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2010 Columns
Quarter 3: July thru September ~ Columns #27 - #39

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September 29, 2010 Column #39: A pattern in practice

"Through My Eyes, the Minneapolis Story Continues"
A weekly column by Ron Edwards featured in the Minnesota Spokesman-Recorder

The tasered death of David Cornelius.

When David Cornelius Smith arrived at the sixth-floor gym of the downtown Minneapolis YMCA, at 30 South 9th Street, on the early afternoon of September 9, 2010, he had no idea he was facing his final hours of life. Within a short period of time, according to the police version, David Smith had become disruptive and threatening and combative.

The police version provided to the Minneapolis Star Tribune, but not to his family, was that he fought with police and injured one before he was tasered and handcuffed. The police report says the police “allegedly realized he was having a medical emergency, and he was rushed to Hennepin County Medical Center.”

The family was later told by medical staff that this 28-year-old had suffered a massive cardiac arrest from the incident. Then, according to a story in Sunday’s Sept 19, 2010 Star Tribune, he was on life support until Friday, September 17. But now let us look at some peculiar aspects.

Number one: Early in the afternoon of Sept 9, the Minneapolis Star Tribune had interviewed Chief Tim Dolan about the death by tasering of a young African American inside the YMCA. He had died.

It was only after a call from a source that the Star Tribune checked further and found out that the story was later changed to the “fact” that David Cornelius Smith, some two or three hours after his death on the sixth floor
of the YMCA, had somehow been miraculously revived.

Of course he never regained consciousness and of course members of his family, who came to Minneapolis 10 days ago, have not been approached by Minneapolis police to discuss the circumstances of his death.

Another “of course” is that I’m sure that neither the family, the American Civil Liberties Union nor the NAACP were told that the Star Tribune and Chief Tim Dolan had already discussed Mr. Smith’s death on the early afternoon of the 9th of September.

However, the Minneapolis Police Department knows how to sanitize a crime scene, witnesses and evidence. It withholds evidence. It gives misleading statements. It intimidates witnesses, such as those who saw that Mr. Smith was tasered after he was handcuffed, not before as in the “official” report. It tampers with security camera footage.

We saw all of this earlier in the tasering death of another African American in December 2008 (see columns of Dec. 17 and 24, 2008, and Feb. 4 and Dec. 16, 2009). It would appear to be a disturbing yet official pattern and set of practices.

The pattern is to change the information. The practice is to lie as much as they can.

What a surprise it must have been to the reporter of the Star Tribune to have interviewed Chief Dolan about the death of Mr. Smith only to learn later from non-police sources that David Cornelius Smith was said to have been miraculously revived some two-to-three hours later, after his death on the sixth floor of the Minneapolis YMCA at the hand of two Minneapolis police officers who tasered him after he was handcuffed and face down on the floor.

I am obviously challenging the police department’s statement that Mr. Smith was tasered before he was handcuffed. According to witnesses, any videos of the confrontation would show that Mr. Smith was beaten and tasered after he was handcuffed, which suggests the serious question of police patterns and practices. I again remind you of the death of Quincy Smith (no relation) in December 2008, a case that took over one year to get presented to a grand jury.

This column predicts, even though the coroner will rule that David Cornelius Smith died as a result of an act of homicide, that unless someone gets the police and the city to change their pattern and practice, this case will never get to a state grand jury.

Again, my friends, “pattern and practice,” a legal term that is part of Title VII, that sets evidentiary requirements held up by the Supreme Court for demonstrating “pattern and practice” in the violation of civil rights laws.

I raise “pattern and practice” not on ideological or political grounds, but on justice and fairness grounds and on homeland security for citizens grounds.

David Smith and his family deserve better. They deserve the truth. The community deserves justice. His death should be reviewed by a federal grand jury. Even though I doubt this will happen, fostered by the city’s patterns and practices, that doesn’t mean it shouldn’t happen.
Stay tuned.

Ron hosts "Black Focus" on Channel 17, MTN-TV, Sundays, 5-6 pm. Formerly head of key civil rights organizations, including the Minneapolis Civil Rights Commission and the Urban League, he continues his "watchdog" role for Minneapolis. Order his books at www.BeaconOnTheHill.com; hear his readings and read his solution papers and "web log" at www.TheMinneapolisStory.com.

Posted Thursday, 9-30-10, 4:28 a.m.


September 22, 2010 Column #38: Strike Task Force officers won’t talk? No problem — empanel a grand jury!

"Through My Eyes, the Minneapolis Story Continues"
A weekly column by Ron Edwards featured in the Minnesota Spokesman-Recorder


“Obstacles Sink State’s Strike Force Case” blared the Thursday, Sept. 9 Star Tribune front-page headline. Really? I’m not convinced.

County Attorney Mike Freeman said he won’t file charges, citing the unit’s poor handling of records and evidence. Instead, “Freeman said that Strike Force members have a constitutional right to decline to be interviewed” and that he cannot compel Strike Force members to give interviews. In this he purposely misleads, refusing to acknowledge they can be compelled to appear before a grand jury.

The press conference timing was no coincidence. On the same front page, Brett Favre was getting ready for the Vikings game in New Orleans (which they lost 14-9). Experts in the area of the public’s ability and time to absorb information will tell you that on Sept. 9 everyone was concentrating on the Vikings, giving little thought to the press conference.

There is no secret to getting people to testify: Subpoena them before a grand jury. They have to show up. You can offer them immunity in exchange for testimony, but if they still refuse, they can be fined or jailed until the grand jury’s time is up.

So what are Freeman and the City so afraid of in Task Force members’ testimony that they would refuse to compel them to appear?

The federal authorities mustered evidence and got results — a $3 million misconduct settlement. But Hennepin County won’t use the constitutionally provided legal mechanisms at its disposal to compel the Task Force members to appear before a grand jury.

Let’s state the obvious: The unit’s poor handling of records and evidence was probably intended to make it harder to make a case if they got caught. Can the county attorney look even more foolish? What did the feds see in the same evidence, same records, same personnel that the County won’t look at and doesn’t want looked at?

As the state had to cough up $3 million for the victims of this police unit, there is something there. I detail much of what they could fear in my referenced columns below.

To find out answers, empanel a grand jury. In the state of Minnesota, grand juries are the property of Minnesota’s Supreme Court. State Attorney General Swanson merely has to petition the State Supreme Court to allow the AG for the State to empanel a grand jury in any county of Minnesota to hear evidence, in this case evidence regarding the Strike Force. Of course, her decision would be based on including evidence the federal government used to obtain the $3 million settlement.

Using available tools (e.g., a grand jury) is sometimes called “innovative justice.” When you think of it, my friends, we reside in a nation, state, county and city in which the most innovative and aggressive tactics have been used to protect the homeland and provide justice for the United States of America in the global war against terror.

In our city’s case, the $3 million settlement clearly spoke volumes to the following proposition: The Strike Force created terror, mistrust and apprehension in the homeland, and the system at the federal level did what was necessary to restore America’s ability to protect her citizens here.

