Florida Courier, May 17, 2019

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MAY 17 – MAY 23, 2019

VOLUME 27 NO. 20

DEATH IN A FOREIGN PRISON In an exclusive first-person story written for the Florida Courier, former State Representative Dwayne Taylor describes his experience as an inmate in Atlanta Federal Prison.

Editor’s note: After a four-day jury trial in Orlando in August 2017, Dwayne Taylor was convicted of eight counts of wire fraud in connection with alleged misuse of campaign funds. His convictions are under appeal.

BY DWAYNE L. TAYLOR SPECIAL TO THE FLORIDA COURIER

It was a little more than a year ago that I had to self-surrender to United States Prison Atlanta Prison Camp in Atlanta, Ga., to serve a 13-month federal prison sentence for a political white-collar crime.

That day will forever be etched in my mind and I remember that

PART 1 day quite vividly. How and why I would come to serve this sentence is another story that I will write about and share some other time.

By the way, I have never been in prison before.

Turning myself in It was a cold day in January 2018, maybe one of the coldest days that year. I was staying at a hotel downtown Atlanta and took a rideshare to the prison.

We drove for about 30 minutes

The Atlanta Federal Prison has been prison home of contract killers and mobsters, including Al Capone and James ‘Whitey’ Bulger. Former Major League Baseball pitcher Denny McLain called it “the filthiest place on the face of the earth” after being locked up there for 30 months. before arriving at the parking lot of the prison. The driver turned to me in the back seat and asked me nervously, “You have to go in there?” I said to him, “Yes, unfor-

tunately I do.”

The place looked like something that came from a 1950s horror movie. I could only imagine Dr. Frankenstein, the Were-

wolf, Dracula and the Mummy all living in there.

It stood on a very large hill. All I can see over this gothic-looking See PRISON, Page A2

Back to back alleys?

B-CU 2019 SPRING COMMENCEMENT

An end and a new beginning

Abortion fight heats up

BY SANDHYA RAMAN CQ-ROLL CALL / TNS

WASHINGTON – Advocates are preparing for a legal battle after Alabama Governor Kay Ivey approved the strictest abortion law in the country on Wednesday, part of a growing national push by abortion opponents to test whether the courts will curb constitutional protections for the procedure.

Alabama’s move, which would essentially ban abortion in most cases, could open the door to restrictions in other states – even though they will all likely be challenged in court. Other states are already pursuing and defending laws to ban abortion after six weeks of pregnancy.

Alabama Lt. Gov. Will Ainsworth backed the bill with zero exceptions. He posted a video of himself on Facebook challenging the 1973 Roe v. Wade court decision legalizing abortions. “Abortion is murder,” said Ainsworth. “Those three simple words sum up my position on an issue that many falsely claim is a complex one.”

Alabama’s law goes farther than the approach taken in many other red states. It would ban abortion at any stage of pregnancy, unless needed to save the life of the woman, and has no exceptions for rape or incest. Abortion providers who violate these terms could be charged with a felony and punished for up to 99 years in prison.

Alabamians already face many barriers to abortion, including a 48-hour waiting period and mandated counseling. Half of the patients in Alabama and two other states served by Planned Parenthood Southeast travel over 100 miles to reach a clinic, said Staci Fox, who heads the group’s advocacy arm.

The American Civil Liberties Union has already signaled it will challenge the Alabama bill in court.

DUANE C. FERNANDEZ SR. / HARDNOTTSPHOTOGRAPHY.COM

Bethune-Cookman University Interim President Hubert Grimes, left, looks over his last group of graduates as B-CU Board of Trustees Chairman Belvin Perry addresses the university’s Class of 2019. Grimes will make way for B-CU’s seventh president, Dr. E. LaBrent Chrite, who is set to hit the Daytona Beach campus on July 1.

Racist robocall defends White woman who killed Black man

BY ZACHARY HANSEN THE ATLANTA JOURNAL-CONSTITUTION / TNS

ATLANTA – A robocall that was paid for by a White supremacist podcast known for sending racist calls has shocked several Clayton County residents, including the

ALSO INSIDE

district attorney.

The call has been circulating after the arrest of a 21-year-old Fayetteville woman who is accused of fatally shooting a man after witnessHannah ing a hit-and-run Payne crash last week.

“Negroes aren’t American. They aren’t really fully human. It’s time to send them all to Africa,” the call, paid for by Road To Power, said. “She’s been cast as the criminal when in fact it was the negro.

“Hannah Payne did nothing wrong,” the call continued. “Tell

the district attorney of Clayton County, Georgia, free Hannah Payne.”

SNAPSHOTS NATION | A6

Hit-and-run killer Hannah Payne was arrested May 7 after witnessing a crash near Clark Howell Highway and Georgia Highway 85, where 62-yearold Kenneth Herring tried to drive away from a wreck he caused, Clayton County police previously said.

Payne followed Herring’s pickup truck for about a mile and boxed him in with her Jeep near the intersection of Riverdale Road and Forest Parkway. After an altercation, See ROBOCALL, Page A2

How voter laws and passion brought people to polls HEALTH | B3 FLORIDA | A3

Principal of year gets top job at Parkland high school

COMMENTARY: MARGARET KIMBERLEY: FACEBOOK AND THE FARRAKHAN DISTRACTION | A4 COMMENTARY: A. PETER BAILEY: CONSIDER THIS WISDOM FROM OUR ANCESTORS | A5

Shortstaffed nursing homes see ratings drop

FOCUS

A2

MAY 17 – MAY 23, 2019

STOJ

Four years after death, Sandra Bland tells her side Sandra Bland won’t just go away.

She spent the final years of her life as an outspoken civil rights activist, spreading the word about racial injustice and police brutality. Even in death, she won’t stop talking.

When it appeared that suspicions surrounding her alleged suicidal hanging in a Texas jail cell in 2015 had been put to rest, she forced us this week to reconsider and ask more questions.

Police dashboard camera video released four years ago showed us what happened that afternoon in southeast Texas, when state Trooper Brian Encinia pulled over the 28-year-old African-American woman for failing to signal a lane change.

The footage authorities released in the weeks following Bland’s arrest and death documented how the routine traffic stop escalated after she refused the trooper’s demand to put out her cigarette.

New view Until now, the story had been told entirely from the officer’s vantage point. Last week, video taken from Bland’s cellphone

Close to home DAHLEEN GLANTON GUEST COMMENTARY

was made public.

The short video shows a calm and controlled young woman at the mercy of an increasingly agitated officer towering over her with a Taser pointed in her face and yelling, “Get out of the car. I will light you up. Get out. Now.” There is no indication that the trooper feared for his life, as he contended. There’s no reason to think that Bland posed a threat to him. The cellphone was already in her hand when he swung opened the car door, contradicting his claim that she was reaching for something.

If anything, the new footage raises more questions about why Bland was hauled off to jail to begin with. It shows that the only person who was a threat that day was Encinia. The one who should have been afraid for her life was Bland. Three days later, she was found hanged in a jail cell. Authorities ruled it a suicide.

I am thrilled that Bland won’t shut up and go away. I am Sandra Bland. Every African-American woman is.

Black women, in particular, cannot allow her story to be silenced. We cannot allow this tragedy that exemplifies the bottomtier justice Black women often receive go unchallenged. We cannot do what everyone seems to want us to do – forget about it and move on.

It is easy to imagine how terrified she must have been that day.

Sure, she was talking tough, but as an advocate against police brutality, she was well aware that such confrontations with law enforcement officials often don’t end well for Black people.

Gender doesn’t matter And while Black men most often are the targets, there have been enough cases in recent years to know that Black women can face the same fate.

Rekia Boyd was hanging out with friends when Chicago police killed her. Charleena Lyles, of Seattle, was pregnant with her fourth child when police shot her to death after she summoned

PRISON

Beginning the process

This was time that inmates begin to “hurry up and wait.” I was pulled in and out of the cell to sign forms and take my “glamour shot” sporting my new red prison jumpsuit.

I was not given any warm clothes or blankets to help fight off Jack Frost. But I did notice all the guards had on thick jackets, sweatshirts or sweaters, so I know it was freezing cold. In between all of this, I tried to keep warm by placing my arms inside of the jumpsuit. But that was not working, and I started to shake and shiver.

Prison lunch By this time, I was starting to get hungry and wanted something to eat. It was around lunch time, so I asked the guard for some food. The guard came back with a brown paper bag and threw it to me. Inside was a slice of cheese, a slice of bologna and four slices of bread. There was also a piece of an apple.

Everything in the bag was cold and impossible to eat. I tried to anyway. I took one bite and just shot it to the garbage can. I put my arms back into the jumpsuit and continued trying to stay warm. I hurried to be taken to different staff personnel.

A mental health counselor determined if I was mentally fit to be placed in general population (“GP”). He asked me a few ques-

Though a grand jury failed to indict Encinia on criminal charged related to Bland’s death,

The next morning, I was awakened by the guard unlocking the small portal in the door. The orderlies would serve the breakfast tray through the portal.

As the sun came up and the lights were turned on, I could see how filthy this cell was. I saw black and green spores of mold, and mildew stains on the walls.

(Later during my stay, the unit manager would order some of the inmates to come in and paint over all of the areas to prepare for an inspection.)

The air vent that was blowing cold air had old toilet paper over part of it. The sink that was an arms-distance from the toilet also had green mold on it, and this was the only place to get drinking water while you were inside the cell.

The water had some floating particles in it and under normal circumstances was not drinkable. I would mix the small KoolAid packs that inmates received with their lunch to try and take away the smell and the taste of the water. But most of the time I did not drink it, and later would become dehydrated.

building was dark gray clouds, thunder and lightning flashing, and a tsunamic rainstorm high above. The sun was shining everywhere else, but when I looked up at that monstrosity, that is what I saw.

