(An oldie but goodie reprint for a friend who wanted my jerk goat recipe...originally posted on Wonderfully Wino...12/29/08)
I got one of those dinner invitations the other day, that start me salivating like Pavlov’s dogs, as soon as I hear my friend’s voice on the phone. My girlfriend (friend, not lover) has Jamaican roots. Her voice still carries the island lilt, even though she’s lived in America for many years.
She speaks and it reminds me of days spent in the sun, watching the ocean gently lick the white sandy shores of her home. She invited me over for dinner, as payment for sprucing up her resume. She said she’d cook whatever I wanted already knowing what I was going to say before I said it. We had a good laugh about her clairvoyance. We ended with her reminding me as always, to choose the wine, and to surprise her.
I knew I was going to be treated to some jerk goat and rice with a Guiness beer mixed into fresh carrot juice on the side. My favorite of favorite Jamaican food. I had to add a good merlot because it was her favorite and we would drink that while she finished preparation and served. All I had to do was sit, drink, listen and eat. She talks enough for both us.
The surprise that she asked for, would be a hearty California Red Zinfandel, a perfect complement to the sorta spicy meat on the table.
I would go so far as to say that red zin is the California signature wine. However, the grapes are not native to the state. Zinfandel grapes originally came from Italy. The same grapes are used to make both the red and white zinfandel varieties. While white zinfandel is actually pink, the red is almost black in color. It has a spicy taste, kind of peppery and fruity at the same time. It’s a wine that really goes well with burgers and pizza.
The price range is big, from pretty cheap to way too expensive. Since it’s red, I guess most people drink it at room temperature. However, my wine mentor, the man who taught me about wines and in fact owned a vineyard in Spain, told me that Zin should be consumed at 65-degrees. That’s warmer than chilled, but cooler than room temp, usually. My old friend kept his wine refrig in the living room within easy reach.
Jerk Goat is an easy prep, but it does take awhile. Sometimes you have to tenderize the meat for a day before cooking. My friend’s recipe follows below for those feeling adventurous. It really is wonderful. She serves the meat with white rice, but you health conscious folks can substitute brown, it’s okay.
The Guiness and carrot juice...well make sure the carrot is freshly juiced. This drink absolutely does not work with canned carrot juice or carrot juice that is more than a half hour past juicing. In Jamaica, it is even sweetened with brown sugar or honey. I like the brown sugar version, but its really not necessary if the carrot juice is fresh. Add a sprig of mint for a kick, if you will.
Jerk Goat Preparation
1 ½ cup onion, finely chopped
4 to 6 cloves of garlic, finely chopped
1 tablespoon fresh thyme leaves (or 2tablespoons dried leaves)
2 teaspoons salt
2 teaspoons ground black pepper
1 tablespoon ground pimiento (allspice)
½ teaspoon ground nutmeg
1 teaspoon ground cinnamon
1/4 cup of soy sauce
1 very hot pepper, chopped,
or teaspoon hot pepper oil
1 leg of goat with bone in
Mix or puree together the onions, garlic, soy sauce, and spices to form a paste. Pierce the leg of goat all over and rub the paste all over the meat. Any unused paste (also known as "jerk rub" can be stored in a glass jar in the refrigerator for up to a month for later use). Cover or wrap in foil and refrigerate overnight to allow spices to penetrate meat.
Preheat the oven to 400 F. Sear the meat loosely covered with foil in a roasting pan at 400 F for 15 minutes and then reduce heat to 350 F. Roast meat for another hour or two depending on weight until the internal temperature reaches 150 to 160 F. Remove the foil for the last 15 minutes of cooking
.
If you use a tougher cut such as a neck roast for cooking, plan on a longer cooking time and on marinating the meat in a mixture of beer and lemon juice overnight. Put the jerk rub on it in the morning and then cook in the afternoon. Enjoy!
Salud!
7.31.2009
7.29.2009
Stranger on My Block
I live in a house that's been owned by my family for 8 decades. We've been associated with this house on this street for so long, that it has become another family member. It is a part of us, like we, the family, are a part of this house and this street.
This house, that I now own, is the first house of my memory. My parents lived here when I was born. I can remember when the street wasn't so wide and the retaining wall across the street, wasn't there, and the public bathrooms at the park shelter were always open. I can remember nights without the unending traffic sounds of I-71, because it did not exist.
I can remember when half my neighbors were Jewish, and Rockdale Temple was located at the top of the hill and a little north on Reading, north of Samuel Ach Junior High. There was a drug store on the corner as well as a butcher shop. Forest Avenue was a couple of blocks over. The Forest movie theater was there. My dad had a part time job as bouncer. We saw movies for free on the weekends.
The bottom of Rockdale was quiet, peaceful, neighborly. Mr Harmon lived there a few doors away. Mr Harmon was known to the world as Chuck Harmon, first Black man to play for the Cincinnati Reds. But to me, he was just Mr. Harmon, my grandfather's friend. I knew everybody up and down the block, Mr. Montgomery and both Mrs Montgomerys, Mr and Mrs Keys, Mrs Johnson, and her daughters next door...their house burned down and was never rebuilt. Mr and Mrs Chandler, after the Keys left. Mr and Mrs Pate on the other side. The Bostons, and Mr Jimmy Woods, Cincinnati's most famous Black golfer. Parts of Avon Field Golf Course are named after Mr. Woods.
This house has always been the center of our family's world. We may leave, but we always came back. It was peaceful, familiar, and comfortable. It was home.
My comfort zone was shattered last night. It was a violation of my space even though I wasn't directly involved. I was directly affected. I felt-feel violated, raped almost. Someone killed a man a few doors down last night. Rolled up on him in a car with no lights, as he was standing outside, leaning on another car, and fired five or six shots into him, leaving his body on the sidewalk, dead.
It was a very big gun...Not the “pop, pop, pop” that everyone talks about...These were big, quick explosions of sound...loud and invasive, ripping through the late evening calm, scaring me and startling my dogs into full throated barks of anger and fear.
The quiet night turned into a death vigil as police shut down the street, people came out of their homes to watch, while others arrived in cars, driving up to find out if they knew the victim.
He was a stranger on my block. He did not live where he died. He died just north of the house where lives a very pleasant young man, a dog owner that I talk to frequently, since we have pet interests in common. It wasn't my neighbor. It was somebody else. Some other mother's son whose blood was spilled this night.
The body lay in view for a long time, while police investigators did their work, counting shots, picking up shell casings by flashlight.
A changing guard of young people, men and women, bathed in the glow of their cell phone lights melted in and out of the darkness, forming yet another outer perimeter, outside police lines and yellow tape, reporting back to those who didn't make the trip....”it's Debo” one of them said as he walked past my house.
This was not my first crime scene, personally or professionally. However it was the first one inside my comfort zone...my home.
It continues to jangle me. Today, my comfort zone looks different. It feels different. Nearly 13 hours later and it's still decorated with crime tape left by careless, uncaring police. They reopened the street, but left the tape hanging, wilted in the rain.
I have talked often of leaving it forever, moving south to be nearer one of my sisters.
Today, sadly I think that dream has become a goal.
It is finally time for me to go.
7.28.2009
Roadblock to Health Care Reform
Courtesy of the New York Times....These are the six holding up Health Care Reform...It's time to ask them how much they are being paid by the Health Insurance Industry, which is dropping one million dollars a day to keep health care reform from passing in a way that benefits the people rather than the corporations....
More info here
Maybe the rules should be....if you take money from the industry...you can't vote on the bills pending in congress...
However, I have a feeling that would negate any quorum, rendering it impossible to pass any legislation what so ever...
It is time to write your congressman, if you haven't already done so...
Kicking the Habit
I'm not sure when I lost my taste for all things sports. I grew up living and dying with the Cincinnati Reds and Royals....I remember being on my dad's shoulders at Fountain Square in 1961, I think..when the the Reds beat the Pirates for the Pennant..
You're talking to someone who couldn't eat for three days after Carlton Fisk hit the homerun to win game six of the '75 World Series. I was in the sports booth when he did it. I was there working as a sports reporter.
I mean what people tend to forget is that the playoffs with the Pirates went down to bottom of the ninth, two outs in two games, before the Reds pulled it out to even get to the World Series.
During the celebration on Fountain Square, in 1976, I was standing, interviewing the police chief when somebody threw a 40 ounce beer bottle at him. It shattered on the wall between us...The Reds went on to beat the Yankees that year...
I used to watch the games from the announce booth with the voice of the Reds, Paul Summercamp. Gordie Coleman and Paul Rathgaber were there, too, sometimes.
Frank Robinson, Vada Pinson, Oscar Robertson's brother Baily were neighbors. Baily was one of my softball coaches. My other coach was Tom Turner of the Negro Baseball Leagues..
My parents were jocks. I thought everyone got up before the crack of dawn to go run six miles on the track at Walnut Hills High School and then go to the Melrose Y to spar, shadowbox in the ring and work the speed bag in the gym. My Dad did that and took me with him. I was two or three...walking..but not much else.
My mom played ball and bowled..She was a highly ranked amateur in Ohio, matching my father's prowess in the boxing ring..
My parents and I used to go to every Mohammed Ali fight...I stood between them as my mom rooted for Joe Frazier and me and Dad rooted for Ali....It was a long ride home the night Frazier beat Ali..Mom has never let us forget it...to this day..
I mean, when I was a kid my Sundays didn't start with church...they started with the Cleveland Browns...Jim Brown...Lou Groza...Paul Warfield..the holy trinity..
