webodec3ARCHIVEPreview
Open in TheBrain

renta bak

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neglected?

see kns tag

see CORE alston

capt 818

renta-tamales latinx

innis

mrs borelli  anti shareholder CRS

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A Black MAGA influencer has revealed that she was kicked out of a rally for Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton over the weekend. What’s more, Thelma Louise – who has a large TikTok account where she creates content advocating for President Donald Trump – caught the incident on video, in which she was quietly watching the rally before she was suddenly asked to leave.

On Sunday, she was enthusiastically documenting her experience at a rally for Paxton, who has fallen behind Democratic opponent James Talarico in the race for the Senate, when she was abruptly asked to leave without cause. As she is escorted out, she’s seen asking politely, “And there’s no one that I can talk to about this?” Once outside, Louise was visibly shocked, saying, “Wow. Oh my gosh. I cannot believe this... Someone just came up to me and said that Ken Paxton’s campaign manager wanted me to leave. I am just — my mouth is wide open right now. I really can’t believe this.”

“I was just asked to leave this event, and I did nothing wrong,” she went on. “I was told that Paxton’s campaign manager didn’t want me here. I’m not making any of this up... I have done nothing but support everyone on the Republican side, and this is how I get treated? I cannot believe the disrespect that I was just given. I left the Democratic Party two years ago, I have volunteered for President Trump’s campaign, and I have worked very hard promoting members of the Republican Party. I’m not quite sure what’s going on, but to be walked out of a room full of people and isolated as if I’d done something wrong — I cannot believe it.”

Paxton – a MAGA loyalist who has run under the endorsement of Trump – has been dragged down by a slew of corruption and personal scandals, and narrowly trails Talarico in most polls. As a result, it has been widely suggested that Texas could flip a Senate seat blue, electing a Democratic senator for the first time since 1988. This has forced the GOP to spend extraordinary amounts of money in Paxton’s favor, while the president has made repeated visits to Texas in an attempt to bolster MAGA support.

Before she was kicked out of the rally, Louise appeared to have an amiable stance on Paxton despite the scandals, saying that she traveled two hours to attend the rally. She was asked to leave anyway, despite footage that appears to show her watching respectfully, regardless of having shown the press credentials she received for Republicans midterm convention in Dallas over the summer.

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Full List of 'Black Americans for Trump' Coalition Partners - Newsweek

jun 2024

...a Marist Poll published on Wednesday shows that Biden has lost considerable support among Black voters in Pennsylvania, a state he narrowly won in 2020. He had won the support of most Black voters in 2020, with 92 percent voting for him and just 7 percent choosing Trump. In Wednesday's survey, 68 percent of Black voters said they were supporting Biden, or leaning towards him, in November's election, while 23 percent said they were backing Trump. The poll was conducted between June 3 through June 6 among 1,277 Pennsylvania adults.

Among Black registered voters, Biden led Trump 57 to 12 percent in a Reuters/Ipsos poll in May, with 16 percent saying they aren't sure who they will vote for, 8 percent saying some other candidate and 7 percent saying they won't vote at all.

The Biden campaign released a statement Saturday regarding Trump's new Black voter outreach, saying the coalition is an "eleventh hour attempt" and "isn't fooling anyone."

"Black voters sent Joe Biden and Kamala Harris to the White House in 2020, and they're ready to make Donald Trump a two-time loser in 2024," the statement read.

On Monday, the White House marked Juneteenth early with a concert on the South Lawn. "Black history is American history," Biden told the crowd. "That's why [Vice President] Kamala [Harris] and I and our administration will always uplift it and protect it."

The Trump campaign provided the following list of people in the "Black Americans for Trump" coalition:

Elected officials

Endorsements

* Herschel Walker, Former NFL Player and Former U.S. Senate Candidate for GA

renta pending:

in 2016, the Rev. Darrell C. Scott — a fundamentalist Pentecostal minister in Cleveland's African-American community — expressed his skepticism about Donald Trump's presidential campaign. But in 2024, Scott (not to be confused with the singer/songwriter) is an outspoken Trump supporter who is urging other Blacks to vote for him.

The Guardian's Ed Pilkington reports that Scott, a former drug dealer, is claiming that up to 25-30 percent of Black voters may vote for Trump over President Joe Biden in November.

Scott told The Guardian, "I hear a lot of positivity regarding President Trump in the Black community. Very little negativity. Those I speak to have changed their tone against him. 'Trump's not so bad after all,' they say."

READ MORE: **The politics of martyrdom and what Trump’s conviction will really mean**

But according to Pilkington, Scott's pro-Trump efforts are getting a lot of pushback from the former president's critics.

"For speaking out on Trump's behalf," Pilkington explains. "Scott has been labeled an Uncle Tom, a sellout, a money-grabbing opportunist. And that's just the start."

Scott's message to Blacks in Cleveland is unwavering: support Trump in November, not Biden. But it's a message that some of the Cleveland-based Black voters The Guardian interviewed are flat-out rejecting.

Voter Leshelle, who is 30, told The Guardian, "Trump's a psychopath; he's not getting my vote."

READ MORE:**'The law finally caught up to him': Experts react to Trump being convicted of 34 felonies**

And 60-year-old Charles, told The Guardian, "I would never vote for Donald Trump. He's a criminal and not a good person."

Ernest, who is 76, told The Guardian, "Our democracy is at stake because of Trump's rhetoric."

READ MORE:**'Shame on him': Trial consultant slams JD Vance for attacking Trump jurors**

Read The Guardian's full report at this link.

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https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2022/oct/10/i-feel-used-how-fossil-fuel-firms-court-black-leaders-to-support-pipelines

pastor Geoffrey Guns was sceptical when asked to join the community advisory board for a gas pipeline, but decided it was his duty to advocate for the Black communities that would be affected by the fossil fuel expansion project.

The Virginia Reliability Project (VRP) is a proposal by the Canadian fossil fuel company behind the Keystone XL pipeline to expand and upgrade gas infrastructure through tribal lands, fragile waterways and underserved neighbourhoods in south-east Virginia.

Almost 50% of the population along the VRP route live below the poverty line and more than half are people of colour.

TC Energy claims the expansion will create thousands of local jobs and that community engagement is core to the company’s mission. For this reason, Guns, a senior pastor at the Second Calvary Baptist church in Norfolk, joined the advisory board along with several other local Black religious leaders.....

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reuters

...As part of the campaign, API has partnered with a number of black and Hispanic business groups, including the Virginia, Florida and North Carolina Hispanic Chambers of Commerce and the Florida Black Chamber of Commerce and South Carolina African American Chamber of Commerce.

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A Pew Research poll published in January showed that 56 percent of Hispanics and 54 percent of blacks opposed offshore drilling, compared to 48 percent of white people.

The Interior Department in January announced a proposal to open up nearly all U.S. offshore waters to drilling, triggering a backlash from coastal states that rely on tourism.

Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke told a Senate panel in April that he is likely to scale back the proposal following meetings with coastal governors. Shortly after he unveiled his offshore drilling proposal, Zinke offered an exemption for Florida after he held a private meeting with Republican Governor Rick Scott.

The oil and gas industry is keen to pursue seismic testing in areas they believe hold the largest reserves along the southern Atlantic coast and to Florida’s eastern Gulf shorelines.

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The API campaign published op-eds in local newspapers this week, including one by Stephen Gilchrist, chair of South Carolina’s African American Chamber of Commerce. In it he touts API’s major talking point that oil and gas exploration jobs offer locals an average salary of $116,000 without requiring a college degree....

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carol swain xian wacko?

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Black conservatism in the United States is a political and social movement rooted in communities of African descent that aligns largely with the American conservative movement, including the Christian right.[1] Black conservatism emphasizes social conservatism, traditionalism, patriotism, capitalism, and free markets.

