NNPA STORIES -
http://www.nnpa.org/news/lead/lawmakers-ponder-fiscal-cliff-blacks-already-in-poverty-ditch-by-freddie-allen/http://www.nnpa.org/news/lead/malcontents-move-to-secede-from-the-u-s-by-phillip-johnson/
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EXCLUSIVE
WILMINGTON TEN PROSECUTOR
CALLED “DELUSIONAL” FOR
DEFENDING “FRAMEUP”
By Cash Michaels
Staff writer
Saying
that former New Hanover County prosecutor James Jay Stroud is “delusional” for
still defending his “frame-up” of the Wilmington Ten forty years ago, Dr.
Benjamin Chavis, leader of the Ten, and others in the pardons effort, maintain
that Stroud’s recent remarks in a StarNews
interview this week are further evidence, beyond his own recently
discovered handwritten trial notes documenting his attempt to racially
gerrymander the jury and cause a mistrial, that pardons of innocence from Gov.
Perdue are well deserved.
“Facts
are facts, and it is an irrefutable fact that all the members of the Wilmington
Ten were completely innocent in 1972 of the racially-motivated framed-up
charges filed against us by prosecutor Jay Stroud,” Dr. Chavis told The Wilmington Journal exclusively late
Wednesday evening.
“It is a fact that the 4th Circuit
U.S. Court of Appeals overturned our unjust convictions on December 4, 1980.
Today in 2012, we, the Wilmington Ten, are still
innocent of Stroud's unjust and illegal fabrication,” Dr. Chavis maintained.
In
a StarNews interview reportedly
conducted in October, but only published Wednesday online after the NCNAACP’s
Tuesday press conference in Raleigh calling upon Gov. Beverly Perdue to pardon
the Wilmington Ten, Stroud was reportedly shown copies of his handwritten notes
from the June 1972 trial by a reporter, and confirmed their authenticity.
But
the former prosecutor denied that racism, as the NCNAACP maintains, played any
role in his jury selection. The “KKK…good” reference he wrote in variations
next to several white potential jurors’ names on the legal pad, for example,
“…was a strike against the juror because of the potential of a hung jury,” the
story said.
“I
could have had an all-white jury, but I didn’t want to do that,” Stroud told the StarNews. “Why would I leave a KKK
on the jury?”
That
rhetorical question runs counter to the written record.
The
StarNews apparently failed to
challenge Stroud on other written notations showing that he approved of several
white potential jurors if they did have Ku Klux Klan attitudes.
Next
to potential juror #6 Stroud wrote, “Heath (O.K.) (KKK?).” Number 28 he wrote,
“(probably o.k.) if white.”
And
potential juror number 52 named “Bryant,” prosecutor Stroud wrote, “(KKK)
good.”
Stroud’s
negative ratings for potential jurors were unmistakable. Next to several on his
list, especially if they had a “B” written in front of their names or numbers,
Stroud wrote, “Leave off” or “stay away from,” but never “good.”
Stroud
further told the StarNews that he
wanted “conservative blacks” on the jury, later specifying that “Uncle
Tom-type” means, “blacks that could be fair.”
But
the StarNews apparently didn’t ask
Stroud why he wrote “Stay away from black men” at the top of one of his jury
selection notes, or didn’t want black jurors from certain towns in Pender
County, where that trial had been moved to.
Because
a jury of ten blacks and two whites was finally impaneled during the June 1972
trial, Stroud, citing “illness,” forced a mistrial to get a jury and judge more
to his favor, the NCNAACP says. His own handwritten notes on the back of a
legal pad, weighing the advantages and disadvantages of a mistrial, betrayed
his intent, the civil rights organization says.
But
in its interview, the StarNews
apparently never asked Stroud about his written mistrial calculations, which
included getting a different judge.
It
was in the second trial in September that year –with a jury this time of ten
whites and two blacks - that the nine African-American males, led by civil
rights activist Rev. Benjamin Chavis, and one white female, were falsely
convicted for conspiracy in the firebombing of a white-owned grocery store
during racial violence in Wilmington in February 1971.
