Umoja (Unity) To strive for and to maintain unity in the family, community, nation and race.

Kujichagulia (Self-Determination) To define ourselves, name ourselves, create for ourselves and speak for ourselves.

Ujima (Collective Work and Responsibility) To build and maintain our community together and make our brothers’ and sisters’ problems our problems and to solve them together.

Ujamaa (Cooperative Economics) To build and maintain our own stores, shops and other businesses and to profit from them together.

Nia (Purpose) To make our collective vocation the building and developing of our community in order to restore our people to their traditional greatness.

Kuumba (Creativity) To do always as much as we can, in the way we can, in order to leave our community more beautiful and beneficial than we inherited it.

Imani (Faith) To believe with all our heart in our people, our parents, our teachers, our leaders and the righteousness and victory of our struggle.

Chancellor Cantor:

I write this letter with fond memories of interactions with the wonderful students at Syracuse University.  While on your campus, I found the students to be both thoughtful and welcoming:  perfect for a university campus.

I write to lend my full support for Dr. Boyce Watkins and his tenure application at Syracuse University.  Dr. Watkins has raised the profile of Syracuse University as he informs our national community on money matters as well as matters of the conscience.  And at this particular time in our country’s history, financial literacy must be viewed as an important life skill.  Dr. Boyce is doing for America what he does in Syracuse University classrooms every class meeting period.  So why would Syracuse University not want such a prolific and publicly appealing face as its representative?

Ultimately, Dr. Boyce must be judged by what he does in the classroom and in publications.  Does Dr. Boyce elevate Syracuse University and does he elevate his field?  Dr. Boyce demonstrates "academics in action" and makes scholarship relevant.  Why should Dr. Boyce’s scholarship and activism (which elevates Syracuse University) not be rewarded by a grant of tenure from Syracuse University?

As a former Member of Congress and Green Party candidate for President of the United States, I realize that political complexities can play a role in the decision to grant tenure to faculty on most American campuses. As I have just concluded successful organizing against war that brought together four 2008 Presidential candidates, I am reminded of the clean break that Dr. King had to make with his friends of the civil rights movement when he decided to speak out against the Vietnam War.  But Dr. King intoned that he had been fighting segregation too long to segregate his moral concerns.  Your decision with respect to Dr. Boyce is both political and moral.  And so, I will end with one very famous Dr. King quote and hope that the leadership of Syracuse University will do in this decision what is right:

"Cowardice asks the question – is it safe?
Expediency asks the question – is it politic?
Vanity asks the question – is it popular?
But conscience asks the question – is it right?
And there comes a time when one must take a position that is neither safe, nor politic, nor popular; but one must take it because it is right."

Sincerely,
Cynthia McKinney

–
http://www.livestream.com/dignity
http://dignity.ning.com/
http://www.twitter.com/dignityaction
http://www.myspace.com/dignityaction
http://www.myspace.com/runcynthiarun
http://www.twitter.com/cynthiamckinney
http://www.facebook.com/CynthiaMcKinney

by Dr. Boyce Watkins, Syracuse University 

The other night on the Oprah Winfrey Christmas special, President Barack Obama made an unwise move. When asked what grade he deserves as president, Obama gave himself a B+. Giving himself a grade was not necessarily the best decision, since there are over 300 million Americans who then realized that they should be giving him grades as well.
So, allow me to be the first to provide our president with a grade for his performance. I’ve been giving grades to college students for the last 16 years, and one thing my students will tell you is that I am fair. My other argument is that I never actually GIVE you a grade; I simply report the grade that you’ve earned.
1) Handling of the Economy (B-): President Obama is better than John McCain ever could have been when it comes to managing our economic downturn. The problem is that while the president has spiraled our deficit out of control, our nation has yet to see any concrete evidence that the economy’s fundamental strength has returned. He has made an enemy out of Wall Street by grandstanding around executive pay issues, but he has lost the backing of Main Street because job losses continue to mount. That’s the problem with always reaching across the isle: Sometimes, you don’t have firm support on either side of it. The president’s inability to translate massive spending into real jobs is going to cost him big time.
2) Management of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan (B): On one hand, the president must face the stern reality that you can’t just walk out of a war in the middle of it. We all know that Bush got us into these messes, and Obama must get us out. At the same time, Obama pledged to get us out of the wars faster than he is actually doing it, and it is incredibly awkward for a man to accept a Nobel Peace Prize while simultaneously escalating the troop presence in an occupied country. Sure Obama didn’t give himself the Nobel Prize, but he still must be held accountable.

Click to read.

Reported in the SU Student Voice.

The Rev. Jesse Jackson and former Rep. Cynthia McKinney have now thrust themselves into the debate over Boyce Watkins’ tenure appeal, The Student Voice has learned.

Three days after the Rev. Al Sharpton sent Syracuse University Chancellor Nancy Cantor a letter in support of Whitman professor Boyce Watkins’ pending tenure appeal case, Jackson told Watkins that he wanted to get involved. Watkins sent SV writer Naresh Vissa a text message early this morning saying Jackson wants to speak with Cantor as soon as possible.