So why won’t Hennepin County do the same? It is difficult to see why a grand jury was not used by Hennepin County to contribute to the protection of this Minneapolis political homeland sanctuary.

At a time when we talk about vigilance and the preservation of homeland security, 29 of the 73 officers (so-called first responders) chose not to respond to repeated requests for interviews; they chose to remain silent.

My friends, in defense of homeland security, for the County to allow this when alternative action is available is an unacceptable way to deal with those who would threaten the very fiber of the democracy we have come to love, respect and defend.

For more about the Task Force, see my earlier columns, available in my online archive: 2007 (Aug. 29; Sept. 12), 2008 (Jan. 2 and 30; Aug. 20; Oct. 8 and 29; Nov. 5), 2009 (Jan. 14; Mar. 25; Sept. 2), and 2010 (Feb. 24; Mar. 10; June 9; July 14; Aug. 4).

Later column addition: When I first wrote this column on Sept. 13, the major civil rights organizations were still silent on this issue. Thus, it was a delightful surprise to read in the Sept. 16 Star Tribune that they are also protesting Freeman’s ruling (“Civil rights groups urge Strike Force grand jury”).

We all agree. Let’s work together to see that a grand jury is empanelled.

Stay tuned.

Ron hosts "Black Focus" on Channel 17, MTN-TV, Sundays, 5-6 pm. Formerly head of key civil rights organizations, including the Minneapolis Civil Rights Commission and the Urban League, he continues his "watchdog" role for Minneapolis. Order his books at www.BeaconOnTheHill.com; hear his readings and read his solution papers and "web log" at www.TheMinneapolisStory.com.

Posted Wednesday, September 22, 2010, 9:30 a.m.


September 15, 2010 Column #37: Justice Still Denied in Killing of Fong Lee Strike

"Through My Eyes, the Minneapolis Story Continues"
A weekly column by Ron Edwards featured in the Minnesota Spokesman-Recorder

Appeal decision only perpetuates this tragedy.

On August 12 the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit demonstrated once again how courts too can be unjust and unlawful.

Despite evidence to the contrary, the three-judge panel of Judges Wollman, Smith and Colloton affirmed the decision of a May 2009 all-White St. Paul federal jury that Officer Jason Anderson was justified in killing 19-year-old Fong Lee riding his bicycle on July 22, 2006, an incident detailed in my August 6, 2006 column “Justice is Demanded.”

[Reposting of September 08, 2010 Column #36: Justice still denied in killing of Fong Lee; Appeal decision only perpetuates this tragedy]

This case needs to go to the supreme court.

The court’s decision in the matter of the trustees of the heirs and next of kin of Fong Lee vs. Officer Jason Anderson and the City of Minneapolis was published as Case No. 09-2771. My June 10, 2009 column was headed, “Let’s admit it. Some judges are bad.”

It is chilling to know that a policeman with a history of domestic abuse, drug abuse, and public disorder got away with killing Fong Lee with two sets of shots. The first set: in the back. The second set: five times to his chest as he lay helplessly on his back after being spun around and dropped by the first set.

The April 5, 2009 Pioneer Press headline asked the key question: “Is the shooting of Fong Lee at the hands of a cop a story of valor, or deception? Police records are in conflict and raise specter of a plant.”

It is at page 14 of the Eighth Circuit’s opinion where we learn that the court engages in more deception, acting as if there were no conflicting evidence as it cited evidence that was never presented in court (page 14, lines 4-9).

If presented, this evidence — the Minneapolis School District tape they claim shows Fong Lee pointing a gun at Officer Anderson — would exonerate Lee. That they won’t show it supports the concerns that the tape was doctored and the gun planted.

So the obvious question remains: Why was it “necessary” to shoot Fong Lee three times — in the back of the heel, the buttocks, and in his upper shoulder area — and then fire five shots into his chest as he lay helplessly on his back?

The Eighth Circuit’s opinion says that after he was hit by the fourth or fifth shot, Fong Lee’s weapon flew from his hand. Yet the gun had no blood, no fiber, no fingerprints and no smudges, and it wasn’t turned in as evidence for 72 hours (hence the belief the gun was planted afterwards).

There was never any testimony of this at the trial. (I sat through every day of the trial.) In fact, there was never any examination or evidence presented on the inconsistency on how Fong Lee was first shot in the back while allegedly also pointing the gun at Officer Anderson. This shows the court consisted of three blind men, like the three blind mice, with justice blind to the truth.

The court clearly gave little weight or consideration to any of the arguments for the deceased Fong Lee. In fact, those with understanding of the protocol of the Appellate Court System of the United States know that the judges did not write this opinion. It was done by law clerks, and although it is fervently hoped that the three judges reviewed what was written, it is clear that if they did they did not remember what was presented to them nor remember what they reviewed during a hearing in St. Paul earlier this year.

Is the false “gang member” label and Lee’s Hmong ethnicity what swayed the White jury and establishment judges? Also disturbing is that this same officer, Jason Anderson, is now being identified by his defender and employer (the City of Minneapolis) to be one of the worst peace officers in modern history.

What a difference a year makes. We are asked to accept that, given the two faces of Jason, it was the good Jason killing Fong Lee on July 22, 2006, when we now know that the main face is that of a bad Jason.

Irony does have its place and time, even in the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals. But this is not irony. It is tragedy and a miscarriage of justice.

NOTE: My previous columns archived online about Fong Lee include August 2, 2006, and, in 2009, February 8; April 8 and 22, May 20; June 3, 10 and 24; July 1 and 29; and September 17 and 21. See also my blog entry of April 5, 2009.

Ron hosts "Black Focus" on Channel 17, MTN-TV, Sundays, 5-6 pm. Formerly head of key civil rights organizations, including the Minneapolis Civil Rights Commission and the Urban League, he continues his "watchdog" role for Minneapolis. Order his books at www.BeaconOnTheHill.com; hear his readings and read his solution papers and "web log" at www.TheMinneapolisStory.com.

Posted September 15, 2010, 10:42 a.m.


September 08, 2010 Column #36: Justice still denied in killing of Fong Lee; Appeal decision only perpetuates this tragedy

"Through My Eyes, the Minneapolis Story Continues"
A weekly column by Ron Edwards featured in the Minnesota Spokesman-Recorder

On August 12 the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit demonstrated once again how courts too can be unjust and unlawful. Despite evidence to the contrary, the three-judge panel of Judges Wollman, Smith and Colloton affirmed the decision of a May 2009 all-White St. Paul federal jury that Officer Jason Anderson was justified in killing 19-year-old Fong Lee riding his bicycle on July 22, 2006, an incident detailed in my August 6, 2006 column “Justice is Demanded.”

This case needs to go to the supreme court.

The court’s decision in the matter of the trustees of the heirs and next of kin of Fong Lee vs. Officer Jason Anderson and the City of Minneapolis was published as Case No. 09-2771. My June 10, 2009 column was headed, “Let’s admit it. Some judges are bad.”

