Things are not aways what they appear to be.  This is a precautionary idiom to prevent us from over thinking ambiguous matters and assuming the worst.

But sometimes things are just what they appear to be. We are conditioned to take it in stride, brush it off, accept the narratives.   

There has been a quiet, but evolving, assault on Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion (DEI) since 2016. It metastasized to state legislatures. Bills were submitted and policies were crafted to limit DEI initiatives.

DEI programs are now prohibited by Executive Order from the President. It is bad for the country, it divides us. 

We have allowed the narrative on DEI policies, programs, and initiatives to be framed as racial preference. It was never about that. It was always about equity and inclusion; it is about the starting line, the level playing field for all qualified applicants.

The assaults have targeted colleges, universities, and the labor force. With executive order prohibiting any nod to DEI, the full throttle push has moved into the media, and network programming, for on camera personalities and support staff.

CNN and MSNBC cable news networks, recently shuffled program schedules and axed some primetime shows.  The programs canceled were primarily hosted by people of color (POC). 

Joy Reid, the voice behind ReidOut, and perhaps the most notable and outspoken, was canceled. Ayman Mohyeldin, Jonathan Capehart, Katie Phang, and Alex Wagner all were felled by the purging axe.

Leadership changes and declining ratings justify the changes. It’s plausible.

Changes at the top often signal a shift in network priorities. Rebecca Kutler is the new president of MSNBC. Some of the canceled programs had ratings challenges, however, some lower-performing shows with White hosts were retained.

The decline in viewership, i.e., ratings, is typical post-election disengagement. The progressive social and political left-leaning programs experienced a 46% decline in viewers compared to the first 10 months of 2024.

Ratings began to rebound after the inauguration. There was an 86% increase in primetime viewership.

Things are not always what they appear to be. Although the shakeup walks like a duck, let’s try to interpret what appears to be from multiple perspectives.

MSNBC leadership may have overreacted to temporary ratings declines. Their impulsive decision to cancel POC hosted programs failed to understand the cyclical nature of political news audiences.

Perhaps the network prioritized the refresh. It introduced a fresh lineup for the renewed audience engagement. Network leadership assessed that the underperforming shows were misaligned with their evolving brand. Restructuring was a calculated move to strengthen primetime programming.

But we cannot ignore that all the canceled programs were POC hosted. Is the network deliberately reducing its diversity footprint? News media is protected by the First Amendment.

We have entered a regressive milieu wherein the duck arrogantly walks. It’s acceptable to boast of being racist with peremptory disregard.

There is another social idiom that comes to mind and may be applicable to the audacity of our times. It was in the lyrics of a popular R&B song of the late 1960s. It was affirming as we mused about our times, and space, and the circumstances of our lives experienced within the social construct of America.

And we mused about it, whether on the dance floors of our favorite escapes, or in the pews of our places of worship. We wanted to believe that the rejection, the oppression, the devaluation of our contributions to the greatness of America, were waning.

Things are never as bad as they seem, it’s just thinking about it that makes it so mean, the song rhythmically chimed.

But we need to think about this!

The post If it walks like a duck: The perception of bias appeared first on The Cincinnati Herald .

It is with incredulous blankness that I have watched the rapid unraveling of democracy.

I am stunned, not just by the gullibility of the people, but by their acceptance of the distorted and the irrational, their unwillingness to take agency in recognizing, and acknowledging they’ve been misled.

I took a step back, I sought to identify the cause. I found the culprit-the “flood the zone” strategy.

Misinformation isn’t just noise, it’s a weapon. ‘Flood the zone’ is a deliberate strategy to drown the media in lies, misdirection, and attacks on American institutions. The result is a complicated morass of confusion and distrust, a psychological trap where facts lose meaning, institutions are discredited, and critical thinking collapses. 

The Trump administration is aggressively restructuring the government according to the Project 2025 blueprint. Central to this effort is the ‘flood the zone’ strategy, which has effectively pushed the false narrative that voters handed the president a sweeping mandate to overhaul government operations.

But the numbers tell a different story. Trump won just 49.8 percent of the popular vote – a mandate requires at least 51 percent. Winning the Electoral College is not the same as earning broad public support.

