Bey-Bey Effect

The quiet revolution sweeping America.


The latest in a series of US Census reports is the stuff of nightmares, if you happen to be an old white guy bent on taking back your country.  Cutting to the chase, according to the Census, white women ain't havin' white babies-at least all white, aryan looking little angels, who could potentially be molded into throwback versions of the old masters of the universe, and that's got bigoted conservatives scared to death. 


Current universal master spokesperson, Tony Perkins, president of the D.C. based Family Research Council, pointed out in a statement, reacting to the numbers, by claiming the economic impact of the decline of traditional American families will result in a country full of people (Black and brown) dependent upon  government assistance for survival.


"The decline of the traditional family will have to correct itself if we are to continue as a society,"..... "We don't need another dose of big government, but a new Hippocratic oath of 'do no harm' that doesn't interfere with family formation or seek to redefine family." -Tony Perkins


 Perkins went on to say the responsibility for change rests with individuals and the church.


And what has caused Perkins and others such pain and suffering? Well, for the first time in the history of the world,  or since figures were first kept in 1950,  Black women headed households outnumber Black married couples (30% to 28%). Most of the woman headed households are single women with children, although the figure also encompasses women who take care of older parents, or live with a sibling or two or three. 


The report also signals the death of marriage in America as we used to know it. In other words, Leave it to Beaver families of a working husband (male), stay at home wife (female), two kids (one boy and one girl), a dog named spot living in  a house surrounded by a white picket fence on a quiet block, is fading fast.  It is happening fast for white people but is moving at speed of light for minorities.


The experts tell us the changing social order should reach full bloom by mid-century...this century.


According to the report 60% of all 3 year olds counted back in 1990 were white. In 2009 non-Hispanic white 3 year olds make up almost half of the number tallied. Factoring in the data from 2010, last year, most babies counted and under the age of 2 are bey-bey's kids.


"We don't die...we multiply!"


The report is derived from the Current Population Survey and the 2009 American Community Survey which sampled 3-million American households, basically to see if whites still were the majority. These surveys showed white babies having the edge at 51%. However when 2010 figures are added in, white babies fell to second place, well below 50% of the population. This primarily because white women have fewer babies than minority women, specifically Hispanic women. 


In fact, 12 states and DC have more minority residents under the age of 5...these include, Hawaii, California, New Mexico, Texas, Arizona, Nevada, Florida, Maryland, Georgia, New Jersey, New York and Mississippi....7 more states are on the "tipping block." They are Illinois, North Carolina, Virginia, Colorado, Connecticut, South Carolina and Delaware.


Compare this with the fact that 80% of old people, those 65 and older, as well as 73% of people 45-64, are white. 


One very interesting discovery is that states with high populations of old white people also have big populations of minority children. In other words, white people's kids are apparently having Black babies or mixed babies, to be politically correct. 


The war on brown people to stop this so called travesty is in full force in Ohio, for instance, where conservative groups are running wall to wall ads calling for a halt in LEGAL immigration, never mind ILLEGAL immigration. These groups don't want anyone allowed into America for any reason..not school and not to work, claiming legal immigrants are responsible for taking jobs away from Americans who want them.


Couple this blatant xenophobia with conservative efforts to gut and or privatize the public school system and I can see a real rumble building in the near future. 


Protectionism abounds in the laws being proposed around the country....proposals against immigrants...plans for banning gay marriage...and the plans to change or eliminate government health benefits such as Medicaid and Medicare.


Another interesting discovery- the number of single Black mothers is actually in decline, according to recent statistics. However  the number of Black marriages are declining faster. But this reflects the overall trend of  American disinclination to get married at all. 


Women headed households make up 19% of all Hispanic households versus 8% for both whites and Asians.  Nearly 1 in 10 Latino households are multigenerational households....parents, grandparents and children living under one roof. 


The other big number to jump out is the number of unmarried partners living together, both gay and straight. Families identifying as gay households have increased dramatically.


Bey-bey kids or an unmarried gay or straight couple with  natural or adopted bey-bey kids... coming to your block..sooner than you think...

Kasich and Legislature Still Stuck on Stupid

Kasich and Legislature continues war on women children and the middle class..

When you do something as dumb as snatching jobs away from the very people who need them, by halting the casino project, you better come back with something better and quick. Governor John Kasich seems to have done that. At least on the surface, anyway. The Cincinnati casino is finally going forward following a two month delay so Kasich's homies could raid the taxpayer filled Ohio treasury. Kasich wanted the voter approved deal "studied."

That's code for, "I have some friends who need an extra half million dollars, so here's the way we're going to give it to them."

Well the study  is now over. The casino developers get more tax breaks, the people of Ohio get 110 million dollars more on the deal spread out over the next ten years. And they get video slot machine gambling at Ohio racetracks, maybe. So yeah, work can resume on that hole in the ground at Broadway Commons in a couple of weeks.

Kasich didn't bother to reveal the amount of his own personal kickback, however.

This new deal may work out for Ohioans, but Kasich's methods leave a lot to be desired. Like all teabaggers who insist on hiding behind the rights and freedoms spelled out in the United States Constitution, Kasich goes against it whenever the mood suits him. In other words its good for the people, just not good for him unless it fits his designs and machinations against the people.

The people spoke, yet the Governor who is sworn to uphold the will of said people, chose to ignore it, with the typical teabag/GOP arrogance that assumes they know what's best for all the rest of us.

Stuck on stupid....

And then there is the Kasich budget which some say is "balanced on the backs of the middleclass."

What middle class? There are rich people and then there are poor people. The middleclass is swiftly going down the toilet like the American dream.  The Kasich budget is full of tax cuts for the upper 8%, while killing jobs and programs for those less fortunate, aka the ex middle class.

For example, women lose out by losing health care. The legislature added amendments into the budget, that have nothing to do with deficit reduction. These amendments ban access to abortions. One prohibits rural or unicorporated areas from offering abortion riders in employee insurance plans. A second amendment bans publicly funded hospitals from performing the procedure. Despite the protestations  of these legislative dimwits...taxpayer funds never, ever go for abortions, because of state and federal law already in place. So there is no need for more law to ban something already prohibited. Just another law designed to keep women in their place...barefoot, pregnant and depending on the masters of the universe for handouts.

Stuck on stupid....

The Kasich budget takes away 50% of all state funding for local governments. This measure along with the plan to privatize the Ohio prison system will cause 51,000 state workers to be fired, according to several governmental watchdog agencies.

Kasich cuts current education funding by 11.5%. That means 10,000 teachers are history, right off the top. You have only to listen to the local news about the various school districts to see how bad it has gotten with Kasich in control.

Stuck on stupid....

Even though the demand for services has increased by 23%, the Kasich budget cuts library funding by 5%. This may not seem like much until you understand that 5% is on top of the 30% in cuts that has taken place since the year 2000.

And get ready for more cuts in police and fire since most municipalities spend their state funding on services that protect and serve.  Worried about all those orange cone detour zones? Well don't fret. Kasich is cutting the money that cities previously used to fix the streets, too. Soon there will be no need for orange cones. And please, check the bridge before you drive over it.

Really stuck on stupid....

Kasich says he is probably going to sign this monument to jackassdom into law in the near future. It is a new law passed last night, the enables people to carry a concealed weapon into a bar, or a restaurant or a sports stadium.

The old law made them leave their piece locked up in the car while they filled up on booze. Now it is not necessary. Guess taking the gun off before you left your car was too much multi tasking for the concealed carry crowd.

Now, the genious lawmakers behind this travesty are quick to point out, that while the gun nuts can take their weapons inside the bar....they can't drink when they do it...not allowed...it's a felony if they drink and carry or shoot...Oh, I feel so safe knowing that.

The law affects roughly 17,000 establishments in Ohio, but it doesn't affect school sports arenas, or churches...still can't shoot in church...at least in Ohio, anyway... at least, not yet.... give em time....

Yeah... totally stuck on stupid...

Politic Wars-The War Against Obama

Not so long ago in the galaxy that we inhabit.....

The brothers Koch, twin wizards, the pair
Put out a call to their champions,  make haste to the state of  New Hampshire.
They have only one goal, and that is  to find,
One among them  strong enough to retake DC
Solely for the purpose of kicking out the rabble in the White House, you see.
The brothers want Obami-wan and Princess Michelle, gone,  vanquished, returned to Chicago. Out of sight...out of mind...out of the way
of the real  masters of the universe, who always rule the day.

A whole round table of champions answered the call
But only seven showed up, veteran warriors all.

