2010 Anniversary Issue Swagga Digital Magazine

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anniversary issue

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First things first: Why we do what we do?

WINTER 2010

As our first year comes to a close and we embark on another year, Swagga Digital Magazine exists to provide an internet portal that is delivered electronically, on your mobile device and in print. Our publication endeavors to illustrate through photographic imagery, written word, contemporary art, interactive media, mobile publishing and print layouts that focus on people of color, their lifestyles, fashion trends, culture and diversity. We strive to illuminate people of different backgrounds, and lifestyles promoting confidence through our photography, print ads, imagery and page layouts. Our ultimate goal is to break down the stereotypical mindsets surrounding fashion, which exits on the catwalks, advertising ads, on television and in the media as a whole.

We want to bring diversity to print ads, advertising in magazines and interactive media.

Ron Fulcher Editor-In-Chief

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DECEMBER/JANUARY 2011

swagga digital magazine

anniversary issue

Swagga Digital Magazine Volume I Issue 5 Winter/Spring 2011 Anniversary Issue Published Quarterly © 2009-2011 Swagga Digital Magazine www.swaggadigitalmagazine.com All Rights Reserved Printed in USA

Advertising Requests Please E-Mail: Advertising@swaggadigitalmagazine.com

For Event and Promotional Copies, Please E-Mail: Promocopies@swaggadigitalmagazine.com

Publishers Note: This issue is dedicated to my mom whose courage, strength, tenacity and love has been a rock for me in the production PUBLISHER, EDITOR-IN-CHIEF of this issue. There were so many people who were instruRONALD FULCHER mental in the production of our anniversary issue, and I could not possibly name them all in this writing, but I just <hgmkb[nmbg` Iahmh`kZia^kl want to thank all of you and you know who you are for :eiahglh A^gkr GZoZkkh assisting me with this issue. Many thanks to all of the KZrObg Iahmh`kZiar wonderful and talented models, make-up artists, hair Fb\aZ^e Pn stylists, and wardrobe stylists. >kbd ;^ee <aZn E^ Reproduction of any material within this publication, in KhgZe] ?ne\a^k whole or in part is, prohibited without expressed consent of AZkkr E^hgZk] publisher. The publisher assumes no responsibility to any CZlhg @b[lhg party of the information, claims or ads herein to include ;kn\^ FZklaZee errors, inaccuracies or omissions. By advertising the Ch^lia AZpd advertisers agree to indemnify the Publisher against all Lm^_Zgb Gb\he^ claims relating to or resulting from said advertisements.

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M

by Andrew Belonsky

FZko^e <hfb\l [^\Zf^ Z kb`am pbg` mZk`^m ^Zkeb^k mabl r^Zk Z_m^k in[eblabg` Z \hfb\ bg pab\a <ZimZbg :f^kb\Z ng]^kfbg^] ma^ M^Z IZkmr' Ghp ma^ =blg^r&hpg^] \hfiZgr aZl \hf^ ng]^k _bk^ _hk aZobg` [eZ\d Z\mhk B]kbl >e[Z ieZr Z pabm^l hger khe^ bg ma^ fhob^ adaptation of ʻThor.ʼ You canʼt make this stuff ni' ?ng]Zf^gmZeblm `khni <hng\be h_ <hgl^koZ& mbo^ <bmbs^gl chbg^] Z [hr\hmm h_ ma^ D^gg^ma Branagh-directed ʻThorʼ, because, according to ma^ `khni% >e[Z aZl gh kb`am mh [^ ieZrbg` Ghkl^ `h] A^bf]^e% [^\Znl^ Zee Ghkl^ `h]l% real people who exist, are Aryan. “Itʼs not ^ghn`a maZm FZko^e ZmmZ\dl \hgl^koZmbo^l oZen^l% ghp frmaheh`b\Ze @h]l fnlm [^ k^&bgo^gm^] pbma [eZ\d ldbg% ma^r pkbm^' Bm l^^fl maZm FZko^e Lmn]bhl [^eb^o^l maZm pabm^ i^hie^ lahne] aZo^ ghmabg` maZm bl ngbjn^ mh ma^fl^eo^l' :ghma^k post attacks Marvelʼs ʻBlack Pantherʼ l^kb^l _hk lrfiZmabs& bg` pbma bg]^i^g]^gm Lhnma :_kb\Z% Zg] Dre^ Kh`^kl% pah heads the Councilʼs Lhnma <ZkhebgZ \aZim^k% eZf^gm^]% FZko^e aZl mZd^g ma^bk Zgmb&pabm^% kZ]b\Ze \ZfiZb`g ^o^g _nkma^k' Ma^r \Zlm Z [eZ\d fZg Zl Z Ghkl^ =^bmr' Ma^l^ i^hie^ Zk^ ahkkb[e^' Ma^ <hng\be% pab\a \Zeel ma^ LmZm^l Zg bgm^`kZe iZkm h_ >nkhi^Zg \bobebsZmbhg Zg] ma^ >nkhi^Zg i^hie^% Zg] bglblml ma^ :f^kb\Zg i^hie^ Zg] `ho^kgf^gm lahne] k^fZbg >nkhi^Zg bg ma^bk \hfihlbmbhg Zg] \aZkZ\m^k% Z fhk^ ihebm^ pZr h_ lZrbg`

pabm^ bl kb`am% aZl ghp hk`Zgbs^] Zg hgebg^ boycott of ʻThor,ʼ Marvel and common ]^\^g\r' >e[Z% dghpg [^lm _hk ieZrbg` Lmkbg`^k Bell on ʻThe Wire,ʼ basically called the boycott as absurd rubbish, saying, “Thorʼs mythical, kb`am8 Mahk aZl Z aZff^k maZm _eb^l mh abf pa^g he clicks his fingers. Thatʼs OK, but the color of fr ldbg bl pkhg`8 Ma^ [hr\hmm \hf^l Z_m^k \hgl^koZmbo^l iZgg^] FZko^e _hk Zg blln^ h_ Captain Americaʼ in which the iconic hero ]^l\kb[^l paZm Zii^Zkl mh [^ Z M^Z IZkmr ikhm^lm Zl Zg Zgmb&mZq mabg`% pabe^ abl Zeer% black hero The Falcon, says he wouldnʼt be p^e\hf^ Zfhg` ma^ Zg`kr pabm^ _hedl'

> BG ?H<NL / <NEMNK> M^Z IZkmr Z]a^k^gml Zg] ma^ <hng\be [hma l^bs^] hg ma^ fhf^gm% pbma hg^ \hgl^koZmbo^ ZgZerlm k^fZkdbg`% Bm l^^fl mh f^ ma^k^ pZl Z clear effort on someoneʼs part to undermine ma^ M^Z IZkmr fho^f^gm' FZko^e pkbm^k >] ;kn[Zd^k pZl _hk\^] mh ]^_^g] ma^ Zkm' B pZl lbfier nlbg` ma^f mh lahp ma^ fhh] bg ma^ \hngmkr bg oZkbhnl ieZ\^l hnmlb]^ <ZimZbg America and the Falconʼs usual home, New York City,” he said. “Itʼs very similar to other things weʼve done in the comic, showing e^_m&pbg` ikhm^lm \khp]l [Z\d ]nkbg` ma^ ^e^\mbhg l^Zlhg bg +))1' Mabl Zee lhng]l o^kr lbeer3 _kbg`^ pabm^ lnik^fZ\blml pZ`bg` Zg ngm^gZ[e^ [hr\hmm' Ma^ <hng\be% ahp^o^k% lahne] ghm [^ lh ^Zlber ]blfbll^]' Mahn`a fZgr ihebmb\bZgl ik^obhnler \hgg^\m^] mh ma^ <hng\be aZo^ ]blZohp^] bml kZ\blm Z`^g]Z maZm eblm bg\en]^l ab`a ikh_be^ e^Z]^kl ebd^ Fbd^ An\dZ[^^% ;h[ ;Zkk Zg] AZe^r ;Zk[hnk ma^ `khni aZl [^^g ]^_^g]^] [r ^jnZeer ihp^k_ne e^Z]^kl% ebd^ :gg <hnem^k% Zg] mabl r^Zk \heeZ[hkZm^] pbma M^Z IZkmr `khnil bg ?ehkb]Z Zg] Fbllbllbiib mh a^ei ^e^\m hnk g^p \hgl^koZ& mbo^ <hg`k^ll' Ma^bk kZ\blf bl k^Ze% Zg] definitely worth keeping tabs on. That doesnʼt f^Zg% h_ \hnkl^% ma^ <hng\be Zg] bml _heehp^kl arenʼt still totally ridiculous. While we all know itʼs great fun to hypothesize on the economics h_ lni^ka^khblf% ma^ fZchkbmr h_ i^hie^ dghp maZm Mahk% <ZimZbg :f^kb\Z Zg] Zee mahl^ hma^k costumed wonders arenʼt a depiction of real eb_^' Lnk^% ma^ <hng\be g^^]l mh phkd hnm bml kZ\blm m^g]^g\b^l :f^kb\Z Zl Z >nkhi^Zg nation,” cʼmon — but would also do well to lnli^g] ]bl[^eb^_ _hk Z l^\hg] Zg] ^gchr ma^ show, because theyʼre doing nothing more maZg fZdbg` ma^fl^eo^l ehhd ebd^ \hfie^m^ b]bhml'

