quote:

His mother, Julia Jackson, calls for something else, too. Two days after the shooting, with her son fighting for his life, she begins her public remarks softly, almost inaudibly, but her own words seem to give her growing strength, and finally a profound resonance. She says that her son would not be happy with the damage to his community. “As I have prayed for my son’s healing, physically, emotionally, and spiritually, I also have been praying, even before this, for the healing of our country,” Jackson says, and she goes on: “We are the United States. Have we been united? Do you understand what’s going to happen when we fall? Because a house that is against each other cannot stand. To all of the police officers, I’m praying for you and your families. To all of the citizens, my Black and brown sisters and brothers, I’m praying for you. I believe that you are an intelligent being just like the rest of us. Everybody, let’s use our hearts, our love, and our intelligence to work together to show the rest of the world how humans are supposed to treat each other. America is great when we behave greatly.”


Her words fall like a healing rain over the grief and the fires of this terrible year. She speaks to the whole country, to our shared humanity, and our desperation. Julia Jackson has given the essential speech of 2020, the one we most need to hear.

quote:

As Republican Sen. Rand Paul left the White House on Thursday night, he was surrounded by a group of protesters and was escorted by police to a nearby hotel.

The scene was captured on video by The Washington Post. The footage shows officers using their patrol bicycles to create a barrier between Paul, his wife and the crowd as the protesters walked around them and shouted "no justice, no peace," "justice for Breonna Taylor" and "you need to respond."

quote:

Often at odds with his party's leadership, Paul has long advocated for criminal justice reform legislation in the Senate. In June, he introduced a Senate bill to ban no-knock warrants called the "Justice for Breonna Taylor Act."