The idea of being one another’s keeper, which many Democrats talked about during the Democratic National Convention (DNC) in Philadelphia, PA leads me to Cory Booker. The senator from New Jersey received lots of praise after he spoke so eloquently during the event. He is often considered a star in the Democratic Party. He was a…
The Republican (GOP) and Democratic national political conventions were interesting. Of equal interest was the near absence of anything African in them. More broadly—while the conventions illuminated the vast differences between Democrats and Republicans in America, at least with an unusual nominee on the GOP side, they spelled out where both parties would like to take…
For the seven years or so that he’s been in office, U.S. President, Barack Obama has focused on the African continent. This is something that is not talked about much, despite such accomplishments as holding the first US-Africa Leaders’ Summit in 2014. Before him, President George W. Bush was praised for his Africa policy. Since the…
The very brutal politics to elect the next U.S. president has left millions of people in the U.S. and around the world spelled bound. It’s been especially rough on the battlefield where the Republicans (GOP), and Democrats to a lesser extent, are waging a new kind of politics. Also, it’s been said that this is…
As the 2016 United States presidential primary elections continue, there are a lot of things on everyone’s mind: issues such as health care, terrorism, immigration reform, and taxes; as well as questions about how to support a particular candidate. This election season has been particularly chaotic, sometimes stressful, and full of opinion, information, misinformation, and…
This past week Zimbabwe’s president, Robert Mugabe celebrated his 92nd birthday. In the midst of a severe drought and mass starvation, Mugabe spent a little over $800,000 with students singing, and with multiple politicians attending the event. Writing for Quartz Africa, Tanashe Mushakavanhu states that “To outside observers, it can be hard to reconcile how Mugabe…
United States President Barack Obama delivered his final State of the Union address on Tuesday, January 12. In his speech, Obama focused on a number of ideas, including the fact that America has never stopped being great, that diplomacy is a better way to deal with conflict, and that all Americans — regardless of differences in…
When you listen to Steve Hogan, mayor of Aurora, Colorado’s second-largest city, it’s difficult not to conjecture what’s on his mind, as he attends plenty of functions involving the African immigrants that are a part of the city he leads. These functions occur all over Aurora, each day of the week. Hogan, who is running for…
Every time U.S. President, Barack Obama makes a trip to the African continent something interesting happens. The media crowd, those who can’t stop saying negative things about the continent come out and begin their Africa mantra. They did this during Obama’s first stop in the continent as president in 2009. They did it when…
There is a cliché in the news business which says, ‘if it bleeds, it leads.’ It’s a reporter’s frame of mind when dealing with big news stories and events of the moment. By this maxim, there is a tendency for crises, and disaster-like events to garner much attention to the detriment of everything else. So,…