Update: The double standard on environmental racism and justice in black and white in #SweetHomeAlabama

Then State Representative Oliver Robinson also argued against the listing before the Alabama Environmental Management Commission. It was also opposed by the Jefferson County Commission. The site has not been not added to the National Priorities List.

Meet Oliver Robinson, who was once one of the most decorated basketball players in UAB history, but now is a toxic waste of talent.

Former Alabama state Rep. Oliver Robinson had it going on. He was a basketball star at UAB, and his political star had been rising in the Alabama Legislature where he served for 18 years until he suddenly resigned last year.
Robinson was a rarity in red-state Alabama politics - a Democrat with power. On the other hand, it turns out he was just another in a long line of crooked Alabama politicians.

 And therein lies the problem, Democrats, especially black Democrats are more likely to be prosecuted for conspiracy, bribery, and fraud than Republicans in Alabama.  But EYE digress.  Back to Oliver Robinson

Robinson pleaded guilty, it was announced on Thursday by the U.S. Attorney for the Northern District of Alabama, to fraud, conspiracy, bribery and tax evasion charges. It was also announced that Robinson is actively working with the FBI, IRS and other agencies to build cases on other conspirators.
All of this stems from Robinson’s involvement, as a representative from Birmingham, in the North Birmingham Superfund Site (officially tabbed the 35thAvenue Superfund by the EPA).
That site, located in the area of Birmingham where steel mills operated for decades, is an environmental mess. Testing has found toxins in neighborhoods to be so high that the top layers of soil have been removed from hundreds of yards, businesses and school grounds. There’s pollution in the waterways and in the air, as well.

So all of a sudden the powers that be care about environmental racism?

Per the white male dominated media

His campaign implored residents in Inglenook and Tarrant not to allow the EPA to test their soil for poisons -- the same soil some of them use to garden in, the same dirt some of their children play in.

And as it turns out, Robinson wasn't pushing back against the EPA because he had strong feelings about federal encroachment or neighborhood property values. He did it because he was getting paid.
He was being paid to tell mostly poor residents, some of them in his own district, that their neighborhoods were safe places to live, when he should have had every reason to know that wasn't true.

 And why is Oliver Robinson the poster boy?

He is going to jail because be spent at least a quarter of a million dollars on personal items rather utilizing the money for the purposes for which it was solicited from corporations--to publish a magazine touting African-American businesses, organize a conference bringing African-American entrepreneurs together with business and political leaders, or produce an event celebrating black achievement.
He is going to jail because he spent campaign funds on personal items, like whatever he bought for whomever at Victoria's Secret for $400 in February 2014.

Really?  Or is he going to jail because he is a powerful African American Democrat?

Civil rights activist Angela Yvonne Davis will speak in Birmingham next week, but for some in Alabama, the Birmingham native might not be welcome.
Two weeks ago, the Alabama Legislature passed a feel-good resolution, sponsored by Rep. Oliver Robinson, D-Birmingham, honoring Davis. However, Gov. Robert Bentley refused to sign it.

Is this about environmental racism or about sending a message to powerful African American Democrats?

It's like Langford himself is pitching this thing. 

Free money! Free money! Refinance now and we can spend $65 million in "profits" on schools and mass transit and the zoo and all those things we haven't been able to spend it on because too many corrupt politicians made too many bad bond deals.
If we remember anything from those days, it's that there much (sic) be a catch.

 And there is. Because in the bill Robinson is expected to sponsor, there will be money left over. Left over, that is, for politicians to steer to their own pet projects or to bolster their own campaigns.

The bill would create a committee to oversee distribution of the cash, but legislators would pick the members and would still suggest how it is spent. It is pass-through pork. Period. And don't forget it. 

Just like former Jefferson County Commission Jeff Germany used. Before it sent him to prison. 

Just like Sen. EB McClain used. Before it sent him to prison. 

In 2004 the county, led by Langford, passed a 1 cent sales tax for a $1 billion bond issue to help schools. He was more interested in the bond deal and political points than the schools. But he rammed it through. Before he went to prison.

EYE suspect the later

Despite being a Democrat in a Republican-controlled Legislature, he held considerable power before he resigned. He had seats on the House Rules Committee, the House Financial Services Committee, and served as co-chair of the Jefferson County delegation.
The foundation later paid Robinson's daughter, Amanda, who actively sought to discourage poor north Birmingham and Tarrant residents from testing their property for pollutants.
Robinson's daughter has not been charged related to the federal investigation.

EYE report.  You decide.

