Racism

On Tuesday, July 23, as CNN Newsroom gave attention to the story that George Zimmerman helped rescue a family after a vehicle crash in Florida, CNN reporter Victor Blackstone inserted some uncalled for commentary as he theorized that the rescued family members "would also hope" that "someone else" other than Zimmerman had rescued them. After Blackstone recounted that the family members "don't…

Abbe Smith, who has written an almost 1,500-word column for the Washington Post, is described as "a professor of law and the director of the Criminal Defense & Prisoner Advocacy Clinic at Georgetown University." The title of her column is "What motivates a lawyer to defend a Tsarnaev, a Castro or a Zimmerman?" -- as if defending an alleged terrorist killer of three and maimer of hundreds…

On Thursday's PoliticsNation show, MSNBC's Al Sharpton used FNC host Bill O'Reilly's comments against certain segments of black culture to resurrect a 2007 smear against O'Reilly which mischaracterized him as being shocked to see patrons at a predominantly black restaurant in Harlem behaving in a civilized manner when the FNC host in reality was criticizing the media for portraying African-…

A recent poll shows that more than eight out of ten non-white voters are fine with their state government requiring a photo ID at polling places. Yet, that fact was completely omitted from a front-page Friday New York Times story by Charlie Savage and Adam Liptak which dutifully praised Obama Attorney General Eric Holder's push to gum up Texas's voter ID law in federal courts. Additionally,…

An NBC News/Wall Street Journal poll released earlier this week get a lot of attention for President Obama’s declining favorability rate especially as it pertains to his handling of the economy. What the media seemed to largely miss is that since January 2009, people’s opinion of race relations in this country has plummeted by 25 percentage points.

Judy Woodruff sat down for a cordial conversation with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid on Wednesday’s PBS NewsHour, and the veteran anchor was not afraid to play up partisan and racial politics. For her final question, Woodruff asked Reid for his reaction to President Obama’s remarks last week on the Trayvon Martin saga and the plight of black men in America, but she added a second part to…

It's been nearly two weeks since George Zimmerman was acquitted of murdering black teenager Trayvon Martin, but the verdict continues to draw heated reaction from across the country. One of the latest responses came from Shawn Carter -- a rapper better known by his stage name of Jay-Z -- who declared that everyone knows the verdict “was wrong,” and it left him “really angry” because the…

[UPDATED BELOW] CNN's New Day used Rep. Steve King's controversial remarks on illegal immigrants to paddle the GOP and hint that bigotry is partly behind opposition to the immigration bill. King had said that for every "valedictorian" illegal immigrant, 100 more are drug smugglers. "But it's important that he [King] said it, because this is what it's about on some level," said New Day co-…

When a CNN guest made an unsubstantiated claim that George Zimmerman called Trayvon Martin a racial slur, CNN's Erin Burnett wouldn't call her on it. On the July 16 Erin Burnett OutFront, the 2008 Miss Black Massachusetts Safiya Songhai said, "So, I mean the idea that race played a role in the case – yes, it played a role in the case. He [Zimmerman] is on the tape saying "F-ing coons."…

On Tuesday's All In show, MSNBC's Chris Hayes attacked FNC's Bill O'Reilly for what he called a "super racist rant" because of a commentary the FNC host gave on Monday's The O'Reilly Factor about racial issues. Hayes charged that such commentary from O'Reilly gives a "cheap, crack-like high" to FNC's "old, fearful white audience." Hayes:

President Obama rarely misses an opportunity to insert himself into an issue. Last Friday, he appeared in the White House pressroom to comment on the George Zimmerman verdict. The president said he could have been Trayvon Martin. Not likely, given his private schooling and the way he was fast-tracked to success. The president said the history of African-Americans partially explains the way…

Appearing on Monday's The Last Word, MSNBC contributor Goldie Taylor called Rush Limbaugh "dangerous," and accused him of "pimping his audience" in response to the conservative talk radio host's reaction to President Obama's statement on the George Zimmerman verdict. After a clip of Limbaugh, Taylor responded:

On his program last night, Fox News Channel host Bill O'Reilly applauded President Obama for speaking out about the George Zimmerman verdict but argued that Obama, and the self-proclaimed civil rights leadership have been avoiding the larger issues facing black Americans. Instead of just focusing on how people felt about Zimmerman shooting Trayvon Martin, O'Reilly urged Obama to talk about…

During his famous “I Have a Dream” speech on Aug. 28, 1963, Martin Luther King Jr. declared that he wanted people to “live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character.” Almost 50 years later, that dream is still a long way off, judging from the clash on Saturday in which CNN Newsroom's black host Don Lemon told conservative white…