In a statement Saturday, Univision apologized to viewers and anyone who was offended, calling the material “unacceptable.”

The skit on the the program “Despierta America” was a parody of the upcoming World Cup soccer tournament. It showed characters in Afro wigs clutching spears and dancing to faux jungle music.

Local civil rights activists Earl Ofari Hutchison and Eddie Jones called the skit demeaning.

The Univision statement said disciplinary action was taken but it did not eleborate.

LOS ANGELES

The decrease in gang violence in recent years has led some experts to theorize that gangs are now working together.

The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) in Los Angeles told La Opinión that although they are not investigating a particular case of collaboration between rival gangs, they are aware of a trend in which gangs of different ethnicities are working together.

“We know Latino gangs are working with African-American gangs to get drugs or arms, and we are already doing intelligence work,” said Robert Clark, special agent with the FBI’s Criminal Division. “It’s a trend we are seeing among different groups. And I think if they see an opportunity to collaborate across these barriers, they’re going to take it,” he added.

Although the LAPD media department said they had not heard of gangs working together, Deputy Chief Michael Moore told La Opinión that they have started to see a “blend” among rival gangs.

“I’m not surprised. The purpose of gangs is to make money,” he said. “And although it’s something we hadn’t seen before, I can tell you that we’re aware of it.”

County and federal attorneys have yet to take legal action against these groups, and local police authorities are not investigating any cases related to collaboration between gangs. But the phenomenon is already taking place on the streets of Los Angeles, according to one gang expert.

Robert Lyons, a detective who has worked for years in the gang division of the Los Angeles County Sheriff’s Department and who did not return calls from La Opinión before the close of business, told the Wall Street Journal that rival gangs like the Bloods and the Crips in South Central Los Angeles had joined together in criminal enterprises.

“They were talking to each other. There were hugs and handshakes. It was incredible,” said Lyons. “Now, instead of having 200 arch enemies fighting against another 200, you have 400 working together against law enforcement agents,” he said.

However, Aquil Basheer, a renowned expert who trains gang interventionists at the organization Maximum Force Enterprise, indicated that this phenomenon is not occurring in some gangs in Los Angeles.

“It seems like they are trying to create a monster so they can get more resources to suppress it,” he said. “And although that’s needed, there is no proof that the gangs are uniting. I think they’re forgetting that the point is to get resources to prevent young people from getting into that life,” he added.

Recently, several members of the Latino gang Hawaiian Gardens were accused of hate crimes against African Americans in what was considered the largest operation ever conducted by local and federal law enforcement agencies.

Authorities have targeted individual gangs in their recent operations; law enforcement has never gone after two gangs that were considered to be rivals.

There are an estimated 41,000 gang members in the city according to the LAPD, and 85,000 in the county according to a report by the California Gang Outreach Committee. Given the number of gang members in the Los Angeles area, this phenomenon seems very far from reality, according to Basheer.

The gang problem has long been a headache for Los Angeles authorities. In the last few years, they have declared an open war on gangs, with huge operations deploying local and state agents, legal restrictions, and efforts in prevention and intervention by the city.

Authorities say these actions have contributed to a historic decline in gang-related crime, which in 2009 was 11 percent lower than the previous year, and 33 percent lower than in 2002, according to the LAPD.

For Earl Ofari Hutchinson of the Urban Policy Roundtable, cooperation between rival gangs can occur only at the level of mafia-style organized crime, as was the case between Jews and Italians during Prohibition in the 1930s.

“Rival gangs are still killing each other, at least those small gangs that fight over graffiti or turf,” he said. “But it wouldn’t be a surprise to see that maybe they’re not going to work together, but at least they’re not going to work against each other,” he added.

Courtesy of New American Media

President Barack Obama, Professor Henry Louis Gates Jr. and Sergeant James Crowley walk from the Oval Office to the Rose Garden of the White House, July 30, 2009.

There once was a Harvard Professor named Gates,
Who came back from China quite late.
Alas, his door was quite jammed.
Then with his shoulder he slammed
But the door wasn’t about to cooperate!

