Breaking News Events

[LeftWriteFemme]

Gay Marriage Effort Attracts a Novel Group of Donors


http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/24/us...s.html?_r=2&hp

[LeftWriteFemme]

Taiwanese court to hear same-sex household registration case

I think the grandparent is really cool



http://www.gaystarnews.com/article/t...ion-case230312

[UofMfan]

Penn State Police Had Warnings About Sandusky in 1998

[SoNotHer]

U.S. Forms Water Partnership to Boost National, Global Security

WASHINGTON, DC, March 22, 2012 (ENS) - "While wars over water are unlikely within the next 10 years, water challenges - shortages, poor water quality, floods - will likely increase the risk of instability and state failure, exacerbate regional tensions, and distract countries from working with the United States on important policy objectives," according to an assessment released today by the U.S. National Intelligence Council.

To mark World Water Day, which falls on March 22 each year, the National Intelligence Council released the unclassified version of its report on Global Water Security over the next 30 years, as requested by U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.


A water distribution point at a refugee camp in Dadaab, Kenya, October 2011 (Photo by S. Modola courtesy UNHCR)

Between now and 2040, the assessment finds, fresh water availability will not keep up with demand without more effective management of water resources. "Water problems will hinder the ability of key countries to produce food and generate energy, posing a risk to global food markets and hobbling economic growth," the National Intelligence Council concludes. "As a result of demographic and economic development pressures, North Africa, the Middle East, and South Asia will face major challenges coping with water problems."

"We assess that during the next 10 years, water problems will contribute to instability in states important to U.S. national security interests," the NIC reports. "Historically, water tensions have led to more water-sharing agreements than violent conflicts. However," the NIC states, "we judge that as water shortages become more acute beyond the next 10 years, water in shared basins will increasingly be used as leverage; the use of water as a weapon or to further terrorist objectives also will become more likely beyond 10 years." Secretary Clinton today called the intelligence community's findings "sobering." "This assessment is a landmark document that puts water security in its rightful place as part of national security," Clinton told a news conference at the State Department.


Secretary of State Hillary Clinton introduces the U.S. Water Partnership (Photo courtesy U.S. State Dept.)

"It is also a call for American leadership in this area," she said. "Our domestic experiences with water and our technical expertise are valued around the world. And as countries become more water stressed or nations face water-related crises, they are increasingly turning to the United States for assistance. We hear this all the time at embassies everywhere. Local leaders meet with our ambassadors and ask, 'What did you do in the United States? How did you do it? Can you help us?'"

To help answer that call for leadership and to expand the impact of America's work on water, Clinton today announced the launch of a new public-private partnership, the U.S. Water Partnership, that gathers partners from the private sector, the philanthropic community, the NGOs, academics, experts, and government. "This approach will help catalyze new opportunities for cooperation," said Secretary Clinton. "The Water Partnership has built-in flexibility to address the world's changing water needs and to continue our work to find sustainable solutions."

A new U.S. Water Web Portal will provide a single entry point to American data, best practices, and training. This information will help empower people taking on these problems in their own communities, said Clinton. "It will help build international support for American approaches, technologies, companies, government agencies, our whole universe of experts standing ready to assist."


Typhoon Sendong causes water panic in the Philippines. A cement-mixer truck brought in water for residents of this village to use for hygienic purposes. (Photo by The 700 Club Asia)

The U.S. Water Partnership will not depend on any one government agency or any one private organization to keep it going, said Clinton. "The State Department is proud to be a founding partner, but we also hope that the partnership will spawn many new projects that may or may not involve us."

"We believe this will help map out our route to a more water secure world," said Clinton, "a world where no one dies from water-related diseases; where water does not impede social or economic development; and where no war is ever fought over water."

The U.S. Water Partnership was inspired by Secretary Clinton's 2010 World Water Day speech in which she pledged to bring American diplomatic, scientific, private sector and development stakeholders together to address global water challenges "holistically." A series of consultative meetings held between January and September 2011 with representatives from all these sectors shaped the partnership.