Loving sports was in my blood. And it lasted a long time. I mean I lived in Chicago the entire time that Michael Jordan played with the Bulls..retired...came back...played again...Michael had this habit of working out at various gyms around the city. One day, for three days, he chose mine on Broadway...He got a good workout...we just watched surreptitiously while playing with the weights and attempting to be cool as he stood among us...
I can remember getting dressed to join my friends at one of the play off games when OJ decided to do his slo-mo run from police. Chicago TV split screened the chase with the game.
I never made it to the game to be with my friends that night, but I do remember sitting there half dressed...watching that split screen...with tears streaming down my face....watching my old hero and my new hero...simultaneously...
It was a joyous time in Chicago...I lived a few blocks from Wrigley Field...open my windows and I could hear Harry Carey sing during the seventh inning....
I braved below zero temperatures along with 3 million other people to welcome home the Bears after the Superbowl...It was magic...
One night after reporting from the Virginia Slims tennis tournament...I was on a city bus that turned over after the driver fell asleep at the wheel and hit an abutment....My knee got stepped on in the ensuing stampede off the bus...I was the only one carried off the bus...If you see me limping today, as I sometimes do...it's because of this particular sports injury...
I played sports....I watched sports....I breathed sports....I worked sports.....
Yet...It no longer dominates...like it used to...
I don't care if Michael Vick finds a new team.....or if there is a coverup surrounding Ben Rothlisberger...
Nor do I care if Pete Rose is reinstated....Hell, unless ESPN takes over ABC network for some sporting event...I never see it these days...
And while I still turn him on to watch or to keep track....I realize that I don't really like Tiger Woods...
He is amazing at his sport...but he seems.....not human....more humanoid...no spark...nothing going on inside....
Same for Roger Federer....mechanical efficiency...yet incites no passion...
Rafa incites passion...but I can take it or leave it..
There is nothing that keeps me coming back anymore... except maybe the Williams sisters.....I guess my passion is gone...
These amazingly talented individuals work their sports like it is a business...and it is....but business is not exciting or passionate..
It's not sport..
and no longer worth my attention..
7.26.2009
Things That Make the Hair Stand Up on the Back of My Neck
A Sunday Rap...
Ex Governor Sarah..
Okay now, let's all sing (to the tune of Jimmy Crack Corn)...So long Sarah, So long Sarah, So long Sarah...we're glad to see you go...
Except my fear is that she will do a “retirement tour” like the Rolling Stones or Cher...and never go away or fade gracefully into the sunset...
As much as I love the Rolling Stones....a 60+ Mick Jagger just doesn't do it for me, anymore...and neither does repeatedly beating up on intellectually-phobic politicians
-0-
Dr. Henry Gates
While I have a very big problem with police who arrest people inside their own homes....I have similar problems with the continuing prima donna behavior of Black men who only seem to remember they are Black when they run smack into the reality the rest of us live with..
I particularly take offense to the good scholar's statements of “I'm 75% white,” etc....as if that means something...
Any Black person born in America can make that statement, thanks to slavery, miscegenation , rape, and passing...
We know this thanks to Gates' genealogy activities and studies...We've all got white blood in us...
So what?
He also sleeps white and has half white children, to use his terminology....
As my sister says....”perception is reality”.....in other words...it's not what you are...it's what you look like....
So get a grip Dr. Gates....and go sit down...
-0-
Darth and Dubya
Cheney wanted to use the army to arrest the terrorist wannabes in Lakawanna...He wanted to turn the army loose on American soil....on American citizens....
If that doesn't scare you...then nothing will.....
The stories in the MSM said he was stopped because Condi stood her ground and Dubya listened to her to follow the law and the Constitution...
Well, I've got news for you....Bush changed the law in 2007...It's called the John Warner Defense Authorization Act........
The troops are already here and ready to go with just one word from the President of the United States....
The troops are under the direct command of Janet Napolitano, Secretary of Homeland Security...
As long as this Act, along with the Military Commissions Act of 2006, are on the books...it doesn't take an act of Congress...it only takes an order from the Commander in Chief....
-0-
Michele Bachmann
The genius from Minnesota argued this week that we should turn our backs on health care reform because it's cheaper than what is presently on the market.....huh?
She is another one against health care for everyone else.....she is in Congress...so we pay her health care and that of her family....
She also has 20 some odd foster children....the government pays for them, too...and since we're the government...well...you get the picture...
But “we” the people...don't deserve the same option...
The GOP put Bachmann on their endangered list this week...as in danger of not getting re elected....
Gee...ya think?
-0-
DINOs...Democrats in Name Only
If you write only one email this week...send it to those congressmen who are fighting health care reform...They have it...they don't think we should...
That's not fair...
If you're confused about it.....read the editorial in the New York Times today for the breakdown...
-0-
Swine Flu
Many of you weren't around in 1976, the last time we had a chicken little, “sky is falling” moment with an epidemic....
Our government, which screws up medications when they have plenty of time to get it right...are now trying to stampede the public into getting vaccinations for this upcoming swine flu pandemic...
The vaccine has just been created, they think... and is about to be tested....
Back in 1976...we faced a similar situation.....they rushed out a vaccine.......
More people died directly from getting the vaccine...then the flu bug....the pandemic fizzled...was much ado about nothing....
I will be honest....I'm part of one of those high risk groups and should according to them..get the vaccine....
However....the question is....Do I trust our government....
Short answer......No!
Will I get the vaccine?
Cross that bridge, if and when I get there...
-0-
Michael Jackson
I wish the msm would spend more time talking about Michael's contributions to the music...which were extensive and go far beyond the pop hits...
This hunt for someone to blame for his death....
Michael is responsible for what happened to him
Nobody else....
7.24.2009
E. Lynn Harris Dies
Sadly, noted Author, E. Lynn Harris has passed. The word coming out of Arkansas within the past hour....
News updates will follow....Harris was just 54
Rest of the Story here
Definition of “Diva"
With Whitney Houston coming back to the music scene, its got me thinking about the true definition of a Diva.
Diva is Italian for a celebrated female singer, usually an opera singer. The term has since spread to theater, and movies and pop music to describe female singers.
Diva, today is also confused with prima donna....most of those calling themselves Divas today are in fact, prima donnas....exhibiting much attitude with little questionable talent...
Whitney is a Diva and apparently not yet ready to give up her crown, for which I'm happy. However, some of ya'll need to go sit down.
Real Divas don't have to proclaim their diva-ness...they just step up to the mike and sing...no makeup, no pretense necessary..
There are many women on my list....Today I'm just in a certain mood and this music fits my mood...
And with that, I'm going to start with an honest to god Diva....Leontyne Price...She is considered the fourth greatest female Opera singer in the universe... but to me she is number one...Maria Callas pales by comparison...
Leontyne Price
Gladys Knight
Nina Simone
7.23.2009
Ohio Lawmakers Bringing Back Slavery
Proposed bill seeks to define women as property
Didn't have time to jump on this yesterday when I saw it on my buddy's blog, QueerCincinnati. Thanks Barry.
However, State Representative John Adams of Sidney has reintroduced a bill that would make it illegal for a woman to seek an abortion without written permission from her sex partner.
Meaning the guy who knocked her up...whether she is married to him...has a relationship with him...is victimized by date rape or any kind of happenstance leading to rape...or incest....or is a jump off....
consensual or not....
This proposed law which claims to give “fathers” rights over their children...mandates legal penalties if the woman does not comply or fingers the wrong man...She can go jail and get fined..heavily..
This proposal also says that if the woman does not name the “father” then she can't have an abortion..at all...under any circumstances...regardless of how she got pregnant...
Fully 53% of unplanned pregnancies happen because contraception fails..Now anyone who is using contraception is not trying to get pregnant...
And just because a woman decides to have sex...does not mean she is giving up her body or her uterus to pregnancy....
Nor does having sex with a man mean that she is surrendering her rights as a human being to her male partner....so that he can make decisions about her body...
Men do not bear the same burden as women when it comes to babies..
They do not carry them....They don't suffer the health issues..the wear and tear on the chassis, so to speak...And they can and do usually go away more often then they stay...
It is not fair that women die from pregnancy...
It is not fair that women have their health permanently affected by pregnancy, sometimes for their entire lives...
It is not fair that the number one cause of unnatural death for pregnant women is murder...
And nowhere in this bill does it address the man's responsibility...
For instance:
Married man fooling around with his wife's best friend....jump off gets pregnant...has complications...can't work....must he step in and support her and her two other children from a previous marriage?
What if she has no maternity leave benefits from her job....must he step in and pay her bills while she carries?
Or, she is forced to carry and deliver..but doesn't want the child...must he take the baby...and raise it...and support it..til its 18th birthday or whenever it graduates from college?
This bill requires a DNA test so, can't nobody lie their way out of it, if named as the male sex partner..
However, this chauvinistic travesty only speaks to the woman's responsibility, leaving men to do what they usually do...
Hit it and quit it...
And let me apologize to my brothers who do take care of their children...There are many men who do step up to the plate when called...
I come from a two parent home...where my parents got married a week before I was born....that was 59 years ago come August...He's still there taking care of my mother and the rest of us when we need it...
This bill is wrong....there is no other way to say it...It reduces women to slaves subject to the whims of a man...
Any man...
We have laws that convey rights on fathers....it's called marriage....
You want some say...then take responsibility and ask her to marry you...and then do it...
Didn't have time to jump on this yesterday when I saw it on my buddy's blog, QueerCincinnati. Thanks Barry.
