Black Cleveland Pastor II

Rev. Darrell Scott, about whom we wrote in our prior post, spoke earlier than his scheduled time tonight. Those of you who missed his six-minute stem winder, or who want to see it again, can watch it here:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=4wYF16x6964

Black Cleveland pastor speaks to nation at GOP convention tonight

There has been scant black presence or even visibility inside the arena at the GOP Convention taking place this week here in Cleveland, notwithstanding the fact that this is a majority black city. In fact, early indications are that there may be fewer African American delegates at the event than at any convention since 1964, the year the GOP nominated Arizona senator Barry Goldwater, whose disdain for the black vote -- if not black people -- was, to be be declaratory about it, a self-evident truth.

The black folk who thus far have had a turn at the convention microphone would be called, in the parlance of our forebears, an embarrassment to the race. Darryl Glenn, the Colorado candidate for the US Senate, and Milwaukee sheriff David Clarke, in particular, seemed zealously out of touch with about 95% of the black people in America, including the large number of socially conservative African Americans. As for Dr. Ben Carson, let's just say some people should be brain surgeons and stay away from politics.

I do intend to watch tonight when one of my neighborhood ministers, Rev. Darrell Scott of mega church New Spirit Revival Center, takes the mike. He gained the first dab of his fifteen minutes a few months ago as an apparent organizer of the aborted attempt to have 100 black ministers meet with Donald Trump at the latter's NYC headquarters, reportedly to endorse his candidacy. When word of the gathering leaked, many of the pastors hastily headed for de Nile River, claiming they had been misled as to the meeting's intent.

Scott is scheduled to speak at 9:10 EDT tonight. I'm most curious to hear him. He will be the second black man with local ties to have a platform at the Convention. But Don King deserves a post all his own.

Trump (Mrs.) channels her inner Obama (Mrs.)

I listened to Melania Trump's speech at the GOP Convention Monday night and thought it was a poised presentation written for her. I figured she hadn't written it because it was replete with the phrases of someone with an ear and feel for the touchstones of a political spouse.

I wasn't surprised when the pundits fell over themselves praising her afterwards. My father schooled me at a young age on the advantages accorded to pretty women. But the praise was so effusive that I had to check myself: had I been too dismissive because she was the wife of an obnoxious prevaricator? While I could certainly acknowledge that she had delivered the speech well, I was in full agreement with one (female) commentator who found her talk fell short because it failed to humanize her husband.  She talked about his love of country and his professional traits but totally failed to talk about him as a loving father and husband beyond the most perfunctory claims. She offered not one insightful vignette of the man at home, interacting with her or the kids. 

So imagine my surprise when it turns out that key parts of Melania's speech was apparently written by Michelle Obama in 2008! A large panel has been discussing this on CNN and even diehard Trump apologists including Jeffrey Lord acknowledge that Melania's speech was plagiarized. The pundits by and large are willing to give her a pass, blaming some unidentified speechwriter for the theft and overlooking her claims to have written much of the speech herself. 

Credit Van Jones for calling b.s., pointing out that Michelle Obama would be vilified if she were found to have plagiarized even if a speechwriter had been the offending party. And credit also Bokari Sellers for noting both the absence of personal anecdotes but also the fact that Melania's prime job was to be Character Reference # 1. That she either accepted the impersonal words of a speechwriter or pilfered them herself may indeed be strong commentary on the candidate's character.

Eye of the Storm

Cleveland, Ohio is the epicenter of the political world this week as the Republican Party (or part of it) comes to town to confirm demagogue Donald Trump as its nominee for President.

My application to the Republican National Convention for credentials to get inside the secured spaces was rejected. I didn't take it personally; there will be roughly 15,000 media in town and lots of them won't be inside the arena either. US political conventions are perhaps the most widely covered spectacles outside the Olympics. But you have your choice of national media for what will happen inside the major venues. Our coverage will focus on local impact from a ground level.