Joining Secretary Clinton at the launch of the U.S. Water Partnership Representative Earl Blumenauer, who is proposing legislation to establish a federal Water Trust Fund to help local jurisdictions repair aging water systems and infrastructure. They were joined by many of the U.S. Water Partnership's 22 founding members: Africare, the Coca-Cola Company, Procter & Gamble, the Nature Conservancy, Rockefeller Foundation, Ford Motor Company, Skoll Global Threats Fund, the Water Institute at the University of North Carolina, World Resources Institute, Global Environment and Technology Foundation, Global Water Challenge, and Clean Water America Alliance.

Government officials were also on hand from the State Department, International Boundary and Water Commission, NASA, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the U.S. Department of the Interior, and the U.S. Agency for International Development, USAID. The international community has achieved the target for water supply three years before the deadline, United Nations agencies announced earlier this month. USAID, the U.S. government and its partners in this effort have provided first time access for millions around the globe, said USAID Administrator Dr. Rajiv Shah, but more work is urgently needed.

"Even as we celebrate the news that the world has successfully halved the number of people without access to water and sanitation, it is important to remember that significant disparities still exist between and within countries," said Shah. "We will continue to work closely with the many countries that have not achieved their individual country Millenium Development Goal target for water supply, especially in sub-Saharan Africa."

[Toughy]

Next week SCOTUS will hear arguments on the Affordable Health Care Act fondly known as ObamaCare:

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/24/us...challenge.html

and another article about the Soliciter General who will argue the case..

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/24/us...%2Findex.jsonp

[Kobi]

Tho various news sources are reporting Cheney received a heart transplant on Saturday, I will forego looking for a link and just hope the donor was a feminist, female, POC with libertarian leanings and the disposition of a Tibetian monk.

After all, we should always want the best for others.

[SoNotHer]

http://world-wire.com/2012/03/16/lym...theastern-u-s/

I have had Lyme twice. I would suggest research and vigilance if you live in near deer, woods, in a high risk area or go camping.

Boom-and-bust acorn crops and a decline in mice leave humans vulnerable to infected ticks

MILLBROOK, NY, March 16, 2012 –/WORLD-WIRE/– The northeastern U.S. should prepare for a surge in Lyme disease this spring. And we can blame fluctuations in acorns and mouse populations, not the mild winter. So reports Dr. Richard S. Ostfeld, a disease ecologist at the Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies in Millbrook, NY.

What do acorns have to do with illness? Acorn crops vary from year-to-year, with boom-and-bust cycles influencing the winter survival and breeding success of white-footed mice. These small mammals pack a one-two punch: they are preferred hosts for black-legged ticks and they are very effective at transmitting Borrelia burgdorferi, the bacterium that causes Lyme disease.

Acorns and mice



“We had a boom in acorns, followed by a boom in mice. And now, on the heels of one of the smallest acorn crops we’ve ever seen, the mouse population is crashing,” Ostfeld explains. Adding, “This spring, there will be a lot of Borrelia burgdorferi-infected black-legged ticks in our forests looking for a blood meal. And instead of finding a white-footed mouse, they are going to find other mammals—like us.”

For more than two decades, Ostfeld, Cary Institute forest ecologist Dr. Charles D. Canham, and their research team have been investigating connections among acorn abundance, white-footed mice, black-legged ticks, and Lyme disease. In 2010, acorn crops were the heaviest recorded at their Millbrook-based research site. And in 2011, mouse populations followed suit, peaking in the summer months. The scarcity of acorns in the fall of 2011 set up a perfect storm for human Lyme disease risk.

Black-legged ticks take three bloodmeals—as larvae, as nymphs, and as adults. Larval ticks that fed on 2011’s booming mouse population will soon be in need of a nymphal meal. These tiny ticks—as small as poppy seeds—are very effective at transmitting Lyme to people. The last time Ostfeld’s research site experienced a heavy acorn crop (2006) followed by a sparse acorn crop (2007), nymphal black-legged ticks reached a 20-year high.

