The Untold Story – 20th Century Slavery in America!

Mos Def explains Casa Bey…

How Social Networking Makes Communicating Harder

Helena Andrews

Contributor Posted: 07/25/10 A few days ago, I woke up in a panic. I was headed to Los Angeles to hawk my new book, and I hadn’t called my grandmother (or anyone with the last name Andrews) to say I’d be home. Our conversation went like this: Me (feigning innocence): “Ugh, Grandmommy, I’ve been crazed, so sorry I didn’t call you all sooner. So can you come?” My grandmother, who’s been protesting her cell phone since 2006: “Oh, I know all about it. Please, with my face [Myspace], your face [Facebook], tweety twat [Twitter] and what not . . . Point is, word travels fast.”

Indeed, 140 characters do travel fast. But what about the fingers behind those tiny Tweet-sized words? Trust me — being a journalist/author/essayist/blogger/columnist is harder than it sounds. And it sounds crazy. The typical j.a.e.b.c.’s day starts with writing a story, blog, column or essay (that requires thinking up, researching, polishing, revising, editing and, ideally, a click-able headline), then sending a Tweet about said output, then posting it to various faces (I’ve got three Facebook pages), and, of course, subtly planting its link in a very witty G-chat status message, and then frequently checking all the aforementioned online outlets to see who’s clicking, who’s commenting and who’s retweeting. (Then I tweak my tweet.) Thrusting them out onto the social-networking main stage, like Mama Rose in Gypsy (sing out, Louise!), is 10 times harder. By the time all that’s done it’s 5 p.m. and whatever actually happened (you know, like outside) that day is lost to self-promotion. Maybe social networking gets the word out, but perhaps it stops you from writing even more of them.

It’s like a social experiment on steroids, all the interfacing we do on the Internet. But where’s the governing body to regulate all this non-contact contact? Sure, we feel more connected. But are we? I haven’t been in Los Angeles in months, but somehow my 88-year-old grandmother, who sent me an e-mail once in 2005 that read “life is no play thing,” knows everything that’s going on with me. Actually she knows what all the other people I don’t really know know, which is where I’ll be and what time (also that I hate the coffee at a certain place on U Street). With all that ego fertilizer clogging up the information highway it’s almost impossible to tell which Tweets you should heed and which you can delete, which kind of defeats the purpose of promoting your book online in the first place. Maybe no one e-listens to my constant and increasing hostile e-blasts (“if you don’t come to Borders on Tuesday I will delete you…FOREVER”).

Like this one about my “rock star book tour”– so dubbed because it is so not — “I’m currently posted up at Houston Hobby because this seemed way LESS depressing than chilling at the Airport Marriott. #booktourshmooktour” Any hotel with “airport” sharing the title marquee is not “rock star,” but these days anyone can be one as long as someone’s following them, buying into it, and perhaps buying their book (but not necessarily in that order). When I first started publicizing my book, a friend of mine, who does social media strategizing for a living, told me I had to get on Twitter. My response? “Umm, no, I’m a writer, I’m not crazy.” But I guess I may be both because now there’s a CNN-ticker of my life @helena_andrews.

The most “it’s funny because it’s true” send-up of social networking’s effect on old-school publishing is author Dennis Cass’ 2008 YouTube spoof, “Book Launch 2.0.” I discovered this viral jewel via Twitter and another author who puts in lots of time online, Rebecca Skloot, whose New York Times best-seller, “The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks,” goes by #HeLa in tweet-speak. In “Book Launch,” an increasingly frustrated and funny Cass, who’s trying to promote his book, “Head Case,” explains to an anonymous friend on the phone (really an avatar for all those anonymous friends out there) that “there’s other ways to get people to know about books” than Oprah. (His pathetic non-Oprah list includes a “big” e-mail blast, a neighbor’s book club and an updated Myspace page.)

“My book can I have a Facebook page?” Cass, the comedian, asks incredulously. “I didn’t know that. I thought you had to have something with a . . . with a face.” Point is these days everything has a face, and it’s the writer’s job to have split personalities. Because even while Cass is mocking the new media landscape, he climbs one of its highest mountains — going viral — with nearly 74,000 views. Now all we have to do is become alchemists — turning page views, retweets and comments into cash.

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What Most Protein Powders Do To Your Brain!

‘I am proud to be an African’*

Eric H. Holder, Jr. was sworn in as the 82nd Attorney General of the United States on February 3, 2009 by Vice President Joe Biden.

By Eric. H. Holder, Jr.

President Barak Obama recognizes the growing importance of the African Union; he understands that a stronger Africa means a stronger America; and he appreciates the work that you are leading to strengthen political and economic cooperation across this continent.

It is fitting that we’ve gathered here in Uganda – the nation that has been called “the pearl of Africa” – to determine how the potential of Africa and her people might be unlocked.

In the last 30 years, the people of Uganda have made progress that, once, had seemed impossible – the restoration of law and order; the reopening of schools and colleges; and the reconstruction of government, health care, and financial systems. The fact that we are here today – and that Kampala is now a center of international politics, learning, culture, and commerce – is a testament to the strength and resilience of the Ugandan people.

This strength has never been more obvious. This resilience has never been more inspiring.

I am proud to stand with the people of Uganda – and with her partners across this continent and around the world. But I am deeply sorry that we are now bound, not only by friendship and partnership, but also by a shared loss, a shared threat, and a shared grief.

Two weeks ago today, Uganda awakened to a new danger and began a new chapter in a history that, too often, has been scarred by violence. As the World Cup’s final match was being played, men, women, and children across Kampala were enjoying life’s greatest blessings – the joys of friendship and fellowship. That evening, the eyes of the world were fixed upon this continent – bearing witness to historic progress, to hard-won unity and, then suddenly, to heartbreaking tragedy.