Watkins and Cantor are scheduled to meet today to discuss Watkins’ future at the university after he was denied tenure, first reported in The Student Voice.

And McKinney, the Green Party presidential candidate in 2008, wrote what Watkins called “the most astonishing letter in support of my tenure case” to SU administration yesterday. Prominent African-American syndicated columnist Julianne Malveaux has also voiced her support for Watkins.

Click to read.

by Elliot Millner, J.D. – Your Black World 

Attorney General Eric Holderrecently spoke at a Black church in Queens, NY, and during his speech he gave Black fathers another talking to, stating that:
"It should simply be unacceptable for a man to have a child and then not play an integral part in the raising and nurturing of the child."
Sounds good on face value. Who doesn’t think that any man who has a child should play a vital role in that child’s growth and development? A.G. Holder is 100% right on that point, and I have no disagreement with him whatsoever.
However lets look beyond the truthfulness of the words. When communicating, there are many other factors to consider other than what is being said. So, let’s consider the question: If a person is truly concerned about promoting the increased participation of Black father’s in their children’s lives, what would that person do? Seemingly, a person sincere about achieving that goal would go speak to the people most in need of that talk, in this case Black fathers who were not being responsible for the children they had helped bring into the world. Although I’m sure it may have been some people in Memorial Presbyterian Church who were being negligent in their parental duties, I doubt that A.G. Holder’s message applied to the majority of them.

Click to read.

Posted by Freezy on December 11th, 2009 under Recent Blogs • No Comments

According to documents filed in California, Dwight Howard is suing Royce Reed, the mother of his 2 year old son, over allegedly defamatory comments that surfaced on gossip site LipstickAlley.com. Dwight claims that posting the comments – whether “directly or indirectly” under an Internet alias – is in violation of an injunction he filed against her. In it Reed is ordered not mention the superstar by name or talk about him (that’s a…

Click to read.

by Dr. Deborah Stroman 

Tiger Woods has a problem and now so do I. I was naïve to think that I could survive this holiday season of Tigervision with its seemingly minute-by-minute reports of his self-described transgressions. Every media outlet needs a story to remain viable in this world of at-your-touch news and Tiger’s naughtiness provides the perfect scoop. This tale probably has no beginning and quite possibly no end. However, my nerves became frayed and I saw the immediate end of my sideline observer role when I changed the channel and popped in on the Joy Behar Show. As they discussed the latest Tiger escapade, Ms. Behar cleverly asked for insight on how the African-American community might possibly feel about his sins. Her query was directed to a female African-American guest, Karith Foster, who calmly stated that Tiger was finally acting like a black athlete. Pump your brakes!

Although Ms. Foster’s listed occupation is comedian, she made her bold statement sans smile or giggle. She was very serious and obviously hurt by his choice of women in this scandal. She went on to describe how the black athlete needs a white woman – a trophy wife – to be successful. Ms. Foster’s understanding of the black male athlete is a stereotype and confusion-filled. Shame on her and the media for supporting the racist mindset that promulgates a representation of the black male athlete as a superhuman man that seeks sexual pleasure from every white female that worships his athletic prowess. Surely we in 2009 know better, right? Yes, the ESPNification of our sports world has created larger than life entertainment figures. Money, power and women. That’s the ticket out of a poor situation – mentally and physically. It is no longer satisfactory to score a touchdown and hand the ball to the referee or dunk the basketball and hustle back to play defense. Instead we see many of our athletes (and more likely a black man) showboating, drawing attention to themselves, and discounting the teamwork necessary to achieve such success. We as fans are drawn to the television waiting to see the clownish antics instead of running to the restroom or going back for more chips.

Click to read.

Watkins, a finance professor at SU, is ignored by the administration.

By Naresh Vissa

In January 2007, college student Heather Ellis and her cousin stood in two lines at Wal-Mart. They agreed that the first to reach a register would combine the items for purchase. When the African-American Ellis gave her cousin the groceries, bystanders behind complained that she had cut. After some verbal exchanges, Ellis walked to her car and found the police waiting to arrest her. She tried her best to resist and suffered numerous cuts and bruises in the process.

Today, Ellis should be in medical school. Instead, she has pled guilty to charges of disturbing the peace and resisting arrest, both misdemeanors.

The case was covered by CNN, MSNBC, ABC News, Good Morning America, The Today Show and every major black media outlet in America. Even more importantly, Syracuse University is connected to it, but hasn’t issued any statements. As a producer of two radio shows, I myself find it embarrassing that I discovered Ellis through a press release pitch e-mail I received.

At the forefront of all the outrage is Whitman School of Management Finance Professor Dr. Boyce Watkins, but it’s not getting any attention from SU administrators.

“I’ve come to accept the fact that the University is not appreciative of my work,” Watkins said. “It’s part of their tradition when it comes to progressive black scholars. If I’d learned to sit down and shut up, I might be treated better. Quiet Negroes do quite well in academia.”

Click to read.