one vigilante. "It was like pheasant season in South Dakota. If it moved, you shot it."

The Nation's article tells the story of Donnell Herrington, Marcel Alexander, and Chris Collins -- a group of friends who were attacked by shotgun-wielding White men as they entered Algiers Point on September 1, 2005. As they tried to escape, Herrington recalls, their attackers shouted, "Get him! Get that nigger!" He managed to get away. Alexander and Collins were told that they would be allowed to live on the condition that they told other Black folks not to come to Algiers Point. Herrington, shot in the neck, barely survived.

And there's the story of Henry Glover, who didn't survive after being shot by an unknown assailant. 2 Glover's brother flagged down a stranger for help, and the two men brought Glover to a police station. But instead of receiving aid, they were beaten by officers while Henry Glover bled to death in the back seat of the stranger's car. A police officer drove off in the car soon afterward. Both Glover's body and the car were found burnt to cinders a week later. It took DNA analysis to identify the body.

Then there's the story of White militiamen who tried to drive their Black neighbors from their homes. Reggie Bell, who lived just two blocks down the street from the vigilantes' ringleader, was told at gunpoint, "We don't want you around here. You loot, we shoot." Later, another group of armed White men confronted him at his home, asking, "Whatcha still doing around here? We don't want you around here. You gotta go."

These are only a few of the stories of Black folks who were accosted in Algiers Point, and you can read more in The Nation. But unless you speak out, we may never learn the full extent of the violence. Journalists have encountered a wall of silence on the part of the authorities. The coroner had to be sued to turn over autopsy records. When he finally complied, the records were incomplete, with files on several suspicious deaths suddenly empty. The New Orleans police and the District Attorney repeatedly refused to talk to journalists about Algiers Point. And according to journalist A.C. Thompson, "the city has in nearly every case refused to investigate or prosecute people for assaults and murders committed in the wake of the storm."

The Nation's article is important, but it's just a start. For more than three years now, these racist criminals have by their own admission gotten away with murder, while officials in New Orleans have systematically evaded any kind of accountability. We have to demand it.

Please join us in calling on state and federal officials to investigate these brutal attacks and the conduct of Orleans Parish law enforcement agencies, and please ask your friends and family to do the same.

http://www.colorofchange.org/nation/

Katrina's Hidden Race War

by A.C. THOMPSON

The way Donnell Herrington tells it, there was no warning. One second he was trudging through the heat. The next he was lying prostrate on the pavement, his life spilling out of a hole in his throat, his body racked with pain, his vision blurred and distorted.

It was September 1, 2005, some three days after Hurricane Katrina crashed into New Orleans, and somebody had just blasted Herrington, who is African-American, with a shotgun. "I just hit the ground. I didn't even know what happened," recalls Herrington, a burly 32-year-old with a soft drawl.

The sudden eruption of gunfire horrified Herrington's companions--his cousin Marcel Alexander, then 17, and friend Chris Collins, then 18, who are also black. "I looked at Donnell and he had this big old hole in his neck," Alexander recalls. "I tried to help him up, and they started shooting again." Herrington says he was staggering to his feet when a second shotgun blast struck him from behind; the spray of lead pellets also caught Collins and Alexander. The buckshot peppered Alexander's back, arm and buttocks.

Herrington shouted at the other men to run and turned to face his attackers: three armed white males. Herrington says he hadn't even seen the men or their weapons before the shooting began. As Alexander and Collins fled, Herrington ran in the opposite direction, his hand pressed to the bleeding wound on his throat. Behind him, he says, the gunmen yelled, "Get him! Get that nigger!"

The attack occurred in Algiers Point. The Point, as locals call it, is a neighborhood within a neighborhood, a small cluster of ornate, immaculately maintained 150-year-old houses within the larger Algiers district. A nationally recognized historic area, Algiers Point is largely white, while the rest of Algiers is predominantly black. It's a "white enclave" whose residents have "a kind of siege mentality," says Tulane University historian Lance Hill, noting that some white New Orleanians "think of themselves as an oppressed minority."

A wide street lined with towering trees, Opelousas Avenue marks the dividing line between Algiers Point and greater Algiers, and the difference in wealth between the two areas is immediately noticeable. "On one side of Opelousas it's 'hood, on the other side it's suburbs," says one local. "The two sides are totally opposite, like muddy and clean."