Fourteen days after bombs ripped through the Kyandondo Rugby Club and the Ethiopian Village restaurant, we now know the statistics that have been assigned to this tragedy – 74 killed, 85 wounded. But we will never be able to measure the grief, the anger, and – above all – the compassion that followed these attacks. Al-Shabaab – a terrorist group operating in Somalia with ties to al-Qaeda – has claimed responsibility for murdering and injuring these innocent victims. And its leaders have infamously described these bombings as warranted acts of vengeance. But make no mistake: these attacks were nothing more than reprehensible acts of cowardice, inspired by a radical and corrupt ideology that systematically denies human rights, devalues women and girls, and perverts the peaceful traditions and teachings of a great religion.

America is among many nations now in mourning – grieving the loss of all of those defenseless victims, including one of our own citizens, and praying for the others who were injured. My nation is also among many working to bring the perpetrators of these vicious acts to justice. To assist Uganda in its investigation, we’ve provided a team of FBI forensic experts and offered both technical assistance and intelligence resources.

The United States also recognizes that ending the threat of al-Shabaab to the world will take more than just law enforcement. That is why we are working closely with the AU to support the African Union’s Mission in Somalia. The United States applauds the heroic contributions that are being made on a daily basis by Ugandan and Burundian troops, and we pledge to maintain our support for the AU and the AU Mission in Somalia.

As our countries work together, with the support of the international community, my hope is that we will also always remember what was irreplaceably lost here in Kampala. Individuals with families. Individuals with futures. And individuals afflicted with the most tragic of fates – dying while doing good.

To his students, Nate Henn was known as “Oteka” – The Strong One. He had traveled from the United States to help Uganda’s most vulnerable children, to provide them with an education, and to reveal to them a simple truth: that great futures await them. Tragically, Nate’s own future has been lost to the ages.

Stephen Tinka, a Ugandan journalist and radio presenter, and one of the many Ugandans who were killed, was known for his infectious personality and his distinctive voice – a voice now silenced.

Ramaraja Krishna, a Sri Lankan father of two daughters, came to Uganda two years ago to help advance this nation’s economy. Today, his body rests, once again, at home.

Marie Smith of Ireland was a missionary who spent 30 years helping Africans less fortunate than herself. But her work came to an abrupt end – not because of who she was or what she believed, but because of the seat she’d chosen on that catastrophic Sunday evening.

That is profoundly wrong. And any attempt to justify these murders of innocents is unimaginably shameful. As we struggle to make sense from the unfathomable, and as we seek justice from the ashes, we can take comfort – and find faith – in the Ugandan proverb that reminds us, “When the moon is not full, the stars shine more brightly.” Yes, it is darker out today than it was just weeks ago. But we must believe – and we must make certain – that the stars of goodwill and grace and, above all, of justice will shine brighter now than before.

In this time of new threats and unprecedented challenges, the importance of the African Union’s mission and work is brought into stark focus. Over the last eight years, you have united a diversity of nations around common goals. You’ve paved new paths for communication and cooperation, and for prosperity, peace, and healing. Together, you’ve established agreements to strengthen democratic institutions, to prevent and combat corruption, and to ensure the integrity of your elections and the strength of your justice systems. And you’ve pooled your resources and knowledge to increase Africa’s participation in the global marketplace and to provide Africa’s people with goods, services, and opportunities, as well as with leadership that honors their will and their best interests.

At the beginning of this year – your membership declared 2010 to be the “Year of Peace and Security.” Together, you ignited a “flame of peace” that was placed in the care of President Mutharika. From Malawi, this flame began a year-long journey to all 53 AU member nations.

This journey continues. This flame still burns. And this Year of Peace and Security must live on. For too much is at stake. Too much has been sacrificed. And too much is yet to be realized.

Like President Obama, I believe that the 21st century will be shaped by what happens here in Africa. Your security and prosperity, the health of your people and the strength of your civil society, will have a direct and profound impact on the world’s communities and on the advancement of human rights and human progress everywhere.

During his early days in office, President Obama traveled to Africa. In Cairo and in Accra, he described what he saw as “an extraordinary moment of promise” for this continent – a new era for international cooperation; a new beginning.

President Obama also made clear that “Africa’s future is up to Africans.” And, today, I want to reaffirm America’s commitment to ensuring that this future is not hijacked or compromised; and that the progress you’re working to achieve is not derailed or delayed.

I am proud to be counted among the African Diaspora – this continent is my ancestral home, I am of this place. Your work is of special and emotional importance to me – and not only because I am proud to serve alongside my nation’s first African-American President or proud to be its first African-American Attorney General. I also join with you, and with my fellow citizens, in celebrating Africa’s success because I recognize that the fate of my own country is intertwined with each of yours.

The future we will share depends on what we do today – on the goals we set, the relationships we forge, the commitments we make and the actions we take. And despite today’s many challenges and uncertainties, one thing is clear:

As your historic efforts to promote peace, development, justice, and opportunity continue, the United States will act in partnership and in common cause to help the African Union achieve its goals and fulfill its mission.

There are four specific areas where, I believe, America’s support must continue and where I hope our partnership can be strengthened:

in combating global terrorism and international crime; in promoting good governance and the rule of law; in creating the conditions and capacity for economic development; and, finally, in ensuring that Africa’s women and girls are no longer disproportionately affected by violence or denied basic rights and equal opportunities to learn, to dream, and to thrive.

In each of these areas, the United States intends to serve, not as a patron but as a partner – as a collaborator, not a monitor.

First of all, because opportunity and prosperity cannot be realized without security, the United States will continue to direct every resource and tool at our command – from diplomacy and military tactics to our courts and intelligence capabilities – to defeat the global terror network. In protecting our people and defending our allies, we will respect the sovereignty of nations, as well as the rule of law. And we will look to engage more AU member nations in this work.

