by Edward E stein WASHINGTON, DC — Sixteen House Democrats led by Rep. Lynn Woolsey of Petaluma called on President Bush on Wednesday to begin the im- mediate withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq, just as some administration sup- ‘porters are starting to question the wis- dom of staying the course in the war. So far, the Bush administration re- mains publicly unshakable in its posi- tion that the elections on Jan. 30 should proceed despite fears about safety for voters in parts of Iraq. The president and other administration officials have said U.S. forces will start withdrawing only once U.S.-trained Iraqi forces can take _Eesponsibility for more of the patrolling withdrawal would be much more phased than the departure envisioned y the House Democrats in a letter sent Wednesday to the president. Privately, however, top administra- tion officials are in deliberations about how to proceed in Iraq, where hopes are fading that the elections on Jan. 30 for a national assembly to write a constitu- tion will improve security. The anti-war Democrats’ letter was sent as mote voices are being raised across the political spectrum in Wash- ington discussing how the United States can begin to remove its 150,000 troops from, a country where almost 1,400 Americans have been killed. and the fighting. And even then, the ° Woolsey and the other House Democrats, including Reps. Sam Farr of Carmel, Pete Stark of Fremont and Barbara Lee of Oakland, urged the ad- ministration to move swiftly. “While it may be logistically diffi- cult to immediately remove every Ameri- can soldier, we urge you to take imme- diate action to begin the withdrawal of U.S. forces from Iraq. This is the only way to truly support our troops,” said the letter signed by Woolsey and her colleagues. e House Democrats, all of them longtime critics of Bush’s Iraq policies, said the U.S.-led invasion in March 2003 had stirred anti-American senti- ments among Iraqis and other Arabs, Army Sergeant Refuses 2nd Iraq Deployment. SAVANNAH, GA — On Thursday, January 13, Sgt. Kevin Benderman, a Army mechanic with nine years in the service, including role in the assault on Baghdad, has refused to return to Iraq, claiming “you just don’t know how bad itis.” S Monica sit at their Hinesville, Georgia, home. Photo: Savannah Morning News Now seeking conscientious objec- tor status, Benderman, 40, said he be- posed to war after seei came mo ‘WASHINGTON, DC.- The Su- preme Court ruled that federal sen- decades ago were unconstitutional be- cause they violated a defendant's Sixth Amendment right to be tried by a jury. The court ruled judges cannot in- crease sentences beyond the maxi- mum that the jury's findings alone would support. [includes rush tran- script) The decisions — in a pair of 5-4 rulings — handed broader discretion to federal judges by telling them to consider the guidelines merely as a sug- estion. Previously, the guidelines Fotoed judges to boost sentences based on factors that a jury hadn't ruled on. Now judges are permitted, but not required to do so. A few thousand defendants who have already been convicted but are appealing their sentences may have a ance to get less prison time, but for tens of thousands of federal prisoners serving time in cases that had reached final resolution, the decision will not apply retroactively. Tsunami Death Toll Expected To Surpass 200,000 With Tsunami Death Toll in In- donesia Possibly Rising Over 200,000, Military Crackdown In Aceh Continues The government has imposed re- strictions on the movement of aid workers and journalists. Aid workers have been told to inform the govern- ment of their travel plans or face ex- pulsion and to take army escorts to most areas outside of Banda Aceh. [in- cludes rush transcript] Indonesia has found nearly 4,000 more bodies of tsunami victims, taking the global death toll from last month's disaster to over 160,000. In- donesia was the hardest-hit country with at least 110,000 people dead and many thousands more are missing. And even that count may be an un- derestimate. Knight Ridder is now re- porting that an official document posted by local officials in Aceh re- vises the casualty count to 210,000 people dead or missing. The paper adds that rescue workers think even that number may be low. Meanwhile, the Indonesian mili- tary plans to send thousands more sol- diers into Aceh bringing the total troop deployment ley a Bie 50,000. In May 2003, the Meeenesien government a massive offen- sive against the Free Aceh Movement ond banned most foreigners from Aceh, but it was forced to scale back and reopen the area last month to al- NEWS - Page 5 . Kevin Benderman and his wife, - Pp tencing guidelines put in place two]. he faces a possible court-martial after fail- ing to deploy Friday with his unit. “I told them that I refused de- ployment because I just couldn't go ack over there,” Benderman said Wednesday. “If I’m going to sit up ’ there and tell everyone that I do not believe in war, why would I go back to a war zone?” Lt. Col. Cliff Kent, a Fort Stewart spokesman, said Benderman was being considered absent without leave because he had orders to deploy to Iraq while the Army processed his conscientious objector claim. “He was AWOL from the unit's movement,” Kent said. “Beginning the application process for conscientious ob- jection does not preclude you from de- loying.” Benderman has been reassigned to a rear detachment unit at Fort Stewart while his case is processed, Kent said. Kent said the Army has not decided whether to bring charges against him. Gaining objector status is a time- consuming process for soldiers, requir- Earl Graves (File Photo) by Makebra M. Anderson NNPA, National Correspondent WASHINGTON (NNPA) - Earl G. Graves, publisher of Black Enterprise, says that before selling to Time Warner, the owners of Essence magazine should have allowed Blacks companies to make an offer to purchase the com- pany. Time Warner, the largest publish- ing company in the world, had previ- ously purchased a 49 percent stake in Essence Communications, the parent company of the magazine. With Time Warner moving many of its people into key positions on the business side, it was expected that it would eventually make a move to acquire total owner- ship of the Black women-oriented publication. “In selling their controlling inter- est to Time Warner, CEO Ed Lewis and the shareholders of Essence Com- munications have made the best deal they felt they could make. It is unfor- tunate, however, there wasn't an open bidding process in which Black entre- preneurs could have made an offer for the company and possibly preserve Essence as a Black-owned business and institution. There are a number of Black entrepreneurs—including those who own and operate BE 100s com- panies—who had the resources and management capability to acquire and run Essence Communications,” Graves says in a statement. The sale of Essence is part of an accelerated trend of major Black busi- nesses being bough by White-owned companies, That list includes Johnson hair products, Motown, Black Enter- tainment Television and now Essence. With the U.S. population expected to grow by 50 percent over the next 50 years ~, with 90 percent of that geowth among people of color—major White companies are expected to increasingly seek of buy Black companies. Robert L. Johnson, who sold BET to media giant Viacom, contends that's not necessarily bad. . In an interview with Richard Prince, author of the “Journal-isms” ing meetings with counselors and a lah with lengthy paperwork atcha f far up the chain of command. Under military law, a person must be opposed to war in all forms to be considered a conscientious objector. “Ifa person said, ‘I’m not opposed to war, but I’m opposed to the Iraq war,’ they would not qualify,” said Louis Hiken, an attorney with the Military Law Task Force of the National Lawyers Guild. Filing an objector claim does not prevent the Army from prosecuting sol- diers for disobeying orders. In May, a Fort Stewart court-mar- tial sentenced Staff Sgt. Camilo Mejia of the Florida National Guard to a year in prison for desertion despite his pending objector application. Mejia filed his claim after refusing to return to his unit in Iraq while home on leave. In December, a soldier who re-en- listed with the Marines after becoming a Seventh-Day Adventist was jailed for refusing to pick up a gun. Cpl. Joel D. Klimkewicz, 24, of Birch Run, Michi- column for the Maynard Institute, ~ Johnson said, “Black businesses will ' have to realize that to be in business takes precedence over being Black, if youre going to grow your business.” He told Prince that other Black businesses, such as Radio One, will eventually follow suit. “At the end of the day, they will sell to the highest bidder” who will likely be White,” Johnson said. “It’s just a question of when.” Time Warner Inc. agreed to buy the remaining 51 percent of Essence Communications, which publishes ESSENCE and Suede magazines, that it didn’t already own in a non-bind- ing agreement that would add the lifestyle publications to its magazine division. Time Inc. currently pub- lishes Time, People, Entertainment Weekly, Sports Illustrated, InStyle, Real Simple and Fortune magazines among others. Time Inc. bought the other 49 percent of Essence Commu- nications in 2000. “Since I’m a proponent of Black entrepreneurship, it's sad that it’s [Es- sence Communications] is no longer a Black-owned company, but in re- cent years there have been more part- nerships between Black owned com- panies and general market companies to fulfill the goals that. both sides have,” says Yanick Rice-Lamb, former editor of Heart & Soul and BET WeekEnd magazines. “From every- thing I’ve heard, it has been a win/ win situation for Essence and Time. Essence will be able to leverage some of Time's resources, which will ensure that it will last longer and even en- dure into the next millennium.” Some say that should not be the only consideration. “It reminds me of when Bob Johnson sold BET to Viacom. You can't blame Bob for worrying about his bottom line and I don't have the right to demand of him to take losses, but I’m still upset that we lost some reat magazines like Emerge and YSB in the process. Essence has always been a clear voice for Black women and you have to be concerned that the focus of the magazine will start to blur,” said Joe Ritchie, professor of journalism and Florida A & M Uni- eave “When Time Inc. bought the first 49 percent, it was already a little worrisome, Essence has always been about the images of Black women in America and in the Black Diaspora. Having that image under total con- trol of White media is troubling.” Ed Lewis, Chairman and CEO of Essence Communications and Pub- lisher of Essence magazine said in a statement that the partnership with Time Inc, will strengthen Essence. “Once the deal has been ap- roved and we become and ful edged member of the Time Inc. fam- ily, we're looking forward to nggrcs- sively broadening the scope of the lf ry - officials to honor Martin Lu Eastern North Carolina's Minority Communit made Iraqis and foreigners in the coun- : try less safe and “intensified the rage of the extremist Muslim terrorists.” “By removing our troops from the country, we will remove the main focus of the insurgents’ rage,” the letter added. Woolsey spokeswoman Susannah ° Cernojevich said only logistical factors prevented Woolsey from calling on Bush to immediately withdraw all the force. “If she had her way, they would leave now,” she said of Woolsey. Secretary of State Colin Powell, in an interview aired Wednesday on Na- tional Public Radio, said the adminis- - tration hoped the elections would make Iraqi security forces more willing to fight, which would allow U.S. forces to begin | to leave. However, Powell wouldn't gan, told his superiors he was a consci- entious objector and cited his new reli- gious status. It was rejected in March _ 2004. Benderman served in Iraq from March to September 2003 with the 4th Infantry Division based at Fort Hood, Texas. When he later transferred to the 3rd Infantry at Fort Stewart, Benderman said, he was already ques- tioning the morality of the destruction he had witnessed. “You can sit around your house and discuss this thing in abstract terms, but until you see and experience it for your- self, you just don’t know how bad it is,” he said. “How is it an honorable thing to teach a kid how to look through the sights of a rifle and kill another human being? War is the ultimate in violence and it is indiscriminate.” Asked why he waited until a week before his unit deployed to file notice of his objector claim, Benderman said, “It takes time for you to make sure that you 100 percent want to do things. This is not something you make a snap judg- menton.” Essence brand and penetrating new markets around the world,” he said. “It will give me great pride and com- fort to know that Essence will be se- cure for generations to come and that its prospects for even greater success with be brighter than ever.” Lewis will remain on board as non-executive Chairman and Founder of Essence and current Group Publisher, Michelle Ebanks, will become President of Essence Communications. Some of the most successful me- Jesse Jackson Backs Off by Louise Chu A ‘A (AP) — The Rev. Jesse Jack- son backed off Monday January 10, from ing for a financial boycott of Colum- bus, Ga., over the handling of a deputy’s fatal shooting of a black man. The civil rights leader caught some local activists off guard last month when he asked that people across the country pull their money out of financial institu- tions based in the city until the deputy who shot Kenneth Walker is federally prosecuted and Georgia adopts anti-ra- cial profiling legislation. He now says such a boycott would only be used as a last resort if negotiations Gil “We would hope that that would not be necessary, but that burden is upon the officials, business and corporate ex- ecutives who live in Columbus,” Jackson said from New York in a conference call with reporters. “Hopefully the citizens of goodwill and good judgment in Columbus can make that escalation unnecessary,” he added. Jackson, founder and president of the Rainbow/PUSH Coalition, made the remarks as he discussed two marches he plans to lead Saturday. The first will be held in his home- town of Greenville, S.C., urging county ther King Jr. with a paid holiday for workers. The fed- eral holiday is celebrated on the third Monday of] anuary and Greenville is the only county in South Carolina without a King holiday. Later Saturday, Jackson plans to be in Columbus, Ga., for a march calling for justice in the death of the 39-year-old alker, who was shot by Muscogee County sheriff's Deputy David Glisson during a Dec. 10, 2003, traffic stop. alker and three friends were riding in a sport utility vehicle that was seen leav- ing an apartment that was under surveil- lance b Metro Narcotics Task Force nts for drug activity. “ Officers erdered the four men from the vehicle, and during that time Walker was shot twice in the head. No drugs of’ ns were found in the vehicle, on Walker or on the other men. Glisson was fired after the shooting, but last November a grand jury opted not to bring charges. “The citizens of that state must roundly renounce what did happen and ies Since 1988 & ai 1Complimentary Issue & iPlease Take One® LTOGEN RANCH esi) Representative Lynn Woolsey (D-CA) above, who is a 6th-term Demoorat from. California who calls the War in Iraq a “Journey into Madness” has in the led is signing a letter to President Bush insisting that he withdraw troops now. Am ong Nol. 17 _ Issue 16- Jan, 15-31, 2008. J those who joined in the signing were Danny Davis (IL), Jesse Jackson, Jr, (Ij) pictured above, Lane Evans (IL), Sam Farr (CA) Raul Grijalva (AZ), Alege Hastings (FL), Maurice Hinchey (NY), Dennis Kucinich (OH), Barbara Lee (CA), John Lewis (GA), Jim McDermott (WA), Grace Napolitano (CA), Majér 4 a4 Owens (NY), Jose Serrano (NY) and Pete Stark (CA). 