Tonight I will be appearing on the O’Reilly Factor w/Bill O’Reilly. The show airs at 8:00PM. We’ll be talking about Snoop Dogg and his recent troubles.

I will also be on Showbiz Tonight on CNN Headline News at 11:00PM, where we’ll discuss Madonna’s adoption controversy.

With the Congressional balance of power in serious jeopardy, the Republican Party has reached into its same old bag of dirty tricks. In Tenessee, where former Chattanooga Mayor Bob Corker and Democratic Rep. Harold Ford Jr. are in a close contest for the Senate seat, a new ad has emerged from the Republican Party that stinks with racism.

In the ad, a young white actress playing the stereotype of a “dumb blonde” talks about meeting Ford, a 36-year-old bachelor who is black, “at the Playboy party.” At the end of the ad, she winks and says to the camera, “Harold — call me.”

Of course, there is some truth to the ad. After all, Ford did appear at a playboy-sponsored event last year. Although the women were wearing bunny costumes rather than the lingerie that certain Republicans have referenced, the image certainly stands in contrast to the Ford-endorsed commercial filmed from a church pew.

Nevertheless, this latest tactic doesn’t merely point out Ford’s alleged moral contradictions. More importantly, it raises deeply rooted Southern (and American) anxieties about White women and Black male bodies.

Although Corker has denounced the ads, he still benefits from its effects. In fact, by demanding that the ad be taken off the air, he not only gets to reap racist rewards, but also assuage the guilt of liberal racists who are looking for an excuse not to elect Ford.

Hopefully, this “Southern Strategy” will backfire and push Ford past Corker. More likely, however, the tactics will work and Ford will lose for all the wrong reasons.

It’s that time again… Feel free to answer these and/or add your own.

1.    Doesn’t it feel a little racist when White people say, “That’s so ghetto?”
2.    Isn’t hard to have sympathy for multimillionaires like Wesley Snipes who commit tax fraud?
3.    Now that Flavor of Love is over, is the “Wendy Williams Experience” going to be our new guilty pleasure?
4.    If Madonna was really attempting to help African people, why not adopt a parentless orphan and give the father enough money to raise his own child?
5.    Shouldn’t Barack Obama listen to Bill Clinton when he says it’s too early to run for president?
6.    On the other hand, given Hillary’s interest in the presidency, isn’t it hard to take Bill Clinton’s advice too seriously?
7.    Does Ice-T know that his new hip-hop reality show makes a mockery of everything he stood for?
8.    If Joe Lieberman wins this election as an independent, will he finally stop pretending to care about the Democratic Party?
9.    Didn’t Dr. Dre leave game out to dry?
10.    Now that he’s doing TV commercials again, has America forgotten about Kobe’s rape case?
11.    Doesn’t Google’s purchase YouTube feel like the end of a good thing?
12.    Why does everyone keep asking about Deelishis’ baby daddy?
13.    Isn’t urban morning radio boring now that Star is off the air?
14.    Now that Tiki Barber has announced his retirement, will more athletes learn to walk away at the top of their game?
15.    Why are the “State Property” movies so damn entertaining?
16.    Now that Janet Jackson and Beyonce have put out terrible albums, will R&B singers learn to separate their relationships from their careers?
17.    Am I the only one who’s desperately waiting for the PlayStation 3 to come out?
18.    Will anybody purchase Farnsworth Bentley’s new album?
19.    Why do Black people with PhDs s get asked why they’re giving political commentary on television when Rush Limbaugh only has a high school diploma?
20.    Isn’t it a bit ironic that VH1 hosts the annual “Hip-Hop Honors” since it proudly refused to play hip-hop for more than a decade?

Last night, activist and author Keith Boykin gave a speech at Central State University about LGBT issues. Unfortunately, like many HBCUS, CSU’s homophobic culture made it a long night. Below is an excerpt of his reflections on the speech. The rest can be found through the link to his site at the end of the article.

