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http://nnpa.org/nnpa_newswire/a-two-bit-racial-arsonist-black-caucus-goes-after-trump-on-birther-fraud/
CASH IN THE APPLE FOR 10-13-16
http://nnpa.org/nnpa_newswire/a-two-bit-racial-arsonist-black-caucus-goes-after-trump-on-birther-fraud/
CASH IN THE APPLE FOR 10-13-16
By Cash Michaels
NEXT WEEK –
So far, we’ve had three raucous national debates – two between presidential
candidates Democrat Hillary Clinton and
Republican Donald Trump, and one
between vice presidential running mates Democrat
Sen. Tim Kaine and GOP Indiana Gov.
Mike Pence.
Next
Wednesday, Oct. 19th, the third and final presidential debate
between Clinton and Trump is scheduled to take place in Las Vegas, Nv. True to
form, no one knows exactly what to expect. But we can hazard some good guesses.
Trump,
right now, is a wounded animal, proven by the fact that he’s striking out at
everyone, including his own party of Republican, who don’t know what to do with
him, especially after that vulgar 2005 Access
Hollywood video tape that revealed the multi-millionaire uttering what he
called “locker room” language to describe what essentially are alleged sexual
assaults on women.
Not only is
Trump angry at Republicans for cutting the cord with him, but he’s more
determined than ever to destroy Bill and Hillary Clinton, calling the former
president a multiple “rapist,” and accusing his wife of attacking Bill’s
victims.
Mind you, even though Bill Clinton was partially impeached
for his White House tryst with intern Monica
Lewinsky back in the late 1990s, he has never been formally charged with
rape by any law enforcement in the land, nor convicted of any sexual assault.
But that hasn’t stopped Trump, nor his number one stooge, former NY Mayor Rudy Giuliani (NJ
Gov. Chris Christie is stooge #2) from insisting that Bill Clinton is a criminal because they say so.
So we can
fairly guess, just based on what happened last Sunday during debate #2, that s
desperate Trump is going to pour it on heavy with the personal attacks against
the Clintons, and make us all cringe with his political vulgarity.
But we can
also guess that former Sec. of State Clinton is going to do what she has
successfully done thus far, and that’s maintain her cool in the face of such
brutal public treatment.
Many
conservatives cackled with glee that Trump seemed to chew Hillary Clinton up
and spit her out during the second debate, bragging that he would put her in
jail if he was elected president.
The problem
with that right-wing cackling is that it is, as always, it is dead wrong. Trump
didn’t do anything to Clinton that she didn’t allow him to do. She clearly had
no intent, nor interest, in going personal toe-to-toe with the foul-mouthed one.
She took a page from her friend First Lady Michelle Obama, “ When they aim low,
we aim high.”
Translation
– Clinton was not going to get in the mud with Trump, no matter what he said or
how many baseless allegations he made. That’s a mud wrestle she can’t possible
win. It was best to fight on a stage she knows better than he ever could –
public policy, which is supposed to be the stage from which Americans are
supposed to choose their next president from anyway.
So as we
enter the home stretch of this historic, yet contentious presidential, which
will Americans choose?
We’ll soon
find out.
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.
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ROY COOPER PAT MCCRORY
MCCRORY, COOPER
DEBATE BLACK ISSUES
By Cash Michaels
Contributing writer
Amid tense
exchanges around HB2, taxes and Donald Trump Tuesday’s statewide televised
debate, gubernatorial opponents incumbent Republican Governor Pat McCrory and
challenger state Attorney General Roy Cooper, Democrat, also clashed on three
key issues of interest to North Carolina’s African-American community – the
state’s new law shielding police body cam video from public release; the Black
Lives Matter movement; and Gov. McCrory’s defense of voter ID laws designed to
suppress African-American voting.