Contents

Overview[

One of the main characteristics of black conservatism is its emphasis on personal choice and responsibilities above socioeconomic status and institutional racism. In the tradition of African American politics and intellectual life, black conservatives tend to side with Booker T. Washington as contrasted with W. E. B. Du Bois.[2] For many black conservatives, the key mission is to bring repair and success to the black community by applying the following fundamental principles

Beliefs[

Black conservatives typically oppose affirmative action and tend to argue that efforts to obtain reparations for slavery are either misguided or counter-productive. Black conservatives tend to be self-critical of aspects of African-American culture that they believe have created poverty and dependency.[4]^

Black conservatives—especially black Republicans—are often accused of being Uncle Toms. Ebony in their May 2001 "100+ Most Influential Black Americans" issue, did not include a number of influential African Americans such as Thomas Sowell, Shelby Steele, Armstrong Williams, Walter Williams and, most notably, Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thom:(style="background-color:#ffff66ff"):}::{as. The Economist described the exclusion of Justice Thomas from the list as spiteful.[5] Black conservatives favor integration of African Americans into mainstream America and, consequently, disagree with black nationalism and separatism. Black conservatives are more inclined to support economic policies promoting globalization, free trade and tax cuts.[citation ^needed]^

According to a 2004 study, 14% of blacks identified as "Conservative" or "Extremely Conservative"[6] with another 14% identifying as slightly conservative. However, the same study indicated that less than ten percent identified as Republican or Republican-leaning. Likewise, a 2007 Pew Research Center survey showed that 19% of blacks identified as Religious Right.[7] In 2004, the Pew Research Center indicated only 7% of blacks identified as Republican.[8]^

A National Election Pool poll showed that support for California Proposition 8 (2008) (a state constitutional amendment defining marriage as an opposite-sex union) was strong among African-American voters; 70% of those interviewed in the exit poll—a higher percentage than any other racial group—stated that they voted in favor of Proposition 8.[9] Polls by both the Associated Press and CNN mirrored this data, reporting support among black voters to be at 70%[10] and 75%,[11] respectively. African American support was considered crucial to the Proposition's passage because African Americans made up an unusually large percentage of voters in 2008; the presence of African American presidential candidate Barack Obama on the ballot was believed to have increased African American voter turnout.[12]^

Historical basis[

From Reconstruction up until the New Deal, the black population tended to vote Republican. During that period, the Republican Party—particularly in the Southern United States—was seen as more racially liberal than the Democratic Party, primarily because of the role of the Southern wing of the Democratic Party as the party of racial segregation and the Republican Party's roots in the abolitionist movement (see Dixiecrats).

Blacks started to shift in significant numbers to the Democrats with the election of Franklin D. Roosevelt[13] and continued with the election of John F. Kennedy. This shift was also influenced by Herbert Hoover's practice of firing loyal African-Americans from positions within the Republican Party, in order to increase his appeal to Southern white voters.[14] This can be considered an early example of a set of Republican Party methods that were later termed the Southern Strategy.[15][better source ^needed]^

Timeline of events

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API: Explore Offshore [vs steyer CA mobilization on prop 23?]

The American Petroleum Institute launched its Explore Offshore project in June 2018 “seeking to convince Hispanic and black communities to support the Trump administration’s proposed expansion of offshore drilling,” Reuters reported. [72]

“We want to build support in minority communities because the message that increasing the supply of affordable energy and good paying jobs will resonate,” said Erik Milito, API’s director of Upstream and Industry Operations. [72]

Explore Offshore describes itself as a “national coalition that supports offshore energy exploration and production to help supply affordable energy for American consumers, small businesses, and manufacturers.”

“Explore Offshore’s mission is to unite supporters of offshore energy development and promote its benefits and its importance to our nation’s economy and energy security,” its website claims.

Coalition members include representatives from Florida, North Carolina, South Carolina, Georgia and Virginia. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce and a range of local affiliates are listed on its coalition page. [68], [70]

According to Reuters, Explore Offshore has partnered with a number of black and Hispanic business groups including the Virginia, Florida and North Carolina Hispanic Chambers of Commerce and the Florida Black Chamber of Commerceand South Carolina African American Chamber of Commerce. [72]

Only one African-American man, South Carolina African American Chamber of Commerce chairman Stephen Gilchrist, was involved in the group. Gilchrist reportedly “counts [Steve] Bannon as a friend.” While the group identifies itself as a “bipartisan coalition,” its sole Democrat is Jim Webb, who has praised “gallantry” of Confederate soldiers and defended “the venerable Robert E. Lee” according to a Politico story on Webb’s roots. [75], [73], [74]

July 24, 2018

Representatives from API and API‘s “Explore Offshore South Carolina” attended a luncheon hosted by the SC African American Chamber of Commerce to discuss “the Economic impacts and safety of Offshore Energy.” [71]

May 16, 2018

Explore Offshore, a “project of the American Petroleum Institute”ran an ad campaign on Facebook promoting offshore drilling in Florida. According to Facebook’s political ad archive, the ads were removed because they lacked a “Paid for by” label while including political content. [68], [69]

The ad text read as follows:

“Contrary to what the opposition wants you to believe, offshore energy exploration has occurred safely alongside marine life, commercial fishing, military activities, and tourism for decades in the Gulf.

‘Not only have these industries co-existed with energy production, but in many cases energy development has stimulated and bolstered investments, increased higher-paying jobs, and supported retail and tourism in coastal towns along the Gulf,’ Cornelia Horner, a spokeswoman with the American Petroleum Institute.

The choice is simple when you have the facts. Say yes to exploring our offshore resources in Florida.”

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i'm guessing 1776 vs 1619

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an 10 21

no lnx

Now that former President Donald Trump's reign is over, the members of his administration have been forced to take their careers in different directions. So, where are the members of the Trump administration now? According to The Intelligencer, many are doing an array of different things; some of which are synonymous with the questionable activities that long-haunted the Trump administration.

Here's where the top Trump White House officials are now:

1. Former Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) director and U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo is still trying to distance himself from the kidnapping of Julian Assange. According to Pompeo, he had nothing to do with it.

Pompeo is adamantly denying any involvement in the plot to kidnap Assange. A report published by Yahoo! News back in September, suggested that Pompeo was livid when he learned Assange divulged U.S. national-security secrets. In fact, the report also claimed that he participated in discussions with members of the Trump administration on how to get retribution.

However, Pompeo is still suggesting the reports are not true. "There's pieces of it that are true," Pompeo said during an appearance on The Megyn Kelly Show. "We tried to protect American information from Julian Assange and WikiLeaks, absolutely, yes … We're not permitted by U.S. law to conduct assassinations. We never acted in a way that was inconsistent with that."

2. Former U.S. Treasury Secretary Steve Mnuchin has been milking his access to the Secret Service.

Thanks to Trump's order extending the use of the Secret Service to members of his administration, Mnuchin has used the professional perk to his benefit. The publication reports that in his first six months out of office, Mnuchin has racked up the highest Secret Service tab. The Washington Post detailed how Mnuchin managed to rack up more than $150,000 in Secret Service expenses.

The receipts showed that agents spent $114,000 over the six months to rent rooms at a W Hotel in Los Angeles, where Mnuchin has a home. They also followed Mnuchin on three trips to the Middle East, where Mnuchin is reportedly seeking to raise money from sovereign wealth funds for a new venture called Liberty Strategic Capital…

Mnuchin's travels with the Secret Service weren't all business, however. Over the six months, the records show three separate trips to Cabo San Lucas — the Mexican resort, where Mnuchin had also vacationed during Trump's presidency.

To guard Mnuchin during those three trips, the records show, the Secret Service paid $56,000 for hotel rooms and $2,000 to rent golf carts.

According to The Hollywood Reporter, Mnuchin is planning to use the $2.5 billion he has raised traveling so he can invest in technology and cybersecurity investments, along with "new forms of content." It remains unclear what Mnuchin specifically describes as "new forms of content" but "many big tech companies are pushing virtual- and augmented-reality hardware and content products and digital gaming."

3. Wilbur Ross is reportedly fantasizing about putting "Trump condos on the moon."

Back in February after the Trump administration transitioned out of the White House, Ross spoke with Bloomberg and shared his upcoming post-government plans; which involve "Trump condos on the moon."

On this particular afternoon, he's sitting in the living room of his 80-year-old home filled with Magrittes and Picassos, sipping a cappuccino, dressed in cashmere sweater, slacks and velvet slippers embroidered with octopuses.

Ironically, it's while ensconced in this paradise of earthly delights that Ross is gearing up to invest in space, among other possibilities. He sees opportunity in extraterrestrial tourism, manufacturing, research and habitation.

Habitation? When asked whether space would be a gold-plated real estate opportunity for Trump, Ross didn't disagree.

"Why not Trump condos on the moon?" he quipped back.

Ross' remarks came just months after the U.S. Commerce Department's inspector general released a scathing report about the former Trump official's behavior. According to The Washington Post, the IG's report "concluded that Ross had made many inaccurate statements to federal officials about his assets before taking office, though he did not willfully violate conflict-of-interest laws."

4. Ben Carson is launching a venture similar to Boy Scouts of America.

After departing Washington, D.C., Ben Carson —the former Housing and Urban Development Secretary— launched an organization called the American Cornerstone Institute.Carson's new think tank reportedly places an emphasis on discovering "commonsense solutions to some of our nation's biggest problems."