The May-July nymph season will be dangerous, and Ostfeld urges people to be aware when outdoors. Unlike white-footed mice, who can be infected with Lyme with minimal cost, the disease is debilitating to humans. Left undiagnosed, it can cause chronic fatigue, joint pain, and neurological problems. It is the most prevalent vector-borne illness in the U.S., with the majority of cases occurring in the Northeast.

Ostfeld says that mild winter weather does not cause a rise in tick populations, although it can change tick behavior. Adult ticks, which are slightly larger than a sesame seed, are normally dormant in winter but can seek a host whenever temperatures rise several degrees above freezing. The warm winter of 2011-2012 induced earlier than normal activity. While adult ticks can transmit Lyme, they are responsible for a small fraction of tick-borne disease, with spring-summer nymphs posing more of a human health threat.

Past research by Ostfeld and colleagues has highlighted the role that intact forest habitat and animal diversity play in buffering Lyme disease risks. He is currently working with health departments in impacted areas to educate citizens and physicians about the impending surge in Lyme disease.

For more information and how environmental conditions set the stage for disease risk:

Ostfeld, R. S. 2011. Lyme disease: The ecology of a complex system. Oxford University Press
Keesing, F., J. Brunner, S. Duerr, M. Killilea, K. LoGiudice, K. Schmidt, H. Vuong and R. S. Ostfeld. 2009. Hosts as ecological traps for the vector of Lyme disease. Proceedings of the Royal Society B, Biological Sciences 276:3911-3916.
Ostfeld, R. S., C. D. Canham, K. Oggenfuss, R. J. Winchcombe, and F. Keesing. 2006. Climate, deer, rodents, and acorns as determinants of variation in Lyme-disease risk. PLoS Biology 4(6):e145.
Schauber, E. M., R. S. Ostfeld, and A. S. Evans, Jr. 2005. What is the best predictor of annual Lyme disease incidence: Weather, mice, or acorns? Ecol. Appl. 15:575-586

The Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies is a private, not-for-profit environmental research and education organization in Millbrook, N.Y. For more than twenty-five years, Cary Institute scientists have been investigating the complex interactions that govern the natural world. Their objective findings lead to more effective policy decisions and increased environmental literacy. Focal areas include air and water pollution, climate change, invasive species, and the ecological dimensions of infectious disease.

Learn more at www.caryinstitute.org

[DapperButch]

Originally posted by Kobi

Tho various news sources are reporting Cheney received a heart transplant on Saturday, I will forego looking for a link and just hope the donor was a feminist, female, POC with libertarian leanings and the disposition of a Tibetian monk.

After all, we should always want the best for others.

Yes, we should, Ms. fellow social worker.

In case others are interested: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/0...6pLid%3D146364

(for some reason my quote button isn't working. Also, the smiley Kobi posted won't copy/paste)

[EnderD_503]

Originally Posted by LeftWriteFemme

Muslim gay hate preacher banned from speaking at university



http://www.gaystarnews.com/article/m...iversity220312

It's great that they didn't allow him to speak. At the same time, it'd be nice to see similar bans happening on anti-Muslim and anti-immigrant speakers at universities. Or banning Christian anti-gay speakers from speaking at universities. As long as these sorts of bans and articles don't just set their targets on Muslims and immigrants as the perpetrators of homophobia vs. a "tolerant" West...which is what happens a lot of the times in these sorts of articles.

[Toughy]

fact sheet from CDC on lyme disease including info on the vaccine........

http://www.cdc.gov/vaccines/pubs/vis...s/vis-lyme.pdf

[Tommi]

James Cameron begins dive to deepest spot on Earth

(AP) – 26 minutes ago

HONOLULU (AP) — Director James Cameron has begun his solo journey to explore a place only two men have gone before — to the Earth's deepest point.

The director of "Titanic," ''Avatar" and other films is using a specially designed submarine to descend nearly seven miles to the bottom of the Mariana Trench, an area 200 miles southwest of the Pacific island of Guam.

