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Bill Cosby: The Fight, The Legacy, The Flowers He’s Earned

BLACKPRESSUSA NEWSWIRE — Six years ago this month, Bill Cosby was sentenced to prison. For some, it was the spectacle of a fallen idol. For others, it was the raw proof that this nation, still drunk on its own lies, can summon racism from the judge’s bench, let it seep into the prosecutor’s chair, and finally stain the jury box.

Published

3 months ago

September 17, 2025

Stacy M. Brown

By Stacy M. Brown
Black Press USA Senior National Correspondent

Six years ago this month, Bill Cosby was sentenced to prison. For some, it was the spectacle of a fallen idol. For others, it was the raw proof that this nation, still drunk on its own lies, can summon racism from the judge’s bench, let it seep into the prosecutor’s chair, and finally stain the jury box. What was lost, what was deliberately hidden, is that Cosby—blind, wealthy, eighty years old—could have walked out untouched if he had only bent his back, signed a paper, confessed to a sin he swore he did not commit. He refused. He chose prison over surrender, isolation over capitulation. That act alone, in a country that has always demanded Black men bow their heads, ought to have been recognized as a radical declaration of dignity.

Refusing the Easy Way Out

Cosby remembered, on Let It Be Known, how they dangled freedom like meat before a starving man. “My lawyer came to me and said, the district attorney is offering you to sign a paper saying you did it… and that you wouldn’t have to do prison time,” he said. “I told my lawyer to continue with the trial… I wasn’t signing any papers or anything.” Even when caged, blind, and stripped of freedom, they offered him release if only he would renounce himself. “Sign the paper and go to these classes, and then we will let you go. Well, my signature would be in a sealed envelope, and nobody could open it.” Again, he refused. He could have chosen the coward’s path. He could have lived out his days in comfort. Instead, he chose to carry innocence as a burden, fully believing that he might never walk free again.

A Courtroom Steeped in Racism

Bill and Camille Cosby, at right, arrive at the Montgomery County Courthouse in Norristown, Pa., on June 12, 2017. Cosby is on trial for sexual assault. (POOL PHOTO)

And in those courtrooms, the poison was naked. Black jurors were denied with cynical ease. A Black woman police officer was struck from service, not because she was unfit, but because she had once beaten back a false charge laid against her. At the retrial, when one Black juror was finally seated, a prosecutor spat, “You got your one.” Another juror declared Cosby guilty before hearing a single word and was still allowed to sit in judgment. And the judge—who should have been the steward of justice—was said to have whistled the theme from Kill Bill outside the jury room before the verdict in the retrial was returned.

The first trial ended in a mistrial, the jury grinding nearly 60 hours before breaking. They had leaned toward acquittal, but the judge forced them back. After the second trial ended in conviction, and when prosecutors argued he might flee because “he has a plane,” Cosby exploded once jurors left the room: “He doesn’t have a plane, you a–hole! I’m sick of him!” Never forget that prosecutors across jurisdictions passed on every other accusation. Only one case was carried forward—and even that was not about rape. The alleged victim admitted to bitterness when Valentine’s Day passed without a call. She later dialed Cosby to ask for tickets to his show for her parents. But facts were never the point. The performance of guilt was the only script the court was willing to stage.

With the Media, The Lie had No Rival.

Camille Cosby walked through those halls like a prophetess, entering a place fouled with racial contempt. She smiled, spoke softly to her husband, and left. That smile, quiet yet defiant, seemed to say: I know exactly what is happening here. And the media, hungry and complicit, huddled with the prosecutor’s mouthpiece to make certain every headline sang the same hymn of untruth. With no cameras in the room, the lie had no rival. The mention of Quaaludes covered newspapers and flooded television news, but the case was about Benadryl, 1 and a half tablets. Fiction and made-up lies were the norm at Cosby’s trials. Mainstream media pushed the narrative that Cosby “slipped” drugs into an unsuspecting woman’s beverage. However, no evidence of such was presented at trial.

