Blackinformant.com – African-American culture, news commentary, politics

(latimes.com) Los Angeles County Supervisor Yvonne B. Burke, who was elected to represent some of the county's poorest neighborhoods, is living in a gated Brentwood home, despite laws requiring her to reside in the predominantly South Los Angeles district she serves. In an interview with The Times two weeks ago, Burke said it was only on weekends and special occasions that she used her Brentwood home — a 4,000-square-foot residence with ...More

(northjersey.com) PATERSON -- Someone stole 1,000 gallons of water from Daisy Valdivia's backyard. And they didn't spill a drop. Valdivia woke Wednesday morning to find that her family's inflatable pool, hip high and 10 feet in diameter and filled with water, was stolen from her backyard in the middle of the night. There is no evidence that the water was poured out, pumped out, evaporated or drunk. "I've never heard of a ...More

(ars.usda.gov) Just in time for bathing suit season: a leaner, meaner watermelon that boasts all the refreshing flavor and good-for-you nutrients of many conventional varieties, but contains more than 50 percent less sugar. Agricultural Research Service (ARS) plant geneticist Angela Davis in Lane, Okla., is the chief breeder of two new low-sugar melons that should be a welcome treat for dieters, diabetics and everyone else wishing to curb their sugar or ...More

(foxnews.com) SAN DIEGO — Leonard Nimoy isn't through with Spock yet. The 76-year-old actor will don his famous pointy ears again to play the role in an upcoming "Star Trek" film due out Christmas 2008. "This is really going to be a great movie. And I don't say things like that lightly," Nimoy told a gathering of 6,500 fans Thursday at Comic-Con, the nation's largest pop-culture convention.(more...) Good lawd! Is the man ...More

(seattletimes.com) Workers accused of concocting the biggest voter-registration-fraud scheme in state history said they were under pressure from the community-organizing group that hired them to sign up more voters, according to charging papers filed Thursday. To boost their output, the defendants allegedly went to the downtown Seattle Public Library, where they filled out voter-registration forms using names they made up or found in phone books, newspapers and baby-naming books. One defendant "said ...More

(AP via blacknews.com) CHICAGO -- The yellow school bus rumbles through vacant lots and past demolished buildings on a tour of what was once one of the most dangerous neighborhoods in the country. For the woman with the microphone, the "Ghetto Bus Tour" is the last gasp in a crusade to tell a different story about Chicago's notorious housing projects, something other than well-known tales about gang violence so fierce that ...More

(sfbayview.com) I was more than a little irritated that none of the people caring for him were African American. Why, I wondered, were there no African Americans in vital jobs that are critical to our community’s health and, moreover, provided good salaries and incredible self-fulfillment? I looked for an answer. Here’s what I learned: California is facing a serious and dangerous shortage of personnel in every health care field. In fact, ...More