MARVEL BOYCOTTED

BY WHITE SUPREMACISTS

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on our radar

=^ohg Fb\aZ^e PZ]^ bl Zg :f^kb\Zg kZii^k% lbg`^k Zg] lhg`& pkbm^k' Mabl fnemb&_Z\^m^] Zkmblm pZl [hkg hg :n`nlm +*% *21. bg ma^ a^Zkm h_ \nemnk^&kb\a AZke^f% G^p Rhkd' K^lb]bg` bg Z \bmr pa^k^ fnlb\Ze `k^Zml hkb`bgZm^]% bm pZl bg^obmZ[e^ maZm Fb\aZ^e [^ bg_en^g\^] mh inkln^ fnlb\4 paZm bl Zlmhgblabg` mahn`a% bl cnlm ahp ng]^gbZ[er hkb`bgZe Zg] mZe^gm^] ma^ rhng` F< bl' A^ \k^]bml abl bg_en^g\^ mh e^`^g]l ln\a Zl CZr S% DZgr^ P^lm Zg] :g]k^ ,)))' Abl ^\e^\mb\ lmre^ bl k^fbgbl\^gm h_ Znma^gmb\ abi&ahi% pbma ikh_hng] erkb\l Zg] l^Zfe^ll ]^ebo^kr' K^ebgjnblabg` Z ikhfblbg` \Zk^^k bg ikh_^llbhgZe [Zld^m[Zee Z_m^k Zmm^g]& bg` \hee^`^ Zm ?k^lgh LmZm^ Ngbo^klbmr% Fb\aZ^e k^lheo^] mh _heehp abl a^Zkm mh abi&ahi bglm^Z] h_ ahhil' Abl _Zgl Zg] ma^ fnlb\ phke] pbee _hk^o^k [^ `kZm^_ne _hk maZm ]^\blbhg' Pbma abl Z[bebmr mh [e^g] [hma ^Zlm \hZlm Zg] p^lm \hZlm lmre^l bgmh i^k_^\m aZkfhgr% mabl rhng` mZe^gm aZl \ZimboZm^] ng]^k`khng] fnlb\ eho^kl [hma ]hf^lmb\Zeer Zg] abroad, but heʼs only just begun. His highly anticipated debut “Thereʼs lhf^mabg` Z[hnm =^ohg pbee ikho^ mh fZbglmk^Zf Zn]b^g\^l maZm a^ satisfies all musical pallets. Michaelʼs mZe^gm aZl ^Zkg^] abf \ho^m^] lihml ln\a Zl hi^gbg` _hk ?Zm Ch^ Zg] i^k_hkfbg` _hk iZ\d^] o^gn^l Z\khll ma^ \hngmkr' Abl fbllbhg bl mh nl^ abl ohb\^ mh [^\hf^ Z e^`^g]% lmZr mkn^ mh abl Zkm Zg] mh l^ee hnm Zk^gZl ^o^krpa^k^ [r ]hbg` lh

artist on the verge

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TABLE OF CONTENTS FASHION

LIFESTYLE

SDM

swaggadigitalmagazine

ONLINE IN PRINT & ON YOUR SMARTPHONE

features WORDS ON PAGES

*+*, .- /1/2 0) 0/ In Focus On our Marvel Radar Boycotted by Artist on the White Verge Supremacists

Behind the Lens Henry Alfonso Navarro

Howard in Flux An HBCU reinvents itself

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In Focus Politics The FCC's Net Neutrality Ruling

On the Catwalk Pictorial Essay

In the Spotlight Ruff Ryders Entertainment

A N N I V E R S A R Y I S S U E W I N T E R /S P R I N G 2 0 1 1

CULTURE

INSIDE departments

MEDIA

EDITORS COMMENTS )+ WHO ARE WE *) ON OUR RADAR *, BEHIND THE LENS .IN FOCUS: POLITICS /2 IN THE SPOTLIGHT 0/ IN FOCUS: TRAVEL 2FASHION: WINTER WEAR 2/ ALL ACCESS *)) ESSENTIAL WARDROBE *)-

02 10 2) 2+ 2- **) Closing Cabrini-Green In Chicago An End to Public Housing In America

In Focus: Lifestyle Will DADT's Repeal Mend Obama's Rift with LGBT Leaders?

In Focus: Lifestyle Our Kind of Vacation

In Focus: Art Art by Biijoni

In Focus Travel San Francisco

In Retrospective Michael Singletary's Coaching Style

Photography: Erik Bell

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"Autumn Delight" or "Delightful Afternoon" Photographer: Chau Le for ChauLePhotography.com MUA & Stylist: Kristina T.

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"Autumn Delight" or "Delightful Afternoon" Photographer: Chau Le for ChauLePhotography.com MUA & Stylist: Kristina T.

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Henry Alfonso Navarro

B

ehind the Lens

How long have you been in photography?

I havenʼt been shooting photography for that long, I started about 3 years ago when I went to China for vacation and at that time I was shooting mostly street photography. I started fashion photography conceptually over a year ago. When I am shooting fashion photography, I try and look at my subjects with an artistic approach. I have been a music producer, therefore I try to stay creatively focused all of my life. What is my camera choice? I use a Canon 5D Mark II, because I wanted a 21MP full frame camera with HD video." I started with the Rebel XT so there was familiarity there.

In your opinion what makes a good fashion photographer? “For me I like to try and capture natural movement. I also try and think outside the box when shooting my subjects." I try to create something other than your typical catalog shoot. My style of shooting is primarily editorial, because of the creative freedom, as opposed to commercial photography. Although, it is widely known most photographers make the greatest amount of money doing commercial photography. “I am definitely not in it for the money.” “In reality I only want to shoot what I want to shoot,” however, “I am very open to collaboration with other photographers, and creative people if the opportunity presents itself provided there are not any limitations.”

In this issue Henry Alfonso Navarro, is our featured photographer, you can find more of his work at: www.lensexposure.com

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H By: Daniel de Vise

Howard in flux: An HBCU reinvents itself

Howard University is concluding the broadest academic review in its 143-year history, hoping to shed weak programs and bolster strong ones in order to compete in the increasingly fierce contest for America's top black scholars. Howard offers 171 academic programs, an uncommonly large number for a university of 10,500 students. The range is a product of the institution's historic role as the epicenter of African American scholarship. But university leaders believe that the sheer number of offerings has become unwieldy, draining resources better spent pursuing excellence in core areas. Howard will still turn out many of the nation's African American doctors and dentists, psychologists and engineers. But the university is considering cutting its undergraduate programs in philosophy, anthropology, the classics and even African studies - a specialty with symbolic importance to many in the Howard community. The school is keeping African American studies. Altogether, Howard President Sidney Ribeau has proposed closing or reducing 20 undergraduate degree programs and at least that many graduate programs, based on recommendations forwarded by a Presidential Commission on Academic Renewal after a year-long review. "You can't do everything at once," said Ribeau, who became the university's president in 2008. Similar exercises in "academic renewal," driven by market forces and dwindling state funds, have happened at other colleges. But few have been so closely watched. "The direction Howard goes in, that's the direction the African American community and the diaspora will go in. There's a lot of weight on it," said Brandon Harris, 21, a junior who is president of Howard's student association. The tough choices at Howard reflect changing times for the nation's 105 historically black colleges and universities.

Black colleges once held a monopoly on black students. Today, HBCUs compete with everyone else for the college-bound African American. Top-tier schools - including Howard, Hampton University and Spelman and Morehouse colleges - vie with Harvard and Princeton for top black students and faculty. "Howard has positioned itself as a college that wants to attract the best and the brightest," said Michael Lomax, CEO of the United Negro College Fund. "There is a lot of competition for those students." Some of the programs identified for possible reduction at Howard turn out only one or two degrees a year.

Others have a faint pulse of academic scholarship, or duplicate the offerings of other departments. Some simply don't fit the school's mission as a hub of scholarship for the African diaspora. Academic renewal has sparked passionate debate on campus. Few dispute the need to pare down the 171 programs. But when it comes to defending their own turf, some faculty members are less than magnanimous.

Ribeau proposes to close the bachelor's program in African studies, which yields about two degrees a year. A larger graduate program would be expanded. Still, some faculty members perceive retrenchment in a signature discipline. "If it is eliminated, we fear it might send the wrong message to other institutions around the country and around the world as far as what Howard is about, what Howard stands for," said Mbye Cham, the department's chairman. Ribeau also would discontinue the philosophy major, possibly merging the department with two others devoted to classics and religious studies.

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Howard's is the only freestanding philosophy department at a historically black college and a major source of Africana philosophy; it was once chaired by Alain Locke, the first African American Rhodes scholar. A Save Howard Philosophy petition has attracted more than a thousand signatures. "Any serious university ought to have a philosophy department," said Kwame Anthony Appiah, chairman of the American Philosophical Association. The classics major is among Howard's oldest, originating with a group of African American intellectuals who met to read Greek and Latin. Howard is the only historically black school with a classics department. It has produced a Rhodes scholar and engaging events such as a two-day marathon reading of "The Iliad." The department graduates about seven students a year. Howard leaders say they recognize the university's role as a pipeline of black scholars.

Howard is the leading producer of on-campus African American doctorates and the nation's only historically black institution identified as a first-tier "Research I" university. Critics "make the arguments that without Howard, their disciplines would not be as diverse. To a large extent, that's true, " said Alvin Thornton, a renowned Howard scholar who led the academic review under Ribeau. "The question is, can Howard continue to be the source of that diversity across such a broad list of disciplines?" The consensus is that it cannot. Instead, university leaders want to concentrate limited resources on a shorter list of programs with high-quality faculty and research, sustainable enrollment and adequate facilities. Howard's academic programs multiplied during the two-decade tenure of President James Cheek, who tripled graduate programs while building the university into a major research institution in the 1970s and 1980s. But some programs, stymied by inadequate resources and archaic facilities, struggled from the start. Howard is known today for professional programs in medicine and law, dentistry and nursing. Other strong graduate programs include social work, psychology, business and pharmacology. To compete, Ribeau said, those programs need modern classrooms, state-of-the-art labs and first-rate, well-paid faculty.

That can come only at the cost of running fewer programs and paying fewer professors, he said. He has promised that all cuts to tenured faculty will come through attrition. Many of the proposed reductions come in areas, such as hospitality management and nutritional sciences, that Howard students might study at nearby community colleges. Ribeau said he wants to explore similar partnerships with four-year colleges. The final academic renewal plan will be published next month. It will refocus Howard on research that resonates among Africans and African Americans: clean water, AIDS and cancer, urban education, public policy.

Ribeau also wants to stress science, technology, engineering and math, answering the national call for more minority scholars in those fields. That is a controversial stance, particularly among humanities scholars. Disciplines such as philosophy and classics are essential, they say, to the character-building at the core of a Howard education.

