Racist history of modern police unions

Transcription

New York’s
Beacon
website:
NewYorkBeacon.net
Vol. 22 No. 05
Showing the Way to Truth and Justice
January 29, 2015 - February 4, 2015
E-Mail
newyorkbeacon@yahoo.com
75 Cents
TAXPAYER’S BURDEN
Cop who choked Garner to death won’t pay a dime
In this July 19, 2014, file photo, Esaw Garner, center, wife of Eric Garner, breaks down in the arms of Rev. Herbert Daughtry and Rev. Al Sharpton, right, during
a rally at the National Action Network headquarters for Eric Garner in New York.
(See Story On Page 3)
(See Story On Page 3)
Supreme Court is sharply divided
over housing discrimination case
BEACON,
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2
Eric Adams
Civil-minded Bklynites urged
to apply for community boards
Brooklyn Borough President
Eric L. Adams has called on
civic-minded Brooklynites to
apply for a position on one of
the borough’s 18 local community boards.
Community boards are local
representative bodies consisting of up to 50 unsalaried members appointed by the Borough
President, with half nominated
by the city council members
who represent the community
district. Board members are selected by the borough presidents
from among active, involved
people of each community, with
an effort made to assure that
every neighborhood is represented; they must reside, work
or have some other significant
interest in the community.
“Brooklyn’s greatness comes
from its residents that are committed to bettering their communities, and nowhere is that better on
display than our community
boards,” said Borough President
Adams. “Community boards are
the most local, grassroots level of
our government, serving as a
sounding board for neighborhood
issues and an incubator for civic
solutions. Their members help to
guide the future of our communities. I encourage any interested
Brooklynite to step up and apply
for membership!”
Borough President Adams further emphasized his interest in receiving applications from teenagers, who can become community
board members for the first time
this year; under a law signed last
(CONTINUED ON PAGE 14)
The Supreme Court appeared
sharply divided Wednesday in a
debate over a decades-old strategy for fighting discrimination
in housing.
Chief Justice John Roberts
expressed serious doubts during
a one-hour argument that the
1968 Fair Housing Act can be
used to ban housing or lending
practices without any proof of
intent to discriminate.
But Justice Antonin Scalia,
who usually aligns with Roberts
and other conservatives, asked
tough questions of both sides,
making it tough to determine
how the court might rule in a
case that has steep ideological
divisions.
The court’s four liberal justices defended the use of socalled “disparate impact” lawsuits that allege even race-neutral policies can have a harmful
effect on minority groups.
Civil rights organizations have
speculated that the court took up
the case to knock out such lawsuits, which have long been criticized by banks, mortgage companies and conservative groups.
The case involves an appeal
from officials accused of awarding federal housing tax credits in
a way that steered low-income
housing into mostly poor, black
neighborhoods in Dallas and generally kept the units out of
wealthier white enclaves.
A Dallas-based fair housing
group, Inclusive Communities
Project Inc., sued the Texas Department of Housing and Community Development in 2008.
The group alleged that agency
policies were keeping Dallas
neighborhoods segregated and
denying blacks a chance to move
into safer neighborhoods with
better schools.
The housing advocacy group
couldn’t prove Texas officials
were intentionally biased. But a
federal appeals court said the
group could use statistics to
show the effect of the policies
still harmed black residents, in
violation of the Fair Housing
Act.
“It is very difficult to decide
what impact is good and what impact is bad,” Roberts said. What
Chief Justice John Roberts
if one community wants to build
low-income housing to revitalize
minority neighborhoods, while
another wants to integrate white
areas, he asked. “Which is the bad
thing to do?”
Solicitor General Donald
Verrilli, who was arguing in favor
of disparate impact, said both
plans may ultimately pass muster.
Under the test that’s been in place
for nearly 40 years, once a disparity is shown, a court must decide whether one race-neutral
policy could be replaced with another race-neutral policy.
But Roberts pressed Verrilli with
the same question three times,
complaining that he wasn’t getting an answer.
Justice Anthony Kennedy said
it seemed “very odd to me” that
disparate impact could work in
either case.
Scott Keller, the Texas Solicitor General, said there was no
clear language authorizing discriminatory impact lawsuits when
the housing law was passed in
1968.
But Justice Ruth Bader
Ginsburg called that argument “a
little artificial” because the
theory was not mainstream until
the Supreme Court approved its
use for employment discrimination cases in 1971.
Scalia told Keller that looking
at the “grand goals” of Congress
in 1968 to eliminate segregated
housing, it seemed possible that
lawmakers thought disparate impact
cases were acceptable. But later,
Scalia told Michael Daniel, lawyer
for the Texas housing group, that
“racial disparity is not racial discrimination.”
“The fact that the NFL is largely
black players is not discrimination,”
Scalia said.
Justice Stephen Breyer noted that
every appeals court to consider the
question for the past 40 years has
found disparate impact acceptable
in the housing context.
“Why when something is so wellestablished throughout the United
States should the court come in and
change it?” he asked Keller.
Texas officials say disparate impact claims would essentially force
them to make race-conscious decisions to avoid liability. And while
disparate impact is allowed under
employment discrimination cases,
they say it is not explicitly mentioned in the Fair Housing Act.
Texas has won support from business groups, including the Mortgage Bankers Association, the
American Financial Services Association and others arguing that federal housing law should punish only
intentional acts of discrimination.
But fair housing advocates say
eliminating such claims means
courts will recognize only the crudest forms of intentional discrimination and not more subtle forms of
bias that persist today.
Video of New Jersey man shot by police officers raises questions
A police video of officers
confronting and then fatally
shooting a black man in
southern New Jersey has
raised questions and stirred
anger over another death at
the hands of police.
The video of the Dec. 30
killing of Jerame Reid in
Bridgeton, a struggling,
mostly minority city of
25,000 people just south of
Philadelphia, was released
this week.
The nearly two-minute
deadly standoff came after
the killings of black men in
New York and Ferguson, Missouri, triggered months of
turbulent protests, violence and
calls for a re-examination of
police use of force.
Conrad Benedetto, a Philadelphia lawyer, said he has been
hired by Reid’s wife, Lawanda,
to investigate. He said in a
statement the footage “raises
serious questions as to the legality and/or reasonableness of
the officers’ actions that night”
because Reid was shot as he
raised his hands.
With the dashboard camera
in their cruiser rolling, police
pulled a Jaguar over for running
a stop sign on a dark night. But
things suddenly turned tense
when one of the officers
warned his partner that he could
see a gun in the glove compartment.
Screaming over and over
“Don’t you f—ing move!” and
“Show me your hands!” at the
man in the passenger seat, the
officer reached into the car and
appeared to remove a silver handgun.
Then, the passenger, despite
being warned repeatedly not to
move, stepped out of the Jaguar,
his hands raised about shoulder
level.
The officers opened fire, killing him.
New Jersey man shot by police
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Joe Biden reveals ‘there is a chance’
he would challenge Hillary Clinton
By Michael Falcone
Adam Powell to run
for Congress in 13th CD
“Now that Congressman Charlie
Rangel has begun his last term, it’s
time to begin the journey to replace him,” declared former Assemblyman Adam Powell.
The 13th Congressional District covers most of Northern
Manhattan and parts of the Northwest Bronx has been represented
by two legendary figures: my father, Adam Clayton Powell, Jr.
(who created the seat and became
the first African American Congressman from New York from
1944-1970) and Charles B.
Rangel (1970-present).
“We need a progressive voice
to preserve the rich history of
these last 70 years. I intend to run
for that seat,” said Adam.
Stated Adam: “This is not an
exploratory committee; I’ve
been exploring this district for
over 20 years. It’s time to run.
I know this congressional district as well as anyone. From El
Barrio to Harlem to Washington Heights & Inwood to the
Bronx, I’ve represented various
parts of this district in the City
Council and in the State Assembly.
Most of the leaders in these
various neighborhoods are
people I know and have worked
with throughout the years. I
hope you pray for me and join
me in this exciting journey.”
Officer Daniel Pontaleo
Pantaleo will pay nothing.
Instead, taxpayers will shoulder
the cost. Between 2006 and 2011,
New York City paid out $348 million in settlements or judgments
in cases pertaining to civil rights
violations by police, according
to a UCLA study published in June
2014. Those nearly 7,000 misconduct cases included allegations of
excessive use of force, sexual as-
sault, unreasonable searches,
and false arrests. More than 99 percent of the payouts came from the
city’s municipal budget, which has
a line item dedicated to settlements
and judgments each year. (The city
did require police to pay a tiny fraction of the total damages, with officers personally contributing in
less than 1 percent of the cases for
a total of $114,000.)
President Obama to pass on meeting
Netanyahu during Washington visit
Israeli Prime Minister
Benjamin Netanyahu’s planned
trip to Washington in March is
kicking up a diplomatic dust
storm in the nation’s capital.
On Thursday, the White
House said President Barack
Obama would not meet the
prime minister when he comes
to the U.S. to address a joint
session of Congress. The official White House explanation was that Netanyahu’s visit
fell too close to the Israeli
election and the Obama administration wanted to avoid
the appearance of taking sides.
“As a matter of
longstanding practice and
principle, we do not see heads
of state or candidates in close
proximity to their elections,
so as to avoid the appearance
of influencing a democratic
election in a foreign country,”
In this Oct. 1, 2014 file photom President Barack Obama meets
with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu in the Oval Office of the White House in Washington.
National Security Council
spokeswoman
Bernadette
Meehan said.
But the timing of
Netanyahu’s visit also gave the
White House a convenient
means of retaliating against the
prime minister for his decision
to accept an invitation from Republican leaders to address Con(CONTINUED ON PAGE 14)
Blood on their hands:
By Flint Taylor
Outraged by New York City
Mayor Bill de Blasio’s
statements concerning the killing
of Eric Garner, Patrick Lynch, the
longtime leader of the New York
City Patrolmen’s Benevolent Association (PBA), the NYPD’s officers union, recently made the
outrageous assertion that the
Mayor had “blood on his hands”
for the murder of the two NYPD
officers.
In Milwaukee this past fall, the
Police Association called for, and
obtained, a vote of no confidence
in MPD Chief Ed Flynn after he
fired the officer who shot and
killed Dontre Hamilton, an unarmed African American; subsequently, the union’s leader, Mike
Crivello, praised the District
Attorney when he announced
that he would not bring charges
against the officer.
In Chicago, the Fraternal Order of Police (FOP), a longtime
supporter of racist police torturer Jon Burge, is now seeking
to circumvent court orders that
preserve and make public the
police misconduct files of repeater cops such as Burge, by
seeking to enforce a police contract provision that calls for the
destruction of the files after
seven years. And in a show of
solidarity with the killer of
Michael Brown, Chicago’s FOP
is soliciting contributions to the
Darren Wilson defense fund on
its website.
Such reactionary actions by
police unions are not new, but are
a fundamental component of their
history, particularly since they
came to prominence in the wake
of the civil rights movement.
These organizations have played
a powerful role in defending the
police, no matter how outrageous and racist their actions, and
in resisting all manner of police
reforms.
New York
In June 1966, New York City
Mayor John Lindsay, responding
to widespread complaints of police brutality, called for a civilian
review board. Five thousand off
duty NYPD cops rallied at City
Hall in opposition, and the head of
the PBA, leading the campaign
against civilian review, intoned
that “I am sick and tired of giving
in to minority groups, with their
whims and their gripes and shouting. Any review board with civilians on it is detrimental to the operations of the police department.” Invoking the specter of increased crime, the PBA mounted
a massive public relations campaign against the measure, and it
was defeated in a referendum that
year.
In 1975, in response to proposed
budget cuts that included police layoffs, the PBA ordered a
rampage through the city’s black
and Puerto Rican communities,
with thousands of off duty cops
waving their guns, banging on trash
cans, and blowing whistles for several nights until Mayor Abe Beame
obtained a restraining order.
Ten years later, after Mayor Ed
Koch revived the issue of civilian
review in the wake of a white cop
killing Eleanor Bumpurs, an elderly
and mentally ill black woman, the
PBA again condemned the idea,
newyorkbeacon.net
With the 2016 presidential
election season heating up and
former Secretary of State Hillary
Clinton considered the presumptive front-runner for the Democratic nomination if she decides
to jump into the race, Vice President Joe Biden is sending a clear
message: Don’t count him out.
“Yes, there is a chance,” he would
challenge Clinton, Biden told
ABC’s George Stephanopoulos in
an interview on “Good Morning
America” today. “But I haven’t
made my mind up about that.
We’ve got a lot of work to do between now and then. There’s
plenty of time.”
Why Today Was the Best Day
Ever to Watch Biden Being
Biden Shots Fired Near the
House of Vice President Joe
Biden. This Might Be The Best
Thing Joe Biden’s Ever Said
The vice president described
Clinton as a “really competent,
capable person and a friend.”
Biden said he didn’t have to
make up his mind until this summer about whether to launch another White House bid. “I think
this is wide open on both sides,”
he told Stephanopoulos. “Right
now my focus is getting implemented what the president
talked about last night: to nail
down this recovery and get the
middle class back in the game.
Vice President Joe Biden
When police officers kill unarmed citizens they are rarely
charged, let alone convicted of a
crime. The victims’ families often turn to civil complaints
against the police, as is currently
the case in New York City, Cleveland, and Los Angeles, where
wrongful death and other civil
rights claims filed in the wake of
officer-involved killings could
result in payouts tallying in the
millions of dollars. Still, the police officers involved are likely
to suffer no financial pain. That’s
because in the vast majority of
such cases, whether they are
settled or go to court, the officers don’t pay a dime.
New York City Comptroller
Scott Stringer is currently
reviewing civil claims brought by
the family of Eric Garner, the 43year old Staten Island man who
died in July 2014 after NYPD
officer Daniel Pantaleo put him
in a chokehold. The $75 million
worth of claims include wrongful death, assault, pain and suffering, and negligent hiring and training by the NYPD. But if the city
decides to settle the case with the
Garner family, a spokesperson
for the comptroller told said
3
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Cop who choked Eric Garner to death
won’t have to pay a dime in damages
Cuomo student loan forgiveness plan
not as good as it seems, advocates say
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Vanita Gupta
Justice Dept. officials,
law enforcement, leaders
discuss building trust, justice
National and local leaders convened in Columbus at a Building
Community Trust and Justice
Summit, hosted by U.S. Attorney
Carter Stewart for the Southern
District of Ohio. U.S. Department of Justice officials and nationally-recognized experts in
the field of criminal justice
joined area law enforcement officers and community members
to discuss the National Initiative
for Building Community Trust
and Justice, the Justice
Department’s
effort
to
strengthen law enforcementcommunity relationships by focusing on procedural justice, reducing bias and racial reconciliation.
“The purpose of initiatives like
this is to build relationships with
the community, which, in turn,
helps foster trusts and aids our
law enforcement mission,” said
U.S. Attorney Stewart. “We’re
all after the same goal – keeping
out families and our communities safe in a fair and just way.”
Assistant Attorney General
Karol V. Mason for the Office of
Justice Programs, Acting Assis-
tant Attorney General Vanita Gupta
for the Civil Rights Division, Director Ron Davis of the Office of
Community Oriented Policing
Services (COPS Office) and Professor David Kennedy of the John
Jay College of Criminal College
joined Franklin County Prosecutor Ron O’Brien, Columbus Police Chief Kim Jacobs,
Westerville Police Chief Joseph
Morbitzer and Columbus City Attorney Richard Pfeiffer in a morning of panel discussion designed
to bring all parties together to
find ways to promote crime reduction while building community trust between citizens and the
police.
“We’re approaching these issues from the perspective that
trust-building is the responsibility of all parties,” said Assistant
Attorney General Mason. “This
is not only about what law enforcement can do to bridge the
divide of trust; it’s also about the
civic obligation that communities
have in engaging with police.”
“I believe we have the potential
Among the school aid recommendations laid out in his 20152016 budget, Gov. Andrew
Cuomo proposed the “Get on
Your Feet” loan forgiveness program for recent college graduates
burdened by large amounts of student debt. During his joint State
of the State and budget address,
the governor said student loans
are one of the biggest burdens on
a recent graduates as they start
their careers.
“Many of our new college
graduates face high student loan
debt as they begin their career and
it’s a troubling situation because
they have high debt and low
wages,” Cuomo said as he proposed to pay off loan debt for new
graduates who make less than
$50,000 a year. “We’ll pay the
debt for the first two years so they
can get their feet under them and
they can get on with their lives,”
Cuomo added.
While this sounds great, some
advocates say a closer examination of his proposed plan reveals
it does little to offset the student
loan burden thousands face.
This is how Cuomo’s proposed
program would work.
After graduating college, students have six-month grace period before they have to begin to
pay their student loans. Then a
standard repayment plan kicks in
with monthly payments that repay
the loan in a 10-year period. For
those who cannot make those payments, another option is the Pay
As You Earn (PAYE) program,
which lets a recent college graduate contribute only 10 percent of
their discretionary income and
never more than the 10-year standard repayment plan.
Under Cuomo’s proposal, the
state would supplement the PAYE
program. A college graduate
would make still have to make the
10 percent payments out of their
pocket. The state would then pay
the difference between the standard repayment and the PAYE program for two years. While it definitely gives graduates a boost, it
doesn’t eliminate the 10 percent
of discretionary income they
must contribute.
In its first year, the program is
expected to enroll about 7,100
graduates and cost about $5 million. When fully phased-in, the
state estimates more than 24,000
graduates will participate in the
program, which will cost about
$41.7 million in 2019-20.
Gov. Cuomo
Which means, under this plan
the average student will receive
$1,750 annually for two years toward their student debt, a Cuomo
administration official said.
“This is not the silver bullet to
help with the state and nation’s
students’ gigantic debt, but it
helps and, to the extent that you
can help offset those costs, is
good public policy,” Blair
Horner, executive director of
NYPIRG, said. “But more needs
to be done. Particularly in the
area of, ‘How do you reduce the
costs so people do not have to
take those loans in the first
place?’”
According to the federal government, the average student debt
balance in New York is $25,537.
For four-year SUNY students, that
number can be much higher. Annual tuition and fees for on-campus SUNY students costs about
$19,602 and CUNY students who
are living away from home spend
about $19,984. In addition to
those loans, students face interest rates on those loans.
