Free Brittany Griner--and lock up Emmett Till's lying accuser, Carolyn Bryant Donham!

The Friday Flashpoints!

Sharing a few things that I like and dislike on this first Friday in July...

***This week it was announced that the Texas State Board of Education is considering a new requirement that would mandate that teachers no longer call what my ancestors endured "slavery," but "involuntary relocation" from Africa to America.

Whatever…

As I have written many times before, the idiots are running the school boards across the old Jim Crow South. Once more, while we all know that the Union won the Civil War, it is clear that the Rebels stay winning the peace, first during the 90 years of segregation that was known as Jim Crow, and now the recent setbacks that comprise Jim Crow, Jr.! 

Ol’ Hobbs will never allow conservatives to denigrate or dismiss the wicked nature of America's enslavement of Black men, women, and children. Never!

American students are already leaving high school with a painful lack of awareness about real American history and Civics, and proposed measures like these only make the ignorant far more ignorant—and I don't like that...

***One week after yhe Dobbs vs. Jackson Women's Health Organization decision overturned Roe vs. Wade, the fallout has led states scrambling to either make abortion more accessible (blue states), or tighten up on restrictions (red states).

While residual suits will be heard for many years to come on Roe's reversal, closer to home, Tallahassee/Leon County Circuit Judge John C. Cooper issued a temporary injunction on House Bill 5, the Republican led measure that prevents Florida women from having abortions after 15 weeks—even if the pregnancy is a result of rape, incest, or human trafficking. 

Florida Republicans are trying to paint Judge Cooper, one of the wisest and most impartial judges I know, as some sort of "liberal activist." But knowing him personally, I realize that he is thick skinned and unafraid of the fallout.

And I like that... 

***Brittany Griner, the WNBA star who was caught with about 0.7 grams of cannabis oil in her vape when she entered Russia earlier this year, was in court Friday and will soon stand trial in a system that Russian legal observers say almost always ends in conviction for alleged offenders. 

Ms. Griner has the misfortune of getting caught while Russia wages a war of aggression in Ukraine, one that has drawn international condemnation from the U.S. and her allies. Which is why this minor case, one that usually ends with a few weeks in jail and a fine in Russia, has her facing up to 10 years—all so that she can be used as a bargaining chip in Dictator Vladimir Putin's rhetorical battles with President Joe Biden. 

Again, when I read that the amount of cannabis oil was 0.7 grams today, my heart broke for Griner as I realize that for reasons that the Biden administration has not shared, no one seems too much in a hurry to get her out of her Gulag nightmare.

And I don't like that...

***Speaking of President Biden, a new poll featured in The Hill finds that "Seven in 10 Americans say they do not want President Biden to run for a second term...Among the contingent of respondents who believe the president should not run, 45 percent said Biden should not make another bid because he is a bad president, while about one-third of respondents said he is too old and about one-quarter said because it was time for a change."

I will withhold full judgment for now, but suffice it to say that I have some concerns about Mr. Biden's 2024 prospects myself. I have a bad feeling that he just may lose to Donald Trump or Ron Desantis if his approval numbers stay this low—and I don't like that...

***So, it seems that Carolyn Bryant Donham, the white woman who lied on Emmett Till, 14, and pointed him out to her husband, Roy, and his brother, J.W. Milam, for a brutal lynching, had an arrest warrant drafted back in 1955—that was never served! 

The Bryants (r), and the Milams after the two men were acquitted of murdering Emmett Till. Two years after their sham trial, the pair admitted to the deed in an article published in Look magazine but, due to double jeopardy laws, could not be tried again…

Right now, Mississippi authorities are trying to determine whether the warrant is still legal and can be served; lest we forget that there is no statute of limitations on murder!

If I had a vote, I would have her arrested and stand trial for her deplorable role in one of the most despicable crimes of the 20th Century.

When I wrote as much earlier today, some folks weighed in that “Missy” Carolyn is nearly 90-years-old and is not in the best health—and I don't like that because these folks act like the prisons don't have an infirmary to treat her until she breathes her very last breath…

Lock her up!

*** The Honorable Ketanji Brown-Jackson was sworn in as an Associate Justice of the U.S. Supreme Court this week, thus, becoming the first Black woman to hold that distinction.

And I like that!

Justice Brown-Jackson, her husband, Dr. Patrick Jackson, and Chief Justice John Roberts during the swearing ceremony…

Here's hoping that her Honor, age 51, will serve long enough to watch the Court's pendulum swing back from the hard right--to center left!