> IN FOCUS POLITICS: The FCC’s net neutrality ruling The Federal Communications Commission last year passed a controversial set of regulations for governing the concept of net neutrality. aim to prevent Internet providers from restricting access to websites and applications, in the name of ensuring equal online access. Here's a brief guide to the ruling.

THE DETAILS: The FCC regulations bar Internet companies from blocking websites that offer services that compete with their own. The guidelines also prevent Internet providers from playing "favorites" by dividing delivery of Internet content into fast and slow lanes." (To translate that goal into terms more familiar to consumers, it means that Comcast cannot make Netflix video stream slower than it should.) The FCC will also prohibit wireless Internet providers, such as AT&T and Verizon, from blocking websites, "but not from blocking applications or services unless those applications directly compete with providers' voice and video products, like Skype." The rules also let broadband providers for the first time charge more to companies that want faster service for delivery of games, videos or other services."

THE MILSTONE: This marks the first time the federal government has been formally granted the authority to regulate Internet traffic.

THE ARCHITECT: The proposal was put forth by FCC Chairman who said in a statement Tuesday morning: "Today, for the first time, we are adopting rules to preserve basic Internet values ... Given the importance of an open Internet to our economic future, given the potentially irreversible nature of some harmful practices, and given the competition issues among broadband providers, it is essential that the FCC fulfill its historic role as a cop on the beat to ensure the vitality of our communications networks and to empower and protect consumers of those networks.

"THE DEBATE: The FCC vote was split 3-2. Some Republican lawmakers are attacking the new rules — which are set to go into effect in early 2011, and will likely face legal and legislative challenges — arguing they could discourage investment in broadband networks and are unnecessary because slow traffic hasn't been an issue consumers have complained about. Net neutrality advocates on the left, meanwhile, say the regulations don't go far enough, and that they include loopholes that fall well short of advancing their ideal of an equal and open Web.

THE OPINIONS: As soon as the FCC announced the new rules, critics from the left, right and center all weighed in. Below is a sampling of the initial reactions:"The good news is that the Federal Communications Commission has the power to issue regulations that protect net neutrality. The bad news is that draft regulations written by FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski don't do that at all. They're worse than nothing." — Sen. Al Franken (D-Minn.).

"The U.S. government's censorious reaction to l'affaire WikiLeaks should serve as counsel to people who would subject Internet service providers to even greater federal regulation. Regulated ISPs will be more compliant with government speech controls ... federal regulation of the Internet is a bad idea."

— Jim Harper of the Cato Institute, a libertarian think tank. "Milton Friedman had it right. Business is no friend of free markets, the Federal Communication Commission's 'net neutrality' ruling is more evidence of this. What the FCC should have done is called it a year, went on holiday and left the Internet alone." James Pethokoukis, Reuters Breaking Views columnist “Yes, it's a step forward — but hardly more than an incremental step beyond the Internet Policy Statement adopted by the previous Republican FCC. After such an enormous build up and tumultuous process, it is unsurprising that supporters of an open Internet are bitterly disappointed — particularly given the uncertainty over how the rules will be enforced." — Harold Feld, legal director of Public Knowledge, a digital culture lobby "The Internet is an invaluable resource. It should be left alone." — By: Joe Pompeo

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on the catwalk

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On the Catwalk Photography: by ronfulcher

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ON THE CATWALK photography by ron fulcher

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In the spotlight R U F F R Y D E R S E N T E R T A I N M E N T

F H M H K < R < E > < E N ; H : D E : G = < A : I M > K

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nitially, when I first met Degree Brown from the Ruff Ryders Motorcycle Club I was somewhat skeptical about writing an article about their organization, because the publication is a primarily a fashion magazine. However, after doing some research I discovered the Ruff Ryder’s Entertainment was much more than Hip Hop and R&B artists. The Oakland chapter of the Ruff Ryder’s (motorcycle club) was formed in the San Francisco Bay Area in 1988 by the Dean Family from New York. There are 20 chapters throughout California of which there are about 350 members statewide in California. This was the start of a worldwide venture that embellished a social network of individuals with a passion for extreme sport, camaraderie and unity; into an international family in support of the motorcycle lifestyle. Ruff Ryders Entertainment is a record label founded by brothers Darrin "Dee" Dean and Joaquin "Waah" Dean, uncles of producer Swizz Beatz. Today it operates as a subsidiary of Universal Music Group, and is distributed by Fontana Distribution. Ruff Ryders' founders were initially famous for managing rappers DMX, Mase and The Lox who became multi-platinum stars for Def Jam Recordings and Bad Boy Entertainment in the late-1990s. After DMX's success, the management company started its own label imprint through Interscope Records, and had success with releases from female rapper Eve, former Bad Boy Records group The L.O.X. and its main rapper Jadakiss, Drag-On, and newcomer Jin, winner of BET's 106 & Park freestyle MC battle competition. The Deans' nephew Swizz Beatz is the main producer for most of the acts on the roster. In 2001 Cassidy was signed to the label through Swizz Beatz along with Full Surface labelmate Yung Wun.

As the first Reunion Project since their 2005 Album The Redemption, Vol. 4 Jadakiss and Swizz Beatz invited Drag-On, Eve, Styles P, Sheek Louch and DMX, who had just been released from jail, for the Remix of "Who's Real".

A Ruff Ryders Reunion Album was announced by Swizz Beatz and was originally set to release in 2008 but it got pushed back. The new Ruff Ryders Album titled "Ruff Ryders Evolution: Generation I" is now scheduled to be released in late 2010. From these music associations, the motorcycle divisions became a reality, because the potential members would show up on their motorcycles for the video shoots. The Oakland Ruff Ryder Chapter was founded in 2001. The State Rep is Bumpie Face, The President of the Oakland Ruff Ryder is Lance Turner, Vice President is Reggie Jr., and the Entertainment Coordinator is Degree Brown, within the MC division you have the stunt teams, who do stunts for the music videos locally, Too Short, Bogle Dread and E-40 and his sister Suga T to name a few.

The Oakland Chapter is involved heavily in community outreach, such as supporting Children’s Hospital patients suffering from Sickle Cell Anemia, and Toy Drives for under privileged children. It is the goal of the Motorcycle Club, Oakland Chapter of Ruff Ryders Entertainment to break down the stereotypical attitudes identified with most motorcycle organizations, and to articulate positivity through its community outreach projects, and events. 

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now in the mix

New Music from Michael Jackson

MICHAEL is a compilation of newly completed recordings by the King of Pop, whose complete collection of music videos is available on Michael Jackson's Vision for the first time ever.

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"It was the fear of the unknown," Lockett says. "You The worst of these prison-like, concrete and Sometimes, moving is a happy event. Sometimes it's can live at a certain place for so long that you can get wire-encased towers, like Chicago's Robert Taylor not. Last week, when Annie Ricks and five of her complacent. You get comfortable with what you have Homes and the infamous Pruitt-Igoe Homes in St. children left the 11th-floor apartment in the become accustomed to. But I didn't realize when I Louis, have been razed or blown up. But many still dilapidated, 15-story high-rise complex where she wonder what happened to the people who once lived moved out of the high-rises that things would begin has lived for the past 22 years, it was a media event. in them. Where did they go, and what became of their to look different." Housing authority officials say they And Ricks, the last tenant in Chicago's notorious are not unsympathetic to the stress caused by the Cabrini-Green public housing project, was not happy. lives? Are they better or worse off today than when massive dislocations, and strive to minimize it as "I didn't want to leave, but I much as possible. "I am extremely empathetic to didn't have a choice," she Closing Cabrini-Green the families who have called Cabrini-Green their said in an interview with When the last tenant moved out of Chicago's home for so many years, and to the anxiety that The Root, while sitting among a sea of boxes in the notorious housing project, it signaled the end change brings," CHA chief Jordan said in an interview. "Change is not a simple proposition, kitchen of her newly and having to leave decades of memories behind of an era and raised questions about the renovated Chicago Housing cannot be an easy thing. But the reality is that Authority apartment on the future of displaced tenants -- and public 1230 N. Burling [the building where Annie Ricks other side of the city. lived] is in disrepair, and CHA, in good housing itself.