Not discussed was how prevalent Quaalude use was among both sexes. The pill they called a disco biscuit was never just a drug but a mirror of America’s hunger for escape, a hunger dressed in sequins and sweat beneath the lights of Studio 54. Hugh Hefner reportedly handed them out like candy in his mansion; a promise wrapped in velvet but steeped in surrender. Andy Warhol scribbled about them in his diaries; the artist turned witness to a culture stumbling between decadence and decay. Later, Jordan Belfort made them infamous in a Wall Street gone wild, his intoxication filmed and sold as entertainment. Notably, during the second trial, when the judge stunningly allowed as many as 20 women to testify, an accuser swore she had already ingested a Quaalude before she visited Cosby with a friend in the 1970s. Another witness testified that she left her boyfriend on an exotic island after Cosby called with a job offer in Nevada, only to be miffed about Cosby’s indifference.

Still another wrote glowing words about Cosby in her autobiography, yet completely changed the story on the witness stand. When Cosby’s team wanted to put forth a witness who allegedly was with the primary accuser when the woman had come up with a ruse to “set Cosby up,” the judge refused to allow her to tell the jury. Striking was the one person who seemed, by far, the most credible witness. A chef who worked for Cosby was present on the night of the alleged incident. That chef, a meticulous older man, testified that the visit by the accuser for which Cosby was on trial occurred on his last night in Cosby’s employ. Significantly, it proved that even if something nefarious took place, which Cosby vehemently denied, it happened well outside the statute of limitations. Among other things, the state Supreme Court agreed. The justices said the trial was illegal, should never have taken place, and the verdict was wrong. The justices ordered that prosecutors refrain from going after Cosby again.

Inside Prison Walls

Behind walls meant to break him, Cosby spoke to men the world had abandoned. At SCI–Phoenix, he joined Man Up, blind, in a wheelchair, addressing those whose bodies bore chains. After speaking of his heroes, one inmate told him, “I will be your hero, Mr. Cosby.” He spoke to Men of Valor, too. “I noticed that in the Bible, the parts about Jesus, Jesus never smiled. And I want you, if you are going to do what you say you are going to do in your turnaround, make Jesus smile.”

Pound Cake Then and Now

In 2004, Cosby thundered about a boy shot dead for stealing pound cake. “And then we all run out and are outraged, the cops shouldn’t have shot him. What the hell was he doing with the pound cake in his hand?” He called out the rot of absent parenting. Now, with years and prison behind him, he said again: “They are putting us under siege.” At Phoenix, sagging pants and untied laces were forbidden. To him, these were not fashion, but chains disguised as choice. “They would rather have a picture of a youth doing nothing, not studying, and have his pants lowered.”

Camille’s Strength

It was Camille who preserved him. “My wife, Camille, is not only a very intelligent woman, but she is a woman who saved my mother’s life, and she has saved my life by continuously saying, it’s what you put in your mouth,” he said. “She makes sure that we eat like that, and that’s why, at age 88, I’m cancer-free, and I don’t have any ailments of forgetting things.” From prison, when he phoned, Camille silenced his weakness. “Whenever I called her, I just badly wanted to tell her how I felt,” Cosby said. “And she would say, ‘Just be quiet.’” He had called her strength “love and the strength of womanhood. And you could reverse it, the strength of womanhood and love.”

Giving Back

Cosby and Camille poured more than $200 million into higher education, including $20 million to Spelman College, at that time the largest gift ever given to an HBCU. Those gifts were not simply donations. They were lifelines—scholarships, endowments, futures carved from generosity.

Television and Film Legacy

Cosby broke into I Spy, the first Black co-lead in a drama. He created Fat Albert, a mirror for Black children. He built The Cosby Show, which for five years reigned supreme, showing Cliff and Clair Huxtable as what America insisted could not exist: a Black family whole, professional, and loving. A Different World sent young people surging toward HBCUs. And with Sidney Poitier, he made Uptown Saturday Night, Let’s Do It Again, A Piece of the Action—comedies still treasured in Black homes, still testaments to resilience and wit when Hollywood offered little but caricature. Cosby demanded truth on screen. When told to strip a poster from Theo’s wall—one that read “Abolish Apartheid”—he warned them: “If you do, you can take the show with it.”