He began the dive Monday at approximately 5:15 a.m. local time, according Stephanie Montgomery of the National Geographic Society, where Cameron is an explorer-in-residence. That is early Sunday afternoon on the U.S. East Coast.

"RELEASE, RELEASE, RELEASE!" were the last words Cameron uttered before beginning the dive, according to a Twitter post from the expedition.

The scale of the trench is hard to grasp — it's 120 times larger than the Grand Canyon and more than a mile deeper than Mount Everest is tall. It was expected to take Cameron 90 minutes to reach the bottom aboard his 12-ton, lime-green sub called "Deepsea Challenger." Once there, Cameron planned to spend six hours collecting samples for biologists and geologists to study. The return trip to the surface was forecast to take 70 minutes.


http://www.google.com/hostednews/ap/...cf6987f19d0524

[LeftWriteFemme]

Gay and lesbian couples celebrate at mass 'wedding' at Cleveland's Galleria


http://www.cleveland.com/metro/index...es_celebr.html

[Tommi]

Good morning,

Earlier this week, Valerie Jarrett, Senior Advisor to the President, joined Attorney General Eric Holder in Arlington, Texas to deliver keynote remarks at the White House LGBT Conference on Safe Schools & Communities.

Valerie Jarrett, Senior Advisor to President Obama, delivers keynote remarks along with Attorney General Eric Holder at the White House LGBT Conference on Safe Schools and Communities at The University of Texas at Arlington, Tuesday, March 20th, 2012.

In speaking before an audience of over 400 teachers, students, parents, community advocates, law enforcement officers and officials, and elected officials, Valerie described the steps the Obama Administration has taken to ensure safety and security for all our young people - including LGBT students - in our schools and neighborhoods.

As she closed her remarks, Valerie told the story of Tempest Cartwright, a 12th grader from Broken Arrow, Oklahoma, who experienced - but was able to overcome - bullying and whose story inspires us to continue to fight for safe schools and communities:

So in closing, I would share one more story from a leader who is here today. Because change doesn't begin in Washington. Change happens because ordinary people do extraordinary things ... people like Tempest Cartwright.

Tempest is from Broken Arrow, Oklahoma - she's 18 years old. When word first got around her high school that she was gay, she lost friends. Some people stopped talking to her at church. Other students called her hurtful words that no young person should ever hear. For a while, Tempest was depressed. But she refused to let bullies ruin her life. As she put it, "Their attitudes and assumptions need to change, not me. If I don't help that along, who will?

So today, Tempest is the president of her school's gay-straight alliance - an alliance that has more than quadrupled its membership since she became involved. It's not easy. In fact, it is hard. When her organization places posters around the school, they often get torn down. But she and other members keep putting them right back up. And every day, bit by bit, she changes the world around her. As she put it, "When people put me down, it inspires me to stand up."

Well, young people like Tempest should inspire us all to stand up, and keep standing up, for what is right. To stand up for the safety of our children and neighbors. To stand up for the belief that in America, no one should face bullying, harassment, or violence because of who they are, because that's not who we are.

Read Valerie's remarks as prepared for delivery. http://links.whitehouse.gov/track?ty...ls-communities

Since launching the White House LGBT Conferences, we've been in Philadelphia, Detroit, and Dallas/Ft. Worth to discuss issues such as Health, Housing and Homelessness, and Safe Schools and Communities. Stay tuned for announcements about future White House LGBT Conferences on issues including HIV/AIDS, Aging, and Families.

Best regards,

Gautam Raghavan
Office of Public Engagement
The White House

[LeftWriteFemme]

School District Told to Replace Web Filter Blocking Pro-Gay Sites


http://www.nytimes.com/2012/03/26/ed....html?_r=2&hpw

[SoNotHer]

Youth in Foster Care Get a Chance at University Education

by Joel Boyce, March 26, 2012



The University of Winnipeg has recently announced the launch of its “Youth in Care Tuition Waiver Program.” Starting this September, the pilot program will see the tuition of 10 new students completely waived, and their living expenses fully covered. For students who might not have thought post-secondary education was in financial reach, this could be a game-changer.