However, State Representative John Adams of Sidney has reintroduced a bill that would make it illegal for a woman to seek an abortion without written permission from her sex partner.
Meaning the guy who knocked her up...whether she is married to him...has a relationship with him...is victimized by date rape or any kind of happenstance leading to rape...or incest....or is a jump off....
consensual or not....
This proposed law which claims to give “fathers” rights over their children...mandates legal penalties if the woman does not comply or fingers the wrong man...She can go jail and get fined..heavily..
This proposal also says that if the woman does not name the “father” then she can't have an abortion..at all...under any circumstances...regardless of how she got pregnant...
Fully 53% of unplanned pregnancies happen because contraception fails..Now anyone who is using contraception is not trying to get pregnant...
And just because a woman decides to have sex...does not mean she is giving up her body or her uterus to pregnancy....
Nor does having sex with a man mean that she is surrendering her rights as a human being to her male partner....so that he can make decisions about her body...
Men do not bear the same burden as women when it comes to babies..
They do not carry them....They don't suffer the health issues..the wear and tear on the chassis, so to speak...And they can and do usually go away more often then they stay...
It is not fair that women die from pregnancy...
It is not fair that women have their health permanently affected by pregnancy, sometimes for their entire lives...
It is not fair that the number one cause of unnatural death for pregnant women is murder...
And nowhere in this bill does it address the man's responsibility...
For instance:
Married man fooling around with his wife's best friend....jump off gets pregnant...has complications...can't work....must he step in and support her and her two other children from a previous marriage?
What if she has no maternity leave benefits from her job....must he step in and pay her bills while she carries?
Or, she is forced to carry and deliver..but doesn't want the child...must he take the baby...and raise it...and support it..til its 18th birthday or whenever it graduates from college?
This bill requires a DNA test so, can't nobody lie their way out of it, if named as the male sex partner..
However, this chauvinistic travesty only speaks to the woman's responsibility, leaving men to do what they usually do...
Hit it and quit it...
And let me apologize to my brothers who do take care of their children...There are many men who do step up to the plate when called...
I come from a two parent home...where my parents got married a week before I was born....that was 59 years ago come August...He's still there taking care of my mother and the rest of us when we need it...
This bill is wrong....there is no other way to say it...It reduces women to slaves subject to the whims of a man...
Any man...
We have laws that convey rights on fathers....it's called marriage....
You want some say...then take responsibility and ask her to marry you...and then do it...
7.22.2009
Aftermath, Dr. Henry Louis Gates
By now you've heard that the disorderly conduct charges against Dr Henry Gates have been dropped with a sorta-kinda apology from the prosecutor. I've spent much of the day reading and thinking about the various opinions put forth by my colleagues in the blogosphere, as well as those comments generated by the many posts that have been written in the wake of yet another racial collision in America.
I've been tired of having to deal with racism for a very long time, long before it hit this ODS level where we currently find ourselves. ODS stands for Obama Derangement Syndrome. I don't know who coined the phrase but it is very apropos for the times.
Throughout the day, I have been surprised at the reaction from Black people to this latest incident. On one hand, everyone says they are not surprised that it happened-only that it happened to probably the most distinguished of our scholars. Many even cite the quote made 40 years ago by Malcolm X....”what do you call a Black man with a PhD”
I don't have to finish it...you know the punchline.
All of us, who are close to my age have lived that joke our entire lives. So Skip Gates getting arrested in his own home should not have surprised any of us, of a certain age.
Yet, I think it did. And I think it startled us, because on some unconscious level, despite our gut feelings, we really and truly wanted to believe in this myth of a post racial American era heralded by the coming of Barack Obama.
From what I have discerned from the media reports, the only crime that Dr. Gates committed was that of raising his voice to a white man. It still gets us killed if we're not careful. Usually though, it leads to lots of discomfort for us, as Dr. Gates discovered.
Racism is one stresser that we can all do without. When you're stressed, you can't relax. You can't sleep. You get a stomach ache that never goes away. ...always looking over your shoulder to see if some pale and arrogant MF with an attitude...male or female doesn't matter...is coming up on you pissed off because you eye balled em the wrong way...
And if you're Bougie...and you've played the game the way they want you to play the game...grown up quiet..gone to school..stayed out of trouble...accomplished more then they ever dreamed....made more money then they ever imagined....
Watched as they daily co opt your culture...your music...your way of dancing...your way of talking...your way of dressing......the way you wear your hair....
Watched them as they resort to needles full of silicon to plump their lips like the ones God gave you... or drop mass amounts of money for butt implants to mimic the roundness of your ass.....spending all day in the sun to imitate the very color of your skin...some even spraying it on from a bottle...
They want to be us but only with their privilege intact.
It is truly a wonder why we as a people haven't gone postal...We continue to stifle our outrage, even now.
Because if we ever as a people acted toward them the way they continue to act toward us...There would be some seriously ugly stuff going down....
The comments from those who chose to identify themselves as white also show that they will never get it. They will never understand, and at this point in my life, I don't care whether they understand or not.
We just need to get over it. Put it past us like we've done so many times before.
The upside to all this....they are disappearing...period...
I've been tired of having to deal with racism for a very long time, long before it hit this ODS level where we currently find ourselves. ODS stands for Obama Derangement Syndrome. I don't know who coined the phrase but it is very apropos for the times.
Throughout the day, I have been surprised at the reaction from Black people to this latest incident. On one hand, everyone says they are not surprised that it happened-only that it happened to probably the most distinguished of our scholars. Many even cite the quote made 40 years ago by Malcolm X....”what do you call a Black man with a PhD”
I don't have to finish it...you know the punchline.
All of us, who are close to my age have lived that joke our entire lives. So Skip Gates getting arrested in his own home should not have surprised any of us, of a certain age.
Yet, I think it did. And I think it startled us, because on some unconscious level, despite our gut feelings, we really and truly wanted to believe in this myth of a post racial American era heralded by the coming of Barack Obama.
From what I have discerned from the media reports, the only crime that Dr. Gates committed was that of raising his voice to a white man. It still gets us killed if we're not careful. Usually though, it leads to lots of discomfort for us, as Dr. Gates discovered.
Racism is one stresser that we can all do without. When you're stressed, you can't relax. You can't sleep. You get a stomach ache that never goes away. ...always looking over your shoulder to see if some pale and arrogant MF with an attitude...male or female doesn't matter...is coming up on you pissed off because you eye balled em the wrong way...
And if you're Bougie...and you've played the game the way they want you to play the game...grown up quiet..gone to school..stayed out of trouble...accomplished more then they ever dreamed....made more money then they ever imagined....
Watched as they daily co opt your culture...your music...your way of dancing...your way of talking...your way of dressing......the way you wear your hair....
Watched them as they resort to needles full of silicon to plump their lips like the ones God gave you... or drop mass amounts of money for butt implants to mimic the roundness of your ass.....spending all day in the sun to imitate the very color of your skin...some even spraying it on from a bottle...
They want to be us but only with their privilege intact.
It is truly a wonder why we as a people haven't gone postal...We continue to stifle our outrage, even now.
Because if we ever as a people acted toward them the way they continue to act toward us...There would be some seriously ugly stuff going down....
The comments from those who chose to identify themselves as white also show that they will never get it. They will never understand, and at this point in my life, I don't care whether they understand or not.
We just need to get over it. Put it past us like we've done so many times before.
The upside to all this....they are disappearing...period...
7.21.2009
It's Only Socialism When We Say it Is
More GOP hypocrisy on health care reform...
I'm still stuck on this health care reform thing, since it affects me so personally. Without going into detail, I'm one of those uninsurables because I have a pre-existing condition.
And although I'm sometimes extremely easy....I'm never cheap...If you want to change my mind, then give me something to change my mind for...
Meaning, if the GOP can offer me a better solution...I will be more than happy to take it...
So what is the republican health care reform plan...the one they've waited until now to reveal, when they would've had an easier time of it when they controlled the White House and Congress. Hell, we could all of had GOP health reform a long time ago...
I can only guess that it wasn't so important to help the people. W and Darth were too busy fighting terrorists and spending or stealing our money, depending on your point of view.
The fat cats on wall street were too busy bilking the public of massive amounts of money to care or to worry about whether the population was chaffing under the strain of a lousy health care system..
During his speech yesterday at the National Press Club, Michael Steele talked about the GOP health plan:
1.It proposes online posting of prices and outcomes for tests and procedures
2.It offers a single simple billing form
3.A paperless health care system
4.Emphasis on preventive care
5.Portability of health coverage between jobs.
All five of these Grand Old Party proposals, as put forth by their chairman Steele are contained in the Democratic bill currently working its way through Congress...
That's the Democratic bill that the GOP, and others are claiming is a Socialistic measure designed to take away our freedoms..
Steele even called it Socialism in the same speech, yesterday, right after he listed the items of his proposal....He said the Democrats are attempting to turn us toward Socialism.
How...and Why is it only Socialism when the Democrats say it?
If you look at what Steele said yesterday....both sides seemingly want the same thing....Isn't or shouldn't that lead to bipartisan cooperation?
Or is the real game....get the Black man in the White House and return him to his place...
Still governing like they think all of us are stupid..
-0-
Changing the subject a little bit....
I'm still stuck on this health care reform thing, since it affects me so personally. Without going into detail, I'm one of those uninsurables because I have a pre-existing condition.
And although I'm sometimes extremely easy....I'm never cheap...If you want to change my mind, then give me something to change my mind for...