Algiers Point has always been somewhat isolated: it's perched on the west bank of the Mississippi River, linked to the core of the city only by a ferry line and twin gray steel bridges. When the hurricane descended on Louisiana, Algiers Point got off relatively easy. While wide swaths of New Orleans were deluged, the levees ringing Algiers Point withstood the Mississippi's surging currents, preventing flooding; most homes and businesses in the area survived intact. As word spread that the area was dry, desperate people began heading toward the west bank, some walking over bridges, others traveling by boat. The National Guard soon designated the Algiers Point ferry landing an official evacuation site. Rescuers from the Coast Guard and other agencies brought flood victims to the ferry terminal, where soldiers loaded them onto buses headed for Texas.

Facing an influx of refugees, the residents of Algiers Point could have pulled together food, water and medical supplies for the flood victims. Instead, a group of white residents, convinced that crime would arrive with the human exodus, sought to seal off the area, blocking the roads in and out of the neighborhood by dragging lumber and downed trees into the streets. They stockpiled handguns, assault rifles, shotguns and at least one Uzi and began patrolling the streets in pickup trucks and SUVs. The newly formed militia, a loose band of about fifteen to thirty residents, most of them men, all of them white, was looking for thieves, outlaws or, as one member put it, anyone who simply "didn't belong."

The existence of this little army isn't a secret--in 2005 a few newspaper reporters wrote up the group's activities in glowing terms in articles that showed up on an array of pro-gun blogs; one Cox News story called it "the ultimate neighborhood watch." Herrington, for his part, recounted his ordeal in Spike Lee's documentary When the Levees Broke. But until now no one has ever seriously scrutinized what happened in Algiers Point during those days, and nobody has asked the obvious questions. Were the gunmen, as they claim, just trying to fend off looters? Or does Herrington's experience point to a different, far uglier truth?

Over the course of an eighteen-month investigation, I tracked down figures on all sides of the gunfire, speaking with the shooters of Algiers Point, gunshot survivors and those who witnessed the bloodshed. I interviewed police officers, forensic pathologists, firefighters, historians, medical doctors and private citizens, and studied more than 800 autopsies and piles of state death records. What emerged was a disturbing picture of New Orleans in the days after the storm, when the city fractured along racial fault lines as its government collapsed.

Herrington, Collins and Alexander's experience fits into a broader pattern of violence in which, evidence indicates, at least eleven people were shot. In each case the targets were African-American men, while the shooters, it appears, were all white.

The new information should reframe our understanding of the catastrophe. Immediately after the storm, the media portrayed African-Americans as looters and thugs--Mayor Ray Nagin, for example, told Oprah Winfrey that "hundreds of gang members" were marauding through the Superdome. Now it's clear that some of the most serious crimes committed during that time were the work of gun-toting white males.

So far, their crimes have gone unpunished. No one was ever arrested for shooting Herrington, Alexander and Collins--in fact, there was never an investigation. I found this story repeated over and over during my days in New Orleans. As a reporter who has spent more than a decade covering crime, I was startled to meet so many people with so much detailed information about potentially serious offenses, none of whom had ever been interviewed by police detectives.
Hill, who runs Tulane's Southern Institute for Education and Research and closely follows the city's racial dynamics, isn't surprised the Algiers Point gunmen have eluded arrest. Because of the widespread notion that blacks engaged in looting and thuggery as the disaster unfolded, Hill believes, many white New Orleanians approved of the vigilante activity that occurred in places like Algiers Point. "By and large, I think the white mentality is that these people are exempt--that even if they committed these crimes, they're really exempt from any kind of legal repercussion,"

Hill tells me. "It's sad to say, but I think that if any of these cases went to trial, and none of them have, I can't see a white person being convicted of any kind of crime against an African-American during that period."

Katrina's Hidden Race War....

BCA may take its fight for black coaches to court

By MICHAEL MAROT
AP Sports Writer

INDIANAPOLIS (AP) -- Floyd Keith is tired of waiting for more black coaches to be hired to lead major college football programs and is hoping to make a federal case out of the issue.

After years of attempting to persuade university administrators into hiring minority football coaches, the executive director of the Black Coaches and Administrators has started searching for a potential lawsuit.

Last week, the BCA opened a national telephone hotline that offers legal advice to coaches, a move that could eventually lead to a landmark case against universities under civil rights legislation.

"I think someone is going to get tired of listening to the excuses," Keith told The Associated Press. "We're giving them (the coaches) every opportunity, but we can't select the individuals. The individuals have to bring this forward. We are looking very strongly at every case, and we're taking it on an individual basis."

BCA may take its fight for black coaches to court....