3 mention any numbers or give any time- table. “It's not possible right now to say that by the end of 2005, we'll be down to such and such a number,” Powell said. “It really is dependent upon the situation.” The Woolsey letter came just a week after Brent Scowcroft, who was national security adviser under Bush's father, President George H.W. Bush, said in a Washington speech that the continuing insurrection in Iraq meant it was time for a discussion of “whether we get out now.” And the Associated Press reported that conservative Rep. Howard Coble, R- N.C., who supported the decision to invade Iraq, also said last week it was dia companies that remain Black- owned include Tom Joyner’s Reach Media, Radio One Inc., which is headed by Alfred Liggins and Catherine Liggins Hughes, Black En- terprise, which run by Earl Graves and Johnson publishing, which pub- lishes Ebony and Jet magazines. Despite concerns that Black- owned businesses are a risk, most un- derstand that business is always about the bottom line. “The magazine business has be- come more difficult over the years be- what is now becoming a pattern in Co- lumbus,” Jackson said. “I’m convinced that the political leadership and corporate leadership can join us in demanding that the man who killed Kenneth Walker face justice.” But some activists, including local Urban League President Reginald Pugh, still insist an economic boycott, or even the threat of one, is the wrong way to seek justice in the case. “The people in Columbus haven't done anything wrong. Local officials, elected officials have done everything the community has asked them to do in the Kenny Walker case,” Pugh said. “How time to start pondering a phased with- drawal in light of the American casual- tiesinIraq. . - “T got fed up with picking up the paper and reading 12 to 15 Americafi soldiers killed,” he was quoted as saying. “How many will we lose tomorrow?” “I dont think anyone is seriously considering withdrawing at this juac- ture,” Coble added. “The time has come for Iraqi people to assume more respon- sibility. . Coble’s statement that Iraqis should assume more of the military burden re- flects long-standing Bush administra- tion policy aimed at training tens of thou- sands of Iraqis to serve in their country’s See DEMOCRATS DEMAND Page 8 cause it takes a lot of money to run a magazine and it takes a long time to make a.profit. Essence would have continued to remain strong, but since Time is so large and has so many suc- cessful publications there is no wa they can’t benefit from that,” she said. “You're always going to get criticism anytime you merge with a larger cor- poration—whether it’s Black- owned or not because people like to see Black- owned companies. We have the time- See PUBLISHER - Page 8 Boycott Over Georgia Police Shooting can you hold the citizens of Columbus responsible for decisions they didn't make or even have control over?” _ Two of Columbus largest financial institutions - insurance giant Aflac and Synovus Financial Corp. - did not imme; diately return calls seeking comment. : « Jackson dismissed critics, saying that he and others participating in Saturday's march were representing the best inter- ests of the community. “You cant very well celebrate the King holiday and then not commit yourself to nonviolent social direct action to explore problems and solve them. This is Dr. ing’s tradition.” Scholarship Endowment Event Scheduled GREENVILLE, NC - Once to Honor Dr. Andrew Best, M.D, . in itis now time for our 22nd Annual Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Senior Recognition Banquet which pays tribute to Dr, King and the senior minority medical students at the Brody School of Medicine. This tradition continues this year with the event being held at the Greenville Hilton on Januaby 22nd at 7:00pm. Sponsors of the event expressed excitment in having Dr Andrew Best, a retired family practitioner to help officiate at the event. Dr. Best, who ptat ticed in Pitt County for almost 50 years, played a key role in the establishment of the School of Medicine at East Carolina University during his tenure as a member of the University of North Carolina Board of Governors and the ECU Board of Trustees. He has also worked tirelessly as a civil rights leader, helping to integrate ECU. Dr. Best has also contributed extensively to the development of young people in Greenville area. For the past several years, the main purpose of this event is to endow a medical scholarship to honor the work of Dr. Best and accordingly the Brody School of Medicine (BSOM) would like to present the endowed scho: ip to honor Dr, Best on January 22, 2005. The goal for this year is an on going effort is to raise $25,000, According to officials endowment forms can be picked up in advance from Virginia Hardy, Ph.D at the Brody School Of Medicine, 600 Moye Blvd, 2N64 Brody Building in Green ville. (FILE PHOTO: Pictured in the center is Dr. Best flanked by friends durin ge recent event.) “Page 2 ‘The Minority Voice Newspaper January 15 - 31, 2004 nm , | Ss ‘ ‘i . ice.” : : 3 NPA eo, n Co 3 . : pre ional Les President Marc Morial, W. GTON (NNPA ~ Retired Congresswoman handedly raised the profile and aspirations of all those newly empowered Blacks One long-time public servant, National Urban League Presid .” Sty Cake ONY) ee a ne seroma and women of that era,” states. “Today, her visionary in Con Se ee work of Shisley Chisholm made Anserica «bese place ft all Ameri to Congress and a 1972 presidential candidate, is being and her quest for the presiden continue to inspire new generations of young _ cans, She remains a beacon for all who believe in the Ametican dr ne ‘cadet 5 hailed in death as a die-hard heroine for justice and equa minorities and women to higher aspirations in public service.” _ ‘TransAfrica President and CEO Bill Fletcher issued a challenge ed on her ity. er Te : One of those women is U. S. Rep. Barbara L (D-Calif.), who calls Chisholm — memory. - a ; - ‘alleen ai "Chisholm, a native of Brooklyn, N.Y., died at her 2 friend and mentor. | zn os or “Ms. Chisholm was an individual who } ihericy sie erica nok of wtp aras Ga ena Becn er Sil rg he derminton and Shee ed bck deca Them Re ’ commitment to justice were an inspiration to a en- Ose WhO at hid : a was i i mule tata soba taeda de peveral pokes and eration,” Lee sentes “I would never have iin: . '. In her life after politics, Chisholm was given reported in Anorinaeting , ng to relatives. But those who worked closely with one of the founding members of the volved with politics if she had not run for President ” Se arace Black Caucus remember her as healthy, feisty outspoken advocate ~ a 4 ; an endowed wh Hadley M at Mount Holyoke | in 1972.” _ College in South Hadley, Mass. She taught there * Woiceless j i i ‘ | four years before traveling extensively on for iceless in . . Lee, elected in 1998, 15 years after Chisholm « » for four y in 1993, Precblon - mace ~ . .. da is Shirley, breaking a barrier, retired, has since earned her own ation for cour- © _ speaking engagements. In » Presi apiertonpenen ney guts to yo for broke onda’ for paar age. In 2001, she was the only maetaber of Congress. - Clinton nominated her to become le dent, effect she had was to encourage » encourage people who were t0.vote against a resolution giving President Bush a _ -_ Sador to Jamaica, but she declined because down and out to understand that without foe you could rea batiers” says free hand in fracting militarily to the September 11. Outgoing, Congresional Black Caucus e a Eleano olmes Ni le . 7 : terrorist : . ov * ° peepee oy in New York when Chisholm _It’s easy to see why Lee admited Chisholm. _ “ Chairman Elijah Cummings also reflected on first ran for Congress in 1972 inst James Fatmer, former chair of the Congressof _. “My greatest political asset, which professional. Chisholm’s impact on the future. "We must re- Racial Equality (CORE), how Chisholm was ridiculed simply for running., politicians fear, is my mouth, out of which come all - main vigilant in our efforts to remain true to her “The contribution that Shirley Chisholm made to America ally was her kinds of things one shouldn't hapeer for rea- vision o creatin 7 America that affords equal- feminism,” Norton says.“ 2 and appealed dice . Sons of political expediency,” Chisholm said. ©. ity and just to all of its citizens. She was an pc poleician who fet het eat without any diffi ty People A pa supporter of the Equal Rights Amend- Chisholm fought for unemployment insur- Chisholm spent 25 yeatsin politics, including four years'as a state assembly- ment (ERA), she was an outspoken critic of gender ance for domestic workers, increased educational woman in New York from in the mid-1960s and in 1969 begit ning the first of bias. Ive al discs beine am assistance for poor students and programs for in Congress. The title of i ~ . bossed — ‘T t more discrimination being a __ - women and children. 5 was pethape the bot deepsea ey va rend woman than being Black,” she told the Associated 4 _. The impact of Chisholm’s 1972 run for the “Those of us who served with her in the New York State Assembly and watched Press shortly before retiring from Congress. “When I - presidency extended beyond politics, says Demo- . her career in the House, to which she was elected in 1968, knew of her boldness ran for een r me et discrimination as a ae nae Committee Chairman Terry ic itment,” recalls U. S. Rep. les Rangel, who served with woman t bei en are men.” * wuliffe, ch olm for 13 yeas. reeals 1S. Rep. Charles who ferved wi Chisholm is beinny lavishly praised this week by She inspired countless others to knock down But says even New Yorkers were awed when she refused her first men and women. the barriers to equality. Her roots were in educa- Congressional assignment to the Agriculture Committee. As a newly-elected repre- “She ran for the U.S. residency,” recalls Jesse __ tion and the lessons from her life will resonate for sentative from an urban area, Chie saw no advahtage in serving on acommit- Jackson, who has been both a political insider and ~ generations to come. tee that focused on rural America. She ultimately wo Sammitee, 4 position that grew in prominence with from Louisiana for House majority Education and Labor Committee. She would later set her sight on the White cratic nomination to George McGovern, election by Richard Nixon. ing all accepted practices of politics, this very junior member of the Harold Ford, Jr. “You have to understand people - like George Bush. He's a nice guy. We need to learn from him. what Bill Clinton did: He figured out what Republicans were doing well, and in- stead of complaining aout it, he fig- ured out a way to do it better.” - Rep. Harold Ford, Jr. (D-TN) The Black body politic has been invaded by corporate money, which seeks ag its media artns to sélect a “new” Black leadership from among a small group of compliant and corrupt Democrats. Memphis Congressman Harold Ford, Jr. is a principal vector of he disease, an eager acolyte of the cor- porate-funded Democratic Leadership Council (DLC), and now the point man - among Black Democrats in the Repub- lican mission to destroy Social Security. Ford should also be known as the “Black Man Whe Dances With Blue - one of only two Black congres- nti members “the Blue D. Demo. cratic Coalition (the other Black and Blue Dog is Georgia Rep. Sanford Bishop). C-span co ional scholar Ilona Nickles aptly describes the Blue Dogs as “closer in purpose to a former ition of southern Members of the House known as the ‘Boll Weevils,’ whose heyday was in the early 1980's, These Members defected as a grou from the Democratic party to vote with Congressional Republicans on budget- ary and tax bills.” Harold Ford is preparing to defect the Democratic and Congressional Black caucuses in service to George Bush's Social Security privatization scheme, which he has embraced in prin- ciple. Blue Dog and DLC congresspersons form the core of the Democrats that Ford hopes will join Republicans, like South Carolina Sena- tor Lindsay Graham, “to create an own- ership society in a variety of creative ways, and move away from ‘if you're bo privatization, you're with the Republi- ‘if you're against it, you're with the Democrats,” in Ford’s words. “Ownership society” is, of course, the slogan George Bush has deployed in his campaign to transfer trillions of Social Security dollars to Wall Street. Fa Walter Fields, Esq. 7 Get Ready For the Wave of De- struction Well it’s here. After a tumultuous 2004 the New Year was ushered in with a natural disaster of Biblical proportion = an ocean borne earthquake that a tidal wave, or tsunami, in Indian Ocean that engulfed several nations along the Asian, Indian and Af- rican coastlines. With the death toll still mounting, the natural disaster quickly Snane the top seory ofler peas tnd all we know may be the leading news story of 2005, In many ways the notion of being swept under by seemingly immovable forces seems as a description of what many Black American are cur- Coming off a presi- ion in which a majority of Americans took issue with the | $ decision to wage war in Iraq, ind began to question Mr. Bush's ratio- male for invadi a. country unprovoked y its government but still said moral or. over John Conyers, an African- White House guru Karl Rove must be giving Harold Ford copies of Bush’s scripts. The 34-year-old congressman has been mimicking Bush on Social Se- Curity since at least April of last year, when rd. addressed a forum organized by Centrists.Org, the Concord Coalition, the Committee for a Responsible Fed- n a seat on the Veteran Affairs the escalation of the Vietnam It was not the first or last time she would buck the ported Hale Boggs, a White Co system. The political maverick from Bedford-Stuyvesant sup rican _from Detroit. When Boggs won, she was rewarded with a seat on the powerful House. She lost the 1972 Demo- who was badly beaten in the general outsider. “She had a vision for America. She was || acutely aware of the role women had to play. She was ~ from the Caribbean Islands, which gav of worldview. She fo e her asense - | t for the Caribbean, for Af- rica, for those who did not have a voice.” Congressman John Lewis (D-Ga.) called her “one of the founding mothers of the modern -day Black political movement.” He explains, “She made it possible, she created the climate for the Rev. Jesse Jackson, the Rev. Al S harpton and all those who will ill come — men and women from every walk of life — who will run for U.S. president. American politics will always be indebted to Shirley Chisholm for extending its reach beyond the mainstream to include the best and brightest minds among us in the important work of public state's DLC; and Albert R. Wynn (MD),who is proud to have “represented the Co onal Black Caucus on the [House Democratic] Caucus Democratic Leadership Council.” Not all of these tainted Black poli- ticians will abandon the historical Black Political Consensus to support eral Budget at the New America Foun- opiraization of Social Security - the dation, and the Alliance for Worker Rise tirement Security, The latter is a front set up by the National Association of , Man rs cally to un Social Secunity. jSaocim Aad is the Blue Dog Coalition's think tank, the Con- cord Coalition opposes “entitlements” of all kinds and spreads hysteria about the coming “bankruptcy” of Social Security, while the New America Foundation’s Committee for : Res wat Federal Budget is a public policy ctory for a mine DLC Democrats and “moderate” Republicans. All are slaves of corporate nding. What do these people have to do with ear mostly Black constitu- ents in the 9th Congressional District in Memphis, Tennessee? Nothing. They are denizens of purely corporate constructs that share no constituencies on Ford’s home turf or