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Minority businesses explore oil, gas opportunities
May 12, 2013 - Construction contractor Gary Barton watches trucks haul stone to gas and oil drilling sites and asks how he can get a bite of that business.
His Akron-based B&G Masonry Remodeling & Construction has had just a small taste so far, a couple of driveway and landscaping jobs in Carrollton for customers who had extra cash thanks to the money drillers have pumped into the local economy. Read more at timesreporter.com.
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In entire Supreme Court term, justices see 1 black lawyer
May 12, 2013 - In roughly 75 hours of arguments at the Supreme Court since October, only one African-American lawyer appeared before the justices, and for just over 11 minutes.
The numbers were marginally better for Hispanic lawyers. Four of them argued for a total of 1 hour, 45 minutes. Read more at blackpoliticsontheweb.com.
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On Benghazi, It’s Time To Give It Up, Turn It Loose, GOP
March 9, 2013 - Dear Republicans: I know that in your mind, Benghazi is all the rage out here on these streets, or at the very least, ought to be. However, I need to inform y’all (for the umpteenth time) that Benghazi is not going to be the big Democratic-hurting scandal you want it to be. No matter how hard you try, the give-a-damn quotient has been reached by the public at large and there is no reset button.
Yes, we mourn the loss of those who were killed in the attack, and of course, if there’s any connection to terrorist organizations, as hinted by some, that information should be released. But as far as this angle to smear members of the Obama administration — okay, Hillary Clinton — goes, it’s never going to be as big a deal as desired. Read more at newsone.com.
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Malcolm Shabazz, Grandson Of Malcolm X, Dead At 28
May 10, 2013 - Juan Ruiz, a member of the California-based labor organization Rumec, told Talking Points Memo that Shabazz was in Mexico City with Miguel Suarez at the time of his murder.
Earlier reports claimed that he was in Tijuana. Read more at newsone.com.
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Pat Robertson: Planned Parenthood Founder Had Plan To 'Lead The Black People Toward Euthanasia'
May 9, 2013 - Televangelist Pat Robertson slammed Planned Parenthood founder Margaret Sanger on Wednesday, saying her writings advocated a plan to drive minorities "toward euthanasia."
"Go back and read her writings," Robertson said on "The 700 Club." "What Margaret Sanger believed was there were defective, genetically defective people. They were Roman Catholics, they were evangelical protestants, they were Southern Europeans, they were Latinos and especially, they were African Americans." Read more at huffingtonpost.com.
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Shonda Rhimes Wants To Make A Show About 'A Woman Carrying A Gun And Kicking People's Butts'
May 9, 2013 - Shonda Rhimes, the woman who brought the world McDreamy and Olivia Pope -- and brought ABC some super high ratings -- does not appreciate when her work is written off as "girly."
“It’s superinsulting that because Olivia is a woman, and the girl who wrote ‘Grey’s Anatomy’ wrote this, it must be for chicks,” Rhimes told journalist Willa Paskin in a New York Times Magazine profile running in this weekend's issue. “Like if it’s geared for women, it’s somehow not as serious as if it’s geared for men.” Read more at huffingtonpost.com.
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Obama Dinner With House Democrats Fails To Produce Strategic Breakthrough
May 9, 2013 - Over a two-and-a-half hour dinner at the Jefferson Hotel in downtown Washington Wednesday night, President Barack Obama and nine House Democrats tried to game out a way to pass a policy agenda through a Congress best known for passing nothing.
Those who attended acknowledged that there are few, if any, good options. The dinner meeting -- the latest bit of congressional wooing by Obama -- helped illuminate the issues the party wants to focus on in the months and years ahead. But it didn't spark any outside-the-box plans to turn those issues into laws. Read more at huffingtonpost.com.
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Black immigrants waiting for reform, too
May 9, 2013 - Recently, thousands of people gathered in Washington D.C. in front of the Capitol to demand comprehensive immigration reform which includes a pathway to citizenship and a cessation of the indiscriminate criminalization of undocumented immigrants. ColorOfChange.org preceded this action by launching a campaign last month aimed at widening the discourse around immigration reform, calling on the Senate’s “Gang of 8″ to end the criminalization of our communities and write immigration reform that protects the rights of all immigrants. Read more at thegrio.com.
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Phaedra Parks and Apollo Nida of ‘Real Housewives of Atlanta’ welcome a baby boy
May 9, 2013 - US Weekly just learned that “Real Housewives of Atlanta’s” Phaedra Parks and Apollo Nida just dropped their bun in the oven! A source told the mag that Phaedra gave birth to the couple’s second son today in Atlanta and, “Mom and baby are doing great.”
Thank God all that drama on the three RHOA reunions didn’t affect Phaedra and Apollo’s little bundle! Though there aren’t any details on the name or the baby’s weight, we’re sure he’s a cutie just like the couple’s 2-year-old son Ayden, and we can only imagine how the southern belle will spoil the new prince in the house. Read more at thegrio.com.
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Black Voter Turnout Passes Whites In 2012 Election, A First In Census History
May 8, 2013 - Making history, America's blacks voted at higher rates than whites in 2012, lifting Democrat Barack Obama to victory amid voter apathy, particularly among young people, new census data show. Despite increasing population, the number of white voters declined for the first time since 1996.
Blacks were the only race or ethnic group to show an increase in voter turnout in November, most notably in the Midwest and Southeastern U.S., the Census Bureau said Wednesday. The analysis, based on a sample survey of voters last year, is viewed as the best source of government data on turnout by race and ethnicity. Read more at huffingtonpost.com.
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Assata Shakur was convicted of murder. Is she a terrorist?
May 8, 2013 - In a grainy video, a woman with flowing dreadlocks strolls through a market in Cuba, smelling spices and smiling at the camera. In another scene, she is wearing a black T-shirt, her long hair parted to reveal the words “framed, jailed, exile.”
