Edshugeo The GodMoor

Good article by Richard Kim. I'm swiping the ending though. The whole thing can be read here.

I only read the first bunch out of 200+ comments. It's like those people have no idea what they're responding to.

Are white working-class voters really racist? How many and where? If a significant number of them are, should Democrats really court them on the terms of their racism? These are questions worth asking since, apparently, a lot of Democrats think they're valid. But as long as the Clinton campaign continues to code the fact that it is counting on a base of white racist support, we'll never have this conversation. And as long as the mainstream media indulges the euphemism of "electability"--one that makes white racism seem like a personal deficiency of Barack Obama's--we'll be stuck mucking around in diffuse fears and anxieties that nobody, least of all Hillary Clinton, wants to name.

So here's my final suggestion: as long as Barack Obama is called upon to explain, denounce and reject black racism, let's have it both ways. Let's have George Stephanopoulos ask Hillary Clinton how she feels about the white racist vote?

Hat tip: SubRealism

May 14th, 2008 - plus an SNL clip as found on Assault On Black Folk's Sanity;

Labels: politics, society, Truth, youtube and other video

This is fucked up.

These details are swiped from Electronic Village;


Villagers remember the horrific story of ten youths that forced their way into a Black woman's home in Dunbar Village housing complex down in Florida. For several hours,they not only gang-raped her repeatedly and viciously beat her young son, but they forced her to have sex with her own child. The teenage boys then placed the two of them in a bathtub and poured nail polish remover in her son's eyes, blinding him for a period of time. They attempted to set them on fire, but couldn't find a match. So instead, they violated them with ammonia and threatened to kill her family if she told anyone.

Only four of the suspects have been apprehended, there are six others on the loose. There is conclusive DNA evidence on at least one of the boys. There is no manhunt for the rest of the criminals, they are running around loose as you read this.


Fast forward to today. It seems that the NAACP and Al Sharpton's National Action Network (NAN) both refused to help this woman because it was 'outside the scope of their mission' ... however, both groups found time to send lawyers down to Florida IN SUPPORT OF THE RAPISTS. The lawyers are claiming that it is 'unfair' to not offer bail to these four rapists.

Barack Obama spoke on the rage that exists in Black America when it comes to race relations. That rage burns especially strong when sexual crimes are committed against Black women and children ... even if the criminals involved are Black!

I encourage all like-minded villagers to join in collective action against the NAACP and Al Sharpton's NAN as a result of their misguided criminal advocacy in the Dunbar Village case. Perhaps it is time for right-thinking villagers to stop fueling the NAACP and NAN with our money and our volunteer activism until they stop trying to hinder the successful prosecution of this heinous crime down in Dunbar Village.

Perhaps it is time to ensure that the safety of Black women and children are non-negotiable. Here are some specific steps you can take:

1. Share this post with others so they might have their conscience and concern raised as yours as been today.
2. Demand an explanation from your local NAACP and NAN chapter about the Dunbar Village case.
3. Cancel your membership to these organizations
4. Write a letter explaining that you will return when they prioritize the public safety needs of Black women and children.
5. Stop donating your time or money to these organizations; instead invest in other organizations that take the lives of Black women and children seriously.

Even if you do not belong to these organizations, call or write them to express your displeasure:


NAACP National Headquarters
4805 Mt. Hope Drive
Baltimore MD 21215
(410) 580-5777

National Action Network
Rev. Al Sharpton
106 W. 145th Street
Harlem, New York 10039
(212) 690-3070

You can obtain more information about the direct action against NAACP and NAN from the Dunbar Village blog (BBR #494).

Labels: bullshit, civil rights, society, terrorism

I'm a little concerned about the way the media is playing the Obama/Clinton primary campaign story. Especially the polling by race stuff. To me that seems way more polarizing than anything coming out of the campaigns.

Are they just reporting what's there? Maybe, but I remember that nobody I knew gave a rats ass about OJ Simpson until polls revealed a racial split among those who thought he was guilty or innocent.