in any significant sector of Black America. The congressman has journeyed far afield to inhabit a Neverland much more dangerous and alien to Black interests than anything Michael Jackson could conjure or imag- ine. Harold Ford has crossed over to the corporate side of the world, beyond re- demption. And he’s not alone. As we wrote in our December 2, 2004 Cover Story, “Black Dems Must Clean Up Their Own Act “: “One-fifth of the CBC are mem- bers of the DLC. These include Harold Ford, Jr. (TN)...Artur Davis (AL), ben- eficiary of the 2002 corporate cash of- fensive that also ousted Cynthia McKinney in neighboring Georgia; David Scott (GA), possibly the most con- servative-voting member of the CBC, also a 2002 Black “New Democrat”: Gregory Meeks (NY), Juanita Millender- McDonald (CA) and James E. Clyburn (SC), an otherwise decent man who nev- ertheless finds it useful to co-chair his cing Our Own T clarity was foremost in their choice of candidate, Blacks appear to be lost in the wilderness; a forty-year leaderless sojourn coming as it does sandwiched n two symbolic anniversaries — the Civil Rights Act of 1964 and the Voting Rights Act of 1965. % as the United States commits close to a half billion in aid for the relief effort in Asia, as they should, I cannot help but be somewhat distracted by the ideological tsunam: that has over- whelmed many Blacks in the United States. Last year we learned once again of the horrific consequences of “tough on crime” laws as statistics re- vealed the aftermath: more than a third of all state and federal prisoners are Blacks and some ten percent of all Black men between the ages of 25 and 29 are imprisoned. Compounding incarcera- tion rates has been the relentlessness of the Bush economy on Blacks secking entry into the labor market. Double- igit unem| t, at rates twice that of whites, and long périods out of the ‘ogram of the New Deal - yafiput Harold’Ford has already sprihted across t divide. Ford's personal ambitions and utter lack of principle have propelled him beyond the bound- aries of the Black Consensus and, there- fore, outside of the African American conversation. The problem is: Black people don't ed the terms of their own conversations. Corporate domin- ion over media is just as endemic to the Black airwaves and print outlets as to general media, and these media corpo- rations celebrate crossover dreams even when they are the product of treachery against historical and current Black as- are troub lacks, ore troubling, pr ive Blacks, including the Tharp the Con- essional Black Caucus (out of 43) that Belong to the Congressional Progressive Caucus, are loathe to confront treason in the ranks, and thus allow malefactors like Harold Ford to work their show for the rich white corporate folks, without olitical penalty. Ford’s constituents in Mem his don't even know that he’s stab- bing them in the back. Yet Harold Ford’s cut ts the deepest cut of all: “I'ma Demo- crat because I think we are more often right,” Ford told the Nashville Scene, back in March. “But there are some things some Democrats believe that I don't. I don’t think government is an insurance p 5) With that statement, the well-edu- cated but ill-raised Harold Ford reveals’ that he either misunderstands or opposes . the very premise of Social Security, which is an insurance program against the vissisitudes of the stock market, On August 14, 1935, President Franklin Delano Roosevelt described his new Social Security Act to the U.S. Con- gress in these words: “[It] represents a cornerstone in a workforce has come to be the experi- ence of many Blacks under this admin- istration. And there does not appear to be much good news on the horizon, not with the notion of a “jobless recov- ery” becoming widely accepted. The undertow has ‘also dredged up statistics that make clear the Stoapag poor health. Research re- ported at the end of the year revealed that almost 900,000 African-Americans deaths during a ten-year period could have been avoided had people received the same quality of health care as whites, It was a striking reminder of how rac- ism has life and death consequences, Meanwhile, AIDS is ravaging Black America and taking a particularly harsh toll on heterosexual African-American women, a fact that exposed the igno- rance of Vice President Dick Cheney during the vice presidential debate when he claimed to be unaware of this crisis. Trailing HIV/AIDS, but still of t significance for Blacks, is asthma, diabetcs, and heart disease. And though Her life, captured in a television documen- tary titled, “Chisholm ’72: Unbought and Unbossed,” will be shown PBS stations in Feb- Lee says, “Shirley's willingness to challenge the stattis quo changed Congress and the face of American politics,” says Lee. “She fought ‘the good fight’ and she remained ‘unbossed and unbought.’ Looking forward to the time that she would no longer be on earth, Chisholm said she did not want to be remember. ” congressman like to be remembered.” Point Man for structure which is being built but is by no means completed - a structure in- tended to lessen the force of possible future depressions, to act as a protection to future administrations of the Gov- ernment against the necessity of goin deeply into debt to funding relief to the needy, a law to-flatten out the and valleys of deflation and of inflation -i other words, a law that wilf tile human needs structure of vastly greater soundness,” Social Security was conceived asan insurance policy against the inevitable booms and busts of capitalism - eco- nomic tremors, and sometimes earth- quakes, that wreak excessive damage among African Americans like Harold Ford's Memphis constituents. In his zeal to position himself to run for Bill Frist’s Senate cm in 2006, Ford would de- € last major government pro thar gives the United States any, claim 0 civilization among industrial nations. He is already embarked on a crime of his- toric proportions, ord has enlisted in a multi-trillion dollar scam, “a fake solution to a fake crisis,” as Princeton University econo- mist and New York Ames columnist Paul Krugman puts it. There is no “crisis” in Social Security, but the Bush adminis- tration is determined to create one at the cost of trillions of dollars in order to de- stroy the last major vestige of Roosevelt's New Deal while filling the coffers of their Wall Street patrons, “The date at which the trust fund will run out, according to Social Security Administration (SSA) rojections, has receded steadily into the ture,” writes Krugman in a special is- sue of the scholarly journal, Economists’ Voice. “Ten years ago it was 2029, now its 2042. As Kevin Drum, Brad DeLong, and others have pointed out, the SSA estimates are very conservative, and quite moderate projections of economic growth push the exhaustion date into the indefinite future.” The promise made to aging Ameti- cans (that is, all of us) under the Social Security program is the same one made to foreign holders of American debt: you will be paid. What George Bush and often categorized as a criminal justice issue, gun violence is a public health crisis that has eae Black neigh- borhoods throughout the nation. As the 109th Congress convenes changes in the federal financial aid pro- gram for college students — the Pell Grant - will mean many young people will received reduced assistance, and some will be excluded altogether, at a time when many colleges and universi- ties, public and private, are increasin tuition and fees, At the secondary leve the maddening push for higher test scores is producing a generation of test driven drones who are ill equipped to fully exercise their God given intellect. And many urban school districts, un- der pressure from Mr. Bush's No Child Left Behind Act and suburban con- trolled state legislatures, are seeing little light at the end of the tunnel. Then there is the matter of Mr. Bush's war, courtesy of Rumsfeld Inc. Any sane assessment of what has tran- spited in the Persian Gulf region will call it for what it is ~ an unmitigated disaster. And an arrogance of power in the Oval Office and a complicit news media are to blame. Whatever hap- ahd at the same'time pro=” vide for the United States an‘¢¢onomic ‘*'| ed for being the “the first Black woman surrogates like Harold Ford are threat- ening - and it isa monstrous threat - is to renege on Americans who have contrib- uted heavily into payroll taxes for most of their lives, while maintaining obliga- tions to the foreigners who finance chronic U.S. debt. Both Social Security and the offshore debt are secured by the “full faith and credit” of the American government. That means, in Krugman’s analysis, “we can't have a Social Security crisis without a general fiscal crisis - un- less Congress declares that debts to for- eign bondholders must be honored, but that promises to older Americans, who pened to those weapons of mass destruc- tion that Mr, Bush claimed we had irre- futable evidence of their existence? Where was that imminent threat in a country that obviously did not have a Sea de strong enough to harm its neighbors or pose a grave danger to the United States? Where was the cred- ible connection between Saddam Hussein and Osama bin Laden? And justifying this mess in the name of spreading democracy is laughable in a country where the process of electing of our own leader is now looked upon with suspicion by a large segment of the citizenry. The behavior of some of our military at Abu Ghraib prison and the U.S, Naval Base detention facility at Guantdnamo Bay, Cuba, the resis- tance of many to reenlistment, and the outright opposition by some men and women in uniform is the legacy of this Rumsfeld-Cheney-Rice collabo. The Bush tsunami in the Persian Gulf has claimed the lives of almost 1400 Ameri- can men and women military person- nel, by all accounts over 100,000 inno- cent Iraqi children, and created a giant portal for terrorist activity in Iraq. So now the wave is just three weeks - column. have spent most of their working lives paying extra Payroll taxes to build up the trust fund, don’t count.” Social Security is, in fact, the great scapegoat for the Bush Pirate regime's current and future corporate raids on the U.S. economy. “The long-term cost of the Bush tax cuts is five times the budget office's estimate of Social Security's deficit over the next 75 years,” writes Krugman, in his New York Times he botched prescription Point Man Continued on Page 3 from coming ashore in the nation’s capi- tal as George W. Bush, in the irony of ironies, places his hand on the Bible and is sworn in for a second term. Caught in the current are thousands of Black families, parents struggling to make ends meet, children trapped in failing schools, young men enticed by the un- derground economy because legitimate eras are few and far between, an young women who are fighting for survival. And there appears to be lice relief on the way for b ack Americans, many of whom are continually swim- ening corinet the tide and some who will be swept up in the undertow. Walter Fields, Esq. s the CEO of the North Star Network and former the Director of Public Affairs for the New York State Trial Lawyers Association, Mr. Fields is a frequent guest on national and local public affairs programs, in- cluding CNBC's “Hardball with Chris Matthews,” MSNBC’s“Equal Time,” Fox News Channels “The O'Reilly Fac- tor,” “America's Black Forum,” and “Hannity & Colmes,” “BET Tonight” and Court TV's “Pros & Cons,” She said, “I'd like them to say that Shirley Chisholm had guts. That's how I'd His Dream On August 28, 1963, in the nation’s capitol before the Lincoln Memorial, and in particular facing the Washington Monument, better known as the Egyptian symbol of the Sun, the Obelisk, Martin Luther Kin Jr. delivered to a crowd of 250,000 bylan and millions more by television the public decree: democracy and freedom long, not to some, but to all men, women, boys and girls. Need anyone remind the other _ that neither the spirit of confusion nor that or chaos was powerful enough to coup the planned celebration of our Almighty God in Heaven on that day. For on that day Martin stood on the top » of the mountain and parted the Red Sea for our maiden voyage. In so doing he freed the spirit, body and mind of a people entrapped by an unrepentant suckling eye her name, trade and commerce. The echoing phrase, “I Have a Dream’, and its ensuing message became King’s indelible mark of distinction, to Beyond Elections: Dr. on is no discussion taking place in the world today that is more crucial than the debate TEE ere is no great ist in Ameri- can histo tua teacher ioe balavar m tics. 's teachings on strategy and tac- In the late 1950s a major change took place within the civil rights commu- nity, a shift from representative govern- ment to direct action democracy. When the young Black movement broke away from the confines of electoral politics, so- ci to change. Re re 1960, “hanes was the most igious civil ri ts organization in the US. Ithandled legal case achieved an historic victory in Brown v Board of Education, and carried out valuable work within the normal channels of govern- ment — Congress and the courts. Its lead- ers were drawn Primarily ily from the profes- sional class, and its ap roach to - wes widen perma droaton nets was respected S., it did not have a mass base in the South. The rise of mass-action strategy changed the course of history. It was a boycott — the Montgomery bus boy- Southeast Asia by Wilbert A. Tatum There is no way that we can ad- equately describe the tragedy that oc- curred on two continents and seven countries in Southeast Asia. At last count, there were an estimated 150,000 people killed, at least 30% of them chil- dren. There is no way at this point that we can tell how high the toll will go. But certainly it will be as many as 200,000 and perhaps even 400,000 after the count for those who were killed by disease, accidents, and poor health er the tragedy occurred. a anid vinion to The Minority Voice Newspaper is Published by The Minority Voice, Inc. Jim Rouse Publisher/Founder _ Galus O. Sims, Sr. Operations /Editor Home Office . perienced one for at that | peace and equity movement have Bs ‘gopienl. ‘A tole oF fate would have ie a [ore ep eqreyenniah amber ty : wh lich, by the way ay was scrapped at mid- point, vay to pause, contemplation ion toa world beyond what ees ‘lar not unmindf tha soe of you ind staggered by the wir of police - brutality. You have been the vewtans creative suffering. Continue to work with the faith that unearned suffering is ~ Go back to Mississippi, go back to Georgia, go back to Alabama, go back to Louisiana, go back to the slums and ghettos of our northern cities, knowing that — i) dream have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live ous the true meaning of its creed: “We hold these truths . to be sef ; “The hab nar cet equal...” (The Autobiography of Martin Cather Kg Warns Ree NY His was a self-proclaimed style of — Social Gospel advocacy, defined as a liberal movement that attempted to apply Biblical teachings to problems associated with industrialization or . changes in €, transportation, and other aspects of society (The Interpreter’s One-Volume Commentary on the Bible, 1984 Parthenon Press, Nashville, TN). Martin was also a student of the teachings of Walter Rauchenbush, whose Philosophy focused on social progress and -cott, led by Dr. King — that launched the modern civil rights movement. Afri- can Americans made up 70 percerit of - the passengers in Montgomery, and the tion that the local merchants were eco- nomically dependent on Black riders. “The oppressed have power.” That was the ironic revelation on which the entire civil rights movement was based. All great social movements — movements that convert dissenting opinion into leverage, =, Movements that becotne aforcein history nication of feconane. on ma 7 t was during the Montgomery