They were all sentenced to 282 years in
prison, some of which they served, before they were released from prison early
after immense public pressure.
In
the StarNews article, former
prosecutor Stroud still maintained that despite a federal appellate court’s
1980 ruling – which not only overturned all of the Wilmington Ten’s
convictions, but also cited him specifically for gross prosecutorial misconduct
– the Wilmington Ten were guilty, and deserved to go to prison.
“They
got more than a fair deal as far as I’m concerned,” Stroud was quoted as
telling the Wilmington newspaper. “I think they should have had to serve their
sentences like any other convicted felon.”
Ironically, in that same StarNews article where
Stroud is convinced that the Wilmington Ten couldn’t have possibly been
anything but guilty, he adamantly agreed that prosecutorial frame-ups do exist.
Against
him.
When
asked about his twelve convictions over the past six years, mostly in Gaston
County, for charges ranging from domestic violence, to repeatedly ramming cars
because, Stroud told a judge, “Satan was with [the drivers],” Stroud, who lost
his license to practice law in 2008, told the StarNews, “I am not guilty of any of the
charges that were leveled against me as stated in the warrants. All of the
charges were false and fabricated."
Jay
Stroud did serve time in jail for several of those charges. He told the Gaston Gazette in 2011 that he’s suffered from a bipolar disorder since his time in college.
Attorney
Irving Joyner, who, along with James Ferguson, the lead defense attorney forty
years ago for the Wilmington Ten, filed the pardon petition papers last May
requesting that Gov. Beverly Perdue grant pardons of actual innocence to each
member of the Wilmington Ten, was resolute.
“We have
never presented any information regarding the Wilmington Ten case which has not
been fully vetted and determined to be absolutely accurate,” Joyner, who
is also a law professor at North Carolina Central University’s School of Law in
Durham, said late Wednesday night.
“Jay Stroud did no more than acknowledge
the obvious with respect to his authorship of the racially inspired efforts to
prevent African-Americans from serving on the Wilmington Ten jury. In the same
handwriting, he also described his successful effort to fake an illness,
misrepresent his medical condition to the Court, and to deliberately perpetrate
a fraud in Court, a criminal offense,” Joyner continued.
“The comments
and notes, which Stroud made, speak for themselves, and further support
the obvious conclusion that the persecution of the Wilmington Ten was
racially inspired and constitutionally deficient.”
“It is now up to the Governor of North
Carolina,” Joyner said, “to
determine whether she is going to correct an injustice, or stand on the side of
a racist and illegal persecution in the name of the State of North
Carolina.”
Renowned UNC
– Chapel Hill criminal law Professor Richard Rosen, in his letter to Gov.
Beverly Perdue supporting pardons of innocence for the Wilmington Ten, wrote, “It has been clear for decades that the
Wilmington Ten defendants were innocent of all of the charges brought against
them, and were the victims of a politically motivated prosecution brought at a
time of acute racial friction.”
“The
key prosecution witnesses have long since recanted their testimony,” Prof.
Rosen continued. “All of the defendants in this case claimed that they were
innocent from the very moment of arrest, and most turned down lenient plea
bargains offered by the prosecution, leading to the subsequent lengthy prison
terms. [Four] of them are now
dead, and all have struggled to repair their lives.”
In addition, Michael Carmichael, a former public information officer with the NC State Attorney General’s Office at the time of the Wilmington Ten case, says Stroud's prosecution was without foundation from start to finish.
“The Wilmington Ten were railroaded to jail in a kangaroo court where the eyewitnesses were all teenaged felons who had been bribed, coerced and coached to perjure themselves,” Carmichael wrote in a comment to a story in the Raleigh News & Observer this week. “[The witnesses’] testimony was rehearsed. The federal court ruled that not one shred of evidence links any of the defendants to the crime.”
