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Shirley Sherrod, who was forced to resign from her government job in Georgia based on incomplete and misleading reports of a speech she gave, has been offered a new job by Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack.

But, she said Thursday she is “not so sure.”

“I’m not so sure that going back to the department is the thing to do,” Sherrod told CNN’s “American Morning.”

Sherrod said she was offered some type of civil rights position in the Office of Outreach at the U.S. Department of Agriculture, and that she was expecting to receive something official in an email from the department.

“I need time to think about it,” Sherrod said, noting she wanted to see how committed the Agriculture Department was to addressing civil rights issues in the department. “I truly do need time to think about it.”

Click here to read more.

Roy Barnes Wins Democratic Race For Governor, Republicans In Runoff

Denise Dunbar — Wed, 21 Jul 2010 16:00:49 +0000

From the AJC.com:

Former Gov. Roy Barnes successfully completed the first step of his political redemption tour Tuesday, handily winning the Democratic nomination for his old job.

Almost eight years after being ousted by Sonny Perdue and becoming the first Democrat to lose a governor’s race to a Republican in modern Georgia history, Barnes overwhelmed a field of six other Democrats Tuesday.

Now Barnes can raise money and bide his time, waiting for Republican voters to decide in the Aug. 10 runoff whom he will face in November.

“Tonight is the beginning to take our state back from the lobbyists and the special interests,” Barnes told a crowd of about 300 cheering supporters in Atlanta. “This is the end of building fish ponds and not paying teachers. This is the end of passing legislation that makes us the laughingstock of the nation.

“It’s time, my friends, to make Georgia work again.”

Barnes weathered a tough primary fight from Attorney General Thurbert Baker, a veteran campaigner who has been running and winning races for more than two decades.

In a short concession speech Tuesday night, Baker said, “We came up a little short but we gave it our all, and that’s all you could ever ask.” He pledged to support Barnes in the general election and “do all I can to make sure he becomes the next governor of our state.”

Dennis Pius, 63, a home inspector from Marietta, said he voted Tuesday for Barnes because “he’s got more experience” than the other candidates, having served as governor.

Barnes’ upset defeat in 2002 at the hands of Perdue signaled the collapse of Democratic Party control of state politics. Within two years, both chambers of the General Assembly were solidly in Republican hands.

Barnes lost in part because his push for school reforms left many of Georgia’s more than 100,000 teachers feeling that he blamed them for poor test scores, high dropout rates and other problems. He’s spent much of the past year apologizing to teachers. And he’s raised more money than any of the other candidates.

Read the full story here.

Farmer’s Wife Says Fired USDA Official “Kept Us Out Of Bankruptcy”

Denise Dunbar — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 18:14:05 +0000

From the AJC.com:

The wife of the white farmer allegedly discriminated against by the USDA’s rural development director for Georgia said Shirley Sherrod “kept us out of bankruptcy.”

Eloise Spooner, 82, awoke Tuesday to discover that Sherrod had lost her job after videotaped comments she made in March at a local NAACP banquet surfaced on the web.

Shirley Sherrod Leaves USDA Over Racism Charge

Sherrod, who is black, told the crowd she didn’t do everything she could to help a white farmer whom she said was condescending when he came to her for aid. She said the video was selectively edited but regardless U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack was adamant that she resign.

“What he didn’t know while he was taking all that time trying to show me he was superior to me was, I was trying to decide just how much help I was going to give him,” Sherrod said in the video, recorded March 27 in Douglas in southeast Georgia.

But Spooner, who considers Sherrod a “friend for life,” said the federal official worked tirelessly to help the Iron City couple hold onto their land as they faced bankruptcy back in 1986.

“Her husband told her, ‘You’re spending more time with the Spooners than you are with me,’ ” Spooner told the AJC. “She took probably two or three trips with us to Albany just to help us out.”

Spooner called Sherrod Tuesday morning.