Labels: bullshit, politics, society

Ms. Malik has avoided prison, which is good. Not so good is that she is still a convicted criminal, if not for writing poetry, then "of collecting information, without reasonable excuse, of a kind likely to be useful to a person committing or preparing an act of terrorism."

Right.

I didn't make any time to write any terror poems or songs, but I did record myself reading Samina Malik's "How To Behead" five times. Four before work, and once after. None of them turned out particularly well (flubbed lines and other stuff), but I uploaded the last two to YouTube, anyhow.





The poem can be read here.
Wanna download the Al Qaeda Manual? Here, but if you live in the U.K., you can be arrested for it.

Labels: civil rights, Fascism, fun, media, politics, society, terrorism, These pictures will come back to haunt me one day, World Affairs, youtube

I mentioned on a previous post, the plight of a young girl, convicted of owning terrorist manuals and writing jihadist poetry in the UK.

A commenter, Rus Bowden, has pointed me towards Clattery MacHinery On Poetry, who has an interesting proposition: celebrate poetic license on the day she is to be sentenced for her thought crime.

I am not sure how I'll take part in this, but I will, I think.

"Instead of prosecuting and imprisoning her, we should celebrate a World Samina Malik Day, when we all dress up as her, or as close to it as we can, and download the information she did, the jihad encyclopedia, the poisons handbook, the sniper and hand-to-hand combat manuals–and then write on it. She is due to be sentenced on December 6th. This should be the day."

I won't be dressing up anything like her, that's fo' sho', but maybe downloading that info and writing some bad terrorist poetry is just the ticket. Or maybe reading her poetry on YouTube? I'll have to read the terms of service first.

Might seem like an empty gesture from those of us who live in countries unlikely (?) to imprison us for such offences, but if even we in the U.S. and other lands that percieve themselves as free, do not excersise our freedoms, then we may lose them.

The Brits thought they were sorta, kinda, free, once.

Labels: civil rights, Fascism, society, solutions?, terrorism, World Affairs

The "$100 Laptop" (actually closer to $200.) project, aimed at getting computers to children in the "developing" world, is set to make them available to developed countries as well. The plan is to have consumers buy two. One for themselves and one for a child in a poor country.

I might be interested in this. If you are, leave your email address at xogiving.org, for a reminder. The program starts November 12th.

Via the BBC.

Labels: computers, good deal, Heroes, Linux, society, solutions?, technology

Found via AfroNerd.

Labels: music, music business, society, youtube

White people need to stop fucking with OJ.

Only thing I have to say is... Oh, no.
Not again.

Labels: bullshit, funny-ass shit, society

Cop gets busted on camera (mostly audio) tryin' to intimidate some kid.

Police harassment has never been an issue for me, but if it was, I'd be inclined to Wi-Fi my movements on a consistent basis. Being a pedestrian, I'd need a smaller camera, of course. I'm not sure what sort of wearable device is available for such things, but if they aren't, they will be eventually. Video blogging would be taken to a new level.

Labels: bullshit, civil rights, funny-ass shit, independent film-making, society, solutions?

Israeli Nazis.

Sorry, but that's funny.

Labels: funny-ass shit, society

Batman's origin often comes to (my) mind whenever the Ku Klux Klan and/or Birth Of A Nation is being discussed and vice versa. Last week, a 1911 entry from the Encyclopedia Britannica was discussed on the Undercover Blackman's site and this passage caught my eye;

“[The Ku Klux Klan] began in 1865 in Pulaski, Tennessee, as a social club of young men. It had an absurd ritual and a strange uniform. The members accidentally discovered that the fear of it had a great influence over the lawless but superstitious blacks..."

There's a famous line in Batman's origin where he says something along the lines of "criminals are a cowardly and superstitious lot" just before a bat inspires him to go out in public dressed up as a guy in a cape and tights.