Who elected Rebekah Caldwell Mason Governor of #SweetHomeAlabama?

Rebekah Caldwell Mason

Meet Rebekah Caldwell Mason, everybody. She is your "real" governor of Alabama, a status she has held with her breasts and behind since 2014. 

The bigger issue isn't whether she and the governor were playing doctor or not. How much influence does she really have on Bentley? Is Ol' Doc's top adviser really his puppet master? The "de facto governor," as Spencer Collier says?

Finally, EYE would like to remind everyone how hypocritical republicans are, especially when it comes to so called #FamilyValues.  It's always the party of so called Compassionate, Conservative, Christians screaming Jesus the loudest, who are the biggest hypocrites.  

What get's me is for the most part they (republicans) get away with it.  Everybody knows if this had been a democrat, or a black lawmaker they would have been tried in the media, forced to resign, and/or convicted/imprisoned.  

Don't believe me?  Ask former Governor Don Siegelman, former Birmingham Mayor Larry Langford, former Jefferson County Commissioner Chris McNair , and others. 

And yes, EYE am playing the race card.

But a reasonable person, looking at the broad picture, could ask: Was the real reason these people were arrested that they represent a county that is mostly black, relatively poor, and largely Democratic? In other words, are political prosecutions still the tool of choice for the conservative elites who rule Karl Rove's Alabama--even with Barack Obama in the White House? Are such shenanigans still going on in other "deep red" regions of the country?

Stay Tuned.  

"Civil Rights Justice on the Cheap"

 

NY Times Sunday Review by Diane McWhorter

This anniversary year could have been an opportunity for Birmingham to practice some rigorous truth and painful reconciliation. It has ended up being a balkanized, largely ceremonial affair. The city’s Empowerment Week, an underpublicized festival of imported panelists and celebrities concluding today, exemplified the crux of the mission’s flaw: why is it so difficult to extend the notion of empowerment to include the powerless? We are more comfortable devoting civic resources to media events and monuments, like the life-size sculpture of the girls unveiled in Birmingham this week, than addressing the persistent casualties of the history being commemorated.

 Modern-day Americans seem loath to do the right thing unless it’s also the smart thing — even “compassionate release” has to be touted for its cost-saving virtues. Birmingham’s black-majority city government knew it had to sell the yearlong commemoration of 1963 as a big economic boon and named a co-chairwoman highly palatable to the business establishment, the native daughter Condoleezza Rice.

 Federal judge orders Chris McNair be released from prison.

McNair is the father of Denise McNair, one of the four little girls killed in the KKK's bombing of Sixteenth Street Baptist Church on Sept. 15, 1963.

Why do they still hate us so much?

Texas congresswoman Eddie Bernice Johnson said progress is being made but vigilance is needed.
"There is nothing we can take for granted," she said. "There is not a person in this room that says they don't want equality, but when you start breaking down what equality is, things change, people differ."

All that blood, sweat, tears, and sacrifice wiped away with a 5-4 vote.

"For those of you who are tired of hearing about racism, imagine how much more tired we are constantly experiencing it." - Barbara Smith

RedEye Around Red State AlaBAMA~Update

 H/T Teanderthal Party

Most red states are dirt poor because they are fed a steady diet of distortions via News(sic) Talk  Radio, whose job it is to use the public airways to misinform the uniformed, and, distract them with so called wedge issues, which in turn, makes them vote against their self interest.  

I meet you all the time. You hate Obama. You hate gay people. You hate black people, immigrants, Muslims, labor unions, women who want the right to make choices concerning their bodies, you hate em all. You hate being called racist. You hate being called a bigot. Maybe if you talked about creating jobs more than you talk about why you hate gay people we wouldn't call you bigots. Maybe if you talked about black people without automatically assuming they are on food stamps while demanding their birth certificates we wouldn't call you racist. You hate socialism and social justice. You hate regulations and taxes and spending and the Government. You hate.

RedEye's  Right Wing Watch

I'm glad I have my own blog to debunk the right wing distortions since Dale "Jackson" won't allow me to comment on his blog because he's afraid to engage me in a debate/discussion.Yep, the same Dale who refuses to debate me online is demanding that Huntsville City Councilman Will Culver bow down, I mean, apologize to him, for daring to walk out of the Council meeting after Dale took aim at him and Calhoun Community College , and, for (get this) threatening to sue Dale, which he really didn't threaten to do, and even if he did so what? 