The American Cornerstone Institute

youtu.be

Carson has also created the Little Patriots program, which is described as a partisan organization for children. Speaking to The Washington Post, Carson explained the organization's initiative. "It will be something like the Boy Scouts," Carson told the publication. "But heavily exposed to the real history of America.

"You probably notice when ISIS goes into a place, they destroy the history, they destroy the monuments," Carson explained. "History is what gives you identity."

  1. Elaine Chao contributed to calls for Kroger to be boycotted.

Chao —wife of Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) and former transportation secretary— worked for several of the country's top corporations prior to her role with the Trump administration. But Intelligencer reports that "she and other Trump Cabinet alums were having a hard time finding cushy landing spots after exiting the administration. 'The feedback was 'It's too soon,' said one of the headhunters involved in an unsuccessful effort to find companies willing to work with Chao."

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Despite her struggles to re-enter the corporate world, Chao was appointed to Kroger's board of directors. But given her history of abusing her power and position with the government, social media users quickly expressed outrage and urged Kroger to drop the former Trump cabinet member from its board.

6. Alex Azar is reportedly conspiring against his former colleagues.

Former Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar is at odds with many of his former colleagues. In fact, several of them including —former FDA commissioner Stephen Hahn, former Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) director Robert Redfield, former Medicare chief Seema Verma, and former White House COVID coordinator Deborah Birx— have reportedly joined forces to prepare their statements regarding the Trump administration's handling of COVID-19.

According to Politico, they've done so out of caution and concern about Azar possibly using them as "scapegoats" to clear themselves.

"I know the way this goes — everyone has a different perspective," Hahn said in an interview. "I wanted to tell what it was that happened and why it happened and the perspective that we had."

In calls and text messages, members of the group have swapped notes, compared recollections, and sent updates on media requests and interview opportunities, four people with knowledge of the matter said …

And in a nod to their individual battles with Azar, some have jokingly referred to the group in private as "AAA," or Alex Azar Anonymous, according to a person in direct contact with multiple members.

From the looks of it, many Trump administration officials are still conducting shady business as they did while in office.

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bizzaro mirror BS; only actual hustler is founder of this cat:

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ken starr impeach

his ticket back into pension plan?aha-let, everyone has their niche/function eg renta-X;eg kellyanne defends 1st lady melania on fake outrage on barron

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new

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...Again, Bernie McKay, the lobbyist who had joined Intuit in the late 1990s and outlasted multiple CEOs, led the company’s campaign. In response to the Obama threat, McKay and Intuit’s small army of outside lobbyists turned to Congress, where lawmakers friendly to the company introduced a series of bills that would elevate Free File from a temporary deal with the IRS to the law of the land.

Republicans have historically been the company’s most reliable supporters, but some Democrats joined them. Rep. Zoe Lofgren, the California Democrat whose district includes part of Silicon Valley, has introduced or co-sponsored five bills over the years that would codify the Free File program, with names like the Free File Permanence Act. Lofgren’s spokesperson told ProPublica that the congresswoman believes the IRS, because of its role as tax collector, should not also be the tax preparer.

Hedging its bets, the company also sought to make sure the IRS could not spend a single dollar creating a public filing system. One internal document says Intuit would “advance legislative language in House Appropriations for ‘No Funds’ restriction on IRS spending” on such a system. It worked. Within a few years, Congress passed a 3,000-page appropriations bill that included a single sentence crucial to Intuit’s financial future: “No funds,” the law decreed, could be used “to provide to any person a proposed final return or statement.”

Another important aspect of Intuit’s influence strategy during the Obama years was covertly enlisting minority and women’s groups to press its case.

The internal 2014-15 “encroachment strategy” document discloses plans to “leverage trade groups to support House/Senate Free File bills.” It goes on to list the groups Women Impacting Public Policy, The Latino Coalition and the National Black Chamber of Commerce.

Intuit has given money to all of those groups over the years. All have signed letters urging Congress to make the Free File deal permanent. “The Free File program has been a clear success,” said one letter signed by The Latino Coalition and the Hispanic Leadership Fund.

A spokesperson for Women Impacting Public Policy said it has received $70,000 from Intuit. The amounts given to the other groups are unknown, and they did not respond to requests for comment.

Company documents also outline plans to “mobilize” a “coalition” that included think tanks and academics, who published op-eds.

Will Marshall, president of the pro-business Progressive Policy Institute,opposed return-free filing in an op-ed in The Hill because doing one’s taxes is “a teachable moment [that] prompts us to review our financial circumstances.”

Anti-tax activist Grover Norquist, the most consistent champion of Intuit’s policy positions, warned that “big spenders in Washington, D.C. want to socialize all tax preparation in America.”

It is unclear whether they were paid by Intuit or the Free File Alliance.Norquist didn’t respond to a request for comment, and a Progressive Policy Institute spokesman declined to say whether Intuit gave the group money.

Whatever external challenges to the status quo Intuit has faced, the company has been able to rely on the IRS’ continuing enthusiastic support of the Free File program. Every few years, the IRS and the industry got together to renew the deal....[long]

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new 819

https://www.mediamatters.org/legacy/oil-industry-enlists-minority-groups-publish-pro-drilling-op-eds

As part of a partnership with the American Petroleum Institute (API), the largest oil and gas lobbying organization in the U.S., Black and Hispanic business groups have been placing op-eds in local newspapers touting the benefits of offshore drilling, as Reuters recently reported. Black and Hispanic Americans are more likely to be opposed to offshore drilling than white Americans, according to a Pew poll conducted in January. The op-ed campaign is part of an industry-driven effort to make offshore drilling look more broadly supported and to shift minority opinion by enlisting groups that purport to represent communities of color.

Op-eds push oil industry statistics but fail to disclose oil industry connections

Media Matters identified six newspapers in the Southeast that have published op-eds by minority business leaders or political leaders who argue in favor of increased offshore oil and gas drilling along the Atlantic Coast. Most of these minority authors are affiliated with the Explore Offshore alliance, which they mention in their pieces -- but they neglect to disclose that Explore Offshore is a project of API and that many of the talking points and statistics they cite in their op-eds come straight from API materials.

API announced the Explore Offshore alliance on June 6, billing it as a “bipartisan coalition representing a diverse group of community organizations, businesses, and local associations across the Southeast that support safe and responsible expanded U.S. access to oil and natural gas through advanced technologies.” The minority business groups in the coalition are highlighted on the Explore Offshore homepage, while most other coalition members are listed in less prominent places on the website -- an indication that API wants to highlight Black and Hispanic participation. The minority groups in the coalition include the Florida Black Chamber of Commerce, the Florida State Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, the North Carolina Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, the South Carolina African American Chamber of Commerce, and the Virginia Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, plus one minority religious organization, the Hispanic Pastors Association.

Florida:

In Florida, The Palm Beach Post and the Tallahassee Democrat published a pro-drilling op-ed written by Julio Fuentes, president and CEO of the Florida State Hispanic Chamber of Commerce. The Tampa Bay Times published a like-minded op-ed co-authored by Miriam Ramirez, a former member of Puerto Rico’s Senate and a co-chair of Explore Offshore Florida, a state affiliate of API's national Explore Offshore coalition.

Fuentes and Ramirez and her co-authors took figures from API’s one-pager about the benefits of drilling in Florida’s waters. Fuentes wrote (emphasis added):

Continued offshore development would put more than 56,000 Floridians to work and add $4.5 billion per year to our economy.

API's one-pager says (emphasis added):

Employment in Florida due to spending by the Eastern Gulf offshore oil and natural gas industry is projected to reach over 56,000 jobs.

…

Contributions to Florida’s state economy due to spending on Eastern Gulf [Outer Continental Shelf] oil and natural gas exploration and development activities could be nearly$4.5 billion per yearby the end of the forecast period.

Ramirez and her co-authors wrote (emphasis added):

Economic studies show that the industry’s spending would bring Florida $1.3 billion per year in government revenue within 20 years of opening up the area for oil and natural gas development.

API's one-pager says (emphasis added):

Florida could see a 37.5% share of the Eastern Coast bonuses, rents and royalties generated which are projected to reach $1.3 billion per year within 20 years.

The Florida State Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, which Fuentes runs, receives support from Duke Energy and Florida Power & Light, two large utilities that are building natural gas-fired plants in Florida. The chamber and the two utilities have backed anti-environment campaigns in the past. In 2016, the Florida State Hispanic Chamber of Commerce joined Duke, Florida Power & Light, and other power companies in supportingAmendment 1, a deceptive, utility-backed ballot measure designed to restrict consumer access to rooftop solar power in Florida. The Florida State Hispanic Chamber of Commerce also receives support from Florida-based, third-party energy supplier Liberty Power, a company that recently paid a settlement to New York state for engaging in deceptive practices and is the subject of a cease-and-desist complaint filed by Connecticut’s Office of Consumer Counsel for allegedly deceiving consumers.