I first* made the Klan/Batman connection, after seeing a documentary on TV (I was probably flipping channels) years ago which included a clip from Birth Of A Nation, where there's some guy chillin' on the lawn somewhere and he sees a couple of Black kids playing. Soon some other kid comes up with a sheet over her (his?) head who scares the crap outta the young ones. This gives the guy on the grass an idea and the rest you can figure out.

Bob Kane was Jewish, I think. Bill Finger, I don't know much about. They're not likely to be big fans of the Klan, but by some reports, BOAN was a box-office success equivalent to a film making $300 million, in today's dollars. A lot of people saw it.

Still, maybe it's a stretch. Though, I always wondered if the fact that superheroes are largely an American phenomenon had to do with the fact that we actually have masked vigilantes in our history seen as heroes in the decades leading up to the early years of comicbooks.

Speaking of Batman, I came upon this "remix" of Detective Comics #27 a couple of days ago, following a link on James Hudnall's blog (the second one). It's called Dusk-Man. I thought it was pretty funny.

*I'm sure I'm not even close to being the first one to think about this. I was referring to the first time it occurred to me.
About three years ago I noticed an ain't it cool news talkbacker used the phrase "Birth Of A Notion" in a thread about the then upcoming Batman Begins. And certainly, connections between the Nazi's raping of Nietzsche's Ubermensch ideas and Superman (created by two Jews) has been brought up time and time again.

Labels: comics, funny-ass shit, movies, society

The video of Mickey Mouse's terrorist cousin, Farfur being beaten to death at the hands of an "Israeli agent".
Funny and sick at the same time. I'd be less judgmental about it if it was a Palestinian sketch comedy show aimed at an audience older than 15.

Labels: bullshit, funny-ass shit, Islam, religion, society, terrorism, World Affairs, youtube

You gotta read this...

Labels: funny-ass shit, media, society

I get it from my pops, 'cuz when a man's in the house, all the bullshit stops."

Chuck D (of Public Enemy)

Oddly enough, I can't remember what song that's from.

Labels: Heroes, society, solutions?

I sure do. Another Dateline NBC/Perverted Justice special. Tonight. Check your local listings, fool.

Labels: Awesome, Fucking Idiots, funny-ass shit, society, tv

From DCEmu.co.uk

Boy cited for taking porn to school

A 14-year old boy was cited with a class C felony after bringing digital images of pornography to school on Friday.

Bismarck Police Lt. Dan Donlin said staff at Wachter Middle School called police after finding pornography on the boy's Sony PlayStation Portable. The boy was charged with promoting obscenity to minors for showing other students the pornography.

Donlin said the boy also was cited with simple assault, a misdemeanor, for scratching another student with a key. Donlin said the student who was scratched was the one who told school officials that the boy had pornography on the PlayStation.

http://www.bismarcktribune.com/artic...cal/113696.txt

Labels: funny-ass shit, porn, PSP, society

Interesting idea. I know crap about economics, but I like the way it sounds. And I think it's accessible enough to the average person, that it may spark a good deal of debate among people who normally don't talk or think about these things. Charles Murray has a book out called In Our Hands which presents an idea that proposes to replace the welfare state.

I first found out about this via Cobb who had some interesting comments and then read Murray's article here. There's also an interview with The National Review that sheds a little more light.

The most interesting opposing views, I've seen so far come from the Amazon.com reviews. I'm looking forward to more debate on this in the weeks ahead.

Labels: politics, society, solutions?

in Texas, they're arresting people in bars... for being drunk.

Ain't that a bitch?

found via; The Assimilated Negro

Labels: blogs, civil rights, Fucking Idiots, society

While I agree intellectually with most, if not all of the points made in Shay's article at Booker Rising (click the title above to read it), I have to say The Three Six Mafia were the most interesting part of the big show. And their song wasn't half bad either.
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I didn't watch most of the show. I'd forgotten it was on till just after nine (it started here at eight, I think) and when I tuned in, I divided my time between that and some other stuff. I miss Jon Stewart's Daily Show. I keep my cable TV very basic since I pay enough for cable internet, which allows me to find whatever I miss anyway. Still, I haven't really bothered to hunt down his show in a while.
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Doesn't it seem like Booker T. Washington should be older than 150? It's about another month from now, but happy birthday, just in case I forget.

