Editorial

As the #MeToo movement gains momentum and the penalties for even being accused of sexual harassment are increasingly severe, society must not circumvent judicial due process in order to prevent injustice.

While ethnic issues are indeed important there are often other considerations of greater significance than the questionable concept of race. As blacks become more involved in sophisticated political, business and professional activities, personal commitments regularly emerge more forcefully than binding ethnic ties.

Minister Louis Farrakhan wants “to change the world.” His contribution to this effort is a collection of music, from classical to the blues, that has been developed with the collaboration of outstanding musicians of all ethnicities. While Farrakhan is well known as a fiery advocate for the rights and interests of blacks in America, he has also been acclaimed since his youth as a gifted musician.

Well before Boston’s building boom erupted, Elma Lewis Partners, LLC had been granted development rights for Parcel P-3. The imaginative plan was to construct housing, office and retail buildings along the now barren site that had been levelled in an earlier plan to extend Interstate 95 through Roxbury and the South End. That highway plan failed and the present P-3 Project under the management of Feldco Development is about to follow suit.

It is clear that during the era of lynchings, black lives did not matter in the South. The callous shooting deaths of unarmed black men by the police, who rarely suffer prosecution for their conduct, seems like a continuation of racial terror lynchings. Is it any wonder that many African Americans believe today that black lives still do not matter to the police?

While poverty is by definition a lack of funds, the problem is not always cured by giving money without conditions to those in need.

The fundamental premise of a democratic government is that voters will support those policies that benefit them, and they will oppose issues that are harmful. The problem in America is that society has become so complex that it is often difficult to determine whether or not a government policy is really beneficial. Republicans are often willing to finance expensive and sophisticated public relations campaigns to delude voters into supporting conservative policies that the middle and working classes should oppose. A prime example of this is the campaign against the Affordable Care Act.

Petitions to change the name of a public way in Boston are usually perfunctory matters. According to a report in the Boston Globe there have been only six petitions since 2011. However, the petition initiated by John Henry, the principal owner of the Boston Red Sox, to change the name of Yawkey Way outside Fenway Park, has stimulated considerable controversy.

The problem with artificially reducing a state’s population today is that it will deprive the state of deserved federal funds. About $600 billion in federal spending is allocated according to population. Accurate census data determine who gets what benefits. That is an issue that does not rank very high on the Republican agenda.

Even though America has developed well beyond the pioneer days when covered wagons traveled west, the philosophy of rugged individualism still prevails. As they say, “you eat what you kill” as a hunter. As a farmer, if your crops are destroyed by the vicissitudes of nature, then you had better have good relations with the neighbors. The point is not to expect any assistance from others, especially from the government.

Few protest slogans irritate whites more than “Black Lives Matter!” In the wake of numerous police shootings of unarmed blacks, this slogan is in defiance of the unlawful police assault on black men. How can whites assert that it is inappropriate?

Holy Week has slipped by this year with little public notice or celebration. The days following Palm Sunday usually generate great solemnity among Christians as they prepare for Easter. The evangelicals are usually among the most ardent Christians, but publicity about the sexual rampages of Donald Trump seems to have stifled their open Christian ardor.