Louis Farrakhan

Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan has as much right to the public airwaves as anyone, and Arsenio Hall can book any guest he wants. If he wishes, Hall can hand over virtually his entire syndicated show to Farrakhan and grovel--as he did, in effect, Friday night. His show, his call. A number of groups slammed Hall for inviting Farrakhan, and publicly urged him to reconsider.

A Chicago teenager beaten to death while on his way home from school was laid to rest Saturday after a three-hour funeral, during which civil rights leader Jesse Jackson and Nation of Islam Minister Louis Farrakhan called for an end to youth violence. Footage of the brutal attack last month on Derrion Albert, a 16-year-old honor student, was recorded with a cellphone camera, and captured the nation's attention. President Obama has announced that Atty. Gen. Eric H. Holder and Education Secretary Arne Duncan will go to Chicago this week to look into the incident.

It was interesting to read that the Congressional Black Caucus and other black leaders have embraced Louis Farrakhan of the Nation of Islam "as a full partner in the effort to improve the lives of African-Americans" (Commentary, by Clarence Page, Sept. 21). The Nation of Islam advocates racial separatism. It calls for "complete separation (for blacks) in a state or territory of our own," and believes "that intermarriage or race mixing should be prohibited." Farrakhan has said that the NOI will no longer preach that the white man is the devil.

Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan said Sunday that having a black president would not mean the end of racial inequity in the U.S. "Even with this remarkable event, the country remains divided and polarized," Farrakhan said of Barack Obama's historic victory. He spoke at Mosque Maryam, the movement's headquarters on Chicago's South Side. Farrakhan said many John McCain voters were older whites living in the South, and that it pained them to see a black person in power.

As a black Vietnam veteran, I find it incredible that a "professional cultural critic" such as Stanley Crouch would try to interpret and distort the articulate words of Louis Farrakhan in order to further his own agenda ("To look upon Farrakhan As Any Kind of Solution Is Condescending," Sept. 30). In the 66 years of the Nation of Islam, there is no history of violence against whites of any persuasion. Any comparison of Farrakhan to David Duke, who led the Ku Klux Klan and identified with the Nazis, is absurd.

I am appalled at the biased media treatment being given minister Louis Farrakhan of the Nation of Islam. I am even more appalled at the lack of response of the black community on behalf of such strong black leadership. An example in question was The Times Letters of Aug. 15 in which only one very brief letter in support of Farrakhan appeared. Let me set the record straight. Although not a Muslim, I have been a supporter of Farrakhan since first hearing him speak almost 10 years ago while a student at Cal State, Long Beach.

The fundamental problem is that the person who conceived the whole business is Louis Farrakhan. Whenever anyone asks if I can separate Farrakhan from the issue, I always ask what about a white counterpart of his? Would anybody give him any slack? If you had something as pernicious--and I'm sure you do--in redneck southern culture as you have in all of these urban communities, and David Duke said, "Let us go to Washington and let us turn our backs on drinking too much, on beating our wives . . .

Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan on Friday questioned the national loyalty of Democratic vice presidential candidate Joseph I. Lieberman, asking if his Jewish religion would make him more faithful to Israel or the United States. "Mr. Lieberman, as an Orthodox Jew, is also a dual citizen of Israel," Farrakhan asserted incorrectly.

The head of an African-American student group at Cal State Northridge accused Jewish students Thursday of "Hitlerian tactics" in a clash over a planned campus speech by the controversial minister Louis Farrakhan of the Nation of Islam.

Hanging up the telephone, stifling an ironic smile, Arthur J. Magida searches for a little patch of calm in his northwest Baltimore home. "That was NBC calling," he says. "About Farrakhan?" he is asked. "What then?" Magida says. "I said, 'Listen, Tom Brokaw, I don't care who you are or how much money you make. . . .' " He laughs at his little joke. Nah, it wasn't Brokaw on the line--just some network flunky asking for help to make the on-camera folks look like real reporters.

It was billed as Hillary Rodham Clinton's last chance to revive her flagging campaign, and she gave it her best shot. For 90 minutes in Cleveland on Tuesday night, Clinton stung coolly and repeatedly at Barack Obama's weak spots, employing everything in her arsenal -- from her confident command of world affairs to a frosty smile that flickered every time she was displeased with his answers. But with a week left to go before the critical primary votes in Ohio and Texas, Clinton had to do more than chip away at Obama.

In a fiery speech promoted as his last, Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan railed against the U.S. invasion of Iraq, calling on the black community to avoid military service at all costs. To join the military "would be the worst mistake you've ever made," Farrakhan told a packed Ford Field sports arena Sunday in downtown Detroit. He continued, "America is preparing for war, for Armageddon."

Minister Louis Farrakhan, who recently ceded leadership of the Nation of Islam to an executive board because of ill health, has undergone a 12-hour operation, the organization said. Physicians told Farrakhan's family they were pleased with the operation's outcome but will monitor him closely for the next 24 to 48 hours, the Chicago-based group said in a statement. No other details were released.

Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan said in a letter to followers that he is seriously ill, and he asked movement leaders to carry on in his absence to make sure the Nation of Islam "will live long after I and we have gone." Farrakhan, 73, said he began suffering pain this year similar to 1998, when he was diagnosed with prostate cancer and underwent surgery.

Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan dispatched a top lieutenant to Los Angeles on Monday for a two-hour meeting with Police Chief William J. Bratton to defuse tensions over the police beating of Minister Tony Muhammad last week, the chief said. A visibly battered Muhammad told reporters last week he was beaten without provocation, but police said he instigated the use of police force by joining in a mob assault on officers.

It was a day when he was lambasted on talk radio and the Internet, linked socially to Louis Farrakhan by a New York Post gossip columnist and threatened with fines by the NBA for not speaking publicly, and near the end of that day Shaquille O'Neal apologized. He said he was not a racist for his taunt of Houston center Yao Ming, said his relationship with the Nation of Islam leader was his business, and, simply by saying all of that, eased any pressure he might have felt from the NBA.

Re "Reparations: A Scam Cloaked in Racial Pain," Commentary, Sept. 9: Jonathan Turley's arguments spotlighting a con game pale when compared with those of an advocate and colleague like Randall Robinson, in his book "The Debt." Turley dredges up the statute of limitations, as if blacks have been dawdling for 400 years in their quest, not for repair of an injury, but for equal justice. His decrying of the "racism" of Louis Farrakhan when the founders of this nation and their descendants were and are indeed racist does not even rise to the level of disingenuousness.

Islam's two preeminent African American leaders, separated by two decades of rivalry before reconciling two years ago, reaffirmed unity Friday in their first joint appearance in Los Angeles. Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan and W.D. Muhammad of the Muslim American Society offered stark contrasts--one a fiery orator of political polemics and black empowerment; the other a low-key leader who resolutely sticks to religion.