Tag: Harold C. Ford
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Daughter of immigrants, Mona Hanna-Attisha details Flint’s disaster and hope: an analysis
“It is easier to build strong children than to repair broken men.” Frederick Douglass (Dr. Mona Hanna-Attisha’s favorite quote) By Harold C. Ford Several dozen area residents gathered at the Flint Public Library Jan. 9 to hear Dr. Mona Hanna-Attisha reflect on Flint’s proud and challenging history, including the evolution of and response to the…
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Review/Commentary: “Destiny of the Republic” a timely look at an honorable president
“When he (James Garfield) was still a very young man, he had hidden a runaway slave… In Congress, he fought for equal rights for freed slaves. He argued for a resolution that ended the practice of requiring blacks to carry a pass in the nation’s capital, and he delivered a passionate speech for black suffrage…‘Let us…
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Educare Flint a model for education reform: “What kids need…what kids deserve”
by Harold C. Ford A broad coalition of public and private organizations—led by the Flint-based Charles Stewart Mott Foundation—publicly launched a dazzling new state-of-the-art school that will provide early childhood education for 220 Flint children from birth to age five. Educare Flint opened its doors to students on Dec. 4, less than a year after…
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“Where are the journalists?” Part Three: As pixels replace paper, journalism still aims to hold powerful to account
This three-part series, concluding with this installment, aims to explore, analyze and lament how many forces challenging the Fourth Estate are playing out in our own community – specifically in a close look at changes in The Flint Journal, now dwindled to a local staff of fewer than 10 people, and subsumed by M-Live Media…
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“Where are the journalists?” Part Two: Capturing the heart of the community
By Harold C. Ford This three-part series aims to explore, analyze and lament how many forces challenging the Fourth Estate are playing out in our own community – specifically in a close look at changes in The Flint Journal, now dwindled to a local staff of fewer than 10 people, and subsumed by M-Live Media…
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“Where are the journalists?” Part One: threats to local news persist as Flint Journal dwindles
“Congress shall make no law…abridging the freedom…of the press…” First Amendment, United States Constitution “Journalism is the only profession explicitly protected by the U.S. Constitution, because journalists are supposed to be the check and balance on government. We’re supposed to be holding those in power accountable. We’re not supposed to be their megaphone. That’s what…
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Detroit 1967: a movie, a book, and a searing memory of when the riots hit Flint
by Harold C. Ford “A riot is the language of the unheard.” —Martin Luther King “The officer hit him and said, ‘We’re going to kill all of you black-ass nigger pimps and throw you in the river. We’re going to fill up the Detroit River with all you pimps and whores’” –from The Algiers Motel…
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Pipe replacement crews dig in: “This is personal”
by Harold C. Ford Almost any day recently on a beat-up block of Copeman Boulevard in northwest Flint, beyond the cacophony of politics, lawsuits, economics, and science that is the Flint Water Crisis, you’ll find a gritty band of workers laboring to resolve a tragedy. Some are guided, in part, by a sense of altruism.…
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Book Review: Sing for Your Life, a Story of Race, Music, and Family
by Harold C. Ford In 1994 at the age of 12, Ryan Speedo Green was taken forcibly to Virginia’s infamous DeJarnette Center after he threatened to kill his mother and his brother. The lowest point for Green at DeJarnette may have been when his downward spiraling behavior landed him in solitary confinement, as related by…
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Glory days in rearview mirror for Flint high school sports: resurrection might be in the works
By Harold C. Ford Flintstones (basketball): The name of the Flintstones rose to prominence during the successful run of Michigan State basketball including three consecutive Final Fours and a national championship. The four (Mateen Cleaves, Morris Peterson, Charlie Bell, Antonio Smith) made up the core nucleus of the team…played together since elementary school…and made…
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