My ‘glam shot’

Eventually fired

Moldy, filthy cell

from A1

I tipped the driver and aimlessly walked around the parking lot not knowing what direction to take until a guard told me where intake was. Once inside, I was taken to the processing area for incoming inmates.

Now this is where the transformation began. I went from a wellrespected honorable human being to the absolute scum of the earth. I no longer had a name to be called; now I was a number.

I was stripped of all my civilian clothes and shoes and given a short-sleeved red jumpsuit and a pair of shoes. The inmates called the shoes “Jackie Chans” or “Bruce Lees” because they looked like the type of shoes they wore in all their movies.

Before I could get dressed, the corrections officer instructed me to take my underwear off completely. There in the middle of this cold room, I stood naked with a guard who told me to “grab my joystick, bend over and cough.”

The guard had a weird look on his face as though he was enjoying my naked body. It made me feel extremely violated. Yes, #metoo. The whole incident took about five minutes before I was told to put on the new clothes, then escorted to a small cold holding cell.

them to her home for a burglary.

Seven-year-old Aiyana StanleyJones was sleeping when police barged into her home in Detroit looking for a murder suspect and ended up shooting her. There are many others.

Some argue in the trooper’s defense that Bland should have kept quiet, that she should have acted more respectful toward him. They still place all of the blame for what happened upon her. They refuse to acknowledge how disrespectful he was to her, or to hold him accountable for his part in escalating the situation.

As in most confrontations involving African-Americans and law enforcement officials, Bland became the offender and Encinia the victim. She knew that she couldn’t trust authorities or their dashboard cameras to tell the truth. That’s why she refused to put her cellphone down, even when the trooper demanded it.

Four years after her death, we know that she was right to keep recording.

COURTESY OF DWAYNE TAYLOR

In 2008, then-City Commissioner Dwayne Taylor welcomed Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama to Daytona Beach. tions regarding my mental state.

I told him I was okay but a little bit nervous because I had never been in prison or done time, so I didn’t know what to expect.

After returning back to my freezing-cold cell, I waited two hours before I was seen by the medical staff. This was very important, because I have an autoimmune disease that was not discovered and diagnosed until I was in my early 40s. Over the last five years, I’ve had to be injected weekly with a very expensive and important biologic to prevent my body from attacking my organs. This disease is deadly and is extremely painful when left untreated.

No life-saving meds I met with the medical staff and informed them of all of my medical issues and gave them a list of medications I was receiving. I asked if they had read the medical issues listed in my PSR and they said, “No.” NO!!!!

A “PSR” – a Pre-Sentencing Report – is a very comprehensive report conducted by the federal probation staff to give the sentencing judge a clear and through picture of the person he or she is about to sentence. It includes everything from education to health conditions.

All of the information in the report must be verified by the probation officer conducting the report. I was quite surprised when I was told they didn’t even look at the report.

The medical staff went on to tell me if my medication was not on the Bureau of Prisons’ list of approved medications, that I would not be receiving them.

I told them how much I needed my medication. They both smirked as if they knew I would not be getting anything.

Keeping my cup The processing period seem like it took forever. They gave me a washcloth, hand towel, one sheet and a spread for my bed, and a small six-ounce styrofoam cup. Inside the cup was a broken piece of soap, a small toothbrush, some toothpaste and a disposable razor. Keeping the cup was important because you only received one.

I was finally moved into the transit unit known as DCU 1 with about 40 other inmates that came in that day. The unit orderly gave all the inmates their new assigned cell. Everyone wanted a bottom bunk, but they were first given to inmates like me who were older and had health problems.

I was escorted to my cell by a guard who opened the door and locked it behind me. Inside the cell was a toilet, sink, a small desk with a metal seat and a bunk bed with a blue thin mattress on the bottom and nothing on the top.

It was late in the day and the dimly-lit light in the cell stayed on long enough for me to put the one sheet and spread on my pillowless bed.

No sense of time I didn’t have a watch because the intake guard took it. There were no clocks on the wall to indicate the time, so I sat on the side of the bed until I could no longer keep my eyes open. Finally, I rolled up the hand towel and used it as a pillow and laid down.

I was unable to sleep because it was super-cold inside the cell. It felt like the air conditioning system was blowing cold air into the cell, and the small windowpane located near my head was seeping cold air from the outside.

This is how my first day in federal prison ended.

Always a line Occasionally when the inmates were allowed out of their cells, I would drink water from the one fountain we had for more than 200 inmates. There was always a line for water and to use the microwave.

We were allowed out of our cells too often. We stayed inside breathing that horrible air more than we were out, including one time we did not come out for almost three straight days.

I remember hearing a conversation between an inmate in the cell next to me and the unit manager. The inmate asked the unit manager, “What did we do wrong for us to be locked down for these days?” I remember the unit manager saying that we didn’t do anything wrong, he just wanted us locked down because he felt like it and he would let us out when he felt like it.

Cold inside and out It was just as cold outside of the cell as it was inside, but this would allow inmates the oppor-

ROBOCALL from A1 Herring was fatally shot in the abdomen, and Payne was arrested on a murder charge.

Police have not released details about the altercation.

No connection Payne’s attorney, Matt Tucker, told WBS-TV his client has no connection to the robocalls or the Idaho-based group, which the Anti-Defamation League described as a “White supremacist and antiSemitic broadcasting outlet.”

Payne maintains her innocence, with Tucker saying the gun fired after a struggle that

it did recommend perjury charges for lying about the events leading up to Bland’s arrest. The trooper was fired.

Bland’s family has never bought the suicide claims. They insist that there is more to Bland’s death than what they have been told.

The family’s attorneys said the cellphone video was never turned over to them for use in the federal lawsuit they settled with the Texas Department of Public Safety, but state officials insist that it was.

After seeing the 39-second footage obtained by a news reporter, Bland’s family wants the investigation into her arrest and death to be reopened. They want to know if there was a cover-up and if other evidence has been hidden.

Several presidential candidates, including Julian Castro and Beto O’Rourke, both of Texas, have joined the call. Many other voices have joined in, too.

But it is Sandra Bland leading the call. She spoke directly to us through her cellphone video. Justice can only be served if we pay attention to what she has to say.

Dahleen Glanton writes for the Chicago Tribune.

tunity to take a shower, use the computer or make a phone call.

The shower stalls had more mold and mildew and the showers remained nasty even after they were cleaned.

Many times you only had time to do one of those things before we were told to go back to your cell. The lines and wait time to do any of those things were long.

Inmates used the computer to send and receive emails to approved family members. Phone calls were limited to only 15 minutes, and you could only call people from an approved list as well.

The staff ignored me when I asked how to use the phone and computer, but the inmates would later show me how to log in on the computer and use the phone.

It took three days before I could send a message to my family to let them know I was okay.

Used clothing On some days during time out of the cell, we could exchange items like socks, T-shirts and underwear. Everything that was given in return were all USED items, including underwear.

Yes, inmates are not given new items, but items previously worn by other inmates. A used pair of underwear worn by another inmate! I could not think of something more disgusting than that.

This was one of the most humiliating and humbling experiences in my entire life.

No meds For weeks, I went without the proper mediation. The prison decided they would not allow me to receive any of my regular medications. It took years for my doctor to find the appropriate dosage and brands that were the best for my medical illnesses. The prison decided to give me what they wanted me to have, even if they were ineffective in treating me.

I began to ache and became stiff. I had chest pain and difficulty breathing. Couple this with the intense cold-weather storms with no warm blankets or clothing, and my illness was exacerbated. This went on for weeks.

Next week in Part 2: A shocking discovery.

left her with scratch marks and a ripped shirt.

Former Fayette County NAACP President John E. Jones was one of the recipients of the call. He told WBS it is only trying to incite a “race war.”

District Attorney Tracy Graham Lawson said she was “flabbergasted” and “repulsed” by the call, adding that no one has contacted her office about the case as a result of the call.

“It’s not going to be doing Ms. Payne any favors for people with attitudes like that to contact this office about the case,” she told the news station.

Payne remains in jail without bond.

MAY 17 – MAY 23, 2019

STOJ

FLORIDA

TOJ

A3

Hepatitis A outbreak in state continues to expand NEWS SERVICE OF FLORIDA

Florida reported 92 hepatitis A cases last week,

bringing the total to 1,129 cases this year as an outbreak continues to grow, according to numbers posted Monday on the

state Department of Health website.

The total is more than double the 548 cases reported in all of 2018.

In the four previous years, the highest number of cases was 276 in 2017.

Hepatitis A, which can cause liver damage, can be

spread through such things as food or drinks that have been contaminated with fecal matter from people with the disease.

Health officials have urged people to get vaccinated against the disease.

Counties with cases The heaviest concentrations of the cases since Jan. 1, 2018, have been in the Tampa Bay region and Central Florida.

Pinellas County has had 344 cases during that period, followed by Pasco County with 292 cases; Orange County with 189 cases; and Hillsborough County with 176 cases, according to the state numbers.

Other counties with large numbers include Marion County, with 82; Lake and Volusia counties, each with 73; Seminole County, with 55; and Hernando County, with 53.

Principal of year gets top job at Parkland high school

BY SCOTT TRAVIS SUN SENTINEL/TNS

FORT LAUDERDALE – Michelle Kefford, the Flanagan High School principal who was recently named Florida’s 2019 principal of the year, will be the new principal at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High, replacing Ty Thompson.

Kefford, who is 44 and lives in Parkland, was formerly a science teacher at Stoneman Douglas. She will take on her new role July 1.