In the video, Assata Shakur’s voice is high-pitched and soft, out of sync with the fact that she is a notorious fugitive convicted of the murder of a New Jersey state trooper. The footage comes from a documentary filmed in Cuba where Shakur — a.k.a. Joanne Deborah Chesimard — has lived since the early 1980s under political asylum. It is a celebration of her radical politics. In it she calls herself a revolutionary seeking freedom for “my people.” Read more at washingtonpost.com.
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Marco McMillian's Family Demands Answers After Mississippi Candidate Slain
May 9, 2013 - Relatives of a slain Mississippi mayoral candidate are renewing their push for a federal investigation.
Clarksdale mayoral candidate Marco McMillian's body was found Feb. 27.
The case drew national attention after his campaign said he was the first viable, openly gay candidate for office in Mississippi. Read more at huffingtonpost.com.
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Flavor Flav Felony Trial Set For September
May 8, 2013 - It seems the clock around Flavor Flav's neck is ticking, as he'll soon have to face the felony assault with a weapon and child endangerment charges resting on his shoulders.
According to Billboard, a Las Vegas judge has scheduled the 54-year-old’s trial date for September 30. During his arraignment on Tuesday, which was originally postponed last month due to his induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame, the rapper, whose real name is Jonathan Drayton Jr., reportedly pled not guilty to charges accusing him of chasing and threatening his longtime girlfriend's 17-year-old son with a butcher knife during an argument last October. Read more at huffingtonpost.com.
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Health And Hip Hop: Rap Industry Shifts Priorities After Recent Deaths
May 7, 2013 - Hip-hop may need a checkup.
The culture that in the 1990s lost its brightest stars to gun violence has in recent years seen a series of notable rappers die of drug- and health-related causes. Since 2011, hip-pop pioneer Heavy D, singer and rap chorus specialist Nate Dogg and New York rapper Tim Dog all died of ailments in their 40s. Kris Kross rapper Chris Kelly was found dead last week in Atlanta of a suspected drug overdose at 34. Read more at huffingtonpost.com.
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Attorney Who Advised Kiera Be Charged With Felony, Drops Charges In White Teen’s Fatal Case Days Later
May 8, 2013 - Assistant State Attorney Tammy Glotfelty, who advised Officer Gregory Rhoden to charge 16-year-old Kiera Wilmot with a felony, has some explaining to do. Just days after doling out a stiff charge for Kiera, Glotfelty decided not to bring any charges against White 13-year-old Taylor Richardson, who mistakenly killed his younger brother with a BB gun, because she deemed his case was a “tragic accident.” Read more at newsone.com.
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Fantasia says ‘American Idol’ needs new judges
May 8, 2013 - Since winning “American Idol” in 2004, Fantasia Barrino has been one of R&B’s strongest voices and among the most accomplished singers in the genre.
The North Carolina native has put out 4 award-winning albums and has been praised for her role as “Ms. Celie” in the Broadway production of The Colored Purple. With her latest album Side Effects of You in stores now, Fantasia chatted with theGrio about her career and if “Idol” still has star making power. Read more at thegrio.com.
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First trailer for Lee Daniels’ ‘The Butler’ released
May 8, 2013 - Starring Academy Award winner Forest Whitaker as Cecil Gaines, the movie is based on the life of Eugene Allen, a White House employee who served eight different presidents throughout the 20th Century.
Oprah Winfrey plays the wife of Whitaker’s character, marking her first movie role since Beloved in 1998. Read more at thegrio.com.
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Charlie Crist: I support gay marriage
May 8, 2013 - Potential/likely Democratic gubernatorial candidate Charlie Crist is taking some heat for having backed a Florida gay marriage ban during his 2006 Republican primary for governor. Tonight he posted the following on Facebook:
Some great news: On Tuesday, Delaware became the 11th state to allow marriage equality. And just a few days ago, Rhode Island adopted a similar measure, which followed victories last fall in Maine, Maryland and Washington. I most certainly support marriage equality in Florida and look forward to the day it happens here. Read more at tampabay.com.
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Is Jada Pinkett Smith Hollywood’s Most Radical (And Awesome) Parent?
May 8, 2013 - I remember vividly the first time I came to know the name Jada Pinkett. It was in the last days of “A Different World,” when the “The Cosby Show ” spin-off sitcom set on a Historically Black College campus was struggling to keep its freshness as it transitioned in to the early 90′s. Beloved characters Dwayne Wayne & Whitley Gilbert were all grown-up and professional, and the show’s once authentic connection to college life, youth culture and energy was dwindling. Insert Jada Pinkett’s Lena James, a powerful pint-sized freshman who boomed with energy and breathed new life in to cast. She joins the cast as a freshman, Lena James, introducing her self to the common area with a not so humble solo step routine: “L to the E, to the N, to the A, Step off, you ain’t getting no play!” From that moment on, in my 9 year-old mind, I was pretty sure I wanted to be her. She exemplified the spirit of what largely came to define the creative Black experience in the 90′s: loud, colorful and unapologetically proud. That was 20 years ago. Read more at hellobeautiful.com.
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Despite Scandal, Ex-SC Gov. Mark Sanford Back In Office
May 8, 2013 - Four years after scandal derailed his political career, ex-Republican Gov. Mark Sanford once again holds a South Carolina political office, winning back his old congressional seat Tuesday after a race in which he battled his past and an opponent who outdid him in fundraising.
Sanford’s resurrection was completed when he defeated Democrat Elizabeth Colbert Busch, the sister of political satirist Stephen Colbert, in a district that hasn’t elected a Democratic congressman in more than three decades. Read more at newsone.com.
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