Richmond Free Press
Giant hibiscus at Oliver Hill Courts Building
Editorial Page
A6
July 7-9, 2016
Exhaling Democratic presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton must be exhaling today after learning she’s off the hook criminally for her imprudent way of handling emails containing classified materials. The FBI’s yearlong probe into the personal home server she used as secretary of state — eschewing the more protected server of the U.S. State Department — found that 110 emails were sent or received containing classified information and secrets, and that it was possible people hostile to U.S. interests may have gained access to her personal email account. FBI Director James Comey, a tough former federal prosecutor in Richmond who had no problem locking people up and boosting the prison rolls with his programs like “Weed and Seed,” called Mrs. Clinton’s actions “extremely careless” but said no charges were appropriate. Careless, without intention to harm, nets some people manslaughter charges in drunk driving cases. Careless, without intention to harm, results in others, like the van driver in Freddie Gray’s case, being slapped with a criminal indictment. U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch said in a statement late Wednesday that Mrs. Clinton will not face any type of sanction or indictment. She said the case is now closed. The questions are these: Did Mrs. Clinton’s actions result in any harm? And what is the administration doing to ensure that nobody currently is working from home using their own RadioShack equipment or will be in the future? We don’t know the answer to either of these questions. Certainly, the world of computer technology, hacking and cyber security has become more complex since Mrs. Clinton served in her cabinet post from January 2009 to February 2013. Universally, we are now more attuned to cyber crimes and the havoc hackers can wreak by not only stealing personal information and credit card numbers, but by bringing down power grids and shutting down economic systems. What is to stop a hacker with terrorist ties from getting the codes to nuclear weapon systems and striking a worldwide disaster? With the increase even in recent weeks of mass deaths at the hands of terrorists, we all must be more cautious with the materials we handle. We, along with Mrs. Clinton, have learned from her mistake. If that’s the worst she has, then it should not cripple her candidacy to become president. Just think about the alternative.
Stop the violence The deadly violence by police against African-Americans and other people of color continues unabated. The latest victim, 37-year-old Alton Sterling, was killed Tuesday outside a convenience store in Baton Rouge, La. As the graphic video shows, he had been wrestled to the ground and restrained by one police officer when another shot him five times at point blank range in his chest and back. According to Louisiana Gov. John Bel Edwards, the U.S. Justice Department’s Civil Rights Division will be the lead investigative agency in this case, with the FBI, Louisiana state police and the U.S. attorney’s office in Baton Rouge assisting. While the governor and others continue the usual post-police shooting pleas for calm and unity, we ask how many more of these police killings must take place before significant action is taken to stop the violence perpetrated by officers of the law? The UK Guardian newspaper, on its website “The Counted,” is keeping a list of all the police killings in the United States. They are doing it because perhaps we are too chicken in this nation to maintain and report such statistics that clearly demonstrate this is a national emergency and disaster that exceeds even Zika virus proportions. These shootings show that the threat is not an imported bug, but an insidious enemy that lives within our communities and, ironically, is sworn to protect us. The Guardian’s statistics show that Mr. Sterling is the 558th person murdered by police in 2016. His death is the 13th since the start of July — just seven days ago. This epidemic has got to stop. We applaud our local constable, Richmond Police Chief Alfred Durham, for continually working to build bridges and trust with the community. He is out there meeting people where they are — in barbershops and through walks in city neighborhoods. His latest community walk was Tuesday, when he led his command staff on a 5:30 p.m. stroll through the largely Latino neighborhood of Southwood off Hull Street Road in South Side, talking with residents. Hopefully, through leadership such as Chief Durham’s, Richmonders won’t have to face the Louisiana kind of brutality here. But we need to put tough questions to our candidates for mayor and City Council who want to lead this city. Ask them what they will do not only to stop the violence in our neighborhoods, but how they will keep the police from perpetrating violence on the people. Those same questions need to be posed over and over and over again to our elected officials on all levels, including this nation’s presidential candidates. They need to provide solutions rather than being a part of the problem.