“She’s very sad about it,” Spooner said. “She told me she was so glad we talked. I just can’t believe this is happening to her.”

Sherrod told the AJC the damning video was selectively edited. She said the video posted online Monday by biggovernment.com and reported on by FoxNews.com and the AJC completely misconstrued the message she was trying to convey.

“For Fox to take a spin on this like they have done, and know it’s not the truth … it’s very upsetting,” said Sherrod, 62, who insisted her statements in the video were not racist. “I was struggling with the fact that so many black people had lost their farmland, and here I was faced with having to help a white person save their land. So I didn’t give him the full force of what I could do. I did enough.”

Sherrod noted that few news reports have mentioned that the story she told happened 24 years ago — before she got the USDA job — when she worked with the Georgia field office for the Federation of Southern Cooperative/Land Assistance Fund.

“And I went on to work with many more white farmers,” she said. “The story helped me realize that race is not the issue, it’s about the people who have and the people who don’t. When I speak to groups, I try to speak about getting beyond the issue of race.”

Responding to what he knew of the video Monday evening, Atlanta NAACP chapter president R.L. White recalled many years of unfair treatment against minority farmers when he told the AJC that the footage, at face value, “does suggest unfair treatment.”

“The playing table should be leveled,” said White, who wasn’t at the March event. “Everyone, regardless of race, creed or color, should be treated same way, regardless of the race of the administrator.”

Vilsack announced Sherrod’s resignation in a statement released to Fox News Monday night.

“There is zero tolerance for discrimination at USDA, and I strongly condemn any act of discrimination against any person,” Vilsack said in the statement.

Read the full story here.

Shirley Sherrod Leaves USDA Over Racism Charge

Denise Dunbar — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 17:03:02 +0000

From MSNBC.com:

A black USDA official in Georgia has resigned after publicly admitting she didn’t help a white man trying to save his farm to the “full force” of her power and instead referred him to “one of his own.”

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack said he had accepted Shirley Sherrod’s resignation, saying there was “zero tolerance for discrimination at USDA.”

Click here to read more.

The snipped of the speech in question:

It’s Primary Election Day!

Denise Dunbar — Tue, 20 Jul 2010 14:22:40 +0000

Voters will have their say Tuesday on who they want to be their next governor. Fourteen people want to replace Republican Sonny Perdue, who can’t seek another term because of term limits. Polls remain open until 7 pm. Be sure to take appropriate identification such as state or government issued ID. Examples of acceptable identification include a Georgia Driver’s License (even if it’s expired), a US passport, military or tribal photo ID.

On the Democratic side, former Gov. Roy Barnes is the clear front-runner. The biggest question in this race is whether Barnes — who’s looking to reclaim the job he lost in 2002 — will earn the 50 percent plus one of the vote needed to avoid a runoff. The latest poll shows Barnes has 59-percent of voter support; therefore, the only thing that could hold him back is whether enough of his supporters turn out to for the election. Barnes’ stiffest competition is Attorney General Thurbert Baker, running to become Georgia’s first African-American governor.

The Republican race is considered a toss up. Karen Handel has bounced to the top because of the endorsement of former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin. The latest poll has her tied with former U.S. Rep. Nathan Deal, who captured the endorsement of former Congressman Newt Gingrich. Polls show State Insurance Commissioner, John Oxendine, is in third place. A runoff is a near certainty in the GOP contest.

Every statewide office is also up for grabs, along with the state House’s 180 seats and the state Senate’s 56 spots. For Congress, three Democrats are facing opposition in the primary. On the Republican side, newly elected Rep. Tom Graves faces five challengers. And eight GOP contenders are vying to replace Republican Rep. John Linder, who is retiring after nine terms.

To find out where you need to vote, log onto www.sos.ga.gov/elections/.