Teachers Michelle were told at Kefford a 7:15 a.m. staff meeting by Superintendent Robert Runcie and district administrators Valerie Wanza and Michael Ramirez.

“Michelle Kefford has been determined to be the top-ranking principal in the entire state of Florida, so it doesn’t get any better than that,” said Lisa Maxwell, executive director of the Broward Principals and Assistants Association.

“She could go anywhere in the country and be a phenomenal principal. In my opinion, the community is fortunate to have her. I think she will do an amazing job.”

Career history

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This advertising is paid for by FPL shareholders, not our customers.

Kefford has worked for the district since 1999, teaching at Stoneman Douglas until 2005, when she became an assistant principal at Western High in Davie. She spent a year as an assistant principal at Boyd Anderson High in Lauderdale Lakes from 2010-11 before being named principal at Flanagan in 2011.

The school received its first A grade from the state at the end of her first year and has kept that grade every year since except 2016 when it was B-rated.

Stoneman Douglas has gone through administrative turmoil and uncertainty this school year as a result of the massacre that killed 17 people on Feb. 14, 2018.

Thompson plans to stay in the district working in a yet-to-be-determined administrative job, Maxwell said.

Three assistant principals currently assigned to the school will remain, teachers were told. They are Ivette Figueroa, Daniel Lechtman and Daniel Most.

Kefford also will appoint three of her own assistant principals.

EDITORIAL

TOJ

A4

MAY 17 – MAY 23, 2019

STOJ

Facebook and the Farrakhan distraction Facebook and other social media platforms are an indispensable means of communicating with people all over the world.

They are vital tools for anyone wanting to share or receive information. That is why their surrender to the dictates of the state is so very dangerous.

The Democratic Party is responsible for this assault, which began in the wake of their 2016 presidential defeat. Blaming Russian interference served them well. They escaped blame for the debacle of their own making, while also getting buy-in for surveillance state censorship from progressives.

Social media became the poster child in the psychological operation meant to convince Americans that the election result was a Russian intelligence operation.

Quick surrender Facebook knew better than anyone that Russian clickbait ads didn’t sway the election result.

The threats against them must have been considerable, because Mark Zuckerberg and his team knuckled under very quickly.

They announced that they would decide what was and wasn’t “fake news” under the guidance of the Atlantic Council, a think tank which is in effect NATO’s lobbyist. It is funded by multi-national corporations, and has strong ties to the military and to intelligence agencies. In other words, only the views of the U.S. foreign policy establishment have been given legitimacy.

MARGARET KIMBERLEY BLACK AGENDA REPORT

While the Deep State had its hands on our communications, America’s friends used the opportunity for their own censorship efforts. Israeli government demands that Palestinian individuals and groups be removed are met with agreement, and the targets are quickly disappeared.

All of which brings us to Minister Louis Farrakhan of the Nation of Islam. Facebook announced that he and right-wing lightning rods Alex Jones and Milo Yiannopoulos were banned from its pages forever. They were said to be “dangerous” and were accused of “spreading hate.”

Don’t believe it No one should believe this well-orchestrated hype. The real targets of Facebook and the rest of corporate- run social media are on the left. That is the group most hated and feared by the Democrats, the people responsible for this censorship.

Black people will defend Farrakhan because he is vilified by White people when they cynically use him for their own political motives. They don’t really care about what he says or does.

The Facebook ban is an excellent example of this fake outrage in action. Jones and Yian-

Our music can’t be taken away We had the pleasure of going to the musical entitled “Pride and Joy” at the National Theatre in Washington, D.C. It was the Mothers’ Day weekend and the theatre was packed.

The history of American Black music is a key component of our history and rich culture. “Pride and Joy” is the Marvin Gaye story as written in the diary of Anna Gordy Gaye – Marvin’s first wife and sister of Motown founder Berry Gordy.

The play was comprehensive dealing with the early days of the company. Plays and movies can sometimes drift away from the actual truth, but this one did not.

‘Ram and rebel’ “Sitting at the piano at a Motown Christmas party, life cannot get any better for a young Marvin Gaye, until his attention is captured by one of the most beautiful and glamorous women he has

HARRY & KAY ALFORD GUEST COLUMNISTS

ever laid eyes on,” according to the playbill.

“This woman’s beauty rivals any Hollywood movie star’s and Marvin must have her, but there is just one problem: she is Berry Gordy’s sister. Marvin finds this intriguing and embarks upon a flirtatious conquest of Anna until she relents.

However Marvin, who refers to himself as a “ram and a rebel,” is met with the fierceness of Anna’s strength, independence, and power, which makes for an explosive love affair with neither willing to be controlled by the other.”

Marvin was born and raised in

Another case of Alzheimer’s When I looked at my email in-box this afternoon, I encountered one of those messages that I dread: yet another person I know has been institutionalized as a result of Alzheimer’s disease.

The sadness conveyed by this person’s partner was clear. They had been together for decades. I could feel the loss.

Around the same time that I read this email, I found myself looking at commentaries regarding Donald Trump’s budget pro-

BILL FLETCHER, JR. NNPA COLUMNIST

posals. Drastic cuts in everything except for the military. Though this may, at first glance, seem to have nothing to do with Alzheimer’s, think again.

VISUAL VIEWPOINT: NANCY PELOSI AND THE DEMOCRATS

nopoulos are equally unimportant. They provide ample opportunity for liberal virtue signaling, but they have no meaningful use as public figures. This sleight of hand should be vigorously opposed. Everyone’s rights are at risk from the confluence of surveillance and corporate control.

Not alone But Facebook isn’t alone in acting as the government’s enforcer.

Google banned Presstv Iran from uploading new content on YouTube and all of its Gmail platform.

Twitter summarily banned 2,000 accounts for “engaging in a statebacked influence campaign.”

Their crime was expressing opinions in favor of the elected government of Venezuela. The explanations for the censorship are vague, but government demands are always a part of the picture.

Black people should not allow themselves to be misdirected by Farrakhan’s expulsion. Of course, he should not be removed from Facebook. But there must be protest about corporate entities acting in concert with the government to decide who and what we can see.

These social media platforms must be regulated just as other utilities are. But that needed action would not completely resolve the problem either.

The problem is political Corporations and the security state now have popular support to attack the free flow of information. They used Russiagate

the northeast section of Washington, D.C. He joined the group Harvey and the Moonglows as a background singer and parttime drummer. Harvey Fuqua, a friend of Berry Gordy and a business partner, brought Marvin to Detroit. He became an in-house session player and later a solo singer.

Her own career At the same time Anna was becoming a principal in the business. She first joined as a songwriter. Before that, she began her career distributing records for Checker Records. She started cowriting songs with Marvin.

Some of her early songs were on an album that Marvin and Mary Wells collaborated on.

Marvin would also do a duet album with Kim Weston, but his biggest duet performance was with Tammi Terrell. By this time, Anna and Marvin were married.

The success of Marvin and Tammi duet songs caused some strain with Anna’s and Marvin’s marriage. They married in 1963 and the marriage was “rocky” but lasted until 1975. They adopted a son and named him Marvin III in the interim. Marvin would have

Millions impacted Currently, Alzheimer’s is afflicting at least six million people in the USA; it is expected to expand to more than double that by the middle of the 21st Century. Yet addressing Alzheimer’s appears to not be a priority of the White House.

The implications of the increase in Alzheimer’s patients goes far beyond the personal loss and sadness experienced by families. We are talking about immense healthcare costs. As I have witnessed in my extended family, an individual who is otherwise healthy can suffer a long and slow decline that can be not only emotionally intolerable for all involved but immensely ex-

RJ MATSON, CQ ROLL CALL

to whip up sentiment in favor of corporate control and right-wing ideological bias. Julian Assange and Chelsea Manning sit in jail on trumped-up charges meant to punish them for revealing America’s crimes.

People like Farrakhan, Jones, Yiannopoulos and others who create phony outrage are in permanent Facebook jail, but the Deep State has free reign over sources of information. People who otherwise claim opposition to Donald Trump and fascism say nothing about this assault, which is fascist by definition.

It is irrelevant if the repugnant Alex Jones and Milo Yiannopoulos appear on social media. They have a right to express themselves. People who want to read about them should be able to do so. This columnist has appeared on Presstv, and finds it a credible source of information. But thousands of people who feel likewise

are unable to see new content because Google acts in close concert with the United States government.

two children from a subsequent marriage to Janis Hunter.

Marvin’s biggest contribution to the world were his songs describing the social issues of the day. “Inner City Blues,” “What’s Going On,” “Mercy, Mercy Me (The Ecology)” captured the attention of the entire nation and will be his legacy. He died violently in 1984 at age 44 when his father shot him to death. Anna worked in the business and was 92 years old when she died in 2014.

Motown is one of the most successful Black-owned corporations known to the world. Marvin and Anna Gaye were major players. Motown specialized in “the Motown Sound.” Its “Hitsville” studios remained open and active 22 hours a day.

Still, Berry Gordy initially rejected two of Marvin Gaye’s tracks that would become critical and commercial successes: “I Heard it Through the Grapevine” and “What’s Going On.”

when Marvin came on the musical scene. But nevertheless, it was most enjoyable.

Quentin Perry, the producer and family friend, used a technique where they would flash actual newspaper clippings onto the background screen. Everyone gasped when they read that Tammi Terrell was just 24 when she died in 1970 from a brain tumor.

I assume that most knew Marvin was shot to death by his father, but when newspaper headlines appeared on screen, we were knocked back in our seats again.

The songs and choreography in the play were so exciting. There were times when Harry wanted to jump up and start dancing. The audience was indeed pumped up.