Sandra Sellars/Richmond Free Press
Affirmative action upheld In many instances, the U.S. Supreme Court’s recent affirmative action ruling upholding the University of Texas’ affirmative action program was overshadowed by a same-day order overturning President Obama’s executive order to ease illegal immigrants’ path to U.S. citizenship. Affirming the university’s admission plan was notable because it squelched an ongoing challenge to affirmative action by well-financed conservative groups. Even more remarkable, the conservativeleaning court rendered the decision shy of its full nine-member participation, with no successor confirmed following the death of conservative Justice Antonin Scalia and liberal Justice Elena Kagan recusing herself from deliberation because of her previous involvement in the case as U.S. solicitor general. The biggest surprise was that Justice Anthony Kennedy, a Ronald Reagan appointee, joined the other liberals on the court — Justices Stephen G. Breyer, Ruth Bader Ginsburg and Sonia Sotomayor — to form the 4-3 majority that said race may be used as one factor among many in building a diverse student body. Dissenting were Chief Justice John G. Roberts Jr. and
Justices Samuel A. Alito Jr. and Clarence Thomas. “A university is in large part defined by those intangible ‘qualities which are incapable of objective measurement but which make for greatness,’” Justice Kennedy wrote, quoting from Sweatt v. Painter, a landmark 1950 U.S. Supreme Court
George E. Curry ruling outlawing the University of Texas’ exclusion of AfricanAmericans from its law school. “Considerable deference is owed to a university in defining those intangible characteristics, like student body diversity, that are central to its identity and educational mission.” To conform to earlier high court rulings, the Texas legislature passed a new plan in 1997 for the University of Texas to admit all high school seniors who ranked in the top 10 percent of their graduating class. But the plan failed to sufficiently diversify the main campus at Austin. Texas is about 38 percent Latino and 12 percent AfricanAmerican. Under the 10 Percent Plan, 26 percent of the students admitted were Latino and 6 percent were African-American. Under challenge was the part of the program that allowed race and ethnicity to be considered along with other factors to fill the slots not taken by the top 10 percent, which usually came to
about 25 percent of each incoming class. No specific points were given for race. Abigail Fisher, a white female from Sugar Land, Texas, applied for admission to UT in 2008. She did not rank in the top 10 percent of her class and university officials said even if no affirmative action program had been in place, she still would not have been accepted. Still, she sued, saying that race should never be used under any circumstances. A lower court ruled against her, a ruling that was affirmed upon reaching the appeals court. Her case was appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, remanded to the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals, and accepted a second time, with the court’s recently ruling against her. Justice Thomas, a staunch opponent of affirmative action, declared, “I write separately to reaffirm that ‘a State’s use of race in higher education admissions decisions is categorically prohibited by the Equal Protection Clause.’ The Constitution abhors classifications based on race because every time the government places citizens on racial registers and makes race relevant to the provision of burdens or benefits, it demeans us all.” He added, “That constitutional imperative does not change in the face of a ‘faddish theor[y]’ that racial discrimination may produce educational benefits.’ “ This is not likely to be the final word on affirmative from
Airbnb working to correct discrimination You learn a lot about the character of an organization when things go wrong. For the team at Airbnb, hearing the outcry from African-American travelers who were denied lodging because of discrimination was one of these moments. I know, because I met with them in San Francisco in early June to discuss this challenge. Everyone I spoke with, including CEO Brian Chesky, Airbnb’s legal, engineering and policy team, and the leadership of the black employees group, made clear that they are willing to do all they can to tackle this problem. What they said to me in private matches what they’ve said in public: Airbnb has zero tolerance for bias or racial discrimination. After spending more than four decades fighting for equality at the ACLU and in other organizations, I’ve seen companies pay lip service to these issues before. But Airbnb leaders have shown a willingness to be transparent and have expressed a sincere desire to ensure that its policies, technology and platform are not facilitating discrimination. Toward that end, Airbnb has hired me to help them lead a 90-day review process to address discrimination issues. In working with them, I plan to hold them
accountable. I will begin that process by spending the summer meeting with technology experts, civil rights leaders, housing advocates and members of the Airbnb community to solicit their ideas. Those conversations will be
Laura W. Murphy guided by three principles and objectives. The first is identifying and fixing structural problems with the platform. Airbnb should be less focused on fixing examples of individual discrimination than on understanding how the platform and underlying technology itself may contribute to possible systemic problems. Airbnb has already tapped its best engineers and product team members to lead this effort, and I’m excited to work with them to make real improvements. The second step is to improve its processes so it can rapidly identify racial discrimination and deal with these matters quickly and decisively. That includes putting in policies and processes that will set the model for the industry and reflect the company’s commitment to fighting discrimination and acting quickly if something goes wrong. It will be important for Airbnb, like any company committed to taking on this issue, to continually educate staff and the community so that the everyone understands these rules and processes so that responses are quick and appropriate.