Free Prescription Drug Cards

Denise Dunbar — Thu, 15 Jul 2010 12:22:02 +0000

Georgians can begin downloading a new discount prescription drug card which guarantees the lowest cost on prescriptions for the entire family. The Georgia Prescription Assistance Discount Drug Card Program was launched yesterday. The card is free and can be used at 60,000 pharmacies nationwide for both brand name and generic drugs. There are no enrollment forms, no restrictions and no age or income requirements. All people... Read more..

Justice Department To Sue Arizona Over Controversial Immigration Law

Denise Dunbar — Wed, 07 Jul 2010 16:00:15 +0000

From the New York Times:

The Justice Department filed a lawsuit on Tuesday against Arizona to challenge a new state law intended to combat illegal immigration, arguing that it would undermine the federal government’s pursuit of terrorists, gang members and other criminal immigrants.

The suit, filed in federal court in Phoenix, had been expected since mid-June, when Obama administration officials first disclosed they would contest the Arizona law, adding to several other suits seeking to have courts strike it down.

The federal government added its weight to the core argument in those suits, which contend that the Arizona law usurps powers to control immigration reserved for federal authorities. The main suit was brought by the American Civil Liberties Union, the Mexican American Legal Defense and Educational Fund and other civil rights groups.

The Justice Department argues the law would divert federal and local law enforcement officers by making them focus on people who may not have committed crimes, and by causing the “detention and harassment of authorized visitors, immigrants and citizens.”

“Arizonans are understandably frustrated with illegal immigration,” Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. said. “But diverting federal resources away from dangerous aliens such as terrorism suspects and aliens with criminal records will impact the entire country’s safety.”

The Justice Department suit is also aimed at stemming a tide of similar laws under consideration in other states. “The Constitution and the federal immigration laws do not permit the development of a patchwork of state and local immigration policies throughout the country,” the suit says.

Justice Department officials are “sending an unmistakable cannon shot across the bow of any other state that might be tempted to follow Arizona’s misguided approach,” said Lucas Guttentag, director of the Immigrants’ Rights Project for the A.C.L.U.

The Justice Department asked for a court injunction to prevent the Arizona law from taking effect as scheduled on July 29. Hearings in the other cases are scheduled for July 15 and 22. The law, signed by Gov. Jan Brewer on April 23, makes it a crime to be an illegal immigrant in the state and requires officers to determine the immigration status of people they stop for another offense based on a “reasonable suspicion” that they might be illegal immigrants.

Ms. Brewer assailed the federal lawsuit. “As a direct result of failed and inconsistent federal enforcement, Arizona is under attack from violent Mexican drug and immigrant smuggling cartels,” she said. “Now, Arizona is under attack in federal court from President Obama and his Department of Justice.”

White House officials said Mr. Obama was not involved in the Justice Department’s decision to sue. But the suit came after steps by Mr. Obama in an effort to frame the immigration debate in terms that will favor Democrats in advance of midterm elections in November, including a speech on Thursday when he restated his commitment to overhaul legislation that would give legal status to millions of illegal immigrants.

Read the full story here.

MARTA Board Approves Major Service Cuts

Denise Dunbar — Mon, 28 Jun 2010 19:27:06 +0000

From the AJC.com:

Come fall, MARTA will be a changed system.

In budget cuts the agency’s board approved unanimously Monday, 40 bus routes are going away. Trains will add wait times up to five minutes more each. Bathrooms will close to the public at 29 stations across the system. This will be the last year for shuttles to Braves games and the Lakewood Amphitheatre.

For the bus routes that do survive, there will often be longer rides because of detours to pick up stretches from eliminated routes. Altogether bus and rail service will decline by more than 10 percent.

MARTA CEO Beverly Scott called it “what I would venture to say was the most difficult budget this agency and this board has ever had to face.”

In addition, more than 300 MARTA employees will lose their jobs, starting Tuesday. Between them and vacant positions, MARTA’s workforce is shrinking by 14 percent. Two of MARTA’s four ride stores are closing, at Lenox and Lindbergh stations. Customer call center hours are cutting back, and there will be fewer agents at stations.

