[VIDEO] Obama: Voter ID Laws Are Racist, Intended To Keep Blacks From Voting…

“It’s just not a common crime.”

Via: Weasel Zippers

[VIDEO] Obama Addresses (GOP) Critics of Clean Power Plan: 'If You Care About Low-Income Minority Communities...'

(CNSNews.com) - "No challenge poses a greater threat to our future and future generations than a changing climate," President Obama said Monday in a speech announcing his plan to achieve a 32-percent reduction in carbon dioxide emissions from power plants by the year 2030.

He spent about a third of his speech refuting critics and "cynics who say it cannot be done."

And he managed to sneak in a plug for Obamacare while he was at it:

"Today, an African American child is more than twice as likely to be hospitalized from asthma. A Latino child is 40 percent more likely to die from asthma. So if you care about low-income minority communities, start protecting the air that they breathe, and stop trying to rob them of health care.

"And you could also expand Medicaid in your states, by the way," the president said, prompting laughter.

The Democrats' Affordable Care Act required the states to expand their Medicaid programs to cover people at or below 138 percent of the federal poverty level. But two years later, in 2012, the U.S. Supreme Court said the decision to expand Medicaid programs must be left to the individual states; the federal government could not compel such expansion. To date, 20 states still have not expanded their Medicaid programs.

Although President Obama did not name the critics of his Clean Power Plan on Monday, he clearly was addressing Republicans.

"We've hear the same stale arguments before," he said. "Every time America has made progress, it's been despite these kinds of claims. Whenever America sets clear rules and smarter standards for our air, our water, our children's health, we get the same scary stories about killing jobs and businesses and freedom."

Obama then told a story about arriving in Los Angeles for college as an 18-year-old, in late August.

"I was moving from Hawaii. And I got to the campus, and I decided I had a lot of pent-up energy, and I wanted to take a run, and after about five minutes, suddenly, I had this weird feeling like I couldn't breathe. And the reason was, back in 1979, Los Angeles still was so full of smog that there were days where people who were vulnerable just could not go outside, and they were fairly frequent."

He got personal again at the end of his speech:

"I don't want my grandkids not to be able to swim in Hawaii or not to be able to climb a mountain and see glacier because we didn't do something about it. I don't want millions of people's lives disrupted and this world more dangerous because we didn't do something about it. That'd be shameful of us.

"This is our moment to get this right and leave something better for our kids. Let's make most of that opportunity."

At Monday's White House briefing, spokesman Josh Earnest said the Clean Power Plan will prompt states and individual utilities to "ramp up their investments in efficiency, ramp up their investments in renewable energy, which is cheaper to produce than energy that's produced by coal, and making those kinds of investments will lead to savings in the utility bills of customers down the line, and that is what we're focused on, both in terms of saving consumers money but also a whole set of benefits that are associated with shifting to renewable energy or the use of less energy."

President Obama refuted critics who "claim that this plan will cost you money, even though this plan, the analysis shows, will ultimately save the average American nearly $85 a year on their energy bills."

Via: CNS News

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How Our Current Immigration System Impedes Black Progress

African-Americans lose out when immigration favors low-skill labor.

Donald Trump’s campaign rhetoric and the San Francisco murder of Kathryn Steinle by an undocumented immigrant with a lengthy criminal history have revived the national debate over immigration policy. While pro-immigration forces have correctly condemned Trump for his stereotyping of illegal Mexican immigrants, federal immigration authorities often release undocumented detainees with criminal records into American towns and cities while their deportation cases proceed. Between 2010 and 2014, 121 such illegal immigrants have been charged with murder. Better enforcement policies can limit these criminal acts. But often lost in the debate over immigration—legal and illegal—thus far has been the way the current system hurts low-wage, native-born Americans, especially in the black community.

Over the last 15 years, teen employment rates have collapsed, from 45 percent in 1999 to 27 percent in 2013. Among black Americans, the rate dropped from 27 percent to 17 percent. The availability of cheap immigrant labor—while not the only cause—has contributed to this trend. Fewer job opportunities for black youth mean fewer legal sources of income as well as the loss of valuable experiences and habits of work that paid employment provides.

The trend’s long-term effect on black men has been damaging. Based on the 2010 census, economists Derek Neal and Armin Rick estimated that 78 percent of 25–29 year-old white males were employed compared with 57 percent of black males. The figures are worse for less-educated black men. Only a quarter of black men without a high school diploma were employed, while almost one-third were incarcerated. More black men with a GED and no additional education were incarcerated than legally employed. These two less-educated groups comprise almost 25 percent of all black males in this age bracket. While I have argued elsewhere that a more important cause of this joblessness is the chaotic and often abusive homes in which many disadvantaged black youth live, black employment is also adversely affected by our current immigration policies, which allow vast numbers of low-skill newcomers to enter our economy.

