Hail to the "Dick"?

O is in town tonight collecting some big checks at David Cohen's crib up in Chestnut Hill. It must be nice. As if Comcast needed more of an edge over their competition. BTW David, my service sucks lately.

I know who won't be at O's fund raiser; my man Mark Halperin. It seems he went a little overboard on MSNBC this morning.  Mark, this could be a "Game Changer" for your ass. I hear that the White House called MSNBC to complain. (A little thin skinned aren't we there O?)

But this begs the question; would a "well respected" journalist call any other president of these divided states "a dick"? I doubt it. But such is the case with O, he is......different.

Halperin is no fan of his Oness, so I guess it was just hard for him to control him self when he saw O acting all uppity "dick" like.

Personally, I don't think that MSNBC should have suspended Halperin, --you all know how I feel about free speech. But it's just interesting to see certain people struggle to contain their inner "color arousal" (thanks for that word, Francis) in public.

Why is it that ... ?

When I left for work this morning my neighbor's Jack Russells were barking incessantly. At air.

When I got home just after lunch (yeah Guru I left work early, again) they were in the same position, barking incessantly. At air.

Why is it that Jack Russells bark incessantly? Little sh*ts!

I remember when D. and I stopped by to view my townhouse the same culprits were barking. I looked at them knowing I would not be feeling their asses in about six weeks.

Six days later I was about to put a cap in both their asses but they belong to two really nice post-apartheid white folks and I'm doing my part for rainbowism and reconciliation. For now!

Why is it that when it is really cold your little toe will find every sharp edge and your fingers will get caught in every door jam in the house?

Five minutes ago I decided to write a very different post but then my finger got caught in the door jam of my bedroom after I went there to put on another sweater over the three I am already wearing.

The pain traveled the length of my resolve to ignore it and then I felt a warm sensation in the palm of my left hand.

And so here I am typing with one and a half hands and my abused finger has a deep cut that is bleeding in tune to the old skool Heavy D playing in the background.

Why is it that the Overweight Luva from Mount Vernon stopped rhyming? "Lovable, huggable, snuggable, ..." and all dat!

Why is it that a girl/?\friend from your very distant teen past can always find the time in her busy married family life and work schedule to just just f*ck your day up nicely on the regular?

Why is it that some folks who are trapped by their inability to think and feel outside of their demons think that just because you know them you understand their sh*t?

Why is it that I even care enough to be hurt by accusations that belong to an imagination I never imagined and a past and present that has f*ck-all to do with me?

Why is it that I have not been to the gym in two weeks? Save it Erica! ;^)

Why is it that I always answer my emails faster than most folks who write me?

Why is it that there were only two racist email attacks in my box today? Buck up crackaz, I'm still promising all of you a gift wrapped cap in yo' ass by Xmas!

Why is it that when your heart is running around somewhere on the left coast you can't think straight and mix up what is left for what is right or for what is left to say and what is all right left unsaid?

Why is it that my heart skips several beats between her written words of late?

Why is it that I am missing your peaceful hands so much?

Why is it that when I dream you are never gone from me?

Why is it that I'm trying to come to terms so hard but I wish even harder that we could sit quietly in the garden and watch her prune roses?

Why is it that I did not see that forever would not be forever even when you warned me so?

Why is it that a finger can bleed so much?

Onward!

Those mean liberals.

It seems that Glen Beckkk is upset because someone (allegedly) spilled wine on his wife at a park in New York.

 "Reuters) - Glenn Beck, the conservative television and radio host, has taken to his Web site and radio show to complain of a "hostile" reception he and his family met from New Yorkers when they attended an outdoor film screening at a park in midtown Manhattan.

Beck told radio listeners that one person at the Bryant Park movie screening of Hitchcock's "The 39 Steps" on Monday evening shouted at him and his family: "We hate conservatives."

Another spilled a cup of wine on his wife, Tania, which Beck said he believes was a deliberate act of malice.

"As we got up to leave the movie, the crowd broke out in applause that we were finally leaving," he told listeners on his syndicated radio show..." [Article]

Question: Is there a more pathetic individual in this country than Glen Beckkk? The guy makes millions of dollars by being a polarizing figure and a lightning rod, and he cries a river because he gets the business at an outdoor park. Besides, it's not like the guy doesn't have his own security detail with him everywhere that he goes. It must be nice. If someone wants to step to me and try to kick my ass I have to go Kingston 12 on his ass all by my damn self.

Anyway, as is always the case with wingnuts; it seems that Mr. Beck might have been stretching the truth a little bit.

  "It was my friend that spilled the glass of wine on Tanya -and I can assure you that it was a complete accident. A happy one, to be sure, but nonetheless a complete and utter accident. As soon as the wine spilled (and I question how Tanya became soaked from a half glass of wine) apologies were made and my friends pretty much scrambled to give Tanya & co napkins -no doubt aware that it would look terrible and that their actions could be perceived as purposeful. No words were exchanged after that, as I think that it became pretty clear to Beck & co that my friends and I were doing everything in our capacity to help clean the “mess”.    

That quote was from a lady named Lindsey Piscitell who claims that Beckkk is full of it. In fact, from all accounts, it was Beckkk and his bodyguards who made everyone in the park tense.

Still, it is clear from the accounts that I have read that Ms. Piscitell has no love for Beckkk, so the truth could be somewhere in the middle.

Beckkk has once again put himself in the spotlight by crying "woe is me". And, of course, his minions are eating it up. "Those liberals are so mean and nasty." 
Stop it! Nothing was going to happen to Glen Beckkk or his family, and if someone even thought about stepping over the line, those well paid bodyguards would have done their jobs.

So Glen, here is a suggestion: Next time dial up Netflix and watch "Birth of a Nation" in that beautiful home theater you have there in your Connecticut estate.

From Liberation to Speculation? Spelman College and African “Land Grabs”

Black Agenda Report 
Jemima Pierre 
June 28, 2011
 

“What does Spelman’s speculative interest in Africa suggest about Pan-African affiliation in the age of neoliberalism?”

When the Oakland institute published their report, “Understanding Land Investment Deals in Africa,” on land speculation by foreign investment funds on the continent, attention focused on the use of the endowment funds of wealthy US universities, including Harvard and Vanderbilt. Lost amidst this discussion, however, was the fact that Spelman College, the historically Black college in Atlanta, was also implicated. Spelman’s investment strategies, like Harvard’s and Vanderbilt’s, are part of the aggressive and entrepreneurial approach to education funding and fund-raising increasingly prevalent over the past decade. Yet is there a difference here? Given the historical role of HBCUs in African liberation, what does Spelman’s speculative interest in Africa suggest about Pan-African affiliation in the age of neoliberalism?