Two of the loan types allowed
under the PAYE program are Direct Subsidized Loans and Direct
Unsubsidized Loans, which have
a 4.66% interest rate in 2015.
So, for example, the average
student with a debt of $25,537
and a 4.66% interest rate would
accumulate $1,021.48 annually
in interest—about $700 less
than the amount given by the state.
“There are other things the
state could be doing,” Horner said.
“The governor could—after having
raised SUNY tuition for the last
three years or so—propose a tuition freeze to help costs. The [Tuition Assistance Program] has not
kept pace with the maximum public tuition, so for the last 20 years,
the state has had a systematic disinvestment in public college. So,
there are other real issues that need
to be addressed.”
Horner said the state could
also take the lead from President
Obama, who proposed free community college tuition during
his State of the Union address.
Obama also proposed in June to
expand the existing PAYE program to include borrowers who
took out loans before Oct.
2007, which would make about
5 million additional people eligible for the program nationwide. A Cuomo administration
official said the current funding
does not address Obama’s proposal.
Horner said this does little to
address the “$1 trillion problem”
of student debt owed nationally.
“The feds have to weigh-in, the
state has to weigh-in, localities
have to weigh-in in regards to community colleges. There’s all of that
stuff, but that doesn’t mean you
can’t do anything unless you do
everything and so that’s our reaction to that. We have a positive reaction to what the governor is saying, but we’ll certainly be urging
more be done,” he said.
Wrongly convicted man to sue NYPD, City for $100 million
By Josh Saul
fice.
A man who had his murder
conviction tossed out after he
spent 20 years behind bars based
on tainted evidence gathered by
a since-retired detective whose
cases are now under review has
filed notice that he intends to sue
the detective, the NYPD, and the
city for $100 million, court papers show.
Derrick Hamilton, 49, was arrested for a 1991 murder in
Bedford-Stuyvesant by Det.
Louis Scarcella, who currently
has about 70 of his homicide
cases being reviewed by the
Brooklyn District Attorney’s of-
“Scarcella framed me,”
Hamilton said Wednesday.
“At the end of the day, it
shouldn’t have taken 24 years for
this exoneration to happen and we
hope that the city of New York has
learned its lesson.”
Hamilton has his conviction
overturned earlier this month. He
had been out on parole since 2011.
“Scarcella is named as a defendant in the notice of claim and we
intend to hold him accountable for
what he did,” said Hamilton lawyer Jonathan Edelstein, who filed
the notice of claim with the city
comptroller Tuesday.
Hamilton was found guilty Derrick Hamilton and his daughter Maia Photo: AP
based on testimony by the victim’s
girlfriend. But she quickly recanted, saying she lied because
cops threatened to take away her
kids, court papers charge.
“Detective Scarcella arranged
for Mr. Hamilton to be arrested
without probable cause, brought to
Kings County and charged with the
crime,” Hamilton’s notice of claim
reads.
“In addition, through the coercion of Ms. Smith’s perjured testimony before the grand jury, Detective Scarcella and/or others in the
employ of the City caused Mr.
Hamilton to be indicted without
probable cause and through manipulation and fraud.”
5
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Editorial
The State of the Union
is a tale of two Americas
Beacon
Walter Smith: Publisher & Editor-in-Chief
Miatta Haj Smith: Co-Publisher & Executive Editor
William Egyir: Managing Editor
What is constitutional in the
2015 State of the Union address?
By Dr. Harold Pease
In listening to the President’s
State of the Union Address one
might think that he actually has
the power to do what he requests. On domestic issues two
old requests from last years
State of the Union Address were
renewed: a request for raising
the minimum wage and, instead
of just making the college opportunity available to all middle
class Americans, he went further
proposing free community college for all. Other requests included advocacy for “a free and
open Internet,” which, given a
recent executive order means
control of it, expanded child
care tax credits, improved job
training, expanded paid leave,
and a new tax benefit for twoincome families. All this to be
funded by increased taxes on the
rich. He threatened a veto to
any legislation that altered
Obamacare or undermined his
recently decreed executive amnesty. He was decidedly unclear
on his request for criminal justice reform, certainly a reference to the riots in Ferguson,
Mo. More federal involvement
always means more federal control.
He defended his positions on
Cuba and Iran and threatened
presidential vetoes if Congress
legislated differently. Constitutionalist had to have cheered
when he seemed to lecture, the
mostly Republican Congress,
on what he called “rash decisions, reacting to the headlines
instead of using our heads; when
the first response to a challenge
is to send in our military—then
we risk getting drawn into unnecessary conflicts, and neglect
the broader strategy we need for
a safer, more prosperous world.”
He called it “a smarter kind of
American leadership” and
seemed aimed at the so-called
military industrial complex of
which President Dwight D.
Eisenhower warned. He saw rewriting the Authorization of Use
of Military Force, which authorized the air campaigns in Iraq
and Syria, as a priority but left
few specifics on what that meant.
He still refuses to use the term
Radical Islamist Terrorists in
describing the Islamists involved
in the mass killing in Nigeria,
Iraq, Syria and France even
though while he spoke they were
threatening to topple Yemen who
has stood with us in opposition
to al-Qaida.
The list went on and on as it does
for every president Republican
or Democrat, but what was different from last year is that he
threatened the use of the veto
rather than the threat of his bypassing Congress with the use of
the “pen” through executive orders. The term executive order
is not found in the Constitution
and initially was nothing more
than inter-departmental communications between the President
and his executive branch with
him requesting some action on
their part. Constitutionally they
have no law-making function.
Unfortunately most, if not all,
of these things are not in Article
II of the Constitution nor have
they been added by way of
amendment as outlined in Article V of that document, thus
they are unconstitutional. It is
very probable that, even with the
approval of Congress, they
would be outside the Constitution but that is a topic for another
time. Presidents, in their thirst
for power and /or proclaimed
expediency, have empowered
themselves to the point of “kingship” with their worshipful,
unchallenging, party followers
(whether Democrat or Republican) quite willing to look the
other way as government grows
beyond its ability to be constitutional or efficient. At any time
he could remind the people of
his real constitutional powers but
he will not as that would drastically reduce his power that is
beginning to look limitless.
We must return to the Constitutional powers of the President
as identified in Article II. As we
list these powers attempt to
match the State of the Union requests wherein he suggests that
he might have a role. Under the
Constitution the president has
but eleven powers. Let us identify them: 1) “Commander in
chief of the army and navy of the
United States” including the militia when called into actual service of the United States; 2) supervise departments (cabinet),
each presumably established by
the Congress (George Washing(CONTINUED ON PAGE 14)
By Reverend Jesse L. Jack- costs are falling, in coalition
with China he’s taken important
son, Sr.
steps toward curbing climate
The State of the Union is a change and he has moved fortale of two Americas. One ward on reforming our immiAmerica has unprecedented gration system. He has ended a
income, profits and wealth, U.S. fighting role in Iraq and
while the other America’s real Afghanistan, is gradually reducunemployment rate is over i n g t h e p r i s o n e r s h e l d i n
11%, wages and income for Guantanamo and taken dramatic
basic workers are frozen in steps to normalize relations with
place, poverty is growing and Cuba. He is challenging the
the disparity in income and huge sums of money in our poliwealth between the haves and tics fostered by the Citizens
have-nots has not been this big United decision and vows to
since the Great Depression. protect voting rights. He has
First, the American people vowed to protect Social Secum u s t c o m m e n d P r e s i d e n t rity, Medicare and Medicaid for
Now that
O b a m a f o r w h a t h e h a s future generations.
achieved in spite of Republi- Republicans are in charge of the
can opposition that has resisted House and Senate they have
everything he has proposed and wasted no time in attacking Sothere is every indication that cial Security, attempting to dethey will continue to oppose rail President Obama’s immihis proposals tonight. But his gration plan and destroy his
direction is sound and should achievement of the Affordable
be supported.
He proposes Care Act. Tomorrow, rather
to eliminate the biggest tax than respond to the positive
loopholes and ensure that the agenda of President Obama,
wealthiest Americans and big- they will continue their negative
gest corporations pay their agenda and vote to make aborfair share. As the president t i o n c h o i c e m o r e d i f f i c u l t .
knows, the top 1% and major Second, however, the American
corporations are enjoying a p e o p l e m u s t a l s o c h a l l e n g e
historic period of prosperity, President Obama on several
while the wages of the average fronts. We need a comprehenAmerican family have flat- sive urban policy. Tax hikes for
lined. He proposes to use the the wealthy and tax cuts for the
s a v i n g s p r o d u c e d b y t h e s e middle class do not address the
measures to reinvest in the zones of catastrophic housing
education and other needs of foreclosures, vacant lots, povthe middle class. He is pro- e r t y, d y s f u n c t i o n a l s c h o o l s ,
posing to make the first two closing emergency rooms and
years at a community college hospitals, and urban abandonf r e e , w h i c h w o u l d i n c l u d e m e n t p r e s e n t i n t o d a y ’s
more students in economic America. Dr. King was right n e e d . A f t e r a r e c o r d 5 8 we need direct investments.
months of continuous eco- President Obama must not only
nomic growth in which the of- defend voting rights using the
ficial unemployment rate has present “structure” of our votfallen to 5.6%, he is focused ing system - states rights and
on raising the minimum wage, local control.
In his 2013
lifting the income of average State of the Union Address,
workers and providing paid President Obama announced a
sick days for all.
The num- plan to convene a commission
ber of uninsured Americans is
at an all-time low, health care (CONTINUED ON PAGE 14)
Two kinds of income inequality
By Sheldon Richman
Income inequality is back in
the news, propelled by an Oxfam
International report and President Barack Obama’s State of the
Union address. The question is
whether government needs to do
something about this — or
whether government needs to
undo many things.
Measuring income inequality
is no simple thing, which is one
source of disagreement between
those who think inequality is a
problem and those who think it
isn’t. But it is possible to cut
through the underbrush and make
some points clear.
We can identify two kinds of
economic inequality, and let’s
keep this in mind as we contemplate what, if anything, government ought to do.
The first kind we might call
market inequality. Individuals differ in many ways, including energy, ambition, and ingenuity. As
a result, in a market-oriented
economy some people will be
better than others at satisfying
consumers and will hence tend to
make more money. The only way
to prevent that is to interfere
forcibly with the results of peaceful, positive-sum transactions in
the
marketplace.
Since
interference discourages the production of wealth, the equality
fostered through violence will be
an equality of impoverishment.
Is it better that people be
equally poor or unequally affluent? This is the important question that political philosopher
John Tomasi, author of Free Market Fairness, puts to his classes
at Brown University. Would they
prefer a society in which everyone has the same low income, or
one in which incomes vary, perhaps widely, but the lowest incomes are higher than the equal
income of the first society?
Which would you choose?
Let’s remember that it is entirely
possible for the poorest in a society to become richer even as
the gap between the richest and
poorest grows. Imagine an accordion-like elevator that is rising as
a whole while being stretched
out, putting the floor further
from the ceiling. Would such a
society be objectionable? Why is
the relative position of the poorest more important than their absolute position? Is concern about
relative positions nothing more
than envy?
We could argue about that all
day, but a much more urgent subject is political-economic inequality. This is the inequality
fostered through the political system. Since government’s distinctive feature is its claimed authority to use force aggressively (as
opposed to defensively), this second sort of inequality is produced
by violence, which on its face
should make it abhorrent.
Political-economic systems
throughout the world, including
ones typically thought to be market-oriented (or “capitalist”), such
as in the United States, are in fact
built on deeply rooted and longestablished systems of privilege.
Favors, which the rest of us must
pay for one way or another, typically go to the well-connected, and
prominent business executives have
always been well represented in that
group.
In the United States this has been
true since the days of John Jacob
Astor, the fur trader who had the
ears of such influential politicians
as James Madison, James Monroe,
and John Quincy Adams. Government was little more than the executive committee of leading
7
BEACON,
Opinion
By George E. Curry
NNPA Columnist
troopers began clubbing the Rev.
James Dobynes, a black minister
at the front of the line.”
NBC News correspondent Richard Valeriani was knocked to
the ground, bleeding from a head
wound, and another journalist,
UPI photographer Pete Fisher,
was also beaten and his camera
was smashed into tiny pieces.
“The panicked crowd tried to
get back into the church, but the
doors were jammed full and the
people spilled around it down a
side street, taking cover wherever
they could,” Fager wrote. “The
troopers came after them, clubs
swinging, splitting scalps and
smashing ribs as they advanced.
Two or three dozen people rushed
through the doors of Mack’s
Café, a few doors down, seeking
refuge in its crowded, dark interior. Among them were Jimmie
Lee Jackson, a young man of
twenty-six years old, his mother,
Viola and his grandfather Cager
Lee, eighty-two. The old man had
already been caught and beaten
behind the church, and was bleeding.
“His grandson was helping him
out of the door to get medical attention when a squad of troopers
came toward them, chasing and
beating people before them, and
forced the two men back into the
café. The troopers came inside,
smashed all the lights within reach
and began clubbing people indiscriminately.
When one hit Viola and
knocked her screaming to the
floor, Jimmie Lee lunged at him.
The trooper struck him across the
face, and the young Jackson went
careening into the floor himself.
Then a trooper picked him up and
slammed him against a cigarette
machine while another trooper, a
man named Fowler, drew his pistol and calmly shot Jackson point
blank in the stomach.”
The author noted, “Jackson
didn’t realize he had been shot
until a few moments later, because the troopers continued beating him and the others unmercifully.”
Someone took Jackson to the
Perry County Hospital. He was
transferred to Good Samaritan
Hospital in Selma, where he died
a week later.
The state trooper, James
Bonard Fowler, was not charged
until May 10, 2007 as a result of
a cold case investigation. He pled
guilty to manslaughter and was
sentenced to only six months in
jail.
According to Taylor Branch’s
Pulitzer Prize-winning At Canaan’s
Edge, although Dr. King had
preached many funerals by then, a
reporter noticed “a tear glistened
from the corner of his eye as he
rose to speak.”
King deplored “the cowardice of
every Negro” who “stands on the
sidelines in the struggle for justice.” King said, “Jimmie Lee Jackson is speaking to us from the casket and he is saying to us that we
must substitute courage for
caution…We must not be bitter,
and we must not harbor ideas of
retaliation with violence. We must
not lose faith in our white brothers.”
Whatever its purported shortcomings, the movie “Selma,” allows Jimmie Lee Jackson to continue speaking to us from the
grave.
George E. Curry, former editorin-chief of Emerge magazine, is
editor-in-chief of the National
Newspaper Publishers Association News Service (NNPA.) He is a
keynote speaker, moderator, and
media coach. Curry can be
reached through his Web site,
www.georgecurry.com. You can
also follow him at:
www.twitter.com/currygeorge and
George E. Curry Fan Page on
Facebook
Selma: White savior not required
By Walter L Fields
NNPA Columnist
The fierce and aligned, if not
coordinated, campaign to smear
the motion picture “Selma” by
suggesting it inaccurately portrays the role of President
Lyndon Johnson in the fight for
Blacks’ civil rights is par for the
course. Critics of the movie that
focuses on the campaign for voting rights in Selma, Ala. suggest
that Johnson was a champion for
civil rights and is principally responsible for securing voting
rights for African-Americans.
At best that point of view is a
misunderstanding, and at worst,
and what I firmly believe, it is a
deliberate attempt to create a
false narrative to diminish the
principal and central role of
Blacks in advocating for their
own freedom.
It is ironic, and sad, that the
first full-length theater released
movie chronicling the leadership
of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. is
being trashed in an attempt to
exalt a White president. The criticism of “Selma” betrays the truth
and common sense. Lyndon
Johnson was a southerner; a
Texas politician firmly entrenched as a Dixiecrat. His selection as John F. Kennedy’s vice
presidential running mate was a
political calculation to secure
southern votes and resulted in an
uneasy alliance between the
Texan and the young Bostonian.
The tragic assassination of JFK
thrust Johnson into the Oval Office and placed upon the Texan the
late president’s agenda.
Lyndon Johnson was no civil
rights champion. He was a pragmatic politician who was smart
enough to read the moment and
self-absorbed enough to recognize
history would judge his legacy
based upon a historical movement
for Blacks’ rights.
Common sense makes plain
that in the turbulent 1960s, no
occupant of the White House, the
seat of world power and White
domination, saw their role as a liberator of the descendants of enslaved Africans. The rights of
Blacks were not central to the
maintenance of power for a president though it became a necessary
consideration for the preservation
of order.
What also challenges the
Johnson-as-savior narrative is the
truth. As president, he walked gingerly in taking on southern governors who were using their powers
to oppress African-Americans and
deny them their constitutional
rights. He reluctantly used his
power to protect Blacks who were
being subjected to violence in the
south. Johnson ‘negotiated’ civil
rights, and used his considerable
skill as a legislator, to win in the
margins. And even while proving
successful in moving civil rights
legislation LBJ co-existed with
FBI director J. Edgar Hoover, who
was leading a campaign to sup-
press and eliminate Black leadership.
Lyndon Johnson should be
credited for a few things. He courageously appointed two AfricanAmericans to positions of authority in the federal hierarchy,
historical appointments that were
impactful in their significance.
Former NAACP legal counsel
Thurgood Marshall was named to
the United States Supreme Court
and the brilliant economist Robert Weaver was made the first
Black to serve on a presidential
cabinet when Johnson made him
secretary of the newly-created
Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD). And
there were other appointments in
the federal bureaucracy that
changed the hue of national government administration. Still,
these appointments did not fundamentally alter the citizenship
status of African-Americans in
our nation.
While I admire LBJ’s tenacity,
the campaign to canonize him as
a civil rights saint is far-fetched.
The simple question is “If King,
Roy Wilkins, Clarence Mitchell,
Jr., SNCC and others had not existed, would Lyndon Johnson
pro-actively advance a civil rights
agenda?” The truthful answer is,
no. Johnson felt the pull of a powerful social movement and understood that change, even if not desired or convenient, was upon the
nation and inevitable his presidency. It was the leadership and
advocacy of Blacks that created
the space for Johnson to exercise
presidential authority in the face
of southern opposition.