Meaning, if the GOP can offer me a better solution...I will be more than happy to take it...
So what is the republican health care reform plan...the one they've waited until now to reveal, when they would've had an easier time of it when they controlled the White House and Congress. Hell, we could all of had GOP health reform a long time ago...
I can only guess that it wasn't so important to help the people. W and Darth were too busy fighting terrorists and spending or stealing our money, depending on your point of view.
The fat cats on wall street were too busy bilking the public of massive amounts of money to care or to worry about whether the population was chaffing under the strain of a lousy health care system..
During his speech yesterday at the National Press Club, Michael Steele talked about the GOP health plan:
1.It proposes online posting of prices and outcomes for tests and procedures
2.It offers a single simple billing form
3.A paperless health care system
4.Emphasis on preventive care
5.Portability of health coverage between jobs.
All five of these Grand Old Party proposals, as put forth by their chairman Steele are contained in the Democratic bill currently working its way through Congress...
That's the Democratic bill that the GOP, and others are claiming is a Socialistic measure designed to take away our freedoms..
Steele even called it Socialism in the same speech, yesterday, right after he listed the items of his proposal....He said the Democrats are attempting to turn us toward Socialism.
How...and Why is it only Socialism when the Democrats say it?
If you look at what Steele said yesterday....both sides seemingly want the same thing....Isn't or shouldn't that lead to bipartisan cooperation?
Or is the real game....get the Black man in the White House and return him to his place...
Still governing like they think all of us are stupid..
-0-
Changing the subject a little bit....
7.20.2009
Monday Musings.....
About Health Care Reform....as the GOP tries to torpedo the plan with the help of the Blue Dog Democrats..
I am serving notice as a taxpayer that I am going to start refusing to pay taxes if we don't get changes in the health system in this country..
The status quo is not working...It isn't even skewed to help people...It is skewed to make corporations and the people who run them richer....
And if I can't have health care that works for me...then neither should our Congressmen...
Since we pay for their health care....I think they should suffer right along with the rest of us for a change..
I've written more than once that dropping a bomb on Capital Hill would go a long way in clearing up the problems we face in America...
This Congress has done nothing to change my mind about their inept effectiveness.
-0-
The Three Musketeers...Thomas, Keys and Steele
I didn't think it was possible for anyone to out Tom, Thomas..but Steele has managed to do so...Every time he opens his mouth...
And as for Keys...well that man is simply certifiable..there is no other explanation....
Why did I bring up Thomas...He opened the judicial door for Keys' most recent round of ignorance in questioning Obama's birth and citizenship...
The D'Artagnan to this group is Ward Connerly...but he's been quiet for awhile..
Connerly, for those of you who don't recall is the guy who led the battle against affirmative action in California....
If I ever meet Mr. Connerly I intend to ask him how he feels about legacy policies....all universities have them....
Legacy policies are those programs that allow for entry into prestigious schools like Harvard and Yale to those scions of the rich who don't otherwise qualify....
Like George Bush, for instance..
Ya'll didn't really think that frat boy George got into Yale due to his scholarly prowess, did you?
Legacy....affirmative action for the rich and white in America...However nobody is talking about doing away with those programs....
-0-
Afghanistan...
Will somebody please refresh my memory.....why are we in Afghanistan?
It seems that the only thing going on is our soldiers are being killed by people who America armed to fight the Russians...
We gave the Taliban those guns and bombs...I'll bet we even taught them to build the IED's, too....
So why are we there?
What is the objective these days......Kill Osama?.... Win another unwinable police action? Nation rebuilding?
What the hell are we doing?
It seems as if Obama is following in the footsteps of George....Big mistake...
When an idiot says.....”let's go this way” you don't follow...that's stupid....Yet that is what seems to be going on....
If it has become Obama's war....then he should set a new course...the old one has run into a roadblock..
And as far as Osama is concerned...anybody check the penthouses in the hotels in New York, lately?
-0-
Call me skeptic....but the hair on the back of my neck is standing up over the pictures of this latest soldier allegedly taken hostage...
I wish him well..I hope he comes home safe, if that is his intention...
However..something is not right about that picture...
-0-
People I would like to take my size 10 foot and stomp a hole in their ass so deep it would make the Mississippi river look like a dried up creek bed...
Jefferson Beaureqard Sessions
Ms. Linsey Graham
Dowager Mitch McConnell
Jim DeMint
The Cambridge Police who arrested Dr. Gates late last week for breaking into his own house.....
That fool at Fox who talked about whites marrying outside their species....He apologized today...two weeks late....
7.17.2009
When is..Enough is Enough
It's time to pry the mike from Pat Buchanan's cold, dead and heartless hands...
Why, Thank You, Massa, suh!
"First, America has been the best country on earth for black folks. It was here that 600,000 black people, brought from Africa in slave ships, grew into a community of 40 million, were introduced to Christian salvation, and reached the greatest levels of freedom and prosperity blacks have ever known.
Wright ought to go down on his knees and thank God he is an American.
Second, no people anywhere has done more to lift up blacks than white Americans. Untold trillions have been spent since the ’60s on welfare, food stamps, rent supplements, Section 8 housing, Pell grants, student loans, legal services, Medicaid, Earned Income Tax Credits and poverty programs designed to bring the African-American community into the mainstream.
Governments, businesses and colleges have engaged in discrimination against white folks — with affirmative action, contract set-asides and quotas — to advance black applicants over white applicants.
Churches, foundations, civic groups, schools and individuals all over America have donated time and money to support soup kitchens, adult education, day care, retirement and nursing homes for blacks.
We hear the grievances. Where is the gratitude?"- PJB, 3/21/08
More, From His Own Mouth.........
"[W]hat did white males do? OK, they were the only guys signing the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, all the dead at Gettysburg, all the dead at Normandy." PJB 2/28/09
The truth of the matter is that 2000 Blacks took part in the Normandy invasion....
At least one woman and Black, that we know of....died at Gettysburg
For most of my adult life I've conducted my own personal boycotts....Pat Buchanan is being added to my official list of things I don't need in my life....So as of today....NBC, MSNBC, CNBC and every other spin off is off limits in my house...
I do not patronize anyone or anything that refuses to recognize all aspects of my humanity..
Like Eddie Murphy said in Trading Places....”the best way to hurt a rich man is to make him poor.”
Maybe if enough of us get together and he gets fired...It will hurt a little bit and make him think the next time he opens his mouth...
Why, Thank You, Massa, suh!
"First, America has been the best country on earth for black folks. It was here that 600,000 black people, brought from Africa in slave ships, grew into a community of 40 million, were introduced to Christian salvation, and reached the greatest levels of freedom and prosperity blacks have ever known.
Wright ought to go down on his knees and thank God he is an American.
Second, no people anywhere has done more to lift up blacks than white Americans. Untold trillions have been spent since the ’60s on welfare, food stamps, rent supplements, Section 8 housing, Pell grants, student loans, legal services, Medicaid, Earned Income Tax Credits and poverty programs designed to bring the African-American community into the mainstream.
Governments, businesses and colleges have engaged in discrimination against white folks — with affirmative action, contract set-asides and quotas — to advance black applicants over white applicants.
Churches, foundations, civic groups, schools and individuals all over America have donated time and money to support soup kitchens, adult education, day care, retirement and nursing homes for blacks.
We hear the grievances. Where is the gratitude?"- PJB, 3/21/08
More, From His Own Mouth.........
"[W]hat did white males do? OK, they were the only guys signing the Constitution, the Declaration of Independence, all the dead at Gettysburg, all the dead at Normandy." PJB 2/28/09
The truth of the matter is that 2000 Blacks took part in the Normandy invasion....
At least one woman and Black, that we know of....died at Gettysburg
For most of my adult life I've conducted my own personal boycotts....Pat Buchanan is being added to my official list of things I don't need in my life....So as of today....NBC, MSNBC, CNBC and every other spin off is off limits in my house...
I do not patronize anyone or anything that refuses to recognize all aspects of my humanity..
Like Eddie Murphy said in Trading Places....”the best way to hurt a rich man is to make him poor.”
Maybe if enough of us get together and he gets fired...It will hurt a little bit and make him think the next time he opens his mouth...
7.14.2009
Only in America-Can't Make This Stuff Up
On a day when 12 White men claiming to represent a diverse and just America, sat down to question Supreme Court nominee Judge Sonia Sotomayor's diversity-inclusive credentials...
GOP chairman and token black man, Michael Steele talked about why minorities should join his party...
He made this statement at this past weekend's meeting of the young republicans, who by the way elected a MILF bigot to lead them....young repubs are supposed to be between 18-40...She's 38...looks every bit of...well...I'll be nice..
Also on this day...a judge has agreed to hear arguments about whether or not our President is legally president...
It's a case brought by Fake Negro Alan Keyes who is questioning Obama's citizenship...
Correct me if I'm wrong...but doesn't the law state that you are a citizen of the United States if one of your parents is a citizen of the United States...regardless of where you are born...
In other words.....Obama could have been born on Mars..... But his momma was born in Kansas...
That makes him an American...a legal American...
And as far as this soldier who is refusing to serve in afghanistan because he says Obama is not legal....well....just shoot the MF....He is a deserter...
but then he follows and listens to a party of men who are serial draft dodgers at every given opportunity...so it's understandable that he feels like he has the right not to defend this country...just like all the rest of em...Rove (college dropout and draft dodger)...Cheney(five deferments)..Bush (awol frat boy)...and the list goes on...
