November 14, 2021
GREATER HOUSTON EDITION
Vol. 26, Issue 43
YOUR VOICE
MATTERS
VOTE
“Addressing Current & Historical Realties Affecting Our Community”
How can you arrest a rapper (black) for inciting a riot at a concert, but wouldn’t arrest a president (White) for inciting a riot on the nation’s capital?? And who continues to incite extreme unrest and discord throughout the nation/world as he seeks election to presidency again.
BUILD “BLACK” BETTER AGENDA By: Roy Douglas Malonson
Almost a year ago with the country plagued by an unprecedented deadly pandemic, economic downturn, significant climate crises, and persistent racial injustices, President Joe Biden revealed his Build Back Better Agenda. The
ambitious attempt to prepare America for a more sustainable, equitable, and prosperous future leaves us wondering, “What does ‘building back better’ look like for the Black community?” And are these promises that will be kept? Lower Costs:
Americans pay a significant 2-3 times more money on prescription drugs than people in other wealthy countries. This contributes to the fact that Black people use 10-40 percent fewer medications than their white counterparts due to the high
cost. President Biden’s agenda will lower costs by allowing Medicaid to negotiate medicine prices rather than large pharmaceutical companies. In the Black community, only 62.6 percent of three- and
Agenda cont’d page 3
HOUSTON BUSINESSMAN INDUCTED INTO TEXAS BUSINESS HALL OF FAME
By: Nevaeh Richardson
A shining example of Black excellence, Gerald Smith can give classes on entrepreneurship and wealth management. This investment manager, chairman and CEO of investment management firm Smith Graham & Co. is one of six new inductees into the Texas Business Hall of Fame. SGIA is one of the nation’s largest minorityowned investment management firms and one of the largest investment management firms based in Houston. Smith wears many hats. According to his bio on the Hall of Fame website, Smith is a board member Hall of Fame cont’d page 6 of New York Life Insurance
“YOUR VOTE AND YOUR MONEY ARE THE TWO MOST POWERFUL THINGS YOU HAVE. BE CAREFUL WHO YOU GIVE THEM TO.” - ROY DOUGLAS MALONSON
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November 14, 2021
President/Chief Editor
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Griselda Ramirez: Production
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Consciousness Bobby E. Mills, PhD
Office: (713) 692-1892 Wednesday – Friday, 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.
Political Party Base Politics It is extremely difficult for Americans to hold a positive view of the future because of “Base Politics.” When a political party is entrenched in its own selfish mindset; not democracy, but autocracy America has a BIG, BIG GOVERNANCE PROBLEM. When the GOP will not discipline its own members; but will allow members to publicly display ungodly behaviors in the citadel of democracy (The Capitol), America will have a BIG TROUBLE. To add insult to injury the GOP has no democratic policy objectives that are universally oriented for the people, by the people, and of the people. Moreover, when Christian Right Evangelicals and White Nationalist Groups use the political tools of gerrymandering and restricted voting procedures/laws seek-
ing to deny minorities their Civil Rights then democracy is in big trouble. America you cannot change ungodly mindsets that are oriented toward White Privilege exclusion. Moreover, from previous experiences we know: “that you cannot convince a fool against his will,” because: “Fools make a mock at sin: but among the righteous there is favour.” America, we cannot change the mindset of Christian Right Evangelicals, The GOP, and White Nationalist Groups, because they are who they are, what they are, and will remain so until they come into the light of the TRUTH, because: “If we walk in the light, as he is in the light, we have fellowship one with another, and the blood of Jesus Christ his Son cleanseth us from all sin.” The Democratic Party has too many voices speaking. Too many voices speaking at the same time creates confusion. God is not the author of confusion, but peace. Democratic Party Officials and Members are listening to too many News Commentators rather than listening to Official Party Leadership. News commentators sensa-
GREATER HOUSTON EDITION
EDITORIAL
tionalize for ratings (salaries). Everyone is not an official elected leader in the Democratic Party; but everyone’s voice should be heard, not necessarily acted upon. Democrats need to speak boldly and with spiritual clarity to all Americans who believe in democracy, and presently it appears as though that’s only Democrats. President Biden should speak universally to political leaders of all persuasions and stripes. Former Presidents Obama and Clinton should be speaking to Democrat-base Voters. Former First Ladies Clinton and Obama, and Vice President Harris, Senator Warren, and Speaker Pelosi should be speaking to all Democrat Loyalists as well as every American that believes in the constitutional principles of democracy. For we know, as Christian Americans: “We are troubled on every side, yet not distressed; we are perplexed, but not in despair, persecuted, but not forsaken, cast down, but not destroyed.”