The Worst Speech of My Life
By Keith Boykin

Last night was an eye opener. In the 10 years I’ve been giving public speeches, I’ve never faced a crowd like the one in Wilberforce, Ohio Tuesday evening. I often talk about sensitive issues in my speeches, so I don’t expect everyone to agree with me when I take to the podium. Although most of my speeches go off smoothly, there have been a few times when things went wrong. I’ve been protested, challenged and questioned several times before. I’ve even seen a few people get up and walk out in the middle of a speech. But I have never spoken to any audience where dozens of students actually booed and jeered and hissed. Until last night.

Last night I was a keynote speaker for the annual convocation at Central State University in Ohio. Central State is a historically black college with a long and proud tradition of educating African Americans. So I was really looking forward to speaking to an educated black audience about homophobia in the black community. I was also looking forward to joining my friend and colleague Staceyann Chin, who was the other keynote speaker for the event. But my optimism quickly turned to disappointment only moments after I walked on stage.

Welcome to Central State

With 400 students in the auditorium, I started my speech by greeting everyone. “Good evening Central State,” I said. From there, I noticed that half of the audience started paying attention. But a number of the students continued to talk amongst themselves in the audience. Some students fidgeted in their seats. A few even turned away from the stage and engaged in conversations with their peers. I knew then it would be a tough audience, but I’ve had tough audiences before and I can usually figure out a way to win them over.

I began my remarks by talking about how happy I was to be at Central State, and I reflected briefly on the importance of my own educational experience in shaping my identity. That seemed to get a few more students to pay attention, but I noticed that dozens of students were still not engaged at all. Many of them were still talking. And it was obvious.

I’ve spoken to several black college audiences before, so I knew that the speech would have to be a little different from my speeches at mostly white colleges. Black students tend to engage in more “call-and-response” behavior and are often more interactive with the speaker. I usually like that. I don’t like speaking to a group of empty faces with blank stares. I like to see the heads nod in agreement or even shake in disapproval. And I like to hear the soft musical sounds that black people make when we listen to a speaker. But last night was a little different.

Coming Out In the Black Community

Five minutes into my 20 minute speech, I started telling my “coming out” story. I talked about calling my mother on the phone and being confronted by my religious grandmother. But almost as soon as I mentioned the word “gay,” several people in the audience turned hostile. About a dozen students stood up and walked out. That was the first major warning sign.

For the rest of the story, click here.

Why sharing your body and sharing your money are very similar processes
Dr. Boyce Watkins

Sharing your money with someone you don’t trust is an incredibly quick path to financial destruction. The wife of the ex-CFO of Enron went to prison for tax evasion because of her husband’s complicated financial dealings. I read a story about a super model in New York who lost millions because she allowed her step father to control her assets. Who you choose to allow access to your money has an unimaginable amount of power over you. Giving away this degree of trust is not something to be taken lightly.

1. It can take you to heights you have never imagined Financial security can be a wonderful thing.

Couples are usually better off than singles, except for after divorce. A marriage is an opportunity for you to utilize the advantages of specialization to dramatically increase your personal and family income. Also, you are diversified, so your wealth is protected when you have a partner who cares about you and pulls their financial weight in some way.

2. Size does matter

But as we all know, more size is not always better. Sometimes having an asymmetry in the size of financial endowments for both partners can cause tremendous discomfort and frustration.

3. It is possible to be used, cheated on, and betrayed in the process

There is a long list of horror stories about one family member making bad financial decisions that left the other family members completely devastated. Sometimes, the events are going on behind your back the entire time, and you don’t learn what is going on until it’s too late.

4. It is only fun to share the process with someone who knows what they are doing

Trying to learn to save and invest with someone who doesn’t know what they are doing can leave you both out of sync and wishing you were doing something else WITH someone else! If you are finding that 1 + 1 = -2, then you should probably take your finances elsewhere!

For the rest of this, article click here.

Boyce Watkins is a professor of finance at Syracuse University and the author of multiple books, including the forthcoming “Financial Lovemaking.” To read more about this, go to: http://www.myfinanceprofessor.com/