An elderly lady had viewed the whole scene,
And begged Lucia Whalen to intervene.
Her 911 call summoned Cambridge’s finest.
Four squad cars with the bravest,
And Sergeant James Crowley leading the team.

Now the Professor was inside on the phone.
Property management needed to come to his home.
He thought they had arrived pretty quickly,
But instead it was only Crowley.
“Sir, could I speak to you alone?”

The Policeman requested some ID
Though signs of a break-in he didn’t see.
Professor Gates got very upset,
And promised Crowley he would regret
Profiling a black man such as he.

“Sir, the burglary report had to be heeded
And it wasn’t my intention to have you mistreated.
If you just tone it down,
In a few minutes I’ll head back to town.
My coffee and donuts to be completed.”

The Professor was shocked and dismayed.
“Is this a joke that’s being played?
Or is it because I’m black,
That you’ve gone on the attack?
If I was white would you have been so afraid?”

The Policeman escorted the Professor outside.
“You’ll be charged for disorderly conduct if you don’t abide.”
“But I’m in my own home!” he did shout.
“Can’t a black man in America be given the benefit of the doubt?”
So back to the station he did ride.

Was this racial profiling, I ask?
Should the Policeman be taken to task?
Or if the Professor had kept his cool
Maybe he wouldn’t have been made a fool.
Given a mug shot for his Halloween mask!

Predictably, Ann Coulter and Al Sharpton appeared on Larry King,
To discuss this horribly overblown thing.
She claimed that racial profiling doesn’t exist,
Then he vented that it always persists
Well, what do you expect when two clowns enter the ring?

Alas, the real racist did appear!
A Boston cop named Justin Barrett did declare.
He ranted and retorted,
“How could Boston Globe’s Abraham have supported
The respected Professor’s side in this affair?”

Barrett’s take on the issue was quite candid.
Had it been him the resolution would have been splendid.
He would have donned his pointy hat and white suit,
And sent Gates back to his roots.
After that his fall from grace was quite rapid.

Well, President Obama ultimately weighed in.
Defending his friend who had been
Treated stupidly by Cambridge’s best.
But his comments only increased the tempest.
Polls the next day registered the President’s chagrin.

Quick to undo his folly,
The President decided to host a jolly
He proclaimed, “I have all the power,
So let’s host the first Presidential Happy Hour.”
Men everywhere cheered: “Good Golly!”

So the Professor, the Policeman and the President
Met on the White House lawn for a “teachable moment.”
With their beer glasses in the air
They regretted that Lucia couldn’t be there.
For better relations with Iran, could this be a precedent?

So what have we learnt from this incident my friends?
Despite a black President, we try to pretend.
Disagreements between the races
Are still headed in the wrong places.
Simple common sense and respect would have made amends.

Andrew McIntyre is a contributer to Carib Press

Photo from The White House Blog (official White House photo by Pete Souza)

Promotional photo of Kamala Devi Harris as she filed her initial paperwork at city hall for her 2010 run for CA Attorney General.

San Francisco District Attorney Kamala D. Harris has announced her candidacy for California Attorney General. Born in Oakland, California, to a Jamaican father and an Indian mother, Harris is the first African-American woman to serve as a district attorney in California.

She was elected District Attorney in December 2003 and reelected to a second term in November 2007. A graduate of Howard University and the University of California, Hastings College of Law, Harris began her legal career as a Deputy District Attorney for Alameda County, California, which includes the City of Oakland. There she specialized in prosecuting child sexual assault cases.

In 1998, Harris was named managing attorney of the Career Criminal Unit in the San Francisco District Attorney’s Office. Two years later she served as head of the San Francisco City Attorney’s Division on Families and Children.

According to her campaign website (www.kamalaharris.org), Harris, who opposes the death penalty, has increased the homicide conviction rate in the San Francisco District Attorney’s Office. Critics, many of whom come from the San Francisco Police Department, accuse Harris of being slow and overly selective in the prosecution of murder cases.

