bet they wanna be rappers

It is apparent for me that we have some serious problems in our community. I mean serious, for any time a young man walking home from school can be beaten to death, in day light, while folks watch and think nothing of it, and even video it without considering that said person may need help, or what they are watching is not right, is a true indication that something is amiss in our beliefs and world view.

I have noticed that there is a difference in general behavior when I look and my parents, myself and the present generation. As a father with a 17 year old son, I am proud to have been a part in raising a fine and responsible young man. An honor student, an athlete and a gentlemen is what best describes my son, yet although he has made it to the 12th grade, I still worry and pray that he continues on his path of success with the next pointy of entry being graduation.

Often we fail to see the difference between blame and problem solving in such matters. Fo9r we get defensive and tend to see ourselves in the problems that we are confronted with. Whether it is that we are single parents, or our environments, we forget that the issue is not blame or deflecting blame but solving the problem. It is not difficult for me to discern what the differences are. I can reduce them to one simple area – media influences. My folks didn’t have to deal with television at all and the music, well let us say it was not as graphic and vivid as it was in my day. In contrast, I grew up with 4 channels on television and they went off before midnight, and the music, albeit it was the beginning of hip hop – the lyrical content was mild compared to today.

It is no wonder that we have folks feeling and displaying penchants that evince appropriate behavior as beating someone to death or watching someone getting beat to death without the consideration of helping. I won’t blame this all on parents, for objectively; I know they can’t control the media influences that bombard their children each day of their formative years. And I know folk will say media, or movies or music cannot make a person do something – I agree, but they can impact the way folks think and define personal standards of behavior. For example, I would assert that most African American males currently would have desires to be professional athletes, producers, Dj’s and rappers because of what they see. Not the jobs per say, but rather the fame and avarice and wealth associated with the aforementioned. Especially the music. I bet if I went down the playlist of any top urban radio station – I will see the likes of idiots inclusive of Gucci Mane, Jeezy, Lil Wayne, Jay-Z and Plies. Songs that contain lyrics espousing staying strapped, shooting folk, fucking ever girl in the world, and having pockets full of money and following ones owns rules.

So understand where I am coming from, and feel my pain as a parent for although Derrion Albert was not my blood, he was my son and I have no problem pointing fingers at the folks above for five to one, the folks who did the beating probably know all the lyrics to your songs more than the formula for slope/intercept and even worse, want to be rappers. The new KKK strikes again so let us bow our head in silence for we still dont know that we are both the hunted and the prey.

no such thing as a jobless recovery

Ok, let me get this out the way, I am sick and tired of this wagging the dog health care debate. A few weeks ago, I pointed out that 80 banks had failed. As of yesterday 91 had fallen victim to poor fiscal responsibility and lack of federal and state over sight.

I still see no real change or attention focused on our economic quandary. Seems to me even the general public doesn’t care. I mean I suspect most folks are employed so really do not have a vested interest in the issue, unlike me who has to pay himself as a small business owner and one who sees business after business around me close and vacant retail space amass like bubbles in bath water. I have patiently been trying to give the current administration a chance to show some balls and actually take this bull by the horns and make some real structural reforms such to get our financial system stabilized and to squash this problem. How ever, Obama has done much to do about nothing from my objective prism. I mean, I’m tired of this “to big to fail argument” that is recanted like some type of witches spell without defining what to big to fail means or describing the process by which such a determination is made. We have had 9 big bail outs over the last score of years and yet our current president still replicates the stupidity of a man who said that he was “suspending the principals of free market to save free markets” – George Bush. Obama has made no structural changes with respect to what has gotten us in this position and even worse, has the same minds over the problem who contributed to this problem.

I know that health care reform is his baby, but who needs or can afford health care if one is broke? Not me, gimme some loot and the ability to make loot. All the money you gave to big banks cant be accounted for and isn’t doing what the present administration described it would – restore credit and lending and remove toxic assets off the books of banks who got our loot. This incessant focus on health care is not as essential as focusing on the economy and anyone who disagrees can kick boulders barefooted. Unemployment is at a 26 year high and all I am hearing is shit about a public option and illegal aliens. Teen unemployment is at 25 percent and speaking of toxic assets, we still don’t know what is on the books of these banks we gave our loot too. I’m not the sharpest knife in the drawer but I can speculate that toxic assets in the form of retail commercial real estate that has lost maybe half their value and credit card receivables that I am sure have declined due to folks loosing their jobs or houses, have decreased as well.