The other Florida minority group that's part of API's Explore Offshore alliance, the Florida Black Chamber of Commerce, has fossil fuel ties as well. It is closely affiliated with the National Black Chamber of Commerce, which has received extensive funding from fossil fuel interests including ExxonMobil and Koch Industries. The National Black Chamber notoriously led minority opposition to the EPA's Clean Power Plan, which would limit pollution from power plants. Eugene Franklin, president of the Florida Black Chamber of Commerce, served on the board of directors of the National Black Chamber of Commerce. Both the Florida chamber and the national chamber supported the pro-utility Amendment 1 in 2016.

South Carolina:

In South Carolina, The Post and Courier and The Greenville Newspublished a pro-drilling op-ed by Stephen Gilchrist, chair of the South Carolina African American Chamber of Commerce and chair of Explore Offshore SC, the South Carolina branch of API's Explore Offshore coalition. Gilchrist also apparently relied on API statistics in his op-ed, writing (emphasis added):

Offshore development could … add $3.8 billion to our state budget per year. This could create 34,000 much needed jobs in the state

But Gilchrist appears to have gotten one of those API talking points wrong by a factor of 20. He claimed that offshore drilling could add $3.8 billion to South Carolina's budget each year, but API’s South Carolina one-pager claims the $3.8 billion would come in over a 20-year period (emphasis added):

Employment due to offshore oil and gas development activities on the Atlantic Coast in South Carolina could reach over 34,000 jobswithin 20 years

…

The cumulative effect on the state budget from 2020-2040 is projected to be over $3.8 billion.

Gilchrist has cultivated questionable alliances that many African-Americans in South Carolina would not be comfortable with. In 2015, Gilchrist invited Donald Trump to an event for Black entrepreneurs that was co-hosted by the South Carolina African American Chamber of Commerce. The crowd at the event was “predominantly white,”according to The Post and Courier. In late 2017, Gilchrist invited his friend Steve Bannon, former Trump advisor and white nationalist sympathizer, to a minority business roundtable sponsored by his group.

Virginia:

In Virginia, the Daily Press published an op-ed co-authored by former state Del. Winsome Earle Sears, an African-American, who now serves as co-chair of Virginia Explore Offshore, API's Virginia coalition. Like her cohorts in other states, she drew talking points right from API materials. From her op-ed (emphasis added):

With the exploration and potential for development of offshore energy resources, Virginia could gain 25,000 jobs, many with an average salary of $116,000 — more than double the commonwealth’s average. We’re also projected to attract $1.5 billion per year in private investment

From API’s announcement of its Explore Offshore coalition in Virginia (emphasis added):

  • By 2035, the oil and natural gas industry could create over 25,000 new high-paying jobs in Virginia
  • Offshore development could result in $1.5 billion in private investment into Virginia ...
  • The average salary for oil and natural gas exploration and development jobs is $116,000.

The Virginia Hispanic Chamber of Commerce, which is part of API's Explore Offshore coalition, joined a number of oil and gas trade associations in signing a letter to the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management urging the agency to allow more offshore drilling. The Virginia Hispanic chamber has also partnered with Dominion Energy, Virginia’s largest and most powerful utility.

Conservative groups with anti-environment agendas and fossil-fuel ties have a history of trying to co-opt minorities

API is mimicking a well-worn strategy in which polluters target minority and low-income communities with industry-funded research and disinformation about energy. For example, in recent years, Americans for Prosperity, the American Legislative Exchange Council, the Edison Electric Institute, and the Heartland Institute, among many others, have waged a campaign to hinder the growth of solar energy at the state level. That effort has included the false claim, often advanced via minority politicians and front groups, that net-metering policies designed to make rooftop solar power more accessible would harm minority and low-income people.

Fossil fuel industries and their allies, including the National Black Chamber of Commerce, also targeted minority groups with misinformation about the EPA’s Clean Power Plan, which, if fully implemented, would have prevented thousands of premature deaths and tens of thousands of asthma attacks each year.

These tactics are especially insidious because research consistently shows that minority and low-income communities suffer disproportionately from the burning of fossil fuels and the impacts of climate change. The third U.S. National Climate Assessment, released in 2014, found:

Climate change will, absent other changes, amplify some of the existing health threats the nation now faces. Certain people and communities are especially vulnerable, including children, the elderly, the sick, the poor, and some communities of color.

In early 2018, EPA scientists published a study in the American Journal of Public Healththat found people of color in the U.S. are exposed to more air pollution than white people are, with African-Americans exposed to the most. A number of other studies have documented the negative health effects of air pollution on minority and low-income communities. A joint report released in 2017 by the NAACP and the Clean Air Task Force found that natural gas facilities in particular are harmful to Black Americans:

  • [M]any African American communities face an elevated risk of cancer due to air toxics emissions from natural gas development: Over 1 million African Americans live in counties that face a cancer risk above EPA’s level of concern from toxics emitted by natural gas facilities.
  • The air in many African American communities violates air quality standards for ozone smog. Rates of asthma are relatively high in African American communities. And, as a result of ozone increases due to natural gas emissions during the summer ozone season, African American children are burdened by 138,000 asthma attacks and 101,000 lost school days each year.

Blacks and Hispanics also suffer disproportionately from climate change impacts such as extreme weather. Just last year, Hurricanes Harvey and Maria devastated African-American and Latino communities in Houston and Puerto Rico.

Polls have shown that nonwhite people in the U.S. are more concerned about climate change than white people are. A 2015 poll of African-Americans found that 60 percent of respondents ranked global warming as a serious issue, while a 2017 survey of Latinos found that 78 percent of respondents were worried about global warming.

Surveys have also documented strong support among minority groups for clean energy solutions. A 2015 poll found that 66 percent of African-Americans believed that using more renewable energy would create new jobs, and 57 percent believed that shifting to clean energy would decrease their energy costs. A separate poll conducted in 2015 foundthat 84 percent of Latinos believed that the U.S. should mandate greater use of clean energy sources like solar and wind power.

Clearly, minority communities understand the risks of climate change and want clean energy solutions to mitigate those risks.

But API has chosen to partner with minority business groups to erode support for clean energy solutions and promote pro-fossil fuel arguments that would harm the very communities these organizations purport to represent. And, in a decision that demonstrates just how out of touch Explore Offshore is with minority communities, API recruited former Sen. Jim Webb (D-VA), a confederate apologist, to be a national co-chair.

Newspapers in the Southeast and around the country should not be letting oil industry allies spread propaganda and claim to represent minority interests. Op-eds that more accurately represent Black and Latino aspirations would point out that these communities have the most to lose from expanded offshore drilling and the most to gain from a shift to clean energy.

==

new 819

https://www.alternet.org/2019/08/how-the-koch-brothers-co-opted-minority-groups-in-a-push-for-a-profit-based-approach-to-education/

no lnx

How the Koch brothers co-opted minority groups in a push for a profit-based approach to education

Written by The Conversation August 23, 2019

Under the mantra of civil rights, billionaires such as Eli Broad, Bill Gates and the Koch Brothers and the powerful corporate-funded lobby group the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) are using venture philanthropy and the political process to press for school reforms in the United States.

The ongoing Vergara law case in California in which nine students are suing the state over teacher tenure laws, is backed by Student Matters, a non-profit that has received donations from the Broad Foundation and the Walton Foundation, run by the Walton family that founded supermarket chain Wal-Mart.

The driver behind the case is a campaign to loosen labour rules in order to make it easier to fire “bad” teachers, under the argument that their presence discriminates against disadvantaged children. Opponents of the case argue that it is a blatant attempt to change the conversation from the realities of California’s divestment in education — the state is 46th in the nation in spending per student in 2010-11, and 50th in the number of students per teacher.

What these organisations and other others such as the the Koch brothers, Bradley Foundation, Heritage Foundation, Students First and Jeb Bush’s Foundation for Excellence in Education – all supposedly supporters of school reform – have as a common denominator is a vision of a profit-based market approach to education.

School vouchers are one of the primary education reform policy approaches pressed by the billionaires and the business lobby. Voucher programs, which provide public funding for students to attend private schools, have become more popular in the US in the past several decades.

Most existing school voucher programs in the US have been small-scale and targeted at low-income students, such as the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program, the Cleveland Scholarship and Tutoring Program, and the Washington DC program. But there has recently been a push to expand programs to include students from middle income families.

