{"id":1620,"date":"2011-08-19T08:00:00","date_gmt":"2011-08-19T12:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/2011\/08\/naacp-paradigm-shift.html"},"modified":"2011-08-19T08:00:00","modified_gmt":"2011-08-19T12:00:00","slug":"naacp-paradigm-shift","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/2011\/08\/naacp-paradigm-shift.html","title":{"rendered":"NAACP paradigm shift"},"content":{"rendered":"Why does it matter that the NAACP wants an end to the War on Drugs?\n<p>\nLeonard Pitts Jr. wrote for the Miami Herald 30 July 2011,\n<a href=\"http:\/\/www.miamiherald.com\/2011\/07\/30\/2338455\/naacps-paradigm-shift-on-ending.html#ixzz1TiTvaxVK\">\nNAACP\u2019s paradigm shift on ending the Drug War<\/a>\n<blockquote>\n<a href=\"http:\/\/www.miamiherald.com\/2011\/07\/30\/2338455\/naacps-paradigm-shift-on-ending.html#ixzz1TiTvaxVK\">\n<img style=\"float:right;border:none;\"\nwidth=\"150\" height=\"150\"\nsrc=\"http:\/\/blogs.roanoke.com\/dancasey\/files\/2009\/12\/leonard-pitts1-300x300.jpg\"><\/a>\nHere&#8217;s why this matters. Or, more to the point, why it matters more than\nif such a statement came from Jesse Jackson or Al Sharpton. The NAACP is\nnot just the nation\u2019s oldest and largest civil rights organization. It\nis also its most conservative.\n<\/blockquote>\nConservative as in:\n<blockquote>\n&#8230;denoting a propensity toward caution and a distrust of the bold, the\nrisky, the new. And that&#8217;s the NAACP all over.\n<p>\n<a href=\"http:\/\/popartmachine.com\/item\/pop_art\/LOC+1103188\/%5BROY-WILKINS-SHAKING-HANDS-WITH-DR.-MARTIN-LUTHER-KING-AT-A-GATHERING...\">\n<img style=\"float:right;border:none;\"\nwidth=\"200\" height=\"148\"\nsrc=\"http:\/\/images.ewins.com\/digital_asset_manager\/image_resize.php?vi=421009&#038;mdx=400\"><\/a>\n&#8230;there has always been something determinedly middle class and cautious\nabout the NAACP. This is the group whose then-leader, Roy Wilkins,\nfamously detested Martin Luther King for his street theatrics.\n<p>\nFor that group, then, to demand an end to the Drug War represents a\nmonumental sea change.\n<\/blockquote>\nHow monumental?\n\n<!--more-->\n<blockquote>\nIt is time to concede what has long been apparent: you cannot jail\npeople out of wanting what they want. But, you just might be able to\ntreat and educate them to that purpose. Granted, that will require a\nparadigm shift some of us will find difficult to get our heads around.\n<p>\nBut if the NAACP can do it, you and I have no excuse.\n<\/blockquote>\nAnd we have no excuse to build a CCA private prison in Lowndes County, Georgia,\nto benefit profiteers from the War on Drugs.\nSpend that tax money on rehabilitation and education instead.\n<p>\n-jsq\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Why does it matter that the NAACP wants an end to the War on Drugs? Leonard Pitts Jr. wrote for the Miami Herald 30 July 2011, NAACP\u2019s paradigm shift on ending the Drug War Here&#8217;s why this matters. Or, more to the point, why it matters more than if such a statement came from Jesse [&hellip;]","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[97,1113,48,40,19,72,1867,2951,178],"tags":[8817,8705,8701,8709,8730,3924,7,2838,8845,8863,2712,3923,60,8749,82],"class_list":["post-1620","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-activism","category-cca","category-code-enforcement","category-community","category-history","category-incarceration","category-mlk","category-naacp","category-vlcia","tag-cca","tag-education","tag-georgia","tag-history","tag-incarceration","tag-leonard-pitts-jr","tag-lowndes-county","tag-martin-luther-king-jr","tag-mlk","tag-naacp","tag-rehabilitation","tag-roy-wilkins","tag-tax","tag-vlcia","tag-war-on-drugs"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p585fK-q8","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1620","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1620"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1620\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1620"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1620"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.l-a-k-e.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1620"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}