Perhaps what galls me most
with the latest effort to bestow
white knighthood on a White
male for racial sensitivity is it
comes upon the heels of protests
against police brutality. If we do
not speak forcefully against the
misappropriation of history, we
will witness a similar false accounting about our present circumstances decades from now.
The campaign to make LBJ the
epicenter of the civil rights
struggle is like making the Warren Court the heroes of school
desegregation and not the plaintiffs in Brown v. Board of Education. It also occurs as Hollywood
churns out another motion picture
anointing White benevolence to-
ward a Black child, a seeming
theme in ‘Tinseltown’ that suggests
Black people are incapable of selfdetermination and success without
the aid of Whites. It is the worst
characteristic of White liberalism
and perhaps the reason why it has
taken until 2015, nearly 47 years
after King’s death, for a major
motion picture to center on the
Nobel Prize winner and human
rights icon.
We are not in need of White saviors. We could use some willing
White partners who recognize and
acknowledge the brilliance of
Black leadership and understand
that their empathy and emotional
investment in our plight can never
approximate the struggle, sacrifice
and commitment of Blacks to our
own liberation.
Walter L Fields is executive
editor of NorthStarNews.com.
CBC members visit Ferguson, Mo.
By Lauren Victoria Burke
NNPA Columnist
“Where do I start? How about
undefinable frustration? It seems
we can’t even catch our breath
from our first tragedy before being hit by another gut-punch from
a second, third, and fourth. The
names Trayvon Martin, Michael
Brown, Eric Garner, John
Crawford, Tamir Rice – and
countless more. Too many more.
That is the brutal truth – as brutal
as the tactics employed with stunning regularity by some who are
sworn to protect us.”
Those were the words delivered
by Rep. Andre Carson (D-Ind.) in
Ferguson on January 18 at Wellspring United Methodist Church.
The Congressional Black Caucus
(CBC) had traveled to the hotspot
in Missouri and Carson, who at 40
is the second youngest member of
the CBC, took center stage as the
newyorkbeacon.net
Although Dr. Martin Luther
King, Jr. and John Lewis captured
the headlines, it was the death of
26-year-old Jimmie Lee Jackson
that inspired the 1965 Selma-toMontgomery March.
After fighting in the Vietnam
War, Jackson had returned home
to Marion, Ala., which also happens to be the birthplace of
Coretta Scott King, about 30
miles northwest of Selma in the
soil-rich Black Belt region of
Alabama. Although Blacks made
up a majority of Black Belt counties, they were less than 1 percent of the registered voters.
A pulpwood worker, Jackson
had attempted five times to register, none successfully. In an effort to expand voter registration
in the area, James Orange, a
Southern Christian Leadership
Conference (SCLC) field organizer, and George Best of the Student Nonviolent Coordinating
Committee (SNCC) had moved
to Perry County in early 1965.
Before long, local residents were
trying to register to vote, most of
them for the first time.
On Feb. 18, Orange, who included students in the movement,
was arrested, allegedly for contributing to delinquency of minors.
That set off a round of protests.
Shortly after being released
from jail in Selma, C. T. Vivian of
SCLC was sent to Marion to address a mass meeting at Zion
Chapel Methodist Church. The
plan was to hold a night march to
the jail, which would cover less
than the length of a football field,
to demand James Orange’s release. If confronted by police,
demonstrators were instructed to
kneel in prayer and return to the
church.
But White law enforcement officials had another plan.
In his excellent book, Selma
1965: The March That Changed
the South, Charles E. Fager recounted:
“But when the preachers at the
head of the line came out of the
door, the sidewalk was lined with
helmeted state troopers, long,
black billy clubs at the ready, and
they were stopped less than a half
block down. ‘This is an unlawful
assembly,’ the police chief announced over a public address system. ‘You are hereby ordered to
disperse. Go home or go back to
the church.’
“Just then all of the street lights
around the square went out, and
Jimmie Lee Jackson inspired Selma march
BEACON,
newyorkbeacon.net
8
(from page 3)
staged a work slowdown in response to the attempted prosecution of the officer, Stephen
Sullivan, and pressured Koch into
reinstating Sullivan even though
he had been criminally charged
with the killing.
In 1992, when David Dinkins,
the first (and only) AfricanAmerican Mayor of New York
City sought to implement a civilian review agency to investigate allegations of police misconduct, the PBA organized another City Hall rally in protest.
This time, the crowd of officers
numbered 10,000, with PBA
members hurtling barricades,
jumping on cars, blocking the
Brooklyn Bridge and kicking a
reporter. Some of the rally’s participants carried signs showing
Dinkins with a bushy Afro haircut and swollen lips, with racist
slogans, including ones that ridiculed him as a “washroom attendant.”
In the mid-1990s, the independent Mollen Commission, appointed by Mayor Dinkins to investigate police corruption,
documented widespread police
perjury, brutality, drug dealing
and theft in the NYPD, and found
that “by advising its members
against cooperating with law-enforcement authorities, the P.B.A.
often acts as a shelter for and
protector of the corrupt cop.”
These findings were seconded by
senior NYPD officials and prosecutors who were quoted by the
New York Times as saying that
they would continue to “have
trouble rooting out substantial
numbers of corrupt officers as
long as the P.B.A. resists them.”
The Times further quoted these
officials as complaining that the
PBA, “fortified with millions of
dollars in annual dues collections . . . is one of the most powerful unions in the city. As an active lobbyist in Albany and as a
contributor to political campaigns, the P.B.A. has enormous
influence over the department
and is typically brought in for
consultations before important
management decisions are
made.”
In the Abner Louima case,
the PBA’s role extended beyond reactionary advocacy and
agitation to active participation in a conspiracy to coverup the brutal crimes of its
members. In 1997, an NYPD
officer sexually assaulted
Louima in a Precinct Station
bathroom by violently shoving
a broken broomstick into his
rectum. His attacker and three
of his police accomplices
were charged with criminal
civil rights offenses.
Evidence in the criminal
proceedings revealed that a
PBA official had chaired an
early meeting with the implicated officers, one of whom
was a PBA delegate, at which
they fabricated a false story
designed to exonerate one of
the conspirators. Even after the
officers were convicted, the PBA
continued to defend the officers,
both publicly and with financial
support, and to advocate for them
with their fabricated version of
events—with none other than
Patrick Lynch claiming that
“people with a political agenda
have fanned the flames of this incident,” leading to an “innocent
man . . . being punished beyond
belief.”
More recently, Lynch and the
PBA, together with the NYPD
sergeants and captains associations, after condemning Federal
Judge Shira Scheindlin’s order
that sharply limited the NYPD’s
discriminatory stop and frisk
policies, unsuccessfully sought
to appeal her order after Mayor
de Blasio made good on his campaign promise not to appeal.
And this past year, confronted
with another indefensible case of
NYPD violence, PBA President
Lynch again went on the offensive. In August, after the medical
examiner determined that Eric
Garner’s death at the hands of officer Daniel Pantaleo was a homicide by means of a chokehold,
Lynch declared that the examiner
was “mistaken” in finding that the
death was a homicide, and that he
had “never seen a document that
was more political than that press
release by the [medical examiner].”
In a classic case of doubletalk,
he further asserted that it was “not
a chokehold. It was bringing a person to the ground the way we’re
trained to do to place him under
arrest.” He chastised Mayor de
Blasio for not “support[ing] New
York City police officers unequivocally.”
In December, Lynch praised
the Staten Island Grand Jury’s decision not to charge Panteleo,
while accusing Garner of resisting arrest, brushing off two police misconduct lawsuits—one
for sexual assault during a
search— brought against
Panteleo and idolizing him as “literally an Eagle Scout,” a “model”
cop, and “mature, mature” officer.
And once again, the PBA unleashed a work slowdown in further protest of Mayor de
Blasio that lasted several weeks.
Chicago
In Chicago, the Fraternal Order
of Police, which represents CPD
patrol officers, has a similarly
notorious history.
Handmaiden to the rioting
cops who indiscriminately and
brutally beat demonstrators at
the 1968 Democratic Convention, the FOP held a reunion of
their 1968 troops in 2009 at
the FOP Lodge. They proudly
displayed pictures of some of
the wanton police brutality on
their website and, in an attempt
to rewrite history (and the
Walker Report’s findings of a
“police riot”), trumpeted that
“the time has come that the
Chicago Police be honored
and recognized for their contributions to maintaining law
and order—and for taking a
stand against Anarchy. … The
Democratic National Convention was about to start and the
only thing that stood between
Marxist street thugs and public order was a thin blue line
of dedicated, tough Chicago
police officers.”
In the 1970s and 1980s, the
FOP, demonstrating its reactionary and racist essence within its
own ranks, aligned itself against
the forces that were fighting to
bring affirmative action to the
CPD. The Afro American
Patrolman’s League led the battle
and was confronted in their legal struggle at every turn by disgruntled white officers and the
FOP.
In 1990, the Chicago City
Council passed a resolution that
declared December 4 “Fred
Hampton Day.” On December 4,
1969, Hampton, a dynamic young
Black Panther Party leader, was
slain in his bed by Chicago police in what, by 1990, had been
documented and widely accepted
in the African-American community as a politically motivated
murder. Surprisingly, Mayor Richard M. Daley did not oppose
the resolution. But the FOP most
certainly did.
FOP President John Dineen
launched a lobbying campaign to
repeal the resolution, publicly
belittled the BPP’s service
programs and slandered Hampton, who was considered to be a
martyr by many African Americans and activists, as a person
who “dedicated his life to killing
the pigs.” History repeated itself
in 2006 when, after the City
Council unanimously voted to
rename the block where Hampton was murdered “Chairman
Fred Hampton Way,” FOP President Mark Donahue organized
the families of slain CPD officers to lobby for its rescission,
while publicly voicing his cop
membership’s “outrage” and
“disbelief” at the decision.
In the early 1990s, the FOP
began its campaign— which it
continues to pursue to this day—
of defending Jon Burge and his
fellow police torturers. In November 1991, the emerging evidence of a pattern of police torture by Burge and his cadre of
all-too-willing enforcers compelled the City of Chicago to initiate administrative proceedings
before the Chicago Police Board
in order to fire Burge and two of
his co-conspirators for the brutal electric shock torture of Andrew Wilson. Since the city was
no longer financing the torturers’
defense, as it had in the civil
rights damages case brought by
Wilson, the FOP stepped up and
gladly assumed responsibility.
The FOP and its spin-off organization, the Burge-O’HaraYucaitis Family Fund Committee
(BOY), then set out on a campaign that sought not only to raise
money for the defense, but also
to viciously attack Burge’s victims and the lawyers from the
People’s Law Office, (including
myself) who had brought much of
the damning evidence to light.
They falsely accused us of fabricating the evidence of systemic
torture and of making millions
from exposing the scandal. They
also organized a raucous
fundraiser at a local union hall
where Burge was lionized by
thousands of cops and prosecutors.
After a six-week evidentiary hearing, the Police
Board fired Burge and suspended one of the other
charged officers. Dineen
called the decision a “travesty
of justice,” and only weeks
later the FOP announced that
it intended to enter a float
honoring Burge and his compatriots in the annual South
Side Irish Parade—a parade in
which Chicago Mayors and numerous other politicians regularly marched. The public outrage and cries of racism that
followed the FOP’s announcement were swift and strong,
and the FOP was forced to
withdraw the float.
A few years later a federal
judge, quoting Martin Luther
King’s “Letter from a Birmingham Jail,” ordered that a number of police files that documented the systemic nature of
the torture “with all its pus
flowing ugliness” be released
“to the natural medicines of air
and light.” The FOP intervened
in the suit, seeking to overturn
the order, and continued to pursue its battle to suppress the
files with an unsuccessful appeal.
In 2008, the FOP again became actively involved in defending Burge after he was indicted for perjury and obstruction of justice for lying under
oath about whether he tortured
African-American suspects.
The FOP Board, without putting it to a vote of its membership, pushed through a resolution to pay for Burge’s lawyers
in the criminal case.
Defending its decision,
FOP President Mark Donahue
asserted that Burge, despite the
more than 100 documented
cases of torture that had been
amassed against him over the
years, had been unfairly tarnished by allegations from
criminals, and that politicians
and lawyers for Burge’s victims
had fueled a media hysteria
which “caused Jon Burge to be
the ‘poster child’ of alleged
police torture in this city for
an entire generation.” Invoking
what can be described as the
F O P ’s u n r e p e n t a n t m o t t o ,
Donahue vowed that it “will
stand with the police officer
every time.” A group of African-American officers unsuccessfully challenged the decision in Court, stating, “We do
not support torture. We do not
condone torture. We do not
embrace torture. We will never
support that type of behavior
on the department.”
In 2011, Burge, despite his
high-priced FOP-financed defense, was convicted of three
felonies and sentenced to
four-and-a-half years in federal prison. Nonetheless, the
Police Pension Board, which
was comprised of four former
or present CPD officers and
four civilians, voted 4-4 on the
question of whether Burge
should be stripped of his pension, which he had been receiving since 1997. By law, the tie
was resolved in pensioner
Burge’s favor.
Illinois Attorney General Lisa
Madigan filed suit, seeking to
reverse the decision, and the
FOP defended the ruling, with
an FOP-financed private lawyer arguing on behalf of Burge.
The case was appealed all the
way to the Illinois Supreme
Court, which, in a 4-3 decision
this past summer, ruled in favor of Burge and the Pension
Board.
This appalling history is not
limited to New York, Chicago or
Milwaukee by any means. Other
notable examples include Detroit in the mid-1970s, where
the Detroit Police Officers Association challenged police reforms and affirmative action initiatives which sought to stem
rampant police brutality against
African Americans with a lawsuit; after it lost its case, it orchestrated a police riot.
In Los Angeles in the early
1990s,
African-American
Mayor Tom Bradley condemned
the state court jury verdict
which absolved LAPD officers
of criminal charges for brutally
beating Rodney King, by stating
that the verdict “will never blind
us to what we saw on that videotape,” and further stated that
“the men who beat Rodney King
do not deserve to wear the uniform of the LAPD.” In response, the L.A. Police Protective League reacted with a vengeance that, according to Police Chief Richard Riordan,
lasted for years.
And more recently, in Seattle,
the Police Officers’ Guild
mounted a verbal attack on thenMayor Michael McGinn after he
stated, in response to the shooting of a Native American wordcarver, that the Seattle police
force had no place for officers
who did not share his commitment to racial justice.
Whether unions which represent police officers, correctional guards and other law enforcement officers are the same
kind of workers’ organizations
as other unions, which can potentially be used to further the
interests of the working class as
a whole, has been vigorously
contested by many progressives
and leftists over the years. But
the disturbing history of these
powerful organizations makes it
very clear that they mirror and
reinforce the most racist, brutal and reactionary elements
within the departments they
claim to represent and actively
encourage the code of silence
within those departments. They
are far from democratic, with
officers of color and women
having little or no influence.
In truth, police unions further
the-all-too-accurate conception
that the police are an occupying
force in poor communities of
color, and are antithetical in
principle and action to the progressive principles of the labor
movement.
Flint Taylor
Flint Taylor is a founding partner of the People’s Law Office
in Chicago. He is one of the lawyers for the families of slain
Black Panther leaders Fred
Hampton and Mark Clark, and
together with his law partner
Jeffrey Haas was trial counsel
in the marathon 1976 civil trial.
He has also represented many
survivors of Chicago police torture, and has done battle with the
Chicago Police Department—
and the Fraternal Order of Police—on numerous occasions
over his 45 year career as a
people’s lawyer.
& CEO of Ariel Investments,
LLC.
As the summit continued, ministers gathered at the
session, Faith & Community
Leaders, to discuss what faithbased communities can do to
promote financial literacy as a
means to achieve economic justice. These faith leaders also examined how they can effectively
work with banking institutions
on partnerships that stabilize and
invest in their communities and
create housing, businesses and
jobs.
Robert L. Silva, Jr., AVP, regional diverse segments manager at Wells Fargo Home Mortgage, encouraged the ministers
to become financially educated
to prevent foreclosures. “The
banks are not in a position to
stop foreclosures because there
is a secondary entity which
needs to receive their monies,”
Silva said. “Learn to downsize,
readjust and even sell the property if your income has been
substantially decreased.”
The session, Focus on Africa:
African Economic Expansion
Forum, served as a follow up of
last year’s “Africa Investment
Opportunities Forum,” and the
recent Inaugural “African Economic Expansion Summit” held
in Durban South Africa. Panelists discussed Africa’s continuing tremendous business opportunities, not only in oil, gas and
natural resources, but also in areas such as energy, telecommunications, technology, entertain-
ment, construction, financial services, and tourism. The forum
also provided an opportunity to
outline U.S. trade policy towards
Africa.
“U.S. businesses need to be
aware of what the opportunities
are in Africa and what tools are
available to take advantage of
those opportunities,” said
Jeannine B. Scott, president/
presidente U.S.-Angola Chamber
of Commerce (USACC).
The Wall Street Project Awards
Luncheon featured World Bank
Group
President
Jim Yong Kim. The Rev. Dr. Calvin
O. Butts, III, Pastor of Abyssinian Baptist Church in New York
City; Hon. Nkosinath Benson
Fihla, executive mayor, Nelson
Mandela bay Metro – South Africa; and Dr. Lonnie G. Johnson,
president & CEO, Excellatron
who were honored for their outstanding contributions to the
community and civil rights.
After paying special tribute to
his father, Rainbow PUSH
national spokesperson Jonathan
Jackson, said: “We need to have a
collective understanding to succeed with the Wall Street Project.
There are so many more doors
that need to be open.”
Closing the 18th Annual Wall
Street Economic Summit today,
Rev. Jackson added the work
doesn’t end with the Summit.
With the establishment of Intel’s
$300 million diversity investment fund, he says follow up and
execution is the next step. He is
gearing up to work alongside the
World Bank to further increase their
diversity efforts on providing capital to poverty stricken countries in
Africa; the fourth movement of the
freedom symphony to provide access to capital, deal flow and increase minority participation in the
technology industry. “We will not
be satisfied until we democratize
our economy and our voting process,” added Rev. Jackson.
The honorary co-chairs for this
year’s Summit included: Cloves C.