The head of the table claimed by Sir Mitt of Mormon,
A presidential specimen if ever there was one.
All spit shined and polished with nary an out of place hair,
No substance, all talk, no real thoughts to share.

Enter, Sir Newton, who just lost his army,
He  vows to fight  on alone, but only if necessary.
He has convinced himself in the world that he inhabits,
The little people love him and desperately need him
To toss out the knaves who are ruining their days.
So Newt answers the call with his lady at his side
Macbeth she is named by the media who hide
out of her reach when she passes by.

Sir Herman of Cain, the pizza man king
Thinks he's ready to step into the heavyweight ring
He's come to believe that he is the next great white hope,
No James Earl Jones here, he's as bad as the pope.
Rescuing America is what he plans to do,
Pepperoni pizza for all
Unless you prefer tofu.

Sir Paul the libertarian is at it again,
Says the world is finally coming around to his way of viewing
Not sure what that means, but I'm sure he will tell us when he so deigns
No newsletter for him, Paul will just talk at us, instead.
Past newsletters you see are very bigoted in tenor,
Not wise  in the biracially brown world that is nearly upon us.
Deny bigoted thoughts, he can't because it is obvious
His demon spawn named Rand has memorized
both chapter and verse, using it as a gameplan
to conquer earth.

Sir Timothy T-Paw Pawlenty,  Minnesota's Vanilla Ice,
searching for the beat, looking for a pulse
trying to find his voice among the cacophony of noise.
Drowned out by the other more vocal crew.
Easily overlooked, doesn't stand out.
Blink and you miss him
Not surprising, no doubt.

Sir Rick of Santorum, don't know why he surfaced.
Long thought politically dead, killed by the verbal poisons
regularly spewing from his mouth, and rumbling through his head.
Hates women and gays and lesbians too.
Black people don't stand a chance
if little Ricky Sunshine makes it through.

And last but not least is the Lady Michele
she of the deer trapped in headlights stare
oft blinded but never at a loss for words,
which often come  garbled,  spilling out nonsensical rhymes
leaving only  confusion and mystification in their  unfocused wake.

The seven stood their ground, talking points imbedded,
rehearsed over and over until convinced they really said it.
Nothing new did they add to the political conversation.
It was old talk..2008 talk..we've heard it before,
There is no surprise, here.  The only real message
laid on the table last night, was to take down Obami-wan
 and turn back the clock.

John Boehner's Voodoo Econ Plan

Got a question for you....given a choice between a 40 year old Edsel and a 2011 hybrid Explorer, which car would you drive? Or to put it another way, if you were asked to give up your I-pad computer and required to work on an Apple IIe, in order to do your job, would you be happy to make the change?

For most, the answer to both questions is a resounding "no!" No Edsel and no Apple IIe.

The Edsel was a lousy car, conceived by an ego driven business mogul paying homage to his son of the same name, that thankfully didn't last very long. Nobody would buy it and those who did, complained about its inefficiency and bad ride.  The old Apple computer was great for its time, back in the day. However it is vastly outclassed by 21st century computing machines. Completely inefficient by today's standards.

New and modern with better ease of use has always ruled the day and pushed humans further into the future. Progress is a good one word description.

Yet, with the American love for the shiny and new,  why do we still embrace a 40 year old economic theory that has never worked? Talking about voodoo economics, now called  the GOP plan for job creation, that Speaker of the House John Boehner will unveil today during another rotary club speech in Middletown.

The complete plan is on Boehner's website. You can read it here.

To sum it up it is heavy on more tax cuts for the wealthy, budget reductions for all social programs including killing medicare and social security, as well as a  massive elimination of regulations designed to protect the middle class from predatory corporations. It is pretty much a rewrite of  Congressman Paul Ryan's budget plan, which is a rewrite of the plan put forth by Bush the younger, which was a rewrite of the Contract on America, which was a rewrite on Bush the Elder's plan, which was inherited from Ronald Reagan's voodoo economics, spiced up by the fictional free market philosophies created by writer Ayn Rand.

 SOPDD...same old plan, different day.

Nothing new dating all the way back to the day Ronald Reagan came up with the plan to screw the middle class into oblivion. Bush the elder, an old school Republican, actually coined the phrase "voodoo economics" recognizing the falacies of the logic. Then he promptly sold his soul to the devil and became Reagan's VP effectively signing onto and thereby validating the lie that is trickle down economics.

If Bush had stood firm, voodoo economics might have gone the way of the Edsel. Instead it continues to hang around today, 40 years later, helping more conservative right wing zealots nail down the lid on the coffin of middle America.

Reagan promised to balance the budget in 4 years...he didn't.  Then he promised to balance the budget in 4 more years...he didn't. Bush the Elder found himself in the unenviable position of attempting to balance the budget while promising not to raise taxes...he couldn't.

Along comes Bill Clinton who stops the trickle down craziness and low and behold the budget balances and son of a gun, there is is even a budget surplus.

Then Bush the younger comes in and promptly reinstates trickle down..slashes taxes...starts two wars illegally...authors a massive social program with no way to pay for it...usurps the civil liberties and freedoms of American citizens. ends most deregulation allowing business to run roughshod and amok and suddenly America is on the brink of collapse.

Come 2008, The American people, tired of the illegal wars, and a tanking economy, wrap this pile of dogstuff into a  leaky brown paper bag and hand it to Barack Obama and tell the anointed "magic negro"  to dispose of it like a a good boy, quickly, which is of course, impossible.

To make matters worse, they don't give BTMN a full four years to effect change....the American people give him two years instead of four to scrub the congressional hallways clean. They don't give him any help...just tell him  to git her done.

Obama has accomplished many wonderful things for the American people...almost everything except create jobs, leaving the American people very unhappy with the situation and still seeking change.

The definition of crazy is doing the same thing over and over and expecting change. Well, that is exactly what the American people keep doing. Unhappy with Obama's apparent timidity and or unwillingness to act more decisively, the midterm elections were used to reinstate  the teabag driven GOP, which immediately took it upon itself to declare war on women and children. The destruction of the middle class was returned to the front burner.

Boehner and company ran on the premise that they would create jobs....They have not...In fact...they haven't tried being too busy pushing their outdated, and bigoted social mores onto the rest of the population. From the midterms on, it has been painfully obvious once again, that the only agenda for the GOP is to dismantle the great society, take women out of the workforce and defeat Barack Obama at all costs, even if it means sinking America. Long live trickle down economics.

And it will, unless America breaks the crazy loop in which it is caught and rejects the voodoo creation that is the Ryan/Boehner/GOP's Job Creation plan, once and for all.

Kasich Fiddles While Cincinnati Burns

Governor playing politics with the lives and well being of Ohio's citizens.

Hey John,

It's been what, two, three weeks since you pulled the plug on the casino project in order to pump some more cash into your homies pockets out in California. I'm sure they're  lovin' you handing them a  study of the people-mandated casino project, here in Ohio.

Hell, I'd be happy to do your study for you too at $400 an hour. And just like them, I'd probably be taking my time finding your answers or solutions that fit your plan, whatever that happens to be, since  I'm not really sure what it is you're doing. Especially since you managed to convince a lot of people that you were going to create jobs first and for everyone, if they made you governor.

But so far instead of creation, you've rained down total destruction on the Buckeye State. No part in the national  light rail system, no street car for Cincinnati, less school funding, making criminals of honest working people and this casino thing which, as if you didn't know, hurts all the big cities in Ohio, not just Cincinnati. The casino wasn't federal...it was Ohio...If you want to hurt Obama... refuse the stimulus funds...trash health care reform...don't screw your own people....although refusing funds and killing health care is the same as making us bend over without benefit of vaseline....it would take longer to feel it than the up close and personal baseball bat whack on our knees that you delivered with the casino suspension.

In fact, you've been a busy little beaver up there in Columbus, when you're not flitting around the state attempting to convince us constituents that you have our best interests at heart. Buy a clue, John, the best way to convince us of your concern for us was to let well enough alone. Let the jobs roll, so to speak. But along with destroying what work force we have left since your president, Dubya, left office, (you remember him, I think), you've also allowed the crazy fringe of your party to declare war on women and children.

What's up with that? You ticked off at your wife? Well why take it out on the rest of us?

But I digress, let's get back to this casino thingey. You know your study is bogus. There was no need to pull the plug and study the matter. The people...as in we the people...voted and approved the measure by a very big margin. It was and remains a good deal. Your input was totally unnecessary. All you had to do was drive the bus and not drive over us in the process. But all you saw was space and opportunity for making money for you and your cronies, and no amount of spin is going to change the fact that you are playing politics with the lives of the people.