The program is unique in Canada, in that it specifically caters to youth in foster care. According to the university’s press release, “There are more than 9,500 children and youth in care in Manitoba, the majority are First Nations and Metis, and it is estimated that less than 5% ever pursue a post-secondary education.”

Although my own parents were not well off, and I always knew I would have to work to pay my own tuition and books, I’m well aware of how fortunate I was to be provided with free room and board as I pursued my university education. Of course, one can’t forget about the emotional support and encouragement to pursue further education even if one’s parents don’t have the personal experience to give any detailed advice.

By contrast, it’s hard to imagine being in foster care, reaching the age of majority and being turned loose to fend for myself. At least, I don’t see myself doing so and still managing to figure out a way to get in, get through and pay for university — not while dealing with rent and groceries and the other basic requirements of daily life. At the very least, student loan debts would likely be substantial.

It’s worth noting to American readers that moving to a far-away university to live in residence is not the default option in Canada these days. In fact, a slim majority of the students in my generation do live at home. The percentage is almost certainly higher for students of the Univeristy of Winnipeg, which is uniquely situated right in the middle of the city’s downtown area. The limited student housing is quickly taken up by international and out-of-town students, while the majority of enrollees commute from somewhere within the city or its outskirts, where they (often) live with their parents.

Lloyd Axworthy, UW’s president and vice-chancellor, has seized on the university’s urban location as an opportunity to be a part of a community during his tenure at the university’s top post. Everything from community engagement, like community barbeques, free public art shows and musical performances, to increased accessibility via need-based bursaries, alternative entrance pathways and early intervention.

The Youth in Care pilot is only the latest in a long series of ongoing programs to improve equity of access for prospective students. The Opportunity Fund, for example, is a need-based scholarship that allows low-income students to earn university tuition credits as early as grade four, by staying in school and working hard. A high school graduate in this program can essentially have their first year paid for by staying focused during their primary and secondary studies.

Read more: http://www.care2.com/causes/youth-in...#ixzz1qJyDVbAq

[betenoire]

Funniest most batshit attack advert of the year!

[Mike]

http://gma.yahoo.com/miss-universe-d...-abc-news.html

[Toughy]

Which one is the real Zimmerman? His (black) friend Joe Oliver is the one offering these contradictory descriptions of Zimmerman's behavior.


This one:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/0...ef=mostpopular

George Zimmerman cried for days in remorse after shooting dead a black Florida teenager, a family friend of Zimmerman said on Sunday, offering a sympathetic portrayal of the man at the focal point of a national uproar.

<snip>

"He couldn't stop crying. He's a caring human being," Joe Oliver, 53, a former television news reporter and anchor in Orlando who has known Zimmerman for several years, told Reuters in a telephone interview.

"I mean, he took a man's life and he has no idea what to do about it. He's extremely remorseful about it," Oliver said, relating stories told to him by Zimmerman's mother-in-law, a close friend of Oliver's wife.

or this one:

http://articles.orlandosentinel.com/...tea-joe-oliver

Neighborhood Watch captain George Zimmerman, who shot and killed 17-year-old Trayvon Martin last month, sparking a national outcry, thought the killing "would all blow over," a friend, Joe Oliver, told ABC News this morning.

"Because he was there and he knows what happened...he's been very confident - naively - that this would all blow over," Oliver said.

<snip>

Oliver told the Today Show that Zimmerman is "just now realizing not just how big this is for him, but how big this is for the country."

<snip>

he (Oliver) believes that it is Zimmerman screaming for help in the 911 call to police.