Campbell, Jr., chair, National Newspaper Publishers Association
(NNPA), Cynthia D. DiBartolo,
Esq., CEO, Tigress Financial Partners LLC and chairperson, Greater
New
York
Chamber
of
Commerce, Earl G. (Butch) Graves,
Jr., president & CEO, Black
Enterprise, Alfred C. Liggins, CEO
& president, Radio One, Inc./TV
One, LLC, The Honorable Charles
B. Rangel, U.S. Representative, DNY
13th
Congressional
District, James Reynolds, Jr., cofounder, chairman & CEO, Loop
Capital Markets, John W. Rogers,
Jr., chairman, CEO & chief investment officer, Ariel Investments,
LLC, and Clifford C. Swint, executive vice president, Capital Markets,
MFR Securities, Inc.
The Rainbow PUSH Coalition is
a progressive organization protecting, defending and expanding civil
rights to improve economic and
educational opportunity. The full
agenda can be found online
at www.rainbowpushwallstreet
project.org.
(Photos by Seitu Oronde)
newyorkbeacon.net
nities for women and people of
color in technology, said Rev.
Jesse L. Jackson, Sr. founder and
president of the Rainbow PUSH
Coalition and organizer of
the Wall Street Project. “We had
measurable results this year with
the expansion and collaboration of
Intel $300 Million Diversity Investment Fund; Black Enterprise’s
release of the 40 most diverse
companies and increasing the bottom line for entrepreneurs;
and Expertise Does Not Equal
Equality. There is no talent deficit, only an opportunity deficit –
diversity and inclusion must continue to grow and it’s our continuous platform.”
The importance of embracing
diversity at the corporate level is
essential as it’s the key for increased financial growth said Earl
G. “Butch” Graves, Jr., president &
CEO of Black Enterprise and
moderator of The Role of Corporate Boards When Driving
Diversity session. “It’s important
to note that it was only 44 years
ago in 1971 that the first African
American was appointed to a corporate board and that was Leon H.
Sullivan when he joined the General Motors company board.”
Bruce Gordon, former NAACP
president & CEO, added “I honestly believe and it has been proven
that diverse companies out-perform companies that are not diverse.” “A company has to look for
diversity. But, we as communities
also have to look for companies
that will embrace diversity,”
said John W. Rogers, Jr., chairman
The 18th Annual Rainbow
PUSH Wall Street Project Economic Summit kicked off on
Tues., Jan. 13, 2015 and concluded on Thurs., Jan. 15, 2015
at the Sheraton New York Times
Square Hotel in New York City.
The theme was “Where Wall
Street, Main Street & Silicon
Valley Converge.” Over 1,000
entrepreneurs, ministers, corporate board members, chief investment officers, African leaders, lenders and elected officials
attended the event.
The culmination of the Summit was the awards luncheon
which featured World Bank
Group President Jim Yong Kim,
M.D., Ph.D. who answered questions about how the World Bank
assist more than 120 countries
in connecting jobs with young
people, matching soft skills jobs
with the private sector and manage how agriculture is key to the
success in feeding people.
“Economic growth has to
change, so it also lifts people out
of poverty,” said President Kim.
“World Bank has expertise on
how to provide jobs to the most
marginalized in the poorest
countries. The Queen of the
Netherlands, who is an investment banker, is working with me
and World Bank to provide universal access to financial services.”
“This year’s Summit was designed to connect Wall Street,
Main Street and Silicon Valley to
bring about an increase in business and employment opportu-
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10
THE ADAMS REPORT
Fashion, Beauty . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .. . . . .& Stuff
By Audrey Adams
Spring prep
Audrey Adams
Tired of the dreary weather?
Hold on tight because Spring is
right around the corner; we have
just a few more weeks of uncertain weather. Even though it has
been an unusually warm winter,
you made it through (freezing
temperatures, snow, sleet, ice,
rain and windy, dark, damp conditions), so take heart. Warm
weather is on the way!
How have utilized these last
few months? Perhaps you have
added a little too much insulation (and we’re not talking
sweaters either) to your frame
to keep you warm. Is your skin
feeling rough and tight? Did you
go a little overboard when you
decided to stop working out because you thought you could
live off of body fat instead of
burning it off? Did you think for
one minute that you wouldn’t
have to pay the piper at some
point? Now, I’ll bet that you
think you can get it together
quickly . . . wrong! It is going to
take time, dedication and a real
commitment to reallocate the
remaining winter days to implement a self-re-improvement
program.
If you are wondering where to
start, might I suggest at the beginning with the basic body? —
Yours. Only look at what your
reality is and what it is you want
it to be within reason. After you
bathe take a good look at yourself
in a full length mirror to see
where that extra insulation
settled. You’ll probably notice that
the muscle definition that you
worked so hard to achieve during
the summer months has almost
vanished into the insulation. Are
those thighs and arms less than
tight and wiggling like gelatin?
Think for a moment about all the
comfort food you indulged in and
how you might modify your diet
a bit. I do not advocate being
someone you’re not or trying to
look like the waifs in magazines.
The only thing that is important
is to be the best you can be. What
do you feel you need to do?
A healthy body isn’t just about
how much you weigh and the firmness of your muscles, it is also
about healthy skin, and maintaining all of your working parts. Have
you had a complete physical? If
not get one before starting any
diet or exercise programs that
you might have in mind. Make an
appointment to see your internist,
gynecologist, dentist and any
other specialist depending upon
your particular needs.
It’s up to you to decide where
and when, how and if to begin. You
have to stop wearing those bulky
winter clothes at some point.
Think about it. See you next week.
Visit TheAdamsReport.com
and checkout my online radio
show, TALK! with AUDREY for a
weekly interviews that will inform, motivate and inspire you.
Tune in to listen to a live broadcast of TALK! with AUDREY . . .
every Tuesday from 6:00 to
7:00 P.M. on Harlem’s WHCR
90.3 FM.
RADIO ON DEMAND: This
week’s
features
on
THEADAMSREPORT.com
This week on TALK! with
AUDREY Radio: JEFF BURNS,
former Associate Publisher of
EBONY Magazine and Senior
Vice President for the Johnson
Publishing Company, worked
directly with his mentor and
founder John H. Johnson one of
America’s greatest entrepreneurs. Burns is now the Vice
Chairman of the John H.
Johnson School of Communications at his alma mater
Howard University and was the
catalyst for naming the school
after his mentor in 2003.
Burns successfully recommended that the United States
Postal Service (USPS) name a
stamp in honor of John H.
Johnson. The USPS approved
his recommendation began issuing the John H. Johnson Forever Heritage Stamp January
2012. Listen any time at:
www.theadamsreport.com
Audrey Adams, former director of corporate public relations and fashion merchandising for ESSENCE continues
to motivate and inspire women
through her syndicated columns and motivational speaking engagements. E-mail your
fashion, beauty and lifestyle
questions or comments to her
at:
Audrey@THEADAMSREPORT.com
THE ADAMS REPORT©
Rosie Perez with two members of View
Rosie Perez and Latinas,
deserve apology from ABC
We are outraged that in the
past few weeks a source from
“The View” has been dispensing
derogatory information to the
press about Rosie Perez, first
telling a NY Daily News reporter
that Ms. Perez “is not the sharpest tool in the box” and most recently, being quoted in the industry outlet, Variety, saying that
Ms. Perez “can’t read a
TelePrompter.”
It doesn’t take a genius to read
into the racist and sexist language
hurled against Ms. Perez. Questioning a woman’s intelligence is
an old stereotype that is sexist
and in this case, also racist. The
fact that the leaks come from one
of your staffers is deeply offensive.
Implicit in “The View’s” insider comments is that Ms.
Perez is unintelligent and illiterate. Ms. Perez is a beloved community icon, an acclaimed author, director, a member of the
Presidential Advisory Council
on HIV& AIDS, an Academy
Award nominated actor, a Broadway stage actor and a dedicated
activist. Those close to her know
her as a compassionate and generous woman-yet this cowardly
insider is maliciously trying to
slander her.
When ABC announced that it
had named Ms. Perez to co-host
“The View,” the Latino and Latina
community was proud and enthusiastic with the choice. Though it
took show executives eighteen
years to cast permanent Latina representation on the show, as Latinos
and Latinas, we were delighted that
finally someone of such caliber
was chosen.
That the network named an award
winning entertainer with an impressive history of activism in education, the arts, and Latino causes,
was even more impressive. In naming Ms. Perez as a co-host, ABC
chose an intelligent, committed,
and esteemed Latina role model.
The fact that in less than four
months someone from your staff
and network is slandering her is not
only outrageous but unacceptable.
The smear campaign seems like
a coordinated, malicious, racist,
and sexist effort against one of the
brightest, most talented, and respected actors and activists in the
Latino community. We are furthermore disappointed that industry
leader, Variety, chose to go with a
story based on rumor and innuendo. This is shoddy journalism at
its best.
Johns Hopkins lab settles race and sex bias suits
The Applied Physics Laboratory at Johns Hopkins University
will pay $359,253 to settle allegations of discrimination made
by two African American women
who were employed at its Laurel,
Md. facility. An investigation by
the U.S. Department of Labor’s
Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs determined
that the lab violated Executive
Order 11246, which prohibits
federal contractors from discriminating in employment on
the basis of race or sex.
“All workers deserve to be
treated fairly, and when they are
not, they should be able to report
it without fear of being harassed
or retaliated against,” said
OFCCP Director Patricia A.
Shiu. “I am pleased that we were
able to achieve a fair and just
remedy for these two women and
to ensure that the laboratory removes barriers to equal opportunity in the workplace.”
OFCCP’s investigation began
in June 2010, after an African
American woman filed a complaint alleging that she had been
subjected to a hostile work envi-
ronment at the APL. When she
tried to pursue a complaint
through the lab’s own equal employment opportunity process,
she was harassed, retaliated
against and, ultimately, fired. During its investigation, OFCCP received a second complaint in November 2010 from another African American woman alleging that
she had been subjected to pay discrimination and a hostile work
environment at the APL. OFCCP
compliance officers found that
the lab had indeed discriminated
against the two former employees because of their race and because they engaged in protected
equal employment opportunity
activities.
The investigators also confirmed that the second employee
was paid less than her similarlysituated male colleagues, and that
the APL had subjected both
women to a hostile work environment by retaliating against them
for filing EEO complaints and by
allowing them to be harassed. This
retaliation culminated in the firing of one employee and the resignation of the other.
In addition to significant financial remedies it will pay to the affected women, the APL has agreed
to revise its policies and procedures to eliminate harassment,
intimidation, coercion or retaliation in its workplace. +
The lab will also ensure that its
internal complaint process is free
of undue influence and will post
notices in English and Spanish to
inform employees of their rights
against employment discrimination.
Finally, managers and employees with responsibilities for hiring, preparing performance plans,
determining compensation or
making transfer, promotion, or
discharge decisions will be
trained on all federal equal employment opportunity laws.
Johns Hopkins University and
its associated hospital constitute
the largest employer in Maryland.
A division of the university, the
APL supports national security,
space science and other civilian
research and development initiatives. From 2009 to 2014, the
APL received more than $3.6 billion in taxpayer-funded federal
contracts with agencies such as
the U.S. Departments of Defense,
Commerce and Homeland Security.
In addition to Executive Order
11246, OFCCP enforces Section 503 of the Rehabilitation Act
of 1973 and the Vietnam Era Veterans’ Readjustment Assistance
Act of 1974. Collectively, these
three laws require contractors
and subcontractors that do business
with the federal government to prohibit discrimination and ensure
equal opportunity in employment
on the basis of race, color, religion, national origin, sex, disability and status as a protected veteran. For more information, please
call OFCCP’s toll-free helpline at
800-397-6251 or visit http://
www.dol.gov/ofccp.
11
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12
Beacon On
Mimi Faust and Sandy Lal host joint birthday bash
Lennox Lewis, Mimi Faust,
Sandy Lal
YestirDay, Arzo Anwar
Sharon Carpenter
Mimi Faust
(Photo by Ronnie Wright)
By Audrey J. Bernard
Style & Society Editor
Birthday Cake featuring
infamous shower pole
Tabasum Mir
On Wed., Jan. 21, 2015, Love &
Hip Hop Atlanta star Mimi Faust
co-hosted a glamorous birthday
bash with entertainment attorney
Sandy Lal, CEO of Kingpin Entertainment Group at NO. 8 night club
in tony Chelsea, New York City attended by some 200 festively
dressed guests. The voluptuous
Faust arrived in a beautiful fringed
white outfit that did wonders for
her curves. This was a stunning
soiree sprinkled with so many
beautiful people having a bangin’
time. However, the over the top
cake presentment was the bomb!
Celebrity manager Lal got the
biggest bang out of the evening
by giving the reality TV turned
adult sex tape entertainer whose
bare all tape featuring a freaky
shower pole with then boyfriend
Nikko Smith is the #1 selling
sex tape. “I have something for
you,” Lal said before four women
covered in body paint brought out
a four-tiered cake topped off with
an edible shower rod. That scene
took the cake and Faust had her
cake and ate it too! Guests watching this all go down with pleasure
included: Former Heavyweight
Champ Lennox Lewis, Laz
Alonzo, Sharon Carpenter,
Mendeecees Harris, Briah
Bettncourt, Tabasum Mir, Jay
Mitchell, Cyn Santana, DJ Rob
Cast, Arzo Anwar, Nema Kamar,
Mark John Jefferies, YestirDay,
and Kamie Crawford. Noticeably
missing was Faust’s sex tape mate
Nikko. “It was such an amazing
night,” said Faust. “I still can’t believe the turnout. It was great to
have so many friends and colleagues come out and celebrate
with me and to meet some new
friends. The party was on point!”
And a fun time was had by all!
(Photos courtesy Getty Images)
at press
New Kids on the Block take over Chase Plaza at Madison Square Garden
for THE MAIN EVENT announcement
80 million albums worldwide — America. American Express card keep giving them what they want!
including back-to-back interna- members are able to get advance We wanted to make sure it was
tional #1 songs, 1988’s Hangin’ tickets and fans will have addi- something new and fresh and fun
Tough and 1990’s Step By Step tional opportunities to purchase and totally worthwhile for all of our
— and a series of crossover tickets early starting Wed., Jan. supporters year after year. This
smash R&B, pop hits like “You 28 by signing up for a Facebook year, we are making it THE MAIN
Got It (The Right Stuff),” RSVP at http://smarturl.it/ EVENT. And we promise, it will
“Cover Girl,” “Didn’t I (Blow NKOTB_RSVP. Tickets can be be THE TICKET of the summer.”
Your Mind This Time),” “Hangin’ purchased starting Jan. 31 on Please visit: www.NKOTB.com,
Tough,” “I’ll Be Loving You,” www.livenation.com. “We always w w w . l i v e n a t i o n . c o m o r
“Step By Step” and “Tonight.” have something special up our www.ticketmaster.com for up-toThe tour, promoted by Live sleeves,” said NKOTB member date information or join
Nation, kicks off on May 1 in Donnie Wahlberg. “Our fans the discussion at #themainevent.
Las Vegas, Nev. and will stop in keep asking us to come back
over 30 cities across North out on the road, and we want to (Photos by Ronnie Wright)
newyorkbeacon.net
New Kids on the Block with TLC and a cut-out of Nelly
conference at Madison Square Garden
num selling artists TLC and
Nelly. “We are thrilled to be able
to join pop icons NKOTB and
On Tues., Jan. 20, 2015, Nelly on tour. We are equally exNew Kids on the Block
-- cited to be back on the road conDonnie Wahlberg, Joey necting with our fans in such huge
McIntyre, Jordan Knight, arenas,” said TLC. The Boy Band
Jonathan Knight and Danny have always had a great sense of
Wood – attended a special press humor and in absence of Nelly who
conference in Chase Plaza at is currently overseas entertaining
Madison Square Garden in which our armed forces, they held up a
they announced The Main Event, life-size cut-out of him as they
a summer headlining tour featur- read his personal message to a
ing special guests, Grammy cheering crowd. NKOTB are trailAward-winning and multi-plati- blazers who have sold more than
New Kids on the Block launches tour with TLC and Nelly
BEACON,
The Scene
13
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14
President Obama to pass on meeting Netanyahu during Washington visit
(from Page 3)
gress. GOP lawmakers and
Netanyahu worked out the arrangement without consulting
with the White House or State
Department, only alerting the
Obama administration a few
hours before the Israeli
leader’s trip was made public.
The White House appeared
stunned by what it saw as a
breach of diplomatic decorum by Netanyahu, a leader
with whom Obama has a his-
tory of tension.
“The typical protocol would
suggest that the leader of a
country would contact the
leader of another country when
he’s traveling there,” White
House spokesman Josh Earnest said. “That certainly is
how President Obama’s trips
are planned when we travel
overseas. So this particular
event seems to be a departure
from that protocol.”
At the center of the maneuvering around Netanyahu’s visit
are the high-stakes, U.S.-led
nuclear negotiations with Iran,
a nation Israel views as an existential threat.
Netanyahu and Republican
lawmakers, along with some
Democrats, are united in their
belief that Congress should
pass legislation threatening
Iran with new economic sanctions if the talks break down.
Obama has vigorously warned
that a sanctions bill could upend the negotiations and has
vowed to veto any measure that
Video of New Jersey man shot by
police officers raises questions
(from page 2)
Reid and the man driving
the car were black. The
Bridgeton officer who spotted the gun, Braheme Days, is
b l a c k ; h i s p a r t n e r, R o g e r
Worley, is white. Both officers have been placed on leave
while prosecutors investigate.
“The video speaks for itself
that at no point was Jerame
Reid a threat and he possessed
no weapon on his person,”
Walter Hudson, chairman and
founder of the civil rights
group the National Awareness
Alliance, said Wednesday.
“He complied with the officer and the officer shot
him.”
Reid, 36, spent about 13
years in prison for shooting at
three state troopers when he
was a teenager. And Days knew
who he was; Days was among
the arresting officers last
year when Reid was charged
with several crimes, including
drug possession and obstruction.
In Bridgeton, where twothirds of the residents are
black or Hispanic, the killing
has stirred small protests
over the past couple of weeks,
including a demonstration on
Wednesday, a day after the
video was made public at the
request of two newspapers under the state’s open records
law.