Second, we will strengthen current efforts to promote good governance and to combat and prevent the costs and consequences of public corruption.

Today, when the World Bank estimates that more than one trillion dollars in bribes are paid each year out of a world economy of 30 trillion dollars, this problem cannot be ignored. And this practice must never be condoned. As many here have learned – often in painful and devastating ways – corruption imperils development, stability, competition, and economic investment. It also undermines the promise of democracy.

As my nation’s Attorney General, I have made combating corruption, generally and in the United States, a top priority. And, today, I’m pleased to announce that the U.S. Department of Justice is launching a new Kleptocracy Asset Recovery Initiative aimed at combating large-scale foreign official corruption and recovering public funds for their intended – and proper – use: for the people of our nations. We’re assembling a team of prosecutors who will focus exclusively on this work and build upon efforts already underway to deter corruption, hold offenders accountable, and protect public resources.

And although I look forward to everything this new initiative will accomplish, I also know that prosecution is not the only effective way to curb global corruption.  We will continue to work with your governments to strengthen the entire judicial sector, a powerful institution in our democracy which depends on the integrity of our laws, our courts, and our judges. We must also work with business leaders to encourage, ensure, and enforce sound corporate governance. We should not, and must not settle for anything less.

Third, the United States – guided by President Obama’s international economic development plan – will work to expand current economic development efforts. Here in Africa, President Obama has signaled his commitment to foreign assistance, with the goal that such support will, over time, no longer be necessary. This goal is driving our work to help Africa develop new sources of energy, to create green jobs, to grow new crops, and to develop new education and training programs.

Finally, because we’ve seen that the global struggle for women’s equality continues – in many aspects of American life, as well as in countries across this continent and around the world – we know that our work to promote security, opportunity, and justice must include a special focus on women and girls. The unique challenges and urgent threats facing women and girls across Africa have inspired unprecedented action, collaboration, and investments by the U.S government. In particular, I am proud of the contributions that U.S. Department of Justice prosecutors and law enforcement agents have made here in Africa, through the Women’s Justice Empowerment Initiative – a three-year, $55-million-dollar program that was developed by the U.S. Departments of Justice and State, and the U.S. Agency for International Development. In Kenya, South Africa, Zambia, and Benin, this initiative has helped to train attorneys, investigators, law enforcements officials, and medical professionals in an effort to improve prosecutions and to raise awareness about the special needs of victims.

Through this initiative, we are joining with partners across this continent to educate Africans about violence against women and girls, to build the capacity of local governments to serve and assist victims, and to strengthen the ability of Africa’s legal systems and law enforcement communities to protect women and girls. This work is making a difference. It must be a priority for all on this continent. This work is changing lives, families, and communities. And while I believe it has the power, the possibility, to transform entire cultures and countries, I am certain that its ongoing success and impact is directly linked to the engagement and commitment of you: Africa’s leaders.

I have great hope for what can be achieved through ongoing international initiatives and strong AU partnerships. But I do not pretend that the progress we all seek – and the conditions and opportunities that all African citizens deserve – will come easily or quickly.

And yet, we all can be – and should be – encouraged that the state of the African Union is strong. And we have good reason to feel hopeful that this extraordinary moment of progress is, indeed, a new beginning – the start of a journey toward greater peace and unity, toward freedom and prosperity, toward opportunity and justice for all.

And although we may take our first steps beneath dark skies, our path forward will be guided by the flame of peace – and by the bright flicker of stars. In this Year of Peace and Security, America is proud to walk at your side, privileged to count you as partners, and grateful to call you friends.

————————

* Holder delivered this address on Sunday at the ongoing African Union summit in Kampala, Uganda

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The Gray And The Brown: The Generational Mismatch

A contrast in priorities is arising between nonwhite young voters and white, older voters.

Saturday, July 24, 2010
by Ronald Brownstein

In an age of diminished resources, the United States may be heading for an intensifying confrontation between the gray and the brown.

Two of the biggest demographic trends reshaping the nation in the 21st century increasingly appear to be on a collision course that could rattle American politics for decades. From one direction, racial diversity in the United States is growing, particularly among the young. Minorities now make up more than two-fifths of all children under 18, and they will represent a majority of all American children by as soon as 2023, demographer William Frey of the Brookings Institution predicts.

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At the same time, the country is also aging, as the massive Baby Boom Generation moves into retirement. But in contrast to the young, fully four-fifths of this rapidly expanding senior population is white. That proportion will decline only slowly over the coming decades, Frey says, with whites still representing nearly two-thirds of seniors by 2040.

These twin developments are creating what could be called a generational mismatch, or a “cultural generation gap” as Frey labels it. A contrast in needs, attitudes, and priorities is arising between a heavily (and soon majority) nonwhite population of young people and an overwhelmingly white cohort of older people. Like tectonic plates, these slow-moving but irreversible forces may generate enormous turbulence as they grind against each other in the years ahead.

Already, some observers see the tension between the older white and younger nonwhite populations in disputes as varied as Arizona’s controversial immigration law and a California lawsuit that successfully blocked teacher layoffs this year at predominantly minority schools. The 2008 election presented another angle on this dynamic, with young people (especially minorities) strongly preferring Democrat Barack Obama, and seniors (especially whites) breaking solidly for Republican John McCain.

Over time, the major focus in this struggle is likely to be the tension between an aging white population that appears increasingly resistant to taxes and dubious of public spending, and a minority population that overwhelmingly views government education, health, and social-welfare programs as the best ladder of opportunity for its children. “Anything to do with children in the public arena is going to generate a stark competition for resources,” Frey says.