At
Tuesday’s NCNAACP press conference, veteran civil rights attorney told
reporters the trial tactics Stroud used were illegal, and that the State Bureau
of Investigation should look into the matter, and then put the former
prosecutor in jail.
Stroud’s
defiant attitude didn’t not surprise Wilmington Ten member Wayne Moore, who
says that Stroud’s dogged campaign to persecute Moore and the nine other young
civil rights activists ultimately led to his own professional downfall.
“From the beginning, Stroud’s colleagues
in Wilmington, including head prosecutor Alan Cobb, knew that Stroud was up to
no good,” Moore, 60, said in an email statement from Michigan Wednesday
evening. “Following the Wilmington Ten case, Stroud was ostracized from
practicing law in New Hanover County.”
“He was an ambitious young attorney who didn't care who he
hurt along the way, including his [boss],” Moore, who spent several years in
prison because of Stroud, added.
“Stroud's
latest admissions of his zeal to unjustly convict us is just another fact why
the Wilmington Ten should be granted a pardon of innocence by Governor Perdue,”
W-Ten leader Dr. Benjamin Chavis says. “Stroud is still delusional forty years
later about basic fairness and equality under the law.”
“I pray that Stroud will one day find it in his heart to
repent for the wrong that he has done with respect to the Wilmington Ten.”
NC
NAACP Pres. Rev. William Barber, who blasted Stroud Tuesday for his
“unconstitutional” and “racist” tactics to “frame” the Wilmington Ten, found
his StarNews comments justification
for singling the former prosecutor out for further condemnation.
“The
more we learn the truths about how race polluted and poisoned the unjust,
unconstitutional and unethical prosecutorial acts utilized on this case by
Stroud, to frame and falsely convict these young people, the more disturbing
they are,” Rev. Barber exclusively told The
Wilmington Journal Wednesday evening.
“We have a crooked prosecutor who
fostered a crooked persecution of innocent individuals, who now wants to admit
on one hand his actions, and then on the other hand engage in a distressing revisionist
rationale as to why he did what he did. NC must see all of these facts for what
they are and represent---- calculated and sinister racism used in our court system.”
Rev. Barber continued, “Only a pardon can begin to cleanse
the depth of wrong being further revealed.”
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NC NAACP BLASTS
“RACIST” ACTIONS
OF WILMINGTON TEN
PROSECUTOR ON
By Cash Michaels
Editor
In
an effort to define both the moral and legal arguments for Gov. Beverly Perdue
to grant pardons of innocence to the Wilmington Ten, the NC NAACP Tuesday
focused on the now infamous, and many say “illegal” behavior of prosecutor
James “Jay” Stroud during the trials forty years ago.
In
fact, veteran civil rights attorney Al McSurely told reporters during Tuesday’s
NAACP press conference that the
State Bureau of Investigation should probe Stroud’s alleged racial jury
gerrymandering, and his calculated “illness” that forced a mistrial in the
first June 1972 Wilmington Ten trial.
“This
is direct evidence, and this evidence should put Mr. Stroud in jail,” attorney
McSurely declared.
Stroud feigned sickness because he didn’t think he could win with a jury of ten blacks and two whites, his own handwritten notes reveal.
Stroud feigned sickness because he didn’t think he could win with a jury of ten blacks and two whites, his own handwritten notes reveal.
When
prosecutor Stroud got both a judge, and a jury – ten whites and two blacks –
that were more to his liking for the second trial in Sept. 1972, that’s when he
was able to falsely convict the Wilmington Ten of conspiracy in connection with
the racial violence that struck the port city in February 1971.
"We rarely get such direct evidence of prosecutorial
racism in jury selection," Rev. William J. Barber, president of the North
Carolina NAACP, told reporters at First Baptist Church in Raleigh. "The
prosecutor is ethically bound to put justice over winning. District Attorneys
represent all the people in North Carolina, not
just white people in North Carolina.”
