NNPA -
http://nnpa.org/nnpa_newswire/new-study-blacks-feel-ignored-by-the-democratic-party/
http://nnpa.org/nnpa_newswire/blacks-will-account-for-nearly-18-percent-of-u-s-population-by-2060/
CASH IN THE APPLE FOR 02-16-17
http://nnpa.org/nnpa_newswire/new-study-blacks-feel-ignored-by-the-democratic-party/
http://nnpa.org/nnpa_newswire/blacks-will-account-for-nearly-18-percent-of-u-s-population-by-2060/
CASH IN THE APPLE FOR 02-16-17
By Cash Michaels
RESISTANCE IS
NECESSARY – There is an old “Star Trek: The Next Generation” episode where
Capt. Picard and his crew encounter that frightening alien race, the Borg. As
fans of the hit Trek know, the Borg were indeed a scary bunch, flying around
the universe, conquering whole civilizations without breaking so much as an
alien sweat and assimilating their victims.
And any time the Borg arrived, and folks began fighting their lives, in
an eery mechanical high-pitched voice you would hear the warning, “ Resistance
is futile!”
Thank GOD
we don’t have to deal with the Borg right now, but to a lot of folks, President
Donald J. Trump is just as scary. He is not the figment of some science fiction
writer’s wild imagination, but given his erratic, egotistical behavior, you
couldn’t blame folks for thinking his mind is from another world. There is no
question that ultimate power is the mother’s milk of existence for Pres. Trump,
with having it his top priority, no matter who it hurts.
And there
can be no doubt that he surrounds himself with some of the shadiest characters
in the White House not seen since the Nixon years, folks so slimy, dishonest
and crooked, even the Russians are impressed (remember how ticked off Russian
Pres. Vladimir Putin was with Pres. Obama, and how Obama would apparently
frustrate Putin at every turn? That’s what any American president should be
doing against a Russian dictator. So is Trump acting as if he wants to tuck old
Pooty in bed every night?)
After last
week’s debacle in the federal courts surrounding Trump’s Muslim ban executive order,
the debacle in the US Senate as ‘Bama Senator Jeff Sessions was confirmed as
our new US Attorney General, and specifically the shutdown of Democrat Sen.
Elizabeth Warren by Republican leader Sen. Mitch McConnell as she appropriately
read a 1986 letter to the Senate opposing
Jeff Sessions then for a federal judgeship, there is no question that
our world has been invaded by the kind of political tyranny we’ve always fought
hard to hold at bay, but couldn’t during the last presidential election.
And yet, it
would seem, that the people aren’t waiting for the message. They aren’t buying
into the Borg mantra that “Resistance is futile,” not by a longshot. Instead,
the people have taken to the streets by the hundreds of thousands all over the
nation, and indeed the world, chanting “Resistance is necessary” is not
“Resistance is vital!”
As recently
as this past weekend, thousands of people converged on Raleigh for the 11th
Annual Historic Thousands on Jones Street People’s Assembly and March,” this
year making it clear that they have no appetite for Trump’s nonsense, nor much
for foolishness from the Republican-led NC General Assembly.
You know,
the right-wing crowd that gave us the ignorant HB 2 “bathroom law,” and refuses
to rescind it because they can’t openly accept just how stupid they already
look.
People know
repression when they see it, and feel it. They know that the political forces
that be believe in an America that has learned important lessons from the civil
rights movement or the women’s movement, but rather pockets of America who
refuse to learn or accept anything about a nation that fights to be forward in
its thinking, and make opportunity available for everyone, just as Pres. Obama
so envisioned.
The folks
who support Donald Trump want their deaf-dumb-and-blind-before-the-civil-rights-movement-America
back, and they’re working hard to bring it back too. The question is, do we let
them?
One can
only hope, as people fill the streets with cries for justice and energy for
activism, that they can maintain this energy going into the next election, and
the next, or else it’s all just a big waste of time.
In which
case, then, resistance would be futile. Let’s not let that happen!
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SHP COMMANDER COL. GLENN MCNEILL
NEW HIGHWAY PATROL COMMANDER
NEW HIGHWAY PATROL COMMANDER
SEEKS TO BUILD
STRONGER BRIDGES
By Cash Michaels
Contributing writer
If you
personally knew the NC Highway Patrol’s first African-American commander, the
late Col. Richard Holden Sr., then you know Col. Glenn McNeill today, that
agency’s newest leader.
Humble but
strong, principled and devoted to service, it is no accident that McNeill asked
Holden, one of the first blacks to become a state trooper, to be his mentor
many years ago, and learned those basic tenets of manhood, and law enforcement,
from him.
“I loved
that man,” McNeill says. “When he walked into a room, you knew he was in
charge. I looked up to him the way he carried himself, the way he loved his
family, and how active he was in the community. To sit in an office that he once
occupied…I’m humbled by this experience and having this opportunity, but I just
don’t think I’m worthy.”
“If I end
up being half the colonel that he was,” McNeill continued, “I will consider
that to be a blessed tenure.”
As of last
Friday when he was sworn-in as the new commander of the 1600 troopers of the
state Highway Patrol (SHP), Col. Glenn McNeill now has that chance. In an
exclusive interview. Col. McNeill pledged to lead a patrol that looks like the citizenry
it’s sworn to protect and serve.
“One of the things that will be a
priority in my administration is our retention, and our recruitment of more
females and minorities, with the ultimate goal of the Highway Patrol working
towards representing and looking like the population in our state,” McNeill
said.
Acknowledging that historically
there has been tension between African-Americans and law enforcement, Col
McNeill pledges that under his watch, stronger efforts will be made to improve
community outreach and understanding. Priority One, he says, is “knowing the
people that we’re serving.”