The twist is that graying white voters who are skeptical of public spending may have more in common with the young minorities clamoring for it than either side now recognizes. Today’s minority students will represent an increasing share of tomorrow’s workforce and thus pay more of the payroll taxes that will be required to fund Social Security and Medicare benefits for the mostly white Baby Boomers. Many analysts warn that if the U.S. doesn’t improve educational performance among African-American and Hispanic children, who now lag badly behind whites in both high school and college graduation rates, the nation will have difficulty producing enough high-paying jobs to generate the tax revenue to maintain a robust retirement safety net.

“The future of America is in this question: Will the Baby Boomers recognize that they have a responsibility and a personal stake in ensuring that this next generation of largely Latino and African-American kids are prepared to succeed?” contends Stephen Klineberg, a sociologist at Rice University in Houston, who has studied the economic and political implications of changing demographics. “This ethnic transformation could be the greatest asset this county will have, with a young multilingual, well-educated workforce. Or it could tear us apart and become a major liability.”

The Changing Face Of America

At the root of the generational mismatch are federal policies that severely reduced immigration from the 1920s until Congress loosened the restrictions in 1965. With immigration constrained, whites remained an overwhelming majority of American society through the mid-20th century, including the years of the post-World War II Baby Boom. (Demographers date the Baby Boom from 1946 to 1964, the year before the restrictions on immigration were eased.) The result was a heavily white generation of young people.

“Most Boomers grew up and lived much of their lives in predominantly white suburbs, residentially isolated from minorities,” Frey wrote this spring. They are now graying into a senior generation that is four-fifths white, according to census figures.

Since 1965, however, expanded immigration and higher fertility rates among minorities have literally changed the face of America, particularly on the playground. As recently as 1980, minorities made up about one-fifth of the total population and one-fourth of children under 18. Today, the Census Bureau reports, racial minorities represent about 35 percent of the total population and 44 percent of children under 18. Whites make up 56 percent of young people and 80 percent of seniors. The 24-point spread between the white percentage of the senior and the youth populations is what Frey calls the cultural generation gap.

This split has widened rapidly over the past quarter-century. In 1980, it stood at just 14 percentage points, according to calculations performed by the Census Bureau for National Journal. The gap expanded to 18 points by 1990 and 23 points by 2000. Today, it is visible across a wide swath of the U.S. In 31 states, the difference between the white share of the senior and youth population is at least 19 percentage points.

Whites compose a majority of the senior population in every state except Hawaii. Minorities compose a majority of the youth population in seven states and at least one-third of young people in 17 more. In 11 states, minorities already represent a majority of elementary and secondary public school students. All of these numbers are likely to grow as the minority share of the youth population rises to nearly 55 percent by 2030 and almost 60 percent by 2040, according to Frey’s projections.

Although the phenomenon is evident in many regions, it is most acute in states with burgeoning Hispanic populations, especially in the Southwest. The largest cultural generation gaps are in Arizona (40 percentage points), Nevada (34), California (33), Texas (32), New Mexico (31), and Florida (29). In all of these states, a majority of young people are nonwhite (at least 56 percent in all but Florida), while at least three-fifths of seniors are white.

Across these states, the two groups’ contrasting perspectives and needs are fueling cultural clashes. Public schools are often an especially volatile frontier. In Texas, for instance, racial change was a charged subtext of a larger ideological battle this spring over history and economics textbooks in the public schools. In March, the Republican coalition that controls a majority on the Texas Board of Education imposed a more conservative presentation on a wide variety of American history topics. Among the amendments approved was one requiring students to be taught not only about Martin Luther King’s nonviolent philosophy during the civil-rights struggle of the 1960s but also about the Black Panthers’ preaching of violence.

Mary Helen Berlanga, a Latina board member, angrily complained that the textbook revisions eliminated discussion of a 1947 federal Appeals Court decision that barred segregation of Mexican-American students in Texas public schools. About 3 million of the students in Texas public schools are minorities. “Who are we kidding?” Berlanga asked. “These are the children that are going to be reading these materials. You want to talk about the Black Panthers in an ugly fashion? What about the Ku Klux Klan? That was a pretty nasty group. Why aren’t we talking about them?”

A similar dispute played out in Arizona this year. In May, Republican Gov. Jan Brewer signed legislation to cut state funds for school districts offering classes that were deemed to encourage ethnic solidarity or promote racial resentments. The legislation, promoted primarily by Tom Horne, the Republican state superintendent of public instruction, was aimed largely at the ethnic studies program in the public schools of Tucson, a metropolitan area where 60 percent of young people are minority but 80 percent of senior citizens are white. According to Frey’s figures, that’s the third-largest such gap for any metropolitan area in America, exceeded only by Phoenix and Riverside, Calif.

Arizona’s ethnic studies dispute, of course, was eclipsed by the searing controversy over another law that Brewer signed that gave police authority to detain anyone suspected of being in the country illegally. Arizona’s immigration law sharply divided the state along racial lines. In a May survey from the nonpartisan Behavior Research Center in Phoenix, almost 70 percent of Hispanics (and 63 percent of other minorities) opposed the law, while nearly two-thirds of white Arizonans supported it. National reactions to the Arizona immigration law have followed similar patterns.

From the front lines, these Texas and Arizona disputes exposed starkly different assessments of the nation’s ongoing demographic makeover. In varying ways, the proponents of the Texas curriculum changes and the Arizona immigration and ethnic studies laws portray their goals as upholding traditional standards — from respect for the law to a melting pot vision of American assimilation — in a period of rapid change. Horne asserts that the legislation he promoted on ethnic studies is meant only to resist separatism. “The purpose of the law,” he says, “is to prevent schools from dividing students by race and teaching them separately by race, and teaching kids ethnic chauvinism and hatred of others.”