"I'm saddened by the inaccuracy of the information that's being disseminated," said Culver. "All those things that are being alleged did not happen."
During the ensuing debate over whether Jackson should be allowed to continue speaking, a clearly agitated Culver packed his briefcase, walked out of the meeting and did not return.
On Friday, Culver called Jackson's allegations "totally unfounded" and said he is "looking at my legal options."

Psst Dale!  Will Culver has the right (pun intended) to pack up his briefcase and walk out of  meeting and to look at his  legal options.  You can't force him to recant his charge any more than he can force you to recant your charges.  You both have 1st amendment rights, remember?  You might want to read  this.  I'm just saying...BTW, you are welcome to comment on my blog anytime because I believe in freedom of speech.

The same Alabama Red Republican Controlled State Legislature that wants to arm teachers, recently passed new gun laws, and the so called Alabama Accountability Act, want to ban certain books in public schools because (wait for it), State Senator Bill Holtzclaw (yes you read it right) finds Nobel Prize winning author Toni Morrison's The Bluest Eye highly objectionable and sees no value or purpose in this book, educational or otherwise.  And you wonder why most red states are dirt poor?

The University of  Alabama sorority row bought, I mean, brought, a late surge in voter registrations for Tuesdays election which helped elect  Lee "Penis Nose" Garrison President of the Tuscaloosa City School Board. And how did the Sorority girls pull off such a feat you ask?  Why they did what any self respecting Southern Belle, I mean, Sorority girl would do...they chartered them some stretch limos and offered free drinks to members who voted.  There are allegations,  not to be confused with facts, that some of the voters weren't even from Alabama.  Why does this remind me of State Senator Scott Beason's infamous Aborigines comment?

The recording followed a different conversation that jurors heard Thursday in which Beason and other Republican senators can be heard talking about “HUD-financed buses” taking black voters to the polls in the November 2010 election if the ballot included a referendum to legalize electronic bingo.

Meanwhile way down yonder in Mobile, Alabama,  the white candidate mayoral beat the incumbent black mayoral candidate with a white surge . Surge must be the word of the day for Al.com.

Mayor Sam Jones lost support among both white and black voters in Tuesday’s election, compared with his first successful mayoral race eight years ago, an AL.com/Press-Register analysis suggests.

White voters left him for challenger Sandy Stimpson, while black voters abandoned him for home.

The difference is that there were fewer black voters, while white turnout was higher and went emphatically for Stimpson.

 Steve Raby, the mayor’s political consultant, said he did not know why white voters turned out in such higher numbers than blacks.

 There's just one little problem with this analysis....

Overall, voter turnout was 46 percent, roughly the same as in 2005.

Which leads me to believe the part about black voters abandoning the black candidate for home, which black voters don't do because the right to vote is sacred to black voters, which is why republicans are trying to suppress the black vote, is not true, but the part about white voters abandoning the black candidate, is true.

On Tuesday, Jones did not come close to winning a district where white voters outnumber blacks. Turnout averaged 48 percent in the precincts that are at least 55 percent white and exceeded 50 percent in five of them. In the precincts that are at least 55 percent black, meanwhile, turnout averaged only 39.2 percent

Rut Rho...Absentee ballots brings scrutiny and confusion on Election Day.

Less than an hour into the Mobile municipal election, people were already complaining of issues at the polls — the most common of those being that when the voter went to the poll, he or she was marked as already voted by absentee ballot. 

The absentee ballots in this election have become a flashpoint over the past few days after it came to light Friday that the U.S. Postal Inspector was looking into possible mail fraud in regard to the way the ballots were being sent in. The inspector, Tony Robinson, told FOX10, "We do have an active investigation in the Mobile area and inspectors there will be seeing that through toward prosecution.”

Herding Alabama DemoCats Rant

So, the Alabama Democratic Majority, which seceded from the Alabama Democratic Party because they refused to bow down to Joe Reed and his bunch,  held a democratic revival were they were supposed to be preaching the democratic gospel of of education, equal opportunity, voting rights, and inclusiveness (sic), however the headline in AL.com said Mark Kennedy's Alabama Democratic Majority seeking Dem's, Republicans to run for Legislature.

Add Republican candidates for public office to the growing umbrella of the Alabama Democratic Majority organization.
Speaking at a reception in his honor tonight, Mark Kennedy, who formed the Alabama Democratic Party in April following his resignation as chair of the state Democratic Party, said his group is seeking not only Democratic candidates to support but also Republicans.
"We're going to support Democrats but we're also going to look at opportunities to support independents and even Republicans to have a more balanced approach to government," Kennedy said.

