National

It has been a year and a half since the fateful night a New Year’s celebration turned deadly for a 22-year-old Black man in California.  He wasn’t engaged in a gang transaction gone wrong, nor was he evading police or hiding somewhere as a fugitive.  No, Oscar Grant was handcuffed face down on the ground with a police officer’s knee pinning his neck when another cop decided to draw his weapon and shoot him in the back.  The single bullet ended his young life as his friends and a train station full of people watched on in horror.  And now, on the heels of a verdict in the trial against the accused officer, Johannes Mehserle, the revulsion only intensifies.

Where the hell is PETA? Yeah i said it? Lemme repeat that incase I was misunderstood.. Where is PETA? You know them, the People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals... Where are those guys around this Gulf Oil Spill Issue?

For many of us this disaster didn't hit home until we started seeing dead turtles and pelicans immersed in oil come washing up on our shores. I mean we lost 11 people and for the majority of us, it was in one ear and out the other..

I've written pretty extensively about the various attempts to divide Black and Brown communities over the immigration issue. At the root of this are racists who hate both Black and Brown but will conveniently show up and suggest to either group why they should hate and distrust the other. Blacks are often told that Browns are taking away jobs and that gangs on the west coast are attacking us indiscriminately.

In the wake of Texas Education Agency proposing that we eliminate historic figures like first African American Supreme Courtt Justice Thurgood Marshall from our textbooks, maybe nows the time to make some new history and get behind the push the Congressional Black Caucus is mounting to replace retiring justice John Paul Stevens. We say this with a bit of tongue and cheek, but in all seriousness all of us should be paying close attention to this process and advocating for who we like.