The Black Press

Unlike so many others who rose to fame, Cosby never turned his back on the Black Press. His only prison interview was with the Black Press. His first long interview after release was again with the Black Press. In 2014, he said, “I only expect the black media to uphold the standards of excellence in journalism, and when you do that, you have to go in with a neutral mind.”

Deserving a Parade

Cosby’s path has been strewn with glory, grief, and betrayal. Yet what remains is a record that cannot be erased. He shattered television’s barriers, poured hundreds of millions into education, gave film and television back to his people, and stood on innocence when it would have been so easy to surrender. Through it all, he was held by Camille, and he never abandoned the Black Press. We say, give flowers to the living. Bill Cosby has earned more than flowers. For what he has given Black culture, he deserves a parade. And somewhere, the ticker tape waits.

Stacy M. Brown

Posts by Stacy M. Brown

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A Nation in Freefall While the Powerful Feast: Trump Calls Affordability a ‘Con Job’

BLACKPRESSUSA NEWSWIRE — There are seasons in this country when the struggle of ordinary Americans is not merely a condition but a kind of weather that settles over everything.

Published

4 weeks ago

December 3, 2025

Stacy M. Brown

By Stacy M. Brown
Black Press USA Senior National Correspondent

There are seasons in this country when the struggle of ordinary Americans is not merely a condition but a kind of weather that settles over everything. It enters the grocery aisle, the overdue bill, the rent notice, and the long nights spent calculating how to get through the next week. The latest numbers show that this season has not passed. It has deepened.

Private employers cut 32,000 jobs in November, according to ADP. Because the nation has been hemorrhaging jobs since President Trump took office, the administration has halted publishing the traditional monthly report. The ADP report revealed that small businesses suffered the heaviest losses. Establishments with fewer than 50 workers shed 120,000 positions, including 74,000 from companies with 20 to 49 workers. Larger firms added 90,000 jobs, widening the split between those rising and those falling.

Meanwhile, wealth continues to climb for the few who already possess most of it. Federal Reserve data shows the top 1 percent now holds $52 trillion. The top 10 percent added $5 trillion in the second quarter alone. The bottom half gained only 6 percent over the past year, a number so small it fades beside the towering fortunes above it.

“Less educated and poorer people tend to make worse mistakes,” John Campbell said to CBS News, while noting that the complexity of the system leaves many families lost before they even begin. Campbell, a Harvard University economist and coauthor of a book examining the country’s broken personal finance structure, pointed to a system built to confuse and punish those who lack time, training, or access.

“Creditors are just breathing down their necks,” Carol Fox told Bloomberg News, while noting that rising borrowing costs, shrinking consumer spending, and trade battles under the current administration have left owners desperate. Fox serves as a court-appointed Subchapter V trustee in Southern Florida and has watched the crisis unfold case by case.

During a cabinet meeting on Tuesday, Trump told those present that affordability “doesn’t mean anything to anybody.” He added that Democrats created a “con job” to mislead the public.

However, more than $30 million in taxpayer funds reportedly have supported his golf travel. Reports show Kristi Noem and FBI Director Kash Patel have also made extensive use of private jets through government and political networks. The administration approved a $40 billion bailout of Argentina. The president’s wealthy donors recently gathered for a dinner celebrating his planned $300 million White House ballroom.

During an appearance on CNBC, Mark Zandi, an economist, warned that the country could face serious economic threats. “We have learned that people make many mistakes,” Campbell added. “And particularly, sadly, less educated and poorer people tend to make worse mistakes.”

Stacy M. Brown

Posts by Stacy M. Brown

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The Numbers Behind the Myth of the Hundred Million Dollar Contract

BLACKPRESSUSA NEWSWIRE — Odell Beckham Jr. did not spark controversy on purpose. He sat on The Pivot Podcast and tried to explain the math behind a deal that looks limitless from the outside but shrinks fast once the system takes its cut.

Published

4 weeks ago

December 3, 2025

Stacy M. Brown

By Stacy M. Brown
Black Press USA Senior National Correspondent

Odell Beckham Jr. did not spark controversy on purpose. He sat on The Pivot Podcast and tried to explain the math behind a deal that looks limitless from the outside but shrinks fast once the system takes its cut. He looked into the camera and tried to offer a truth most fans never hear. “You give somebody a five-year $100 million contract, right? What is it really? It is five years for sixty. You are getting taxed. Do the math. That is twelve million a year that you have to spend, use, save, invest, flaunt,” said Beckham. He added that buying a car, buying his mother a house, and covering the costs of life all chip away at what people assume lasts forever.

