Rand Paul & the GOP: Black Friend Wanted

Big week in conservative outreach to the black community! 

Rand Paul went to the Harvard of historical black colleges -- Howard University -- to school a roomful of already educated black students on how President Abraham Lincoln was a Republican and that all of the NAACP's founders were Republicans. (Some were also white! And really light-skinned Negroes!!! And Ida B. Wells!!!!) Of course, all the students (and me and most black people who can read) already knew this.

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Slavery? Not That Bad, Sez CPAC Attendee

Stay in school, kids. Or ... um, don't stay in school. They're probably teaching that unit on slavery wrong if you live in certain parts of the American South and Texas. (Source: Clutch)

GOP Performs Autopsy On Ailing Political Body

Head of the Republican National Committee, Reince Priebus talks about the GOP's report on CBS's "Face the Nation."In the new "autopsy" report, (called the "Growth and Opportunity Report) is out! Re-published by Politico, the GOP outlines what they need to do to get out of their rut of losing presidential elections. Highlights: endorsing comprehensive immigration reform, a $10 million outreach effort for minority communities, reforming its digital operations and making the GOP presidential primary process shorter and having their nominating convention sooner.

Because this report is long and you probably don't want to read it, I'm going to break it down for you with some highlights and commentary. Giving you only what you need to know about what the GOP thinks it's doing wrong to get your vote.

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Well, The Sequester Happened ... So When Is the Apocalypse Scheduled?

President Barack Obama talks with Congressional leaders prior to the Rosa Parks statue unveiling ceremony at the U.S. Capitol in Washington, D.C., Feb. 27, 2013. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)The DNC has flooded my (and possibly your) inbox with sequestration facts since Friday afternoon. And if you're like most people you're either looking up from your meal of Top Ramen inside your cardboard box going "huh" or you've been dreading this day ever since you learned you would be directly affected by the $85 billion harsh cuts coming from this bullshit poison pill, crafted by Congress years ago, only to finally come to roost last Friday.

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The New Republic Breaks Down How the GOP Doubled-Down on Whiteness

The best retort critics could come up with was "you do it too."

That was the slam after The New Republic published its piece "Original Sin: Why the GOP is and will continue to be the party of white people." Conservatives quickly googled Wikipedia, and pointed out how lacking in a tan The New Republic's staff is, failing to grasp that The New Republic (while could benefit from diversity) is not one of two national political parties that takes turns in writing, executing and judging our laws.

I'm going to go out on a limb and say the GOP might be a bit more important and powerful than a magazine. I can't think of the last time TNR did something that determined what military contracts we might purchase and how much interest the government will have in my womb year-to-year.

As Dylan Byers writes at Politico: "Should TNR diversify its offices? That's up to them. But for the GOP, it isn't a case of should or shouldn't. It's a case of must."

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Clutch Magazine: Condi Rice Glosses Over Important Part When She Talks Civil Rights

Former Secretary of State Condozeela Rice addressed the Republican National Convention Wednesday night in a speech that touched on everything from her foreign policy strengths (or weakness depending on who you ask), to social issues. But one of the issues she skiddladdled right by was the Civil Rights movement. Wanting to keep things in that "feel good" mode she spoke as if that leap from segregation to her becoming secretary of state was a glorious lap Americans ran together, rather than a knock down, drag out grudge match that people are still wielding cudgels about today. Never mind the fact that it took sending the National Guard to many states just to enforce the rule of law.

Jim Crow didn't die so much as he was a suicide bomber who tried to take as many folks with him before he finally blew up Alabama, and the scaring was so deep we're still dealing with the consequences today. To paraphrase the film "Magnolia," Rice may be through with the past, but the past isn't through with us.

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Mittens Finds A Mate: Paul Ryan Is Romney's GOP "Dream Date" Candidate

Photo via ClutchMitt Romney, the on purpose yet somehow accidental, presumptive GOP candidate for president announced Saturday that Rep. Paul Ryan will be his running mate. He announced this news during a time/date slot normally reserved for stories politicians want to bury in the haze of lazy Fridays, sleep-in Saturdays, an audience focused on how to get their drink on this weekend, not the news and the Olympics.

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Supreme Court Upholds Obama's Health Care Reform Law

Source: Twitter, via user @delrayser

It boiled down to the government has the right levy a tax. But considering that the government already has multiple social welfare programs going involving health care -- from Medicare to Medicaid to veterans' health care, etc. -- I was always more surprised that people were fighting the legality of it in court rather than hashing it out in Congress to modify the existing law. But in a 5-4 decision where Chief Justice John Roberts joined Justices Elena Kagan, Ruth Bader Ginsburg, Stephen Breyer and Sonia Sotomayor in upholding the law, the signature legislation of the Obama Administration was allowed to remain unchanged. The descending votes came, unsurprisingly from Justices Anthony Kennedy, Antonin Scalia, Clarence Thomas and Samuel Alito, who felt the law was an overreach and should have been struck down completely.

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Obama Administration To Stop Deporting Certain Illegal Immigrants Brought Here As Children

President Barack Obama greets people in the audience after delivering the keynote address at the Asian Pacific American Institute for Congressional Studies 18th Annual Gala Dinner in Washington, D.C., May 8, 2012. (Official White House Photo by Pete Souza)When the DREAM Act died in Congress many feared of what would come of the thousands of children, many now adults, who unwittingly were not citizens when their parents brought them illegally to the United States. Many, not knowing their status until their mid-to-late teens, found pathways to careers and college closed as they lived in constant fear of deportation from the only home they've ever known. Circumventing Congress, the Obama Administration announced Friday they would stop deporting certain younger illegal immigrants who fit a specific criteria: those who were brought here at age 16 or younger; are presently age 30 or younger; have no criminal record; have been in the US for at least five continuative years; and have either a GED, a U.S. high school diploma or have served in the military.

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