I wasn’t surprised by the outcome of the 2024 election. Without relying on speculation, I observed the significant role social media played. In the digital age, where news is consumed in fragments, the ‘flood the zone’ tactic thrives, leading many to accept narratives without critical analysis.

What’s most alarming is how deeply this psychological incarceration of critical thinking is woven into America’s institutions. Nowhere is this more evident than in the false narrative that voters handed Trump a mandate to strip the nation of its humanitarian dignity and compassion.

This manipulation thrives in the digital age, where media and social media flood the public with lies and misinformation, and shaping perceptions without scrutiny.

The USAID’s $40 billion budget accounts for less that one percent of government spending. Yet, a false narrative paints it as fraudulent and wasteful. USAID programs provide critical humanitarian relief to underdeveloped countries, with millions depending on them for daily survival.

American farmers will also feel the pinch. There will be loss of agricultural exports, disrupted supply chains, increased surplus and lower prices, weakened global influence, and the ripple effect on rural communities. Small town America will question, will double-think, “this is not what we voted for.”

It’s an impenetrable wall. Congressional Republicans, political strategist, and media stay relentlessly on script. “The American people gave President Trump a mandate to eliminate waste, fraud, and useless government programs,” they claim.

A consistent target is DEI – Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion It divides the country. Its language, programs, and initiatives are prohibited for corporations and educational institutions receiving federal funds.

This repetition isn’t just messaging, it’s a strategic effort to cement a false narrative, drowning out dissent and reenforcing ideological control.

Republicans and the conservative right used the ‘flood the zone’ strategy to seize control of a disoriented nation. This strategy has been the playbook for at least a decade.

Floods are destructive. When the waters recede, they leave behind ruined foundations, washed-away structures, and an unrecognizable landscape. The discomfited must adapt to a new normal.

The greatest damage isn’t to the buildings, the foundations, or the altered landscape, it’s to the people. Their lives, their perspectives, and their expectations have been reshaped. What they believe, what they accept, what they question – it all shifts. And in the aftermath, there is only incredulous blankness, a stunned silence in the face of what has been lost.

We could wish that we had known then what we know now before we handed our nation over to those who would dismantle its core values.

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It’s not going to be pretty. We will have to accept some inconveniences. Some privileges traditionally taken for granted will become appreciated, valued, missed.

The price of eggs will increase. The cost of housing will stretch beyond the reach of the lower rung of the middle-class social ladder and make an impossible dream for low wealth Americans.

There will be labor shortages, crops loss and many small farms will be pushed out of the market. Rural communities, predominantly agrarian, will experience economic decline, and loss of jobs and services.

The domino effect.

Diminished agricultural output will lead to supply chain disruptions. There will be a scarcity of certain foods, increased demand and increased prices.

Without immigrant workers to plant, cultivate and harvest crops, farmers may suffer significant crop loss, particularly for the labor-intensive production of fruits and vegetables. The fruit smoothie and the egg omelet may become occasional treats rather than a daily choice.

A shift to greater reliance on imports could also increase costs to consumers. Tariffs on imports and transportation, trade policies will add to the cost for consumers.

America without immigrant workers will suffer contractions in agriculture, the housing construction industry and a ripple effect throughout the economy.

But America is resilient and will take measures to counter contractions in these economic sectors.

The decrease in production, leading to a decline in agricultural exports, creates a trade imbalance. It puts America at a competitive disadvantage in global markets.

Pressures from the global trade imbalance may push agriculture toward greater technological investment. Automation and robotics can step up to fill the gap in some agricultural fields.

It’s not a one size fits all solution, and transition will be costly. Small farms, without financial resources, cannot afford mechanization or pay competitive domestic wages. The family farm may fold; depending on the geographic location, the acreage could be sold to real estate developers.

That sale passes the baton of mass deportation economic distress to an industry itself laden with labor shortages and increased material cost.

Immigrant labor makes a significant contribution to the housing construction industry. These unwelcome laborers play a critical role in the fields of roofing, drywall and framing. They often fill labor-intensive, skilled and in-demand positions.