Many supporters of these and similarly minded initiatives view themselves as a last line of defense against a flood tide of change threatening to sweep away national traditions. “The key thing that I wanted to make sure was for our kids to understand what makes America an exceptional place,” Don McLeroy, a member of the Texas Board of Education who led the effort to rewrite the textbook standards, said in an interview. “What I think is important is that we stick to the principles we were founded on and that our kids learn those principles as they were meant to be understood.”

Critics view these initiatives as thinly veiled appeals to whites who are uneasy about the racial change occurring around them. They commonly describe such proposals as trying to turn back the clock to the preponderantly white society that many of today’s seniors remember from their youth. In a typical assessment, Judy Burns, president of the Tucson Unified School District’s board, says of the attacks on the city’s ethnic studies classes, “It’s hard for me to believe there is no racism there.” In Texas, Berlanga similarly argues that the changes in the state curriculum constitute “an attack on minorities.” The conservatives who make up the school board majority, she charges, “want everything returned to the way it was in the 1950s, 1940s, 1930s.”

Across a charged cultural battlefield, one side sees a program of preservation, the other an agenda of exclusion. The distance between these perspectives isn’t likely to narrow any time soon.

Competition For Taxpayer Dollars

Although cultural disputes often generate the most heat, government budgets are likely to become the central point of conflict between younger minorities and older whites. At the state level, where governors are grappling with persistent deficits, the strains revolve around the choice between raising taxes or cutting spending. At the national level, Congress faces not only that familiar debate but also the competition between investing in education and other programs that benefit children, or spending on those that benefit seniors, primarily Medicare and Social Security.

The entire white electorate has grown more skeptical about the value of public spending and the ability of government to solve problems even as Washington, first under President Bush and now under Obama, has undertaken a series of almost unprecedented interventions to revive the weakened economy. That skepticism is especially intense among older white Americans. In a Pew Research Center survey this spring, just 23 percent of white seniors said they preferred a larger government that offers more services; 61 percent preferred a smaller government that offers fewer services. Among minorities, the attitude was essentially reversed: 62 percent preferred a larger government and 28 percent a smaller one.

In the states, these contrasting attitudes complicate the struggle to close massive budget deficits. The Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, a liberal think tank, recently calculated that the combined, cumulative shortfall facing state governments — even after adding in federal aid from the 2009 stimulus — increased from $71 billion in 2009 to $137 billion this year and is projected to rise to $144 billion next year.

To some extent, states wrestle with the decision of whether to slice programs for seniors (such as home health care or other services provided under Medicaid), of those that help children (such as K-12 and higher education, or public health programs for the uninsured). But to a larger extent at the state level, the real choice pits all spending against tax increases.

These debates don’t always follow racial lines. In Arizona, voters this spring approved a three-year sales tax increase that Brewer touted as the only option to avoid even deeper cuts in education and public safety than the state had already approved to close a budget shortfall. “That argument resonated with everybody,” said David Liebowitz, a public-relations consultant who worked on the campaign supporting the increase. “Ironically, our internal polling showed a lot of the support came from senior citizens and older people, which flew in the face of what we generally understand to be true about older folks and tax increases.”

But in many state budget disputes, racial dimensions are not far below the surface. Typically, Republican legislators and governors, most of whom rely primarily on the votes of whites, prefer to close the gaps principally (if not exclusively) by cutting spending, rather than raising taxes. Democrats, who rely more heavily on the votes of minorities, and include more minority legislators in their caucuses, typically prefer to buffer spending cuts by pairing them with tax increases. Even in Arizona, notes Bruce Hernandez, research director of the Behavior Research Center, the “willingness to fund [public programs] has been much stronger within the Hispanic community” than among whites, many of whom “want roads and that’s about it.”

California’s massive and persistent budget shortfalls have forced these issues into particularly sharp relief. As in other states, neither side in the argument has seen much benefit in highlighting the racial connotations of the budget choices.

In a state where minorities represent fully 70 percent of residents under 18, however, those implications are not difficult to discern. Policy makers are grappling with education cutbacks that have left elementary and secondary schools with $17 billion less than they expected over the past two years; tuition increases greater than 30 percent at state colleges and universities over the same period; and proposals from Republican Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to reduce spending on day care and food assistance while raising costs for families receiving public health care. “It’s hitting poor kids and kids of color by far the most severely,” said Ted Lempert, president of the advocacy group Children Now.

The racial dimension of the budget crisis became unusually visible this spring when the American Civil Liberties Union of Southern California and other groups sued the Los Angeles Unified School District over layoffs at three middle schools in which most of the students are minorities. In California, as in many states, the least experienced teachers are often assigned to heavily minority schools, which are typically considered the least desirable; state law requires administrators to first lay off teachers with the least seniority. The result was that nearly half of the teachers in two of the schools and nearly three-fourths in the third lost their jobs last year, forcing students to cycle through a parade of substitute teachers. In May, the Los Angeles Superior Court blocked further layoffs at the schools.

Mark Rosenbaum, the Southern California ACLU’s chief counsel, maintains that the school district would not be making such cuts if the school-age population had not tilted so sharply toward minorities. “That’s part and parcel of what is going on,” he says. “This would not be happening to the same degree if it were not families of color and low-income families that are suffering the most.”

Political Implications

These budgetary fights typically line up across partisan lines, with most Democrats on one side and most Republicans on the other. But the competing needs of young minorities and older whites can also create tensions within each party’s coalition, particularly for Democrats. State laws that require teacher layoffs to follow seniority, for instance, tend to draw strong support from heavily Democratic teachers unions but opposition from advocacy groups representing low-income children.