Officer directing me out of his path of travel

I went downtown yesterday afternoon to get a sense of the area's vibe and the security preparations for the convention. I was coming from around 86th and Hough, a scant few blocks east of 79th and Hough where, fifty years ago, the city's black residents exploded in paroxysms of rage against the inhumane conditions of overcrowded, substandard housing to which they had been relegated by intentional public policies of segregation and neglect. Scars from the killing, burning and military occupation that followed can still be seen half a century later -- even as new community self-regeneration occurs, remarkably, cheek by jowl to the still-present desolation -- as we headed west a few miles to downtown. Staying off the main streets, we got all the way down to east Ninth and Chester before encountering more than minimal traffic or any significant number of pedestrians.

Everything changed at that point. Heavy black fencing, maybe ten feet high divides the wide north south thoroughfare. A medley of security forces -- Cleveland cops, Secret Service details (plainly market in black combat vests) among them -- congregated there.

Aware of the tension in the air these days -- further horrific news had come out of Baton Rouge only hours earlier of the senseless murder of three police officers -- I approached one of the uniforms to ascertain the ground rules. I was reasonably well dressed, having just come from interviewing two bright and highly articulate black women attorneys about their Republican Party membership. I was also carrying a miniature shoulder bag with my reporting tools and other gear and wanted in no way to raise the apprehensions of these security personnel, even though they appeared not to have noticed me at all, the five or so them being preoccupied in conversation with one another or directing traffic.

The Secret Service guy was disarming in his amiability. I could go pretty much anywhere, he said, not clearly prohibited by the traffic barriers. I let down my guard at that point, and my curiosity rose. Cleveland’s my town, and I wanted to see what had been done in preparation. I turned south and went up to Euclid and Ninth, once the city’s financial heart where the bankers and white-shoe lawyers who once ran the town were all headquartered. The former Huntington Bank Building, which sits on the northwest corner, rises 21 stories and is reportedly the largest horizontal office building in the USA after the Pentagon.

As I headed west on Euclid towards East 4^th Street — Cleveland’s one block version of Bourbon St. — and Public Square, several sirens began to wail, coming up Ninth St. and turning east on Euclid. Understandably, this seemed to provoke more than the normal interest of passersby, who were increasing in number as they moved up and down Euclid, Cleveland’s dominant thoroughfare, connecting downtown to University Circle about 4 miles away. But sensing no danger, I continued along Euclid along increasingly busy sidewalks.

Joy Reid [back to camera] and Chuck Todd on MSNBC East Fourth Street set

Arriving at East Fourth, I seemed to be in a new city. MSNBC has erected two temporary studios on the east side of the block. In short order I saw TV host Joy Reid entering the makeshift studio to join Chuck Todd of Meet the Press. I recognized Washington Post reporter and cable talking head Dan Balz walking down the street, looking for all the world like an ordinary Clevelander. For some reason I called out his name; he turned and looked and me, and after a moment, said hello and kept going.

East Fourth seemed mostly filled with natives, there for a drink or just to take in the spectacle. But there were a number of conventioneers and out-of-town media, recognizable from their convention I.D. tags. I could make out no conventioneers of color.

The ordinariness of it all is what struck me the most, as I headed down Prospect and then through Public Square. I decided to walk up Ontario St. to check out the new Hilton Hotel, built with public funds. Although the sidewalks were much less busy, the security presence was much greater, as I saw mounted police, military forces [probably National Guard], and a SWAT team. Ohio State Troopers were also in evidence around the Square. Most of these forces seemed to be socializing with each other when they weren’t moving as a unit from one spot to another. I felt no tension anywhere, notwithstanding the morning attack in Baton Rouge. I saw no protesters, save for a lone spokesman manning a sign calling for support of the Kurdish struggle.

I was taken aback a bit as I prepared to enter the Hilton and was greeted by this sign:

I did not find such inhospitality at any of the other hotel lobbies I passed or entered, including the Drury, which I was scouting for an old college chum who plans to pass through town sometime this fall. I can’t say I was charmed by what they’ve done with the lobby. All that marble seemed austere. [Note: the marble isn’t new. The Drury, which opened earlier this year, is a conversion of the old Cleveland Board of Education building. I did see an efficient, welcoming and hard-working staff in operation.]