[MsTinkerbelly]

Supreme Court denies review of Seventh Circuit decision striking down anti-transgender law
By Scottie Thomaston

Wisconsin passed the “Inmate Sex-Change Prevention Act”, a law that maliciously targeted people who are transgender to deprive them of necessary life-saving and life-affirming medical care. Three people who were serving prison time sued for prisoner access to this medical care, for prisoners to continue receiving prescribed hormones and care from qualified doctors who would monitor their hormone treatment. The Act was challenged in federal court on the grounds that it violated the Eighth Amendment’s ban on cruel and unusual punishment as well as the Fourteenth Amendment’s Equal Protection Clause. The plaintiffs won in District Court and again at the Seventh Circuit Court of Appeals.

The Supreme Court denied review today, meaning that their victory at the court of appeals will stand and the law is struck down.

The Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel reported:

The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday declined to hear Wisconsin’s appeal of a ruling that struck down the state’s effort to ban all hormone treatment and sex-change surgery for transgender prison inmates.

Three such inmates challenged the law in 2006, and a federal judge in Milwaukee granted a preliminary injunction to allow their hormone treatments to continue, then heard a full trial in 2007 before ruling in 2010 that Wisconsin’s 2005 Sex Change Prevention Act was unconstitutional on several grounds.

Chief U.S. District Judge Charles N. Clevert found that the law amounts to “deliberate indifference to the plaintiffs’ serious medical needs in violation of the Eighth Amendment,” because it denies hormone therapy without regard to those needs or doctors’ judgments. He found the law unconstitutional on its face and also in violation of the inmates’ rights to equal protection.

The statute reads:

The [Wisconsin Department of Corrections] may not authorize the payment of any funds or the use of any resources of this state or the payment of any federal funds passing through the state treasury to provide or to facilitate the provision of hormonal therapy or sexual reassignment surgery.

The Seventh Circuit’s opinion, which was upheld today, begins by recalling the findings of fact made by the District Court below. One of the first things the judges note is that experts testified that gender dysphoria is incredibly serious and requires the type of medical care denied to these patients under the Wisconsin law:

These experts explained that GID can cause an acute sense that a person’s body does not match his or her gender identity. Even before seeking treatment and from an early age, patients will experience this dysphoria and may attempt to conform their appearance and behavior to the gender with winch they identify.

The feelings of dysphoria can vary in intensity. Some patients are able to manage the discomfort, while others become unable to function without taking steps to correct the disorder. A person with GID often experiences severe anxiety, depression, and other psychological disorders. Those with GID may attempt to commit suicide or to mutilate their own genitals.

The accepted standards of care dictate a gradual approach to treatment beginning with psychotherapy and real life experience [*554] living as the opposite gender. For some number of patients, this treatment will be effective in controlling feelings of dysphoria. When the condition is more severe, a doctor can prescribe hormones, which have the effect of relieving the psychological distress.

The defendant’s argument is a familiar refrain:

Defendants do not challenge the district court’s holding that GID is a serious medical condition. They contend that Act 105 is constitutional because the state legislature has the power to prohibit certain medical treatments when other treatment options are available. And defendants argue that Act 105 is justified by a legitimate need to ensure security in state prisons.

In other words, defendants argue that medical treatment should be given or denied based on legislative judgment, not a doctor’s considered expert judgment after that doctor reviews a patient’s case file. If legislators don’t think certain groups of people deserve certain care, whether or not it’s deemed medically necessary, those legislators should be able to ban it

[Kobi]

This gives new meaning to denial.


Associated Press Mar 27, 2012


Race can be a very uncomfortable thing to talk about. It is so uncomfortable for some conservative writers to talk about that they feel moved to call for everyone to stop talking by declaring racism dead. As vociferous as the outrage over Trayvon Martin's death has been, it's not really been a partisan story. The main national political angle has been over gun control -- Florida adopted Stand Your Ground after some efforts by the National Rifle Association -- but the heart of the story is a local one about race: whether a white Hispanic man was blinded by racist stereotypes and killed a black teenager, whether white law enforcement officers then looked the other way because of the race of the victim and shooter. Unlike some other national flare-ups involving race (the left's fixation on racist placards at Tea Party rallies in 2009, the right's fixation on alleged voter intimidation by New Black Panthers in 2010, or the Republican primary's fixation on birtherism in early 2011), no one in the Trayvon Martin case has been calling Republican politicians or Tea Partiers racist. But after President Obama briefly addressed the story last week, after a reporter asked him about it at a press conference, by saying, "If I had a son, he'd look like Trayvon," conservative pundits have seemed to sense that the Martin case is somehow benefiting liberals and Democrats who have been saying that, well, racism is still a problem in the United States of 2012. Conservatives must therefore argue that, no, it isn't. Racism is not even real.