“Pride and Joy” will soon be coming to a town near you, and you should certainly put it on your to-do list.

From Kaye’s perspective Harry knew all 28 songs that were performed during the musical. I didn’t know half of the songs. I was just a sweet little girl

pensive, sometimes to the point of personal bankruptcy.

Yet, this is not an affliction that the White House, to borrow from a recent article in STAT.com, is fighting: “Like Nixon’s ‘war on cancer,’ President Trump should open a war on Alzheimer’s.”

Fighting Alzheimer’s necessitates significant financial investments to advance the development of possible treatments.

This will not happen on its own, and one cannot rely on the private market to invest. The private market is more often than not cowardly regarding investments until and unless they get a signal from government that there is a genuine interest in a possible direction.

Charles W. Cherry II, Esq., Publisher

Opinions expressed on this editorial page are those of the writers, and do not necessarily reflect the editorial stance of the newspaper or the publisher.

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Farrakhan won’t be last Black Agenda Report has already been declared a tool of Russian influence by Propornot, the front group for the Jeff Bezosowned Washington Post. BAR is endangered and so are its political allies if this trend continues without protest.

Free Farrakhan! Free Presstv!

Keep Black Agenda Report and other independent news sites from ever being captured by corporate social media incarceration.

Margaret Kimberley is a cofounder of BlackAgendaReport.com, and writes a weekly column there. Contact her at Margaret.Kimberley@BlackAgendaReport.com.

Harry C. Alford is the cofounder and president/CEO of the National Black Chamber of Commerce (NBCC). Kay DeBow is the NBCC co-founder.

Contact them via www.nationalbcc.org.

Seeing the damage Many of my friends over the age of 50 dread the possibility that they may become victims of Alzheimer’s. Most of us feel on our own in addressing this plague. We have seen it destroy individuals and take down entire families.

It is well past time that the government make this a priority.

Fighting Alzheimer’s vs. another weapon system we don’t need?

Not a difficult choice.

Bill Fletcher, Jr. is the former president of TransAfrica Forum. Follow him on Twitter, Facebook and www.billfletcherjr.com. He is the author of the mystery “The Man Who Fell From the Sky.”

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MAY 17 – MAY 23, 2019

STOJ

Black health requires Black power Of all mothers in the U.S., Black women are the most likely to die in childbirth, according to data released this week by the national Centers for Disease Control (CDC).

The death rate for Black mothers is 42.8 for every 100,000 live births. For Native American mothers, the second most at risk, mortality is 32.5 per 100,000.

Non-Hispanic White mothers’ death rates are only 13 per 100,000.

But even U.S. White mothers’ mortality is far higher than women in all the other rich countries.

America ranks 46th among nations in maternal mortality, even trailing the former Soviet republic of Kazakhstan.

No single factor Like infant mortality, the death rate for mothers is linked to a broad range of health factors.

“No single intervention is sufficient” to bring the death toll down, said the CDC report. “Reducing pregnancy-related deaths requires reviewing and learning from each death, improving women’s health, and reducing social inequities across the life span, as well as ensuring quality care for pregnant and postpartum women.”

In other words, the United States is an unhealthy place to live because its deplorable health care structure leaves people at the mercy of a cutthroat capitalist economy, while racism condemns its Black and Native citizens to shorter and sicker life spans than prevail in much of what used to be called “the Third World.” The Black maternal death rate in the U.S. roughly matches that of Cape Verde and Turkmenistan.

GLEN FORD BLACK AGENDA REPORT

The best measure of a society’s overall health is infant mortality – the rate at which babies die before they reach their first birthday. The United Nations Population Division rates the U.S. at 38th worldwide, between Brunei and Belarus.

Cuba is No. 31 – an amazing feat, given that more than half its population is descended from slaves that were not freed until 1886, a generation after U.S. emancipation. Then Cuba fell under U.S. occupation, combining Dixie-style Jim Crow with White Latin American racism.

Yet despite 50 years of U.S. economic (and medical) blockade, Cuban infant mortality dropped from 81 deaths per 1,000 births in 1955, to 5.5 in 2010, slightly lower than the U.S. overall rate (5.97). In contrast, Black American infants die more than twice as often, at a rate of 11.4 per 1,000 births – about the same as babies in Thailand and Argentina.

Black America is a very different country from White America – no country for babies or pregnant women, or for young Black men between the ages of 15 and 34, for whom murder is the leading cause of death. Virtually every health indicator places Black Americans in Third World status, giving bloody statistical credence to those that describe Black America as an internal colony of U.S. empire. It is a captive nation that is grossly medically

Consider this wisdom from our ancestors It was in 1619 that the first African captives were brought to what is now Virginia, North America. Since then, many of our courageous ancestral warriors, men and women, have fought against the physical and psychological terrorism inflicted by the proponents of White supremacy/racism.

If we people of African descent had paid more attention to and agreed upon the guidance and advice from our ancestors, we would be further ahead in the war for equal rights, equal justice and equal opportunity. Their directives include the following: David Walker – I pray that the Lord undeceive my ignorant brethren, and permit them to throw away pretensions, and seek after the substance of learning.

I would crawl on my hands and knees through mud and mire, to the feet of a learned man, where I would sit and humbly supplicate him to instill into me that which neither devils nor tyrants could

A. PETER BAILEY TRICE EDNEY NEWS WIRE

remove, only with my life– for coloured people to acquire learning in this country makes tyrants quake and tremble on their sandy foundations.

Dr. Mary McLeod Bethune – If our people are to fight their way out of bondage, we must arm them with the sword and the shield and the buckler of pride – belief in themselves and their possibilities, based upon sure knowledge of the achievements of the past. That knowledge and that pride we must give them if it breaks every back in the kingdom!

Benjamin E. Mays – I hope we will make it clear to ourselves and our children –that whether we believe in integration, separatism

Africans are dying to become Europeans Reports about African migrants dying to breathe free have become so normalized that they hardly register in public consciousness, let alone prick our collective conscience.

From the BBC, May 10: “At least 65 migrants have died after their boat capsized in the Mediterranean off the coast of Tunisia…The incident is thought to be one of the deadliest shipwrecks involving migrants since the start of the year…The passengers are understood to have been from sub-Saharan Africa.”

Have you heard?

Did you know about this latest tragedy? Even if you did, chances are that you’d probably stay inured and carry on unconcerned about how normalized such tragedies have become.

According to a UN report, an average of six migrants died every day in 2018 trying to cross the Mediterranean Sea. I’ve been lamenting these serial tragedies for years. Hence my assertion

ANTHONY L. HALL, ESQ. FLORIDA COURIER COLUMNIST

that they’ve become normalized, which betrays the utter futility of my commentaries.

Some of my despairing titles read like alarms nobody heard: “Europeans Erecting Fences to Maintain Good Relations with African Neighbors” in 2005; “Lampedusa Tragedy Highlights Europe’s ‘Haitian’ Problem” in 2013; “African Migrants (Still) Turning Mediterranean Sea into a Vast Cemetery” in 2016; “Africans Selling Africans as Slaves…Again” in 2017; “Colonial Ties Have Europe in Knots Over African Migration” in 2018.

I remember Nonetheless, my conscience

underserved.

Although Blacks make up about 13 percent of the U.S. population, they comprise only 6.8 percent of doctors, a huge proportion of whom were trained in a few historically Black medical schools. Although a single payer system would be of most benefit to Blacks, Black people will continue to die at far higher rates than Whites, as the CDC report states, until “social inequities” are reduced “across the lifespan.”

Only a social and economic transformation can lift Black America to a First World state of well-being. Anti-Black racism is baked into every U.S. institution, including medicine and all the social sciences – the legacy of the U.S. as a White Man’s Country.

And capitalism is the greatest organizer of killing fields – deaths fast and slow – in human history.

EDITORIAL

TOJ

A5

VISUAL VIEWPOINT: PRESIDENT DONALD TRUMP

DARYL CAGLE, CAGLECARTOONS.COM

sion from scratch. Cuban doctors now look like the Cuban people, and live among them. A crisis, once met, became a blessing.

As Fitz writes: “It became clear that medical care could only be improved if a country simultaneously addressed necessities such as food, housing and education; medical campaigns must be based on mass participation; it may be possible to cope with an obstructive institution such as mutualism by creating a better method of delivering care before abolishing the old one; an institution could be improved by undertaking two contradictory processes simultaneously (such as centralizing and decentralizing medicine); despite the shortterm damage of 3,000 doctors leaving, the long-term ability to renovate medicine was blessed by their absence.”

and political crisis that demands a tsunami of new Black doctors to serve in new community health institutions that are answerable to the people – just as schools and police must be made accountable to the community.

The logical places to begin producing this flood of Black doctors are historically Black Howard, Meharry and Morehouse Colleges of Medicine, whose facilities and mission would be vastly expanded for a “Black New Deal” in health. Similarly, Black colleges should be central to a whole range of transformative public projects that build Black community economic and social capacity and power.

How’s that for a 2020 plank for Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren or the Green Party?

or nationalism, there is no substitute for a trained mind. For the future belongs, always has and always will belong, to the man who knows, and the man who has skills.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. – Education without social action is a one-sided value because it has no true power potential. Social action without education is a weak expression of pure energy.

Deeds uninformed by educated thought can take false directions.

When we go into action and confront our adversaries, we must be as armed with knowledge as they are. Our policies should have the strength of deep analysis beneath them to be able to challenge the clever sophistries of our opponents.

Malcolm X – Education is our passport to the future, for tomorrow belongs to the people who prepare for it today… Just because you have colleges and universities doesn’t mean you have education. The colleges and universities in the American system are skillfully used to miseducate.