It is chilling to know that a policeman with a history of domestic abuse, drug abuse, and public disorder got away with killing Fong Lee with two sets of shots. The first set: in the back. The second set: five times to his chest as he lay helplessly on his back after being spun around and dropped by the first set.

The April 5, 2009 Pioneer Press headline asked the key question: “Is the shooting of Fong Lee at the hands of a cop a story of valor, or deception? Police records are in conflict and raise specter of a plant.”

It is at page 14 of the Eighth Circuit’s opinion where we learn that the court engages in more deception, acting as if there were no conflicting evidence as it cited evidence that was never presented in court (page 14, lines 4-9). If presented, this evidence — the Minneapolis School District tape they claim shows Fong Lee pointing a gun at Officer Anderson — would exonerate Lee. That they won’t show it supports the concerns that the tape was doctored and the gun planted.

So the obvious question remains: Why was it “necessary” to shoot Fong Lee three times — in the back of the heel, the buttocks, and in his upper shoulder area — and then fire five shots into his chest as he lay helplessly on his back?

The Eighth Circuit’s opinion says that after he was hit by the fourth or fifth shot, Fong Lee’s weapon flew from his hand. Yet the gun had no blood, no fiber, no fingerprints and no smudges, and it wasn’t turned in as evidence for 72 hours (hence the belief the gun was planted afterwards).

There was never any testimony of this at the trial. (I sat through every day of the trial.) In fact, there was never any examination or evidence presented on the inconsistency on how Fong Lee was first shot in the back while allegedly also pointing the gun at Officer Anderson. This shows the court consisted of three blind men, like the three blind mice, with justice blind to the truth.

The court clearly gave little weight or consideration to any of the arguments for the deceased Fong Lee. In fact, those with understanding of the protocol of the Appellate Court System of the United States know that the judges did not write this opinion. It was done by law clerks, and although it is fervently hoped that the three judges reviewed what was written, it is clear that if they did they did not remember what was presented to them nor remember what they reviewed during a hearing in St. Paul earlier this year.

Is the false “gang member” label and Lee’s Hmong ethnicity what swayed the White jury and establishment judges? Also disturbing is that this same officer, Jason Anderson, is now being identified by his defender and employer (the City of Minneapolis) to be one of the worst peace officers in modern history.

What a difference a year makes. We are asked to accept that, given the two faces of Jason, it was the good Jason killing Fong Lee on July 22, 2006, when we now know that the main face is that of a bad Jason.

Irony does have its place and time, even in the Eighth Circuit Court of Appeals. But this is not irony. It is tragedy and a miscarriage of justice.

NOTE: My previous columns archived online about Fong Lee include August 2, 2006, and, in 2009, February 8; April 8 and 22, May 20; June 3, 10 and 24; July 1 and 29; and September 17 and 21. See also my blog entry of April 5, 2009.

Ron hosts "Black Focus" on Channel 17, MTN-TV, Sundays, 5-6 pm. Formerly head of key civil rights organizations, including the Minneapolis Civil Rights Commission and the Urban League, he continues his "watchdog" role for Minneapolis. Order his books at www.BeaconOnTheHill.com; hear his readings and read his solution papers and "web log" at www.TheMinneapolisStory.com.

Posted September 15, 2010, 10:40 am


September 01, 2010 Column #35: The Vikings Plantation.No Black Team Leaders?

"Through My Eyes, the Minneapolis Story Continues"
A weekly column by Ron Edwards featured in the Minnesota Spokesman-Recorder

The songs of the south are being sung once again. “Happy Days Are Here Again.” Zip-a-Dee-Doo-Dah.” What a wonderful day. A white leader for a white town: Bret Farve is back to steer the great Viking ship.

But there are some peculiar things happening on deck that raise serious questions about how steady things actually are between the Blacks and Whites of the Great Viking Warship.

This latest round of Black-White unease started a year ago with the treatment of Tavaris Jackson. He was much maligned by the white Twin Cities media and by unidentified sources within the Vikings organization.

It was clear last year that a lot of Viking players went along with the skit. They have agents and those agents are here to protect them and their livelihood. But it is quite obvious that there are some Vikings that didn’t think it was a funny sequel when Act II of the “No Bret Favre Show” began in late July with training camp.

The hidden plays could not disguise the uneasiness on the Great Vikings Ship. Earlier in the year, Adrian Peterson, the outstanding running back for the Vikings, concerned with the preferential treatment some received, did not show up for Minicamp.

On August 5th, in a Star Tribune headline entitled, “Just another day in Favreville” we were given a glimpse into what Bret was thinking down in Hattiesburgh Mississippi, while his team mates toiled under the sun and humidity of Mankato.

And then a peculiar Star Triune headline appeared on Aug 14, “Harvin situation takes another turn” in which we learn that the Vikings handed Harvin “a five day warning letter”. This is a young man fighting migraine headaches, who lost his Grandmother July 2nd. The Vikings responded by ordering him to report to Training Camp immediately or face being declared ineligible to play in the 2010 season (and thus not be paid).

We now find out that Percy Harvin, four days after reporting, suffered a serious medical condition that caused him to be hospitalized under Doctor’s care. So much for the health of a Black athlete. By the way, Bret didn’t get a five day letter; instead, he got a $7 million raise, after having said money was not an issue.

The Vikings greatest insult? Telling the Minnesota Vikings, of whom ¾ are Black, in essence, that it was white folks business to convince the great Bret Favre to return to the great Viking ship. How? By sending three white “team leaders” to cajole Bret to return.

The suggestion is clear. The Willamses, Brian McKinney, Adrian Peterson, EJ Henderson, and Antoine Winfield, are not leaders on this team. Yet they are very respected leaders in the locker room. No black players were even offered the opportunity to be a part of “will you please come back Bret” showtime performance in the deep south of Hattiesburg, Mississippi.

We hear a lot of rhetoric in professional sports about cohesion and unity and mission of purpose, but in 2010, the Vikings organization’s leaders kicked all of that to the curb when they said, this is white man’s business; blacks not need apply to come along.

This does not bode well for a season of success. The result of these ugly naked facts and truth will be the rolling out of the Vikings’ propaganda squad. So we’ll hear that this black player or that black player was asked to go along on the flight to Hattiesburg. But if is true, who were they, and why did they decline?

And why were we told it wasn’t an issue of money when it is clear that Bret and his agent were extremely shrewd and held out for the big bump of $7 million? How does that make the Williamses and Adrian Peterson and Winfield, who stretched the endurance of their bodies last year to get to the Super Bowl, which they missed by a heart beat?

And what about Percy Harvin, a young man who gave his all to the Vikings organization? Before he collapsed on the field he too had been much maligned inside the Vikings organization and by the white media here in the Twin Cities. There seems to be no consideration given the fact that he was in medical danger and could have been fatally disabled.

No, my friends, the great Vikings ship has a terrible divide based on Black and White not being treated the same. Who do you think is in the galley and who do you think is on deck? Stay tuned.