Add this to the list of  I tried to tell some of y'all this is a farce.  Now why would Democrats seek republicans to run for office?  I don't see republicans say they are seeking democrats to run for office.  You know why? Because democrats and republicans have an entirely different agenda.  I'm sick and tired of  candidates running on the democratic ticket, getting elected with democratic votes, then governing like a republican.  If my choice is between a conservadem and republican I will stay my Ebony Donkey at home on election day.  If I wanted to vote republican, I would be a republican.  Maybe Kennedy and Company didn't get the memo that recent polls suggest calling Someone a republican is an insult?

 The independent political polling company NSON Opinion Strategy [1] recently published the results of a case study in which 250,000 randomly selected American voters were asked a series of questions. The details of how and where the study was conducted have yet to be released but the results are clear: 87% of Americans consider the word “Republican” to be synonymous with greed, racism, and violence.

No Absence of Malice in Bama  Update;

Attorneys for former Alabama Governor Don Siegelman, who is in jail for something that is not a crime,  filed a brief with the 11th Circuit Court of Appeals asking for a new trial, or at the minimum additional discovery about the role of former U.S. Attorney Leura Canary.  Maybe now that President Obama's former White House counsel is listed as the lawyers on is defense team this travesty of injustice will be over for the Siegelman family.

 Seven years after the former governor was found guilty, and after numerous failed appeals, Dana Siegelman said the family is still driven to overturn what she describes as a miscarriage of justice carried out by those who wanted her father exiled from state politics.

Free at  Last!  Free at Last!  Thank God Almighty Chris McNair is Free at Last!

BIRMINGHAM, Alabama -- A federal judge this afternoon issued an order for the immediate release of 87-year-old former Jefferson County Commissioner Chris McNair, who is serving time in prison for his conviction on public corruption charges related to the county's sewer system. 
 McNair is the father of Denise McNair, one of the four little girls killed in the KKK's bombing of Sixteenth Street Baptist Church on Sept. 15, 1963. The 50th anniversary of that  pivotal moment in Civil Rights history is 17 days away.

RedEye Around Red State AlaBAMA over and out for now.

All that blood, sweat, tears, and sacrifice, wiped away with a 5-4 vote

Fumbling Toward Divinity: Remembering Four Little Black Girl

On Sunday, 15th September, 1963, a white man was seen getting out of a white and turquoise Chevrolet car and placing a box under the steps of the Sixteenth Street Baptist Church. Soon afterwards, at 10.22 a.m., the bomb exploded killing Denise McNair (11), Addie Mae Collins (14), Carole Robertson (14) and Cynthia Wesley (14). The four girls had been attending Sunday school classes at the church. Twenty-three other people were also hurt by the blast.

Civil rights activists blamed George Wallace, the Governor of Alabama, for the killings. Only a week before the bombing he had told the New York Times that to stop integration Alabama needed a "few first-class funerals."

 Again, the  reason I oppose the republican party has nothing to do with me being a democrat, and I don't oppose republicans just to support democrats.  I oppose republicans because the people who perpetrated the 16th Street Baptist Church bombings and other terrorist acts joined the GOP.

I oppose the Alabama Democratic Majority because they believe the Alabama Democratic Party is the black man's party, like that's a bad thing.

Does this sound familiar?

Prior to the the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, and Nixons Southern Strategy, these people were loyal democrats, then the Democratic Party split along sectional lines in the aftermath and the republicans reached out to the disaffected Southern Democrats, encouraging them to join the GOP.  The party did not change the Dixiecrats, the Dixiecrats changed the party. 

When Lyndon Johnson signed the 1965 voting Rights Act, he said “there goes the Democratic Party in the South.” How right he was.

"What ever political party draws it's strength from these people is the party I'm going to work to defeat. "

Are you with us, or are you with them?

That is the question.

I weep for "Four Little Girls, and all of the others who lost their life fighting for the right to vote in the United States of America

The Congressional Gold Medal has been posthumously awarded to four girls killed in the 1963 bombing of Birmingham's 16th Street Baptist Church. President Obama signed the legislation Friday, as (from left) Birmingham Mayor William Bell, Dr. Sharon Malone Holder, Attorney General Eric Holder, Rep. Terri Sewell, and relatives of Denise McNair and Carole Robertson look on.

What's wrong with this picture?  Here's hint, relatives of Denise McNair look on because Denise McNairs critically ill 85+  year old father is in jail. convicted of bribery and the conspiracy to commit bribery in connection with the construction and repairs of the Birmingham sewer system.