I mean come on....your California buddies have a working relationship with the casinos in Indiana..you know the ones that Ohio's casinos are going to compete against if they ever get built? Can't you see the problem with your sudden attempt at a cash grab at our expense?

You just  had to prove you're in charge. You're the man. You're our second rate John Wayne wannabe cowboy of a governor who couldn't wait to trash the state, stop the recovery, kill the comeback in education, put another nail in the coffin of the disappearing middle class.

If you wanted to play cowboys and indians, why didn't you move to Texas? There's a fool down there who wants to secede from the Union. Maybe if you put your half a brain with the quarter of a brain housed in his skull, you might figure out a way to be annexed by Mexico and Ohio would be in the midst of major recovery, instead of backslidding into bankruptcy once again.

Heck, Texas annexed by Mexico would be a good thing for you GOP/teabaggers...fewer American mouths to feed...smaller government, right...that's what y'all keep preachin', isn't it?

Every few days the news media asks you "whass up, Gov?"  And your office says the email update is coming, and nothing lands in the inbox that day or the next. So what, you having your emails delivered by the postal service? Is there someone in your office who understands the workings of the "send" button?  Inquiring minds want to know, John.

Either way, you need to ask somebody and quick.

Talk at cha later Gov.

"Look at Me! Look at Me! Look at Me!"

Sarah Palin's mystifying bus tour to the "statute" of liberty and beyond....

"This away ballerina...that away ballerina...this away ballerina...all night long!"
"Strut miz lizzy....strut miz lizzy...strut miz lizzy...all night long!"

Remember that  old playground game where the kids line up and sing the song as each takes a turn in the spotlight...struttin' their stuff for all to see. Well Palin's tour is it...just spread out over a bigger playground.

Except instead of a group of kids playing games, it's just Palin and Todd followed by a massive hord of media, recording her every move. They think she's going to run for president and this is her impromptu way of preparing the ground.

Well, seems the only thing she really wants is the spotlight perpetually shining on her. There doesn't seem to be a public service bone anywhere in her body.

Mother's bone either...one particularly galling photo op from earlier this week, had Sarah stepping out of her bus with her youngest child draped like a sack of flour over her shoulder as she addressed reporters. The kid was hanging there like a prop.  The other kid dutifully at her feet in her mother's shadow, with Todd skulking in the background, the perfect fame seeking American family on vacation.

Who does she think she's fooling?

Palin may be interested in running for president...she might even want to live in the White House and partake in the perks that come with being First Family. But running the country, that's something totally different.

She has already shown that she has no stomach or substance for governance. She quit remember, for no real reason, half way through  her term as governor. Alaskan Governor was just something to do until bigger and better things showed up.....like running for Vice President with John McCain.

And look at all the money she's made....do you really think she is going to walk away from the cash cow..doubt it!

No, she has simply expanded her reality show and instead of Palin's Alaska, she wants us to think the new show is Palin's America. She's even moved to Arizona to prove she can exist in the lower 48. Being president...that's right up there with being Queen...except the USA doesn't have an official queen...plenty of queens to go around...just not an official one...

Question: Since the Black community is probably the most conservative community in America...is Palin's conservative-unifying tour going to make stops in some of America's ghettos, too?

Just askin. Would love to see her in Avondale or Roselawn or Evanston. But I guess Todd wouldn't like that too much. His past affiliations with the Alaskan Independence Party reveal his discomfort with minorities....even though Sarah keeps trying to reassure everybody that Todd is half Eskimo and therefore minority acceptable or biracial.

Besides girlfriend can always reach back into her own closet of "others" and pull out her lesbian friend from high school or her black witchdoctor, religious mentor from that church she claims to attend. They can vouch for her compassionate conservative inclusiveness.

Anyway that's all it takes to sway minorities into voting...just wave a symbol at em to show them you care....like dance at Cinco de Mayo....or beat a drum and shake your booty during a Kwanzah celebration....or gather in a big circle for a rousing chorus of "cum by yah" with everybody...works everytime..doesn't it?

"This away ballerina...that away ballerina...this away ballerina...all night long!"
"Strut miz lizzy....strut miz lizzy...strut miz lizzy...all night long!"

Ode to the Anonymous Commenter

A is for anal retentive walking waste of oxygen
N is for neanderthal incapable of any rational thought or reasoning
O is for opportunistic coward ready to spew hatred at the touch of a key
N is for the nothings that result from the massive amounts of brain power expended
Y is for the yawn produced after attempting to read but a few words of said drivel
M is the monumental chuckle generated if only you can maneuver through the misspellings, bad syntax and alien grammar
O is for orgasm, a real world ejaculation generated by meaningless cybersexualized bullying of strangers
U is for usual, as in "usual stuff " expected from someone with no functioning neural ganglia
S is for sanctimonious belief, that AC opinions actually matter in the real world outside said cave dweller's hole in the ground

C is for the control that you don't have over anyone, including yourself
O is for ordinary, nothing special, nada, zilch...not worth 15 seconds, let alone 15 minutes
M is for mentally challenged or retarded, as in dumb-ass, stupid, etc, except that would be stooping to AC level by resorting to unimaginative name calling
M is for midget as in mental midget able to generate third grade logic at the flick of an internal switch
E is for evil, no you ain't going to heaven, son
N is for nevermind, please don't make my day
T is for talentless, pretending to be a wordsmith is way above your burger flipping pay grade, do mc-fries come with that?
E is for empty, time to get a life
R is for racist and bigoted, last refuge of the anachronistic individual lacking in imagination and creativity

To sum up Anonymous Comments in one word-BORING!

Please, please, to reiterate, don't come into my space and expect me to get all hot and bothered over your immature and hyperbolic rantings. I've heard it said much better and with greater clarity at other points in my life. Your inbred fourth generation dumb down version just doesn't push the same buttons, other than to make me yearn for the days when real conservatives and bigots with balls, in other words, those unafraid to sign their names and stand behind their comments, drove the conversation, instead of all you stunted growth eunuchs who flunked social civility in high school and ended up being home schooled by the obsessively adoring  high school dropout beast- of a mother who bore you.

You...your idea of creativity is stating the obvious...IE..."you wear glasses...I'ma call you four eyes! hehehehehe!"

 I would leave you with a quote from Oscar Wilde, but you probably wouldn't understand or get what I'm telling you, even if you wrapped all of your miniscule brain around it and knew who Wilde was in the first place. So I will leave you with words you can relate to:

 you need to  crawl back down into that lichen infested basement under yo jello assed meth usin', pond scum suckin' momma's house and let grown folks continue the conversation.

Y'all don't come back now, ya hear?

The Poxy-clipse, Harold Camping and the Canonization of Oprah

Good thing I didn't cancel my gas and electric and HBO subscription, because now Harold Camping, the self proclaimed doomsday prophet says The Rapture isn't going to happen until October 21st, some five months from now.  Of course he came to this conclusion when it didn't happen as he predicted on May 21st, which was this past Saturday.

Camping didn't offer any new mathematical equations to back up his newest suppositions either.  Just stuck with the old erroneous ones. Personally, I'm thinking maybe Dude should take a remedial math course since his calculations have twice been shown  to be sadly lacking. He admitted his mistake back in 1994 when zombies didn't bust out of their graves and start walking again, but hasn't expressed anything other than bewilderment about his more recent algebraic attempts.

Maybe he should just admit what most of us know about ourselves...we hate math...we were lousy at it...and most of us haven't figured out why we need to learn algebra in the first place...let alone use it to figure out when Jesus is coming back.

All he has to do is turn on his microphone at the beginning of his next radio program and say, "Hello, I'm Harold and I suck at math!"  I'm sure his sheeple will forgive him again and start preparing for October.

Of course, Camping's attempt to tap into the machinations of the cosmic universe may have been obscured by his fixation on King James. Maybe what Camping really saw in his egotistical attempts to second guess god was the ending of the Oprah Winfrey Show instead.

 Maybe what old Harold saw when he looked into his crystal ball was not a David Bowie thin white guy with long flowing brown locks and blue eyes, wearing a pale Boy George frock snatching people up to heaven, but a well endowed, medium tall brown woman with flawless makeup, all her own hair, no extensions necessary, clad in designer togs from head to toe.

  Maybe he simply saw Oprah.

 Talk about fireworks and revelatory realignments, in between the finales of Dancing with the Stars, Glee and American Idol, the universe has literally come to a stand still as Miz O makes her transition from mega talk show host to network magnate. Maybe that's what he prognosticated.