Name one of these warmongering cowards who volunteered to go fight, outside of McCain who was forced into it because of his daddy and his grandfather...
GOP chairman and token black man, Michael Steele talked about why minorities should join his party...
He made this statement at this past weekend's meeting of the young republicans, who by the way elected a MILF bigot to lead them....young repubs are supposed to be between 18-40...She's 38...looks every bit of...well...I'll be nice..
Also on this day...a judge has agreed to hear arguments about whether or not our President is legally president...
It's a case brought by Fake Negro Alan Keyes who is questioning Obama's citizenship...
Correct me if I'm wrong...but doesn't the law state that you are a citizen of the United States if one of your parents is a citizen of the United States...regardless of where you are born...
In other words.....Obama could have been born on Mars..... But his momma was born in Kansas...
That makes him an American...a legal American...
And as far as this soldier who is refusing to serve in afghanistan because he says Obama is not legal....well....just shoot the MF....He is a deserter...
but then he follows and listens to a party of men who are serial draft dodgers at every given opportunity...so it's understandable that he feels like he has the right not to defend this country...just like all the rest of em...Rove (college dropout and draft dodger)...Cheney(five deferments)..Bush (awol frat boy)...and the list goes on...
Name one of these warmongering cowards who volunteered to go fight, outside of McCain who was forced into it because of his daddy and his grandfather...
I Love The View!
Can you believe it....Five women....Whoopie Goldberg (my favorite)...Barbara Walters (my idol)....Joy Behar...Sherrie Shepard and Elizabeth the Republican....
Then...they segued to a story from Japan that said People who are chubby at 40 live longer than skinny people....
Debating the merits of MASTURBATION on Daytime TV...
I love it!
No double entendres....no bleeps.... no word substitution.......just plain talk....
honest talk from Whoopie...as in “yes” I do pleasure myself....
to sillly talk from Sherrie....trying to turn the conversation to abstinence...
Then...they segued to a story from Japan that said People who are chubby at 40 live longer than skinny people....
7.12.2009
Young GOP Tone Deaf, Too
Group elects Audra Shay to leadership position
The 38 year old republican with a taste for racist remarks on her Facebook page has been elected national chairman of the Young Republican organization, proving the apples don't fall too far from the tree.
Find the full story here:
Shay won by 50 votes. A total of 950 were cast.
Bet she's chomping at the bit to get out there and convince all of America's Black, brown, yellow and red people that the GOP is our only salvation...
After all, she occasionally talks with the Hip Hop Republican Group...(a group of young Black GOP)..so there may be hope for the rest of us...huh.
Probably thinks like her elders, that she can ignore Black people and go after Latinos and Asians, and people from Bobby Jindal's mother country.
Probably also thinks that by coddling gay white rich boys she will wrap up the LGBT vote, too.
Good luck with that.
More on the story here:
The 38 year old republican with a taste for racist remarks on her Facebook page has been elected national chairman of the Young Republican organization, proving the apples don't fall too far from the tree.
Find the full story here:
Shay won by 50 votes. A total of 950 were cast.
Bet she's chomping at the bit to get out there and convince all of America's Black, brown, yellow and red people that the GOP is our only salvation...
After all, she occasionally talks with the Hip Hop Republican Group...(a group of young Black GOP)..so there may be hope for the rest of us...huh.
Probably thinks like her elders, that she can ignore Black people and go after Latinos and Asians, and people from Bobby Jindal's mother country.
Probably also thinks that by coddling gay white rich boys she will wrap up the LGBT vote, too.
Good luck with that.
More on the story here:
7.11.2009
Another Movie List
Whenever some organization or critic puts together a best movies list, he/she also puts together a worst movies list to compliment and contrast with the good.....
Recently I posted my favorite Black movies list as well as my favorite overall list. I always intended to revisit this subject and eventually post my worst movies list, as well....
However there is a problem in that I am having trouble naming any movies that I don't like, primarily because I only go see movies that catch me with the trailer in the first place...
The cost of a movie ticket these days makes me very selective in what I go to see. It also makes me selective in the bootlegs that I buy on the street, since they do cost a few bucks..
And the movies that I may download from the internet...If I'm gonna get busted for movie theft....I want it to be a movie that I liked and actually wanted to see...
I can name movies that I refused to see.......”Soul Plane” for instance....
I can name movies that I walked out on.....”Hotel New Hampshire" to name one...
But a list of movies that I didn't like.....well....here goes... In no certain order...
The Color Purple...or Stuff by Steven Spielberg...He whitewashes good stories..takes the teeth out of them for the masses....turning mature stories into bedtime stories for children..
Brokeback Mountain....bored me to tears....If I had been in a theater, I would have left within 20 minutes...as it was, I was viewing a friend's copy and simply turned it off...There are straight guys who can play gay...but these two weren't it.....
Claire of the Moon....an absolute joke of a movie...saw it at the premier in Chicago...the entire audience loudly and verbally abused this movie during the screening...It remains a travesty..
Thelma and Louise...I wanted this one to be good...It was girls night out.... One of my favorite actors (Susan Sarandon)...two of us didn't like it and said so....blew that date...
Jodie Foster movies....with the exception of Silence of the Lambs...that includes Taxi Driver
Tropical Thunder....Robert Downey was funny as hell...but the movie was too damn long...fell asleep on it...still have it in my rack of movies to revisit in order to give it a second chance...maybe..
Dave Chapelle's Block Party....another one turned off after 20 minutes in...
Steven Seagal movies...nearly all of them....seen a few...hated em...they were usually always date movies not of my choosing... the one about the submarine with Tommy Lee Jones and the blond crazy guy...that one was okay..
Animal House and Animal House genre movies...young white boys getting stoned, puking, drinking beer, and doing tricks with feces and their undersized male parts don't tickle my funny bone in the least...
American Beauty with Kevin Spacey....boring.....
X Files....movies and TV series......boring....and I paid for that one....Only one episode that I liked...it was called, I believe....”Humbug”....It contained a character named The conundrum...
Bruno movies....He's so not funny....
Wow....I'm getting a headache trying to think about stuff I don't like....so I will stop now...
My list of best movies continues to grow...I think at my age, I need to do a “best” list for every decade...
Because after the fact...I left out some damn good movies on my first list....like
The Godfather movies...all three...
Bonnie and Clyde....Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway
The Hunger with the afore mentioned Susan Sarandon and Catherine Deneuve and David Bowie
Street Car Named Desire with Marlon Brando and Karl Maldon
Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Paul Newman, Liz Taylor
Suddenly Last Summer, Liz Taylor and Montgomery Clift and Katherine Hepburn
Silence of the Lambs
The Long Hot Summer.... You can see, I've just got a thing for Tennessee Williams...
I quit....
to be continued later...
Recently I posted my favorite Black movies list as well as my favorite overall list. I always intended to revisit this subject and eventually post my worst movies list, as well....
However there is a problem in that I am having trouble naming any movies that I don't like, primarily because I only go see movies that catch me with the trailer in the first place...
The cost of a movie ticket these days makes me very selective in what I go to see. It also makes me selective in the bootlegs that I buy on the street, since they do cost a few bucks..
And the movies that I may download from the internet...If I'm gonna get busted for movie theft....I want it to be a movie that I liked and actually wanted to see...
I can name movies that I refused to see.......”Soul Plane” for instance....
I can name movies that I walked out on.....”Hotel New Hampshire" to name one...
But a list of movies that I didn't like.....well....here goes... In no certain order...
The Color Purple...or Stuff by Steven Spielberg...He whitewashes good stories..takes the teeth out of them for the masses....turning mature stories into bedtime stories for children..
Brokeback Mountain....bored me to tears....If I had been in a theater, I would have left within 20 minutes...as it was, I was viewing a friend's copy and simply turned it off...There are straight guys who can play gay...but these two weren't it.....
Claire of the Moon....an absolute joke of a movie...saw it at the premier in Chicago...the entire audience loudly and verbally abused this movie during the screening...It remains a travesty..
Thelma and Louise...I wanted this one to be good...It was girls night out.... One of my favorite actors (Susan Sarandon)...two of us didn't like it and said so....blew that date...
Jodie Foster movies....with the exception of Silence of the Lambs...that includes Taxi Driver
Tropical Thunder....Robert Downey was funny as hell...but the movie was too damn long...fell asleep on it...still have it in my rack of movies to revisit in order to give it a second chance...maybe..
Dave Chapelle's Block Party....another one turned off after 20 minutes in...
Steven Seagal movies...nearly all of them....seen a few...hated em...they were usually always date movies not of my choosing... the one about the submarine with Tommy Lee Jones and the blond crazy guy...that one was okay..
Animal House and Animal House genre movies...young white boys getting stoned, puking, drinking beer, and doing tricks with feces and their undersized male parts don't tickle my funny bone in the least...
American Beauty with Kevin Spacey....boring.....
X Files....movies and TV series......boring....and I paid for that one....Only one episode that I liked...it was called, I believe....”Humbug”....It contained a character named The conundrum...
Bruno movies....He's so not funny....
Wow....I'm getting a headache trying to think about stuff I don't like....so I will stop now...
My list of best movies continues to grow...I think at my age, I need to do a “best” list for every decade...
Because after the fact...I left out some damn good movies on my first list....like
The Godfather movies...all three...
Bonnie and Clyde....Warren Beatty and Faye Dunaway
The Hunger with the afore mentioned Susan Sarandon and Catherine Deneuve and David Bowie
Street Car Named Desire with Marlon Brando and Karl Maldon
Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Paul Newman, Liz Taylor
Suddenly Last Summer, Liz Taylor and Montgomery Clift and Katherine Hepburn
Silence of the Lambs
The Long Hot Summer.... You can see, I've just got a thing for Tennessee Williams...
