Rain or shine, President Barack Obama and First Lady Michelle Obama withheld their commitments and gave commencement speeches at two HBCU graduation ceremonies this weekend.

The Commander-in-Chief addressed the new grads of Morehouse College, and the FLOTUS delivered her remarks to the students and families of Bowie State University.

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While both Obamas made extraordinary points, Michelle was spot on about education issues that affect African Americans and Barack stressed the importance of giving back to the community.

Check out our favorite excerpts and lessons from both must-hear speeches below.

1. Giving back is just has important has working toward your dreams. (President Obama)

“I know some of you came to Morehouse from communities where life was about keeping your head down and looking out for yourself. Maybe you feel like you escaped, and you can take your degree, get a fancy job and never look back. And don’t get me wrong – with the heavy weight of student loans, with doors open to you that your parents and grandparents could scarcely imagine, no one expects you to take a vow of poverty. But I will say it betrays a poverty of ambition if all you think about is what goods you can buy instead of what good you can do. Yes, go get that law degree. But if you do, ask yourself if the only option is to defend the rich and powerful, or if you can also find time to defend the powerless,” the President said. “Sure, go get your MBA, or start that business, we need black businesses out there. But ask yourself what broader purpose your business might serve, in putting people to work, or transforming a neighborhood.”

“The most successful CEOs I know didn’t start out intent on making money, rather, they had a vision of how their product or service would change things, and the money followed,” he added.

2. Inspire those who look up to you to expect more of themselves. (President Obama)

“We know that too many young men in our community continue to make bad choices. Growing up, I made a few myself. And I have to confess, sometimes I wrote off my own failings as just another example of the world trying to keep a black man down,” he said. “I had a tendency to make excuses for me not doing the right thing. But one of the things that all of you have learned over the last four years is, there’s no longer any room for excuses.”

3. Career success means nothing without success at home. (President Obama)

“I still wish I had a father who was not only present, but involved. And so my whole life, I’ve tried to be for Michelle and my girls what my father wasn’t for my mother and me. I’ve tried to be a better husband, a better father, and a better man.” he said. “Even now, I’m still learning how to be the best husband and father I can be. Because success in everything else is unfulfilling if we fail at family.”

“I know that when I’m on my deathbed someday, I won’t be thinking about any particular legislation I passed, or policy I promoted. I won’t be thinking about the speech I gave, or the Nobel Prize I received,” he continued. “I’ll be thinking about a walk I took with my daughters, a lazy afternoon with my wife, whether I did right by all of them.”

4. A degree is not everything. (President Obama)

“Whatever success I achieved, whatever positions of leadership I’ve held, have depended less on Ivy League degrees or SAT scores or GPAs, and have instead been due to that sense of empathy and connection – the special obligation I felt, as a black man like you, to help those who needed it most; people who didn’t have the opportunities that I had, because but for the grace of God, I might be in their shoes. So it’s up to you to widen your circle of your concern – to create greater justice both in your own community, but also across our country. To make sure everyone has a voice; everyone gets a seat at the table; to make sure that everyone – no matter what they look like or where they come from, or who they love – gets a chance to walk through those doors of opportunity if they want it bad enough.”

5. Too many young people fantasize about becoming ball players and rappers, opposed to teachers and lawyers. (First Lady Michelle)

“Today, more than 150 years after the Emancipation Proclamation, more than 50 years after the end of ‘separate but equal,’ when it comes to getting an education, too many of our young people just can’t be bothered. Today, instead of walking miles every day to school, they’re sitting on couches for hours playing video games, watching TV. Instead of dreaming of being a teacher or a lawyer or a business leader, they’re fantasizing about being a baller or a rapper,” she said and the audience applauded. “Right now, one in three African American students are dropping out of high school. Only one in five African Americans between the ages of 25 and 29 has gotten a college degree — one in five.”

6. Education is for everybody. (First Lady Michelle)

“As my husband has said often, please stand up and reject the slander that says a black child with a book is trying to act white. Reject that,” she said. “In short, be an example of excellence for the next generation.”

