raceAhead: The Midterm Results Keep On Coming

By Ellen McGirt

Here’s your week in review, in haiku

From there to here, from

here to there: one vote, two votes

red wave or blue wave?

“The video makes

clear that Acosta’s wrist is

a lethal weapon.”

I have watched enough

House of Cards to know that Ruth

didn’t just “fall down”

I’m looking forward

to the Conway holiday

newsletter this year!

Three hundred and twelve

chances for thoughts and prayers:

It’s been a long year.

Sending extra love and safety wishes to the people and first responders fighting the #WoolseyFire; extra love and gratitude to all veterans and their families. Take good care, everyone.

RaceAhead will return on Tuesday, November 12.

On Point

Lucy McBath wins in GeorgiaIt may be the most poignant of victories, a squeaker that was worth the wait. McBath became an activist and a candidate after her son, Jordan Davis, was shot and killed by a man who was irritated by the music he was playing in his car. But McBath is more than a one-issue leader; she was a consistent voice for progressive, no-nonsense reform. "For me, I was looking beyond my own tragedy, looking for the other tragedies that were most definitely going to happen if I didn't keep talking about this crisis," she told CNN. Her Georgia house seat was a Republican stronghold, once held by Newt Gingrich.CNN

The rainbow tsunami you didn’t know was coming

Come to find out, some 157 openly LGBTQ candidates have been elected so far in state or local contests during the midterms, including at least three gay or trans Republicans. According to the LGBTQ Victory Fund, this includes lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans, queer, and intersex candidates. Here’s just a snippet: Jared Polis became the first openly gay man elected governor of a U.S. state, Betsy Driver is a new intersex member of the Borough Council in Flemington, N.J., and two trans women — Gerri Cannon and Lisa Bunker —are joining the New Hampshire state legislature. Click through for more.

Into

One of the other things you didn’t see coming

Some 59 Republican judges were voted out of office in Texas on Tuesday. Two might be familiar to the raceAhead crowd. Harris County judges, Judges Glenn Devlin and John Phillips, had become notorious for their harsh sentencing of juveniles. The two accounted for more than one-fifth of all the children sent to state juvenile facilities; many of the offenders skewed younger than those sentenced by other judges and were often incarcerated for less-serious offenses. Some 96 percent of the kids were black or brown. Yesterday, Devlin nodded to the voters by releasing up to ten minors before his court. “If I release you, are you going to go out and kill anybody?” he was quoted as saying. More about the Houston Chronicle investigation into the two judges here, more on the election below.

Washington Post

Magic Johnson means business

There are always new entrants into the sit-and-chat-about-your-life genre of video, but Kneading Dough is turning out to be the real deal. The show is produced by Uninterrupted, the digital media company founded by LeBron James and his business partner Maverick Carter, and focuses on athletes, their business lives and their money. The series, hosted by Carter, launched with All-Star and Golden State Warriors forward Draymond Green who shared his dream of start-up investment success. Carter’s most recent guest was Magic Johnson, who talked about how he developed his executive excellence. “I didn’t listen to nobody,” he said. “You know what stamped me as a serious business man? That deal with Starbucks.” Enjoy.

YouTube

The Woke Leader

A personal full-court press

The country’s premiere documentary film festival, DOC NYC, starts this weekend. If you’re in Manhattan, then check out Life Without Basketball if you can. It’s the heartbreaking true story of Bilqis Abdul-Qaadir, a young, Muslim, African-American basketball phenom whose dreams of a professional career were dashed when a controversial ruling from the international governing body of basketball (FIBA) prevented her from wearing hijab while playing. While she fought the rule, she began training the next generation of Muslim girl athletes, a dream deferred while paying it forward. The trailer is one of the most compelling I’ve seen in ages.

The Shadow League

Policy matters in policing

The idea that addressing the small signs of disorder—broken windows, graffiti, panhandling, subway fare-beaters, would prevent more serious criminal activity, took root in the 1990s, and changed the way the NYC police department focused their efforts. It turns out that “broken window” policing was not only utterly unsuccessful, it created problems that have destroyed entire communities.

NPR

What never to ask a prison wife

This is, in part, a romantic tale of a tragic post-high school romance and break-up, and a reunion decades later. Except in this case, the Romeo in this star-crossed tale is incarcerated. “I have many identities: I am a (single) mother, first and foremost. I am a master’s student. I am a full-time employee during the day. And I am a prison wife,” says Heather Moore in this honest personal account of how she navigates the dicey personal politics of life while her husband is in prison. She rarely tells people at her job, and she is used to the judgmental sniffs of the corrections officers. And yet, in her own way, it works. “I would like a little bit of empathy,” she says. “I've never been happier in my life, but I still have days when I struggle.”

The Marshall Project

Quote

To sit on the front steps — whether it’s a veranda in a small town or a concrete stoop in a big city — and to talk to our neighborhoods is infinitely more important than to huddle on the living-room lounger and watch a make-believe world in not-quite living color.

Harvey Milk