Undocumented immigrants are a substantial portion of the construction workforce. Fifty percent of roofers are immigrants. Drywall labor is similarly dominant in the trade that requires precision and stamina.

Once mass deportation sweeps up the undocumented immigrants, construction delays, reduction in housing inventory and higher building cost will result.

The Feds could take measures to lower interest rates. With lower mortgage rates and a shortages of housing inventory, the resulting seller’s market would be optimum for homeowners and real estate professionals. Economics is a strange creature.

The emotional fervor for mass deportation of immigrants is a “cut off your nose to spite your face” approach. It pursues unsustainable political and emotional goals with the inevitable self-inflicted harm to the economy, society and consumers.

The emotions resulting from fear mongering do not allow room for critical thinking.

The short-term thinking to solve the immigration issue with mass deportation does not consider the long-term fallout on the economy, on consumers, on the small family farms of America.

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As I sat to write this last column of 2024, I wanted to write something reflective, an authentic refection, honest, revealing our vulnerabilities, and the strength of our hope.

A challenge to find optimism while standing amid the shards of morals, values and integrity.

The new America emerging from the cathartic election seems empty, harsh and vulnerable to political parasites questing for absolute power.

The common electorate were misled. In frenzies of hope, they flocked to the polls to reclaim their country. What we witness leading up to the official transfer of power offers a glimpse into the darker side of authoritarian rule.

It was never about concern for forgotten Americans. It has always been about the deep pockets of the top 1% gaining positions of control. Politics and the economy are deeply intertwined, both driven by an insatiable pursuit of wealth. 

The last two federal elections reveal the parallel tracks of the economy and politics. The 2020 and 2024 campaign financing, and campaign spending reveals their connected roles.

Here is a look into the numbers.

Total spending is projected to reach $15 billion. $1.2 billion was spent on political ads in Pennsylvania. A record spending for one state.

Billionaire Elon Musk, it is reported, spent $277 million through various political action committees (PACs). He gave random awards of $1 million to individuals who registered as Republicans leading up to election day.

The various media outlets were the primary beneficiaries. The pollical advertising revenue that poured into coffers underscores the critical role media plays. These outlets were also the conduits through which messaging shaped the perceptions of the electorate.

Television networks captured nearly 72% of campaign ad spending. Fox News was a dominant source of political messaging. The network’s strong viewership attracted record political revenue.

Digital platforms also shared in the influx of advertising revenue. Google, Meta (Facebook and Instagram) exceeded $1.35 billion during the election cycle. Local and national radio stations experienced a revenue boast of $750 million. Print media $250 million.

Overall, a significant windfall of advertising revenue from this election cycle.

The narratives, the negative messaging of information, misinformation, and disinformation channeled through these various media proved effective. More than 155 million people cast ballots in 2024.

According to the University of Florida Election Lab, nearly 64% of eligible voters cast ballots. The second highest turnout in the last 100 years, only the turnout in 2020 was higher. Seventy-one percent of the electorate were white voters.

Reproduction rights and immigration were two policy issues that drew on the values of the electorate. Approximately 23 million women voted; forty-six percent of the 38 million eligible Latinos voted for candidate Trump despite his policy stance on immigration.

President-elect Trump won 49.9% of the popular vote.  The below fifty percent of the popular vote falls short of an “unprecedented” and “powerful mandate.”

It’s not uncommon for presidents to over-read their election victories.

There is infighting within the MAGA camp over immigration, and the failure to adhere to their pre-inauguration ploy to dictate House policy and shut down the government. Elon Musk wanted the debt ceiling increase included in the stopgap measure.

The Republican House defied the mandate. We are not certain of how long their courage will last. The Democrats are standing their ground.

Feature Image: Rev. Norman Franklin. Photo provided

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     The three-letter acronym for the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the FBI, conjures up a plethora of emotions, suspicions and reactive behaviors with the mere mention of it.

     These emotions and reactive behaviors are experienced by the political elites, social activist, and the common citizens, and are a mixture of fear, anger, distrust, and a lament for justice.

     The emotional and psychological reactions to the “mention” vary based on the tone and tenor, and the individual’s perception of authority.