NASCAR settles $225 million suit with ex-official

By JENNA FRYER
AP Auto Racing Writer

CHARLOTTE, N.C. (AP) -- NASCAR has settled a $225 million lawsuit filed by a former official who said she was subjected to racial discrimination and sexual harassment during her two-plus years working for the stock-car organization. The suit was settled during a Dec. 3 mediation held in New York between Mauricia Grant and NASCAR. Settlement terms were confidential. Neither side admitted liability or wrongdoing, according to NASCAR.

"We're glad to have the case settled on mutually acceptable terms," NASCAR spokesman Ramsey Poston said Thursday. "NASCAR remains dedicated to maintaining a professional work environment for all employees at all times, and we wish Ms. Grant well in her future endeavors."

Grant's attorney, Benedict P. Morelli of New York-based Morelli Ratner PC, did not immediately return a call from the AP for comment.

NASCAR settles $225 million suit with ex-official....

Time Magazine Names Obama 'Person of the Year'

By: Associated Press

NEW YORK - President-elect Barack Obama has won another contest: He's been named Time magazine's "Person of the Year" for 2008.

The magazine has named Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, French President Nicolas Sarkozy, Gov. Sarah Palin and Chinese director Zhang Yimou as runners-up.

Last year's winner was Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin. Previous individual winners have included Bono, President George W. Bush and Amazon.com CEO and founder Jeff Bezos.

Time Magazine Names Obama 'Person of the Year'....

‘Planet of the Apes’ May Be a Classic, But It Was Racist

By: Gregory P. Kane

Not all anniversary observances are worth celebrating, and the 40th anniversary of the release of the film “Planet of the Apes” may be one of them.

But celebrating there has been. It started on the Fox Movie Channel on Thanksgiving Day with marathon showings of the 1968 film starring Charlton Heston and its four sequels. The whoop-a-thon has continued this month, with more showings of POTA and its sequels on several premium channels, as well as Fox.

There’s the obligatory pithy commentary, of course, about the film and its impact and its originality and its legacy. All the commentators so far have been white, which may be why not one of them has addressed, much less answered, this question: Isn’t "POTA" one of the most racist films ever made?

I’m not sure if the producers, director and screenwriter (who was “Twilight Zone” creator Rod Serling, who had some pretty liberal creds) intended it that way as a commentary on racism or race relations in 1968, but the racism - much of it subtle - abounds in the film.

Take, for example the Charlton Heston original. Three astronauts land on a planet - unknown to them, they’ve gone through a time loop and landed on Earth in the year 3978, thousands of years in the future - where civilized apes rule, and humans are hunted like animals. One of the astronauts is black, and I guess black folks circa 1968 were supposed to be grateful for that. But there is not one black human in the future Earth. And the setting is what’s left of New York City in the future, mind you.

All those black folks in New York today, and NOT ONE survived in the future? Oh, and there are no Latinos or Asians either. Every one of the future humans - the ones who survived - is white.

Subliminal wishful thinking on the part of the film’s producers? Or were they just too darned cheap to hire black, Asian or Latino extras for the film?

COMMENTARY....

It's Now Official: Barack Obama is Elected 44th President

By: Associated Press

RICHMOND, Va. - As 13 electors cast ballots Monday for the nation's first black president in the Confederacy's old Capitol, Henry Marsh emotionally recalled the smartest man he ever knew - a waiter, who couldn't get a better job because of his race.

"He waited tables for 30 years, six days a week, 12 hours a day, from 12 noon to 12 midnight, and he supported his family," Marsh, 75, a civil rights lawyer and state senator, said of his father as he fought back tears. "He suffered a lot. He went through a lot."

In all 50 states and the District of Columbia, the 538 electors performed a constitutional process to legally elect Democrat Barack Obama the 44th president.

More than 131 million voters cast ballots - the most ever in a presidential election. But Obama's election is not complete until Congress tallies the outcome of Monday's Electoral College vote at a joint session scheduled for Jan. 6.

Monday's voting was largely ceremonial, the results preordained by Obama's Nov. 4 victory over Republican Sen. John McCain. Obama won 365 electoral votes, to 173 for McCain. With every state reporting, all the electors had cast ballots in accordance with the popular votes in their states.

In many states, the formal, staid proceeding was touched with poignance, particularly among people old enough to recall a time when voting alone posed the risk of violence for black Americans.

The contrast at Virginia's Capitol, where the Confederate Congress met, was particularly striking.

Gov. Timothy M. Kaine noted in his speech that the 200-year-old Capitol was where lawmakers just 50 years ago orchestrated the state's formal defiance of federal school desegregation orders. But he also noted that it is where L. Douglas Wilder took his oath as the nation's first elected black governor in 1990.

