Commentary

On Bill Cosby, Voting Rights, And The Truth

Just remember the Republicans want to deny you a chair and some water while you wait in line to vote in some states. That’s where this country is these days.

Published

3 years ago

July 9, 2021

Christy Price

A young black man with his I voted sticker after voting in an election./iStock

After three years in prison, Bill Cosby, the man whose sexual assault conviction was overturned due to a procedural matter, is a free man.

When a district attorney in Pennsylvania made a deal not to prosecute Cosby on criminal charges back in 2005, Cosby couldn’t ‘take the Fifth’ in a civil deposition on the same charges. So, Cosby simply told the truth—that essentially, he used quaaludes and alcohol as his M.O. to have non-consensual sex with women. The deposition should never have been used in 2015 when a new D.A. decided to go after Cosby criminally. But it convicted Cosby, who was in prison until the Pennsylvania Supreme Court decided a deal was a deal.

And that is how you get this thing called justice in America. It takes the best attorneys and lots of money. Most of us don’t have that and will never see it. Cosby had it. He did serve three years, but he’s out now.

I feel for all the women who came forward after years of silence. I feel for the plaintiff in the one case, Andrea Constand.

But this is the law. We can change it. Or other Cosby victims—if time hasn’t run out–can come forward and lodge new cases. In the meantime, we should be happy the law works. Because most of the time, the wrongfully accused and jailed are not the Cosbys of the world, but the innocent nobodys who get a raw deal. The law works for us all.

Note that no one is saying Cosby is innocent. But it’s a tough lesson when the truth is revealed and can’t be used because of a D.A.’s blunder.

But it does fit in with where we are in this truth-forsaken country of ours.

When we stood on the Fourth of July among fellow Americans–after looking at the sparkle of peonies and coronavirus shapes shot in the air– did you ask yourself if our democracy was going up in smoke?

We have an ex-president who continues to upset the democratic equation by challenging the very fact that he lost the election fair and square last November. We know that to be as true as there are 50 states in our union.

But here we are in mid-2021, after the twin disaster of an actual pandemic and a political pandemic, that is four years of a president who, though out of office, is still hellbent on destroying our democracy. After all that, what are we left with? Not a sense of unity. Not in an America where no one can seem to agree on anything. Masks? Vaccines? The Constitution? Truth?

And let’s put aside hot buttons like abortion, policing, or race, for now. Let’s just think of practical matters like how do we fund and fix our infrastructure to make sure our country’s roads and bridges are safe for all?

Or how can we balance our priorities and close the income gaps that exist between the very wealthy and the very poor?

And then we have the basis of our democracy itself. How do we make sure that everyone gets heard in our country through the fundamental right of franchise? Not the right to open a Jollibee. a Panda Express, or a Popeye’s Chicken. I mean the right to vote. That kind of franchise.

Just remember the Republicans want to deny you a chair and some water while you wait in line to vote in some states. That’s where this country is these days.

On the other hand, if you maintain that the presidency was stolen last November from Trump, then you believe not only in the “Big Lie,” but in its enabler, the myth of voter fraud.

And then it’s likely you were either part of the insurrection of the capitol or supporting the violent actions to de-certify the election on January 6. Is all that worth investigating—to protect our democracy? But Republicans don’t think so.

They prefer the anti-democracy solution: to exclude people from voting by making the rules tighter and tougher so that even legally cast ballots are disqualified. These are laws that will likely hurt Blacks and other people of color disproportionately.

Last week at the U.S. Supreme Court, in Brnovich v. Democratic National Committee, six conservative justices (including the three Trump appointees) beat back the three liberal ones to side with voting restrictions. Already 17 states have restrictive laws, and now challenging any of them will be near impossible.

This is another blow to perhaps the single most important civil rights law, the Voting Rights Act of 1965. Weakened over the years, last week’s ruling is the alarm for Congress to take action and pass the John Lewis Voting Rights Act in order to restore protections that would preserve our democracy.

As they say, keep your eye on the prize. Bill Cosby? Just a distraction. Let him defend Phylicia Rashad’s Free Speech rights to defend Cosby.

Right now, the fight of the ’60s has been renewed. The threats to our democracy are that real.

Christy Price

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Activism

In 1974, Then-Gov. Jimmy Carter Visited the Home of Oakland Black Black Political Activist Virtual Murrell While Running for President

civil rights icon Georgia State Representative Julian Bond said that Carter, along with governors Reuben Askew of Florida, Dale Bumpers of Arkansas, and Terry Sanford of North Carolina, were all a part of what was being dubbed the “New South” and so supported civil rights and voting rights for African Americans.

Published

1 day ago

January 3, 2025

Oakland Post

Virtual Murrell chats with Jimmy Carter two years before Carter was elected president in 1976. Courtesy photo.

By Virtual T. Murrell
Special to The Post

On his way to seeking the presidency, then-Gov. Jimmy Carter visited the Bay Area in his capacity as campaign chairman of the Democratic National Committee in March of 1974.