Likewise, the typically generous retirement benefits for state public employees, another Democratic mainstay, may become a target for party reformers looking for revenue to avoid systemic reductions in educational and social services. In California, Education Trust-West, a group that advocates for poor children, says that its constituents are being trampled beneath taxpayer groups that are dead-set against raising taxes and public employee unions that are demanding generous benefits. “The folks who get squeezed are the neediest students and families in the state of California, because you’ve got taxpayer associations on one side and public employee unions and other interests on the other side,” said Arun Ramanathan, the group’s executive director.

In the years ahead, he believes, the state will face increasingly direct trade-offs between investing in young people and supporting state government retirees. “You can’t say our system does a very good job of educating its kids, particularly the high-need students,” Ramanathan says. “And then you have massive pension and health care benefits that were given away in very sweet times to public employee unions. Where in the future are the dollars going to come from to improve the quality of the education system?” he asked. “I think you’re going to see some generational issues down the line.”

Similar questions loom over the federal budget debates. Largely because of Medicare and Social Security, Washington now spends $7 per senior citizen for each $1 it spends per child, according to a 2009 report by Julia Isaacs, a fellow at the Brookings Institution. Even including spending by state and local governments, which fund most education costs, government at all levels still spends more than twice as much per capita on seniors (about $22,000) than on children (about $9,000). To compound the inequity, she says, young people are not only slighted for investment now, they are also likely to face a “tax burden … much higher than current tax rates” to fund the retirement benefits promised to seniors.

The health care bill that Obama drove through Congress this year took a small step toward balancing these scales by reducing the growth of Medicare spending to fund expanded coverage for the uninsured, many of whom are young. But as Simon Rosenberg, president of the Democratic advocacy group NDN, noted at a recent National Journal forum, the administration pushed in the opposite direction this year by protecting other entitlement spending while proposing a freeze in discretionary spending that includes public investments. “[That] would arguably be the inverse of what you would do based on these [demographic] changes,” he argued.

Overall, the tilt toward the elderly over the young in federal priorities remains strong. “Look at where American money is going today. We are investing in the past, not in the future — which is education, research and development, infrastructure,” former Republican Rep. Tom Davis, now director of federal government services at the Deloitte consulting firm, said at the same forum. “We’re General Motors, when you take a look at where the investments in this country are today. And how do you compete globally with that?”

This competition for resources takes place amid a stark divergence in the political preferences of the old and the young. In 2008, Obama won the backing of two-thirds of voters under 29 and fully four-fifths of all minority voters, but he lost a majority of all seniors and nearly three-fifths of white seniors, according to exit polls. The public reaction to Obama’s performance so far suggests that those differences will persist, and possibly widen, in 2010 and even 2012. In Gallup’s weekly tracking poll through mid-July, Obama received positive approval ratings from about two-thirds of nonwhite voters and three-fifths of young people, but only about one-third of whites over 50.

And yet, as Davis and Rosenberg both note, Republicans are generally pushing to retrench entitlement programs that benefit the senior population that is increasingly leaning toward them. Democrats, meanwhile, resist constraints on entitlement costs that could help fund investments in the younger, heavily minority, generation that has become the foundation of their electoral coalition. “It creates an interesting political dynamic, with Republicans calling for cutting entitlements [and thus] cutting their base, and Democrats refusing to cut entitlements and [thus] hurting their base,” Davis says.

One further irony is that older whites will increasingly depend on the payroll taxes paid by younger minorities to fund Social Security and Medicare benefits. Demographic experts such as the Urban Institute’s Robert Lerman project that the number of whites in the workforce will decline over the coming decades, and that all of the increase in the labor market will come among minorities. Today, only about three-fifths of Hispanic and four-fifths of young black people complete high school, compared with about 90 percent of whites; similarly a much larger share of adult whites (about 30 percent) than blacks (17 percent) or Hispanics (under 13 percent) have obtained college degrees.

“The Baby Boom has a tremendous stake in investing in the education of young Latinos and African-Americans so they will get good jobs and we can tax the daylights out of them to support [the Boomers'] retirement,” Klineberg, the Rice University sociologist, says. “The [racial] gap in achievement has to be narrowed if there’s any serious hope for American competitiveness in the global economy.”

Indeed, Frey projects that if the U.S. does not significantly improve college completion rates for African-Americans and Hispanics, the overall share of American adults with college degrees will decline “very sharply in the next 10 or 15 years.” That’s an ominous trend in an increasingly knowledge-based economy.

“A Titanic Battle”

What’s clear is that demographics aren’t going to provide much relief from these pressures for decades. As the minority population ages, it will make up a steadily increasing share of seniors over the coming decades, Frey notes. But the minority share of the youth population will continue to grow at a comparable pace. So, the chasm between the mostly white senior population and the mostly minority youth — the cultural generation gap — could remain as large as it is today through 2030, before narrowing slowly in the decades thereafter.

If anything, the nation’s evolving demography may wind these tensions even more tightly. While the share of the population represented by young people is expected to stabilize at just under one-fourth, the senior share is projected to steadily rise from about one-eighth today to one-fifth by 2040. By Frey’s projections, that will slowly shrink the working-age population — those who provide the tax base for young people and seniors alike — from about 63 percent of the society now to 57 percent by 2030.

In that world, the generational and racial implications of the choices between tax cuts and spending reductions, and between public spending aimed at the old or the young, could grow increasingly explicit and explosive. Rosenberg isn’t alone in believing that the way the United States sorts through those options will powerfully shape not only its economic but also its social future. “The challenge for us in the next few years is creating a politics of investment during a time of potential austerity to make sure that we’re … funding the future and not the past,” Rosenberg says. “This is going to be a titanic battle not only at the federal level but at the state level as well.”

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Health Watch: Dirty Little Secrets of Soy – For vegans and health conscious people this is a must see!!!