     The authoritarian President-elect Donald Trump’s contentious relationship with the agency reflects a broader challenge with maintaining trust, loyalty, and aligning the independent law enforcement agency with his agenda.

     In an era of political polarization, a call for the overhaul or dismantling of the agency will be implemented by the appointed agency head. The FBI has come to be viewed of late as a tool of oppression.   Those harboring this view have the authority to minimize the influence welded by the agency.

     The “mention” to persons of African descent, the “mention” to Civil Rights activist and social justice organizations conjures up thoughts of suspicion, remembrance of intimidation, reflections of oppressive measures exacted by the agency of J. Edgar Hoover.

     The 48-year tyrannical leadership of Hoover was a reign of abuse of power that intimidated groups on the social, political, and individual levels. It became his personal tool of oppression, intimidation, and manipulation.

     His amassed power intimidated and frustrated Presidents Truman, John Kennedy, and Lyndon Johnson.

     Hoover’s agency conflated social justice activism with communism, and Civil Rights leaders as threats to national security.

    We can empathize with Pres. Elect Trump. Since the Civil Rights era, the marginalized Americans of melanin rich skin have cast a suspicious eye of mistrust on the FBI.

     In 1956, Hoover launched COINTELPRO to monitor, infiltrate, and disrupt social and political activism. Specifically targeting Civil Rights groups in the 1960s. The goal was to sow discord, discredit leaders, and prevent the rise of a “messiah” who could bring unity to the Black Liberation Movement.

     The FBI, a government agency, positioned itself as an enemy of social justice, and the guardian of the status quo. They employed a range of unethical, controversial practices to subvert progress toward social equality.

     Dr. King’s was subjected to wiretapping, smear campaigns and propaganda to discredit his character and reputation. The agency infiltrated the ranks of the Southern Christian Leadership Conference (SCLC), the Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee (SNCC), the Black Panther Party, and the Nation of Islam.

     The Agency played a significant role in the murder of Chicago Black Panther organizer, Fred Hampton. The FBI often failed to protect Civil Rights activists against violence, although often forewarned of potential violence erupting in opposition to the activist’s staged events.  

     We can empathize with the suspicion, the erosion of trust, and intimidation Pres. Elect Trump may be experiencing. The African American has been subjected to it for decades. We lacked authority to do anything about it. We were not positioned to fire the Director or restructure the agency to our advantage. We just wanted the right to vote.

     President Trump considers the FBI part of a “deep state” conspiracy that worked to undermine his presidency. There’s an irony embedded in his position.

     The Agency conspired to disrupt the efforts of Civil Rights organizations, discredit activist leaders, sow discord, and disrupt progress toward full participation in the dream American citizenship promised.  Only it wasn’t “deep state” conspiracy, it was agency policy.

     The irony of it all is that the marginalized, the people of melanin rich skin – Black and Brown, and Red, have historically maintained a tenor of suspicion of the FBI.

     More than likely, the level of suspicion will only grow more deeply ingrained, in perception and perspectives, with the new Director and the diminished independence of the restructured agency.

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This has been an erratic election cycle. At times insane. Other times nonsensical. The campaign rhetoric was ratchet. The platform ominous.

Yet here we are. The nation, saturated by four years of disinformation, has chosen a new direction. It is our hope that campaign rhetoric does not become the new administration’s policies.

The rhetoric was not only ratchet, but vicious, disrespectful, and non-Christian principled. But it captured the emotions of the people.

Although inflation was down, and job creation up, wages were stagnant, and we believed the hype that the nation is headed in the wrong direction.  The price of eggs was central to the people’s choice.

A sustained campaign of misinformation, fear and disinformation led to “self-interest” voting. It polarized the nation into camps of “what is good for me.”

The promise of a great America gripped our emotions and harnessed our hope. It was fueled by iterations of failed policies, socioeconomic principles, and hardhanded treatment of immigrants.

But emotions don’t allow for critical thinking. Emotions reign in the moment. Emotions reign at the gas pump and the checkout counter at the grocery store.

Critical thinking allows one to process data that looks at the layered influence of international policies, and decisions of past and present administrations. 