Akron SWAT team members in University Circle

I circled back through the mostly empty [as always] Arcade, a building that every visitor should experience, before taking the Healthline back uptown. When I got to University Circle, I saw a SWAT team and a police squad from Akron, perhaps returning from dinner somewhere on the Case campus. They were likely a few of the nearly 2000-person security contingent being housed on campus this week, a situation that produced such angst within the University community that the school has closed until the Convention is over.

Akron police in University Circle

Despite the extraordinary security precautions and momentous action about to be taken by the GOP this week, overall I sensed neither great drama nor tension. Perhaps it was the calm before the storm.

• • • • •

Low-key Larchmere affair affords rare sighting of Black Republicans

A famous dictum attributed to former US Speaker of the House Tip O’Neill declares,  “All politics is local.” While no doubt an exaggeration, it is probable that if black Republicans are ever to increase in number — especially given the current toxic national political environment — it will be due to the efforts of people like Laverne Gore, who is simultaneously and unapologetically black, proud, and Republican.

L-R: Arkeya Thomas, Laverne Gore,
Judge Michael Sliwinski, Sam Gantous

Gore has for sometime been convening groups large and small of black Clevelanders and bringing them together with local and national GOP hierarchy as well as rank and file party members. Last summer, for instance, she hosted a cookout at her home in the tidy CHALK neighborhood just north of Shaker Square featuring GOP national chair Reince Priebus. That brought black Republicans from all over the state, including Youngstown and Cincinnati. 

Gore has also been busy connecting with black conservatives around the country, facilitating get-togethers that put all manner of black people in the same space with Republican operatives and officeholders. Her diligent efforts began well before the GOP hierarchy decided to hold its 2016 convention here in Cleveland and will likely place her in the thick of much of the activity that surrounds a national convention spectacle.

An example of Gore’s efforts could be seen two nights ago

Shalira Taylor, GOP District 11 candidate for state
representative, between Rev. Jeffrey and Mrs. Lori Jemison

at the Academy Tavern, a well-known and popular eatery owned and operated for years by Sam Gantous on Larchmere Avenue. The restaurant is on the border of Shaker Heights and Cleveland, an area that has weathered ethnic and socioeconomic transformation far better than most neighborhoods in Greater Cleveland. Situated on the crest of the first foothill of the Allegheny Plateau — the beginning of the Heights — one can stand in the middle of the street and see clear downtown, though the route is fraught with many demographic changes. 

Larchmere turns into Woodland Ave. as it moves westward towards downtown, passing through areas once heavy with industry and residential areas full of European immigrants who could either walk or take public transportation to work in the factories, foundries, and machine shops that once comprised the heart of the city. Today, one traverses westward along Woodland towards downtown and the largest complexes encountered are housing projects, churches, and one of the city’s oldest cemeteries. Conversely, if you headed the other way, you could enjoy a serene walk into Shaker Heights, where former Mayor Carl Stokes lived during his years as the first black mayor of a major American city.

The history alluded to here somehow made the unpretentious and homey tavern’s rear patio an ideal spot for a low-key mingling of black Republican hoi polloi and adventurous white politicians. There were no speeches, no heavy-duty politicking; in fact, had you innocently wandered into the space — as some Academy regulars may in fact have done — you would have been hard-pressed to discern that you had stumbled upon a political gathering.

It just may have been the kind of political affair that could bring some healing to this era of political malignancy.

One City — Two Tales

This weekend’s Movement for Black Lives may frame next year’s GOP Convention

All eyes will be on Cleveland in July 2016 when the Republican National Convention comes to town. Fifty thousand people, including 15,000 members of the media, are expected to gobble up every hotel room for miles around, rent apartments and condos at exorbitant rates, and create an economic impact of some $200 million dollars. The city fathers are absolutely giddy. If recent history runs true to form, the demographics of most of those spending all that money will skew Caucasian, wealthy, heterosexual, Christian. Party leaders hope that their actions will result in one of their own becoming the next President of the United States, the Leader of the Free World, and the Restorer of the Old.

