"Words that make actions speak louder."
The debate over health care reform has taken a particularly worrisome turn. Suddenly we’re in a place where passing something kind of like reform may be more important than getting to reform itself. In the name of "compromise" and in interest of getting something passed, we could get a health reform bill that helps fewer […]
In my house, we take a deep breath before calling or answering a call from Detroit. My spouse’s family live in the suburbs of Detroit, and all work in the auto-industry. The headlines we read every day are one thing, but the real day-to-day impact of the news reported literally hits home. This morning, America […]
Coming to terms with race and resolving racial disparity in America feels like an insurmountable, unfinished task, because it is unfinished. The work was started and abandoned, started and abandoned many times by generations before us. But it’s only insurmountable to the degree that we tell ourselves the work is finished – or "finished enough"- […]
As a parent, I’m familiar with the powerful effect that even the threat of a “change in policy” can have on behavior. It can bring troublesome, annoying, or even hazardous behavior to an abrupt end. That change in behavior suggests two things: that behavior could have been changed voluntarily all along, and that a permanent […]
Now, what did he do that for? That was my first thought when our newly-minted attorney general reached for his own rhetorical handful of elephant, as in the previous examples. Not because I thought he was wrong, but because he was saying what was virtually unsayable to a country still basking in, and congratulating itself […]
In many ways, the discussion of race in America, particularly as it relates to today’s issues (the economy, health care, education), brings to mind the parable of the blind men and the elephant. Different people have a firm grasp on part of the truth in the middle of the room — be it the tail, […]
National Urban League head Mark Morial recently described the state of black America today as “the best of times and the worst of times.” He’s right. The inauguration of the first African-American president was a moment worth celebrating as an undeniable example of the progress we’ve made regarding race. Many African-Americans from communities across the […]
Many people — including the president himself — have mentioned the absurdity of judging Obama’s success at cleaning up messes that were decades in the making, based on his first 100 days in office. It’s equally absurd to expect the first 100 days in the administration of our first African American president to change 390 […]
Hillary Clinton surprised me when she said, on a recent trip to Mexico, "Our insatiable demand for illegal drugs fuels the drug trade." Strong words, and far more sagacious than George W. Bush’s declaration, during a trip to Mexico in 2001, that, "One of the reasons why drugs are shipped, the main reason why drugs […]
“Budgets are moral documents” ~ Rev. Jim Wallis “What is required of us now is a new era of responsibility… This is the price and promise of citizenship.” ~Barack Obama, January 20, 2009 There are moments when the stark contrast of values between progressives and conservatives is crystal clear. Appropriately enough many of these moments […]