Gates and Crowley Beer Summit II
Professor Henry Louis Gates and Sergeant James Crowley apparently enjoyed their beer summit with the president so much that they've decided to have another round. Minus the president. In a setting a tad less formal, with no president or national press on hand, the Harvard professor and the Cambridge cop at the heart of last summer’s White House “beer summit” met ...Posted in Outside The Beltway on October 30, 2009 06:54
White Cities
White elites, shockingly, seem to enjoy cities where the culture is dominated by white elites. Aaron Renn breaks the news. Among the media, academia and within planning circles, there’s a generally standing answer to the question of what cities are the best, the most progressive and best role models for small and mid-sized cities. The standard list includes Portland, Seattle, Austin, ...Posted in Outside The Beltway on October 24, 2009 08:39
Morehouse Bans Women’s Clothes
Morehouse, the top historically black college for men, has issued a new dress code of which Bill Cosby will approve but gays groups do not. Since he was named as president of Morehouse College in 2007, Robert M. Franklin has stressed the importance of defining education broadly, well beyond courses. He has been talking about the social and ethical obligations of ...Posted in Outside The Beltway on October 19, 2009 11:30
Limbaugh, Obama, and the NFL
Joseph Ashby argues that something fishy is being ignored in the matter of Rush Limbaugh's failed bid to buy the Rams. NFL Players Association Executive Director DeMaurice Smith served as counsel to Attorney General Eric Holder and was a member of Barack Obama’s transition team. [...] Despite the fact that Smith’s opposition was based on Limbaugh’s political commentary, the report failed to mention ...Posted in Outside The Beltway on October 16, 2009 12:57
Rush Limbaugh Dropped from Rams Bid Team
Missouri native Rush Limbaugh has been dropped from membership in a group seeking to buy the St. Louis Rams and keep them in the city. This speeds up the inevitable conclusion fo the NFL's owners refusing to let the controversial pundit join their ranks. Limbaugh was to be a limited partner in a group headed by St. Louis Blues chairman Dave ...Posted in Outside The Beltway on October 15, 2009 09:25
Obama White Support Declining
President Obama is losing support among white voters -- including white Democrats -- a new LAT poll finds. The voters losing faith in the president are the ones he had worked hardest to attract. New surveys show steep declines in Obama's approval ratings among whites -- including Democrats and independents -- who were crucial elements of the diverse coalition that helped ...Posted in Outside The Beltway on September 8, 2009 09:46
Justin Barrett Kills Two Jobs with One Stone
Justin Barrett, a 36-year-old soon-to-be-former Boston cop and Massachussetts Army National Guard captain, is making the headlines with a letter he circulated describing, a bit too enthusiastically, his views on a Boston Globe column on the Henry Louis Gates incident. Alan Colmes has the background: His palpable anger appears to be directed at Globe columnist Yvonne Abraham, to whom he refers as ...Posted in Outside The Beltway on July 30, 2009 07:58
Obama: ‘Cambridge Police Acted Stupidly’ in Gates Matter
In last night's press conference, President Obama weighed in on the disorderly conduct arrest of Harvard Professor Henry Louis Gates. “The police are doing what they should,” he said. “There’s a call. They go investigate. What happens? “My understanding is that Professor Gates then shows his I.D. to show that this is his house, and at that point he gets arrested for ...Posted in Outside The Beltway on July 23, 2009 05:56
Gates, Hazelton, and Chappelle
Robert Cox passes on the story of Demetrius Hazelton, the 17-year-old son a New Rochelle police detective, who is suing said PD after he was arrested after using a "white racial monotone voice" which police claim is the same voice used by Dave Chappelle "when making fun of white people." Bob supplies the following Chappelle video, which is decidedly R-rated: Dave Chappelle ...Posted in Outside The Beltway on July 21, 2009 13:10
Sotomayor and Affirmative Action
Julian Sanchez argues that, while Sonia Sotomayor was given special consideration because she's a Latina at various stages in her life, her case is "pretty close to the ideal of how affirmative action is supposed to work." From a pool of highly qualified candidates, you let ethnicity act as a tiebreaker. It seems self-evident to me that John Smith with Sonia ...Posted in Outside The Beltway on July 18, 2009 07:54
Sotomayor Wise, Disingenuous Latina
I'm in rare agreement with John Hinderaker in finding Sonia Sotomayor's explanation for her infamous "wise Latina" line less than plausible. I want to state up front, unequivocally and without doubt, I do not believe that any ethnic, racial or gender group has an advantage in sound judging. I do believe that every person has an equal opportunity to be a ...Posted in Outside The Beltway on July 14, 2009 14:44
Wise Gringos
One wag on Twitter (okay, it was me) asked, "When #Sotomayor is confirmed, will others have to call themselves #wisegringos?" (The annoying hashtags are apparently de rigeur on Twitter as a means of differentiating the cognoscenti from the hoi polloi.) Thus far, the response has been positive. For the sheer hell of it, I bought wisegringo.com which, surprisingly, was still available. ...Posted in Outside The Beltway on July 13, 2009 14:04
Swim Club Racism in Philly?
A rather thinly sourced piece in the Philadelphia News alleging racism at a private swim club is getting quite a bit of attention. More than 60 campers from Northeast Philadelphia were turned away from a private swim club and left to wonder if their race was the reason. "I heard this lady, she was like, 'Uh, what are all these black kids ...Posted in Outside The Beltway on July 9, 2009 09:09
Obama: Ricci “Moved the Ball” on Race
President Obama told the AP that the Ricci case "moved the ball" on race relations. President Barack Obama said Thursday the Supreme Court was "moving the ball" on affirmative action in this week's decision favoring white firefighters in New Haven, Conn., but he added that the court had not ruled out the use of racial preferences in the future. In a White ...Posted in Outside The Beltway on July 2, 2009 14:01
White Firefighters Win, Sotomayor Loses
By a slim 5-4 margin, the Supreme Court ruled in favor of the white New Haven firefighters whose promotions were denied because not enough non-whites passed the promotion exam. Among those ruling the other way on the lower court was a certain wise Latina. The Supreme Court ruled Monday that white firefighters in New Haven, Conn., were unfairly denied promotions because ...Posted in Outside The Beltway on June 29, 2009 11:06