bus boycott, spontaneous in origin, that Dr. i whipConkrae decane Lea chip Cooks docioct. tipnaaier fair rest aoe sca re 2 King dese db tics : t to Gandhi his ic revelations lied ethics and social move- ments. He raises the questions that all movements address: Do strikes and boy- cotts work? Are they fair? Are the hard- ships worth the pains? Whereis the o pressor vulnerable? And where does the tential power of the oppressed reside? King gveran inane “We woud use this boycott method to give birth to justice and freedom... . I came to see that what we were really doing was withdraw- i ‘our cooperation from an evil system, than merely withdrawing our sup- pany, being an external expression of the system, would naturally suffer, but the basic aim was to refuse to cooperate with havemaponded thscry ye Ute to this cry ni States and others for help. Many have responded. The United States - in spite of its being criticized for being stingy - as were other rich countries, provided most of the food, clothing, shelter, fresh water and money needed to prevent further death and provide relief from the maladies that occurred as a conse- quence of the tsunamis that came about as a result of an earthquake. Tsunamis are something relatively new for this country. We have not ex- fifty years, and occurred in Alaska, where the death toll was so low in comparison that our istori was Wecan count now: we have already given you the numbers as we see them, and they are frightening, 2B! rooted in the American dream. Disaster: gs the essential goodness of man; such - thinking later became the blue print- more or less- for Roosevelt’s New Deal Policy- whereby social programs were set forth to assist the poor into economic ‘rom the philosophical pen of Plato, Locke, Hobbes, tothe Sociological brilliance of Karl Marx, the Western especial te sy of Ghani paste the stu ’s passive resistance/non-violent philosophies, ing was an enormous figure who dared ink outside the box. Fearlessness of the unknown allowed Martin's genius to explore and evil. We were simply saying to the white community: We can no longer lend our cooperation to an evil system. From that moment on I conceived of our movement as an act of massive ion.” King always recognized the signifi- cance of spontaneous actions, but he also realized 1 without organization and range strategy, spontaneous ene boycotts played a major role throughout all phases of the civil ri its movement. On February. 1st 1960, four Black “co! eS er down at a whites- only lunch counter at Woolworths in Greensboro, North Carolina. The sit-in movement was born. Supported by Dr. King, SNCC (the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee) called for a boycott of Woolworths, “a nation-wide campaign of selective buying.” Pickets went out the country. White students Saleh were r to rt ts move- ment, The hational boycott provided a vehicle for their pent-up energy and cre- ativity. They put up posters, set up pick- ets, devised new chants, sang songs in front of stores, and turned shoppers into activ- ists for civil rights. Some of the students who participated in the boycott later be- came founders of Students for a Demo- cratic Society, a massive nation-wide stu- dent organization committed to partici- patory ; : Students are more easily aroused and energized by direct action than by elec- toral campaigns for pre-selected candi- dates. The vitality of the civil rights move- ment was due in part to its independence You will recall that fewer than 2,000 Americans have been killed in the war now going on in Iraq and.Af- ghanistan (plus ten times as many na- tionals of those countries), although we reinterpret one-eyed views of s Tea ¢ fundamentalist teaching. Riverside Webster’s II Dictionary defines fundamentalism as the belief that religious o political doctrine should be ented literally, not interpreted or - imp! adapted. For Martin was convinced that, ‘ay religion profeing concen forte seule of men and is not equally concerned about the slums that damn the economic conditions that strangle them and the social conditions that cripple them is a spiritually to be buried.” (The Autobiography of Marinate Kg, Warne Boos Ni 1998) - Ours is his rich with meaning, moral and ethical applications for good living and unending chings On Strat from the confines and self-censorship of electoral politics. Under the leadership of Dr. King, the civil rights movement kept the initiative and put the supporters of the status quo on the defensive. The boy- Becar 2 ecw Re ae insane a . . rare iets % eR oo Sga 8 9 lil Rocorcneere that the United States and other (rich) countries such as Germany, Italy, En- gland, France and Australia were being called stingy by the rest of the world, it was clear th the United States alone oa get ra van ies had contributed ures Irom their | 4 QUESTION WAS POSED As To | ™°re in goods an overnments. Ten services than all of es as many |WHETHER THIS KIND OF DISAS-} ¢he5¢ countries would be a fair TER CAN OCCUR ON THE combined. Yet, guess. Bur even at_| SHORES OF NortH AMERICA? Henies chine t, the to ANSWER were to is only 20,000. And Le = TEs. bring water, medi- the tolfof death attributed to the tsu- cine and food to the broadest reaches of namis will surely be 200,000, 300,000 these seven countries on two continents. or more, It has been estimated that there were Fortunately for us, we can see the —_at least 200,000 Europeans on the sub- devastation due to the miracle continents when the earthquake struck, of television that began tocomeinim- and their own counties are working val- mediately after the first tsunami hit the _iantly to see to it that they, or their bodies, day after Christmas. In spite of the fact are recovered in a timely fashion. ng progress no hatter ee DCTS . <> Blac be the mountains we must climb. Martin Percpen, nou aed age you, és the key to alll thi: Ours is his legacy that implores us to search for the truth and to choose analysis over ‘paralysis in all situations no matter the reactionary forum in which it rises. It's been along 40 years, but look at what progress we've made. To that Dick Gregory, who graced ECU Murphy's center Monday on January 10, 2005 in Celebration of King, adds “no other group of people on the face of this earth have come as far in as many years-what gains, what strides. Be proud! Martin is seem hw pnp wlio ake years | him...and what he did for the world.” On that note, now that we're out cots enabled millions of supporters to par- ticipate in the movement on a weekly and daily basis For King, the calendar of jus- tice was not determined by the dates of Presidential and Congressional elections. See ML Te ek A questign was posed as to whether this kind of disaster can occur on the shores of North America? The answer is yes. Itis only a matter of time'when such a disaster does occur, but American scien- tists have put in place the kinds of warn- ing signals that will eliminate the kind of massive death and ion that we see going on now in Southeast Asia. As days go on and we see more and more death, more and more destruc- tion, we will probably begin to realize how futile it is for us to go to war with one another, There are enough natural disasters for the world to get along. There are enough disasters to fulfill any appetite that mankind may have for such atrocity. Where must we go, as a civilization, from here? We certainly must figure out what scientists from over the rest of the world ponder: how Because whatever happens to Ameri America first.. of the wilderness let’s not party to revel, but plan a party to ensure that we: our spirit of endurance and survi ae 3 < - oe ote. to the masses. And for those who ask the.: question: They still here? Our litele* survivalist can respond resoundingly, YES- we still be in house that us folks bui Hollar! . Yours in the struggle, Susie Clemons ERRATTA: December 15, 2004: edition of M-Voice newspaper. The’ statistics on HIV/Aides for black women i and girls, _5 paragraph, should have read:. « . “Black women are diagnosed with 72% of all new HIV/Aids cases among women, and Black girls 76% of all teenage teens.” . Essence Magazine, December 2004, volume 35, number 8. | Civil rights leaders chose their own battle? fields according to their own needs and: strengths, and they set the deadlines for their adversaries. King did not wait to see Continues on Page 5 an effective and early warning system egy Tactics This Could Happen Here : can be devised, and whether there is _ any technical knowledge that we might gather in order to combat that which appears to be unchallengeable-anatu- ral disaster without any form of relief. Even as we sit and ponder, there is nothing that can be offered to those _ who suffer except death and luck. That is not a very friendly kind of persua- | sion. Let us close out where we are now with prayers for the living and prayers for the dead resulting from this freak of nature, and hope for those who survive that man can, in his wisdom, create something to counteract such maladies - of, ifnothing else works, an assurance that prayer is the only answer. ilbert A. Tatum is Publisher Emeritus & Chairman of the Board of the Amsterdam News oint Man Continued from Page 2 drug bill passed in 2003 does more, all by itself, to increase the long-run budget deficit than the projected rise in Social Security expenses,” The pre- scription drug bill is a massive transfer of public funds to the pharmaceutical industry, without lowering prices for American consumers, the igh in the world - the job Republicans were put in office to perform. Along with the fake Social Secu- rity crisis comes fake Black ae in the person of Harold Ford, vouched for by People magazine as one of the “50 most beauti ple in the world,” Ford, the enter, ex- of bamboozlement, and armed with a total immunity to facts, is so dense that he believes his relative youth trumps reason and data. “I’m 33 years o many in m tion will tell you they're not expect- _ ing to be able to rely on Social Secu- rity,” Ford told the April meeting of anti-Social Security mercenaries, He was simply repeating a Bush line that is not rooted in reality, but endlessly ech- oed in corporate media. The Bush plan is, however, a self-fulfilling prophecy, designed to destroy both the political premise and financial basis of Social Se- curity in the United States. ts of young Black people are not as dumb or duplicitous as Harold Ford. Dr, Maya Rockeymoore, a vice sopnaay of the Congressional Black aucus Foundation who is roughly Ford’s age, notes that the 20 cents on the dollar “gap” in Social Security in- puts conservatively projected for the 2052 isa statistical blip on the fall concury screen. “What privatizers don't want Americans to know is that this 20 cent gap per dollar of prom- ised benefits is manageable and can be closed without radically altering the system,” wrote Rockeymoore, in the December 16, 2004 issue of The Black Commentator. “In fact, the tax cuts President Bush gave away to the wealthiest one percent of Americans could have covered the amount of the long-term Social Security shortfall and there would have still been money left over for other important priorities.” Rep. Ford’s dialogue with sworn enemies of Social Security has led him to devise schemes ‘to “target benefit levels to those who actually work longer” - a dagger in the heart of Black Americans, who are forced to work under less reliable terms of employ- ment and with less compensation than whites. Thus, Ford would exacerbate the institational racist bias against Black workers > a population about which he appears to know nothing. But Dr. Rockeymoore, does: “Because of historical patterns of discrimination in the U.S. education system and labor market, African Americans are more likely to earn a modest living during the course of their working lives, more likely to have experienced spells of unemployment or underemployment, and more likely to retire with less income from private pensions, assets or personal savings.” The Bush administration's assault on the last bastion of the American social safety net can be repulsed, but only if we reject the Trojan Horses who have been positioned in Black ranks - most Sau , Harold Ford. The de- plorable state of Black media has set charlatans like Ford free to trot around the country, forging alliances with Republicans and Dixiecrats at will. Ford was among the “Four Eunuchs” of the ee Black Caucus who endorsed George Bush's Iraq War pow- ers, in October 2002. He was re-elected the next month, and two years after that, as were the three other eunuchs. There seems to be no account- ability in Black politics, no incisive coverage of political figures on Black radio and effective print media (for- get television), and no reliable cam- paign contributions except from the | corporate sector and stingy labor unions. In this environment, media caricatures like Harold Ford thrive. The virus spreads, undermining the Black Political Consensus that never- theless propels 90 percent of us in the same direction, every presidential elec- tion, But we fail to exercise due dili- gence on the home front, in our own istricts. That's why Harold Ford ex. ists, asa. article finds its wa where it can do the most good, Harold Ford . didereat styles himself as the can greed an ambition are ag old as dirt. | litical figure, We hope this’ into as many’ Memphis households as possible, - However, we know that . ee ee Sah fallin cy kk eae gee oa tse RE oe ee oe +35 es ek ie pi age ee ee ee iad ‘ SES ERG SLI ea RS IR NR eR ong EEE Me BORN Bee ES. ae ; - ey — ge ot ¥ Sg rs —— ‘ prt ora * %: | . tolive E E (BE) an- its list ofthe 75 Most Poser America, as featured inthe Febreny ver story. The list, which in- cludes 18 CEOs (15 men and three women), was, culled from the 1,000 larg- _ est domestic and international corpora- tions traded publi rt S. equi ties masieee inchide re sentatives from a tor of62.cn rm tod Paden Ri Paces Sorc eign, pepper mentand ts unqualified Nim, resident Aristid's administration, the ight signal, whatever that signal hap the Bush administration repeatedly de. MU6®-Itis allied with the puppe Fanmi Lavalas politcal pary, are under- So, what about Haiti? The violence "leadership of President Aristide is now Sow bythe Benallan tlary ground or in exile. Unemployment is is certainly not on the scale that is taking os ‘entirely or considered “4 70 2 that be aceomnben ie: going through the roof. So, one may ask, Plat in Iraq, but more importantly, the either 4 ignored bleshort ofa UN trusteeship. ,, Jeo, snore den leit tesigtaene ( why mot just put the whole thing off robin olen byooroont aig anetatons ae taking place in Peritg the ey for new elections, Un ‘Asyoumayhavenoted, the thegortaee ae te Haid cot epdic bon ake erie Bt ely, asistance from the USA, word: Iraq. As you may have noted, the the government, otherwise known asal- Haiti on a regular . Ure be RAC esi oauk selby Bush administration hasbeen willing Finck the USA Thus iedoes nottake an ‘tum of elected President Anstide. If with the possible exception of sonte fi. push forward with an election in aq Eins in to understand that should the the many oust: of Haiti then free ‘222i! assistance co an Bow ‘dies despite the fact that there is full-scale Bush administration truly wish to end Seat aan edi of Fiat cen fee ceng ec any illa war underway, along with the the killings in Haiti . ‘the Sective resins of establishine an answer vtaken ‘against che Aria 1 project activities of terrorists. There is no stabil- sundwork for elections, that it could In order for es tabishing, place, the under by ake USA take, ide admin ity, yet the Bush administration and this with a bit of pressure on both the fem ble ee bean uding on of fisenh chised BI des ahver an initi Jat- 92 hed y under the guise of US involvemen Ca source of concer , m. The eB oe a ) tempt was brutally turned back on Bghebsea a anerhe gus of