Indeed, the 54-year-old conscience, could not allow good people to stay mother of eight from By: Sylvester Monroe there any longer than was necessary."Jordan said he Alabama didn't have a choice about leaving Cabrini. they lived in "the projects"? At one point, as many as was confident, though, that the relocation choices The building where she lived is scheduled to be offered to displaced, low-income public housing 30,000 people lived in the 28 sixteen-story Taylor demolished early next year. She moved there about a Homes buildings. Pruitt-Igoe had 5,800 apartments in tenants will eventually not only improve their living year ago, after another Cabrini building, where she conditions but also afford them brighter futures. The 33 eleven-story buildings before the last buildings had lived for 21 years, was also torn down. Ricks choices include moving to so-called scattered-site successfully challenged the housing authority's order were razed in 1976 to make way for mixed-income housing all over the city using Section 8 vouchers or to evacuate the building by the end of November. She townhouses. As television cameras and news wanted to move to a rehabbed apartment in a low-rise photographers recorded Annie Ricks' move from the relocating to new or renovated public housing apartments. "It's a misnomer that families who building, but it was not ready. When Ricks was finally condemned Cabrini-Green apartment building, they forced to vacate last week after CHA officials decreed also documented the end of an era in Chicago public relocated from public housing units have left public housing. At the same time, a few blocks away, CHA, housing," said Jordan. Part of the goal, the CHA chief that the high-rise building was no longer inhabitable, explained, is to end the extreme isolation and City of Chicago, and regional and national HUD she was first offered a home in a Cabrini rowhouse officials were holding a celebratory press conference disconnectedness of poor people who live in racially apartment. But Ricks was concerned about gun and economically segregated public housing that in a renovated public housing building to announce battles between "the reds," residents of the red brick breeds crime and violence and other anti-social the completion of a massive rehabilitation of 700 apartments, and "the whites," who live in Cabrini's behavior. "You put a bad neighborhood into another apartments for low-income seniors, including high-rise towers, an ongoing rivalry fueled by gang upgrades for disabled residents. Officials also touted bad neighborhood, and the violence just escalates," and drug violence. "That would have put my kids in said Deonte Ricks, a 25-year-old home-security the city's compliance with a Voluntary Compliance jeopardy," she said. Instead, she was forced to salesman and one of Annie Ricks' eight children. "If Agreement between Chicago and HUD three years choose between two low-rise CHA properties on the ahead of schedule. The pact was signed in May 2006. you put bad-behaving people in a good neighborSouth Side. She also has the option of returning to hood, they have no choice but to adapt to the When fully implemented, Chicago will have 9,300 Cabrini next year when more units are rehabbed. "It environment." In fact, that is the basic idea behind rehabbed units of public housing for seniors, more was the Dearborn Homes or Wentworth Gardens," Chicago's Plan for Transformation project, launched than any other city in the nation. "With the she said. "I settled for this one [in Wentworth] completion of these upgrades in our senior portfolio, 10 years ago to demolish the worst of the city's because it was not a high-rise." But she said the new public housing and replace it with new mixed-income CHA has set a new standard in accommodating apartment is too small. Though it is completely developments scattered across the city. "What people senior and disabled Chicagoans across the city," renovated, with new kitchen appliances and bath are seeking around the country really is how we can said Lewis A. Jordan, CEO of the housing authority. fixtures, it has only three bedrooms, compared with "This is a great day for Chicagoans with disabilities," better connect families from low-income public the five she had in Cabrini. As a result, Ricks' oldest housing to the larger communities," said Jordan."It's said Marca Bristo, president and CEO of Access daughter and her baby son, who lived with Ricks in Living, a Chicago organization run by and for people an ongoing struggle," said John Trasvi単a, assistant Cabrini, had to move to their own apartment in a secretary for fair housing and equal opportunity at with disabilities. "You have raised the bar for different complex. Ricks also said that the low-rise housing authorities across the country." Bristo said HUD, who was in Chicago last week for the CHA building hallways are too narrow to get her she planned to accompany Jordan to Washington to press conference on rehabbed senior housing. "The queen-size bed into the apartment. "I just feel like worst thing is to have people living in difficult they didn't try hard enough to accommodate me," she explain to the U.S. secretary of housing and urban development how Chicago is emerging as a national situations and say you have to leave to get said. Annie Ricks' frustration and unhappiness are leader in accessible public housing. It's all part of the something physically better, but it's still segregated. not unusual as the CHA and others struggle to You want to redress segregation as well. It's not just improve the physical living conditions of hundreds of city's "Plan for Transformation," which has been touted as the largest redevelopment-rehabilitation of better housing, but fairer housing." But sometimes, thousands of poor and low-income families stuck in even when "fairer" housing is available to low-income public housing in the history of the United States. substandard public housing across the country. At families who have known nothing but segregated one point, 15,000 people lived in Cabrini-Green before For the past decade, the CHA has been relocating public complexes all their lives, they choose not to deteriorating conditions, gang and drug violence, and low-income families from older, dilapidated public accept it. "In most cases, moving from what they had housing buildings into newly constructed or other crime earned the 58-year-old complex a rehabbed properties. But the moves have not always initially, it can't do anything but get better," said reputation as the most notorious of Chicago's Chicago Alderman Walter Burnett Jr., who represents dangerous housing projects and transformed it into a been met with applause.Brenda Lockett lived in the 27th Ward, which includes Cabrini-Green, where Cabrini-Green high-rises for 40 years before being national symbol of inner-city warehousing of he lived until he was 17 years old. "But some go to America's largely black and brown urban underclass. relocated to a rehabbed apartment in nearby row areas of the city that are still crime-ridden, and they houses six months ago. Like Annie Ricks, she was are comfortable with that. They may end up moving not happy about it at first and did not want to leave to worse communities than they left, but the key thing the only home she had ever known. is that they get the choice."

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Will DADT's Repeal Mend Obama's Rift With LGBT Leaders?

In Focus / Lifestyle With the repeal of "Don't ask, don't tell," President Obama is

well on his way to fulfilling his campaign promises to the LGBT community. But some activists still question his commitment.

By: David Kaufman

When President Obama signs legislation in 2010, repealing "Don't ask, don't tell," he will fulfill one of his key campaign promises to both the LGBT (lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender) community and the entire nation. Yet while high-profile gay and lesbian pundits such as Rachel Maddow and Andrew Sullivan are roundly declaring the repeal to be Obama's victory, there remains a segment of the LGBT community for whom this president can do little or no good. Indeed, despite the president's months-long maneuvering to end DADT's 17-year reign of terror, many LGBT voices are reducing his role to marginal, 11th-hour efforts to appease angry activists. And some are simply leaving him out of the picture entirely. Writing for the Daily Beast, feminist author Linda Hirshman offered gratitude to soldier groups such as the Servicemembers Legal Defense Network but made no mention of the White House. Influential lesbian blogger Pam Spaulding thanked Sens. Kay Hagan (D-N.C.) and Richard Burr (R-N.C.), along with Rep. Patrick Murphy (D-Pa.), but had no appreciative words for the president.

Over at the progressive site AMERICABlog, writer John Aravosis added a tepid thank-you to Obama at the end of a long screed: " … and even the President, who finally got into gear (albeit a tad late) and made the calls necessary to make this happen." Longtime LGBT leader David Mixner offered little more than a lukewarm thanks: "The repeal of DADT would not have happened without President Obama ... he was clearly on our side." And Jim Burroway " cleanly quipped, "In the end, President Obama's strategy worked after all. But it worked not so much because it was a brilliant strategy but because he was lucky." Although a few individual writers hardly speak for the entire LGBT community, there's little doubt that the president has been vilified by many "gaystream" leaders since his election two years ago.

Considering the president's impressive record on LGBT issues -- from enacting hate-crime legislation to extending benefits to federal employees to ending the ban on HIV-positive visitors entering the United States -- that anger seems confoundingly misdirected. After all, wasn't it President Bill Clinton who approved both DADT in 1993 and the Defense of Marriage Act three years later -- two of the most regressive laws in the history of civil rights legislation?

And weren't LGBT rights further imperiled under President George W. Bush, who infamously opposed extending hate-crime legislation to protect LGBT people and promoted a constitutional amendment defining marriage as an exclusively heterosexual institution? True, Obama must still undo DOMA as well as pass the Employment Non-Discrimination Act to meet all of his LGBT campaign pledges. But now that he's two-for-two in less than two years, isn't it time that Obama's gay haters began showing him some love? Or at least began moving on from the notion that Obama is a "homophobe," a "bigot," an "enemy of the gays" and any of the other epithets routinely hurled against him?

"The president is obviously not a homophobe, but he is a pragmatist, someone who governs from the center," says Jillian T. Weiss, a professor of law and society at Ramapo College of New Jersey who regularly writes about LGBT topics. "This drives people crazy, particularly folks at the margins, like activists solely focused on marriage equality. For them, anything less than this holy grail could be construed as homophobia." Although Obama once favored same-sex marriage, he now supports civil unions -- a position shared by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, the favorite among the LGBT community during the 2008 presidential campaign. Activists such as Spaulding regularly deride Obama's faith-based opposition to marriage equality and his now infamous quote: "For me as a Christian, [marriage] is a sacred union. God is in the mix." Indeed, that Obama is religious at all is often used by critics as proof of his anti-gay sentiments. With the Obamas clearly no more churchgoing than the Clintons before them, why has Bill and Hill's Christian faith escaped the same kind of scrutiny?

It's simple, AMERICA blog's Aravosis says: "Obama is the president; Hillary is not." Yet Aravosis also offers a more alarming explanation -- one echoed by fellow LGBT bloggers from Spaulding to Mixner: Obama is black -- or at least biracial. And Obama's race shouldn't just make him sensitive to LGBT issues; it should make him more sensitive than the white presidents before him. And this includes white presidents like Clinton, who was responsible for the very regressive legislation our black president is currently saddled with repealing. "Well-educated minorities [like Obama] -- one would hope they would be more sensitive to other minorities," Aravosis explains. "That is the expectation: He should be trying harder because he is a minority." Aravosis may merely be expressing a popular (yet unspoken) sentiment, but the notion that African Americans should be held to a higher standard than their white counterparts is the very definition of racism itself. What's more, like most race- (or racist-) based ideologies, it places the president in a position where even his greatest pro-gay achievements will -like the repeal of DADT -- never fully satisfy his critics. At best, Obama's victories will be rendered Pyrrhic; at worst, they will be repackaged as an act of generosity by his (mostly white) naysayers. "All of the activist heat [to repeal DADT] may actually have saved Obama's presidency," Aravosis says. "The repeal could still blow up in his face, but if implemented right, it really might save him." Despite the strong anti-Obama sentiment among many in the LGBT chattering class, the good news is that the LGBT masses clearly support the president.

An October poll of almost 4,500 LGBTs by Greenberg Quinlan Rosner Research found that 64 percent of respondees "strongly" or "somewhat" approved of President Obama's performance on LGBT issues. What's more, a similar percentage want to "work with" rather than "protest" the White House on the path toward LGBT equality.

Perhaps most telling of all, bloggers like Aravosis and Spaulding have virtually no impact on mainstream LGBT politics or thinking. As the GQR poll noted, even the most followed LGBT blogs, like Andy Towle's Towleroad and Queerty, were read by a mere 3 percent of respondents; AMERICAblog by 2 percent; and Spaulding's Pam's House Blend, a scant 1 percent. The disconnect between the bloggers' perspectives and that of the LGBT masses is not necessarily surprising. After all, "there are multiple communities within the LGBT 'community'," says Juan Battle, professor of sociology, public health and urban education at the Graduate Center of the City University of New York. "Some gay people approve of the president and some don't -- just like in the larger society." Despite the disconnect, one person who certainly is reading Aravosis, Spaulding and Towle is Obama himself. He invited them to the White House for the DADT-repeal signing, along with activists such as former Lt. Dan Choi and Get EQUAL's Robin McGehee. As some of his harshest critics, the bloggers and activists are certain to continue demanding that Obama live up to the rest of his "fierce advocate" campaign pledges. Nonetheless, the invites confirm that the Obama White House has -- at least for this week -- reached a much needed détente in the battle to sway LGBT public opinion.