While the nature of hedge funds is secretive and abstract the implications of their operation for the everyday lives of African workers and peasants is anything but. The Oakland Institute reports that Western hedge funds and speculators are acquiring large tracts of land in various places in Africa, forcing local farmers off small food farms to “make room for export commodities, including biofuels and cut flowers.” As a result, the control over the global production, distribution, and price of basic foodstuffs by hedge funds is increasing.
 

“Western hedge funds and speculators are acquiring large tracts of land in various places in Africa, forcing local farmers off small food farms.”

One such fund highlighted in the report is Emergent Assets Management. Founded by two former JP Morgan and Goldman Sachs investors, Emergent uses private equity to invest in industrial agriculture in Africa. The company’s African Agri-Land Fund, sees Africa as “one of the final frontiers” to “secure food production across a diverse range of soft commodities.” To that end, it has created EmVest, a fund management company based in South Africa to “establish farm hubs” throughout the continent and “to develop large scale agriculture on a commercial basis.”
 
Susan Payne, the CEO of Emergent Assets Management, explained the logic of her African Agri-Land Fund in the following way: “In South Africa and Sub Saharan Africa the cost of agriland…that we’re buying is 1/7th of the price of similar land in Argentina, Brazil and America… We could be moronic and not grow anything and we think it will make money over the next decade.”
 
It is this investment logic that has marked Spelman College’s own path to maintaining and growing its endowment. University endowments are cash and assets accumulated from private and corporate donations and are a school’s “investment engine.” In the past few decades, Spelman has managed to increase the worth of its endowment through a similar capitalist economic model as predominantly white and richer universities: aggressively diversifying its investment strategies and searching for less conservative deals and higher returns. (Many private equity funds promise high returns—sometimes between 20%-40% on investments from large university endowments). According to one report, Spelman’s endowment success demonstrates that “HBCUs are keeping pace with the higher education mainstream through an increasing financial sophistication.” As of June 2008, Spelman had the second largest endowment fund among HBCUs with a value of $351,706,000 and a portfolio spread over the U.S. stock market, foreign stock, real estate, and other investments.
 

“Spelman has managed to increase the worth of its endowment through a similar capitalist economic model as predominantly white and richer universities.”

In the economic and political climate since the official end of segregation in this country, it is clear that HBCUs have had to work hard to maintain relevance. HBCUs have lost some of their best students to richer white institutions, and have faced higher operating costs and declining federal support. In this context, its investment actions signal almost a strategy for survival. But at what cost? While it is not yet known how much of Spelman’s investments are connected to African land grabs, what is clear is that, in keeping pace with economic strategies of other similar institutions—even as a matter of survival—it is bound to be implicated in the exploitative actions of the West.
 
But it does matter that a U.S. Black university, founded in the context of racial terror and Black disenfranchisement, has a part in a scheme that potentially has grave consequences for Blacks in Africa. HBCUs have a unique history and a deep connection to Africa. In the early twentieth century, led by institutions such as Howard and Lincoln Universities, Black American institutions were an influential force in African and other diaspora decolonization movements. They were sites of a radical and international Black presence and exchange, not only training future leaders of African independence, but also creating the space for domestic student activism. How, then, do we reconcile this rich history with HBCU’s contemporary neoliberal economic practices? What hopes do we have for global Pan-African cooperation?
 
Perhaps there is no hope – and perhaps by attempting to resuscitate the claims and affiliations of a prior age of Pan-Africanism we remain lost, deluded, and out of step with the political contours of the moment. In this sense, then, Spellman’s role in Black liberation may be no greater or less than that of its rich white cousins.
 
Jemima Pierre can be reached at BAR1804@gmail.com.

Comment: It is a deplorable situation no doubt that raises an important question here in South Africa.  How many South African universities and private/public corporations are investing in the same kind speculative schemes? 

I have a hunch we will be shocked if we knew. 

See also "Who is making them cry?" by Gladson Dungdung which covers Indian nationalism and land alienation.

And we are not free.

Onward

Justin's big adventure.

"ass hole knee grows you are the biggest bunch of racists in america and are only good for turning where ever you live into a cesspool.just like field knee grow did to jay-may-key.i wish you knee grows would come on to my property and threaten me because i have a nice high capacity present for you.field knee grow you are just a dumb ass commie traitor. go fuck up jay-may-key some more and take detolit with you." ~ Anonymous poster~

Festus, save your "high capacity present", there are plenty of those right here in my hometown. Besides, I don't work in the pest control business, so I doubt seriously if I will be coming on your property anytime soon.

Don't you just love haters?

Anywhoo, I want to talk about the botched Negro award show that was held recently. No, not the teleprompter screw up. (Can't BET do anything right?) But rather something else that some of you Negroes are writing about.

"Most talk about Sunday’s BET Awards centered on the Chris Brown-Rihanna screw-up, however, I heard little to nothing regarding the skit involving rapper Nicki Minaj and teen heartthrob, Justin Bieber.

During the segment in which both artists rambled about who had the strongest fan base, Bieber began to flirt with the female MC. Minaj, 26, responded by asking the 17-year-old if he could drive, implicitly suggesting he is too young for her. While it rendered as a harmless crush — as would a student have for his older, attractive teacher—things got a little inappropriate when Minaj posed the question to Bieber, “Can you handle curves?” The comment was an apparent sexual innuendo and reference to her infamous rear end. Bieber replied with a resolute “Yes I can.”

Though I understand the skit had no intention to be inappropriate or offensive, it unfortunately turned out to be just that.

Since when was it OK for a minor to be implicated in such sexualized language?
17-years-old or not, Bieber is still underage, not to mention most of his fan base (most of whom stood with him on the stage) are preteen and teenage girls. The blame could be placed on Minaj and Bieber, but truthfully BET is the ultimate culprit. The network’s attempt to be provocative fell flat into a dangerous and highly sensitive locale.

But where is the public scorn?

There’s no way this would have passed if the circumstances were different. If the skit featured a male hip-hop artist and an underage girl (God forbid even white), the media would have thrown pebbles at BET and the artist himself. I guess it’s excusable if it’s a female rapper and an underage Canadian.

This isn’t the first time Justin was involved with inappropriateness regarding older women. Bieber raised eyebrows when he and Kim Kardashian, 30, befriended one another in what seemed a bit improper. Personally, I feel Bieber is growing up too fast and it’s much too soon to be involved in such raciness. While this is purely entertainment, in the real word it reaps punitive implications.

I suggest BET, Bieber and Minaj be a little more careful the next time they decide to partake in an immodest 'joke.”' [Article]

I must confess that I didn't see the skit, and, if I did,I am not sure that I would have even noticed what the writer is clearly so upset about. (Am I being sexist?)

But since he put it out there, what do you think?
   

