With all the focus directed toward President Obama’s Tonight Show appearance, and also with the likes of Eric Holder, Michael Steele and Richard Parsons making headlines, their positions of prominence tend to mask a harsh reality of this severe economic downturn: it’s black men who’ve been the most beaten down by our worsening recession. Just barely half of all young black men are working. Just. Barely. Half. It’s a downward spiral that’s pretty much covered up every time somebody ends a discussion about lingering racial inequalities with “but Obama is president!” With all the focus directed toward President Obama’s Tonight Show appearance, and also with the likes of Eric Holder, Michael Steele and Richard Parsons making headlines, their positions of prominence tend to mask a harsh reality of this severe economic downturn: it’s black men who’ve been the most beaten down by our worsening recession.

Just barely half of all young black men are working. Just. Barely. Half. It’s a downward spiral that’s pretty much covered up every time somebody ends a discussion about lingering racial inequalities with “but Obama is president!”