Frequently
referring to large poster blowups of pages from the Stroud legal pad where the
prosecutor wrote to “stay away from black men” during jury selection for the
first trial; put a “B” next to the names and/or numbers of prospective black
jurors; and wrote “KKK…good” for white jurors he liked and “Uncle Tom type”
next to black jurors he would accept, Rev. Barber went on to detail how
methodically prosecutor Stroud was in trying to racially gerrymander the jury.
"If
this direct evidence had been available for the Fourth Circuit [US Court of
Appeals, which overturned the Wilmington Ten convictions in Dec. 1980],"
Rev. Barber commented, "I believe they would have recommended prosecuting
the prosecutor." "The new evidence is a nightmare. It's a
nightmare to see evidence of this District Attorney committing such egregious
acts of hate on behalf of the citizens of North Carolina. The evidence clearly
reveals the injustice that took place in the conviction of the Wilmington 10
and the entrenched racism that polluted the process. North Carolina needs to repent
and cleanse itself of this tragic misuse of power in our judicial system."
Attorney
Irv Joyner, chair of the NCNAACP Legal Redress Committee and attorney for the
Wilmington Ten Pardons of Innocence Project, said even without the Stroud
files, the evidence that the Wilmington Ten are innocent of all crimes they
were convicted for is overwhelming.
The
Stroud files just add fuel to the fire that further proves that the state of
North Carolina framed the Ten because of their civil rights activism, not for
any crimes the state accused them of committing, he said
Both
Joyner and Rev. Barber urged Gov. Perdue to grant pardons of innocence to all
members of the Wilmington Ten, four of whom have since died.
In an interview published Wednesday in StarNewsOnline.com, Stroud confirmed that the damning handwritten notes were his, but denied any racial intent in his jury selection notations. He added that he still felt the Wilmington Ten were guilty, but denied any guilt at all for the many crimes he's been convicted and sent to jail for for the past six years.
Stroud lost his law license in 2008.
In an interview published Wednesday in StarNewsOnline.com, Stroud confirmed that the damning handwritten notes were his, but denied any racial intent in his jury selection notations. He added that he still felt the Wilmington Ten were guilty, but denied any guilt at all for the many crimes he's been convicted and sent to jail for for the past six years.
Stroud lost his law license in 2008.
The Carolinian, and other
African-American member newspapers of the National Newspaper Publishers
Association – the sponsor of the Wilmington Ten pardons of innocence effort -
first and exclusively reported about the Stroud files last September after
attorney Irving Joyner, law professor at the North Carolina Central University
School of Law; and James Ferguson, longtime lead defense attorney for the
Wilmington Ten, revealed the contents of the Stroud files at a forum at the law
school.
With
the exception of an Oct. 28th Associated
Press article which mentioned the Stroud files, this week was the first
time that the mainstream press en masse statewide actually focused on the
story.
In
their reporting, it was revealed that New Hanover County District Attorney Ben
David admitted that he turned over a box of materials labeled “Wilmington Ten”
to Duke University historian Prof. Timothy Tyson several years ago. Prof. Tyson
was doing research for a book about the Wilmington Ten case.
In
that box were the files of former New Hanover County Assistant District
Attorney James Stroud, and the infamous yellow legal pad that has been the
center of so much controversy.
In
February of this year, Prof. Tyson allowed the Wilmington Ten Pardons of
Innocence Project access to the materials, which were all public record.
During
the spring and summer, attorneys Joyner and Ferguson, who had filed the legal
petition with the Governor’s Office of Executive Clemency, extensively
researched the entire file to authenticate every document against the court
record.
They
revealed their findings last September.
Prof. Tyson, a Senior Research Scholar at
the Center for Documentary Studies at Duke University in Durham, says the
Stroud files are now located at the Southern
Historical Association at UNC in the Timothy B. Tyson Papers section.
Last
week, the national NAACP launched a nationwide online petition for the
Wilmington Ten pardon effort. Officials say they expect to garner at least
10,000 signatures by the end of this week.
Here
in North Carolina, thousands of petition signatures – both hard copy and online
– will be calculated this weekend and delivered to the Governor’s Office next
week.