Ron hosts "Black Focus" on Channel 17, MTN-TV, Sundays, 5-6 pm. Formerly head of key civil rights organizations, including the Minneapolis Civil Rights Commission and the Urban League, he continues his "watchdog" role for Minneapolis. Order his books at www.BeaconOnTheHill.com; hear his readings and read his solution papers and "web log" at www.TheMinneapolisStory.com.

Posted September 15, 2010, 12:35 am


August 25, 2010 Column #34: The Whitest Professional Sport in America: Golf

"Through My Eyes, the Minneapolis Story Continues"
A weekly column by Ron Edwards featured in the Minnesota Spokesman-Recorder

When a young Tiger Woods emerged on the golf scene ten years ago, we all had a dream that by 2010, a small legion of African American golfers, both male and female, would be on the professional circuits. Yet at the completion of the PGA tournament two Sundays ago in Wisconsin, in a tournament that ended in controversy, the chilling reality could not be dismissed: on both the Seniors Tour and the Professional Golf Association Tour, there are a total of only two African Americans, Tiger Woods on the PGA tour and Jim Dent on the seniors tour.

I call your attention to the 3M tournament 3 weeks ago, in which the only African American was the legendary Jim Dent. Some white commentators would have you believe that the African American involvement and play on the field of competition began with Charlie Siffert in the 1950 and 1960s. But that’s not true.

The record shows that in 1896, John Shippen became the first Black to play in the U.S. Open, and in 1899, African American George Grant invented the golf tee. So here is a quick run down of key African American players, even after the sport was purposefully segregated to prevent inclusion and participation:

George Adams, 1925
Rhonda Fowler, 1935
Bill Powell, 1946
Theodore Roads, 1948
Ann Gregory, 1950
Harold Dunovant, 1954
Charlie Siffert, 1962
Althea Gibson, 1963
Pete Brown, 1964
Renee Powell, 1967
Lee Elder, 1975

The contribution of those named above are part of a wide ranging assortment of contributions to the game of golf:

The great boxing champion, Joe Louis, after Theodore Roads filed the civil rights law suit against the PGA, personally, out of his own pocket, sponsored at least five of the top Black golfers in America, who began to compete on the professional links. It took fourteen years, but Charlie Siffert finally became the first African American to play for the big money.

Tiger Woods has single handedly increased the revenue for professional golfers, but if it had not been for Joe Louis, in 1948, coming up with the plan and committing the dollars, there would have been no Charlie Siffert, no Pete Brown, no Rene Powell, no Ann Gregory, and there would have been no Tiger Woods. Sometimes it helps to remember history, to remember who you were, how you got here, and if you can keep stepping.

There is a reason that golf has become America’s whitest professional sport. Commentators, both Black and white, fearful of losing their prestigious jobs and salaries, are told not to talk about it. And a lot of it today has to do with the well coordinated attacks and denunciations of a man called Tiger Woods who has done all he can to stop us from totally returning to an era of total and absolute segregation in professional golf, both male and female.

Do you realize, my friends, that there are more Blacks, African American and Afro Canadien, playing professional hockey than those playing as card carrying members of the Professional Golf Association of America, by a 25 - 1 ratio.

I can remember a time in this country when folks would say Blacks would never play professional hockey. That, of course, is another story for another column. But that does not take away from the fact that pro golf has become the whitest sport in white America?

Ron hosts "Black Focus" on Channel 17, MTN-TV, Sundays, 5-6 pm. Formerly head of key civil rights organizations, including the Minneapolis Civil Rights Commission and the Urban League, he continues his "watchdog" role for Minneapolis. Order his books at www.BeaconOnTheHill.com; hear his readings and read his solution papers and "web log" at www.TheMinneapolisStory.com.

Posted September 15, 2010, 12:25 a.m.


August 18, 2010 Column #33: Receivership: a fresh start for Minneapolis public schools. Less drastic measures have failed

"Through My Eyes, the Minneapolis Story Continues"
A weekly column by Ron Edwards featured in the Minnesota Spokesman-Recorder

“No Child Left Behind school failures ease up in Minnesota” was the headline above a Wednesday, August 11 Star Tribune story. Given our annual rite of school failure reports, this came as no surprise. [See reader comments.]

Of the three largest school districts in the state — Anoka County, St. Paul and Minneapolis — 19 Minneapolis schools are failures, none in Anoka, and only one in St. Paul. Statewide, a whopping 46 percent of schools (1,048 schools) did not meet student performance targets of the No Child Left Behind federal program. This is celebrated with “easing up”?

That 19 failing Minneapolis public schools need restructuring is staggering, stunning and tragic. Our school district, once famous for its high level of standards and achievement, has become the most infamous school district in the United States, proportionally worse than New Orleans, New York and Chicago.

There is no other way to say it: Our public schools and our public officials continually let down our kids and our community. Do the words “criminal” and “immoral” apply?

From the article we can only conclude that the editors of the Star Tribune obviously consider poor quality education for minorities no problem; a good education for minorities is not their priority.

We “hear” the usual deafening silence also from our so-called leading minority organizations, the NAACP and the Urban League. We ask them, is there an area more important for our future than quality education for our kids?

It was further disconcerting to read in the Star Tribune story that the schools’ director of research, evaluation and assessment attempted to whitewash this disaster by putting the blame on the students, saying it serves no purpose to fire principals and shift staff around because this failure is really driven by high poverty and language barriers.

That is absurd when you think about the hundreds of millions of dollars that this school district has received and spent in general, and the hundreds of millions it has spent specifically for special education.

So who isn’t getting the job done, the students or the professional educators? I address this problem each year. I don’t look at good intentions. I look at bad results.

In Chapter 7 (The Corrupt and Racist School System) of my 2002 book, I wrote: “Poor schools for poor kids to keep them poor: Clubbing the Cubs into inferiority and helplessness.” In columns since then I have called for a stop to the clubbing, calling instead for teaching skills, competencies, thinking, and the values of lifelong learning, optimism and hope.

For example, my April 25, 2007 column refers to “MPS educational genocide,” and the “plans that threaten the Black community” rather than enhancing it. And my October 7, 2009 column asks “the ‘Big 7’ (DFL, NAACP, Urban League, mayor, city council, governor, state legislature) when will they stop closing schools for Blacks while opening schools for Whites?” My February 3, 2010 column asked, “When will the Board of Education become concerned about the future of the African American community’s children?”

Republican Governor Tim Pawlenty has expressed concern about the downward trend of education failure in Minnesota, and talked of invoking state law to place districts like Minneapolis in State receivership. This would mean dissolving the school board and the office of the superintendent, making staff reapply, and appointing a special master or special administrator to run the school district.

This was done 30 years ago in New York City, as children were being violated by not being educated. So why not receivership in Minneapolis?

When legislators talked about receivership, were they serious or merely throwing a bone to the parents while cowering in obeisance of the state’s powerful teachers federation that donates so much to their campaigns to get elected and re-elected?