The Battle Was Over Before it Even Started

A couple of years ago my boy B. called and invited me to his 45th birthday party.  He sounded excited and I heard the melodic voice of a twenty-sumthen significant other in the background saying "Tell him he can stay with us especially if he brings a date ..."

The staying part had to do with me traveling from Village Hell where I was doing time and penance teaching political science to an almost post-Mandela generation and one faculty member who may have been older than dirt.

I was not eager to go.  Not because I did not want to see my Muslim brown boy B. suck in his middle and introduce his much younger Christian white English bride as his partner.

And I was not even dreading listening to his defeated mother telling me at length that it was OK for Muslim men to marry Christian women as long as they installed a bidet for her.

My trepidation had to do with hitting the long road to Joburg in the 1996 Isuzu pick-up truck (bakkie) I had reconditioned to drive around after my dad passed.

The Isuzu was my space for communing with my dad on trips from Kimberley to Village Hell.  I knew he loved that truck because it never failed him even after a drunk white man rear-ended him with an eighteen- wheeler and left him with a broken back in the middle of Namibia.

He fixed the truck but he was never the same.

The truck did not fit the car loving image of my dad.  He was known for the flashy American sports cars he drove throughout the 80s and early 90s.

But my dad reached a place when he set aside pretense and flash.  By the time I returned to South Africa the same process was unraveling in my head.

Most days I would sit alongside him in the garden.  Often in contemplative silence.  He was the quintessential pacifist.  A measured man who would just laugh at me when I tried to draw him into a play scrap.

I often thought that my father's non-violent nature would turn Gandhi violent.

"I am a peace loving man Ridi," he would often say.

I decided to attend B's birthday party if only for the chance to escape Village Hell.  The party was held at a posh hotel where a dude in a penguin suit wanted to valet park the Isuzu.

"Ummm no broer just point me in the direction of where I should park," I said to a quizzical disbelieving face.

Moments later B. introduced me to his partner for the 50th time and she gushed about having me come and then asked about the date I should have brought along.

"There is so much space at home.  You really should not be shy.  If you meet someone tonight just bring her over.  We won't mind. We not judgmental."

I looked at the white girl wondering why she was so f*cking happy and giddy.

"Ridwan will be OK darling," my boy said to his candy stick waif in training.

"Oh I know love.  Just wanted to be open to whatever," she replied from inside his wrapped arms.

Being the jolly dateless man I walked toward a group of men and introduced myself.  "Oh yeah B. mentioned you were coming.  You the American guy."

"I'm South African."  "But you have been there in and amongst the ugly Americans for most of your life.  Please don't be offended but what would make any sane person live there?"

My short fuse was being tested and by non other than a spiked haired Anglo-Indian with a medical degree and twiggy tight jeans that matched his pink crocodile emblem golf shirt and over-sized wrist watch.

My limit was on full.  And two or so more American insults and it was on like Donkey Kong.

"You know it is exactly calorie deficient f*cks like you who test my peaceful resolve not to just beat the living sh*t out of your greasy sinewy ass."

Prakesh or Imtiaz or Hitesh or whatever the f*ck his mamma named him the day she enrolled him in medical school seemed to go limp and he and his Golf GTI and BMW M3 crew fell silent.

I stood my ground.  Militant but decidedly peaceful.   The battle was over before it even started.

My thoughts turned to my dad and his memory that I had been revisiting inside long bumpy and noisy Isuzu rides for almost a year.

I recalled an early Saturday evening in my late teens sitting on my red Kawasaki outside my friend Gary's house when this car full of wannabe thugs stopped by to rearrange my grill.

The head neanderthal had a huge crush on the one who rode pillion on my motorcycle and he decided to prove his 'manliness' in the street.

Right about the time when he was about to jump my ass my dad pulled up in his brand new imported Chevy Corvette.  He got out and walked over to where we were standing.

"You touch my boy and I'll shoot your f*cking knee caps off," he said as the neanderthal backed off and profusely apologized calling the episode a misunderstanding.

My dad saved my ass.  He, the non-violent pacifist, took a militant stand and it worked.  The battle was over before it even started.

Three decades later I reminded him about that day and he smiled quietly.  "And if they touched you I would have shot them," he said.

"But I thought you abhor violence?" I replied.

"I do but there are some times when you just use the threat of violence and it is enough.  Other times the only option is violence for self-preservation.  But violence must never be prescribed over settling things peacefully even where you may need to use the threat of violence to ensure peace.  Read your Qur'an.  It is all in there."

My dad was literally half the size I am but he was very much stronger in ways that count more than just how much one can bench press in the gym.

My mouth and impatience gets me into a lot of trouble and on more than one occasion his silent strength saved me.  And it still does.

I will never sell that Isuzu.  You can't disentangle his presence from that truck.  And if you show up at number 11 any day soon I will take you out for a ride so you can experience its peaceful noise.

Onward!

Here comes another one!

I see that Michele Bachmann has officially declared that she is running to become president of these divided  states.(Just look at that picture. If that isn't "Americana" I don't know what is.) Unfortunately for her, there were some issues. Michele, you can't confuse an A-merry-can icon with a serial killer. You just can't. And I am not sure  that I would have launched my presidential campaign from a place called Waterloo. But that's just me. Still, I hope the cynics will believe me when I say good luck to Ms. Bachmann. This is what a democracy is all about; different people with different points of views being able to run for the highest office in the land.

Michele has some strong opinions about government and the role that government should play in our lives. She believes that it should be limited, and she does not believe that people should depend on the government for handouts...........Wait, somebody get out the Windex. I think we might have a lot of glass to start cleaning around Michele's house.

"Rep. Michele Bachmann has been propelled into the 2012 presidential contest in part by her insistent calls to reduce federal spending, a pitch in tune with the big-government antipathy gripping many conservatives.

But theMinnesota Republican and her family have benefited personally from government aid, an examination of her record and finances shows. A counseling clinic run by her husband has received nearly $30,000 from the state ofMinnesota in the last five years, money that in part came from the federal government. A family farm in Wisconsin, in which the congresswoman is a partner, received nearly $260,000 in federal farm subsidies." [More]

Oh My! I wish the main stream media would leave Ms. Bachmann alone. They won't stop until the drive away all the good people running for public office. Oh well, take heart Michele, there is always FOX NEWS.  





     

Of Junk and Trunks

"Hey Ridwan thanks for helping me pick out my car.  But I need you to help me figure out why there is a doof doof sound coming from the back where you ... you know?  Can you leave your office and meet me in the parking lot downstairs?"

"Sure thing Y. I'm right down there in a minute.  Let me just rub the sleep out of my eyes and I'll check out the clunk coming from your trunk ... I mean boot," I answered with a smile that grew larger as I hung-up and began to think about junk and trunks (hey I'm a man).