7. People who are more educated live longer. (First Lady Michelle)

“Today, getting an education is as important if not more important than it was back when this university was founded. Just look at the statistics. [Applause] People who earn a bachelor’s degree or higher make nearly three times more money than high school dropouts, and they’re far less likely to be unemployed. A recent study even found that African American women with a college degree live an average of six and a half years longer than those without. And for men, it’s nearly 10 years longer. So yes, people who are more educated actually live longer.”

8. Be proactive. (First Lady Michelle)

“If the school in your neighborhood isn’t any good, don’t just accept it. Get in there, fix it. Talk to the parents. Talk to the teachers. Get business and community leaders involved as well, because we all have a stake in building schools worthy of our children’s promise.”

“And when it comes to your own kids, if you don’t like what they’re watching on TV, turn it off. [Applause] If you don’t like the video games they’re playing, take them away. [Applause] Take a stand against the media that elevates today’s celebrity gossip instead of the serious issues of our time. Take a stand against the culture that glorifies instant gratification instead of hard work and lasting success.”

Check out the full-length speeches below and weigh in on your favorite parts in the comment section.

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As a member of the Black Panther Party and the Black Liberation Army, Assata Shakur, formerly Joanne Deborah Chesimard is the definition of falsely accused. The history-making activist’s life may have continued in Cuba since her heroic escape from prison, but it seems that Shakur is still a prisoner. The FBI has decided to place 65-year-old Assata on their Most Wanted Terrorists List! And get this–they’re “honored” to do so–specifically FBI Special Agent in Charge in Newark, NJ. (Is that a real title? I digress…)

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In 1973, while driving on the NJ Turnpike, police pulled Assata, Zayd Shakur and Sundiata Acoli over for a faulty taillight. Shortly after being pulled over, a shootout claimed the lives of Zayd Shakur and officer Werner Foerster.

At the time of the shooting, Assata did what she was told and held her hands high, but was still shot multiple times. And even though the other officer claimed to have shot Zayd and there’s no physical way possible that Assata could have shot anyone, she was still convicted and placed in jail while the powers that be attempted to pin six other crimes on her.

Shakur wrote:

“I am a 20th century escaped slave. Because of government persecution, I was left with no other choice than to flee from the political repression, racism and violence that dominate the U.S. government’s policy towards people of color. I was convicted by—I don’t even want to call it a trial, it was lynching, by an all-white jury. I had nothing but contempt for the system of justice under which I was tried.”

And flee she did. In 1979, Assata escaped from prison and made her way to Cuba, where she’s received political asylum and has been living ever since.

However, Assata hasn’t been living peacefully. Now, over 30 years later, Assata’s infamous name continues to be slung through the mud. The FBI has placed Assata on their list of Most Wanted Terrorists. You’ve got to be kidding me! 65-year-old Assata Shakur–a woman who was charged for a crime she never committed is now a terrorist 30 plus years after she was charged for her alleged crimes. That makes all the sense in the world.

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The reward for Assata’s capture has now doubled to $2 million. “We want her to come back here and face justice and serve out her sentence,” New Jersey Attorney General Jeffrey Chiesa said. That’s not all they want. They want the small amount of freedom Assata has left. New Jersey State Police Colonel Rick Fuentes is claiming that Assata is “flaunting her freedom.”

NewsOne’s Kirsten West-Savali may have said it best, regarding Assata making the FBI’s Most Wanted Terrorists List:

“It speaks to the hypocrisy of the United States that there are police officers who have not only killed unarmed, innocent people, but are roaming free and lauded for their bravery. Based on the criteria, there are certain police departments who should be characterized as domestic terror cells. But instead, the FBI is going after a 65-year-old revolutionary who isn’t even guilty and — by international law — has the right to seek political asylum.

It is amazing — and pathetic — how swiftly the FBI felt compelled to frame the domestic terrorism conversation around a Black revolutionary living in Cuba, instead of two White men from Boston. Timing is everything — and the timing of this travesty of justice speaks volumes.