Defenders of such policies cite studies that point to the overall positive impact of immigration on the U.S. economy; they downplay the evidence of its negative effect on less-educated, lower-earning native-born Americans. They also slight the effects of job competition by claiming that most illegal (and some legal) immigrants take jobs that native-born workers won’t do. Interestingly, the same liberals who jumped all over Jeb Bush for his perceived suggestion that American workers are lazy for not working more hours claim that native-born workers reject strenuous physical labor. They overstate the case: while native-born workers might not take, say, seasonal agricultural jobs, most would accept permanent, even if physically demanding, urban service jobs. Undoubtedly, employers would have to offer higher wages for these jobs if the supply of cheap immigrant labor was cut off.

Some liberals, especially those in the professional class, claim that immigration should be seen as a moral issue. Those who flee unbearable conditions have been victimized once, they say; we shouldn’t victimize them again after they enter the United States illegally. Of course, these professionals feel particularly comfortable making these arguments. They benefit from the increased demand for professional services, including teachers and social workers, and the lower prices for domestic and household services, that our immigration system makes possible.

Why shouldn’t the United States adopt immigration policies such as those already in place in Canada and other countries—policies that would restrict the arrival of less-educated workers and emphasize skills that the economy needs? Such a system would be beneficial to both the economy as a whole and a significant share of black men of modest means.

Robert Cherry is the Stern Professor at Brooklyn College and the CUNY Graduate Center.

Via: City

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NANCY PELOSI THINKS SLUGGISH JOBS REPORT SIGN OF PROGRESS

House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) thinksJanuary's jobs report is a sign of progress, though economic analysts believe it represents, at best, an economy stuck in place. 

Even though the report showed that the economy did not add the 150,000 jobs necessary to keep up with the growth in population, Pelosi said in a statement, “Today’s jobs report shows our recovery continuing to move forward."

She also said her colleagues in Congress could do more to "create jobs and build an economy that works for everyone." She slammed Republicans for not extending unemployment benefits and playing "politics with the lives and livelihoods of millions of Americans.”

According to Reuters, though, January was the "second straight month of weak hiring - marked by declines in retail, utilities, government, and education and health employment." In addition, the last two months represented the "weakest two months of job growth in three years, [as] December payrolls were raised only 1,000 to 75,000."

The Associated Press was not optimistic either, saying that the "surprisingly weak jobs report" will renew concerns that the "U.S. economy might be slowing after a strong finish last year" and "undermine hopes that economic growth will accelerate this year." The AP also noted that employers added 194,000 jobs last January while only adding 113,000 this January. The unemployment rates for blacks and Hispanics also increased from the previous month.

Via: Breitbart

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Los Angeles Police Dogs Only Bit Blacks And Latinos In The First Six Months Of 2013

A new report on the Los Angeles Sheriff Department Canine Special Detail finds that the number of minority individuals bitten by police dogs has dramatically increased between 2004 to 2012. In a department already plagued by accusations of racial targeting, 100 percent of dog bite victims in the first six months of 2013 were blacks and Latinos.

In the past nine years, the minority-heavy, urban areas of Century, City of Industry, Compton, Lakewood, and South LA/Lennox, experienced more dog bites than 21 other agencies or stations combined.

One of the more troubling aspects of the report found that police canines cause injuries at far higher rates than other weapons, such as batons, tear gas, and guns. The pressure from a dog bite is equivalent to “a car tire running over a body part,” as one federal judge put it.

Dog bites are not the only police tactic blacks and Latinos in Los Angeles have to fear. The LASD has racked up a lengthy racial profiling record. TheDepartment of Justice found that the LASD systematically singles out blacks and Latinos for stops, seizures, and excessive force at higher rates than other races.

LASD officers regularly target immigrants without legal authority. A class-action lawsuit against the department charged the LASD was holding thousands of immigrants in jail cells for longer than the legal maximum of 48 hours. Detained immigrants were also not allowed to post bail even after a court allowed it. In 2011, the sheriff’s department illegally detained nearly 20,000 people on immigration holds for an average of three weeks longer than inmates without immigration holds.

Via: Think Progress

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BLACK HOMEOWNERSHIP HITS 18 YEAR LOW

In a report released Tuesday, Bloomberg reports that black homeownership has collapsed to an 18 year low. Bloomberg buries this brutal fact under a nonsensical headline that makes it look like a local Chicago story: "Black Homeownership Dying Where Obama Revitalized." But four paragraphs down we not only learn about the collapse in the black homeownership rate, but that it is now almost half that of whites:

For most Americans, the real estate crash is finally behind them and personal wealth is back where it was in the boom. For blacks in the U.S., 18 years of economic progress has vanished, with a rebound in housing slipping further out of reach and the unemployment rate almost twice that of whites. The homeownership rate for blacks fell from 50 percent during the housing bubble to 43 percent in the second quarter, the lowest since 1995. The rate for whites stopped falling two years ago, settling at about 73 percent, only 3 percentage points below the 2004 peak, according to the Census Bureau.