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Food for Thought Oscar Blayton
The beloved lies about America One particularly blatant example was the political maneuver by Virginia’s Republican Gov.-elect Glenn Youngkin when he claimed that he would ban Toni Morrison’s book “Beloved” from Virginia’s public schools. This attack by Youngkin on a book, which won the Pulitzer Prize for Fiction in 1988 and was written by the 1993 winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature, was clearly intended to be a loud dog whistle to the white supremacists whose votes he was courting. Youngkin’s campaign dug up a controversy from more than eight years ago to successfully whip his supporters into a frenzy of grievance politics that would drive them to the polls. The truth of this matter is that while the pretext for attacking Toni Morrison’s book was its explicit
references to sexual activity, it was not the sex that sent white supremacists into a rage, but the agonizingly embarrassing description of how enslaved Black people were treated in “the land of the free and the home of the brave.” There are too many currents in “Beloved” to give a full account of the book here. But the core of the story’s horror is based upon a true account of the actions of an escaped slave, Margaret Garner. Rather than allow her children to be returned to the abomination of slavery by slave catchers who had tracked them down, Garner attempted to kill them all, but succeeded only in killing her 2-yearold daughter. All of Garner’s children had been fathered by white men, including her owner’s brother, who had raped her during her years of enslavement. This revelation in “Beloved” rips the flesh from the mythical America of goodness and virtue. White fragility cannot abide a book that so unsparingly brings this type of evil to light with such glaring intensity.
For more visit aframnews.com
GREATER HOUSTON EDITION Agenda cont’d four-year-old Black children are enrolled in preschool or kindergarten due to high childcare costs. Biden’s plan is to reduce childcare costs making high-quality educational programs accessible to all threeand four-year-old children. The agenda also includes 12 weeks of paid maternal and medical leave, which will help improve Black women’s maternal health and reduce the wage inequality continuously affecting Black women. Before President Biden took office, almost 3.9 million Black people were uninsured in 2019. The Affordable Care Act, even with premium subsidies, was still too expensive for most families. The Build Back Better Agenda aims to lower health care costs for those buying insurance through the ACA by extending the American Rescue Plan’s cost savings, helping 360,000 Black people save $50 per person per month. It also adds dental, vision, and hearing coverage for more than 5.8 million Black people on Medicare. Though higher education has become more of a necessity to succeed in the 21st century, it has become unaffordable for the average family. Under Biden’s agenda, there
will be two years of free community college, boosting the wages of high school graduates by nearly $6,000 yearly. The plan also increases the maximum federal Pell Grant to $1,500 and invests billions into subsidized tuition for low- and middle-income students at Historically Black Colleges and Universities and other minorityserving institutions. The agenda also aims to help low-income students by implementing evidencebased strategies to boost completion and retention rates. Thirty percent of Black renters spend over half their income on rent. The agenda will lower housing
November 14, 2021 costs and increase affordable housing by tax credits and government financing. This includes the rehabilitation and construction of over one million sustainable rental units and more than 500,000 homes for working families. An estimated 22.1% of Black people are below the poverty line and are struggling to pay basic living expenses like food, health care, and transportation. Biden’s plan will expand the Child Tax Credit expansion in the American Rescue Plan providing a major tax cut for the families of more than 66 million kids and nearly three million Black people. This cuts the Black poverty rate
by 34.3 percent and is especially significant for the 85% of Black women who are sole or co-breadwinners for their families. The plan also includes tax cuts for workers without children, affecting nearly 17 million lowwage workers including cashiers, delivery drivers, childcare workers, etc. The Building Back Better Agenda will ivest in creating and growing jobs through high-quality career and technical education pathways and Registered Apprenticeships. The agenda will also invest in clean energy jobs, effectively combating climate change and job shortages simultaneously. As part of
AFRAMNEWS.COM 3 the U.S. Innovation and Competition Act, the Build Back Better Agenda would also restore American manufacturing with R&D investments— including critical investments to compete on clean energy. Finally, the Build Back Better Agenda will focus on investing in teachers and schools. Even before the pandemic, the country has suffered a shortage of 100,000 teachers, disproportionately impacting students. Only 7% of the nation’s public school teachers are Black, even though Black students make up 15% of public schools. President Biden plans to upgrade school infrastruc-
ture, address teacher shortages and advance teacher preparation, as well as increase the diversity of careers in teaching and expanding free school meals to 9.3 million children during the school year and help families purchase food during the summer. But while Biden has a documented list of “planned” promises, we must never forget who is ultimately in charge of our lives – WE ARE! Use your time and these planned improvements to your benefit. It is time for us to take control and Build BLACK Better. - AANI