The state of the economy at any given time is a continuum of policies from past administrations. Fiscal policies, trade policies and regulatory/deregulatory policies have cumulative impact.

Messaging void of this recognition leads the electorate to assign credit or blame for conditions on the current administration. They are not solely culpable.

One promise of President-elect Trump is to implement mass deportation of illegal immigrants. Hispanics and the recently disparaged Haitians will be subject to dislocation and the trauma of abrupt family separation.

The Hispanic electorate, now 20% of total population, cast their ballots in support of harsher immigration policies.

American history curricula fall short. An authentic presentation of the contributions of its diverse complexion, and the injustice many suffered are excluded. It’s detrimental to building a vibrant social climate.

The lack of authentic history education has far-reaching consequences. It perpetuates social divisions, limits civic engagement, and discounts the need to address ongoing injustices.

In the 1930s Great Depression era, hundreds of thousands Hispanic Americans were deported.  Estimates range that, between 1929 and 1939, nearly two million Mexican Americans, and Mexican nationals were rounded up and deported. The Mexican Repatriation is an overlooked chapter in American history.

The scarcity of jobs, and the fear that Mexicans were taking jobs from American citizens led to the deportation of documented and undocumented Mexicans. The government and media promoted the division. Fear drives the act of self-preservation.

Emotion driven, self-interest voting has set the tone and direction for the country. In God we trust.

Editor’s Note: The views expressed in this commentary piece do not necessarily the express the opinions of The Cincinnati Herald.

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We thought we had grown. We thought were becoming a nation, one nation under God; a nation of unity and respect for one another. Humanity was created to be relational. But we are tribal, conflicting, arrogant, and unaccommodating. 

Annually, on Jan. 15, communities across the nation come together in a facade of unity; we talk of tearing down invisible barriers — self-constructed barriers, and we celebrate the “Dreamer” the twentieth century Prophet of justice and unity in America. 

“I have a Dream!”

We echo the words of that unforgettable speech Dr. King gave before thousands on the Washington Mall. That was 1964. 

The Dream, in the context of a segregated society, was about the ludicrous practices of a color-based social system and its inclinations of superiority, inferiority and exclusion based on skin color. 

The Dream: a concise capture is, stop dismissing the accomplishments of the African American; see the legacy of value we bring. 

We have, as a nation, maintained a hypocritical facade of unity. We ignore the elephant in the room. We toss a white sheet over it. Once a year we pretend we want to overcome. 

The elephant, the deep-seated cultural biases indoctrinated over decades, over centuries of mythopoetic ideologies of color-based superiority, will not go away. 

Living in a system based on the delusions of superiority is deleterious to the oppressed and the oppressor. 

It compromises the intelligence of the privileged — most often the oppressors, it distorts their belief systems, and twists their Christian interpretations of what the Savior has commanded us to do: love one another as you love yourself.

The Bible tells us in the book of Romans, chapter 8, verse16, that we are of one family, brothers and sisters, if we are in Christ. 

1 John 4:19-20, then, should give us pause on the uncivil discourse, the sophomoric name calling, dismissive remarks and derogatory labels. 

A recalcitrant ideology forced legislative guarantees for full access to the promise of inalienable rights for Americans of African descent, for Native Americans, and for immigrants. 

Affirmative Action (AA) legislation and Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion policies (DEI) were designed to pry loose that clinging dead, dry leaf of racism intrinsic in the soul of America.  

AA and DEI initiatives have been misrepresented and maligned. They have become dismissives, “dog whistles” that undermine the competence of people of color. Professional standards were lowered for them to qualify for the positions. 

African American doctors, engineers, scientist, CEOs of Fortune 500 corporations, mayors, governors, senators and POTUS prove the mindsets laughable. But the tentacles of racist dismissiveness are still tethered to some who fear equality, those who fear the challenges of a level field.  

The elephant trumpets every time the people with melanin-rich-skin, step out of the shadows of oppression and into leadership roles.   

It comes as no surprise that Tom Burchett, (R-Tenn), a cognitive challenged, alum of Neanderthal University, would label VP Kamala Harris a DEI hire. It resonated with the Fox Network jesters who immediately pushed it in their program broadcasts. 