"This temple of Democracy shines very brightly today," Kaine told a standing-room-only crowd attending what had always been a sparsely attended afterthought.

It's Now Official: Barack Obama is Elected 44th President....

The Debate Rages: Is Barack Obama Black, White or Neither?

By: Jesse Washington

A perplexing new chapter is unfolding in Barack Obama's racial saga: Many people insist that "the first black president" is actually not black.

Debate over whether to call this son of a white Kansan and a black Kenyan biracial, African-American, mixed-race, half-and-half, multiracial - or, in Obama's own words, a "mutt" - has reached a crescendo since Obama's election shattered assumptions about race.

Obama has said, "I identify as African-American - that's how I'm treated and that's how I'm viewed. I'm proud of it." In other words, the world gave Obama no choice but to be black, and he was happy to oblige.

But the world has changed since the young Obama found his place in it.

Intermarriage and the decline of racism are dissolving ancient definitions. The candidate Obama, in achieving what many thought impossible, was treated differently from previous black generations. And many white and mixed-race people now view President-elect Obama as something other than black.

So what now for racial categories born of a time when those from far-off lands were property rather than people, or enemy instead of family?

"They're falling apart," said Marty Favor, a Dartmouth professor of African and African-American studies and author of the book "Authentic Blackness."

"In 1903, W.E.B. DuBois said the question of the 20th century is the question of the color line, which is a simplistic black-white thing," said Favor, who is biracial. "This is the moment in the 21st century when we're stepping across that."

Rebecca Walker, a 38-year-old writer with light brown skin who is of Russian, African, Irish, Scottish and Native American descent, said she used to identify herself as "human," which upset people of all backgrounds. So she went back to multiracial or biracial, "but only because there has yet to be a way of breaking through the need to racially identify and be identified by the culture at large."

"Of course Obama is black. And he's not black, too," Walker said. "He's white, and he's not white, too. Obama is whatever people project onto him ... he's a lot of things, and neither of them necessarily exclude the other."

But U.S. Rep. G. K. Butterfield, a black man who by all appearances is white, feels differently.

Butterfield, 61, grew up in a prominent black family in Wilson, N.C. Both of his parents had white forebears, "and those genes came together to produce me." He grew up on the black side of town, led civil rights marches as a young man, and to this day goes out of his way to inform people that he is certainly not white.

Butterfield has made his choice; he says let Obama do the same.

"Obama has chosen the heritage he feels comfortable with," he said. "His physical appearance is black. I don't know how he could have chosen to be any other race. Let's just say he decided to be white - people would have laughed at him."

"You are a product of your experience. I'm a U.S. congressman, and I feel some degree of discomfort when I'm in an all-white group. We don't have the same view of the world, our experiences have been different."

The entire issue balances precariously on the "one-drop" rule, which sprang from the slaveowner habit of dropping by the slave quarters and producing brown babies. One drop of black blood meant that person, and his or her descendants, could never be a full citizen.

Today, the spectrum of skin tones among African-Americans - even those with two black parents - is evidence of widespread white ancestry. Also, since blacks were often light enough to pass for white, unknown numbers of white Americans today have blacks hidden in their family .....

The Debate Rages: Is Barack Obama Black, White or Neither?....

Barack Obama: Snuff the Newports, Homie

By Jimi Izrael

President-elect Barack Obama has a problem, and it's time for all Americans to get behind him and help him—he needs to quit smoking. We all watched that 60 Minutes program a couple years back when Obama told America he was trying to quit, and Michelle told you to call her if you caught him puffing. Well, evidently Obama's still smoking, and it's become its own issue of sorts. The fact of the matter is that it's a free country, and he can smoke if he wants to. But it's not a good look for a president, besides the fact that Hillary Clinton put a smoking ban in effect back in the day. So, can you imagine, during a crisis, seeing a picture of Obama outside the White House huffing on a Kool? No, me neither. So now it's time for you and me to step up and give Obama a hand.

COMMENTARY....

Sorry, We’re Booked, White House Tells Obamas

CHICAGO—The White House has turned down a request from the family of President-elect Barack Obama to move into Blair House in early January so that his daughters can start school on Jan. 5.

The Obamas were told that Blair House, where incoming presidents usually stay in the five days before Inauguration Day, is booked in early January, a spokesperson to the Obama transition said. “We explored the idea so that the girls could start school on schedule,’ the spokesperson said. “But, there were previously scheduled events and guests that couldn’t be displaced.”

