Watch: Pres. Obama awards Medal of Honor to 24 minority soldiers.

Ben Carson Was a Role Model for Black Teens Until He Sold Out to the Right

By Joshua Dubious

I read this article by someone who was inspired and motivated by the life story of Dr. Ben Carson. I wanted to share the story and the disappointment of a man who once greatly admired Dr. Ben Carson to show how two different groups view a man who could have been a great example to all. George Cook AAreports.com.

Ben Carson Was a Role Model for Black Teens Until He Sold Out to the Right

[ SOURCE ] The African American neurosurgeon’s story inspired many teen boys, but when he compares America to Nazi Germany, he destroys his own legacy.

Dr. Ben Carson was in the news again this week, this time for comparing America to Nazi Germany. But his story is, for many African American men, a deeper tragedy—in ways that others may not know. 

For me, I "met" Dr. Carson in my 10th grade year. There had been a scuffle at school; well, a scuffle after football practice is more precise. First words, then shoves, were exchanged, and finally, testosterone thick in the air, a few blows were thrown. Both my combatant and I claimed that the other was at fault. And we were both suspended from school. 

My mother was dismayed, thinking that my college prospects had flown out the window with the first punch. In addition to a range of more severe punishments—no driver's license this year!?—she marched me into our den and handed me a worn, dog-eared book:Gifted Hands: The Ben Carson Story, by Ben Carson, M.D. I was not to leave the room, except for food, bathroom, and sleep, until I finished this book.

A smiling, wise-looking Black man with a stethoscope around his neck stared out from the cover. I disliked him at first; our introduction had not been voluntary, and he seemed like the type of guy who would frown on me getting suspended. But I cracked open the book, and it didn't take long for my opinion to change. 

Here was a kid, young Carson, growing up in inner city Detroit with an absent father and mom who was facing all sorts of problems. But she still instilled in him the values that allowed him to thrive, and thrive this young man did, all the way to Johns Hopkins, where he became the chief of neurosurgery. 

I was floored by his story. And l found out later that thousands of other young Black boys were floored right along with me, provoked by thousands of concerned, caring moms who handed them the same book. I can't say that Carson's narrative was life-changing—it was something short of that—but it did become embedded in the back of my mind, a device to pull from at low moments. "Well, Dr. Ben Carson did it, so perhaps so can I."

Skip roughly 15 years later. I was at the National Prayer Breakfast in early 2013, and heard Carson's speech there, where he lambasted “political correctness” and progressive policies. It was an unfortunate speech, but not because it was a conservative speech; it was unfortunate because of the occasion. 

This prayer breakfast, which I had attended for years, is intended to be a haven of bipartisan civility for members of Congress and the president in a year otherwise filled with discord. Carson's disjointed ramblings about health savings accounts and the national debt might be fine at a Tea Party rally, but slotted between prayerful invocations and benedictions, they were caustic, awkward at best. Many in the room, Republican and Democrat, quietly agreed, and decided that future years should not feature such partisan speakers. 

But the Tea Party smelled an opening, and in Carson they had found their guy.  The brief limelight created by his prayer breakfast speech elevated him to the level of pundit, and the fringes of the Republican Party begged him for more red meat. I held my breath when I heard that Carson was speaking at the Values Voter summit last year, praying that he would focus more on the personal responsibility, family-oriented conservative message that had so much power for him, and for those of us who admired him. But, playing to his audience, Dr. Carson took things in a different direction.

”I have to tell you Obamacare is, really I think, the worst thing that’s happened in this nation since slavery," Carson, a Black man who should know better, told summit attendees. “It was never about healthcare," he said,  "it was about control."

This comparison wasn't a spasm, an aberration. This past week, at another gathering of conservative leaders, Carson declared that we are now living in a "Gestapo age," and that America has become "very much like Nazi Germany," because political correctness abounds. 

This, of course, is pure ignorance, as any Black or Jewish person with the most basic knowledge of history will tell you. The problem is not that Carson has become a prominent Black conservative. There are many conservatives who don't foolishly equate 21st century America with the Nazi genocide that murdered six million Jews.  There are many conservatives who see a marked difference between the personhood-destroying impact of the Atlantic slave trade and the forced possession of Black bodies, and a piece of legislation, Obamacare, about which there is admittedly much disagreement.  