On the new
North Carolina law which went into effect Oct. 1st prohibiting law
enforcement agencies from releasing video footage of fatal police encounters
publicly unless a judge rules otherwise, McCrory said, “ We need to balance the
public interests, b ut also balance the constitutional rights of those being
investigated.” The governor went on say as much a s the news media “would love
to show the video because it helps your
ratings,” doing so impedes ongoing criminal investigations. McCrory also
maintained that “politicians shouldn’t be making that decision” to release
police body cam footage of fatal shootings. “It should be an impartial judge
who determines where the constitutional
rights of those being investigated that are being seen in the video,
versus the right of the public to know, and that’s exactly what this new law
does.”
Atty.
General Cooper disagreed. He said he was “mindful that there are so many
communities out there who feel targeted, and they yearn to be heard, and they
yearn for respect.” Cooper said North Carolina needs a governor who will work
to “make sure that we have that mutual respect, and part of mutual respect is
transparency,” adding that the community must trust what law enforcement is
doing. Cooper added that there were “significant problems with the new law.” I
believe that the records and these videotapes should be open,” he said, holding
open that there may be times that confidentiality may be required, but overall,
transparency should be the rule.
Gov.
McCrory responded that he won the endorsement of the Fraternal Order of Police
for his position, and Atty. Gen. Cooper did not. The Democrat countered that he
had “strong support of law enforcement” in his campaign.
Regarding
whether police officers have “implicit bias,” Cooper said you address that with
better training to counter that bias. He also favors more community policing to
build stronger citizen-police relations.
Gov.
McCrory agreed that more training of police officers was needed, as well as community policing. But the
governor accused Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton and Res.
Obama of attacking the police after various police shooting incidents of
unarmed black men. “It was totally inappropriate,” McCrory said.
On the
subject of “Black Lives Matter” the black millennial movement that demands an
end to police brutality, Roy Cooper said “It’s true.” He went on to say that
“many communities of color feel targeted, feel discriminated against, and what
they want to be is heard and they want to be respected.” Cooper said many in
law enforcement agree that “this is something we have to do.”
Gov.
McCrory, however, dismissed BLM, saying instead that “all lives matter.” He
went on to say that while the “anger” of communities who negatively interact
with law enforcement should be recognized, the “pressure” of police officers
who do a dangerous job should also be respected.
On North
Carolina’s 2013 voter ID, which the US Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals recently
ruled targeted African-American voters “with surgical precision,” Republican
McCrory, who was a defendant in the lawsuit overturning parts of the law, still
defended it as necessary.
Democrat
Cooper countered that he agreed with the appellate court that law was
unconstitutional and racially discriminatory.
Earlier on
Tuesday, President Barack Obama campaigned in Greensboro on behalf of candidate
Hillary Clinton, and then took part in an ESPN television taping at NC A&T
University.
-30-
DAN BLUE III FOR
STATE TREASURER
By Cash Michaels
Contributing writer
Most people
who know Daniel Blue III agree that he is disciplined, studied, principled, and
one of the sharpest people in or out of politics. Thanks to the legacy of his
father, Democratic Senate Minority Leader Daniel T. Blue Jr. – formerly the first
African-American speaker of the NC House – Dan III has rarely known life
outside of politics, except for when he worked on Wall Street in New York City
over 15 years ago.
Today, Dan
III, 43, is jumping head first into his first bid for elective office, running
to become NC state treasurer succeeding fellow Democrat and incumbent Janet
Cowell, who has endorsed him. His Republican opponent is former state Rep. Dale
Folwell of Winston-Salem, who also once served as head of the state Employment
Security Division.
The state
treasurer manages North Carolina’s retirement system and $90 billion pension
fund, administers the state’s health care plan, and maintains North Carolina’s
Triple A credit rating.
“North
Carolina deserves fiscally responsible leadership that respects and protects
the public employees, taxpayers, and communities throughout the state,” Blue
says about why he is running. His biography certainly reads like a young man
seeking to prepare himself for bigger things.
The Raleigh
native is a graduate of W. G. Enloe High School, and Duke University, where he
earned his B.S. in Engineering, and minored in public policy studies. He also
studied finances at Duke’s Fuqua School of Business, earning a Masters of
Business Administration, and Duke’s School of Law, graduating with a Juris
Doctor.