Finally, Airbnb must build broader and enduring relationships with diverse travel, civil rights, grassroots, small business, social science and educational institutions. The staff at Airbnb cannot make its way in this increasingly diverse world unless they are a more diverse company and active in communities that will support them in this effort. One meeting in the middle of a crisis won’t do it. They need relationships with experts that last. Discrimination in the sharing economy is not going away anytime soon, and if Airbnb wants to be in the forefront of tackling this problem, it will be mutually beneficial to be a part of a sustained dialogue with individuals and organizations. These steps are just the beginning. Airbnb understands that there’s no single solution to the problem of deeply entrenched biases and discrimination in the travel industry or in our society as a whole. It will need to engage in an enduring effort to ensure that every single member of its community is treated equally. At its core, Airbnb is about helping people feel like they can belong anywhere, no matter who they are, what they look like, or where they’re from. They take that mission very seriously, and I will do whatever I can to help them get it right. The writer recently retired as director of the ACLU’s Washington Legislative Office after 17 years. Trice Edney News Wire
The Free Press welcomes letters The Richmond Free Press respects the opinions of its readers. We want to hear from you. We invite you to write the editor. All letters will be considered for publication. Concise, typewritten letters related to public matters are preferred. Also include your telephone number(s). Letters should be addressed to: Letters to the Editor, Richmond Free Press, P.O. Box 27709, 422 East Franklin Street, Richmond, VA 23261, or faxed to: (804) 643-7519 or e-mail: letters@richmondfreepress.com.
the high court. Lawsuits against Harvard University and the University of North Carolina, each prepared by Project on Fair Representation, the same conservative outfit that represented Ms. Fisher in the UT suit, , are making their way through lower courts and could end up before the U.S. Supreme Court. If those cases reach the high court, they could well be decided by the results of the November presidential election. Writing on Scotusblog.com, Lyle Denniston observed: “Depending upon who wins the presidential election in November, a Scalia successor could hold the balance of power on affirmative action in the future, even if Kennedy were to return to his prior skepticism about such uses of race in public policy decisions. Justices Breyer, Ginsburg, and Sotomayor might well have Justice Kagan with them in the future and might form a definite majority when a ninth Justice is on board — depending on presidential politics.” The writer is president and CEO of George Curry Media.
Richmond Free Press 422 East Franklin Street Richmond, VA 23219 Telephone (804) 644-0496 FAX (804) 643-7519 Mailing Address: P.O. Box 27709 Richmond, VA 23261 ______________
Founder Raymond H. Boone President – Publisher Jean P. Boone Managing Editor Bonnie V. Winston bonniewinston@richmondfreepress.com
Vice President – New Business Development Raymond H. Boone Jr.
jrboone@richmondfreepress.com
Vice President – News Enhancement Jeremy M. Lazarus Vice President – Production April A. Coleman Staff Writers Fred Jeter, Frances Crutchfield Hazel Trice Edney Photographers Sandra Sellars James Haskins, Rudolph Powell and Clinton A. Strane ______________
Vice President – Administration Tracey L. Oliver Advertising Traffic Coordinator Cynthia Downing Advertising Fax: (804) 643-5436 e-mail: advertising@richmondfreepress.com classifieds@richmondfreepress.com
National Advertising Representative EPMG ______________
Distribution Reed Marshall LLC ______________
Richmond Free Press is published weekly by Paradigm Communications, Inc. Copies of the Richmond Free Press (one copy per person) are free of charge at outlets in the Richmond area. Back copies are available at the Free Press office at $3 per copy. Bulk orders can be made prior to any upcoming edition at special rates.
A Publication of
PARADIGM COMMUNICATIONS, INC.
422 East Franklin Street Richmond, VA 23219 Telephone (804) 644-0496