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As the first family heads to Martha’s Vineyard for their first first-family vacation, last year the island is still all aflutter over cultural critic Touré’s New York magazine feature characterizing black Vineyarders as a bunch of self-segregating snobs. Blacks who make the island off the coast of Cape Cod their summer home have not felt this misunderstood since Lawrence Otis Graham’s " Our Kind of People cited intraracial class division and snobbishness, and name-dropped the rich and powerful. As a lifelong Vineyarder, I can tell you that neither writer captures the nuances of the island’s appeal to black Americans. If you haven’t been there before, you might think that black Vineyarders are all elitist, insensitive and economically monolithic. People bring their own perceptions and personal context to Martha’s Vineyard. The thing is, the Vineyard never started out as a buppie haven. It’s far from it. The majority of the earliest black summer visitors to Martha’s Vineyard were the families of late 19th-century laundresses and hairstylists working for white Bostonians.

In his article, Touré notes that Shearer Cottage was the first black-owned inn. But it wasn’t the first, nor was it the only one. Blacks of varying professional backgrounds shared their homes before Shearer Cottage. Some of these thrifty folks saved enough to purchase the guest cottages of their employers. They, in turn, invited their friends—chauffeurs, doormen, butlers—to stay with them.

And in time, Oak Bluffs became the destination spot for black folks. Black Bostonians, and to a lesser extent, New Yorkers, from all walks of life, called Oak Bluffs their summer home. Blue-collar workers, merchant marines, schoolteachers, housewives, itinerant artists and part-time actors mingled; their children and grandchildren became lifelong friends. Self-segregation was never part of the equation. Martha’s Vineyard, and specifically Oak Bluffs, provided black families with a place of respite and recreation when few other places fit the bill. The summer population of Oak Bluffs was 50 percent black way before the Vineyard was thrust into the national spotlight via Sen. Edward Kennedy’s accident at Chappaquiddick, the filming of the blockbuster Jaws and visits by Clinton family. It is only natural that such a legacy would later appeal to the Spike Lees, Charles Ogletrees and Vernon Jordans of the world. Many of the names and celebrities both Graham and Touré cite as examples of a self-segregating black elite have only been visiting Martha's Vineyard since the early or mid-1990s. Though much of the black summer population is professional or white-collar, they do not exclusively socialize with black folks. Black Vineyarders attend or host cultural events, party, play sports and cook out with black and white friends and colleagues. They also hang out with black or Cape Verdean year-round residents.

(Oak Bluffs’ per capita income in the 2000 census was $23,829, with much of the economy being seasonal.) Even if Vineyard blacks were seeking an escape from whites, they wouldn’t find it there.

You’re more likely to find all-black summer enclaves in the historically black beaches of Maryland, South Carolina and Florida than in coastal New England. But then again, it is refreshing for little black children to splash water on a beach or fly kites in a place where black accomplishment is not an anomaly. Some things have not changed since those black laundresses of the Victorian era took their little ones for a dip in the Vineyard Sound. The Flying Horses is still America’s oldest operating platform carousel. Concerts are still held at the historic Tabernacle, the original site for the Methodist Campgrounds meeting place. Then there’s the old gazebo in Ocean Park—depicted in Stephen L. Carter’s mystery best-seller, " The Emperor of Ocean Park. As for the wild, impromptu South Beach parties Touré recalls from the mid- to late-1990s, there were a few of those, but they didn’t result in an intraracial class clash. Many of the July 4 partiers were white-collar professionals. They weren’t undergrads; no drug dealers were among the revelers. Nor did longtime Black Vineyarders rally to ostracize their younger counterparts from the island. The appeal to the Steamship Authority to restrict its ferry reservation (a requirement for those driving vehicles onto the island) and standby policies grew out of years of angry letters-to-the-editor to Vineyard newspapers. Summer and year-round residents had long complained about large, noisy house parties, litter and sizable crowds lingering on Oak Bluff’s main street, Circuit Avenue, after the town’s few night spots had closed. It was primarily black letter writers, who identified themselves as older than the partygoers, and in some instances, activists and local NAACP leaders, who wrote letters defending the July 4 set as well-mannered, professional and unfairly singled out because of their race. Town meetings and reservation rule changes ensued.

The combination of Jim Crow legislation and de facto segregation led American blacks to form many social organizations and institutions of their own, from Greek letter societies to national professional organizations. To imply that blacks who vacation on Martha’s Vineyard are racist or are running away from whites, is as unfair as asking, “Why are there still black colleges?”

People enjoy Martha’s Vineyard for their own reasons, and black Americans are not alone in their quest to sustain family traditions, valued friendships and summer fun for their children.

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Our Kind of Vacation

The class warfare debate that breaks out every summer when black people head to Martha's Vineyard always misses the point. For most people, Oak Bluffs is about family tradition.

By:Bijan C. Bayne

Photography Ron Fulcher

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Art by Biijoni Byron Elmore. (a.k.a. Biijoni) A Oakland,California native raised in the little-known housing projects of Alameda California. Byron is a self-taught painter whose chosen medium is: â&#x20AC;&#x153;Acrylicsâ&#x20AC;?.

Byron has been painting for quite a few years now and has developed a wide range of paintings ranging from Still Life , Abstract, Realism Scenes to Animals and more. His portfolio contains hand-painted artwork, digital photo montages, and digital composite art pieces where he has combined hand painted art with digital images. More of his art can be seen at: www.biijonart.com and in person at the The Premier art gallery located in the rear of the Market Village a indoor boutique village located at: The Bayfair Mall 15555 East 14th Street San Leandro,CA 94578 For more info. call: 510-485-8488 www.marketvillage.org

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Photography Ron Fulcher

>IN FOCUS/travel The quintessential boomtown, San Francisco has been alternately riding high and crashing since the gold rush. Those bearish during the heady days of the dot-com bubble had barely finished dancing on the grave of the Internet economy when biotech rode into town, turning bust to boom once again before the housing market downturn brought the city's previously stratospheric median home price almost down to earth. So which San Francisco will you find when you come to town? A reversal of fortune is always possible, but here's a snapshot of what the city's like—for now, anyway. Today's San Francisco:…is just as liberal as you've heard. Baghdad by the Bay, Sodom by the Sea: prudish types have been pegging San Francisco as a bastion of sexy liberalism since the town first rolled out the welcome mat. And we do tend to espouse a pretty live-and-let-live attitude here. Health insurance for city employees has covered gender-reassignment surgery since 2001. We voted in 2005 to ban handguns; we have a female fire chief, Joanne Hayes-White; and our biggest bash of the year is June's gay pride celebration, when roughly a million people descend on the city to party. Our dashing young Mayor Gavin Newsom, himself a raging metrosexual, won the eternal devotion of gay San Franciscans when he decided to issue marriage licenses to same-sex couples in 2004, helping to shove the issue onto the supreme court docket as well as the ballot. And in this town he's considered a moderate. Newsom enjoys the city's tolerance as well. Following the 2007 revelation that he had a fling with his social secretary—who was also the wife of his good friend and campaign manager—and Newsom's admission that he has a drinking problem, his approval rating topped 70% and he went on to win a second term virtually unopposed. embraces its eccentrics. If a 6-foot-tall transvestite in evening wear doesn't merit a second look, just what does it take to stand out in this town? If history serves, it takes quirkiness and staying power. For instance, back in the 19th century a San Francisco businessman declared himself Norton I, Emperor of the United States and Protector of Mexico.

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Instead of shipping him off to a nice, quiet place, San Franciscans became his willing subjects, police officers saluted him, and newspapers printed his proclamations (among them that the Democrats and Republicans be abolished for bickering). …Today the Brown Twins, ladies of a certain age who dress alike in eye-catching outfits and are always together, have their own place on the list of San Francisco icons. There's also Pink Man, who rides on a unicycle wearing a hot pink unitard and cape. (He says you can tell someone's a local when "they don't balk at Pink Man.") One of the most celebrated eccentrics is Frank Chu, a middle-aged guy in a frumpy suit who's been faithfully carrying a picket sign around the Financial District since the 1990s. He accuses various politicians of being in cahoots and keeping millions of dollars from him and the population of the "12 galaxies." The city's response? Politicians buy ad space on the back of his sign and fans named a Mission District bar 12 Galaxies in tribute. Chu eats and drinks on the house there. …is reshaping its downtown. Limited by its geography, San Francisco simply has nowhere to go but up. The sprawling area south of Market Street was long an industrial center, but since that industry has dried up, new high-rise developments are under way. Plot the nascent high-rises on a map and you can see a radical shift southward, stretching from Mission Street to Mission Bay (where UCSF's 43-acre medical and biotech campus is rising). More than 20 towers are in the works, several of which will eclipse the city's current tallest building, the 853-foot Transamerica Pyramid.

Got your bearings? Then join the locals as they constantly check the pulse of the city. Although the frenzied adrenaline rush of the dot-com era has died down, a new wave of energy is gathering. FODORS.COM

:=O>KMBL>F>GM

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ALL ACCESS THE LATIN GRAMMY AWARDS Photography by: Bruno Shakira

Bruno Shakari, Photographer, Visual Candy Studio Inc., is a native of Washington, DC. He Studied at the Corcoran College of Art & Design, Howard University, and Hollywood Film Institute.

His three passions in life are photography, cinematography and writing. Living bicoastal (NY/LA) he seeks to document his own personal experiences and capture scenes and events as he sees them and share the beauty and diversity of the world he envisions.

Bruno draws inspiration from artist like Gordon Parks Jr, David La Chapelle, Douglas Kirkland, Gered Mankowitz and Danny Clinch. “As the images of other photographers have inspired me to explore the world, I hope my own contributions will inspire others to do the same. “ –Bruno .