The Cumberland County
p r o s e c u t o r ’s o ff i c e p r e v i ously said a gun was seized
during the stop but would
not comment further on the
investigation. Bridgeton police would not answer any
questions about the video
and said they opposed its
release as neither “compassionate or professional.”
County prosecutor Jennif e r We b b - M c R a e h a s d i s qualified herself from the
case because she knows
D a y s . B u t L a w a n d a R e i d ’s
lawyer and activists are demanding the state attorney
g e n e r a l ’s o ff i c e t a k e o v e r
the investigation, something
it said it will not do.
In the video, the mood
changes in a flash when Days
tells his partner about the gun
and starts yelling, “Show me
your hands!” The driver, Leroy
Tutt, raises his hands immediately. Reid does not at first.
Days, still yelling,
reaches into the car and appears to remove a gun.
“I’m going to shoot you,”
Days shouts, at one point addressing Reid by his first
name. “You’re going to be f—
ing dead. If you reach for
something, you’re going to be
f—ing dead.”
Days tells his partner, “He’s
reaching for something.”
Faintly on the video, Reid
can be heard telling the officer, “I ain’t doing nothing.
I’m not reaching for nothing,
bro. I ain’t got no reason to
reach for nothing.”
Then one of the men in the
car tells the officer, “I’m getting out and getting on the
ground.”
The officer again orders
Reid not to move. Seconds
later, Reid emerges from the
car, raising his hands, which
appear to be empty. Both off i c e r s f i r e i m m e d i a t e l y,
shooting at least six rounds.
Bystanders start yelling at
the officers, and other emergency vehicles arrive.
The South Jersey Times reported this week that residents
had filed seven municipal
court complaints against Days
since 2013 and two against
Worley in that span for alleged
abuses of power; all the complaints were dismissed.
lands on his desk.
In another eyebrow-raising
bit of foreign intervention,
British Prime Minister David
Cameron said during his own
visit to Washington last week
that he had been calling U.S.
lawmakers to voice his concern about sanctions legislation. Britain is one of the U.S.
negotiating partners in the Iran
talks, along with France, Germany, Russia and China.
House Speaker John
Boehner, who helped orchestrate Netanyahu’s visit along
with Senate Majority Leader
Mitch McConnell, told a private meeting of GOP lawmakers Wednesday that Congress
would proceed on further penalties against Iran despite
Obama’s warning.
“He expects us to stand idly
by and do nothing while he
cuts a bad deal with Iran,”
Boehner said. “Two words:
‘Hell no!’ … We’re going to
do no such thing.”
Netanyahu was originally
scheduled to address Congress
on Feb. 11. But the date was
changed to March 3 to coincide with the prime minister’s
address to an annual conference held in Washington by
AIPAC, the pro-Israel lobby
group.
Netanyahu stands to gain politically at home from the U.S.
visit. He is in a tough fight to
win re-election in Israel’s upcoming
March
vote.
Netanyahu’s Likud Party is running behind the main opposition
g r o u p h e a d e d b y Yi t z h a k
Herzog’s Labor Party, which has
been highlighting rancor in the
country’s critical relationship
with the United States.
House Minority Leader
Nancy Pelosi said it was inappropriate for Boehner to invite
Netanyahu to address Congress
in the shadow of the election and
give the appearance of endorsing the prime minister.
“If that’s the purpose of
P r i m e M i n i s t e r N e t a n y a h u ’s
visit two weeks before his own
election, right in the midst of
our negotiations, I just don’t
think it’s appropriate and helpful,” Pelosi said.
In 1996, then-Israeli Prime
Minister Shimon Peres traveled
to the U.S. to meet with President Bill Clinton less than a
month before Peres faced voters. Peres faced some criticism
for using the trip as a ploy to win
votes, particularly from opposition
leader
Benjamin
Netanyahu.
“I can’t find an example of
any previous Israeli government
whose prime minister, on the
eve of elections, made a cynical attempt to use relations between Israel and the United
States as a party advertisement,”
Netanyahu said.
Civil-minded Bklynites urged
to apply for community boards
(from page 2)
year by Governor Andrew
Cuomo, borough presidents can
appoint up to two teenagers over
the age of 16 to each community
board in New York City.
“Teenagers play a vitally important role in our communities,
and it’s time they sit on these
boards as well, so our government
reflects the opinions of all
people,” said Borough President
Adams. “Getting our young
engaged in serving their
What is constitutional in the 2015 State of the Union address? people
neighbors is an important part of
(from page 6)
disputes with respect to conven- power to make any rules and a well-rounded civic education,
ing; 9) receive ambassadors and regulations on us. This is the job which I believe needs to become
ton had but four); 3) grant re- other public ministers; 10) make of Congress alone.
prieves and pardons; 4) make certain that “laws be faithfully
treaties with the help of the Sen- executed;” and, 11) “commission
All measures listed in the
ate; 5) with Senate help appoint all the officers of the United 2015 State of the Union Address
positions established by law States.”
are but suggestions to Congress,
such as ambassadors, ministers
Simply stated the president which alone, as per Article I,
and judges; 6) fill vacancies has two supervisory powers over Section I, has all law-making
“during recess of the Senate;” existing organizations and two functions—the president has
7) make recommendations to shared powers with the Senate, none. That said, he is within his
(from page 4)
Congress on the state of the otherwise he pardons, recom- constitutional bounds with his
union; 8) convene both houses mends, appoints and entertains. threat of the veto, which is likely
to cement the success we’ve
on special occasions and handle That is it! Notice the absence of to be used liberally.
made in reducing crime,” said
Director Davis. “And we can do
it at the same time we re-establish faith in the integrity of the
policing function where that faith
and limitations on same-day with common sense minimum has been compromised.”
(from page 6)
registration. The President standards. The American
“The conversation between law
on improving the voting expe- should support adding a right to people must also insist that the enforcement and stakeholders
r i e n c e o f A m e r i c a n s . Ye t vote amendment to the U.S. President fight for police re- seen in Columbus is one that comsince then, 21 state legisla- C o n s t i t u t i o n s o t h a t e v e r y form that includes more than just munities across the country
t u r e s h a v e p r o p o s e d a n d American has, not just a “state car and body cameras. So we should strive to have,” said Actpassed a range of laws that right” to vote, but a fundamen- must commend and challenge ing Assistant Attorney General
m a k e i t h a rd e r f o r s o m e tal individual citizenship right President Obama at the same Gupta. “In its mission to uphold
people to vote – including re- to vote, with Congress having time. Commend him for moving the civil and constitutional rights
strictive photo ID require- the authority to establish a uni- in the right direction and chal- of all Americans, the Civil Rights
ments, cuts to early voting form national voting system lenge him to do even more.
Division will continue to work to
a cornerstone of our approach to
holistic community development.
I am looking forward to reviewing
the applications of our young
people this year and appointing
some great new talent to our
boards.”
Applications for appointment
and re-appointment for community
boards are available on Borough
President Adams’ website,
www.brooklyn-usa.org. The application deadline for those interested
in being appointed or re-appointed
this year is Sunday, February 15th;
original applications must be notarized and returned by mail to
Brooklyn Borough Hall.
Justice Dept. officials,
law enforcement, leaders
discuss building trust, justice
The State of the Union is a tale of two Americas
build trust between law enforcement and the communities they
serve, bringing them together in
order to solve our most important
problems.”
Building Community Trust and
Justice is part of President Obama’s
My Brother’s Keeper Initiative.
My Brother’s Keeper is a partnership with private entities and local
governments that’s designed to create ladders of opportunity for
youth, especially those who live in
minority communities where crime
and disorder are prevalent. Building trust between law enforcement
and communities is a key emphasis area of the initiative.
the film from Selma City
Hall to the city’s Edmund
Pettus Bridge where civil
rights protesters were
beaten and tear-gassed by
officers in 1965.
The exhibition event was
hosted by Louise Mirrer, NYHS president & CEO, Brenda
M. Greene, executive director,
Center for Black Literature,
and photographer Stephen
Somerstein. Some of the
guests spotted at the event included Ann & Johnny Parham,
Helen Appel, Jacqueline
Adams, Shelia Hopkins, Neva
Shillingford-King and NYC
Council member Andy King,
Patricia Klingenstein, Bonnie
Reiss, Rick Reiss, NYC Council member Helen Rosenthal,
Pam Schafler, Kimberly Ayers
Shariff,
Medgar Evers
College’s Fred Price and many
others. (Photos by Gerald Peart)
for Black Literature serves as a voice,
mecca, and resource for Black writers and the general public to study the
literature of people from the African
Diaspora. I t is the only center devoted to this in the country.
About the Center for
Black Literature
The Center for Black Literature
at Medgar Evers College was established in 2003 to institutionalize the National Black Writers
Conference (NBWC). In addition to hosting the NBWC, the
Center has a mission to provide
a forum for the dissemination of
knowledge about Black literature
and to support Black writers and
Black literature through author
readings, workshops, retreats,
and conferences. To achieve its
mission, the Center partners with
high schools, the college, and
community and cultural organizations to provide literary arts to
youth, college students, and the
general public. The mission of
the Center for Black Literature
is to expand, broaden, and enrich
the public’s knowledge and aesthetic appreciation of the value
of Black literature. The Center
About The New-York
Historical Society
The New-York Historical Society,
one of America’s pre-eminent cultural
institutions, is dedicated to fostering
research, presenting history and art
exhibitions, and public programs that
reveal the dynamism of history and
its influence on the world of today. Founded in 1804, New-York
Historical is the oldest museum in
New York City. N-YHSl has a mission to explore the richly layered
political, cultural and social history of New York City and State
and the nation, and to serve as a
national forum for the discussion
of issues surrounding the making
and meaning of history.
Stephen Somerstein, Pam Schafler, Helen Appel
Neva King, Andrew King
Harry Belafonte
Tandra Birkett, Yvonne Jewnell
Stephen Somerstin, Brenda Greene
Johnny & Ann Parham
Shelia Hopkins, Kimberly Ayers
Shariff
Helen Appel, Loauise Mirrer
Andrew King, Avery Shoates, Stephen
Somerstein
Harry Belafonte, Stephen Somerstein
Ernest Tollerson, Patricia Klingenstein, Stephen
Somerstein
Ernest Tollerson, Fred Price
newyorkbeacon.net
Actor, civil rights activist and
humanitarian Harry Belafonte
fired up hundreds of invited
guests during his inspirational
remarks at the opening reception
for Freedom Journey 1965: Photographs of the Selma to Montgomery March by Stephen
Somerstein on Thurs., Jan. 15,
2015 at The New-York Historical Society (N-YHS) and the
Center for Black Literature at
Medgar Evers College joint presentation. The powerful selection of photographs that
chronicle the 1965 Selma-toMontgomery Civil Rights March
paid tribute to the fiftieth anniversary of the protest that
changed the course of civil rights
in America.
To put things in perspective,
the 1960s was one of the most
compelling and dramatic decades
in American history. It was an era
that was met with many challenges as people fought for the
advancement of civil rights in
America. One key moment of
the Civil Rights Era was the historic 1965 march from Selma,
Alabama, to the state capital of
Montgomery that helped to raise
awareness of the injustices
Blacks in America faced and that
galvanized the passage of the
Voting Rights Act.
Belafonte was introduced by
Ernest Tollerson, interim president of the Nathan Cummings
Foundation. And he wasted no
time in getting to the crux of the
matter! “I’ve been on a bit of
whirlwind tour around the United
States. … Many young people
want to know what was essentially different today than what
existed at the time of the march
from Selma to Montgomery,”
stated Belafonte. “In many ways
a lot has changed and in many
ways a lot has not changed.”
True to his reputation,
Belafonte spoke about his involvement in the march, poverty
and current race relations – here
and abroad. He also spoke about
the importance and impact of the
exhibit. “What makes this exhibit so terribly important is that
it informs; the absence of information is what makes this exhibit
so important.” He concluded
with the role the community
plays in disseminating information on issues that plague us. “…
I hope what you see on the walls
that are hanging might lead you
to hunt more deeply [for infor-
mation],” he said.
The exhibition — which runs
through Apr. 19 — features fortysix black and white and color photographs that document the quest
for equality and social justice over
the five-day historic Selma to
Montgomery Civil Rights March
in 1965, where determined Blacks
marched to the Alabama capital to
raise awareness for civil rights
and voting rights legislation.
Photographer Somerstein, who
was then a student at the City University of New York and photo
editor of the student newspaper
and went to the South to document
the monumental crusade, added,
“These photos still continue to
move me.”
Ironically, as this event was
taking place, Oprah Winfrey
and the cast from the historic
movie SELMA led hundreds of
civil rights activists in an enactment march that appeared in
15
Civil Rights leader Harry Belafonte
attends Selma to Montgomery exhibit
BEACON,
AUDREY'S
SOCIETY
WHIRL
BEACON,
newyorkbeacon.net
16
CBC members visit Ferguson, Mo.
(from Page 7)
keynote speaker.
“I come today with the Congressional Black Caucus because
you ignited a flame,” he told the
crowd. “You showed the world
the cancer in Ferguson that continues to plague so many communities across our country.”
In addition to Carson, two
other members of the Black Caucus spoke in Ferguson the day
before the MLK Holiday: Chairman G.K. Butterfield (D-N.C.),
and Rep. Lacy Clay (D-MO)
whose
district
includes
Ferguson. In all, 10 CBC members were in attendance. While
the service was underway, a group
of Ferguson activists were protesting at restaurants for their
#BlackBrunchSTL direct action.
In all, 1 young activists met with
the Black Caucus members.
“I talked to some brilliant
young activists. They expressed
their frustration with the challenges with the older generation.
It’s a universal gripe that everyone
has when we’re younger. They say:
‘The old people should step aside
and let us take over.’ But where are
you taking us? What is the action
plan? Where are we going? Yes, we
see your brilliance but do you have
the heart of a surgeon,” Carson
told the packed church.
That question has become the
million-dollar question: What is
the plan? What do the leaders who
have come out of the Ferguson
movement want to push in terms
of police and what is their strategy? So, far many of the new
groups formed in the wake of
Ferguson have been detailed about
their demands. However, there has
been less detail on how to get
those demands implemented.
Carson also focused on the key
issue of getting out the vote in a
town where voting participation is
down.
He said, “There are many ways
that we can serve and contribute
to society. But in Ferguson I humbly submit to you that there is one
act that stands out clearly at this
time and that is us leveraging out
voting block and exercising our
right to vote.”
That the message in Ferguson
was delivered by one of the Black
Caucus’ youngest members was
noteworthy. The Black Caucus often operates on seniority. Rep.
John Conyers (D-Mich.) is now
the oldest member of the U.S.
House. He will turn 86 in May.
Rep. Charlie Rangel (D-NY) will
turn 85 on June 11. Rep. Jim
Clyburn (D-SC), who is a member of the House leadership, is 74.
The Black Caucus has 12 members over the age of 69.
The CBC has five members
who were born in the 1970s: Rep.
Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY), 44,
Rep. Marc Veasey (D-Texas), 43,
Rep Cedric Richmond (D-La), 41,
Two kinds of income inequality
(from page 6)
manufacturers, planters, and
merchants (to risk opprobrium
by paraphrasing Marx). As Adam
Smith put it in The Wealth of
Nations in 1776, “Whenever the
legislature attempts to regulate
the differences between masters
and their workmen, its counsellors are always the masters.”
While business interests today
are not the only ones that get
consideration in the halls of
power, it’s a mistake to think
they do not retain major influence over government in economic and financial matters.
“Regulatory capture” is a wellknown phenomenon, and ostensible efforts to limit it always fail.
Unlike market inequality, political-economic inequality is unjust and should be eliminated.
How? By abolishing all direct
and indirect subsidies; artificial
scarcities, such as those created
by so-called intellectual property;
regulations, which inevitably burden smaller and yet-to-belaunched firms more than
lawyered-up big businesses; eminent domain; and permit requirements, zoning, and occupational
licensing, which all exclude competition. These interventions and
more protect incumbent firms
from conditions that would lower
prices to consumers, create selfemployment and worker-ownership opportunities, and improve
bargaining conditions for wage
labor.
Instead of symbolically tweaking the tax code to appear to be
addressing inequality — the politicians’ charade — political-economic inequality should be ended
by repealing all privileges right
now.
Sheldon Richman is vice
president and editor at The Future of Freedom Foundation in
Fairfax, Va. (www.fff.org).
and Rep. Mia Love (R-Utah) who
is 39. Another African American
member of Congress, freshman
Rep. Will Hurd (R-Texas), is the
youngest Black member of Congress at 37.
Other members who took the
trip to Ferguson were Reps.
Emanuel Cleaver (D-Mo.),
Sheila Jackson Lee (D-Texas),
Jim Clyburn (D-SC), Karen Bass
(D-Calif.), Marcia Fudge (DOhio), Joyce Beatty (D-Ohio),
Lacy Clay (D-Mo.) and Don
Payne (D-NJ).
With all the talk in the wake of
Ferguson of “old leadership vs.
new young activism,” Carson
may have scored a breakthrough.
Photos from the dinner meeting
activists had with the Black Caucus showed the Congressman
with young protesters Johnetta
Elzie and Deray McKesson. Both
Elzie and McKesson have been
active and on the scene in
Ferguson since last August after
Michael Brown, an unarmed
Black teenager was shot eight
times by Darren Wilson, a White
Ferguson police officer.
A St. Louis County grand jury
refused to indict Wilson in connection with Brown’s death.
“We are here to support and encourage you to continue by engaging in the political process,” Carson
said. “You have the power to determine the outcome of your mayor,
school board, sheriff, and city
council. The world is watching
Ferguson – and Ferguson will always have the full force and power
of the CBC, the conscious of the
U.S. Congress as allies.”
Lauren Victoria Burke is a
freelance writer and creator of
the blog Crewof42.com, which
covers African American members of Congress. She Burke
appears
re g u l a r l y
on
“NewsOneNow with Roland
Martin” and on WHUR FM,
900 AM WURD. She worked
previously at USA Today and
ABC News. She can be reached
t h ro u g h
her
website,
laurenvictoriaburke.com, or Twitter @Crewof42 or by e-mail at
LBurke007@gmail.com.
