The county chief is being accused of hatching a very un-American plot

The head of the Michigan’s Macomb County Republican Party, which is in a key swing county in the upcoming presidential election, denied charges late Thursday that he had hatched a plot to block residents with foreclosed homes from voting in November. Read more about the alleged plot at BET.com/News.

Angolan opposition party concedes election

An Angolan opposition party recently accepted its landslide defeat in the country’s parliamentary elections last weekend, reports The Associated Press. The National Union for the Total Independence of Angola (UNITA), a former rebel group led by Isaias Samakuva (above) that turned to violence against the government when it lost in elections 16 years ago, made the announcement at a news conference on Monday. The results were not even close, with President Jose Eduardo dos Santos’ party (Popular Movement for the Liberation of Angola) receiving 80 percent of the vote. His party has ruled Angola since the country gained independence from Portugal in 1975. The nation last held elections in 1992; UNITA did not accept its loss in that election and turned to fighting, resulting in a civil war that ended in 2002. This weekend’s elections were criticized earlier in the week by European observers for being disorganized, but voting itself was generally peaceful.

U.N. threatens to stop aid to Darfur

Violence in Sudan’s Darfur region is too out of control for the United Nation’s World Food Program, reports the BBC. It’s so bad that the group has threatened to stop sending aid to parts of the region if the security doesn’t get better. “It has become too dangerous for our drivers to continue doing their jobs,” said Rachid Jaafar, a group spokesman. Just this year, 43 drivers and 69 trucks went missing after being attacked by armed rebels, he said. This is a critical time for needy families in the region who have been suffering over five years of a notoriously violent civil war that has resulted in the deaths of 300,000 people and more than 2 million being displaced. September is the month when food collected last year runs out ahead of this year’s harvest. The almost 10,000 joint U.N. and African Union peacekeeping troops do help the World Food Program by providing security, but they don’t have enough troops to secure all food convoys, Jaafar said. Black Africans revolted against the mostly Arab government in 2003 alleging discrimination.

But when you get right down to it, there’s really no surprise here
Democrats and Republicans definitely don’t see eye to eye when it comes to the New Yorker magazine cover featuring caricatures of Barack and Michelle Obama. But is that really a surprise? According to The Associated Press, nearly two in three Democrats found the cover, which showed Obama wearing a turban and other traditional Muslim clothes, and his wife, Michelle, wearing camouflage, to be down right wrong. However, about the same percentage of Republicans said they had no problem with the cover. Obama’s campaign has called the illustration “tasteless and offensive.”

IThe death of Bush’s former press secretary was too soon
Pamela On Politics: Tony Snow’s death, at 53, was something we all feared would come too soon, and for his family, friends and colleagues it is defiantly did. I met Tony more than 20 years ago when we were both guests on the weekly public affairs show “Evening Exchange.” The WHUR-TV show, hosted by longtime D.C. fixture Kojo Namdi, featured a round-table of journalists who discussed the happenings in the nation’s capital. Read more at Pamela On Politics.

McKinney nominated to lead Green Party
The Green Party nominated former Georgia Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney as its 2008 presidential nominee on Saturday, helping to revive the political career of the controversial Democrat. At its nominating convention at the Chicago Symphony Center, 313 of the 532 votes cast by delegates, she earned the right to represent fellow party mates. “I am asking you to vote your conscience, vote your dreams, vote your future, vote Green,” she told the convention’s 800-plus attendees. “A vote for the Green Party is a vote for the movement that will turn this country right-side-up again.” McKinney, who served in the U.S. House for six terms, was praised and vilified for asking the question: “What did this administration know and when did it know it, about the events of September 11th?” But that was only the beginning of the negative spotlight she earned over the years. One might also remember her comment that “Al Gore’s Negro tolerance level has never been too high. I’ve never known him to have more than one Black person around him at any given time.” Donna Brazile, a Black woman, was Gore’s campaign manager at the time.) Her latest high-profile misstep was when she was charged with slugging a U.S. Capitol Police officer who asked her to show her ID as she entered her Capitol Hill office in March 2006.

Certified Worldwide
Greg Street aka, The Voice of the People, prepares to release highly anticipated album.Get the details here.

On Location: Missy’s Birthday Party

See hot pics from Missy Elliot’s 37th birthday party at Marquee in downtown Manhattan here.

Boat captain convicted of murder in smuggling case

The captain of a Bahamian fishing boat, convicted of murdering three illegal immigrants who he forced to jump into the sea at gunpoint, is looking at a possible life sentence and $37 million in fines. Last week, a federal jury in West Palm Beach, Fla., found Rickey Thompson guilty of 30 counts, including second-degree murder, importing drugs and smuggling humans, mainly from Jamaica and Haiti. His victims, who he was trying to smuggle into the United States, drowned during the ill-fated December 2006 voyage.

Reggae party is nearly a dance of death
A reggae party nearly turned into a dance of death at a Georgia home Saturday as bullets rang out in a room of about 100 people, wounding seven. Officials with the Rockdale, Ga., Sheriff’s office described the incident as a reggae party gone bad. Apparently people from Florida and a group from DeKalb County, Ga., were beefing shortly before the bullets started flying, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution reports. After the smoke settled, six people were taken to the hospital and released, while one person was admitted. No arrests have been made, authorities said. That was the second shooting into a large crowd over the weekend.

A gunman fired into a Milwaukee crowd of at least 100 people
Four people were killed Sunday after somebody fired into a crowd of at least 100 people in Milwaukee, police say. Police are attributing the violence to a battle between rival gangs, saying that two of the victims, Kendrick L. Jackson, 34, and Jacoby E. Claybrooks, 28, were members of a Chicago gang that has killed two dozen people over the past decade, The Associated Press reports. The two women victims, Theresa Raddle, 23, and Marielle Fisher, 27, were two innocent people in the wrong place at the wrong time, police said. Milwaukee Mayor Tom Barrett is asking members of the community members need to step forward – even if it means turning in a family member, according to AP.