Notably, a small, but vocal cadre of civil rights advocates from US minority groups have allied with the billionaires and business lobby via groups such as the Black Alliance for Educational Options (BAEO), pushing for school vouchers and other neoliberal education reforms.

Have they been hoodwinked or led astray? It is understandable that minority groups are searching for alternatives to the status quo, as the US has a history of consistently and purposefully underserving students of colour. In fact, we still do. For example, one wealthy suburban district in Texas recently spent nearly $120m on a football stadium and performing arts centre, while poorer districts have struggled to afford adequately trained and certified teachers.

School reform advocates in the US are often a motley alliance between civil rights proponents whose primary focus is greater opportunity for historically underserved students of colour, and neo-liberals who desire to reduce the role of the state in public education and shift the education system towards a profit-making enterprise.

Vouchers aren’t the answer

In the case of vouchers, the long-term impact on civil rights is already known. A decade of peer-reviewed research in Chile has demonstrated that a voucher market has increased inequality for students living in poverty and closed public schools.

A voucher approach escalates inequality because capital rules the day. Test scores become negotiable capital in addition to hard currency. Students without this capital are denied access to attractive schools because there are other individuals in the market that are more desirable to schools.

School choice becomes exactly that in a voucher system — schools choose. So, if you are a proponent of school “choice” and interested in civil rights and equity —- vouchers will not help you realise your goals. But if you are a neoliberal, you are in business.

How can we conceive choice and education reform differently? If you don’t like the choices that have been forced upon you for decades, then you are going to want access to alternatives. Are vouchers the choice parents should have? Turns out that vouchers show very little promise in analyses of peer-reviewed research literature for improving student success or equity at large.

However, there are gold standard reforms in the peer-reviewed research literature that show at much more impact on student success than vouchers. These include full-day pre-kindergarten education. Underserved communities should have access to empirically-supported choices rather than ideological ones. Parents in Milwaukee and elsewhere should also be able to choose schools that are attractive and well-resourced like the private and public schools across the tracks or river or highway. Why don’t US high-poverty communities have these choices?

Pressure on public school funding

In Florida, Ohio, Arizona, Texas we have seen billions of dollars in fiscal cuts to schools while school vouchers, Teach For America, and charter schools are peddled by ALEC and the usual billionaire proponents as an alternative to the restoration of school funding for public schools.

In Texas and elsewhere, legislatures have used politics to force inadequate funding of US public schools while at the same time arguing that the schools are inadequate. The response from coalitions of citizens across the US has been a slew of lawsuits aimed at states over inadequate public funding to force politicians to respond.

Colin Powell once said, “If you break it you own it.” That’s the end game for these education “reformers” backed by billionaires and corporations. First, they seek to transfer the cost of education from the state budget to the family, household budget. Second, civil rights and equity are not their true priorities.

Instead these special interests are supporting vouchers and other neoliberal reforms contrary to the interests of students of colour. In doing so they will shift the US education system to maximise corporate profits, while limiting democratic control of public schools.

These same billionaire “reformers” have co-opted the equity discourse by offering a carrot to minority groups. This can sometimes be in the form of millions of dollars as in the case of the Black Alliance for Educational Options and Parents for Educational Freedom in North Carolina. But all this hides the inequity that profit-based approaches to education foment.The Conversation

By Julian Vasquez Heilig, Associate Professor of Educational Policy and Planning, University of Texas at Austin.

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fox news insider BS

no lnx

'Light on Facts': Tucker Calls Out 'Wholly Ignorant' Media For 'Dishonesty' on Caravan

Tucker Carlson called out on Wednesday what he described as the "relentless dishonesty" from media outlets on the migrant caravan headed toward the southern border.

Michael Moore Likens Trump Supporters to Enablers of Rapists

Liberal filmmaker Michael Moore compared supporters of President Trump to a person who enables a rapist.

CNN's Lemon Calls on Media to Disobey White House, Turn on Cameras

CNN anchor Don Lemon called on media organizations to disobey the Trump White House and turn on the cameras during Sean Spicer's briefings.

Lemon Refuses to Report on Susan Rice Unmasking: We Won't 'Aid & Abet' a Diversion

CNN's Don Lemon slammed President Donald Trump last night for seizing on the Susan Rice "unmasking" story to support his claim that he was wiretapped by the Obama administration.

'How Foolish!' Bill O'Reilly Blasts The View's Sherri Shepherd

Bill O’Reilly has been outspoken about his frustration with the “race hustlers” in America. CNN’s Don Lemon became an unlikely supporter of O’Reilly’s criticism of the ‘gang’ lifestyle that young black men can fall into. Lemon has since been attacked for agreeing with the Factor host.

FIERY O'Reilly Fights Back Against 'Race Hustler' Al Sharpton: "Your Day Is Done"

Bill O’Reilly responded to Al Sharpton and the “Grievance Industry” in tonight’s Talking Points Memo. The Factor host has previously stated that George Zimmerman profiled Trayvon Martin, based on his clothing and appearance, resulting in his tragic death.

==

===

MMA

According to a report in The Washington Post, pro-Trump CNN commentator Paris Dennard was removed from his previous position at Arizona State University for making "sexually explicit comments and gestures towards women." CNN suspended Dennard following the report. A review of Dennard's CNN commentary revealsDennard vehemently defending Trump against reports that the president had committed sexual assault.

Meanwhile, CNN's new pro-Trump commentator Rob Astorino confirmed on air that he had signed a non-disclosure agreement with Trump that barred him from making disparaging remarks about the president.

CNN has spent years bringing on paid pro-Trump commentators, and it keeps backfiring.

==

==

i

have not gone to renta-tom before, but at least useful tool cover if not intentional sellout:

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==

https://www.alternet.org/right-wing/homophobia-misogyny-and-islamophobia-rights-new-darling-mark-keith-robinson-has-it-all

This  Saturday, pro-gun control MAGA hordes will gather at the Orange County Second Amendment (OC2A) rally in Hillsborough, North Carolina. Among the speakers will be the newest darling of the right—recently granted fawning coverage by outlets such as Breitbart, Twitchy, Tucker Carlson’s The Daily Caller and Glenn Beck’s The Blaze—Mark Keith Robinson. The right’s latest attack dog epitomizes the current Republican brand, as a “birther pundit who says gay people are ‘devil-worshipping child molesters,’ black Democrats are ‘slaves,’ the student survivors of the Parkland shooting are ‘silly little immature media prosti-tots,’ and Michelle Obama is a man.”

As Shareblue Media notes, Robinson became a favorite among alt-right and right-wing media back in April after delivering a pro-gun speech at a town council meeting in Greensboro, North Carolina. But he’s also incredibly vocal on social media. In a Facebook post dated February 7, Robinson wrote that homosexuality has been “pushed...over the top” and hysterically concludes “PEDOPHILLA is next, which will be closely followed by the END of civilization as we know it.”

There is nothing more beloved by the GOP than a token visible minority who’s eager to promote the party’s racist views. Robinson, who is African-American, frequently promotes the ahistorical GOP view that the party remains that of Abraham Lincoln, and tacitly accuses black people of being too stupid to understand their own political interests. “Half of black Democrats don't realize they are slaves and don't know who their masters are,” Robinson posted on Facebook in February, employing a corruption of a totally fake Harriet Tubman quote. “The other half don't care.” (“Nor do all of them vote. Yet always the first to complain,” wrote a fan of Robinson’s in the comments.)  In March, Robinson posted a meme that declares President Barack Obama “entered the White House with a fake birth certificate.” And in yet another example of his misunderstanding of how slavery worked, Robinson recently compared Senator Maxine Waters, an African-American woman, to 19th-century “PRO SLAVERY Democrat Preston Brooks,” and labeled her an “OVERSEER.” Following his lead, fans of Robinson filled the comments with overtly racist and misogynoir responses, including memes that paint Sen. Waters as a “crack addict” and imagine her speaking in clumsy, misspelled, inarticulate phrases.

Just this Friday, Robinson took to Facebook to call Hillary Clinton a “witch,” a word he apparently thinks works for pretty much any woman he doesn’t like, considering he used the same term in 2016 to describe Beyonce. Shareblue points out that Robinson “uses the male pronoun to refer to Michelle Obama, echoing a conservative theory that she is male.”

Robinson has also disparaged Muslims via his social media. In one deleted post (saved in this screenshot), he declared, “The question is not ‘When is the last time you saw anyone but a Muslim holding a severed head and smiling’....The question is, when is the last time you saw a Muslim protesting against a Muslim who severed a head, or bombed a shopping mall, or ran down a group of humans with a truck, or shot up a nightclub, or burned someone alive.....”