In the Summer of 2005 a multi-count indictment naming 21 defendants was filed by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) in connection with alleged bribery, conspiracy and obstruction of justice. As of April 2008 fifteen individuals have been convicted of bribery.

• Chris McNair (Jefferson County Commission), convicted December 2006, pleaded guilty during appeal in February 2007, sentenced to 5 years imprisonment in June 2007, but later freed after he was granted a new trial.
• Gary White (Jefferson County Commission), convicted on 9 counts, but granted a new trial
• Mary Buckelew (Jefferson County Commission), agreed to plead guilty to obstruction of justice in exchange for cooperation with investigators.
• Jack Swann, (Director of Environmental Services), sentenced to 102 months imprisonment and $350,000 in restitution to the County. Currently free on appeal.
• Harry T. Chandler (Assistant Director of Environmental Services), sentenced to 2 years probation and a $33,000 fine
• Ronald Wilson (Chief Engineer for Environmental Services), sentenced to 13 months imprisonment and a fine of $250,000. Released February 2008.
• Clarence Barber, former County Maintenance Chief, sentenced to 5 months imprisonment. Scheduled for release in June 2008.
• Larry Creel, sentenced to probation.

As expected the United States Supreme Court over turned Section 5 of the Voting Right Act, and I have that same pit in my stomach I had when the Supreme Court ruled in Bush v. Gore .  A lot of us tried to tell y'all It's The Supreme Court Stupid, but did you listen to us?  Nope.  So here we are, Mission Accomplished, it's about to get uglier because this ruling opens the door to republican gerrymandering, Voter suppression ensuring a permanent republican majority.  Yee Haw!

“This is a devastating blow to Americans, particularly African-Americans, who are now at the mercy of state governments. Given last year’s attempts by states to change voting rules, it is absurd to say that we do not need these protections.~ Rev. Al Sharpton

To say that I am angry is an understatement.  

I'm angry the Supreme Court stopped the vote count in Florida because it would do irreparable harm to George W. Bush, who ended up doing irreparable harm to we the people.  Strike that, we the black/brown/poor/disabled/ people.  The next time someone say's it doesn't matter who the President is, remember Supreme can Federal Court nominations.

I'm angry that not one democrat would sign the challenge to the 2000 election.

I'm angry at President Obama for not restoring honest and integrity to the United States Justice System like he promised.

I'm angry at the so-called mainstream media for enabling the gop infused Tea Party to take control of our government.

I'm angry at Alabama democrats.  If they fought the ALGOP with the same intensity they fight Joe Reed, we wouldn't be in this mess.  Instead of all the fingers on the hand working together to form a mighty fist,  they had to go and form their own group because the ADP party catered to blacks at the expense of whites, like that's a bad thing.  Instead of fighting the GOP, they want to be the gop.

To be clear, this ruling means the Fox is guarding the Hen House, and we the people can't even vote the Fox out of the Hen House.

God, help America. 

RedEye tiptoeing away from the computer to go weep.

Here we go again, It must have been "the tone and tenor" of something I said.

 

First I was banned from the AL.com forum because I opposed George W. Bush's policies, especially the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.  Then I was banned from Left in Alabama because I didn't support Artur Davis for Governor of Alabama.

 Next I was banned from The Attack Machine for defending the feckless leader of a failed party.  Now I've been "un" friended (yes I know that's not a word)  by a friend on face book and removed from their Yahoo group because I stood up for Dr. Joe Reed and Nancy Worley. Sigh

The funny thing is it's OK for them to attack  Reed and Worley and accuse them of corruption, racism,  bigotry and everything else under the sun, but when I defend or rebut the charges  made against them I'm attacking democrats and being divisive.

There is a lot of misinformation being spread that needs to be cleared up.  The Alabama Democratic Party isn't in debt because Joe Reed is borrowing and spending money like there is no tomorrow.  Most of the debt stemmed from elections before Kennedy’s tenure and from former Gov. Don Siegelman’s failed drive for a state lottery in 1999.

It's not true no one wants to lead the Alabama Democratic Party because they don't want to bow down to Joe Reed.

 Birmingham attorney Ed Gentle had sought the chairmanship, but Worley said Gentle decided not to take the post on a judge’s advice because of his work as a special master in a couple of cases involving politics.

It's not true  donors won't contribute to the ADP as long as Joe Reed is in control with no accountability.