The reaction was instant. Many heard entitlement. Many heard a millionaire complaining. What they missed was a glimpse into a professional world built on big numbers up front and a quiet erasing of those numbers behind the scenes.

The tax data in Beckham’s world is not speculation. SmartAsset’s research shows that top NFL players often lose close to half their income to federal taxes, state taxes, and local taxes. The analysis explains that athletes in California face a state rate of 13.3 percent and that players are also taxed in every state where they play road games, a structure widely known as the jock tax. For many players, that means filing up to ten separate returns and facing a combined tax burden that reaches or exceeds 50 percent.

A look across the league paints the same picture. The research lists star players in New York, Philadelphia, Chicago, Detroit, and Cleveland, all giving up between 43 and 47 percent of their football income before they ever touch a dollar. Star quarterback Phillip Rivers, at one point, was projected to lose half of his playing income to taxes alone.

A second financial breakdown from MGO CPA shows that the problem does not only affect the highest earners. A $1 million salary falls to about $529,000 after federal taxes, state and city taxes, an agent fee, and a contract deduction. According to that analysis, professional athletes typically take home around half of their contract value, and that is before rent, meals, training, travel, and support obligations are counted.

The structure of professional sports contracts adds another layer. A study of major deals across MLB, the NBA, and the NFL notes that long-term agreements lose value over time because the dollar today has more power than the dollar paid in the future. Even the largest deals shrink once adjusted for time. The study explains that contract size alone does not guarantee financial success and that structure and timing play a crucial role in a player’s long-term outcomes.

Beckham has also faced headlines claiming he is “on the brink of bankruptcy despite earning over one hundred million” in his career. Those reports repeated his statement that “after taxes, it is only sixty million” and captured the disbelief from fans who could not understand how money at that level could ever tighten.

Other reactions lacked nuance. One article wrote that no one could relate to any struggle on eight million dollars a year. Another described his approach as “the definition of a new-money move” and argued that it signaled poor financial choices and inflated spending.

But the underlying truth reaches far beyond Beckham. Professional athletes enter sudden wealth without preparation. They carry the weight of family support. They navigate teams, agents, advisors, and expectations from every direction. Their earning window is brief. Their career can end in a moment. Their income is fragmented, taxed, and carved up before the public ever sees the real number.

The math is unflinching. Twenty million dollars becomes something closer to $8 million after federal taxes, state taxes, jock taxes, agent fees, training costs, and family responsibilities. Over five years, that is about $40 million of real, spendable income. It is transformative money, but not infinite. Not guaranteed. Not protected.

Beckham offered a question at the heart of this entire debate. “Can you make that last forever?”

Stacy M. Brown

Posts by Stacy M. Brown

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FBI Report Warns of Fear, Paralysis, And Political Turmoil Under Director Kash Patel

BLACKPRESSUSA NEWSWIRE — Six months into Kash Patel’s tenure as Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, a newly compiled internal report from a national alliance of retired and active-duty FBI agents and analysts delivers a stark warning about what the Bureau has become under his leadership.

Published

4 weeks ago

December 2, 2025

Stacy M. Brown

By Stacy M. Brown

Black Press USA Senior National Correspondent

Six months into Kash Patel’s tenure as Director of the Federal Bureau of Investigation, a newly compiled internal report from a national alliance of retired and active-duty FBI agents and analysts delivers a stark warning about what the Bureau has become under his leadership. The 115-page document, submitted to Congress this month, is built entirely on verified reporting from inside field offices across the country and paints a picture of an agency gripped by fear, divided by ideology, and drifting without direction.

The report’s authors write that they launched their inquiry after receiving troubling accounts from inside the Bureau only four months into Patel’s tenure. They describe their goal as a pulse check on whether the ninth FBI director was reforming the Bureau or destabilizing it. Their conclusion: the preliminary findings were discouraging.

