Mfume

Michael Mfume, the Morgan State student who wrote, produced, directed and appears in "The Weekend It Lives," has told a Sun reporter that it isn't "Citizen Kane."And it isn't.So let's begin with the good news. The good news is that at least for a while, the movie is engaging. A somewhat crude tracing of a somewhat crude original (Sam Raimi's "The Evil Dead"), it follows as a group of college students head off to a house in the country for a weekend of partying and then are assaulted by a large zombie fellow with a machete and an ax.Chop chop, snap snap, and the group is reduced by half.

WASHINGTON -- House Speaker Newt Gingrich said yesterday that he planned to "swap districts" with Rep. Kweisi Mfume and spend a few days in Baltimore this spring as part of an effort to enlighten House Republicans and members who represent minority districts about each other's worlds.But Mr. Mfume, who spoke with Mr. Gingrich about the program this week, appeared less than enthusiastic about the idea when asked about it yesterday. He said he would "reserve judgment" about the program and hold off his support until he learned more about it and was convinced it had a well-defined purpose.

INDIANAPOLIS -- U.S. Rep. Kweisi Mfume, chairman of the Congressional Black Caucus, told the NAACP convention yesterday that civil rights activists "must focus anew on corporate America" in trying to achieve economic equality for black Americans."

NAACP President Kweisi Mfume has called upon the Justice Department and congressional leaders to investigate alleged discriminatory practices against African-Americans and Latinos -- in Baltimore and nationwide -- who have been denied mortgage loans.Mfume's remarks came on the heels of Thursday's national release of the 1997 Home Disclosure Mortgage Act report.Compiled by the Federal Financial Institutions Examination Council, which is part of the Federal Reserve System, the report lists the number of home mortgage loans that were granted across the country last year based on racial, geographic and income levels.

THE HISTORIC event occurred on July 8, 2002, in Houston. Mark it on your calendar. It doesn't happen often, and indeed may never happen again. But a black leader in America, the one who heads the country's oldest, most powerful and influential civil rights group, actually used the dreaded "b" word. And he used it immediately after the word "black." Here is the precise quote of NAACP President Kweisi Mfume as revealed in news reports on the organization's annual convention, which concluded last week in Texas' largest city.

Hours before the first bombs fell on Baghdad, Iraq, Tanika Saunders, a seventh-grade student at the William H. Lemmel Middle School, picked up her pen. The neat script captured the innocence of youth and the belief that a war could somehow be averted."

WHEN the president of the NAACP announced that the group is filing a class-action lawsuit against gun manufacturers and distributors to end practices that are putting guns in the wrong hands, it was the first big news to come out of the NAACP in years.The civil rights group has been criticized for being sleepy, irrelevant, out of touch with grass-roots black folks, not to mention its sex scandals and money problems. But it's finally showing signs of life again.At its annual convention this week in New York City, President Kweisi Mfume also threatened to lead a boycott against the major television networks for putting together a fall lineup of shows that doesn't have a single person of color playing a leading role.

YOUR EDITORIAL of Jan. 20, ''Mfume rebukes his own,'' missed the mark. First, Justice Clarence Thomas was never slated to appear at a ''youth rally.'' Nor was the sponsoring group a Boys and Girls Club. Adult Delawareans were the sponsors and expected attendees at the planned fund-raiser.Young people were to be involved only as some of the proceeds were promised to the Boys and Girls Club of Delaware.Thus Mr. Thomas was misleading in saying, as he withdrew, that he was doing so ''for the safety and well-being of the children involved.

STANDING prominently in a bold, black, pin-striped suit amid Howard County's elected Democrats as they publicly endorsed U.S. Rep. Benjamin L. Cardin for the U.S. Senate last week was an unelected, yet formidable, figure: the Rev. John L. Wright, longtime pastor of First Baptist Church of Guilford. The feisty clergyman served for more than seven years as chairman of the Maryland branch of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, from 1986 to 1994, after heading Howard County's chapter.

Someone tell Kweisi Mfume that Louis Farrakhan is not worth agonizing over, and that the Baltimore congressman's comments on the most recent example of hate-speech from the Nation of Islam were, shall we say, inadequate.No more hand-wringing, please. What has happened is not, as Mfume said last week, "a cause of concern." It does not create "a climate of unparalleled concern." And it does not "cry out for clarity." It cries out for full condemnation by Mfume and a complete and final divorce from Farrakhan.