Rosie Perez and Latinas,
deserve apology from ABC
(from page 10)
The stereotype that Latinas are
stupid is outrageous. It took ABC
and “The View” eighteen years
before it named its first Latina
co-host and now one of your
staffers is going around, cowardly, and anonymously maligning one of our own in a vicious
way. There is no excuse for this
behavior. Network officials
should not tolerate this kind of
racist conduct.
Ms. Perez, Latinas and the entire
Latino community merits respect,
not insults. We expect more from
the staff of “The View” and ABC
network. An attack on Rosie Perez
is an attack on all women, particularly women of color, and especially, Latinas.
When you disparage the only
Latina on “The View” you disparage all Latinas.
Rosie Perez and by extension, all
Latinas, deserve an immediate apology.
The Knicks’ ten-day triplets
(from page 24)
ference? I believe that the ten-day
triplets have something do it with
it.
It is not that these guys are super talented or game changers.
They just play with a sense of urgency that was lacking prior to
their arrival. Less than a month
ago Galloway, Thomas and
Amundsen were playing in the
Development League playing
towns like Grand Rapids, Bakersfield and Erie. Now, they are
playing in the World’s Most Famous Arena and they are making
the most of it.
Galloway, the pesky little point
guard, is averaging 12 ppg, 4 rpg
and 3 apg. He has tendency to
make clutch baskets. Thomas has
a nose for the ball. He averages
6 ppg and 4 rpg. Amundsen has a
full throttle motor and his energy
is straight up contagious.
Now I am not delusional to
think that the Knicks are going
to embark on some magical playoff run based on the Ten-Day
Triplets’ play. Yet, I still like what
they bring to the table. The energy they bring every night and
their unselfishness helps lift
their teammates and produces a
better brand of basketball than
the team was playing prior to the
blockbuster trade.
I just got the feeling that Smith
and Shumpert were playing with
sense of entitlement. They knew
that they were going to play regardless of their production. You knew
that Jackson was not going for that
and he sent them packing with some
nice parting gifts. At least Jackson
traded them to a contender and they
are playing along side Lebron
James. That is not bad.
As for the Triplets, they will get
a chance to show that they not only
belong in the Big Leagues but they
can play with the Big Boys. This is
also a huge opportunity for Travis
Wear and Jason Smith, two players
penciled in for the D-League at the
beginning of the season. This will
give Cleanthony Early a chance to
showcase his talents as well.
I will take urgency over complacency any day. The Triplets play
with urgency while JR Smith and
Shumpert, as talented as they are,
were complacent. In addition to giving Jackson multiple options, his
wheeling and dealing has given him
a chance to evaluate the Triplets as
well as other players on the current
roster. Sometimes you have to take
a step backwards to take a couple
steps forward. Let’s hope that they
are heading the right direction.
HOT TOPICS
Betty Byer's wedding
Khamala Harris
Don Thomas
NEWSMAKERS
ARTS/ CULTURE/MEDIA
Woodie King, Jr,the New Federal
Theater founder and producing
director,hosted a press conference
at the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, to announce
the launch of a Kickstarter campaign,
on January 16, to raise $40,000 necessary for the production of Amiri
Baraka’s final play, “The Most Dangerous Man In America,” about a disturbing chapter in W.E.B. DuBois’
life. The drama unfolds in the early
50s, when the US Federal government indicted DuBois, 82 -NAACP
co-founder, a scholar and political activist - as an agent of a foreign power,
during the infamous McCarthy Era.
The cast toplinesArt McFarland, retired WABC-TV reporter, and veteran
actor, as W.E.B. DuBois and Petronia
Paley as Shirley Graham Du
Bois.Directed by Woodie King, “The
Most Dangerous Man In
America”will have its world premiere at OffBroadway house, the
Castillo Theatre, in Manhattan, on
May 28.Internet news of the
Kickstarter campaign for “The Most
Dangerous Man,” has been spreading like a good virus. Originally budgeted at $100,000, King and the New
Federal Board had already raised
$60,000 prior to Kickstarter. A week
into the Kickstarter campaign, donations have exceeded $18,000. Make
your donation today. Visit New Federal Theatre Kickstarter Page.
Johnson Publishing, the parent company of Ebony and Jet Magazines and
Fashion Fair cosmetics, will sell its
photo archives, which is valued at
$40 million, and which includes upDR MLK HOLIDAY 2015:
wards of 5 million photos. Archives
span 70 years of Black history, datTELEVISION: Kudos to OWN, ing back to the 1940s. The pocket
Amiri Baraka
Congrats and best wishes to a handsome, sixtysomething NY couple, fine
artist Bette Byer and Essie Green Gallery owner, Sherman Edmiston, who tied
the knot in a civil ceremony, on January 15, Dr. King’s birthday. That evening,
they attended a private reception at the
Metropolitan Museum, the venue of
their first date.
Stephen Hill was named BET Networks President of Programming. He
reportsto Debra Lee, BET Chair/CEO.
A 15-year BET veteran exec, Hill oversaw and/or launched BET shows and specials such as the BET AWARDS and
BLACK GIRLS ROCK, and the Real
Husbands of Hollywood. And its first
Aquarian birthday shoutouts to baseball great Hank Aaron;Tatyana Ali;Lois
Bellamy; BRANDY, Paula Richardson
Bodin; Trevor Gobern;Heath
Hamaguchi; Michael Jordan; Alicia
Keys; Toni Morrison; Chris Rock; NY
Carib News’ Faye Rodney; Michael
Singletary; Corinne Simpson; NY Beacon Entertainment Editor Don Thomas;
Alice Walker; Kerry Washington;and
Oprah Winfrey.
WINTER CALLENDAR
Melissa Mark-Viverito
The Brooklyn Independent Media
will host THE PRICE OF
GENTRIFICATION TOWN HALL
MEETING, at the BRIC House Ballroom, 647 Fulton Street, Brooklyn,
11217, on January 28 from 7-9 pm.
Meet the panelists Brian Vines, B;
SharonZukim, Brooklyn College Professor; Neil deMause, author of “The
Brooklyn Wars;” Urban Planner Ron
Schiffman, Pratt Center for Community Development; Jherell Benn,
Flatbush Tenant Coalition; Juan Ramos
Broadway Triangle Community Coalition. Visit:
bricartsmedia.org or call:
718.683.5600,
Victoria Horsford is a Harlem-based
writer who can be reached at
victoriahorsford@yahoo.com
newyorkbeacon.net
USA: President Barack Obama
had barely completed his first victory lapafter his populist 2015 State
of the Union address, when GOP
Congressional Speaker John
Boehner announced that he invited
Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin
Netunyahu to address a joint session of Congress, so that he can
challenge President Obama’s policy
of achieving some sort of nuclear
accord with Iran, which would lift
sanctions against Iran and usher and
possibly add a new tier of peace in
that region. Obama’s Iran course is
favored by most Western democracies and oddly enough the
Mossad, Israel’s revered intelligence operation. Netunyahuis hawkish about more sanctions against
Iran, a nation which he considers
Israeli’s major enemy. Neither
Boehner’s invitation nor its acceptance by Netanyhahu makes any
sense vis-a-vis American National
Security.
Moreover, the Boehner invitation
to Netunyahu violates protocol. It
is the first time, in the nation’s history that Congress has invited a
world leader to address a joint session. World leader protocols resides exclusively with Executive
Branch. Boehner’s action is presumptuous, disrespectful, and racist. It is yet another GOP attempt to
erode the office of the Presidency
and Obama’s legacy. If the Boehner
invitation to Netunyahu, which confounds commonsense is a prelude
to GOP Congressional actions
through December, 2017, I foresee is a landslide Democratic victory for the 2017 Presidential race.
NEW YORK: The big 2015media headlines are fixated on the Feds
corruption charges leveledat
Democratic Assembly Speaker
Sheldon Silver. NY Times, NY Daily
News and NY Post editorials have
called for his resignation as did New
York’s US Senators Gillibrandand
Schumer. On 1/26,it was reported
that Silver will temporarily relinquish his Speaker duties, which will
be assumed by a team of five assemblymen, two of whom are African Americans, Harlem’s Herman
Farrelland the Bronx’ Carl Hastie.
On 1/27, the Democratic caucus
said that team was not acceptable
and that Silver should step down.
…… Downstate, it is rumored that
NYC City Council Speaker, Melissa Mark-Viverito of East Harlem
will toss her hat into the ring for
Charlie Rangel’s congressional
seat. Her candidacy and victory are
within the realm of possibility. The
congressional district is predominantly Latino, and incumbent Rangel
won re-election last year owing to
the substantial East Harlem voter
turnout. Alas, Adam Clayton Powell
IV and Senator Espaillat will be saddened by Melissa’s interest in the
Rangel congressional seat.
size, weekly, Jet Magazine cut its frequency to a bi-weekly, and was discontinued last year, replaced by an internet
edition, which was eventually shelved.
Bob Herbert former NY Times oped writer and former NY Daily News
columnist, currently a Sr. Fellow at
Demos, a NY based research and policy
center, has written a non-fiction book
“LOSING OUR WAY: An Intimate Portrait of a Troubled America.” He was
on BOOK-TV last week and presented
a good argument to buy and read his
tome.
The bi-weekly NY Magazine January 12/
25 issue’s cover story is titled “THE
OBAMA HISTORY PROJECT: How
will textbooks eventually rate this
president. Jonathan Chait and 53 Historians Gamely Make Their (WILDLY
PREMATURE) PREDICTIONS. It includes speculative, fun commentaries
by notable Black historians like Khalil
Gibran Muhammad and Annette Gordon- Reed.
Sister 2 Sister Magazine is no
more!Sister 2 Sister was the IT magazine for African American entertainment news and profiles for 26 years.
Founder/publisher Jamie Foster Brown
said that she had to file for a Chapter
11 bankruptcy proceeding to “protect
the brand from its creditors.”The good
news is that she continues to publish
the e-zine, S2SMAGAZINE.COM,
which attracts 1.8 unique visitors
monthly.
By Victoria Horsford
the Oprah Winfrey TV Network
channel, which aired SELMA50, a
chronical of the Selma to Montgomery March, in 1965, Dr. King and how
it altered he American political landscape forever ,culminating with the
Voting Rights Act of 1965. Piece includes a Gospel Brunch segment attended by many of the 1965 March
and gospel music elites. Kudos also
to Amy Goodwin’s TV Show, “Democracy Now,” which aired a recently discovered one of Dr. King’s
speeches, about Africans’ 400 year
experience in America, delivered in
London in 1964…… FILM:
SELMA, the biopixabout Dr. Martin Luther King, the movement,and
the March for Blacks voting rights,
was snubbed by the Academy of
Motion Pictures Oscar nominations,
except for a Best Picture nod. Perhaps, an American psychologist proffer some clinical explanation for the
snub. Was it about director’s Ava
DuVarnay’s characterization of
President Johnson, which so many
critics have articulated? Ava
DuVarnay appropriatelyanswers critics, “I was not interested in making a
white savior movie.”
In NYC, 27 prominent AfricanAmericans, including Debra Lee,
BET; Ursula Burns, Xerox; Ken
Chenault, AMEX; Reginald Van Lee,
Booz Allen; Vernon Jordan; and
Adebayo Ogunlesi, Global Infrastructure ) paid for 27,000 NYC 7th,
8th, and 9th graders to see SELMA at
local movie houses. The SELMA
bulk ticket purchases have been made
by Black businessmen, across country.
BEACON,
WHAT’S GOING ON
17
BEACON,
newyorkbeacon.net
18
NNPA Award Winner
Enter tainment
By Don Thomas
Regal Diana Ross to open majestically restored Kings Theatre
Special Assignment
“What can I say except wow!”
exclaimed former Brooklyn Borough President Marty Markowitz
at the reopening of the gloriously
renovated Kings Theatre in the
nostalgic Flatbush section of
Brooklyn, New York. “Brooklyn
now has its Beacon and its Apollo
Theater all in one.” The ribbon
cutting ceremony for the $95
million project that took nearly
two years to restore took place
on Fri., Jan. 23 and was attended
by local officials and VIPs. “Today marks a milestone for the
Flatbush community,” remarked
Deputy Mayor Alicia Glen.
The historic Kings Theatre has
been restored to its luminous
opulence and will celebrate its
grand opening with an elaborate
opening night concert featuring
Ms. Fabulosity herself, Diana
Ross, on Tues., Feb. 3, 2015.
Billed “An Evening with Diana
Ross” the inaugural concert is
already sold out. Following the
concert, there will be free open
house with tours of the restored
structure on Sat., Feb. 7, 2015.
The showy showplace will offer
“a wide spectrum of programming from local, national and international performing artists,”
with more than 200 performances annually.
Built in 1929 and inspired by
the Palace of Versailles and the
Paris Opera House, the Kings
Theatre closed in 1977 and was
acquired by the city in 1983. The
renovation was closely supervised to make certain that the
palace’s grand flourishes were
left untouched including its original fixtures like chandeliers;
Diana Ross
restored and new carpets; and
tapestries and curtains — based
on archival photographs and remnants, designs.
“The Kings Theatre is
now once again an integral
part of this community, after
being lost to the City for so
long. We are so proud to welcome New Yorkers back to the
Kings and we thank the community for its incredible support of the revitalization
project. It is our hope that everyone will join us as we celebrate the historic reopening
and embark on the Theatre’s
Marquee of Kings Theatre features grand opening on Feb. 3. i n a u g u r a l y e a r o f p e r f o r mances,” stated David Ander2015-An Evening with Diana Ross
son, president for ACE Theatrical Group, the company that
is operating the theater.
Once it has reopened, the
venue will host performances
— including music, dance,
theatre, and comedy — and
provide “a resource to foster
and support creativity in the
area, creating jobs and attracting thousands of visitors to the
neighborhood.” It will also
become the largest theater in
Brooklyn, with over 3,000
seats.
“It is only fitting that the crown
jewel of Flatbush, and one of the
finest theaters in America, will
have one of the greatest artists
ever as its inaugural show,” said
Chamber of Commerce head
Carlo A. Scissura. “By bringing
Broadway back to Brooklyn, the
Kings Theatre will be a destination for people across the country — and Diana Ross is the perfect performer to raise the curtain.”
About Diana Ross
Diana Ross’ famed and remarkable career spanning almost five
decades has resulted in her
receipt of major awards and accolades and music history milestones. Ross is a consummate
performer as well as one of the
most iconic female singers of all
time and one of the most prominent women in popular music history and pop culture of the late
20th century.
Her international achievements
were acknowledged by the prestigious Kennedy Center Honors
in December 2007 in Washington
DC. The honor celebrated Ross’
lustrous career of excellence in
music, film, television and theatre, as well as her cultural influences, humanitarian work and her
contributions to American culture. The National Academy of
Recording Arts & Sciences
(Grammys) celebrated her remarkable career in 2012 with their
highest honor, The Life Time
Achievement Award.
Beginning in the 60’s as lead
singer of the world renowned
group, The Supremes, Diana Ross
achieved the unprecedented feat
of 12 number-one singles in the
U.S. becoming the most successful American group in history and
rivaled only by The Beatles for
the position of the biggest hit
group of that generation. Ross
went on to achieve 6 number-one
singles as a solo artist, amassing
a total of 18 #1s in her career.
Career milestones include
induction into the Rock & Roll
Hall of Fame, The Songwriters
Hall of Fame, National Academy of Recording Arts & Sciences Hero Award, NAACP Entertainer Award, Billboard’s
Female Entertainer of the Century Award, The Soul Train Legend Award and International
Lifetime Achievement at the
World Music Awards.
Her iconic status is forever
cemented in history with two
stars on the Hollywood Walk
of Fame. “Stop! In The Name
of Love,” “Where Did Our
Love Go” and “You Keep Me
Hangin’ On” have all been inducted into the NARAS Hall of
Fame. “Stop! In The Name of
Love” and “You Can’t Hurry
Love” are among The Rock &
Roll Hall of Fame’s Songs that
Shaped Rock & Roll.
The Guinness Book of Records
awarded her with its Lifetime
Achievement Award and the title
of “Most Successful Female Vocalist of All Time.” She first
reached the No.1 position on both
the U.S. and UK charts with
“Where Did Our Love Go.” This
was the first of a number of consecutive No.1 hits in the U.S.
Her love of life, never-ending
wonder, the appreciation of goals
and achievements and sheer human
spirit define the artist that is Diana
Ross and continue to make her one
of the most identifiable, unique,
beloved and influential singers of
successive pop generations.
About Kings Theatre
The Kings Theatre —
formerly Loew’s Kings Theatre —
is located at 1027 Flatbush Avenue
(between Duryea and Regent
Places), Brooklyn, New York. The
Theatre was designed by the architectural firm of Rapp and Rapp in
the Rapp Brothers’ signature
French-influenced baroque style.
The interior decor was designed by
Harold W. Rambusch. It was built
and operated by the Loew’s
Theatres chain.
This 3,676 seat house originally
presented shows that combined
movies and live vaudeville. It
opened September 7, 1929 with a
program that included the
film Evangeline, a live stage show,
orchestra and solo pipe organ. The
film’s star, Dolores del Rio made
a special live appearance. With the
decline of vaudeville, however, the
theater soon converted to showing
feature films only.
The Kings Theatre was one of
New York’s five sumptuously
decorated Loew’s Wonder Theatres, and operated for decades
alongside several other massive
cinemas on Flatbush Avenue. It
stopped operating, in the name
of money, not love, in 1977, and
in subsequent years lost light
fixtures to thieves, ornate plaster-work to water damage, and
red-velvet drapes to mildew.
Many celebrities who grew up
in Brooklyn and went to area high
schools worked as ushers at
Loew’s Kings. Among them
were Sylvester Stallone and Henry
Winkler. Ben Vereen danced on the
stage at the Kings, where his
mother was working. After closing, the theater was subject of a film
documentary, Memoirs of a Movie
Palace.
The Kings Theatre will be a
state-of-the-art venue featuring
a blend of original ornate details with modern patron improvements. The lavish theater
boasts superb sight-lines and
acoustics and will be the largest theatre in Brooklyn and the
third largest in New York City.