Join us on this Hands Off Assata Shakur movement!

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The first time I read F. Scott Fitzgerald’s “The Great Gatsby,” I was taken by the effort marked in a simple mention of African-Americans riding in a car that raced past the narrator, Nick Carroway, as he and Jay Gatsby rode around the Hamptons of Long Island, NY in 1922.

The line, written with a singeing racial eye, reads, “As we crossed Blackwell’s Island, a limousine passed us, driven by a white chauffeur, in which sat three modish Negroes, two bucks and a girl. I laughed aloud as the yolks of their eyeballs rolled toward us in haughty rivalry.” You can miss it as a speck in the vastness of language and storytelling that makes up one of the finest pieces of American literature written to date. It reminds me stories I have learned in my time living in New York of people like poet Langston Hughes vacating to the Hamptons in the same time period.

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But as an outsider to the literary mainstream, those three black extras–the ones you won’t find in the 1974 film, and the ones who most likely will not be present in the upcoming Baz Luhrmann movie due out this weekend–are everything. We exist! The fun and gaiety and excess that was the 1920s also spilled into African-American culture that was creating its own wealth, through various means, that did not go unnoticed by the mainstream.

Favoring the successful and ambitious blacks of establishments of today, this early elite class of African-Americans did not hold inventory in the retelling of the Roaring Twenties. They are now a fleeting rumor, skipped in the media depictions of history upon which we most often rely. It is interesting to imagine what representation in media would be if such effort as Fitzgerald’s had grown even at a constant over the years since the novel was published in 1925, and film adaptations began the following year.

The more I think of that line from the novel, the more it lingers as a thoughtful nod in era when representation of blacks happened more often by omission or in black face performance. Especially given that Fitzgerald seemed to be the type to have entertained uptown at the likes of the Cotton Club, which opened in 1920. After all, Fitzgerald is often sited as the greatest writer of a period known as the Jazz Age, a musical style and era that launched the entertainment industry as a path to wealth for African-Americans.

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So as movies seem to increasingly serve a purpose intended for history books, the story of blacks in the 1920s, a time period between Reconstruction and the Great Depression, remains under a veil. The style, intelligence, influence and complexity of the African-American race, all elements prominent in the cultural conversation prior to the 1970s, are now a restricted knowledge revealed at discretion of those who produce the film and television mainstream.

Between 1900 and 1930, according to the US Census Bureau, the black population in New York State grew from 99,232 to 412,814, an increase felt as Harlem entered its incarnation as a major center of black migration from the South. In fact, it was as wealthy White Americans exited life above 110th Street, that the architects of the Harlem Renaissance and the first advances of black citizenship took residence.

In the three years of HBO’s “Boardwalk Empire,” we have learned nothing of legendary gang leader Stephanie St. Clair, who vied with the likes of Lucky Luciano and for whom Bumpy Johnson served as a driver and successor. A woman of Martinican heritage, St. Clair led one of the most violent gangs and successful numbers racket in Harlem, taking out Dutch Schultz, who worked for Luciano to hold claim of her influence uptown. She is represented in the 1997 movie “Hoodlum” by Cicely Tyson’s character, Madame Queen. Perhaps with Terrence Howard’s entrance to the “Boardwalk Empire” cast, the refinement and intent that has always existed as a norm in black culture will make its mainstream reveal.

But as we anticipate the explosion of romance and music that make Lurhmann’s films worthwhile, we might consider our own investigation of African-American glamor, great for sparks just decades after slavery, producing works and inventions absorbed into the American cannon. Bessie Smith sang, Claude McKay wrote, James S. Adams files the patent for the airplane propeller, and King Oliver discovered a young trumpeter named Louis Armstrong. Among them, doctors and lawyers and mailmen and gangsters and teachers and laborers lived. It was the birth of post-slavery African-American society, a self-definition, somewhat like that attempted by the great Jay Gatsby.

