Well, the most recent entry I found was from August 3rd, so perhaps Glenn Reynolds has finally decided to shut the hell up:
TED TURNER LAND-GRAB UPDATE: The Associated Press has picked up on the Ted Turner / Gullah legal conflict.
Michael Moore and Doonesbury remain silent, however.
The previous entry, from July 21st, gives a few more details:
TED TURNER GULLAH LAND-GRAB UPDATE: Democratic weblogger WyethWire has more information on Ted Turner's efforts to wrest a parcel of land on St. Helena Island, S.C. away from a group of descendants of slaves who want to keep the land from being developed. (If the second, permalink, doesn't work -- as has been all too common with Blogger sites lately -- follow the first link and scroll if needed). He has links to maps and all sorts of other information. Excerpt:
And to add insult to injury, the island that Ted Turner wants to turn into his own playground is home to the Penn Center, where Dr. Martin Luther King and the Southern Christian Leadership Conference planned the March on Washington.
I'm quite surprised at how little attention this story has gotten beyond these reports in local papers. Is it because of some sort of professional courtesy among media barons?
I like the wording in that one. "[A] group of descendants of slaves". What percent of the black people in this country does that describe? I'm gonna go out on a limb and say "most".
Most definitely applies to these guys:
Two hundred members and supporters of the Black Farmers and Agriculturalists Association spent their July 4 sitting in at the U.S. Department of Agriculture's regional offices in western Tennessee. The group alleges that the federal government has mishandled operating loans for local African-American farmers, and it ended its five-day sit-in only when U.S. Secretary of Agriculture Ann Veneman agreed to meet with the farmers and discuss their grievances.
Since 1996, African-American farmers have lost their farms at a rate three times higher than white farmers and, according to the association, the Agriculture Department routinely delays or denies them farm-operating loans and disaster relief. Of the 16,000 farmers who received federal funding in 1985, only 209 were African American. In 1999, 20,000 African-American farmers won a class-action suit against the Agriculture Department (Pigford v. Glickman). The feds agreed to compensate each farmer $50,000 for discrimination suffered between 1981 and 1996. To date, 40 percent of those awards have yet to be dispersed.
Link via Tapped, which also mentions a Washington Post article on the same issue.
Anyone waiting on Instapundit to comment on this with anywhere near the vehemence he directed at Ted Turner, I hope you packed a lunch.
Spelling out my objections for the slow learners, seems to me Glenn was only railing about the Gullah dispute because it let him sling accusations of racism at evil liberal(?) Ted Turner. If it was anyone else messing with the little brown people, he wouldn't even pretend to give a fuck.
I would, of course, be thrilled to be proven wrong about this.
Glenn was making a point about media standards, not race. The WP story about the black farmers actually reinforces his point -- when government wrongs minorities, you get a major media cover story on it. When a media baron does it -- relative silence.
He's not making a hypocritical pretense of defending black interests. He's making a (for him) wholly consistent critique of the media.
You've never been to Indianz.com, have you?
That's ok. Neither has Glenn, apparently.
Er, no. Why?
Not to be a dullard....
I was freaked out when I saw this.
Then, I looked at the WaPo article you linked and I'm not sure now if it's the gov or the plaintiff's attorney messing up a settlement.
From that article: "Some farmers are now circulating a mock "Wanted" poster, describing Pires as a "snake in the reparations grass." Gary Grant, head of the Black Farmers and Agriculturalists Association, the nation's largest such organization, filed a motion last month to have the court fire Pires for incompetence."
I also read:
"The lead plaintiff, a North Carolina farmer named Timothy Pigford, withdrew from the case in frustration; 60,000 farmers missed a filing deadline, so their claims cannot be considered; and the nation's largest black farmers' organization is still staging protests across the country against the terms of the settlement."
None of this was mentioned over at the Policy Action Network write-up you quoted.
Clearly the "Since 1996, African-American farmers have lost their farms at a rate three times higher than white farmers..." is fucked up. The resolution of the settlement on the other hand seems to be largely because of the lead attorney.
As all the conservative/libertarian boys hide in this thread. . .
Sorry, given a choice between another pointless political debate, where no one learns anything, no one changes their mind and it all turns into name-calling, and Rebecca Blood in leather. . . what's the matter? Don't you like girls?
Gentrification-causing mugs.
Indianz.com pretty much daily has stories not picked up by the major media about little brown people getting hosed, Davey. Don't remember seeing any of them on Glenn's site. But, whatever, you're right, he's a watchdog, pointing out their hypocrisy, yadda yadda yadda.
Now, if you'll excuse me, Rebecca Blood in leather.
"Indianz.com pretty much daily has stories not picked up by the major media about little brown people getting hosed, Davey. Don't remember seeing any of them on Glenn's site."
So because he doesn't address ALL of them, he can't address ANY of them.
I get it! You're right!
Suppose I could take the time and trouble to make sure Rupert Murdoch has never, ever been involved in a land dispute with aborigines in Australia, but that really wouldn't prove anything either.
This was all about attacking Ted Turner and theliberalmedia, which you pretty much said yourself. For Glenn to make a point of using the words "descendents of former slaves" is the bit that bothers me. If, as you say, he's not defending black interests, why even say that? And especially using those words?
Whatever. I see he's moved on to attacking DC statehood, comparing their population with Knoxville (which is, y'know, in a state) rather than, say, Wyoming.
The "descendants of former slaves" bit was moronic hyperbole. Although you see variations on that a lot when you read about Gullah culture. Since the islanders have managed to preserve a comparatively large chunk of their African cultural heritage (thanks, isolation!), it tends to strike writers that whoa, these people are descendants of slaves!
"What percent of the black people in this country does that describe? I'm gonna go out on a limb and say 'most'."
Right.