Folk, I was born here and this descendent of slaves cares more about me being able to feed my kids than getting a H1N1 vaccine. We cannot bail out folk with non performing assets yet over look us at the bottom of the food chain. I do not know if Obama really cares more about health care or the bank lobby is really that strong. What ever the case, I know that credit markets are still frozen and that the artificial bubble we see in the stock market may be a function of the poorly thought out “too big to bail” mantra. Please show me some or at least one new regulatory reform. Mr. Obama your administration aint done jack, nada. I want you to succeed but your inactivity and bush economic copy catting aint gone do nothing because we will see more bank failures due to commercial bank failures for the next few years. Ones, don’t give the FDIC more of my money if you do not take this seriously, for I firmly believe that I do not need health care if I cant pay my mortgage, feed my kids, and I am broke. Aint no such thing as a jobless recovery mane.

PS – will deal with them racist over the weekend

idiot idolatry

I have come to concede that it is not the H1N1 or HIV that is the scourge of American culture, but rather ignorance. And not any ignorance, but the blinded kind that is accentuated by our inundation with celebrity. And I’m not gonna hat, for the simple reason although I don’t understand why someone would want to watch a person get a moon man over the first day of NFL football, I do accept that accidents happen.

It is just strange to me that folk all up in arms when someone they see on TV or a movie screen die than they are the economy, something that actually impacts me, or stick up for a person with no home training as the obvious case with Joe Wilson or Kanye West and not even talk or assert caring about how Wall Street Corporate CEOS aint been indicted or held accountable for getting us in this economic quandary. And yea, you can quote me, “I don’t give a fuck about Bich azz Kanye West “ and I think any person who would support is 4^th grade behavior is a feculent groupie or fool and likely look at TV more than they read. I tell you this, if he took the mic from my son or daughter, he would have his teeth kicked down his throat again.

I say this just to use my professional expertise to assert that we have become a nation of idiots as a result of our incessant Idolatry. We have lost our way, we move from Martin King Jr. to getting a black man in the office of the Presidency, to just being happy that he is there and feeling that we do not need to struggle anymore as if we have succeeded. We have not and some folks inability to care is worse than the actually commitment of the crime for more times than not, they will be the first to complain without being informed. Such saddens me. To me Hank Greenberg needs to be under the jail and even worse that folk wont know who he is but know about dirty dance dude who died, how many songs on Jay – Z new album and Kayne West bich azz antic on a movie awards show.

So Yawl can say what yawl want about me. I don’t know or care about none of these folks don’t know like or as if I know them. In fact the only celebrities I know are my kids and my family. If yawl were about anything you would be talking about the ones you love more than these other folk even Michael Jackson. That is just really real from folk here jones.

flu over Cuckoo's nest

Sorry I aint been posting to regularly, but best believe I’ve been writing : going over my next book of short stories and finalizing these plays, and writing a screen play called TOOL MAN SON. But with that said, creativity fosters more appreciation within this soma than sharing my erudite yet terse toilet sitting on contrived ruminations on current discourse. But I have to drop a few lines on this Swine Flu stuff, since all my folks been asking my recommendation as a scientist about the shots being handed out like free bubble gum.

It just strikes me as strange that the swine flu is renamed and talked up all of a sudden as if it was Ali vs. Frazier I. Government officials all across the country have been running around as if the sky is falling. They have been doing everything from rewriting disaster plans and stocking up on masks and even drugs that they don’t even know will work. More than half of Germans indicate that they do not want to take the shot and recently, here in the US, we have found out that our federal government has paid Novartis (based in Switzerland) and GlaxoSmithKline (UK) more than 400 million for vaccines made with adjuvant (a substance which isn't approved by the Food and Drug Administration).

The swine flu virus, which is now called H1N1, may infect up to half the U.S. population. Thus a justification for all the loot already spent/wasted on the make believe pandemic. The feds have already sent $350 million to state and local governments, $90 million to assist hospitals and emergency rooms get ready. Add to this that Obama wants to The Obama administration will spend an additional $2.7 billion to buy swine flu vaccines, that we don’t even know if they will work.