In 2012, Ace Theatrical
Group inked a deal with the city
to restore the cinema to its
former glory. The woodwork
and marble floors were largely
intact and the restorers, convinced that the mountain was
high enough, but not too high to
surmount, began a $94-million
restoration of their love child,
with taxpayers footing half of
the bill.
AUDREY’S REEL WHIRL with Film Reviewer Audrey J. Bernard
Ryan Guzman, Jennifer Lopez, Andy Cohen
Universal Pictures’ saucy
thriller The Boy Next Door starring sexy Jennifer Lopez and
featuring young eye candy Ryan
Guzman set fire to the box office with a $15M debut making
it the second most watched film
in box office receipts last week.
Directed by Rob Cohen and
written by Barbara Curry, the
psychological thriller stars
Lopez as a teacher who engages
in an affair with a younger man
played by newcomer Guzman.
The film also stars John
Corbett, Kristin Chenoweth,
Hill Harper and Adam Hicks.
Although the suspense thriller
received tepid reviews, Lopez
Jennifer Lopez stops traffic
in Giorgio Armani
and her producers are laughing
all the way to the bank as the
film which was made in 23 days
cost a mere $4 million to make.
This film was a labor of love and
very important to Lopez who
stars in and produces the film.
“Two Latinos opening in a mainstream movie, if it does well,
that’s gonna change things,”
Lopez said. “I would love for the
Latino community to come out
and support this movie because
it would give us the freedom …
That gives me a lot of freedom
as an artist; it gives us a lot of
freedom to make more movies
in this way. Whatever kind of
stories we want to tell – it’s ex-
citing.” The beautiful actress
stopped traffic – something
that’s part of her DNA – at the
New York City premiere wearing a Giorgio Armani coat over
a black sheer cocktail length
dress with a titillating plunging
neckline. Producers of the film
include Jason Blum, John
Jacobs, Elaine GoldsmithThomas and Benny Medina.
Couper Samuelson, Jeanette
Volturno-Brill, and Zac
Unterman served as executive
producers. The Boy Next Door
– which is rated R for violence,
sexual content/nudity and language — opened nationwide Jan.
23, 2015.
Kristin Chenoweth, Ryan Guzman, Jennifer Lopez
newyorkbeacon.net
Universal Pictures’ Seventh Son is depicted as an epic adventure
starring Jeff Bridges, Ben Barnes, Alicia Vikander, Kit Harington,
Olivia Williams, and Antje Traue with Djimon Hounsou and Julianne
Moore. The action flick is directed by Sergei Bodrov and written
by Charles Leavitt and Steve Knight with a story by Matt Greenberg
based on a book series “The Last Apprentice” by Joseph Delaney.
The movie is produced by Basil Iwanyk, Thomas Tull and Lionel
Wigram, with executive producers Jon Jashni, Brent O’Connor,
Alysia Cotter. As the story goes: In a time of enchantments when
legends and magic collide, the sole remaining warrior of a mystical order (Oscar winner Jeff Bridges) travels to find a prophesized
hero born with incredible powers, the last Seventh Son (Ben
Barnes). Torn from his quiet life as a farmhand, the unlikely young
hero embarks on a daring adventure with his battle-hardened mentor to vanquish a dark queen (Julianne Moore) and the army of supernatural assassins she has dispatched against their kingdom. Sergei
Bodrov directed Seventh Son from a screenplay by Charles Leavitt
and Steve Knight and a screen story by Matt Greenberg, based on
the book series “The Last Apprentice” by Joseph Delaney. The film
is produced by Basil Iwanyk, Thomas Tull and Lionel Wigram. Jon
Jashni, Brent O’Connor and Alysia Cotter are executive producers,
with Jillian Share and Erica Lee co-producing. The film will be
released in 3D. www.seventhsonmovie.com
UPCOMING FLICK
BEACON,
Jennifer Lopez steams up the screen in saucy thriller ‘The Boy Next Door’
19
BEACON,
newyorkbeacon.net
20
‘Mello Yello’ story of Jack “The Rapper” Gibson
If ever one man embodied the
Black experience in America, it
was Jack Gibson, known to the
world as “Jack the Rapper.” Beginning with childhood remembrances of Marcus Garvey in the
1920s, Gibson continued to
cross paths with the most famous
African American personalities
of the 20th century.
Directly and indirectly, the
first radio DJ opened doors and
launched the careers of several
noted radio personalities and
superstars. His long reaching
influence began in 1949, when
he and J.B. Blayton established
the first Black-owned radio station in the United States —
WERD. Gibson’s popularity on
radio paved the way for a lifetime
of career moves.
As an emcee and promoter, he
built enduring relationships with
the early Black royalty of the
entertainment world, among
them, Sammy Davis, Jr., Billie
Holiday, Erroll Garner, Sarah
Vaughan, Nat King Cole, Pearl
Bailey, Dinah Washington,
Nancy Wilson, and Ray Charles.
When he was hired by a young
go-getter named Berry Gordy to
head up promotion at a fledgling
record company called Motown,
Gibson befriended a new crop of
stars including Stevie Wonder,
The Supremes and Smokey
Robinson.
Moving on to the Revelot label, and then to Stax, Gibson’s
uncanny timing once again
placed him in a position to further the careers of promising future stars: Otis Redding, Jackie
Wilson, Isaac Hayes, The Staple
Singers, Rufus Thomas, Carla
Thomas and many others.
In addition to his involvement
in the music scene, Gibson gave
voice to one of the most critical
periods of American history —
the Civil Rights Movement. In a
long
on-air
interview
with Malcolm X in 1963, he
shared some anger and even a few
laughs with the controversial
spokesman for the Nation of Islam.
In 1968, when the news broke
about the assassination of Martin
Luther King, Jr., radio and television announcers immediately
dismissed the angry reaction as
“senseless violence.” Enraged by
the one-sided reporting, Gibson
rushed into the streets of Detroit
to conduct a live radio broadcast.
As the neighborhood burned
around him, he captured the tearful frustration of a people mourning the death of their last hope
for true equality.
But as the years rolled on,
Gibson witnessed positive
changes, pushing them along
whenever he could and always
reporting them. And his life experiences ran the gamut from
tragedy to hilarity:
Bailing out Sammy Davis Jr.,
who had been arrested in 1952
for being Black and walking the
streets of Miami Beach without
his I.D. card after sundown; A rare
look at the humorous side
of Supreme Court Justice
Thurgood Marshall; Radio interviews “by window” with Martin
Luther King; An unusual account
of role-reversal, involving
Muhammad Ali; An interracial
love affair for film star Bette
Davis; and A touching tale about
honoring the legacy of the late
Jackie Wilson
But Gibson’s most long-reaching achievement was the annual
Black music convention he
called ”The Family Affair.” As
founder and organizer, Gibson
not only provided the ultimate
springboard for new talent, but he
established a forum for discussions, which culminated in sweeping changes for African Americans
in radio and the recording industry. The heavy hitters of the music industry cleared their schedules each year to lend their talents
to the Grand Old Man’s Family
Affair: Prince, Tina Turner,
Nancy Wilson, Janet Jackson,
James Brown, Whitney Houston,
Eddie Murphy, Hammer, Toni
Braxton, Sinbad . . . and the list
goes on like a “Who’s Who” of
entertainment superstars.
A string of tragic events eventually toppled Gibson from his
position of influence — the death
of his beloved wife Sadye, estrangement from his son, and finally, financial failure and the demise of his Family Affair. But after his induction into the Rock and
Roll Hall of Fame, other unexpected honors slowly began to roll
in: The United States Congress,
the Smithsonian Institution, and
countless other organizations.
With decades of stories and
music still alive in his soul, and
buoyed by the reconciliation with
his son, Gibson returned to his
roots — radio. Nearly fifty years
after his beginnings at WERD,
Jack the Rapper’s voice once again
crackled across the airwaves in
Las Vegas, Nevada, proclaiming
three simple words: “I’m still
here.”
Shortly after completing his “as
told to” autobiographical collabo-
ration with Walker Smith, Gibson
passed away in Las Vegas, Nevada.
He is survived by his loving wife
Elsie, his daughter Jamilla Gibson
Bell, and his son “Jack 3” Gibson.
His last wish was that the book of
his life be published and widely
read so that this missing Black
chapter of American History would
not be forgotten. For more information, please contact: Jacqueline
Rhinehart@917-554-2851.
About the Author
As the child of a jazz drummer
and a book-addicted beatnik,
Walker Smith grew up in a house
filled with music and literature.
The music bug bit first, and
Walker was signed as a recording artist with the prestigious
Casablanca label (under the
name Bobbi Walker). But between studio sessions and appearances, she quietly pressed
on with her creative writing and
history studies. Three solo albums later, she walked away
from the music business and
headed for New York to pursue
her real dream to write. She
wrote interviews and articles for
A f r i c a n Vo i c e s a n d Ve r t i g o
magazines, features for the Reel
Sisters Film Festival, and a collaborative biography with black
radio pioneer Jack the Rapper
Gibson. After releasing her first
historical novel The Color Line,
she began work on what
would become her most personal novel—Bluestone Rondo.
Ed Lewis pens tell all book titled ‘The Man from Essence’
Ed Lewis pens tell all book titled
‘The Man from Essence’
Essence magazine is the most
popular, well respected, and largest circulated Black women’s
magazine in history. Largely
unknown is the remarkable story
of what it took to earn that distinction.
The Man from
Essence depicts with candor and
insight how Edward Lewis, CEO
and publisher of Essence, started
a magazine with three Black men
who would transform the lives of
millions of Black American
women and alter the American
marketplace.
Edward Lewis, Clarence O.
Smith, Cecil Hollingsworth and
Jonathan Blount made their mark
on America’s magazine industry
with the launch of Essence Communications Inc. (ECI) in 1968,
and began publishing Essence
magazine in May 1970. Initially
the magazine opened with a mod-
est print run of 50,000 copies, but
it has now grown into a powerhouse with a circulation of more
than 7.5 million in what The New
York Times called the “pre-emi-
nent voice for Black women.”
Gordon Parks served as its editorial director during the first
three years of its circulation.
In 2000, Time Inc. purchased
49 percent of ECI, a publishing
company. In 2005 Time Inc. made
a deal with ECI to purchase the
remaining 51 percent it did not
already own. The deal placed the
ownership of the 34-yearold Essence magazine, one of the
United State’s leading magazines
for women of color, under white
ownership.
The Man from Essence is
more than a rags-to-riches story:
It tells how the idea of the “Essence woman” permeated American culture; how all the high
drama, hijinks, and challenges
brought on by thirty-five years in
magazine publishing were not
enough to keep Lewis away from
the business; and how he became
one of the greatest entrepreneurs
of his generation. Ultimately, it is
the story of how Black men and
women defied the odds, shaped
history — and it proves that
Lewis’s success was no accident.
Throughout Essence’s colo r f u l a n d s t o r i e d h i s t o r y,
Lewis remained the cool and
constant presence, a quiet-talking corporate captain and business strategist who prevailed
against the odds and the
naysayers. He would emerge
to become the last man standing — the only partner to survive
the battles that raged before the
magazine was sold to Time, Inc.
in the largest buyout of a Blackowned publication by the world’s
largest publishing company.
In this remarkable life
story, Essence magazine cofounder and philanthropist Ed
Lewis tells how he rose to become
one of America’s premier publishers and entrepreneurs.
About Ed Lewis
Ed Lewis grew up in a South Bronx
neighborhood plagued by drugs and
violence. Nonetheless, his parents
ingrained in him a strong determination and work ethic that served
him for years to come. After graduating from high school, Lewis received a football scholarship to attend the University of New
Mexico, where he was one of
twelve Black students on a campus
of more than 8,000. It was during
the height of the American civil
rights movement — a defining moment for America as well as
Lewis. Yet his dreams surpassed
the roadblocks, and after graduating from college, he landed a
j o b i n N e w Yo r k C i t y a n d
steadily rose through the ranks
in the financial industry. More
than anything, it was his desire
to start his own business — a
uniquely Black business — that
drove him forward.
Barbara Smith pens new book about her contributions to Movement Building
Barbara Smith has played a
groundbreaking role in opening
and expanding our national cultural and political dialogues
about the intersections of race,
class,
sexuality,
and
gender. Ain’t Gonna Let Nobody Turn Me Around, edited
by Alethia Jones and Virginia
Eubanks, brings to life the controversies, players, and strategies that expanded the definitions of freedom and liberation
over four decades. As an organizer, writer, publisher, independent scholar, teacher, and most
recently as an elected official,
Barbara has contributed to mul-
tiple freedom movements (Civil
Rights, Feminism, Lesbian and
Gay Liberation, Anti-racism, and
Black Feminism). She offers a
distinct lens on the nature of liberation struggles and the
difficult art of building political
movements that embrace and reflect our full selves.
Barbara and colleagues are
credited with the first published
work that utilized the term “identity politics,” defining it as a political analysis and organizing approach critical for recognizing
and addressing the often “interlocking oppressions” of race,
gender, class and sexuality. Now
re-popularized
as
“intersectionality,” this analytical
approach has shaped scholarship,
teaching, and progressive activism for at least two decades. Her
work has been a source of guidance and inspiration to activists
and movements battling classism,
sexism, racism and homophobia
both outside and within.
Ain’t Gonna Let Nobody Turn
Me Around is formatted as a reflective conversation through
four decades of activism. Editors
Alethia Jones and Virginia
Eubanks were enlisted by Barbara
Smith to explore her life from her an elected official in Albany. They
childhood to her recent work as meticulously selected material
from over two hundred articles,
images, and recordings and a dozen
original interviews. The book juxtaposes hard to find historical
documents with new unpublished
interviews with fellow activists and
scholars bringing to life the controversies, players, and strategies
that challenged movements to expand their definitions of freedom
and liberation. In a clear, accessible,
and conversational style, the book
engages readers in fundamental
questions that those committed to
social justice must grapple with in
order to deepen their work and
heighten their integrity, accountability, and courage.
FLICK-CHAT with Senior Film Critic Kam Williams
21
Bradley Cooper
other recent war flicks like Lone
Survivor and The Hurt Locker.
Consequently, we really care
whether this patriot will ultimately return home safe and
sound.
Kudos to Clint Eastwood for
fashioning such a moving and
well-deserved tribute to a true
American hero! To see a trailer
f o r A m e r i c a n S n i p e r, v i s i t :
h t t p s : / / w w w. y o u t u b e . c o m /
watch?v=5bP1f_1o-zo
Excellent (4 stars)
Rated R for graphic violence,
sexual references and pervasive
profanity
Running time: 132 minutes
Distributor: Warner Brothers
Bittersweet biopic chronicles exploits of cryptologist who cracked Nazi code
At the outset of World War
II, the Nazis gained the early
advantage with the help of its
Enigma, the encrypting machine which enabled the German military to communicate
without having to worry about
any messages being intercepted. In response, Winston
Churchill deputized eccentric,
m a t h g e n i u s A l a n Tu r i n g
(Benedict Cumberbatch) to
handpick a team comprised of
fellow savants whose appointed mission would be to
crack the Enigma’s inscrutable
codes.
Operating on the campus of
a cypher school located in
Buckinghamshire’s Bletchley
Park, Turing’s exceptional
eggheads proceeded to embark
upon a surreptitious race
against time every bit as important as the fighting simultaneously unfolding on the
battlefield. And when they finally did manage to decipher
German communications, it
remained important that they
keep that fact a secret.
You see, the info unearthed afforded the Allies on the front
lines a competitive advantage
which would immediately be lost
if the Nazis ever caught wind of
the fact that their supposedly inscrutable commands were actually being intercepted. For, they
would undoubtedly have simply
altered their encrypting in an instant.
The British government
credited Turing’s team with
saving millions of lives while
shortening the conflict in the
European theater by a couple
years. That important achievement is the subject of The Imitation Game, a bittersweet
biopic directed by Norwegian
Morten Tyldum (Headhunters).
Nominated for eight Oscars
including Best Picture, Director, Lead Actor (Cumberbatch),
and Supporting Actress (Keira
Knightley), the film is based
on “Alan Turing: The Enigma,”
Andrew Hodges’ belated tribute to the unsung hero. Unfortunately, despite the pivotal
role he had played, Turing was
never really recognized as a
national hero because of his
homosexuality.
Instead, after the war, he had
to suffer the indignity of being persecuted, arrested, convicted, and ultimately chemi-
cally castrated for being gay.
That led the brilliant visionary
to commit suicide while on the
brink of inventing the computer.
Though that tragedy can never be
undone, at least we live in more
enlightened times, when an icon of
Turing’s order might finally be afforded his due. A well-crafted character study which just might land
the talented Benedict Cumberbatch
a coveted Academy Award. To see a
trailer for The Imitation Game,
visit: https://www.youtube.com/
watch?v=S5CjKEFb-sM
The Imitation Game Poster
Excellent (4 stars)
Rated PG-13
for sexual references,
mature themes and smoking
Distributor: The Weinstein
Company
Brad Pitt Plays Tough Tank Commander in WWII Flick
It is April of 1945, and
the Allies are making major
inroads across the European
t h e a t e r. H o w e v e r , A d o l f
Hitler has responded to the
attrition in the ranks of his
army by exhorting women
and children to take up arms
in a desperate fight to the
death.
This is the state of affairs
a w a i t i n g D o n “ Wa r d a d d y ”
Collier (Brad Pitt) when he
reaches Germany after engagements in Africa, Belgium
and the Netherlands. Sergeant
Collier is the commander of a
Sherman tank that is part of a
battle-hardened armored division being dispatched deep
into enemy territory to help
deliver the coup de grace to
the Nazis.
We meet Wardaddy during a brief pause in the action taken to refuel, to restock ammo and to replace
his recently-deceased “best
damn gunner in the 9 th battalion.” Now, he must make
do with Norman Ellison
(Logan Lerman), a private
with no fighting experience
just plucked out of the typing pool.
The other members of
Collier’s motley crew include
t a n k d r i v e r Tr i n i G a r c i a
(Michael Pena), Bible-thumping Boyd Swan (Shia LaBeouf)
and a good ol’ boy who goes
by Coon-Ass (Jon Benthal).
Their next mission is to rescue some stranded GIs urgently in need of assistance.