On weekends, trains will start at 6 a.m., not at 4:45 a.m.

MARTA receives much of its operating revenue from a sales tax levied in Fulton and DeKalb counties, and those revenues have declined in the sour economy.

The cuts approved Monday, however, are only half as bad as those proposed earlier this year. MARTA has scaled back the slicing a number of times: As early as a month ago it was planning to close all bathrooms but those at Five Points station. Now it intends to leave nine open, at some end-of-the-line and transfer stations. A small amount of bus and train service is being restored too.

Read the full story here.

Brother & Sister Brawl Over Mac And Cheese

Denise Dunbar — Thu, 24 Jun 2010 16:37:35 +0000

From Wenatchee World:

A culinary argument between a brother and sister about whether to use butter or margarine in macaroni and cheese turned violent, resulting in an attack with a knife-edged barbecue spatula, police say.

A 21-year-old man called East Wenatchee police on June 6 to say his 17-year-old sister had just attacked him and tried to cut his neck with the serrated edge of the spatula, wrote Officer Carrie Knouf in a police report filed in Douglas County Superior Court.

The sister told Knouf she was making macaroni and cheese when her brother asked if she was using butter.

“They began to argue over the difference of real butter to margarine,” wrote Knouf in the report.

The verbal argument escalated into a shoving match, and then the sister is accused of trying to cut her brother, Knouf wrote.

The girl was charged with fourth-degree assault June 10. She did not show up for a Wednesday hearing, so Douglas County Superior Court Judge John Hotchkiss issued a warrant for her arrest.

Campbell Soup Recalls 15 Million Pounds Of SpaghettiOs

Denise Dunbar — Fri, 18 Jun 2010 17:02:46 +0000

From CNN.com:

Campbell Soup Co. is recalling nearly 15 million pounds of canned SpaghettiOs with meatballs because of possible under-processing, the U.S. agriculture department said.

The recall includes 14.75-ounce cans with a use-by date between June 2010 and December 2011 of three varieties of the product: “SpaghettiOs with Meatballs,” “SpaghettiOs A to Z with Meatballs” and “SpaghettiOs Fun Shapes with Meatballs (Cars).”

Consumers who have purchased those products with a plant code of “EST4K” should not eat them and should return them to the store where they were purchased for an exchange or full refund, Campbell Soup said.

The company said in a statement that it was voluntarily recalling the products “in an abundance of caution,” and that there was “no information indicating that any under-processed product has reached consumers.”

Read the full story here.

McDonald’s Recalls Shrek Glasses

Free Major Mortgage Help Is Coming!

Denise Dunbar — Tue, 08 Jun 2010 13:29:09 +0000

Atlanta Mayor Kasim Reed calls the mortgage crisis shocking and he is doing something about it, by endorsing what he calls, “non-stop help.”

At a press conference this week, Reed said, ‘It’s a crisis that strikes at the heart of the middle class all throughout our city and those who make up the bedrock of our society are losing their homes in which they have invested their savings and built their lives and we need to do something to stop it.”

The City of Atlanta has given its approval to the nonprofit group, the Neighborhood Assistance Corporation of America (NACA) that will be at the George World Congress Center offering mortgage relief.

Last year, NACA attracted lines that wrapped around the Georgia World Congress Center. Thousands of homeowners facing foreclosure found help with NACA working out mortgage refinancing and repackaging of existing loans.

Because of its enormous popularity, this time, NACA is going “non-stop” from Friday morning to Tuesday evening (June 11-15). The doors of the World Congress Center won’t close. “That means for 100 straight hours. It’s actually a Save-a-Thon,” said Bruce Marks, President of Neighborhood Assistance. Regardless of when a homeowner shows up from Friday until Tuesday, Neighborhood Assistance experts will be there to help revamp loans and bring interest rates down.