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Then, after she arrived (and the world breathed a collective sigh of relief that the baby seemed to have inherited a nose and lips similar to that of her mom, Beyonce,), looks-related attacks of other kinds popped up, the one most recently over Blue Ivy’s apparently uncombed hair, photographed during a family trip to Paris.

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The blogs had a field day over the weekend, poking fun of innocent images of the one-year-old offspring of “King Camel and Queen Beysus,” per Bossip, traveling through France, some posting nasty memes that, among others, compared the child to hip hop star Drake.

Sandra Rose quipped that the toddler had “nappy hair, looking like Buckwheat,” while the Twittersphere was predictably mean, with one follower asking “Why the f— Beyonce won’t do Blue Ivy’s hair? That baby ugly enough already.”

The whole thing makes you wonder about how miserable folks have to be in their own lives to take aim at a child for looking like a normal little girl rather than an extra on “Toddlers and Tiaras.”

Similar to the controversy that courted gold medalist Gabrielle Douglas after her historical wins at the London Olympics last summer, the hair haters appeared in full force – most predictably, Black women. Reminiscent of that classic scene in Spike Lee’s 1988 musical-drama “School Daze” where the Jigaboos faced off against the Wannabes in a war over “natural” versus weaved-and-wig hair, this time, instead of projecting age-old tensions at other adults over being perceived as either too “nappy” or “fake,” they cast them upon a one-year-old incapable of doing her own hair, and a mom — already a slave to public perception — who is clearly not interested in her daughter becoming one, too.

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You’d think with the natural hair movement currently in full swing that Beyonce might be spared the pressure to slap a “Just for Me” children’s perm kit into her child’s hair, or some bows and barrettes or whatever folks would find more presentable than her natural baby ringlets. But because the judgmental vitriol remains between hair camps — with some of the newest naturalistas declaring their afros, twists and locs as evidence they truly love themselves — it’s no wonder little Blue can’t find a safe haven even there: the so-called “natural hair mafia” might just as well turn its back on her the moment her baby fro was hot-combed.

In the end it’s all just harmless ridicule, though — or is it?

Blue Ivy aside, what message do we send our daughters and other little girls — ones that are old enough to understand what “ugly” and “nappy” mean — just because they rock their hair in its natural state, which may not or not always be perfectly coiffed?

What message do we reinforce within ourselves about our own beauty – or lack-thereof — when we are easily shamed into trying to conform to other people’s visions of beauty and not our own?

Viewing Blue Ivy’s hair controversy through that lens doesn’t make her situation nearly as funny then, does it?

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We reached out to Spelman and Morehouse for statements, but at this time, neither school cannot legally speak on this topic. However, Morehouse has released a statement, explaining the steps they take with their students after learning of a tragic incident like this one:

ATLANTA, May 1, 2013  In March, there were two alleged assault incidents involving Morehouse students.

After the information was brought to the attention of campus police, the suspectswere identified and arrested.

While we cannot speak to specifics of these cases, our policies and procedures call for disciplinary actions against students who violate our code of conduct and the law, up to and including dismissal from the College.

Morehouse has a zero tolerance policy related to violence of any kind. Violence is the very antithesis of the Morehouse ethos and the values of a Morehouse Man.

Morehouse College police are working with the Fulton County District Attorney’s Office and will continue to do so until these cases are resolved.

Rape in college culture is often an issue that is so hush-hush. Think about it–if colleges were to fully acknowledge the rapes that happen on campus would be the worst kind of public relations for any institution of higher learning.

According to Crisis Connection, every 21 hours, a woman is raped on an American college campus. What’s even more sickening is that of the rapes that occur, only 10% of them are reported. God bless this Spelman student who’s brave enough to stand up and speak out against these athletes. Obviously victims find it difficult it speak out because of the stigma attached to victims of rape. Sadly enough, society tends to blame women who are raped, or worse yet, challenge their truths.

What do you think about this statement?

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According to The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, three student athletes have been charged for the alleged rape of an 18-year-old Spelman College student. Basketball players Chukwudi Ndudikwa and Malcolm Frank currently face rape and aggravated sodomy charges, and Tevin Mgbo is looking at aggravated sodomy, kidnapping and reckless conduct charges.