Carter G. Woodson – No systematic effort toward change has been possible, for, taught the same economics, history, philosophy, literature and religion

which have established the present code of morals, the Negro’s mind has been brought under the control of his oppressor. The problem of holding the Negro down, therefore, is easily solved.

When you control a man’s thinking you do not have to worry about his actions. You do not have to tell him not to stand here or go yonder. He will find his “proper place” and will stay in it. You do not need to send him to the back door. He will go without being told. In fact, if there is no back door, he will cut one for his special benefit. His education makes it necessary.

Dr. W. E. B. DuBois – May God write us down as asses if ever again we are found putting trust in either the Republican or Democratic parties.

Frederick Douglass – It is easier to raise a strong child than to repair a broken man.

Marcus Garvey – Our leader will not be a White man with a Black heart nor a Black man with a White heart but a Black man with a Black heart.

Harold Cruse – The Black man’s one great and present hope is to know and understand AfroAmerican history.

Lerone Bennett, Jr. – Given

one way we were forced to live in this society, the miracle is not how so many families are broken, but that so many are still together. That so many Black mothers are still raising good children, is the incredible toughness and resilience in Black people that gives me hope.

Dr. C. DeLores Tucker – We believe that anyone who will condone, support, produce or profit from gangsta rap is conspirator in the denigration and destruction of the Black community. We will not be silent and allow our youth and our community to be murdered. We will not be silent and allow our women to be degraded and denigrated…

Steven Biko – The most important weapon in the hands of the oppressor is the mind of the oppressed.

Fannie Lou Hamer – For 300 years, we’ve given them time. And I’ve been tired so long, now I am sick and tired of being sick and tired. We want a change.

remains sensitized. I feel a little of our shared humanity dying every time I read about migrants dying for the freedoms we take for granted.

History (and God, ultimately) will judge African and European leaders harshly for dealing with this migration crisis so inhumanely. But I have already rendered judgment, damning them jointly and severally in many commentaries. Here, for example, is what I wrote in the Lampedusa commentary cited above: It speaks volumes that Europeans are ascribing no blame for this Lampedusa tragedy to the African governments that have failed their people so abysmally. This failure, after all, is the only reason so many Africans, utterly bereft of hope at home, are fleeing to Europe in desperate pursuit of peace, prosperity, and happiness. But I suppose this self-recrimination among European governments demonstrates how difficult it is for them to sever that umbilical cord of colonial obligation…

I just hope the damning irony is not lost on any proud African that, 50 years after decolonization, hundreds of Africans (men, women, and children) are risking their lives, practically every day, to subjugate themselves to the paternal

mercies of their former colonial grants might just be European chickens from colonial days commasters in Europe. ing home to roost. And it might be collective guilt more than shared ‘Hypocritical’ silence You’d be hard-pressed to find humanity that is motivating Euany African leader who has do- ropeans like Merkel and Egeland.

But only man’s inhumanity to ne more to redress this crisis man explains generations of Afthan German Chancellor Angela Merkel. And even her record is rican leaders doing so little to redress this migration, and showing not without blemish.

You’d also be hard-pressed to so little concern about the fate of find any African aid worker who their migrants. has called out fellow Africans the way Jan Egeland, secretary gen- Shameless leaders eral of the Norwegian Refugee Regrettably, these leaders seem Council, called out fellow Euro- incapable of feeling any shame. peans on January 23: Because only a modicum of it “I remember when European would prevent any African leader leaders, organisations and col- from ever setting foot in Europe umnists in 1989 expressed their until Africans implemented Africollective outrage about those can solutions to solve this (Afriwho had died fleeing across the can) migration crisis. crumbling Berlin Wall…Around And speaking of damning si250 died trying to escape across lence, don’t get me started on the Berlin Wall during the three American leaders, especialdecades from 1961 to 1989; ten ly Black ones. Because, as far as times as many, 2,000-3,000 [Afri- they’re concerned, these African can] men, women and children, tragedies might as well be playing now die every single year in their out on Mars. attempt to escape their hopelessAnthony L. Hall is a native ness and reach protection and a better life in Europe. The silence of The Bahamas with an intersurrounding these mass drown- national law practice in Washings is unacceptable and hypo- ington, D.C. Read his columns and daily weblog at www. critical.”

Granted, these African mi- theipinionsjournal.com.

Can’t be copied

The Cuban system of neighborhood medicine, with double the proportion of primary care physicians as the U.S. at less than one-tenth the cost ($813 per person per year, compared to $9,403 in the U.S.) – is inseparable from the Cuban revolutionary process.

Capitalists cannot copy it.

In an article titled “When Cuban Polyclinics Were Born” by Don Fitz, Cuban historian Hedelberto López admits that “the revolution in medicine would have been impossible if doctors had not fled the country. They would have disrupted everything.”

These doctors were wedded to a system that excluded the Black and poor. Most of them were Glen Ford is executive editor White, and like other profession- A small step In the U.S., single payer health of BlackAgendaReport.com. Eals, most of them fled Cuba after the revolution, forcing the state care is only the first baby-step. mail him at Glen.Ford@Blackto recreate the medical profes- The Black health crisis is a social AgendaReport.com.

A. Peter Bailey’s latest book is “Witnessing Brother Malcolm X, the Master Teacher.”

TOJ

A6

NATION & WORLD

MAY 17 – MAY 23, 2019

STOJ

Deadline and ID However, Myrna Pérez, deputy director of the democracy program at the Brennan Center for Justice, said a roughly 30-day registration deadline before elections is typical for the 35 states that still didn’t have same-day registration.

The deadline is 30 days in Texas and 25 days in New York.

Pérez was more critical of Texas’ photo ID requirement for voting. “Texas does first make it harder to register, then you’re hit with a voter ID law,” Pérez said.

Sam Taylor, communications director for the Texas secretary of state’s office, said the state has set aside $4 million for grassroots outreach programs to encourage more voter registration, and that voters without photo ID can vote if they fill out a form at the polls.

AL SEIB/LOS ANGELES TIMES/TNS

Voters cast their ballots at the Venice Beach Lifeguard Operations polling location near the Venice Pier in Los Angeles on Nov. 6, 2018.

How voter laws and passion brought people to polls

BY TIM HENDERSON STATELINE.ORG/TNS

WASHINGTON – In Utah, marijuana revved up voter interest last year, and new election policies made it easier for people to cast their ballots, leading to the nation’s biggest jump in midterm turnout.

Around the country, state efforts to widen ballot access and Trump-era political passion spurred more voters to the polls in November than the last midterm elections in 2014.

Nationally, 53% of the citizen voting-age population voted in 2018, a 12-point bump from the previous midterms, according to new U.S. Census Bureau estimates.

The increases ranged from 21 points in Utah, where about 58% of voting-age citizens voted, down to Colorado, where there was little change. Turnout already was high in Colorado at 59%, partly because the state was a pioneer in expanding ballot access.

Automatic registration Georgia (13 points) and California (15 points) saw big improvements with similar programs, such as automatic voter registration.

States with more restrictive voting policies didn’t always see the same results.

While turnout increased in New York and Texas, both of which still require early registration, they remained in the bottom 10 among states, with turnout below 50% of citizens despite some hot races.

Utah’s turnout vaulted from 45th in the nation in 2014 to 13th in 2018, the first year all counties used both same-day registration and vote-at-home options. The state also allows residents to enroll in automatic voter registration when they get new driver’s licenses.

“The legislature has always passed the policies that take away barriers to voting, balanced with measures to make sure people are who they say they are,” said Justin Lee, Utah’s director of elections.

Utah initiative Utah’s turnout rose from about 37% of citizens in 2014, according to U.S. Census Bureau estimates released in April.

The biggest vote-getter in Utah was a medical marijuana initiative, which got more than a million votes and passed by a close margin.

That issue, along with ballot initiatives on independent re-

districting and Medicaid expansion, gave millennials a reason to vote, and nonprofits reached out to them throughout the year in registration drives, said Chase Thomas, executive director of the Alliance for a Better Utah, a nonprofit watchdog group.

“These issues really energized the left-leaning segment of our electorate in Salt Lake County and other parts of the state that has felt their vote didn’t really matter before because of the extreme conservative bent,” Thomas said.

Controversial issues The marijuana bill boosted turnout in Democratic-leaning Salt Lake County, where the proposition was popular, but also in more conservative Utah County, where voters opposed it, Lee said. The medical marijuana measure passed with about 53% of the vote (the state legislature has since replaced it with a new law, a move now being challenged in state court).

“I think the issues had a lot to do with it,” Lee said, “and then the policies facilitated that turnout.”

Experts disagree on how much turnout depends on state voter access policies. Arizona, New Jersey and Missouri saw big boosts without changing voting rules, as tight House and Senate races

brought more people to the polls.

“It’s just as easy to argue that states that had high turnout rates were more likely to value political participation, and thus enacted more liberalized registration laws,” said Charles Stewart III, a political science professor who studies turnout issues at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.

But voting rights advocates see opportunities for more voting in states as politically different as Texas and New York.

Texas turnout Since the 2018 midterm elections, New York has enacted laws to allow early voting and other policies such as pre-registration for 17-year-olds.

A March report by Nonprofit VOTE, a coalition of state and national nonprofits advocating for easier ballot access, argued that Texas would improve its turnout with same-day registration.

The Texas U.S. Senate race pitting Democratic U.S. Rep. Beto O’Rourke against incumbent Republican U.S. Sen. Ted Cruz was the state’s closest Senate race since 1978 and drew national attention.

