Tag Archives: Martin Luther King Jr.

Why Rush wants to own an NFL team

UPDATE: We’ve revised this post to replace disputed Rush comments with confirmed-by-video ones. After all, we want to be fair. And balanced.
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Rush Limbaugh wants to be an NFL owner. Or does he? Jason Whitlock says it’s a publicity stunt, and he may be right. Glenn Beck has been getting a lot of run lately and Rash needs to maintain his position as the Barking Right’s alpha blowhard. Whitlock also wonders why the NFL’s uber-dominator, Commish Roger Goodell, didn’t immediately neuter this, the Mother of All Bad Ownership Ideas. After all, a high percentage of the league’s players, coaches and fans are black, and Rush has a history of saying bad things about black people. Some samples: Read more

Columbine and the power of symbols

columbine-hillPart three of a series.

In the days following the murders at Columbine High School I visited the school and the grounds of Clement Park. Those walks produced this piece, which was originally published ten years ago today.

We have learned a great deal about the  events that took place at Columbine since  this essay was written (for instance, we now know that the  “Cassie Said Yes” story never actually happened,  and we also know that the whole “Trenchcoat Mafia”  thing was also a media-propagated fiction). But it seemed to me that going back  and revising to account for new information would damage the  fabric of what I wrote in late April and early May of 1999.  I have therefore elected to leave the factual inaccuracies  in place. I do, however, note the spots containing errors with an asterisk (*).

Salon.com and Westword.com provide as thorough and accurate  a picture as we are ever likely to have of the shootings and  the aftermath, and I recommend them highly.

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Sunday, May 2, 1999

It won’t stop raining, and nobody seems to care. Read more

I (still) have a dream…

Early morning, April 4
Shot rings out in the Memphis sky

40 years ago today Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated in Memphis, Tennessee. Today a black man who doesn’t want to make race an issue is running for president. He is opposed by one man who opposed honoring King with a holiday and by many more people who very much want to make race an issue.

Discuss.

Read more

42: A Tribute to Jackie Robinson

I try to avoid getting teary-eyed about This Great Land in Which We Live. We all know the United States has tremendous shortcomings, and it seems like our every success only reminds us of ten more problems which have not been adequately addressed.

Tonight, though, we saw a remarkable moment, and for a few seconds between innings at Shea Stadium we were reminded of the courage and strength of those who devote their lives – often risking and losing everything in the process – in the service of genuinely ennobling ideals and a basic sense of justice and fair play.

On April 15, 1947, Jackie Robinson became the first black to play Major League Baseball in this century. Read more