A few weeks ago Y. asked me to help her decide between two Audi TTs for her driving pleasure.

The dealer dude drove the first car over to our office building and I walked around the car with all the knowledge of a man who used to live for wheeled jewelry.  Not to mention junk and trunks ;0)

"Not this one Y.," I said.  "Why not," she replied somewhat dejectedly.

"Ummm ... too many damn miles and it is black.  I know it is fashionable to be black but a black car does not age well and it always looks dirty right after you wash it.  Plus this one has four different tires and it's a quattro.  Who needs all-wheel drive in Pretoria where it never snows even though it is still too white?"

The car dealer dude who was white was definitely not feeling my diss and left looking like he was gonna lynch someone.

I was just getting back to putting more sleep into my eyes when my desk phone rang.

"Hey hey Ridwan check your office email I think you gonna like this one."

"Ummm I'm not wanting to meet anyone because you know I'm still trying to put sh*t together with this virtual  ...."

"Snap out of your comedy routine Ridwan and look at this car I found."

So I did and there it was.  A blue convertible Audi TT.  Clean and almost new.

"Yep that is the one.  You need a convertible to get your swagga on and also cause this is South Africa where the sun actually shines though you may want to watch for carjackers and rugby crackaz."

And that was it.  She went to her mattress or bank or both and plonked down a deposit worth more than my entire pension fund.

And then just one week after delivery I was standing there and asking Y. what happened to the rearranged left side of the car.

"Don't ask just figure out why there is a doof doof sound coming from the boot."

"You lock some brother up in there .... ?"

"Ridwan stop with the comedy and drive dammit,"  she sounded off with a smile.

And so I did.  Put the top down in the middle of winter, put my Los Lobos shades on, and let the wicked wind whip up memories that had everything to do with this sweet and sexy two door blue convertible Mercedes-Benz SL I bought on an assistant professor's salary in early 2002.

The car was gorgeous and my Victoria Secret girlfriend at the time got into it on the showroom floor and then would not get out so I drove both home to the hills of Sylvan. 

I had swagga and game back then.  The capitalized playa kind.

I was cool on campus and voted best professor two years in a row for my reputation to fill halls with followers who wanted to hear me ... deconstruct whitey and ... uummmm ... capitalism.

Two months into the new convertible wheels in a town where it rains nine months of the year I was sharing my extreme coolness with a few giggling and enamored female graduate students on the steps of the library when someone called my name minus my title and I turned to look into the eyes of a small squat young woman.

"How does a radical like you drive a convertible Mercedes worth more than the annual salary of three people just working to make a living?  That is so fake and whack," she said after the usual pleasantries.

"I ummmm ... well I take public transport too and sometimes even ride my motorcycle to work ... 'cause of environmental concerns but you know it rains a lot ... "

Home gurl was not buying my spiel.  The giggling stopped and Professor Cool turned into Professor Fool.

I walked back to my office and called the dealer and sold the car back to him at a huge loss the very next day.  He threw in a two-door econo-box car to lessen my pain of losing the convertible Benz and I used that car until I bought a four door family car to fool myself into a settled-man mindset (that sh*t almost worked too but you know ... I liked to party too much back then).

"See Ridwan do you hear the ...  what is that?", Y. asked staring at my spaced out noggin.

"Nothing to worry about it is just that all convertibles flex over bad roads.  It is part of the price you pay for being cool."

"And that doof doof sound?", she pressed on.

That my dear is my conscience kicking me from inside of my noggin, I thought to myself as I wondered whatever happened to Victoria and her trunk full of secrets. ;0)

Onward!

I Don't Like Mondays (Part Repost)

16 year old Brenda Spencer

Do you remember the 1979 Brenda Ann Spencer case in San Diego? She used the rifle her father gave her for christmas and shot and wounded 8 kids at the elementary school across from her house. In a 6 hour standoff she also shot and wounded a cop, and killed the principal and head custodian.

When the standoff ended she was asked why she did it.

She answered: "I don't like Mondays. This livens up the day."

Her detached statement inspired Bob Geldof, then a member of the Boomtown Rats, to write their hit song "I don't like Mondays."

Tell me why?

I don't like Mondays ...

I want to shoot

The whole day down.

PS: When you asked me if I ever liked Mondays this post from April 2007 came to mind.  Not for the same reasons of course. 

Do you think Marx was right about labor alienation in capitalized societies?  And does capital/labor alienation explain why so many folks live such psychologically alienated and depressed lives in capitalized states?

I think so and that is why I particularly don't like Mondays when immersed in meaningless work motioning at places like salary hell.

Nonetheless, five Mondays from today I will rekindle my like for Mondays and every other day of the 'work week'.

I do hope your Monday is a great one.

Onward!

Picture Credit

Newt, is she really your friend, or is that just a photo op?

I see that Newt is courting the black vote for the "grand old party" these days. Memo to Newt: If you want to get black folks to vote for your party, tell us what you will do for us that will uplift our condition, not how bad Obama has been for us.

Newt can't really believe that black folks are going to all of a sudden forget what the republican party represents and change party affiliations, can he? That's just not going to happen. All Newt is going to get are editorials like the following that appeared in The Grio:

"Courage is one thing. But Gingrich will have to dust off his magic time machine and effectively undo a history of policy decisions and political shenanigans that have negatively impacted black communities in ways that have and will span generations.

For instance, President Ronald Reagan never supported the use of federal power to provide blacks with civil rights. In fact, he opposed the Voting Rights Act of 1965. In 1980, Reagan called the landmark legislation "humiliating to the South." It was Reagan who extolled the virtues of "states rights" when announced his bid for the presidency in Philadelphia, Mississippi where civil rights workers Andrew Goodman, Michael Schwerner and James Cheney were tortured and murdered. "States rights" and, by extension, the south's ability to continue the slave trade, was the very issue that lit the fuel on the Civil War.

For Gingrich to be right, we would have to forget about Willie Horton. We'd have to forget a now infamous television ad run by the late North Carolina Senator Jesse Holmes in which he attacked Affirmative Action by saying it took away jobs from hard working, more qualified white people and his 16-hour filibuster against honoring Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. with a federal holiday". [Article]

Well, maybe you black folks would do well in the republican party; you certainly seem to have memories like elephants.

     

A Fluffy Blog

This blog is in its fifth year.  Over this period it has moved between posts about motorcycles and dogs and politics and pissed off rants.

The latter two have been more consistent features - there is no me without a rant :)

Of late I have just written freely about things personal and close to my heart and things that weigh, for now, heavy.

Truth is I'm not even reading the daily ton of newspapers and journals that usually inform some of the more substantive posts here.  I have been slowly disconnecting myself for reasons not entirely apparent.