But prior to shipping out,
Collier wants to make sure his
greenhorn is ready for the
front. So, he forces him to
shoot a captured SS officer in
the head to show he has no
qualms about killing.
That is the premise established at the outset of
Fury, a fairly gruesome adventure written and directed
by U.S. Navy veteran David
Ay e r ( Tr a i n i n g D a y ) . F a i r
warning: this is a film you
don’t so much watch as endure. Picture the sheer intensity of Saving Private
Ry a n c o u p l e d w i t h t h e v i sual capture of The Thin
Cast of 'Fury' starring Brad Pitt, Shia LaBeouf, Michael
Pena, Jon Bernthal, and Logan Lerman
Red Line, the harrowing
claustrophobia of Das Boot,
and the utter insanity of
Apocalypse Now.
Brad Pitt exudes an endearing combination of confidence and charm as a calm
leader who proves himself
quite capable of generating
a genuine camaraderie
among his men d e s p i t e t h e
cramped quarters and constant close brushes of
death. Moreover, he exhibits an uncanny ingenuity
when forced by circumstances to survive by his
wits as their resources
dwindle.
The meat grinder that was
World War is II convincingly
portrayed from the point-of-view
of a band of brothers who were like
sitting ducks stuck in a sardine can.
To see a trailer for Fury, visit:
h t t p s : / / w w w. y o u t u b e . c o m /
watch?v=q94n3eWOWXM
To order Fury on Blu-ray,
visit: http://www.amazon.com/
exec/obidos/ASIN/
B00OMC0W9G/ref%3dnosim/
thslfofire-20
Blu-ray Extras: 50+ minutes of
deleted and extended scenes;
Director’s Combat Journal; Armored Warriors: The Real Men
inside the Shermans; Taming the
Beast s : H o w t o D r i v e , F i r e
a n d S h o o t i n s i d e a 3 0 - To n
Ta n k ; P h o t o G a l l e r y ; a n d
Blood Brothers.
Excellent (4 stars)
Rated R for sexuality, graphic
violence, grisly images and pervasive profanity.
In English and German with subtitles
Distributor: Sony Pictures
Home
Entertainment
newyorkbeacon.net
Navy Seal Chris Kyle served
four tours as a sniper in Iraq between 2003 and 2008. Over the
course of dangerous deployments to Ramadi, Sadr City,
Fallujah and other hot spots, he
racked up enough kills to become
the most lethal sniper in the history of the U.S. military. Directed by the legendary Clint
Eastwood, American Sniper is a
reverential biopic chronicling the
eagle-eyed sharpshooter’s enviable exploits.
The film is based on Kyle’s
autobiography of the same name,
been forged.
Another focus of the picture is Kyle’s relationship
with his terminally-worried
wife, Taya (Sienna Miller).
She’s raising their kids back
in the States, but often finds
her long-distance phone chats
with her hubby rudely interrupted by everything from
IED explosions to enemy fire.
However, Kyle always attempts to qualm his frazzled
spouse’s fears with calm reassurances that he’ll survive
the ordeal.
This deliberate humanizing
of the soldier at the center of
the story into a tenderhearted
family man is what sets
American Sniper apart from
Kam Williams
and stars Bradley Cooper in the
title role. Besides highlighting
battlefield heroics, the movie
mixes in plenty of poignant flashbacks from the protagonist’s formative years.
For instance, in those early
childhood scenes, we see Kyle
learning to shoot from his father (Ben Reed), nobly protecting his little brother Jeff
(Luke Sunshine) from a playground bully (Brandon Salgado
Telis), and piously pocketing
his dog-eared copy of the
Bible while attending Church
services. These telling tableaus are obviously designed
to provide hints at how such an
exemplary combination of
character and skills might have
BEACON,
Bradley Cooper Stars in Biopic
Chronicling Sharpshooter’s Exploits
BEACON,
newyorkbeacon.net
22
ON THE TUBE with Television Reviewer Audrey J. Bernard
‘The Nightly Show’ with Larry Wilmore debuts on MLKing’s birthday
Ironically, the anxiously
awaited “The Nightly Show” starring Larry Wilmore premiered on
a very important day — the birthday of iconic civil rights leader
Martin Luther King, Jr., Mon.,
Jan. 19, 2015 at 11:30 pm ET on
Comedy Central. The premiere
show did not disappoint and attracted an impressive 963,000
viewers according to Nielsen. In
addition, the freshman show cornered 79 percent of the 1.2 million nocturnal viewers who
watched, and drew an astonishing
577,000 among the valued 18-49
audience. So far, so good for
Wilmore who is the replacement
for Stephen Colbert after he was
selected as successor to the retiring CBS late night star David
Letterman.
I met the charming 53-yearold comedic genius at a media
meet and greet breakfast on his
pristine set blinked out in fashionable grey – the new black —
and sleek chrome décor. We sat
in the audience section consisting of comfortable grey tufted
seats while he told us what viewers can expect from his show.
Wilmore, a former actor, comedian and producer, as well as
a writer for “In Living Color,”
“Sister, Sister” and “The Fresh
Prince of Bel-Air,” and the
former senior Black correspondent on The Daily Show with Jon
Stewart dating back to 2006 will
use headlines as his launch pad
with a panel of guests weighing
in who are cornered with controversial questions in the hilarious
“Keep It 100” segment.
The buzz surrounding the show
is phenomenal and Wilmore will
stick to Stewart’s proven formula.
“His basic idea was there were
lots of underrepresented voices
THE Nightly Show debut guests-(L-R) Contributor Shenaz Treasury, Senator Cory
Booker, host Larry Wilmore, comedian Bill Burr, hip-hop artist-activist Talib
Kweli appear on the debut episode of Comedy Central'
out there that deserve to be heard,”
explained Wilmore in an interview. “He envisioned it as a Daily
Show/panel show, with me hosting. I was surprised he had me in
the middle of the bull’s-eye. My
jaw just kinda dropped. I went,
OK…sure. That sounds great.’”
“The Nightly Show will provide viewers with Wilmore’s
deconstructive point of view
and comedic take on current
events and pop culture. The
late-night show will also
broach topics such as race relations and other things that
people are uncomfortable talking about; and feature a diverse
panel of voices including cont r i b u t o r s S h e n a z Tr e a s u r y,
Attendees at 'The Nightly Show' premiere party at Stone Rose
Lounge
Actress Danielle Brooks
Ricky Velez, Shenaz Treasury,
Mike Yard at premiere party
Ricky Velez, Mike Yard and
guests who offer a perspective
largely missing in the latenight television landscape.”
Presently, Wilmore’s in a
class by himself; and as the only
African American hosting a latenight TV show, he has his work
cut out for him. The last African
American to do so was Arsenio
Hall. Although it was the second
time around for Hall, it was
short-lived as the dog pound
funnyman did not last in a pool
filled with comedic sharks. This
will not be the fate of Wilmore
who was hand-picked by Stewart
who has a proven track record
when it comes to picking thoroughbreds.
“Jon Stewart and I got together
to talk about what we might do
with the slot,” says Kent
Alterman, the president of content, development and original
programming at Comedy Central.
“He had this idea for this show
with Larry as the host, since his
whole career has really built him
toward that moment. Considering Jon’s track record when it
comes to discovering talent,
you’d have to be a real idiot to
argue with him.”
On Thurs., Jan. 22 from 811 p m Wi l m o r e a n d T h e
Nightly Show team mixed and
mingled with a capacity crowd
at the show’s premiere party at
the amazingly beautiful Rose
'The Nightly Show' co-executive
producer Amy Ozols, 'The Nightly
Show' head writer Robon Thede
Jordan Carlos
Host Larry Wilmore on set of
The Nightly Show
St o n e L o u n g e i n t h e Ti m e
Warner building in Columbus
Circle, New York City with its
quintessential view of Central
Park. This was one helluva party
featuring non-stop club music,
plentiful food and booze all night
long. Wilmore was there from start
to finish and took lots of photos
with guests. The consensus was
that he’s a nice and friendly guy
whose sharp and witty sense of humor will take him far. We’ll be
watching!. The #NightlyShow is
also available on: Facebook; Twitter (@NightlyShow); Instagram
(TheNightlyShow); and Tumblr
(nightlyshow.tumblr.com).
(Photo credit: The Nightly Show)
Aasif Mandvi, Larry Wilmore
at Stone Rose Lounge premiere
party
Soledad O'Brien
Amy Holmes
Hasah Minaj
Sasheer Zamata
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Marc Rasbury
SPORTS
Super Bowl can’t be deflated
By Marc Rasbury
Here we have one of the best
Super Bowl match ups in the
nearly five decades of the game
and what are we talking about?
Deflated balls, Really! A New
England Patriots-Seattle Hawks
match up is a dream scenario but
all we are talking about is an obscure rule that did not have that
much of an impact on the game in
question.
I don’t care what ball they
played with, the Pats were going
to kick the Indianapolis Colts
@$$ regardless of the footballs
used. Playing with regulation-
pressured balls was not going to
change the outcome of the AFC
Championship game.
The Patriots were accused of
deflating the Pounds Square
Inch( PSI) on the balls that they
used in the 45-7 mauling of the
Colts in the AFC Championship
Game. Some feel that they took
the footballs in question after
they were approved by the
League Officials and deflated
them by a couple of PSI. That
move according to many experts
allowed QB Tom Brady and their
running backs to grip the ball better. They could have played with
a beach ball and still ran
roughshod over the Colts.
You have experts on both sides
ing for Coach K. “It means a great
deal for me and my family. He has
even more so helped me as a man,
things of that nature, that’s why I
want to be by his side.” Mike
Krzyzewski talked to the team
about the uniqueness of the game. By Andrew Rosario
“He actually said he hasn’t been a
Florham Park, NJ - There
part of a game like this so for
1,000 wins to never be a part of a were no guarantees and no promgame like we just played…it ises. There were no bold predicmeans a lot. His main focus is to tions. There was no calling out
make sure we weren’t stressed other teams or head coaches.
a b o u t i t o r w e w e r e n ’ t When Todd Bowles was named
overhyped, we wanted to come the 18th coach of the New York
h e r e a n d f i n i s h o u r non- Jets last Wednesday (the second
conference schedule undefeated, African American coach hired by
the organization) his press conso he did a great job.”
New York Knicks All-Star For- ference was the antithesis of the
ward Carmelo Anthony was in at- days of Rex Ryan.
Flanked by newly hired Gentendance as Coach K became the
Manager
Mike
first coach in Men’s Division I e r a l
basketball to reach 1,000 wins at Maccagnan and owner Woody
the place where he plays his home Johnson, Bowles was introgames. Anthony spoke about duced to the media and it was
1,000 wins for Coach K after clear from the start that the
a recent victory, and said “1,000 organization wants to put the
days of talking just to make
wins, that’s crazy.”
Melo, who played for Coach K headlines behind them. In fillfor USA Basketball at the 2008 ing both positions, Johnson
and 2012 Olympic Games, where has looked to two individuals
the team was 16-0 and won two w h o a r e l o c a l N e w J e r s e y
gold medals, discussed what products. Bowles attended
makes the coach so special. “His Elizabeth High School while
knowledge for the game, the way M a c c a g n a n i s a n a t i v e o f
he is able to put groups of differ- Highstown, NJ. Both have
ent guys together. How he is able been well aware of the history
to get guys to play, how he is able of the Jets keeping their eyes
to motivate guys to go out there on the local team while makand play, to enjoy the game of bas- ing their way through the NFL.
ketball, work hard, enjoy it and Bowles has come full circle
have fun with the game of basketball, so that was my experience
with him.”
Mike Krzyzewski earns
win 1,000 as Duke tops
St. John at MSG
By Derrel Jazz Johnson
The Duke University Blue Devils trailed the St. John’s Red
Storm 61-51 with 8:35 left in the
second half with Head Coach
Mike Krzyzewski stuck on win
number 999 at Madison Square
Garden. It was a fitting story that
he would earn wins 1,000 at the
World’s Most Famous Arena, but
it appeared unlikely. Duke would
then go on a 21-4 run that gave
them a 72-65 lead and Coach K
earned win number 1,000 of his
Hall of Fame career.
“To win the 1,000th here, you
have to be a lucky guy,”
Krzyzewski said after the game.
“I like my place, Cameron, but
this is a magical place and we
beat a really good team and a storied program.” Legendary St.
John’s head coach Lou
Carnesecca was in attendance.
“They’ll be others that will win
more, but it is kind of neat to be
the first one to 1,000 wins.”
Duke Basketball standout Jahlil
Okafor, who is projected to be
the number one overall draft pick
in the 2015 NBA Draft, and who
is also coveted by the New York
Knicks and their fans alike, spoke
about the win after the game. “It
was very special. This is one of,
if not, the best arena in the
world. It was great to do it in the
same place (Mike Krzyzewski
got win number) 903 and that was
something I watched on TV, so
it’s sort of surreal to think I am
here right now.”
Okafor also talked about play-
Never has a NBA team started
three players that were working
on ten-day contracts. We all
thought Phil Jackson and the
Knicks were giving up on this
campaign when sent JR Smith and
Iman Shumpert packing two
weeks ago. However, Langston
Galloway, Lance Thomas and Lou
Amundsen saw this as an opportunity for them. Now they are
making the most of this opportunity and are rewarding the Knicks
with some inspiring play.
into that investigation they still have
not talked to Brady or Belichick.
Then they released a statement indicating that they have identified a
person of interest who was seen
taking the approved footballs from
the referees’ locker room to another room prior to the start of the
game. They did not mention that he
was only in the second room for
less than two minutes. He could not
alter twelve balls in that period of
time.
All I can say, let’s put this issue
to aside until the Super Bowl is
over and enjoy this game. If the
League finds the Patriots guilty of
breaking this rule, throw the book
at them. But until let’s enjoy this
great match up come Sunday!
Jets name new head coach and GM
as ironically his pro coaching
career began with the Jets as
assistant head and secondary
coach. He made stops in Miami, Philadelphia, Dallas and
Cleveland before becoming
the defensive coordinator for
the past 2 years with Arizona.
It was his success with the Cardinals that put him on the
head-coaching map.
Mike Maccagnan’s path was
similar except from a management perspective. Hired was by
Washington from 1994-2000. He
then moved on to Houston until
this past year. In 2011, his last year
as assistant director of college
scouting, the Texans selected J.J.
Watt. A player considered by
many to be in the running for
MVP.
From the start, it seemed like
Johnson and the organization
were desperate to fill both positions. Head coach names surfaced
even before a general manager
was even considered. To his
credit, Johnson took a step back,
hired consultants Charlie
Casserly and Ron Wolf. At their
suggestions, first Maccagnan was
hired and soon after Bowles was
tapped to lead the team.
Both men, sharply dressed, had
a calm presence in their response
and vision given the current state
of the team. Not making the playoffs the last 4 years is the cloud
currently hanging over the organization. Dealing with QB Geno
Smith will be a top priority as well
as drafting players that hopefully
will make an immediate impact.
Something the organization has
failed miserably over the last
couple of years. Said Bowles of
Smith, “obviously, he was a great
college quarterback. We’re going
to evaluate Geno as well as everybody on the team.” Putting points
on the board has been an issue for
the team. Bowles hopes the hiring
of Chan Gailey will help resolve
that issue. “We have an offensive
coordinator that’s going to call the
plays and run the show. We have to
do what’s best for our team and play
complimentary football.”
The New York Jets after 6 years
of Rex Ryan’s failed predictions
have clearly gone in the opposite
direction in the hiring of Todd
Bowles. There will be no guarantees any promises. There will be no
bold predictions or calling out
other teams or head coaches. For
now, the Jets are looking to become
something they have not been in the
last 4 years. A playoff team.
Brooklyn Nets have become walking wounded
The Knicks’ ten-day triplets
By Marc Rasbury
of the fence claiming that the deflated balls were an advantage or
not an advantage according to
whom you listen to. Just look at
that score and you could see that
it was not that much of an advantage. Moreover, the footballs in
question were confiscated and replaced with regulated footballs
after halftime and that is when the
Pats blew the game wide open.
Coach Bill Belichick, Tom
Brady and even Owner Robert
Kraft all held press conferences
where they have vehemently denied knowing anything about
someone in the organization deflating the balls. The League has
launched one of their infamous
internal investigations. A week
Do you think that it is a coincidence that Knicks have gone on 31 run since these guys have been
part of Head Coach Derek
Fisher’s rotation. I know they beat
a depleted Pelican squad, the
Sixers and the Magic, but a win is
a win. No one was feeling sorry
for the Knicks when Carmelo Anthony and Amar’e Stoudemire
were out nursing sore knees. All I
know is that three weeks ago the
Knicks would have found a way to
lose those games. What is the dif(CONTINUED ON PAGE 16)
By Derrel Jazz Johnson
On Friday, January 2 nd , the
Brooklyn Nets stood at 16-16
after defeating the Orlando
Magic and had won six out of
seven games. Less than four
weeks later, the team is struggling on and off the court.
The Nets have lost 10 out
of their last 12, and have lost
those games in many different
ways. They lost a tough overtime
game to the Dallas Mavericks in
overtime at home, and lost a
tough game in Miami to the Heat
by four. But they have also lost
to bottom feeders of the Eastern Conference, the Boston
Celtics and Philadelphia
76ers. Worse, after winning
their first game on their threegame road trip out west, the
Nets were embarrassed in
back-to-back games getting
pummeled by the Los Angeles
Clippers and Utah Jazz, giving
up a combined 231 points, losing by a combined 64 points.
The struggles follow the
Nets off the court as well.
Sharpshooter Mirza Teletovic
is out for the season after being diagnosed with blood clots
after experiencing breathing
problems, and Deron Williams, the former All-Star who
has struggled with various in-
jury problems, has been out
since January 7th with an injury
to his ribs.
Surprisingly, the Nets are
only a half-game out of the playoffs in a mediocre Eastern Conference, and if they can get a
healthy Williams back while
continuing to manage the health
of center Brook Lopez, the
team should have enough talent
to make it to the playoffs. As
an eight or even seven seed, they
would almost certainly be
eliminated in the first round, and
with a roster filled with talented
players, would once again finish
a season being looked upon as
underachievers.

Racist history of modern police unions

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