“A photograph captures moments that can never be re-created, only re-lived through that perfect picture.

It's not about the click of the shutter and the flash of the lights , it's about the person behind the camera and a flair for their art.”…….Bruno Shakari “Whether it's the world of music, fashion, or fine art Bruno’s eye for detail and passion for the art is full of promise”………..

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Why Fiery Doesn't Cut It for Black NFL Coaches Michael Singletary's coaching style clearly doomed him as head coach of the 49ers, and here’s why. By: Deron Snyder

Former San Francisco 49ers head coach Mike Singletary's skills with the X's and O's -- the nuts and bolts of coaching football teams -- were suspect enough. But even if he was deemed adequate in that regard, his persona made his suitability as coach of the 49ers questionable. Society has not reached the point yet where the "fiery black man" approach is acceptable for CEO-type positions, especially when it doesn't deliver positive results, as evidenced by San Francisco's 0-5 start this season and its current record of 5-10. Unfortunately, the same attributes that led Singletary to a Hall of Fame career as a Chicago Bears linebacker practically doomed him as the 49ers' head coach and helped lead to his firing on Sunday. We can never forget pictures of Singletary as the wild-eyed tackling machine, anchoring the Bears' defense with ferocious intensity and passion. One reason the memories remain fresh is that he kept much of that same demeanor in leading the 49ers. And it couldn't be more out of place in the NFL, which embraces its image as a button-down, Fortune 500 conglomerate.

For an instant injection of emotion and excitement, Singletary was a fine choice when the 49ers gave him the full-time job in December 2008, after he went 5-4 as the interim coach. Nicknamed "Samurai Mike," he became a pop culture phenomenon in his very first game at the helm.

While he was interim coach, Singletary sent star tight end Vernon Davis to the showers with more than 10 minutes remaining in the game, and issued a classic rant -- "I want winners!" -- in his postgame news conference. It was later reported that Singletary mooned his players at halftime as a motivational ploy, though a team spokesman stressed that the coach never dropped his drawers. The last example of Singletary's combustible nature came in Sunday's loss at St. Louis, when he engaged in a prolonged and heated exchange with 49ers quarterback Troy Smith. Earlier this season, TV cameras caught him in the face of 49ers quarterback Alex Smith. Such conduct is simply unbecoming of a head coach in the NFL. Football is an emotional game, but championship teams usually possess coaches who remain calm and collected in the most stressful scenarios. Think of New England's Bill Belichick and former Indianapolis coach Tony Dungy. There are exceptions -- such as New York Giants coach Tom Coughlin, who berated his punter on the sideline after a game -- but that style is rarer and wears thin quickly when a team isn't winning.

Besides, history suggests that it's riskier for black men in high positions when they lose their cool or become too "colorful."

Black men have been hampered through the ages by negative stereotypes, considered susceptible to emotional outbursts and uncontrollable anger that makes them undependable in leadership roles that require clear, levelheaded thinking. For instance, some of President Obama's critics want him to show more fire, passion and emotion. But many of his supporters believe that's difficult, if not impossible, for a black president who needs to retain mainstream support. Likewise, Kenneth I. Chenault, chairman and CEO of American Express, probably needs to retain his composure more consistently than a white counterpart would, lest Chenault risk alienating the board of directors. In the NFL, a head coach has the same type of prominence because he's the public face representing management. Television cameras are constantly aimed at the coach during games as commentators and viewers interpret facial expressions and body language. The coach holds multiple

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press conferences during the week, and his words are parsed for hidden meaning. His actions are scrutinized in newspapers, blogs, sports radio discussions and TV shows. Under that high-intensity microscope, the best approach is steady and stable. Singletary was the opposite. Aside from the spectacular shouting matches with his quarterbacks, he jerked them in and out of the lineup all this season. He fired his offensive coordinator after Week 3 and watched another top assistant resign after Week 13. Singletary didn't even wait to see which direction the season was headed before jumping into (overre)action, calling an emergency team meeting after the first game and talking smack about the defending Super Bowl champion New Orleans Saints during Week 2. That sort of behavior might have worked back in the days of Mike Ditka, Jerry Glanville and Buddy Ryan, but the NFL is more conservative now. Denny Green, only the second AfricanAmerican head coach in the modern NFL era, had an infamous rant ("The Bears are who we thought they were!") and other controversies, but he also went 97-62 with the Minnesota Vikings, leading them to the playoffs in eight of his nine seasons. However, every NFL coach, and especially African Americans, would be better off following the levelheaded example set by Dungy or his protégé -- fellow African American and Super Bowl winner, Pittsburgh's Mike Tomlin.

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Judith Jamison on Leaving Alvin Ailey By: Valerie Gladstone Judith Jamison has an awful lot of which to be proud. Under her leadership, begun in 1989 after the death of choreographer Alvin Ailey, the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater has become one of the most popular and distinguished dance companies in the world.

It has performed for more than 23 million people in 48 states and in 71 countries on six continents, including two historic residencies in South Africa. In 2003 it opened the $50 million Joan Weill Center for Dance, the nation's largest building dedicated to dance. She has been awarded the National Medal of Honor, named to Time magazine's 2009 list of the world's 100 most influential people and received the 2010 Congressional Black Caucus Foundation's prestigious Phoenix Award, among many other honors.

In July she steps down as artistic director, handing the reins to choreographer Robert Battle, whom she selected as her successor. But she will not disappear quietly. On Jan. 2 the company held a joyous farewell program for her, with more than 10 works performed by current and past members. And in the next months, she will accompany the troupe on a 24-city tour, starting with a stint at the Kennedy Center from Feb. 1 to 6, to introduce Battle to audiences around the country.

The Root caught up with Jamison on New Year's Day, a day before the farewell program, as she recuperated from a cold.

The Root: What have been your greatest moments as director?

Judith Jamison: Watching my dancers grow. I felt it was my whole purpose to help them develop as artists. It thrilled me to see them change and become incredible performers before my very eyes. It fills my heart to see them transformed onstage.

They work so long and hard to achieve that. It's a very intimate experience to witness, like watching your child grow up.

TR: What did it feel like to take on this responsibility after Alvin passed?

JJ: There wasn't any time to think, really. There was so much to do. I just put my head down and went.

TR: What helped you through?

JJ: Although I wasn't aware of it then, I think my training as a dancer. Somehow it was innate in me. Running the company didn't seem foreign. Part of that again had to do with people around me, the staff and dancers. And some of it had to do with Alvin. He was so grounded -- things flowed naturally from him.

We flowed from that. And then, of course, my faith.

TR: What do you consider your greatest accomplishments?

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JJ: Getting our building up. The Ailey camps for inner cities all over the country, which I want to proliferate. The B.F.A. program with Fordham University, which allows Ailey students to get their degrees from Fordham. But I have to say they were not my accomplishments alone -- they wouldn't have been possible without my incredible staff. They often had the ideas and just ran them by me for approval.

TR: In relation to the dancers, what are you proud of?

JJ: Bringing in choreographers to challenge them, choreographers like Jawole Willa Jo Zollar, Ronald K. Brown, Mauro Bigonzetti, Rennie Harris, Maurice Béjart, John Butler and, of course, Robert Battle. By working with such a diverse group of artists, they've learned all different kinds of styles, and became more flexible as a result. They can literally do anything.

TR: What has been most challenging about leading the company?

JJ: To keep pace with the growth of the organization. It was small when I took over. It's blossomed into a huge artistic endeavor.

TR: What do you plan to do after you step down?

JJ: I'll have a desk at the company for at least a year and check into the classes and rehearsals, coach and keep up with things.

One way or another, I'll continue to educate and entertain -that's my mantra.

TR: Are you excited about going on tour?

JJ: I love being with the dancers in different theaters, hearing the audiences' reactions, catching up with old friends. And it's wonderful to see everything come together, the crew, the wardrobe, all of it creating one beautiful package. But the logistics -- the madness of preparation, the airports, the buses, staying in hotels -- not at all. I wish I could get there by osmosis. That they could beam me into cities so I didn't have to do the traveling. Remember, I started on the road as a dancer in 1964. It's been a long time.

Valerie Gladstone, who writes about the arts for many publications, including the New York Times, recently co-authored a children's book with Jose Ivey, A Young Dancer: The Life of an Ailey Student.

“After 21 years with the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, renowned director Judith Jamison is saying farewell. ”

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Feds monitoring Oscar Grant protests since 2009 By Ali Winston But law enforcement personnel who worked the Oscar Grant protests say federal involvement had nothing to do with a political ideology and everything to do with keeping civilians and critical infrastructure sites safe and preventing disorder. Oakland Police Captain David Downing, who was in charge of “Operation Verdict,” the police response to the July 8th post-verdict protests, says the handful of federal agents were nothing more than extra eyes among the several hundred law enforcement officers working on July 8th.“Their only job was to be out there and videotape, be observers and feed information,” said Downing, who was in charge of Operation Verdict. The DEA, California DOJ and Secret Services agents were a fraction of the several hundreds of law enforcement agents from across Northern California who took part in Operation Verdict.Much like several police departments provided officers to assist with crowd control, the state and federal agencies brought their investigative capacities to the table, as well as equipment. The FBI and DEA both offered helicopters for air support. Documents indicate that anarchists were on everyone’s mind. In a running police log from the July 8 protests and in emails exchanged between OPD command staff in the days prior, there is extensive mention of potential acts of property destruction and violence by “anarchists.” The log was later forwarded to the Department of Homeland Security’s National Operations Center. “They were interested in the event,” said Captain Downing.

During previous protests about the Oscar Grant case, media reports focused on property destruction allegedly perpetrated by “black bloc” anarchists. “They’re a concern,” said Captain Downing of the Oakland Police. “They don’t really care about the cause other than using the mask of a large mob to engage in property damage.”

Documents recently obtained by The Informant reveal the significant involvement of state and federal law enforcement in monitoring the various Oscar Grant protests in Oakland over the past two years. According to internal Oakland Police Department documents about the July 8th protests that followed Johannes Mehserle’s involuntary manslaughter conviction, agents from the Drug Enforcement Agency, United States Secret Service, and the California Department of Justice were assigned to monitor crowd activities.