It’s a reverse euphemism that reveals one whose mentality is trapped in the ignorance of supremest ideology. One who can’t see the beauty of the forest because his/her focus remains on one dying tree. 

VP. Harris graduated from Howard University in 1986, and from Hastings College in 1989. She earned a BA in Political Science and Economics from the HBCU and a law degree from Hastings. 

She is the daughter of immigrants. Her father is from Jamaica, her deceased mother from India. They came to America during the Civil Rights era. They met in 1962 while studying for their Ph. Ds. at UC Berkeley.

Donald Harris is Professor Emeritus of Economics at Standford University. Shyamala Gopalan was a biomedical scientist at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory. 

Father, mother, and daughter Kamala all have impressive credentials, phenomenal accomplishments, but not enough to escape the dismissive label of “DEI hire.” 

Editor’s Note: The views expressed in this commentary piece do not necessarily the express the opinions of The Cincinnati Herald.

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Joe Biden has done an honorable thing. He set aside his ego and put America first. He has withdrawn from running for a second term as Commander-in-Chief. His mental acuity decline, his physical stamina, and his age were the major issues. 

He did the right thing for the good of the nation. There are others serving the nation, serving in Congress that should consider bowing out for the good of the country.

More than a quarter of House and Senate members should consider retirement. Twenty-eight percent are over the age of 65. Many of them serve on committees vital to the operations of our country, our economy, agriculture, energy and climate, and our relationship with other nations. 

Six are ages 86 to 90; fifteen are ages 81 to 85, and forty-five are 75 to 80. The work of these committees touches our daily lives in personal ways. 

Here are a few of the crucial committees that these aging senators and representatives serve on:

The Committee on Appropriations; the Committee on Commerce, and Transportation; the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions; the Committee on Finance, the Committee of Foreign Relations; the Committee on Small Business and Entrepreneurship, the Committee on the Judiciary, and the Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs; and the list goes on. 

It is the legislative branch that touches our lives to the greatest extent. 

Mandatory retirement age and term limits have received light discussion and scant media attention; it’s pass time to give it serious considerations. 

Can a 90-year-old, an 89-year-old, an 87-year-old, or 86-year-old senator or representative come to the job each day fresh, energetic, cognitively sharp and ready to give their best for the good of the country? 

We saw Joe Biden lose focus, mumble answers and Donald Trump slur his speech and trail off into incoherent musings; we saw Mitch McConnell have a mental pause in the middle of a speech. What signs of diminished capacity are we missing from senators and congressional leaders who are not always in front of the camera?

It should make you wonder. 

President Joe Biden is 82. Chuck Grassley, R. IA, is 90 and serves on the Committee on Agriculture, Committee on Finance, and is ranking member on the Committee on the Budget, and more. The 86-year-old Hal Rogers and Mitch McConnell, 82, both serve in vital, demanding roles. We should monitor their vitality. 

Rep. Grace Napolitano, D.CA, Delegate Eleanor Norton, D. DC, and Bill Pascrell, D. NJ, are all 87 years old.  

An adage is that “with age comes wisdom.” 

Wisdom recognizes when we have stayed too long; wisdom acknowledges that essential skills necessary for valued contributions have diminished; wisdom does not ignore the signs written in large letters — IT MAY BE TIME TO TURN IN YOUR PAPERS. 

Editor’s Note: The views expressed in this commentary piece do not necessarily the express the opinions of The Cincinnati Herald.

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The Brown vs. Board of Education decision handed down by the Warren Court in 1954 changed the social landscape in America. Particularly in the southern region where Jim Crow laws mandated separation of the races.

The Fourteenth Amendment armed the former slaves with the constitutional rights of due process of law and equal protection of the law.

The Fifteenth Amendment gave the new citizens the right to vote. [Editor’s note: The 15th amendment, ratified on Feb. 3, 1870, gave the right to vote to all male citizens regardless of their ethnicity or prior slave status].