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Recent updates in the case reveal that the alleged assault happened at on-campus party at the Otis Moss Suites residence hall on March 8. According to court documents, the victim claimed she was celebrating spring break at a club , then campus party. She admitted to underage drinking but said she did not willingly use drugs of any kind that night.

However, the lawyers of the accused men “tell a story of a drug- and alcohol-fueled evening in which a young woman had consenting sex.”

A witness told police that she saw the young woman consuming a white powdery drug, possibly the illicit party drug “Molly.”

Here’s how a few witnesses described the incident:

Several witnesses say the victim did have sex with several men in several rooms, and one witness says the victim used a drug.

One witness also said the victim was drunk, dancing, fell and hit her head.

One of the victim’s friends says he tried to help her but she would not allow it. He told police she kept hitting him and even picked up a knife and tried to stab him saying she knew what she was doing. He says the next morning the victim was unaware of what happened and he took her to the hospital.

Another witness says some of the suspects came and confronted the victim about the rape accusations. That witness said he told them “no one forced her to do it but she was not fully aware of where she was or what she was doing”.

In a completely unrelated case, fellow Morehouse student Lucien Kidd was also arrested for an off-campus rape charge that was reported in March.

According to jail records, the four men have been released from jail on $10,000 bond.

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The League is said to be comparable to The Tea Party–a group in the U.S. that challenges issues with security, sovereignty and domestic tranquility. The secretary of the Northern League has been quoted saying that Kyenge is the “symbol of hypocritical, do-gooding left that would like to abolish the crime of illegal immigration and only thinks about immigrants’ rights and not their duties.”

Wow, seriously? Kyenge has always fought for the rights of immigrants in Italy as one of the officials of the Democratic Party’s Immigration Forum. She’s been immediately seeking she’ll seek to focus Parliament’s attention on the values they have been sharing at the Democratic Party’s Immigration Forum.

She believes that Italy needs to guarantee fundamental rights to all, including immigrants. According to Africa News, “there are almost a million minor children of immigrants who represent the future of the country. Out of these, more than 570,000 were born in Italy and more than 600,000 go to Italian schools.”

Kyenge’s fight for immigrants rights will prepare her for this position and we hope that she proves to her haters that she’s got what it takes!

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On Wednesday, the nodes of patriotism were cast on the PBS broadcast of The Central Park Five, a documentary by Ken Burns, Sarah Burns and David McMahon.  The telecast held two of the top 10 trending positions (#cp5 and #CentralPark5) for the United States on Twitter for the duration of the airing through midnight.  The film told the story of the five African-American boys, age 14 to 16 in 1989 almost 30 years ago to the date of the television screening, who were coerced into taking the fall for the brutal rape of the woman who became known as The Central Park Jogger, even though both DNA and other evidence attached none of the convicted at the scene of the crime. (For disclosure, I attended the premiere of the film at Maysles Cinema in Harlem for which I previously wrote a review and coordinated a March screening at the Charles Hamilton Houston Institute at Harvard Law School.)

Amen. RT @JuddApatow: @realDonaldTrump Just stop calling for people's executions. And if they happen to be innocent maybe apologize. #cp5—
Touré (@Toure) April 23, 2013

So many Americans tuned into the true story of innocent boys who were hanged in the court of public opinion and tried as the incarnations of the most vile, racist archetypes of African-American men. The media, the NYPD and influencers including Donald Trump were complicit in their conviction, without basic review of facts, never public retracting the false condemnation. The Central Park Five dragged viewers through the unforgiving and hope-fleeting tailspin that remains a shadow over the lives of wrongfully imprisoned and sparsely repaired Antron McCray, Kevin Richardson, Raymond Santana, Kharey Wise and Yusef Salaam. Heart-wrenched viewers responded through social media and followed through to sign the petition for reparations for these men, as well as viewed the New York Times Talk with the cast and crew the following night.