Despite—or rather, because of—Robinson’s remarks, he’s become a highly sought-after speaker on the right. There are appearances this summer in Broward County, Florida; Tallahassee, Florida; and Milwaukee, Wisconsin, among many others. This month, Robinson shares a bill with Candace Owens, the black conservative provocateur who wrote that Trump “isn’t just the leader of the free world, but the savior of it as well.” During his April appearance on Fox & Friends, co-host Ainsley Earhardt gushed, “You’re great; I really think you should run for office.”

As previously mentioned, Robinson’s latest stop will be a speaking gig at the Orange County Second Amendment (OC2A) rally in Hillsborough, North Carolina, this Saturday. In a press statement, Hillsborough Progressives Taking Action (HPTA) notes that he’ll be joined by “speakers from Grass Roots NC, whose PAC ‘recommends’ white supremacist and anti-Semitic House candidate Russell Walker.”

==

greenwash splc

new wave of greenwashing attempts, in particular the formation of Progressives for Immigration Reform as a purported group of “liberals,” is only the latest attempt by nativist forces to appear as something they are not. The white-dominated Federation for American Immigration Reform (FAIR), the most important of the groups founded by Tanton, has been behind the creation of three other front groups that supposedly represented African Americans (Choose Black America), Latino Americans (You Don’t Speak for Me!) and labor (Coalition for the Future American Worker). In fact, FAIR had its own white spokesman double as a press representative for the first two organizations. Another group unrelated to FAIR, Vietnamese for Fair Immigration, turned out to be led by a white man who used a fake Vietnamese surname and whose only connection to that country was that he liked the food.

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https://www.alternet.org/news-amp-politics/fox-news-guest-seriously-says-three-fifths-compromise-gave-humanhood-black-people

Fox News Guest Seriously Says Three-Fifths Compromise Gave 'Humanhood to Black People'

This came after he told another panelist to "just shut up."

By Media Matters Staff / Media Matters May 16, 2018, 5:45 AM GMT

14

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25 COMMENTS

Photo Credit: Fox News Channel

From the May 15 edition of Fox News' The Ingraham Angle:

LEO TERRELL: Let me just simply say this, Laura, since I love history and government. When this constitution was created, me, because I was black, I was considered three-fifths of a human being.

KEVIN JACKSON: That's just nonsense.

TERRELL: He's absolutely right about the historical shame of blacks being considered property when this country was created.

[...]

JACKSON: First of all the Three-Fifths Compromise was essentially what this particular gentleman doesn't understand was it was to give humanhood to black people. Spike Lee learned that and it was an embarrassment to him. So all this nonsense about America, look, where do you want to live?

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Please Stop Helping Us: How Liberals Make It Harder for Blacks to Succeed

By Jason L. Riley

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https://www.c-span.org/video/?440595-1/sellout

JANUARY 22, 2018

Sellout Author and Liberty University professor Ron Millertalked about his book, Sellout: Musings from Uncle Tom’s Porch. In his book, he examines the role minority conservatives play in the discussion about politics and race in America.

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https://www.alternet.org/right-wing/clueless-conservative-actress-stacey-dash-considering-california-congressional-run

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iwf: thot this was defunct, i assoc with philyis schlafly, but keeps showing up lately in GMO background? ACTA

cf renta-tom: ideological entrepreneur can find a niche to spin counter-narrative, often mirroring?

privilidged white women would want to reject victim narrative? successful (self-made?) women would want to deny they got special help/resources from RWI??

is it training? a hub?

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==

peding

http://www.nationalreview.com/article/430397/katrina-pierson-donald-trumps-controversial-spokeswoman

pierson cruz --> trump

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http://dailycaller.com/2013/08/11/harry-alford-on-obama-priorities-this-is-not-america-video/

Committed to successful black entrepreneurship, Harry C. Alford, Jr. has been president of the National Black Chamber of Commerce since 1993.

During that time, he has spoken out with increasing boldness against the liberal orthodoxy hurting the black community. In 2009, he took on Democratic California Sen. Barbara Boxer at a cap-and-trade hearing, and that videowent viral.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FE_jGD5nZ6U

[boxer invites to come to CA to see new jobs,  comdescending, it's racial, i take offense to it, a vet of this country; why don't you quote an Asian? path going to explode in the Post

Pews study, naccp resolution put in record; john grant 100 bl men of atlanta (milions of jobs, support naccp; Just as in my community..." oil co CRA report: exxon mobil 100K$ for CRA he cites; inhofe wants actual resolution CRA represent broad...anyone who wants them to do work they will]

Army: must contend with some other black gp; this has to do with energy; married to vet, nothing to do with this issue; ]

In this interview with Alford, he continues to boldly confront the politics of government dependency, which he believes stand opposed to the founding principles of capitalism, private property and opportunity.

Alford claims President Barack Obama is hurting black entrepreneurship everyday with entitlements and dependency.

“He’s just after votes,” Alford said of Obama. “And people who don’t know, ‘He gives me a free cell phone, I increase my food stamps.’ That’s not America. That’s not why we fought the British.”

==

rick perlstein;:

what do you call a blk man at gop mtg? the keynote speaker

==

greenpeace ggl doc:

:{:{More Analysis: again, ironic that company that actually plants bombs (induces activists to do it] stokes fear of eco-terrorism; perhaps a spin on Brownie/Abramoff model to create a problem then seemingly sell the solution; }:

}:

:{:{}:

}:

Renta-tom also part of fustercluck: Dreissen to Innis; DDT as murder of poor brown people) yet try to discredit real EJ folks [a perhaps forgotten aspect of the story, even given the 10th anniversary is how many toxins were released in katrina from oil and chemical industries]

===

premature on tom?

FIRE keynote:

Jason Riley is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute and a columnist for the Wall Street Journal, where he worked for more than 20 years writing opinion pieces on politics, economics, education, immigration and race, among other subjects. He’s also a commentator for Fox News, where he’s appeared for more than a decade, and a frequent public speaker.

After joining the Journal in 1994, he was named a senior editorial page writer in 2000 and a member of the Editorial Board in 2005. In 2008 he published "Let Them In," which argues for a more free-market oriented U.S. immigration policy. His second book, “Please Stop Helping Us,” which is about the track record of government efforts to help the black underclass, was published in 2014. He joined the Manhattan Institute in 2015.

Born in Buffalo, N.Y., Mr. Riley earned a bachelor's degree in English from the State University of New York at Buffalo. He has also worked for USA Today and the Buffalo News. He lives in suburban New York City with his wife and three children.

==

http://www.amazon.com/Knocking-Hustle-Against-Neoliberal-Politics/dp/0692540792

Businessmen love Jay-Z. Specifically, they love one line the rapper-turned-business-owner says in Kanye West's 2005 single, "Diamonds From Sierra Leone (Remix)": "I'm not a businessman, I'm a business, man." Jay-Z's declaration that he's not merely an earner in the music industry but a brand all to himself became the lead sentence in a Forbes piece titled "10 Startup Tips from Hip-Hop Lyrics," which pointed out that Silicon Valley venture capitalist Ben Horowitz uses rap lyrics to teach business lessons. In a different Forbes piece, entrepreneur, best-selling author, and ViSalus Sciences CEO Ryan Blair used Jay-Z, and that lyric specifically, as a signpost guiding his own evolution from a "suit-wearing, briefcase-carrying businessman" to "creating a brand in business unique to myself." Being a business, man: You're not just making your way—every move you make puts money in the bank.

Lester Spence hears that entrepreneurial swagger in the lyric as well. What the Johns Hopkins associate professor of political science and Africana studies sees that line as representing, though, is more complex than a simple rags-to-riches tale of success in free-market American capitalism. For him, the lyric is a distinct comment on black labor today. Rappers, as hip-hop fans know, regularly boast about how constantly they have to work to make ends meet. Their songs are often tales of street entrepreneurs working in underground economies, sure, but the songs extol getting paid by any means necessary. They produce so everybody else—the kids and loved ones they're supporting, the fans who are listening—can consume.

Spence sees such tales of "hustling," as the day-to-day grind is known in hip-hop, as an echo of African-American work songs, which were sung by men tethered by slavery or prison to hard labor. While the iron chains of the eras that produced those songs are gone, hip-hop's hustler wears a metaphorical chain of his own making. He hustles just to get by, the way so many people do today.