It remained unclear who on Bushes guest list outranked the incoming President.

“It’s not a public schedule,” said Sally McDonough, spokeswoman for First Lady Laura Bush, in refusing to disclose who was staying at Blair House. “It’s not a question of outranking the Obamas. Blair House will be available to them on January 15.”

Ms. McDonough said “there’s nothing more to say other than that it’s not available and won’t be available until January 15.” She added that “you’re trying to make a story out of something that’s not a story.”

A State Department official said he didn’t know of any foreign dignitaries staying at Blair House in early January.

Sorry, We’re Booked, White House Tells Obamas....

Lisa Jackson Set to Become Nation’s First Black EPA Chief

By: Dina Cappiello


WASHINGTON - Lisa Jackson is in line to become the first African-American to lead the Environmental Protection Agency.

President-elect Barack Obama intends to announce Jackson as EPA administrator in the coming weeks, barring unforeseen circumstances that derail his plans, according to Democratic officials close to the transition.

Jackson, a Princeton University-educated chemical engineer, would take the helm at the agency at a time of record-low morale and when it is still grappling with how to respond to a 2007 Supreme Court decision that said it could regulate the greenhouse gases blamed for global warming.

During the Bush administration, the White House has at times overruled the advice of the EPA's scientific advisers and the agency's staff on issues ranging from air pollution to global warming.

Supporters say Jackson, 46, has the experience to steer the agency down a new path.

Lisa Jackson Set to Become Nation’s First Black EPA Chief....

WWII's Tuskegee Airmen Invited to Inauguration

By: Nafeesa Sayeed


WASHINGTON - The Tuskegee Airmen, who made history during World War II as the country's first black military pilots only to return home to discrimination and exclusion from victory parades, have been invited to Barack Obama's inauguration.

"I want to come hopping, skipping and jumping!" said 92-year-old Spann Watson, an airman from Westbury, N.Y. who flew above Pennsylvania Avenue for President Truman's inauguration. "We had a part in changing these United States."

John L. Harrison Jr. an original airman now in his 80s, also said he plans to attend Barack Obama's inauguration.

"It makes us very very proud," said Harrison, of Philadelphia. "And it sort of compensates for a lot of the things that we had to endure in the early days."

WWII's Tuskegee Airmen Invited to Inauguration....

Sources Say Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. Is 'Senate Candidate No. 5'

By BRIAN ROSS

Chicago Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr., D-Ill., is the anonymous "Senate Candidate No. 5" whose emissaries Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich reportedly offered up to $1 million to name him to the U.S. Senate, federal law enforcement sources tell ABC News.

According to the FBI affidavit in the case, Blagojevich "stated he might be able to cut a deal with Senate Candidate 5 that provided Rod Blagojevich" with something "tangible up front."

Jackson said this morning he was contacted Tuesday by federal prosecutors in Chicago whom he said "asked me to come in and share with them my insights and thoughts about the selection process."

Jackson said, "I don't know" when asked whether he was Candidate No. 5, but said he was told "I am not a target of this investigation."

Jackson said he agreed to talk with federal investigators "as quickly as possible" after he consulted with a lawyer.

The congressman, a son of the famed civil rights leader, denied that anyone had been authorized to make payments or promises to the governor on his behalf.

Sources Say Rep. Jesse Jackson Jr. Is 'Senate Candidate No. 5'....

Obama calls for Illinois governor to resign

By LIZ SIDOTI

WASHINGTON (AP) — President-elect Barack Obama on Wednesday joined others calling for Illinois Gov. Rod Blagojevich to resign, distancing himself further from the unfolding scandal over allegations that the governor schemed to barter Obama's vacant Senate seat for personal gain.

"The president-elect agrees with Lt. Gov. (Pat) Quinn and many others that under the current circumstances it is difficult for the governor to effectively do his job and serve the people of Illinois," Obama spokesman Robert Gibbs said in response to questions from The Associated Press.

Blagojevich was arrested Tuesday, accused of seeking money or other favors to influence his choice in picking Obama's replacement. The governor has authority to appoint the replacement, but top Illinois lawmakers have said they are preparing to call the Legislature into session as early as next week to set a special election to choose Obama's successor.

Asked whether Obama supports that move, Gibbs said Obama believes the Legislature should consider a special election and "put in place a process to select a new senator that will have the trust and confidence of the people of Illinois."

Over the past two days since Blagojevich's arrest, Obama and his aides have largely refrained from commenting on the scandal. When he has spoken about the case, he's been cautious.