How government works

The case for the right to rob you

Hilarious, but it’s not just a joke.

Where do the people who show up at our doors with guns and badges (don’t pay the IRS and see what happens) get their authority from?

It’s not a trivial question and this gentleman makes some thought provoking thoughts.

Far From Gulf, a Spill Scourge 5 Decades Old

By ADAM NOSSITER

Hannah Baage walked through polluted Gio Creek in Kegbara Dere. She said recently, “There is Shell oil on my body.”

BODO, Nigeria — Big oil spills are no longer news in this vast, tropical land. The Niger Delta, where the wealth underground is out of all proportion with the poverty on the surface, has endured the equivalent of the Exxon Valdez spill every year for 50 years by some estimates. The oil pours out nearly every week, and some swamps are long since lifeless.

Perhaps no place on earth has been as battered by oil, experts say, leaving residents here astonished at the nonstop attention paid to the gusher half a world away in the Gulf of Mexico. It was only a few weeks ago, they say, that a burst pipe belonging to Royal Dutch Shell in the mangroves was finally shut after flowing for two months: now nothing living moves in a black-and-brown world once teeming with shrimp and crab.

Not far away, there is still black crude on Gio Creek from an April spill, and just across the state line in Akwa Ibom the fishermen curse their oil-blackened nets, doubly useless in a barren sea buffeted by a spill from an offshore Exxon Mobil pipe in May that lasted for weeks.

The oil spews from rusted and aging pipes, unchecked by what analysts say is ineffectual or collusive regulation, and abetted by deficient maintenance and sabotage. In the face of this black tide is an infrequent protest — soldiers guarding an Exxon Mobil site beat women who were demonstrating last month, according to witnesses — but mostly resentful resignation.

Small children swim in the polluted estuary here, fishermen take their skiffs out ever farther — “There’s nothing we can catch here,” said Pius Doron, perched anxiously over his boat — and market women trudge through oily streams. “There is Shell oil on my body,” said Hannah Baage, emerging from Gio Creek with a machete to cut the cassava stalks balanced on her head.

That the Gulf of Mexico disaster has transfixed a country and president they so admire is a matter of wonder for people here, living among the palm-fringed estuaries in conditions as abject as any in Nigeria, according to the United Nations. Though their region contributes nearly 80 percent of the government’s revenue, they have hardly benefited from it; life expectancy is the lowest in Nigeria.

“President Obama is worried about that one,” Claytus Kanyie, a local official, said of the gulf spill, standing among dead mangroves in the soft oily muck outside Bodo. “Nobody is worried about this one. The aquatic life of our people is dying off. There used be shrimp. There are no longer any shrimp.”

In the distance, smoke rose from what Mr. Kanyie and environmental activists said was an illegal refining business run by local oil thieves and protected, they said, by Nigerian security forces. The swamp was deserted and quiet, without even bird song; before the spills, Mr. Kanyie said, women from Bodo earned a living gathering mollusks and shellfish among the mangroves.

A boy playing by Bodo Creek in Bodo, Nigeria. As many as 546 million gallons of oil spilled into the Niger Delta over the last five decades, experts said.

With new estimates that as many as 2.5 million gallons of oil could be spilling into the Gulf of Mexico each day, the Niger Delta has suddenly become a cautionary tale for the United States.

As many as 546 million gallons of oil spilled into the Niger Delta over the last five decades, or nearly 11 million gallons a year, a team of experts for the Nigerian government and international and local environmental groups concluded in a 2006 report. By comparison, the Exxon Valdez spill in 1989 dumped an estimated 10.8 million gallons of oil into the waters off Alaska.

So the people here cast a jaundiced, if sympathetic, eye at the spill in the gulf. “We’re sorry for them, but it’s what’s been happening to us for 50 years,” said Emman Mbong, an official in Eket.

The spills here are all the more devastating because this ecologically sensitive wetlands region, the source of 10 percent of American oil imports, has most of Africa’s mangroves and, like the Louisiana coast, has fed the interior for generations with its abundance of fish, shellfish, wildlife and crops.

Local environmentalists have been denouncing the spoliation for years, with little effect. “It’s a dead environment,” said Patrick Naagbanton of the Center for Environment, Human Rights and Development in Port Harcourt, the leading city of the oil region.

Though much here has been destroyed, much remains, with large expanses of vibrant green. Environmentalists say that with intensive restoration, the Niger Delta could again be what it once was.

Nigeria produced more than two million barrels of oil a day last year, and in over 50 years thousands of miles of pipes have been laid through the swamps. Shell, the major player, has operations on thousands of square miles of territory, according to Amnesty International. Aging columns of oil-well valves, known as Christmas trees, pop up improbably in clearings among the palm trees. Oil sometimes shoots out of them, even if the wells are defunct.

“The oil was just shooting up in the air, and it goes up in the sky,” said Amstel M. Gbarakpor, youth president in Kegbara Dere, recalling the spill in April at Gio Creek. “It took them three weeks to secure this well.”

How much of the spillage is due to oil thieves or to sabotage linked to the militant movement active in the Niger Delta, and how much stems from poorly maintained and aging pipes, is a matter of fierce dispute among communities, environmentalists and the oil companies.

Caroline Wittgen, a spokeswoman for Shell in Lagos, said, “We don’t discuss individual spills,” but argued that the “vast majority” were caused by sabotage or theft, with only 2 percent due to equipment failure or human error.

“We do not believe that we behave irresponsibly, but we do operate in a unique environment where security and lawlessness are major problems,” Ms. Wittgen said.

Oil companies also contend that they clean up much of what is lost. A spokesman for Exxon Mobil in Lagos, Nigel A. Cookey-Gam, said that the company’s recent offshore spill leaked only about 8,400 gallons and that “this was effectively cleaned up.”

