Signs You Might Not Get What's Going on in Baltimore

1. Posting quotes about non-violence from Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. and ignore the ones where he talks about pain and injustice. “…a riot is the language of the unheard.”

2. Swallowing the media bias in selective use of labels like criminals and thugs to describe rioters but those who celebrate or mourn losses after sports teams win football or baseball games, also destroying public property are rowdy college kids.

3. Saying that protesting police brutality and injustice is a “Democrat” problem and not an American problem.

The roots of anger flaring up in Baltimore and Ferguson are fueled by the countless victims in thousands of other cities across the United States whose names won’t make headlines.

We must realize that there are two Americas. And that many of us have no idea what the reality is like for those with a hue of skin that marks them as targets for systemic violence.

Without this acknowledgement as a common ground, there can be no conversation. And without listening, there will no change.

How to Get Rid of Political Dynasties

hilaryBefore typing the title for this blog post, I had not noticed that the word dynasty has the word “nasty” in it. Don’t get me wrong. I was excited and warmed by the Hillary for America video in which Ms. Clinton announced her intention to run for office.
Ah, America, the bastion of liberal democracy, who has yet to vote in a female chief. How ironic that EIGHT Muslim countries (including Pakistan and Bangladesh) who did so decades ago. Perhaps we are finally going to have a female president. Hilary is an amazing candidate.

In this announcement video we saw none of the entitlement in her 2008 run-off. “I’m going to work for your vote,” she says with a sparkly smile. Yes, this is more of the tone we want to see not the anger against an upstart young senator.

And yet the fact that this next election may come down to two candidates from two political families, the Clintons versus the Bushes, chills me.

We are faced with the wife of one president and the son/brother of two others.

The 2008 and 2012 elections were vituperative, drawing deep gouges between families, friends, and co-workers.

The 2016 election is going to be an all out war. Brace yourselves world. You haven’t seen a battle like this one.