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Editorials/Columns
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Don’t Give Up
“Never, never, never, never give up.”
Winston Churchill
Empowered greeting!
on’t give up. You are half way to the end of
the year. There is still time to make the rest of the year the best of the year. I encouraged you to make this an unprece- dented year full of leaps and bounds to your next tier of progress. I hope you have been setting the pace and running the race to success. You are half way there.
Despite any blunders, bloopers or mistakes you have made, there is still time for a strategic turn around in your life, in your business, in your ministry or any endeavors you are pursuing. Don’t give up. Don’t lose hope. Stay in the
fight. Hold your head up and keep it together. You are half way there.
Success is calling your name. You are half way there to the most productive year of your life. Stay focused and dis- ciplined, even in the midst of adversity. Troubles, trials and test will come to distract you. Instead of drawing back, allow the issues of life to build your character and strengthen you where you are weak. Don’t get stuck focusing on the problem. Focus on the solution, so that you can continue on your path of creating the life of your dreams for 2016 and beyond.
Don’t Give up. Your dreams are waiting to be liber- ated so that your voice can cry out in victory of having made it, in spite of.
Don’t give up. You’ve come
too far to give up now! The road ahead is far more prom- ising than the roads you’ve al- ready traveled.
Don’t give up. The right opportunity is waiting for you to reach out and grab it. It’s yours and it has your name written all over it.
Again I say, never, never, never, give up because your finest hour has not yet come. Your brightest days are in front of you. Reach onward and upward, but don’t give up.
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If you need help to with- stand the journey so that you don’t give up, get connected with Selphenia.
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Police Shootings Questioned
ot rushing towards a claim of guilt or innocence, we
are still left wondering why it was necessary for a white police officer to shoot at point-blank range, a 37- year-old Black man, Alton Sterling, five times while he and another officer had Sterling pinned to the ground. As we have pointed out previously, we believe implicit bias training should be required of all law enforcement offi- cers currently employed and by all police recruits before they are hired.
A recent analysis of police shootings in 2015 by Bowl- ing Green State University and the Washington Post pro- vided some interesting information and raised some serious questions in our minds. The result of a review of public records and interviews with law enforcement offi- cers, judicial and other legal experts, the analysis indi- cated that “to charge an officer in a fatal shooting, it takes something so egregious (shocking), so over the top that it cannot be explained in any rational way. ...It also has to be a case that prosecutors are willing to hang their repu- tation on.” Even in those cases, the majority of the officers whose cases have been resolved have not been convicted. No wonder such data causes the majority of Black citizens to feel the lives of Black people don’t matter to law en- forcement officers.
Some jurors appear to be very reluctant to punish law enforcement officers, tending to view them, regardless of the situation, as guardians of order. This is by no means, an accusation of mindless violence against all police offi- cers. Indeed, law enforcement must have the trust of the public in order for it to fulfill its promise to protect and serve. However, no one is above the law . . . no, not even law enforcement itself.
187 Chicago
hen it comes to mur-
der no one does it like the residents of Chicago. This year the Windy City cur- rently has more recorded homicides than New York and
Los Angeles combined.
Over the July 4th weekend
alone 50 individuals lost their lives on the streets of Chi- Town. That follows the 74 who were killed in June and brings the total body count to over 340 since January.
Overall more than 2,000 people (including survivors) have been shot in northeastern Illinois in the last six months. And, the sad thing is that, a majority of the victims and perpetrators are people of color.
Of course, this is nothing new. The gang violence re- sponsible for the chaos that is "Chiraq" has been occurring for over 40 years. And, I ima- gine, because that kind of acti- ivity has been deemed a typical occurrence in the Midwestern
metropolis for such a long time, sensitivity to the carnage becomes lost in the wake of the mayhem.
But how can what's happen- ing in Chicago be viewed as anything close to normal? I mean, seriously, where else in this country do parents have to place makeshift signs on street corners that read: "DON'T SHOOT. KIDS AT PLAY" in an effort to keep their children alive?
If this type of thing was oc- curring in a predominately white community there would probably be Congressional hearings and non-stop media coverage directed to solving the problem. But, because names like Shaquanda and Daquan don't garner the same level of sympathy as names like Sally and Biff, I guess no one feels the need to pay much attention.
Even Black people seem to have a hard time showing any concern. When a Black life is
taken by a white cop everyone runs to the streets in protest. But, when Black people are killing other Black people at this rate, shouldn't we be just as upset?
The irony of it all is that a country, which claims to be at war with terrorism all over the world, is either incapable or unwilling to address the terror crisis occurring in its own backyard. But, I assume, when it's a population they could care less about is being af- fected, the urgency for con- tainment is minimal.
I am sure some people read- ing this may not be able to see the connection between what's going on in Chicago and their sun-filled lives in Florida. Un- fortunately, though, the reality is that, with gang culture being a cancer that spreads like a wildfire, what we're seeing now from a long distance could be just a glimpse of what we can one day expect to see outside of our own front doors.
And, since stopping the bloodshed doesn't appear to be possible, being prepared for what's coming is the next best option.
Reality On Ice is © by the Florida Sentinel Bul- letin Publishing Com- pany. You can TEXT C.B., II, at (+18133080849).
Hillary Clinton And The Court Of Public Opinion
ne of the most revered, yet most lampooned beliefs
in American jurisprudence is “a person is innocent until proven guilty.”
So, we are not surprised at what transpired the other day in the name of a totally objective report, which left Democratic Party presidential candidate Hillary Clinton in the dark.
And just who was FBI director James B. Comey talking to or about when he went out of his way to assure some- one’s ears regarding Secretary Clinton’s e-mail issue? What was he really talking about when in one long breath, he said, “From the group of 30,000 e-mails returned to the State Department, 110 e-mails in 52 e-mail chains have been determined by the owning agency to contain classi-
fied information at the time they were sent or received . . ?”
And from the morass of seemingly endless information to the contrary, why should we not be shocked when the FBI’s conclusion sounded more like a verdict than an observa- tion, “Hillary Clinton is not guilty of the non-accusations as not yet charged?”
Yes, the FBI – like Pontius Pilate – had to wash its hands regarding Clinton’s e-mail complicity. But like Pilate, the FBI director seemed to realize his comments did not bring calm to a disquieting public-Conservative crowd who cried for crucifixion. For, public opinion is like a hungry dog at the garbage can.
We congratulate Hillary for her clean bill of health, thus far.
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