The
Wilmington Ten Pardons of Innocence Project is still encouraging those who want
to continue to support the effort to write Governor Beverly Perdue, and send
their letters to:
The
Honorable Beverly Eaves Perdue
Governor of
North Carolina
116 West Jones
St.
Raleigh,
North Carolina 27603
Letters should be sent by Dec. 15th.
A spokesperson for Gov. Perdue says while she
will be stepping down by January 5th, 2013, there is no timetable
between then and now for the governor to make her pardons decision.
Indeed, it could be the last thing Gov. Perdue
does as she leaves office.
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[FOR BOX]
The
first African-American woman ever to serve on North Carolina’s highest court
will be stepping down shortly, allowing outgoing Gov. Beverly Perdue to now make
an appointment to the NC Supreme Court before she leaves office Jan. 5th.
Published
reports say Justice Patricia Timmons-Goodson, 58, has filed her papers to step down, and
told colleagues on the seven-member court of her departure. She was first appointed to the High
Court by then Gov. Mike Easley in 2006, and then won election to an eight-year
term later that year. Her term ends in 2014. Timmons-Goodson previously served
as a state district court judge and a NC Appellate Court judge.
At
press time Wednesday, Gov. Perdue praised Justice Timmons-Goodson for her many
years of service to the state and the criminal justice system.
-30-
TRIANGLE NEWS BRIEFS
RADIO STATION
APOLOGIZES FOR RACIST PARADE DISPLAY
An
area FM radio station is finding itself on the short end of bad public
relations after featuring a black man hanging from a tow truck, dressed in a
fairy dress with wings, during the recent Raleigh Christmas Parade. Radio
station G-105FM is apologizing for the racist stunt by its morning man Bob
Dumas, who hosts the station’s daily “Showgram” show. Dumas was quoted as
calling the black fairy figure, “Tyrone the Black Christmas Fairy who was going
to turn crackers into Beyonce.” A station official said “poor judgment “
accounted for the racist stunt.
Raleigh
Mayor Nancy McFarlane didn’t find it funny, saying that racism will not be
tolerated in Raleigh. She apparently told reps from G-105FM that when she met
with them recently. Meanwhile the Greater Raleigh Merchants Association, the
group that sponsors the annual Raleigh Christmas Parade, said it will now
tighten up standards on what is allowed in what is supposed to be a community
family event.
RALEIGH MOTORISTS!
BEWARE OF FAKE PARKING TICKETS
City
officials say someone is placing fake parking notices on the windshields of
cars in West Raleigh, demanding that drivers pay overdue fees totaling $476.
The notices have the City of Raleigh emblem and have “Parking Violations Bureau”
on them. Luckily, the scammers listed a website, a toll free number and two
post office boxes for payments, none of which either work or exist. If you have
any information about who may be behind this, Raleigh police ask that you call
them at 919-996-3335.
-30-
STATE NEWS BRIEFS FOR
11-29-12
MINISTER URGES ALL TO
“BOYCOTT SANTA’S COST”
[Oxford]
An activist minister is urging all who celebrate Christmas not to go broke this
holiday season, but rather teach their children the true reason for the season.
Min. Curtis E. Gatewood, head of the Faith, Hope and Justice Ministries in
Oxford, has kicked off “Operation Boycott Santa’s Costs,” his way of warning
families not to spend beyond their means for Christmas, and instead teach their
children the biblical story of the birth of Jesus Christ. “Santa is only a face
the commercialists hide behind to rob us blind spiritually and financially,”
Gatewood says. He adds if you must spend, to then do so with an
African-American small business in the community.
