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Ignorant or Just Ignoring Minorities?

Last night during the Vice President debate moderator Gwen Ifill queried, "I want to talk to you about AIDS, and not about AIDS in China or Africa, but AIDS right here in this country, where black women between the ages of 25 and 44 are 13 times more likely to die of the disease than their [white] counterparts. What should the government's role be in helping to end the growth of this epidemic?" Cheney responded by stating "I had not heard those numbers with respect to African American women.. . I was not aware that it was that severe an epidemic there, because we have made progress in terms of the overall rate." --- What, now he wants to play dumb? As with the election fiascos in Florida, Republicans always want to appear blameless. But uncounted votes were not solely the result of "sloppiness", "malfunctions", "mistakes", "incompetence" or "negligence". Black votes were not counted due to the purposeful, deliberate conduct of Republicans intent on stealing an election. Here, due to some benign oversight, Dick Cheney wants to make believe that he is unaware of the disproportionate impact that AIDS has had on Black Women and communities of color. Like the sun, the only way he could pretend to ignore the AIDS reality is by looking away. He knows. Dick Cheney is a demonstrated liar and he could care less about the well being of Black Women or their families and the communities they come from.

Although African American and Latino women represent less than a quarter of all women in the United States, together they make up 80 percent of AIDS cases among women in the United States, according to a report "Women and HIV/AIDS: Confronting the Crisis"[ more ]
AIDS is the leading cause of death for African Americans aged 25-34. Overall, while women have become a larger share of AIDS cases in recent years, there are considerable racial differences. Black women represented nearly a third (34 percent) of newly-reported AIDS cases in 2001, compared to 15 percent for White women. [more ]
Full Report [here ]
Transcript of the debate [here ]
African Scholar: Aids Disease is "a weapon to wipe out Blacks" [more ]
Since the mid-1980's, AIDS and HIV have silently devastated Black America [more]
Cheney and Edwards flub debate's domestic AIDS question: It's the prisons, stupid. [more ]