same can be said for France which p ' the AE Legacy OF MLK. ‘slots Sunday onthe Edmund tecs world of America making, Fifty peroent nothing short ofa despicable ole in the ) te Bridge. Gathering up his disciples and of the Black men in New York City are overthrow of Aristide, There are, how. ry gleg| eet ern apartheid and regained our sense of devotees of the movement, with the eyes unemiployed. The numbers in other ur- ever, countries in res fear of als as articulated in the D ion of dignity as a people — because we stood, of the world watching, the second at- ban centers are not at the same level, but American States and srnciee inion, Independence and the Constitution. made demands and backed them with tempt succeeded. Out of this momen- are still di high. Inferior educa- along, perhaps with the Nordic coun- ~ Coupli the uilosophy of the Hindu : tous triumph of the was . pawne tion is the order of the day in America’s tries, that might be willing and able to 2 pee led cial justice activist, April 4, 1967, they killed th the historic Voting tsActof 1965. “dark ghettos,” a fact that inevitably assist in the transition back to democ- Mahatma Ghandi, with the tenets of with the intent of destroyi But the meaning of that moment has means thata disproportionate number racy. iti the social gospel of Christianity King the dream and the movement that ha been tarnished by the fact that forty years of young Black men will end up popu- We have to stop permitting our lead- galvanised oe of oe ignificant transformed America. since King’s later we have experien yet another lating America’ jails and prisons. In the ers to speak with forked tongue. There is social movements in the history of this tragic and untimely death, the power election where Black voters were disen- face of these stark realities, nowhere do nothing special about Iraq that permits Country, a movement that eventually in- elite of this nation has to ren- franchised in Ohio and other states. we hear plans for a “domestic Marshall it to have elections in a time of war— ired oppressed people in virtually ev- der the dream impotent and passé by Two years from now the Voti plan” to rebuild the urban ghettos and leaving aside the entire question of the =e quarter of the world to believe that smothering it in meaningless celebration, Rights Act will come up for renewal and rescue the shattered lives of millions of leptimacy of their proposed elections— “we shall overcome.” ritual, pomp and circumstance. The is no certainty that the Con people for whom King’s dream is a mi- e Haiti remains under a cloud. There | But King’s triumphs did not flow. National Holiday, though educational under the sway of conservatives, will are some disturbing racial overtones to from merely postulating and ing andi tive, treats King’sdreamas be in a to extend it. Moreover, Therefore, ceremonies, celebra- the notion that Haiti is an eternal basket ideas about social justice and social if it is a fait accompli, as if | struggle election 2004 exposed once again that tion and rituals can be no substitute _ case that can only be improved by being inge. In the spirit of Frederick for social justice and social change for there is an urgent need for election re-_ for the kind of righteous work that caged as aUN protectorate. The basket s, his triumphs were the result Africans in America and other form to take private money out of poli- King did while he walked among us. _ in which Haiti is encased is one that was of serious $ Douglass taught that people is finished. Hence, the. oliday _ticsand make it easier for peo toper- We must keep King’s spirit alive in woven by the USA and France avery = “power concede nothing without ade- is generally devoid of the kinds of ac- manently register and vote. isalso words and deeds, mar ing, picket- long time ago. It is time for Haiti to re- mand, it never has and it never will. Find tions that reflect King’s determination aneed to open up the to provide ing, demonstrating, voting, engaging gain ts sovereignty and be permitted to out just what a will submit to to continue the struggle until America greater access to third parties ar/d inde- _ in civil disobedi ing tocoura- follow its own Pa - and you have the exact amount has indeed lived up to its promise to pendent candidates. As we commemo- geously fight for social justice and so- Bill Fletcher Jr. is president of __ Of injustice and wrong that will be im- ensure “life, liberty and happiness” for ~ tate the 40th Anniversary of the Selma cial until we can truly proclaim —_TransAfrica Forum, a W: n, D.C.- Afti- posed them...” King understood _ all her sons and daughters. The spirit of to Montgomery March this year; it is clear that all of God’s children are “free at based non-profit educational and orga- this and hence his was King no lohger lives in the celebrations that we must keep King’s spirit alive. last.” This is the lesson to be learned nizing center formed to raise awareness to inspiring the toriseup, that adorn America in his name. However, protecting the right to m reflecting on the life of Rev. Dr__ in the United States about issues facing non-violently, to and overcome There is much work to be done to vote is not the only issue on the unfin- Martin Luther King, Jr., our Black the nations and peoples of Africa, the the injustices and wrongs that had been make America and the world ae ished civil rights/human rights agenda. Saint! Caribbean and Latin America. He also is heaped uponi them. The sons and daugh- ised land” Kin envisioned. 19 5 wit- ere is a war in that is thwarting Ron Daniels isan internationally co-chair of the anti-war coalition, United ters of former enslaved Africans rose up _nessed one of the greatest triumphs in the process on “swords into recognized human rights activist and for Peace and Justice to confront, challenge and overcome the the ministry of Martin Luther King. He ploughshares” to meet the human newt, Executive Director of the New York City (www.unitedforpeace.org). He can be sons and daughters of former slave mas- was called to Selma to lead a march to or Poof al working people inthis coun- based Center for Constitutional Rights reached at ters. We shattered the shackles of south- Montgomery to demand voter rightsfor _try.and the world. Jur civil liberties are’ (CCR) bfletcher@transafricaforum.org. is Anowunt it of 75 Nat Pera iia Americans in Corporate Amerie | ? John W. Thompson, Chairman _willl continue to grow. I think it’s ex- _to take tage of the opportunities DEBT PROBLEMS? 2000 and CEO, Symantec Corp. tremely positive that we have a num- “The corporate leaders on our inau- FOR FREE LEGAL CONSULTATION On > Lloyd soe pas ya vet of. Ain American EOS presi- gun Int oftap ee annages seas. . resident, GE Consumer and In- ents, and chief operating officers o manv of the ex- i Mine dustrial and major Scum as effective role —_ecutives on our 2005 list were | CHAPTER ] OR B BANKRUPTCY R.L. “Bob” Wood, Chairman, models,” says Ronald A. Williams, tomatch—and exceed. We are i CALL: . CEO, and President, Crompton resident of the S17:9 billion Aetna that today’ black corporate elite will do . Jerome Corp. Ine “And it helps organizations focus the same future generations of African . : 4 Ten companies have multiple ex- on becoming more of [meritocracy], American co rate achievers,” says & Attorn And Counselor t Law ecutives on the list. General Electric— where cople can be judged on the Graves. The criteria and com- _ ey a ; j . the parent sthe basis of the value they create and not prehensive profiles of the 75 Most Pow- I. pO a ne eee way with four, followed by Xeroi With ‘dn the basis of their race or ethnicity.” —_ erful African Americans in Corporate i iz 125, Pitts sp A RRR ALF all three. Ei t companies haveTWO ex- Paula Madison, president and gen- _ Americais available in the Feb laryissue | . a ESS EON ET : ecutives on the list: Duke ,Panig eral manager of Los Angeles-based of BLACK on Ofc: (250)75)-9951 Mae, FedEx Express Corp., Ford Mo- KNBC a] regional manager for two _ newsstands January 18th. _ tor Co., Genera! Mills, McDonald’s Telemundo stations, sums up her phi- USA, Starwood Hotels & Resorts World- losophy of the. advancement of blacks, wide Inc., and Wachovia. particularly women, simply: “The im- In a corporate environment that is portant thing is to continue getting us often inhospitable to black profession- mo the pipeline and have us positioned “and absolutely there is no doubt there wings Fenn : Ir: wing al . It's; we happen In 1988 BE - By 1993, there were 12 presidents and two CEOs among the 40 African Ameri- cans included in the top tier: Richard D. Parsons, the then-CEO of Dime Savmgs Bank of New York, and Clifton _R.Wharton, Jr. CEO of TIAA-CREF When BE selected the Top 50 Blacks in Corporate America in 2000, the num- ber of CEOs had to six. This year, the number of Afecan American rose to 18—a 300% increase Franklin Has progress been made? “Well yes and no,” says BE Founder and Pub- lisher Earl G. Graves St. “While it is true that the corporate elite identified in our 2005 list represent a 300% increase over our 1988 list, it is also true that African Americans still hold less than 12 of the tens of of senior-level, cor- at America’s 1,000 Arthur Harper, CEO and President, GE Equipment Services Carl Horton, CEO and Presi- eal Absolut Spirit Com- yf Lewis, President and cm Renetta McCann, CEO, Starcorn Amencas E, Stanley O’Neal, Chairman, CEO, and President, Mernil Lynch & Co. t., CEO, Packer, als, these top executives say the number of blacks who reside in corner offices so that as more executive positions be- come available, we're poised and ready NEED YOUR CHURCH BULLETIN TYPE? NEED YOUR SCHOOL PAPAER TYPED? FAST, ACCURATE AND ON TIME! GIVE AUDREY TYSON A CALL! 252-695-2020 Papers, School Work Just $2.00 per Page CORRECTIONS WILL BE MAD Church Bulletins... Negotiable | (YOU MUST PROOFREAD YOUR OWN WORK... 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A penalty mey be lnpused for warty wither mes, United wre ote reas be wien or charged st ey tn withont noe, Certain rextclons may sept No brokered (Os accepted, firstcitizens.com 1-888-FC DIRECT Merrboer Foc dae i i i 3 Mrs. Beatrice Maye A World Without Fathers To The Editor - A recent NEWSWEEK carried the face of a black boy about seven and the headline “A World Without Fathers,” More than half of our black males are raised without fathers. A large per-ent- age of these males become a risk in ado- lescence. More and more white males are being raised similarly, without fa- thers and thus at risk of undisciplined behavior, unclear responsibilities, anti- - Social behavior, and an inability to at- tach completely to adult women, thus continuing the cycle of divotce. “Four of every ten children in America will go to bed tonight in a heme where their father doesn't live. Sixty per- cent of rapists, seventy-two percent of 4 adolescents murderers and seventy per- _ cent of all long-term prison inmates are boys who grew up without their fathers in the home.” Crime statistics are only avery dra- | Matic way of pointing out the common sense idea that if dad's not around, the son has a greater chance of acting out - against society. Therefore, the father a boy needs. WHAT WE MUST DO: A MANIFESTO FOR CHANGE WHAT WE MUST TEACH OUR BOYS: We must teach our boys to appre- ciate their African heritage. We must dis- | ply before them our heroes, to let them ow that many people have paved the way for our blessing and success. We must tell our boys how to speak to people, look people in the eye, hold their heads high, and believe in their hearts that they are somebody. People who are confident make . People who are confident are the most likely to succeed. We must remind our boys that they are loved and lovable. And we must start by teaching our boys that, too. A loved child can face anything. A loved child is better able to accept God’s love, be- cause he has experi- enced the beauty of the parent-child relationship. We must teach our boys that real men dont just produce children—they/ other them. TEACHING OUR MEN, REACHING OUR FATHERS WHAT WE MUST TEACH OUR MEN We must demonstrate to our men SCLC Holds Give-away at their new headquatrters over the Holiday — Shown at their new SCLC Headquarters on the corner pf 14th Street and Flemi State President SC » Bennie Roundtree, Community College St: From left to right, Brother Bru, County Commissioner Melvin McLawhorn, and SCLC recipient, Commissioner Dave Hammond and William Clark of WOOW Radio/M-Voice News | salutes Matin Luther King, Jr. In honor of Black History Month Celebrate with us and “TREASURE YOUR History” duking the month or February 2005. os Gods _ barrier to their sone emotional, spinal le that cheating, stealing, and of their wives or children is not 5 Way. . We must teach our fathers that they will never help their sons be-come men unless they first become men. We must stress to them that their own failure to take responsibility will be the biggest evelop- psychological, and sociological ment. . ‘ We must teach our men what a real * a priest—one who leads the spiri- tual development of a family, ®a eee who is able to pro- vide Er of a households basic needs, * a protector—one who knows how to keep bad influences, people, and cir- cumstances away, and * a lover (for husbands only)—one who loves his wife as his own flesh, and remains faithful to her in mind and spirit as well as in the body. We must teach our men that the failures of their own fathers does not January 15 - 31,2004 The Minority Voice Newspaper mean that they are destined to fail their sons. We must not use our own dismal past as an excuse. At some point, we have to break these See pee can't it be you? We must teach our men that real men respect and cherish all women as special. We must teach our men that real men call their wives if they're run-ning late, and have no problem telling them why. They come home at a decent hour because they respect their wives and chil- dren. We must re-verse this macho psy- chology that “she doesn't need to know— I'll get there when I get there.” We must teach our men that real ment never, never lift a hand to any woman. We must teach that real men do not just talk to their parents (the obliga- tory once a week phone call); they take care of their aging parents and make sure they live lives of quality until God calls them home. . We must teach our men that real Pitt County NAACP Obtains Over the past two years the Pitt County NAACP has been at the fore- front of controversy surrqunding its advocacy in high profile cases such as the police custody death of 41 year old Eugene Allen Boseman, and the death of 23 year old Kenneth Grey Suggs, Jr. Each year hundreds of Greenville, and Pitt County, residents complain to the NAACP that their civil rights have been violated. The NAACP takes the com- plaint, conducts its investigation, and determines what action it should take. Local President, Calvin Henderson, said, “the NAACP is being overwhelmed by residents complaining of civil rights violations. We have sought out help to screen cases so that we can focus our at- tention on cases that truly involve Con- stitutional and Civil Rights violations.” According to Mr. Henderson, he has sought the help and support of Attor- - ney Demyra R. McDonald. Henderson said, “Miss McDonald has agreed to serve on our Redress Committee and as our local Counsel.” He added that hav- ing the availability of a local Attorney will help us to become more effective in serving the needs of Greenville and Pitt County residents, and will give us an eye of expertise to assist us in the case Screening process. Attorney McDonald obtained her Juris Doctor Degree from the Thurgood Marshal School of Law, Texas Southern University, a historically black college, in 1995. McDonald was admitted to the North Carolina Bar in 1996. She was born in New York and grew up in _ Kinston, North Carolina from age 5 years old. She has an identical twin sister who “is also a licensed attorney in the State of North Caroliriai McDonald's mother is “ the Vice President of Nursing at Lenoir Memorial Hospital. Attorney McDonald has a history of civil rights advocacy from an early age. McDonald served as President of the NAACP Youth Chapter while in junior high school in Kinston. After graduat- ing from Kinston High School in 1987 McDonald attended Hampton Univer- sity. She graduated Hampton in 1991 with a Bachelors Degree in Political Sci- ence. McDonald also holds an Associ- ates Degree in Broadcast Technology from Lenior Community College. McDonald also holds an interest in Black History and served on the African Holocaust Memorial Committee in Greenville, North Carolina in 1991 that resulted in the historic event of an American city government acknowledging: the African Holocaust. After law school, McDonald prac- ticed law in Kinston for approximately 3 years and in July of 1999 began to practice in Greenville in a local law firm. Her practice has included Criminal De- fense, Traffic, Personal Injury, and Medi- cal Malpractice. In January of 2004 she opened McDonald Law Offices, PC., located on the Northwest comer of 10th and Evans Streets in Greenville. McDonald Law Offices, P.