henry louis gates
GRITtv: Racial Profiling: It's Time to Face the Truth
Our friends at the Applied Research Center and the Rights Working Group are organizing a "night of 1000 conversations" around racial profiling, and they sent us this video to ask for your support and involvement.
Email this pageGRITtv: Media Panel: Deepening Healthcare Concerns and the Ongoing Saga of Henry Louis Gates' Arrest
Recent polls have shown more and more Americans doubting Obama's stance on health care, though the majority is still generally supportive. With Republicans and conservative Democrats balking at reform while right wing pundits condemn his plans, will Obama go the way of Clinton when it comes to health care? Most agree the issue of health care is getting sufficient coverage and exposure in the mainstream media, but is it getting the right kind of coverage? The topic has often been belittled to another means of partisan divide, and most citizens still lack basic knowledge of reform plans in favor of rhetoric from one side or the other. Mainstream media reaction to Henry Louis Gates' arrest and its aftermath continued to fill the airwaves, with Glenn Beck commenting on Obama's "racism" and desire for "reparations," Rush Limbaugh accusing him of trying to ruin a white police officer, and Michele Malkin calling him a "racial opportunist." To discuss these topics and more we're joined by Hendrik Hertzberg, Senior Editor and Staff Writer for The New Yorker, along with Editor and Publisher of The Nation Katrina Vanden Heuvel, and Nancy Giles, contributor for CBS News Sunday Morning.
GRITtv: The F Word: Equal Protection is Better Than Beer and Dialogue
The National Council of La Raza, a top Latino civil rights group, is taking a shot at RNC chair Michael Steele and several prominent GOP figures for skipping its ongoing annual conference while Democrats are basking in the contrast. Having nominated the first Latina to the Supreme Court and sending no end of speakers to the La Raza conference, they're in like Flynn with Latino voters, they hope. But things are not so simple. The day after the La Raza affair there was another gathering in NY, and Latinos came out in big numbers. And that was to protest at the Council on Foreign Relations -- where Homeland Security Secretary Napolitano was talking up the Administration's anti-terror policy. A slew of human rights and immigrant-rights organizations, including many Latinos, were protesting loudly, because -- for all the nice talk -- the administration's immigration policy has actually put more, not less power in the hands of law enforcement and done little so far to stop abusive raids and deadly detention abuses. Armed federal immigration agents are still illegally pushing and shoving their way into homes and taking people away on suspicion. As I said, beer and a chat is nice. But ensuring equal protection is better.
GRITtv: Henry Louis Gates' Arrest: A Teachable Moment?
There's been an endless cycle of commentary on the Henry Louis Gates affair since the Harvard Professor was arrested in his home and President Obama made the off script remark that the Cambridge police had "acted stupidly." Both men are now saying it is time to move on and that what happened was a teachable moment. But what, if anything, have we learned? Bill Fletcher, Jr., Executive Editor of Black Commentator, Ron Kuby a Civil Rights Attorney and the host of Doing Time with Ron Kuby on Air America, Dennis Parker, Director of the Racial Justice Program at the American Civil Liberties Union, and Rev. Irene Monroe, a Ford Fellow and Doctoral Candidate at Harvard Divinity School on race, class, and law enforcement in America. The ACLU has recently published a report on racial profiling that you can find here.