“I can tell you we are broke, but today I’ll remove two of the brokes,” Worley said.
Worley said some donors stepped up "to keep the doors open for the party" and the rent is now paid through June at the party headquarters in Montgomery.
“We are working the bills down as we can get money,” Worley said.
Worley said about half of the party's $500,000 debt dates back to the 1999 lottery referendum when the party spent considerable funds on get out the vote efforts.

I could care less about being banned from the AL.com forum and The Attack Machine because I expect them to close their eyes, ears, and mind, to people who don't agree with them, and you would think I would learn by now real  friends respect each others opinions and treat them as  equals. 

 I've discovered a disturbing pattern in all of this...don't like what I'm saying, ,on't  want to heari it.........shut me out   and maybe I will go away.  If that doesn't work.....  shut you down, or worse. 

I still believe we should test the theory that all will magically be right (pun intended) and white men will flock back to the party, a new generation of leaders will emerge, candidates will run for office, and donors will dig deep into their pockets  if the Alabama Democratic Party got rid of Joe Reed and his bunch.

While the ADP is destroying it's on the Roberts Court is poised to strike down Section 5 of the Voting Rights Act. I'm going to say as an African American I feel like I'm under attack not only by the republicans, but the democrats too.   Republicans don't want us to vote,  and some democrats (not confused with all) don't want us to have any power.  What to do and where to go?

In any event I'm through with the ADP vs ADM psycho drama and moving on to something important.
Black leaders plan caravan in support of Voting Rights Act.

The National Coalition of Leaders to Save Section 5 announced on Tuesday that Farrakhan would join them for a June 14 caravan and pilgrimage that will stop at 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, at the Shelby County courthouse in Columbiana, at the Edmund Pettus Bridge in Selma, and conclude with a 4 p.m. event at the state Capitol in Montgomery.

The caravan will start at the 16th Street Baptist Church in Birmingham, Alabama  where four little girls were killed when a bomb exploded during Sunday school class, in the state where their killer died after serving 6 months in prison, and the 85 year old father of one of those girls is serving time in prison convicted of bribery and conspiracy in 2007 for his role in the Jefferson County sewer scandal.

I wouldn't want to see/hear/think about stuff like this either.

RedEye tiptoeing away from the computer to 'Comfort the disturbed, disturb the comfortable' one blog post at a time.

 

African American Elected Officials are Common Thugs,

and should be treated as such say the Common thugs. Sorry I couldn't resist the pun after last weeks Faux News manufactured Common Controversy and in light of the ongoing "ethical lynching" of the lone African American member of the Huntsville City Council. None dare call it stereotyping. You see the media paints all black men as thugs. Strike that, the media paints all black men that dare speak up and speak out at thugs.

The powers that be wanted to market rappers flashing cash, sporting bling, and showing off fancy cars; rappers with little real sense of what was going on in the world around them. Those powers didn’t want you to hear from conscious artists like Public Enemy, KRS-One, Nas, Dead Prez, Immortal Technique, Saul Williams, Mos Def, Talib Kweli, or even a Common. Often the Dave Chappelle Show was the only place you could find some of them.

African American elected officials are painted as the picture of corruption in three piece suits in the media, by the media, for the media. Every little thing morphs into proof they should trade their cuff link for handcuffs.

It's not just Huntsville it's all over the United States of America. Those African American elected officials who stand for something and aren't afraid to speak truth to power are eventually investigated and convicted of some kind of corruption and people like me who call it out are called racist.

Attempting to keep Common out of the White House was not about trying to censor lyrics that seemed offensive. It was about trying to silence a voice who rhymes about real issues, and speaks for the oppressed.

Don't get me wrong, you don't have to be an African American Democratic elected official to be investigated and convicted, in some cases all you have to do is be a liberal democratic elected official and off you go too.

Yep, it's open season on those African American elected officials, liberal democrats and Activist who stand for something in Sweet Home Alabama, but none dare call it racism, they prefer to call it thuggery.

This proud nation is at a crossroads.

One direction hurling towards increased economic inequality, the slashing of social safety nets, deregulation, xenophobia, discrimination of the gay community, voter suppression, and the unconscionable pollution of our environment. The other is a direction of ending poverty, protecting and helping the oppressed and unfortunate, holding Wall Street accountable, embracing immigration, and preserving our ecosystem.

What Willie Nelson said

“Rather than trying to put an end to Eminem or some other rapper, politicians should think about why they’re rapping. It’s easier to try to censor some kid who’s swearing about poverty than it is to stop the poverty.” – Willie Nelson

RedEye's translation
It's easier to investigate and convict the politicians who are not afraid to take a stand and speak out than it is to cure the reasons they stand up and speak out.