Reports Describe Widespread Internal Distrust and Open Hostility Toward President Trump

Sources across the country told investigators that a large number of FBI employees openly express hostility toward President Donald Trump. One source reported seeing an “increasing number of FBI Special Agents who dislike the President,” adding that these employees were exhibiting what they called “TDS” and had lost “their ability to think critically about an issue and distinguish fact from fiction.” Another source described employees making off-color comments about the administration during office conversations.

The sentiment reportedly extends beyond domestic lines. Law enforcement and intelligence partners in allied countries have privately expressed fear that the Trump administration could damage long-term international cooperation according to a sub-source who reported those concerns directly to investigators.

Pardon Backlash and Fear of Retaliation

The President’s January 20 pardons of individuals convicted for their roles in the January 6 attack ignited what the report calls demoralization inside the Bureau. One FBI employee said they were “demoralized” that individuals “rightfully convicted” were pardoned and feared that some of those individuals or their supporters might target them or their family for carrying out their duties. Another source described widespread anger that lists of personnel who worked on January 6 investigations had been provided to the Justice Department for review, noting that agents “were just following orders” and now worry those lists could leak publicly.

Morale In Decline

Morale among FBI employees appears to be sinking fast. There were a few scattered positive notes, but the weight of the reporting describes morale as low, bad, or terrible. Agents with more than a decade of service told investigators they feel marginalized or ignored. Some are counting the days until they can retire. One even uses a countdown app on their phone.

Culture Of Fear

Layered over that unhappiness is something far more corrosive. A culture of fear. Sources say Patel, though personable, created mistrust from the start because of harsh remarks he made about the FBI before taking office. Agents took those comments personally. They now work in an atmosphere where employees keep their heads down and speak carefully. Managers wait for directions because they are afraid a wrong move could cost them their jobs. One source said agents dread coming to work because nobody knows who will be reassigned or fired next.

Leadership Concerns

The report also paints a picture of leaders unprepared for the jobs they hold. Multiple sources said Patel is in over his head and lacks the breadth of experience required to understand the Bureau’s complex programs. Some said Deputy Director Dan Bongino should never have been appointed because the role requires deep institutional knowledge of FBI operations. A sub-source recounted Bongino telling employees during a field office visit that “the truth is for chumps.” Employees who heard it were stunned and offended.

Social Media and Communication Breakdowns

Communication inside the Bureau has become another source of frustration. Sources said Patel and Bongino spend too much time posting on social media and not enough time communicating with employees in clear and official ways. Several told investigators they learn more about FBI operations from tweets than from internal channels.

ICE Assignments Raise Alarm

Nothing has sparked more frustration inside the FBI than the orders requiring agents to assist Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The reporting shows widespread resentment and fear over these assignments. Agents say they have little training in immigration law and were ordered into operations without proper planning. Some said they were put in tactically unsafe positions. They also warned that being pulled away from counterterrorism and counterintelligence investigations threatens national security. One sub-source asked, “If we’re not working CT and CI, then who is?”

DEI Program Removal

Even the future of diversity programs became a point of division. Some agents praised Patel’s removal of DEI initiatives. Others said the old system left them afraid to speak honestly because they worried about being labeled racist. The reporting shows a deep and unresolved conflict over whether DEI strengthened the organization or weakened it.

Notable Incidents

The document also details several incidents that have become part of FBI lore. Patel ordered all employees to remove pronouns and personal messages from their email signatures yet used the number nine in his own. Agents laughed at what they saw as hypocrisy. In another episode, FBI employees who discussed Patel’s request for an FBI-issued firearm were ordered to take polygraph examinations, which one respected source described as punitive. And in Utah, Patel refused to exit a plane without a medium-sized FBI raid jacket. A team scrambled to find one and finally secured a female agent’s jacket. Patel still refused to step out until patches were added. SWAT members removed patches from their own uniforms to satisfy the demand.

A Bureau at a Crossroad

The Alliance warns that the Bureau stands at a difficult crossroads. They write that the FBI faces some of the most daunting challenges in its history. But even in despair, a few voices say something different. One veteran source said “It is early, but most can see the mission is now the priority. Case work and threats are the focus again. Reform is headed in the right direction.”