“We are able to restructure mortgages, take the existing mortgages, reduce interest rates to as low as 2 percent and sometimes reduce the outstanding principal. People are saving $500 to $1,000 a month in a number of cases,” Marks said. “Everybody is eligible provided the home is owner-occupied, not an investor and they have an unaffordable mortgage. It doesn’t matter what the income is, what the mortgage amount is, and it doesn’t matter what the credit score is, “ Marks said.

All services offered are free to homeowners. For more information, log onto www. naca.com.

Sinkhole Closes Downtown Atlanta Street

Denise Dunbar — Tue, 08 Jun 2010 13:11:53 +0000

A major downtown street is shut down Tuesday morning after a water main break overnight caused a big sinkhole.

The hole, which measured about 20 feet by 8 feet and was about 10 to 15 feet deep, swallowed a couple of lanes of Centennial Olympic Park Drive at West Peachtree Place, near the Georgia Aquarium.

Crews from the Atlanta Department of Watershed Management are not surprised by the break, since the water main is nearly 100 years old and part of the city’s aging sewer system. Crews stopped the flow of water gushing from the 12-inch main by 5 a.m.

There was no word on when the hole might be repaired, and it could take days before the road is repaired and reopened.

Times Square Bomb Suspect Arrested Trying To Flee Country

Denise Dunbar — Tue, 04 May 2010 13:00:14 +0000

From CNN.com:

Authorities hunting for the suspect in the botched Times Square bombing dramatically beat the clock overnight, seizing a Pakistani-American citizen moments before he began a long trip to his strife-torn homeland.

Faisal Shahzad, 30, was arrested around 11:45 p.m. ET Monday at New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport, said Attorney General Eric Holder.

Shahzad will appear sometime after 2 p.m. ET Tuesday in federal court, the U.S. attorney’s office in Manhattan said.

The suspect is set to go before Magistrate Judge Kevin Fox. Charges will be read against the defendant, and the judge will determine if a bail will be set.

Shahzad was on board Emirates Airlines Flight 202 to Dubai, United Arab Emirates, and the jetway had been pulled back when the plane was called to return to the gate, a law enforcement source said. Shahzad was booked through to Islamabad, Pakistan, via Dubai, a senior airline official confirmed.

“They just caught him at the last second,” a law enforcement source said.

Security officials removed three passengers from the flight late Monday, including Shahzad — who was taken into custody, the senior airline official said.

Authorities searched the plane, luggage and checked all passengers again before the flight took off early Tuesday for Dubai minus the other two passengers who were removed with Shahzad, the airline official said.

Those two passengers have now been cleared and released, a federal law enforcement source said later Tuesday.

The source said the two “had nothing to do with this” but had been taken off the plane in an abundance of caution “in the rush of the moment.”

Cell phone calls helped lead police to the suspect in the failed bombing attempt, authorities said Tuesday.

Police have been engaged in a furious manhunt in the New York area for those responsible for an intended terrorist attack Saturday night in the heart of Manhattan’s Times Square.

Read the full story here.

Flash Flood Watches And Warnings

Denise Dunbar — Mon, 03 May 2010 16:39:58 +0000

A flash flood warning is in effect for most Atlanta area counties through Monday evening. This means the ground and weather conditions are favorable for flooding.

The rainy system that’s currently crawling over Georgia will dump as much as four inches of rain on some areas in Atlanta, and Central Georgia. Atlanta won’t see the extensive flooding that we saw a few months ago, but this system will cause ponding, or high accumulation of water on streets and highways, and this system will cause some creeks and streams to overflow.

DO NOT CROSS ROAD BARRIERS put up by authorities! Even if the road looks safe to drive on, the road structure underneath the water may be weakened and may not be able to sustain the weight of your car.

To get updated reports on road conditions or to report them to the Georgia Department of Transportation, dial 511.

To report power outages, call Georgia Power at 1-888- 891- 0938.