I quit....
to be continued later...
7.10.2009
Friday Rap
Nominees for the “Walking Wastes of Oxygen Award"
The Obama Administration-for not killing DADT, while yet another gay naval officer dies while serving his country...brutally killed on base here in the US....shot three times...his body burned to hide the crime...Rod 2.0
The Cincinnati Enquirer-shrinking and now disappearing, will anyone notice?
Charles Krauthammer- (future Hall of Famer) Usually wrong and continually unrepentant about his ongoing obtuseness...
Sarah Palin-Make no mistake about the naked Emperess, she quit for the money..no other reason, Alaska be damned
Representative Peter King- Me thinks he dost protest too much about everything...can't wait to see his skeletons come falling out of his closet
Blue Dog Democrats- Don't want a public option on health care, then don't take it, but leave the rest of us alone. Choice and competition.. isn't that capitalism...we have choice, your business buddies say they thrive on competition...or do they? Isn't it just more of they want to get paid and damn the consumer...isn't that the real capitalism at work?
John Ensign- Man, those are some cojones...gets Daddy and Mommie to pay for his mistress, all the while playing holier than thou Christian Congressman leading the “do as I say, not as I do”crowd..
Jefferson Beauregard Sessions III- 2009 congressional version of Strom Thurmond and ranking bigot on Capital Hill, except he doesn't have a Black daughter hidden somewhere, does he?
Audra Shay- a walking example that racism is taught....too young to have experienced the 1960's, all the while continuing to live in a bigoted time warp perpetuating the thinking of past generations. She represents the cluelessness that permeates the GOP.
Bill O'Reilly- bigot with a mic who apparently hasn't yet received the email....that old world colonialism is dead...white people can no longer dictate to the masses what is and is not...
Rupert Murdoch- for destroying journalism and the once honorable fourth estate
Brian Kilmeade- the most brain dead of the talking heads on Fox and Friends, who said this week that America is being destroyed because white Americans keep marrying outside their species...huh?
Congressman Steve King for his ongoing fight against Black people over running his white christian nation..
7.09.2009
Cincinnati Link to Chicago Cemetery Scandal
Burr Oak Cemetery final resting place of Heavyweight Champ Ezzard Charles
The manager and three gravediggers at historic Burr Oak Cemetery, located outside of Chicago have been charged with desecrating more than 300 graves in a scheme going back some four years, say officials. The plan was to empty the graves and resell the plots. Full story here.
Cincinnati son and former heavyweight boxing champion Ezzard Charles is one of many luminaries buried within the Burr Oak confines. Charles who succumbed to Lou Gehrig's disease in 1975, was ranked by ESPN as the 27th greatest fighter of all time, ahead of Mike Tyson, Floyd Mayweather, Jr, Larry Holmes and Jake LaMotta.
He was preceded by Joe Louis and followed by Jersey Joe Walcott and held the title from 1949-1951.
At one point in time, Burr Oak Cemetery was the only place where Blacks could be buried in or near Chicago. Many people, including Emmett Till, the 15 year old boy who was lynched for allegedly whistling at a white woman, his mother, Singers Dinah Washington and Willie Dixon, among others are also interred there.
Ezzard Charles, who was a friend of my Dad's, was a graduate of Woodward High School. He fought Rocky Marciano twice in two fights that are considered classics among boxing aficionadoes.
Downtown Cincinnati has a street named Ezzard Charles Boulevard in his honor.
The manager and three gravediggers at historic Burr Oak Cemetery, located outside of Chicago have been charged with desecrating more than 300 graves in a scheme going back some four years, say officials. The plan was to empty the graves and resell the plots. Full story here.
Cincinnati son and former heavyweight boxing champion Ezzard Charles is one of many luminaries buried within the Burr Oak confines. Charles who succumbed to Lou Gehrig's disease in 1975, was ranked by ESPN as the 27th greatest fighter of all time, ahead of Mike Tyson, Floyd Mayweather, Jr, Larry Holmes and Jake LaMotta.
He was preceded by Joe Louis and followed by Jersey Joe Walcott and held the title from 1949-1951.
At one point in time, Burr Oak Cemetery was the only place where Blacks could be buried in or near Chicago. Many people, including Emmett Till, the 15 year old boy who was lynched for allegedly whistling at a white woman, his mother, Singers Dinah Washington and Willie Dixon, among others are also interred there.
Ezzard Charles, who was a friend of my Dad's, was a graduate of Woodward High School. He fought Rocky Marciano twice in two fights that are considered classics among boxing aficionadoes.
Downtown Cincinnati has a street named Ezzard Charles Boulevard in his honor.
7.08.2009
Tom, Angelina and Madonna Less White?
Because they have Black children? Does that somehow make them less caucasian?
Funny how nobody tears up their white privilege card for adopting dusky hued babies, while at the same time stomping all over Michael Jackson's grave because he made some white babies to raise.
Why does Michael Jackson having white children make him less Black or African American?
Another question....why is it that white people still think they can tell us what is Black or what defines African American?
They keep trying to convince us that we now live in a post racial world....that the “one drop” rule has been repealed....
So why are they still questioning Michael's Blackness?
In Michael's case, we Blacks, have obviously done it for ourselves... we defined him...just as we did it for OJ and every other successful Black sports figure-entertainer-business entrepreneur-government official, who steps outside the race to sleep, cheat on his/her wife with, or to make babies with.
The dominant culture can talk about him and everyone else...anyway they want...but we will define who is Black...or who is a leader...or who speaks for us....
I know, I know...Tom, Angelina and Madonna are seen as rescuing members of the underclass, bringing them up to their standard of living...civilizing the young ones...enabling them to take their place in polite...read that....dominate society.
They are viewed through the prism of white privilege as modern day missionaries bringing religion to the savages.
Michael Jackson having white kids is seen as a perversion of the norm...It is a step down, rather than a step up.
Face it, we live in a world where designer babies are being created for designed families...it is becoming the norm...
Don't get me wrong....I have a real problem with what he did to his face....In my mind I see and will remember the face of the very talented Black man I came to love a long time ago. That man who lives in my memory does not resemble the stringy long haired white woman that he turned himself into...
And like many Blacks, I grew up around people with vitiligo and I feel in my bones that his excuses for changing skin colors were bullshit...But they were his reasons and his excuses...and oh well....
It never did make sense....but in my mind it didn't make him any less of a Black man...to me..
It just meant he went to his grave without solving his issues...we all have issues....
I know that sounds crazy...but then we are all what we feel inside....and Michael...despite how he looked...never felt like anything other than a Black man...and furthermore...never said he was anything other than a Black man, either.
Funny how nobody tears up their white privilege card for adopting dusky hued babies, while at the same time stomping all over Michael Jackson's grave because he made some white babies to raise.
Why does Michael Jackson having white children make him less Black or African American?
Another question....why is it that white people still think they can tell us what is Black or what defines African American?
They keep trying to convince us that we now live in a post racial world....that the “one drop” rule has been repealed....
So why are they still questioning Michael's Blackness?
In Michael's case, we Blacks, have obviously done it for ourselves... we defined him...just as we did it for OJ and every other successful Black sports figure-entertainer-business entrepreneur-government official, who steps outside the race to sleep, cheat on his/her wife with, or to make babies with.
The dominant culture can talk about him and everyone else...anyway they want...but we will define who is Black...or who is a leader...or who speaks for us....
I know, I know...Tom, Angelina and Madonna are seen as rescuing members of the underclass, bringing them up to their standard of living...civilizing the young ones...enabling them to take their place in polite...read that....dominate society.
They are viewed through the prism of white privilege as modern day missionaries bringing religion to the savages.
Michael Jackson having white kids is seen as a perversion of the norm...It is a step down, rather than a step up.
Face it, we live in a world where designer babies are being created for designed families...it is becoming the norm...
Don't get me wrong....I have a real problem with what he did to his face....In my mind I see and will remember the face of the very talented Black man I came to love a long time ago. That man who lives in my memory does not resemble the stringy long haired white woman that he turned himself into...
And like many Blacks, I grew up around people with vitiligo and I feel in my bones that his excuses for changing skin colors were bullshit...But they were his reasons and his excuses...and oh well....
It never did make sense....but in my mind it didn't make him any less of a Black man...to me..
It just meant he went to his grave without solving his issues...we all have issues....
I know that sounds crazy...but then we are all what we feel inside....and Michael...despite how he looked...never felt like anything other than a Black man...and furthermore...never said he was anything other than a Black man, either.
If Obama is Serious About Health Care Reform...
Then a public option would not be negotiable....It would be a requirement...
Real health care reform would also include limitations on “pain and suffering awards” in malpractice suits...
Real health care reform would make health insurance mandatory for everyone over the age of 21..
Real health care reform would include a reworking of the tax system so that citizens can deduct the cost of health insurance rather than the corporations...
Even a blind man can see that the corporations are going to use any public option to dump employees off their corporate plans and onto the public dole at the first given opportunity..this will benefit their bottom line and make them even more profitable....
So basically, what are they screaming about...they win without the public option...they win with the public option....
The public...gets screwed as usual...Yet the people really need the public option to sorta level the playing field, somewhat....
The health care industry is not in the business of providing health care...it is in the business of making money...period..
Obama is a smart man...he sees and understands that....tossing us to the wolves on this issue is not the way to get re elected....