Labels: fun, society, Truth, tv

Holocaust denier deserves to be ignored, not thrown in prison By Richard Cohen

Last winter, on a cold and black night, I went to hear the Holocaust denier David Irving speak at the University of Colorado. I arrived early to get a good seat and soon after me came five huge young men, all of them looking like skinheads. I glared at them, and they glared at me and for a moment I feared I was going to meet my maker. But it turned out that when Irving started to speak, the skinheads of my fertile imagination rose as one, unfurled an Israeli flag and announced themselves as Jewish protesters. Had it not been for those protesters, a handful of the curious and me, Irving could have held his lecture in a nearby broom closet. He is a man of justifiably small following, a claque of bigots so addled by Jew-hatred that they cannot see the evidence before their own eyes. The many pictures, the films, the artifacts, the testimony of victims and perpetrators alike is to them proof of a different kind: the ability of Jews to hoodwink the world. It never happened. The Holocaust is a lie. Now Irving has admitted the lie is his. There were gas chambers at Auschwitz, he now admits. The Jews there did not die of disease, but were murdered outright and fed into the ovens. This confession of truth was extracted by a dilemma. Irving was facing jail time in Austria for the crime of denying the Holocaust. His penitence got him very little. A judge hit him with a three-year sentence. A little delicious satisfaction is allowed. Irving is a liar. He is an anti-Semite. He has squandered his considerable gifts at dreary research for the glad rags of demagoguery. He had a Web page. He gave lectures. He sued and was sued. He picked the pockets of the gullible. Years ago, he mistook justifiable criticism by some Jews as an attack by an entire people. This is the odd talent of the anti-Semite: to see all by seeing one. Still, it is troubling to fight fire with fire - a fascist mentality with fascist laws. At the very heart of totalitarianism is an absolute fear of dissent. Anti-Semitism is an idea - a bad one, an odious one, but one all the same. The current Austrian government enforces a law against Holocaust denial that is an attempt to ensure that the old days do not return, but it is always a bad idea to have such legislation on the books. It is a precedent others can abuse. Article 48 of Germany's pre-Nazi Weimar constitution allowed the president to rule by decree in times of emergency. The law was abused in the Weimar era and then, of course, by Hitler. It got him on his feet as a dictator. The remarkable thing about bad laws is their plasticity: anyone can bend them to their needs. Germany, France and other European countries also have laws regarding Holocaust denial. These are some of the same countries who hold Turkey in sneering contempt for its law forbidding any insult to "Turkishness" - specifically references to the massacre of Armenians during World War I and the more recent trouble with the Kurds. To many Europeans, this is proof of Turkey's alien ways and a reason it should not be admitted into the European Union. It does not occur to many Europeans that Turkey is merely protecting its version of history as Austria and the others protect theirs. Truth, of course, matters - but what also matters, critically if not paramountly, is the effort to impose it by government fiat. It is easy enough to dismiss Irving and say he doesn't matter. But what makes him dangerous is not his ideas, but the official, censorious, response to them. He is muscled up solely by virtue of the forces arrayed against him. These governments, particularly Austria, have transformed the imbecilic into something exotically taboo. By banning these ideas, the various European governments accord them a certain respect: See, why are they afraid of us? It must be because what we say is true. Let Irving howl his idiocy in freedom. He doesn't deserve to be jailed. He deserves to be ignored. Originally published on February 23, 2006

Labels: society, Truth, World Affairs

But this is some funny shit right here. Via Cobb, though I first came across Zombietime's Anatomy of a Photograph via James Hudnall's site. That article has since been updated with a rebuttal to an article (itself a rebuttal) by the news organization in question (no pun intended).

Also worth looking at; The Tookie vigil from about a month ago. Hell, there's lots a' good stuff on there.