“Justice does not necessarily occur if you put all the expectations of the community, all the resources that are necessary to putting on a trial, just to ‘go for it,’ knowing that you don’t have the evidence to convict,” Harris said in response to her critics in a 2006 San Francisco Chronicle article. “Because in that process a guilty man is getting away with murder, and the community is certainly not winning.”

Harris is not the first African-American woman to run for California Attorney General. In 1978, US Rep. Yvonne Brathwaite Burke won the Democratic nomination, but lost in the general election to Republican State Senator George Deukmejian, who eventually became Governor of California.

Robert Wheaton is a writer for Carib Press.

Photo from Wikipedia

Gallery Plus in Leimert Park features a changing inventory of African-American art.

While many of us are checking our budget in tough times, there is a reason for optimism in Leimert Park Village, a cultural center of African-American life in Los Angeles.

The optimism shone forth during a June 6th book fair that came with the theme of “Celebrating Our Literary Legacy: Our Heritage, Our Words, Our Stories.”

Carib Press headed to Leimert Park Village — between Downtown Los Angeles and the beach city of Santa Monica — for the 3rd annual edition of the book fair on June 6th.

It soon became clear that walking is the way to take in the sights of the book fair, which set up shop on Degnan Boulevard and 43rd Place. The pedestrian-friendly village has a growing number of small businesses, including coffee houses, jazz clubs, restaurants, retail shops, and a farmers’ market every Saturday. There are more than 20 small shops lining both sides of the boulevard and a look at their wares shows an inventory of artifacts from around the world.

Ackee Bamboo Jamaican Cuisine restaurant is a relative newcomer to this established community, and it appears to have earned its spot. The place has been serving up authentic Jamaican style cooking for the past three years.

Marlene Sinclair, owner of Ackee Bamboo, says there are always exciting things going on in the village. She’s about to add to the excitement, too, with plans for an expansion project that will bring Adassa’s Cafe and Entertainment next door to her restaurant.

The Gallery Plus store in Leimert Park Village

Laura Hendrix, who owns Gallery Plus, says that the art store has been in Leimert Park Village for 18 years. She offers an array of African-American art, and the stock changes each time she returns from buying trips.

And there have been buying trips, despite the lagging economy.

“Business has been pretty good these days,” she said.

Augustus Muhammad spent time at the recent book fair promoting books of poems from a grassroots perspective.

“I was inspired by my father to write poems,” Muhammed said. “My father was searching for a positive and productive way for me to be creative with a positive perception of self.”

Haitian Entrepreneur and filmmaker Uscla “Johnny” Desarmes visited the book fair to promote his movie, titled “Life outside of Pearl.”

“I am pushing it at a grassroots level,” he said, adding that he wants to sell 500,000 copies of the movie with proceeds to benefit infrastructure work in Haiti.

The Africa By the Yard store

Oran Z of Pan African Black Facts and Wax Museum proudly displayed a waxed figure of Levar Burton in his vendor booth. His museum on 3742 West Martin Luther King Jr. Boulevard, a mile from Leimert Park Village, has a large selection of black artifacts, postcards, black wax figures, and a reference library. He says he plans to work on a poster of the legendary reggae artist, Bob Marley. He has coined himself a Posterian — someone who tells stories out of pictures and poster art.

The Leimert Park Village Book Fair encourages reading, writing, and literacy in Los Angeles and other Southern California area communities. The Book Fair provides the community access to writers and their work — and gives writers and spoken word artists a place to network with other artists, exhibitors and sponsors.

Face painting, clowns, storytellers, a crafts pavilion, and a special performance by Mayseo the Magician, were featured in the Children’s Village. A poets’ stage, Farmers Market, cooking demonstration, outdoor theatrical performances from the Pasadena Playhouse Theatre Players and the Towne Street Theatre, along with musical entertainment, rounded out the book fair.

Cynthia Exum is the producer and coordinator for the Leimert Park Village Book Fair. Various arts beyond literature were incorporated in this years’ event because “organizers are committed to supporting the community and parents with creative ways to encourage reading and writing,” she said.

Sheannette Virtue is a writer for Carib Press.

Photos by Carib Press