What has made building bridges of
understanding harder to accomplish in recent years, McNeil continued, is that
unlike twenty-three years ago when he first joined the SHP stationed in Durham
County, there is a greater strain on law enforcement resources now more than ever
before, resulting in a greater demand on resources. One of those resources is
time, and having enough of it for community outreach.
“Well our
members are so busy now, that [community outreach] hasn’t been a priority because
we’re so busy running call to call,” McNeill noted. That must now change so
that officers take the time to build relationships, and ultimately personal and
professional capital, in the areas of the state that they patrol. As other law
enforcement agencies have shown, doing so helps to create healthy partnerships
between police and citizens in communities that need them the most.
It also
helps when there are “high-risk” incidents, like the fatal shooting of a gun-wielding
motorist last Friday in Durham County by a state trooper after a high speed
chase. The State Bureau of Investigation is probing that incident now.
“If we made
investments in those communities before those high risk incidents occurred,
then we are able to earn some trust and some credibility with those communities
[where they happen],” Col. McNeill says.
Born in
Whiteville, Glenn McNeill graduated from Mount Olive College with a degree in
Business Management and Organizational Development, and UNC – Wilmington with a
degree in criminal justice.
He joined
the SHP in 1994 as a trooper in Durham County, later serving in the Special
Operations Section, and as a Troop Commander. Col. McNeill most recently served
as Director of Training for the SHP since 2014.
He
graduated from the FBI National Academy in 2015 as a distinguished graduate.
Having a
mentor like Col. Richard Holden - who
joined the SHP in 1969, taking command in 1999, and then retiring in 2004 after
35 years of service, passing at the age of 67 in 2014 - has certainly molded Col McNeill, so much so
that when he interviewed with Gov. Roy Cooper for the job, he was honored just
to be considered.
“I shared
with our governor when I broke the threshold of his office door that I wasn’t
worthy to occupy any of his time, and for him to conduct an interview of me – a
poor kid from Reidsville, NC - I felt like I had already won regardless of who
he ended up selecting,” Col. McNeill recalled, adding that he and Gov. Cooper
had very similar ideas regarding “…wanting our state to be safe, and state
troopers being ambassadors of the state because we are the largest, most
recognized state agency in North Carolina.”
The new SHP
commander says he and his force are committed to the safety of the traveling
public, and working with other law enforcement agencies to share information to
reduce the flow of illegal drugs coming into the state, assisting in fighting
domestic and foreign terrorism, and expanding on motor carrier enforcement to
maintain the 78,000 miles of highway they cover.
“I told the
governor that I will work tirelessly,” Col. McNeill said, “to exceed his
expectations.”
-30-
STATE NEWS BRIEFS FOR 02-16-17
FEDERAL LAWSUIT
ALLEGING JONES COUNTY VOTING DISCRIMINATION
[WASH.,
DC] A federal lawsuit has been filed
against the Jones County Board of Commissioners this week, alleging that for
the past twenty years , black voters, who make up at least one-third of the
county, nave been systematically denied electing black candidates of their
choice to the five-member commission board. The last time an African-American
was elected to serve was 1994. Attorneys with the Washington, D.C.-based Lawyers
Committee for Civil Rights Under Law, along with two private law firms, say the
at-large system of electing candidates in Jones County locks blacks out. The attorneys say this is the first major
federal voting rights case of 2017.
ESTIMATED 80,000
ATTEND H K ON J MARCH AND RALLY IN RALEIGH
[RALEIGH]
Though there’s no official estimate, organizers of last weekend’s 11th
Annual H K on J March and Rally say they had the largest turnout in the event’s
history. Some, however, estimate that at least 80,000 filled the stteets of
downtown Raleigh, coming from all over the state, an even other parts of the
country. Led by NCNAACP Pres. Rev. Dr. William Barber, demonstrators protested
not only against the Trump Administration in Washington, but also the “extremist”
Republican majority in the NC General Assembly, and laws like HB 2, and their
attempts at voter suppression.
GOV. COOPER PROPOSES
NEW HB 2 REPEAL COMPROMISE
[RALEIGH] Saying that he’s willing to compromise in
order to get the HB2 “bathroom law” off the books as soon as possible, Gov. Roy
Cooper Tuesday, flanked by Democratic leaders from the state House and Senate,
proposed a compromise measure. Instead of a clean, straightforward repeal that
Republican leaders say their caucuses reject,
the compromise measure would increase penalties for crimes committed in
public bathrooms and locker rooms, and require municipalities that seek to
enact their own local nondiscrimination ordinances to inform the state
legislature 30 days before they do.
Republicans
apparently weren’t impressed. The HB2 law the GOP majority passed required
transgender citizens to use the bathroom of their original gender. Republicans
say Cooper’s compromise still allows men to use women’s bathrooms, regardless
of any new penalties.
THREE-JUDGE PANEL
REMOVES BLOCK ON SENATE CONFIRMATION HEARINGS
[RALEIGH] A three-judge panel
has now sided with the state Senate, and ruled that because Gov. Roy Cooper’s
power to appoint hasn’t suffered any, Senate confirmation hearings of his
Cabinet appointments may proceed. Last week, a three-judge panel granted the
governor an emergency stay of the hearings, based on his argument that it was a
violation of his constitutional right to appoint his team. Republican Senate
leaders countered that they had the constitutional responsibility of “advise
and consent, giving them the right to vet
Cooper’s appointments before they take office. A spokesman for the
governor says he will wait until March 7th for a full hearing on the
constitutionality of the hearings.
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