Tri-County Sentry
Friday
MARCH 28, 2014
Commentary Beyond the Rhetoric:
Still Fighting for Right to Vote
President Obama’s War Against Minority College Student
Jesse L. Jackson, Sr. This week, I wanted to focus my column once more on the issue of voting. After 246 years of slavery, Americans fought a brutal Civil War — the bloodiest in our history — to end slavery and preserve the union. Three amendments were added to the Constitution: the 13th abolished slavery; the 14th guaranteed equal protection under the laws, and the 15th outlawed discrimination in voting on the basis of race or prior servitude. But although they surrendered on the battlefield, the Confederates did not give up. They waged a fierce rear-guard battle over state sovereignty, also known as “states’ rights.” They sabotaged the post-war reconstruction, unleashing a wave of terror across the South. Several states began to enforce segregation against the newly freed slaves. And in the shameful decision of Plessey v. Ferguson in 1896, the Supreme Court gave approval to state Jim Crow laws, endorsing the oxymoron of “separate but equal.” It took another half century of struggle to reestablish the reach of the civil rights amendments. In 1965, the Voting Rights Act was passed to enforce the 15th Amendment’s guaran-
tee against discrimination in voting. States, counties and municipalities in the South continued to invent new obstacles to voting, but for areas with a history of discrimination — largely Southern states — the Voting Rights Act required preclearance of any changes in voting laws. This enabled the Justice Department to prevent significant voter suppression. But having lost the military battle in 1865 and the legal battle in 1965, the Confederates did not give up. They continued to argue for states’ rights. And since the 15th Amendment only outlawed denying a citizen his right to vote based on race or color, voting procedures remained under the control of states and localities. In 2013, with a conservative majority in control of the Supreme Court, the Supreme Court revived states-rights arguments in Shelby v. Holder, acting shamefully to weaken federal authority, gutting much of the vital preclearance portions of the Voting Rights Act. Once more as the federal authority was weakened, the Confederates churned out new obstacles to voting — strict photo ID requirements, elimination
Harry C. Alford
of same-day voter registration, reducing early voting periods, eliminating early registration for young people, outlawing use of student IDs and more. Within two hours of the Shelby decision, Texas Attorney General Greg Abbot — now running for governor — announced that the Texas’voter identification law, previously rejected by the U.S. Justice Department and a federal court (which said it was the most discriminatory measure of its kind in the country), would immediately be implemented. North Carolina followed shortly. Now some 34 states have erected new obstacles to voting. The absence of a constitutional guarantee to the right to vote remains the source of continuing injustice. Professor Obama wasn’t just teaching history; he was introducing his students to an ongoing human rights struggle. If the fundamental individual right to vote had been constitutionally guaranteed in 2000, Al Gore would have been elected VOTE, See page 12A
Last week, the Obama Administration declared war on one million underserved students pursuing higher education throughout the United States. While the President and First Lady launch their campaign to make it easier for lowincome minority students to access college, the Department of Education has launched an unprecedented assault on this same community through a new proposal that will cut thousands of college programs that disproportionately serve poor communities, single working mothers, veterans and other at-risk populations. At a time when American employers desperately need an educated, skilled workforce to sustain economic recovery, a confused and conflicted White House is hurting the underserved communities it claims to support. On March 14, the Department of Education published its new proposed “Gainful Employment” rule. The rule is a rehashed patchwork of regulations concocted several years ago in an attempt to prevent abuse of the federal financial aid system. Rejected through legislative process and shot down in federal court only a few years ago, the Administration has nonetheless resur-
peers seeking high paying jobs. The same is true for those pursuing their passions in culinary training, design, animation and other careers in the arts. This will hurt employers like hospital systems, hotels, restaurants and food service companies who heavily recruit qualified talent from programs threatened by the rule. Perhaps the biggest problem with the ill-conceived Gainful Employment rule is the fact that it discriminates against programs that are sought primarily by low income minorities and other nontraditional students. From poor working families, to single mothers to veterans and other special needs communities, there are millions of Americans who don’t fit the mold or plainly weren’t accepted for a typical college experience. In order to gain the skills, training and credentials needed to secure and maintain a job, many of these individuals enroll in proprietary vocational programs. President Obama’s Gainful Employment rule WAR, See page 12A
Lee A. Daniels
Walter L. Fields, Jr. Even the left-leaning cable TV outpost MSNBC got in on the fun and gave Keyes a show to promote his idiocy on the airwaves. Then there was Florida congressman and Tea Party darling Allan West who was so far on the extreme right that he became a caricature of a Black conservative caricature. And who can forget Herman Cain, the former corporate pizza pusher, a political simpleton whose ignorance convinced the former CEO that he could run for the presidency and made thinking Republicans blush. The dark side of the far-right is truly an intellectual wasteland. What makes Carson stand out is his professional pedigree. He was seen as the epitome of Black success; a true rags-to-riches story, having overcome challenges in his youth to rise to a place of prominence through hard work, determination and sheer brilliance. He might not have earned a place on the wall in Black households beside John, Martin and Jesus (and soon Obama), but his name was certainly held in great esteem by Black parents who wanted to provide their children with a role model to emulate. At least until Carson voices his political beliefs. The famed surgeon has
