Tag Archives: senate spot

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The President introduces Elena Kagan


Today, it is my great honor to nominate our Solicitor General, and my friend, Elena Kagan, to be the next justice of the United States Supreme Court.

As I send my nomination to the Senps://youtu.be/hDO0W6QxsN

https://youtu.be/hDO0W6QxsN4


Elena is widely regarded as one of the best legal minds of her generation — earning praise from across the ideological spectrum throughout her career. Above all, she is a trailblazer. She wasn’t just the first woman to serve as dean of Harvard Law School — she was one of its most beloved and successful leaders, building a reputation for openness to other viewpoints and skill in working with others to build consensus. These were some of the many reasons why I selected her to be my Solicitor General, the nation’s chief advocate — the first woman to hold that post as well.

Her work as Solicitor General has allowed me to see firsthand just why Elena is particularly well-suited to the Court: She has not only a keen understanding of the law, but also one that is rooted in a deep awareness of its impact on people’s lives. Last year, she made that clear — choosing the Citizens United case as her first to argue before the Supreme Court, defending bipartisan campaign finance reform against special interests seeking to spend unlimited money to influence our elections.

Now, I look forward to the prospect of Elena taking her seat alongside Justice Ginsberg and Justice Sotomayor. For the first time, our nation’s highest court would include three women, ensuring a Court that would be more inclusive, more representative, more reflective of us as a people than ever before.

When Justice Stevens wrote me to announce his retirement, I knew that the Court would be losing a standard bearer. And I felt a responsibility to nominate an individual capable of being that same guiding force, a consistent voice of reason on the Court.

I am certain I have made the right choice. As you learn more about Elena, I am confident you’ll see what I do — that she is a voice we need on the Supreme Court.

Please watch the message — and share it with others:

http://my.barackobama.com/ElenaKagan

Thank you,

President Barack Obama

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Michelle Obama … Mrs O. Style


WASHINGTON (AP) – Michelle Obama says being criticized is part of the president’s job, and she understands why her husband has been on the receiving end.
~ In the Library

In the Library … the Sunburnt Queen


“The Sunburnt Queen is an extraordinary narrative. The writing’s fresh immediacy brings history to life.”—The Sunday Independent (South Africa)

In the late 1730s, the local inhabitants of South Africa found a seven-year-old girl called Bessie, washed ashore on the beach of the Wild Coast. Bessie was brought up by them, growing into a young woman of legendary beauty and wisdom, and marrying one of the most important tribal chiefs in the area.

Using oral histories and written accounts by early missionaries, Hazel Crampton traces the extraordinary story of Bessie and the turbulent history of the Eastern Cape.

Resource: amazon.com

~ Culture & History, ~ politics petitions pollution and pop culture

The Charleston Shooting … In memory of


By

Wednesday’s tragic murder of nine black parishioners in Charleston’s Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church by a 21-year-old white man wanting “to start a civil war” is weighing heavily on the hearts of all of us. We cannot begin to understand the grief felt by the families of those lost or the Charleston community. But we can speak about what we do know. This was a racist committing a racially motivated murder. This was another tragic example of how guns too easily fall into the hands of dangerous people. This was a terrorist act.

Here is a round-up of the columns and news that we are reading and talking about. We hope they foster and inform your conversations, reflections, and actions too:

1. Jelani Cobb in The New Yorker: Murders in Charleston. “We have, quite likely, found at 110 Calhoun Street, in Charleston, South Carolina, the place where Columbine, Aurora, and Newtown cross with Baltimore, Ferguson, and Sanford.”

2. Ta-Nehisi Coates in The Atlantic: Take Down the Confederate Flag—Now. “Moral cowardice requires choice and action. It demands that its adherents repeatedly look away, that they favor the fanciful over the plain, myth over history, the dream over the real. Here is another choice. Take down the flag. Take it down now.”

3. Jeff Duo in the Washington Post: The legal loophole that allowed Dylann Roof to get a gun. “Dylann Roof, the man accused of a shooting spree that left nine people dead at a historic black church in Charleston on Wednesday night, should not have been able to get a gun.”

4. Jamelle Bouie in Slate: The Black American Holiday Everyone Should Celebrate but Doesn’t. “Juneteenth isn’t just a celebration of emancipation, it’s a celebration of our commitment to make it real.”

5. Jennifer Mascia in The Trace: Charleston Area Faced Gun Violence Spike Before Church Shooting. “Nearly eight out of every 10 killings in the area last year involved a firearm.”

6. Dan Wasserman’s editorial cartoon in The Boston Globe:

wasserman charleston

CREDIT: Dan Wasserman

And be sure to check out the latest news and opinions from our partners at ThinkProgress:

1. Judd Legum: NRA Board Member Blames Charleston Victim For His Own Death. Seriously.

2. Ian Millhiser: When John Roberts Said There Isn’t Enough Racism In America To Justify The Voting Rights Act. It’s a sordid business, this divvying up the amount of racism in the United States to decide whether Congress is allowed to enact laws intended to fix it.

3. Jack Jenkins: How The Charleston Shooting Is Linked To The Confederate Flag, According To A South Carolinian. While the Confederate flag is certainly about heritage, it is and always has been about hate.

4. Kiley Kroh: Charleston Victim’s Son Addresses Media On The Baseball Field. “Love is always stronger than hate. So if we just love the way my mom would, then the hate won’t be anywhere close to where the love is.”

Wishing you a safe and peaceful weekend.

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Anniversary of Brown v. Board of Education of Topeka – remember Black History


Posted by Robin Caldwel

On May 17, 1954, Supreme Court under Chief Justice Earl Warren rendered a unanimous, landmark decision (9-0) declaring that state laws establishing separate public schools for black and white students and denying black children equal educational opportunities unconstitutional. The Brown v. the Board of Education of Topeka ruling overturned previous “separate but equal” rulings, including the 1896 decision, Plessy v. Ferguson. In effect, separation by race de jure (by law) violated the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment of the United States Constitution.

In 1951, thirteen Topeka parents filed the class action lawsuit on behalf of their 20 children in the United States District Court for the district of Kansas. Leaders of the Topeka NAACP recruited the plaintiffs with Oliver Brown as the named plaintiff in the suit. The contention was that the state of Kansas, essentially, did not comply with separate but equal facilities for black and white children. Oliver Brown’s daughter, Linda, had to walk 6 blocks to catch a school bus that took her to the black elementary school 1 mile from their neighborhood, while a white elementary school was only seven blocks from the Browns’ home. Brown tried to register Linda at the school but was rejected. The Brown lawsuit was presented before the Supreme Court on appeal along with other suits representing plaintiffs in Washington, D. C., Virginia, South Carolina and Delaware.

The plaintiffs by name are as follows: Oliver Brown, Darlene Brown, Lena Carper, Sadie Emmanuel, Marguerite Emerson, Shirley Fleming, Zelma Henderson, Shirley Hodison, Maude Lawton, Alma Lewis, Iona Richardson, and Lucinda Todd.

Chief counsel for the NAACP, Thurgood Marshall, argued the case before the Supreme Court.