Labels: Fucking Idiots, funny-ass shit, politics, society, Truth, World Affairs

This was the 85th comment to Cobb's post, "Fond Memories Of Tookie". It's written by someone identified as Frank Gonzalez. With apologies to him, I'm posting his story (which I find amusing) in it's entirety. Here goes...

An appropriate sentence for Stanley “Tookie” Williams, convicted four time murderer.

Many others and I believe that the punishment should fit the crime, that is, an eye for an eye and a tooth for a tooth. Therefore, using this criterion, Tookie should be sentenced to death by SHOTGUNNING, as he sentenced his victims to die by.

I can see it all now, a macabre flight of fancy, with myself cast as the Chief executioner of San Quentin correctional facility.

One hour before the execution, final preparations would be made in the green room, the warden presenting me with hearing protection muffs and a sawed off, Mossberg 935 12 gauge magnum autoloading shotgun. The magazine would contain brass cased, hotloaded 00 buckshot.

“Are you sure you can handle this?” the warden would ask, a review panel having found that lethal injection was much too merciful for those such as Tookie Williams.

“Sure, I’ve dropped many a deer with one of these babies,” I would answer, hanging the muffs around my neck.

“No, that’s not what I mean, do you think you can slaughter inmate Tookie in such a brutal manner?"

“Why not, he killed his victims in the same way.”

“Very good,” the warden would reply, “Your weapon has been provided with four shells, one for each of his victims. The entire procedure is to take five minutes, in order for Tookie Williams to feel the maximum amount of pain for his crimes.”

“Yes sir.”

“Remember that each shot must be felt by the condemned, the last shot being a point-blank blast to the left side of his face, in memory of his victim Ye Chen Lin. Oh yes, and please be certain the final shot is so directed that it blows his brains out.”

“No problem,” I would answer confidently, sitting down in the death chamber with the Mossberg autoloader in my lap, awaiting instructions to carry out the duly ordered execution.

“Executioner, remember also that you must not speak to the condemned, as it is against prison procedure.”

“Yes, sir,” I would answer from my seat.

Later, Tookie would be drug in, kicking and screaming, to the death chamber. He would look at me with sullen eyes as he was strapped in the chair. The warden would pronounce the sentence, and the chamber would be closed.

“You may proceed, executioner,” the warden would remark over an intercom speaker.

I would nod, place the muffs over my ears, rise from my chair, and cock the Mossberg, chambering the first round.

“You’re a sick muthafucker,” Tookie would yell while I would pause to determine where to place the first shot, for maximum prolongation of his agony.

Remaining silent and focusing on the lower part of his legs, I would pull the trigger, shredding the prison uniform and blowing off his left kneecap, flesh, bone and blood flying everywhere. The spent shell would eject to the floor with a metallic clatter; smoke and the smell of burned powder would fill the room. An overhead exhaust fan would come on, ventilating the noxious fumes from the death chamber. Tookie would shriek in pain, his formerly powerful arm muscles struggling against the nylon restraining straps.

The warden would call out, “Hold for one minute.”

I would nod, preventing myself from uttering a word.

A minute would pass.

“You may proceed.”

Having time to decide where to place the second shot, I would direct the muzzle at Tookie’s right arm and pull the trigger. The blast would sever the arm below the elbow as the condemned would thrash about, writhing in exquisite torment as the spent shell bounced off a thick glass window in the death chamber. Blood would shoot in torrents from the remains of his thrashing arm; the severed lower part still strapped to the arm of the chair.

“Hold for thirty seconds,” would come over the speaker while the exhaust fan would hum in the background.

I would turn to the warden with a quizzical expression.

“He’s running out of blood, at this rate he’ll be dead before you blow his head off.”

I would nod.

“Proceed.”

The muzzle would be aimed as to produce a painful lower gutshot, the 00-buck blasting in a wide pattern, nearly severing his penis and lower spine; the third shell casing bouncing off a wall before landing on the floor of the death chamber.