Well
–rounded in key areas, Blue worked at GlaxoWellcome Pharmaceuticals, helping to
launch Healthmatics. Shortly after, Dan III moved to New York City to become an
investment banker at Bear, Stearns & Co. on Wall Street. He was there in
New York during the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attacks, and vividly recalls
living through the ordeal.
In 2004, on
the advice of his mother, Edna Earle Blue, Dan III moved back to North
Carolina, starting his own company, Pharmaceutical Institute, which trained
biotech professionals. He later sold the successful company, and joined his
father’s Raleigh firm, working alongside his younger brother Damien. Dan III
handled debt financing for large companies and government agencies, but also advised
small businesses. His work was recognized in 2015 by the Triangle Business
Journal.
Blue is
married to educator Traci C. Blue, and the couple has two children.
A recent
Public Policy Polling survey had Blue leading Republican Folwell
38 to 37 percent, with many still undecided. The two have
squared off in several joint appearances, debating North Carolina’s
controversial HB 2 law that prohibits transgender people from using public
bathrooms contrary to their birth gender (Blue says the law is “problematic”
and has cost the state millions in lost business);
sitting on corporate boards (Blue says he won’t “for pay or
play”); and helping school systems meet their fiscal needs (Blue is for it).
-30-
COLEMAN SEEKS
LT. GOV OFFICE AGAIN
By Cash Michaels
Editor
North Carolina families aren’t
being treated fairly by this economy, or their state government, says Linda
Coleman, who is running once again for lieutenant governor.
She wants to change that, which is
why she’s back four years after her first bid to fight first-term Lt. Governor
Dan Forest, who defeated Coleman by a slim margin in 2012. She feels the
arch-conservative and other GOP lawmakers leading the NC General Assembly have
done more harm than good in North Carolina, especially after passage of voter
suppression and HB 2 laws.
“The Republican majority
running things in Raleigh continues to unravel so much of what built our great
state…,” Coleman says on her campaign website, “… and all the while they’ve had
a cheering partner in our lieutenant governor. It’s time for a different
approach.”
If Coleman indeed
wins on November 8, she would be only the second African-American in the
history of the state to be a member of the NC Council of State [the late Ralph
Campbell Jr., former state auditor, was the first] – a constitutional panel of
the state’s nine top elected officials, chaired by the governor, who make
important decisions about the borrowing of money, the sale of state property,
and other matters.
Beyond being the next in line
constitutionally in case, for some reason, the elected governor is unable to
fulfill his duties, or presiding over important events in the governor’s
absence, the lt. governor also presides over the NC Senate, voting there only
to break a tie. The lt. governor also chairs various state boards and
commissions, including the state Board of Education and board of Community
Colleges.
The office of lt. governor can be a
springboard for a possible run for governor in the future, political observers
say. Indeed, Gov. Beverly Perdue first served as a state lawmaker, then as a
lt. governor before finally winning the top seat in 2008, making history as the
first woman governor in North Carolina history.
A “Lt. Gov.” Linda Coleman could
one day vie to become the second.
Ms. Coleman is the mother of two, a
grandmother of two, and “a proud product of the public school system of this
state.”
She was
born and raised in Greenville, earning her B.A. from NC A&T University on
Greensboro. She later earned a masters degree in public administration from the
University of Pittsburgh’s Graduate School of Public and International Affairs.
In her
public life, and after teaching in the classroom, Coleman was elected to the
Wake Board of Commissioners, chairing that body. She was then elected to the NC House, serving
three terms, helping to past the Earned Income Tax Credit “which helped put
money back into the pockets of working families,” she says.
As a state
lawmaker, Coleman also helped to pass the Racial Justice Act, which helped
correct racial-biased death penalty sentences. Both laws have since been
repealed by the Republican-led NC General Assembly.
Coleman then went on to lead as the
director of the Office of State Personnel from 2009 to 2012. She left that post
in 2012 to first run for lt. governor. She lost by a razor-thin 6,800-vote
margin to Dan Forest with 2.1 million votes cast for her statewide.
