Race in America

On Sunday, the historically black Morehouse College will graduate its first white valedictorian, the AP reports. Joshua Packwood is graduating with a perfect 4.0 GPA and says the recruiter who talked to him about Morehouse didn't initially realize he was white. "I've been forced to see the world in a different perspective, that I don't think I could've gotten anywhere else," Packwood says. More »

John McCain’s first post-primary ad declares him “the American president Americans have been waiting for," and the repetition tells all, Harold Meyerson writes in the Washington Post . Forget "strong," or "experienced," he notes. For the GOP, " ‘American’ is a term to be used as a wedge issue, a way to distinguish their more racially and religiously homogeneous party from the historically more polyglot Democrats.” More »

Volunteers in Barack Obama's campaign have had to steel themselves against racism on the trail, even as the White House hopeful has repeatedly played down the anti-black sentiment his candidacy has revealed. Though the campaign maintains its travels “only reinforced Sen. Obama’s view that this country is not as divided as our politics suggest,” the Washington Post finds many anecdotes to the contrary. More »

Secret Service supervisors exchanged racist remarks in emails made public yesterday in a lawsuit filed by black agents, the New York Times reports. The messages were shared between at least 20 top agents between 2003 and 2005. One anecdote jokes about assassinating Jesse Jackson. And, according to the lawsuit, the head of the Presidential Protective Detail sent a crude joke about interracial sex to a colleague. More »

Washington is investigating Al Sharpton and his companies for nearly $1.5 million in back taxes and penalties, the AP reports. Sharpton, who has been negotiating the size of his federal debt, brushed off the government's latest move today. “Whatever retaliation they do on me, we never stop," the civil rights agitator said. "I think that that is why they try to intimidate us." More »

New York City police arrested the Rev. Al Sharpton and the fiancée and mother of Sean Bell today during protests over the April 25 acquittal of three officers who shot Bell to death in a 50-bullet barrage. Hundreds blocked traffic at the Brooklyn Bridge and other city hot spots, the New York Post reports. Dozens were arrested, including two of Bell's friends who survived the 2006 shooting. More »

Mildred Loving, whose challenge to Virginia law led to the Supreme Court decision overturning bans on racially mixed marriage, has died at the age of 68. Loving, who was black, and her white husband Richard pleaded guilty to “cohabiting as man and wife, against the peace and dignity of the Commonwealth” before their suit led to a landmark civil-rights ruling in 1967. More »

Coming together “isn’t all it’s cracked up to be,” Gregory Rodriguez writes in the LA Times , and Barack Obama's attempt to start a national dialogue on race was foiled by an unlikely actor: Barack Obama. Jeremiah Wright "didn't really say anything new last week," Rodriguez argues. "He called Obama’s bluff.” More »

The US Hispanic population is booming, driven more by a high birth rate among those already in the country than immigration, the Census Bureau says. Since 2000, Latinos have jumped from 12.6% to more than 15% of the total population—swelling their numbers to 45.5 million from 35.7 million. "If you close the borders tomorrow, there is still going to be a large Hispanic increase," a demographer tells the Wall Street Journal. More »

Jeremiah Wright's ideas don't "represent mainstream black thought on Sunday morning," black ministers and parishioners tell the Los Angeles Times —and they're worried that his recent comments are offensive and damaging to Barack Obama’s candidacy. “This didn’t have anything to do with the black church—it was basically an attack on the individual message he proclaimed, which hurt some individuals,” says one pastor. More »

Barack Obama has spent his entire career trying not to be an Angry Black Man, but yesterday Jeremiah Wright forced him to tap his rage, Maureen Dowd writes in the New York Times . Wright, seemingly among the angriest of black men, had created a full-blown crisis for Obama, forcing the Democrat to commit “a painful form of political patricide.” More »

Barack Obama's angry break with his former pastor marks a dramatic change in tone for the Democratic hopeful—and the party's superdelegates are paying close attention, the New York Times reports. Obama's forceful handling of the furor has impressed many but the revival of thorny racial issues ahead of next week's primaries is causing some to fret. More »

Will Robinson, the first black basketball coach at a Division I school and a Detroit Pistons scout who discovered Joe Dumars and Dennis Rodman, died Monday. He was 96. Robinson died at a Detroit hospital, Pistons spokesman Matt Dobek said. Robinson had been sick for 15 months and in a nursing home for more than a year, Dobek added. More »

Barack Obama today rejected the idea of additional debates against Hillary Clinton, the Chicago Tribune reports. “I’m not ducking. We’ve had 21” debates, the senator said, insisting he prefers face-to-face talks with the kind of blue-collar voters who helped clinch Clinton’s Pennsylvania win. More »

Sean Bell’s fiancé spoke out today, condemning the court for acquitting the men who shot her husband. “The justice system let me down,” Nicole Paultre Bell said. “April 25, 2008: They killed Sean all over again.” In her first public comments since yesterday’s verdict, Paultre Bell vowed to fight for another decision in the case, while Al Sharpton threatened to “shut the city down.” More »

A New York judge yesterday cleared the detectives who fatally shot Sean Bell, but the NYPD is awaiting its own verdict, after the case provoked charges of shoddy undercover police work. The shooting “revealed significant deficiencies in supervision, tactical planning, communications and management accountability,” said the Queens district attorney. The case’s chief prosecutor added, “This was a slipshod operation.” More »

Rev. Al Sharpton blasted today's acquittal of three NYPD officers who killed an unarmed man in a 50-slug fusillade in 2006, CNN reports. "Justice didn't miscarry," Sharpton said. "This was an abortion of justice. Justice was aborted." Mayor Michael Bloomberg urged citizens to respect the “authority” of the court; meanwhile, the Justice Department is considering civil-rights charges, Reuters reports. More »

Maybe Geraldine Ferraro and BET founder Bob Johnson are right about Barack Obama’s success, Colson Whitehead sarcastically posits in the New York Times. " The Guy Who’s Where He Is Only Because He’s Black" runs down his busy schedule and puzzles over the fact that "the higher up you go in an organization, the less you see of me." More »

A judge today acquitted three detectives who killed an unarmed New York City man in a hail of 50 bullets hours before his wedding in November 2006, the New York Times reports. The judge cited problems with witnesses' testimony in the killing of Sean Bell and a lack of sufficient evidence. Roughly 150 Bell supporters had gathered inside and outside the courtroom, including fiancée Nicole Paultre-Bell, who ran from the courtroom when the verdict was read, and the Rev. Al Sharpton. More »

Race underscores the stoner misadventures of Harold and Kumar—whose second film comes out tomorrow—but it’s not the point. The movies, about two friends who “just happen not to be white,” set a multicultural standard that Hollywood hasn’t figured out, writes Mark Olsen in the Los Angeles Times . When it comes to cultural issues, “filmgoers are a bit savvier than they are given credit for,” says a co-director. More »