This morning I thought over coffee that I am baring too much of me here.  I thought that some of the moments when I just write personal and edit later may cause some people close to me to be uncomfortable.

I then took several posts down and then put them up again (being a Gemini) after I thought the damage was done already.

I know my cousin A. will disagree with me.  She reads the closest here and though she does not post comments I get her thoughts on the daily and many times in person.

She is wholly supportive of me writing so close.  But still the mirror in me head is making me worry.

I have wondered what my struggle brother, Angry over at ANG, may be thinking about the late course and content of this small piece of me.

Blogs can be anything as you must know.  You either write 'em or you don't.  You either read 'em or you don't.

I started this blog and carried it as a contrived piece of irreverent protest and not out of any simplistic 'struggle' pretense (it is after all just a damn blog).

I never intended this space to be a Facebook type of interaction.  I'm not saying that it is but I am feeling concerned that some of what I write here (of late) is just fluff or too fluffy.

I am not worried that the Guru may be offended.  He is above the mundane and knows I carry him in high, if even somewhat tainted, esteem.  :0)

Much of what the brother says is right.  He can see and talk even when he sleeps.  And in the wee hours of this morning I heard him tell me to accept that the option to just walk is primarily a matter of my privilege.

Yeah I have the latitude to thumb my nose at salary hell and its idiots because I can.  I hear you O' wise, shaven, and decidedly forever single sage but you are also wrong about what I am heading toward (and what brought me here).

All of the above gets me to the belabored point of saying that I am deciding what to do with this blog.

I have been here before.

I don't want to stop writing here but I don't like fluff, fluffy, or even a little of both.

Onward!

Too Close for Comfort.

I just watched the USA Mexico Gold Cup soccer final. Is that Giovani Dos Santos still breaking down the US defense? Somebody stop that man! 4-2  to Mexico. Maybe next time boys.

Now on to some more serious business. If you feel a bump about one o'clock Monday afternoon, it might just be something breaking off and hitting us from that "tour bus" sized asteroid that will be coming a little too close to mother earth for the kid.

"UPDATE for 5:35 p.m. ET: NASA has recalculated the time of closest approach for this event to be about 3 1/2 hours later than initially reported. The change is reflected below.

Here's something to dwell on as you head to work next week: A small asteroid the size of a tour bus will make an extremely close pass by the Earth on Monday, but it poses no threat to the planet.

The asteroid will make its closest approach at 1:14 p.m. EDT (1714 GMT) on June 27 and will pass just over 7,500 miles (12,000 kilometers) above the Earth's surface, NASA officials say. At that particular moment, the asteroid — which scientists have named 2011 MD — will be sailing high off the coast of Antarctica, almost 2,000 miles (3,218 km) south-southwest of South Africa.

Asteroid 2011 MD was discovered Wednesday (June 22) by LINEAR, a pair of robotic telescopes in New Mexico that scan the skies for near-Earth asteroids. The best estimates suggest that this asteroid is between 29 to 98 feet (9 to 30 meters) wide.

According to NASA's Near-Earth Object Office at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, Calif., an object of this size can be expected to come this close to Earth about every 6 years or so, on average.

There is no chance that 2011 MD will hit Earth but scientists will use the close pass as opportunity to study it w/ radar observations," astronomers with NASA's Asteroid Watch program at JPL wrote in a Twitter post Thursday (June 23).
Even if the asteroid were to enter Earth's atmosphere, it likely wouldn't reach the surface, they added.

"Asteroid 2011 MD measures about 10 meters. Stony asteroids less than 25 m would break up in Earth's atmosphere & not cause ground damage," Asteroid Watch scientists said.

The asteroid's upcoming Earth flyby will be a close shave, but not a record for nearby passing asteroids. The record is currently held by the asteroid 2011 CQ1, which came within 3,400 miles (5,471 kilometers) of Earth on Feb. 4 of this year."

Okay NASA, now that you have my attention, how concerned should I really be?

Finally, it's nice to see Van Jones trying to stand up to FOX. His lawyers have sent them a "cease and desist" letter (good luck with that), but I am pretty sure that it will be business as usual over at wingnut propaganda central. If Mr. Jones is planning a defamation suit it will be an uphill battle; but hey, at least he can give it the old college try. Besides, maybe the folks at FOX will think twice before they make false and inflammatory statements about him in the future.

Falling in Love So Late and Sunday Soul

"What you doing falling in love so late?" he laughed through the long distance line.

Dunno.

But I expect when her tired being picks up from mountains and trails there may be a reason.  And when is late too late?

I can't see that life holds any formulas.  And hearts greater than mine have said that love knows no rhyme or reason or time and place.

Still.  I dunno. 

Have you ever had someone steal your heart away
You'd give anything to make them feel the same
Have you ever searched for words to get you in their heart
But you don't know what to say
And you don't know where to start

... Gotta get you in my world
'Cuz baby I can't sleep ...

Onward!

Reclaiming The Uncertainty of Hell

Somewhere inside of a day spent just doing this and that and hanging with my boy D. in and around Pretoria I called the Guru with an important labor relations question.

"Hullo yes.  What?" is perhaps the warmest greeting one can expect from the distant spiritual one.  He is after all often too busy being godly to be remotely cordial.

"Are you feeling better?" I asked.

"Yes I am almost there."

"I'm confused.  Are you not the one who keeps company with the gods and, therefore, should be immune from the ailments of the earthbound?" I asked between sips of steamy coffee shop cappuccino. 

"Yes I do but not everything can be avoided.  What is going on?" he breathed through still clogged passages.

I asked my question and he sighed heavily.

"What the f*ck you gonna do in that dusty town now that you quit your job?  Don't you know that the grass is never greener on any side.  Have you not tried this before?"

"Chief we run different clocks and value systems.  I am tired of the sh*t I put up with at salary hell and it is important to live for something than to just die slowly for nothing," I pressed in vain to the holy one who sees everything from inside a system that does not even approximate the complex systems theory approach that genius woman who now wears hijab explained to me on our way to Mount Hood one summer evening.

"You should put up with half of the stuff I do in an average day and you will be holding onto your job.  The grass is not greener anywhere and you just seem lazy to me," the Guru puffed.

"You let me worry about the grass chief.  I have seen it and if it ain't green I'll paint it f*cking green.  Later," I said and ended the call.

"What that coloured f*ck say?" my boy D. asked as he paged through a copy of Satre's "Being and Nothingness" he just picked up.  I repeated the pearls from the dutiful sage who knows heaven and its purpose.

"Forget that fool man.  He believes that little shriveled man was god and expects you take him seriously?" D. said in Afrikaans shaking his head in reflex.

I take the Guru seriously.  He is a good man and friend who speaks his mind.  Sometimes I like what he says but most times not.  Whatever he may dispense though you can be sure it is not just warmed over opinion.