You want to see Jesus in action...look at Oprah...she was primed from birth...look at the name of her network....OWN...the Oprah Winfrey Network....didn't even have to change her name to get to it...she had it from birth....everybody say "Amen!"

Now I've lived through other transitions in the past....Kookla Fran and Ollie... Howdy Doody....Bill Cosby...Hill Street Blues...Gunsmoke...Dark Shadows, but I have to tell you Oprah's transition makes me feel like I'm watching the making of a new saint, or even the death of one.

It feels like she is being measured for a constellation spelling out Harpo Productions to be hung up next to the Milky Way in the near future, for all to seek comfort from before going to bed at night.

She ain't going nowhere. She's changing hats within the same industry...getting more powerful and making more money. She will still be heard from. She will still be doing great things. It's a great opportunity for a party...but damn! You'd think the chile was dying from one of those incurable diseases that Dr. Oz likes to talk about when he's on.

So get over it...the world didn't end on Saturday....and it's not gonna end today either when Oprah says goodbye.

Her, leaving talk show heaven, is simply a signal that the rest of us should turn off the TV, go outside, smell the fresh air, and then go find our own lives because the daily peeks into hers are now over.

 Come to think of it, that will be an apocalypse for some people.

Preparing for A Raptured Lift Off

 Hey God, Is it too late to say I'm sorry?

Dear G,

You and I have been on a first name basis since my pastor told me to go read the bible after one too many questions that he couldn't or wouldn't answer. I was 11, but you already know that.  My grandmother gave me a bible later that year for my birthday, and in it you made it clear that if I wanted my questions answered all I had to do was to ask you. So I fired my Pastor and started reading and talking to you directly.

Well,  now I've got a big one...Some of your followers say The Rapture is coming on Saturday. That's the day when you start snatchin' people up to heaven, leaving the rest  to suffer and eventually go to hell on October 21st when you destroy earth.

By most common definitions that I've heard, I'm not one of those who will be snatched up by you, even if you can get a good grasp on my bald head.  I don't fit the general description of a rapturite. Ain't married. Don't have kids (don't even like em most of the time), and happen to be an avowed lover of women...I mean I luv me some women in every carnel sense of the word, okay.

 But you know that. You made me. I didn't know the word for it back in the day, but I knew what "it" was by the time I started kindergarten, when I fell in lust for the sixth grader who, my mother paid to walk me to school everyday.  I haven't looked back from that day. I've never even questioned the fact that you don't love me. I was told you do, and you have said  so repeatedly that you love all your creations.

So me and you are cool, right?

But by all standard man made definitions I'm doomed. After all this man's world is pretty clear about its definition of what is heavenly and what is not. Face it, I've never been tall, blond haired nor blue eyed. My people aren't Aryan..some of them are..but that angel apparently missed me... Well, that's my question to you, the boss of bosses....Am I going to hell? Am I going to be left here on Saturday to suffer for the next five months and then be obliterated by lightening bolt on October 21st?

Because if I am not on the Rapture list, I need to know if I should apologize to some people and maybe get on the pull up list, or at least get my ish together-settle a few scores, give away my stuff and all that happy horse pucky.

While you're checkin' your list and making up your mind, I'm going to start settlin' up,  clean up my slate, so to speak, okay?

Cool...I'd like to apologize for....

Giving my sister that Shirley Temple album of greatest hits for Christmas.

And for...

Cussing at my fire truck within hearing of my dad who was out of sight but close enough to take issue with my behind and my choice of adjectives..

Also for...

Helping to lock my other sister in the bathroom, causing her to break the big bathroom mirror as she tried to escape and lying to our mother that the mirror just fell off the back of the door..

Hanging my Huey P Newton poster on the wall  of my bedroom for the sole purpose of pissing off my dad and his white friends when  they came to the house for a sunday social....

Threatening to kill my younger sister if she lost my baseball glove...only to have our other sister steal the glove and bring it home without telling the one who borrowed it....kid wouldn't come home...we had to go find her...

Helping two friends steal 33 watermelons...we left them on the doorsteps of our neighbors like early christmas presents in September....

Walking thru my mother's Thursday card game...having one of her friends ask me "Jo-when you gonna get married?" and me saying "Oh-hasn't mom told you I'm gay yet?" My mother was totally mortified..I kept walking..

And I need to apologize to David my photog....
While driving through Kentucky doing some tornado chasing when I worked news...saw three abandoned black lab puppies on the side of the road...there were four by the time I made my photog turn around and go back...I took the puppies back to channel 12 but not before they barfed all over the news car...the smell was awful...Dave the photog didn't want to work with me anymore since car cleanliness was his responsibility...he cleaned it while I found homes for all the dogs ...

And I guess walking around naked on All Hallows may have been fun...but not what a traditionally raised gal should do..but did....I went to a Halloween party as a flasher...complete with funky hat...long red tie to cover strategic places...big overcoat and brogans...and nothing else on and it was cold that night...I  only flashed on request..

And to Arnold (pronounced Arn-no)...Driving to a friend's party in the south of France on a scooter...gave him a lift...he kept trying to grab my breasts as I drove..so I left his ass on the side of the road in the middle of nowhere...between villages....made him walk...he still refuses to speak to me even though we're on separate continents now..

Laughing at the three guys who actually proposed marriage to me...one because I couldn't handle having part of  my name as "Orange".....the second one because he was looking for a power couple business arrangement and proposed on our first date..it was a good date, excellent wine and a five star restaurant....I loved the repast..and the third because he was flat out crazy...Number 3 ended up in jail on a life sentence for killing the woman he did marry after me and her boyfriend after they divorced...saw it on TV...nobody told me about it when it happened...I was gone...I don't keep track of the broken hearts in my wake...

You know what G, on second thought,  this is going to be an helaciously long list...sooooooooo if you don't mind,  just surprise me come the weekend...

I'll be here...bet!

Give Me Some Bullets with Those Tequila Shots, Please

Ohio's Downward Spiral into Teabag Insanity

"Our bill says you cannot consume alcohol and exercise your rights as a conceal carry license holder......... Alcohol and weapons do not mix."-Ohio State Rep Terry Johnson (R)

No shit Sherlock!

And after saying that, Johnson proceeds to sponsor a bill allowing  people to carry concealed weapons into restaurants and bars.  Even more terrifying is the fact that the Ohio House GOP passed the measure without protest, last Friday.

Johnson justifies his bill by saying it takes the confusion out of Ohio's current concealed carry law which bans guns in the same spaces where alcohol is sold, meaning you can't take your piece to  a restaurant, a bar, in a shopping mall, nightclub, retail outlet or  on a riverboat.

The current law seems pretty straight forward to me...if you're going out shopping or taking your wife on a date night, then leave your gun at home or in the car. If that is confusing, then maybe those confused folks should not have been issued concealed carry permits in the first place.

According to Johnson, business owners can still post their establishments as gun free zones...probably do as much good as those signs proclaiming bars to be smoke free zones.

The republicans backing this bill say it allows "law abiding citizens" to legally defend themselves....Defend themselves? From what?

People who have concealed carry weapons ain't shootin' nobody! Especially in self defense. Most gun accidents still happen in the home...Black men still kill other Black men and...white people still kill other white people, usually their wives or girlfriends,  usually during domestic incidents and the cops kill the rest.

Concealed carry to discourage crime is a myth...just like stranger danger....most sexual pervs come from inside the family or is the neighbor next door or across the street.....most kids are kidnapped by a parent...societal myths...one and all...

House Bill 45 passed with all GOP/teabaggers voting in favor and all Democrats voting against.

And a word to stupid Democrats....offering amendments that ban guns only in urban...read that black neighborhoods is not only discriminatory...but racist as well...

It will now go to the Senate which in all likelihood will approve along party lines, sending it to our teabag governor to sign into law.

Dear John Kasich-An Open Letter

Dear Governor,

I am one of your constituents who did not vote for you in the last election, and based upon your work since your swearing in, my fears about your inability to handle the job have come to quick fruition. Your past record revealed you to be anti woman, anti worker,  anti black and anti gay, and that is why you didn't get my vote in the first place since I am all of the above. Well, you certainly didn't lie to us about it. I will give you credit for that. If your goal is to drive away everyone from Ohio who is not male, white and over 60..you're succeeding royally.

You ran on a platform of jobs and prosperity for  all the people of Ohio. Yet you didn't see fit to put Blacks,  minorities and women in your cabinet, and we have seen no jobs materialize. In fact, we have seen them rapidly disappear as you have trashed in short order, Ohio's participation in a nationwide light rail system, killed Cincinnati's grab at 21st century people friendly relevance by destroying the streetcar project, and now, you've tanked the Casinos...all of em in Cincinnati, Columbus and Cleveland.