The problem is that, when exposed to the political limelight, Carson's “gifted hands” have become careless, callous. And that's a huge problem for former admirers like me.  Before our eyes, he is trading in the lasting significance of his impact on the world for whatever small reward is offered to him by CPAC, Fox News, or whatever Tea Party figure applauds him next. And we—the Carson boys, who met him years ago in our low moments and who he helped in ways small or large—can only watch in horror. For us, Dr. Ben Carson's story has become an American tragedy. We can only pray that he reclaims his narrative in a way that still will offer others hope.

Paul Ryan to meet black U.S. lawmakers after 'offensive' remarks

Look I don't know if Paul Ryan is racist or not but what he said recently about the "inner city" definitely was. If he and other republicans/conservatives want people to stop accusing them of being racist then they have to stop repeating things that were born out of a racist ideology. Anyway, after Ryan's offensive "inner city" remarks he will be meeting with the Congressional Black Caucus. This wont accomplish sh*t but I guess it's a great PR move. George Cook AAReports.com.

Republican Representative Paul Ryan on Friday agreed to meet with the Congressional Black Caucus after members of the group branded his remarks about inner-city poverty this week "highly offensive".

The controversy began on Wednesday after Ryan said on William Bennett's talk radio show, "Morning in America," that there was a "tailspin of culture, in our inner cities in particular, of men not working and just generations of men not even thinking about working or learning the value of work."

Representative Barbara Lee of California, a member of the Congressional Black Caucus, called Ryan's remarks a "thinly veiled racial attack."

"Let's be clear, when Mr. Ryan says 'inner city,' when he says, 'culture,' these are simply code words for what he really means: 'black'," Lee said in a statement.

Read more here: Paul Ryan to meet black U.S. lawmakers after 'offensive' remarks

Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie wins US National Critics Book Prize

Nigerian author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie has won the US National Critics Book Prize for her novel Americanah. The writer’s work tells the story of a Nigerian woman who moves to the US to pursue a college education.

In an interview with the Los Angeles Times, the author said her book drew on her own experiences as an African living in the US, particularly with African Americans.

“I don’t know race in the way an African American knows race… Sometimes it takes an outsider to see something about your own reality that you don’t,” she said.

Synopsis of Americanah:

A story of love and race centered around a young man and woman from Nigeria who face difficult choices and challenges in the countries they come to call home.

As teenagers in a Lagos secondary school, Ifemelu and Obinze fall in love. Their Nigeria is under military dictatorship, and people are leaving the country if they can. Ifemelu—beautiful, self-assured—departs for America to study. She suffers defeats and triumphs, finds and loses relationships and friendships, all the while feeling the weight of something she never thought of back home: race. Obinze—the quiet, thoughtful son of a professor—had hoped to join her, but post-9/11 America will not let him in, and he plunges into a dangerous, undocumented life in London.

Years later, Obinze is a wealthy man in a newly democratic Nigeria, while Ifemelu has achieved success as a writer of an eye-opening blog about race in America. But when Ifemelu returns to Nigeria, and she and Obinze reignite their shared passion—for their homeland and for each other—they will face the toughest decisions of their lives.

Fearless, gripping, at once darkly funny and tender, spanning three continents and numerous lives, Americanah is a richly told story set in today’s globalized world: Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s most powerful and astonishing novel yet.

Hip-Hop Pioneers Plan a Museum for the Bronx

Before hip-hop became a musical genre, it was a form of expression — and an escape — for its early creators in the Bronx.

Now some of those elders of the genre want to underscore its Bronx roots by opening a hip-hop museum inside the Kingsbridge Armory, a long-empty fortress that is being redeveloped into a national ice sports center. The museum — to be called the Universal Hip Hop Museum — would utilize interactive technology to provide a comprehensive look at hip-hop, including its historical and cultural roots and the contributions of break dancers and disc jockeys, according to museum organizers.

“Many people have a misconception of what hip-hop is,” said Afrika Bambaataa, who is often called the godfather of hip-hop and will serve as the museum’s chairman. “When they say hip-hop, they only say it’s the rapper, and there’s a whole culture and movement behind it.”

The plan for the museum was announced by a group of hip-hop artists and their supporters at a news conference in front of City Hall on Wednesday after a City Council ceremony inside to honor the achievements of Mr. Bambaataa and other early hip-hop pioneers, including Grandmaster Melle Mel, Grandmaster Caz and Grand Wizard Theodore. The new museum, which is still being developed, is the latest in a line of efforts to honor hip-hop that date back to at least the mid-1990s.

Read more here: Hip-Hop Pioneers Plan a Museum for the Bronx