On air: Does it matter if Michael Jackson was black or white?

This is what Jamie Foxx said at yesterday’s Black Entertainment Awards in LA. “We want to celebrate this black man. He belongs to us and we shared him with everyone else.” Just a couple of sentences, but it’s brought to the boil a heated debate that was already simmering.

Madoff: did the judge get it right?

150 years for Bernard Madoff. Is that the right figure? His lawyer had complained before the sentence about a sense of “mob vengeance” in the way victims were campaigning? If that’s proved to be the case, would you mind?

Michael, Neda, and us.

The death of two people last week has got you talking – and some of you making comparisons between the two.

Neda Agha-Soltan was shot dead in the street in Tehran, and Michael Jackson died after a cardiac arrest at the age of 50.

When the Iranian protests began, we spent 7 of the next 8 days discussing the issue on-air, and here on the blog.

When Michael Jackson died, it was a huge story (i realise that’s a massive understatement ) but for some of you it wasn’t worth spending any time on.

Are we rewriting history over Michael Jackson?

At the Black Entertainment Television awards on Sunday night, there was one comment that got a bigger cheer than any other. To screams of support, host Jamie Foxx yelled, “We want to celebrate this black man. He belongs to us and we shared him with everybody else.” Isn’t this the same identity that Michael Jackson rejected as his skin became lighter and lighter? With his death are we rewriting the history of Michael Jackson’s life?