Three candidates have emerged as finalists for the national NAACP's top position, the Free Press has learned.
But an undercurrent of discontent over the choices of a special NAACP search committee may force the nation's oldest civil rights organization to find an alternative from within its own upper ranks.
According to sources who wish to remain anonymous, the three finalists for president and chief executive officer are:
• Benjamin Todd Jealous, 35, a former executive director of the National Newspaper Publishers Association and now president of the Rosenberg Foundation in California;
• The Rev. Frederick D. Haynes III, 47, a Dallas megachurch leader;
• Alvin Brown, 37, a former White House senior advisor to President Bill Clinton and urban policy director for Sen. Hillary Clinton's campaign.
Contacted at the NAACP's Baltimore headquarters this week, Richard McIntire, a spokesperson for the national organization, would neither confirm nor deny the names. However, he did say the first opportunity for the NAACP's 64-member board to take any action would be at its May 16 and 17 meeting in Baltimore.
Leaks have sprung from what was to be a highly guarded process because of the antipathy with which the three finalists are viewed by many insiders....

Over the past 40 years since the assassination of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr., extensive advancements have been made in the Black community.
 For example, the African-American high school graduation rate has increased by more than 214 percent and the college graduation rate for African-Americans has increased by more than 400 percent, according to the Institute for Policy Studies in a special report released last week.
However, at the rate of the advancements over the past 40 years, in most instances, it would take more than another decade for Blacks to catch up with the current graduation rate of Whites

"I'm about to blow the top off of everything I saw," writes Bruce Williams, longtime friend and former right-hand man to successful rapper and record executive, Dr. Dre, one of the best hip-hop mega producers of all time and the brains behind the record label Aftermath.
In "Rollin' With Dre: The Unauthorized Account," by Williams with Donnell Alexander, Dre's former go-to guy gives readers an inside look at the roller coaster that is hip-hop culture."
You can see Williams in the flesh at noon, Saturday, April 12 at Barnes & Noble Bookstore, 300 Andover Park W., Suite 200 in Tukwila.

Mahki Sanders 12 and Malcolm Tyson 11, read some of the biography of Paul Robeson at the 11th annual Paul Robeson Peace and Justice Awards,  April 5 at the Montlake Community Center. The event is sponsored by Mother's for Police Accountability and honors community members who fight for justice,  This years honorees included the ACLU: Voter Restoration Project-Coalition Partner of the Year; Christie Hedman, of Washington State Defenders Association-Lawyer if the Year; Black Student Union, Foster High School-Youth of the Year and Jenna Stephens, Volunteer of the Year.

What's happening for me in Portland this week? Read here a day-by-day diary of free community events to fill your week. For a full calendar please click on "Read the complete article" below....

Jobtini
Job Seeking with a Twist

May 21 2008

MISHAWAKA, Indiana (AP) _ A political tempest over Barack Obama's remark about bitter small-town voters who "cling to guns or religion" has given rival Hillary Rodham Clinton a new chance to court working class Democrats 10 days before Pennsylvanians hold a primary that she must win to keep her presidential campaign alive.
Obama tried to quell the furor Saturday, explaining his remarks while also conceding he had chosen his words poorly.
"If I worded things in a way that made people offended, I deeply regret that," Obama said in an interview with the Winston-Salem (North Carolina) Journal.
But the Clinton campaign fueled the controversy in every place and every way it could, hoping charges that Obama is elitist and arrogant will resonate with the swing voters the candidates are vying for not only in Pennsylvania, but in upcoming primaries in Indiana and North Carolina as well.
Political insiders differed on whether Obama's comments, which came to light Friday, would become a full-blown political disaster that could prompt party leaders to try to steer the nomination to Clinton even though Obama has more pledged delegates. Clinton supporters were eagerly hoping so.
They handed out "I'm not bitter" stickers in North Carolina, and held a conference call of Pennsylvania mayors to denounce the Illinois senator. In Indiana, Clinton did the work herself, telling plant workers in Indianapolis that Obama's comments were "elitist and out of touch." ...

BRADENTON, Fla. (AP) -- Gen. Andrew Jackson's early 19th century hunt for Angola ended with the Florida settlement's destruction. Documentarian Vickie Oldham is now trying to find remains of the old Florida town, the Southeast's last major outpost for free Blacks and fugitive slaves.
Since 2002, Oldham has worked to bring the story of Angola to life. A former television reporter in Sarasota, she has recruited historians, archaeologists and educators to produce a documentary, Web site and educational materials about Angola.
But its exact location in the Tampa Bay area remains elusive -- although some promising clues have recently been uncovered.
Historians say finding Angola would give new insight into Florida's role as a safe haven for runaway slaves. It would also highlight the state's violent transition into a bastion of bondage.
"They were making it on their own,"

Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson released an ambitious and far-reaching plan to revamp and consolidate regulation of the U.S. financial services system. The 218-page Blueprint for Modernized Financial Regulatory Structure, which Paulson described as a two- to eight-year reform plan, makes the Federal Reserve the "market stability regulator" to manage overall liquidity and systemic risk within the financial system, and advocates eliminating the thrift charter and merging the Office of the Thrift Supervision into the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, ideas that ICBA has vigorously and consistently opposed. ...

Tre Turner and James Watkins, both 11, were among the children enjoying hoola-hooping at the Roots and Wings Festival, at the Lloyd Center last Saturday. Andi Wilson, a member of HoopShine, a hoola hoping group helped lead the activities. An educational event for families, the festival included storytelling, a Native American drumming circle, a kids parade, juggling, a puppet show and a yoga demonstration. A wide variety of social service organizations and nonprofits sponsor the festival which aims to support families.