Earl Ofari Hutchinson

The GOP convention organizers made much of the announcement that former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, former Democratic Congressman Artur Davis, and Mayor Mia Love of Saratoga Springs, Utah, would be among the featured speakers at the convention.

Two reports issued the same day told of two appalling realities. One report on poverty was based on an Associated Press survey finding that the poor are getting poorer, and more numerous than at any time in the last half century. The other report from the Tax Justice Network found that the super-rich are getting richer, and they are squirreling their money away to the tune of tens of trillions in offshore tax havens that are far outside the reaches of the U.S. and other nation’s tax collectors.

President Obama and top Democrats repeatedly have exuded cautious confidence that the Supreme Court tomorrow will uphold part or most of the Affordable Care Act. Underneath their strained optimism, the Obama administration almost certainly knows that politics, not law, will ram its way into the court’s final decision.

Less than two weeks before his death, I was scheduled to interview Rodney King on the public stage at the annual Leimert Park Book Festival. I had two conflicting thoughts about the interview. One was that if the well-worn term “accident of history” ever applied to anyone, it was King. The second was what made King, twenty years after that fateful night that his beating by four white Los Angeles police officers was captured in shocking detail on videotape, still made him such as enduring figure, name and most importantly, a symbol.

Presumptive GOP Presidential candidate Mitt Romney got exactly what he wanted last week at the Universal Bluford Charter School in West Philadelphia. That was the ultimate photo-op. He had a room filled with black teachers, administrators and at times, smiling students. But most importantly he had banks of TV cameras and reporters recording his every move and word at the school.

The bullet-riddled tee shirt of President Obama, posted brazenly on Facebook by seven semi-automatic gun-toting men among them a Peoria, AZ, police sergeant, was much more than the standard non-stop litany of racist cartoons, depictions, web postings and kooky loose talk threats against him.

There is no surprise in the recent Pew Research survey on Mormonism on one issue:

[Editor’s Note: An interview with Mark Lundberg, Chairman of the GOP in Sioux City, Iowa.]

Ron Paul will win the Iowa Caucus whether he actually comes out on top or not.

An interview with David Frum, editor of the FrumForum.com