“Texas, in spite of having one the nation’s closest, most watched, and most expensive U.S. Senate elections, still ranked among the bottom 10 in turnout thanks in part to a registration deadline four weeks before Election Day,” the report stated. Texas’ turnout was 48.4% in 2018. On average, the 15 states with sameday registration had higher turnout, 56%, while others averaged 49%, according to the report.

China issues list of U.S. goods to be hit by tariffs

Georgia increase Georgia had a nearly 13-point increase over 2014 midterms to 56% turnout, the census estimates showed, propelling the state from 27th place to 17th.

That reflected high interest in the governor’s race, a squeaker that Republican Brian Kemp won over Democrat Stacey Abrams by less than 1%age point.

Automatic voter registration, a policy at least partly adopted in 18 states, had an outsized effect on Georgia, where new voter registrations nearly doubled after it took effect, according to an April report from the Brennan Center for Justice, a watchdog group that favors expanded ballot access.

Georgia in 2016 began automatically registering anyone who got or renewed a driver’s license.

Colorado did so the next year, and the Brennan Center considers Connecticut, New Mexico and Utah to be “very close” but not fully “automatic.”

Applicants in those states must choose to register, rather than opting out if they choose not to register.

‘Reckless leap’

BY ROBYN DIXON LOS ANGELES TIMES/TNS

BEIJING – China on Monday announced tit-for-tat tariffs on $60 billion in U.S. goods as brinkmanship between the world’s two largest economies undermined hopes for an end to a trade war that threatens the global economy.

Saying it would “never surrender” to outside pressure, China published a list of U.S. goods that would be hit by tariffs starting June 1. The list on the Ministry of Finance website includes more than 5,000 items with tariffs of 5 percent to 25 percent.

“We have said many times that adding tariffs won’t resolve any problem. China will never surrender to external pressure. We have the confidence and the ability to protect our lawful and legitimate rights,” said Chinese For-

‘Exact match’ policy Almost 10,000 of those forms were used in the 2018 elections, he said.

“I don’t think anybody who showed up wanting to vote was unable to do that,” Taylor said.

“It was the second-highest number of votes in state history — the highest was 2016. We saw a turnout like we usually see in a presidential election.”

Another red state where passion and policy played a role in boosting turnout last year was Georgia.

Under the state’s “exact match” policy, enacted in 2017, election officials can suspend or purge voters from the rolls if a name doesn’t precisely match state driver’s license and Social Security records.

Even trivial typos, such as a missing hyphen in a last name, can trigger the law, and a disproportionate number of the affected voters were African Americans. Nevertheless, Georgia saw a big lift in overall turnout, partly because of automatic voter registration.

THOMAS PETER/POOL/GETTY IMAGES/TNS

President Donald Trump and China’s President Xi Jinping meet business leaders at the Great Hall of the People on Nov. 9, 2017 in Beijing, China. eign Ministry spokesman Geng Shuang at a regular briefing earlier.

Washington blamed Chinese state media blamed Washington for the crisis and argued that China’s economy

and political system were strong enough to outlast the U.S. in a battle of wills.

The editor of the Communist Party-owned Global Times, Hu Xijin, earlier tweeted that China’s countermeasures would be carefully designed to ensure that its plan “hits the U.S. while mini-

mizing damage to itself.”

Hopes for an end to the trade war plummeted on May 10 after the Trump administration raised tariffs on $200 billion in Chinese goods from 10 percent to 25 percent, a step that could threaten some Chinese companies heavily reliant on American exports.

With the U.S. threatening steps to impose tariffs on another $325 billion in goods, Hu earlier tweeted that such a step would end a stalemate that China would not lose, because of its political system.

Other state media took a similar line. An opinion piece in the People’s Daily condemned Washington’s “reckless leap into the dark” and said China would never compromise on matters of principle.

“The U.S. wielded the tariff stick once again because it misjudged China’s strength, capability and will power. By further escalating the trade tensions, does it really want to push its trade ties with China to breaking point?” read a piece under the byline Zhong Sheng, a pen name often used by the daily to express its opinions on foreign policy.

A Global Times editorial said Washington’s “fierce offensive” would hurt America more than China.

“Washington obviously hopes that the fierce tariff war, which is unprecedented in trade history, will crush China’s will in one fell swoop and force China to accept an unequal deal in a short term.

“However, once the country is strategically coerced, nothing is unbearable for China in order to safeguard its sovereignty and dignity as well as the long-term development rights of the Chinese people.”

HEALTH | FOOD | TRAVEL | SCIENCE | BOOKS | MOVIES | TV | AUTOS COURIER Van Jones

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“I can’t say pageants make you beautiful.

I think they make you more confident in the person that you are.’’

– Cheslie Kryst, Miss USA 2019

Left and below: Cheslie Kryst, a North Carolina lawyer who represents some prison inmates for free, was crowned Miss USA on May 2.

COURTESY OF NBC AND MISS USA/MISSUNIVERSE.COM

Triple CROWNS

For the first time, Miss USA, Miss America and Miss Teen USA are all Black women.

BY STACY M. BROWN NNPA NEWSWIRE

C

heslie Kryst, the recently crowned Miss USA, said she’ll never forget the time a judge at a law conference told her to wear a skirt instead of pants because judges prefer skirts.

The 27-year-old Black lawyer, who earned a law degree and an MBA at Wake Forest University, had a message for that judge after she won the competition where the three finalists were all women of color.

“Glass ceilings can be broken wearing either a skirt or pants,” Kryst said.

Alejandra Gonzalez of New Mexico was the first-runner up and Oklahoma’s Triana Browne the secondrunner up during the competition in Reno, Nevada.

The winner and finalists, which also included another woman of color in the top five, was also a not-so-subtle reminder and rebuke of President Donald Trump, who once owned the pageant but sold it after he ran for office in 2015 and after he famously disCOURTESY OF MISSAMERICA.ORG paraged immigrants and individuals Miss New York, Nia Franklin, was crowned Miss America of color.

‘Really cool’ Kryst’s May 2 victory also made history because it ensures that for the first time Miss USA, Miss America and Miss Teen USA are all Black women.

Kaliegh Garris of Connecticut was crowned Miss Teen USA 2019 on April 28. In September 2018, Nia Franklin of New York won the Miss America title.

Kryst, who does pro bono work to reduce sentences for inmates, said she didn’t feel nervous as she advanced through each round of the competition.

“I just kept hearing my name get called. All I could think was, ‘This is really cool,’” she said.

It was also cool to send a message to the judge who tried to demean her years earlier.

on Sept. 9, 2018. She is a graduate of the University of North Carolina School of Arts where she majored in music composition.

Frustrating incident According to NBC News, Kryst told reporters afterward she’ll never forget being in law school at Wake Forest participating in a moot court competition in Louisiana with a panel of judges who provided very little feedback to her and her partner.

“We stood there for 30 minutes after practicing for months and all you said was wear a skirt next time?” Kryst said.

“It was very frustrating. Don’t tell females to wear different clothes while you give the men substantive feedback on their legal arguments,” she said.

Kryst, who advances to the Miss Universe competition, said her inter-

COURTESY OF MISS TEEN USA/MISSUNIVERSE.COM

Kaliegh Garris, a teenager from Milford, Connecticut, garnered national attention for her Miss Teen USA win and for rocking her natural curly hair during the competition.

est in pageants began when she was 10 years old, watching her mother ride a horse-drawn carriage in a parade when she was named Mrs. North Carolina in 2002.

“It was a time in my life when I didn’t know who I was and wasn’t confident in myself. I was that little weird kid who had a unibrow and didn’t have any friends. My hair was always pulled back. I thought, ‘I want to be just like her,’” she said.

beautiful. I think they make you more confident in the person that you are,” she related.

“I’m still that same weird kid. I still like reading books. And at the end of the day, I like to sit by myself in my house and just watch movies. But I think pageants taught me all that, and my mom was really the one who introduced me to that and drew me to pageantry,” Kryst added.

What pageants taught

Stacy M. Brown is a correspondent for NNPA Newswire. Follow him on Twitter at @StacyBrownMedia.

Kryst went on to compete in pageants in high school.

“I can’t say pageants make you

ENTERTAINMENT & FINEST

B2 Van Jones poses in the press room during the 50th NAACP Image Awards held at Dolby Theatre on March 30 in Hollywood, Calif.

STHANLEE B. MIRADOR/SIPA USA/TNS

Van Jones making crime personal with ‘The Redemption Project’

BY LORRAINE ALI LOS ANGELES TIMES/TNS

Media personality. Green jobs adviser to President Obama. CNN “Crossfire” host. Human rights advocate. Political target.

Van Jones (aka Anthony Kapel Jones) has played many roles since graduating from Yale Law School 25 years ago. His latest: host of the new CNN series “The Redemption Project With Van Jones.”

The show brings offenders face to face with the people most affected by their violent crimes over eight moving, powerful and unpredictable hourlong episodes.

With the help of experienced restorative justice workers, Jones — long a proponent of criminal justice reform — facilitates the meetings, giving voice to both parties through interviews with the subjects, victim advocates, prison wardens and more.

He spoke with the L.A. Times about crime and punishment, call-out culture and competing against “Game of Thrones” for ratings.

Q: What is the first thing you want people to know about “The Redemption Project”?

A: It’s not a true crime show.

True crime is a whodunit. We already know who did it. The questions we ask are: What is the truth long after the crime? Is the (perpetrator) sorry? Have the family members healed?

What do they still need 10, 20 years later? I’m not interested in true crime. I’m interested in the “what happened after the crime,” and that’s a messier truth.

Q: Criminal justice reform is a hot topic, but it’s often argued on a policy level. Your show tackles it on a personal level inside prisons around the U.S. A: Going in and out of prisons for work, I discovered that there are some real diamonds behind those walls. There are people who went in arrogant or remorseless but, despite prison conditions, have transformed themselves. I want those diamonds to get a chance to shine. On the other side of crime, the victims and survivors are often left dehumanized because they never got their questions answered.