-C. presently focuses on Criminal Defense, Traffic, Personal In- jury, and is expanding into the areas of Business and Civil Rights. Her practice currently serves Pitt, Greene, and Beau- fort Counties. McDonald Law Offices, PC. also works with a network of attor- neys in other counties. McDonald has served as a volun- teer in the local community by present- ing a Community Law Forums for low- income families and local residents to educate them about the law and to serve as a role model for youth. McDonald said, “I feel a great responsibility to give back to the community and help others. I have been blessed in my life. I do not take the opportunities I had to get an education and gain professional experi- ence for granted. I feel a responsibility to help the community and improve the lives of all people.” NAACP President Henderson said that, “Attorney Demyra McDonald is a shining example and role model for our: young people. She is both an excellent. attorney and businesswoman. She is an asset to this community. Her willingness to volunteer with the NAACP speaks to her concern for others in this commu- nity.” McDonald said that she has sup- ported the goals of the NAACP since junior high school ad added that, “At a time when, once again, Americans of all races are giving their lives to fight for our liberty and freedom it is imperative that we protect our Constitutional and Civil Rights at home. It is unfortunate that in . eon eee ca a oe hee Nc) | Barbers & Beauticians Wanted | 312 MicmorialBivd Greenville, NC Phone: 355-7133 & 757-1930 Hows: Tues-FriStoG Saturday 8-6 Legal Counsel men guard their tongues. James 3:6-8 says that the tongue, while a “little mem- ber.” has the power to bless and to curse and can set on course the fires of hell if unbridled. That give us reason to be so- ber about what we say. We must teach our men that real men move from lust 2 ee, from “shacking” to building a relationship that he can present before the very face of God without shame or embarrassment. We must teach our men that real men seek to own rather than rent, to save rather than spend, to give rather than take. We must work to- ward the elimination of debt. The borrower serves the lender; an over-load of debt can even hinder your ability to serve God, your family, and your community. WHAT WE MUST TELL OUR BOYS, OUR MEN AND OUR FATHERS We must tell our boys, our men, and our fathers how special they are ev- ery day. They won't get that anywhere if they don’t get it at home. Atty Demyra R. McDonald spite of the sacrifices made by people of I races to assure the freedom of all Americans there are so many who con- tinue to suffer the abuse of discrimina- tion, racial profiling, and other abuses.” According to Henderson, some of the issues that we are concerned about include minority voting districts and voting rights violations, racially identifi- able schools and discrimination against African American children in obtaining a sound basic education, discrimination in recruitment, hiring, and promoting within City and County Governments, racial profiling and police abuse of citi- zens, as well as the treatment of African American college students on campus. McDonald said, “I am committed to working with the Pitt County NAACP _ pssisting in the evaluation of complaints made by citizens and providing guid- ance to the organization for appropriate redress of grievances.” Henderson added that, “we are inundated with complaints from citizens alleging civil rights viola- tions. corpses partment Shots By for Effective immediately Pitt County Health Department will begin offenng flu shots to members of the priority population by appointment only Indi- vidual who meet the criteria should call 902-2449 for an appointment. Ap- pointments will be required. Priority Groups tor Vaccination include tae following high risk groups: * All children age 6 - 23 months * Adults age 65 and over * Persons 2 64 years of age with chronic medical conditions including heart disease, lung disease, diabetes, chronic kidney disease, suppressed im- mune system * All women who are pregnant during the flu season * Residents of nursing homes and long term care facilities * Children 6 mos - 18 years of age on chronic aspirin therapy: eo Additionals members of the prioirity population includes: * Individuals age 50-64 * Out-of-home caregivers and household contacts of ersons in high risk groups ° Health Care il ditect patient care {new group Schools effective January 3. 2005} ; Pitt County Dr, Martin Luther King, Jr. January 17, 2005: NEXT STOP LAW SCHOOL Modupe Rouse NCCU GRADUATE; Pictured above and all smiles after much hard work and dedication is Ms. Modupe Rouse, the daughter of Publisher/ : Broadcaster Jim Rouse of the Minor- ity Voice/WOOW/WTOW ‘Radio, posing with her degree in Mass Com- munications. Ms. Rouse who finished her bachelor studies Magna Cum | * Laude, plans to continue her educa- tion with her sights set on becoming a lawyer. a Above Historian John Hope Franklin and Educator Nell Lewis recently en- joyed lunch together in Durham, N.C. during an afternoon of discussions on Black issues. Mr. Franklin recently cel- ebrated his 90th birthday this pass Janu- 2nd. . Conference For Black Journalists Coming to ATLANTA, GA - World Journalism Institute invites professional and stu- dent journalists to attend the second annual Spring Conference for African- American Journalists of Faith at Morehouse College in Atlanta, April 29-30, 2005. . Award-winning reporters who will speak include Gracie Bonds Staples of the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, John W. Fountain (formerly, New York Times), and Lisa Jones-Townsel from the St. Louis Post-Dispatch. The weekend is a unique oppor- tunity for black journalists who are Christians to integrate their Christian faith and journalism practice through lectures, discussions, and fellowship. The conference begins Friday, April 29, with dinner at Paschal’s Res- taurant and lecture and discussion with Anthony Bradley of the Acton Institute. The closing dinner Saturda will feature the Samuel Eli Cornish Memorial Lecture. i” Other speakers for the weekend include Washington, D.C.-based freelance writer La Shawn Barber, Lawrence Smith of The Southern Bap- tist Seminary, and M’Ronald-Keith Tuck of Morehouse College and New Life International Family Church. Housing and meals will be com- plimentary for accepted students. ooks of interest will also be given to those attending. The registration fee is $25. For more information and to apply online, go to www.worldji.com World Journalism Institute also offers multi-week college-level journal- ism courses during the summer months in Washington, D.C., New York City, and Los Angeles. Students at these summer courses have the op- portunity to study for three weeks with outstanding journalists who are Christians. The most promising stu- dents are awarded paid internships with newspapers across the country. The mission of the World Jour- nalism Institute is to recruit, equip, place, and encourage journalists who are Christians in the mainstream news- rooms of America. For more informa- tion, please visit www.worldji.com Literacy Votunteers Tutor Training Work- Training Literacy Volunteers is recruiting vol- unteer tutors for its adult Basic Literacy and English as a Second Language pro- grams. Volunteers will learn proven teach- ing strategies at a 12-hour Literacy work- shop or a 9-hr. English 'as a Second Lan- guage workshop in February, of another is not necessary to an ESL tutor. A rewarding experience awaits you as you help an adult learn; For training dates and times contact Literacy Volunteers at 353.6578 or sessions are held at the LV-PC office located at 504-A Dexter St,, Greenville (near the Beef Barn Restau- rantand the Emp Security Com- mission.) nated African issues to add: s problems in other pafts of the world. It is an error that some experts say has direct implica- cons for global security, which May prove costly in the global war on terrorism. Theres one strategy fr how mel approach wo desing wah FI AIDS, Fi Aten fon, eet many policymakers have underestimated the importance of African curt “During the see! Wat, Abzica was indeed percerved in security terms,” but “when the Cold War ended a fake assumption was made [that] Africa no longer figured into the tension between the Soviet Union,” Moose said. But failure to prioritize African secu- rity has lead to greater problems for the world. The 1994 Rwandan genocide left a permanent stain on the conscience of the international community, when close to one million were killed within one month, itis in the aftermath of such destruction that many African countries struggle with weak institutions and fail- ing governments. “The same conditions that allow al- Qaeda to develop in stan exist in Atrica,” Moose said. “They present op- portunities for criminal gangs and terror- ‘sts like can embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998, Osama bin Laden was living in Sudan. Now, im USS. State re has accused is same government that provided a training ground for al-Qaeda (NAPSA)-Warts are tiny skin growths that havea rough, cauliflower like ! and often grow on hands (common warts) or on soles of the feet (plantar warts). 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The product can be pur- chased from PediFix’s catalog, in many drugstores and on amazon.com. “What better place to go than some- where that is failing?” said Wynfred Russell, temporary African Issues ‘and West African History at the Univer- sity of Minnesota. “It’s an invitation — these guys are shopping around lookin for ananbes Afpharbea® hee cad. ° Russell, who was born in Liberia, added that double standards in western Policy toward Africa contribute to exist- ing problems. He poinits to the relative inaction by U.S. officials to the situation in Darfur, [Sudan] to represent how the U.S. responds to a crisis in Africa. “On the one hand they say itis geno- cide, but they haven't done anything,” Russell said. “Some of these western coun- neat economic interests in tars and is why they are dragging their feet.” But hy bs pata dt powers been ee hesitant when dealing with African affairs? The answer is a com- bination of fear, racism and a general lack nr Aeaisavay “Africa is asecond thought on behalf of western an and policymakers,” Russel aid. “The U.S. es- pecially, is quick to wash its hands of Af. . _ This ambivalence toward Africa is “We still haventt shaken off all of the racist attitudes toward Africa,” said Russell, “Everything pertaining to Africa goes that same racist system.” om ‘att, (NAPSA)-American soldiers wounded in Iraq and Afghanistan are survivin what Here once fatal injuries thanks to high-tech body armor and rapid medi- care. Recovering from those wounds, however, can be a long process. That's why the Department of Vet- erans Affairs (VA) is working closely with the Department of Defense (Dol) to provide the best possible care for America’s combat wounded. Last year, VA authorized free health care for veterans who served in combat after Nov. 11, 1998, for any conditions they feel are related to their service. That eligibility extends for two years after separation from the military and includes National Guard and Reserve members coming off active duty. More than half of the U.S. military personnel wounded in Iraq have been unable to immediately return to dut y. Many have separated bom military ser- vice and are receiving rehabilitation and specialtycare in VA hospitals, Combat injuries often result in limb loss. VA offers prosthetic services at medi cal facilities across the country. | *hysical therapists help amputees master the lat- est prosthetic devices, including com- puterized legs with programmable memories and myoelectric arms that re- spond to the body’s nerve impulses. Be- hind the scenes, VA and DoD research- ers are collaborating on the next genera- tion of artificial limbs with embedded microprocessors, composite materials and neural feedback systems. Spinal cord injury can change a veteran's life forever. VA's network of 23 spinal cord injury and disorder centers links with veterans’ hospitals and clinics throughout the country to provide the specialized care and support these inju- ries require. VAs comprehensive blind rehabili tation program incorporates multi-dis- ciplinary visual impairment service ding racial attitudes. He added that a lack of interest in African affairs by African Americans feeds into the way that Africa is treated. A poll taken during Liberia’ civil con- flict indicated that 82 percent of Blacks polled were against U.S. involvement. “That was very disappointing,” Russell said. “I don't think people are going to take Africaseriously if the people of Afri- can descent don't take Africa seriously,” he added. . But even when the U.S. has inter- vened in African affairs, the results were not always positive. The movie “Blackhawk Down,” based on the 1993 U.S. intervention in Somalia, remains a contem symbol of what is considered U.S. humanitarian intervention in Africa. During this conflict, 18 U.S. soldiers died and two Blackhawk helicopters were shot down, prompting a removal of troops by then-U.S. President Clinton. “Everybody looked at the i in Somalia and became frightened,’ Moose said. “That experience caused some seri- ous hesitation in getting involved in Afri- can conflicts — that is what conditioned the slow response to the Rwandan geno- cide,” he added. But Russell is not convinced that the defeat suffered in Somalia provides reason enough to disengage with Africa. “It’s a shameless alibi for them to not get involved in Africa ~ to try and use the situation in Somalia to not get involved,” Russell said. == America’s Defenders g War is Just the teams and blinded rehabilitation out- patient specialists at VA hospitals with 10 residential blind rehabilitation cen- ters where blind and low-vision veter- ans learn how to regain their indepen- denck.._. na Tsai the 1991 Gulf Wai; VA per and D®f) established the Defense and Veterans Head Injury Program to pro- vide evaluation, treatment and rehebili- tation services for veterans who suffer traumatic brain injuries. The program includes a brain injury registry and re- gional clinical network, as well as research SUPPort. VA offers counseling for combat veterans who experience difficulties ad- justing to civilian life at 206 Vet Cen- ters located in communities across the country. These services include confi- dential sessions with an experienced counselor and group therapy with other combat veterans. For more information on VA ser- vices tor Iraqi Freedom