In Cincinnati, there is a hole in Broadway Commons where the Casino is supposed to go. That hole matches the one in my gut that has been there since you snuck into the Governor's mansion by the slimmest of margins. The casinos were voted upon and approved by WE THE PEOPLE, before you got into office. It was working. People were working. People were making plans to work, by investing in the surrounding area. There was literally a renovation going on. But  not now. That big sucking sound you hear is the oxygen being driven out of the Ohio Valley, from your blow to our collective solar plexis.

Your desire to study the matter is nothing more than  politics at it's ugliest. It wasn't even an original idea, but came from a crony of yours, if reports are to be believed. There was no concern for Ohioans. It was only another way for you and yours to steal another buck from taxpayers...Damn the people...I want mine...that's what you did. And your buddy's firm is not even from Ohio. Your casino deal study is being done by a California company where your friend works or owns.  Not even one job resulted for an Ohioan from this gubernatorial power play. And according to news reports, your consultants get a cut of the take, a cut, possibly amounting to 13-million dollars funded by us taxpayers. Have you no shame? The arrogance of your behavior defies belief.

You've put forth a budget that literally will kill what is left of the middle class and relegates to invisibility anyone who happens to find himself living below the poverty level. Thanks to you, death panels are soon to be a reality in Ohio, because you've made it so. It may not be his strength, but is balancing budgets one of your strengths? Learn about accounting schools online.

 In one fell swoop you've managed to destroy the progress being made by Ohio public schools. You apparently not only like your women barefoot and pregnant, you want your sons dumbed down, too.

You've made it possible for folks to lose their job simply because they are willing to speak up about injustices at work.  No more collective bargaining. The new rules are kiss the ring of your employer or let your family starve.

 You've made it impossible for people to buy insurance or get coverage for their significant other if that person doesn't happen to line up with your vision of a traditional American family.

You've apparently decided to stand silent as the more extreme members of your party wage open warfare on women. What health care coverage that women can buy now is mediocre at best. The laws being proposed in the legislature send the signal to young women that male sex toy and baby making machine is what they  should aspire to in life. No Pell grants necessary when half the population stays home and raises the progeny of the masters of the universe such as yourself.

I guess your definition of  "cool" is staying in Ohio, single, straight,  jobless, and stupid, working at a McJob without health care insurance.

You've spent your first 100 plus days traveling around Ohio justifying your "my way or the highway" stance on everything. When are you going to do the work you were hired to do, which is put Ohio back to work?


Inquiring minds want to know Mr. Governor. Feel free to respond, but I won't hold my breath.

Respectfully yours

jo

Osama Dead, Be Happy!

Nearly ten years after the attack on the World Trade Center, Osama Bin Laden is dead, killed by American special forces, summarily executed inside his own bedroom. The killing sparked a number of reactions including utter and complete elation at his demise. Chants of "USA! USA!" filled the air as Americans rejoiced at the news.

The boogey man is dead, never mind that the war is not yet over. It was a collective exhale. People were happy. The party was on. America is caught up in the rapture of a nationwide feel good moment.  Happy and patriotic Americans continue to dance in the streets.

But not everyone is celebrating. Some feel the celebration of the death of another human being was wrong and somehow not Christian or religious or human. As details of the raid filtered out, others took issue with the use of the name Geronimo as code for Bin Laden, stating it was a slap in the face of Native Americans to use the name of so great a chieftain. Yeah, so what else is new?

Those wringing their hands miss the point. The celebrations were not because one man died or due to another great man's name being used without due reverence. Geronimo's name was probably spit out by computer. After all, that is the way they choose those stupid battle names in the first place. What do you do, kill the programmer, because the programming points to the deeply entrenched  racism that permeates America? Bin Laden was more symbol than man. Kill the symbol, take the flag. Win the war. Win the competition. It's the American way. Passion for politics and law?  Find out about  law degrees online.

 With the exception of those two great persecutions and killings of brown Americans, namely the Civil War, and the wars against Native Americans, wars are never fought on American soil. Wars are fought "over there." American civilians don't die in war. Our soldiers do, but then they volunteer to defend the rest of us. The rest of us go on about our daily lives, tying yellow ribbons around tree trunks, voicing outrage when cryptkeeper Fred Phelps and family show up at military funerals, or become a little aggravated by the inconveniences of stepped up security, refusing to dwell on what is being done by our government in other countries in our name. It's like Jack said "we can't handle the truth!" We Americans really don't want to know.  We just want someone else to do it and please don't slow my roll in the process.

 And truth be told, the biggest outrage of September 11th is not that it happened, but that it happened on American soil, in our greatest city.

Bin Laden's boys literally walked into our collective bedroom wrapped in our goodwill and raped our significant other in front of the whole world. He pissed on our award winning roses and then turned around and told us he was coming back for more.

America lives by that old saying "you start it...we'll finish it."  In other words, you can screw my wife, but take her to a hotel...don't you dare have sex with her in my bed or in my house. Doing your dirt on our turf is the ultimate insult. Like the Japanese,  Bin Laden chose to bring war to America. Big mistake. Huge mistake.

Bin Laden's braggadocio set off a worldwide, decade long manhunt and two wars. He became public enemy number one, right up there with Al Capone and the heads of all the big South American drug cartel leaders. The feds put a 25 million dollar price tag on his head. No American was safe while Bin Laden was alive, we were told. He became our excuse for invading other countries, sowing our version of democracy as we traipsed along killing babies, women and children, raining destruction on whole nations. Where was the religious, pseudo-christian outcry then?

Bin Laden didn't hurt America per say, he insulted America. He killed more of his own people, people who shared his belief system, then he did Americans. Taken in perspective, the destruction of the World Trade Center was more  like a solidly landed left hook that may have staggered us, but never even brought us to our knees. The September 11 attack  temporarily hurt our collective self esteem. It stung, showed us we do bleed, all the while acting as a shield enabling the greedy neocons to drink their fill of foreign oil.

If we were truthful with us, we would admit that we are not really a religious world, or a caring people concerned about the death of one man or of a hundred men or even thousands of people. Religious people, true followers of god or higher power don't fight or sanction wars of any kind or in any form, what so ever. They don't look away as thousands of innocents die in the name of regime change or nation building or self defense. To voice concern about the death of one man is disingenuous, more self serving than anything, wrapped around the fear of further repercussion.

Americans danced in the streets this week because, the hunt for and execution of Osama Bin Laden merely reinforced our self perceived superiority in the world. Bin Laden's death was the squelching of the idea that America is volunerable, fat and lazy lacking a counterpunch. Bin Laden's death showcases what some call American exceptionalism. We are simply the best. Bin Laden's death lets us know that it is okay to go shopping again.

Exhale!

WHO LET THE DOGS OUT? OBAMA! OBAMA!

Who let the dogs out? OBAMA! You Betcha!

Ain't no half steppin' when this president sends in the cavalry. No sirree! Pirates take a ship with an American crew, Obama says shoot em in the head and they did. Three shots...BAM! Ship no longer hijacked. Hostages safe.

And Osama Bin Laden, the fool who 10 years ago, started all this crap in the first place...caught hiding in plain sight...just like some of us imagined. I always figured we'd find Bin Laden in New York hunkered down in the Bin Laden family condo on Time Square.

It wasn't New York, but it was a luxurious house in Pakistan within shouting distance of the seat of government and the Pakistani version of West Point. He was there with family according to reports, living the life of a king in exile.

Can't tell me the Pakistani government didn't know he was there. And I'll bet my next paycheck that the intel only got real when Obama told our people to bypass the known government snitches and do the intel on their own, like it should a been from jump.

One of the big downsides of Don't Ask Don't Tell was that most, if not many of those drummed out the military for being gay were translators who could have been put to better use in the hunt for Bin Laden, and doing what they were trained to do rather than being forced to stay in the closet to calm the homophobic tendencies of the brass back in the Pentagon and on Capital Hill. Osama might have been caught a lot sooner than later, we might still not be in Iraq or Afghanistan and Bush might really have had his Mission Accomplished moment instead of a photo shopped photo op.

The Navy seals double tapped Bin Laden's ass......shot him in the head and delivered a second tap for good measure. End of story, body put in a bag and dumped at sea...all in accordance with Islamic scripture, we're being told, this to keep his grave from becoming a terrorist holy site.

