Subject: Equality

  • Reintroducing America to Itself

    Tonight, the first evening of the Democratic convention, America was reintroduced to its grass roots. Some memorable moments: Jimmy Carter addressed the hall via video from New Orleans. As he walked through the still-devastated neighborhoods, he talked with residents about…

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    One Less Truth-Teller

    Congresswoman Stephanie Tubbs Jones, Democrat of Ohio, died yesterday after suffering a burst brain aneurysm. Tubbs Jones, 58, was the first black woman to represent Ohio in Congress. She was first elected in 1998 to represent Ohio’s 11th District, which…

  • The Urban, Dystopian Blame Game

    Like any number of small- and big-screen thrillers, the film’s engagement with 9/11 is diffuse, more a matter of inference and ideas (chaos, fear, death) than of direct assertion. So asserts the New York Times’ review of The Dark Knight,,…

  • A Big Easy Comparison, But How Similar?

    “Katrina” is a loaded word, less associated with an actual hurricane than it is with catastrophic destruction from natural disaster, breathtaking flaws in effective federal emergency response (or lack thereof), ineptitude of the executive branch, and a sobering magnifier of…

  • Race and Class: Katrina vs. Iowa

    Concentrated poverty and hypersegregation generate wide-ranging costs in almost every major U.S. city, particularly for less favored populations. New Orleans clearly fits this description. Cedar Rapids less so. The problems facing residents of New Orleans in the face of Hurricane…

  • Drops in the Bucket on Racial Inequality

    Check out Greg Squires’ challenge in yesterday’s article on The Nation’s Web site to talk about race in a way that matters during the presidential campaign. Despite all the coded barbs during the primary season about race—“hard-working white Americans,” Bill…

  • Not Your Father’s Electorate (Instead, His Father’s)

    The Republican vote was as high as ever. But the Democratic candidate still won—because more Democrats turned out to the polls than ever before. The electorate had expanded, and the demographic had shifted. Working class city-dwellers suddenly realized their true…

  • Will Obama Fever Heal Black-Latino Relations?

    The day before Obama’s thrilling clinching of the Democratic nomination, I met with a group of high school students at the Rudy Lozano Leadership Academy, an alternative, activism-oriented high school in Chicago’s mostly immigrant Pilsen neighborhood. The students were planning…

  • Asking the Big, Fat Question

    The huge news this past week, of course, was Scott McClellan, who, a few years too late, called his former White House boss a big, fat liar. But “big fat” was key in another story that got a few days…

  • You’ve Seen One Hussein, You’ve Seen ‘Em All

    I’ve been thinking about democracy a lot lately. It happens every time there’s an election. Every time I start getting bombarded by mailers for candidates and propositions. Every time I realize how susceptible people are to propaganda. Week before last,…