He is as thoughtful as he is annoying.  

Like it or not, the Guru thinks I am making a beeeeg mistake to cast aside a well-paying, if even mediocre and uninspiring job, and do so without a five-year-plan or career briefing to "strategize for 'the what's next".

"I would really like to see your bank balance.  You must have more money than you show anyone.  What will you do for money?  Money is better than no money!  A job is better than no job," he said to me just weeks ago.

Whatever doos!  Money is not the be-all and end-all of anything in life.  Nothing comes out of living scared and living in the shadow of comfort you construct to keep you shaded from your fears.

I expect, no I know, you will find that those dreams you fondled throughout your thirties and discarded in your early forties still haunt you.

Is that living?  Fronting through your fears and setting aside the will to push another storyline over the tired over-played account that finds you thumbing (or is that numbing?) through the TV guide looking to escape the Jaws theme that plays in your consciousness.

Somewhere in Mangalore a few years ago I confirmed a truth about my character I suspected all along.  And that personal truth is that I simply don't give a f*ck about playing games, especially this game that is constructed as life.

Falling flat in Mangalore also made me realize that the most profound question I had ever asked and will ever ask was when I was seven and in conversation with my dad at our kitchen table.

"If there are so many poor people suffering in the world because they don't have enough money why not just print enough money for everyone," I asked my dad.

Four degrees later and a stop-start academic career and I still consider that question to be the most important deconstruction of what is constructed as life and value.

In a sense I committed metaphorical suicide that day in the kitchen of my tender years when I withdrew my consent to be cast as Sisyphus in their game of life.

I know you read here dude.  I know you probably shaking your head as your eyes mist over from the incense that follows your holiness around.

I told you a long time ago that when I retired I was going to join you on your stoep and remind you that you should have f*cked more and f*cked up even more.

We not far from that stoep Hesus.  We may not make it there together but don't you just want to put the remote down and find that other dream.  Again.

And if we fail to make it into the gates of heaven why should we even care?  You know my ass will be bored with all that angelic virginal sh*t and finality.

Join me in hell here and in the afterwards.  In either hell, at the very least, there are still unanswered questions and suspense for living from moment to moment.  In the hell of the afterward we can join forces with Che and stage a revolution and send the devil to heaven where s/he can atrophy under certainty and all that fake ashram-like happiness.

We will teach that red mutha  to know that nothing, nada, and niks is certain in any context.  And then hell won't be such a bad place after all and you can drink all the beer and smoke all the reefer you want and marry as many strippers as you like!

Don't be scared boet.  I'll meet you there in just a few short ones.  So for now stop hiding under your satin bed sheets and start driving toward hell.

Onward!

Jon, why did you do it?

I always wonder why folks who want to maintain even an ounce of credibility would agree to go on FOX NEWS. The latest is Jon Stewart, who did a sit down with Chris Wallace and ate him for lunch. The folks at FOX NEWS are still talking about it every chance they get. And Stewart can't stop talking about it because he believes that the FAKE NEWS folks edited the interview to make him look bad. Duh! IT'S FOX NEWS!

Anyway, Wallace went on The Dom Imus Show [Yes, that Dom Imus] to defend the way FOX handled the interview.

"Chris Wallace defended his interview with Jon Stewart--and denied that it was edited out of context.

The interview on "Fox News Sunday" caused a huge ruckus, and Stewart spent two days talking about it on his own show. Most notably, he claimed that Fox News, in editing his 24-minute appearance down to a 14-minute segment, had made him look emotionally unstable and had taken out key portions of the interview.

"Speaking to Don Imus on his Thursday radio show, Wallace said that he thought the conversation had gone well.

"He scored some points, I scored some points," he said. He added that Stewart was "somewhat in denial about the bias of his program and more importantly of the mainstream media, and I also think he lives in denial about his ambitions."
Imus asked about Stewart's charge that the segment was edited to make him look bad. "I think if he looked bad it was his fault," Wallace said, chuckling. "The reason that anybody has seen the full version is because we put it out. We weren't hiding anything ... quite frankly, Jon was filibustering ... and we had to cut it down."

The two also agreed about Stewart's mockery of Herman Cain. (Cain harshly criticized Stewart, saying that he was being mocked because he is a black conservative.

"Name one other white performer who could get away with that," Imus said." [Story]

I know Don, you would love nothing more than to be able to mock a black person, again.

So anyway, if Cain is pissed at the way Stewart criticized him, how does he feel about the most popular conservative comparing Obama to Hitler to millions of his listeners?

Let's see if Herman breaks away from the other black conservatives and condemns one of his white conservative brethren when they make offensive and outrageous comments......Ahh wait, who am I kidding? It will never happen. Jig Herman, jig.

The end of the road for "Whitey".

I see that the feds finally caught "Whitey". Dude was chilling in Santa Monica in plain sight. He was even wearing a Red "Sax" hat for crying out loud! And here I thought he was living in some town way off the beaten path down in Mexico. It must be nice to have a certain skin tone when you are a criminal,---especially when you are an old one. Folks just tend to kind of leave you alone.

Whitey, it was a nice run, but it's time to retire to a nice quiet and secure nursing home run by the feds.

Speaking of aging white people; as the white population ages, you minorities just continue to kick out these damn babies. Now, unfortunately for some, A-merry-ca might have a problem.

"For the first time, minorities make up a majority of babies in the U.S., part of a sweeping race change and a growing age divide between mostly white, older Americans and predominantly minority youths that could reshape government policies.

Preliminary census estimates also show the share of African-American households headed by women — mostly single mothers — now exceeds African-American households with married couples, a sign of declining U.S. marriages overall but also of continuing challenges for black youths without involved fathers.
The findings, based on the latest government data, offer a preview of final 2010 census results being released this summer that provide detailed breakdowns by age, race and householder relationships.

Demographers say the numbers provide the clearest confirmation yet of a changing social order, one in which racial and ethnic minorities will become the U.S. majority by midcentury.

“We’re moving toward an acknowledgment that we’re living in a different world than the 1950s, where married or two-parent heterosexual couples are now no longer the norm for a lot of kids, especially kids of color,” said Laura Speer, coordinator of the Kids Count project for the Baltimore-based Annie E. Casey Foundation." [Story]

Oh Lawd! Could this be far behind?

Finally, I know that you Negroes love your television, but this is ridiculous. And can some USC fan out there tell me if the guy that the Sixers took with the 16th pick can actually play? Is he the next Dirk? Or is he the next Shawn Bradley?
 

Throw (only) the Negro from the plane.