Reports tell us this was plan B...Plan A was to simply drop a bunker buster bomb on his head...but that would have obliterated all the evidence, thereby allowing conspiracy theorists with names like Berg, Bachmann, Taitz and Trump to run with a newer and more delusional fantasy.

America needed to be able to point to the house and show the wicked witch's feet sticking out from under it. So President Obama demanded his "ding dong the witch is dead!" moment. President Obama has really earned his ruby slippers. Think they will leave him alone now...Nope!

This has been a very big weekend when it comes to taking out despots. NATO scored an "almost" on Khaddafyi in Libya...they reportedly got some family members and now America takes out Al Qaeda Number 1. All of this on the historical anniversary of the downfall of Adolf Hitler. Bitchin'!

Enjoy your day, Mr. President..you've earned every second of it.

Obama's Birth Certificate- Another WOOSAH Moment

I know why he did it. I completely understand the ramifications behind Obama's release of his birth certificate, but it doesn't make me feel any better about the situation.

Since 2008, we have had every white man from a fucking fake plumber to a fake ass paper billiionaire demand to see the President's "papers." As if THEY have the right of approval over all of us at any time THEY choose to ask for it.

It's been that way since 1619 in this country. It changes, but barely.

I haven't felt like this since the day after Martin Luther King was killed and I had to go to class at the high school that me and three others integrated, to hear one of my classmates stand up and say she didn't understand what all the fuss was about, because King was nothing more than a troublemaker...her word!

Before that, I had a 10 year white girl call me a nigger in Pogue's department store. She looked homeless..my clothing was hand made by my professional seamstress grandmother, who was standing next to me in designer attire.

After that, I was talking to some friends at work, casual conversation until some young hillybilly fool from Lebanon injected the word "colored" into the conversation. The others waited for me to explode on his ass, but I have long shied away from being the angry black woman that every white person suspects we all are. I walked away, again.

I chilled again on my birthday when a pale female friend of mine said "come here and kiss me with your big nigger lips!" This from a friend....I didn't kiss...and we are no longer friends.

I was angered on those days and I am angry now. Having spent a lifetime in white neighborhoods, attending white colleges, inside white corporate America, holding my tongue for as long as I could because I was always, always outnumbered and cognizant of my surroundings and the need to survive, and my mother didn't raise no fool.

No matter how high we rise...no matter how much we accomplish...no matter how much money we bank...we are still no better than an illiterate road-kill eating trailer trash white boy from  the Okefenokee swamp.

To be sure, there are good white people out there. I am friends or at least before this note, used to be friends with some of them. But generally, I wouldn't give two lead nickels for the lot of em. If every white person disappeared today, and that includes members of my own family, I wouldn't miss em. Not today.

People who continually vote against their own welfare solely on the basis of race or because some rich white guy has convinced them they can one day be like him, when the deck is as stacked against them as it is me, deserve to suffer what they get.

Colored is the race on my birth certificate.

I am American born and I  happen to be Black, Female, Lefthanded and lesbian.

Today is not a good day to come knocking on my door with some bull shit because there is a reason why I don't have guns in my house.

This is one of those days....

Forget the Mayan Calendar-The World Ends This Year

Okay, the picture is becoming clearer. The end of the world is not gonna happen on May 21st. It's gonna happen on October 21, 2011, later this year. So that gives you five more months to get yourself ready.

What is gonna happen on May 21st is The Rapture according to those in the know. The Rapture aka Judgment Day is when god reaches down and snatches the chosen folk up by their hair and takes them into heaven or into the clouds and out of harm's way in order to keep them from getting swallowed up when the world ends. Based on current hair trends, I would say Rastfarians have the edge, here.

So, if you think you're one of the chosen ones, then you might want to consider forgoing that Christian-Mormon-evangelical buzz cut and grow dreds, so god can get a good grip on your head when he starts snatching folks up to heaven.

It is also safe to say that if you don't get snatched up on May 21st, then you're not one of the chosen ones and are probably going to hell with the rest of us.

These dates have been carved in stone by one Harold Camping, an evangelical radio broadcaster, who claims he has figured out the celestial biblical calendar that governs all our lives and is spelled out in the Book of Genesis in the bible. Back in 1994 Camping said Jesus would come back and the rapture would happen, and the world would end, but he didn't and it didn't. Camping said at the time, on May 22nd, I would guess, that he made a mistake in his mathematical end of the world calculations.

He remains undeterred in his predictions, however. This time around he's put up billboards and has many of his followers driving RV's around the country proclaiming coming events.

What makes Camping think that judgment day is upon us this time around? Well, according to his biblical math, the year 2011 is exactly 7000 years after god flooded the world saving only Noah, his wife and three sons and their families as well as two animals from every species on earth. 2011 marks the end of the time that god has apparently given to man to get himself right with the lord, so to speak.

May 21st also corresponds, according to Camping to the day that god shut the door on Noah's ark, forcing everybody on the outside of the big boat to swim or tread water for 40 days and 40 nights. What is taking place on May 21st is a  symbolical door shutting on those who have not been chosen to ascend during The Rapture.

So, what's gonna happen between May 22nd and October 21st for those of us not chosen? Well, it ain't gonna be pretty. Those five months are going to be pure hell, so to speak. You can read about it in Revelation in more detail. But expect locusts with the power of scorpions to hunt down and kill the billions of people without god's seal of approval on their heads, which is everybody left over following The Rapture, according to Camping.

The dead are going to rise up (think Sean of the Dead), earthquakes will happen all over the world (think Japan), and those who died before May 21st and were saved will be resurrected and taken up with the raptured ones (think Easter Sunday). Those who died without being saved will stay dead and scattered all over.

Then, according to Camping's reading of the biblical calendar the final act on earth will be the great feast (Tabernacles) and when the feast is over, there will be a great fire that consumes the earth. The end.

Camping says our collective goose is cooked unless we get right in the next couple of weeks. However there is a slim possibility that you can save yourself like the good people of Nineveh saved by Jonah. God told the city he was going to destroy it, so the king and all his people shucked off their good clothes and started dressing in sack cloth and poured ashes on the floor from their fires and sat on the ashes and fasted and god had a change of heart and didn't destroy the city, that time.

Camping also says god never destroys the world until after he warns the people, so consider yourself warned.
Judgment Day is May 21, 2011

The world ends on October 21, 2011

Forget the Mayan Calendar...the world will be gone by the time the Mayan Calendar ends on December 21, 2012.


  

" Honest George, I Really, Thought Turkeys Could Fly!"

Kids, too apparently...In Porkopolis...the land of flying pigs and turkey drops..

So, Cincinnati otherwise known as Porkopolis or the Queen City, builds a new school down in the East End about five years ago, as part of a massive new school construction project.

This new school happens to land in the flood plain of the Ohio River, sitting  on the banks of the great Ohio in fact. The construction gods of Cincinnati Public Schools have the school built  on stilts...to keep the school from flooding and being damaged by high water.

However, they apparently didn't take into consideration how the kids would access the school once the water rose.  Not if...but when the water came up...nor did they consider where teachers and administrators would park or get  safe access to work while the Ohio River is out of it's banks.

Kids and teachers have already been displaced twice this year by rising water...so far...and this was after using up their calamity days because of snow...we've had a lot of bad weather this year.

And...The shiny new school isn't even situated on the site of the old school...The site was actually moved TO the flood plain....in a place that floods even when there are no record breaking rains swamping the Ohio valley, like right now.

So what did school officials do....outsource this school construction project to people who don't live in Ohio and have no idea about how often the area floods nor how to crack a history book and look it up?...Ohio flooding info...complete with pictures is on the internet...and always front and center is the East End, which is what we're talking about here...

Maybe they got tripped up by the name change...East End and Eastern Avenue were changed to Riverview in an attempt to attract rich people to what was one of the poorest white sections of Cincinnati....But call it East End or call it  Riverview or call it Columbia Tusculum...it still floods...yearly.

And I know the rich people are building on the hills overlooking the East End...but then water affects hills, too...witness the occasional mudslides that shut down Columbia Parkway access. Put enough million dollar condos up in them thar hills and the East End will start looking like a landslide of Pacific Palisades, California proportions.

As for the kids...well...they are being shipped off to high ground.... Burton Elementary in Avondale....just behind my house...Burton Elementary was closed a few years ago and the kids there dispersed to other nearby elementary schools...Burton was stipped of electricity and other utilities at the time...These necessities have since been replaced because the kids from the river school are temporarily being housed there while the water is up.....they are in fact being bused..and probably have to get up earlier...their parents have to make unusual accomodations, etc...seems like a lot of wasted money and effort..