As Spence notes in his recently published book, Knocking the Hustle (Punctum), from the early 1970s to the present, American labor productivity has increased 80 percent while wages have stayed stagnant or declined. That we work more to earn as much as we once did—or even less—is a standard woe of the American economy in 2015. How these hip-hop celebrations of the hustler function in African-American communities, though, is what Spence finds disconcerting. Hustling is embraced as theappropriate adaptation to living in today's economy. The individual's having to learn whatever it takes to get by is a virtue in today's economy. Anybody who isn't constantly looking for ways to improve the return on his personal human capital simply isn't hustling enough. And for those people who are too lazy to maintain a level of at least subsistence hustle? Their failures and their poverty are a cul-de-sac of their own making. The black church will tell them that. Black elected officials and business elites will tell them that. Hell, Jay-Z himself will tell people that. In his song "Can't Knock the Hustle," he sneers at day-job drones who only work 9 to 5, "lunching, punching the clock."

The devastation of poor and working-class black communities was caused by people, be they elected officials or thought leaders, implementing and embracing neoliberal policies and ideas.

The ideas represented in the "I'm a business, man" lyric strike Spence as an instance of popular culture reproducing a political idea and story: Successful people work hard and get ahead by investing in their human capital, and people who aren't successful simply aren't working hard enough to do that. Recall President Barack Obama on the 2014 midterm elections campaign stump, lamenting that "if Uncle Jethro would get off the couch and stop watching SportsCenter and go register some folks and go to the polls, we might have a different kind of politics." In other words: The problem with black people is not that the economic and political infrastructure has anything wrong with it, but that they're not doing enough for themselves.

That there are gaps—in education, in wealth, in political power—between blacks and whites isn't what Spence is zeroing in on. Those gaps have been well-documented and studied. Black unemployment remains twice as high as white unemployment. Economic disparity between whites and blacks widened during the recent recession. Racism is real, and it continues to segregate cities, schools, and the workforce today. It fuels practices such as redlining housing policies, voter suppression, and mass incarceration. But what racism doesn't account for are the political ideas and policies that reproduce similar economic and political power disparities within African-American communities. Racism doesn't account for black elected officials who embrace the same economic policies that adversely impact black populations. Racism doesn't account for the belief among black leaders that the onus for improving the lives of black people falls not on addressing inequities built into economic, educational, and social infrastructures, but on addressing shortcomings in African-Americans' character.

For Spence, the ways in which black politics has been shaped by neo­liberalism start to address how these inequalities have been reproduced within the black community over the past 40 years. The core of neoliberalism economic philosophy is the idea that society, and all of its organizations and institutions, works best when allowed to operate on free-market principles, free especially of government intervention. Neoliberalism, in the view of its advocates, produces a system that rewards enterprising people who improve the return on their human capital—the entrepreneurial hustlers. The period from the 1970s to the present witnessed the slow erosion of the domestic programs and policies enacted from the New Deal through the Great Society. When unemployment and inflation spiked during the economic crises of the 1970s, politicians and policymakers began following an economic model that insisted that a free market could fix what government regulation hampered. By the 1980s, neoliberal ideas were becoming entrenched: What was good for the economy was also good public policy.

Political scientists, economists, and pundits wrote about neoliberalism while political scientists wrote about racial politics. But much less was written about how neoliberalism and racial politics overlap. David Harvey's 2005 A Brief History of Neoliberalism explored how neoliberal economic policies evolved into political policy in Western democracies. Cornel West's 1993 best-seller Race Matters argued that conventional liberal/conservative American political discussion ignored the role race played in social and moral public discourse after the civil rights era. Each took the short, overview approach; neither focused specifically on how neoliberal economics had slowly invaded black politics over the past 40 years. With Hustle, subtitled Against the Neoliberal Turn in Black Politics, Spence has written that book.

It's a dense but readable hybrid of ambitious scholarship, partly touching on the histories of economics, urban policy, and education since the 1970s, and partly showing how those developments worked to narrow the point of view in black political discussions.Spence has brought together a wide web of research—everything from academic papers in economics, political science, and sociology to pop culture criticism and daily print and television journalism—to shape his argument. Hustle is Spence's attempt to write a book about what one could argue is a guiding force of our era, he says. He's written it for a general reader, hoping to speak directly to the people now living under neoliberalism's fallout, people who haven't seen the policies of the past 40 years, for instance, improve schools or their job prospects or the cities in which they live.

"Can I write a thing for black people that does some of the work that Race Matters did for previous generations?" he asks, adding that the devastation of poor and working-class black communities was caused by people, be they elected officials or thought leaders, implementing and embracing neoliberal policies and ideas. "When I'm thinking about who the reader is, I'm thinking about my dad. I'm thinking about my fraternity brothers. I'm thinking about people who can read this and see that there's this thing hanging over them in all these different ways, but it's the creation of human action. The neoliberal turn was the product of human action, again and again and again."

Hustle's most revelatory chapter focuses on black churches. And it's illuminating precisely for how Spence connects the content of "prosperity gospel," a variant of evangelical Christianity, to the political imaginations of churchgoers. Rarely do academics—or journalists for that matter—look at what is presented in churches as political content, outside of how churchgoers impact elections. (For example, the emergence of the Christian right as a voting block in the 1970s.) Spence argues that what is said in church from the pulpit represents a neoliberalization of the black church.

The chapter opens with a brief discussion of two New York Times articles from the Detroit area following the 2008 economic crash that hit the automotive industry and the region hard. One, "Detroit Churches Pray for 'God's Bailout,'" was a report from the Greater Grace Temple, one of Detroit's many churches that, at the time, held special services to help its congregations through a difficult time. Spence notes that in the photo that ran with the article, three white luxury SUVs shared the stage with the church's leader, Bishop Charles H. Ellis III. The article reported that the vehicles were on loan from local dealerships and that Bishop Ellis, "urged worshipers to combat the region's woes by mixing hope with faith in God." Spence sees the vehicles as having two symbolic values. For those who worked in the automotive industry, it was a symbol of what they depended on to survive. For those who didn't work making automobiles, the SUVs were status symbols, reminders of what they could have if they would only hustle harder.

The following year, another Times reporter visited Pontiac, about 30 miles outside Detroit, to write about the automotive industry's role in creating a black middle class in that area, and how the industry's collapse was decimating those families. Titled "GM, Detroit, and the Fall of the Black Middle Class," the article told its story through a profile of Marvin Powell, a longtime autoworker, one of the 600 who still worked making trucks at General Motors' Pontiac Assembly Center. Powell worked the only shift the plant maintained after getting rid of nearly two-thirds of its workforce through buyouts, early retirement, and layoffs.

Prosperity gospel frames the problem of poor people as a problem of those who do not improve their human capital, not as something wrong with the system in which they must live.

During the reporting of the story, Powell learned that GM was planning on shutting down all of its factories for 10 weeks, which would leave him without his $900-per-week paycheck for that period. Powell said he might use the freed-up time to try and become a chef and start a catering company, adding that he had never intended to be a "GM lifer."

He attributed his positive outlook in trying circumstances to being a Greater Grace congregant, where he led a Sunday school class and was one of the church's armor bearers, an honorary position. His leadership role in Greater Grace had made him an esteemed figure at the auto plant, and his co-workers had encouraged him to run for a union leadership role. He demurred from that, but they sought him out for advice, nevertheless. What was he going to do when the plant closed? Powell told them that he couldn't control the plant's closing, so he didn't worry about it. He also said, "I tell them that God provides for his own, and I am one of his own."

That leapt out at Spence. Born and raised in Detroit as the son of a Ford autoworker, he was struck by Powell's resilience in the face of so much economic upheaval. But he was also taken aback by the way Powell conceptualized the situation. The autoworker didn't consider a union leadership position as providing him with an opportunity to fight for his and his co-workers' jobs. Instead, as Spence writes, "in Powell's opinion those who choose God will be saved from the worst of the economic crisis while those who don't, won't." Spence identifies this idea as part of the message spread by prosperity gospel, a doctrine that started in white churches in the 1950s and sprang to national attention through 1980s televangelism. It has taken strong root in black megachurches over the past two decades. Spence visited a black church in Baltimore County led by a charismatic prosperity gospel preacher who argued that everything associated with the economic crisis—debt, poverty, unemployment—was caused by a "poverty mindset." The minister reasoned that this mindset causes people to spend their money instead of saving it, causes "them to lay around when they should be hustling." And this mindset was the direct result of somebody having a bad relationship with God.

Spence writes: "Note the logic here. People are materially poor because they don't think right. Their inability to think right makes it impossible to receive God's blessings"—which can come in the form of spiritual or material reward. And the only way to right that bad personal relationship with God is for a person to change how he or she thinks—to improve their human capital through spiritual pursuits. These spiritual pursuits, it should be noted, often take the form of sermons and books that congregants can buy and workshops they can pay to attend, in addition to supporting the church by tithing.