A year prior to this highly publicized event, which is to say starting today, hundreds of black people will arrive largely by car and bus, for a Movement for Black Lives Convening. The demographics of these attendees will be overwhelmingly African American, intergenerational, and omni-sexual, if that term represents the broadest spectrum of human sexual orientation. The economic impact will be slight — many of them will be crashing in church basements or possibly in the homes of total strangers. They will meet in classrooms at Cleveland State University for workshops to learn, heal, organize and mobilize for what they are determined must be a new American regime where Black Lives Matter equally as much as all others.

The backlash of the Civil Rights Movement, the dawning of the Information Age, and globalization are among the potent forces that have produced the growing divide in America between the relative few who have enormous amounts of wealth, liberty, and secure and expansive personal space, and the vast numbers of other Americans who have increasingly less.

While technology has made it possible to create and transfer immense wealth almost by keystroke — the mortgage manipulation that precipitated the Great Recession is Exhibit A — the smartphones and social media that make us all potential eyewitnesses and video reporters have spotlighted the continuing dangers of being black in America.

One hundred years ago Cleveland was the symbol of great wealth in America. It is currently on a run celebrating the centennials of great civic institutions — the Cleveland Foundation, the Cleveland Orchestra, the Cleveland Museum of Art, and many other cultural gems in and around University Circle. Nobody looks too closely beyond a point at how the fortunes were accrued that launched these proud markers of civic accomplishment.

The choice of Cleveland as the site of the Movement for Black Lives was made intentionally, because our city has come to represent all of the ills that plague black people nationally: indifference and hostility to women of color, especially members of the LGBT community; excessive and outrageous police misconduct, documented by the most recent U.S. Department of Justice report; economic disparity; a public education system that is besieged on all sides; communities with Third World health statistics; and even Ohio’s status as an open-carry state.

For one observer, this week's Movement for Black Lives convening evokes the spirit of the old Chambers Brothers anthem, Time Has Come Today, first released in 1967 ["I don't care what others say. Time has come today!"]. One spokesperson told us the convening is inspired by this spirit of creative resistance, righteous resistance, prophetic resistance.

More than 800 people are expected to register for this weekend’s programs. Registration is open, inexpensive, and begins at 8am. Information is available online at www.movementforblacklives.org.

Business Tuesday

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The big news in our region today was of course the announcement that the 2016 Republican Convention will be held in Cleveland. Tentative start dates are reportedly either June 27 or July 18, depending — get this! — on whether Quicken Loans Arena will be needed as a site for the NBA Finals. That might seem ludicrous except for the possibility, no longer entirely incredible that free agent LeBron James might return home as the prodigal son.

IF he did, well, then we would have to consider that in his first eleven years, his teams have made the NBA Finals five times. So, just maybe the Repubs will have to wait until July to have the run of the Q.

Meanwhile, the question of the day is who will step forward to negotiate one of those Community Benefit Agreements with the Republican National Committee?

We of course will have much more to say about the Republican Convention but for now, we simply offer our congratulations to Mayor Jackson, County Executive FitzGerald, and those folk who will be ponying up some $65 million or so to make this happen.

PC Scholar Graduation Reception canceled

We reported in last week’s Nonprofit Thursday post that The Presidents’ Council reception for this year’s graduates of its PC Scholars program would be held this Thursday, July 10.

This event has been canceled for the best of reasons: the honorees are so busy this summer with internships, gainful summer employment and the like, that it seems about half of them are unable to attend the planned festivities in their honor.

We are pleased to share the roster of 2014 PC Scholar Graduates below. Their names are followed by the schools they will enter this fall and their high schools. Each will receive a scholarship from the program once their fall schedules have been certified.

2014 PC Scholar Graduates

Ronisha Buckhanon, University of Akron, Collinwood HS

Elexsus Collins, Cuyahoga Community College, Max Hayes HS

Zalina Harp, Cuyahoga Community College, James Ford Rhodes HS

Diva Jones, University of Akron, John Adams HS

Tatiana Meadows, Cleveland State University, John F. Kennedy HS

Joshua Minor, Cuyahoga Community College, New Tech East HS

Danielle Quarles, Cuyahoga Community College, John Hay A & D HS

Erica Vanzant, Sierra Nevada College, Cleveland School of the Arts

Alexis Wiggins, United States Air Force, John Hay A & D HS