I guess the permanently shuttered Burton is the temporarily permanent solution to flooded Riverview, since nobody is talking about studying the matter or moving the school out of the flood plain..

The school is pleasing to the eye...where it sits on its stilts by the River....however...pretty is not always functional, is it....school kids need function and simplicity...not pretty and useless...

The Riverview kids are good kids....I see them when they turn up at the local Avondale Library...which is crowded even on slow days...It literally overflows when the Riverview kids come to the neighborhood and mingle with the Avondale kids. Maybe Avondale needs a new library to accomodate the increase in clientele...

Meantime....Cincinnati Public Schools are laying off a couple of hundred people because of decreasing state education money...as teabag Governor John Kasich continues his plan to privatize education by funding charter schools...bolstering home schooling...while defunding the public schools...

Oh, what a world...what a world...

Sing!

"hey there..if you've ever wondered...wondered whatever became of me...I'm livin' off the air in Cincinnati...Cincinnati WKRP!"

John Kasich, You're Fired!

There is no law on the Ohio books to allow for the recall of a sitting governor, but there should be. Six months after the perfect storm of the midterm November elections, the teabaggers have swallowed up the GOP and have begun to reshape America in their ultra conservative anti woman, anti black, anti gay, anti union, anti poor people image.

The perfect storm was created when Blacks, young people, many gays and lesbians and just about everyone else except old white people stayed home in droves from the polls, apparently thinking their vote wasn't really necessary or were disillusioned at the pace that Obama was working to change things.

Six months later, it has become painfully obvious that the freedoms and civil rights that we take for granted, are now on the chopping block. Conservatives have begun reshaping America state by state, just as they have done to the Federal Court system in the past several years, all the way to the Supreme Court.

Kasich's first act as governor was to privatize job creation in Ohio, by turning over the job creation function to a non profit corporation that he chairs. Of course this was after he cut administrative wages across the board in order to give his job board and personal assistants a pay increase. He labeled the decrease in wages as a cost saving measure for the state.

Then Kasich got to work on House Bill 5 which bans collective bargaining for unions and makes criminals of anyone daring to take part in a strike against their employer. More than 350,000 union members are affected by this...and I would suspect that many of them voted for the GOP during the midterms, never expecting the GOP to turn on its own....surprise!

A rider on this law also repealed domestic partnership law in Ohio doing away with a long fought for civil rights for the Ohio LGBT community.

Kasich has declared war on Cincinnati, by playing politics with the planned street car, and gambling casino. Kasich pulled the plug on promised state money for the project, effectively killing jobs and possibly the project itself. He has also thrown a monkey wrench into the casino project, hiring an out of state firm to oversee the project, doing away with the time frame for getting the Casino open next year. The street car would have enabled visitors to get around downtown Cincinnati without having to worry about a car or the need to buy gasoline.

Today comes word that he is going to cut the money for child care and head start for those who can least afford it.

None of this has anything to do with deficit reduction or job creation, rather the opposite.....Kasich is playing politics with the very lives and existence of Ohioans. He says he wants to make Ohio “cool”.....well....news flash.... this ain't it Bra....

Meanwhile....Across the country:

GOP/teabag electives are attempting to nullify any federal law with which they don't agree.

Women are being stripped of health care. Health care for women has never been equal to that for men. It is even less so now. Some states such as Virginia have passed laws literally shutting down women's health clinics. These clinics are being shut down, say conservatives, to keep federal money from paying for abortions...Well, here's some breaking news for conservatives....The Hyde Amendment that prohibits using federal funds for abortion procedures is still law....AND...abortion is still legal in America....

Gays and lesbians are in danger of losing recent hard won civil rights...reversing the repeal of Don't Ask, Don't Tell, losing domestic partner rights in Ohio (it was a rider on the bill that outlawed collective bargaining), as well as re-entrenchment of Defense of Marriage Acts.

By the way....Speaker of the House....Ohioan John Boehner is demanding the Justice Department reimburse Congress for the money it will use to defend the Defense of Marriage Act. This after Obama told Justice not to defend what is clearly a discriminatory law.

Concealed carry gun rights have come to college campuses in at least three states......nothing like a 19 year old drunken frat boy with a fully loaded gloc pistol strapped to his waist under his hoodie.

Congressman Paul Ryan has introduced and gotten passed in the House, a budget that will require senior citizens to pay $6,400 more when they qualify for Medicare, that is if they qualify. Ryan's plan eliminates the guarantee to provide Medicare and Medicaid to senior citizens, now defined as anyone over 55 years of age.

In fact, two thirds of Ryan's measure cuts low income programs...a balancing act on the backs of the poor. All this while expanding tax cuts for the rich and repealing regulations on business and wall street.

Ryan's bill also cuts Pell Grants for all 9 million college students, putting higher education further out of reach for many. One million, in fact, would be cut from the program starting next year.

Food stamps will be cut by $127 billion dollars over the next 10 years if Ryan gets his way.

100,000 kids will be cut from Head Start beginning next year.

At least 20 states are following Wisconsin and Ohio's lead to limit the rights of its citizens....to roll back long fought for job and collective bargaining rights.....to keep women from adequate health and family planning care.....and to rollback or install discriminatory laws aimed at gays and lesbians.

Public education and the environment are also under attack at a time when we can least afford it.

25 legislatures and 29 governor's offices were turned over to the GOP during the mid term election last November.

So tell me....How's that GOP/teabag “take back our country” thingey workin' for ya?

There is a recall petition circulating in Ohio and online, to throw Kasich out of office...If you happen to run across it...Sign it please....

150 Years Later-Still Fightin'

"This is a white man's government; that white men are able to defend and protect it, and that to enlist a negro soldier would be to drive every white man out of the service,"-Ohio Governor David Tod responding to a request to allow Black men to join the Union Army to fight against the Confederacy.

"The employment of negro soldiers is...a disgrace to the Government that employs them--a reproach to our cause--calculated to bring upon us the shame of the whole world, and to cause the South to fight as one man against us."-A Cincinnati politician's statement printed in the Cincinnati Enquirer, 1862.

Today marks the anniversary of the shots fired at Fort Sumter South Carolina, to start the Civil War. Southern states have been celebrating since the first of the year, presenting and spinning a squeaky clean image of the turmoil that tore apart the new nation of America. The south argues to this day that states rights were the reason behind the Civil War, while refusing to admit that the only states right in question was the right to own another human being as property.

Meanwhile, northern states such as Ohio, where slavery was outlawed from the beginning, have been content to stand behind an equally squeaky clean presentation of what took place back then...a “south, bad-north, good!” scenario, when the truth is out there and a bit more complicated.

In 1803 Ohio's capital was in Chillicothe, not Columbus. In 1803 state lawmakers decided to outlaw slavery in the newly formed state. However the decision was a majority decision that rested on just one vote. That one vote may have outlawed slavery, but it didn't make Blacks free, especially in Cincinnati which sits on the banks of the Ohio River directly across from the slave holding state of Kentucky.

Blacks who made it across the Ohio river were constantly looking over their shoulder for the Kentucky slave catchers who operated in Cincinnati just like they operated in the Bluegrass state. Blacks had to post a bond just to stay in Cincinnati and another bond to work, if they could find a job in the first place.

It was a common occurrence to see free Blacks literally snatched off the downtown streets by slave catchers and returned to points south, never mind if they were runaways or not. Despite popular notions, many Blacks did not come to this country in chains. Many came as free men, at least or until they crossed paths with a slave tracker.

The Cincinnati Enquirer is still in existence operating today with the same sort of blind eye bigotry that it did back in the early days of Cincinnati, presenting white washed stories of heroic people who took part in the Civil War starting with the Black Brigade and Powhatan Beaty.

“Beaty was born a slave in Virginia in 1837 and came to Cincinnati in 1849, although it is not clear if he was freed before or after he arrived here. In Cincinnati, he studied acting and was a free man when the war broke out. In 1862, Beaty joined the “Black Brigade,” a unit of African-Americans who built many of the defenses around Cincinnati when it was threatened by Confederate forces.”- Cincinnati Enquirer, 4/2011.

Or William M. Dickson:

"A Cincinnati lawyer, Dickson organized and commanded the “Black Brigade,’one of the early all-African-American units. Dickson’s Black Brigade didn’t fight, but it built all the breastworks and defenses around Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky. Dickson’s wife was a cousin of Mary Todd Lincoln”.- Cincinnati Enquirer, 4/2011.

