I’m sure I’m not the only one who almost started singing the Doxology when I seen for the first time the Serena Williams cover of the new ESPN Magazine.

Williams is one of several high profile African-American athletes including NFL player Adrian Peterson, NBA’s Dwight Howard and U.S Olympian Michelle Carter who participated in the “Body Issue” of ESPN Magazine. All models are naked with private parts concealed for obvious reasons.

Of course some are questioning the decision of some of the athletes posing in the magazine. But others applaud a mainsteam magazine applauding the beauty of black women.

Obama image found hanging on Kentucky campus

. Authorities at the University of Kentucky are trying to find out who hanged a life-sized stuffed doll of Democratic presidential candidate Barack Obama on campus (the bottom of the display is pictured). The Obama likeness was found hanging from a tree on campus Wednesday morning, college spokesman Carl Nathe said. Police immediately took it down. School President Lee Todd says that he plans to personally apologize to the Obama family on behalf of the university and that he is “personally offended and deeply embarrassed by this disgusting episode.” It’s the second time an effigy has been found on a college campus recently. Earlier this week, George Fox University in Oregon said it was punishing four students who confessed to hanging a likeness of Obama from a tree. Obama wasn’t the only victim of such pranks. Secret Service agents recently visited a California home where a mannequin of Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin hangs from a noose. The display also features John McCain surrounded by fake flames coming out of the bungalow’s chimney. Deputy Special Agent in Charge Wayne Williams told The Associated Press that so far that incident seems to be a harmless Halloween display. He said they are not treating it as a threat.

Is the GOP concerned that its own candidate can’t stand up to the standard?

Pamela On Politics: Republicans appeared to have disserted the platform of family values for the 2008 presidential race, and no doubt it’s because their nominee’s checkered record might not stand up to the scrutiny of his challenger. Read more at Pamela On Politics.

Lawmaker: Bill Clinton’s faltering image in Black society is his own fault.

Rep. Jim Clyburn, the third-highest-ranking member of Congress and a member of the Black Caucus, said that former President Bill Clinton ought to look in the mirror if he wants to see who’s responsible for his falling out with Black America. Speaking to ABC News last week, Clinton said that the South Carolina Democrat was once a friend of his, but that he “was not Hillary’s supporter. Never. Not ever. Not for a day.” Find out what else he said and how Clyburn responded at BET.com/News.

More Americans are going deaf
One of three U.S. adults already suffers from some degree of hearing loss, experts said on Monday. The use of personal stereos and an aging population may create a hearing impairment epidemic, a new study shows. A team at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore estimated that 55 million Americans have hearing loss in one or both ears, with men, Whites and the least-educated most affected, the researchers said. One out of six – or 29 million adults – has some trouble discerning speech, more than previous estimates, they reported in the Archives of Internal Medicine. “The prevalence of hearing loss in the United States is predicted to rise significantly because of an aging population and the growing use of personal listening devices. Indeed, there is concern that we may be facing an epidemic of hearing impairment,” Dr. Yuri Agrawal of the Baltimore hospital wrote. It is normal for people to ignore or disavow hearing loss, the researchers said, leading to difficulty communicating that can result in productivity problems at work, depression, and less access to health care that ultimately raises the risk of sickness and death. Hearing loss affected 8.5 percent of those in their 20s and 17 percent of people in their 30s. Exposure to workplace noise, firearms and loud music were all risk factors.

You need 55 minutes a day to lose weight permanently
Obese and overweight women need to cut calories and exercise 275 minutes a week more than their baseline physical activity – or at least 55 minutes a day, five days a week to lose weight and keep it off , a new study says. The research was led by John M. Jakicic, Ph.D., of the University of Pittsburgh, and colleagues. They tracked 201 overweight and obese women over a two-year period; 170 women completed the study. At the start, all of the participants were sedentary. They were randomly assigned to one of four groups based on how much and how intensely they exercised and how many calories they burned. The participants were told to eat or drink no more than 1,200 to 1,500 calories a day. Researchers tracked them by talking to them on the phone and having face-to-face talks. Participants were encouraged to spread the exercise out over five days during a week, done in at least 10-minute chunks. The women were given treadmills to use at home and taught to monitor their own heart rates. At the end of the two-year study, women who had lost 10 percent or more of their initial body weight reported that they had done more physical activity, compared with those who did not lose as much weight. After six months, women in all four groups had lost an average of 8 percent to 10 percent of their initial body weight. But the hard part was keeping that weight off. Most of them regained the weight. Nearly 25 percent of the participants managed to keep 10 percent or more of their original body weight off over the two years. Those women exercised about 275 minutes a week more over their baseline activity levels.

Will Michelle Obama’s image help young Black girls?
Vital Signs: She’s been called unamerican, an “angry Black woman,” the “b” word and worse. But is the criticism of Michelle Obama, whose worked to soften her image, hurt or help how young girls see themselves and what they can accomplish? Read more at Vital Signs.

The Dem nominee sees that racism ain’t no joke in the race for the White House

Sen. Barack Obama knew when he entered the race for the presidency that he’d face White folks who weren’t too keen on the idea of a Black president. And that notion has been confirmed repeatedly by exit polls and news interviews – even among hard-line, multi-generational Democrats who say they’re not ready to vote for a Black guy. But there’s no way he could have anticipated monkey T-shirts, stuffed monkeys in a suit and 5-dollar bills with hate messages stamped on them. In an act that’s seems straight from the Jim Crow days, a Utah couple has been hawking a sock monkey in a suit with a lapel pin for Barack Obama. “We don’t get enough of him at his public speaking events. Now you can have your very own TheSockObama™ 24/7! Fall in love with your chosen candidate all over again,” a message on their site said as late as last Friday. Bloggers and angry browsers blew up the message board of David and Elizabeth Lawson of West Jordan, Utah, calling them racist and expressing their shock. The Lawsons were rocked so hard that there is now a message on their site apologizing and explaining that the item is no longer available. The sellers say they are stunned by the negative reaction. “We at TheSockObama Co. are saddened that some individuals have chosen to misinterpret our plush toy. It is not, nor has it ever been, our objective to hurt, dismay or anger anyone. We guess there is an element of naiveté on our part, in that we don’t think in terms of myths, fables, fairy tales and folklore. In earnest folks, we’re so sorry we offended anybody.” It’s not the first monkey shines involving Obama’s image. In the spring, a Georgia man made a mint selling T-shirts with the monkey Curious George eating a banana; underneath the picture read: “Obama’08.” Mike Norman, who sold the shirts at his Georgia pub, stopped after Houghton Mifflin Harcourt threatened to sue him over unauthorized use of its Curious Georgia cartoon moniker for racist purposes. But such antics aren’t limited to rural America. Just last week, the gothamist.com reported, some people in Staten Island, N.Y., reported getting 5-dollar bills with the following message stamped on them: “LETS [sic] KEEP THE WHITE HOUSE WH!TE!” The words were situated next to the Lincoln Memorial on the back of the bill. The Web site reported that a spokesman for the U.S. Secret Service called the incident “rather innocuous … given the current political place where the country is.”