What about the concerns of parents convinced that if you are a child of color in the Minneapolis public schools you are targeted to fail? When the director of research and evaluation and assessment says that it is the students’ fault for living in poverty, or not having an excellent command of the White king’s English, he blames education’s victims.

It is clear that this school district continues to prefer the status quo, neither seeking answers nor desiring solutions. The only thing that they seem able to do is to pursue failure (and be well paid for it). Some pray the 19 schools will get a fresh start, restructure and succeed, but prayers are not going to get the job done.

The children deserve better. Everything else has failed. What besides placing this school district in receivership will provide a fresh start?

Stay tuned.

Ron hosts "Black Focus" on Channel 17, MTN-TV, Sundays, 5-6 pm. Formerly head of key civil rights organizations, including the Minneapolis Civil Rights Commission and the Urban League, he continues his "watchdog" role for Minneapolis. Order his books at www.BeaconOnTheHill.com; hear his readings and read his solution papers and "web log" at www.TheMinneapolisStory.com.

Posted Friday, August 20, 2010, 12:55 a.m.


August 11, 2010 Column #32: Disparities study long overdue in Minneapolis.Documents reveal City’s dereliction of duty

"Through My Eyes, the Minneapolis Story Continues"
A weekly column by Ron Edwards featured in the Minnesota Spokesman-Recorder

Civil rights has always been about redressing historical discrimination and the denial of access and opportunities to descendents of slaves. Two of the great areas of discrimination have been and remain in the areas of education and jobs. This column is about the disparity study the City is required to make to guard against discrimination in jobs and its failure to do so.

The last disparity study was in 1997, when African American Mayor Sharon Sayles Belton insisted the required study be done. The study was expanded to also include Hennepin and Ramsey Counties.

The study was completed under the civil rights departments of the two Twin Cities. In Minneapolis, it was under the tenacious supervision of Richard “Dickie” Kelly, then contract compliance director for the Minneapolis Civil Rights Department.

Eight years later, in 2005, the City of Minneapolis mayor, R.T. Rybak, though warned that required disparity studies had not been conducted, failed to conduct one, even though then-Minneapolis Civil Rights Director Jane Kalifa appropriated $300,000 for a study.

As I have previously reported, a firm in Austin, Texas was contracted to conduct a study and report. Of course, as of the writing of this column there is still no such disparity report. Instead, the Economic Policy Institute has reported that Minneapolis ranks as the #1 city in America in the area of job discrimination by race. (See my June 23, 2010 column, “Shameful Black unemployment gap in Minneapolis gets silent treatment.”)

What we have received is the political trickery of the City and its civil rights department, pretending they monitored the construction of the U of M Gophers’ TCF Stadium, the U of M Children’s Hospital, and the MLB Twins Target Field.

When the Minneapolis Civil Rights Department, on June 12, 2008, acting as an agent for the City of Minneapolis, sent a document identified as “Notice of Dismissal,” I could see the game they were playing, as in the document they admitted that they actually had “no jurisdiction” to review the above-noted three projects, and didn’t even have the authority to be on the properties.

By its own hand, as seen in specific court rulings cited at the end of this column, the Minneapolis Civil Rights Department has demonstrated its own dereliction of duty and malfeasance in office. The Civil Rights Department had no authority to monitor these projects and it knew it.

Yet, so far, no disparity study report. As the courts have declared, the City has no power over the State unless the State specifically gives it in words “so plain, clear and unmistakable as to the intent.”

In fact, in a document identified as “Answers to the charge of discrimination,” File # A6392-BS-1F-7, the Minneapolis Civil Rights Department admitted that it had no jurisdiction whatsoever to even review an examination of hiring at the three projects previously mentioned. At p. 3 of the document submitted September 4, 2007, attorneys for Mortenson and the Ballpark Authority reinforced the non-jurisdictional position of the Minneapolis Civil Rights Department, although it was not conveyed as part of the dismissal of the Discrimination Complaint until June 2008.

This documents states, “…the City would be acting outside of its jurisdiction in attempting to enforce statutory obligations whose monitoring is assigned by the legislature to the AG of the State of Minnesota.”

In other words, during meetings of the Ballpark Authority in 2007 and up to June 2008, all parties knew that the civil rights department had no jurisdiction. Attorney General Swanson had appointed a deputy attorney general to do the monitoring.

No document or correspondence has been put forth from the Attorney General of the State of Minnesota indicating legislation had allowed waiving the State’s jurisdictional authority and statutory authority in monitoring U of M TCF Stadium, U of M Children’s Hospital, and, specifically, the Twins Target Field.

Absent any such authorization, we again raise several questions: Where did the numbers come from, as there is no submitted report? Who audited the numbers?

Who certified the numbers? And who takes legal responsibility for the numbers?

The documents of Sept. 4, 2007, and June 12, 2008, show that a fraud has been perpetrated upon the citizens of Minneapolis, especially people of color.

We openly request the attorney general open a criminal investigation of this outrageous violation of Minnesota law which has impacted the lives and families and children of those thus discriminated against.

This long-term discrimination in jobs is another contributor to young men standing on street corners instead of working.

Referenced court rulings include: Welsh vs. City of Orono 355 NW 2nd 117 and 120, MN 1984; City of Minneapolis vs. UM 356 NW 2nd, 841 MN Court of Appeals 1984; and MN statute 645.27 in 2008.

Ron hosts "Black Focus" on Channel 17, MTN-TV, Sundays, 5-6 pm. Formerly head of key civil rights organizations, including the Minneapolis Civil Rights Commission and the Urban League, he continues his "watchdog" role for Minneapolis. Order his books at www.BeaconOnTheHill.com; hear his readings and read his solution papers and "web log" at www.TheMinneapolisStory.com.

Posted Wednesday, August 11, 2010, 7:45 a.m.


August 04, 2010 Column #31: So much for Operation CeasefireHomicide within two hours of crime reduction meeting

"Through My Eyes, the Minneapolis Story Continues"
A weekly column by Ron Edwards featured in the Minnesota Spokesman-Recorder

The Minneapolis part of the National League of Cities 2009 Report, “The State of City Leadership for Children and Families,” tells us that “Mayor R.T. Rybak has successfully reframed the youth violence issue through an extensive process of planning.” Thus it is that Minneapolis wants to treat youth violence as a public health issue,” “a virus,” and use Chicago’s “Ceasefire” program as the cure.

Thus does Minneapolis turn its back on education and jobs for minority youth and young adults, enabling the gentrification to continue which displaces inner city Blacks from Minneapolis, further diluting the city’s Black voting pool.

When I made the announcement on my TV Program, Sunday, July 25th, that a meeting was to take place on Wednesday July 28th, at Urban Ventures Headquarters, I already knew much of the history of Chicago’s Operation Ceasefire that was presented at that meeting. I attended the meeting. I sadly report that I have indeed been on target about “planning,” as they have been more about hype than hope, with policies that will either have African Americans again riding in the back of the bus or have us thrown under the bus.