and Enduring Freedom veterans, contact the nearest VA medical center or clinic and ask for the combat veteran coordinator, or call toll free 1-877-222-8387 or visit QUAL Real Estate he ie § RENTALS Since 1949] "Call Steve Johnson lf You Would Lik, To Reat A 1, 2 or 3 Beroom Housing Unit ee hvamanicarian insereacs on could be —___ The way it-which the [Bush] ad- can deliver primary services to their com- used,”headded, : pursued this war has been . munities. As it stands now, “only a frac- Present conflicts in Sierra Leone, incompetent, headed. Moose does, how- _tioni of it gets to the people who really Liberia, the Ivory Coast, the Democratic ever, ctedit the Bush _-needit,”hesaid. Republic of Congo as well as in Darfur ministrati Yet, the only way for Aftica to face its threaten forther destabilization in Aft inAftica. “Thisad-. current problems is if more advanced The African Union has attempted ministration was the first to make a com- countries extend commitments that will to addaew thao peoblenns begets at mitment to the global fund [for AIDS]. If help promote democracy and human to do so, for lack of resources and support _ ithad not been of that commitment there ts. International policymakers must has to be recognition that these proble 3 Fifteen million dollars over the course ditions that would ma African coun- %§: of Ales hfe thems eras exe AIDS treatment and prevention plans in ment, Moosesaid. a partnership with the U.S. and others,” Africa and the Caribbean. !What we need _ Failure to do so could create a secu- oose said. to judge them on is whether they are able ity call that permeates other world He added that logistical support in. to sustain it and put into place the effec- _ affairs. “If those countries are not given transportation and communications _ tive disbursement, he added. the resources to get out of their current should be provided to the African Union. But implementation of the plan has state of affairs, that chaos and anarchy will “We havent made that commitment. Nor drawn its share of critics, “There is a lot of serve as a breeding ground for terrorist cells has anyone else,” he said. } conditionality on the money,” such asab- and terrorist entities to set up shop, However, the current approach to the __stinent based sexual education, Russell said. ° Russell said. . war on terror may prove too difficult _ “My contacts on the ground tell me that He added, “If the War on Terrorism for the U.S. to address otherconflicts the money has been caught up in the is to be won, the war on terrorism needs to around the world. “One of the reasons _bureat ” which has made it very dif- ' be taken seriously” and “if it is a global that we can't be more robust in what is ficult to reach the intended audience,” he effort, then Africa should be looked at just happening in Sudan is that we are added. ae RATS DEMAND P, standing up to the insurgents. is in place that a large portion of the ee Se Page I Back om a weeken ttip to Jor- US.and coalition force would leave army, national guard and police force. _dan, where she met with women run- Iraq within a set period, perhaps 18 So far, the training hasn't achieved the ©, ning for the Iraqi assembly, Rep. Ellen months. “That could show we aren't desired results, and the Iraqi forces, who have suffered heavy losses in ter- rorist attacks, have a mixed record in See PUBLISHER - Raggy honored tradition ‘to much is given, much is expected’, but a lot of busi- ness people are about the bottom line. At the end of the day, it has to be profitable and whatever it takes to make that happen they will do.” Ritchie is not impressed by that argument. ' “It's a shame to see Essence go because the magazine was really about quality and maintaining its role as the defying entity of Ai can-American culture as far as the image: of Black women was con- cerned,” he says. “It didn’t’ matter what your socioeconomic status was, if you were a Black woman, you paid attention to Essence. I would much rather something that plays such a major cultural role in the African- merican community be in the hands of Black people.” Tauscher, D-Walnut Creek, said she opposed starting an immediate with- drawal because of the side effects it would cause. “This is a mess, but it’s our mess,” Tauscher, a member of the House Armed Services Committee, said of the situation in Iraq. “I’m not just for toss- ing a hot potato on Jan. 30 and leay- ing town. “The last thing we can do is extri- cate ourselves and leave a failed state in the region ... that will come back to bite us in the short, medium and long term,” added Tauscher, saying the coun- try could fall apart in a civil war and me a haven for anti-U.S. terrorists, _ Military analyst Michael O'Hanlon said the Democrats’ call for an immediate withdrawal wouldn't influence hes a nlnistestion. complete) withdrawal option isa loser,” O Hanlon fret “Reali ‘cally speaking, you'll see a debate over a more al reductio » In strategy. He said such a nuanced strategy might include a public announce- ment after the new Iraqi government really occupiers,” he said. “We'll start to hear more about such options.” Cliff May of the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies said talk of a withdrawal without completing the job in Iraq would be dangerous for U.S. forces and for Americans at home. “It says we're defeated, and we expect to be defeated. If Anyone ex- pects this to be our last defeat, they would be mistaken,” said May, say- ing a sudden withdrawal would embolden the al Qaeda terrorist net- work and its allies to again attack the United States. “If we don’t want to fight them in Iraq, we should decide what is the proper battlefield,” he added. In Baghdad on Saturday, Senate Majority Leader Bill Frist, R-Tenn., said there was no timetable for with- drawal. “T’m not going to speak for the president of the United States, but we represent the legislative body, and there will be no pulling back until the job is done,” Frist said. WOW Time Fli We Offer: + 24He ms, * Guaranteec Cashing * Fast Service * Competitive Fees * No Long Lines & Waiting li Bring this slip with you to receive $10.00 OFF of your rapid return. “eens a b ested in entering your ee ees a's se ee as es ee e's SA's “e . Sa ey Are you ready to invest attend the E 907 Dikinson Ave, Greenville, NC (252) 757 -3191 ee ee The Pitt County Alumnae Chapter of Detea Six;: The Pep Proaernts Is your child between the ages of 6 months and six years? in his or her future education? Are in the pageant? If the ermint Pageant ntry Orientation. Place: Room 143 Leslie Building Pitt Community College Date: Saturday, January 29, 2005 Time: 11 am-1 pm There is a Non-Refundable $25 Registrati n ° phone to one of the following ake 252-746-5141 or 252-756-2985 Delta Theta Sigma is a Public service Sorority send Peee FT Peer bes SP Orcrity, ine, you inter- answers are "Yes", then Fee. Please RSVP via January 15 - 31, 2005 The Minority Voice Newspaper Page 9 7 : | Leader's of the New School: America’s Young Civil Rights Heroes. iscvs:i;iioseinssese By Monét Cooper, Many of the surviving leaders of the 1960s Civil Rights Movement have turned to careers in public ser- vice, pursued other professions, re- tired or become ad hoc activists (asin Jesse Jackson's case). Now, a new gen- eration of black young people is ris- ing to the challenges of our time, shar- ing a deep comnmitment and desire to . improve the quality of life in their neighborhoods, communities and cit- Following in Here are 10 youi and-com- ing black leaders whos chrongh their vocation and avocation, are positively impacting the economic, social and political life of African Americans. Moya alley | Moya Bailey, a senior at Spelman College, is an advocate for eliminat- ing inequality of any kind, but espe- cially the discriminatory treatment of black women: She’s passionate about ending the war in Iraq and politics, especially as it relates to women and the Steps of Madame CJ people of color. Last spring, as chair of Spelman’s Feminist Majority Lead- ership Alliance, Bailey spearheaded a Protest against Nelly’s “Tip Drill” video, in which a credit card is swipe a woman's butt cheeks, when the rapper came to campus. Bailey is still working to make syre that people understand: what the srotest was re- ally about: connecting struggles, in this case, the depictions of black women in the media. Black women have been talking about representa- e tions of themselves for a long time and it really just brought it to the nation’s attention. Money isn't the answer,” explains Bailey. “Just because Nelly’s getting paid or women are gettin paid, it’s not the answer. What kind of damage is it doing to the commu- nity? What is it doing to the young women who are coming after us?” Radcliffe Bailey Artist Radcliffe Bailey calls his art “a quest to find out who I am.” Cer- tainly, Bailey's work is a portrait of his Walker, Warm Spirit. Pours $6.5 Million Back Into African American Communities life as much as that of his ancestors whose photos he uses as focal points in his mixed media pieces. The At- lanta resident plies his trade on build- ing works of art out of canvas, paint, hotos and the things he says reflect life as a black citizen of the world. Bailey uses the concept of remem- brance to tell his stories:. An anatomi- cal drawing of a red heart, the aorta dripping blood, is his own broken heart. The steady gaze of a young man, looking at those who look at the paint- ing, is the shape of his past. An ances- tor whose stare he has scanned and blown up to the size of life. Bailey, an assistant professor of art at the Uni- versity of Georgia in Athens, Ga., ..was writing poems—about striking ~°+ garbage worker and their trucks. To- day, as a hip-hop laureate, Blackman uses her rhyme scheme to help others figure out their place in the world. She co-founded Free Style Union in 1994, a New York-based nonprofit that organizes rappers, musicians and others involved in hip-hop culture to create work that raises awareness of different cultures and backgrounds while inspiring activism. Blackman — has even gotten the U.S. government _ into the groove. The U.S. Department of State appointed her American Cul- tural Specialist and Hip-Hop ambas- sador. She is also a 1999 fellow of Echoing Green, an organization that guides emerging leaders as they shape . ; : paints his civil disobedience one their organizations. EXETER, NH - Nadine Thompson is than 15 years, Madame CJ Walker built lar that is sold is returned back into the supportive hetwork anda product people stroke at a time, telling his autobiog- . Jamal-Harrison Bryant not only the President, CEO and Co- an empire of neatly 20,000 black women pockets of the consultants, therefore _ love and want more of the first time they raphy with a brush, some paint, ob. In many ways, African-American Founder of WARM SPIRIT, she isthe _ called Walker Agents, the Walker Manu- wealth and profits are recycled directly try it. Unlike any other black entrepre- jects and a photo. houses of worship were the bedrock visionary and leader of a community of facturi Co. and the Walker Collegeof back into their communities. neur, Nadine Thompson is creating Toni Blackman , over 10,000 women and men who are Hair Culture. In 2004, WARM SPIRIT paid out wealth in our communities and provid- When Toni Blackman was 8 years Continues on P, age 10 empowered entrepreneurs and change Only 6 years ago, in 1999, Thomp- close to $4 million in commission checks ing opportunities for people to live to ‘ son founded WARM 'SPIRIT with her ents. WARM SPIRIT is transformi e face of the direct sales and network friend and entrepreneur Daniel Wolf, and our top 20 consultants had annual incomes between $11,000 and their potential. . Thompson is. also a wife and Wachovia Foundation Awards NCCU $1. marketing industry by providing anop- excited about the possibilities ofa busi- $150,000 through our com ensation mother of two children, Camilla (1] wit usin , Sch larshi portunity for wealth and financial free- ness venture that incorporated her belief plan. WARM SPIRIT has been extremely and Isaiah (8). She lives in Exeter, ah on for 4 ess/Teacher 0 ps dom that has not always been accessible in enlightening and empowering successful in creating wealth through its Phillips Exeter Academy with her hus- em . ee for women and even less so for Aftican- women. Not only does WARM SPIRIT empowering compensation plan. In _ band Rev. Robert H. Thompson. oS Poe American women. provide access to entrepreneurial oppor- 1999 they paid out $12,000; in 2000, WARM SPIRIT can be found Its been almost 100 years since Sa- tunities and high quality natural prod- $74,000; in 2001 » $172,000; in 2002, through a nearby consultant, at rah Breedlove, better known as Madame —_ ucts, most importantly, itcreateswealth $832,000 and in 2003, $2.2 million, www.warmspirit.com or by calling 1- C] Walker started her hair care Products for the consultants and their communi- To date, WARM SPIRIT has paid out 888-296-9854. For mote information —_ company to become this countrys first . ties. WARM SPIRIT’s unique market- $6.5 million in commission checks to its about WARM SPIRIT, interviews, prices self-made Black female millionaireand _ ing planisanem wering entrepreneur- consultants! or products, contact Keesha Abraham at she did it by pioneering what is now _ ial opportunity t helps create wealth. WARM SPIRIT consultants start 603-772-7508 or 1-888-388-9276 or recognized as network marketing. In less Approximately 50 cents from each dol- their own business for $99.95 with a keesha@warmspirit.com Della Reese Offer's Healthy Tips (NAPSA)-Diabetes is an epidemic in the United States. abproximately 18 right, regular physical activity and, when prescribed, taking diabetes For Managing Type 2 Diabetes pressure and cholesterol checked on a regu- ¥ i basis by your health care provider. million people have diabetes and ap- medication mf, day. ; Recsealso suggests findin asup ee proximately 90 to 95 percent of those __, Reese has found that education system to help create and implement ac who are diagnosed have type 2 dia- is the first step to managing diabetes right diabetes management plan. A sup- betes. Actress and singer Della Reese and encourages those diagnosed with en can include a th care team, : has type 2 diabetes and is dedicated . the disease to ask their health care pro- ly and friends. ; ee ‘ to educating the public about how Vider for information about every- . __‘Idoeverything I can to fight diabe- Chancellor James H. Ammons discusses the $1 million gift with she manages the disease. thing that could impact their diabe- ts. I eat right, stay active San ae Clayton, Wachovia regional president for the Central North “When I found out I had type 2 tes. Fle personal tips for managing medication every day,” said Reese Carolina region, and John Messick, Wachovia Durham market diabetes, I was upset because I keew type 2 diabetes include: “Ifyou take an active role in managing resident. From left to right are Messick, Ammons and Clayton nothing about the condition and I v__ Improve your meal plans; lose your disease, y ou can be stronger than dia- p ” the extra pounds by reducing calorie betes. I'm living proof! had nothing to fight it with,” said Reese. “Since my diagnosis I learned that I have the power to make mean- ingful changes in my life and that my diabetes management plan prays abig part in staying happy and healthy.” ere is no cure for type 2 dia- betes and ignoring the condition can lead to serious diabetes-related com- lications, such as heart attack, stroke, blindness amputation, and kidney failure. While the cause is unknown, there is hope for the millions of people intake and eating smaller portions to help lower blood sugar levels. U — Ask your health care provid- ers about finding the right fitness pro- gram; physical activity is a significant actor in managing diabetes and achieving overall