I honestly was not going to blog about this sagging pants (dude kicked off the plane) story. Because, quite frankly, I just couldn't come to the defense of this Negro. He set the sartorial aspirations of black folks back a hundred years. He gets no love from the field. Yeah I know he was having some issues, and unless he was exposing his private body parts, he had every right to make a fool of himself. This is, after all, A-merry-ca. US Air was wrong to kick him off, but I just didn't feel like blogging about it.

That is until now. Why? Because, once again, I see hypocrisy in A-merry-ca.

Why does a young black man get kicked off a plane for showing his boxers, and a white man gets to wear nothing but his favorite Victoria's Secret outfit? [*pic] Black folks you have a right to cry double standard on this one.

"The gray-haired cross dresser boarded a June 9 flight from Fort Lauderdale to Phoenix wearing a little more than stiletto heels, thigh-high black stocking and tiny, electric blue panties, the San Francisco Chronicle reported.
Witnesses said passengers complained about the flamboyant flyer, but U.S. Air let him board because the company doesn't have any rules against showing skin.
"We don't have a dress code policy," spokeswoman Valerie Wunder told the Chronicle. "Obviously, if their private parts are exposed, that's not appropriate…So if they're not exposing their private parts, they're allowed to fly." [Story]

"We don't have a dress code policy"? Ahh, let me amend that statement a little bit: "We don't have a dress code policy" for white folks. But we do have a dress code policy for  Nig black people.

*Looking for my US Air frequent flyer card* Now where did I put those scissors?



  

A wingnut Governor showing his true colors, and a cell phone debate.

I see that Governor Big Hair is already showing the rest of A-merry-ca how he would act as our leader. (h/t to Nichole Wicks for this story)

"SAN ANTONIO (Reuters) – Texas Gov. Rick Perry on Monday added to state lawmakers' special session agenda a measure that would criminalize "enhanced pat-downs" by Transportation Security Administration agents at airports in the Lone Star State.

The bill died during the regular session of the Texas Legislature, which ended May 30, and the Republican governor -- who is thinking of running for president -- has been under pressure from conservatives and Tea party groups to ask lawmakers to reconsider the measure. During special sessions, the Legislature may only consider items that the governor puts on the agenda.

"I am grateful that the governor heard the calls of the people demanding that lawmakers stand up for the liberties of Texans," Wesley Strackbein, a conservative activist and founder of TSATyranny.com, told Reuters. Strackbein said he traveled to the Republican Leadership Conference in New Orleans over the weekend to confront Perry on the issue.

The bill would make it a Class A misdemeanor -- punishable by up to a year in prison or a $4,000 fine -- for a TSA agent to "touch the anus, sexual organ, buttocks, or breast of another person, even through that person's clothing" for the purpose of "granting access to a building or a form of transportation."

TSA pat-downs have drawn some high-profile criticism, including from former Miss USA Susie Castillo, who said in a widely-viewed online video. that she felt "molested" by a pat-down at Dallas/Fort Worth International Airport in April.
The proposed law passed the Texas House during the regular session but was pulled off the Senate floor without a vote after U.S. Attorney John Murphy circulated a letter to senators warning that TSA has the authority to prevent airplanes from taking off from Texas airports if the agency cannot certify that they are safe.

In a blog on its website, TSA pointed out that the supremacy clause of the U.S. constitution prohibits states from regulating the federal government.
"We, transportation security officers in particular, are trying to work in partnership with the traveling public to make you safe on flights," the blog says. "Work with us to provide the best possible security. That's all we ask." [Story]

Oh yeah, the Supremacy Clause. Hey, who needs a "stinkin" Supremacy Clause when you are going to be your own country, soon?   

Finally, there is a fierce debate going on  among some of you about who invented the cell phone. Some of you Negroes have declared that it is Dr. Henry Sampson, the brilliant African American engineer and author who became the first African American to earn a PhD in Nuclear Engineering back in the day. 

Well, there is a problem, because some folks have declared that Martin Cooper, a white guy, invented the cell phone. And, sadly for some of you Negroes, they might be right. But here is the deal: It doesn't matter who really invented the cell phone, we are just glad to have it. Unfortunately certain folks in this country can't stand to see members of another tribe take (or get) credit for anything, so that "color arousal" kicks in. (Thanks again for that word Francis)
Then, as is to be expected, there is a push back. Black folks can't understand how folks in the majority have such a hard time giving them credit for anything, and they wonder why Charlie always has to "check and raise" us at every turn.    

But here is the deal people; none of it matters. You have given more than enough of your blood sweat and tears for this country. Don't get caught up in this silly game of who invented what. It will take you away from focusing on what's really important: Making sure that you do what is right for you and your family, and ensuring that one day your children might be in a position to invent some things of their own.
  

Mrs Obama Arrives in Pretoria

Arriving in Pretoria last night

When I saw this picture in a local newspaper my first thought was that the 'birthers' are gonna be pissed.

It is downright unAmerican to wrap the President's kids in the colors of another country, ain't it?

The 'birthers' should relax though, the South African flag looks a lot like the old Amtrak logo.  So maybe the kids were getting ready to take a train?

Word is that Mrs Obama will be honoring Mandela.  Maybe in keeping with her 'get fit' spiel she can also help the podgy ruling class onto a treadmill?

Dunno.

Onward!

Picture Credit
Log Credit

Cases Line Up Against Greenpeace

Common Dreams. org
 June 20, 2011.

AMSTERDAM, Netherlands, June 20 (UPI) -- Eleven activists with Greenpeace appeared before a Dutch court as the group's executive director remained jailed for protesting arctic oil drilling.

Eleven members of Greenpeace faced court Monday on charges related to their protest at the climate change conference in Copenhagen last year, the advocacy group said.

A Dutch court ruled against Greenpeace recently in a case involving the work of Cairn Energy in the arctic waters off the coast of Greenland.

Greenpeace activists are barred from moving within 1,600 feet of Cairn's rigs for six months. The group would have to pay $73,000 per day if it violates the order. The court set a penalty limit at $1.4 million though Cairn had requested $2.8 million for each day its drilling was disrupted.

Greenpeace claimed that it caused Cairn to suspend drilling operations for four days while activists suspended themselves in a survival pod about 80 feet above the sea for nearly 100 hours.

South Africa's own Kumi Naidoo

Kumi Naidoo, international executive director of Greenpeace, was arrested last week and placed in a Greenland jail after scaling a Cairn platform.

Cairn, which left the arctic last year empty-handed, said it was committed to safe operations in Greenland's waters. (© 2011 United Press International)

Comment: Way to go Kumi.  Give 'em hell and when you done there get stuck into the environmentally wasteful South African government.

Onward!

Desperate measures.

I see where some poor guy just robbed a bank for a dollar so that he could get proper medical care. (h/t Vaughn for this story) That is not a good look for A-merry-ca. This reminds me of the story of that Michigan woman who is trying to sell her handwritten letter from O to pay her house note. Both cases of desperate people doing whatever it takes to survive in these post Bush apocalyptic times.