And then, for further confirmation, two and a half hours later, another African American youth was gunned down, just 50 yards from where the Ceasefire meeting took place. This was déjà vu again. for when the city held meetings in June 2006, I wrote in my June 21, 2006 column: “blocks away…shots were being fired and African American youth were being wounded.”

All of us support the goals of ending violence in our community, especially the Black on Black killings by our young men. As I wrote in this column June 21, 2006, the mistake then, as now, was/is “labeling this a Black problem, as this was ‘a gang and crime problem’. Recall history: when John Dillenger and other white gangs headquartered in St. Paul in the 1930s, they didn't call it a ‘white problem,’ but a gang and crime problem.”

Operation Ceasefire as a “public health” problem is merely another jobs program for white and Black “professional leaders” who are not out to solve the problem (that would end their jobs) but to maintain it, to “reduce” the incidents of violence, not “prevent” them.

What is needed, as I have written for the past seven years in this column, and in my books, is education that leads to jobs all the while “keeping our eyes on the prize.” By calling violence a public health problem, likened to a virus, neither victims nor perpetrators nor city officials have to take responsibility for the incidents, as the “professionals” keep their jobs by containing the problem that then maintains their jobs, not eliminating the problem that would then eliminate their jobs.

Ceasefire Chicago is an offshoot of the original Operation Ceasefire program in Boston, which concentrates on crime deterrence as well as reduction. The Chicago version just concentrates on reduction, following the public health metaphor. In October 2008, The John F. Finn Institute For Public Safety reported that Ceasefire claims that “violence can be interrupted” by “treating it the same way as polio, smallpox, and HIV/AIDS,” by “interrupting” it “as you would fight tuberculosis” and, thus, find who is “infectious and stop the transmission”. As Dr. Gary Slutkin, Ceasefire Chicago founder says, “The longer-term aim, like treating AIDS, is to change the behavior of the whole group so that shooting (like unsafe sex) becomes unacceptable in the peer group, even gang communities” (see “CeaseFire-Chicago, A Synopsis”).

As I wrote March 1, 2006 what is ignored is “the correlation of social ills like deliberate institutionalized (purposeful) poor education, purposeful blocks to economic opportunity, and purposeful racism, official actions that can deteriorate the mental state of mind of a human being.”

In my August 16, 2006 column, I offered an invitation to the Mayor “to talk about a long term plan to clean up the North side of gangs, including education, jobs and housing. The city was supposed to put a plan together last March with the PCRC, but the Mayor refused.”
As I wrote, October 11, 2006: “It remains our goal that all in Minneapolis be invited to sit at the Minneapolis Table. When we do that, we demonstrate our capacity to soothe pain, to foster dignity, and to dredge up goodwill … and still be gracious and accepting of one another as we keep our eye on the prize and remain true to the dream.”

Also see my columns of May 10, 2006, and July 5, 2006, and November 22, 2006.

Ron hosts "Black Focus" on Channel 17, MTN-TV, Sundays, 5-6 pm. Formerly head of key civil rights organizations, including the Minneapolis Civil Rights Commission and the Urban League, he continues his "watchdog" role for Minneapolis. Order his books at www.BeaconOnTheHill.com; hear his readings and read his solution papers and "web log" at www.TheMinneapolisStory.com.

Posted Wednesday, August 4, 2010, 3:18 a.m.


July 28, 2010 Column #30: What happened to due process in the trashing of Shirley Sherrod?

"Through My Eyes, the Minneapolis Story Continues"
A weekly column by Ron Edwards featured in the Minnesota Spokesman-Recorder


Shirley Sherrod went from accused “racist” to recognized race healer and justice fighter in less than a week as condemnations gave way to profuse apologies, affecting journalism, race relations, and presidential understanding.

All this was due to a three-minute audio clip edited from a 33-minute speech that Shirley Sharrod, serving as U.S. Department of Agriculture director of rural programs for the State of Georgia, gave at the scholarship dinner of the Douglass County, Georgia, chapter of the NAACP. She delivered a simple message to the young recipients of the Excellent Achievement Award — move beyond race — using her motto “Let’s work together” to get beyond racial division, as the real issue is poverty, working yet poor.

She did so by giving testimony to her own journey to get beyond a Black-only race focus after her father’s murder by a White farmer when she was 17 (no charges were brought against the shooter), to involving all with the goal to work for change, recognizing the importance of working for a new South, a new direction, a new purpose, and new relationships for all.

Last week that humble and confessional inspirational speech was twisted by left and right media to make her a “racist,” callously abandoning due process and its inquiring search for truth. Shirley Sherrod was accused by Fox News and CNN, by conservative bloggers and Tea Partyers, as well as by the Department of Agriculture where she worked and by the White House, the NAACP, and the Congressional Black Caucus, of purposefully not fully helping a White farmer 24
years ago.

By the time the apologies came, the devil that defines others as “divisive” was again out of the bottle. The president was not served well by his staff. Even though the Fifth and 14th amendments of our Constitution guarantee “due process” and the “rule of law” to help guarantee the principles of “liberty” and “justice,” these were, at first, denied her.

They picked on a woman they did not know had spent 40 years fighting injustice. She joins the legacy circle of Mary McLeod Bethune, Marian Anderson, Rosa Parks, and Minnesota’s own beloved Nellie Stone Johnson.

Instead of offering her due process, U.S. Department of Agriculture Undersecretary Cook called her and ordered her to pull over to the side of the road (she was driving back to Albany, GA) and use her cell phone to text in her resignation.

All this due to a three-minute tape edited out of context from a 33-minute speech. No one called her or the farmers in the story to check.

Nor had they listened to the full speech, actually one of the most compelling and honest descriptions of the importance for Whites and Blacks coming together. In that speech the entire world hears Sherrod for who she really is, a tireless veteran of four decades fighting in the cause of civil rights.

In that March 2010 speech, she told her story of rising above the heartache of being made fatherless at 17 and of her mother left as a widow to raise five young girls and an infant baby boy. She told of the extraordinary strength of her beloved mother, who was later the first Black elected official in the history of Baker County, Georgia. She talked of the strength of her four sisters and her brother.

In that March 2010 speech she talked about her transformation after her father’s murder and of her experience in 1986 involving a White farmer named Roger Spooner and his wife. Her efforts helped save the Spooner’s 3,000-acre farm.

The TV interviewers finally showed up to ask questions of the White farmer’s widow and were surprised to find him very much alive, as both Mr. and Mrs. Spooner expressed their admiration and respect for and friendship with Shirley Sherrod. As the truth finally forced the “gotcha” journalists, left and right, to pull back, the world sees the real Shirley Sherrod: a 62-year-old African American woman who, for 40 years, has dedicated her life to the have nots, a woman committed to the working poor whether White or Black.

That poverty, she says, is the real issue — not race.

So first and foremost in this tragedy, Sherrod was denied due process. No one asked for and checked the facts. Secondly, her superiors denounced her and called for her termination. They sought to strip her of her job and, more tragically, sully her reputation, question her integrity, and dismiss her achievements just to score he-said-she-said political points.