But many experts and local officials say the companies attribute too much to sabotage, to lessen their culpability. Richard Steiner, a consultant on oil spills, concluded in a 2008 report that historically “the pipeline failure rate in Nigeria is many times that found elsewhere in the world,” and he noted that even Shell acknowledged “almost every year” a spill due to a corroded pipeline.

On the beach at Ibeno, the few fishermen were glum. Far out to sea oil had spilled for weeks from the Exxon Mobil pipe. “We can’t see where to fish; oil is in the sea,” Patrick Okoni said.

“We don’t have an international media to cover us, so nobody cares about it,” said Mr. Mbong, in nearby Eket. “Whatever cry we cry is not heard outside of here.”

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The Benefits of Fathers as Primary Caretakers (VIDEO) by Kari Henley

How often do we equate the word “father” with “caretaker?” Until fairly recently, most men were expected to garner power, fame and fortune outside of the house, and serve a more ancillary role in raising kids. Not anymore. The number of fathers solely responsible for the care of their children is growing at a rate almost twice that of single mothers, and now numbers over 2 million.

With the ongoing impact of the recession, 80 percent of people being laid off are men, and tens of thousands of fathers are being thrown into new roles at home. Whether the role of full time Dad comes as a conscious decision to spend more time with the family, or due to circumstance – fatherhood is evolving.

Women have dedicated the past 40 years establishing an equal footing in the professional world, and have now achieved a 50 percent presence in the workplace. Now, a quiet but powerful revolution is beginning to happen on the other side. More men are staying home and not only liking it, but discovering how powerful and important their presence is for child development.

When guys are home parenting, you can bet there are a lot more games of Superman crashing through the house, soccer outside and creative meals made in one pot, but studies show kids benefit equally from a house run by a single mom or dad. As many modern parents know, the old adage that men ‘aren’t as good at parenting’ reflects more a fact of lack of practice or opportunity, than aptitude.

Jeremy Adams Smith, is author of The Daddy Shift: How Stay-at-Home Fathers, Breadwinning Moms, and Shared Parenting are Transforming the American Family, now available in paperback. He is holding the primary parent role in his family, and has done extensive research into parental roles. He writes:

Where once it was thought that the minds and bodies of men were hardly affected by fatherhood, today scientists are discovering that fatherhood changes men down to the cellular level. For more than a century, it was assumed that mothers, not fathers, were solely responsible for the care, life choices, and happiness of children. In recent years, however, we have discovered that father involvement is essential to a child’s well being, and that dads provide unique kinds of care and play that mothers often do not.

In so many ways, raising a family remains slanted in our collective psyche towards the more feminine interests and styles. Full time Dad’s often feel awkward at the library “play groups” and feel like an outcast on the playground. Yet, when men become involved with their children, it helps bolster their self-esteem, improve performance at school and keeps them from high risk behaviors. While women have demonstrated different, but equally effective methods of leadership in the boardroom, men are standing up to redefine how to run a household.

One of the most creative and effective ways to explore the complexities of changing social systems is through storytelling. So, for all you Dad’s who are out there manning the stove, changing diapers, driving the teenagers and taking primary responsibility for watching the kids, have I got a wonderful summer reading book for you. After all, I highly doubt the “Twilight series” is on the top of any macho reading list.

Home, Away is a new fiction book about a Major League Baseball player who quits the big leagues in his prime — and gives up a $42 million contract — to care for the son he lost in a custody battle years before. Written by Jeff Gillenkirk, freelance writer and former speechwriter for New York Governor Mario Cuomo, the story evolves from his own experience as the divorced father of a teenage son.

“This is a story about someone struggling with the conflict between work and family that so many people face: how can I have a career and raise a kid?” said Gillenkirk as we chatted by phone this week. Part of this story is inspired by divorced Arizona star Matt Williams, a major league baseball player who decided to leave the sport to spend more time with his family — a brave move in a very masculine sport.

Whether or not you like baseball, have been in a divorce or raised a child single-handedly, this is a fun and quick read that reflects the complexities of relationships, the up’s and downs of life, and the necessary sacrifices that are often required of both men and women in the long journey of parenthood.

Publicist David Jacobsen of Chin Music Press commented, “A stay-at-home dad myself, I can attest to the fact that there are really no novels that grapple with the conflict between a man’s ambition and the love of parenting. Home, Away is about that conflict, set against the dramatic backdrop of professional baseball.”

Gillenkirk is an advocate for educating men about the importance of early involvement in their children’s lives. He plans to use his fiction novel as a tool to help men talk about the importance of being involved with their kids, as they are going through mandatory parenting classes before formal divorce. He meets with prison inmates to explore the generational toll of absent fathers, and high risk behavior.

“If Dad’s get involved at the beginning, they become bonded and so involved, it stays for the rest of their life,” said Gillenkirk. “It often boils down to men not taking the opportunity to parent, and always default to work taking precedence.”

If books are not your cup of tea, there is a great new documentary out called The Evolution of Dad, written and directed by New Jersey-based stay-at-home dad Dana Glazer, who sees the shifting landscape of fathers, and recognizes this is a time unlike the generation before, or the generations to come. According to The New York Times, “Dads like Glazer are redefining the role, rejecting old expectations while still answering to them, knowing they don’t want the earlier model but not yet certain what the new model should be.”

Check out this emotion-filled YouTube clip of the film that this is sure to awaken the special place Fatherhood holds in our collective hearts.

WATCH:

Evolution of Dad – Introduction from Evolution of Dad on Vimeo.

As Ed and Deb Shapiro often cite here on HuffPo, “Be the Change.” How are men redefining the role of caretaker in your experience? Love to hear your comments and stories below. Feel free to click on “Become a Fan” to receive weekly updates.

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