“Hold for thirty.”

Blood would be dripping to the floor from Tookie’s wounds and spattered about the death chamber; I would pause to wipe blood from my shooting glasses as the smoke cleared.

My glasses replaced, the bored warden would remark in monotone, “You may again proceed executioner.”

“Finish me off you cruel muthafucker!” Tookie would yell with his remaining strength.

“With pleasure,” I would retort with a vicious smile, momentarily losing control and violating prison procedure for the first time in my career as Chief executioner of San Quentin correctional facility.

Calmly aiming point blank at the left side of his face, I would move the checkered buttstock of the sawed-off Mossberg high to my right, so the kill shot would enter his skull at an oblique angle. The trigger would be pulled, the final brass shell casing ejecting automatically. The blast would erase the left side of Tookie’s face; his brains erupting through the skull from the rear of his head, splattering like red, white and gray Jell-O over the green walls of the death chamber.

Slumped in the chair, a dying Tookie would gurgle blood from his mouth for a minute or two; I feeling remorse for having spoke to him in his final moments.

As the smoke cleared the chamber would be opened for a physician to pronounce Tookie dead. The doctor, not really caring, would look over the mangled remains and say, “Well, if Tookie Williams isn’t dead, I’ll bet dollars to donuts that he wishes he was.”

The warden would walk in, stare at me and say, “Christ, what a gory mess, look at you, you’re practically covered in blood from the condemned!”

Yeah, it’s a good thing Tookie didn’t have AIDS or hepatitis,” I would answer nonchalantly, quickly adding, “Sorry warden, I violated procedure by speaking to the condemned.”

“Don’t worry about it, I don’t blame you, he was a mouthy piece of shit; were I you, I’d have punched him for his smart remarks.”

With those words, the execution party would leave, with other death row prisoners assigned to remove the body and disinfect the death chamber.

Later, the warden looking on in sheer disgust, the remains of Tookie Williams would be carried off from San Quentin in an unmarked coroner’s van, to be dumped into San Francisco Bay from the Golden Gate Bridge.

Labels: Awesome, death, fun, society, solutions?, terrorism

Words like genius and legend are too easily thrown around nowadays, but here was a man who, without effort (or seemingly so), lived up to those words. He was also funny as hell. His work influences me as an artist, musician, and in some ways, the manner in which I perceive the world around me, and laugh at it.

Labels: death, fun, Heroes, society

I think he's one guy you can cross off this year's Christmas list.

Just finished reading the "Los Angeles County District Attorneys Response To Stanley Williams' Petition For Executive Clemency". (found via Cobb) Interesting read, all in all, but I found the following to be of particular interest;

"Moreover, Williams remains loyal to the gang member street code of ethics. He has refused, despite his hollow claims of attonement, to be debriefed by the prison authorities. Such a debriefing could provide the prison authorities with important information to aid them in establishing institutional security. It would also provide tremendous insight into how the gang members operate within the prison walls and how they are able to continue their criminal activities on our city streets while locked up behind those walls. Lastly, it wouldshow that Williams has finally renounced his criminal life, and in some small way, has begun to accept responsibility for his actions.

Despite the value of such a debriefing, Williams, falling back on his ever-present gang mentality, claims that he would not submit to a debriefing because to do so would be to act as a "snitch" and as any gang member would concede, in the gang world there is nothing lower in the hierarchal order then a snitch."

In other words: reformed, my ass.
I have some simpathy for those who oppose the death penalty based on their view on life and whatnot, but the bullshit being spouted by Jesse Jackson and his collection of C-list celebrities (and Snoop Dogg) is a little unbareable. Children's books? Get the fuck outta here! Innocence? Come on! Seriously! He's the co-founder of the Crips. He's unleashed a virus that's killed thousands.
Jesse's now on my "Harry Belafonte list of formerly useful activist celebrities I previously respected". I think there's only two people on this list, Jesse (it was a long time coming, wasn't it?) and Mr. Tallyman, who thinks that calling Colin Powell an uncle tom is decent political discourse. This list might be bigger, but I rarely remember to write these things down.