It was well into the twentieth century before the Fifteenth Amendment was fully exercised. It took decades of struggles, protest and demonstrations, and murder before the apartheid south was bought under the law of the 1965 Voting Rights Act.

Blacks would use the intent of these laws to challenge systemic social and political attitudes prohibiting the exercise of their constitutional rights.      

The law was subject to interpretation. Interpretation of the law lays on the altar of perspective. For example, the recalcitrant White culture encoded Jim Crow laws to defy the rule of the new social order. Blacks, never obsequious, used the intent of the law to fight back.

Homer Plessy challenged Jim Crow laws that prohibited Blacks from the use of public facilities, from riding the same buses, and attending the same schools as Whites. Plessy refused to give up his seat to a White man on a train. He was jailed.

The Fourteenth Amendment case, Plessy vs. Ferguson, was argued before the US Supreme Court in 1896. Perspectives interpreted the law. In an 8-1 vote, the Justices upheld Jim Crow.

The majority agreed that the amendment was meant to enforce equality, which they viewed as political equality, but not social. “If one race be inferior to the other socially, the Constitution of the United States cannot put them upon the same plane.” 

That perspective of “one race inferior” and separate but equal accommodations, governed well into the twentieth century.

The errant perspective of “intent of the law” employed to uphold separate but equal became the primary argument of the NAACP Legal Defense Team. Charles Hamilton Houston and Thurgood Marshall won a string of victories before the Supreme Court against Jim Crow laws.

They argued the intent of the law to defeat discrimination in institutions of higher education. The separate but equal and equal protection clauses were successfully argued in four cases before the Supreme Court from 1936 to 1950.

The string of victories sharpened the strategic genius of NAACP lead counsel, Thurgood Marshall.

Marshall had five cases before the Supreme Court of the United States in 1952. Each challenged the constitutionality of state-sponsored segregation in public schools.

The Supreme Court consolidated the five cases under Brown vs. Board of Education.

Separate school systems for Blacks and Whites were inherently unequal, Marshall argued, and therefore violated the “equal protection clause” of the Fourteenth Amendment.

He also introduced sociological data from social scientist Kenneth Clark. The data showed that segregated school systems tended to make Black children feel inferior to White children.

The unanimous decision, delivered by U.S. Supreme Court Justice Earl Warren on May 17, 1954, ruled that state-sanctioned segregation of public schools was a violation of the 14th amendment of the U.S. Constitution and was unconstitutional. Chief Justice Warren stated, “We conclude that in the field of public education the doctrine of ‘separate but equal’ has no place. Separate educational facilities are inherently unequal.”

The decision changed the landscape of public education and gave the name of Thurgood Marshall a coveted place in history. We pause to celebrate his legacy of audacious genus; we pause to celebrate 70 years of the transformative Brown vs. Board of Education decision.

But we can only pause. Reflection is needed amid setbacks trending in the toxic sociopolitical environment eroding social progress today.

In many ways, the sociopolitical environment is as toxic now as in the era that required the Brown vs. Board of Education fix.

These setbacks are trending: extremist rhetoric in the political arena; restrictive voter legislation; the Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) gutting the 1965 Voting Rights Act; SCOTUS gutting Affirmative Action; state legislatures’ move to make Diversity, Equity & Inclusion (DEI) statues in education, government, and private industries that receive federal funds, illegal; and legislative moves to prohibit the sharing of accurate history in K-12 school curriculum because it makes some uncomfortable.

Setbacks.

But we are better prepared to stand our ground and push back against efforts to roll back progress. The legacy of Justice Thurgood Marshall resonates with this generation of leaders.

Editor’s Note: The views expressed in this commentary piece do not necessarily the express the opinions of The Cincinnati Herald.

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By Rev. Norman Franklin

Herald Guest Columnist

Does America have a race problem? Is systemic racism permeating every fiber of the socioeconomic, sociopolitical institutions of America? Are race-based theories, particularly the Critical Race Theory, liberal extremism, or is it a reality that remains unacknowledged – the big grey elephant always in the room?

Answers trending from conservative Republican majorities grant us some perspective. Racism does not exist. And if history is properly presented, it never existed.