Obama calls for Illinois governor to resign....

AP Top Stories 12.09.08

Illinois governor arrested on corruption charges; Fighter jet engines may have failed before crash in to San Diego neighborhood, NYPD officers charged with assault; Leno to move to prime time.

AP Top Stories 12.09.08

3 dead after a fighter jet crashes Calif.; New York police step up search for missing woman; Former NY congressman sentenced to 5 days in jail for DUI; Negotiations on auto industry bailout continue.

Here are Three Little Words for the Obama Haters: Get Over It

By: Deborah Mathis

I wish the Barack Obama haters would go away. But I’m not going to ask them to. Why not? Because, even though I rejoice in Obama’s victory and am eager for his administration to get underway, I understand.

I know what it’s like to feel so disappointed, so frightened, so alarmed, so furious and so outraged by the ascension of a certain someone to the highest office in the land. I know because that’s how I felt in late 2000, when George W. Bush connived to gain the presidency, with a conservative majority on the Supreme Court of the United States handing him the coup de grace.

I know because that’s how I felt in late 2004, when, at the last minute, the Bush folks recognized that the gullibility of some voters was the key to pulling ahead and, accordingly, played those folks like a fiddle, pretending that abortion rights and gay marriage were at stake in the race. They weren’t. But it worked.

I remember the anger that millions of my fellow Americans had actually fallen for the guy with his shallow intellect; his famous lack of curiosity; his avowals about “compassionate conservatism,” which, to this very day, has been neither defined nor produced.

I was dejected and incredulous the second time, when I had hoped that four years of foppishness and a dangerous, unnecessary war would have snapped Americans out of their daze. No such luck.

To make matters worse, he had a Republican majority on Capitol Hill for six of his eight years in office. And two Supreme Court seats were his to fill.

So it has been, for the past eight years, that I have despised and resisted so much of what Bush has done. Rarely did I approve of any thing he did or said in an official capacity. I have been unhappy, dissatisfied, ashamed, forlorn, worried and hungry for any and every signal failure, hoping that it might snap Americans out of their daze.

It did, eventually, as evidenced by the abysmal poll ratings. Only, there was never any consequence beyond that. Bush seemed not to mind that most of his countrymen and women thought he was lousy at the job. Such is the advantage of arrogance.

Now, the shoe is on the other foot.

COMMENTARY....

Obama Plans Massive Public Works Program to Bolster Economy

By: David Espo


WASHINGTON - President-elect Barack Obama said Sunday the economy will get worse before it gets better, pledged a recovery plan "equal to the task" and warned lawmakers that the days of pork barrel spending are over.

Less than six weeks before his inauguration, Obama declined to say how large an economic stimulus plan he envisions. He said his blueprint for recovery will include help for homeowners facing foreclosure on their mortgages if President George W. Bush has not acted by Inauguration Day, Jan. 20.

"We've got to provide a blood infusion to the patient right now to make sure that the patient is stabilized. And that means that we can't worry short term about the deficit. We've got to make sure that the economic stimulus plan is large enough to get the economy moving," he said.

Obama made his comments on NBC's "Meet the Press," in his most extensive interview since winning the White House more than a month ago, and later at a news conference in Chicago.

The president-elect said it is important that domestic carmakers survive the current crisis, although he accused the industry's executives of taking a "head in the sand approach" that has prevented their companies from becoming more competitive.

"Congress is doing the exact right thing by asking for a conditions-based assistance package that holds the industry's feet to the fire and gives the industry some short-term assistance," he said.

Obama Plans Massive Public Works Program to Bolster Economy....

Barack Obama's grass roots in search of new turf

By Peter Wallsten

Reporting from Washington -- James Dillon, a onetime Republican activist who grew disgusted with politics, was so inspired by Barack Obama's candidacy that he joined the campaign's massive volunteer army, hosting house parties and recruiting supporters.

But beyond influencing the November election, Dillon thought he was joining a new political movement that would be mobilized for big goals -- to end poverty or fix the healthcare system, or maybe to end the U.S. reliance on foreign oil.

So Dillon, a Florida real estate developer, was discouraged by the suggestion that Obama's campaign manager e-mailed last week: "Excited about the much anticipated first dog?" it read, referring to the Obama daughters' quest for a new puppy. "Support your local animal shelter to give animals in your area a chance."

Amid Obama's transition to power, a spirited and often secretive debate has broken out among top campaign staff members over how to refashion the broad network of motivated volunteers into a force that can help Obama govern.

