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Senate Majority Leader Harry M. Reid (D-Nev.) apologized Saturday for referring to President Obama in private conversations during the 2008 presidential campaign as “light-skinned” and as having “no Negro dialect.”

“I deeply regret using such a poor choice of words,” Reid said in a statement. “I sincerely apologize for offending any and all Americans, especially African Americans, for my improper comments.”

Obama said in a statement that Reid called him about the matter on Saturday afternoon. “I accepted Harry’s apology without question because I’ve known him for years, I’ve seen the passionate leadership he’s shown on issues of social justice and I know what’s in his heart,” Obama said. “As far as I am concerned, the book is closed.”

Reid’s remarks about Obama were revealed in “Game Change,” a book detailing the 2008 race by Time’s Mark Halperin and New York magazine’s John Heilemann.

The authors describe Reid assessing Obama’s strengths as a candidate. Reid, they write, “believed that the country was ready to embrace a black presidential candidate, especially one such as Obama — a ‘light-skinned’ African American ‘with no Negro dialect, unless he wanted to have one,’ as he said privately. Reid was convinced, in fact, that Obama’s race would help him more than hurt him in a bid for the Democratic nomination.”

The National Republican Senatorial Committee jumped on Reid’s comments. “For those who hope to one day live in a color-blind nation, it appears Harry Reid is more than a few steps behind them,” communications director Brian Walsh said.

Reid also called civil rights leaders and African American congressmen to apologize.

Reid’s apologies came on the same day that a poll conducted by the Las Vegas Review Journal showed him facing an uphill fight for reelection in November. Reid trailed former state Republican party chairwoman Sue Lowden 50 percent to 40 percent, and he was lagging businessman Danny Tarkanian (R) 49 percent to 41 percent. One in three voters viewed Reid favorably and 52 percent saw him in an unfavorable light in the poll.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/01/09/AR2010010902141.html

(CNN) — Bobby DeLaughter — the prosecutor who secured the conviction in the infamous Medgar Evers Mississippi murder case — is himself now headed to prison.

It was DeLaughter’s dogged 1994 prosecution and the subsequent conviction of Ku Klux Klan member Byron De La Beckwith that helped trigger the reopening of dozens of civil rights cold cases.

DeLaughter became an instant hero of the civil rights movement. Alec Baldwin portrayed him in the 1996 movie, “Ghosts of Mississippi,” and his closing statement was once dubbed one of the greatest closing arguments in modern law.

“Is it ever too late to do the right thing?” DeLaughter told the jury of eight blacks and four whites. “For the sake of justice and the hope of us as a civilized society, I sincerely hope and pray that it’s not.”

DeLaughter would go on to become a state judge in 2002. His years in the robe came to an end in 2009, when DeLaughter pleaded guilty to obstruction of justice for lying to an FBI agent in a far-reaching corruption probe that has rocked Mississippi’s judicial system.

When he was sentenced in November, Byron De La Beckwith’s son sat in the chamber wearing a Confederate flag pin on his red blazer. His father had also worn a Confederate pin during the 1994 trial.

DeLaughter is to begin serving his 18-month prison sentence today at a facility in Kentucky.

“The man has now been destroyed, politically and economically. It’s that serious,” said Charles Evers, the brother of Medgar Evers.

He said he is trying to raise money to help pay DeLaughter’s expenses while he’s in prison. “What can we do but fight for a man who fought for us?” he said. “I want DeLaughter to know I’m behind him 100 percent.”

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A vicious New York City rapper who attempted to massacre police officers in Times Square is seen in this photo with Al Sharpton.

Sharpton is holding a copy of the would be spree shooters CD. This would not be the first time Sharpton has been linked to extremist thugs. Sharpton “co-directed” a rally in Harlem with the New Black Panther Party in 1998. At the rally speakers urged violence against Whites, police and Jews.

The rally was headlined by Khallid Muhammed, who’s speeches were so violent, Louis Farrakhan banned him from speaking at NOI mosques and events.

When Muhammed died of a brain aneurysm a couple years after, Sharpton gave his family $10,000 to pay for the funeral.

In an online YouTube memorial, hundreds of NYC blacks have posted messages praising the gangster rapper.

