The Black Agenda, Open Primaries, Centrists, and Extremists

Fred Newman talks about Tavis Smiley, the Black Agenda, Rev. Al Sharpton, Minister Louis Farrakhan, Jessie Jackson, Cornel West and Karl Marx. While campaigns are underway in Louisiana and California for open primaries that would allow independents and decline-to-state voters to vote (right now parties are allowed to exclude these voters), voters in many states are registering into parties in order to vote in primaries. Centrist John Avlon's new book decries political extremes as "wingnuts". NYC Dems don't want charter revision ballot referendum items this year.


TALK TALK

• How Should Black Leaders Relate to a Black President? A Controversy. (Talk Talk with Fred Newman and Jackie Salit) Newman: What substantial improvements there have been for the black community, have come through blacks and others, particularly whites, working together. So, if these issues are being raised from the point of view of whether the entire problem of inequality has been solved by the continued use of an integrated strategy, what you’re really saying, in my opinion, is that the entire problem isn’t solved, period.
• You can view Tavis Smiley's Black Agenda Summit on C-Span here

OPEN PRIMARIES

• LA: Frenzied election season starts (By William Johnson, Daily World) If there are ever two or more candidates from any of the officially recognized parties — Democratic, Green, Libertarian, Reform and Republican — then the closed party primary election kicks in.
• CA: Are Republicans moving too far right to be elected? (By Thomas D. Elias, Highland News) Only when all voters can vote in all primaries will candidates need to appeal to the broad middle ground, unrepresented in California for decades as the right wing rules the GOP and a far left/organized labor coalition controls the Democratic Party.

VOTING IN PRIMARIES

• Kansas and Ohio Voters Look to Change Voter Registration Before Primaries (The State Column)
• CO: Primary ballots begin to take shape-Candidates who don’t get party nod still could petition to run (Steamboat Pilot, By Tom Ross)
• NC: Today last day to register for primary - Voters must submit new applications, or change existing ones, by 5 p.m. (David Anderson, ENC Today)
• NJ: Monday is deadline for nominations for political office in June primary (By John Barna, NJ.com Gloucester Co.)

PROP 14

• Voices divided on Prop. 14's potential effects (James Rufus Koren, San Bernardino Sun)
• Proposition 14 Increases Right to Participate in Primary Elections (CA Voter Guide)

CENTRISTS

• The Rise of Political Extremism and the Decline of Decency -- John Avlon discusses his new book "Wingnuts" (By Jessica Rettig, US News & World Report)

NYC CHARTER REVISION

• Panel hosts citywide public forums in April (by Michael Lanza, Assistant Editor, Queens Chronicle) “Out of any one issue that was represented, it was probably the non-partisan elections — because there were a lot of people from the Independence Party who testified,” Queens Charter Commission member Ernest Hart said. 
• The charter reform we need; Emulate the Koch model (By Scott Stringer, The Villager) If this new commission is to succeed, its work must be geared to developing proposals for the ballot in 2011, not later this year.
• No Rubber Stamp for the Mayor (By DAVID W. CHEN, NY Times/City Room)

NEW YORK

• Mayor asks 50,000 political donors to think of NYC (By SARA KUGLER - AP) New York City sends millions of dollars to political candidates nationwide, and the average New Yorker gives 2.5 times more money to federal candidates than other Americans, according to Bloomberg. During the 2008 election cycle, candidates collected more than $114 million from New York donors, second only to California.