Thirty-three federal, state and local officers were assigned to video details posted in buildings surrounding Frank Ogawa Plaza and throughout the crowd of several hundred demonstrators. Among them were personnel from the Secret Service, the state Bureau of Narcotics Enforcement, and Bureau of Intelligence and Investigation who took video of the protest. Some DEA and Oakland Police officers recorded the protest, while others dressed in plainclothes provided intelligence from within the crowd to OPD’s Emergency Operations Command Center at 1605 Martin Luther King Jr. Drive. The documents indicate FBI involvement in monitoring the Oscar Grant protests as early as January 2009. A police report included in the case file of Holly Noll, a 24-year-old activist who plead no contest to charges of assaulting a police officer, shows the FBI was providing intelligence to OPD on the movements of “black bloc” anarchists in Downtown Oakland on the night of January 14, 2009, when the latest of several protests agitating for Johannes Mehserle’s arrest erupted into property destruction and clashes with police. Oakland Police Officer Scott Seder’s report from that night indicates specific FBI interest in “anarchists.” The report reads as follows:

“OPD [Oakland Police Department] radio announced a communications order stating the FBI advised groups of anarchists, described as MW [male, white], 17-25 years old, wearing black and red clothing, were en route to the protest and planned to commit acts of violence and vandalism adjacent to the main demonstration.” Jose Luis Fuentes, an attorney at Siegel & Yee, the law firm that is defending those arrested in the July 8th protests, believes the involvement of state and federal agencies in intelligence-gathering is part of a larger effort to scrutinize political protest. “They’re trying to build a case against ‘black blocs’ or anarchists as domestic terrorism,” said Fuentes. “The federal government wants to know who’s protesting. They’re documenting who the agitators are — This is all COINTELPRO resurfacing.” The Counter Intelligence Program, or COINTELPRO, was an extensive federal operation that ran from the 1950s through the 1970s that monitored political activists, sometime using law enforcement to harass and discredit everyone from the National Association of Colored People to the Ku Klux Klan, who federal authorities considered dangerous.

Defense attorney Jose Luis Fuentes remains convinced the intelligence gathered during Operation Verdict was part of a broader effort to intimidate political protest. The subtext is that, “If you’re going to protest and violate any law, we might prosecute you federally,” Fuentes said. A November 16th primer on “Anarchist Extremism” on the FBI’s website describes the Bureau’s general policy on anarchists:

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“Currently, much of the criminal activities of anarchist extremists fall under local jurisdiction, so they’re investigated by local police. If asked by police, the Bureau can assist. But we have a heavy presence at a major national or international events generating significant media coverage—that’s when the threat from anarchist extremists, as well as others who are up to no good, dramatically increases.” According to an OPD investigative log, the FBI explored the possibility of charging some of the July Oscar Grant protesters federally. FBI Special Agent Russell Romero contacted OPD on July 21 to set up a meeting about the July 8th incident. On July 27, Agents Russell Romero and Kari McInturf met with OPD investigators “to see if Federal charges can be brought.” Romero and McInturf obtained a list of all the July 8th arrestees and their charges from OPD. To date, no federal charges have been filed.

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Reading (the Constitution) Is Fundamental But saying it out loud is not the same as understanding it. And that includes accepting that the nation's founders knew the document's interpretation would change with the times.

By: Sherrilyn A. Ifill

I started carrying around a pocket version of the U.S. Constitution in my purse in 1998 after I visited South Africa for the first time. It was only four years after the first full democratic election in that country. When the ANC was voted the ruling party in 1994 and Nelson Mandela was elected president, hundreds of thousands of black South Africans stood in lines extending for miles to exercise their franchise for the first time. Four years later, everyone -- from parliamentary officials to the woman selling tea at a makeshift kiosk in the townships outside Cape Town -- carried a small copy of the South African Constitution on their person. It was inspiring to see how engaged everyone was with the foundational document of their country. So, all things being equal, I have no objection to the leadership of the newly elected U.S. House of Representatives deciding to open the first session last week with a reading of the Constitution. It was also gratifying to see the reading turn into a bipartisan affair. Of course, as noted by Rep. Elijah Cummings (D-Md.), the House didn't have the stomach to read the original Constitution along with its amendments. Thus the reading excluded some of the framers' greatest constitutional hits, including Article I, Section 2, the counting of slaves as "three fifths of all other Persons" for representation purposes. Nothing like reading an edited and sanitized version of the Constitution to demonstrate respect for it. But the deletion of the unpleasant parts of the Constitution is only one of the problems with the constitutional read-in that opened the new congressional session. Many of us hoped that members of Congress would have read the Constitution before they took the oath of office -- in fact, before they ran for office, so that they would be familiar with the structure of government they hoped to influence. But if Republican leaders who hatched this stunt believe that reading the Constitution aloud is the same thing as understanding it, then this new Congress is in for a bumpy year. It's important for our leaders to understand that a constitution differs from other sources of law. Unlike a statute or regulation, a constitution sets out the fundamental legal regime by which a nation is organized. Constitutions are meant to stand the test of time. It was Chief Justice John Marshall who reminded us in 1819 that our Constitution was "intended to endure for ages to come … and to be adapted to the various crises of human affairs." The framers understood this. They provided a means of amending the Constitution, but also drafted language that left enough room in the joints of our governing structure so that successive generations could ensure that our government could function. The perfect example is the Article I "necessary and proper clause," which gives Congress the authority to "make all laws which shall be necessary and proper" for executing the powers vested in the legislative branch by the Constitution. Determining when a law is "necessary and proper" to the execution of a constitutionally enumerated power cannot be determined simply by reading the words of Article I, Section 8, over and over.

Likewise, determining the extent of Congress' power under the "commerce clause" to "regulate commerce … among the several states" has been subject to centuries of interpretation by the Supreme Court. Thursday's spoken-word performance has not revealed the parameter of Congress' power in this area. Behind the Republican leaders' constitutional posturing, of course, the stage is set for an effort to repeal the newly enacted health care law.

Challenges to the constitutionality of the law in federal court have centered on the breadth of Congress' powers under Article I, Section 8. The new health care law seems to fall squarely within Congress' power under the commerce clause, which has been interpreted by the Supreme Court to authorize Congress to legislate in a variety of areas.

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As long as economic activity substantially affects interstate commerce, the court has been inclined to find that Congress may legislate in that area. For example, the Supreme Court ruled that Title II of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which forbids hotel owners from denying services to clients based on race, is an exercise of Congress' commerce clause power, and ruled that the commerce clause permits Congress to regulate medical marijuana in the states. But Judge Henry E. Hudson, in Virginia v. Sebelius, offers a cramped analysis of the commerce clause that seems at odds with these cases. In striking down the health care law, Hudson concedes that Congress can regulate economic activity that affects interstate commerce. But, Hudson contends, Congress cannot regulate "inactivity." Thus, according to Hudson, Congress cannot regulate those who seek not to participate in the health care market by having insurance. Hudson's decision has been derided by many legal scholars, and conflicts with the decisions of other courts that have reviewed challenges to the health care law. (Hudson has also been criticized for his financial connection with an organization that provides services to a number of Republican elected officials -- including Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli, who filed the legal challenge to the health care law.)

But simply reading the Constitution, without reference to the nearly 200 years of Supreme Court interpretation of its various provisions, doesn't help us understand the interplay between the commerce clause, the necessary and proper clause, and Congress' power to levy taxes. Nor will it bring the new Tea Party-spooked congressional Republicans any closer to completing the hard work of enacting legislation in a divided Congress. What's even more disturbing are those Tea Party activists and Republicans who position themselves as the only true protectors of the Constitution. In fact, the whole exercise of reading the Constitution at the start of the new House session was designed to suggest that Republicans will be operating within the confines of the Constitution, in contrast with their Democratic counterparts. It is ironic, therefore, that it's most often members of the Republican Party who seem most determined to change or overturn provisions of the Constitution -- whether it's Iowa Rep. Steve King's new proposal to overturn the Constitution's birthright-citizenship provision or earlier efforts to amend the Constitution to outlaw same-sex marriage. Other Republican elected officials recently advocated nullification -- the refusal by states to comply with federal law -- a term most often associated with Southern resistance to school desegregation orders. But no matter. The Constitution -- along with "patriotism," "national security" and "family values" -- is fast becoming yet another term co-opted as part of the permanent GOP campaign.

Almost 200 years ago, Chief Justice Marshall cautioned against defining Congress' power in Article I so narrowly that our foundational document would become merely a "splendid bauble." Congressional Republicans will need to do more than merely admire the Constitution or parrot its many provisions en masse to fulfill their oath of office. It's all well and good to carry a copy of the Constitution in one's pocket -in fact, it's an excellent habit for the citizens of any country. But our nation's legislators will need to do more than carry and read the Constitution. They will have to do the hard work of enacting legislation to strengthen our nation and to advance the people of this country as the framers empowered them to do.

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This Place of Men Trilogy: A Story of Love, Sexuality, Religion and Redemption Through Humanity After twenty years a gay man returns home to confront the minister and the ex-lover who destroyed his life. During his return he uncovers many secrets, including one that will change him forever. As teens, Otis and Terrell were lovers. But their relationship was torn apart by Terrell's father and his pastor causing the two young men to travel disparate roads in their lives.Now, as they near their fortieth birthdays, each seeks to confront the pains and truths that have shaped his journey: Otis returns home, having endured years of hardship in search of the peace that has eluded him for so long. During his stay he finds he must confront his father who had turned his back on him; the lover who denied him and the minister who brought about his downfall, and most of all a surprise that awaits PHOTOGRAPHY BY RON FULCHER him. Then there is Terrell who finds that in spite of the 'perfect' life he chose to live, his marriage to Karen and his dedication to his two kids, there can be no peace without reconciling the differences that determines his sexual identity. 'This Place of Men' begins a journey that covers almost thirty years for Otis and Terrell and explores the lives of not only these two men, but others who struggle with truth and sexual identity.