For Spence, prosperity gospel, through prolific and celebrated pastors such as Creflo Dollar, founder of the mammoth World Changers Church International in Georgia, transforms "the Christian Bible into an economic self-help guide people can use to develop their human capital." It's a way to make questions about who lives comfortably and who lives in poverty a matter of which one spiritually deserves to do so. This notion, Spence writes, represents a neoliberalization of the black church—not only because the prosperity gospel frames the problem of poor people as a problem of those who do not improve their human capital (not as something wrong with the system in which they must live), but also in how the increasingly multi-millionaire leaders of black megachurches compete for their congregants' tithes and spiritual consumerism. Such a practice not only creates vast economic disparities between ministers and congregants—Spence notes an AtlantaBlackstar.com news website article that named eight black preachers who make more than 200 times what their churchgoers do—but it shapes parishioners' political imagination.

Fighting poverty, debt, and whatever economic adversity a congregant faces thus becomes only a spiritual matter for the individual, not the collective concern of a political organization. And getting people to see the political content in a church service is something Spence hopes readers will take away from the book. "What I want is for people to read it and see their world through new eyes," he says, adding that he hopes that by pointing out how prosperity gospel reproduces neoliberalism's disparities, readers might begin to seek other solutions to dealing with it.

There are possibilities for finding ways out of the neoliberal situation other than simply buying into the hustle, Spence says. Throughout the book, he offsets his charting of how neoliberalism seeped into black politics by citing contemporary instances of grassroots activism and political organizing to combat neoliberal advances. They may be modest, they may be temporary victories, but the examples he cites—the Urban Debate League that cultivates policy debate among city high school students; the Malcolm X Grassroots Movement that organizes communities to develop more equitable public policies; the Baltimore Algebra Project and Leaders of the Beautiful Struggle that in 2008 blocked Maryland Governor Martin O'Malley's attempt to spend $108 million in taxpayer money to build a new prison to house juveniles charged as adults—actively oppose the neoliberal turn in public policies.

"When people write about neoliberalism, there's a tendency to make it seem like a fait accompli, that it's going to happen and there's nothing you can do to stop it. I wanted to make an aggressive assertion that political organizing matters."

Lester Spence

Spence considers himself a product of such black activism. At 46, he's spent almost his entire life in majority-black cities. He was born and raised in the Detroit area; his father was a pipe fitter who worked for Ford Motor Company, his mom a substitute teacher. The Spence family lived in the predominantly black Inkster neighborhood until moving to the predominantly white suburb Redford in 1985 as economic depression hit the city, and he attended the University of Michigan in nearby Ann Arbor for both college and graduate school. But he didn't get into Michigan at first. It was only through the university'sSummer Bridge Program, an introduction to collegiate life for incoming low-income freshmen and students of color, that he was able to enroll. That program was the result of black student activism on the school's campus. Between 1970 and 1987 African-American students repeatedly protested the university's practices and policies in three Black Action Movement protests, the second of which, in February 1975, led to the creation of the program that became Bridge.

"I would argue that the reason diversity is now important at Michigan is because of black student activism," Spence says. "It didn't work perfectly, but that's how politics works. It's not pretty. It's very long term. It's not sexy. It's not going to get you on TV. It's not going to get you any of that stuff. But it matters." And he's hoping Hustle's readers will take that message from the book. "When people write about neoliberalism, there's a tendency to make it seem like a fait accompli, that it's going to happen and there's nothing you can do to stop it," Spence says. "I wanted to make an aggressive assertion that political organizing matters."

To make such alternatives visible is why Spence decided to place Hustle with the open-access publisher Punctum. A print copy can be bought through Punctum's website, but the publisher is also making a digital version available free of charge six months after release. If Spence is going to advocate knocking the hustle, he might as well do it himself. If he's writing a book that argues against being one of the many entrepreneurial hustlers just looking to get paid, then he better not put an economic barrier in front of somebody wanting to access that idea.

"I believe in public action, to the extent that if we're going to problem-solve this world, our ability increases when we're able to see public examples," he says. "I mean, I can't live a perfect life, that's not possible. I, too, get caught up in the hustle. But at the very least I can write against that in ways that will inform not just the ideas and behaviors of people around me but also ways that can inform my own behavior. It can allow me to say, 'There's this other way to be—and you don't need to do this to yourself.'"

Bret McCabe, A&S '94, is the magazine's senior writer.

https://punctumbooks.com/titles/knocking-the-hustle/

Lester Spence on how he conceptualized this book as a sort of critical response to Cornel West’s Race Matters and David Harvey’s A Brief History of Neoliberalism, and why he chose punctum books as his publisher, HERE.

Over the past several years scholars, activists, and analysts have begun to examine the growing divide between the wealthy and the rest of us, suggesting that the divide can be traced to the neoliberal turn. “I’m not a business man; I’m a business, man.” Perhaps no better statement gets at the heart of this turn. Increasingly we’re being forced to think of ourselves in entrepreneurial terms, forced to take more and more responsibility for developing our “human capital.” Furthermore a range of institutions from churches to schools to entire cities have been remade, restructured to in order to perform like businesses. Finally, even political concepts like freedom, and democracy have been significantly altered. As a result we face higher levels of inequality than any other time over the last century. In  Knocking the Hustle: Against the Neoliberal Turn in Black Politics, Lester K. Spence writes the first book length effort to chart the effects of this transformation on African American communities, in an attempt to revitalize the black political imagination. Rather than asking black men and women to “hustle harder” Spence criticizes the act of hustling itself as a tactic used to demobilize and disempower the communities most in need of empowerment.

About the Author

Lester K. Spence is an associate professor of political science and Africana studies at Johns Hopkins University. He specializes in the study of black, racial, and urban politics in the wake of the neoliberal turn. An award winning scholar (in 2013, he received the W.E.B. DuBois Distinguished Book Award for his book, Stare in the Darkness: The Limits of Hip-hop and Black Politics) and teacher (in 2009, he received an Excellence in Teaching Award), he can regularly be heard on National Public Radio and the Marc Steiner Show. He also has his own blog HERE.

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koch aspen 2016

he U.S. Senate Judiciary Committee held a hearing on that part of the Koch agenda just two weeks ago in which some Members expressed deep concerns about the effort to use the need to address the disproportionate mass incarceration of African Americans as a vehicle to let white-collar criminals off the hook.

It also favorably mentioned the Kochs' recent funding of the United Negro College Fund, without noting the strings the Kochs put on the scholarships and the role of Koch Industries in determining who is sufficiently supportive of their ideology to get the money.

It noted that the Kochs' Libre Initiative, which basically markets Koch kool-aid to Latinos, gave out holiday turkeys to some families--without noting how the group has come under wide criticism for peddling policies that hurt many Latino families like opposing increasing the minimum wage, opposing access to affordable health care, and undermining workers' rights.

It also portrayed concerns about the Kochs' secretive but enormous role in elections as partisan--saying they "face deep skepticism from Democrats"--even though pollingconsistently shows that Americans from both major political parties and independents are deeply concerned about the influence of special interests on our elections and super-majorities oppose the Citizens United decision that has helped unleash the Koch election machine.

It also uncritically quoted Bob Woodson, a black conservative who was an architect of George W. Bush's faith-based initiative, and who is working with the new group. He claimed the Koch brothers and the right-wing CEOs and trust-fund babies they gather are just "grass-roots rich people" and "not the kind of corporate elitists who boast all the time about their vacations in France." And it comes from a guy who claims the Kochs' "philosophy and operating principles [are] ... 100% compatible with the way we help the poor." That's some nice spin.

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http://www.renewamerica.com/columns/marcus

http://www.renewamerica.com/columns/washington

http://www.renewamerica.com/columns/sthompson

http://www.renewamerica.com/columns/keyes

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  WASHINGTON, Feb. 27 /PRNewswire/ -- Harry C. Alford, President and CEO of:(style="font-family:Merriweather"):
the National Black Chamber of Commerce (NBCC) and Joe Byrd, President of the:(style="font-family:Merriweather"):
National Native American Chamber of Commerce (NNACC) today praised Members of:(style="font-family:Merriweather"):
Congress who supported legislation that removes major barriers to high-speed:(style="font-family:Merriweather"):
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removing counterproductive regulation, the Internet Freedom and Broadband:(style="font-family:Merriweather"):
Deployment Act of 2001 (HR 1542), delivers more competition and choices for:(style="font-family:Merriweather"):
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