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The Rev. Al Sharpton held a press conference today to blast Tiger Woods for the lack of diversity among his mistresses. Sharpton claims that the lack of African-American women among Woods’ harem will have a negative affect on the black community, specifically young black girls.

“Why is it that a man who calls himself black can’t bring himself to cheat on his wife with a black woman?” said Sharpton, speaking to a group of supporters in Harlem. “What does it say to young black girls everywhere when you pass them over? Shame on you, Tiger Woods. What would your daddy say?”

Sharpton, who has long championed taking black women as mistresses, said that today’s black athletes need to stop neglecting black women when it comes to extramarital affairs, and should follow the examples of positive black role models such as Jesse Jackson and Martin Luther King, Jr., both of whom cheated on their wives with black women. Sharpton also stressed that cheating with African-American women would help the black community financially by giving black girls the chance to sell their stories to tabloids and gossip magazines. Added Sharpton, “I’m not asking you to not cheat on your wives, I’m just asking you to give back to your own community.”
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A branch of the University of Minnesota may require all education students at the school to understand and accept that they are either privileged or oppressed and that they be well-versed in issues like “white privilege,” “institutional racism” and the “myth of meritocracy in the United States.”

Critics are condemning the Race, Culture, Class and Gender Task Group at the University of Minnesota Twin Cities, which proposes making race, class and gender issues the “overarching framework” of all teaching courses.

The task group, formed as part of the Teacher Education Redesign Initiative at the state university, aims to change how future teachers are trained, based on the assertion that the teachers’ lack of “cultural competence” contributes to minority students’ poor grades.

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“We have not been forceful enough in our efforts to protect the most vulnerable population.” Maxine Waters (D-Calf)

WASHINGTON —- Congressional Black Caucus (CBC) members on Wednesday criticized Obama administration for not doing enough to help African-Americans through the bleak economy.

Soon after withholding their votes on a wide-ranging financial services bill, 10 CBC members said they are pressurizing the White House to do more.

The House Financial Services Committee voted 31-27 in favor of the bill, but the lawmakers’ boycott came on a major financial measure the administration wants to see Congress pass this month.     ARTICLE

Six people accused of helping the suspected gunman in the killing of four Lakewood police officers in a Parkland coffee shop evade police have been arrested. Four were booked into the Pierce County Jail on Monday and early Tuesday for investigation of rendering criminal assistance on four counts of first-degree murder. They are Rickey Hinton, Eddie Lee Davis, Douglas Edward Davis and Darcus Allen. Two women – Letricia Nelson and Quiana Wiliams – were arrested and booked on Tuesday night, also for investigation of rendering criminal assistance.

In court Tuesday, Eddie Davis and Douglas Davis both pleaded not guilty. Clemmons’ half brother, Rickey Hinton, has not been charged yet, but has been booked into jail for investigation of rendering criminal assistance. More from source

Seattle police shoot and kill Maurice Clemmons, a career criminal who gunned down four police officers early Sunday as they sat in a suburban coffee shop; police also arrested three people believed to have helped Clemmons escape, with more arrests expected.

Seattle police shot and killed the fugitive suspected of gunning down four officers in a suburban coffee shop, a sheriff’s spokesman said Tuesday.

Maurice Clemmons was shot to death after a “very alert patrol officer” tracked down a stolen vehicle linked to him, Ed Troyer, a spokesman for the Pierce County sheriff, told Fox News.

Clemmons, 37, is suspected of murdering the four Lakewood police officers at a cafe Sunday morning in Parkland, a Tacoma suburb about 35 miles south of Seattle.

He was killed in a working-class neighborhood after police found him with the help of information about possible hiding spots, Troyer said.

“Shots were fired,” Troyer told “Fox & Friends” Tuesday. “We’re very happy that the Seattle police officer is OK. … This could have turned out a lot worse.”

Sgt. Mark Renninger, 39, and Officers Ronald Owens, 37, Tina Griswold, 40, and Greg Richards, 42, were the victims of Sunday’s shooting spree.

Troyer told Fox police arrested three people overnight on suspicion of rendering criminal assistance. The suspected getaway driver also was caught early Tuesday morning, about 6:30 a.m., he said at a briefing.

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