With 13 million e-mail addresses, hundreds of trained field organizers and tens of thousands of neighborhood coordinators and phone bank volunteers, the network has become one of the most valuable assets in politics, and Obama's team may choose to deploy it to elect other Democratic officials, or to lobby Congress for his toughest legislative goals, or even to apply pressure on local and state policymakers across the country.

This weekend, hundreds of field staffers and some key volunteers are planning a marathon closed-door summit at a Chicago hotel to begin negotiating details of what the network might look like when Obama takes office in January. A group of field organizers from battleground states has been enlisted to draw up a plan.

Barack Obama's grass roots in search of new turf....

Simpson Gets at Least 6 Years in Prison

O.J. Simpson was sentenced to at least 6 years in prison Friday for his role in a Las Vegas hotel armed robbery.

Simpson gets prison sentence of at least 15 years

LAS VEGAS -- O.J. Simpson was sentenced Friday to a minimum of 15 years in prison for the gunpoint robbery and kidnapping of two sports memorabilia dealers.

Simpson, 61, will not be eligible for parole for five years.

A jury on Oct. 3 convicted Simpson and Clarence "C.J" Stewart of a multitude of charges against them in the Sept. 13, 2007, confrontation with the dealers at a Las Vegas casino hotel room.

Simpson gets prison sentence of at least 15 years....

AP Top Stories 12.05.08

Democrats fight for automakers; O.J. Simpson to be sentenced; Blackwater guards could get 30 years; Thailand airport reopens.

AP Top Stories 12.04.08

Big Three return to Washington; Rice in Pakistan; Calif. Train engineer not on drugs during Sept. crash; NYC lights Rockefeller Center tree.

Why are Taxpayers Funding Private Companies? The Fix is In

By: Joseph C. Phillips

In 1850, the French writer Frederick Bastiat observed, “The law is not a breast that fills itself with milk … Nothing can enter the public treasury for the benefit of one citizen or one class unless other citizens and other classes have been forced to send it in.”

Bastiat’s observation is particularly prescient today as industries from far and wide are lined up at Washington’s door with their hands out. Not one dime of the alms sought by an ever expanding pool of supplicants comes from government. Every penny comes from the wallets of the American taxpayer. The economic “fix” we are engaged in is, in fact, a huge transfer of wealth from John Q Public to those with political connections. And as Bastiat further observed, when the law acts to give to one man at the expense of another it is not a source of justice, but a source of legal plunder.

While the issue of plunder is clear in this instance, the issue of legality remains something of a question.

For the life of me, I can’t put my finger on the language in the Constitution that allows Congress to take money from taxpayers in order to take ownership positions in private corporations. Nor can I pinpoint the section authorizing Congress to transfer its legislative power to the treasury secretary - an unelected official of the executive branch. Oddly enough, I can pinpoint the exact section that says it is illegal: Article 1, section 1.

The bill itself circumvented constitutional rules requiring that taxes originate in the House and not the Senate. In order to circumvent these rules, an old House bill was resurrected, and the new bill was simply “tacked on,” along with about $150 billion of unrelated pork.

And that is perhaps the greatest problem with political solutions: They are, well, political. Violations of law are sold with good intentions, and favors are doled out based on influence. No doubt this is why the number of lobbyists in Washington has more than doubled since the year 2000. These junkies for our dollars are even now meeting with congressmen behind closed doors attempting to convince them that they too are in need of a “fix.” It may also be the reason Nancy Pelosi and her Democratic counterparts in Congress have attempted to redirect a portion of the more than $1.5 trillion in taxpayer money, otherwise known as the bailout to automobile makers.

COMMENTARY....

Global AIDS Crisis Overblown? Some Experts Dare to Say It Is

By: Maria Cheng

LONDON - As World AIDS Day is marked on Monday, some experts are growing more outspoken in complaining that AIDS is eating up funding at the expense of more pressing health needs.

They argue that the world has entered a post-AIDS era in which the disease's spread has largely been curbed in much of the world, Africa excepted.

"AIDS is a terrible humanitarian tragedy, but it's just one of many terrible humanitarian tragedies," said Jeremy Shiffman, who studies health spending at Syracuse University.

Roger England of Health Systems Workshop, a think tank based in the Caribbean island of Grenada, goes further. He argues that UNAIDS, the U.N. agency leading the fight against the disease, has outlived its purpose and should be disbanded.