Not only is racism dead, the only people who think it still exists are liberals. "Increasingly, racism -- and more generally the division of our country into racial and ethnic interest groups -- is all the Democrats have. The rest of liberal/leftist ideology is disintegrating all around them, as fragile and illusory as the welfare state itself," writes Pajamas Media blogger Roger L. Simon. He should know, he asserts, since he was "an ex-civil rights worker (South Carolina, 1966)." Liberals keep pushing the notion that racism exists not because they oppose it but out of a "yearning for the halcyon days of the civil rights movement when we all could feel righteous (or self-righteous) for battling the likes of Bull Connors or George Wallace... What we see now is an attempt -- conscious or unconscious -- to generate racism by false accusation, literally to manufacture it." Out of thin air! This non-existent racism.

Presidential candidate Newt Gingrich agrees. Obama's identification with Martin based on their shared race was "appalling," Gingrich said. "It's not a question of who that young man looked like ... Is the president suggesting that if it had been a white who had been shot, that would be OK because it didn't look like him?" Former Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour, considered a potential presidential candidate a year ago until he was quoted in the Weekly Standard reminiscing about how great the segregationist White Citizens Councils were, wasn't quite sure where to stand on Gingrich's comment in his appearance on Meet the Press this past Sunday. At first, Barbour said of Gingrich's comments, "Well, I wouldn't have characterized it that way. But look, he's right. Any child, white, black, brown, red or yellow that gets killed, it's a tragedy... Now there's -- he's absolutely dead right, there's no difference because of what race somebody is when something like this happens." But then later on the show, he backtracked a little, invoking famous lynching victim Emmett Till. He praised the mayor of Sanford, saying, "That's what leaders are supposed to do. Even if it's not proper at home to say, 'Guys, it's in our interest, it's the right thing for the city, the state, let's bring the F.B.I. in here. Let's bring the Florida State Police in here. Let's do whatever it takes to get all the cards on the table, face up, and then we'll figure out what to do.'" Barbour is admitting race might play a role after all -- not just in the crime, but in local public opinion, too.

This would put Haley Barbour at odds with a big swath of the conservative commentariat. The National Review's Jonah Goldberg argued Tuesday that black liberals who think racism is real are merely misinformed about black America. "If you go by Charles M. Blow of the New York Times, or Donna Britt in her NPR interview, or much of the blather on MSNBC, you’ll get the impression that the foremost problem facing young black men in America is violent white racism," Goldberg writes. Wrong! Goldberg exlpains:

The richest and most successful African-Americans spend a lot more time in elite 'white' America than they do in Compton or East St. Louis. And, my hunch is, they’re more understandably more worried about white men with guns than they are about guns in their kids’ private schools.

If they're only hanging out with rich white people, and they're "understandably" scared of white people with guns, does that mean rich white liberals are the real people you have to watch out for going on racially-motivated shooting spree? Perhaps they read his book Liberal Fascism and have seen the light that their liberal white friends are secretly Nazis? Alas, Goldberg does not elaborate. Instead he continues that this is black folks' version of the red-state-blue-state divide.

I also think it’s a lot easier for rich black liberals to have an “honest conversation” about white racism than it is for them to engage in an honest conversation about the other problems facing black America that have little to nothing to do with white racism.