By Friday, the assailants in Boston furthered their violence until ultimately one was killed and the other apprehended, identified as brothers Tamerlan Tsarnaev, 26, and Dzhokar Tsarnaev, 19, immigrant white males from Russia. Their havoc, on what is usually a unifying holiday for the city, transformed mindsets across the U.S. toward recollections of 9/11, the phobia of Muslims and unsettled fears of native terrorism most recently revealed at the Sandy Hook elementary school massacre. The families and communities of the bombers are covered in shame; the families of those lives lost, as well as those whose lives were re-coursed, to the inexplicable act are pummeled with pain, left with little place for solace. The facts of the attack, slow in their emergence, were clearly laid out for the public to process. And yet the question remains, what is going on?

surreal. #PrayforBoston RT @SMGebru: Greater Boston looks like a war zone. Every type of law enforcement agency here http://t.co/i1ePAopNz0—
Saran Kaba Jones (@sarankjones) April 19, 2013

The two tales–one of the immediate moment and one previously tucked away into the headlines of a time long ago; one of guileless assailants and one of the unjustly accused; one of young, immigrant white men and one of young black boys, citizens with not-oft-guaranteed rights–rallied Americans into a review of our society. Both pushing parents to questions of how to raise, protect and nurture their sons; both leaving the public as helpless, unguided bystanders in dark moments, uncertain of the media’s stewardship; both stories drenched in tragedy.

Why are so many young White men unrelentingly angry?

Why are so many young Black boys consumed by the policing system within our country?

Why do we not see race pulsing through the actions of young White men?

Has race consumed the hopefulness of our young Black men?

How is the nation as a whole culpable for these tragedies?  Are they parallel?

What is going wrong with our society?

How can we as individuals make it right?

In both cases, I am called to thoughts for national healing. In both cases, there is the bright side of the human spirit prevailing over evil. And, overall, it seems that before the idea of world peace is the wish for peace in America, a love in my own backyard.

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“Would you like to be my bridesmaid?”

With engagement season behind us (most proposals take place between Thanksgiving and Valentine’s Day), and the spring wedding season in full swing, many brides-to-be are planning their nuptial ceremonies and and every detail for the big day.

One of the most influential factors of a bride’s experience are her bridesmaids — the women who will offer emotional support, attend every rehearsal and dish out serious cash for their dress, shoes and accessories.

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By definition, that’s a big responsibility. It’s expensive, time-consuming, and if you are dealing with a bridezilla, it can be very stressful. Depending on where you are in your life — in graduate school, unemployed, living out of the state or planning your own wedding — it may be the most logical to decline the invitation.

Now, weddings are a joyous celebration and if the bride is a close family member or friend you should feel honored that she’d like to share her happy occasion with you. However, it is okay to say no. It’s better to decline up front than to drop out last minute.

Here are a few tips to help you decline without feeling guilty.

1. Say your not comfortable with the role of bridesmaid.

It’s important to support your loved ones — even if it means sucking your teeth, wearing an unflattering dress and sacrificing your time. However, if you are not comfortable being a bridesmaid, there’s no golden rule saying you must accept the invitation. Ask for a different, smaller role. There are multiple tasks that a bride may need help with on her wedding day. Opt to handle the guestbook, organize the gift table or cut the cake.

2. Respond how you would want a friend to respond to you.

Be gracious and polite, but the most importantly honest. Be straightforward: “I’m not in a place financially to afford this commitment” or “I may not have the time right now to be the best bridesmaid that I can be.” It’s better to be honest in the beginning than to regret your decision down the line. Plus, the bride should want her wedding party to participate because they genuinely want to; not because they felt obligated or forced.

3. Remember, it’s not about you.

Even though you are declining for your own personal reasons, let the bride know that you still care about her big day. Weddings can be a frustrating ordeal and you’d never want the bride to think that you are jealous or not 100 percent happy for her in any way. Remember that turning down a bridesmaid position doesnt relieve you of your roles as a friend, so continue on with your same friendly pre-wedding duties. Sometimes friendships mean sacrifice.

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