Understand me....This is one Black woman who votes her conscience and her pocketbook...not her color.....
And I don’t believe I’m alone on this...
Real health care reform would also include limitations on “pain and suffering awards” in malpractice suits...
Real health care reform would make health insurance mandatory for everyone over the age of 21..
Real health care reform would include a reworking of the tax system so that citizens can deduct the cost of health insurance rather than the corporations...
Even a blind man can see that the corporations are going to use any public option to dump employees off their corporate plans and onto the public dole at the first given opportunity..this will benefit their bottom line and make them even more profitable....
So basically, what are they screaming about...they win without the public option...they win with the public option....
The public...gets screwed as usual...Yet the people really need the public option to sorta level the playing field, somewhat....
The health care industry is not in the business of providing health care...it is in the business of making money...period..
Obama is a smart man...he sees and understands that....tossing us to the wolves on this issue is not the way to get re elected....
Understand me....This is one Black woman who votes her conscience and her pocketbook...not her color.....
And I don’t believe I’m alone on this...
7.06.2009
Max and the Coons
I’ve never met Max. He is one of many people who periodically read and comment on my blog. I read and comment on his blog once in a while, as well. One of the best things about writing a blog is that sometimes you develop long distance conversations with strangers that would not ordinarily happen in the course of your life. For me, my long distance conversation with Max is one of those conversations.
Based on where he lives, I would never accidentally run across this guy. I don’t always agree with him. He seems like a great guy and I like the way his head works. If I could put together a writer’s round-table for discussion, like the one that used to take place at the Algonquin in New York, fueled by good wine and good food, his would be the first invitation that I would issue.
Ours would be a friendship powered by intellect, conversation and debate.
So why am I writing about Max, well, he did a post today that got me thinking about things, again. You can check him out here, and go through your own thought process.....
I was going to comment on his post, but comments, to my mind, should be short and sweet, not equal to the length of the original post.
So I am resorting to my own blog in order to continue my thoughts which were generated by his post.
So without further ado...
My father moved us to the suburbs when I was 16. I had grown up in the Bougie city neighborhoods prior to the move, surrounded by upwardly mobile college educated black professionals and hard working blue collar folks and their families. We had yards, dogs, picket fences, houses and walnut trees for climbing in the back yard.
Yet my father wasn’t satisfied. He wanted more apparently, and more meant a house in the burbs surrounded by white people. We “broke” the block, in fact, as one of our soon to take flight neighbors informed us. I was the only black female in the graduating class of 1968. There were only four of us all told.
I spent the longest year and a half of my life, living in a place called Mt. Healthy. It wasn’t, healthy or cool. Yet I didn’t know exactly what it was that made me dislike the place so, from the very beginning.
Wasn’t just the white people...I’ve always been the fly who had to swim through the buttermilk, so I was okay, if not totally comfortable or trusting around them. Among other things they taught me that there is a difference between Jewish people and white people. But that’s another story for another time..
In fact, it wasn’t until I moved back to the city, when I was 18 to start college that it came to me what was wrong..I missed the noise of everyday living...There were no life sounds...no people on the streets....no kids making a racket outside your window...no conversations on the porch...no, knowing your neighbors, intimately..no barking dogs......I
Nothing except identical houses, with identical lawns, with identical cars in the driveway with the requisite number of children and pets, and people pretending to live, yet quick to hit the mute volume at sunset.
I was too naive at the time to see all the secret living going on behind closed doors or to discern the destination of all the secret trips into the city to engage in forbidden pleasures and fantasies with people not welcome in the burbs.
Our natural tonal richness with which we were gifted at birth, was bleached out and faded in order to blend with our vanilla surroundings.
No coons...except for the ones who occasionally wandered out of Winton Woods Park.
Lifeless....If this was the American dream...I did not want it....
Tears came to my eyes the first night I went to sleep in my own tiny apartment, listening to the too loud sounds of the winos on Lincoln, walking to the Down Beat Bar on the corner, a few blocks away.
I missed life and I made myself a promise to never lose it again. 40 years later, I still live in the cities among the people and not too far from that first tiny apartment.
Got to have it...This tangible life is vital to my personal well being, and I suspect, if we were all honest, speaks to something in all of us. We need life, good or bad, in order to mutate into something different. We need life to grow.
I have a home, filled with the mementoes of a very successful professional life. A relatively new car parked in the driveway of a home, a rather large home. But instead of the burbs, it’s in the city. The corner bar is gone, but the kids are still noisy, the Seventh Day Adventist and the Mormons still ring my doorbell on Saturday. I have to cut grass, but not as much as my dad. I even have deer in my side yard and real coons the size of my smallest dog, who happens to tip the scales at 75 pounds these days.
My dad got mad at me one time because I told him the only thing his home in the burbs was missing was a moat filled with alligators. His anger told me I’d struck a nerve. He didn’t want to live with coons, yet he couldn’t happily live without them, either.
40 years later, they have come to him. His suburb has changed and he’s not happy. But he’s too old and too entrenched to move. White flight took place when we moved in. Bougie flight happens when the people from the projects invade, chased out by the yuppies who think it’s cool to live and renovate the big old homes of the city and take over the life that happens, just because... never realizing they are destroying that life when they squeeze out the people who already reside there.
We watch BET, Black Embarrassment Television, because it is our last connection to some parts of our life, that, if we’re honest about....we miss...
We know and miss the people that Tyler Perry talks about.
Celebrating the American dream became a drive to deny who we are....It became a suppression of our differences from the dominant culture....
In an effort to integrate, we lose our identity. We reconnect only by watching the overblown characterizations of Black life perpetrated by the hip hop generation. Sometimes we laugh at it..sometimes we don’t...But, usually we always watch from the safe distance of the burbs and inwardly, it doesn’t feel so good...
In the 1960s we screamed “I’m Black and I’m Proud.”
Today, we wear our hair natural...yet...we still look for that American Dream and it’s house and a yard with a picket fence in the suburbs as the true symbol of success...bereft of life...colorless....unfulfilling...
I don’t have an ending or answer...this is a ramble that goes on...
to be continued...
Based on where he lives, I would never accidentally run across this guy. I don’t always agree with him. He seems like a great guy and I like the way his head works. If I could put together a writer’s round-table for discussion, like the one that used to take place at the Algonquin in New York, fueled by good wine and good food, his would be the first invitation that I would issue.
Ours would be a friendship powered by intellect, conversation and debate.
So why am I writing about Max, well, he did a post today that got me thinking about things, again. You can check him out here, and go through your own thought process.....
I was going to comment on his post, but comments, to my mind, should be short and sweet, not equal to the length of the original post.
So I am resorting to my own blog in order to continue my thoughts which were generated by his post.
So without further ado...
My father moved us to the suburbs when I was 16. I had grown up in the Bougie city neighborhoods prior to the move, surrounded by upwardly mobile college educated black professionals and hard working blue collar folks and their families. We had yards, dogs, picket fences, houses and walnut trees for climbing in the back yard.
Yet my father wasn’t satisfied. He wanted more apparently, and more meant a house in the burbs surrounded by white people. We “broke” the block, in fact, as one of our soon to take flight neighbors informed us. I was the only black female in the graduating class of 1968. There were only four of us all told.
I spent the longest year and a half of my life, living in a place called Mt. Healthy. It wasn’t, healthy or cool. Yet I didn’t know exactly what it was that made me dislike the place so, from the very beginning.
Wasn’t just the white people...I’ve always been the fly who had to swim through the buttermilk, so I was okay, if not totally comfortable or trusting around them. Among other things they taught me that there is a difference between Jewish people and white people. But that’s another story for another time..
In fact, it wasn’t until I moved back to the city, when I was 18 to start college that it came to me what was wrong..I missed the noise of everyday living...There were no life sounds...no people on the streets....no kids making a racket outside your window...no conversations on the porch...no, knowing your neighbors, intimately..no barking dogs......I
Nothing except identical houses, with identical lawns, with identical cars in the driveway with the requisite number of children and pets, and people pretending to live, yet quick to hit the mute volume at sunset.
I was too naive at the time to see all the secret living going on behind closed doors or to discern the destination of all the secret trips into the city to engage in forbidden pleasures and fantasies with people not welcome in the burbs.
Our natural tonal richness with which we were gifted at birth, was bleached out and faded in order to blend with our vanilla surroundings.
No coons...except for the ones who occasionally wandered out of Winton Woods Park.
Lifeless....If this was the American dream...I did not want it....
Tears came to my eyes the first night I went to sleep in my own tiny apartment, listening to the too loud sounds of the winos on Lincoln, walking to the Down Beat Bar on the corner, a few blocks away.
I missed life and I made myself a promise to never lose it again. 40 years later, I still live in the cities among the people and not too far from that first tiny apartment.
Got to have it...This tangible life is vital to my personal well being, and I suspect, if we were all honest, speaks to something in all of us. We need life, good or bad, in order to mutate into something different. We need life to grow.
I have a home, filled with the mementoes of a very successful professional life. A relatively new car parked in the driveway of a home, a rather large home. But instead of the burbs, it’s in the city. The corner bar is gone, but the kids are still noisy, the Seventh Day Adventist and the Mormons still ring my doorbell on Saturday. I have to cut grass, but not as much as my dad. I even have deer in my side yard and real coons the size of my smallest dog, who happens to tip the scales at 75 pounds these days.
My dad got mad at me one time because I told him the only thing his home in the burbs was missing was a moat filled with alligators. His anger told me I’d struck a nerve. He didn’t want to live with coons, yet he couldn’t happily live without them, either.