Thankfully we have Goldberg to explain black life for them. Sure, black and white liberals alike might say that the problems Goldberg aludes to are the lingering effects of past racist practices like redlining. But no. His colleague Heather Mac Donald statistically proves racism isn't real. How can you quantify how widespread an attitude is? Murder statistics:

Most homicides are intraracial, but the chance of a black being killed by a white or Hispanic is much lower than the chance that a white or Hispanic will be killed by a black. Seventeen percent of what the FBI calls “white” homicide victims in 2009 were killed by blacks, compared to 8 percent of black homicide victims who were killed by “whites.”

Simon cites the same statistics and comes to a slightly different conclusion: since so many murders involve killers and victims of the same race, there are very few racist murderers. Or as he puts it, "By way of comparison, traffic deaths for the same year were 33,963. Obviously, you have much better chance of being killed by a Porsche than by a racist." So hooray! By the bar's lowest setting (how often are people killing each other because of race?) racism has been made to disappear. But that's not the end of it. By arguing that if the killed teen were white, and the shooter were black then the police would have investigated immediately, racism-manufacturing liberals are defaming law enforcement, Mac Donald argues:

But if such evidence of racial indifference does emerge, it would be not only shameful but also a great exception to the practice of police departments across the country. Far from showing a “reckless disregard for [black] lives,” in Sharpton’s words, it is the police and prosecutors who are the most reliable responders to black victimization, trying relentlessly to put together a case even when the witnesses to crime refuse to cooperate. Most police chiefs will say that they could solve every inner-city killing if the people who saw the crime or know the perpetrators came forward, instead of obeying the “no snitching” code.

Her sole evidence for the relentless efforts of police nationwide is that the rate of blacks being murdered has been cut in half since 1991. She does not point out that the murder rate for victims of all races has also been cut in half since then. Nor does she provide statistical evidence that more crimes would be solved if those dummies quit "obeying the 'no snitching' code."

Not everyone on the right is seizing the moment to declare the end of racism. For some it was already dead. Michelle Malkin writes that she hasn't had enough time to cover the Martin case, but says the left has "turned the horrible death of Trayvon Martin into a racial litmus test." Then she links to a 2010 post in which she declared racism dead. Back then, some Democrats said some Tea Partiers were racist. "[T]he Left never takes a break from falsely accusing the Right of fomenting hatred and violence through political speech," Malkin wrote. This was Democrats' tool to pass health care reform, she said. "If you can’t stand the heat, manufacture a hate crime epidemic."

Conservatives' declarations of the end of racism would be more compelling if they didn't have such strange ideas of what black people are like. There's Mac Donald's casual reference to "stop snitching." National Review's Victor Davis Hanson declared racism dead back in September, since white people were supporting Herman Cain. "In the current racial circus, the president of the United States, in addressing an assembly of upscale black professionals and political leaders, adopts the style of a Southern Baptist preacher of the 1960s," he wrote. Of course, it seems unlikely that Obama would, as Hanson charges, consciously steal from Southern Baptists, since their church's founding principle was an explicit endorsement of slavery. (The church did manage to apologize for explicitly endorsing segregation… in 1995.) Then there was Goldberg's January post mocking Mitt Romney for talking about the "streets of America," writing, "If he's street than I'm the shock collar for a vicious Mexican drug gang." Of course, the term is "shot caller," as anyone who has ever watched MTV knows. Shock collars are to keep the tiny toy poodles that people like Goldberg feed caviar and paté from yapping. (Is that a gross stereotype? My b.). And then there was Geraldo Rivera's argument for why racism didn't kill Martin, it was his sweatshirt and his race. "I am urging the parents of black and Latino youngsters particularly to not let their children go out wearing hoodies," he said Friday. "I think the hoodie is as much responsible for Trayvon Martin’s death as George Zimmerman was." On Tuesday, he apologized to anyone offended by his "crusade to warn minority families of the danger to their young sons inherent in gangsta style clothing; like hoodies." Alas, the hoodie-loving gangsta's shopping at JCrew.com did not heed his call, as the photo at right shows.

http://www.theatlanticwire.com/polit...sm-dead/50406/