I’m quite familiar with Detroit. I’ve been there many times. I was born in Sandusky, Ohio, and I can see that many Detroiters are familiar with my hometown, too, as evidenced by the license plates of the cars snaking their way along the roads leading to Cedar Point.

Ohio has a Rust Belt problem, too. On two occasions (2002 and 2004) I was the Republican candidate for state representative in a portion of Ohio’s Rust Belt, encompassing Lorain, Oberlin, parts of Elyria, and the vicinity. I didn’t win the elections, as one would expect in such Democrat bastions, but I had a chance to think long and hard about remedies for Rust Belt decay as I drew up my own economic development plans for the district I hoped to represent.

It would take a book to detail each facet of what I envisioned, and even my own blog, to date, contains only a fraction of my proposals, so I don’t plan to elaborate much within this thread (it’s already a wall of text, as it is), but my approach to urban renewal differs from most other approaches I’ve come across. My approach is different because my assessment of the causes of the decay are different. While I readily agree that Detroit’s economy must be diversified to counter the prevailing trend, I do not think that the auto industry is at the root of the decay at all. Attitudes are at the root of the decay.

Once upon a time in a Fairy Tale land called Chicago, there lived a little boy named Tre. Tre lived with his mother in a two bedroom apartment in a run down housing complex. His father was a police officer killed in the line of duty.

Tre loved everything about seeing his father in a uniform. The pride he took in making sure his clothes were clean and pressed made Tre want to do the same. The time he spent talking to the every person he met on the street had opened Tre’s heart and allowed him to open his ears. But nothing compared to what Tre’s father gave him outside of his uniform.

Tre’s father loved Science. He was always in their little garage doing experiments with John, the boy next door. Tre was to small at the time to help with any of the experiments but he loved sitting and watching as his father tried, failed, and tried again. After his father died, John would often come over and continue the experiments.

HIV/AIDS is a leading killer in the African-American Community not only because of the rate at which African-American people engage in sexual activities and participate in the drug culture but also because they are not using preventative measures which are available to them.

The isolation of mentally ill people in Group Homes, from the society and from the communities in which they live, is the bases upon which Federal Judge Nicholas Garaufis, on September 8th, 2009 ruled that New York State, in its use of large Adult Group Homes, had violated The Americans with Disabilities Act.

Two Black men who all but gift wrapped someone the police had been looking for couldn’t possibly be concerned about public safety, like, two White men in the same position. Needless to say that tells us there are many moons to go in inner city/police relations. Were it not so tragic it would be funny because receptions like these provoke a community gag order when officers come around asking if onlookers have any information about a crime under investigation. When I was a kid, the welcoming committee in blue may have tried to arrest us for simply entering a precinct under color of Blackness. Is our experience progress- well, it’s something.

It’s ironic. When Democrats (including key Black Democrats) wanted Secretaries of State Powell and Rice to “fail” under the Bush Administration (i.e., not deliver the goals set forth by the Bush Administration in the best interests of the American people), it was not out of racism and not wanting to see the first two Black secretaries of state to success. Of course, it was out of principle against the Bush foreign policy.

Too close to home is all I think of in learning of the death of another one of my nearest and dearest friends from breast cancer this morning. The latest victim entered the hospital in July and is dead today less than six weeks from initial presentation. Of the six of us who hung together in high school and for class reunions, three are dead of breast cancer.

Andrew Simon is a young black Canadian conservative and former Vice President 2004-2006 of the Campus Conservatives at the University of Calgary in Calgary, Alta. He has worked and volunteered for Lee Richardson, a Member of Parliament Calgary, Alta. Andrew Simon is also the radio host of HHR Blog Radio here he speaks about minorities and the future of the Republican Party.

Some master mind boggler wove a magic spell over Inner City America and took a culture that produced dignity against all odds and replaced it with what we see on a daily basis. If I could find him I’d give him an exorcism courtesy of my size 15 foot!

Today is what would’ve been Marcus Garvey’s 122nd birthday. Although liberal black nationalists have incorporated his Pan-African perspective into their philosophy, they have willfully neglected the fact that Mr. Garvey – who was an admirer of Booker T. Washington – was a staunch capitalist.

There is very little proof that MLK was a Republican. Most of the evidence is hearsay and unconfirmed reports. In the past, this blog has linked and published writings by contributors claiming that MLK was a Republican. We have stopped providing such links and articles because the writers have not given us any scholarly proof [...]

Thoughtful, cool, almost cerebral, Yosef Abrahamson is not your average Crown Heights Brooklyn Lubavitcher Chasidic Orthodox Jewish black teen Republican from Omaha, Nebraska. Then again, the 17-year-old two-time winner of the NYPD’s “Commissioner for a Day” essay contest is not exactly average anything, either.

I was shocked to learn about the history of the democrat party and how that party laid the foundation that has influenced race relations in America in the past. Those past political actions by the democrat party continue, to this day, to exploit the impoverished condition of black Americans, which were caused by the democrat party for the purpose of gaining political power.

The fact that persons of color such as President Obama and Sotomayor are taking positions of power in our society is a great thing and it means we are living up to the promise E Pluribus Unum. But that also means we as persons of color have to be big boys and girls and take the slings and arros that come on the political stage.

As a fellow Puerto Rican, I am proud to see Sotomayor being considered, and hope that she will make a good justice. But that Pride doesn’t mean tossing her softball questions.

From health to education, CNN’s “Black in America 2” will investigate some of the most significant and challenging issues facing African-Americans. Airing on July 22 & 23 at 8PM (ET), host Soledad O’Brien focuses on emerging leaders, innovative community programs and business ventures that are addressing the most persistent and pressing issues and disparities facing African-Americans.