Somebody submitted a plea, lawyers jumped in, so 10 or 20 years later the (survivor) is still hurting. They never got a chance to ask the basic questions: Why did this happen? Are you truly sorry or are you just saying that because you’re trying to get a shorter sentence? What were my loved one’s last words? So many questions have gone unanswered that these people are trapped.

Q: Why televise these very intimate and painful meetings?

A: The opposite of criminalization is humanization, and just showing the complexity and the preciousness of each human life, and never allowing ourselves to give in to the temptation to define

FLORIDA’S

finest

a person’s entire life based on the worst thing they ever did. Everybody is more than just the one worst thing they ever did. You are.

And so am I. Q: You walk many paths. How would you describe what you do?

A: I consider myself to be a commentator and a talk show host and an advocate. Being an advocate might not be consistent with being a TV host, but I think about it like this: I have an opportunity to tell stories that I hope have an impact on people.

Now whether I’m telling that story sitting in front of a committee and subcommittee in Congress or over a microphone at a rally or in a community center or on television or radio, it doesn’t matter.

The key is, is the story true? If the story is not true, then I’m doing a bad job no matter what hat I’m wearing.

Q: You’ve argued social issues and politics as a CNN regular for a decade, but “The Redemption Project” is a different approach.

A: The idea of redemption is bigger than just a political idea.

It’s not about the laws on the books. We now live in a call-out culture where it’s fashionable to have no empathy. We’ve made it trendy to be unforgiving, and that is very poisonous. I wanted to go 180 degrees against that culture and offer an example of people trying to listen to each other across the hardest gulf you’ll ever have. It’s a personal transgression gulf, and it doesn’t get much tougher than that. I have yet to find a person who’s been able to watch these episodes without dabbing their eyes at least once.

Q: I cried, at least twice, during each of the episodes I watched.

A: That means something in a world where you can hear about

MAY 17 – MAY 23, 2019 a mass shooting and just change the channel and not even blink.

Trying to get people to feel anything is a big part of the mission of this show because my fear is that we’re in a zombie culture that has actually flatlined.

Brains are still active, but the heart is dead. So we’re trying to resuscitate that human heartbeat. We’re not taking an easy assignment. This is not nonviolent drug offenders. It’s people who have done really bad stuff. But we hope that by the end of the show you’re rooting for both parties to show up and express what’s needed to heal.

Q: It must have been nerveracking to make this show — the emotion, the weight, the unpredictability.

A: It was stressful. You don’t know what’s going to happen. We spent hours and days with both sides beforehand, but the day of the meeting, you don’t know if the victims and survivors will even show up. You’re walking somebody into a prison to talk with someone who shot them or killed their kid or who ran over their child. Every word that is spoken in all these episodes is the honest expression of somebody trying to get out of hell. And nobody knows how they’re going to react.

Two of our shows do not get to a warm and fuzzy place at the end. But at least those victims and survivors get some answers that help them move closer toward healing. But in three of our episodes they reach such a breakthrough that the survivors actually help us successfully get the person out of prison. You literally have a full range of experiences.

Q: How do you tackle it in a way that is empathetic and meaningful but not exploitative?

A: I would say don’t try this at home. We partner with organizations that have been doing this quietly for decades. The restorative justice movement is a very small but highly principled movement. We were able to rely on the organization with this very tough assignment. We said we wanted to find the truly repentant accused, as best as we can tell, and find someone who has been a victim, who wants to have the conversation. They can never have spoken before and they need to be willing to do it on television.

Q: Each hourlong episode is very intense, but also very reflective. The stories unfold slowly out of respect to both sides and require some patience.

A: The editors and producers trust the silence to do some of the work that the words can’t do.

If there’s anything brilliant about

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the show, it’s in the trust that the producers place in the audience to walk with these people a few steps.

Q: While serving in the Obama administration you were targeted by the right in a smear campaign and ended up stepping down. But you catch flak from all sides, recently from the left when you supported President Trump’s passing of the First Step Act for criminal justice reform. How do you push through all that?

A: I have to put things in context. They put dogs on my uncles’ ankles when they were marching for civil rights. They put fire hoses on people who look like me.

They shot Dr. King in the face in front of his friends when he was only 39 years old. But none of his friends gave up the fight. And I’m supposed to collapse over a mean tweet?! That doesn’t make sense.

I don’t like it when I’m trending for two or three days on Twitter because the liberals are mad at me. I don’t like it when Fox News decides to make me the villain of the day. But at the end of the day I have to have perspective. I’ve never met anybody in prison who said, “Please get me out of here, but whatever you do, don’t work with any Republicans.” I can’t let this bullying culture stop me from standing up to the real bullying that’s going on inside the incarceration industry.

Q: You also host CNN’s “The Van Jones Show” with a mix of guests, from Jay-Z to Amy Klobuchar.

A: CNN had Larry King and he had pop culture stars all the time.

I’m trying to just take a tiny little corner of that big canvas that he painted and build there. We’re at a place where people actually trust artists more than they trust the politicians. Artists will say things that the politicians would be scared to say. Then when I talk to politicians, I love to ask them about personal stories. I give them a chance to show a side of themselves they don’t often get to show.

Q: That airs every other Saturday while “The Redemption Project” airs Sundays. You’re essentially dominating the weekend at CNN. A: It’s an unbelievable blessing.

And Sunday was Anthony Bourdain’s time slot, which is sacred ground at CNN. I’m honored.

Q: But you’re also up against “Game of Thrones.”

A: (Sighs) I know, and there are no dragons in our show. But we’re only competing on the East Coast time slot. They can use their DVRs and watch it the next day. As long as I still get my ratings …

Think you’re one of Florida’s Finest?

E-mail your high-resolution (200 dpi) digital photo in casual wear or bathing suit taken in front of a plain background with few distractions, to news@flcourier.com with a short biography of yourself and your contact information. (No nude/glamour/ fashion photography, please!) In order to be considered, you must be at least 18 years of age. Acceptance of the photographs submitted is in the sole and absolute discretion of Florida Courier editors. We reserve the right to retain your photograph even if it is not published. If you are selected, you will be contacted by e-mail and further instructions will be given.

Thousands of Caribbean culture lovers converge on South Florida every year before and during the Columbus Day weekend to attend the annual Miami Broward Carnival, a series of concerts, pageants, parades, and competitions.

On Carnival Day, “mas” (masquerade) bands of thousands of revelers dance and march behind 18-wheel tractor-trailer trucks with booming sound systems from morning until nightfall while competing for honors.

Here are some of the “Finest” we’ve seen over the years. Click on www.flcourier to see hundreds of pictures from previous Carnivals.

Go to www. miamibrowardcarnival. com for more information on Carnival events in South Florida.

CHARLES W. CHERRY II / FLORIDA COURIER

MAY 17 – MAY 23, 2019

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HEALTH

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B3

for their overall assessment after CMS weighed inspection results and the facilities’ own measurement of residents’ health improvements.

That overall rating is the one that garners the most attention on Nursing Home Compare and that some hospitals use when recommending where discharged patients might go. Of the 1,638 demoted nursing homes, 277 were rated as average in overall quality (three stars), 175 received four stars, and 48 received the top rating of five stars.

Protest from groups

MIAMI HERALD/TNS

The federal government accelerated its crackdown on nursing homes that go days without a registered nurse by downgrading the rankings of a tenth of the nation’s homes on Medicare’s consumer website.

Short-staffed nursing homes see drop in Medicare ratings

BY JORDAN RAU AND ELIZABETH LUCAS KAISHER HEALTH NEWS/TNS

The federal government accelerated its crackdown on nursing homes that go days without a registered nurse by downgrading the rankings of a tenth of the nation’s homes on Medicare’s consumer website, new records show.

In its update in April to Nursing Home Compare, the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services gave its lowest star rating for staffing — one star on its five-star scale — to 1,638 homes.

Most were downgraded because their payroll records reported no registered-nurse hours at all for four days or more, while the remainder failed to submit their payroll records or sent data that couldn’t be verified through an audit.

“Once you’re past four days (without registered nursing), it’s probably beyond calling in sick,” said David Grabowski, a health policy professor at Harvard Medical School. “It’s probably a systemic problem.”

Quality issue It was a tougher standard than Medicare had previously ap-

plied, when it demoted nursing homes with seven or more days without a registered nurse.

“Nurse staffing has the greatest impact on the quality of care nursing homes deliver, which is why CMS analyzed the relationship between staffing levels and outcomes,” the agency announced in March. “CMS found that as staffing levels increase, quality increases.”

The latest batch of payroll records, released in April, shows that even more nursing homes fell short of Medicare’s requirement that a registered nurse be on-site at least eight hours every day.

Over the final three months of 2018, 2,633 of the nation’s 15,563 nursing homes reported that for four or more days, registered nurses worked fewer than eight hours, according to a Kaiser Health News analysis. Those facilities did not meet Medicare’s requirement even after counting nurses whose jobs are primarily administrative.

Anemic on weekends CMS has been alarmed at the frequency of understaffing of registered nurses — the most highly trained category of nurses in a home — since the government last year began requiring homes to submit payroll records to verify staffing levels.

Before that, Nursing Home Compare relied on two-week snapshots nursing homes reported to health inspectors when they visited — a method officials worried was too easy to manipulate. The records show staffing on weekends is often particularly anemic.