Shirley Sherrod continues the legacy of women who neither bend nor break while defending civil rights. May her accusers show concern for today’s real problems: jobs, low wages, worker poverty, and sons and husbands dying in far-off wars as well as on our city streets.

May God bless Shirley Sherrod and her family, and may there be an honest examination of the rush-to-judgment denial of her due process.

Ron hosts "Black Focus" on Channel 17, MTN-TV, Sundays, 5-6 pm. Formerly head of key civil rights organizations, including the Minneapolis Civil Rights Commission and the Urban League, he continues his "watchdog" role for Minneapolis. Order his books at www.BeaconOnTheHill.com; hear his readings and read his solution papers and "web log" at www.TheMinneapolisStory.com.

Posted Tuesday, August 3, 2010, 1:48 p.m.


July 21, 2010 Column #29: Fairway Foundation gets it done.When will the NAACP get it done?

"Through My Eyes, the Minneapolis Story Continues"
A weekly column by Ron Edwards featured in the Minnesota Spokesman-Recorder

I was in Kansas City, Missouri, last week, where I was an honored guest of the Fairway Foundation at the annual Alvin Brooks Classic Junior Golf Tournament. They use the game of golf to mentor Minnesota's at-risk youth, 7-18, “by instilling the values inherent in the game of golf: honesty, self-reliance, sportsmanship and integrity,” as last year.

On the other side of town, the NAACP held its annual meeting, an organization that dishonored itself by expelling me for writing about how it colors the truth and devalues integrity. The title of my book’s Chapter 14, notes that Black organizations are “…part of the Problem Rather than the Solution, As They Move Toward White-Like Black-Elite Rule For Spoils Not Principles And Sell Out Inner city Black Community Interests: Education, Housing, Jobs, Dignity and Recognition.”

For over 20 years, the Fairway Foundation, run by David Goodlow, his wife Francis, and their son Erik, has accomplished much for young African Americans. The foundation leaders lay to rest the stereotype that Black Americans can’t get it done. Father and son and their staff have put together one of the most comprehensive programs in the country for youth golf committed to enabling African American youth to be a part of “a seat for everyone” through equal access and equal opportunity to play golf.

The Alvin Brooks Classic was played, as it is each year, over two days on two separate courses despite a Kansas City heat index registering between 107 and 114 degrees on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday, July 12, 13 and 14. Despite the heat, it was a fascinating sight.

The tournament is racially mixed, with 85 percent of the participants being African American youth. It was a joy to watch these young men and women from Texas, Oklahoma, Kansas, Colorado, Nebraska, Missouri, Iowa, Illinois and, of course, Minnesota.

Once again the Fairway Foundation had the largest contingent of participants as well as the largest group of parents accompanying these young men and women on this joyous and productive bus trip down to Kansas City and back.

So again, congratulations to the Fairway Foundation and to the participants, who are involved not only in golf and recreation, but also in academic development. This, in fact, is one of the reasons why Mr. Goodlow and his son were asked to take over the golf program at one of St. Paul’s most prestigious high schools, and why it will soon have a permanent home at the Highland National Golf Course.

Seventy years ago, Black players were not permitted to play with Whites, which makes me wonder when the NAACP will put aside its race card, quit crying victim, celebrate Ivy League-educated couples that have gotten it done (like attorneys President Barack and Michelle Obama and Rhodes Scholar NAACP President Ben Jealous and his attorney wife Lia Epperson), work to bring the rest of our African American inner-city communities to the mountain top with them, and stop allowing a few tokens to pass as winning the prize of integration — to stop talking the walk and, as the Fairway Foundation does, actually walk the talk.

Because of the negative publicity about Tiger Woods, one of the great legends of the game, there has been a backlash. Those of us in the African American community know and understand that. It doesn’t make it right, but it is in play. That does not take away from the value being done by organizations like the Fairway Foundation that bring youth to this tournament, one of the most prestigious in America.

The NAACP could “birdie” inner-city problems and hit “holes in one” regarding education and jobs and again attain relevance and significance by accepting the plan for the future that I outlined in 10 suggestions for the NAACP Board to consider in my July 2007 column, which were laid out in extended detail in my Blog entry of June 8, 2007 and "Solution" paper of July 8, 2007.

As one liberal publication this month put it, the problem is not Tea Parties but the single-party rule backed by the NAACP in our inner cities. It has become the supporter of the exclusiveness today that it fought yesterday. As it supports the “regressive and diversionary” tactics it accuses the Tea Parties of, the NAACP becomes, as one liberal publication put it last week, the National Association for the Advancement of Cynical Politics.

Stay tuned.

Ron hosts "Black Focus" on Channel 17, MTN-TV, Sundays, 5-6 pm. Formerly head of key civil rights organizations, including the Minneapolis Civil Rights Commission and the Urban League, he continues his "watchdog" role for Minneapolis. Order his books at www.BeaconOnTheHill.com; hear his readings and read his solution papers and "web log" at www.TheMinneapolisStory.com.

Posted August 3, 12:10 p.m.


July 14, 2010 Column #28: Please! We need help here!

"Through My Eyes, the Minneapolis Story Continues"
A weekly column by Ron Edwards featured in the Minnesota Spokesman-Recorder

A plea for help doesn’t necessarily have to be confined to the person or group making it. Sometimes it is a plea for the common good and common interest. That is what this column is about.

Two more senseless homicides over the Fourth of July: See recent Strib headlines “16-year-old becomes city's 26th homicide victim” (North Minneapolis) and “downtown Mpls. stabbing death” of a middle-aged African American male (on Hennepin Avenue, the most traveled avenue in Minnesota).

We need help, Black and White together. Some are too bashful or too proud to ask; others too stubborn; and yet others are so defeated they can’t allow themselves to care.

But the Black community does care. We may be shell-shocked by the shootings and homicides in our community, but we care. And so the heartbreak, the sorrow, the tears, the dreams shattered by young deaths tell us that regardless of why we hesitate, we must ask for help.

As a journalist, activist and community member, I ask that our city, which prides itself on being able to get things done on its own — stadiums, towers of commerce and residency, arts projects, and events like the Aquatennial — transform Minnesota Nice into Minnesota Caring. The movers and shakers with wherewithal and influence, White and Black, must step up to address this violence and implement existing plans for dealing with it.

Why do those who could make a difference stay silent? I don’t want to believe that the mayor, city council, corporate community, and state officials don’t care about the sons and daughters of the African, but what else can I conclude if they won’t implement existing plans?

If you stood with me on Sunday, July 4, and saw the heartache and heartbreak of the friends of 16-year-old Anthony Titus, you too would be deeply moved. How many more funerals will we have to have? How many more emergency-room experiences will be required? How much more can we absorb?

In Chicago a week ago, the homicide toll reached 290. Some would say the Minneapolis count, 26 or 30 depending on whose counting, pales by comparison. But that, my friends, would not be true; for given that Chicago has nearly three million people and we have but a third of one million, we are close to Chicago’s homicide percentage rate.