All this fro0nting really makes me speculate that something else is going on, mean when was the last time folks in America spoke of forcefully quarantine people in the event of a Swine Flu pandemic. The "Pandemic Response Bill" would allow the state to forcefully quarantine people in the event of an outbreak plus even put folks in jail and fine them for $1000 a day if they refuse to comply. It would also let health providers forcefully vaccinate folk without their permission and authorize forcible entry into private homes for such purposes.

My concern, at least one of them is that the seasonal-flu kills more folks and infects more folks annually than this flu and don’t get no love – it like some body wants this in the news for reason yet to be discerned from my peanut sized brain. Then they don’t know how many shots will be required. It could consist of two shots but no matter what, you know it will be given to at-risk populations first. Truth is Obama nor scientist actually know if the vaccine will do anything, to prevent or minimize the flu. Not to mention will likely contain a form of mercury called thimerosal. It has also been asserted that this new form of the wine flu is also birds as well as humans. Yes it is or maybe the result of human laboratory manipulation encompassing the North American avian flu and a form of human flu. I also want to what is the rush and why is it that Health Secretary Kathleen Sebelius is so anxious to get this vaccine out on the market?

I still remember the last time the US had an outbreak when mass vaccinations led cases of a rare disease called Guillain-Barre syndrome – which temporarily paralyzes parts of the nervous system. Not to mention this may all be a sign of the chickens coming home to roost. Especially if the article I read in nature about five years ago was true - the one that described how a team of US scientist lead by Dr Yoshihiro Kawaoka of the University of Wisconsin manipulated the 1918 "Spanish" flu pandemic virus to make a new killer Flu virus. So to me all of this is foul, impractical and borders on quackery to me. Giving out a virus that is rushed to be developed and placed on the market because of a media campaign is not smart nor scientifically supported. Moreover, I would like to accept my warnings from other scientist not me and not politicians or elected/appointed public health officials who could not tell the difference between mutation and selective adaptation. So when folks ask me, I don’t go Cuckoo of getting this vaccine and tell them “I wouldn’t get it.” Maybe wrong, but I feel better knowing I have used reasoning to decide such over fear.

i dont want to be successful

As I type, I am back home in Memphis. I haven’t written much lately and I am back because my granny is very sick, in fact don’t know how much she has left in this temporal world we term life. Just two years ago I lost my other grand mother and if you are a faithful reader of mine you would recant the post, which I called a diamond treated like glass.

I know they will never be away from me, for I live them and the words of wisdom and lessons of life in my heart daily. One of which was to never compete and that never settle to just be successful. In their eyes anyone could be successful and with hard work and confidence it was my mandate to be great. Maybe that is why I never really desired to be successful. I always wanted to be great and was inspired that I was great since I was knew high to my granny’s waist.

You see, I was blessed. I was raised in a time when things were not cars or clothes or money but how you developed and created and achieved with ones mind and work effort. It was not just enough to be successful for back then, successful folks just got theirs, moved away and never returned to their community in spirit or through life. It is a difference that is extremely noticeable today – the penchant for things ones own to define themselves as opposed as the accomplishment that leads other to achieve greatness outside of the isolation of others.

For us, it was historically our accord to be great for greatness would never be obviated from ones life the way material goods and wealth can. For wealth in heart is that of love and the joys of GOD. It is how we speak to others and listen t others as equals. It regards the vision of being a group as opposed to an individual. It is the locution of sharing as opposed to hoarding and knowing that I am no better nor worse than the next person.

So I am here in Memphis, where I was born and raised, and I am under my grand mother, bathing her, changing her gown, letting her play with my hair and hold my hand as she goes to sleep. I hope she is here for longer than the weekend, albeit she has stopped eating and my mother and her sisters think she doesn’t have to long to be with us. But I know she will always be here in my heart, and can tell by the way she hugged me and went to sleep with me in her arms last night like I was still 3 years old. I just wish Trey Songz and Drake had the type of influence I had to be great – for being successful is not enough and just wont cut it in this day and age.