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A married man comes to terms with his sexuality, forcing him to come out of the closet. Terrell and Otis's saga continues from 'This Place of Men' (book one of the trilogy). In 'People Like Us', Terrell finds he must end his marriage to Karen, so he decides to come out of the closet. Now the 'ex-couple' must struggle with the love and respect they once had for each other as well as with their new identities: she, as a single woman scorned by her gay husband and he, as a man who has come to identify himself as gay...

And what about their children?

'People Like Us' is for anyone who has ever been married or in a relationship where one partner comes out of the closet.

BOOKS IN PRINT A gay father fights to save the son he never knew from a life in the streets and from the darkness that haunts him. However, the father has his own demons and finds that he must not only save his son's life, but his own life as well. Leaving Gomorrah brings together all the main characters from the first two books - 'This Place of Men' and 'People Like Us' - and is the final book in the 'This Place of Men Trilogy'.

Otis is a gay man who discovers he has a son from a one night affair many years ago. Now his son, Antonio, a young man in his twenties, has come to live with him.

Everything is fine until Otis realizes that Antonio is living a secret life hustling his body. It's a trade Otis is well aware of because he once lived that same life.

Antonio, Otis’s son, feels he has been blessed with great sexual prowess, just like his father. He doesn’t consider himself gay or bi-sexual, but he has used his ‘gift’ to dominate both men and women to get what he wants. But there is one thing he can’t get from sex, and that is peace of mind from the darkness that haunts him, the same darkness that haunted, and later destroyed his mother.

Now Otis must fight to save Antonio from a life in the streets and from the darkness that haunts him. However, Otis has his own demons, and he finds that he must not only save his son's life, but his own life as well. Eventually, the battle between these men and the streets as well as their pasts comes to an explosive end.

'Leaving Gomorrah', Book 3 of the 'This Place of Men Trilogy'

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ON OUR RADAR 'The Game' Returns to Television The Game is returning to television tonight on BET. After it was unceremoniously canceled, fans took to the Internet demanding its return. The protests, zines, homage videos and 2 million Facebook followers fell on deaf ears at the CW, but BET heard the call and decided to answer. BET and the show's creator, Mara Brock-Akil, announced last year that The Game would be returning to TV with the entire core cast, much to the delight of fans.

Facebook is all abuzz with the return of the show, with cities as diverse as Los Angeles, New York, Charlotte and Atlanta hosting The Game watch parties.

Fans and critics are wondering how the shift to a different network will impact the show. BET has been critiqued for having low production values in the past. Will that change with this game-changing show?

Actress Vonetta McGee Passes Away Model-turned-actress Vonetta McGee has passed away. The San Francisco native, who beat Hodgkin's lymphoma as a young girl to grow up and star opposite Hollywood heavyweights Richard Roundtree, William Marshall and Clint Eastwood, died from a heart attack. McGee is best remembered for her roles as Aleme in Shaft in Africa, co-starring Roundtree; as Luva/Tina in Blacula opposite William Marshall; and as Jemima Brown in The Eiger Sanction, co-starring Clint Eastwood.

She continued to work in film, starring in To Sleep with Anger, and in television, including turns on Cagney and Lacey and Bustin' Loose (the television show). She was 65.

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Waiting for Lauryn Hill For a decade, we have held our collective breaths waiting for the return of the Lauryn Hill. For many of us, The Miseducation of Lauryn Hill served as both Greek chorus and sound track to our young adulthoods. Now she's back with a national tour ahead of her, and adoring fans at the ready. But she's not the Lauryn we once knew.

I've carried Lauryn with me since I was 17. From the first time I heard her spit to the last exhaled inflection, I was hers. Though just one year older, she was the cooler big sister I wanted to be. And that face! That kinky halo of hair and her wide, deep-set eyes, full lips and cocoa-tinted skin -- I was in love. For the first time, there was a celebrity who looked like me.

Before Lauryn, I loved hip-hop but often felt that hip-hop didn't love me. The men certainly didn't represent me, but I couldn't identify with the women, either. Lil' Kim and Foxy Brown were a lot more comfortable with their sexuality than I was in my early 20s. Half the time, I had no clue what the hell they were talking about. I'm embarrassed to say that Kim's line about swallowing a Sprite can in "The Jump Off" had to be explained to me in detail.

by Bassey Ikpi

Haiti's Yearlong Aftershock One year after a monstrous earthquake rocked the small Caribbean nation, progress is glacial -- and in many ways, things have gotten There was some violence, widespread charges worse. By: Joel Dreyfuss What has Haiti done to deserve this? A year after the devastating earthquake, many Haitians and Haitian Americans can't help asking themselves what this poor little Caribbean nation has done to suffer such an unbroken string of calamities. The earthquake of Jan. 12, 2010, was the most brutal, of course -killing some 230,000 people and leaving thousands more badly injured in a country where the infrastructure was already fragile, and medical care a luxury for most.

Then there was hurricane season last fall, with several powerful storms battering a country with more than 1 million people living in flimsy tents. And then came cholera, a disease unknown in Haiti within the last hundred years, taking 3,500 lives so far and mounting -- amid suspicions that the disease might have been brought in by South Asian United Nations troops.

Even good deeds seemed to get punished. The country held elections in November that had been postponed from February 2010. Many observers warned that it made no sense to hold elections when much of the country's infrastructure had been destroyed and hundreds of thousands were still homeless. But Haitian President René Préval's term was running out, and foreign donors wanted a legitimate government to deal with. Rap artist Wyclef Jean -maybe the best-known Haitian living abroad -joined a crowded field of presidential hopefuls but was disqualified from running.

of fraud and voter intimidation, and finally, a first-round result that no one accepted. From 19 candidates, two remained: Jude Celestin, backed by Préval's party, and Mirlande Manigat, a law professor whose husband had served briefly as president a couple of decades ago -- before being ousted in a coup.

Third by less than 1 percent was Michel Martelly, a musician better known as Sweet Micky, and infamous for his outrageous onstage behavior. Martelly objected vigorously -- and his supporters took to the streets.

For several days, protesters swarmed the rubble-filled streets, set up barricades and burned tires.

Now a special delegation from the Organization of American States has reviewed the election results and will reportedly recommend that Martelly and Manigat be the candidates in the runoff. Celestin, backed by Préval and his party, would be cast aside. So far, Haiti's much discredited elections council, known as the CEP, has not reacted to the report. But a runoff between the candidates most Haitians believe won the first round could calm the anger and result in a chief executive with the credibility to lead Haiti out of this continuing streak of bad luck.

The winner will need it. After a year, just 5 percent of the rubble from the powerful 7.3 earthquake has been cleared; less than 10 percent of the $5.3 billion pledged after the quake has been disbursed. Thousands of NGOs (nongovernmental organizations), from the massive Red Cross to tiny volunteer religious groups, are on the ground.

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ON OUR RADAR NASHVILLE ARTIST TRENT DABBS INTRODUCES HIS NEW SOUND AS SOUTHERNER, SELF-TITLED ALBUM TO BE RELEASED FEBRUARY 22 NASHVILLE, TENN – Southerner, Trent Dabbs' sixth full-length record to date, will be released Feb. 22 on his own, Ready Set Records. This project is both a return and a departure. The album is a return to Trent's heritage, and recalls how the South has shaped his art, but the tone is also a slight departure from his previous pop and rock-driven songwriting.

The track titled, “Leave To See”, the first song written for the album, fittingly describes the paradox of more clearly seeing your home from a different place, a different perspective.

Trent says that on Southerner he, “wanted to peel back the layers . . . and portray ten separate stories that have been woven into my southern life”. Growing up in the rich literary and religious environment of Mississippi, and then moving straight into the country-soaked musical world of Nashville, Trent has many stories to tell. Like Flannery O’Connor with her short story collection, A Good Man Is Hard To Find, Dabbs pieces his own spiritual and relational questions into a coherent, haunting compilation.

The ghosts of Johnny Cash, old gospel-choirs, Neil Young, and Nick Drake are heard roaming the halls of Trent’s songs. An artist with a unique business sense, Trent Dabbs has forged his way through an ever-changing music industry by uniting some of Nashville’s best up-and-coming musicians in a touring and recording collective called, Ten Out of Tenn. Many of these artists such as Butterfly Boucher, Erin McCarley, Matthew Perryman Jones, and Joy Williams, among others, have gone on to have critically and commercially successful careers as performers and songwriters. In 2010 Dabbs released two pop focused albums, Your Side Now and Transition, both albums fostered numerous television placements including Grey's Anatomy, One Tree Hill, Vampire Diaries and many others as well as earning a #1 spot on itunes PHOTOGRAPHY BY RON FULCHER

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singer/songwriter charts and recognition from pop princess, Taylor Swifts' favorites playlist on itunes. “That chorus and melody is so gorgeous,” Swift said of Dabbs' song Off We Go, featuring Universal recording artist, Erin McCarley. Despite these successes, Trent remains a humble and avid supporter of his fellow musicians, and anyone who is looking to create authentic art. As noted in Athens Blur, “as beautiful as the talent Trent Dabbs helps introduce to the masses, it’s his own music that merits the most attention.”

Trent’s desire is that his audience will take the time to listen to Southerner as a whole. Though many of the tracks stand on their own, and will surely find their way as snippets into scripts and onto screens, it is the story that concerns Trent the most. Our generation is one of ADD and instant gratification. Maybe what we need is to shut out the rest of the world, sit on the porch with a glass of tea, take a deep breath in, and just listen.

Dabbs will be celebrating the release with a show at Eddie's Attic in Atlanta, GA on February 24th and at 12th and Porter in Nashville, TN on February 25th. Southerner will be available on cd and vinyl in local record stores and on all online retail stores. Trent Dabbs 2011 Tour Dates: January 18 – Room 5 Lounge, Los Angeles, CA February 24 – Eddie's Attic, Atlanta, GA* February 25 - 12th & Porter, Nashville, TN* March 10 – Harry's Coffeehouse, Birmingham, AL more dates TBA *album release shows

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