The article in The Atlantic, linked above, features the work of Richard Sander, who has been arguing for a while now that AA in law schools hurts black people. Most people who study this, though, have come to the opposite conclusion; the bulk of the research shows that folks admitted into elite law schools via [...]
Obama is an individual who is both black and white. I mean, why is this so difficult to get? Americans are infected with a type of dichotomous, either/or frame of reference. This makes it really hard to have discussions about anything … much less race, one of the more complex issues in this country. I [...]
In some ways, Obama’s courtship of African American voters is reminiscent of the way white liberal Democrats have tried to gain black support. Kennedy’s 1960 campaign, for example, was adept at reaching out to the African American electorate through channels unseen by average white voters. At the same time, Kennedy routinely went out of his [...]
When it comes to refining vocabulary, I often think it’s better to inject history back into a term (sorry to be Barthesian, but the erasure of history is typically how terms lose their basic meaning) than to coin a new one. Why? Because people who don’t get where ‘Black’ comes from or the idea that [...]
You know, I feel for the Muslim community in this, in part because my lack of religious belief is treated pretty much the same way when it comes to being addressed by politicians. Atheists are at least as invisible as Muslims to mainstream politicians. There are twice as many Muslims serving in the US House [...]
Im sorry, but whether you like ralph nader or not, he is generally correct that Obama is your traditional democrat on most issue–especially those economic.
Be honest, is an advisory team of cutler, liebman, goolsbee, and furman the group that will–or even wants to–destroy entrenched urban poverty.
I too have worked in Chicago’s ghettos, and while I [...]
Again some poll claims to know what Black people think. Miss Hillary was told by Rangel and the New York Congressional group that put her in the Senate there to stand down or twist in the wind by her own damn self. Barack put the smackdown on her. It’s his Party now. What role she [...]
When I think of my father, I think of a dynamic, tyrannical consistency. He cut his children off at every pass, and his message was terrifying: “I am bigger than you, stronger than you and smarter than you. I will win.” We felt a constant pressure, a pervading sense that ending up as a nothing [...]
The Santogold stuff along with J*Davey and Janelle Monáe I find pretty thin. I can’t quite put my finger on it but there is something disingenuous about what they do. I can understand the desire of black folks of a certain age to want a subcultural adolescence outside of hip hop and soul. I also [...]