A friend of mine, Bill Lynch, a Democrat from San Francisco, had been asked to host Carter, who was then relatively unknown. Seeking my advice on the matter, I immediately called my friend, civil rights icon Georgia State Representative Julian Bond, for his opinion.

Bond said that Carter, along with governors Reuben Askew of Florida, Dale Bumpers of Arkansas, and Terry Sanford of North Carolina, were all a part of what was being dubbed the “New South” and so supported civil rights and voting rights for African Americans.

Based on Julian’s comments, I agreed to host the governor. We picked him up at the San Francisco Airport. With his toothy smile, I could tell almost right away that he was like no other politician I had ever met. On his arrival, there was a message telling him to go to the VIP room, where he met then-Secretary of State Jerry Brown.

After leaving the airport, we went to a reception in his honor at the home of Paul “Red” Fay, who had served as the acting secretary of the Navy under President John Kennedy. (Carter, it turned out, had been himself a 1946 graduate of the U.S. Naval Academy and served as a submariner in the 1950s.)

The following afternoon, the Niagara Movement Democratic Club hosted a reception for Carter, which was a major success. Carter indicated that he would be considering running for president and hoped for our support if he did so.

As the event was winding down, I witnessed the most amazing moment: Carter’s wife, Rosalynn, was in the kitchen with my former wife, Irene, wearing an apron and busting suds! You would have to have been there to see it: The first and last time a white woman cleaned up my kitchen.

A few months later, President Richard Nixon resigned amid the Watergate scandal. He was succeeded by his vice president, Gerald Ford.

On the heels of that scandal, Jimmy Carter’s election in 1976 represented integrity and honesty at a point in America’s history when he was just what the nation needed to lead as president of the United States.

Oakland Post

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Activism

Oakland Post: Week of January 1 – 7, 2025

The printed Weekly Edition of the Oakland Post: Week of January 1 – 7, 2025

Published

3 days ago

January 2, 2025

Oakland Post

To enlarge your view of this issue, use the slider, magnifying glass icon or full page icon in the lower right corner of the browser window.

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Activism

Racially Motivated Violence Against Black Teen Prompts $10 Million Claim Against LAUSD 

In December, a second altercation, on a video shared with news media, showed 4 to 6 boys attacking a Black student and using racial slurs. The video also shows a person in a safety vest trying to stop the fight and telling them to “handle it after school.” Then, the video ends. 

Published

6 days ago

December 30, 2024

Oakland Post

(Left to right) Civil Rights Attorney Caree Harper comforts the victim’s mother as she becomes emotional when describing the attacks on her son while her attorney Bradley C. Gage listens. Verdugo Hills High School on Thursday, Dec. 20, 2024, in Tujunga, CA. (Solomon O. Smith /for California Black Media)

By Solomon O. Smith, California Black Media

A distraught mother and her legal team announced a $10 million lawsuit against the Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) on Dec. 16, alleging that her son was the target of bullying because of his race.

“CS DOE is a 14-year-old African American student at Verdugo High School. He is a Ninth Grader,” reads a statement the plaintiff’s attorneys shared with California Black Media (CBM).

“Almost from the first day of class (in August 2024), CS DOE was targeted by Latino students who called him racial slurs, physically attacked him and threatened to stab him.”

The family’s identity has not yet been released to the public due to safety concerns, according to their attorneys Bradley C. Gage and Caree Harper. The student’s mother is identified only as A.O. in the complaint.

The first video, filmed in August, showed several non-Black students punching and kicking a Black student in a bathroom on campus while yelling racial slurs. The mother claims that the students who attacked her son were not punished, and the administration asked her to move her son to another school for his safety.

“They wanted him to leave the school without giving any disciplinary action towards those students,” said the student’s mother. “He’s not going anywhere. He’s going to finish. I wanted him to at least stay until the December winter break, and then I was going to transfer schools for him.”

Before she could enroll her son in a different school the attacks escalated.

CS DOE, a 14-year-old freshman, left the school but was followed by a car, according to Gage. Several individuals exited the vehicle, one with a “large butcher knife.” A fight ensued and two people were stabbed. The Black student was arrested for assault with a deadly weapon but was later released into his mother’s custody.

The high school freshmen is scheduled to appear in juvenile court on Feb. 1, but Harper says she will reach out to the District Attorney and make the case against charging the young man.

“His mama had to go find him because he was hiding and fleeing for his very life,” said Harper.

According to the boy’s mother, the young student is still traumatized and has not been able to return to the area because it remains unsafe. Racial slurs have also been spray painted on their home.

“I’m sad. I’m devastated, you know,” said the mother. “I still feel like they’re after him. I still feel like they can kill him, possibly.”

The LAUSD and principal of Verdugo High School did not respond to CBM’s requests for comment.

If you are – or someone you know is – has experienced a hate crime or hate incident, please visit CAvsHate.org for more information and to find out what you can do about it.