• Michael Slager Fired After Being Charged With Murder of Unarmed Suspect

    Less than 24 hours after a shocking video showing Officer Michael Thomas Slager firing eight shots into the back of an unarmed man went viral, his firing from the police force has been confirmed. Slager claimed that he feared for his life after stopping unarmed Walter Lamar Scott, 50, for driving with a busted tail light last weekend. A bystander saw the altercation between both men and captured video of Scott running away from Slager as he slowly followed him repeatedly firing his weapon. A murder charge was quickly filed against the officer, and protests are planned for later today, April 8, in North Charleston.

  • Ray Stevens Defends 'Ahab the Arab' Many Call Racist

    Ray Stevens is a dyed-in-the-wool conservative, but he has long maintained his 1962 country hit "Ahab the Arab" is not a political statement. In fact, he has defended the song several times over the years, and he has recently been forced to do so again. The 75-year-old was asked by Nashville Gab if he still gets criticism. "Yeah, only from screaming liberal idiots," he replied, via The Boot. "You know, some guy on MSNBC called me a racist; I doubt if he'd ever heard the song." Stevens explained how the song, about a young Arabian man with a camel named Clyde who secretly courts one of the sultan's women, came to be. "When I was a kid, my mom gave me a book called 'Arabian Nights,' and I wrote the song just from information I learned outta that book," he said. "You know, the book talked about Ali Baba and the 40 Thieves and 'Open sesame' and, you know, all the fun stuff that is in that book. And so I thought, I'll write a [song] about this guy, and he's messing around with one of the sultan's girls in the harem. There's nothing racist about it." Here is a sampling of the lyrics: "And he'd say "[alleged Arabic content] "Which is Arabic for, 'Stop, Clyde! "Clyde would say "[alleged Arabic content] "Which is camel for, 'What the heck did he say anyway?'" Stevens sat down with Fox News's Bill O'Reilly in 2010 to discuss the tune. Here was part of the transcript, according to ThinkProgress:

  • Rosie O'Donnell Threatened to Quit 'The View' After On-Air Blowout with Whoopi

    Last Thursday, Dec. 18, Rosie O'Donnell and Whoopi Goldberg had their worst clash so far on "The View." What began as a discussion about how racism is actively affecting everyday life in the U.S. turned into a shouting match with Goldberg insisting that O'Donnell had no idea what true racism really is. Of course her statements were met with complete disagreement, and it was downhill from there. Apparently things were even worse behind the scenes, and once O'Donnell heard the conversation going on off-camera, she threatened to walk. According to a report by Radar Online, O'Donnell heard the staff discussing doing a split-screen between her and Goldberg and flipped: "Rosie heard several staffers talking about using a split screen if the fighting continued when taping resumed. Rosie went absolutely ballistic, pointing out that was the reason she had quit the first time. Racism is a very serious subject, and Rosie felt that the staff of the show was trying to exploit it for ratings. Whoopi and Rosie aren't even pretending to like each other on the air. It won't be the last time they spar. Needless to say, the crew is looking forward to the Christmas break. Both of them are acting extremely immature."

  • Will Rosie O'Donnell Exit 'The View' After Another Fight on Camera with Whoopi Goldberg?

    There has been so much talk lately about Rosie O'Donnell's unhappiness on "The View," mostly because of her almost-daily clashes with Whoopi Goldberg. If you have tuned in for even only a few minutes you will realize the tension that hangs in the air between these two. A few weeks ago, rumors started swirling that O'Donnell might not even make it the entire season without quitting, and after an ugly fight on camera between the two this morning, we almost have to wonder if ABC is hoping for that to happen. O'Donnell and Goldberg have not seen eye to eye lately on issues such as the Bill Cosby scandal or the Ferguson protests, and today they clashed over racism, with Goldberg insisting that O'Donnell had no idea what it is. Both Goldberg and O'Donnell addressed each other in a heated exchange that left the other women at the roundtable unsure of what to say.

  • Ex-NYC Mayor Rudy Giuliani: Darren Wilson's Case Should Never Have Been Before a Grand Jury

    Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani really gets heated when the topic of Ferguson comes up. In the last few weeks he has popped up on various news programs, insisting that while this case took on racial overtones early on, the problem actually starts with what is wrong within the community itself. Giuliani insisted on "Fox News Sunday" that Darren Wilson's shooting of 18-year-old Michael Brown never should have made it in front of a grand jury in the first place. "I don't see how this case normally would even have been brought to a grand jury. This is the kind of case — had it not had the racial overtones and the national publicity — where a prosecutor would have come to the conclusion that there is not enough evidence to present to the grand jury. [U.S.] Attorney General [Eric] Holder's gonna have to take a case in which a jury couldn't find probable cause to indict, and he's gonna have to try to find probable cause in front of a federal grand jury. It's an impossible case to present to a grand jury," said Giuliani. He also held firm to the notion that it is the community's job to get itself together and to work to bring the violence down among themselves. While it is the local police department's job to protect the peace, if people were treating each other humanely in the first place, then situations like Ferguson would rarely occur.
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