My only gripe about the death penalty is that it isn't often enough dealt to those who snuff out black lives, whatever the color of the perp. Some would say, "hey, there's a reason to abolish the death penalty." I say, "no, we know what the problem is. Fix it." Also, 24 years of appeals? Isn't that excessive?

Labels: death, society, solutions?, terrorism, Truth

This article says pornography to go is a no-brainer, but oddly enough, I never saw this coming. I liked the idea of the video iPod when I first heard about it and I like porn. I don't care much for the idea of carrying "Rocco Ravishes Europe" or anything by Max Hardcore in my pocket, though. My feeling is that iPod porn will soon make headlines in the context of it's use by students in classrooms. I have to worry too, about whether or not public masturbation becomes more convenient and thus more prevalent. I take public transportation. And public restrooms, fuggedaboutit!
Anyway, I still don't have an iPod nor any of the other portable mini music players as of yet. I have a portable cd player that plays mp3s on CD. While the video iPod sounds cool, I may be leaning toward the Sony PSP, which plays games as well as video. I'll probably get one around January-ish. I haven't had a close up look at either product, but I assume the screen sizes will make watching subtitled movies troublesome. That's kinda an issue for me. Also the price.
iTunes is selling video downloads for $1.99 or something. That seems a bit much, but people appear to be buying 'em. Plus a more reasonable price point might have people questioning the 99 cents they're charging for music downloads. Tough to argue with success, though. Besides, there are alternatives for the resourceful among us. "Nudge, nudge, say no more"...

Labels: downloads, media, porn, PSP, society, technology

Prince has a new song for which proceeds will go to the efforts to help the victims of Hurricane Kartrina. Get it here, if you're so inclined. If not, there's http://www.redcross.org/ for direct donations.

Labels: downloads, music, Prince, society, solutions?

http://www.redcross.org/ or the charity of your choice. Small amounts are okay if that's all one can do. Millions of small amounts add up.

Labels: society, solutions?

Not because of the war in Iraq, which I believe he opposes as well, but for Bush's immigration policies (or lack thereof). Click here for the article.

I found that story while searching for articles on Farrakhan's endorsement of a comment made by Vincente Fox a while back. I didn't spend a whole lot of time on the issue, but all I found were repetitions of the Associated Press story which concentrated on a few one-liners. I was hoping to find a more detailed account. The story's a week old or so, but I'd just heard about it, having downloaded and watched a couple of episodes of Bill Maher's Real Time yesterday.

Here's a re-cap of the controversy.

As for Farrakhan, a lot of people had the usual comments (I have mixed feelings on the dude, myself), but conservatives seem to be in denial of the fact that he is one of them, more or less. That's besides the point anyway.

Here's a view I tend to agree with.

Labels: funny-ass shit, politics, society

Another swipe from the New York Post. One might get the idea, that I actually like this paper. I don't. Doesn't mean I won't look through it every now and then. This piece expresses a suspicion I've harbored for a while, especially about "ebonics", and why (to my ears), African-Americans sound completely different to Black Africans across the non-American diaspora. This is not to say we all sound the same, but there are similarities I hear in various dialects that suggest some sort of relationship. To me, African-American (not counting the Geechees, which I've probably spelled wrong) slang sounds completely removed from that relationship.

The other points are interesting as well. I plan on buying Mr. Sowell's book and giving it a read.


By WILLIAM RASPBERRY

May 17, 2005 -- THE plight of have-not blacks in America's urban ghettos, says economist Thomas Sowell, can be laid at the feet of white people.

And not just any white folks. The culprits are that particular breed of white people known as "rednecks."

If you've followed the writings of Sowell for as long as I have, you'll know that he's not saying anything as simple as racism accounts for today's black poverty. He's saying something much more complex and, to my mind, far more intriguing.