rected the policy and repackaged it in an 841-page proposal that will decimate college programs and career-focused vocational training currently serving one million students. The proposed regulation, which applies primarily to proprietary (for-profit) colleges and universities, would make academic programs ineligible for federal Title IV financial aid if they fail to meet arbitrary formulas primarily related to student debt and earnings a few years out after graduation. Put more simply, students who don’t command high enough starting salaries relative to their student loans will find their programs eliminated without any solution for continuing their educational career. If the rule is enacted as proposed, thousands of vocational training and educational programs will disappear, creating an $8 billion shortage in the higher education market and many aspiring students left out in the cold. Students pursuing careers in public service, which often pay lower starting salaries, like teachers, social workers, nurses and other allied health careers will be barred from receiving the same federal aid as their
The GOP’s “Culture of Poverty” Gambit
Ben Carson’s Political Malpractice By any measure Ben Carson is at the top of his field. The renowned surgeon has established a clear and irrefutable legacy in medicine. His life-altering surgical procedures are the stuff of legend, and the fact that he is an African-American male in a profession where Blacks comprise just 4 percent of practitioners is all the more impressive. I first became aware of Carson during my years in Baltimore as he made news at the Mecca of medical research, Johns Hopkins Hospital in the port city. Now, Carson is making news not for his medical exploits but for his foray into the world of partisan politics. The surgeon has declared himself an unabashed conservative and has become the latest Black darling of the political right. Every so often we hear a Black voice being elevated by the far-right in an attempt to neutralize racial claims in political discourse while actually inflaming the passions of the overwhelming majority of Blacks who see through the charade. We’ve seen the likes of Alan Keyes emerge, as he ran for every office with the exception of dog catcher and seemed to appear everywhere when race was at the center of the debate.
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become a stalker, attacking the Affordable Health Care Act every chance he gets to stand behind a podium or make a television appearance. Carson uses his credibility in the medical profession to assault Obamacare and by effect, disparage the nation’s first AfricanAmerican president. His vitriol has earned him the admiration of the GOP’s right flank and given him ‘most favored Black son’ status with the conservative propagandist tool, the Fox News Network. Carson gives conservatives a convenient race-shield, a Black person who can carry their water and deliver messages that are racially codified but cannot be charged with being a racist due to his race. And unlike the silent assassin on the United States Supreme Court, Ben Carson usually doesn’t look like a buffoon when he engages in buffoonery. It’s not just Carson’s critique of health care reform that is earning him rave reviews from the political right. At the Conservative Political Action CARSON, See page 12A
The 2014 mid-term elections are just eight months away – and the Republicans are worried about Black voters again. They have good reason to be – that is, to worry about a repeat of 2012. Then, despite the best efforts of GOP-dominated state legislatures to block Blacks’ access to the polls, black voters’ turnout rate surpassed that of Whites for the first time ever. That achievement, along with the substantial turnout of both Hispanic-American and Asian-American voters, helped underwrite President Obama’s decisive re-election victory. Equally important, Obama’s name on the ballot was only partially responsible for Blacks’ march to the polls, because the Black vote had been rising markedly since 1996. So, despite the predictions of some politicos and pundits that the Democrats will lose the Senate in November, the vote of voters of color may once again prove the president’s party’s ace in the hole. That’s part of the political lens through which to consider the recent comments by Paul Ryan, the Wisconsin Republican chairman of the House of Representative’s budget committee, and Bill
O’Reilly, the Fox News talk show host, painting black Americans as “problem people.” Their purpose was to signal the GOP and conservative echo chamber that it’s time to start whistling “Dixie” anew— but this time replacing the words of longing for the “old times they are not forgotten” with a lament about blacks’ supposed culture of poverty. O’Reilly, responding to President Obama’s late February announcement of a Black Male Initiative to help young males of color prepare for a productive adulthood, commanded Obama adviser Valerie Jarrett to “ attack the fundamental disease if you want to cure it … get people like Jay Z, Kanye West, all these gangsta rappers to knock it off.” Daily Beast.com columnist Jamelle Bouie drily noted O’Reilly’s ignorance, pointing out that “Jay-Z is a multimedia mogul with a gift for business and the credibility of the art world. Kanye West is a hyper-talented producer and visual artist who has refined and redefined the sound of pop music several times over. And in their relentless drive for accomplishment and success, they embody the American dream. “To Bill O’Reilly,
however,” he continued, “they’re just ‘gangster rappers’ who need to be put in their place.” Ryan, who’s tried mightily to erase the public’s memory of his spectacular failure on the 2012 GOP presidential ticket by talking about the country’s crisis of poverty, claimed it was largely due to a “tailspin of culture, in our inner cities in particular, of men not working and just generations of men not even thinking about working or learning the value and culture of work. So, there’s a real culture problem here that has to be dealt with.” California Democrat Rep. Barbara Lee quickly and bluntly got ahead of the resulting firestorm, characterizing Ryan’s remarks as a “thinly veiled racial attack … [that] cannot be tolerated. Let’s be clear,” she said, “when Mr. Ryan says ‘inner city,’ when he says, ‘culture,’ these are simply code words for what he really means: ‘black.’” Lee added that Ryan should “produce some legitimate proposals on how to tackle poverty and racial GOP, See page 12A