But the only number that counts to a parent is one. To a mother or father, the shattering heartache of the taking of one son’s or daughter’s life is no less important than 100.

So, whether Minneapolis or Chicago, St. Louis or Portland, pain and heartbreak is still felt. We need help. Elected and appointed officials and leaders must exercise their responsibility and step up to the plate. They have plans in their desk drawers. It is time to implement them.

Just hours before the writing of this column, I heard a tragic, sobering story of an activist so anguished he talked last Wednesday of being burned out, of wanting to take his own life just to get away from the pressure of homicides, to get away from the anguish and despair resulting from senseless deaths, the tearing apart of families, and the shattering of dreams. Despite walking these streets for 50 years, I still find the pain of saying “welcome to the club” is great.

We are at a dangerous point for Whites as well as Blacks. We are each others’ burden. What is happening in our streets reminds me of the Book of Violence and the fear I sense that there is no final chapter, no end to the book, no end to the heartbreak and personal devastation that goes with it.
As we pause to reflect on the African Americans who have lost their lives to violence in this city, we must have the courage to ask what the final chapter to this tragic sequel will be for both Blacks and Whites, as this is about the safety and sanity of Whites as well as Blacks. Mary McLeod Bethune, longtime friend of Eleanor Roosevelt since 1920 and tireless seeker after justice and integration of the races, wrote: “I will not rest while there is a single Negro boy or girl without a chance to prove his worth.”

If we have the courage and tenacity of our forebears, who stood firmly like a rock against the lash of slavery, we shall find a way to do for our day what they did for theirs.

Stay tuned.

Ron hosts "Black Focus" on Channel 17, MTN-TV, Sundays, 5-6 pm. Formerly head of key civil rights organizations, including the Minneapolis Civil Rights Commission and the Urban League, he continues his "watchdog" role for Minneapolis. Order his books at www.BeaconOnTheHill.com; hear his readings and read his solution papers and "web log" at www.TheMinneapolisStory.com.

Posted Wed, 8-4-10, 3:40 a.m.


July 07, 2010 Column #27: Whose mental health issues incite Black violence?It’s not poor Blacks propagating dysfunctional social policies

"Through My Eyes, the Minneapolis Story Continues"
A weekly column by Ron Edwards featured in the Minnesota Spokesman-Recorder

The Wednesday, June 30 Star Tribune headline said this of Monday, June 28: “Seven hours, seven victims in North Minneapolis.” Subhead: “Despite a sobering night on the North Side, the number of shootings hasn't risen dramatically this year,” with the rate being “the same as two years ago.”

The Strib left off the headline it meant but didn’t print: “Black violence in the community is due to Black mental health problems.”
Seven victims aged four years old to 18. Does the Strib’s comment on the rate set a new standard of acceptable violence as long as the victims are Black?

And is this new “standard” why North Minneapolis Fourth Precinct Inspector Mike Martin stated that “the city was as safe now as it was at anytime in the last 10 years,” even with this “Shoot-’em-up Monday” drama?

I was called to the scenes and visited three of the five sites of the shootings. Another statistic is this: an average of one fire truck, one ambulance, and at least eight police cars at each site. This was the scene at 4 pm at 2301 Sheridan North, at 5:50 pm at Glenwood, at 9:05 pm at 2651 Newton Avenue North, at 9:25 pm along the 3300 block of Dupont Avenue North, and at 10:20 pm at 1400 Oliver Avenue North.

During that evening, shots rang out throughout the North Side. How many others were shot at or were shot and wounded but didn’t report it? Despite the presence of emergency and police vehicles and yellow tape, we saw no presence of White media.

And nothing in the Strib Tuesday about these shootings. Now you tell me what’s going on.

Why did the White press take so long to report? I remember John Williams’ 1967 novel The Man Who Cried I Am, about a journalist’s knowledge of the King Alfred Plan for annihilating all people of African origin. I wrote of this in an earlier column (May 4, 2005) on what I called the Minneapolis King Arthur Plan of 1972, when the late Judge Lindsay Arthur proposed a plan, therapeutic in nature, an “of course” plan, in which Judge Arthur called for the quarantining of African Americans in Hennepin County in fenced camps.

Shocked? Questioning if this is true? Then go back through newspaper archives for the stories on the Arthur Plan and ask, of then and of now, what is “truth” and what is “fiction,” and ponder when fiction like Williams’ is used to expose the truth.

It would appear that removing Blacks is foundational in Minneapolis, no matter how long it takes. Is this also the foundational idea of the folks at the closed meeting at the United Way last week where it discussed how to deal quickly with what they claim are mental health problems that result in violence in the Black community?

Why were there no Black presenters? Why were there few if any Black professionals in attendance? This should raise red flags for all of us.

These Whites see violence in the Black community as a Black mental health issue rather than as what it actually is, their mental health issues of White racist denial of funds for education and job training, as they deny the education and jobs that are needed for equal access and equal opportunity.

Instead, these “progressive” Whites focus on Black childhood education and early Black childhood indoctrination, reminiscent of plantation life in the antebellum South, as their way of “solving” Black mental health problems.

Why call Black violence mental illness and leave untouched the far greater problem of White violence? We are dealing primarily with social policy developed by educated White people, not social policy developed by poor, uneducated Black people.

At this meeting at the United Way, it was announced that the State of Minnesota is considering creating an Office and Department of Early Child Development. To give it power, the plan is to disempower existing nonprofits that deal with people of color by reducing their funding, putting the State of Minnesota’s evaluation services in their place by early 2011.

This is but the 21st century version of Whites accepting “The White Man’s Burden,” rescuing us by taking our babies and indoctrinating them against us as they target our children and babies and Black single heads of households.

Give your state representative a call and ask to be brought up to speed on this new and aggressive program to indoctrinate the youngest of our people. Remember, my friends, this is how genocide begins.

Stay tuned.

Ron hosts "Black Focus" on Channel 17, MTN-TV, Sundays, 5-6 pm. Formerly head of key civil rights organizations, including the Minneapolis Civil Rights Commission and the Urban League, he continues his "watchdog" role for Minneapolis. Order his books at www.BeaconOnTheHill.com; hear his readings and read his solution papers and "web log" at www.TheMinneapolisStory.com.

Posted July 8, 2010, 12:24 a.m.


Ron hosts “Black Focus” on Channel 17, MTN-TV, Sundays, 5-6 pm. Formerly head of the Minneapolis Civil Rights Commission and the Urban League, he continues his “watchdog” role for Minneapolis. Order his book, hear his voice, read his solution papers, and read his between columns “web log” at www.TheMinneapolisStory.com.

Permission is granted to reproduce The Minneapolis Story columns, blog entires and solution papers. Please cite the Minnesota Spokesman-Recorder and www.TheMinneapolisStory.com for the columns. Please cite www.TheMinneapolisStory.com for blog entries and solution papers.

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