NJYankee, because that's all we know for sure. He was walking in the street on the way to his grandmother's house. And per the police chief, the police officer did not know that he was accused of shoplifting and bullying the shopkeeper, and that probably wouldn't even be allowed in court.

As for your question for Mr. Meredith, I would never dare to speak for such a giant of American history.

I will point you to [this Kerner Commission report][1] done after the urban riots of the 1960s. "Looting" is often an element of uprisings done for very valid reasons. That doesn't mean the looting is good; but it does mean that fixating on such a symptom is very shortsighted and won't solve anything.

This issue with Ferguson, regardless of the specific facts, is that African Americans are sick and tired of their unarmed children being killed by police officers and other whites, often without arrests, real investigation or prosecution. They are right about that, and our full society needs to try to understand the issue and help solve it. Otherwise, we are not civil, democratic or much more "free" than we were 50 years ago.

http://www.eisenhowerfoundation.org/doc…

[1]: http://www.eisenhowerfoundation.org/doc…

I'm correcting several errors on the roadmap above. I hadn't noticed the errors here until pointed out to me. We apologize. We know these dates well, but these errors got past factcheck and shouldn't have.

I'm a bit confused, though, why she's listed as a contributor when she tends to be paid by campaigns. This merits more research.

Here's a National Review article about her:
http://www.nationalreview.com/article/3…

Wow, what madness. I knew the name "Mitzi Bickers" sounded familiar. We reported that [she was one of Tony Yarber's top contributors][1] in the mayor's race this year.

[1]: http://www.jacksonfreepress.com/news/20…

I suspect that, too. Except for Republican African Americans, of course. It'll be interesting to see if the last-hour appeal to black voters works. The hypocrisy is stunning.

There is no freakin' way I would vote for someone who couldn't find it in himself to vote with the majority for a resolution apologizing for the federal government's refusal to stop lynching. And that's only one reason.

All those contrasting campaign cards going to "white" neighborhoods with one message and "black" ones with another is yet another reason.

I can't stand hypocrisy. Of course, that's what Mississippi politics is all about.

I'm not going to delete you if you will stay on topic. Complaining about the moderation is also against the user agreement. Either go along with it or not. We make our decisions, and your scolding of me will do nothing to change that. Be respectful of others, and start all the complaining about how you're treated when you're not, and you'll be fine. Your choice.

Here's a white-privilege quiz we ran in a GOOD Ideas issue on race dialogue a while back:

http://www.jacksonfreepress.com/news/20…

Because, JS, it's nicer than saying he was "whitesplaining." The problem is that Turtle crossed the line into condescending to someone of apparently another race and telling him how he and his whole race should act. That comes across as bigotry at best, and certainly violates our user agreement.

My job is to moderate this site. If you don't like that, take a hike.

Turtleread, do you really think you're treating Duan with respect with such "mansplaining" about how he should be acting and reacting? You are talking down to him, which is textbook privileged behavior. I'm sure you don't realize it, which is also textbook privileged behavior.