PROGRESSIVE GROUPS
WANT REPUBLICAN NC SUPREME COURT JUDGE NEWBY TO RECUSE HIMSELF FROM
REDISTRICTING CASE
[Raleigh]
Plaintiffs in a lawsuit challenging the constitutionality of the new
redistricting plan created by the Republican-led NC General Assembly have filed
a motion asking that Republican NC Supreme Court Justice Paul Newby recuse
himself from hearing the case because Republicans bankrolled his re-election
campaign to ensure that the High Court’s Republican majority was held in place
when the case reaches its level. The NCNAACP, state Democratic Party, and other
nonprofit progressive plaintiffs allege Republicans “with a direct stake” in
making sure the redistricting plan – which favors Republicans – stands, spent
almost $2 million to keep Newby on the bench. To allow the Republican justice
to then hear that very case would threaten the integrity of the court.
Supporters for Justice Newby argue that he had no control in who spent what to
re-elect him, thus he shouldn’t be targeted or asked to recuse himself from any
case.
ST. AUG UNIVERSITY
SEEKING TO PURCHASE ST. PAUL’S COLLEGE
[Lawrenceville,
Va.] Historically black St. Augustine’s University in Raleigh is close to a
deal to purchase struggling St. Paul’s College in Virginia, published reports
say. St. Aug, which officially adopted its university status last August, will
manage St. Paul”s, another HBCU, beginning Jan. 1st. The Raleigh
school hopes to eventually turn St. Paul’s into a satellite campus. St. Paul’s
has been losing enrollment even since it lost its accreditation from the
Southern Association of Colleges and Schools.
-30-
CASH IN THE APPLE for
11-29-12
By Cash Michaels
THE WILMINGTON TEN PARDON
EFFORT - As you may know, besides being editor/chief reporter for The
Carolinian Newspaper in Raleigh, and a staff writer at The
Wilmington Journal in Wilmington, I am also coordinator for The Wilmington Ten Pardons of Innocence Project - sponsored by the National Newspaper Publishers Association
(of which The Carolinian and Wilmington Journal are member
newspapers) working to have Gov. Beverly
Perdue grant pardons of innocence to the Wilmington Ten before she leaves
office on January 5th.
The Wilmington Ten, as you know, were nine black males and one white
female who, forty years ago, were falsely convicted and sentenced to 282 years
in prison - some of which they all served - for crimes they did not commit in
connection to racial violence in Wilmington in 1971.
History shows that the three witnesses who testified against the Ten
later admitted they committed perjury. In Dec. 1980, the US Fourth Circuit of
Appeals overturned the Ten’s convictions based on prosecutorial misconduct. But
the state of North Carolina never followed suit.
Since then, four of the Wilmington Ten have died, never seeing the
day when their names could be cleared.
We have been working hard since January of this year to change that.
Dec. 1st is our deadline for getting in all of our
petition signatures for the Wilmington Ten Pardons of Innocence Project, so
we're trying to get as many signatures as possible before then.
Please, go to our Change.Org petition link at https://www.change.org/petitions/nc-governor-bev-perdue-pardon-the-wilmington-ten, sign it, and then send out the link via
your own email tree, asking everyone you contact to also sign it, and then
share the link with their contacts BEFORE Dec. 1st.
The governor will be making her decision in December, and we want to
have at least 1,500 online signatures for her. Currently we have over 918 as of
Tuesday evening (we should have topped well over 1,000 by the time you read this
on Thursday), so you see we're hustling for the goal.
We are also asking, for those individuals, churches or institutions
who wish to beyond just signing the petition, to send letters to Gov. Perdue
asking her to grant pardons of innocence to the Wilmington Ten by Dec. 15th.
Here is that address:
Hon.
Beverly Eaves Perdue
Governor of North Carolina
20301
Mail Service Center
Raleigh,
NC 27699-0301
If
you want more information about the Wilmington Ten Pardons of Innocence
Project, you can go to www.wilmingtonjournal.com or on Facebook
at https://www.facebook.com/TheWilmingtonTenPardonOfInnocenceProject
Please, as we enter this holy season of Thanksgiving and Christmas,
let us deliver peace and justice to those who have been forty years denied.
As a black journalist, and a proud member of the community, after
forty long years, I’d like to see justice done for the Wilmington Ten.
I sincerely hope that you do too.