CMS’ demotion of ratings on staffing is not as severe as it might seem, however. More than half of those homes were given a higher rating than one star

Still, CMS’ overall changes to how the government assigns stars drew protests from nursing home groups. The American Health Care Association, a trade group for nursing homes, calculated that 36% of homes saw a drop in their ratings while 15% received improved ratings.

“By moving the scoring ‘goal posts’ for two components of the Five-Star system,” the association wrote, “CMS will cause more than 30 percent of nursing centers nationwide to lose one or more stars overnight — even though nothing changed in staffing levels and in quality of care, which is still being practiced and delivered every day.”

The association said in an email that the payroll records might exaggerate the absence of staff through unintentional omissions that homes make when submitting the data or because of problems on the government’s end.

Recording the data The association said it had raised concerns that salaried nurses face obstacles in recording time they worked above 40 hours a week. Also, the association added, homes must deduct a half-hour for every eight-hour shift for a meal break, even if the nurse worked through it.

“Some of our member nursing homes have told us that their data is not showing up correctly on Nursing Home Compare, making it appear that they do not have the nurses and other staff that they in fact do have on duty,” LeadingAge, an association of nonprofit medical providers including nursing homes, said last year.

Kaiser Health News (KHN) is a national health policy news service. It is an editorially independent program of the Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation.

Study: White patients far more likely to get buprenorphine

BY AUBREY WHELAN PHILADELPHIA INQUIRER/TNS

An addiction treatment drug that health officials around the country have touted as a crucial part of the battle against the opioid epidemic is prescribed far more often to White patients.

The study, authored by researchers at the University of Michigan and published on May 8 in the Journal of the American Medical Association, looked at how often patients of different races and ethnicities were prescribed the treatment drug buprenorphine at doctors’ visits.

Getting the medicine at a doctor’s office is a selling point of the opioid-based treatment medication that has fewer federal regulations attached to it than methadone, which must be doled out at clinics and is more stigmatized.

Special permission Patients can take buprenorphine in the privacy of their homes or doctor’s offices, and most patients on buprenorphine do receive the drug in “officebased settings,” the study authors wrote.

Still, doctors need special permission to prescribe buprenorphine, something that isn’t required for the opioid painkillers that may have sparked the addiction crisis.

The study looked at more than 13 million doctors’ visits in which buprenorphine was prescribed between 2012 and 2015, and found that 12.7 million of those visits were by White patients, compared to just 363,000 for all other races.

That’s despite the fact that national surveys suggest White patients are only slightly more likely than Black patients to use heroin, or to take prescription pills without a doctor’s direction.

JOE RAEDLE/GETTY IMAGES/TNS

Bottles of the generic prescription pain medication Buprenorphine are seen in a pharmacy in Boca Raton. The narcotic drug is used as an alternative to Methadone to help addicts recovering from heroin use.

Payment options matter

the study’s lead author. “

Patients prescribed buprenorphine were also more likely to have private insurance, or pay cash, than to have Medicaid. This held even after the Obamacare Medicaid expansion added more people to the public-insurance rolls.

“It makes you question whether people of lower income or those on Medicaid have equitable access to care,” said Pooja Lagisetty, an assistant professor at the University of Michigan and

Examining disparities The study didn’t look at state data, and Lagisetty said it’s possible some states have policies in place to address racial disparities in treatment. Nor did the study examine what’s behind the gap in buprenorphine prescribing. Lagisetty said the authors hope their paper spurs further research. “(Buprenorphine) is offered in a traditional health care setting, where there is a lot more flexi-

bility about reimbursement patterns and which physicians offer it. When that flexibility exists, it’s hard to control whether we’re providing equitable treatment,” she said.

“Our results show it’s been inequitable from the beginning, and these trends are persisting,” even though doctors are prescribing the drug more often.

Overdose deaths The opioid crisis has been portrayed largely as affecting

White Americans. But in cities like Baltimore and Washington, D.C., most victims of fatal overdoses are Black. In Philadelphia, though Whites made up the largest share of opioid overdose deaths in 2017, deaths among Blacks rose 34%, and deaths among Hispanics jumped 60% from the prior year.

“We’re all trying to rapidly improve access to treatment,” Lagisetty said. “But we have to be thoughtful about really improving access to treatment for those who need it most.”

FOOD

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MAY 17 – MAY 23, 2019

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Enjoy the goodness of grapes for healthy snacks and meals FROM FAMILY FEATURES

Establishing a regular pattern of healthy snacks and meals made from fresh, whole foods is essential to promoting good health. Fresh grapes always make a great snack because they are tasty, healthy and portable. Yet grapes can also be used as an ingredient to make good-foryou dishes that are just as satisfying as they are healthy.

According to an IFIC Food and Health survey, consumers are looking more and more to foods for health benefits, with cardiovascular health topping the list as the leading benefit sought.

Grapes of all colors – red, green and black – are a natural source of beneficial antioxidants and other polyphenols. Plus, they are naturally fatfree, cholesterol-free and low in sodium. Pairing heart-healthy grapes with other healthy ingredients – including fish, legumes, whole grains and vegetables – offers a vast array of options for nutritious make-at-home dishes.

In these recipes for Chicken Larb with Grapes, Trout with Grape and Lentil Salad, and Smashed Cucumber and Grape Salad, grapes add a juicy burst of flavor, vibrant color and crunch to deliver wholesome meals with bold flavors and fresh textures.

For more meal inspiration for healthy eating, visit GrapesfromCalifornia.com.

TROUT WITH GRAPE AND LENTIL SALAD Servings: 4 3/4 cup green lentils, uncooked 2 1/2 cups water 2 tablespoons minced shallot 1 1/2 cups halved red California grapes 1/4 cup fresh chopped dill 1/4 cup chopped walnuts 2 tablespoons lemon juice 1 teaspoon lemon zest 1 tablespoon white balsamic vinegar 1 tablespoon, plus 2 teaspoons, olive oil, divided 1 cup arugula 1/2 teaspoon sea salt, divided 1/4 teaspoon pepper, plus additional, to taste, divided 4 trout fillets (4-6 ounces each), skin on 1/2 teaspoon lemon zest In medium saucepan, combine lentils with water. Bring to boil then reduce heat to simmer; cover and cook 15 minutes. Turn off heat and allow lentils to steam 5 minutes; drain and let cool.

In medium bowl, combine lentils, shallot, grapes, dill, walnuts, lemon juice, lemon zest, vinegar, 1 tablespoon olive oil, arugula, 1/4 teaspoon salt, and pepper, to taste; set aside.

Heat oven to broil. Move rack to highest position.

Sprinkle trout fillets with lemon zest, remaining salt and 1/4 teaspoon pepper; brush with remaining olive oil. Broil trout 4-5 minutes. Serve with lentil salad.

Nutritional information per serving: 480 calories; 40 g protein; 36 g carbohydrates; 20 g fat (38% calories from fat); 3 g saturated fat (4% calories from saturated fat); 80 mg cholesterol; 380 mg sodium; 10 g fiber.

CHICKEN LARB WITH GRAPES Prep time: 20 minutes Cook time: 10 minutes Servings: 4 1/2 red onion, thinly sliced 2 cups halved red California grapes 2 tablespoons rice vinegar 2 tablespoons vegetable oil 1 pound ground chicken 1/4 teaspoon salt 1/4 teaspoon freshly ground black pepper 1-2 Thai chilies, thinly sliced 2 teaspoons fish sauce 3 tablespoons lime juice 1/4 cup coarsely chopped cilantro 3 tablespoons coarsely chopped mint leaves 4 cups steamed jasmine rice

2 cups shredded green cabbage 2 tablespoons chopped roasted and salted peanuts In medium bowl, combine onion, grapes and rice vinegar; set aside.

In large skillet, heat oil over medium-high heat. Add chicken and cook, stirring frequently until just cooked through, about 6-7 minutes. Season chicken with salt and pepper. Stir in chilies, fish sauce, lime juice, cilantro and mint.

Divide rice between four serving dishes and top with chicken, cabbage, marinated onions and grapes; sprinkle with peanuts.

Nutritional information per serving: 540 calories; 26 g protein; 65 g carbohydrates; 19 g fat (32% calories from fat); 3.5 g saturated fat (6% calories from saturated fat); 100 mg cholesterol; 480 mg sodium; 3 g fiber.

SMASHED CUCUMBER AND GRAPE SALAD Prep time: 20 minutes Servings: 6 1 1/4 pounds English or Persian cucumbers, ends trimmed 1 teaspoon kosher salt 2 tablespoons rice vinegar 1 tablespoon reduced-sodium soy sauce 2 teaspoons granulated sugar 1-2 teaspoons chili oil 1 teaspoon toasted sesame oil 1 cup halved California grapes 2 scallions, thinly sliced 2 teaspoons toasted sesame seeds Using rolling pin, smash whole cucumbers lightly, just enough to break open. Tear or cut into 1 1/2-inch pieces and season with salt. Transfer to sieve and let drain 10 minutes.

In large bowl, whisk vinegar, soy sauce, sugar, chili oil and sesame oil; stir in grapes and scallions. When cucumbers finish draining, add to bowl with grape mixture and stir to combine.

Sprinkle with sesame seeds and serve.

Nutritional information per serving: 70 calories; 1 g protein; 11 g carbohydrates; 2.5 g fat (32% calories from fat); 0 g saturated fat; 0 mg cholesterol; 170 mg sodium; 1 g fiber.

GO FOR A GRAPE SNACK Snacking, for many people, is a significant part of daily food consumption, thus making smart snack choices a vital part of promoting good health. According to a study conducted by Mintel, 94 percent of adults snack daily, and 55 percent of people said they snack 2-3 times per day. Grapes are a healthy and hydrating choice without the added fat, salt and sugar found in many processed snacks.