"A 59-year-old man has been jailed in Gastonia, N.C., on charges of larceny after allegedly robbing an RBC Bank for $1 so he could get health care in prison. Richard James Verone handed a female teller a note demanding the money and claiming that he had a gun, according to the police report.

He then sat down and waited for police to arrive. "… I say, 'I'll be sitting right over here, on the chair, waiting for the police,'" Verone told reporters, recalling the June 9 robbery in an interview from Gaston County Jail.

   And wait for the police, he did.

"He's sitting on the sofa as you walk in the front door," the bank teller said in a 911 call.

Police arrested Verone where he sat. He was unarmed.

Verone said he asked for $1 to show that his motives were medical, not monetary, according to news reports. With a growth in his chest, two ruptured disks and no job, Verone hoped a three-year stint in prison would afford him the health care he needed.

"I'm sort of a logical person and that was my logic, what I came up with," Verone told reporters. "If it is called manipulation, then out of necessity because I need medical care, then I guess I am manipulating the courts to get medical care."

But the charge of larceny, not armed robbery, is unlikely to keep Verone behind bars for more than 12 months. He is being held in Gaston County Jail on a $2,000 bond, according to a spokesman for the jail, and is scheduled to appear in court June 28." [Story]

Poor Richard, the poor  guy can't buy a break; he didn't even rob the bank right.

I wonder if he voted for Obama and "Obamacare"?

Sharia-Phobia in America

Habib Siddiqui
Countercurrents.org
June 19, 2011

Are Muslim Americans trying to impose a Taliban-style Shariah law in the USA ? Seemingly, the answer is ‘yes', if you are a Republican politician. The idea that America is this close to having her constitution replaced by the Muslim Scripture – the Qur'an - used to be a fringe notion in the post-9/11 era of Islamophobia that was packaged, promoted and propagated by malicious “Islamist watchdog” bloggers, neocon pundits with some think tanks and pen-pushing zealots. But nowadays that absurd idea has inched closer to the mainstream, thanks to our Republican politicians. Truly, outside Ron Paul of Texas , I don't know of any serious Republican politician who has not tried to bank on this ‘menace.'

Newt Gingrich, the former speaker of the House, is the lead dog in this evil campaign. Last year, in his speech at the American Enterprise Institute (a neocon think tank) where he is a senior fellow, Gingrich said, “The fight against Shariah and the maddrassas and mosques which teach hatred and fanaticism is the heart of the enemy movement from which the terrorists spring forth… One of the things I am going to suggest today is a federal law which says no court anywhere in the United States under any circumstance is allowed to consider Shariah as a replacement for American law.”

Gingrich is a morally decadent person with a history of corruption and adultery, and has obvious reasons for opposing the Shariah or God's Law that could find him guilty for violating some of the Ten Commandments like ‘ Thou shall not commit adultery' and ‘thou shall not covet thy neighbor's wife' and, thus, punished in this world, let alone his wretched state in the afterworld.

But what about other Republican politicians?

Read the rest here.

Comment: My brain is too fried to even add to what has been said here before and before then too.  That there is even anyone in the US who thinks Gingrich should be president is a scary thought on its own.

Does anyone think Obama can lose?  

Onward!

In praise of AMC and Father's Day. And a phony Obama gets the boot.

I am having "The Killing" withdrawals already. Now what am I supposed to do at 10:00PM on Sunday nights? With all due respect to HBO, AMC is fast becoming the best channel on television for original programming.

So anyway, another Father's Day has come and gone. Hopefully, putting some focus on one particular day will continue to make us aware of the importance of being  good fathers. Clearly this guy wasn't a good father, and these guys more than likely weren't raised by one. But I suspect that most of you reading this are good fathers and were raised by good men. I know that I was. My father was the kind of man who was as comfortable with college presidents and Prime Ministers as he was with the "average Joe" on the street. He taught me the importance of judging people by their character and and not their title or the size of their bank book. He loved the same woman as long as I knew him, and he raised his two children to value education, family, and the community in which they live.

In the black community, now, more than ever, we need good fathers. I am glad that our president is a good role model in that respect. But we need the cab driver, the cop, and every dude in the neighborhood pushing a nine to five (even the ones who aren't) to be good role models as well.      

Finally, I see that those oh so sensitive republiclowns yanked an Obama impersonator after his "tasteless Jokes" at their Leadership Conference in New Orleans.

Funny, they didn't yank my man until he started telling jokes about the republiclown candidates. It seems that only tasteless jokes about O will be tolerated by my wingnut friends.

Sorry Reggie, I hope that you at least got your check before you left.



 

The Original

Laila when you remembered my dad for me today it hit me hard.  Very hard.  I cannot tell you how many father's days passed inside of my politics and stance against the Hallmark commercialization of my love for my father.

He never complained.  Never waited for a card or a call on this day.  And he loved me still.

In my head I believed it was his solidarity with me against the machine that has slowly reduced us to contrived products.  His politics is my politics as you know but I feel much less certain this cold day of hindsight.

I think he knew more.  Always.  And I now know that he loved more intensely and with greater introspection than I could see.

If time was kinder with 20/20 I would do it different and just tell him that I loved him over and above my resistance to commidify our bond.

I would be bigger than just a posture because I am learning that life and love is more than just a politics.

So I am uncertain today but also certain that my stance in his time with me just glossed over him and his feelings about this day and other days when my heart was absent.

I don't know my beautiful sista because I never asked him. 

Now two years on and some more I would do it very differently.  I would still resist but I would do so with my heart in his hand.

Just days ago Erica in South Carolina sent me a picture of her dad sitting in the car on his way home from a doctor's appointment.

I stared at the brother and could see my father through Erica's eyes.  In that time that my dad struggled before he died Erica walked for me.

Her heart became mine across the miles as I sat silently fuming at powers and a course greater than me and my clenched memory.

Erica called on me to be bigger than my hurt and pain.  She asked me to honor my love for him and accept that life is a course of painful realizations that cannot be avoided.

I know what she is going through as she struggles now to live the words she wrote for me in compassion and love.

I pray she will dance with her father many more times so he may remember what her mother felt all those years ago before her final calling.

I hope that you will also dance with your father if even over the phone.  He is a wonderful man who reached for me when the lights made my eyes dark.  I will never forget his kind heart.

I guess inside of all this emotion it is perhaps most appropriate that I remember my father with my mother today.  Her heart must be more broken than mine.

But were it not for you and your love that bends around plastic stances and porous politics I would not be wishing with all my heart that I could just hold my father and tell him that I love him more than anything in this world and beyond.

Thank you for caring so much to remind me to remember the man who called me his copy.

Onward!