"The global HIV industry is too big and out of control. We have created a monster with too many vested interests and reputations at stake, ... too many relatively well paid HIV staff in affected countries, and too many rock stars with AIDS support as a fashion accessory," he wrote in the British Medical Journal in May.

Paul de Lay, a director at UNAIDS, disagrees. It's valid to question AIDS' place in the world's priorities, he says, but insists the turnaround is very recent and it would be wrong to think the epidemic is under control.

"We have an epidemic that has caused between 55 million and 60 million infections," de Lay said. "To suddenly pull the rug out from underneath that would be disastrous."

Global AIDS Crisis Overblown?....

AP Top Stories 12.02.08

Arrest in the murders of Hudson's relatives; Burress posts $100-thousand bail; Clinton nominated for Obama's Secretary of State; Largest solar panel installation in California.

Estranged Relative Arrested in Hudson Killings

The estranged brother-in-law of Oscar-winning actress Jennifer Hudson has been arrested for the murders of her mother, brother and 7-year-old nephew.

One Thing for Sure About Hillary: She’s Allergic to Failure

By: Deborah Mathis

My reaction when I first heard that President-Elect Obama was thinking of nominating Hillary Clinton as his secretary of state? A heartfelt, cell-deep, in-my-bones, shiver-inducing cringe.

What, was he nuts? A masochist? A wimp, too conciliatory for his own good? What could possess him to include the junior senator from New York and erstwhile first lady of the United States in his brand spanking new cabinet?

Not known as either a cheerleader or a team player, Hillary Clinton is a shrewd, ambitious, fierce-willed politician who, during the tortured primary season, not only stepped over the line in berating her worthy opponent, but annihilated the thing, handing the Republicans some of their biggest hammers against Obama, including one statement in which she all but said John McCain would be a better choice than the man from Illinois.

And who can forget her long goodbye?

Why in Tarnation would Obama resurrect that old dynamic? Did it hurt so good or something?

Having had several days to digest what is now foregone, I have returned to my senses, and what my faith has told me all along about Obama: He’s nobody’s dummy, nobody’s lackey and nobody’s schmoo. If he thinks Hillary Clinton should be the country’s top diplomat – and fourth in the line of succession – then, as Sarah Palin would say, by golly gee, I betcha he knows what he’s doin'.

I am relieved to report that as of now, with the nomination a fait accompli, I not only no longer cringe, but actually welcome Hillary Clinton as secretary of state-designate. It took me a while to remember an important quality of hers – something I can vouch for, having known and covered her for more than three decades.

Hillary Clinton, like Obama himself, deplores failure. It is her chief allergy, her kryptonite. It foils her and breaks her, sickens her and debilitates her and haunts her (I don’t know that she has ever gotten over the health care reform debacle of 1993 and ’94). Thus, she is driven to succeed.

What’s behind the drive is pure intrigue. Pride, some deep-seated trauma, a need for adulation and acclaim - who knows? What’s important is that this person who is about to inherit, literally, a world of trouble gets up every day unhappy about the state of things; spends every waking moment trying to make the world better; paces and dreams and meets and schemes and works to set things right because it’s just not in her to leave things no better than she found them. Why it’s not in her is moot.

One Thing for Sure About Hillary: She’s Allergic to Failure....

Obama Naming Clinton Secretary of State Today

By: Beth Fouhy

A deal with Bill Clinton over his post-White House work helped clear the way for Hillary Rodham Clinton to join President-elect Barack Obama's national security team as secretary of state, reshaping a once-bitter rivalry into a high-profile strategic and diplomatic union.

Obama was to be joined by the New York senator at a Chicago news conference Monday, Democratic officials said, where he also planned to announce that Defense Secretary Robert Gates would remain in his job for a year or more and that retired Marine General James L. Jones would serve as national security adviser.

The officials requested anonymity because they were not authorized to speak publicly for the transition team.

To make it possible for his wife to become the top U.S. diplomat, the officials said, former President Clinton agreed:

-to disclose the names of every contributor to his foundation since its inception in 1997 and all contributors going forward.

-to refuse donations from foreign governments to the Clinton Global Initiative, his annual charitable conference.

-to cease holding CGI meetings overseas.

-to volunteer to step away from day-to-day management of the foundation while his wife is secretary of state.

-to submit his speaking schedule to review by the State Department and White House counsel.

-to submit any new sources of income to a similar ethical review.

Bill Clinton's business deals and global charitable endeavors had been expected to create problems for the former first lady's nomination. But in negotiations with the Obama transition team, the former president agreed to several measures designed to bring transparency to those activities.

Obama Naming Clinton Secretary of State Today....