good health. v Talk to your health care pro- vider about which medication would who have type 2 diabetes. The condi- be right for you; an oral medication tion can be managed through eating may | Top 20 erstone @ @ Christian F s0o0kstore Books, me Greeting , i ein dro Socila Invitations, Songbook Tree non Churchware, Art, Jewelery, Mugs Ceramics Sunday School & Vacation Bible School materials Biship T.D. Jakes Tapes & Videos, Plus Much Moret! Open Wednesday through Saturday 12:00 p.m. - 6:00 p.m. . Sunday 1:00 to 2:00 p.m. Cornerstone Christian Bookstore 1095 Allen Road, Greenville, NC Bus: (252) 752-3846 Fax: (252) 752-4405 AE a8 dl a. al eee es Dey shearaton Capital Vrrowl i e needed if meal planning and physical activity are not doing enough to improve your blood sugar levels. People interested in learning more about type 2 diabetes can receive a one-of-a-kind copy of “Take Della’s Challenge: Be Stronger Than Diabe- tes,” a booklet filled with quick tips and true-life advice on managing type 2 diabetes, as well as Reese’s favorite diabetes-friendly recipes. Also in- cluded is a free motivational music CD to encourage a more active lifestyle featuring one of Della Reese’s songs. The free booklet and CD can be ob. tained by calling 1-866-463-6342 or by visiting www.delladiabetes.com. 0 Have your AIC level, blood Ci[cyalan Gre Felze Credit Specialist NoMatter What Your Situation Is CALLOURCREDITHELPLINE AT 252-413-3924 Hy Toll Free: 1-866-713-2663 Pager 252-757-5779 Snow Hill 747-1833, Pivots (ft oe) i . We serve all counties in North Carolina , DURHAM, N.C. —Wachovia Founda- tion awarded $1 million to North Caro- lina Central University today to estab- lish the Wachovia Scholarship Fund in the schools of business and education for student scholarship and professional development. “We are grateful to Wachovia for this award, rich is a major investment in the future growth and development of the University,” said Chancellor James H, Ammons. “This scholarship fund will provide support for academically tal- ented students and is yet another ex- ample of Wachovia's ongoing support for teacher education and business. It is going to better position NCCU to ad- dress the critical shortage of teachers in this state and also enhance our ability to recruit teaching fellows and other aca- demically talented students.” The Wachovia Scholarship Fund in the School of Education would receive a total of $600,000 to suppogt 25 teach- ing fellows and to establish Wachovia Fel- lows in the School of Education. A por- tion of the award will be used for profes- sional development and computers for the scholars. In the School of Business, the $400,000 Wachovia Scholarshi Fund would support Wachovia Scho ars “Supporting education is one of our top priorities at Wachovia,” said Jack Clayton, Wachovia regional president for the Central North Carolina region. “N.C. Central University has excellent pro- grams available for its students, and we | want to be a part of helping them suc- ceed. These scholarships and grants will allow NCCU to help their students suc- ceed.” NCCU and Wachovia Bank, which merged with First Union in 2001, have had a long and fruitful partnership. In 1995, First Union established an En- dowed Chair in the Department of English. They also sponsored the First Union Harvest Classic, the women’s basketball tournament. . ,, From 1983-1987 the company con- tributed $50,000 to the Wachovia Fund for Excellence and in 1995, Wachovia established the Asa Spaulding Endowed Scholarship Chair in the School of Busi- ness in the amount of $500,000. In June 2001, Wachovia awarded $5,000 to fund the Julius L. Chambers Endowed Scholarship. “T feel confident that Wachovia Bank will continue to provide support for scholarships, endowments and student experiences in the years to come,” said Ammons. “We are grateful for their gen- erosity.” Wachovia Corporation (NY SE: WB) is one of the largest providers of financial services to retail, brokerage and corpo- rate customers, with retail operations from Connecticut to Florida and west to Texas, and retail brokerage operations nationwide. Its four core businesses, the General Bank, Capital Management, Wealth Management, and the Corpo- rate and Investment Bank, serve approxi- mately 14 million client relationships (in- cluding households and businesses), pri- marily in 15 states and Washington, D.C. Its full-service retail brokerage firm, Wachovia Securities, LLC, serves clients in 49 states and Washington, D.C. Glo- bal services are offered through 33 inter- national offices. Online banking and brokerage products and services also are available through wachovia.com. Wachovia had assets of $436.7 bil- lion, stockholders’ equity of $33.9 bil- lion and market capitalization of $61.4 billion at Sept. 30, 2004. SouthTrust had assets of $53.8 billion and stock- holders’ equity of $4.7 billion at Sept. 30,2004, ONGSHS WIOICTIC’, Datars) SOMINODIGY USIFOURIG GAD, JG, OVUCRE provides: * individual and group counseling for trewns, violent crime ond domestic abuse + Sister-to-Sister support grows: Sat. 2:00 eng * Brother-te-Brether suppert groups: te. PAGE 6% COiananiiry GED pragrem + Teen Talk progrom + Life Seminars and Classes / EXERCISE FREE FREE Cok TOR-B9G6 oF stop by our office ot 400 Witeuse Avenue (enxt to Seivie Chapel Church) for more information or to tthedvie @ coafidentiol session. | | Page lO - The Minority Voice Newspaper ee of the Civil Rights Movement. And the Rev. Jamal-Harrison Bryant wants bene seagylyrd a ice it 7 pastor of Empower- ment Temple ia Ronn: Bryant has mobilized ch oers to be mentors in their neighborhoods and the pris- a In its first 14 monet; the chuyech reportedly grown from 43 mem- bers to 2,300. Fie’ in the process of building an elementary school and adult learning facility that will open next fall and focusing his congrega- tion on building wealth, by givi them the tools si advice ther 1 need through wor! and credit semi- nars. Some would say his message— part spiritual, part activist—is a nod to his previous job as the director of the NAACP’s Youth and College Di- vision where he made stopping the high rate of black-on-black violence at the top of his agenda. His pop cul- ture sensibility and love of music (he is a member of the national board for the R&B Hall of Fame) pepper his talks with a message listeners ofall ages are able to can relate to and under- stand. ° Jessica Care Moore - : Never one to relegate her ete: of writing, acting, publishing and po- etically prophesying to folks who pre- ATLANTA, GA - With its unique com- t * * ofa: . : fer their rhymes while quaffing cof- fee in austere galleries, jessica Care moore has plied her trade of word play to the tough crowds of Harlem's _ Apollo and international audiences in France, Berlin and London to return tformances on “Russell Simmons’ Bet Poetry Jam” and with platinum- selling rapper Nas. The former jour- nalist made: a name for herself after winning “It’s Showtime At the Apollo” five times back-to-back. She discusses everything from feminism, and hip-hop culture to humanism and the lives and souls of black folk. She's written two original one-woman shows and launched her own im- print, moore Black Press, in 1997, which has published books by her- self and other writers. In 2003, moore » Started the Literacy Through Hip Hop Campaign, which uses rap lyr- ics as a way to push the importance of reading and the power of words. Kendrick Meek You could say that Kendrick Meek inherited the family business. His mother is Carrie P. Meek, a mem- ber of the U.S. House of Representa- tives for almost a decade and an elder stateswoman of Florida politics. Meek remembers staying up with his mother, reading bills and other pieces of legislation into the early hours of the morning, That's why it’s no sur- prise that, in 1994, he was elected to tors, animators, interactive entertain- Black Film Fes- the Florida state congress. Eight later in 2002, he wo cre os the U.S House of Representatives, win- ning the same seat his mother held for several terms. Now a member of the U.S. House Armed Services Commit- tee and the Select Committee on Homeland Security, he is an avid sup- porter of Haitian causes, the voting rights of felons and other issues facing minorities. Alisha Thomas Morgan _ Alisha Thomas Morgan has grown ac- customed to doing the unbelievable’ In November 2002, Thomas Morgan, a Democrat, became the first black elected to the Georgia House of Rep- resentatives from the prodominare white Cobb County, a county orth of Atlanta that was the former stomp- ing ground of stalwart conservative politicians like Newt Gingrich and Bobb Barr. But her election also marked another milestone, one not just colored by race, but also by age. Thomas Morgan became the oung- est serving member of the Georgia General Assembly at the age of 24. Since her term began, she has opposed a constitutional amendment banning gay marriage in Georgia, drawing criti- cism from fellow legislators and con- stituents. Thomas Morgan has been able to keep the confidence of her con- stituents, garnering 64 percent of the vote to beat a Republican opponent « _ As part of the IBFF, a think tank tiative. The daughter of entrepreneurs, . re inald Spei Martin County Community Action, Inc. (Serving Beaufort, Martin & Pitt Cou ty) ht, Exec. Dir. and’. ment developers, film buyers and dis- “called ‘A Cinematic Tsunami’ wil bea 2 strong entertainment base, Atlanta _tributors, content providers, game pub- useful session to ide the media towards stands poised to be the epicenter for this studio executives an others. change. We will provoke change from collision of art and science. This land- The result is a fertile cuvironment the stereotyped and negative portrayal mark convergence provide the back- . ere ang ideas and techniques of Black/African people in the media to- drop for the 500 05 Independent Black that help continue the evolution o the — ward a more positive portrayal of people Film Festival (IBFF), to beheld March _industry. This goal also is achieved this in the African Diaspora. The mass me- 3-6, 2005, in various venues through- _year thro ¢ strategic partnership dia has a great influence on our behav- out Atlanta's Buckhead and Midtown _ between I SFF and the Atlanta-based ior and thinking. We need a tsunami- areas, including the Woodruff Arts Cen- s Austin Foundation, a non-profit ike agenda to ange the landscape of ter, the High N »and the Georgia organization whose mission is to ingrease the movie industry. Centers For Advanced Telecommunica- _ participation of urban youth in, and Too often, we hear that the media tions Tec py (GCATT). Nowin its promote their understanding of, all as- producers are only giving the audience second year, the IBFF achieved great _pects of the film, music and entertain- what they want. We must change this initial success in 2004 by bringing to- ment industry by providing the re- motto to say, “Responsible media pro- gether great minds from technology, sources to support initiatives developed ducers need to give the audience what music videos, feature films and’ by urban rimary/secondary school sys- they need.” This think tank will formu- videogames for a week of panel discus- tems and Historically Black Colleges and — ate ways to educate both media pro- sions, hands-on workshops, cultural Universities. “We want people of allex- ducers on the importance of providing events, screenings and socializing, . perience levels across of these iridus- positive and uplifting information ona __ Loosely modeled after other land- tries to Have the Opportunity to talk with continual basis, mark festivals such as Sundance & and learn from each other, so we've cre- In the struggle for the hearts and Toronto, The Independent Black Film ated a forum that should foster creative minds of the lost souls in the Black/Afri- Festival goes a step further by bringing _ collaboration while allowing ample time can Diaspora, power will need to be ob- something that’s lacking in the film, tech- to celebrate the creative thinkers behind tained with a powerful-like tsunami nology and music industries: the ability these businesses,” said Asante Addae, _ force. The power to define is the power for individuals in these cpr sahip creator cee of the IBFE. “We're to direct minds and conditions that will hesses to come together in an offici especially pleased to have a partner.in cause aie ences io seraggle. rum, Attetidees will have the chance to _the Dallas Austin Foundation, which For more information about the hear, lam ftom, and interact with award- shares our vision for the future of this upcoming event, call (877) 236-6975 winning film and music producers and —_ industry and the possibilities it opens or go online at www.indieblackfilm.org directors, screenwriters, high-profile ac- up to young people of all backgrounds. ? who attacked her position on the ga marriage ban. During her time in of- fice, she has focused largely on the is- sues of prison reform for juveniles, education and healthcare. Alicia Reece _In her hometown of Cincinnati,. Ohio, where turmoil between the lice and its black residents have fre- quenced national headlines in the past ew years, Alicia Reece is as controver- . sial as she is loved. In November 1999, Reece, 28 at fhe time, became the youngest wontan in Cincinnati history to be elected to an at-large city coun- cil post. She later became the city’s acting vice-mayor and was appointed vice-mayor in 2003 by Mayor Charlie Luken after placing second in the Cin- cinnati City Council elections. In 2002, she helped settle a racial profil- ing lawsuit filed against the city. The settlement provided a blueprint to improve the relationship between law enforcement and the community, in- cluding policies on the use of weap- ons, and a joint $20 million commit- ment from the city and the Depart- ment of Justice to fund the new ini- Reece has also made changes to hel business owners and has been an ad- vocate for healthcare, lobbying for additional funding that kept commu- nity clinics open for people with little or no health insurance. Omar Wasow : When Omar Wasow clicks his mouse, everybody listens. It goes with the territory of being one of the lead- ing voices in technology and the Internet. As executive director and founder of Blackplanet.com, an online community for African Americans, he helped to attract more blacks online. When Oprah needed help as she made het maiden voyage into cyberspace, she called Wasow, who guided her in the 12-part series “Oprah Goes Online.” New York television station NBC-4 and MSNBC tapped him to explain Internet trends to their viewers. When he’s not debunking myths about cut- ting-edge technology, Wasow remains vocal in education reform and serves as a co-chair of The Coalition for In- dependent Public Charter Schools. Programming since he was 11 and online at the age of 12, Wgsow wants children to have access to the oppor- € tunities — and technology — he did ata young age. B. Michael Young _ According to the 2000 U.S. Cen- sus, there were 281.4 million people living in the United States. Of that number, 36.4 million of those ople were African American. B. Mic hae} Young's greatest concern is for the ones 21 to 40 years old, which totals about 15 million people. As president of the National Urban League Young Profes- sionals (NULYP), an auxiliary of the National Urban League, Young wants blacks to help themselves by building wealth, becoming politically active and aware, improving their health and rallying together for “racial justice.” Young has served on the executive board of the Washington, D.C.-chap- ter of the Urban League as treasurer, vice president and, from 1998 to 2000, two consecutive terms as presi- dent. Before becoming NULYP’s president in September 2003, Young was a regional vice president for four consecutive years. About the Author; Monet Cooper is a writer living in Atlanta.