For those in the working and middle class, if you have any wealth, it is most likely found in whatever equity you have in your home -- either based on what you have paid into it, its increase in value, or both. This is why the housing crisis was and is so devastating to so many everyday Americans… of all colors.

Had Obama enacted proven economic policies after becoming president, the economy and housing market would have already rebounded and beyond. But Obama chose big government policies, and now we find ourselves in the middle of a so-called recovery that only our pathetic and subservient media could spin as  "good enough."

Via: Breitbart

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Unreal: Florida Passes Plan For Racially-Based Academic Goals, Asian Students Expected To Be Top Performers, Blacks Last…

Palm Beach, Fla. (CBS TAMPA) – The Florida State Board of Education passed a plan that sets goals for students in math and reading based upon their race.

On Tuesday, the board passed a revised strategic plan that says that by 2018, it wants 90 percent of Asian students, 88 percent of white students, 81 percent of Hispanics and 74 percent of black students to be reading at or above grade level. For math, the goals are 92 percent of Asian kids to be proficient, whites at 86 percent, Hispanics at 80 percent and blacks at 74 percent. It also measures by other groupings, such as poverty and disabilities, reported the Palm Beach Post.

The plan has infuriated many community activists in Palm Beach County and across the state.

“To expect less from one demographic and more from another is just a little off-base,” Juan Lopez, magnet coordinator at John F. Kennedy Middle School in Riviera Beach, told the Palm Beach Post.

JFK Middle has a black student population of about 88 percent.

“Our kids, although they come from different socioeconomic backgrounds, they still have the ability to learn,” Lopez said. “To dumb down the expectations for one group, that seems a little unfair.”

Others in the community agreed with Lopez’s assessment. But the Florida Department of Education said the goals recognize that not every group is starting from the same point and are meant to be ambitious but realistic.

As an example, the percentage of white students scoring at or above grade level (as measured by whether they scored a 3 or higher on the reading FCAT) was 69 percent in 2011-2012, according to the state. For black students, it was 38 percent, and for Hispanics, it was 53 percent.

In addition, State Board of Education Chairwoman Kathleen Shanahan said that setting goals for different subgroups was needed to comply with terms of a waiver that Florida and 32 other states have from some provisions of the federal No Child Left Behind Act. These waivers were used to make the states independent from some federal regulations.

Via: CBS News

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How To Read Political Racial Code

Part of my job when I speak about politics is to speak up for black people and say things black people need said. This mission has rarely felt so necessary as it has when racial code words recently entered the Presidential election. These code words are ancient racial stereotypes in slick, modern gear. They are linguistic mustard gas, sliding in covertly, aiming to kill black political viability by allowing white politicians to say ‘Don’t vote for the black guy’ in socially-acceptable language. Sometimes the code comes directly out of a candidate’s mouth. Sometimes it comes from supporters, or can be found in advertisements.

(MORE: Inside the Racist Mind)

Do not be fooled by the canard that both parties do it. That was former RNC Chairman Michael Steele’s response when I asked him about it on my MSNBC show “The Cycle.” Using certain words to invoke racialized fear and scare white working class voters is a long-established part of the Republican playbook. The GOP is a 90% white party and has been for decades. According to Ron Brownstein of the National Journal, Mitt Romney will need over 60% of white people to vote for him or he will lose. “That,” Brownstein says, “would be the best performance ever for a Republican Presidential challenger with that group of voters.” Given that math, in a base turnout election where Romney has a big lead among white, non-college educated men, it’s understandable why he’d try to motivate those voters with code words that remind them of their racial difference with Obama and stigmatize that difference. In this effort a word like “welfare” is extremely valuable. Sure there are more white than black Americans on welfare, but when a candidate says ‘welfare’ many whites think of their tax dollars being given to blacks.

So when Romney began running ads about Obama “dropping the work requirement from welfare” — ads which are still running even though the claim has been thoroughly debunked — he was merely updating Ronald Reagan’s old “welfare queen” meme. Both are designed to create racial resentment around entitlements. This tactic is bolstered by the classic stereotype of blacks as lazy. A recent Pew Research Center poll, for example, found that 57% of Republicans believe people are poor because they don’t work hard. When a recent Washington Post poll asked “Why do most black voters so consistently support Democrats?” the second reason given by Republicans was “black voters are dependent on government or seeking a government handout” while for Democrats it was that “their party addresses issues of poverty.” (The top answer for members of both parties was “Don’t know”.)

Via: Time Magazine

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