The truth of the matter is that the Black Brigade, like everything else about Black life back then was not voluntary for Black men. In September of 1862, days after the Emancipation Proclamation was issued, Powhatan Beaty and other Black men were rounded up and jailed until they were set free to labor for the Union Army. This was how the Black Brigade was formed, no organization needed from Mr. William M. Dickson.

These men were taken away from their families and were never compensated for their work, barely remembered in historical reference. Other Black men left the state to join legitimate regiments such as the 54^th out of Massachusetts. Beaty distinguished himself when he was finally allowed to fight and a was awarded the Medal of Honor for bravery. He is buried at Union Baptist Cemetery in Price Hill.

Ohio, in fact had a law on the books banning Blacks from joining the Ohio Militia in any form, a law repeatedly upheld by the aforementioned Governor Tod until he was forced into action by the federal government.

This white washing of history does no one any good. All people suffer when the truth is not told. The sanitized version of the Civil War as presented by nearly everyone north or south perpetuates deeply buried racism and bigotry that underlies every institution in the United States of America. When Blacks talk about institutional or ingrained racism, this is what we mean. Institutional and ingrained racism is denied by whites today as a figment of a Black mindset that simply won't die.

Ingrained racism is mirrored in insidious, bigoted and cowardly attacks of a bad makeup wearing, on paper, billionaire real estate developer looking for publicity for his television show.

Ingrained racism and bigotry keeps alive the birther movement long after the truth is known.

Ingrained racism against Blacks gives birth to the tea party movement today while harkening backward in history to a movement called the copperhead movement. Today's tea party regularly uses slogans coined by copperheads back in the day.

Institutional and ingrained racism allows deniers of all colors to rewrite history into a fairytale of happy Negroes singing, dancing and smiling on the plantation, safely snatched from the horrors of their African origins and families.....”America, white people, good-Africa, black people, bad!”

Institutional racism allows the news media to give air time to any bigot stupid enough to utter or write out the word “nigger” in an email addressed to people of similar mind set, while ignoring the lack of diversity within their own ranks.

Blacks suffer, victimized outright by white denial and flight, but also from refusing to recognize our own complicity in our degradation.

Blacks must first seek the truth behind the history presented. Blacks must also learn the difference between “integration” and “assimilation.” We are being assimilated and erased...not a good thing.

Salvation lies not in the Black church...another product foisted upon Blacks by whites during slavery...but in education and the taking of responsibility for our own communities and behavior. 72% out of wedlock birth rate is not responsible, nor are the daily killings of young Black men by other young Black men..it is slow and painful community wide suicide.

In 2011, on the 150^th anniversary of the Battle of Fort Sumter, Black people rather than celebrating the beginnings of our official fight for freedom are embroiled in a fight for existence.

And the fight for civil rights, well it is basically passe...destined to become a footnote in the history of a now, admittedly mixed race America.

Congressmen Worth More Than a Soldier....In Whose World?

Under the rules of a government shutdown, congress gets paid...but the "boots on the ground...in the air and manning the ships" don't....

I don't get that.

They are willing to die for us....they are willing to defend this messed up bigoted, racist, backward society for us...they are willing to march into hell and pull dictators out of worm holes so that we can drink Starbucks at 5-dollars a pop and drive around in gas guzzling big ass SUVs while living in one house that would easily shelter four generations of four third world families comfortably, as we watch all the bloody action on TV, like a video game from the sanctity  of our 2000 sq ft living room.

Yet...they can't get paid for their service...It's not enough that they have to buy their own body armor in this illegal warfare....Now, if they survive the illegal wars in the first place....they can't feed their families....they can't pay their mortgages...send their kids to good and safe schools....they can't even count on reasonable and safe medical care for their injuries...nor can their wives get reasonable and safe medical care..just because she is a female...

I don't get that...

The only thing a soldier should have to do when he comes home from war is to put his military Id on the counter and get the services, the goods and medical care that he's risked his life to guarantee for the rest of us.

It's the least we can do to say thank you.


If the government is going to shutdown....then shut the mafuka down....ALL THE WAY...nobody gets paid...period...

The GOP is Dead-So Says John Boehner

Well, you heard it from the man's mouth...."there is no daylight between me and the tea party." So says the Speaker of the House, John Boehner. He made the statement during an interview today on GMA with gorgeous George. 

In other words, we can stop distinguishing the Tea Party from the Republican Party because they are one and the same. Their agenda for America is the same.

The GOP, the grand old party is no more. The party of Lincoln is history. Rest in peace, republicans...because the GOP is now the party of  radical christian conservatives, bent on taking back their country.

No compromise necessary....no compassion for anyone except the wealthy 1%....no more need to hide any misogynistic tendencies against women....their women are under control....other women...as usual...don't count..except for occasional sex on the down low.

It's a white man's world and welcome to it.

This means the tea party will control the channel....the tea party will control the frequency....the tea party will control the volume and the purse strings....welcome to the Outer Limits...

It will decide who eats....who gets paid...who goes to school...who gets medicine....who lives....who dies...Rape and incest are no longer crimes because women are only good for fixing dinner and servicing the master.

However everyone will have to go to church...Christian church....not catholic...not muslim...not Jewish...Christian..Jesus worshiping in god we trust church...They will call it the church of our founding fathers...except most of the founding fathers were what would be considered atheists in today's parlance...but that won't stop the teabag ruling elite....

The United States of America now runs on Teabag rules....so says the Speaker of the House...He and They are one...he said today.."no daylight between us!"....Boehner's exact words.

 Boehner also signaled today that he is  fully on board with Congressman  Paul Ryan's plan to gut America, and in keeping with Boehner's "we are one" declaration...I am retiring GOP and Republican acronyms, names and phrases from my writings except in an historical sense.

Henceforth from today forward...Congress is made up of Democrats, Independents and Teabaggers...

Teabag Congressman Paul Ryan's budget which was introduced this week and is currently being overshadowed by all the government shutdown talk is nothing more than a scheme to openly wage class warfare against the poor, the middle class or what's left of it, and senior citizens.

Ryan's budget proposal seeks to privatize all services and shift the financial burden off onto the backs of the very people who can't handle it.  Rich people get richer...poor people...well, poor people are left to rot and die within a harsh system not of their making.

By the way...did you know that the richest 5% of America holds fully 64% of the country's wealth? Did you know that the bottom 80% of Americans subsist on 12% of the pot?

Ryan's plan privatizes all entitlement programs and doesn't make any real cost saving cuts. He also refuses to raise taxes on the wealthy upper crust or hold corporations responsible in any way what so ever.

And before you say that is a good thing...Ryan shifts the problem off the federal government...but directly onto the already cash strapped states, senior citizens, the disabled, and the low income...and  even with all this...fails to balance the budget until at least 2040.

Income, estate and corporate taxes would be repealed or drastically reduced while a national sales tax would be put into play, raising the tax obligations of those who can least afford it.

Ryan's budget does not address the massive waste in defense spending or farm subsidies. It does not address the money wasted on two failed wars begun by his party back in the day.

But then neither does Mr. Speaker.

 Boehner said today during his talk with George Stephanopoulos that the problems began last year...not during the previous administration, when he and most of his cronies were in power and could have stopped many of our troubles if they had chosen to do so.

In other words, today's problems are all Obama's fault....nobody else did this...America screwed up when  it put a timid inexperienced black man in the White House. Now suddenly, America is on the verge of default and the rest of the world hates us.

Obama's fault, period.

Government Shutdown-Are Food Riots in the Offing?

Just like in 1995, if the government does shutdown on Friday certain benefits and services will continue.

Mail delivery will go on...it is a self funded entity...

Food Stamps will continue....can't imagine anybody except a rabid teabagger willing to tempt food riots in the streets of America..

The VA will continue to treat patients...however the armed forces may not get paid on time...wonder if that applies to generals and Pentagon hacks?

Border agents will stay on the job as will other so called essential personnel..

Essential personnel includes the fools of Congress, too...

In other words, they won't have to suffer without a paycheck or their health care under any circumstances...

Passports will not be issued, nor will gun permits, and national parks will be closed.

Thousands of federal workers will simply be told to stay home for a while, so there will be nobody answering phones about taxes, social security benefits or anything else for that matter.

Oh, and forget about getting your IRS refund if you've got one coming because it ain't...coming that is..

The last time government workers were furloughed Congress approved back pay for them, so they didn't really lose anything.  However with the teabaggers calling the shots...retroactive pay may not happen this time.

No one really knows what will happen until it happens since the federal guidelines for a shutdown are so broad.

All we know is that the fools who trigger it will get off scot free without consequences like always...

I am so ready for a revolution.