REV. EUGENE TEMPLETON – By the time you read this, I would have
already sat down for an exclusive interview with the Rev. Eugene Templeton, the former pastor of Gregory Congregational
Church in Wilmington.
Templeton was an historic figure. In 1971, he was the white pastor of
what was a predominately African-American church. As a minister in the United
Church of Christ, Templeton was the one who contacted church leaders in the
midst of the black student boycott in New Hanover County Public Schools, asking
for assistance.
That’s when a young Rev.
Benjamin F. Chavis was sent to the city to help guide the young people.
The rest, as they say, is a disturbing history.
Rev. Templeton hasn’t said much publicly about what happened that
resulted in police, a year later, arresting Rev. Chavis and nine others. So my
interview with him, during one of his rare visits back to North Carolina in the
past forty years, will be historic.
Look for the exclusive in next Thursday’s edition.
PRESIDENT WINS AGAIN; GUN
SALES UP AGAIN – About three years ago when I was covering the state Republican
Party Convention in Raleigh, I interviewed a black minister who was also the
son of a black preacher.
This young man was so
conservative, and so ignorant, he was convinced that Pres. Barack Obama was going to do a lot of evil things.
Like take away his right to
bare arms.
And even though there was no
evidence that either Obama, or Attorney General Eric Holder, was even thinking
about taking anybody’s pop pistol or worse, this clown was certain that the
“evil” and “unchristian” Obama was going to do great harm to his rights as an
American.
Three years later, and what’s
happened?
Nothing.
In fact, if anything, Pres.
Obama has expanded gun rights, permitting folks to legally carry one in federal
parks.
Doesn’t matter. After the
president won re-election a few weeks ago, the guns and ammo began flying off
the shelves again, just like they did in 2008 after Obama won the first time.
So part of the population
wants to lock and load, and another part want to secede from the country
entirely.
If that isn’t proof of just
how deeply sick our nation is, I don’t know what is.
But I do know this…this
foolishness tells me that it only takes one idiot to try to change history.
I pray it never happens.
THE DEATH OF ELMO – I’m not
going to be graphic at all here, because I know children sometimes read this
column (I know my youngest daughter does.) So, suffice it to say, I am more
than heartbroken about what has happened to Kevin Clash, the black puppeteer who rose to worldwide fame as
“Elmo” from TV’s “Sesame Street.”
As you know, Clash was forced
to resign from the long-running children’s educational program because of serious
allegations made against him which cast a dark shadow over his alleged past
behavior with children.
Again, these are allegations.
A lawsuit was filed this week by one of three accusers (the first recanted his
story, the second got Clash fired). So this will all come out in court, unless
some kind of settlement is reached.
It is important to note that
Clash has denied all three allegations.
The bottom-line is Clash’s
career in entertainment is essentially over. There are certain allegations no
one puts up with. Allegations that dogged singer Michael Jackson and almost landed him in prison before he was
acquitted in a court of law.
I pray for Kevin Clash and
his family, for this is going to be extremely hard for them. The alleged
victims certainly deserve prayer too.
But for something so ugly to
touch the otherwise joyful image of one of the world’s most famous children’s
characters, is just such a sad shame indeed.
Make sure you tune in every Thursday afternoon at 4 p.m.
for my talk radio show, ''Make It Happen'' on Power 750 WAUG-AM, or online
at www.myWAUG.com.
And read more about my thoughts and opinions exclusively at my new blog, ‘The
Cash Roc” (http://thecashroc.blogspot.com/2011/01/cash-roc-begins.html).
I promise it will be interesting.
Cash in the Apple - honored as the Best Column Writing
of 2006 by the National Newspaper Publishers Association. Columnist Cash
Michaels was also honored by the NNPA for Best Feature Story Journalist of
2009, and was the recipient of the Raleigh-Apex NAACP’s President’s Award for
Media Excellence in Sept. 2011.
Until next week, keep a smile on your face, GOD in your
heart, and The Carolinian in your life. Bye, bye.
-30-
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