40 years later, they have come to him. His suburb has changed and he’s not happy. But he’s too old and too entrenched to move. White flight took place when we moved in. Bougie flight happens when the people from the projects invade, chased out by the yuppies who think it’s cool to live and renovate the big old homes of the city and take over the life that happens, just because... never realizing they are destroying that life when they squeeze out the people who already reside there.
We watch BET, Black Embarrassment Television, because it is our last connection to some parts of our life, that, if we’re honest about....we miss...
We know and miss the people that Tyler Perry talks about.
Celebrating the American dream became a drive to deny who we are....It became a suppression of our differences from the dominant culture....
In an effort to integrate, we lose our identity. We reconnect only by watching the overblown characterizations of Black life perpetrated by the hip hop generation. Sometimes we laugh at it..sometimes we don’t...But, usually we always watch from the safe distance of the burbs and inwardly, it doesn’t feel so good...
In the 1960s we screamed “I’m Black and I’m Proud.”
Today, we wear our hair natural...yet...we still look for that American Dream and it’s house and a yard with a picket fence in the suburbs as the true symbol of success...bereft of life...colorless....unfulfilling...
I don’t have an ending or answer...this is a ramble that goes on...
to be continued...
7.03.2009
Friday Rap
***********************************************************************
Palin resigns....giving up governorship at the end of the month...
You don't really think she believes that she can win the White House in 2012 do ya?
Nah!
************************************************************************
Organic Foods-you are what you eat..
Another government approved scam forcing consumers to pay more for less...
Think you’re buying “healthy” when you pay more for the so called organic food in the grocery store?
Well, think again. It’s not...organic or good for you. In fact, much of the alleged organic stuff contains the inorganic non-healthy chemicals that have always been there..
And those healthy, organic companies....Boca and Morningstar, and Honest Tea, they’re owned by Kraft Foods, Kellog and Coca Cola, respectively.
When the government put in place the “organic food laws” back in 2002, there were only 77 substance-additives allowed...
Today, thanks to lobbying from the big agra food companies...allowable additives have jumped to 245 chemicals...
And that pesticide option...of no pesticides on so called organic food...that option was never implemented thanks to the lobbying efforts of people within the FDA..
The only way to get organic food is to buy from small local farmers, or to grow it yourself...
If you’re buying organic from a grocery store..you’re paying good money for fake stuff...
Read more about it here
-0-
BET-Black Embarrassment Television
I almost broke a rule to watch the BET awards this past week because I wanted to see what kind of tribute they would mount for Michael Jackson...but in the end, I couldn’t bring myself to watch.
BET is Stepin Fetchit TV for the masses....with apologies to the real Stepin Fetchit who only played at being a fool for white people in order to get paid...BET for those of you who don’t know is owned by Viacom....I’m not sure there are any Black owned TV stations anywhere in the world, anymore...
And before anyone comments about TVone....it’s not totally Black owned or controlled either..
One of my great laments about integration is that it has taken our identities and is slowly consuming our singular culture...
Not only are there no Black genes coming into our gene pool, many of us still chase the white ethic when it comes to attempting to look good or to feel successful, media outlets are owned outright or controlled by whites, businesses in the neighborhoods are owned and operated by Middle Eastern people, schools are in disrepair, and the best and brightest are moving to the burbs without looking back.
In Cincinnati, the death knell of neighborhoods was sounded years ago when the city repealed the ordinance mandating that people who worked in Cincinnati..had to live inside city limits...
with that rule...your teachers were your next door neighbors...your police officers and firemen lived across the street....the postman, lived around the corner...the neighborhoods were beautiful, well kept and kids were forced to go school, because there was nowhere you could hide that somebody didn’t recognize you and would tell your parents...
My fourth grade teacher lived down the street...she went to school with my mother...her husband was the mail man...she told him about her day...he would tell our parents...if we screwed up...that was two whippins’ in one day...from the teacher...and from my mom when I got home...
-0-
Found a Guy From Cincinnati.....
Today’s announcement that the Statute of Liberty is opening up to tourists again, reminded me of when I spent two and a half hours with friends walking to the top of the statute back in 1979..
Of course, that was before 9/11 and you didn’t need a ticket or reservation.
The steps were wooden at the time and it was quite a climb. When we got to the top, there was a guy and his girlfriend in front of us...who proceeded to yell “Cincinnati” out of the windows of the crown...
We cracked up...we traveled in a pickup truck through the Poconos to spend a weekend in New York, take in a show, climb the Statute of Liberty, look out of the crown only to meet a guy and his girlfriend from our hometown...
Small world...
-0-
Go Williams!
It’s an all Williams final at Wimbledon again....Fourth time that’s happened...Serena’s playing like she’s mad Venus beat her last year and wants revenge this year...
Well, she’s gonna have to play better than she did yesterday, because “V” is looking pretty invincible...
Venus has walked through the field like a juggernaut...hasn’t dropped a set...Of course that means she really hasn’t been tested either...
Serena was her own worst enemy yesterday against Dimentieva...The Russian should have won...but she didn’t have enough smarts or confidence...although she is turning into a helluva player...
Safina..the other Russian who is ranked number one in the world and will remain so regardless of who wins the tournament...
Met the real number one player in the world yesterday...and got demolished....6-1, 6-0...
Totally embarrassing what Venus did to that girl, Thursday.
I'm putting my money on Venus...she who will not be denied...history!
Palin resigns....giving up governorship at the end of the month...
You don't really think she believes that she can win the White House in 2012 do ya?
Nah!
************************************************************************
Organic Foods-you are what you eat..
Another government approved scam forcing consumers to pay more for less...
Think you’re buying “healthy” when you pay more for the so called organic food in the grocery store?
Well, think again. It’s not...organic or good for you. In fact, much of the alleged organic stuff contains the inorganic non-healthy chemicals that have always been there..
And those healthy, organic companies....Boca and Morningstar, and Honest Tea, they’re owned by Kraft Foods, Kellog and Coca Cola, respectively.
When the government put in place the “organic food laws” back in 2002, there were only 77 substance-additives allowed...
Today, thanks to lobbying from the big agra food companies...allowable additives have jumped to 245 chemicals...
And that pesticide option...of no pesticides on so called organic food...that option was never implemented thanks to the lobbying efforts of people within the FDA..
The only way to get organic food is to buy from small local farmers, or to grow it yourself...
If you’re buying organic from a grocery store..you’re paying good money for fake stuff...
Read more about it here
-0-
BET-Black Embarrassment Television
I almost broke a rule to watch the BET awards this past week because I wanted to see what kind of tribute they would mount for Michael Jackson...but in the end, I couldn’t bring myself to watch.
BET is Stepin Fetchit TV for the masses....with apologies to the real Stepin Fetchit who only played at being a fool for white people in order to get paid...BET for those of you who don’t know is owned by Viacom....I’m not sure there are any Black owned TV stations anywhere in the world, anymore...
And before anyone comments about TVone....it’s not totally Black owned or controlled either..
One of my great laments about integration is that it has taken our identities and is slowly consuming our singular culture...
Not only are there no Black genes coming into our gene pool, many of us still chase the white ethic when it comes to attempting to look good or to feel successful, media outlets are owned outright or controlled by whites, businesses in the neighborhoods are owned and operated by Middle Eastern people, schools are in disrepair, and the best and brightest are moving to the burbs without looking back.
In Cincinnati, the death knell of neighborhoods was sounded years ago when the city repealed the ordinance mandating that people who worked in Cincinnati..had to live inside city limits...
with that rule...your teachers were your next door neighbors...your police officers and firemen lived across the street....the postman, lived around the corner...the neighborhoods were beautiful, well kept and kids were forced to go school, because there was nowhere you could hide that somebody didn’t recognize you and would tell your parents...
My fourth grade teacher lived down the street...she went to school with my mother...her husband was the mail man...she told him about her day...he would tell our parents...if we screwed up...that was two whippins’ in one day...from the teacher...and from my mom when I got home...
-0-
Found a Guy From Cincinnati.....
Today’s announcement that the Statute of Liberty is opening up to tourists again, reminded me of when I spent two and a half hours with friends walking to the top of the statute back in 1979..
Of course, that was before 9/11 and you didn’t need a ticket or reservation.
The steps were wooden at the time and it was quite a climb. When we got to the top, there was a guy and his girlfriend in front of us...who proceeded to yell “Cincinnati” out of the windows of the crown...
We cracked up...we traveled in a pickup truck through the Poconos to spend a weekend in New York, take in a show, climb the Statute of Liberty, look out of the crown only to meet a guy and his girlfriend from our hometown...
Small world...
-0-
Go Williams!
It’s an all Williams final at Wimbledon again....Fourth time that’s happened...Serena’s playing like she’s mad Venus beat her last year and wants revenge this year...
Well, she’s gonna have to play better than she did yesterday, because “V” is looking pretty invincible...
Venus has walked through the field like a juggernaut...hasn’t dropped a set...Of course that means she really hasn’t been tested either...
Serena was her own worst enemy yesterday against Dimentieva...The Russian should have won...but she didn’t have enough smarts or confidence...although she is turning into a helluva player...
Safina..the other Russian who is ranked number one in the world and will remain so regardless of who wins the tournament...
Met the real number one player in the world yesterday...and got demolished....6-1, 6-0...
Totally embarrassing what Venus did to that girl, Thursday.
I'm putting my money on Venus...she who will not be denied...history!