Coleman is proud of what Democrats
accomplished in giving women access to affordable health care in the state, tax
incentives to small businesses, in addition to more funding for education.
She has
blasted Lt. Gov. Forest for suggesting that public education in the state can
be funded through the sale of license plates, like the special one he has on
his car.
“Raleigh is just not working for us
anymore. We are working for Raleigh to fund the wealthiest among us,” Coleman
says, noting how Republican tax reform has shifted the tax burden from the rich
to working families, and eliminated the childcare tax credit.
“We need somebody to go to Raleigh
and say, “Listen, let’s start working for the people of North Carolina,” Linda
Coleman says about her candidacy for lt. governor. “Let’s bring North Carolina
back.”
-30-
STATE NEWS BRIEFS FOR
10-13-16
19 HURRICANE
MATTHEW-RELATED DEATHS ACROSS THE STATE, OFFICIAL SAY
[LUMBERTON]
At press time, at least 19 deaths were attributed to the impact of Hurricane
Matthew on the state, state official confirm. One of those deaths happened when
a state trooper fatally shot a man during a flood rescue operation. Massive
flooding in eastern North Carolina has forced people from their home,
overwhelmed farms drowning animals and streaming animal waste with streaming
flood waters. There have also been drownings in Robeson, Wayne and Columbus
counties. Pres. Obama has designated 31 counties as federal disaster areas.
Parts of I-95 are closed because of flooding.
PRINCEVILLE RESIDENTS
TOLD TO EVACUATE BECAUSE OF POTENTIAL FLOODING
[PRINCEVILLE]
In 1999 during Hurricane Floyd, the African-American town of Princeville in
Edgecombe County was virtually destroyed by flood waters from the Tar
River crested. Now, in the aftermath of
Hurricane Matthew, the Tar River is threatening the oldest town in America incorporated
by black people. It’s only hope is the new levee installed after Floyd to hold
the Tar River at bay. But residents have been told to evacuate regardless as a
safety precaution.
STATE HIGHWAY PATROL
KICKS OFF “OPERATION STOP ARM” NEXT WEEK
[RALEIGH] In support of
Operation Stop Arm week, the State Highway Patrol will be aggressively
enforcing stop arm violations and other traffic violations in and around school
zones. The operation will be conducted 6 a.m. on Monday, Oct. 17tviolationsh
to Friday, Oct. 21st. The Patrol expects Operation Stop Arm will
decrease violations and reduce school
bus incidents involving children.
-30-
TRIANGLE NEWS BRIEFS
FOR 10-13-16
RALEIGH POLICE TO
TEST 20 BODY CAMERAS STARTI9NG NEXT WEEK
As promised, the Raleigh Police
Dept. will begin conducting test programs for officer body cameras and vehicle
dash cameras in the field for the purpose of evaluation. Three vendors are
vying for contracts with the city to provide the equipment, and ultimately, the
department plans to outfit at least 600 police officers with the chosen models.
Officers will be required to activate the cameras when they encounter
situations involving criminal activity, and must give a reason why they are
turning them off on the record before they do. Each company’s equipment will be
tested for 30 days.
CONTROVERSIAL REPORTS
ACCUSES CITY COUNCIL MEDDLING IN POLICE AFFAIRS
Members
of the Durham City Council are a bit put off over a police consultant’s report
that suggests that they inappropriately gave voice to allegedly unjustified
concerns about racial disparities in citizen traffic stop treatment by the
Durham Police Dept. The 244-page report by the International Association of
Chiefs of Police states, “This
level of oversight and the associated actions by government officials have
contributed to a sense of distrust among these entities, which has also
contributed to a deterioration of community confidence in the police
department.” But Durham Mayor Bill Bell responded that the city had been
fielding complaints about the disparity of treatment between black and white
motorists by Durham police officers for several years, and wanted to make sure
that action was being taken to address the issues.
-30-
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