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November 14, 2021
KNOW YOUR HISTORY
GEORGE T. RUBY By: N.L. Preston
There are so many African Americans who fought for our advancement in the Texas political arena, and we won’t stop until you get to know them all. Learn about George Thompson Ruby in this week’s “Know Your History.” Ruby (1841-1882) was a prominent black Republican leader in Reconstruction-era Texas. Born in New York and raised in Portland, Maine, he worked in Boston and Haiti before teaching in New Orleans, Louisiana before the end of the American Civil War. In September 1866, with Louisiana schools shutting down for lack of funding, Ruby left for Galveston, Texas where the Freedmen’s Bureau agent assigned him as an agent and teacher. Working to set up and run schools for Blacks, Ruby helped organize local chapters of the Union League on which mobilization for the newly created Republican party would depend. In 1868, he was elected the League’s first state president,
a powerful political position. Later that year, he was the first Af r ic an-Amer ic an from Texas to attend the Republican National Convention. In time, he became editor of the Galveston Standard. Like many Republican papers, it had a brief life. Provisional Governor Elisha M. Pease appointed Ruby as a notary public in Galveston. When elections took place for delegates to a state constitutional convention in 1868, Ruby was chosen for the district comprising Brazoria, Galveston, and Matagorda counties. He was one of 10 African Americans elected as delegates. He allied with the more radical end of the party. Deeply disturbed by the conservative compromises that made it into the final document, Ruby worked for some months to have it defeated or rejected by the national government. He believed that equal rights for Blacks in Texas de-
Ruby cont’d page 5
GREATER HOUSTON EDITION
GREATER HOUSTON EDITION Ruby cont’d pended on a Republican government. Although discussed as a possible running-mate for Republican gubernatorial nominee Edmund J. Davis, Ruby was far younger at age 28 than would have been the norm. In addition, Republicans were reluctant to nominate a Black candidate, because of the risk of driving away white votes. Blacks were a minority statewide. In 1870, he was first elected to the Texas Senate in a very close vote, where he served two terms, in 1870-71 and again in 1873. He pressed hard for bills protecting the freedpeople’s civil rights, including a measure open-
November 14, 2021 ing public conveyances to all, regardless of race—a bill that white members made sure never came to a vote. At the same time, with an eye to his largely white constituency, Ruby introduced bills supporting construction of railroads radiating from Galveston, including several transcontinental projects such as the Southern Pacific and the International & Great Northern. Railroad aid was not a win-win deal; money or lands appropriated to help out their projects came at the expense of other needs of the state, such as a well-financed public school system. He served as a delegate to two Republican Party national conventions, the first time as the only African American
from Texas. He was also appointed as a customs officer in Galveston in 1869. With close connections to labor organ i z at i o n s in Galveston and as president of the Texas Colored Labor Convention in 1869, Ruby had i n f lu e n c e far beyond Galveston. He also helped Black workers gain jobs at the Galveston docks after
AFRAMNEWS.COM 5 1870. One historian called Ruby, “the most important black politician in Texas during Reconstruction in terms of power and ability.” He had an ability to mobilize Republican voters along the Gulf Coast and black voters e ve r y w h e re in Texas. “In the postCivil War era no Black man in Texas exercised more political power than did George Thompson Ruby,” Moneyhon wrote. “An as-
tute politician, Ruby built a base of power in the Black community of Galveston, then used that support to make himself a major force in the state at large. He was a forceful advocate of civil and political rights for his race, but he knew when to compromise to gain his larger goals, and he moved carefully among hostile white politicians in his efforts to expand opportunities for Black people.” With the return of the Democrats to power in 1874, Ruby left Texas and returned to Louisiana. Ruby died on October 31,1882 of malaria at his home on Euterpe Street, New Orleans. -AANI
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November 14, 2021
TITLE
GREATER HOUSTON EDITION
HEADER
By: N.L. Preston
300 WORDS TO FILL THIS SPACE.
Hall of Fame cont’d and the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas, and chairman of the Texas Southern University Foundation. He is a proud graduate of TSU with a BBA in Finance, while also receiving an honorary doctorate degree
from his alma mater where he established the Gerald B. Smith Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation to help young Black and Brown peo-
ple better compete in today’s business environment. Smith has received numerous awards for his entrepreneurial success and commu-
nity service. Recently, the City of Houston proclaimed Gerald B. Smith and Anita Webber Smith Day for their community service and philanthropic giving.
The sole person of color on this year’s list, Smith joins Dallas billionaire Mark Cuban, Austin Billionaire John Paul DeJoria, Fort Worth private
investor John Goff, Dallas private investor Morton Meyerson, and Dallas executive Randall Stephenson. -AANI
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November 14, 2021
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