Gov. Ron DeSantis (R.Fla.) signed into law a bill that bans initiatives on diversity, equity and inclusion. He viewed them as discriminatory practices. This was in April 2023. In May, Gov. Greg Abbot (R.Tx.) followed suit with legislation that shuttered all DEI initiatives. A June 2023 SCOTUS decision gutted Affirmative Action.

A July Harvard Business Review article, “Why Companies Can – and Should- Recommit to DEI in the Wake of the SCOTUS Decision” debunks a myth.    African Americans have been the face of Affirmative Action. The article by Tina Ople and Ella F. Washington, reveals that White women benefited the greater from Affirmative Action policies.

America has a proclivity for scapegoating African Americans. Ronald Reagan’s fictitious Cadillac Welfare Queen pictured Blacks as milking the Welfare System. When in fact, Whites were the greater number on the welfare rolls.

Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) is the latest boogeyman. DEI is about promoting awareness of our differences, addressing structural inequalities, and creating an environment of community and respect for human differences and social identities.

Opponents portray an ominous goal of DEI.

More than 20 states have a combined 50 bills pending or signed into law that restrict or eliminate DEI programs. They purport to protect First Amendment free speech and shield potential employees and students from coercive practices. They are forced to align with divisive, discriminatory policies of DEI initiatives, they assert.

Legislators take the floor and pontificate destruction to our democratic system of government. Some draw analogies to Marxism and Communism. There is no mention of the centuries long system of chattel slavery or the decades of codified discrimination that fostered the inequities that must be righted.

According to Acts 17:26, God made every nation and people from one bloodline. “And He has made from one blood every nation of men to dwell on the face of the earth..”

But we are different. We were made that way. We process our experiences differently and come up with perspectives influenced by our experiences. In our nation of Christian leadership, this “great melting pot” of democracy, those differences should not erect invisible fences that keep us opposed to the goodwill of one another. The truth should tear down the fences and set us free.

We cannot deny the interconnectedness of the past and the present. We cannot deny America’s history and its imprint on the discord in our society, the imbalance in our economy, and the ambiance of conflicted dysfunction in government – state and federal.

Conservative legislatures move to prohibit the inclusion of African/African American history in academic curriculum. Native American history is equally shunned.

African American history and Native American history is American history; however, the amalgamated and comfortable version legislators prefer castrates our experiences and insults our heritage.

The genesis of the opposition is that Whites should not experience guilt when learning about history. That’s a misappropriation of guilt. Knowledge of the past bears no guilt; it could lead to shame, and shame spurs corrective action to ensure that mistakes are not repeated.

Erasure of African American and Native American history justifies the opposition to DEI initiatives. It denies the need to correct the imbalance resulting from generations of a privileged/marginalized social construct. If there is no cause, there is no effect, there is no need to take institutional corrective measures.

When the seats of government — the legislative and the executive branches – rests in the hands of one ideological movement, unrestrained by the weakness of opposition, legislative measures born out of the simmering angst of decades of feigned “go along” with social correctives, are pushed through that roll back the progress towards the more perfect union.

The legislative body is comfortable with the imbalance of power and inequalities of society. They wield the sphere of authority over the marginalized.

The African American could feel a sense of betrayal; but we felt the sting of ingratitude when we returned from the battlefields in Europe and the Pacific Theater. Our red blood soaked into foreign soils, but many were denied access to the GI benefits that fueled postwar prosperity.

Those who govern are the descendants of those who enslaved us; they deny the inhumanity of this immoral and unjust system.

Those who govern are the generations of those who codified Black Codes and Jim Crow Laws into a social construct that devalued Black life and castrated their dignity.

These are the progeny, the sons and daughters of those who have benefited from systemic injustice, but deny that inequality permeates every fiber of the social construct of America. It’s all they have known; it feels so normal. They can feel justified in the unjust laws they legislate; they can feel comfortable in the rollback of corrective measures. They can see no wrong in ending DEI initiatives.

As the Ronald Reagan, the quintessential Republican, said during a presidential debate. “There you go again.”

Editor’s Note: The views expressed in this commentary piece do not necessarily the express the opinions of The Cincinnati Herald.

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