Immigration from the British Isles to the New World was not so random as many of us imagine. Most of the settlers of Massachusetts, for instance, came from near Haverhill in East Anglia. Virginia aristocrats came from the south and west of England.

And the Deep South was populated largely by immigrants from the northern borderlands, Ulster and the Scottish Highlands — from "among people who were called 'rednecks' and 'crackers' in Britain before they ever saw America." And these are the people who formed the culture — the speech patterns, preaching styles, social behaviors, propensity for violence and attitudes toward schooling — that became the culture of Southern blacks, Sowell claims in his new book, "Black Rednecks and White Liberals."

And it is this cultural heritage, he argues, "more so than survivals of African cultures," that has produced the urban black culture of today.

So what?

So this, says Sowell: The redneck culture has been a developmental millstone for both blacks and whites imbued in it — witness the lower academic achievement in the Deep South.

But he says it has been preserved most faithfully in the black ghettos — just as the French spoken in Quebec retains formulations now considered archaic in France. Indeed, in a fascinating switcheroo, the redneck culture has become, to many of its defenders, the authentic black culture and, on that account, sacrosanct.

And it continues to be a millstone, though many of the penalties it extracts are blamed on racism.

But as Sowell argues — and has been arguing for decades — the racism explanation cannot account for differential outcomes among blacks from within and without the redneck culture. For instance, a recent study found that most of Harvard's black alumni were either from the Caribbean or Africa or were children of Caribbean or African immigrants.

It is interesting to read the Sowell analysis alongside University of Pennsylvania professor Michael Eric Dyson's new book, "Is Bill Cosby Right? (Or Has the Black Middle Class Lost Its Mind?)."

I hope it won't give away too much of the plot to reveal that his answers to his own questions are: No and Yes.

Dyson, who can coin a phrase with the best of them, spends a large part of his new work defending the "knuckleheads" of Cosby's inelegant description against those who (like Cosby) believe their refusal to adapt the manners and language of the middle class is holding them back.

Or as Dyson puts it, defending the Ghettocracy from the Afristocracy.

The point, as he is at great pains to make, is that there's nothing wrong in the ghetto that an end to racism wouldn't fix. For Cosby to suggest that slovenly language and dress have anything to do with the trouble that black youth are in is to blame the victim and "let white people off the hook."

And Cosby, whom Dyson "deeply respects," etc., has been letting white people off the hook for years — with his universal (rather than an authentically black) approach to humor and even with his toweringly successful Huxtable family (which reassured white TV viewers that the nightmare of racism had ended and it was safe to lay their guilt aside).

The danger is that in our zeal to score points off one another, we'll forget what the game is about in the first place. Dyson, for example, roundly defends the black youngsters whose circumstances sparked the Cosby campaign; but he has no practical advice for them. It is up to the rest of us, he suggests, to keep alive the faith that racism is the only explanation we need.

Is Sowell's redneck culture a better one? Perhaps more to the point, is it salable?

One thing seems beyond dispute: Maybe we haven't laid racism to rest, but we have reached the point where what we do matters more than what is done to us. That's great, good news. Would somebody write a book about it?

E-mail: willrasp@washpost.com

Labels: society, Truth

Goddammit!

Labels: politics, society, solutions?

I feel that not voting is the same as voting. It just says that "whatever
the rest of you decide is okay by me". It reinforces the status quo.
Personally I think a more valid "none of the above" option would be to cast
a vote for a long shot candidate. One who's not likely to win. It lets the system know that while you're not happy with the two major candidates, that you're still willing to participate
in the process. It's often what I've done. Sure it makes little impact if
any, though I think more are finding that option with third party candidates
they actually like (won't be happening much this year), but the party that
loses in a close election will know that victory could've been theirs had
they captured more of the third party vote, as was the case with the Dems
and Ralph Nader (and the Repubs w/ Pat Buchannan not too long ago). More
votes in play means the parties have to work harder, less makes their work a
little easier.

More on this subject another time...

Labels: civil rights, politics, society, solutions?