Robin Adams Cheeley: Putting my two cents on the latest news | Columnists

Robinson is a hustler and a charlatan, doing whatever he can to stay out of public unemployment. His decade-old article about paying for his then-girlfriend’s abortion is likely close to who he really is — a black man struggling, willy-nilly, to survive in America. I think much of what he says and does now is intended to appease a rabid group willing to tolerate any madness under the guise of morality or respect for fundamental religious principles.

Before becoming the state’s highest black elected official, he lost his furniture-making job, he says, because of NAFTA, filed for bankruptcy three times and had privileges imposed on him. by the IRS.

After getting the attention he received at a Greensboro City Council meeting where he talked about guns, he saw an opportunity to make money and took it and is still taking advantage of it. a chance to get paid. He likes to brag, needs the money, and the right can use him as a card to some of my best friends who are black.

What he’s realized is that smooth, loose talk makes him money. Durham-based INDY Week found that Robinson’s campaign donations are increasing after he made outrageous claims. So he gives people what they want.

The day after a video of him referring to transgender and homosexuality as ‘dirt’, he received the most contributions up to that point, bringing in $48,256 in one day to 561 people.

So he rants about black elected officials, black Democratic voters, LGBTQ people, ‘Black Panther’ movie makers, President Joe Biden, Black Lives Matter, Jews, Muslims, and anything that motivates his followers to dig. and to give. He knows where the money is.

None of his campaign posts made it clear what Robinson does for a living. In fact, he viewed his campaign cash as his personal money and accrued many questionable expenses that have yet to be explained.

Last year, a campaign finance watchdog noted that Robinson’s campaign:

Spent $2,840 at Lake Gaston Outfitters in Littleton, a specialty sporting goods store, for “country clothes and accessories.” Who wears scuba gear or brings a fishing rod to campaign events?

Withdrew $2,400 in cash from his campaign without explanation. Under state law, you are only allowed to withdraw $50 without a detailed description.

Reimbursed his wife $4,500 for campaign clothes.

Billed $186 in campaign medical bills.

Does he believe everything he says, or does he say it because he needs to keep a job and maintain his lifestyle, and the $133,365 paycheck he and his wife are living on? are used to? Only he knows for sure. But as voters, you can all continue to support him and elect him governor in 2024 or tell him to find a real JOB.

Thank you, U.S. Senator Cory Booker, for coming to the rescue of Judge Jackson as she wrapped up three days of grilling by Senate Republicans. I wish you could address these words to some of your colleagues, especially the senses. Ted Cruz, Josh Hawley, Marsha Blackburn and Lindsey Graham. These gentlemen and ladies needed a good conversation.

When Blackburn, R-Tenn., asked Jackson to “provide a definition for the word ‘woman,'” I knew we had long since strayed from the required advice and consent of Congress when the president nominates a candidate. to the Supreme Court.

His question and many of those of his fellow Republicans had more to do with submitting to a right-wing fear of an anonymous bogeyman in the closet than with determining Judge Brown Jackson’s qualifications for the court. After all, she hadn’t been charged with sexual assault or had the distinction of being the least qualified candidate in the last 30 years.

Judge Jackson got where she is because she can and did the hard work. She knows what it’s like to be a black woman interviewed by white men who think you’re there because you’re a black woman fulfilling a non-existent quota; and by black men who think you took something from them and white women who swear you don’t understand the harms of being a woman. She’s old enough and has enough melanin in her skin to know she had to work twice as hard.

But Senator Booker, I understand why you may have taken this approach. If you had pursued the real culprits, you would be considered violent and the aggressor. Your words and your image would have been food to feed the right-wing media. Too bad that’s your only option.

But unless something drastic happens, Justice Jackson is set to become the first black female justice on the Supreme Court. And while that won’t erase the pain she’s had to endure, it seems like a just reward.